Milva, it seems to me, had been greatly affected by her tragic accident–and loss. I write ‘it seems to me’ for I am aware that being a man I cannot imagine what such a loss means for a woman. Though I am a poet and a man of the quill, even my educated and trained imagination betrays me here and I can do nothing.
The archer swiftly regained her physical fitness, which could not be said for her mental state. It often happened that she would not utter a word throughout the whole day, from dawn to dusk. She would disappear and remain isolated, which worried everyone somewhat. Until finally a crisis occurred. Milva released the tension like a dryad or a she-elf; violently, impulsively and not very comprehensibly. One morning, in front of our eyes, she drew a knife and without a word cut off her plait just above her shoulders. ‘It doesn’t befit me, for I’m not a maiden,’ she said, seeing our jaws hanging open. ‘But nor am I a widow,’ she added, ‘so that’s the end of my mourning.’ From that moment on she was her old self; brusque, biting, mouthy and inclined to use unparliamentary language. From which we happily concluded that she had come through the crisis.
The third–and no less curious–member of the company was the Nilfgaardian, who kept trying to prove he was not one. He was called, so he claimed, Cahir Mawr Dyffryn aep Ceallach…
‘Cahir Mawr Dyffryn, son of Ceallach,’ Dandelion declared, pointing his pencil at the Nilfgaardian, ‘I have reconciled myself with many things which I don’t like, and actually can’t stand, in this honourable company. But not with everything! I can’t bear it when people look over my shoulder when I’m writing! And I don’t intend to put up with it!’
The Nilfgaardian moved away from the poet, and after a moment’s thought seized his saddle, sheepskin and blanket and dragged them over to Milva, who was dozing.
‘I apologise,’ he said. ‘Forgive my obtrusiveness, Dandelion. I glanced involuntarily, out of pure curiosity. I thought you were creating a map or drawing up some tallies—’
‘I’m not a bookkeeper!’ the poet said, losing his temper and standing up. ‘Nor am I a cartographer! But even if I were, it doesn’t justify taking a sly look at my notes!’
‘I have apologised,’ Cahir repeated dryly, making his bed in the new place. ‘I have reconciled myself with and become accustomed to many things in this honourable company. But I’m still accustomed to apologising only once.’
‘Indeed,’ the Witcher joined in, totally unexpectedly–for everyone, himself included–taking the side of the young Nilfgaardian. ‘You’ve become devilishly touchy, Dandelion. One cannot fail to notice that it is somehow connected to the paper, which you have recently begun to deface with a bit of lead while we camp.’
‘It’s true,’ Regis agreed, putting more birch branches on the campfire. ‘Our minstrel has become touchy, not to say secretive, discreet and loving of solitude recently. Oh, no, having witnesses when performing his natural needs doesn’t bother him at all which, in our situation, one cannot indeed be astonished by. His shameful secrecy and oversensitivity to being watched extends solely to his scribbled notes. Is, perhaps, a poem being written in our presence? A rhapsody? An epic? A romance? A canzone?’
‘No,’ Geralt retorted, shifting towards the fire and muffling his back with a blanket. ‘I know him. It can’t be verse, because he’s not cursing, mumbling or counting the syllables on his fingers. He’s writing in silence, so it must be prose.’
‘Prose!’ The vampire flashed his pointed fangs–which he usually tried not to do. ‘A novel, perhaps? Or an essay? A morality play? Dammit, Dandelion! Don’t torture us so! Reveal what you are writing.’
‘My memoirs.’
‘Your what?’
‘From these notes,’ Dandelion displayed a tube stuffed with paper, ‘will arise the work of my life. My memoirs, bearing the title Fifty Years of Poetry.’
‘Nonsensical title,’ Cahir declared dryly. ‘Poetry has no age.’
‘And if one concedes that it does,’ added the vampire, ‘it is decidedly older than that.’
‘You don’t understand. The title means that the author of the work has spent fifty years, no more and no less, in the service of Lady Poetry.’
