Time of Contempt (The Witcher) (12 page)

They were saved by the shaggy little dog who, still yapping shrilly, broke free from its owner’s arms – she had fallen and become entangled in her own six skirts – and lunged
at the monster. The wyvern hissed, rose up, pinned the cur down with its talons, twisted its body with a swift, serpentine movement and sank its teeth into the dog’s neck. The dog howled
wildly.

The squire struggled to his knees and reached down to his side, but didn’t find his hilt. Ciri had been too quick for him. She had drawn his sword from its scabbard in a lightning-fast
movement and leapt into a half-turn. The wyvern rose, the dog’s severed head hanging in its sharp-toothed jaws.

It seemed to Ciri that all the movements she had learned in Kaer Morhen were performing themselves, almost without her conscious will or participation. She slashed the astonished wyvern in the
belly and immediately spun away to avoid it. The lunging lizard fell to the sand spurting blood. Ciri jumped over it, skilfully avoiding its swishing tail. Then, with a sure, accurate and powerful
blow, she hacked into the monster’s neck, jumped back, and made an instinctive – but now unnecessary – evasive manoeuvre, and then struck again at once, this time chopping through
its backbone. The wyvern writhed briefly in pain and then stopped moving; only its serpentine tail continued to thrash and slap the ground, raining sand all around.

Ciri quickly shoved the bloodied sword into the squire’s hand.

‘Danger over!’ she shouted to the fleeing crowd and the spectators still trying to extricate themselves from the canvas sheeting. ‘The monster’s dead! This brave knight
has killed him dead . . .’

She suddenly felt a tightening in her throat and a whirling in her stomach; everything went black. Something hit her in the bottom with tremendous force, making her teeth snap together. She
looked around blankly. The thing that had struck her was the ground.

‘Ciri . . .’ whispered Fabio, kneeling beside her. ‘What’s the matter? By the gods, you’re as white as a sheet . . .’

‘It’s a pity,’ she muttered, ‘you can’t see yourself.’

People crowded around. Several of them prodded the wyvern’s body with sticks and pokers. A few of them began dressing the pockmarked man’s wounds. The rest cheered the heroic squire:
the fearless dragon killer, the only person to keep a cool head, and prevent a massacre. The squire revived the apricot maiden, still staring somewhat dumbstruck at the blade of his sword which was
covered with smeared streaks of drying blood.

‘My hero . . .’ said the apricot maiden, coming to and throwing her arms around the squire’s neck. ‘My saviour! My darling!’

‘Fabio,’ said Ciri weakly, seeing the city constables pushing through the crowd. ‘Help me get up and get us out of here. Quickly.’

‘Poor children . . .’ said a fat townswoman in a cap as she watched them sneak away from the crowd. ‘Oh, you were lucky. Were it not for this valiant young knight, your mothers
would be sorely grieving!’

‘Find out who that young squire serves!’ shouted a craftsman in a leather apron. ‘That deed deserves a knightly belt and spurs!’

‘And to the pillory with the animal catcher! He deserves a thrashing! Bringing a monster like that into the city, among people . . .’

‘Water, and quickly! The maiden’s fainted again!’

‘My darling Foo-Foo!’ the stallholder suddenly howled, as she leaned over what was left of the shaggy little dog. ‘My poor little sweetheart! Someone, please! Catch that wench,
that rascal who infuriated the dragon! Where is she? Someone grab her! It wasn’t the animal catcher; she’s to blame for all this!’

The city constables, helped by numerous volunteers, began to shove their way through the crowd and look around. Ciri had overcome her dizziness.

‘Fabio,’ she whispered. ‘Let’s split up. We’ll meet up in a bit in that alleyway we came along. Go. And if anyone stops you to ask, you don’t know me or
anything about me.’

‘But . . . Ciri—’

‘Go!’

She squeezed Yennefer’s amulet in her fist and murmured the activation spell. It started working in an instant, and there was no time to lose. The constables, who had been forcing their
way through the crowd towards her, stopped, confused.

‘What the bloody hell?’ said one of them in astonishment, looking, it would have seemed, straight at Ciri. ‘Where is she? I just saw her . . .’

‘There, over there!’ yelled another, pointing the wrong way.

Ciri turned around and walked away, still a little dazed and weakened by the rush of adrenaline and the activation of the amulet. The amulet was working perfectly; no one could see her and no
one was paying any attention to her. Absolutely no one. As a consequence she was jostled, stamped on and kicked innumerable times before she finally extricated herself from the crowd. By some
miracle she escaped being crushed by a chest thrown from a cart. She almost had an eye poked out by a pitchfork. Spells, it turned out, had their good and bad sides, and as many advantages as
disadvantages.

