Oh my gosh, I see how that quote could be ambigous! Good thing I didn't actually write that text, it's a quote... phew! No, Geralt didn't want to bind his fate to that of the djinn, but to that of Yennefer! For better or for worse...

14 Last Seed, 4E195 - Velen

Geralt arrived in Velen, a large province consisting predominantly of swamps. Where would he find Ciri's trail? In which swamp? How much mud would he have to swallow before he found anything? He looked around. The only way to proceed was to talk to people.

It took him a good week or more to "settle in" as it were - to show his face in most villages in the Western part of Velen and to let people realise that a witcher was around. He was also hoping for some contracts, because witchers had to eat. But mostly he knew that people would only start telling him things when they felt at ease in his company. Even if some would still spit as he walked past and make unflattering comments about the size of his private parts. He learned to ignore that.

Eventually he got a lead: Ciri had argued with a witch. Which witch, he didn't know, but there couldn't be too many witches around, could there? Indeed, he overheard a conversation about a local witch, a pretty girl, it seemed, quite new to those parts. That was worth investigating.

The witch turned out to be no simple country witch but a sorceress that Geralt knew quite well - Keira Metz, a former adviser to King Foltest, a member of the Lodge of Sorceresses... now residing in a simple cottage lost among the swamps of Velen.


"Keira!" He thought he knew what she was doing there, but asked anyway. "What are you doing in Velen?"

"Enjoying the country air, what else!" Keira laughed with such sadness, that Geralt momentarily regretted his question. "Mages, sorceresses, even healers and alchemists are all being hunted and burned at the stake! Don't you read the papers? I am hiding!" Tears glistened in her eyes.

"Ugh, I am sorry," Geralt didn't expect quite such a reaction. "Have you quarrelled with Ciri by any chance?" An abrupt change of topic seemed like a good plan to take Keira's mind off her misfortunes. It appeared to work, too.

"Ciri?" Keira spun around, her face brightening. "No, I didn't quarrel with her - why would I? She didn't come here... was she supposed to?"

"I don't know, I am trying to find her," Geralt's brow furrowed. "I was told she quarrelled with a witch. Are there other witches around?"

"Hmm... Not sure about witches, but there was an elven mage here, asking about her," Keira rubbed her chin. "What a coincidence. He left a message... Let me think... Ciri was to meet him in the old elven ruin not far from here, and she was to... err... follow her destiny? It doesn't make much sense, I know..."

"Hmm... No, it doesn't," Geralt was confused too. "Where is that ruin? May be it will make sense there."

"I am coming with you!" Keira got ready to leave. "The mage had promised me something... a lamp... but since things don't seem to go according to plan, he may never bring it here. Perhaps it is still at the ruin."

...

The elven ruin was infested with the usual monsters and vermin, and it transpired that Keira was afraid of rats. Rats! Ordinary non-magical rats. Rats that she could have evaporated with any of her powerful spells, if she could collect herself enough to cast them. But she couldn't. Good thing she had a witcher for company...

They went through the ruin, followed the clues that the elven mage left for Ciri, clues that Geralt could decipher because he knew Ciri so well. They came to the chamber where the mage was staying, but he was no longer there. The place was covered in ice - the Wild Hunt got to him first. It was a dead end.

"Oh look - here is the lamp he promised me!" Keira picked up a curious elven lantern. "Good. We're done here, let's go."

"No, we're not done yet," Geralt shook his head. "The Wild Hunt got to the mage before us, and we lost Ciri's trail. We have to search through this ruin again, perhaps we missed some clue..." He turned to go back the way they came, but Keira stopped him.

"There is nothing else here, Geralt," she said softly. "But I know which witch you need to find."

"What? You met her? Why did you not say anything earlier?" Geralt's frustration was getting the better of him, he was now angry, and Keira realised she might have gone too far.

"I had to have the lamp..." she said in a small voice. "And it was a good lead with the mage, wasn't it? I didn't know how it would turn out... And I never met that witch but I read about them... Here, see for yourself." She pulled a book from one of the shelves around them and handed it to Geralt - an old tome of what looked like folk fairy tales.

"Fairy tales?" Geralt glared at her. "Speak plainly, Keira." This sounded like a threat.

"Fairy tales that have roots in reality, as always," she nodded. "The Witches of the Crookback Bog are the ones that Ciri quarrelled with... must have done, anyway... they are evil. And they actually exist, it's all in there. It fits." She tried to sound convincing.

Geralt knew of course that fairy tales did often have roots in reality, so he cooled off a bit and started leafing through the book. It gave directions on how to find the witches... they seemed familiar somehow. He might have been to those places already. This was worth a closer investigation. He sighed and stuffed the book into his belt.

"Alright, let's go," he said much more calmly. "What's with the lamp, anyway? What does it do?"

"It allows you to speak to ghosts," Keira replied brightly. "Interesting stuff... I need it for... err... research..."

"Aha," Geralt squinted. "In Velen, right. Well, never mind then."

There was nothing left to do there, they walked around a bit longer trying to locate the exit, and eventually stood outside under the incessant rain.

"Thank you, Geralt," Keira looked genuinely grateful. "I hope you've got the right lead now," she smiled. "That's all I know, I swear."

"Good luck with your... err... research then," Geralt smirked. "See you around."

"Wait... eh... I've got another favour to ask of you..." Keira seemed embarrassed.

"Of course you do," Geralt turned around to face her again. "Let's hear it."

"It is a job for a witcher," Keira said carefully. "No, really. There's a curse that needs lifting. And I... well... I don't know how to lift a curse."

Geralt could never refuse a woman, in particular a sorceress, and especially if she was asking him to do something that he as a witcher would do anyway. So of course he listened and agreed to help. This was the story that he and Lena would be remembering many years later in a bath house of the Pale Pass Inn. We've already told this story, but it's been a while - over two years in our time... Incredible. Still, there is no need to reprint it, since we can simply read it as it was written back then:

21 Last Seed, 4E195 - Velen - Fyke Isle - Oreton

2 Hearthfire, 4E202 - Pale Pass Inn

22 Last Seed, 4E195 - Fyke Isle tower

23 Last Seed, 4E195 - Keira's Elven bath house

2 Hearthfire, 4E195 - Family matters

When Geralt approached the cottage previously belonging to Keira Metz, a small crowd was blocking his way. They stood in a half-circle surrounding the front yard, watching something or waiting for something... The tension was thick in the air. Geralt nudged his way through, but there was nothing going on. Then the door was flung open and a woman backed out of it, bent, dragging something behind her. She took a few steps and straightened up, and the corpse she was dragging slumped to the ground. Next to another such corpse, Geralt noticed. The woman turned around to face the crowd.

"Which of you set the witchhunters onto me?" She glared at the villagers. "Well? Speak up!" Waves of cold seemed to emanate from her youthful figure, but she wasn't casting spells.

"Well, you see, miss..." someone started carefully. "They had papers, miss..."

"From King Radovid, miss!"

"To arrest all witches, see, miss..?"

"But she ain't a witch!" A woman in the crowd glared at the men that were taking turns to speak. "I did tell yah, too! This one's a healer! Who'll be making salves for the little ones now?" Then, turning to the woman standing over the corpses, she added: "Menfolk are such fools, miss!"

"That they are," the woman nodded, still glaring at the men. "How much did they pay you?"

"It ain't like that, miss!" One of them quickly objected. "They had papers..."

"Oh, it's exactly like that!" Another man intervened, clenching his fists. "You took all the coin, you did! Shared naught with us!"

"You greedy bastard!" More calls followed, more fists were clenched.

"HOW MUCH?!" The young woman yelled, and all fell quiet. Suddenly someone realised that she was standing over the corpses of those witchhunters. Corpses of two well-armed grown men.

"She's a witch, she is! Killed them with magic!" One of the men now turned on her, fists still clenched. Another man kneeled over the corpses.

"Shut up, you fool!" He cut him off. "This one's had his throat slit, and this one's been stabbed through the heart! It ain't magic!"

"Men are fools, don't leave us, miss!" The woman from the crowd was pleading now. "We need a healer!"

"How can I trust you people now?" The young woman was looking at them in turn. "You'll sell me out again. I'd be safer out in the woods, with the bears!"

Suddenly there was a tussle and a brawl among the men. It was over quickly, and one held out a pouch with coin.

"Here's the coin, miss. Take it. Almost all still there, I reckon... He won't sell you out again... We'll see to that."

The young woman took the pouch, weighing it.

"Almost all there, you say... Alright, I suppose it'll do. You'll need to bury these corpses for me, too. Right here in front of the house. Let their graves remind you lot of what had occurred."

Sighs of relief were heard all around, except from the one fellow who had sold her out - he was curled up in the bushes, moaning with pain, he'd taken quite a beating. The healer shot him a cold glance, nodded to the rest, noticing two men picking up shovels to dig the graves. She turned around and went into the house without another word. Geralt followed.

...

"What happened?" Geralt asked with worry, when he and Lena finally sat in the back room, away from the windows. "And what are you doing here, in Keira's house?"

"Well, Keira left, you know that," Lena shrugged. "She's on her way to Kaer Morhen now, and she left me this house. Which was left to her by the witch who lived here before... I wonder what happened to her... Died of old age, perhaps..?"

"Stay on topic," Geralt prompted her, his brow furrowed. "Keira left, so what? Why are you here and not in Flotsam?"

"Because you are here and not in Flotsam," she smirked. "You've got a sister now, get used to it." She glared at him, but then let out a long sigh and softened her gaze. "I've never had a brother before. And I don't want to lose one now."

"I'm not used to having family either," Geralt said grimly. "Ciri is already more trouble than I need..." He looked at Lena darkly, then noticing her face fall, he hastened to add: "That didn't come out right... I didn't mean..."

Women could be such touchy creatures. Lena jumped up, tears swelling in her eyes, she tried to hide it, but Geralt noticed. No, he didn't want to lose his newly found sister either. Family was trouble, true, but also... Not knowing how to fix the situation, he acted on impulse. What would a brother do?

"Come here," he took her into a hug. "No one is going to lose anyone just yet."

...

"I am staying here for a while," Geralt declared some time later. "I've got several contracts going, there's the matter of a lost goat and a matter of a goose that stopped laying... What?" He looked up, hearing Lena giggle. "A witcher cannot be choosy about the sort of thing that pays his fees."

"Oh, I'm sure it is a monster of a goat, no less," Lena was laughing now. "Thanks, but I don't need a bodyguard." She stopped laughing.

"Don't start," Geralt sighed. "Those witchhunters were not joking. And it is true about all the contracts. They are not all goats, either. I'll stick around until things cool off with the villagers, I'm sure word has already gotten around about who you really are."

"Who?"

"An assassin." He looked at her with significance. "Next time they'll be better prepared."

"Alright," Lena gave in. "But you don't look too well yourself. Were you coming here hoping to find Keira? Then you need help. Healing perhaps. What happened?" Clearly, it was Lena's turn to ask questions.

"Aye, I needed a place to lay low for a while," Geralt nodded. "I knew Keira had left. That last string of jobs... well... I can't go on to Novigrad just yet. Ciri was here, she left a trail, the White Hunt will follow. I need to stay and see what happens. Gather my thoughts... Novigrad will be tough, I have a feeling... And you are not to follow me there - you hear me? They'll burn you at the stake!" He looked straight at Lena and she knew this was true. Although she wasn't a witch or a sorceress as such, she knew enough magic to qualify for King Radovid's war on mages, and going to his seat of power was nothing short of suicide. She promised not to go there.

"Tell me about your recent jobs then," she sat back in her chair. "I have a feeling it's a fascinating tale."

"Alright," Geralt opened another bottle of vodka. "Have you heard of the Crones of the Crookback Bog?"

...

It was a lead that Keira gave to Geralt in a form of a folk tales book. It told of a path through the swamps marked with ribbons and bright flowers, with sweets and treats all along the way. Unwanted children were sent down that path, never to return. The fairy tales spoke of old witches with a fondness for human flesh, particularly that of children. Most people thought those were but fairy tales meant to scare kids into good behaviour, but Geralt had learned to his horror just how literal the stories were.

Keira thought that if Ciri had indeed quarreled with some witch in Velen, it would be with the Crones - the witches from the fairy tale, and naturally Geralt had to find them. It was easier than he had expected, the path in the swamps was exactly as described in the book: unusually bright flowers, ribbons and sweets - it was all there. He followed it and came to a clearing with two or three houses and a mill. Children were playing outside. The place looked peaceful.

"What are you doing here in the swamps?" He struck up a conversation with the kids.

"We live here," they said. "We're orphans. Gran takes care of us."

"That's an unlikely place for an orphanage..." Geralt started saying, but then a grey-haired woman came out of one of the huts and the children scattered.

"What are you doing here?" She went straight to Geralt. "You are a stranger. Strangers are forbidden. You should leave."

He tried telling her that he was there looking for his daughter, or at least looking for a witch with whom she might have quarreled, but it was no use. The woman refused to talk to him. Yet Geralt felt that she knew of Ciri, had seen her. He waited until she went back into the hut and the kids returned to their games, and trying talking to the children again. It wasn't all that hard to convince them to help, all he had to do was play hide and seek with them... which he did with pleasure. It was of course too easy for a witcher.

With the kids' help, and after another errand, the woman finally conceded that she'd seen Ciri there.

"You will need to speak to the ladies," she said with a sigh. "You will come to regret it, you will... but have it your way..."

She led him to the old mill which turned out to have a shrine inside with a tapestry of three lovely ladies. She touched the tapestry and fell into a trance.

The ladies spoke through her, they had lovely longing voices. They would tell Geralt all about Ciri, but he had to do a service for them first. A great evil woke in the woods, an evil that was killing folk and destroying cattle, deal with it and all would be told. He was given a dagger as a symbol and was sent to speak with the alderman of a village just outside the swamps.

"And don't forget to collect his payment when you are done!" The ladies made a point of that.

It didn't sound like anything unusual or untoward, yet Geralt felt uneasy. Something about that request didn't sit right with him, but he needed to find Ciri, and this was the only way. Besides, if there was indeed a great evil in the forest terrorising the populace, it was his job to deal with it.

The alderman stood aghast at the sight of the dagger.

"I did not know you belonged to them, sir," he gasped.

"I belong to no one," Geralt said firmly. "I am here to deal with your problem, that is all. Now, tell me about it."

With a sigh of relief the alderman told him of a great evil... almost literally repeating what Geralt had already heard from the ladies. So it seemed it was true. No one knew what it was, but folk had gone missing, only to be found dead, and so on and so forth. He was shown the hill that seemed to be the centre of it all.

"This isn't in the fairy tales," Geralt was leafing through the book. "So this is either something new or something very, very old."

He found the hill that the alderman spoke of, and saw corpses all around. He was attacked by wolves at first, then werewolves too. A voice sounded in his head telling him to advance no further, to turn around and leave... which only convinced him he was on the right track and he proceeded. There was a cave beneath the hill, and in it a strangely pulsating growth was speaking to him again...

"What?" He shook his head in disbelief. "Who are you?"

"A spirit older than this wood, imprisoned here by the very ladies that sent you to kill me," the voice answered. "Release me instead, so I might roam free once again!"

From everything that Geralt had seen and heard so far, he was certain that the spirit was evil. He was also certain that the ladies were evil as well. Which should he choose? Release the spirit and earn the wrath of the ladies or kill the spirit and thus make the ladies stronger? Which was the lesser evil? The folk of those parts claimed that the ladies protected them from misfortune, yet the land knew misfortunes aplenty. Was it the ladies' doing or were the ladies holding even greater evil at bay?

The spirit claimed that the ladies ate children, the very children living in the middle of the swamp - that's why they were there. But was he to free the spirit, the children would be saved, the spirit would see to that. How? It did not specify...

Geralt did not believe the spirit. He felt there was no right choice in this dilemma. He attacked the pulsating growth causing it to rupture and thus destroying the spirit. He watched it in disbelief. Surely, a spirit should have fled its cage, if this was its cage as it had claimed... What was it that he killed just then? But it was too late to ask such a question.

When he came out of the cave, he found the villagers gathered outside, with more corpses piled high before them. Where did those corpses come from? They were not there before... The alderman approached, thanking Geralt for killing the great evil in the cave. When Geralt reminding him of payment for the ladies, the alderman nodded, took the ladies' dagger, cut off one of his ears and handed it to Geralt.

"Here," he said. "Take this to the ladies. We obey."

...

Back at the orphanage in the middle of the swamps he found the woman that used to look after the children. She was alone. All the children were gone. She took the alderman's ear from Geralt and put it on a rock. The air grew misty and Geralt felt magic all around him. Then three horribly ugly women appeared - the Crones of Crookback Bog. They were pleased with Geralt's choice of action... and he was horrified to have appeased them, while at the same time he wondered what would have happened, had he released the spirit instead.

The Crones kept their word - they told him about Ciri. Yes, she had been there. Fell out of the sky and right into their swamp. They picked her up, let her rest.

"But she is of Elder Blood!" They exclaimed. "She is not destined for us!"

They would have kept here there by force until the Wild Hunt arrived, but Ciri had been wounded, and they figured she could not run away even if she wanted to... Fortunately for Ciri, her wounds healed fast and she sensed the danger. She bolted, running through the swamps until the Wild Hunt lost track of her, at least for a short time.

Was that lead important? Hardly.

Geralt had already found out that Ciri had left for Novigrad. After she escaped from the Crones, she wandered through the swamps, met a lost child along the way and eventually together they got out to higher ground. There they ran into a hunter who took them to the local baron hoping for a reward - the baron's wife and daughter were missing. They were good twenty years older than Ciri and the girl, but the hunter played dumb anyway. There was no reward for him, but the baron took the girls in, gave them food and shelter... Geralt learned all this from the baron who had asked him to find his wife and daughter in return for the information about Ciri - alas, nothing in that world was free.

The woman at the orphanage of the Crookback Bog who served the Crones, turned out to be the baron's wife. When the baron heard of this, he wanted to free her, despite all the bad blood, betrayal and beatings that led her to seek help from the Crones. He told his side of the story... his wife wasn't blameless either. Their daughter grew up with hatred for her father, not knowing what caused his ire. This was another story not meant to have a happy end.

The baron asked Geralt for help and Geralt felt so involved in all of this, that he simply had to see it through. They came to the village near the entrance into the swamps only to find corpses hanging from trees. Not of everyone, but enough. Who did this and why? A group of religious zealots looking for a way into the swamp, they strung up everyone who stood in their way...

Arriving at the site of the orphanage, they found the zealots. The place was deserted, apart from the monsters that had overrun it completely. The fighting was fierce, but the baron's men, the zealots and Geralt prevailed over the monsters. Then it was time to talk. Who where they and what were they doing in that swamp?

"I am here to take mother home!" A young woman stepped forward, and it was only then that the baron recognised his daughter under all that armour.

"Home? Home where?" He looked dejected.

"Away from here!" The young woman was defiant.

"Is that why you killed all those men back at the village?" The baron was still hardly believing his eyes.

"We killed those men because they stood in the way of the Holy Flame," a man in a long coat stepped forward. "They refused to denounce their gods!"

"What?!"

This didn't bode well. Geralt thought that a fight between the baron and the chief zealot was a very bad idea just then, so he rushed to intervene.

"Stop argueing, you can do it later," he said calmly but firmly. "We must find the baron's wife first. So far we only found monsters."

Fortunately, everyone agreed and spread out to search. The door to the old mill had been barred, but once broken down, this was where they found the baron's wife. She was scrubbing the floor, mumbling some nonsense, not quite understanding where she was or what was going on...

"Mother! I am taking you home!" The baron's daughter ran to her mother. "Come!"

"You will do no such thing," her Commander interfered.

"But... you promised!" She turned to him, not understanding what happened. "You promised to help me find my mother!"

"And I have done so," he stood firm. "Here she is, and her husband is here to take her home. I see true remorse in his eyes, he is a changed man. And anyhow... where would you have taken her? You have duties."

"Duties? What duties?" The young woman stood quite aghast.

"Duties that come from your commitment to the Church of the Holy Flame," the man replied calmly. "The commitment that you made willingly not so long ago. Have you forgotten?"

...

"Family is trouble," Geralt looked at Lena darkly. "The baron found his wife, but she had lost her mind. He found his daughter, and lost her at the same time. I killed a spirit that may or may not have been evil in order to appease horrifically evil crones just so I could get a lead to find my own daughter, and that lead was all for naught, for I already knew where she'd gone! And then I came here to find you've been attacked by witchhunters!"

Lena silently opened another bottle.

"I see the need to lie low for a while," she said pouring the drinks. "Let things settle. A lost goat and a goose that stopped laying seems strenuous enough."

9 Hearthfire, 4E195 - Triss Merigold

"Time to go, sis," Geralt finished repairing his armour and turned his attention to the swords. "Ciri had gone to Novigrad, and I have to follow." He shook his head, watching Lena crushing roots for an infusion. "As it turns out, this whole outing to Velen was entirely pointless. Yennefer told me straight away that Ciri had been seen in Novigrad, reported by none other but Triss Merigold. I should have gone straight there and not wasted my time in Velen."

"So why did you not go straight to Novigrad then?" Lena squinted at him. "Where you required to investigate Velen? To what end?"

"I was and I don't know," Geralt scoffed. "Well, it's done now, and I lost... what? a month? Ridiculous."

"Alright, be careful now," Lena gave him a hug as he was ready to mount his horse. "I won't come to Novigrad as I promised, but I might find a quiet spot in the suburbs," she winked. "Don't worry, I have no intention of getting burned at the stake."

...

The road to Novigrad was uneventful. Novigrad greeted Geralt with two pyres in the central square - a sorceress and a wizard. Geralt sighed and turned away as there was nothing he could do. The Church of Holy Flame was preaching death to all who wielded magic, witchers included. The atmosphere was stifling. "Why would Triss buy a house here, of all places?" He wondered. "Has she gone mad? Assuming she's still alive, that is." He still resented Triss his half a year of amnesia, but he did not want her hurt or dead.

Triss had a lovely house right by the central square. Or rather, it used it be a lovely house, but was currently decorated with nasty graffitti. Household items were thrown all over the courtyard, too. A couple of thugs were looting them.

"Oi!" They turned on Geralt. "We're looting here, so shove off!"

"No."

"Arrrghhh!!"

One of the thugs tried punching Geralt's armour, but hit himself in the eye, it seemed. A moment later they were telling all they knew about the Putrid Grove - a place where thieves, thugs and sorceresses currently took refuge. Thugs worse than themselves, that is.

"Triss is in trouble," Geralt concluded, setting off in search of the Putrid Grove.

...

It took days upon days and cost him a lot of coin and effort, but eventually Geralt did gain an audience with the King of Thieves who was also giving protection to sorceresses in distress. He even tried to extend his protection to Geralt, but Geralt just laughed.

"What are you doing here?" Geralt asked when he finally located Triss. "Are you mad? They are burning sorceresses at the stake by the dozen, have you not heard?" The look on his face must have been telling volumes because Triss took a step back.

"I am surviving as best I can," she answered in a small voice. "Novigrad is the heart of the witch hunt, true, but it is also a big city. It is easier to hide here than in a village where everyone knows who you are."

She looked downtrodden and Geralt couldn't help but pity her.

"You can't stay here though, you have to leave - go far, go abroad," he said in a much softer tone.

"That's what I've been trying to do," Triss nodded. "Sail away. That's why I came here. All sorts of ships dock in the port of Novigrad, I was hoping to leave on one... but it didn't work out yet."

"Do you have a plan?" Geralt started seeing the point of coming to Novigrad.

"Yes," Triss smiled. "The King of Thieves is organising a ship, we are trying to round up as many mages as we can before they get burned at the stake... We are not always successful... We need funds, too..."

She paused, and Geralt felt a string of requests coming his way, for the old times' sake. Whatever his personal feelings, he would help, of course. But he had a job of his own, too.

"I hear you met Ciri," he changed the subject. "I am tracking her."

"Oh, so you came here looking for her..!" Disappointment in Triss' voice was unmistakable. "Of course," she caught herself. "Yes, Ciri was in Novigrad. She asked Dandelion for help! Dandelion! Of all people!" Triss was outraged and amused all at once. "And of course he messed it up! Royally! As only Dandelion can!!"

"Ugh..." Geralt shook his head - of course it was up to him to sort it out. "But where is she now?"

"I have no idea," Triss smiled, putting her arm around Geralt's shoulders. "She's got powers, you know, she could be literally anywhere, on any world. I have no idea how you could possibly track her down."

"Don't start," Geralt looked at Triss sideways, gently taking her hand off his shoulder. "I'll help you of course. I'm obviously staying in Novigrad for a while. Ciri must have left clues behind, I'll need to examine every scrap. We'll get Dandelion out of his fix and we'll get your mage friends on that ship. None of you can stay here."

"Geralt..." Triss started saying something, then stopped. It was too late.

...

A month later Triss was finally boarding a ship. They gathered as many mages as they could, but many still perished. Geralt and a few others were seeing them off, it was the middle of the night and the ship was docked at a sewer exit - smuggling mages out of Novigrad carried a death sentence.

"Are you just going to let her go?" One of Geralt's new acquaintances was looking at Triss with amasement. "She loves you!"

"Yes," Geralt nodded, also looking at Triss helping others board the ship, keeping her back turned to him. "I know. But I love another."

Triss turned to look at him one last time, no longer hiding her tears, then boarded the ship herself. They sailed without delay.

Sad to see the dark light of the Church of Holy Flame cover Novigrad. Thankfully, Triss was able to find a ship out.

Yes, Novigrad looked rather grim. I must say that I never enjoyed that part of the game - that's too grim for my taste. Yeah, it's what witch hunts were like in real life... But this is a video game. If I wanted real life, I could just read the news.

Anyway, yes, Triss gets saved, but only just. Others are not so fortunate. I think the actual name of the church in question is the Church of Eternal Fire... hmm... rather suggestive, that. There are several variations of the name, I think, all revolving about the all-consuming fire that is supposedly good for your soul.

23 Hearthfire, 4E195 - The djinn

Geralt's search for Ciri in Novigrad once again led him nowhere. Yes, she had been there before but she was now gone, vanished without a trace. Geralt's only consolation was that his time wasn't wasted as he helped Triss escape the danger of being burned at the stake. Together with a group of similarly fated mages she sailed away, to Kovir or elsewhere, to a place relatively safe and free from witch hunts and persecution.

Having seen off Triss, Geralt focused on tracking Ciri once more. There were no further clues for him to examine in Novigrad, and so it was time to sail to the Skellige Isles where Yennefer was investigating the remnants of an unusual magical explosion that she believed had everything to do with Ciri.

"Finally," Geralt was thinking, watching the waves. "She was so tense last time we met... Let's hope she's in better spirits now."

It wasn't hard to find Yennefer on the Skellige Isles, she wasn't hiding and wasn't trying to avoid Geralt in any way, and he was relieved to see that she seemed calmer and more relaxed. Yet they had a job to do, and she was focused on it and not ready to talk about their private affairs. Again, Geralt had to wait.

Then, quite suddenly, Yennefer went right to the core of the matter.

"Our connection came to be because you asked the djinn to bind your life to mine," she said without a preamble. "It's been a turbulent twenty years. Is there still a topic left that we haven't quarreled about? I can't think of any."

"Does it mean we are done quarreling?" Geralt smiled.

"Probably not," Yennefer shook her locks, smiling in return. "But the more important question is this: do we have feelings towards each other that are our own? Or is it all just the curse of that djinn?"

"I love you," Geralt wasn't taking any chances. "But yes, I would also like to know where this feeling sits. You have a plan, I take it?" Yennefer would have never brought it up if she didn't have a plan.

"Yes," she nodded. "I am glad you also want to find out. I located that pot... the one that used to house the djinn... It is actually exactly where we left it, more or less - on one of these islands. The magic responded to my search spells when I was looking for Ciri," she added. "We have to go there anyway..."

"Let's go tomorrow," Geralt nodded.

"But just in case it will all vanish tomorrow..." Yennefer put her hands on Geralt's shoulders. "I still love you today."

...

The next morning they got up late, and it was morning no longer. Yet there were still enough hours of daylight left to take a boat and sail to the other island.

"Why did you stay away so long?" Yennefer was walking slowly, as if suddenly becoming reluctant to confront the djinn.

"I had amnesia..." Geralt stopped, looking at her. "Surely, you know. Letho told me you too had amnesia after the Wild Hunt."

"Of course," she nodded. "But as soon as we got to Vizima, the mages there made me a memory potion, and amnesia was cleared in minutes. Any mage can brew it, and you had Triss with you all that time... unless..." A sudden realisation cast a shadow on Yennefer's face. "But she is my dear friend!"

"She never offered me a memory potion and I didn't know it even existed," Geralt froze too. That was one detail he wasn't aware of. Triss had deliberately withheld her help. She knew what to do and didn't do it.

"So you had to wait for the amnesia to wear off on its own..." Yennefer's face softened, her mood had visibly improved. "Oh my gosh..."

"Come, let's get that djinn," Geralt said decisively after a suitably long kiss. "I want to get it over with."

...

The djinn wasn't playing nice. Once released from the pot, he was ready to blow up everything to smithereens, the pot included, and especially the pot. This was one djinn who didn't want to go back. But this time Yennefer came prepared. Her plan was to make the djinn lift the enchantment that bound her and Geralt together, then to send the djinn back into the pot with an old spell she found in a dusty tome. The snag was that the djinn wasn't cooperating.

"We have to weaken him so he could be trapped!" She shouted to Geralt over the deafening noise of explosions that the djinn was setting off all around them. "Use your silver sword!"

"I was just going to knock him out with a spoon, actually," Geralt scolded. "What do you think this is?!" He was swinging his silver sword wildly left and right but the djinn seemed to always be on the other side of him.

"He's teleporting!" Yennefer noticed.

"Moondust bomb!"

"NOOOOO!!" Yennefer screamed with such urgency that Geralt froze for a moment, then mentally slapped his forehead.

"Of course not," he pulled out a different bomb. "Sorry, dear... Forgot that it would disrupt your magic as well. Let's try Dragonbreath instead."