‘In that case, it’s even more nonsensical,’ said the Witcher. ‘You aren’t even forty yet. Your writing ability was thrashed into you in the temple elementary school, at the age of eight. Even if we allow that you were writing rhymes in school, you’ve not been serving Lady Poetry for longer than thirty years. But as I well know, for you’ve often told me about it, you only began seriously rhyming and composing melodies when you were nineteen, inspired by your love for Countess de Stael. That makes it the nineteenth year of your service, Dandelion. So how did you come up with this titular fifty years? Is it meant to be some kind of metaphor?’
‘I,’ the bard said, puffing up, ‘trace broad horizons with my thought. I describe the present, but I pass into the future. I intend to publish this mighty work in some twenty or thirty years, and then no one will be able to cast doubt on the titular reckoning.’
‘Ha. Now I get it. If anything astonishes me, it’s the foresight. You aren’t usually bothered about tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow still doesn’t bother me much,’ the poet declared with superiority. ‘I’m thinking about posterity. About eternity!’
‘From the point of view of posterity,’ Regis observed, ‘it isn’t too ethical a beginning to write now, in advance. On the basis of the title, posterity has the right to expect a work written from a genuine fifty-year perspective, by a person with a genuine fifty-year store of knowledge and experience—’
‘A person whose experience amounts to half a century,’ Dandelion interrupted unceremoniously, ‘must be–from the very nature of the case–a seventy-year-old, decayed old gimmer with his brain eroded by the hag of sclerosis. Someone like that should be sitting on the veranda breaking wind, not dictating their memoirs, for people would only laugh. I won’t make that error. I’ll write my biography at the height of my creative powers. Later, just before publication, I shall merely make cosmetic corrections.’
‘It does have its merits,’ Geralt said as he massaged and cautiously flexed his painful knee. ‘Particularly for us. For though without doubt we appear in his work, though without doubt he has mauled us, in half a century we won’t be especially concerned about it.’
‘What’s half a century?’ the vampire smiled. ‘A moment, a fleeting instant… Aha, Dandelion, a minor observation. In my opinion, Half a Century of Poetry sounds better than Fifty Years.’
‘I don’t deny it,’ said the troubadour, crouching over a page and scribbling on it with a pencil. ‘Thanks, Regis. Something constructive at last. Does anyone else have any comments?’
‘I do,’ Milva began unexpectedly, poking her head out from her blanket. ‘Why are you goggling at me? Because I’m unlettered? But I’m not stupid! We’re on an expedition, we’re going to rescue Ciri, we’re travelling through enemy lands with sword in hand. This rubbish of Dandelion’s might fall into enemy mitts. And we know the poetaster, it’s no secret he’s a gasbag, a sensation-seeker as well as a gossip. So let him have a care with what he’s scrawling. So we don’t accidentally get hung because of his scribblings.’
‘You’re exaggerating, Milva,’ the vampire said gently.
‘Greatly, I’d say,’ Dandelion continued.
‘I’d say the same,’ Cahir added carelessly. ‘I don’t know what it’s like with the Nordlings, but in the Empire, possession of a manuscript isn’t considered a crimen, nor is literary activity punishable.’
Geralt swept his eyes over him and snapped the stick he was playing with.
‘But libraries are torched in cities captured by that cultured nation,’ he said in an unaggressive tone, but with a distinct sneer. ‘Never mind, though. Maria, I agree that you’re exaggerating. Dandelion’s scribblings, as usual, don’t have any importance. Not regarding our safety.’
‘Oh, sure!’ said the archer, getting hot under the collar and s
itting up. ‘I know what I know! When the royal bailiff were taking a census round our way, my stepfather took to his heels, bolted into the forest and stayed there for a fortnight without poking his nose out. Wherever there’s parchment there’s a judgement, he used to say, and whoever’s name is captured in ink today is broke on the wheel tomorrow. And he was right, the rotten bastard! I hope that whoreson’s sizzling in hell!’
Milva threw off her blanket and–now quite wide awake–moved closer to the fire. It looked, Geralt observed, like another long fireside conversation was in the offing.
‘You weren’t fond of your stepfather, I deduce,’ Dandelion observed after a moment’s silence.
