Season of Storms (The Witcher, #6)

by Andrzej Sapkowski

‘Do you know the story of that Lebioda, whom some called a prophet?’ asked Addario, scraping the rest of the blood pudding from the skillet. ‘I mean the real story.’ ‘I don’t know any stories,’ replied the Witcher, running a piece of bread around the pan. ‘Neither real nor invented. I was never interested.’

‘Because I often keep company with a certain poet. And he, when he has to choose between the real version of an event and a more attractive one, always chooses the latter, which he moreover embroiders. Regarding that, he laughs off all accusations using sophistry, saying that if something isn’t truthful it doesn’t mean at all that it’s a lie.’

‘Let me guess who the poet is. It’s Dandelion, of course. And a story has its own rules.’ ‘“A story is a largely false account, of largely trivial events, fed to us by historians who are largely idiots”,’ smiled the Witcher.

‘Geralt of Rivia,’ he finally said. ‘Vanquisher of monsters and supernatural creatures. A legendary vanquisher, I would say. If I believed in the legends, that is. And where are your celebrated witcher swords? I can’t seem to see them.’ ‘It’s no wonder you can’t see them,’ replied Geralt. ‘Because they’re invisible. What, haven’t you heard the legends about witcher swords? The uninitiated can’t see them. They appear when I utter a spell. When the need arises. If one arises. Because I’m capable of doing a lot of damage even without them.’

I’m Nimue verch Wledyr ap Gwyn. I’m headed for Gors Velen. To Aretuza, to the school of sorceresses on the Isle of Thanedd.

‘I am taking my daughter,’ she finished. ‘That is more important than your lives. But it was you who stood in their defence, O White-Haired One. Thus, I shall come looking for you. One day. When you have forgotten. And will be least expecting it.’

Ignoring the grumbling of Nikefor Muus, Antea walked towards the door. She was aware of somebody observing her and glanced surreptitiously. A woman. With black hair. Attired in black and white.

‘Indeed. You will take away the Witcher’s swords at once, I presume. After all, to him they mean—’ ‘—everything.’ Yennefer completed his sentence. ‘He’s bound to them by destiny. I know, I know, indeed. He told me. And I’ve begun to believe it. No, Molnar, I won’t take the swords today. They can remain in the safe deposit. I’ll soon send an authorised person to collect them. I leave Novigrad this very day.’

A mon retour (hé! je m’en désespere!) Tu m’as reçu d’un baiser tout glacé. Pierre de Ronsard

Dandelion impressed with his intelligence. By stating something so obvious that Geralt was still unable to completely adjust himself to it. Or completely accept it.

You should then dress your countenance in a joyful smile, not a saturnine and gloomy grimace which, believe me, doesn’t suit you at all. With it, you look quite simply like a man with a serious hangover, who to cap it all has got food poisoning and doesn’t remember when he broke a tooth and on what, or how he got the semen stains on his britches.

‘Geralt has no secrets before me,’ Dandelion said, puffing himself up. ‘I know. I learned many details of his private life from your ballads.’ ‘But—’ ‘Dandelion,’ the Witcher interrupted. ‘Take a walk.’

The moss-covered rocks were as slippery as soap. Dussart metamorphosed into a wolf to continue. Geralt, after slipping dangerously several times, forced himself onward, cursed and overcame a difficult section on all fours. Lucky Dandelion’s not here, he thought, he’d have turned it into a ballad. The lycanthrope in front in wolfish form with a witcher behind him on all fours. People would have had a ball.

Otto Dussart looked at the small bottles of elixirs with curiosity and watched the Witcher drinking them. He observed the changes taking place in Geralt’s appearance, and his eyes widened in wonder and fear.

Dussart, now in human form, stood up over Pastor’s corpse and wiped his lips and chin. ‘After forty-two years of being a werewolf,’ he said, meeting the Witcher’s gaze, ‘it was about time I finally bit someone to death.’

As for Dandelion, he had announced from the beginning that he would scorn the royal nuptials and take no part in them. For he had been added to the guest list as a relative of the royal instigator and not as the world-famous poet and bard. And he had not been invited to perform. Dandelion regarded that as a slight and took umbrage. As was customary with him his resentment didn’t last long, no more than half a day.

‘I had to,’ he said. ‘I was carrying out orders.’ The Witcher looked long and hard at him. ‘You wouldn’t believe how many times I’ve heard similar words,’ he finally said. ‘But it’s comforting to think it was usually from the mouths of men who were about to hang.’

‘Don’t listen to him, Geralt!’ Dandelion somehow managed to make a sound from his constricted throat. ‘They won’t dare to touch me! I’m famous!’

‘We’re going to the king,’ said Ferrant de Lettenhove. ‘Give me your sword, Witcher . . . And clean it a little. You stay here, Julian—’ ‘Fuck that. I’m not staying here for a moment. I prefer sticking close to Geralt.’