He tossed a bomb in the general direction of the djinn and prepared to cast a sign.

"Stand back!" He motioned Yennefer to get in cover. She raised an eyebrow but obeyed. Geralt threw a fireball. The whole room in front of them exploded into flames, and in the center of it stood the djinn, untouched in his shielding sphere. "Now!" Geralt readied another sign, motioning Yennefer to do her bit.

An ear-splitting bang of a shooting lightning was probably heard all the way to Novigrad, but the djinn's shielding sphere still held.

"Again!" Geralt pulled out another bomb ("NOT moondust," he reminded himself). Yennefer shot another bolt of lightning at the djinn and Geralt tossed the bomb at him a split second later. "And now - Yrden!"

A stiff figure of the djinn was floating inside a circle of purple bars raised by the magic trap. Yennefer's lightning had finally breached his shielding sphere, and Geralt's Samum bomb froze him solid before he could cast another. Then Yrden, the magical trap, confined him in place.

"Admavoy Ye Arctavoy Balangua!" Yennefer addressed the djinn in ancient Ayleidoon. "Hear and Know my Power!" The djinn was still quite stiff from the Samum bomb, but he turned to look at her. The words seemed to bind him stronger than any trap. "Admavoy Ye Epevoy!"

"Hear and Speak, of course," Geralt was watching the djinn, his sword at the ready.

"Abagaianye Ehlno," the djinn smirked, watching Geralt's sword out of the corner of his eye. "A na Nenagai."

"You may not fear us mortals due to your own immortality, but I bet you don't want to go back into that pot!" Geralt hissed mostly to himself, leaving Yennefer to converse with the djinn. The djinn seemed to have heard him though and frowned.

"You placed an enchantment linking our fates," Yennefer addressed the djinn in an official tone. "We wish you to unbind that enchantment."

"It wasn't your wish," the djinn answered flatly. "Only the one who made it, can ask for it to be undone."

"I wish it undone," Geralt said firmly and his heart skipped a beat. That was it.

"No." The djinn turned to him. "I won't do it."

"What?!" Yennefer was taken aback. Djinns were not supposed to refuse wishes.

"What do you want in return?" Geralt squinted - he thought he had an idea where it was going.

"I want to be free," the djinn looked at them in turn. "No more pots." He glared at the pot that served as his prison with unimaginable contempt. "I want that pot destroyed!" He exclaimed flying into a rage, then calming down just as suddenly. "You are a sorceress," he seemed to pierce Yennefer with his gaze. "Destroy that pot and I shall unbind you two."

Yennefer seemed to be hesitating, but Geralt knew just how treacherous djinns could be, and also how fickle... He dared not to interfere and hoped that Yennefer knew what she was doing... "Do not destroy the pot!" It was all he could do but to keep repeating it in his head.

"Well, may be," Yennefer said slowly. "But you have to unbind us first, and then I shall destroy the pot."

"No." The djinn folded his arms.

"Alright," Yennefer folded hers. "Then I am just going to make three easy wishes that you are bound to fulfil, and you'll be back in that pot before you know it. I wish..."

"Alright, alright!!" The djinn shouted over her words. "Moraga!" He uttered the word, snapped his fingers, there was a pop and a flash... "There, your bonds are broken," he smiled contentedly. "Now destroy that pot!"

"As you wish," Yennefer nodded, turned to the pot and cast a spell.

...

When the debris finally settled, Geralt looked around the room searching for the djinn, but couldn't see him anywhere. The pot however was still sitting in the corner, shaking slightly.

"You sent him back into the pot," he grinned. "Never trust a djinn."

"Or a sorceress and a witcher," Yennefer grinned back. "Let's sit down for a moment."

They hadn't realised just how long it took them to handle that djinn. They'd been at it all night, and the sun was just about to rise from the waters. They sat down on some crates looking out into the sea.

"Did he really lift the enchantment?" Geralt looked at Yennefer sideways. "I don't feel any different. How long until it kicks in?"

"I have no idea," Yennefer shrugged. "I feel the same too." She smiled and rested her head on Geralt's shoulder. "I never found any mention of such an enchantment in any book what-so-ever... strange..."

"Djinns have powerful magic of their own though," Geralt was stroking her hair. "It may not be in a book..."

"Time will tell, I guess..."

...

It was late afternoon when Geralt and Yennefer returned to the inn on the main island. They would resume their search for Ciri in the morning, shifting matters of the heart into the background. It had been a perfect day - a day without a single quarrel. Perhaps the djinn had done something after all.

"Mathmeldi! Jorane dena... Auran hame, El Djinn!" The djinn smirked to himself, lamenting his renewed incarceration. "Moraga... Foolish mortals... there is no spell to bind two fates together... but we're even now, as they do not know this..."

20 Frostfall, 4E195 - Brothers in arms

Geralt's search for Ciri took him back to Velen. The swamps held the answer, it seemed. Once again he trudged through the mud and fought hordes of drowners and ghouls feasting on the bodies of the fallen soldiers, now heavily decomposed. But with all the dirt and gore, he preferred it to the pyres of Novigrad.

He took a request from a notice board to clear out monsters from an ancestral home - an old estate deep in the woods. Arriving there, Geralt found no monsters, but traps, skillfully arranged around the perimeter. Someone did not wish to be disturbed. Geralt proceeded with caution.

It could have been anyone hiding there, a deserter, a bandit, but something about those traps seemed familiar... "Letho," Geralt smirked to himself, remembering those months that they spent together tracking the Wild Hunt. This time, Geralt recalled it all. He straightened up, careful not to set off the traps, but no longer weary to be shot in the back either.

"Finally! That took you long enough," Letho grinned when Geralt spotted him. "That amnesia left traces, you know."

"What are you doing here?" Geralt looked around. "Expecting company, I see?"

"Ever since Loc Muinne, ever since your name got cleared, I have been the wanted man, for I am the kingslayer," Letho smirked. "But you know how that feels, I guess. I've been on the run, found this manor in the woods, overrun with monsters... a perfect hiding spot. How did you find me?"

"I wasn't looking for you. I am here to deal with the monsters," Geralt held up the notice. "The old lady needs to have a roof over her head."

"Well, remember me when you collect the pay," Letho clicked his tongue at the promise of a reward in the notice. "But someone sold me out. I've had a visit from the bounty hunters already, and expect another one any minute now. Want to stay for the games?"

"Wouldn't miss it for the world," Geralt nodded, looking out the window. "Here they come. You've got a plan?"

"I always do," Letho grinned, leaping out of the window. "Improvise!"

...

"This cannot be the main course," Geralt was turning over one of the corpses with his boot. "Lightly armed and lightly armoured, although this is professional gear. These are no bandits."

"A scouting party, probably," Letho nodded.  "I intend to take the dance to their boss. With a detour to the chap who sold me out. He should know where they are."

Geralt didn't wait for an invitation. Letho may not have needed backup against a lightly armed scouting party, but the main group would be a different matter altogether. These were professionals with a reputation to maintain.

...

Cutting down the bandits that took under their wing the person who sold out Letho's whereabouts, was a simple matter. The traitor was the last man standing, or rather crouching, trying to hold his abdomen together.

"But Letho, times are tough, there's a war on, don't you know? We fell on hard times... and the bounty hunters were paying good money for the information! It's nothing personal, I assure you!"

"Hmm... I see," Letho looked pensive. "That wound of yours needs bandages and a potion. I've got one in my saddlebags. Where are these bounty hunters?"

"In Lindvale," the traitor looked hopeful. "But it's a large group, be careful! And they are well armed!"

"And so I noticed, met a few of them already," Letho nodded. "Be seeing you." He turned and walked to his horse, mounted and waited for Geralt to follow.

"But my potion..?" The traitor cried after him.

"You crossed the wrong witcher!"

...

The group in Lindvale counted a dozen or more well armed and well armoured bounty hunters led by a famous character with a reputation to maintain. This group would not suffer defeat already because it would mean the end of their business. Geralt checked his chainmail.

"No, you stay here and don't interfere, no matter what happens," Letho said firmly. "I intend to put an end to these pursuites once and for all. Don't ruin it for me."

He walked to the barn that the bounty hunters made into living quarters and knocked on the door. A dozen of them came out, words were exchanged, a short swordplay followed. Half of the bounty hunters lay dead, but Letho too took a heavy wound and slumped to the ground. A moment later he was dead.

"Well, that was easier than I thought it would be," the leader smirked, looking down at Letho's corpse. "Let's cut off his head as proof."

"You don't need his head, all you need is his witcher medallion," Geralt approached them. "That's a lot easier to handle."

"And you are..?" The bounty hunter raised his Persian axe, eyeing Geralt. "Oh, I know - you are the previous kingslayer! But there's no bounty on your head any longer. Still, I won't mind chopping it off."

"Aha..." Geralt was still not drawing his sword. "Your dance with Letho lasted - what? - two minutes? If even that. And half of you are dead. How many of you will be left standing if you dance with me too?"

"Hmm... perhaps you're right. A medallion is easier to carry. The head will stink by the time we get to Vizima." The bounty hunter put away his axe and bent down for Letho's medallion. "There, he's all yours. We've got no use for his corpse."

...

"Thirty-six hours," Geralt checked the time when Letho finally opened his eyes. "That is a very dangerous poison, and you could still die. Got the antidote?"

"Saddlebags," Letho said with difficulty. He looked grey, like a corpse. His body started to bloat. "But now Letho the Kingslayer is dead, and I can stop walking on eggshells." He smiled, then thought of something. "I was half expecting you to interfere and spoil everything. How did you know?"

"Smelled it," Geralt smirked. "But I had to intervene after all. They wanted to cut off your head. Your plan wasn't fail-safe."

"Life is full of surprises," Letho smiled and lost conciousness.

...

The following morning Letho looked a lot better and was no longer in danger of dying.

"What are you going to do?" Geralt was getting ready to leave.

"Go South... or North... West perhaps... Lie low for a year or two. Then get back on the Path," Letho smiled. "I am still a witcher."

"Go to Kaer Morhen," Geralt said firmly.

"And be torn apart by your Wolf friends? I don't think so," Letho shook his head. The witcher schools of the Wolf and of the Viper were not on the best of terms.

"There are too few of us left to fight over it," Geralt insisted. "Tell them I sent you. They know we fought together. Lambert may complain, but Eskel and Vesemir will know better. They'll give you space. That fortress... well... it's big and empty."

"I know..." Letho mirrored Geralt's sadness. The School of the Viper was gone completely with only ruins left. At least Kaer Morhen still had walls. "Alright, you convinced me," he nodded. "See you around, Wolf."

...

A week or two later Geralt took another notice from a board. A dangerous beast appeared in the woods, and the village elders were looking for a witcher to take care of it. Interested, he went to see the elder.

The village was swimming in blood. There were corpses everywhere. Their wounds were deep, many were sliced in two. "No monster did this," Geralt looked grim. Then suddenly he heard a little voice from the bushes - a child. Trying not to frighten the child, he carefully approached the bush, and after some cajouling, a little girl crawled out. She told Geralt of the massacre that took place just the other day...

"The men attacked him," she was saying, still somewhat confused. "But why would they do that? He was a nice man, he came for his payment... But they attacked!"

"Are you sure?" Geralt was trying to calm her. "It must have been awful."

"Aye, that it was," she nodded. "But I am sure. They attacked. And then... so much blood..." She started crying and Geralt had to calm her again.

"And how did you survive?" He asked carefully when she stopped sobbing.

"I hid in the bushes... The man wasn't looking for me!" She exclaimed. "But mummy... and everyone else... they came out with knives and axes... they are all dead now..."

"That's bad business," Geralt had heard enough. "Do you have any other family? In another village perhaps? I'd take you there."

"My auntie! In Oreton."

It wasn't far, and a short time later Geralt was knocking on a door in Oreton. The folk had already heard of the disaster, and the girl's auntie looked at the child with pity.

"I'd take her in, but I got no money and too many mouths to feed as it is," she sighed. "So you might as well take her back."

"Back where?" Geralt couldn't quite believe what he was hearing. "Alright, how much?"

"Twenty crowns should do it," the woman smiled.

"Here."

He did not argue. He felt rage rising in him as well - the woman had no children, it was plain to see. For all that talk of "folk good and true", he saw none of that there. Still, the girl would be safe with her auntie, at least for a while.

Returning to the scene of the massacre, Geralt still wanted to find the witcher who did it, get to the bottom of what happened. He quickly spotted traces of blood, followed them and soon came to a clearing with a campfire burning. A witcher was waiting for him.

"Well, you found me," he said calmly. "What will it be?"

"What happened?"

"They promised me payment, I came to the elder in that barn, heard the door lock behind me, and there they were - came at me with pitchforks... They figured, they'd kill the witcher and keep the coin," he smirked. "It's always the same, but this was rather extreme. I snapped. The rest you know. Do what you will."

"Got any vodka left in that bottle?" Geralt sat down by the fire. "They call me the Butcher of Blaviken for a reason."

...

They talked about the life on the Path, the many ugly sides of people that they'd seen, the few kind and generous souls that they'd met. The other witchter told Geralt about his family, how he was given to the School of the Cat in thanks to the witcher who saved them from monsters. He was about Geralt's age - pushing hundred.

"My parents died years ago, when I was still young, but I had a sister... Used to come by whenever I was in the area," he said with a nostalgic smile. "She died some years back, an old woman... while I... well, you know how it is." He looked to be in his thirties. "I'm all alone now..."

"Such is a witcher's fate," Geralt nodded. "I've never had any family, was given to the school as an infant. But I have a sister now... it's strange... we were separated at birth..."

"And she still lives?" the other witcher looked up, surprised.

"She does... she... it's a curse, I think... a disease... something." Geralt was trying to recall what Lena explained about her form of vampirism. "Not sure I understand," he admitted. "She looks young... but she isn't."

"It doesn't matter," the other witcher shook his head.

"I guess not..." Geralt got up to leave. "Kaer Morhen. In case you change your mind. See you around, Cat."

...

The night was still and Geralt let Roach slow down, there was really no rush. He was on the road again, without a destination. He followed every lead in his search for Ciri, yet she seemed to have vanished into thin air. "Something that Ciri can very well do," he reflected. The whole enterprise of trying to find her seemed completely futile. Triss was right - she could be anywhere. On any world.

And yet there had to be something he overlooked... He had a feeling, he had dreams - Ciri used to appear in his dreams when she was in danger. That was years and years ago though, when she was just a child, his temporarily adopted daughter. Was she his daughter still? She had appeared in his dreams again, and he had to continue his search.

The life of a Witcher can be hard and fraught with danger, at times.

That's an understatement of the century! When someone shouts "Monsters!!!", the witcher is the one running in the opposite direction of everyone else.

27 Frostfall, 4E195 - Uma

"Is this a monster?" A local baron in Velen pointed at a gnome that could pass for a severely malformed monkey, human or elf. "He is not violent and does not seem evil, he barely talks... But I can't help but feel there's a man inside that body."

"There's magic about him, no doubt..." Geralt squatted in front of the gnome. "It might be a curse... This does not seem to be his natural shape."

Upon hearing this, the gnome started jumping up and down, flailing his long arms and making joyful sounds... at least Geralt thought they were joyful, for it was really hard to tell.

"I think he agrees," the baron observed.

"What do you call him?"

"Uma."

"Uma?" Geralt looked up in surprise. "What kind of a name is that?"

"That's what he calls himself," the baron shrugged. "Or at least that's one of the few words that he managed to pronounce. I did try to ask his name when we just got him, see. That was his answer."

"Alright," Geralt turned to look at Uma again. "Uma it is."

Uma was the last lead that Geralt was following in his search for Ciri. A dead man on the Skellige Isles told him and Yennefer that a strangely malformed gnome was seen in the boat with Ciri just before Ciri vanished into thin air. A dead man told them... quite. They had found a witness, only to discover that he had been executed for cowardice, but he was the only man to have seen Ciri leave the island.

"A dead man can still be made to speak, as long as his brain and tongue are not too badly decomposed," Yennefer said in a low voice when everyone was out of earshot. Necromancy was a forbidden practice. "It won't sit well with your moral values though," she added with a sigh. "There will be a price to pay."

"Is there another way to find out what happened to Ciri? This is our last lead," Geralt frowned.

"He was the only witness," Yennefer shook her head. "And they executed him. I doubt he was such a coward either for letting her go. I don't think he had a choice or a say in the matter, but these folk will never believe that a young woman could simply snap her fingers and teleport to another world. But anyhow, he is dead, and there aren't many ways to interrogate a dead body."

"You are right, I don't like it already," Geralt frowned again, shaking his head. "But I also don't see another way... His spirit has departed - it would have been easier to talk to his wraith. But he must have been at peace... good for him, not good for us." He examined the corpse carefully, after they took it down from the branch it was hanging from. "Decomposition hasn't set in too deeply yet. What do you intend to do?"

"Reanimate his flesh," Yennefer was also examining the corpse. "The tongue looks to be in good condition, let's hope the brain is still fresh too... Oh, you are not going to like this at all."

"Let's get it over with," Geralt got up. "What do you need?"

"Bring me three gallbladder stones from virgin chickens, a toad that's been kissed by a prince and a young girl's used handkerchief... What do you think I need? I am no country witch," Yennefer smirked. "All I need is energy... lots of it... all of it, in fact..." She looked around at the trees of the ancient Freya's Garden where they were standing. "Such a pity... but perhaps these folk should not have turned their Freya's Garden into gallows to begin with. So be it... Hilyat Ehlno Ceynaril! Admavoy Ye Epevoy!"

A darkened sphere of energy gathered around Yennefer, a wind went through the trees. She drew it all in, then cast a bolt into the corpse. It jerked, and a hoarse distant voice replied: "I hear and obey..." Geralt shivered, his medallion was buzzing out of control. She was right, he didn't like it at all.

Yennefer asked the corpse several questions, trying to find out as quickly as possible what happened to Ciri. Matters were aggravated by the fact that the young man seemed to have fallen in love with Ciri, and all he wanted to talk about was how beautiful she was and how he wanted to make her happy... But time was short, and those were not the answers they were seeking. Yennefer had to renew her dark sphere of energy several times, the trees rustled again and again, the corpse's speech was getting more and more slurred... But in the end he did say what they needed to hear. Ciri had been on a boat with a strangely deformed gnome, that gnome seemed to cast a spell and Ciri vanished into thin air. The young man whose corpse was saying this, was later executed for cowardice because the villagers didn't believe him. They thought that Ciri had drowned and he hadn't jumped into the waters to her rescue.

"Autavoy Sepredia!" Yennefer closed the spell. The corpse slumped to the ground, she stumbled, but steadied herself. Her skin looked grey, her eyes turned white and her hair hung matted and lifeless around her shoulders. But she stood back, not letting Geralt touch her. "Not now! Stay away. This will pass. We have to leave." It was only then that Geralt had noticed dried brown leaves at their feet and dry, lifeless branches of the trees around them.

"What happened to the garden?" He asked with a gasp, a moment later realising that he already knew the answer.

"It died," Yennefer replied with a sigh. "Reanimation takes a lot of energy... I did say you woudn't approve."

"Let's go."

But before they could leave, the Keepers of the garden appeared, realising what happened to the trees. There was no end to their reproaches, but Yennefer was on her last legs and Geralt had had enough of it.

"None of it would have happened had you believed him in the first place and had you not turned your cherished garden into a garden of gallows!" He cut through the flood of reproaches from the Keepers. "What possessed you to hang people off the branches of your sacred trees? Or to worship a werewolf living in the cellar? It was you who was bringing villagers to him! Did you think I would not find out? You'll just have to plant a new garden and hope that Freya forgives you this time, although I don't see why she should!"

Stunned by this outburst, the Keepers did nothing to stop them, and Geralt and Yennefer left the now dead Freya's Garden, returning to the main island where they were staying. It took several days before Yennefer looked herself again - it wasn't just the garden that gave its life for those precious few words.

With a lead gained at such a high price, Geralt was not taking any chances. How many deformed gnomes could there be in the Northern Realms? Not that many, granted, but tracking one down was still no easy task. Finding Uma, however, was only the first step. He could not speak or write, and neither Yennefer nor anyone else could figure out how to communicate with him, although as soon as they tried, they realised that he had a lot to say. The curse was clearly meant to stop him from communicating.

"I order you to lift this curse!" The Emperor concluded, having examined Uma himself. "This man clearly holds the key to locating Ciri! Go to it."

"Yes, Your Majesty," Yennefer bowed. "As you command."

It was only when they left the Audience Chamber that she rolled her eyes at Geralt.

"He ordered us... Like this is going to make a difference," she smirked. "I don't know how to lift this curse yet. Do you?"

"No," Geralt was going over the various curses that he did know now to lift. "Nothing even comes close. What shall we do?"

"We'll take him to Kaer Morhen," Yennefer said suddenly.

"What? Why?"

"Kaer Morhen has a library... Yes, I know there isn't much left there, but I think it's worth a shot. With what I know already... I am certain we'll make it work," she said with a smile.

"You have a plan," Geralt squinted. "Something that I won't like, by the sound of things. What is it?"

"Well, it's not a full plan yet. It will depend on what is left at Kaer Morhen..." Yennefer was becoming evasive. She wouldn't say any more, and Geralt knew from experience that it was better to give up than to quarrel. For once, he gave up. He longed to return to Kaer Morhen anyway, so why not. Things would clear up eventually.

...

"I never wanted to be a witcher!" Lambert was his usual prickly self. He and Geralt had to get to the top of the mountain behind the Kaer Morhen main tower and get an amulet enchanted on the altar. That path went through several caves filled with monsters and trolls - you had to fight the monsters and talk to the trolls. Except the one troll that was too grumpy to talk to - you had to sneak past him. This was one of the final trials that young witchers had to take before graduating. But now that the school no longer had any pupils, Vesemir didn't mind for the grumpy troll to be killed if they couldn't sneak past it. "Remember Eric? The slim boy in my year..." Lambert sighed. "Of course you were already long out by then... that old Grumpy killed him!" Anger was rising in Lambert's voice and he readied his sword. "I want to give Grumpy what's coming to him! For Eric! For all the other boys that he'd killed!"

Geralt hesitated for a moment - the final trial, as well as all other trials, was there for a reason. A witcher who could not handle the "tame" monsters around Kaer Morhen, stood no chance in the wilds. But the relevance of it was now lost, and Lambert was breathing down his neck...

"All right, go for it!" Geralt readied his sword too. "You do it, I'll just watch your back."

...

"There. He will never kill another boy again," Lambert sheathed his sword with satisfaction. "You can negotiate with the other trolls if you like, I won't interfere."

Geralt nodded and said nothing. "He will never kill another boy again because we have no boys here to start with..." he thought with sadness. Then he realised that he never knew how Lambert was picked for the school and why he resented so much becoming a witcher. He was a very good witcher, too.

"What do you have against being a witcher?" Geralt asked. "You've always resented it, but why?"

"You don't know my story?" Lambert sounded surprised. "No, I guess you wouldn't, you were never teaching here. So I'll tell you. A witcher from this school saved my father from monsters, and in return he got took me for the school. That's a common enough practice and normally we don't complain. I was ten years old, I remember it well. But in my case, we were praying and hoping that my father would be killed... he used to beat my mother, he nearly killed her several times, he was always drunk and we never had any money. So one night he got drunk and walked right into a nest of nekkers... He would have been dead, were it not for that witcher! Of course the witcher could not have known, I do not blame him for that... But after I was taken to the school, my father killed my mother in a fit of drunken rage... and I wasn't there to save her."

"You were too young to save her anyway, Lambert," Geralt shook his shoulder. "Do not blame yourself for your mother's death. It is true that some are best left without aid, but we cannot know in advance, cannot choose... But you know all this, of course."

"I know! And I've done the same thing as that witcher countless times, no doubt!" Lambert exclaimed, his face contorted with pain. "It's the not being able to know who it is you are saving that gets to me! Which is the real monster - the necrophage or the human?"

"Now you see why folk think that witchers have no heart," Geralt said grimly.

"You must have done it too," Lambert was once again reliving his pain and his memories. "How do you deal with it?"

"You move on," Geralt answered softly. "You focus on the job, or else the next monster will kill you. You try not to slaughter the so-called innocents... if you can... you know I couldn't always stand back and watch."

"The Butcher of Blaviken," Lambert suddenly remembered. "I never made the connection... I knew, of course... but didn't realise... too focused on my own pain, I guess..."

"Don't worry about it," Geralt smiled at him. "We've all known each other for so long... There is no bad blood between us."

"There never was," Lambert agreed.

"So, what was it that Yennefer ordered?" Geralt changed the topic, resuming the walk towards their goal. "Enchant an amulet on the altar at the top? You got it still, I hope? We'll never survive her wrath if you lose it along the way!"

"Got it right here," Lambert grinned. "But isn't it the altar where we enchanted our witcher medallions? What is she planning, I wonder?"

They exchanged glances and shrugged their shoulders, both agreeing that some things were best left unsaid until the very end.

27 Sun's Dusk, 4E195 - Cirilla

"Cirilla is not just another elf," Avallac'h looked at everyone in turn. "She is special."

"Ciri is not an elf," Geralt objected. He didn't care for Avallac'h's airs.

"She is not, and she is," Avallac'h inclined his head. "She is of Elder Blood, that predates humans and elves both. But elves predate humans, and thus..."

"Do not argue about technicalities," Yennefer put in. "We know that Ciri is special. Tell us something we don't know. Like where she is."

Avallac'h smiled at her impatience - or was it arrogance? - but answered the question.

"I sent her to the Isle of Mists," he smiled again at the blank stares he was getting. "It is a realm of its own, well hidden even from those versed in travelling among realms. The Wild Hunt won't find her there. At least, not so quickly."

"Was it the Wild Hunt that cursed you?" Geralt squinted, trying to piece things together. "When you were in Velen, in that ruin that Keira showed me?"

"Indeed."

"Why was Ciri looking for you?" Geralt distinctly didn't like Avallac'h.

"Cirilla is not just another elf," Avallac'h repeated. "Yes, it is important. She is a Source, meaning she has the power not only to travel between worlds, but to transform worlds, to destroy and to create. This power is far greater than any magic you can master here, as you well know." He looked at Yennefer saying this, and she nodded. There was no argument about that. "This power overwhelms Cirilla, she cannot handle it, as you have seen a few times when she was but a child." Avallac'h looked at Geralt this time, who knew exactly what he meant. Ciri had spent her childhood at Kaer Morhen with Vesemir training her, and at some point her powers started manifesting themselves. Some of the destruction in that fortress was Ciri's doing, not deliberate but accidental, when the power got out of control and overwhelmed her.

"We could not teach her how to control her power," Geralt sighed. "We tried to teach her to control her emotions instead, and that seemed to help."

"Indeed, it did," Avellac'h agreed. "It was the first step, but it wasn't enough. When Cirilla finally realised it, she came to me for help."

"Why you and how did she know where to go?" Geralt squinted again.

"Her grandmother left papers," Avallac'h shrugged. "Or perhaps it was an instinct, or both. Cirilla had been visiting our world since her powers manifested themselves. Our world is her home."

Geralt was about to object, but Yennefer touched his knee - don't. Or perhaps: not now. Geralt mentally settled on "later". The pressing issue of the moment was to find out how to get to the Isle of Mists.

"You cannot just go to the Isle of Mists unless I teleport you there," Avallac'h said, as if reading Geralt's mind. "I can see that you cannot wait but to find her, but have you considered what will happen then?" He frowned and looked at Geralt with reproach. "You will bring her here and the Wild Hunt will be upon you both, and she will die!" He raised his voice, underpinning the urgency of this statement. "She is not ready yet! She does not master her power! She will destroy herself, you and your whole world if the Wild Hunt confronts her!"

His voice was still ringing through the echos in the large central hall of Kaer Morhen. Everyone was stunned, not because this was something they hadn't thought of, but because it was the first time someone said it so directly. And everyone knew it was true.

"So what do you propose?" Geralt spoke much more calmly. "She cannot hide forever, already because the Wild Hunt will find her eventually, even on the Isle of Mists."

"The Wild Hunt will need to be confronted, indeed," Avallac'h nodded. "And Cirilla is the one who must defeat the King, even if she dies as well. There are many forces within the Wild Hunt, mages and warriors, and together they are invincible, even for Cirilla. But taken separately... ah, that is another story."

Avallac'h described in detail which forces comprised the Wild Hunt and how they could be defeated one by one. Each of those battles would be epic, each taking many lives and sacrifices.

"Cirilla must survive each of these battles in order to fight the last one, she must defeat the King, putting an end to the Wild Hunt once and for all," Avallac'h concluded. "She is your daughter, it is your responsibility to guide her and support her through all of this." He looked at Geralt, and Geralt sat up. "Whether she lives or dies, depends on you." He paused, letting his words sink in. "I tried to train her to control her power, but she cannot do it yet. I stand ready to continue whenever possible, she knows how to reach me. Yes, it will mean using her power and alerting the Wild Hunt, but have no illusions - the Wild Hunt is watching you already. The moment you bring Cirilla from the Isle of the Mists, they will descend upon you, again and again. Refraining from using her powers will not hide her any longer. The game is on."

The evening was closing in, and the people sitting around the table in the central hall of Kaer Morhen watched normal life slip away with the last rays of sunlight. Suddenly earthly affairs, the wars among kingdoms, the regicide and even the witch hunts looked like child's play in comparison. The battles against the Wild Hunt were not to be won by armies but by a small group of witchers and sorceresses hiding in their midst the Source that was Cirilla. And in the end it was up to her.

...

The month that followed was as Avallac'h had foretold. As soon as Geralt brought Ciri from the Isle of Mists, the Wild Hunt was upon them, with mighty battles fought and enemies defeated, yet everyone felt as if they were wading against a constant stalemate. The Emperor wanted to see his daughter too - for Cirilla was his daughter by blood. The Emperor felt it was time for her to ascend to the throne, as soon as the Wild Hunt was dealt with. The Emperor was no fool and knew exactly what was at stake and just who his daughter was. It was the reason he made Geralt adopt her when she was a little girl, long before her powers had manifested themselves. He took on the role of a disinterested and absent father, but in fact Kaer Morhen prepared Cirilla for what was in store for her far better than a childhood at the palace could ever hope to do.