The amulet’s effects did not last long. Ciri was not powerful enough to control it or extend the time the spell was active. Fortunately, the spell wore off at the right moment, just as she
left the crowd and saw Fabio waiting for her in the alley.

‘Oh my,’ said the boy. ‘Oh my goodness, Ciri. You’re here. I was worried . . .’

‘You needn’t have been. Come on, quickly. Noon has passed. I’ve got to get back.’

‘You were pretty handy with that monster.’ The boy looked at her in admiration. ‘You moved like lightning! Where did you learn to do that?’

‘What? The squire killed the wyvern.’

‘That’s not true. I saw—’

‘You didn’t see anything! Please, Fabio, not a word to anyone. Anyone. And particularly not to Madam Yennefer. Oh, I’d be in for it if she found out . . .’

She fell silent.

‘Those people were right.’ She pointed behind her, towards the market square. ‘I provoked the wyvern . . . It was all my fault . . .’

‘No, it wasn’t,’ retorted Fabio firmly. ‘That cage was rotten and bodged together. It could have broken any second: in an hour, tomorrow, the next day . . . It’s
better that it happened now, because you saved—’

‘The squire did!’ yelled Ciri. ‘The squire! Will you finally get that into your head? I’m telling you, if you grass me up, I’ll turn you into a . . . a . . . well
something horrible! I know spells! I’ll turn you into—’

‘Stop,’ someone called out behind them. ‘That’s quite enough of that!’

One of the women walking behind them had dark, smoothly combed hair, shining eyes and thin lips. She had a short mauve camaka cape trimmed with dormouse fur thrown over her shoulders.

‘Why aren’t you in school, novice?’ she asked in a cold, resonant voice, eyeing Ciri with a penetrating gaze.

‘Wait, Tissaia,’ said the other woman, who was younger, tall and fair-haired, and wore a green dress with a plunging neckline. ‘I don’t know her. I don’t think
she’s—’

‘Yes, she is,’ interrupted the dark-haired woman. ‘I’m certain she’s one of your girls, Rita. You can’t know them all. She’s one of the ones who sneaked
out of Loxia during the confusion when we were moving dormitories. And she’ll admit as much in a moment. Well, novice, I’m waiting.’

‘What?’ frowned Ciri.

The woman pursed her thin lips and straightened her cuffs.

‘Who did you steal that amulet of concealment from? Or did someone give it to you?’

‘What?’

‘Don’t test my patience. Name, class, and the name of your preceptress. Quickly!’

‘What?’

‘Are you acting dumb, novice? Your name! What is your name?’

Ciri clenched her teeth together and her eyes flared with a green glow.

‘Anna Ingeborga Klopstock,’ she muttered brazenly.

The woman raised a hand and Ciri immediately realised the full extent of her error. Only once had Yennefer, wearied by Ciri’s endless complaining, showed her how a paralysing spell worked.
The sensation had been extremely unpleasant. It was the same this time, too.

Fabio yelled weakly and lunged towards her, but the fair-haired woman seized him by the collar and held him fast. The boy struggled but the woman’s grip was like iron. Ciri couldn’t
budge an inch either. She felt as though she were slowly becoming rooted to the spot. The dark-haired woman leaned over her and fixed her with her shining eyes.

‘I do not approve of corporal punishment,’ she said icily, straightening her cuffs once more. ‘But I’ll do my best to have you flogged, novice. Not for disobedience, nor
for theft, nor for truancy. Not because you are wearing non-regulation clothing. Not for being in the company of a boy and not even for talking to him about matters you are forbidden to speak of.
You will be flogged for not recognising an arch-mistress.’

‘No!’ shrieked Fabio. ‘Don’t harm her, noble lady! I’m a clerk in Mr Molnar Giancardi’s bank, and this young lady is—’

‘Shut up!’ yelled Ciri. ‘Shut—’ The gagging spell was cast quickly and brutally. She tasted blood in her mouth.

‘Well?’ the fair-haired woman urged Fabio, releasing the boy and tenderly smoothing his ruffled collar. ‘Speak. Who is this haughty young maid?’

Margarita Laux-Antille emerged from the pool with a splash, spraying water everywhere. Ciri couldn’t stop herself looking. She had seen Yennefer naked on several
occasions and hadn’t imagined anyone could have a more shapely figure. She was wrong. Even marble statues of goddesses and nymphs would have blushed at the sight of Margarita Laux-Antille
undressed.