‘Hey! Look!’ Dandelion said suddenly. ‘A rat!’ Geralt didn’t react. He knew the poet and knew he tended to be afraid of any old thing or become enraptured by any old thing and sought out sensation where there was nothing worthy of the name. ‘A rat!’ said Dandelion, not giving up. ‘Oh, another! A third! A fourth! Bloody hell! Geralt, look.’ Geralt sighed and looked.

‘I came back,’ she said, looking at the Witcher. ‘No, you didn’t,’ he retorted. ‘You left.’ She looked at him. With cold, strange eyes. And soon after fixed her gaze on something very distant, located very far over the Witcher’s right shoulder. ‘So, you want to play it like that,’ she stated coolly. ‘And leave a memory like that. Well, it’s your will, your choice. Although you might have chosen a little less lofty style.

‘Let’s go,’ said Geralt, pulling wet seaweed from his collar. ‘Dandelion? Where’s my sword?’ Dandelion choked, pointing at an empty place at the foot of a wall. ‘A moment ago . . . They were here a moment ago! Your sword and your jacket. They’ve been stolen! The fucking bastards! They’ve been stolen! Hey, you there! There was a sword here! Give it back! Come on! Oh, you whoresons! Damn you!’

‘Most of the neighbouring villas are lying in rubble at the foot of the cliff,’ Yennefer said, breaking the silence. ‘But yours is untouched. Not even a single roof tile was lost. You’re a lucky woman, Coral. I advise you to consider buying a ticket in the lottery.’

‘Primo,’ Lytta coughed slightly, but didn’t look down, ‘I’ve never done anything like that to a close friend. Secundo, your Witcher wasn’t interested in me at all.’ ‘Wasn’t he?’ Yennefer raised her eyebrows. ‘Indeed? How can that be explained?’

All he left were cooled sheets and not a single trace. He left because he had to. He vanished into thin air. Gone with the wind.’ Although it seemed impossible, Mozaïk paled even more. Her hands trembled. ‘He left some flowers,’ said Yennefer softly. ‘A little nosegay of flowers. Right?’ Mozaïk raised her head. But didn’t answer. ‘Flowers and a letter,’ repeated Yennefer.

‘I find it astonishing,’ Lytta repeated. ‘I’d never have expected it of him.’ ‘Because you didn’t know him, Coral,’ Yennefer replied calmly. ‘You didn’t know him at all.’

Dandelion sighed. And spurred on the gelding. He looked back. And sighed again. He was a poet so he could sigh as much as he liked.

The lone man sitting at the table raised a hand. Flickering tongues of flame were shooting from his fingers. The man brought his hand closer to a candlestick on the table and lit all three candles one after the other. He let them illuminate him well. His hair was as grey as ash with snow-white streaks at the temples. A deathly pale face. A hooked nose. And yellow-green eyes with vertical pupils. The silver medallion around his neck that he had pulled out from his shirt flashed in the candlelight. The head of a cat baring its fangs.

‘Few of you remain,’ replied Geralt calmly. ‘Which makes things easier. You’re Brehen. Also known as the Cat of Iello.’ ‘Well, I prithee,’ snorted the man with the feline medallion. ‘The famous White Wolf deigns to know my moniker. A veritable honour. Am I also to consider it an honour that you mean to steal the reward from me? Ought I to give you priority, bow to you and apologise? As in a wolf pack, step back from the quarry and wait, wagging my tail until the pack leader has eaten his fill? Until he graciously condescends to leave some scraps?’

A sword of siderite steel, total length forty and one half inches, the blade twenty-seven and one quarter inches long. Weight: thirty-seven ounces. The hilt and cross guard simple, but elegant. The second sword, of a similar length and weight: silver. Partially, of course, for pure silver is too soft to take a good edge. Magical glyphs on the cross guard, runic signs along the entire length of the blade.

Dubhenn haern am glândeal, morc’h am fhean aiesin. My gleam penetrates the darkness, my brightness disperses the gloom.

‘Winter is coming,’ Brehen said with effort. ‘And I, unlike some, have nowhere to lodge. Warm, cosy Kaer Morhen is not for me!’ ‘No,’ stated Geralt. ‘It is not. And well you know the reason.’ ‘Kaer Morhen’s only for you, the good, righteous and just, is it? Fucking hypocrites. You’re just as much murderers as we are, nothing distinguishes you from us!’ ‘Get out,’ said Geralt. ‘Leave this place and get on your way.’

‘It’s a lie to say that Vesemir passed sentence on you,’ said Geralt as Brehen passed him. ‘Witchers don’t fight with witchers, they don’t cross swords. But if what happened in Iello occurs again, if I hear word of anything like that . . . Then I’ll make an exception. I’ll find you and kill you. Treat the warning seriously.’

received the swords from Yennefer of Vengerberg. It occurred two weeks ago in Novigrad.

‘How . . .’ said Geralt, swallowing. ‘How is she? Yennefer? In good health?’ ‘Excellent, I think,’ said Tiziana Frevi, peering at him from under her eyelashes. ‘She’s doing splendidly, she looks enviably well. And to be frank I do envy her.’