It was a long and arduous month, and Geralt was doing his best being a good father. He did not know what to do, he never had a father or a mother of his own. He struggled to understand which of Ciri's outbursts were just teenage moods and which went deeper and needed real consolation. She was prickly and easily offended, she was insecure and stubborn all at once. Yennefer was around much of the time, trying to offer a woman's touch, and it seemed to work... But with growing confidence in her abilities, Ciri's arrogance grew as well, and Geralt felt being pushed away by the child he cared for so deeply. She was not his daughter by blood, but she grew up as his daughter in every other respect... and yet not once did she call him "father".

Geralt must have been doing it right, however, as even Avallac'h noticed Ciri's progress, her improved mastery of her powers and emotions alike. He would have liked to train her further however... but time had run out. The final battle had to be fought and could be delayed no longer.

Avallac'h, Ciri and Geralt stood on top of a tower in a strange world, a space between world perhaps. Avallac'h opened a portal.

"This is it," he said solemnly. "When you step through this portal, the world will close upon you and you will have to battle the King of the Wild Hunt until he dies," he looked at Ciri searching. "Are you ready?"

"I am," Ciri straightened up.

"Be strong," Geralt looked at her and his heart skipped a beat. "If you want help..."

"No, Geralt," Ciri turned to the portal. "What do you know of saving worlds? You are but a witcher."

She gave them both a final look and stepped through the portal.

I just wanted to add that Ciri's behaviour and in particular her words in the end are exactly as they appeared in The Witcher 3. That left quite an impression. It was one of those moments that shaped my attitude not only to the characters but to the game itself.

15 Morning Star, 4E196 and on - White Orchard in winter - Years after the end of the Wild Hunt

It's been weeks since anyone had heard from Ciri. After she stepped through the portal for the final battle with the King of the Wild Hunt, Avallac'h had teleported Geralt back to Velen, then left for his own world. Ciri would return when the King was defeated... or the Wild Hunt would return if she failed. But time passed differently in different realms, and what could be just minutes for Ciri, could easily translate into weeks and weeks on the mortal plane.

Patience wasn't Geralt's strong suite, and neither was it Yennefer's, and having to sit and wait did them no favours. Quarrels resumed, but both felt that the root of it was the wait for Ciri, and that the best thing to do was to split up and wait it out. Thus Geralt returned to the Path, and Yennefer went back to the Skellige Isles to resume her study of unusual magical phenomena just to take her mind off Ciri.

With each passing week the Nilfgaardian army was gaining momentum and the war in the Northern Realms was raging on and on, but no one reported any sightings of the Wild Hunt which meant that either Ciri was still fighting or that she had already won.

"Damn the time dilation," Geralt cursed thinking about it. "There's really no way to tell!"

The wind was cold and the ground was frozen, and normally Geralt would not be out on the Path in winter, but this year was different. He built a fire and sat so close, that the flames were nearly licking his knees. Suddenly a raven appeared, circled above his campsite, then landed onto his shoulder. A note was tied to its leg.

"Ciri has returned," it read. "Come to White Orchard. Y."

...

The reunion was joyful - Ciri had won. It didn't take six weeks in her timeline, but no one was talking about the wait any more. The Wild Hunt had been defeated. That village had never seen so many strange folk together all at once, and the inn was making good coin off them all. Finally, Ciri herself appeared and festivities shifted into a higher gear.

In the morning Ciri wanted to go rabbit trapping with Geralt. "Like in the old days when I was little!" She said, and how could Geralt refuse. She was in good spirits, she was dancing around him, playing chase and not paying attention to rabbits at all.

"I see a load is off your mind," Geralt smiled, watching her. "Did you get hurt in that fight?"

"I did, but not as much as he!" She laughed out loud. "I beat him, Geralt! I beat the King of the Wild Hunt!" She was jubilant, and rightly so... yet something was weighing on Geralt's heart, but he didn't want to bring it up. Ciri had not had a happy childhood, none of that care-free time that most kids get. Her life had been far from easy. What awaited her next? Geralt thought he knew, which meant he also knew why Ciri wasn't talking about it.

When they returned from the forest, they found a detachment of Nilfgaardian Elite troops waiting for them in the village.

"Whenever you are ready, Your Highness," the commander addressed Ciri. "But do not delay too long, as your Father is waiting."

This was Ciri's escort, there to accompany her to the Emperor's palace. He was ready to abdicate in her favour, it was her fate and her duty, she had been born into this.

...

The following morning the witchers and sorceresses that had gathered to greet Ciri, were still there, in the same inn in White Orchard. It was time for them to look into their own future, something none of them dared to do for months.

"It is the middle of winter and I should be at Kaer Morhen," Vesemir shrugged when someone asked him what he was planning. "Plasterwork needs retouching and we have more rubble now than we've ever had, what after the recent battles. I'll set off as soon as we're done here."

Eskel was coming with him, too. Letho hesitated, but it wasn't hard to convince him to join them as well. Lambert however refused point blank.

"If he's coming, I'm NOT coming," he glared at Letho. "He's a Viper!"

"He's a witcher, the same as you," Vesemir chastised him. "You fought together, for goodness' sake! What's gotten into you, Lambert? Spit it out!"

"He's not coming because he's otherwise engaged," Keira said with a giggle. "What?" She turned to Geralt who nearly spit out his ale in surprise. "You're not the only witcher around, don't you know! And Lambert is younger!"

A round of hilarity followed, with several people retelling the story of how Geralt fell onto Keira from a roof, and how that wasn't the same as to fall for someone.

Triss was very quiet all that time. She had joined them for the battles, having teleported to Kaer Morhen from Kovir where she was taking refuge. She came to see off Ciri of course, always making sure to sit at the opposite end of the table from Yennefer who generally behaved as if Triss wasn't there. Perhaps it was better than the alternative, and everyone knew what went on anyway.

"What about you, Geralt?" Eskel asked, trying to change the subject. "Coming with us to Kaer Morhen for the rest of the winter?"

"May be," he was evasive. "Got to tie up a few loose ends first..."

Vesemir gave him a long look, Yennefer shivered, and the conversation shifted to others.

...

When most visitors finally left the White Orchard, Geralt and Yennefer were still lingering behind.

"What's next, Geralt?" Yennefer looked pensive. "You seem to have plans."

"Plans - no," he shook his head. "But... do you think that djinn did what he was told? Broke the enchantment?"

"Who knows," Yennefer shrugged. "With all the events in between, it's hard to tell. There was no time for it anyway."

"My thoughts exactly," Geralt nodded. "So we still don't know whether our feelings are real or not."

"You want to put it to the test," Yennefer guessed.

"I want to be sure."

"What about Ciri?"

"What about her? She will become the Empress of Nilfgaard in a not too distant future," Geralt shrugged.

"You could join her, you know."

"As who? Her bodyguard? No thanks." He gave Yennefer one of those looks. "You know how much I hate palaces."

Yennefer thought there was more, but didn't say it. Geralt never told anyone what Ciri said to him before her final battle, but those who knew him, could see that he'd changed.

"Back on the Path then," Yennefer summarised. "I see. Well, don't be a stranger, I won't be hiding."

"Where are you going?"

"Skellige Isles," she shrugged. "A few more loose ends to tie up, as you say... Then I don't know."

They talked a bit longer, then went their separate ways.

...

"You should return home," Geralt went to see Lena in Velen. "Back to Tamriel."

"I... why?" She was taken aback. She did miss home, it was true, but was unprepared to hear it.

"Because you miss home," he shrugged. "Why did you think? There's nothing for you here. This land is scarred from the war, there are witch hunts still in full swing, and even if kings call it off, people got the taste of it now. It's not safe."

"They turn against witchers too," Lena pointed out. "Yet you are not looking to leave."

"I might, you know..." He was musing. "How long does it take? The trip, I mean? A few months?"

"To Tamriel? Yes, if you are lucky... There's no telling, really." Lena froze. "What are you planning?"

"Nothing," he shook his head. "No plans, honest. I just need... to get my head in order."

It took the rest of the night talking in circles until Geralt finally told Lena about Ciri's words in that tower between worlds.

"Why would she say it? I just don't get it," he looked like he had been trying to solve that puzzle for months. "Was that a teenage mood, you think?"

"No, it wasn't," Lena's eyes grew cold. "I think you saw the real Ciri there." She bit her tongue so as not to curse.

"You don't like her."

"I do not."

"Explain."

"During the battle at Kaer Morhen... That was the first time I met her. She behaved like a spoiled child. I had to hold her back so she wouldn't run out and get you all killed."

"She had to stay inside, yes," Geralt nodded. "Vesemir told her. Surely, she would have obeyed."

"She did at first, but not when the battle got heated."

"What did you do?" Geralt squinted. He wondered how Ciri had managed to stay inside and not come out, he thought she was too impatient and reckless for that.

"Nicked her skin with a poisoned dagger," Lena shrugged. "Not to kill her, of course, and not to make her sleep, in case we needed her powers. But it made her too tired to run."

"Just like an assassin," Geralt grinned. "She didn't mention that."

"Of course not. She was ashamed of it later, realised I was right." Lena paused, then continued. "We talked quite a bit. And, well, we didn't get on. I think the feeling is mutual."

They sat in silence for a while.

"She's been through a lot," Geralt said quietly. "She never had a good childhood. She traveled to all those worlds, running away from the Wild Hunt, living in hiding, yet still managed to help me and Yennefer twice... You can't discount that."

"I don't discount that, but it is not an excuse," Lena shook her head. "She traveled to other worlds... It may seem exotic to you, but not to me. There's nothing to it, believe me, people are the same everywhere. She's been through a lot... true. But so have you and I, and Triss and Yennefer and everyone else. You may forgive her, but I don't. Not that she needs my forgiveness, of course." Lena smiled, then thought it was time to close that topic. "You'll need to work it out for yourself. She is your daughter."

"She was my daughter," Geralt looked up sharply. "But some tears don't mend."

...

During the following few years Geralt spent a lot of time on the Path. There were still plenty of monsters around, he focused on that, allowing his soul to heal. He met up with Yennefer regularly, and every time they found their feelings unchanged, and yet he was not satisfied. The turmoil started by Ciri's words left a deep scar on his soul. Lena eventually sailed back to Tamriel, and life seemed to have returned back to normal on all accounts. Meeting Yennefer in late autumn, Geralt mentioned his intent to spend the winter at Kaer Morhen, asking her to join him there. She agreed. Without Lambert to quarrel with, it was a peaceful winter for all, and even Letho had to admit that Yennefer wasn't always such an insufferable know-it-all.

Then suddenly Geralt's visits stopped, and after some months without a word from him, Yennefer started to worry.

"He is still not sure about that djinn!" Yennefer was lamenting the situation. "Surely, it's been long enough now! Sometimes I just..."

"Get angry with him?" Dandelion smirked, refilling her wine goblet. "Yeah, I know. He'll be back though, don't you worry."

"He could be dead, for all I know!" Yennefer exclaimed. "It isn't like him at all. Test or no, he should have been in touch."

"Can you search for him?" Sometimes Dandelion could be helpful. "Put a magic trace or something? Send a raven?"

"In order to send a raven, I need to know where he is!" Yennefer exclaimed with exasperation. "I did search for him. That's just it. I can't find him."

"Hmm... May be the other witchers will know? In case he is dead, that is?" Dandelion suggested, hoping with all his heart it wasn't the case.

"They might..." Yennefer agreed. "Thanks, Dandelion..." She got up and left, she suddenly seemed to be in a hurry.

"Why is everyone so surprised when I say something sensible?" Dandelion wondered aloud, then laughed to himself.

After a few months not hearing from Geralt, Yennefer poured herself into the search for him, not unlike she did for Ciri before. Her heart was insisting he was alive but she feared him dead, and with each fruitless attempt she grew more and more sombre and sad. Like with the search for Ciri, a change of tactic was needed, and Dandelion's suggestion to ask the other witchers gave her an idea. She would travel to Kaer Morhen and start looking in a whole new direction. It would take months to get everything ready, and the witchers would have to help, but unless they were sure that Geralt was dead, they would be glad to assist, Yennefer felt certain. They too would want to find their missing brother.

Frostfall, 4E200 - Preparations

Yennefer arrived at Kaer Morhen in late Frostfall when the winter was just descending onto the valleys, but the mountains were already covered in snow. This was the time of year when the witchers would start retreating to their fortress to spend the winter, and she had a surprise for them. She needed their help to set up a very special search for Geralt, a search that would not limit her to the mortal plane.

"Yennefer! That's a surprise," Vesemir greeted her at the gates. "Here for the winter? Is Geralt coming too?"

"Geralt is why I am here," Yennefer replied and Vesemir instantly felt the sadness in her voice. "I cannot find him."

"Hmm... That's not like him at all," Vesemir shook his head. "And you think we can help? That's why you are here, yes. Of course we shall help. Come. I'll get the fire going in the guest room."

...

"What do you intend to do?" Vesemir was ladling stew and passing it around the table. Eskel and Letho had already arrived. "You brought enough equipment to open a university."

"That's my megascope with a few sets of lenses," Yennefer nodded. "The main tool for the search. It's just a tool... The essense is in how to use it. It takes the mage's energy and projects it... to wherever you specify. And so far anything I tried returned one and the same result: Geralt wasn't there."

She stopped, not sure how much more she needed to explain, but no one was saying anything, yet everyone was listening, and so she continued.

"He is not in the Northern Realms, not in the South and not in Kovir and beyond, I checked," she sighed. "And this is as far as the scope can look. I need to search elsewhere. I want to look beyond the mortal plane."

"That's... dangerous," Letho said quietly. "It's like the Wild Hunt all over again."

"No-no, not like the Wild Hunt," Yennefer shook her head vigorously. After all, she had been captured, she knew what it was like, even if she didn't remember it, her heart and soul still knew. "The Wild Hunt was mortal. Those wraiths - they weren't wraiths, it was just armour. They were people - elves from another realm. They had some powerful magic, but that was all. No, I have something else in mind."

"Necromancy," Eskel looked up from his stew. "You intend to look beyond death."

"Yes."

"You are crazy."

"You have a better idea?"

Everyone focused on their stew for a while.

"No, I do not." Eskel admitted, looking at them all in turn. "But we haven't heard of him getting killed... We normally hear such things."

"So there's still hope," Yennefer looked up and smiled.

"Then why look among the dead?" Eskel was getting confused.

"She is not going to search among the dead, not primarily," Letho seemed to have figured it out. "She wants to enter the realm between worlds and try to trace him from there, she can look further that way than just following the mortal plane."

"How do you know all this?" Eskel was seeing a whole new side of Letho.

"Our school - the Viper. They tried to look beyond the mortal plane," he smiled. "The poison... it takes you there. But those books have been lost," he looked at Yennefer with a sad smile. "You know it, of course. The Viper, the Cat, the Griffin - all our schools lie in ruins. And even the Wolf does not have all the notes for the Trial of the Grasses... So what is your plan?"

"To find the books," Yennefer said firmly. "That I can trace. And that is why I shall need your help. Retrieving them will often require a witcher."

"And who is to drink the potion? You?" Vesemir looked at her with a mix of admiration and amazement. "The risk of death is..."

"I know!" Yennefer cried out. "And Ciri won't help me now. It is a risk I am willing to take! And I shall prepare... the Trial of the Grasses is done in stages, is it not? To give it a greater chance of success... I'll do the same. And the goal will not be to become a witcher but to transcend into the Middle Realm... the Fade... the Void... the Rift... you know what I mean."

They knew what she meant and how dangerous and hard it would be to get it all together. But could they refuse her? Not a chance.

"We need a Cat," Letho said. "A stable one if we are lucky... one can never be sure with a Cat..."

"We need to have our heads checked," Eskel smirked. "All of us. This is crazy." He stared at his stew for a moment, then looked up and grinned. "But I am with you of course. Where do we begin?"

...

"First explain how you knew the recipe for the Wolf Trial of the Grasses that you used to transform Uma into Avallac'h," Vesemir wanted a clean slate. "We thought all the records had been lost."

"Most but not all," Yennefer nodded. "You have a library in the basement... You know that, of course. And yes, it's been badly damaged. But I found some scraps, and putting them together with rituals I found in other old tomes, I came up with something that resembled the Trial of the Grasses. It wasn't the same thing." She looked at Vesemir apologetically. "I didn't want to say anything then because we had no time for debates."

"Then why did you need a newly enchanted witcher medallion if it wasn't the Trial of the Grasses?" Eskel squinted. "It took Geralt and Lambert the better part of the day to get it."

"The medallion wasn't strictly necessary," Yennefer admitted. "But I needed them out of the way... while I sneaked into the library..."

To her relief, a round of laughter followed rather than a round of reproaches. Everyone was just glad to have the Wild Hunt out of their hair, whatever the price. Even if it meant accomodating Yennefer.

"You could have said," Vesemir winked. "I'd have sent them fight the manticore on the other side of the mountain..."

"Speaking of the manticore..." Yennefer looked up. "We shall need a manticore egg."

"What?!" Letho and Eskel exclaimed almost in unison. A manticore egg was highly poisonous, assuming you survived the ordeal of getting it, which was extremely unlikely.

"Not straight away," Yennefer backed down. "But we will need it eventually. There is really no substitute for a fresh manticore egg..."

"You talk like you're about to make an omelette," Vesemir smirked. "You'll want Lambert here, and you two don't exactly get on... unless Keira already worked her magic on him... so you'll want Keira as well," he nodded to his own thoughts.

"We need a Cat," Letho repeated what he said earlier. "They have a technique... I've seen them do it... No one can sneak up to a monster quite like a Cat."

"There's one living in Novigrad," Eskel scratched his chin. "He became a merchant, he's got a family... if you believe such a transformation," he smirked. "But Geralt thought it was real."

"People change," Letho shrugged. "But we don't want a merchant. We need a witcher."

"There's one in Velen somewhere," Vesemir recalled something. "Remember Geralt telling about him? Invited him to come here, too... Looks like he needs to be found."

...

They were talking late into the night, adding more names to the list of people that would need to join them in order to make it work, then realising that those people were dead, fallen in battle or burned at the stake... Each time it made them fall silent and take a step back - they were lucky to be alive.

The list of items needed to brew the potions for the slow stages of the Trial of the Grasses was growing quickly, as Yennefer took every precaution to make it as gentle as possible, hoping to survive it. Some recipes were still missing - they would need to locate books and notes to fill in the gaps. That work was likely to take months and months, but there didn't seem to be any other options. Besides, the witchers were eager to locate and preserve what notes they could, even though the chances of ever training more witchers stood firmly at nil.

...

Finally, the first batch of potions could be brewed.

"We need a healer to watch you," Keira was taking Yennefer's pulse. "Like Triss."

"No." Yennefer jerked her wrist.

"Well... Hmm... Philipa?" Keira was trying to think of a sorceress that hadn't been burned at the stake.

"Philipa won't come," Yennefer shook her head. "She doesn't meddle in other people's affairs unless she's interested, and she isn't interested, I spoke to her."

"Well, I suppose if I live to be six hundred years, I won't be interested either," Keira mused. "Alright, who else have we got?"

"Sile de Tansarville," Yennefer suggested tentatively. "Although she does not approve of Necromancy..."

"She won't need to do any Necromancy," Keira objected. "Besides, she owes you and Geralt her life. It was some feat of yours, to compress her into a figurine in order to smuggle her out of that prison... She would have been dead there for sure."

"It was a great risk, she was nearly dead already," Yennefer nodded. "But Geralt wouldn't kill her, even though she begged... I had to try."

"And then nurse her back to health... Don't think I don't know what it takes," Keira gave her a look. "In the middle of everything else that was going on, too. She won't refuse you, I am certain."

The halls of Kaer Morhen were getting filled with people, rubble was getting cleared to open up more rooms, the kitchens were stoking more fires, and everyone seemed to be in better spirits already because of that. Yet Geralt's absence was felt acutely by all, and the deadly nature of Yennefer's experiment was never forgotten.

At last the day came when Yennefer was ready to begin with the potions. She could die from the first one already, there was really no telling what would occur... Vesemir had seen so many boys die in agony when undertaking the Trial of the Grasses... but there was no other way. They prepared all possible antidotes and restoratives for Sile to administer at will, but in the end it was up to Yennefer to survive.

They were taking it slow, allowing Yennefer to fully recover after each stage. In the end they were successful, in that she still lived. Whether or not she could transcend the mortal plane and walk in the Void, remained to be seen.

Step into the void, my friend. Just be careful not to get lost. It's been said that walking the myst for the first time is like climbing an Escher staircase, it goes here, there and nowhere.

Frost Fall, 4E201 - Through the mist

Yennefer stepped out of a portal and into a world veiled in a grey mist. The ground under her feet was grey; the air was grey; the horizon... there wasn't any, all she could see is more grey ahead. Which way was ahead? It didn't matter, every direction looked the same - grey. The portal had vanished the moment she stepped through it, and having turned around a few times, she couldn't tell where it had been.

"Well," she thought, trying to keep her mind organised. "This must be the Fade. I see where it got the name from." Any of the other names would have been just as befitting - the Void, the Rift, the Space between Realms... She stopped pondering the name of the place and tried to decide where to go. "That way," she pointed ahead of her, as if explaining it to someone else. "Let's try that way."

...

"You again, girl?" An unpleasant male voice said sharply into her ear. She spun around, but didn't see anyone. "I told you to get lost!" The voice was getting irritated. Instinctively, Yennefer hastened her step. That wasn't just any voice...

"But he is dead!" Yennefer forced herself to slow down again. "This is an illusion."

"Call me an illusion, how dare you, girl!" The voice cried out and a shape of a man stepped out of the mist. "Does your mother know about this?" He said menacingly, walking towards her. Yennefer stopped, then took a few steps back.

"No! You are dead," she said to the man, but he still kept coming. There was a shadow of a doubt in her voice. He was dead, indeed, but he could also still be real - it could be his ghost.

"Why, I think I'll need to teach you a lesson, girl!" The man now stood right in front of her. "Let's see if you remember!" His face contorted with anger, he slapped her across the face, then caught her in his grip and thrust his hand down her blouse. "Still nothing!" He exclaimed angrily. "No shape to you at all, except for that hump! Bend over!" He caught her around the waist and pushed down on the back of her neck, making her bend forward. It was quite clear what he was about to do.

"No! Not any more!" Yennefer made herself exclaim, even though she was frozen with a long forgotten fear. "You are dead! And you will torment me no longer, father!" She straightened up, and the man loosened his grip around her waist.

"So, you've got the nerve to shout at the ghost of your father," the man smirked. "For all the good that it did you. Your hump is still there, and you are nothing but an ugly little wench." He spit and stood there, glaring at her.

Yennefer turned around and ran.

...

"That was not at all what I expected," she forced herself to slow down again. "Although I should have known... any demon or spirit out here can see straight into my soul."

"That we can, girl," a female voice answered and Yennefer shivered. "Have you finally come to pay your respects? You, an ungrateful little wench?!" The voice became shrill with anger. "Why we're feeding you, I have no idea!"

"You are not a ghost," Yennefer looked around, not seeing the woman who spoke. "My mother's ghost had long departed."

"And how would you know that, girl?" The woman's voice was mocking. "Think you're such a clever sorceress now, all grown up? But that hump is still weighing you down like always before!"

"I have no hump," Yennefer couldn't stop herself saying it, even though she knew that arguing with demons was the wrong thing to do.

"Ha! Then look at yourself!" The voice laughed, and a large mirror appeared in front of Yennefer. In it she saw a teenage girl with raven black hair hanging flat and lifeless around her shoulders. Her face was asymmetric and distorted with one eye larger than the other, her head was cocked at an odd angle because her back and shoulders were deformed by a large and unsightly hump... "See there, girl! You haven't changed at all!"

Childhood memories flooded Yennefer's mind, an acute pain pierced her heart... She screamed and ran.

...

"No, stop," she told herself after a while. "I should have expected this... Those memories were never gone, but only suppressed..." She sighed, straightening up. "You have to fight back, Yen!" She told herself, feeling the tingling of a gathering current run down her arm and sparks fill her hand. "That's right, just like then."

She looked around - there was a human shape in the distance. She thought it must have been her mother or father, but it was too vague to tell. It didn't matter, she gathered the sparks and shot a bolt of lightening at it. "Begone, spirit!"

"That is no way to treat your dear friend," a female voice said languidly, accompanied by a lightning bolt in return. "I cared for him while you stayed away," the voice smirked. "Your pride wouldn't let you come."

"Triss!" Yennefer froze. "What are you doing here? You are not dead!"

"No thanks to you!" Triss stepped out of the mist. "I wondered why you didn't just kill me back at Kaer Morhen, then blame the Wild Hunt for it! I guess you're not as mighty as you make people believe!"

"What..?" Yennefer took a step back. "Who are you? What kind of a demon..?"

"You are an old woman now, Yen!" Triss continued, stepping towards her. "You're over a hundred. An old witch, long past her prime! Who will want you now?" She smirked, shooting another bolt of lightning at Yennefer. It went right through, hurting her soul. "Just look at yourself!"

Yennefer turned around, wanting to run but instead she was facing another large mirror. An old woman with long grey hair was looking at her, and in the background Geralt was making love to Triss...

She turned around and ran.

...

"Life can be really rough sometimes, can't it," a vaguelly familiar voice sounded from a distance away. "Did you really think that a woman sixty years your junior and in love with your man, could ever be your friend?" The voice was commiserating. "That was a foolish thought."

"Who is this?" Yennefer stopped, looking around. "Ghost or demon?"

"Neither," the voice was approaching - a woman. "It's time you came in from the cold."

...

Yennefer was thrashing around and it took several people to hold her down so that she wouldn't fall off the bed and hurt her head on the hard stone floor.

"She is having nightmares," Sile was trying to wake her up.

"That is to be expected," Keira nodded, holding Yennefer across the shoulders. "She is trying to sit up, I think!"

"We'll give her a few more minutes, but if it doesn't stop, I'll have to go in and bring her out," Sile shook her head.

"Then you will be in the same predicament!" Keira almost let go of Yennefer in surprise. "What if you start having nightmares too? Who will pull you out?!"

"No, I won't go in fully," Sile was measuring out some honey-coloured liquid. "Just enough to get through to her..."

She drank it in one swallow, grimacing to the bitter taste, then falling into a trance. Her eyes moved under her closed eyelids and she was making little sounds like people do when they are dreaming. Then, a few minutes later, both Sile and Yennefer woke up.

"You gave us a fright!" Keira let go of Yennefer. "We were trying to keep you from falling off the bed..."

"So it was you holding me down?" Yennefer breathed a sigh of relief. "Then... oh... never mind." She smiled, closed her eyes and fell asleep almost immediately, exhausted.

"She will sleep now without any nightmares," Sile walked over to look at her. "She's just tired after her ordeal."

...

"Tell me what you've seen," Sile was facing Yennefer the next morning, having made everyone to leave the room. "Were those childhood memories?"

"Yes... how did you know?" Yennefer looked up, confused.

"I do not approve of Necromancy because I know Necromancy," Sile looked stern. "Childhood memories, especially unpleasant ones, are the first things that spirits latch on. And I know your history..." She stopped, then seeing Yennefer's quizzical look, decided to explain. "I am older than you... by quite a bit," she smiled. "I have seen you when the Academy just took you from your parents... and why they did it. Such strong magic in such a young girl!" She smiled again. "But the reason for it was also clear..."

"Yeah... don't..." Yennefer paled, she never talked about those events since the sorceresses at the Academy repaired the flaws in her appearance, as they did for all girls in their care.

"You suppressed it, and that's why it hurt so much to have it brought back," Sile nodded. "Not that I blame you at all... my own past..." she sighed, then cut herself off. "But it doesn't matter. You should be prepared for this treatment to occur every time you enter the Fade, but it should be easier next time, since you know what to expect. Remember why you go there."

"That... I had completely forgotten about that..." Yennefer looked at Sile with worry. "I got so absorbed..."

"And that's what the demons are counting on," Sile nodded. "That's why I pulled you out. But next time I'll let you stay longer, so be ready."

...

Yennefer was taking regular plunges into the Fade, but every time the ghosts of her past managed to derail her and make her forget why she went there in the first place. She was getting upset and angry with herself for failing such a simple task, but Sile insisted that there was nothing simple about that. Keira suspected what Yennefer was going through, having gone through the same Academy herself. Her own history was different and she didn't know Yennefer's details, but she didn't need to. Everyone had memories they'd rather not recall, the ones that revealed the origins of a child's magical powers. No one knew what Keira saw when she looked into the mirror...

It's been months and months since the first time Yennefer went into the Fade. Sile was no longer in a rush to bring her back, and Keira no longer needed to hold her down. Yennefer learned to resist the demons, to survive and return on her own. The only thing she still could not master, was to remember why she was there. Then, one day, she succeeded - she remembered. From that point on her search for Geralt from beyond the Veil could finally commence.

The first thing she did was contact the sorceresses enquiring about Geralt. She got mildly surprised reactions for the most part ("But you asked me that already? He isn't here, Yen!"), with Philipa being the only one to recognise the difference.

"You don't give up, do you?" She smiled, raising an eyebrow over her burned out eyes. "I don't need mortal eyes to see you in the Fade, in fact I see you better without them!" She shrugged at Yennefer's question. "King Radovid may have burned out my eyes, but he's just a fool, we know that. Well, Geralt isn't with me, but I suspect that's not why you're calling," she grinned. "Your experiment worked! Now start looking in earnest, good luck to you... Oh to be young..."

When Yennefer returned from that particular visit, Sile could tell that she had finally truly transcended the mortal plane.

This. -- Intense. Urging Garrus to drink blood holy moley. From a fountain (not a body) but still. This is nice. You wrote up some Oblivion Gates.

http://chorrol.com/forums/index.php?s=&...st&p=339306

I remember when I was playing it for the first time - I was really unsure about those blood fountains. Was I supposed to drink from them? I mean, Lena was a vampire, but still she didn't want to drink that! I don't know how it's worse... but it was worse somehow. However, there was no other way to stay alive... she ran out of all her potions and stuff... so...