‘I weren’t,’ Milva said, audibly grinding her teeth. ‘For he were a rotten bastard. He made advances when mother wasn’t looking, interfered with me. He wouldn’t listen, so finally I couldn’t stand it no more and took a rake to him, and when he fell over I gave him a kick or two, in the ribs and the privates. Two days later he were lying and spitting blood… So I decided to flee into the world, without waiting to see if he got better. Later I heard rumours he’d died, and mother soon after him… Oi, Dandelion! Are you writing that down? Don’t you dare! Don’t you dare, hear me?’
It was strange that Milva was trekking with us, and the fact that a vampire was accompanying us was astonishing. Nonetheless, strangest–if not simply incomprehensible–were the motives of Cahir, who had suddenly changed from an enemy into–if not a friend–then certainly an ally. The youngster had proved that at the Battle on the Bridge, unhesitatingly standing with sword in hand beside the Witcher against his countrymen. By this deed he gained our appreciation and conclusively dispelled our suspicions. In writing ‘our’, I have in mind myself, the vampire and the archer. For Geralt, though he had fought shoulder to shoulder with Cahir, though they had looked death in the eye side by side, was still mistrustful of the Nilfgaardian and did not like him. He did, admittedly, try to hide his resentment, but he was–as I believe I have already mentioned–as simple as a spear shaft, incapable of pretending, and his aversion crept out at every turn, like an eel from a rotten trap. The reason was clear: it was Ciri.
It had been my lot to be on the Isle of Thanedd that July new moon when the bloody battle took place between sorcerers loyal to the kings and traitors incited by Nilfgaard. The traitors were helped by the Squirrels–rebellious elves–and Cahir, son of Ceallach. Cahir had been on Thanedd, he had been sent there on a special mission; he was to have seized and abducted Ciri. Ciri wounded him defending herself; Cahir had a scar on his left hand, at the sight of which my mouth always went dry. It must have been hellishly painful and he still could not bend two of his fingers.
And after all that, we rescued him on the Ribbon, when his own countrymen were carrying him away to cruel torture in fetters. Why, I ask? For what misdeeds did they want to execute him? Or was it only for the defeat on Thanedd? Cahir is not garrulous, but I have a sensitive ear even for monosyllables. The lad is not yet thirty, but looks as though he were a high-ranking officer in the Nilfgaardian Army. Since he speaks the Common Speech impeccably, which is seldom found among Nilfgaardians, I think I know what kind of army Cahir served in and why he was promoted so quickly. And why he was sent on such strange missions. Including foreign ones.
For Cahir was the man who had tried once before to abduct Ciri. Almost four years before, during the massacre of Cintra. The destiny guiding the girl’s fate had made itself felt for the first time. By coincidence I talked about this with Geralt on the third day after crossing the Yaruga, ten days before the Equinox, as we were negotiating the forests of Riverdell. That conversation, although very short, was fraught with unpleasant and worrying overtones. And at that moment there was writ on the face and in the eyes of the Witcher a harbinger of the horror which was to explode during the Equinox, after we were joined by the fair-haired Angouême.
The Witcher wasn’t looking at Dandelion. He wasn’t looking ahead. He was looking at Roach’s mane.
‘Just before her death,’ he began, ‘Calanthe forced an oath on several of her knights. They were not to let Ciri fall into Nilfgaardian hands. During the flight, those knights were killed, and Ciri was left alone amidst corpses and conflagration, in the web of streets of the burning city. She would not have got out alive, that is beyond doubt. But he found her. Cahir. He carried her out of the pit of fire and death. He rescued her. Heroically! Nobly!’
Dandelion reined Pegasus back somewhat. They were riding at the rear, and Regis, Milva and Cahir were about a quarter of a furlong ahead, but the poet didn’t want a single word of their conversation to reach the ears of their companions.
‘The problem was,’ the Witcher continued, ‘that our Cahir was only acting nobly by order. He was noble as a cormorant is: he did not swallow the fish because he had a ring on his throat. He was meant to take the fish to his master. He failed, so the master was angry at the cormorant! The cormorant is now out of favour! Is that why he’s searching for friendship in the company of fish? What do you think, Dandelion?’
The troubadour ducked in the saddle to avoid an overhanging linden branch. The branch already bore completely yellow leaves. ‘But he saved her life, you said so yourself. Thanks to him Ciri left Cintra in one piece.’