‘That horrifying character was wearing a medallion similar to yours,’ the poet said, joining the conversation. ‘He was one of the Cats, wasn’t he?’ ‘He was. I don’t want to talk about it, Dandelion.’ ‘The notorious Cats,’ said the poet, addressing the sorceress. ‘Witchers – but failures. Unsuccessful mutations. Madmen, psychopaths and sadists. They nicknamed themselves “Cats”, because they really are like cats: aggressive, cruel, unpredictable and impulsive. And Geralt, as usual, is making light of it in order not to worry us. Because there was a threat and a significant one. It’s a miracle it went off without a fight, blood or corpses. There would have been a massacre, like there was in Iello four years ago. I was expecting at any moment—’

According to still one more into an awful monster, a striga. As a result of a curse, because the princess was the fruit of an incestuous union. Apparently, the rumours are being invented and spread by Vizimir, the King of Redania, who has territorial disputes with Foltest, is seriously at variance with him and will do anything to annoy him.’

‘Dandelion.’ ‘Yes?’ ‘Lately everything that could have gone wrong has gone wrong. And it seems to me that I’ve fucked everything up. Whatever I’ve touched lately I’ve botched.’ ‘Do you think so?’ ‘Yes, I do.’ ‘It must be so, then. Don’t expect a comment. I’m tired of commenting. And now go and feel sorry for yourself in silence, if you would. I’m composing at the moment and your laments are distracting me.’

‘Illusions are what you think about. What you fear. And what you dream of.’ ‘I beg your pardon?’ The vixen barked softly. And metamorphosed. Dark, violet eyes, blazing in a pale, triangular face. A tornado of jet-black locks falling onto her shoulders, gleaming, reflecting light like peacock’s feathers, curling and rippling with every movement. The mouth, marvellously thin and pale under her lipstick. A black velvet ribbon on her neck, on the ribbon an obsidian star, sparkling and sending thousands of reflections around . . . Yennefer smiled. And the Witcher touched her cheek. And then the dead dogwood bloomed.

‘You know, you never congratulate me on my ballads,’ Dandelion suddenly spoke up. ‘I’ve composed and sung so many of them in your company. But you’ve never said: “That was nice. I’d like you to play that again.” You’ve never said that.’ ‘You’re right. I haven’t. Do you want to know why?’ ‘Yes?’ ‘Because I’ve never wanted to.’ ‘Would it be such a sacrifice?’ asked the bard, not giving up. ‘Such a hardship? To say: “Play that again, Dandelion. Play As Time Passes”.’ ‘Play it again, Dandelion. Play “As Time Passes”.’ ‘You said that quite without conviction.’ ‘So what? You’ll play it anyway.’ ‘You’d better believe it.

A flickering candle, the fire went out A cold wind blew perceptibly And the days pass And time passes In silence and imperceptibly You’re with me endlessly and endlessly Something joins us, but not perfectly For the days pass For time passes In silence and imperceptibly The memory of travelled paths and roads Remain in us irrevocably Although the days pass Although time passes In silence and imperceptibly So, my love, one more time Let’s repeat the chorus triumphantly So do the days pass So does time pass In silence and imperceptibly Geralt stood up. ‘Time to ride, Dandelion.’ ‘Oh, yes? Where to?’ ‘Isn’t it all the same?’ ‘Yes, by and large. Let’s go.’

And around it, even quicker, so quick that he was blurred, danced a man. Armed with two swords.

‘That mare . . .’ she said, so excited she was barely able to enunciate her words. ‘That mare is called Roach. Because all your horses bear that name. For you are Geralt of Rivia. The Witcher Geralt of Rivia.’ He looked long at her. And said nothing. Nimue also said nothing, eyes fixed on the ground. ‘What year is it?’ ‘One thousand three hundred . . .’ she said, raising her astonished eyes. ‘One thousand three hundred and seventy-three after the Revival.’

‘If so—’ the white-haired man wiped his face with his hand in his sleeve ‘—Geralt of Rivia has been dead for many years. He died a hundred and five years ago. But I think he would be happy, if . . . He’d be happy if people remembered him after all those hundred and five years. If they remembered who he was. Why, even if they remembered the name of his horse. Yes, I think, he would be happy . . . If he could know it. Come. I’ll see you off.’

There are things to be afraid of. Because darkness will always, always exist. And Evil will always rampage in the darkness, there will always be fangs and claws, killing and blood in the darkness. And witchers will always be necessary. And let’s hope they’ll always appear exactly where they’re needed. Answering the call for help. Rushing to where they are summoned. May they appear with sword in hand. A sword whose gleam will penetrate the darkness, a sword whose brightness disperses the gloom. A pretty fairy tale, isn’t it? And it ends well, as every fairy tale should.’ ‘But . . .’ she stammered. ‘But it’s a hundred years . . . How is it possible for . . . ? How is it possible—?’

The story goes on, she thought. The story never ends.