I figured Garrus would have the same dilemma. He didn't realise that the Oblivion Crisis wasn't all glory... there were these other sides to it as well.

28 First Seed, 4E202 - Encounters in the Fade

Once Yennefer became comfortable enough going into the Fade and returning at will, she started searching for Geralt from there. The first step was simple: contact the other sorceresses, a technicality more than anything. Next she had to start in earnest.

"So, let's begin," she told herself stepping through the portal again. "Which way?" She looked around. Everything was grey around her. No, this wasn't how the Fade worked. She had to abandon any idea of order, and she was very uncomfortable with that. "Ugh..."

Yennefer started walking. It didn't matter which way she went.


A castle appeared in the distance. She approached - it looked familiar. Kaer Morhen? May be... but not quite. It was just like in dreams, where you entered a familiar house only to find it unfamiliar inside, or perhaps somehow twisted. Yennefer explored the castle, going from tower to tower, from encampment to encampment, yet it was completely deserted. "Why am I seeing this?" She wondered. "Geralt isn't here."

Finally she went into the large central tower. A beautiful ancient library greeted her with its leather-covered guilded tomes... So many books... So much exquisite old knowledge... She would just read a few... just this... and that... another book... Oh look - a fire in the centre, a lovely leather sofa, deep, welcoming... Sit down and read a book...

...

Yennefer didn't know how long it had been since she found the old library. It could have been hours or days. She could only measure it in the number of books she read. Every time she'd look up from a page, her gaze would be drawn to yet another tome a little further away, golden lettering reflecting the candlelight. She'd always wanted to read that book... now it was within reach... she'd just read that one and then...

"What then?" She said aloud and jumped up. "Why am I here?"

She looked around - the rows of bookshelves stretched into infinity. The stack of books by the sofa seemed to glow and swell. Her magicka seemed to dwindle.

"This place is sapping away my magicka!" She realised with a start. "It's a trap!"

She wanted to run out, she remembered it was a tower, surely, she had entered a tower, there must be a staircase going down and out... She ran along the rows of bookshelves, but the space had twisted and morphed while she was reading on that leather sofa, and the stairs were no longer there. The library had no bounds.

Yennefer closed her eyes and took a deep breath, focusing on her inner thoughts. Why was she there? Where was she exactly? Where was she supposed to be?

...

She didn't know how long she stood there, trying to focus her mind, but her feet were throbbing with pain. Must have been a long time. Pain... broken fingers... broken arms... broken ribs... all those bones that had been broken in her body suddenly started to ache... Death was looming over her...

Wait... death? The proverbial figure - a cape-wearing skeleton with a scye...

"She does not care for you," Death said. "We might as well kill you."

"Then we'll have nothing," another Death approached. "We need to keep her for now... it's a stalemate."

Two Deaths..?

Yennefer almost jumped. The Wild Hunt. Those were no wraiths or deaths or anything... it was just armour. Those were elves, torturing her, trying to get to Ciri. Until Geralt took her place...

Yes! Geralt. Who was now missing. For whom she'd been searching in the Fade. The Fade. The Void. The realm between worlds...

"This is not a library," Yennefer said aloud. "Geralt is not here."

The bookshelves dissolved in a grey mist. All features vanished.

"Phew," she sighed with relief, rubbing her tired ankles. "Nearly fell for that one." She shook her head, straightened her back and started walking again.

...

Yennefer came to a clearing on the edge of a forest by a lake. Several fishermen sat by the fire, it was early evening, they were roasting fish and drinking mead. They pitched up tents, one was larger than the rest. Geralt was not among them. Yennefer was about to turn around and try a different direction when she noticed a young woman approach the clearing. Something about her was familiar, so Yennefer stayed back and watched and listened.

The woman talked to the fishermen, they invited her to join them, said it could take all night... But what? She was looking at something... or someone... She was staring at a bench by the fire as if someone was sitting there... Yennefer watched from behind a tree. The young woman said something to the empty bench, paled, then blushed... strong emotions were playing on her face... But then she sighed and sat down by the fire, accepting mead from one of the fishermen. They talked some more, then she went into the big tent, sat down on the cushions, opened a book...

"Oh no!" Yennefer suddenly realised who the young woman was. "It's Lena Wolf, Geralt's sister... but what is she doing here? She is no sorceress! How did she manage to enter the Fade? And more importantly, why is she here?"

One of the fishermen noticed Yennefer behind the trees, jestured her to join them - they had fish and mead, there was still room in the tent, she must be tired, why not rest for a while...

"Oh no! No-no-no! It's another trap!" Now Yennefer was certain of it. She peeked into the big tent where Lena was reading, and saw that Lena now curled up on the cushions and fell asleep. "I've got to get her out of there! Whatever she's here for, it's not for this!"

Zap! She got Lena with a lightning bolt, but Lena only shivered and put a pillow over her head.

Zap! A stronger bolt, and another pillow.

Zap! Zap! Zap!

"What?!" Lena stood up, her own lightning gathering in her hand. "Who are you? What do you want?!" She looked around but didn't see Yennefer, even though she was looking right at her. The sparks in her hand died down, she shrugged and went back into the tent.

"The demon already clouded her brain,"  Yennefer realised. "Well, there's nothing else for it..."

Zap!! A much stronger bolt practically shot Lena out of bed. She jumped up, now coming out of the tent.

"Wake up!!!" Yennefer yelled in between further lightning bolts. "Wake up and walk!!" She shot a bolt a distance away, and Lena walked in that direction. "Good. Now again!"

They walked this way until the clearing was completely behind them and they were surrounded by nothing but grey mist.

"Alright, I'm awake, stop zapping me," Lena said, turning to Yennefer but still not seeing her. "Thank you."

"What are you doing here?"

"I... am not sure..." Lena seemed shocked. "But there was a reason... there must have been..."

"It's that demon, he wiped your memory," Yennefer sighed. "Well, you need to try and remember. You probably forgot plenty other things too. You must remember."

"Yes," Lena nodded. "I'll be alright now. I still can't see you... so I'll say goodbye. Whoever you are."

She turned around and walked with determination. Yennefer could not help her any further. Everyone was alone in the Fade.

...

As Yennefer walked, various scenes from her past appeared before her, but she dismissed them all, recognising them for what they were - traps designed to keep her there. How would she find Geralt in a land of memories? She was searching in the wrong place... she didn't want to find him in the past, she wanted to find him in present.

"And that means finding a room big enough to set up my megascope and start doing things scientifically," she told herself. "Come on, Yen, focus: we want to find a room! A tower, a castle or an old fort would do the trick." She had a hunch that a fort would appear if she were to imagine it.

...

It didn't take long and Yennefer noticed lights in the distance. As she approached, an outline of an old fort appeared from the mist with torches burning by the entrance. She entered. The fort had a circular tower with a large empty room on the top floor.

"Perfect," Yennefer smiled to herself with satisfaction and started setting up her megascope which, too, appeared from thin air. "Now let's see if it works."

She cast a spell and an image appeared in the middle of the room.

"Well, you don't give up, do you?" A woman with a bandage over her eyes shook her head. "Still in the Fade?"

"And nice to see you too, Philipa," Yennefer grinned. "But this is different from before. This megascope is not actually..."

"I see," Philipa nodded, peering at it, then taking a look around the room. "You are making progress. Well done."

"Progress..?" Yennefer was taken aback. "Oh, you mean my magic... yes, but I still can't find Geralt anywhere!"

"Then swallow your pride and ask Triss."

"I have! He isn't with her."

"Well, then perhaps you need to look somewhere else entirely..." Philipa looked around the room again. "Why don't you ask her?" She pointed at something behind Yennefer and broke the connection.

Yennefer spun around. Lena was climbing the stairs.

"Who are you?" Lena asked. "Who was that woman? I feel I should know you both..."

"But you cannot remember, right?" Yennefer shook her head. "That Sloth demon!" She clenched her fists. "Follow me!"

The room on the lower floor was set up as a laboratory and Yennefer ordered Lena to sit and wait while she brewed her a memory potion. Then she handed it to Lena.

"Here, drink this. It will knock you out - getting your memories coming back in a flood is quite an experience... believe me, I know," she grimaced. "But it won't kill you and when you wake up, you'll remember what you've forgotten." Lena drank it and passed out. "So it worked," Yennefer concluded with satisfaction and sat down to wait for Lena to wake up.

...

"You are Yennefer," Lena sat up after a while. "Thank you."

"Ah, you are back!" Yennefer smiled. "What are you doing here?"

"I am looking for a friend," Lena said firmly. "He died... I repaired his heart, but he didn't wake up. I am here to find his spirit and ask it to come back."

"And not to fall prey to demons," Yennefer smiled. "Be careful."

Lena nodded. "Oh, I've learned my lesson!" She looked around, noticing all the equipment. "What are you doing here, Yen? Are you dead?"

"Not dead, and the same as you I am looking for someone..." she hesitated. "Geralt is missing. I am looking for him."

"Geralt isn't here!" Lena exclaimed and Yennefer's face fell - it was another failure. "No, I mean he isn't dead! He is in Skyrim, Yen! He misses you awfully, you know how he is, stubborn, it's just a test, he took a ship..."

But before she could finish, Yennefer opened a portal and pushed Lena into it. "Remember why you are here! Find your friend!" She shouted after her. Then she took one last look around the tower, opened another portal and returned to Kaer Morhen. It would not be easy, but a trip across the ocean, even to the other side of the Great Maelstrom would be a walk in the park compared to travels through the Fade.

17 Hearthfire, 4E203 - Everyone knows the White Wolf

Yennefer's ship finally docked. They'd been at sea for many months, but it felt like years.

"Next time I'm building a portal." Yennefer stepped out of her cabin, somewhat weak and unstable, infinitely preferring a brief pull of magic teleportation to months of sea sickness.

"Don't you worry about a thing, Mistress," the captain addressed her as she stepped onto the main deck. "We'll deliver your belongings to your final destination. Where will you be staying?"

"I have no idea," Yennefer looked at him with a blank face. The many brochures and leaflets about Skyrim that she read and re-read cover to cover during their long trip, could not tell her where to find Geralt. Although she was confident she was in the right country, it was still a very large country to cover.

"We'll leave them with the port warehouse then," the captain decided. "Here's your receipt. Three trunks and... one unicorn?" He looked up, only now realising what the huge crate in the hold had been.

"A stuffed unicorn, yes," Yennefer smiled. "A memento of sorts..."

"If you say so," the captain shrugged his shoulders. Sorceresses were known for their eccentricities. "Just contact the port authorities when you know where you'll be staying."

Windhelm greeted Yennefer with an icy wind and light snow, with the white disk of the sun barely visible through the clouds. She stepped onto the quay. Solid soil at last! She looked at the carvings decorating the houses, at the longboats in the dock, noticed a galleon at another jetty and an elven galley at sea... "Elves," she shivered. "Let's hope they are nothing like those of the Wild Hunt." The port workers were rushing back and forth past her, unloading the new arrival from the Northern Realms. Crates, barrels, trunks and chests were being carried from the ship to the warehouse, loaded onto carts, or carefully stashed away into side alleys. "People are the same everywhere," Yennefer smiled. Her trunks were too large to disappear in a side alley, she made sure of that. "Well, the first thing to do is to find an inn," she said aloud, not talking to anyone in particular.

"You'll be wanting the Candlehearth Hall," a dock worker heavily dropped the barrel he was carrying. "A fine lady like yourself will not want the Cloudfog Inn," he shook his head, looking her over. "Unless the lady would like some entertainment, that is..." He licked his lips, but then quickly straightened up and picked up his barrel under Yennefer's cold stare. "Right, of course not," he coughed. "Just follow the quay that way, then up the stairs, to the plaza on the top, and there it is, right by the gallows. We've just had a hanging yesterday, so the corpse doesn't stink yet."

Slightly bewildered, Yennefer followed the directions. She liked the city. It was a busy port, and she'd seen more strange faces in half an hour than in her whole life before that. The majority were humans, tall and broad shouldered - the Nords, she gathered. It was, of course, their native land. But she also saw humans of other races, as well as elves and "beastfolk" - she'd read about them in the brochures. "No dwarves though," she noted. "Oh right, their dwarves had vanished," she remembered a footnote from somewhere. There was certainly no lack of new material to study. She wouldn't get bored here, once she found Geralt and settled down in some house some place... Geralt... where would she even begin looking? Skyrim was a very large country, where would she find one man among everyone else?

...

"If it's a mercenary you want, the strongest one is right here," a Nord in heavy armour addressed Yennefer at the inn when she sat down at the neighbouring table. "I am Stenvar. Will you be traveling somewhere, lady? You will want an escort then. Against wild beasts and bandits alike," he added with a nod.

"I might do..." Yennefer sized him up, wondering whether a mercenary like himself would have heard about Geralt. "I am looking for someone... He is new in this land... Arrived a year or two ago..."

"We get folks arriving every day," Stenvar wrinkled his forehead. "Is he famous? What does he do?"

"He is a witcher," Yennefer answered automatically, then recalled that witchers were not common in Tamriel. "He hunts monsters," she clarified. "White hair, two swords, tall but not heavily built, with a scar across his left eye..."

"...and cat-like orange eyes, fights like a demon," Stenvar finished her sentence. "Everyone knows the White Wolf."

...

It didn't take long, and the whole inn was rushing to tell stories of the White Wolf. Yennefer listened, smiling to herself - while some stories seemed mostly true, others were exaggerated to the point of being bizarre.

"He does not have two dicks!" One storyteller interrupted another. "He's a man, a Nord, your Khajiit is lying!"

"I have it on good authority!" The first storyteller puffed up his cheeks. "Heard it from that pussy in Snowhawk - she had to charge him double!"

"Well, it's nice that he's been having fun!" Yennefer laughed out loud to that. "But no, that... Khajiit, you said? She is mistaken. Although a double charge was probably in order."

"Oh yes? And who would you be..?" The first storyteller squinted at Yennefer. "I don't remember seeing you before, Imperial. And I have an eye for Imperials." He squinted again, his grin shifting into a menace.

"Imperial?" Yennefer was taken aback. She did wonder what race people would ascribe her to. Imperial was probably as good as any. At least it was human. "Well, I happen to know some of his anatomy," she smiled. "But I have nothing to prove to you, Nord." She squinted back. She was getting into the swing of things.

"If there's going to be a brawl, go outside!" The innkeeper shouted over the voices. "Out! I'm still paying for the last refurbishment!"

Several people got up and started to cheer - everyone wanted to see a brawl between a chunky Nord and a slim black-haired Imperial. Wagers were placed - the onlookers thought she didn't stand a chance.

"Alright then, stand ready!" The Nord put up his fists menacingly, facing Yennefer on the plaza outside. "Show us what you're made of, Imperial!"

"You've got to be joking!" Yennefer laughed.

Zap! The Nord went down with his arm still moving in a punch.

"Unfair!" Someone shouted. "She's using magic!"

"Fair!" Someone else contradicted. "No one said magic was forbidden!"

"Unfair!" "Fair!" "Fair!!" "Unfair!!!" The real brawl finally began.

When the dust settled and everyone had a black eye or a split lip, the bookie announced that the original fight was fair because no one had stipulated that magic was forbidden, and the lady being Imperial and a newcomer to Windhelm, could not have known such rules in advance.

"Well, there's your fee all paid up," Stenvar grinned, collecting a hefty purse from the bookie. "Ready to escort you wherever you please."

"You bet on me?" Yennefer looked at him with amusement. "How did you know I was a sorceress?"

"I didn't," Stenvar shrugged. "But I made the same mistake as they did the first time I saw the White Wolf. And his sister. And her... The point being," he cut himself off, "that they are made of tough stuff, and you must be too, if you are who I think you are," he winked. "Black and white, and that scent - lilac I recognise, but what's the other? Seems sweet, like berries."

"Gooseberries," Yennefer smiled. "Quite common, where I'm from."

"If you say so," he nodded. "I heard he's got a house in Morthal. That's a town West from here, perhaps a day's ride. Longer if we run into trouble. It will be my pleasure to accompany you there. I didn't lie about wild beasts and bandits - the forests are teaming with them."

With the business thus concluded, they decided to leave in the morning.

...

The trip to Morthal was largely uneventful, barring some wild beasts and bandits, as Stenvar had predicted. It took them two days all in all, mostly because Yennefer was still a bit unsteady after her long sailing and didn't want to rush. They spent the night at the Nightgate Inn about half way, and arrived in Morthal when the sun was setting on the following day.

"Geralt isn't around," the innkeeper shook her head with regret when Yennefer asked about him. "Haven't seen him in weeks... He must be on a trip somewhere. But yes, he's got a house - the Windstad Manor, right on the shore. But since he isn't in town himself, I don't see how..."

"Isn't there someone here who can tell the lady more?" Stenvar interrupted. "Someone looking after his house while he's away?" If looks could kill, the innkeeper would have already been incinerated.

"Felion," the innkeeper shrugged. "They seem quite close for some reason." She pouted her lips. "Don't see what he sees in that elf myself..."

"Thanks," Stenvar nodded and turned to leave, gesturing Yennefer to follow. "Felion is a mage here," he explained when they were outside. "Helps folk with... well... curses and such. Some say he's a Necromancer, but I don't believe it myself. I'll stick around until you're settled. Find me at the inn."

He took his leave and Yennefer knocked on Felion's door.

"Ye-es? Can I help you with something?" Felion answered the door, looking at Yennefer with curiosity. Then suddenly he took a step back, opening the door wide and inviting her in. "Oh! You've finally arrived! But please, come in! He isn't around, but I've been expecting you!"

...

"...and so you see, he's quite settled down here with us," Felion finished his recount of Geralt's adventures on the moors of Morthal. "Here's the key to the house - your house. He asked me to says so when you arrived."

"But where is he?" Yennefer was starting to worry. Geralt was there, yet he wasn't there! Felion knew more than he was saying.

"He's on a trip," Felion answered evasively. "You need to understand a few things first..." he coughed. "About his condition."

"Condition?" Yennefer was becoming irritated. "I've been told he's got two dicks. Did he catch something that I should know of?"

"Oh, nothing of the sort," Felion laughed. "What do you know about lycanthropy?"

"Geralt is not a werewolf," Yennefer said firmly. "And cannot become one, either. That I know."

"Geralt is not a common werewolf, no," Felion confirmed. "And it isn't exactly a curse... nothing that can be cured, anyway." Felion paused, searching for words. Geralt had warned him about Yennefer's volatile temper, and Felion was trying to avoid provoking it. "Do you know that his sister is Dragonborn?"

"She what..?" Yennefer sat up. "No."

"Ah. Well, it's another condition." Felion got up and pulled a few books off the shelf. "I believe you will find copies of these books in the library in your house, but if not, please take these. Your husband will return when the Great Hunt is over..."

"My WHAT?!"

"Is he not?" Felion kept his cool, smiling at Yennefer, his deep sanguine eyes looking straight into her soul. "What is he to you, then? Why are you here?"

"I... thank you for the books," Yennefer said after a pause. "I have a lot of reading to do, it seems."

"Come if you need anything, or when you have questions," Felion smiled. "As I'm sure you will. My door is always open."

...

The Windstad Manor came into view all of a sudden, as Yennefer followed a path around a large rock. The house was looking out to sea, and the turret on the front was getting light from every direction. "Perfect for a megascope," Yennefer smiled. She entered, finding dust and cobwebs here and there, but also blankets and furs, firewood, candles and books laid out waiting for her arrival. Geralt wasn't there, yet at the same time he was...

It didn't take long to get the fire going, and Yennefer started relaxing, suddenly realising just how tired she was. Her whole body was aching with all that traveling. She went into the bedroom and dropped onto the bed made up with furs as was Skyrim's tradition. Her hand touched something out of place... a piece of paper... a note. She opened it. "I love you. No more tests."

She breathed in the scent of cured leather and dried monster blood, noticed an old chainmail in the corner and a few silver swords on the rack, vials on the table, jars on the shelf, and herbs, nightshade and wolfsbane, mandrake root and... "I'll wait for you, witcher... no more tests..."

YES, good point! Even though she's a vamp, it's not really expected, drinking blood from a fountain. Over time she's gotten used to the idea of going for warm bodies.

Anyway, she's in an Oblivion gate,,, in Skyrim. Do you (or did you) enjoy closing closing gates? I dreaded them at first, years ago when I did the main quest on PS3. But over time I began looking forward to them; the guaranteed adventure they posed. When my Champion finally finished the MQ I actually began missing the gates.

Whoa... Ice Worms! What adds those into the gameworld??

Yikes, werewolves. "Lena Wolf is unconscious". Really awesome you were adding so much into Skyrim Improved, while gaming[/i], annd while writing this story.

http://chorrol.com/forums/index.php?s=&...st&p=339440

I don't particularly like or dislike them... they are a part of the world, like any other dungeon.


This is all from TWMP Skyrim Improved. I wasn't adding anything to it yet, when that part of the story was written, I just went exploring. But admittedly, I very quickly wanted to add things to that wondrous world of Skyrim...

Sorry, this is not a new episode... This is a note to those wondering what's the hold-up. Well, in order to tell you about Geralt's trip to Solstheim, I have to actually get him to Solstheim first, wherein lies the problem. To do so, I am using several new and untested mods, and the witcher is currently very busy testing and debugging them for me. Monster bug hunting, you know. He's very good at this. "You don't need a hero, you need a professional." Quite.

The story will continue as soon as Geralt is done with this particular monster bug contract.

Very intense and visual, the scene when she follows Geralt's advice: drinks a potion so she can "die", then confronts the afterlife (if that's indeed where she is).

http://chorrol.com/forums/index.php?s=&...st&p=339700

11 Last Seed, 4E203 - Solstheim

"I've just returned from Solstheim, I am not about to sail there any time soon," the captain of a barge in Windhelm shook his head at Geralt. "I've had enough of plagued bears and naked Nords, thanks," he spit into the water, emphasizing his sentiment. "I plan to enjoy naked Nords back here for a while, preferably in my bed. See ya, witcher!" He grinned and disappeared into the Cloudfog Inn.

Geralt looked up and down the quay in Windhelm, not seeing any ships or barges that looked like they could be bound for Solstheim.

"Hey, white one," someone spoke softly behind him. "I can take you to Solstheim, if you've got the coin..."

...

"I said Solstheim, I didn't say Fort Frostmoth," the owner of a small cog gave Geralt a big smile approaching the Northern shore of Solstheim. "I've got folks living furhter up, but I'll let you get off here," he said encouragingly. "There's no one around, you'll be safe. Fort Frostmoth is not too far away, it ain't that big of an island. I have no clue why you had to bring your horse as well," he shook his head watching Roach gingerly getting off his boat. "Horses hate snow." Roach seemed to understand that and gave an approving snort.

"See you," Geralt cut short the conversation as the seaman raised the sail and vanished from view.

Everything around them was white. If Skyrim was wintry, Solstheim was icy. Geralt raised his collar and smiled - it felt like home. Winters at Kaer Morhen could get pretty cold too.

"Come on, Roach, let's get going before we get snowed under," he patted his horse, mounted and steered South East.



...

Fort Frostmoth towered on the Southern shore of Solstheim, its grey walls stood out against the icy blue water. At least this part of the island wasn't all frozen, and Roach was soon engrossed in sampling local vegetation. Geralt walked into the courtyard and found himself waist high in thick grass.

"Doesn't anyone cut the grass here?" He wondered aloud, trying to figure out which of the heavy wooden doors led to an inn. "Surely, there must be a public area in this fort," he mused. "It's the only building for miles around, and with two ships moored by the shore, where are those people supposed to sleep?" Then it dawned on him: "Perhaps I should go ask them." Travellers were bound to know the way to an inn.

...

"Would you like to go back?" An Argonian hissed through his clattering teeth. "I would gladly take you back to Vvardenfell right away! It's so cold here!"

"I just got here, so I don't want to go back..." Geralt looked him over but couldn't spare any of his own clothes for the poor fellow.

"Well, if you insist on staying, then go see Captain Falx Carius at th-the f-fort," the Argonian looked in serious danger of frostbite. "I wish there was an inn, but no..."

Geralt was going to ask why he would need to see the commander of the local regiment if all he wanted was just a mug of ale, but thought he'd probably find out later anyway. Perhaps they had a job for a witcher.

"Would you like to come with me?" An attractive Dunmer woman was all smiles as she touched Geralt's arm.

"Well, I..."

"I can take you to a place of splendour and wonder!" She continued cheerfully. "Just step on board of this ship and we'll be off!" She took a step towards the ship moored behind her.

"Erm... I'd love to, Miss..." Geralt gave her a broad grin but stood his ground. "But I just arrived here, and I would like to see what's going on first... and find an inn..."

"Are you our escort?" Someone came up behind him interrupting the conversation. "We are waiting for our escort! We've been promised escort!"

"Do I look like escort to you?" Geralt spun around to face three nervous strangers.

"You do! You've got two swords!" They answered almost in unison. "Carnius Magius promised us escort!"

"Sorry, fellows," Geralt shook his head. "I'm just looking for an inn."

Everyone looked at him as if he was crazy.

"There are no inns on Solstheim, outlander," a Dunmer woman looked him over with a sigh. "This isn't Vvardenfell, you know. Civilisation is over there. Here there are just Nords and plague bears." She wrinkled her nose and walked off.

Geralt looked around him, shook his head and went to the fort.

...

"Can I help you, citizen?" An Imperial soldier enquired politely but not cordially. "This is Fort Frostmoth."

"I figured as much," Geralt nodded. "I was actually looking for an inn..."

"There are no inns on Solstheim," the soldier sighed with regret. "The nearest public house is Thirsk Meadhall on the other side of the island. That's too far to walk on an empty stomach," he added firmly. "Your best bet is to talk to the priest at the Imperial Cult shrine in the other building and hope that he can spare you some shein and a kwama egg and let you curl up behind the crates for the night." The soldier smiled and Geralt got a distinct impression that his speech had been prepared and rehearsed.

"Lay off him, Zeno," a familiar voice sounded from a side corridor with surefooted steps of Legion boots following. "He's not your average smuggler," an Imperial officer in full regalia entered the hall. "He's with me."

"Of course, Optio," the soldier named Zeno straightened up and took two steps back in the same movement, almost colliding with a table laden with helmets, gauntlets and broad daggers.

Geralt turned around, noticing a highly polished beastplate and supple pteruges of a high grade suit of armour, well worn but also well cared for. Presentation went a long way in the Legion.

"Hauk!" Geralt grinned. "I've heard you were in Morrowind... but this is unexpected!"

"May be, and may be not," Hauk grinned back and winked. "Come, we have lodgings upstairs."

As strange as it appeared, Geralt decided not to argue. Zeno didn't need to hear any more than what he'd heard already, and a good bed was infinitely preferable to curling up behind some crates with an insect egg in your belly.

...

"What is going on?" Geralt finally asked after a good meal in the guest room upstairs. "This is one of the strangest places I've been to. It feels like everyone is mistaking me for someone else!"

"Nah, they're not," Hauk smirked, finishing his own plate of mutton and moving untouched kwama eggs to the top of a chest of drawers. "This place doesn't exist yet. Well, the Legion fort obviously exists, but it isn't a regular Legion outpost - it's a penal colony. These soldiers are not regular Legion material," he shook his head. "Which doesn't matter normally because there's nothing here apart from wolves and bears. Not yet, anyway." He stood up to refill his mug with mead and Geralt noticed again the gleam of his polished steel and the rich sheen of the leather of his pteruges. This was more than just dressing his rank - Hauk was on a mission. "The East Empire Company decided to open an ebony mine nearby," he returned to the table. "Under the protection of the Legion. THIS Legion." He emphasized the word and paused to let it sink in. "As of now this is no longer a penal colony but a regular Legion outpost."

"Did they tell the soldiers?" Geralt looked bewildered.

"Better ask whether they told the East Empire Company what sort of an outpost this is," Hauk smirked. "But Carnius Magius has connections, and Falx Carius does not deserve to be stripped of his rank because some stupid bureaucrate in the Imperial City could not be bothered to check the designation of this fort. Falx is a good commander, the Legion values people like him. And I am here to see that nothing goes wrong. Which of course it will." He took another swig of his mead. "Plus, you are here."

"How did you know I'd be here?" Geralt looked up.

"The Blood Moon is rising."

For a few minutes they sat staring at each other.

"What do you know of it?" Geralt finally asked.

"The same what everyone knows," Hauk shrrugged. "Hircine calls a Great Hunt once or twice every era, there are signs long in advance and there are plenty of witches around to read them. The Great Hunt has been called once again, and this time it's here on Solstheim. And that's why you've come, is it not? You heard the call of Hircine."

"Yes," Geralt nodded. "I read the books too. I hear his call, and so I am here. But what now? I suppose events will unfold and we'll see."

"Something will occur..." Hauk mused. "The witches of the Glenmoril Wyrd have already arrived as well. They will know more, I expect, sense more. You could go to them, or you could hang around here, get involved with the goings on and watch and wait... The choice is yours."

"I'll stay here," Geralt answered without hesitation. "I need to get a feel for this land. The Dunmer, the Nords, the plague bears... the Nords, in particular. They are different from the Nords of Skyrim. We got ambushed by a pair of them in the wilderness, Roach and me, but before I could even dismount, there was a bear, two wolves, three wargs and gods know what else joining the fight! And the weirdest thing was that the Nords were totally naked, apart from a bear helm..."

"Naked Nords, eh?" Hauk laughed heartily. "Welcome to Morowind, my friend! They've got a thing with naked Nords here... can't see why, myself..." He laughed and winked, kicking off his boots and unbuckling his armour. Masser the colour of blood was rising. It was 3 a.m. and high time to finally go to bed.

Last Seed, 4E203 - Falling

Lena returned to Cheydinhal after her trip to Castle Volkihar. She was happy to be back home, to finally hold her newborn son in her arms without the fear of frightening him with her vampirism. Lucien was there too, having delegated any and all jobs to Ocheeva and Vicente during Lena's absence. Everything was peaceful and cheery, yet Lena's soul was not at rest.