‘And she cried out in the night, seeing him in her dreams.’
‘But he did save her. Stop dwelling on it, Geralt. Too much has changed, why, it changes every day. Brooding achieves nothing, save distress, which clearly does you no good. He rescued Ciri. That fact was, is, and will remain a fact.’
Geralt finally tore his gaze away from the horse’s mane and raised his head. Dandelion glanced at his face and swiftly looked away.
‘The fact remains a fact,’ the Witcher repeated in an angry, metallic voice. ‘Oh, yes! He yelled that fact in my face on Thanedd, and his voice stuck in his throat from terror, for he was staring at my sword edge. That fact and that cry were supposed to be the arguments which would stop me murdering him. Well, it did and I don’t think it can now be undone. Which is a pity. For a chain ought to have been begun then, on Thanedd. A long chain of death, a chain of revenge, about which tales would still be told after a hundred years have passed. Tales which people will be afraid to listen to after dark. Do you understand that, Dandelion?’
‘Not really.’
‘Then to hell with you.’
That conversation was hideous and the Witcher’s expression had been hideous too. Oh, I did not like it when he was in a mood such as that and went off on such a tack.
I must, though, confess that the vivid comparison with the cormorant had played its role. I began to worry. The fish in its beak, taken to be clubbed, gutted and fried! A truly nice analogy, joyful prospects…
However, good sense belied such fears. After all, if we were to continue with the fishy metaphors, then who were we? Small fry. Small, bony fry. In exchange for such a meagre haul the cormorant Cahir could not count on imperial grace. In any case, he was far from the pike he wanted to be thought of as. He was small fry, just like us. When the war was raking both the earth and people’s fates like an iron harrow, who was paying the slightest attention to small fry?
I am certain that no one in Nilfgaard remembers Cahir now.
Vattier de Rideaux, chief of the Nilfgaardian military intelligence, listened to the imperial reprimand.
‘So,’ Emhyr var Emreis continued scathingly, ‘an institution which devours three times as much of the state budget as education, culture and the arts taken together is incapable of finding one man. This man simply disappears, goes into hiding, although I spend astronomical sums on an institution from which nothing has any right to remain concealed! One man, guilty of treason, blatantly mocks an institution to which I have given so many privileges and funds as would give even innocent men sleepless nights. Oh, trust me, Vattier, when the council next speaks of trimming the funds for clandestine services, I shall prick up my ears. You may trust that!’
‘Your Imp
erial Majesty,’ Vattier de Rideaux croaked, ‘will make, I have no doubt, the right decision, after weighing up all the pros and cons. Both the failures and the successes of the intelligence service. Your Majesty may also be certain that the traitor, Cahir aep Ceallach, will not escape punishment. I have taken steps—’
‘I do not pay you for undertakings, but for results. And those are miserable, Vattier, miserable! What about Vilgefortz? Where the hell is Cirilla? What are you mumbling now? Louder!’
‘I think Your Highness ought to wed the girl we are holding in Darn Rowan. We need that marriage, we need the legality of Cintra’s sovereign fiefdom to subdue the Isles of Skellige and the rebels in Attre, Strept, Mag Turga and the Slopes. We need a general amnesty, peace at the rear and along supply lines… We need the neutrality of Esterad Thyssen of Kovir.’
‘I know. But the girl from Darn Rowan is not Ciri. I cannot wed her.’
‘May Your Imperial Majesty forgive me, but does it matter if she is not authentic? The political situation requires your nuptials. Urgently. The bride will be in a veil. And when we finally find the genuine Cirilla, the girls will simply be… exchanged.’
‘Have you taken leave of your senses, Vattier?’
‘The fake one was only shown briefly at court. No one has seen the real girl in Cintra for four years, and rumour has it she spent more time in Skellige than in Cintra. I guarantee that no one will see through the deceit.’
‘No!’
‘Your Imperial—’
‘No, Vattier! Find the real Ciri! Pull your finger out. Find Ciri. Find Cahir. And Vilgefortz. Vilgefortz in particular. For he has Ciri, I’m certain of it’
‘Your Imperial Highness…’
‘Go on, Vattier! Speak!’
The Tower of Swallows Page 10