"I feel grim tidings approaching," she told Lucien when they were alone at night. "It's like I have to take stock of all my bonds, my friends, my child, my heart... that is you..."

Lucien looked up hearing this, his eyes darkened, he too had premonitions.

"We'll have to take it as it comes," he said softly. "New trials for you, it seems. New trials for me too, but not yet. One of us must stay behind to care for Derric."

"If we get any say in the matter," Lena smirked. "Fate does not always offer us a choice."

That evening was spent in a quiet conversation and the night that followed was not given to sleep.

...

"You're Warlock Wolf, aren't you?" An out of breath young man bumped into Lena in the street the next day. "Warlock of the Mages Guild?" He stared at her, trying to decide whether she was who he thought she was. "Here, I've got a letter for you!" He finally blurted out, pressing a sealed letter into her hands, then charged off before she could say anything.

"Interesting," Lena mused. She turned the letter over in her hand, examined the seal - she did not recognise the crest. "Nothing good will come of it," she thought, opening it.

We uncovered a new Ayleid ruin near the shrine of Vaermina. Your presence is required, Warlock, as it is your duty to the Mages Guild to assist in such matters. Do not delay, there is no time to loose.

The message was signed: Raminus Polus.

"This doesn't sound like Raminus at all," Lena shook her head. "This is a trap." She folded the letter and returned home to prepare for the trip. Even though it was clearly a trap, she could not ignore it. She decided to allow herself another day of rest and another night with Lucien before setting off again. For all their closeness, they were rarely in the same place at the same time.

"We must assume you will be teleported somewhere, yes," Lucien agreed with Lena's assessment of the letter. "Another world, another realm perhaps." He took her hand, their wedding rings touched, making a faint sound. "Go and come back. I'll be waiting."

...

When Lena arrived at the shrine of Vaermina, the worshippers had no idea of any new Ayleid ruin nearby. They also refused to summon Vaermina. "The Prince is not here to answer your questions, Breton!" One of them was getting aggressive. "This has nothing to do with My Lord, so leave now, before I get angry!"

Ordinarily Lena would have snapped with "Or WHAT?!" to such an impertenance, but that day she decided to ignore it. "Have it your way," was all she said. She would circle around the shrine and look for anything out of place. She didn't really expect any new Ayleid ruins either. Then, behind the statue she found a chest in the grass. "I don't remember it being here before," she noted, took a deep breath and opened the chest.

...

Lena was falling into the darkness. After a while she was able to make out walls at the edge of her vision. It was mostly bare rock, but here and there she saw lights, platforms, columns. "The Everfall," she recalled. "I should try to land on one of the platforms." And just as she thought it, she hit the ground and was knocked out by the force of the impact. This Everfall had a bottom.

...

"Well, which of you was it?" A menacing voice was repeating these words over and over. Lena opened her eyes. She was lying on the ground in a cave with several other people, all wearing prison garb and wrist irons. She looked at her own attire, and it was the same. "Which of you was it?!" She turned towards the voice - a mage and several guards stood on the other side of the bars of the cave. The mage was staring at Lena. "It was you, wasn't it?" His voice grew more menacing. "I knew it!" He drew his staff. "Come on! Get up! Follow me!"

The other prisoners looked at Lena with pity and fear. "Here we go again," she thought, getting up. "I wonder which world this is."

The mage led Lena through some cave corridors, the guards were pushing her from behind every time she stumbled. She felt tired and weak, her magicka was depleted. "The wrist irons," she realised. "They sap my strength and stunt my magic."

"There," the mage stopped in the middle of an opening that looked like a pit of a giant well. "The excavation site. Get to work! I shall not suffer another rebellion!" He glared at Lena and the guards pushed her towards the side of the pit where other prisoners were moving rocks out of a freshly blasted cavity. Manual labour. That wasn't the worst that could have happened, Lena figured, picking up a rock.

...

"This will kill you ere long," a familiar voice said in her ear. "The work is too hard even on us pawns, never mind someone like yourself."

Lena nearly dropped the rock she was carrying onto her foot, but managed to jump aside in time.

"Rook?!" She spun around. "What..? Where..?"

"Hello, Wolf," he smiled. "Welcome to the excavation site. Something will occur ere long, be ready."

Just as he spoke, there was a noise of another explosion followed by more noise of falling rock, followed by screams.

"Let's go see," Rook winked, pulling Lena towards the noise.

A medusa towered in a newly uncovered chamber, it was quite annoyed to have been so rudely woken up. Its huge serpent-like body was uncoiling itself, the tail thrashing around, sending guards and prisoners flying.

"Don't just stand there, KILL IT!!" The overseer mage bellowed, shooting spells at the medusa.

"Beware of medusa's gaze!" Rook sharply pulled Lena out of harm's way, but several guards were less fortunate and had been petrified on the spot. "This way!" Medusa's thrashing opened up a passage, and Rook and Lena ran in that direction. Dead guards were everywhere, their weapons too. Rook quickly picked up a staff, Lena grabbed a bow and daggers, but rather than fighting, they just ran. There was daylight at the end of the passage, daylight and freedom.

"After them!!" The overseer noticed their escape. They ran out of the cavern, but the path ended on a cliff edge.

"Jump!!" Rook shouted, Lena thought he had gone mad - no one could have survived a fall from such a height. Yet it was Rook urging her to do something stupid, which was a contradiction in terms, Rook being the most level-headed person Lena could think of. She jumped. She landed on a griffin's back. The griffin soared.

The land below them looked familiar, yet not completely. It reminded Lena of Gransys, but perhaps it was only because Rook was there. She saw mountains and the sea, towns and villages below, forests and a desert. "The desert is new," she turned to Rook. "Gransys didn't have a desert."

"This isn't Gransys," Rook shook his head. "But it is indeed one of the worlds connected to the Rift. There's a dragon too, and you must be the Arisen... But beyond that, I do not know what to expect."

"I cannot be the Arisen," Lena shook her head. "I got my heart back, remember?"

"And is it still beating in your breast?" Rook's smile was sad, and when Lena pressed her hand to her chest, she realised with horror that she could not detect a heartbeat.

"Here we go again," she said with abandonment.

"Indeed."

As the griffin was flying over a coastal village, someone cranked up a ballista and shot it down. It spun as it fell, sending Rook and Lena into the river below. The brine engulfed them.

"Fear not, for neither I nor you will permanently perish," Rook wasn't trying to fight the brine which was pointless. "If you wish it, we shall meet again. Take your place in this world, Arisen, and find your path."

...

"Hey, are you alright?" Someone was shaking Lena awake. She opened her eyes - she was lying on the shore and a group of soldiers stood beside her. One helped her up. "Hmm, we saw a griffin being shot down, and here it is, but who are you and what are you doing here?" He eyed her with suspicion.

"I... err..." Lena shook her head.

"She is concussed, can't you see," another soldier intervened. "Probably can't remember her own name," he smirked. "Let's take her to the encampment, they'll figure it out there. She's no threat to anyone in her current state."

The others agreed. After all, the encampment was nearby, and it was always a good idea to defer difficult decisions to someone else.

As they approached the encampment, Lena started getting a funny tingling feeling in her fingertips. She hadn't felt it for a long time - the feeling she got near a riftstone.

"Arisen, we welcome your return," a group of pawns stood by the riftstone. "Pray, select a pawn to help you on your path."

"What - no trials first?" Lena looked at the pawns before her. "No 'prove your resolve, Arisen' kind of thing?" She squinted. "Does the Legion accept just anyone now?" She glared at them.

"That's she alright," one of the pawns said quietly to another. "It falls to us to deal with the insolent one." Then turning to Lena he added: "Just touch the riftstone, will you? I'm sure any pawn will be thrilled to walk with you."

He glared and bared his teeth. Lena glared back and drew her daggers.

"You have no idea!" She took a step forward. "Defend yourself!"

"Hey!!!" Several pawns cried out, rushing to stand between Lena and the other pawn. "What are you doing?! That's against the rules! Pawns cannot fight an Arisen! You'll ruin everything!!"

"Pawns cannot be given the Arisen's Bond either, I was told," Lena snapped, sheathing her daggers. "Yet the Bond's magic does not answer to the Legion, as we've discovered. Don't believe everything you hear." She touched the riftstone and Scorpio stepped out of the Rift. "See, I don't even have to go in. My pawn never left me."

"Then the rumours are true, it is all your fault," another pawn spoke. "You started it."

"That illness that affects the pawns," another one chimed in.

"Makes us restless and unruly."

"Makes us defy the Arisen and act for ourselves."

"Devastating."

"Catastrophic."

"Frightening."

"Aha," Lena looked at them in turn. "An illness to undo your curse, you mean? Yeah, that would be my doing." She grinned ear to ear.

"But mayhap this world is not ready for it, Arisen," Scorpio said quietly. "Mayhap this world still heeds the dragon's dogma. You've been recalled, and I with you, and neither of us is free from the grip of the Legion. Where will it lead this time, I wonder?"

"And for how long?" Lena echoed Scorpio's words, taking his hand. The Arisen's Bond wrapped around their fingers, leaving the other pawns stunned. "There is only one way to find out," she looked up at him. "Let's go."

Last Seed, 4E203 - On the road

"What do you mean - I cannot have both daggers and a bow?" Lena was glaring at the sergeant on the encampment. "I am an assassin, I need both."

"Assassin is not a vocation, it's a state of mind," the sergeant shook his head. "Choose between an Archer and a Thief."

"A Thief?!" Lena couldn't believe her ears. "How's that a vocation while an Assassin is not?!"

"Look, Miss," the sergeant took a step back eyeing Lena's daggers. "I don't make the rules. They call it a 'thief' but to be quite honest with you, it is all about killing rather than stealing. Mostly. Anyway, let's just say - daggers. Choose archery or daggers, but you can't have both."

Lena glared at him again but eventually had to choose. Daggers.

...

"Before we go anywhere in earnest, we should get the feel for this land and stock up on supplies," Scorpio was checking the edge of his sword. "This is all pretty basic gear, we won't get far on it, but may be it will suffice for now. And... err... you may want to buy some clothes."

Lena wasn't naked, but she was still wearing prison garb and wrist irons, and that had to change. The only shop on the encampment didn't sell any clothes, only weapons and armour, and it was way too expensive for someone who had exactly zero gold coins to their name.

"You'll just have to walk around with a convict for a bit longer," she shot a glance at Scorpio. However, he was right. Prison garb may be enough for the wilderness, but it wouldn't do as townwear.

The next few days were thus spent running errands for the quartermaster, earning some coin, exploring nearby caves and trying to build a team with two more pawns so that together they could take on a pack of goblins.

"Wow, did I hit my head or were those goblins really tough?" Lena looked at her pawns in turn when they finally made camp in a quiet spot. "It isn't my first time handling daggers but I found this battle a struggle."

"You hit your head and those goblins were rather tough," Scorpio nodded. "Do you even remember how you got here?" Lena gave him a blank stare. "Exactly. And those wrist irons that you were wearing, they left permanent damage. You'll need to relearn most things from scratch."

It was a daunting prospect. The only consolation was that Lena did in fact remember her past, and Scorpio still knew how to fight. But under the circumstances it didn't change much.

Eventually they gathered enough coin to buy some armour so that Lena could finally ditch her prison garb.

"You will want to go to the capital," one of the soldiers said to them. "If you are indeed a true Arisen... well... that... umm..."

"What?" Lena's heart fell.

"You can't be, see," the soldier finally spit it out. "You'll be arrested and executed without delay. The Queen Regent already has an Arisen who will soon be crowned as King. Mind you, it happens to be her son who is actually not an Arisen... err..." The complexities of politics were above his paygrade, to be sure. "Well, anyhow. If you just turn up in the capital, the next thing you'll see will be the gallows. Unless they decide to quarter you first, then it'll be the chopping block... or may be they'll start with the stretcher, just to see what you might know..."

"I get the picture!!" Lena interrupted the soldier. "So what do I do?"

"Go talk to the Captain," the soldier was releaved to be done with that conversation. "We've seen you summon pawns. Only an Arisen can do this. Not everyone is happy with the Queen Regent anyway..."

He cut himself off and walked away.

"Why can't I get teleported to some land of roses with chocolate unicorns and marshmellow bunnies instead of nasty queens, dragons and goblins?" She sighed.

"Because you did not will it, Arisen," Scorpio said quietly. "You always get what you wish for, whether you know it or not. The will of the Arisen is what shapes this world, so in a way it is all your own doing..."

She shot him a sharp glance and he stopped talking - that was not what she wanted to hear. "Yes, master, by your command..." Now he got a jab under the ribs - that was not what she wanted to hear either. One thing was blatantly clear: Scorpio needed some armour.

...

"I want to find Rook," Lena was saying a few days later. "He's the best mage I know and we need a mage."

"What about all these other mage pawns around here?" Scorpio cast his eyes about picking out half a dozen mages, at least. "Some of these girls look pretty hot..."

"Rook!" Lena touched the riftstone.

...

Rook was still dressed in his prison garb and didn't have a staff. Lena insisted on getting all that gear for him which meant more cave delving. The other pawns were rolling their eyes and shrugging their shoulders, and some started deliberately ducking out of her line of sight when she once again was searching for the third pawn to join their party.

Eventually she was satisfied. It was time to make for the capital.

"I shall escort you there under guard," the Captain smiled when she finally approached him. "For your own safety. There are checkpoints along the way..." This was going to be a long trip.

The road twisted and turned, running along the bottom of a canyon for the most part. They encountered numerous goblins, harpies and an odd cyclops, and after a day of traveling Lena seemed to have passed the Captain's test.

"Take this letter," he gave her a sealed scroll. "We don't need to escort you any further. When you arrive in the capital, just say you're an Arisen and get arrested. The Captain there will interrogate you personally and without witnesses. Give him this scroll. Good luck, Ser Arisen."

He saluted, called up his men and marched off.

"So," Lena looked at Scorpio, Rook and the third pawn whose name she could not remember. "Once again my heart is missing, there's a dragon to kill and the local sovran wants me dead. You know, I think I would definitely prefer marshmellow bunnies instead..."

She shook her head, picked a mountain path and signalled her pawns to follow. Life became simple again.

Last Seed, 4E203 - Glimpses of the past

"Let's just get to Gran Soren and be done with it," Lena and her companions stood on top of a cliff overlooking much of the land before them. "There - you can see the city in all its splendour."

"It isn't Gran Soren," Scorpio said quietly. "This is Vernworth, the capital of Vermund. We are not in Gransys."

"It does look awfully similar though," Lena squinted at the horizon. "The layout of the city, the ruined aqueduct in front of it, down to the watchtowers and coastal outline... It's just bigger."

"Well, they do say that all these worlds were designed by the same hand," Rook agreed, also surveying the area. "We pawns see a lot of them, it's hard to keep them apart. Let's go and get you arrested, as planned."

This was one of the rare occasions when Lena actually planned to get arrested. She had a letter for the Captain of the Guard which should get her off the hook. In theory.

...

"So, you are indeed a true Arisen," the Captain was satisfied, having read the letter and closely examined the scar on Lena's chest. "And your heart is missing, indeed. And you have pawns with you. Hmm... I guess I have to believe it. You must be the current Arisen, Ser..."

"The current Arisen?" Lena looked up in surprise. "Do you mean to say there are more Arisens here?"

"Oh yes, past Arisens who failed to kill their dragon or simply walked away," the Captain shrugged. "Plenty of them around. They are immortal, of course, but pawns stop following them, pawns only follow the current Arisen."

"Arisens are not immortal," Lena wasn't sure just how much the Captain knew about this whole Arisen business. "Arisens can fall in battle and die. All past Arisens also perish when 'the current Arisen' as you put it, kills the dragon and regains his or her heart. Unless this world works differently somehow?"

"No, this is about right," the Captain agreed. "Only the past Arisens here don't perish when the dragon is killed. They only perish when the current Arisen ends the cycle instead of killing the dragon... Except that the cycle then restarts again... I think... The Great Reset they call it... But it is only a legend. All great past Arisens have killed their dragons, that's the right thing to do because that makes you the Sovereign of Vermund. Until such time that one of the future Arisens kills their own dragon and replaces you... Err... I've never known a king who would willingly relinquish his crown though..." He added in a low voice, seemingly to himself. "The details are shrouded in history!" He confidently continued. "It has been centuries since the previous King of Vermund killed his dragon, and no one knows what happened to the sovereign who reigned before him! This is also not important. What is important however, is that we are currently without a king at all. Yes, Arisens are mortal, and I should have thought of that, because our last King, our last reigning Arisen, was murdered! We have Queen Regent now instead, the last King's wife, and she wishes to crown her son as the King of Vermund. Except that he is not an Arisen, and therefore cannot be our king..." The Captain looked at Lena triumphantly, having talked himself out of that corner. "Our rightful sovereign is you, Your Majesty!"

"WHAT?!"

"I pledge my fielty to you, the true Sovereign of Vermund!"

The Captain went down on one knee and bowed his head as he pronounced his oath, leaving Lena utterly stunned.

"Err... Umm... Captain... please rise," she finally managed to say. "That's rather unexpected."

"Perhaps," the Captain continued in a more relaxed tone, standing up. "But it's how it is. It is your duty, Your Majesty, to seek out and kill the dragon, not to shirk it, not to fail, it is your duty to the people of Vermund, as you are our true sovereign."

"Riiiight..." Lena squinted. "So by addressing me as 'Your Majesty' you plan to have me undertake all sorts of tasks for the good of the people of Vermund. Clever, Captain Brandt."

"You are either the true Arisen and therefore our rightful sovereign, or you are an imposter and I'll have you quartered and hung by the morrow. Your choice." The Captain put his hand on the hilt of his sword, his face impassable.

"Well, as long as we understand each other, Captain," Lena smiled at him. "As your true sovereign to whom you just now pledged your fielty, I need you to prepare the ground and make a list of those tasks that need doing..." She sighed with resolve. "While I start asking around about the dragon."

"As you command, Your Majesty!" The Captain clicked his heels. "Oh, and by the way... you are now persona non grata at the castle because Queen Regent will not suffer a true Arisen at her court. The Guard is sworn loyalty to her, but they answer to me. You will therefore be allowed to walk the castle grounds, but should you set foot in any of the buildings, you will be arrested and thrown in the gaol. Forgive me, Your Majesty, but I must do my duty. So a little discretion on your part would not go amiss..." His voice trailed off as he took in Lena's appearance - her dark leather armour, her daggers, her soft, quiet boots. "A thief, is it?" He grimaced, but quickly straightened his face. "It is of no import, Arisens come from all walks of life."

"Thief - no. Thieves die by my hand." Lena suddenly recalled in all vivid detail the bloodbath in Riften.

"I see," the Captain nodded approvingly. "Good luck to you, Assassin."

...

"What a mess!" Lena was retelling that interview to Rook and Scorpio. "I have no wish to become the sovereign of Vermund!"

"It doesn't look like you have a choice in the matter," Rook shook his head. "At least not yet. Getting quartered and hung is the less agreeable alternative. Did the Captain say what he wanted you to do?"

"Find and kill the dragon," Lena shrugged.

"A mere trifle," Scorpio nodded. "Where do we begin?"

...

As it turned out, Captain Brandt did come up with a number of tasks for Lena to do, mostly involving sneaking around the castle at night, preferably without getting caught. He had no idea how to locate the dragon however, so he suggested to travel the land and see if anything turned up.

"You might want to start in the village of Melve, Your Majesty," he pointed it out on the map. "They've recently suffered an attack by the dragon, so that may be a lead."

Melve was a coastal village like any other. When Lena and her pawns arrived there, it was just being attacked by a dragon.

"How convenient!" Lena cursed. "All right, let's join in the fun." She drew her daggers and charged at the dragon without hesitation.

"Has she gone soft in the head back in her own world?" Rook turned to Scorpio as they started preparing their respective incantations. "Daggers against a dragon?"

"No, you just watch," Scorpio grinned, hitting the dragon with a lightening bolt. The dragon stopped spitting fire for a moment, then shrieked in pain and surprise watching thick red blood spilling from deep gashes on its leg. It tried to lift off but found the wings perforated too... It didn't take much longer and a combined force of the village militia and Lena's pawns had the dragon lie dead. That was too easy.

"This isn't a dragon," Lena was examining the body. "It's a drake of course, so may be a wyvern or some such," she got up turning to her pawns. "Small and sickly, too. You do not kill a real dragon with daggers."

"It wasn't your daggers but the strength of your will, my hero!" A young woman with a bow wrestled her way through the crowd to where Lena was standing. "You are the Arisen! You must be!" Her eyes were sparkling, her lips were parted, her chest was heaving with excitement...

"And you are..?" Lena tried to cool things off.

"I am Ulrika, I lead this village in the fight against the dragon!" She answered proudly. "I welcome you to our village, Ser Arisen!"

"Your village is fighting against the dragon..?" Lena looked dubious and was about to say something unflattering, but Scorpio quickly intervened.

"Ser Arisen will be delighted to avail herself of your hospitality, Ser Ulrika," he offered gallantly. "We live to serve."

...

"That Ulrika is a bit odd," Lena was musing when they finally left the village of Melve the next day. "She fussed around me as if I am a knight in shining armour..."

"Well, some women prefer..." Scorpio started saying but Lena cut him off.

"Yes, I know!" She nearly screamed. "Just like that Queen What's-Her-Name in Gransys!" She rolled her eyes. "But don't I get a say in the matter, too?!"

"Apparently not," Rook chuckled. "Although it does make for decent entertainment..."

They walked in silence for a time, only interrupted by screams of goblins and howls of wolves that foolishly crossed their way. When the night fell, they set up camp on a clearing. With the four of them sitting around the fire, Dennis, their third pawn, casually observed: "Incidentally, I notice that all of us pawns are men. I wonder if it says something about the Arisen's preference."

"Yes, it does," Lena looked up sharply. "Women are annoying."

"Interesting," Dennis continued, grinning. "But this one Arisen whom I served, insisted on hiring exclusively women... I wonder why..."

"So how did you get in, then?" It was Scorpio who looked up this time.

"He couldn't find a female fighter with the right skills," Dennis shrugged. "He had me wear a petticoat all the while..."

"Each to their own," Rook closed the discussion. "Slaying a dragon while wearing a petticoat still counts. Come on, it's time we slept. I'll take the first watch."

...

The roads of Vermund and neighbouring Battahl were long and winding, circling around high cliffs and deep ravines, and although neither country was very large in area, travel took a lot of time. Travel and battles, as the lands were filled with aggressive beasts.

Days turned into weeks, weeks into months. The tasks that Captain Brandt penned for Lena, sent her all over the place, and often it was up to her to decide what to do next. Between the fighting and court intrigue, she had little time or energy left to think of home since she could not leave until she got her heart back from the dragon. And even then, finding a way to get back to Tamriel would prove a task in itself, just like it was in Gransys.

One night they were camping among red clay cliffs of the desert of Battahl. The night was pitch black as it could only be in the desert, with stars shining brightly above their heads. The world was reduced to a starry sky and a circle of light from the fire with four people gathered around it. Crickets were heard in the dark. All else was still.

Rook quietly got up and walked into the darkness, sitting down on the edge of a cliff, his back turned to his companions. He just sat there, looking at the stars.

After a while Lena joined him.

"You miss Benita, don't you?" She said quietly. "It's been a long time. Have you often been recalled since last we met?"

"Occasionally, yes," he nodded. "For Benita it only lasts a few hours each time, perhaps I'd be gone overnight at most. For me, however... it varies," he sighed. "You know how it works. Time loops and we are returned to the same night as when we were recalled, more or less. At least Benita doesn't age while I'm away, that is my only consolation."

Benita was Rook's human wife, she would grow old and die like all humans must, while Rook would go on living the life of an immortal pawn.

"I shall release you the moment you ask for it," Lena looked at him, but he kept looking at the stars. "It's been three months. Surely, that's long enough for anyone."

"Ordinarily, yes," he nodded. "But you are not just another Arisen. You're a friend, and I'll stay for as long as it takes, for as long as it makes sense for you to have me around. After all, there are mages more powerful than me, to be sure."

"To be sure, but I'd rather have a friend," Lena replied. They sat in silence for a while.

"You and Scorpio have to work it out," Rook suddenly said, looking at her sideways. "You're acting like two strangers while you're nothing like that."


"He built a wall around his heart again," Lena sighed. "Likely because I married. And I... if I had to choose, either choice would leave a wound that I would not survive... One has my heart, the other has my soul. And my child... yet with another man... I made such a mess of my life..."

"Life is a mess to begin with," Rook said quietly. "Which is why I married. My time with Benita is short and fragmented, yet those shards of warmth and light will remain with me when she is gone. It is a human tradition to marry, and so I did, to make her life less of a mess. Why did you marry since you could not choose?"

"My child," Lena paused. "It was a surprise, I never thought it possible. And when it happened... of course I kept it. But what a mess..."

She thought back to that morning when Lucien asked her to marry him. "Whatever for?!" She had exclaimed. "Mara can add nothing to what binds us already!" It was true, but Lucien's reply had brought her back to reality. Her child. "Marry me so that our child would have both parents," he had said. Her child, that was or wasn't his. The child that he had pledged to raise regardless. The child that was now in his care while she was on another world, with another man.

"Scorpio doesn't want to get hurt again," she sighed. "He opened up to me once and I married another man. And even though at the time I had thought I'd lost him forever, he was still hurt, of course... At least he came when I called for him in the Rift."

"Of course he came, he has a piece of your soul," Rook smiled at her. "Have faith. Your Arisen's Bond still holds, does it not?" A sliver of golden light wrapped around Lena's finger. She shot a glance towards the fire, and a sliver of golden light wrapped around Scorpio's finger as well. He looked up. They would have to work it out, but not on that night which was already turning into dawn.

Scorpio is now on PS5 servers, currently level 59. He alternates between a Fighter and a Sorcerer. He does get called up for pawn duty, like every other pawn.

This is Dragon's Dogma II by Capcom!

Lena, what game are those screenshots from?

This is Dragon's Dogma II by Capcom! Sorry, I forgot to say. It is all new, just came out on 22 March this year. I've been playing it since on my brand new PS5. So the story is also from there, although I won't be telling it as such, so no spoilers. What I told so far was only introduction.

I keep forgetting taking screenshots as I play. This cyclops was particularly annoying, but it slumped in this peculiar pose in the end. It is well dead in this picture.

One big improvement of Dragon's Dogma 2 compared to the original title, is in the postures of NPCs. A lot more variety here, as you see with that elven lady trying to look at the cyclops without turning around. All my screenshots are from the game itself, no mods, I play on PS5, so mods are not possible to begin with! And I wouldn't use mods until I played the game in vanilla through and through anyway. Got to discover what it has of its own, and this game has A LOT.

Glad you're enjoying Dragon's Dogma II!

Hearthfire, 4E203 - Life is not meant to make any sense

Lena was once again waist deep in politics of the world she was in, regardless of how much she disliked to be mixed up in politics. She was being called upon to perform all sorts of "duties" to the "people of such and such kingdom" from thwarting regicide to abating rebellion to thwarting said rebellion...

"How can all of it be for the good of the people?" Lena looked at her pawns in turn when once again they were camping in the desert of Battahl. "Surely, most of these tasks have conflicting interests?"

"Well, they all serve at least some of the people," Rook chuckled. "Just not necessarily the same ones. You're the Arisen, you get called everywhere. You don't have to accept each request, you know."

"I cannot not accept," Lena sighed. "If I am to understand what is going on, I have to get into all of it. How else am I to track down that damnable dragon? No one knows where it is!"

"Or no one is telling you - yet," Scorpio looked at her with significance. "Remember how it was in Gransys? Someone knows, but won't tell until much later. I bet it's the same here. First they'll try to get you killed, until they eventually give up and tell you about the dragon in the hope that the dragon would finish the job. I don't know for sure, but it seems a logical course of action."

Lena was getting frustrated with the tasks, with the negative attitude and derisive stares of people of Battahl towards her pawns, she was getting tired of the incessant fights with bandits, of goblin packs appearing from nowhere, of cyclopi and golems hiding behind every cliff... But most of all she was frustrated with Scorpio behaving like an exemplary pawn. The wall around his heart was thickening, without a sign of it breaking down.

One day they were crossing a ravine over a rope bridge when they got attacked by harpies, and even though Lena tried to urge her pawns to cross quickly and fight afterwards, the harpies were too fast for that. They hit the bridge and it collapsed, sending Rook and Scorpio into the river below and to certain death. One harpy also grabbed Fairy, their fighter, who had crossed the bridge with Lena. A moment longer, and Fairy too would be dropped into the river... It was luck more than anything that Lena managed to shoot down that harpy before it reached the ravine, and Fairy was saved. Together they brought down the entire flock, but that of course could not save Rook and Scorpio. Lena stood on the cliff edge looking down into the waters far below.

"It's dangerous to stand so close to the cliff edge, master," Fairy said quietly. "They are not permanently perished, you know that, right?"

"I know," Lena answered in a low voice. "I've been around the block a few times before..." Her voice trailed off as she was trying to stop tears running down her face. "I still can't bear it..."

Fairy put her arm around Lena's shoulders and gently moved her away from the cliff edge. They sat down on a rock a few paces away.

"These things happen," Fairy said quietly. "They didn't even fall in battle... It was an accident. There was nothing you could have done..."

"Yes, there was!" Lena suddenly cried out. "I could have told you all to wait before the bridge, I could have shot down most of those harpies from a distance, or else ran over the bridge myself and dealt with them... I could have..." Her sobs interrupted her outburst.

"But why, master?" Fairy was perplexed. "We are immortal... No pawn perished in a harpy attack as yet... Not these harpies, anyway... These don't petrify... You'll get your pawn back at the next riftstone... and even if you don't, you can always have another. It's not like he's got a piece of your soul..."

Lena didn't say anything, she was silently crying, her chest filled with grief. Yes, she would get Scorpio back at the next riftstone. Scorpio, her pawn, not Scorpio, her friend. She had tried everything she could think of to change his attitude, but her efforts had so far been in vain. Rook thought she should keep trying, as their Arisen's Bond still held, not showing any signs of fading. So what was she doing wrong?

"Scorpio is not just another pawn," Lena finally said. "Rook isn't either. But I am not worried about Rook - I know I can call on him again. But Scorpio... I don't know what to do with him, see. He's changed."

"Do you not wish him as your pawn any longer?" Fairy's voice fell. To be abandoned by your master was the worst fate any pawn could suffer.

"No," Lena shook her head. "I want him back as my friend." She turned to look at Fairy who was even more perplexed than before. "He does have a piece of my soul."

They sat in silence for a while, then Fairy suddenly got up and said in a decisive tone: "Come, master. There is a riftstone not far from here. Sitting here sobbing will not do anyone any good." She took Lena by the elbow and lifted her up. "Follow me."

Somewhat bewildered, Lena followed. Weren't pawns supposed to follow their master instead..?

Arriving at the riftstone, Lena again followed Fairy's urges and touched it, and Scorpio stepped out of the Rift.

"Here I am again, master," he said quite dispassionately. Lena turned away.

"Why don't you go and fetch Rook, master," Fairy said matter-of-factly. "We'll wait here."

As Lena stepped into the Rift to look for Rook, Fairy turned to Scorpio.

"You are the biggest dunderhead I've ever met!" She hissed at him. "And I've met a few in my day, pawns and Arisen both! What's that around your finger?" She pointed at the Arisen's Bond, glowing in the dark. "How many pawns do you know that got that from their Arisen? One or two, perhaps. But you've got something else as well, I hear - a piece of her soul! So what's your problem? Playing hard to get?!"

If there ever was a scorned fury, she was now glaring at Scorpio. Stunned, he took a step back.

"How did you..?" He was too surprised to say anything sensible. What business was it of hers, anyway? "That's none of your business!" He finally caught himself. "That's between my Arisen and me!"

"And have you seen what that does to your Arisen?" Fairy wasn't giving up. "What happens to her when you fall to your death? Well? You can see into her soul, so do it!"

Fairy's tone was commanding, but Scorpio was having none of it.

"Is this some sort of female solidarity or something?" He squinted at Fairy. "She made her choice - she married another man. I've been set aside. I am her pawn still, but that's as far as it goes."

"Idiot!!" That was all that Fairy could say before Lena emerged from the Rift with Rook. Rook took one look around and understood what was going on.

"Shush, everyone, I need to focus," he took out his staff and started incanting a spell. "Wolf and Fairy require healing."

...

"I want to stay in this world until the end of time, provided you stay with me."

They were back in town and Lena was sorting through herbs, fruit, bits of horn, bone and ore that they collected on the road. Scorpio stood behind her holding more bags of bits to sort. He spoke softly, as if to himself.

"I miss you too."

Lena remained silent, taking the next bag he handed to her and resuming sorting.

"My heart is slowly dying behind the wall I built to keep you out."

Lena stopped sorting and stood up to face him.

"And my soul hurts every time I run up against that wall."

"I know, I can feel it too."

"But?"

"But..." Scorpio sighed, taking her hand and touching the wedding ring on Lena's finger. "I cannot figure it out, Wolf. Your first bond was with you since before we met. I always knew it... Why did you give a piece of your soul for me when I perished? Why did you forge the second bond when you already had the first?"

"I could not face losing you..." Lena shuddered, instantly transported to that moment in her mind. "My bond to you had already been forged before that... and I didn't know what I was doing to you by giving a piece of my soul. I should have let you go and dealt with my loss... but instead... I was selfish."

She gave him a quick peck on the cheek, pulled out her hand and resumed sorting materials.

"Is the Arisen at home?" A voice spoke outside the window.

"She's inside, sorting materials, I think," Rook replied. "She'll be out soon enough." He said something else, keeping the visitor from entering the house.

"Your young elven admirer is seeking your company again," Scorpio looked out the window. "Why are you leading him on?"

"I like him," Lena grinned. "He's polite and he blushes easily... Didn't he just have his adulthood ceremony or something? He's too young for me, I'm sure he realises that."

"He's an elf," Scorpio shook his head. "This makes him well over a hundred years old. Hardly a child any longer..."

"In which case he should know not to fall for older women," Lena shrugged. "Or women who already have previous bonds."

She stood up facing Scorpio again.

"Life is not meant to make any sense." She wrapped her arms around him and kissed him, ignoring the icy response at first, then feeling the ice melt away. The young elf outside glanced into the open window.

"Isn't that... her pawn?" He turned to Rook with a look of incomprehension.

"This Arisen makes unusual choices," Rook smiled. "Defies convention... a bit like yourself, keeping company with humans and all. I think that's why she likes you. Give them a moment. She'll come out and grant your request, I'm certain."

Evening Star, 4E203 - Coronation

Lena killed the dragon and became the Sovran of Vermund, but she didn't get her heart back. The day of the coronation was all a haze to her. The best royal beauticians spent hours reducing the puffiness under her eyes and the inflamed redness of her face as she had spent the night crying.

"I just don't see a way out..." She was saying over and over, sobbing. "Where did I go wrong? I killed the dragon, should I not have received my heart back? I got it back last time..."

"This world works differently, it seems," Scorpio didn't have any answers, so he just sat next to her, stroking her hair. "This is evidently not the end. We'll just need to figure out how things really work here."

"And in the meantime they are crowning me into a Sovran!" Lena's sobs redoubled. "I am no queen! I don't want to be a queen! But I cannot refuse - if I do, they'll hang me as a false Arisen!"

"And we want to avoid your untimely demise," Scorpio tried to calm her. "It is not as bad as that. You get to live in a castle, you'll have the best garments, the loveliest jewels..." Lena's sobs were only getting worse - she didn't care for any of those things, not at all... not really... well... may be a little... that part wasn't too bad, in fact... but definitely not worth being stuck there for all eternity, and without her heart!

"They don't allow pawns in the castle," she continued sobbing. "They won't let you in and I'll be all alone here..."

"Well, but you will be the Sovran," Scorpio shrugged. "You can change that." Lena stopped sobbing. "In fact, the previous king had his pawn with him here, as his bodyguard. I shall be your bodyguard then."

"Hmm..." Lena stopped sobbing and looked at him. "My consort. Not bodyguard."

"They won't allow it, pawn or no pawn," Scorpio shook his head. "Your hand in marriage is too valuable as a diplomatic commodity to allow it to go wasted on a consort."

Lena rolled her eyes but didn't say anything. On the one hand, Scorpio was probably right, on the other hand, if the gentry of Vermund decided to crown her as their Sovran, they may be getting more than they bargained for - this Arisen was not a fraud and had a will and stubborness to match.

"All right, we'll start with the bodyguard," Lena nodded. "In appearances at least..."

...

The coronation the following day was as pompous as could be expected. Lena's head felt heavy, her speech was sluggish, her thoughts were somewhat confused. "Surely, this could not be because of all the tears last night?" She wondered, trying to shake off the haze and being unable to do so. Time and time again she turned around to make sure that Scorpio was still right behind her, that he had not been removed while she wasn't looking. As the ceremony progressed, some twenty or thirty pawns were led into the Great Hall and made to kneel to her, demonstrating her power over them, the power of a true Arisen. But it wasn't she who was commanding them... it felt odd, she felt being set up. At the culmination of the ceremony, newly crowned, she was offered a goblet of wine to be raised for the glory of Vermund. She raised it. The crowd cheered. She drank... and everything went black.

...

"Well?! I can do this all day!" Lena heard Scorpio's angry voice between clashes of steel and shrieks of pain. "The Arisen is not accepting visitors!"

Lena opened her eyes. She was lying on a luxurious four-poster bed in a richly decorated chamber. Her coronation gown was draped over a stand nearby. She was wearing... prison garb? How odd...

She rubbed her eyes and looked around. This was the royal chamber, she recalled it from her sneaking around the castle previously. Scorpio was fencing with several opponents, it seemed, not allowing them to enter... What on Nirn was going on?!

Whatever it was, appearing in prison garb was the wrong thing to do, she felt instinctively, so she threw it off... but not finding anything else to replace it, and not having the time or assistance to get into the coronation gown, she wrapped herself in a bedsheet - after all, togas never went out of fashion.

"What is going on?" She stepped towards the door, keeping her hand on the hilt of her dagger hidden in the folds of her "toga".

"Your Majesty!" The knights on the other side of the door immediately stopped combat. "By the order of Lord Chancellor, we are here to guard your person," one of the knights turned to Lena, "but this... pawn..." he glared at Scorpio, "is preventing us from fulfilling our duty!"

"This is Ser Scorpio, my personal guard," Lena tried to sound as official as possible. "Have you not been informed? I shall have a word with Lord Chancellor about that," she looked sternly at each of the knights, and they each took a step back. "You may guard my chambers from the outside. Make yourselves useful and fetch me my maid. And bandage those cuts - you're dripping blood all over the floor!" She glared at them another time and closed the door into their faces. "What the..?" She started saying, but Scorpio signalled her to be quiet and went about checking every alcove, every closet and every window. When he was satisfied, he tossed her some clothes from a chest in the corner - her old assassin's armour.

"Glad you have a clear head again," he said, watching her dress. "You were drugged at the coronation, probably before the coronation as well. You fainted and were brought here, they tried to kill me but failed, I got in through the window, found you on the bed unconscious wearing prison garb... I believe the plan was to have these knights come in and discover that their new Sovran is a false Arisen... But it didn't work out like that," he grinned.

"Where did you get my armour from?" Lena was checking her pockets - poisons, potions, lockpicks - everything was in place.

"Rook," Scorpio was watching shadows in the castle gardens as the sun was setting. "He seems to have known what to expect... somehow..."

"There's a lot more to Rook than what meets the eye," Lena nodded. "Level ten mage my foot," she smirked. "But anyhow - what do we do now?"

"It's your choice: either we escape and you become a fugitive, or we stay and you play the Sovran. I believe your life is in no immediate danger, at least not tonight."

"We stay," Lena said firmly. "This court intrigue needs to be unravelled. I need to find who is pulling the strings. It can't be the previous Queen Regent, surely?"

"I think not," Scorpio nodded. "I think it is whoever was manipulating her... whoever murdered the previous king, perhaps."

"How delightful," Lena grimaced.

At that moment there was a knock on the door and a maid laden with clothing and accessories entered the room.

"Your Majesty called?" She panted. "I gathered these and came as quickly as I could... I hope at least some of these garments will fit Your Majesty's person... until more suitable garments can be made... I didn't know what to do... there have been no orders..." She blushed, clearly confused. "Oh... Your Majesty is all dressed already! But how..?"

"It's fine, thank you," Lena tried to be soothing. "Let's see what you brought. I don't expect my armour would be appropriate to wear to dinner anyway..."

...

When Lena appeared at dinner that evening, dressed in a suitable attire and accompanied by her personal guard, heads turned, and some surprised glances were exchanged. The Sovran of Vermund was taking her place. With the dragon slain and the Arisen to guide them, the people of Vermund were looking forward to many years of peace and prosperity. All hail the Sovran! All hail..!

The new queen of Vermund! The coronation could have gone better methinks. Yikes, plenty of courtly intrigue about but I imagine Lena is right - the gentry of Vermund is getting more than they bargained for. . . .

Indeed... A lot is still to come. Without her heart, and without a way back to Tamriel, Lena is stuck in that world and needs to figure it out so that she could leave. How long will she end up staying there? That's a very good question. Last time in a parallel world, it took years to find a way out. She thought this time she could "skip" it but it seems this world works differently, while still being so very familiar... She's having the deja vu effect all the time, yet is still stuck.

The story that I'm telling here is NOT the story told by the Dragon's Dogma game. It is loosely based on the introductory cinematic and on a few ideas hinted at during the game. As such it is not a spoiler as it does not retell anything that takes place in the actual game.

There are two reasons for this. Firstly, the game is new and too many people haven't played it yet and I don't want to spoil it for them. Secondly, Capcom is not very good at story telling... As brilliant as both Dragon's Dogma games are, the stories in them are filled with gaps and inconsistencies... if you can fill something with gaps... it's worse than Swiss cheese! So instead I am telling my own story, and let's hope it will lead Lena back home some day...

Evening Star, 4E203 - Strike where it hurts most

"That was a brilliant plan, congratulations!" Someone was gazing into a crystal ball. "Look - now she went and killed the dragon! And ended up right where she began! Genius!"

"You wanted her out of the picture," another voice replied. "We've so far been trying to get her removed - killed, teleported, transformed - but she managed to thwart it all and even escaped back into her own world for a time. But the answer was much simpler than that: this Arisen cannot leave injustice well alone; she cannot leave her goals alone. She will always try to slay the dragon. So we let her. It's just that the dragon no longer carries her release..." He chuckled. "She followed her instincts and they led her astray."

"She's well and truly mired in this quicksand now," the first voice laughed. "The stronger her will, the greater her efforts to free herself, the deeper in she will sink... Congratulations, my friend. I believe the Legion can breathe easy again."

"Perhaps we should not become complacent, however," the second voice sounded cautious. "She is resourceful. She may surprise us again."

"We'll keep watch, to be sure," the first voice grew somber. "We need to give her something to do, an impression of purpose... Get to it."

...

The weeks after the coronation were peaceful. Lena was getting acquainted with the court and the gentry of Vermund, for if she was to figure out who was plotting intrigue against her, she had to know the players. Her life thus resembled the life of any noble, with receptions, dinners, social gatherings, dances and luncheons in never ending succession. Wherever she went, Scorpio was never far behind, for the Sovran would not be seen without her personal guard. Both of them were getting very bored, and yet Lena had not learned anything of value.

"I don't know how much longer I can do this," she was saying to Scorpio one evening after a particularly long and boring soiree. "All these lords and ladies seem too inconsequential to be plotting against me... They seem happy to have me here as long as I indulge them in their favourite passtime... even if I honestly cannot see how they can stand it, day in, day out."

"I wouldn't mind fighting another dragon instead," Scorpio nodded. "I feel numb. And I'm not the one having to engage in conversation with them... I don't know how you can stand it at all."

...

The next morning, like every morning, Lena was taking a walk in the Castle Gardens among the roses, the fountains and the bird song, nodding and waving to lords and ladies doing the same. As usual, Scorpio was with her, a few steps behind. He still wore his half plate armour, having rejected larger and heavier knight's full plate, even though his position as the Sovran's bodyguard warranted the best and most fanciful armour. "It's too heavy and we are not fighting a golem, I don't need that protection," he would say. "Agility is more important for a bodyguard." And so, his slender hips and half-exposed chest with a dragon tattoo attracted many a glance, both of envy and admiration.

"Do you suppose there's anything going on between the Sovran and her bodyguard?" Lena finally overheard. "Such an attractive young man..."

"Hardly a young man! And keep your voice down!" Someone hissed back. "He's a pawn... he may be centuries old... time loops for them, I heard... there's no telling how old he is. Pawns aren't people."

"He certainly looks like a man to me!" The first voice disagreed. "And a touch of experience makes him only more attractive... I would not be at all surprised if he was more than a bodyguard... Doesn't he stay in her chambers?"

"Of course he does, he's a bodyguard!"

"Well... Perhaps someone needs to check on them some time."

The voices went quiet. Lena tried to see who the two people were, but rose bushes were too dense to see through. "Two older men," she thought. "One voice seems familiar, the other one new. Lord Chancellor and someone unknown. Interesting."

The truth of the matter was that of course Scorpio was more than a bodyguard, and he didn't sleep on the floor in her chamber either. Lena had been very surprised so far to not have received a reprimand from the likes of Lord Chancellor for it. Did they not want to make her marry some prince from a distant land for the good of the people of Vermund? That was the way of royalty in every world Lena had known. She was therefore relieved to finally hear concern in Lord Chancellor's voice.

"We may receive a visit in the middle of the night one of these days," she told Scorpio when they were alone. "I overheard a conversation..."

"Yeah, I heard it too," he sounded rather annoyed. "I told you they would not allow a consort."

"I wonder who the other man was."

But the night came, and there was no visit, no mention of the matter to Lena in any way. She didn't like it, and Scorpio liked it even less. "They are plotting something," he would say, his eyes red from the lack of sleep. "I'll have to sleep eventually, and then..."

Several weeks passed, and nothing happened. Scorpio finally relaxed and resumed sleeping at night because pawns had to eat and sleep just like everyone else. The only edge that he had, was in his training which was superior to most guards. But then again, palace guards didn't normally have to battle dragons.

The change was subtle and gradual and worthy of a proper Courtly Intrigue. Scorpio got noticed by the gentry. He was no longer perceived as one of the statues behind the Sovran, he was now seen and treated as a member of the court. People would greet him personally. Engage in small talk. Invite him to gatherings and soirees. Ser Scorpio became the news of the moment, and Lena was surprised to realise that he was just as good at sophisticated conversation and gallant dancing as he was at thrashing goblins. And he didn't learn it walking with her, so... oh yes, he was no young man.

"You seem uneasy," he said one evening. "Do you not wish me to engage with the members of the court? I can be mute, if you prefer."

"No-no, it's not that," Lena lied. "It's..."

"It's a nice try, but please don't lie to me," Scorpio smirked. "I've been around the block a few times, you know. With you, as well as with other Arisen. Courtly intrigue is always the same. You wanted to know what was going on, and this might give you a lead. But I shall stop if you want me to stop, my all is yours to shape, master..." He laughed as Lena shot him a glance - not that again! They were long past the master-pawn stage.

"Well, I guess I am jealous," Lena said, blushing. "And I have no right to be, I know. But it doesn't work that way."

"I wonder if someone is trying to make you jealous," Scorpio mused. He got up and took a careful look at the wall opposite the bed revealing a well-concealed peephole that didn't look new. "A standard device to monitor the current sovran," Scorpio smirked. "They always use this room as the Royal Chamber, do they not? And this bed looks so solid and heavy, it surely never moved from the spot. Indeed. So they know that you and I... and nothing so far occurred... I don't like this at all."

Any good Courtly Intrigue involves each party knowing everything about the other party and the fact that the other party knows everything about them, so when someone makes a move, it is anticipated by everyone else, making the response one of the anticipated responses to which then... Are you with me still? Lena's head was spinning. Did she in fact know what the other party's response to Scorpio might be? She did not, she was playing it by ear, and may be that wasn't enough. One morning she woke up alone - Scorpio was missing.

Lena's first thought was to find Rook and ask him for help, but pride and shame stopped her in her tracks. "This mess is of my own making," she thought. "What did I expect, exactly? It is for me to solve on my own." She didn't have many leads and started with Lord Chancellor.

...

"Your Majesty!" Lord Chancellor greeted her when she entered his office. "To what do I owe the pleasure of your visit? Do you wish to pass a new decree? Is there a rebellion to be quelled? A new royal gown to be ordered, perhaps? The Chancery is at your disposal."

"I wish to select a new personal guard," Lena said pleasantly but firmly. "My old one is... indisposed."

"Indeed?" Lord Chancellor looked astonished. "That is most... err... I mean... Does Your Majesty insist on the new guard having the same duties as the previous one? Or perhaps... err... the knights outside Your Majesty's door might suffice?"

"Lord Chancellor, what are you saying?" Lena looked sternly at him. "I am aware of the rumours regarding me and my previous guard, and I wonder whether that is the reason he has been removed. What is your take on this?"

"Well, since you put it like that," Lord Chancellor sighed a sigh of relief. "We cannot allow for a royal consort, Your Majesty. Not even one that is as close to you as your pawn. Yes, we are aware of the... err... rumours. But with that said... Even Queen Regent before you... carrying on the way she did... I never interfered. Forgive me, Your Majesty, I am an old man, and love is a game for the young..."

Lena silently smirked at that. Lord Chancellor must have been taking her at face value, and she looked in her twenties.

"I thank you, Lord Chancellor," she nodded and smiled. "The knights outside my door will certainly suffice for now. Please keep me apraised of any unexpected developments, should any occur..." She turned to leave, then turned back to face him again. "Whatever happened to the previous ruler - Queen Regent? You didn't hang her, I hope?"

"Oh gods, no!" Lord Chancellor stepped back in horror. "She is the widow of the previous sovran! Her life is sacred! Queen Regent and her son still live in the castle... Perhaps her son Sven might make for a suitable company for you, being equal to Your Majesty in age and standing... He is the late king's son, after all... or the son of the late king's widow, at least... for Arisen cannot sire children, I hear..."

"On the account of being in fact living dead, yes," Lena looked straight at him. Lord Chancellor seemed to be more at ease talking to her about her missing heart than about her missing lover. "I thank you, Lord Chancellor, for your candid response."

She left the room. She had heard rumours about Queen Regent and some foreign dignitary before... But was it of any importance? "Arisen cannot sire children, yet the previous king had a son... and no one bat an eyelid," she smirked to herself. "I wonder who his father might be." Sensing that answering that question might lead her closer to the core of the matter, she decided to befriend Sven. "Close to me in age in standing," she smirked again. "But he's like... twelve!"

Sven wasn't twelve but twenty, with all the rebellious spirit of a teenager cooped up within castle walls. Guards had their hands full extricating him from street fights and brothels alike. He was, in a word, a regular young man. And he was a prince, but without any hope of the throne. The laws of Vermund required the sovran to be an Arisen, not a mere child of such. Befriending him was easy, he was glad of new company and soon was accompanying Lena everywhere she went, almost like Scorpio did before him. A week had passed, then another. The courtiers had all but forgotten about Ser Scorpio and focused on Regentkin Sven. The search for Scorpio went stale and cold.

Pinevale, nice. I'm getting Pinevale. Wow. So we have to remove border restrictions to get there, that's great. They're talking about changing the borders line of code in Oblivion.ini, correct?

Oh nice. Going straight into Skyrim. Dwemer Ruins with TES4's art style, whoa.

How're you able to get it so that Lena's vision is blurry? I'm guessing that's part of the Red Hall. This is a freaky scene! All these NPCs passed out on their beds.

http://chorrol.com/forums/index.php?s=&...st&p=339934

Yes. It can also be done with a mod, but Oblivion.ini is better.


It's Red Hall doing it. Geralt was having a great time apparently, didn't want to leave.

Graci. Asked because Pinewatch's mod author stated he or she used 'a mod' to disable borders but it didn't work. But then he/she never said which method eventually works.

but another question: after disabling borders and then reaching Pinewatch in the game, will the place be surrounded by all of those 'lower-texture'-looking trees & surroundings? Know what I mean? Like, first time I had a character go past a former border the actual landscape isn't as detailed.

The "mod" method is very simple, really. It sets the same game setting, that is all. However, there have been reports that this method is not always working. If you want to disable borders permanently, editing Oblivion.ini is best.


Actually, no, I don't know what you mean. The trees and textures over the border are exactly the same for me as elsewhere. And anyway, Pinevale is only just over the border, so everything should be the same regardless.

1 Morning Star, 4E204 - A new year, a new perspective

"A new day, a new perspective" was what Scorpio used to say rounding up their party ready to set off again after a night's rest. It was the duty of the Main Pawn to keep an eye on the other pawns in the group and make sure they didn't try to idle, shirk combat or avoid carrying items. He didn't really have much to do in that respect, because Lena would immediately get rid of such pawns, sometimes within half an hour of hiring them, as tendencies usually became evident pretty quickly. She would also get rid of anyone who talked too much, who always wanted to lead, who tried to advise her when advice wasn't asked for, who was being over-protective, who walked too close to her, who ran too far ahead, who kept repeating how devoted they were to her, who constantly needed help in battle, who... in a word, she would quickly get rid of anyone annoying, and for the most part those were women. "All pawns in this party are once again men, I notice," one of the pawns would remark every now and again. "I would not at all mind if that were to change." But when asked who would be willing to leave to make that happen, invariably there were no volunteers.

"A new year, a new perspective," Lena told herself on the morning of the new year. She'd been dreaming of past adventures, of the pawns she walked with, of the friends she made and the worlds she visited, of Lucien, of Scorpio, of Geralt and Hauk... Where were they, she wondered, how did they fare? She looked around the Royal Chamber and it seemed like a prison to her. Her friends had been replaced by the lords and ladies of the court, there was no more room in her life for adventure or freedom. She felt bound, restrained, mired in her royal life, a life without end, for without her heart she was nigh immortal... "Scorpio needs to be found," she told herself sternly, shaking her head. "I've been going about it the wrong way around. I am no queen." She sat in front of the mirror brushing her golden blond hair, her amber eyes glinting in the sun, jewels around her neck filling the room with reflections centered around her person. "Scorpio did not just run off," she told herself firmly. "Someone must know something."

She tried carefully talking to Lord Chancellor about Scorpio's disappearance, but he simply shrugged and declared that Regentkin Sven was a much better companion for Her Majesty anyway, and why worry about a runaway pawn. "Pawns are like people in many ways," he suddenly added. "Wasn't Ser Scorpio enjoying the favour of this court just before he... left?" He looked at Lena as an older parent might look at a child - with regret that the child was about to make an unpleasant discovery. "Perhaps he found someone to his liking? The ladies were very fond of him, from what I have seen, and with Your Majesty no longer engaged with the dragon... his duty by Your Majesty was thus fulfilled."

"You know of the ways of the Legion," Lena said in a hoarse voice. Even though she did not believe that Scorpio simply left with one of the ladies, hearing it like that still hurt.

"Pawns are welcomed in our Kingdom, as Your Majesty knows," Lord Chancellor replied with a little bow. "The ways of the Legion and the pawns' duties are well known to us. A pawn is only bound to remain with the Arisen for as long as the Arisen is engaged with the dragon, and after that it is that pawn's choice. The Arisen no longer holds sway over them once the dragon has been defeated. So Ser Scorpio's disappearance is nothing but his own choice..."

...

"You seem distraught today," Sven touched Lena's arm, startling her. They were taking a walk in the Castle Gardens, Sven was telling her something... she could not recall. Lord Chancellor's words kept ringing in her ears: "Ser Scorpio's disappearance is nothing but his own choice".

"No, I don't believe it," she said aloud and Sven looked at her with incomprehension. "I am sorry, yes, I am distraught today," she pulled herself into reality. "My... pawn is missing," she brought herself to call Scorpio that. "He's been missing for a few weeks already, and it's not like him at all. I am worried."

"Your... pawn?" Sven was even more perplexed. "Don't they just leave after you've defeated the dragon? Why do you worry about a pawn? When the dragon returns, you'll have new pawns to help you fight it again... Father did, that's how it works."

"How many times did your father face the dragon?" Lena suddenly realised that if anyone could tell her anything about the previous sovran, the previous ruling Arisen, that it would be Sven.

"Many times, but it was all before I was born," Sven rubbed his chin. "The dragon only comes every fifty years or so. Father married mother some time after the previous dragon's demise. I remember him saying he'd had enough of being a ruler, and mother... well, you know how she is. She ruled the land in his stead until you appeared..." Sven stopped talking and blushed a deep shade of purple.

"There was an intrigue, I know," Lena tried to put him at ease. "Quite understandable, really. The law demands that the ruler be an Arisen..."

"The most recent Arisen, to be precise," Sven corrected her, regaining his composure. "There are plenty of old Arisen in this land, the ones that failed to kill the dragon and father had to deal with it himself in their stead."

"Wait - what?!" Lena turned to him sharply. "Say that again," a recollection of how things worked in Gransys suddenly clicked into place. "An Arisen who kills the dragon becomes the Sovran of Vermund, replacing the previous sovran, you say? What happens to the previous sovran then?"

"Nothing," Sven shrugged. "I have no idea. They retire, perhaps? They aren't killed, if that's what you're asking. With every new dragon and every new Arisen, father could have been replaced. But when the newest Arisen fails to kill the dragon, then the last successful Arisen - that is, the Sovran - has to deal with the dragon instead. As father always had done... never failed... he was a true Arisen..." Sven's voice trailed off.

"You miss him, don't you," Lena said softly. "You miss your father."

"I do," Sven nodded. "For him to die just as the signs of a new dragon appeared... He was murdered, you know. I just hope it wasn't so that I could be king..."

Lena watched Sven taking control of his emotions and thought that he was no longer a child. Far from it. Grown up in the castle amid courtly intrigue, he could say things by saying the opposite, he saw more than he let on, and he used his boyish appearance to make people forget he was the royal prince.

"Well, enough of this serious stuff," Lena said cheerfully. "It's the first day of the New Year! We should be celebrating! I feel completely cooped up in my Royal Chambers amid our most pious gentry," she winked at Sven. "I hear you know a place or two where one might have fun... Perhaps you'd let me in on a secret? With all that dragon slaying business I never had the chance..."

"But of course!" Sven grinned ear to ear. "Say no more and follow me..!"

And with that he leaped out of the window with the ease and assuredness of someone who'd done it many a time before. The narrow balcony outside opened onto a ledge wrapping around the building, and a few minutes later they stood in a sparingly lit corridor covered in carpets and tapestries that muffled sounds and gave the impression of luxury and comfort.

"Welcome to The Rose," Sven smiled. "Madam Wilhemina should be here somewhere. I shall need to introduce you... even though you're quite well known in the land," he winked. "But you haven't got one of these," he pulled an elegant card out of an inner pocket. "Officially you've got to have it. So come along."

They walked along the corridor, Sven knocked on a few doors, and eventually Madam Wilhemina stood before them. She welcomed Lena with an unexpected cordiality, vowed to personally see to her every need, then she sent Sven on his way (and it looked like he knew where he was going), and ushered Lena into a luxurious bedroom that far outstripped the Royal Chamber in taste and comfort.

"Coffee?" Wilhemina brought a silver set. "Or do you prefer champagne for breakfast?"

"Coffee would be fine," Lena smiled, wondering whether Wilhemina understood the reason for her visit. "This is a lovely room."

"Indeed," Wilhemina was sizing her up with a glance. "And so very secure. So, speak freely, Your Majesty - what is your desire?"

"Scorpio," Lena said without thinking, then regretted it the moment she said it, but it was too late.

"He is not on our books, I am sorry," Wilhemina replied after a short pause. She did not seem surprised. "We do have other pawns though, both male and female... Perhaps Your Majesty would care to choose..?"

Lena was leafing through a thick ledger with pictures of some of the most attractive men and women presented with taste and care.

"This is quite a selection," she looked up at Wilhemina. "Why, this is... Lady Nel, surely? I remember her from some of the soirees..."

"Nel is one of our agents, yes," Wilhemina smiled. "Very sophisticated. She is mostly in charge of recruitement. But even she could not get Ser Scorpio to join us... So I don't know where he is. Because this is what you wanted to know, was it not, Your Majesty?"

...

The conversation with Wilhemina proved most fruitful indeed. While The Rose was eyeing Scorpio as a potential recruit, there were other forces at play as well. The Rose never insisted on anyone joining, for a good service could only be rendered if the person was willing to do it. With the wages that The Rose was paying, they never had a shortage of personnel. So when Scorpio refused their offer, they left him alone.

"It is not uncommon however for people to change their mind," Wilhemina smiled slyly. "Our offers do not expire that quickly. He'll be still welcome to join when he returns..." Lena looked up at her and blushed - she did not like the idea. "It isn't the first time we've arranged things this way. The Sovran is not permitted a consort of their choosing."

"That... is interesting," Lena said slowly. It dawned on her that The Rose might well have been offering other types of private services too. Such as spying. However, she felt that Wilhemina's good will had all but run out, and some contribution to the establishment's prosperity was expected. She briefly considered to simply offer money for the information that she received, but then thought better of it. She was in a brothel. A brothel that was very keen to be regarded as such. A brothel that definitely did NOT want to be seen as a place to buy information. And so Lena smiled pleasantly and asked for another cup of coffee. "And if I may look through that wonderful book of yours," she smiled radiantly. "I think I spotted someone I would be glad to get to know..."

She took her time leafing through the pages. She recognised a few "lords" and "ladies" from the social gatherings, but for the most part the faces were all unknown to her. And then suddenly...

"What about this fellow?" She pointed at a picture of a skinny mage looking at her from the page. "He seems nice."

"I see Your Majesty prefers the gentle type," Wilhemina smiled. "His name is Rook and he will be summonned for you presently. Please help yourself to the refreshments while you wait..."


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We do not have the picture of Rook that was prepared for the ledger of The Rose. We understand it was most flattering. However, here are a few pictures from Lena's adventures, when she was still free to go where she pleased.

2 Morning Star, 4E204 - Never thought I'd meet you here

"Your companion for tonight is here," Madam Wilhemina ushered Rook into the room Lena was in. "This room is yours for twenty four hours, or longer if you wish it," she smiled. "We do not skimp on time. Do ring for room service for refreshments."

She left, with a glance of encouragement towards Rook. He gave her a curtly nod and turned to Lena. "Good evening, My Lady."

...

"I never knew you had an alternative occupation," Lena was looking at Rook with interest once they were alone. He wore his usual mage's coat and had his staff at the hip - not the look she had imagined for an escort. "I am not lecturing or complaining, but I am surprised, to say the least..."

"Surprised?" A slight offence in Rook's voice made her sit up. "Should I demonstrate?" He started unbuttoning his coat, not taking his eyes off her, and she blushed to the roots of her hair.

"I didn't mean it that way..." she managed to say. "I... please forgive me." She jumped up from the bed and hugged him. "I've seen you naked already, so I know what's underneath," she pulled away, still blushing. That had been very awkward of her! "Please sit down, there's fresh coffee..."

"Alright," Rook smiled, sitting down and proceeding to load his coffee with cream. "Why am I here?"

"Scorpio is missing," Lena said in a near whisper. "Been missing for weeks."

"And naturally you came to a brothel looking for him." It was Rook's turn to tease.

"Rook!"

"Wolf?"

"Umm... yeah, I know how it looks."

"No, you don't," Rook was watching her, sipping his coffee. "It looks like you should have called me as soon as he disappeared, but instead you tried to solve it on your own, and as a result we lost a good month to your obstinence. When you didn't make contact within the first week, I enlisted here because sooner or later I knew you'd come looking. Fortunately, there wasn't much work for me in the meantime... This isn't really what I do."

"I am sorry," Lena knew he was right. But then, something he said... "How did you know that Scorpio disappeared?"

"Word around town," he shrugged. "He was popular with the court, so the gentry and mostly the guards were talking about it all day long. Then he vanished. That didn't go unnoticed. As well as your friendship with Sven. Word is, you are engaged to be married."

"WHAT?!" Lena's coffee went flying.

"No? Well, one shouldn't take rumours at face value," Rook grinned. "But everyone thinks it is the logical thing to do, you two being of the same age and standing..."

"Rumours are getting out of control," Lena said grimly.

"As rumours always do, pay it no mind." Rook sat his cup down. "Tell me what you've found out."

"Not much," Lena sighed. "I learned that the Legion releases the pawns once the dragon is slain, which means that Scorpio is no longer bound to me. He can come and go as he pleases... he could be anywhere."

"Which also means that he could be abducted and forcibly held somewhere without the Legion coming after the perpetrators," Rook looked at Lena with significance. "They couldn't do it while he was in your service, they'd have the Legion to answer to. But now it's another matter. They could kill him and the Legion would not respond. There are always more pawns. You'd just have to pick someone else when the dragon next appears."

Lena shuddered at the thought.

"What about you?" She was trying to get her head around it. "You have no master."

"Except for the Legion, of course," Rook smirked, rubbing a glowing mark on his hand, the mark of a pawn. "I could be recalled to guide a new Arisen, for that is my job... There's always a new Arisen somewhere..." He looked wistful. "But until then I'm yours to command, My Lady."

He leaned back in his chair waiting for Lena to decide their next move.

"It's late and my head is spinning," she suddenly realised just how tired she was. "I don't want to go back to the castle... Stay with me, please..."

"Of course, that is why I am here."

Rook got up and started incanting a spell. Lena fell back on the cushions and breathed a sigh of relief. She slept without dreams that night.

...

Lena was woken up by a sun ray streaming through the gap in the curtains, the morning seemed to be well underway. She looked around, shaking off the sleepiness. Rook was lying next to her, reading a book. Neither of them wore any clothes.

"I don't remember undressing... What happened?" Lena rubbed the back of her neck - she had not been knocked out again, surely?

"You fell asleep and I had to make sure we didn't look out of place here," Rook shrugged. "You remember where we are, right? This is a brothel."

"But I thought Wilhemina had said this room was secure..."

"Meaning that it has fewer peepholes than the others," Rook smirked. "Plus, there's the maid. We've got fresh coffee." He got up to pour Lena a cup. "But worry not - for Wilhemina knows what's good for her. I simply wanted to ensure that the maid would not be wondering about Her Majesty not making use of her escort. That would have looked suspicious."

"But the fact that Her Majesty's escort is actually her old friend - that wouldn't look suspicious?"

"Nah, they've seen all sorts." He took Lena's cup from her as she finished her coffee, set it aside, returned to Lena and kissed her. And before she could utter any surprise or protest, he whispered into her ear: "Remember the peepholes..." A minute later she had no wish to protest.

...

"What do we do next?" Lena was watching Rook fussing with jugs of hot water to ensure the bath was of exactly the right temperature.

"Next I take you out for a walk," he put down the jugs, satisfied. "After the bath. You need to get some colour into your cheeks."

"Oh, I think you've managed that already," she grinned, seeing this entirely new side of Rook. "Is that standard practice for an escort to take their clients out for a walk?"

"It may be... it depends," Rook answered matter-of-factly. "It depends on the client. We aim to please."

She stared at him for a moment, then sank deeper into the tub.

"It's not that different to walking with an Arisen," Rook said softly. "Pawns are the ones who know what needs doing, yet it is the Arisen who calls the shots. We are here to serve, yet we are often superior to our masters... Many masters scorn that. Not every Arisen treats us well... but I think you have an inkling of that."

"I think you are superior to most people, to be honest," Lena mused. "And not just in combat... Do you like being an escort?"

"I might have liked it if I got to choose my clients... but it doesn't work that way," he smirked.

"We need our freedom back, both of us," Lena said through clenched teeth. "We need to find Scorpio too... but I have no idea where to start..."

"You started already, this is the right approach," Rook objected. "It is all in the royal court. The Rose caters only for the gentry, every person of standing comes here sooner or later. And now that I got picked by Her Majesty herself, my fee has been doubled. Oh, have no illusions - the word has already spread," he smirked, noticing Lena's surprise. "Your patronage here brings more clients to Wilhemina, and she in turn may reveal a thing or two to you when she trusts you enough. She has an eye for people, you cannot buy her trust."

"You seem to respect her."

"I do," Rook nodded. "She runs a business, to be sure, but she treats us well... and doesn't stand for... well... certain practices that some clients are fond of. I wish the Legion cared for pawns as much..." His voice trailed off, then he caught himself. "But you don't want to hear those tales, I'm sure. I am glad to have met you. Friends are rare among us pawns."

Finding Rook employed as an escort specifically so that she would stumble upon him when she ran out of leads in her search, had a sobering effect on Lena. Just how far was he willing to go for friendship? For Rook was married, his heart belonged to Benita, yet instead of returning to her, he linguered in this world in order to help his friends... Had he expected that Scorpio would get into trouble once Lena was established as the Sovran? He probably had. Had Scorpio himself expected that? Yes, for certain. But still, neither of them could prevent it. It was now up to Lena to act. "Pawns know what needs to be done, but it is the Arisen who calls the shots." Rook's words resonated in her mind.

...

"Am I permitted to walk in the town outside the castle walls?" Lena looked at Rook with uncertainty when he suggested a walk along the pier. "I was under the impression that the Sovran was supposed to stay put..."

"Well, yes, but there's no law against walking in town either," he winked. "Besides, you have escort, My Lady. Walking alone might have raised eyebrows, yes, but not when you're being escorted."

"I shall never understand these practices..." Lena rolled her eyes, accepting his arm. "Sven has been running off to town all on his own for years."

"Sven is a young man," Rook objected. "He can walk on his own... But on the flipside, he could not have anyone from The Rose escort him in public - that would be a scandal. While for a lady it is a perfectly natural thing to do..."

It felt good to stroll through town again and not be caged in the Castle Gardens. They went to the market and to the armoury, to the Pawn Guild and to the inn, greeting the shopkeepers that they used to frequent in the Times of Hunting the Dragon. Heads turned and glances followed them around, whispers were exchanged behind their backs, but Lena didn't care what was being said. An illusion of freedom tasted sweet, too.

"I wonder what the talk of the town will be on the morrow," she said when they sat down for a drink at the tavern. "That Her Majesty dropped Regentkin Sven in favour of an escort from The Rose? Or that the escort from The Rose was in fact one of Her Majesty's most loyal pawns?"

"Probably both," Rook shrugged. "And also that Her Majesty took as long as a month to find herself a new escort since her previous one disappeared..."

"No one had any illusions then, right from the start."

"Of course not."

Returning to the castle grounds, Lena fully expected that Rook would have to turn back since pawns were generally not allowed beyond the castle gate. And indeed, a guard on duty watched their approach, but instead of stopping them, he gave a nod to Rook and allowed them to proceed.

"I shall accompany you to your chambers," Rook said to Lena. "The word had already been sent. You can call for me whenever you wish, or come to The Rose... I should be glad to see you."

They walked in silence for a few minutes - Lena felt stunned.

"I don't understand... You have been assigned as my consort..?" The suddenness and absurdity of it completely confused her.

"Your escort," Rook corrected her. "You can have another, if you prefer."

"No, I don't prefer!" She cried, then hushed herself - raised voices were frowned upon on the castle grounds. "I don't prefer another," she repeated in a hiss. "It's just... this is so strange... you are my friend... but also... and no one thought to ask me on the matter..."

"Your actions were clear enough, My Lady," Rook smirked. "I am to be your escort until you pick another. If you were pleased with my services, that is..."

They were walking through a colonnade flanked by rows of rose bushes dense enough to hide anyone from view. Lena quickly pulled Rook behind the bushes into an alcove of the castle wall.

"I may be confused by the courtly intrigue but if this is how the game is played, then you'll find me a willing player." She kissed him and got a kiss in response. "You got yourself a client, you can tell Wilhemina that. I don't want to find you engaged when I call."

"Exclusivity will be expensive."

"Lord Chancellor will have to foot the bill."

...

"Such passion!" Rook wiped his brow, still panting. "You're a fury not just with goblins. And you're the coldest assassin, too... I never imagined..."

"You'll see it one day, I'm sure," Lena smiled, cooling off. "Scorpio discovered it quite early on, way before we became close. I expected him to leave, but he stayed... for some reason..."

"He couldn't leave - he was bound to you."

"I offered to release him but he refused."

"Interesting..." Rook pulled her close and kissed her again. "I see what Benita meant... She said your heart would burn the dragon from the inside for swallowing it... You're not just another Arisen."

"How could she have known? I am not from that world."

"Perhaps this is something we'll both discover one day. Come, I'll take you to your chambers. It's time to return to the Courtly Intrigue, My Lady. The world has changed today."

4 Morning Star, 4E204 - Engagement

"Word is - Her Majesty the Sovran and Regentkin Sven are engaged to be married!"

"No!"

"Yes!"

"I heard others say the same!"

"Happy days!"

The rumours spread like wildfire, and within a day or two of Lena's outing to The Rose, the town was talking about her being engaged to Regentkin Sven. Which made no sense what-so-ever, apart from it being the logical thing to do.

"Do you really believe that they went to see different people at The Rose?!"

Even the fact that Lena appeared with Rook around town, could not change anything.

"Of course Her Majesty needs an escort on her walks," people would say. "Someone older than Regentkin Sven. A pawn is most appropriate."

Some went further, considering the services of an escort from The Rose, but even that was found "most appropriate" - much more appropriate than having Regentkin Sven appear in that role. People were happy because a union of the current Sovran and the child of the previous Sovran could only mean improved prosperity and stability of the kingdom for years to come.

...

"This is getting worse by the minute!" Lena was lamenting the rumours to Rook. "They'll have me marry the nipper before I know it! This cannot be happening!"

"Calm down, calm down," Rook was trying to diffuse the situation. "No one can force you to marry anyone! It's just talk, pay it no mind."

But Lena took the rumours to heart and was very worried, especially since Sven seemed to have vanished from the royal court.

"Where could he have gone to?!" She exclaimed for the fifth time within half an hour. "Perhaps his mother is getting him ready?"

"Ready for what?" Rook was trying to be patient, but Lena's worry was overwhelming. "Snap out of it, Wolf! It's only been two days! He's probably still at The Rose..."

"But what am I supposed to do??? He's almost under-age!!"

"He is not, he's twenty!"

"A baby!"

"An adult, by all accounts..."

"Two hundred years my junior!"

"Well, but people here don't know that..." Rook held the door for the maid in their room at The Rose. "Here, have some coffee. And some of these..."

"Chocolate unicorns and marshmallow bunnies..?" Lena stopped in her tracks staring at the tray. "Where on Nirn did you get these from..?"

"Wasn't it the first complaint you made when you realised which world you landed in?" Rook grinned. "That you would have preferred to be in a world with chocolate unicorns and marshmallow bunnies? It took some work with the court kitchens, but The Rose is very persuasive. I thought it might cheer you up."

"In a word, you had enough of me complaining..." Lena smiled, nibbling on a unicorn. "Thank you."

Rook breathed a sigh of relief while Lena got to work on the unicorns and bunnies, after all, someone had to. When half a tray was cleared, she fell back in her plush chair, her mood markedly improved.

"We could use those rumours to our advantage, you know," Rook said cautiously, half expecting the complaining to restart. But Lena remained calm, and he continued. "You will have to revoke your exclusive rights on me, too. You cannot be courting Regentkin Sven and have an exclusive escort at the same time. Besides, I might hear a thing or two from the other clients, but not if I can't have any."

"You are right, of course," Lena sighed. "Our goal is, after all, to find Scorpio. But what do you want me to do with Sven?" She looked up at him and he grinned.

"Well, I think you have a pretty good idea..."

"No!"

"I am not saying drag him into bed," Rook shook his head. "He's too smart for that. He is really not a child. And... no offence... but I don't think he wants to marry you either."

"But that's the thing with royalty," Lena pointed out. "They don't marry for love but for politics. If his mother thinks it's a good idea - and I bet she does - then Sven may not have any choice."

"Talk to him, you might be surprised."

"Hmm."

As sceptical as Lena was regarding Rook's suggestion of talking to Sven, she still followed up on it, mostly because she couldn't think of anything better. So when Sven reappeared at courtly gatherings a day or so later, she put on cheerful airs and invited him to join her at the royal luncheon, the royal soiree and every other royal event on the agenda. To her great surprise, Sven gladly agreed. They also resumed their walks in the Castle Gardens.

"I hear you enjoyed your time at The Rose," Sven smiled at her when they found themselves in a quiet corner of the garden. "Met an old friend, too?"

"News travels fast," Lena smirked. "Yes. It seems he was in need of coin," she lied. "But actually... oh, never mind," she smiled brightly. "It is a nice place, The Rose."

"Lady Wilhemina does run a tight ship," Sven nodded. "Not like some other places, there're no strange goings on at The Rose! But if you wanted something more exotic, I could mark a few spots on your map," he grinned.

"Err... not right now, thanks."

"Hmm... that's not what I imagined."

"What did you imagine?"

"Well, you being a true Arisen... walking with pawns all this time... mostly men, I hear..."

"Yes..? And..?"

"You must have... you know!"

"Really? We mostly were busy fighting monsters, to be honest. Then treating our wounds. Romance under the dragon's wing is not my preference... or atop a unicorn, for that matter..." she added absent-mindedly and smirked to herself, remembering Geralt's complaining about Yennefer's preference.

"Atop a unicorn..? Wow, you really do get up to things!" Sven whistled.

They walked in silence for a while. It was nearing lunch time, and the garden was getting quite empty.

"My mother wants me to marry you," Sven said suddenly, making Lena jump. "So that I could be Regent King."

"I heard."

"Look, I like you and all, but..."

"You're too young for me," Lena said quite firmly, facing him. Sven stopped too. "Do you know how old I am?"

"Not twenty."

"Smart," Lena nodded.

"That makes no difference to mother, though. She says a royal marriage is for politics only."

"What are we going to do?" Lena wanted to hear Sven's take on the matter, especially since he brought up the subject himself.

"I don't know..." he sighed. "You look in your twenties, you are the Sovran, you are unmarried. You won't be able to stay that way."

"Your father was unmarried for a long time," Lena objected.

"No, he wasn't," Sven said slowly. "It is all rather hushed up, but I read the archives... Father was married several times, to various princesses of the neighbouring countries... They each died under mysterious circumstances around the time the next dragon appeared... He had no children with any of them. Arisen cannot sire children."

"So you know."

"Of course. Don't know who sired me, but father was the one who raised me." He turned away for a moment. "Do you think it strange?"

"No, I do not," Lena replied, and bit her tongue. Her own child was being raised by a man who wasn't his sire. But speaking of children was dangerous for a Sovran, and pointless too, seeing how it was in a different world. Sven was not a friend, she reminded herself. Confiding in him had to be avoided.

They resumed walking, the Castle Garden was now completely empty.

"Your mother has connections in Battahl," Lena said softly, making sure that no one would overhear. "I know, I found some documents... I wonder whether your sire hails from there."

"You think they are still in touch?"

"I would not be surprised."

A long pause followed, and each of them knew that the other had something important to say.

"We shall have to trust each other," Sven said in a near whisper. "I cannot help you find your pawn if you don't tell me what you know about Battahl."

"Figured it out, did you," Lena smiled. "What gave it away?"

"Your choice of escort."

"Well, he's an actual escort, it's not a fraud..."

"I know, I saw it."

"You what..?" Lena laughed. "Oh yes, the peepholes."

"And rose bushes."

"Alright, but why? What difference does it make what I choose to do with my escort?"

"It shows intent, commitment, trust," Sven stopped to face her. He suddenly looked much older than his age. "He enlisted after your pawn disappeared, I checked. Next to no calls on him, considering his looks. Then you appear, request exclusivity at first, then revoke it, and suddenly he's the most requested escort at The Rose. Still the same looks, but if what I saw was real... wow." He smiled at Lena. "Are all pawns like that?"

"Pawns are people, Sven," Lena shook her head. "They are all different. That was just... Rook."

"And you think your pawn was forcibly removed, you don't think he just left... And after what I've seen, I tend to agree..." Sven paused. "So then, shall we help each other?"

"Come to my chambers tonight," Lena smiled. "Make sure you're seen. There's a peephole, but we can cover it up. I've got something to show you. The game is on, Sven."

Sun's Dawn, 4E204 - Strands in a web

It took many weeks collecting every little piece of information they could find - both about Battahl and Queen Regent's past and present connections there, and about anyone with designs to remove Her Majesty's personal guard, that is, Scorpio. Between Lena, Rook and Sven they figured out that it was all connected, but were still uncertain about the particulars. The three of them could not be seen together, so Lena acted as a link, courting both of them. The rumours of her liason with Sven were growing stronger with every passing day, and people were openly speculating when their engagement would be announced.

"They will allow it to mature for a year or two," some were saying. "It is a matter of wealth. Is the Arisen wealthy? She is, as our Sovran, but was she wealthy before she was crowned? That needs to be assessed."

"No, they won't wait that long," others disagreed. "Just look at her armour and that of her pawns! Of course she was wealthy! She owns a mansion in the Noble Quarter, besides. And a house in town. There is no question of wealth!"

"Does she still command pawns?" Yet others wondered. "With the dragon slain, does that power wane? They want to make sure she remains in control, dragon or no dragon."

But the most salacious remarks were about her and Sven, as could be expected. That was on purpose, for people were most likely to focus on something saucy. Sven would visit Lena's chamber on a regular bases, noises would be heard, and some would swear to have seen action, too... What they really heard and saw however, was a performance not unlike the performance that Lena and Ser Maximilian put on back in Gransys so many years ago. The peephole in Lena's chamber had been securely blocked, and glimpses through a half-opened door could be easily manipulated.

"Why do you not put on a performance with Rook?" Sven asked one evening.

"We meet at The Rose, it has to be real. Too many experts would know the difference," Lena shrugged. "Rook never stays here."

Sven thought there was more to it, but didn't ask. They still weren't friends.

"Here, have a look at this," Lena and Sven were sitting in a blind corner of her chamber, certain not to be seen or heard. She put an old letter on the table. "That's a Battahli crest."

"The letter speaks of a 'service' to be rendered to mother," Sven read. "But the person to render it is only named as 'His Lordship'," he sighed. "That doesn't help at all... Although... The service appears to be of intimate nature."

"There is no date on the letter, although it is old. But is it old enough?" Lena thought that the 'service' might have been that of ensuring that the Sovran of Vermund had a child.

"Hmm..." Sven wasn't sure. "But look at this," he produced another old letter from his pocket. "This is quite intimate, and it is signed."

"Lord Allard," Lena read. "But not nearly old enough... the paper isn't discoloured. Lord Chancellor mentioned something... that he never intervened. The 'service' might have been repeated. Lord Allard still lives in this very castle."

"I wonder if father married mother for love or was it... Hmm..."

"Only she can tell us that now, I fear." Lena sat back in her chair. "And I am not about to ask."

This was a typical conversation between Lena and Sven, with each of them producing one or the other letter of more or less intimate nature and trying to figure out whether it was of any importance at all. The royal court seemed to have an infinite number of such letters, and everyone of the gentry seemed to have been involved with everyone else at some point in the past. Considering how easy it was to find these letters, just left behind in desks and drawers, unlocked and unguarded, they didn't seem important. Unless of course one of them was...

"If someone wanted to hide an important letter in this castle, they would just put it in some old drawer along with all the nonsense," Lena shook her head. "To find what we seek among all of this... seems nigh impossible."

"We need to start discounting people," Sven looked up. "Like this Lord Allard, for instance. He's been around the court for ages, well before I was born. But this letter is recent, and means probably nothing... We need to know more about him. And who is this 'Lordship' from Battahl? Keep every Battahli letter, as there are not many of those..."

Considering such goings on, Lena's visits to The Rose hardly attracted gossip - it was, after all, a common thing to do.

"Her Majesty is still frequenting one and the same escort," people would say. "One of the pawns she used to walk with... I wonder if there's anything more to that."

"Her Majesty likes a man with experience," others would shrug. "She found one she likes, and that's that. Mayhap she knew his worth from before he joined The Rose..."

People would grin and move on to more juicy news of the day.

Rook was doing well at The Rose. He was in constant demand. His fee rose above most others. As such, he was assigned a room of his own, with all the luxuries and conveniences of that. But with all this, alas, information was still not forthcoming. Instead, he was being asked more than he was told.

"What does Her Majesty like?" His clients would ask. "Show me, I want to know."

"Your Ladyship would not want me to show Your Ladyship's likes to others," he would decline with a smile. "The Rose guarantees the clients' privacy."

One day as the maid was serving coffee and the door stood open, they heard loud voices from the lobby.

"I want the Sovran's escort! He is not in this book!"

"These are all the escorts that answer Your Lordship's preference," a much quieter voice of the receptionist tried to calm down the client.

"Nonsense! I just said what I wanted!"

"That's Lord Allard," Rook's client sat up, listening in. "Wanting you... I would not recommend it."

"Lord Allard seems to have quite a temper," Rook noted, also listening in.

"A temper and a name in the court..." the lady nodded. "Everyone avoids him now. Everyone. Even Queen Regent... and they were close once."

"He served the court for many years, I hear."

"Since he was young..." She got up to look at him from behind the door. "He isn't what he used to be any longer... There's been talk that he fathered Queen's child, Sven. If you can father a child after it's born!" She chuckled. "No, he was with me when the Queen... you know. She'd been away for a time, then Sven was born half a year later."

She stepped back into the room as Wilhemina walked past the door towards the lobby.

"I must ask Your Lordship to keep your voice down," she said firmly. "The Rose is a peaceful retreat. Kindly select your escort from the ledger."

"The Sovran's escort isn't in it!" Lord Allard replied angrily, but in a lowered voice. "What game are you playing?!"

"You are confusing us with similar houses in the Lower Town," Wilhemina answered evenly, but with an undercurrent of disdain. "Our agents determine what services they provide. The Sovran's escort does not cater for your preference."

"Whores! All of you!!!" Lord Allard bellowed, there was a sound of steel against steel, then all went quiet.

"Escort His Lordship outside," Wilhemina said to someone in the lobby. "His membership is thus revoked."

"You are lucky to work here," Rook's client accepted coffee that he handed her. "Wilhemina understands what makes for good service... for pleasant times... unlike Lord Allard down below."

...

"So Lord Allard isn't your sire," Lena related this information to Sven next time they met. "The lady said your mother had been away, then you were born. Away to Battahl, perhaps?"

"It certainly looks that way," Sven agreed. "But to meet whom? And could Lord Allard still be involved in your pawn's disappearance?"

"I think not," Lena shook her head. "He seems out of control. It isn't easy to abduct a fighter such as Scorpio... They failed at the coronation, so they planned better this time. This job was served cold."

...

The next piece of the puzzle also came from Rook. He had a new client, and as soon as she entered, he felt dizzy and somewhat confused. He felt compelled to do what she asked, going far beyond his normal bounds. When she left, his head cleared. His body was scarred and burned in places, a practice not endorsed by The Rose.

"What happened to you?!" Lena gasped when she saw it. "I thought The Rose didn't allow..."

"It doesn't," Rook nodded. "I don't understand it myself... It is as if I was in a haze..."

"We have to tell Wilhemina," Lena was adamant.

"Godsway," Wilhemina concluded with disgust. "A substance that controls pawns. There's been talk of it in recent years... but this is the first time we had it in our house!" She added with anger. "You are off duty for the rest of the week! I won't stand for this! We have a lot of pawns!" She stormed off.

"Godsway," Lena repeated, examining Rook's bruises closely. "Tell me what you remember."

Godsway appeared to have clouded Rook's judgement and suppressed his will but not affected his memory much. He knew exactly how he got every bruise, yet could not oppose the hand that inflicted them.

"I do remember resisting somewhat," he looked apologetic. "Perhaps that's what she wanted..."

"I wonder if the dose you got was only little," Lena mused. "Since you could resist. But what if it was increased? May be that's what they used on Scorpio?"

...

"Godsway is prohibited in our Kingdom!" Sven exclaimed with indignation when Lena told him about the incident at The Rose. "Exactly because it affects pawns in this way, and pawns are welcome here. It is imported... I don't know how it is made. It's used... well... the way it was used on Rook. He got a standard dose. We'll catch the smugglers, but I wonder... What if the dose was increased? What then?"

The smugglers were caught, a quantity of godsway was recovered.

"This was a medium size operation, Your Majesty," Captain Brandt was delivering his report at the Chancery. "The substance will be incinerated."

When he finished, Lena quietly followed him out of the Chancery office.

"Captain," she spoke softly. "I wonder if I could have a word."

It wasn't too hard to convince the Captain to hand over godsway to her. She wanted to know its effects when given in larger doses, and Rook reluctantly agreed to test it. The Captain too wanted to see the effects. It required some preparation, but eventually guard training was arranged out in the fields, thus leaving the barracks free.

"Don't make me fight you, I am not that bad of a mage," Rook joked nervously as they were getting ready to start. "There is no telling what it will do..."

The effects were astounding. Rook remained conscious throughout, he could walk and talk, and indeed fight, and he executed every order to the letter, even though they had agreed that he would try to resist. But as soon as the crystal was moved a distance away, he regained full control of his will.

"It's strong but of limited range," the Captain concluded. "Dangerous stuff. This will be incinerated. I shudder to think what it could do if it was refined..." He gathered up the crystals. "And you should know... it is imported from Battahl."

The pattern was becoming clear. The strands of the web led to Battahl.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sun's Dawn, 4E204 - A grain of sand in a desert

"This is like finding a grain of sand in a desert!" Sven shook his head when Lena told him they had to look for clues in Battahl. "How to tell which one is the right one? We have a stack of letters from Battahl, intimate and otherwise, signed and unsigned, old and new... Which one would point to 'His Lordship' that is my sire? Which one would lead us to your captured pawn? Is the same person behind both? Twenty years apart? That seems unlikely..." Sven sighed. "Yet at the same time I sense it is exactly the case... But why..?"

"There is something else at work here," Lena mused, looking through the letters on the table again. "Something that we are yet to uncover. I too feel that the same person may be behind both... I just hope that Scorpio is still alive..."

"I haven't considered that," Sven looked up with sadness. "It's been... what? Four, five months? If he is being tortured... strong as he is, that's a long time... assuming they didn't kill him directly..." He stopped talking, noticing Lena's heartache, but she got the distinct feeling that he said those things on purpose. Perhaps in order to see her response.

"Yes, I miss him, if that's what you wanted to know," she said with rebuke and Sven blushed slightly. "It isn't an act."

"But you have Rook now..."

"Rook is my friend. Scorpio is... more." She kept her eyes on Sven trying to figure out why he was asking these questions, and what it was that he wasn't asking but wanted to know.

"I've watched you and Rook," Sven met her gaze without blushing. "You seem completely at ease with each other. He's not guarded with you as he's guarded with his other clients, you are not a client to him. I do not understand... And you say there can be more?"

"Rook is married, did you know that?" Lena smiled. "Not to me, that is. But we are old friends, we've been through so much, I trust him with my life and more... But yes, there is another level... more than one level, in fact..."

"But if he's married... Why did he become an escort?"

"To help me find Scorpio." Lena paused, watching the puzzled look on Sven's face. "Or do you mean to ask why Rook is such an excellent escort? Because that's Rook. When he decides to do something, he does it right. He doesn't skimp, doesn't shirk, doesn't try to fake it. He took the job for a different reason, but it is now his job, and he does it well. His clients can sense it, which is why he is in demand. Not just because he's the Sovran's escort."

"I never imagined that slaying the dragon could bring people together like that," Sven said softly, still puzzled.

"It wasn't the dragon..." Lena thought of the times she would lose a battle in order to save her pawns, of the times her pawns would keep fighting for her and die when she could not save them, the times she really lost a pawn, not merely sent them back to the Rift... "Pawns are not completely immortal," she smiled at Sven. "Yet they do not falter, and not all of it is driven by duty or their magical bonds to the master... I've had pawns that..." She stopped talking, suddenly realising that speaking of that would be betraying their trust. Not all pawns were equally loyal, despite the common belief. "It wasn't the dragon that brought us together," she closed the topic. "But it is between me and them."

...

One evening Lena slipped into The Rose from a particularly boring soiree - there seemed to have been secret passages from every part of the castle. She didn't know whether Rook was with a client, and didn't want to go barging in. She linguered in the corridor, trying to make up her mind.

"Your Majesty," she heard Wilhemina's voice behind her. "Your escort will finish shortly," she smiled. "But until then, please come with me."

Wilhemina led Lena into an empty room, closed the door and kissed her.

"Not interested?" She stood back, surprised. "Not many clients get my attention."

"Forgive me, Lady Wilhemina," Lena smiled. "But..."

"Say no more," Wilhemina smiled back. "It is unusual, but not unheard of. But may be I can still please you with something else..."

She walked to a framed picture on the wall and flipped it aside, revealing a peephole. Lena looked in.

The room on the other side seemed empty, but then she noticed movement in the curtains. A masked man silently stepped forward, and a masked woman appeared from another corner of the room. Lena recognised Queen Regent, because, let's face it, masks didn't work for people who knew each other well, such as members of the same court. The man, however, was unknown to Lena, and his mask would indeed prevent her from remembering his face.

"Disa..." he said, taking Queen Regent into his arms. "You wanted me to stay away, and I did. It's been a long wait... but you look just like you did twenty years ago."

"You flatter me, Phaz," she smiled. "But the wait is nearly over. Sven will marry the Arisen and then..."

"How long do you plan to let her live?"

"Just long enough to calm the waters," she shrugged. "Her pawn does complicate matters, though."

"Her pawn? But we removed him, surely?"

"Her other pawn... her escort here at The Rose. We cannot touch him here."

"That is most unfortunate."

"But equally... he's just an escort," Queen Regent made a gesture of brushing off an annoying fly. "Not a bodyguard, as was the one before him. And he's just a mage... Not a match for you, Phaz."

"You want that I kill him myself..?" The man she called 'Phaz' sounded surprised.

"If need be..." She sighed. "Just send him back to the Rift, that will do."

"Easier than killing him outright," Phaz agreed. "Her main pawn is still alive... somehow... we've done all we could think of... it's been five months."

"Alive?" Disa pulled back, surprised and worried.

"We could have sent him back to the Rift, but that would have served no purpose," Phaz explained. "She'd get him back right away. No, he needs to die a proper death, there are ways... he seems unconsious and his body is ailing, yet he still lives..."

"That is enough," Wilhemina covered the peephole with the picture again. "Your escort awaits you, Your Majesty."

Lena followed her to Rook's chamber and didn't come out until the following afternoon.

...

"Sven has been watching us," Lena told Rook when she finally stopped crying. "He's been asking me about your... skills," she grinned. "Whether all pawns are like you."

"And what did you say?" Rook smirked, pouring coffee.

"That all pawns are exactly the same, of course, powered by secret magic, just like golems," she laughed. "What did you think I said? There's no one quite like you, Rook."

"I wonder why Wilhemina lets him watch," he mused, settling down in a large plush armchair with his cream-laden coffee. "I didn't think it was a part of a standard service."

"Education? His mother does want him to marry me."

"For political reasons, yes," Rook objected. "Besides, he's been running around brothels long enough now not to require any further training..."

They didn't know what to make of it, but ultimately it wasn't important and they didn't care, so they spoke of it no more.

...

Hearing about Scorpio's condition gave an increased sense of urgency to their investigation, but still they could not move any faster than they did. The man named 'Phaz' was in the centre of it all, but his identity was unknown, and although they surmised that he must be the mysterious 'His Lordship' from the old correspondence, it didn't actually help them to figure out who he was. Lena thought he was a sorcerer, but Rook pointed out that Queen Regent's words would have worked just as well if the man was a knight.

"Any vocation is stronger than a mage when it comes to battle," Rook objected. "He could even be an archer, for all we know. Although I would probably be able to deal with an archer..."

"I still think a sorcerer is most likely," Lena was being stubborn. "And anyhow, we have a register of noteworthy sorcerers, and there are exactly three of them in the whole kingdom, as opposed to literally hundreds of knights."

"Let's start with sorcerers then," Rook grinned. "Except... aren't you looking in the wrong kindom? He's supposed to be from Battahl."

"With so few sorcerers around, they all are bound to know each other," Lena was pouring over the map of Vermund. "We have a court sorcerer here at the castle... An old man with his nose in books. I don't think he's involved in any plots - too busy reading. There's an Elven sorceress up in the Sacred Arbour..."

"As if Elves ever minged in human affairs!" Rook shook his head.

"True. Then there's Magister Myrrdin living in a small town near the border with Battahl. I think I shall pay him a visit."

"Hold it - hold it!" Rook pulled the map out of Lena's hands. "Your Majesty cannot go visiting some random sorcerers in small border towns. I'll go. You stay put."

...

"Magister Myrrdin is not receiving visitors," a stern-looking maid answered the door. "State your business."

"I thought he wasn't receiving visitors?" Rook smiled at her. "I heard much about Magister Myrrdin's learning and was hoping to discuss ways to improve my battle spells... I am but a mage, you see, battle is not my speciality."

"Then you've come to the wrong house!" The maid barked at him. "Magister Myrrdin does not teach dilettantes!"

She slammed the door in Rook's face. This matter required a different approach.

...

"I saw you trying to get into Myrrdin's house," a shady character in dirty leather armour sat next to Rook at the tavern that evening. "We've been trying it for weeks. Best give it up, mate, that house is a fortress."

"I wasn't actually..." Rook started saying when another unsavoury character interrupted him.

"You lot will never get in!" He said to the other thief. "You ain't got class. Stick out as a sore thumb... This fellah on the other hand, he stands a chance... If dressed right... I reckon... may be..." He took a step back, eyeing Rook head to toe. "I'll tell you what you need to do, but we take half the cut."

"There won't be any cuts, so there's nothing to take," Rook said firmly. "I daresay I don't need your help."

"You won't get past that door without us!" The thief retorted angrily. "And I have a rush order on an opal orb from that house, so you WILL go in!"

"Not for you, I won't."

"We'll see about that!!"

Daggers flashed from several directions, an arrow flew past Rook's ear, someone even tried to stab him, but Rook was completely unharmed.

"That does it, really!" He pushed away one of his attackers and quickly cast a spell. A lightning bolt hit in the middle of the fighting crowd, the sparks latched onto the weapons, jumping from fighter to figher, some people fell to the ground, others were still standing, shaking. Either way, the fight was over, and the barman was quick to throw them all outside. The crowd dispersed as quickly as it had assembled, out of sight and out of reach of the city guard.

"It's always the same here," a guard addressed Rook and spit. "They start the brawl, but they are too quick for us. You, on the other hand... In the name of Her Majesty the Sovran, I arrest you for disturbing the peace in this town." He put wrist irons on Rook who didn't resist. "It's this way to the gaol..."

...

Stripped of his coat and staff and dressed in prison garb, Rook woke up in the morning on a pile of dirty straw in a rat-infested gaol of a small border town. His head didn't hurt and he remembered everything that happened, but he felt empty and hollow. The wrist irons - they sapped his strength and magicka, leaving him defenseless.

"How do I get out of here?" He asked the guard who brought him bread and water. "If it's money you want..."

"Aye, there's a fee to pay," the guard grinned. "But not yet. You are a pawn, are you not? You pawns get a different treatment."

He checked the lock on the bars and walked off, leaving Rook with a feeling of foreboding. His trip was not going according to plan.

Sun's Dawn, 4E204 - Pawns

"That's enough, this cargo is worth more than your lives taken together!" A sorcerer with an unusual staff barked at the guards beating up prisoners. "Count them and load them into the cart! And if any of them is seriously injured... I'll have your heads!"

A dozen or so prisoners were manhandled into a covered cart, but the beating stopped. The back of the cart was barred and the ox resumed pulling it up a mountain road.

Rooked looked at the prisoners, they were all pawns. All cuffed in wrist irons like his own, all wearing prison garb in various states of disrepair. "So, we're to be slaves... But what kind?"

The cart slowed as the ox was struggling to pull it over rocks, and the sorcerer overseer walked past the cart. A splitting headache pierced Rook's brain, he squeezed his temples... and saw the other pawns do the same. He felt empty and hollow, more so than ever before... he felt his will drain away... "Godsway," he thought. "But stronger..." The headache was overpowering, making him faint.

...

"Well, which of you was it?" He heard an angry voice. "Which of you started the rebellion?" The overseer stomped his staff on the ground. "I'll know who it was, you cannot hide it from me, pawns!"

Rook opened his eyes. He was lying on the ground in a cavernous cell, occupied by several pawns; he saw more such cells along the corridor, each with several people inside. He could not remember how he got there; he could only remember the cart and the splitting headache from the overseer's staff. And yes, he could remember the gaol in a small border town, then being beaten and loaded onto the cart. Why was he in that town? To visit a sorcerer... with the purpose of finding a man named 'Phaz' in Battahl. Yes, his memory was intact.

"Which of you was it?!!" The overseer bellowed, stomping his staff again, but Rook did not get a headache from it. Instead, he felt compelled to get up. "Ah, so it was you!" The overseer stared at Rook. "Have I seen you before? Hmm... You do seem familiar... I never forget a face! Follow me!" He signalled the guards to unlock the door and let Rook out, locking the other pawns in. He led him through some corridors, and guards pushed him up every time he stumbled. He felt weak... the wrist irons were sapping his strength.

The overseer led him to a large pit where half a dozen prisoners were moving stones from a freshly blasted cavity. "Get to work!" He barked. "I shall not stand for another rebellion!" The guards pushed him on. Manual labour. It could be worse.

Miners were opening up a new passage, blasts were heard every minute or so. That alone was making Rook ill, but he focused on moving stones and tried to avoid getting hit by debries and rocks. Another blast, and the whole side of the pit came crushing down, burying pawns and guards alike. Puddles of bluish light appeared under the rubble - pawns killed by falling rock were returning to the Rift.

"Idiots!!!" The overseer bellowed at the miners. "Their lives are worth more than yours! You let them escape!!!" He did not care for the guards that were killed along with the pawns, for their lives weren't worth as much.

"I must not be killed by falling rock," Rook told himself. "That would return me to the Rift, but I must stay here and learn what is to be learned. That staff has a godsway crystal. This is a pawn labour camp. This is the same labour camp where I found the current Arisen oh so long ago... The Arisen that is now waiting for me in Vermund. The difference is... last time I was here on purpose. This time I am just a slave."

Operating without the protection of the Legion was infinitely more difficult than guiding a new Arisen. Rook didn't lack a will of his own, but it wasn't a matter of will. With only the overall goal being clear - to rescue Scorpio - the immediate goals of what to do next were up to him to set and pursue. "This is a lot harder than hunting down the dragon," he thought, carrying rocks from one corner of the excavation site to another. "Where do I go from here? I cannot see a clear path... is it because I am a pawn?" He wondered. The Legion had always claimed that pawns needed an Arisen to give them direction. Rook never believed it, until that moment at the labour camp when he started doubting himself. "Wolf would know what to do, she is an Arisen," he thought. But then... "Have you forgotten something, Arisen? You're looking rather lost..." "You're staring, Arisen!" "Shouldn't we get going, master?" "What are you doing, Arisen? The path is that way!" All those times when pawns had to remind an Arisen what needed doing; all those times when he or the others had to lead an Arisen to their goal; all those times when... "...when an Arisen had no clue what to do," Rook smirked at the memories. "No, there's nothing wrong with us pawns. I just need to focus."


He tried to think what Lena would do when she was unsure how to proceed... "She would do nothing..." he thought. "Sleep on it... Perhaps I'll see things clearer tomorrow."

It had been several days, all the same, all filled with labour of moving rocks from one side of the pit to another. Rook wondered what the purpose of the excavation was, as the miners seemed to be blasting tunnels in every direction. So many explosions often caused cave-ins that had to be cleared with more explosions... There didn't seem to be a plan. "They are searching for something," he finally realised. "They don't know in which direction to proceed. Perhaps it's time for me to look around."

And so, instead of just carrying rocks from one spot to another, he started paying attention to the rock formations, noting different structures, veins of ore, slabs of basalt, pieces of polished marble... "Pieces of polished marble?" He grinned. "Oh yes, it's this way." It didn't take long for the miners to notice polished marble too, and they redoubled their blasts in that direction. After a few days, they blasted through a wall of an arena.

"Inform Lord Phaseus!" The overseer was excited by the discovery.

A day later several richly dressed mages came to the site, examined the arena, talking excitedly among themselves. If anything, they looked like tourists visiting an ancient site. "Perhaps that's exactly what they are," Rook wondered, watching them. "Their spells are so weak... These are mages in name only, nothing more."

More mages came the following day and the day after that, and Rook stopped paying them much attention. Then the tours stopped and a single mage with a half a dozen guards came to the site. He commanded the overseer to clear the site, moving the pawns and the camp guards back into the caverns. Rook hid among the rubble, resisting the headache caused by the overseer's godsway staff, just hoping to wait it out until the staff was out of range... He persevered. He could now watch the mage in the arena.

"Come forth, I command you!" The mage - or rather, the sorcerer, as Rook noted - raised his staff that sent a beam of light into the sky causing a vortex to form. A dragon descended from the vortex, circled the arena and hovered over the mage - or may be the mage's staff. "I command you to land!" The mage proclaimed and the dragon landed, waiting for further orders. "Ha!" The mage looked smug. "It worked. So far, anyway. Now kill it!" He shouted to his guards who started attacking the dragon.

It didn't take long and the dragon lay dead. It didn't resist, it didn't fight back, the mage's staff was controlling its will, it appeared. "Collect all the crystals, we'll need them for later," the mage told the guards. "Now to get to the heart..." He put away the staff and drew a long dagger, walked up to the dragon's chest and cut it open. Foul viscous liquid erupted from the cavity, but the mage continued widening the cut until the dragon's chest lay wide open. "But... it has no heart!" He was taken aback. "How..?" He walked around the dragon several times, made several more cuts but alas, there was no heart to be found.

"This is a lesser dragon," Rook noted to himself watching the mage's disappointment. "They have no hearts... It would have been more amusing to watch him summon a drake and find three hearts inside," he smirked. "This isn't THE dragon. That dragon cannot be controlled with a godsway staff."

Just as the mage was ready to leave the arena, another mage walked in. He had a commanding aura about him. He examined the dragon, lamented the lack of a heart, exchanged a few words with the other mage, then proceeded collecting the viscous liquid oozing from the dragon's chest.

"Take these vials to the lab," he told the guards. "Perhaps this foul slime will finally kill that pawn..." He watched the guards fill a chest full of vials. "Whatever keeps him alive... Never had a subject quite like him."

"Are you certain that he is no longer bound to his Arisen?" The other mage asked.

"She killed the dragon, that always breaks the bond..." he mused. "Unless there is another bond between them? But no matter, she hasn't long to live. Once she is dead, the pawn will surely perish. And even if not... He will no longer be a threat to us. Pawns have no will or purpose of their own."

...

When the mages and the guards left the arena, Rook cautiously climbed out of his hiding spot and approached the dragon's body.

"Lesser dragons have no hearts but they are not entirely useless," he smirked. He reached deep into the dragon's liver and pulled out a blueish stone. "Vernworth!" He said, throwing it into the sky. There was a flash of light and Rook vanished.

...

"What was that?!" The overseer saw the flash of a ferrystone being deployed on the newly unearthed arena. "Who did that?! Who escaped?!! Ooh, it's that pawn from the latest shipment! The one that escaped a year ago as well, and with another pawn! Don't think I don't remember! I never forget a face!" He ran to the arena but there was nothing to see there apart from a dead dragon covered in foul slime.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First Seed, 4E204 - Her Majesty's escort

Rook's teleportation to Vernworth did not go unnoticed. The porticrystal stood next to the Pawn Guild on a major thoroughfare, and an arrival of a single pawn covered in foul slime and dressed in prison garb, immediately got him arrested.

"In the name of Her Majesty the Sovran, I am arresting you for disturbing the peace in this city!" The guard proclaimed, trying to cuff Rook in wrist irons, only to realise that he was wearing wrist irons already... "Which prison did you escape from?" The guard squinted suspiciously. "Well, never mind, the Captain will soon get it all out of you! This way to the gaol..."

...

The gaol in Vernworth was exactly the same as any other gaol, with its dirty straw for bedding and rats for company. The cell doors had sturdy locks and the guards were patrolling the corridors. Rook could do nothing but wait for someone to let him out, one way or the other...

"You are Her Majesty's escort, are you not?" A night guard spoke in a hushed voice through the bars of Rook's cell. "I saw you with her around town a few times... What did you do to end up here?"

"I arrived at the porticrystal wearing this..." Rook shrugged.

"Disturbing the peace," the guard nodded. "Sometimes I think they do go too far with it... We're no fashion police... And if Her Majesty likes games of that sort, arresting the escort seems counter-productive."

He stared at Rook for a while expecting an answer with juicy details, but Rook remained silent, his face impassable.

"You're not going to tell me anything, are you?" The guard sighed with disappointment. "They do say that The Rose guards their clients' secrets well... But the fact of your appearance here already speaks volumes. We'll just have to fill in the details ourselves..."

"You are fishing," Rook thought but again said nothing, and the guard eventually walked away.

A few days passed with no change, then another guard came in with a jug of hot water and a bundle of clothes.

"Wash up and get dressed, you are being released," he set the jug down and tossed the bundle at Rook's feet. "Your fee's been paid... must be nice to be Her Majesty's escort." He scowled and locked the door behind him, not removing Rook's wrist irons. One could never be too careful with convicts.

When Rook was ready, the guard escorted him to the exit, only then removing his cuffs. Wilhemina stood at the door.

"If he's been injured... If there's a single bruise upon his body..." She stood quite close to the guard speaking in her languid voice that carried a clear menace, "...if he has to recover afore he can work... well... let's hope it isn't the case."

The guard backed off, saluted and vanished.

"Come with me," Wilhemina turned to Rook. "There's a prize on your head. And not every guard will be as gullable as this one..."

...

"They can't actually cut off my head, the pawn magic would have me return to the Rift before it was done..." Rook was perplexed to hear that indeed there was a prize on his head payable upon presenting said head to the Captain of the Guard. "Since when?"

"Since this morning," Wilhemina sighed. "Which is why I had to hurry as the night guard would not have had the brief as yet..."

She led Rook into the basement of The Rose, pushed a false wall panel and revealed a small but tidy room behind it.

"You will stay here for now. Her Majesty will be informed. Her engagement to Regentkin Sven was announced two weeks ago, making him her escort instead of you. But you served The Rose without fail, and I don't abandon my agents. When this is all over... I hope you will return to The Rose..." She looked into his eyes and sighed. "But I have no illusions that you won't."

Wilhemina left. The basement room had everything needed for a long stay, including books. Rook picked one and prepared to wait.

...

"It is time to announce your engagement," Lord Chancellor was saying to Lena and Sven, having summonned them to his office a couple of weeks previously. "There's talk..." he grinned. "Your Majesty will have to abandon your escort at The Rose, it is unbecoming a sovran engaged to be married," he looked at her sternly. "As you are as of now."

"This is rather sudden," Sven seemed genuinly surprised. "We were never told..."

"Your Grace's behaviour left no doubt," Lord Chancellor objected. "When your mother Queen Regent learned of the goings on in the Royal Chamber... well..." he rolled his eyes. "Any further delay would have been nothing short of a scandal." He puffed his cheeks as if stopping himself from saying more. "The date for the wedding ceremony has not yet been set, there are preparations to be made, you understand... But fear not, the Chancery is known for its expedience."

He ushered them out, as only Lord Chancellor could do.

"Congratulations," Sven said with anger. "It was your plan to put on a show. And now look where it got us!"

"Shhh... Keep your voice down," Lena hushed him. "We don't want talk about the first royal squabble, do we?" She pulled him towards her chamber. "We talk there."

The guards grinned seeing them enter the Royal Chamber flushed and slightly disheveled, the rumours being thus confirmed.

"Rook is still away, and even if he returns with new information, the game has changed," Lena was saying when they were sitting in the blind corner of her chamber again. "I don't like it either... But say... what are you going to do when you finally learn who is your sire?"

"Confront mother," Sven shrugged.

"And..?"

"What for..? Yeah... I never thought of that," he rubbed his chin in a second surprise of the morning, and Lena thought that perhaps indeed he never thought it through. "I guess I just wanted to know." He paused, then looked up at Lena. "What are you going to do once you learn who captured your pawn?"

"I'll go after him, of course," Lena shrugged. "Sovran or no Sovran."

They fell silent, and Lena thought that although Sven was still not a friend... he was coming close to it. He so far hadn't betrayed her... so far... still, something was keeping her on her guard. With Rook still out of town and with her new status of being engaged to be married, Sven was to be her only company, whether she liked it or not.

"Once we're married, you can have another escort," Sven suddenly said. "Royal couples are not expected to... you know. Especially since you couldn't bear children anyway."

Lena stared at Sven - his statement sounded out of place and out of character somehow, so cold and brutal the way he said it. Was that the real Sven speaking? Or was that something he was told to say?

"Arisen cannot sire or bear children, that's true," she nodded. "So, how is your royal line to continue, then? Just when exactly shall I be executed?"

Sven paled.

"Executed..? But that would be treason..."

"Oh Sven, you are not that naive," Lena smirked, her eyes growing cold. "Games seem to be over. My life is safe until the wedding and for a little while after that, but then I shall be nothing but a hindrance. Arisen are not immortal."

There didn't seem to be anything else to say. They sat in silence for a while, then Sven got up and left. Games were really over.

...

It was hard to tell night from day in the back room of the basement under The Rose. Rook thought that perhaps two or three days had passed, yet no one came to see him. Then suddenly the door opened and closed, but no one seemed to come in.

"Wilhemina told me how to find you," Lena said softly, dispelling her shadow veil. She wore her assassin's armour and had a sizable pack under her arm. "Get dressed," she passed it to Rook. "We are leaving."

"Where to?" He asked, finding his coat and staff in the pack, along with other bits. "What have you learned?"

"That there's a prize on your head..." she watched him, trying to assess his condition. "You seem weaker than normal... what happened?"

"Wrist irons," Rook scowled. "They leave permanent damage, as you found out. I was imprisoned for too long..." Lena gasped, but he shook his head. "No matter. I shall regain my form ere long. I have new leads... we need to go to Battahl."

"I figured as much," Lena nodded. "Come. We'll talk on the road."

...

To Rook's surprise, they didn't go very far. Lena led him out of the city, then turned East instead of West towards Battahl.

"This isn't the path to our destination..." Rook found himself saying. "Where are we going?"

"Somewhere safe," Lena smiled. "I am not done in the city as yet, but you cannot stay there. We need to talk and prepare, I need to work on Sven..." she sighed. "Then we shall leave for real. But until then... You will be safe among thieves and assassins."

She took him to the village where they'd been before - the seat of the local thieves and assassins guild, for in that world there was no quarrel between them. Lena didn't like the thieving part, but had to accept it. "You don't have to pilfer if you don't want to," the leader shrugged his shoulders. "It isn't an obligation. But you're still one of us." This was the only place where Rook was safe from assassination attempts because the thieves understood very well that no prize would be paid for a pawn's head as the pawn would vanish into the Rift as soon as he is killed, with his head still attached to his shoulders... "It is a ploy for the gullible," the leader nodded. "There is nothing left when you kill a pawn."

Leaving Rook in the Nameless Village, Lena returned to Vernworth and to her place as the Sovran of Vermund. She was only gone for a couple of days, and no one thought anything of it, except Sven.

"He wasn't just your escort, was he?" He asked during a morning walk in the Castle Gardens. "I know you said he was your friend... But I think there's more to it still."

"What does it matter, Sven?" Lena shrugged. "Rook is now out of the picture. You and I shall be married soon, and you will be Regent King."

"You don't trust me."

"Should I?"

"No."

"Well then..."

They walked in silence, waving and nodding to lords and ladies in the garden.

"You no longer command the pawns," Sven suddenly said. "Once you've killed the dragon, the magic is broken, I know, I read it. You can go into the Rift but you cannot summon or lead them out. Such are the rules! So why are they still flocking to Vernworth and follow you around?" He frowned and stopped, facing her. "What manner of magic is this?!"

"It's no magic, Sven," Lena shook her head. "Pawns are able to traverse the worlds on their own. They just need a reason to do it... Perhaps they sense that I am still here? There's always another dragon lying in wait, and who is to say how long it will be before it appears? Is fifty years a rule? Or are we in fact already expecting another?"

"You are leading me on," Sven said with scorn. "There is no dragon... You just... I don't believe you." He pouted his lips and didn't speak to Lena for the rest of the morning.

...

"What are you doing?" Someone was looking into a crystal ball. "She is about to slip away! They are preparing her execution just after the wedding, and of course she figured it out! That's blatantly obvious, that! Is that your idea of giving her something to do?!" The person flung the crystal ball off the table.

"We didn't plan it this way..." someone replied in a rather shaky voice. "It's their free will, you see... the plot is entirely of their own design..."

"But you could have opposed it! Confused it! Altered it!!" The first voice was growing angrier by the minute. "When her life is in danger, she finds ways to evade the threat - we shall lose track of her again, and where will we be then?!"

"Ah, but she still has not regained her heart," the second voice objected. "Whatever she does, she won't leave this world without it. She'll hide, she'll settle down for a time, but she won't leave. It is as you ordered, Sire."

...

A day or two passed, and Lena felt it was time for her to leave. Yet she didn't want to just disappear turning into a fugitive and then a recluse. She wanted her freedom, including the freedom of living in Vernworth and not being its sovran. The key to that was Sven.

"We need to talk," she said to him in a rare moment when they were out of earshot of everyone else. "Come to my chamber tonight." Sven squinted at her but agreed.

...

"I want to leave," Lena said without a preamble when Sven appeared in her chamber. "This cannot wait till the wedding. You can be Regent King even without that."

"I suppose it could be arranged..." Sven looked her over, noting armour and daggers under her royal cloack. "What will you do?"

"You know."

"Well, I guess..."

"Here, take this." She took off the crown from her head and put it on Sven's. "It suits you. Enjoy."


Sven looked uncertain, he touched the crown, setting it into his hair.

"I guess I can get used to this," he grinned. "What do you want in exchange?"

"My freedom," Lena said simply. "Sign this..."

She handed him a scroll with a royal seal. It proclaimed that Her Majesty the Arisen the Sovran of Vermund abdicated her throne in favour of her fiancee His Grace Regentkin Sven, henceforth to be known as His Majesty Regent King, thus annulling their engagement in favour of the Arisen's escort known as Rook, a pawn of the Pawn Legion, thus annulling the prize on his head in any and all persecutions that may be pending in the Kingdom of Vermund... etcetera, etcetera... granting the Arisen and any of her pawns the freedom of movement and residence in the Kingdom without limitations... Signed: Her Majesty the Arisen the Sovran of Vermund, henceforth to be known as the Arisen.

"I knew it!" Sven was jubilant when he finally got to the end of the scroll. "Annulling the engagement in favour of your escort! The way he behaved with you!"

"Just sign the scroll," Lena rolled her eyes. "Your Majesty."

...

Lena reached the Nameless Village by the morning, leaving goblins roam the plains and sneaking past cyclopi and ogres. "You cannot do it with pawns around," she smirked. "They cannot pass up a fight... or may be I cannot... but not tonight." Her pack was heavy with extra equipment for Rook, with vials of medicine for the road, with several bows, sets of daggers, a sorcerer's staff, a robe, and a collection of poisoned arrows for those special moments...

"What's with the robe and the sorcerer's staff?" Rook looked up at her in surprise. "Isn't that Scorpio's?"

"I didn't want to leave it behind," Lena smiled. "We'll find him. Battahl awaits."


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~