The enchantress took a pail of cold water and poured it over her breasts, swearing lewdly and then shaking herself off.

‘You, girl.’ She beckoned to Ciri. ‘Be so good as to hand me a towel. And please stop being angry with me.’

Ciri snorted quietly, still piqued. When Fabio had revealed who she was, the enchantresses had dragged her half the length of the city, making a laughing stock of her. Naturally, the matter was
cleared up instantly in Giancardi’s bank. The enchantresses apologised to Yennefer, asking for their behaviour to be excused. They explained that the Aretuza novices had been temporarily
moved to Loxia because the school’s rooms had been turned into accommodation for the participants of the mages’ conclave. Taking advantage of the confusion around the move, several
novices had slipped out of Thanedd and played truant in the city. Margarita Laux-Antille and Tissaia de Vries, alarmed by the activation of Ciri’s amulet, had mistaken her for one of their
truants.

The enchantresses apologised to Yennefer, but none of them thought of apologising to Ciri. Yennefer, listening to the apologies, simply looked at her and Ciri could feel her ears burning with
shame. But it was worse for Fabio; Molnar Giancardi admonished him so severely the boy had tears in his eyes. Ciri felt sorry for him but was also proud of him; Fabio kept his promise and
didn’t breathe a word about the wyvern.

Yennefer, it turned out, knew Tissaia and Margarita very well. The enchantresses invited her to the Silver Heron, the best and most expensive inn in Gors Velen, where Tissaia de Vries was
staying, delaying her trip to the island for reasons known only to herself. Margarita Laux-Antille, who, it turned out, was the rectoress of Aretuza, had accepted the older enchantress’s
invitation and was temporarily sharing the apartment with her. The inn was truly luxurious; it had its own bathhouse in the cellars, which Margarita and Tissaia had hired for their exclusive use,
paying extortionate sums of money for it. Yennefer and Ciri, of course, were encouraged to use the bathhouse too. As a result, all of them had been soaking in the pool and perspiring in the steam
by turns for several hours, gossiping the entire time.

Ciri gave the enchantress a towel. Margarita pinched her gently on the cheek. Ciri snorted again and dived with a splash into the rosemary-perfumed water of the pool.

‘She swims like a young seal,’ laughed Margarita, stretching out beside Yennefer on a wooden lounger, ‘and is as shapely as a naiad. Will you give her to me, Yenna?’

‘That’s why I brought her here.’

‘Which class shall I put her in? Does she know the basics?’

‘She does, but she can start at the beginning like everyone else. It won’t do her any harm.’

‘That would be wise,’ said Tissaia de Vries, busily correcting the arrangement of cups on the marble tabletop, which was covered in a thin layer of condensation. ‘That would be
wise indeed, Yennefer. The girl will find it easier if she begins with the other novices.’

Ciri hauled herself out of the pool and sat on the edge, wringing her hair out and splashing her feet in the water. Yennefer and Margarita gossiped lazily, wiping their faces from time to time
with cloths soaked in cold water. Tissaia, modestly swathed in a sheet, didn’t join in the conversation, and gave the impression of being utterly absorbed in tidying the objects on the
table.

‘My humble apologies, noble ladies,’ called the innkeeper suddenly, unseen, from above. ‘Please forgive my daring to disturb, but . . . an officer wishes to talk to Madam de
Vries urgently. Apparently the matter will brook no delay!’

Margarita Laux-Antille giggled and winked at Yennefer, upon which they pulled the towels from their hips and assumed exotic and extremely provocative poses.

‘Let the officer enter,’ shouted Margarita, trying not to laugh. ‘Welcome. We’re ready.’

‘Children,’ sighed Tissaia de Vries, shaking her head. ‘Cover yourself, Ciri.’

The officer came in, but the enchantresses’ prank misfired. The officer wasn’t embarrassed at the sight of them, and didn’t blush, gape or goggle, because the officer was a
woman. A tall, slender woman with a thick, black plait and a sword at her side.

‘Madam,’ said the woman stiffly, her hauberk clanking as she gave Tissaia de Vries a slight bow, ‘I report the execution of your instructions. I would like to ask for
permission to return to the garrison.’

‘You may,’ replied Tissaia curtly. ‘Thank you for the escort and your help. Have a safe journey.’

Yennefer sat up on her lounger, looking at the black, gold and red rosette on the soldier’s shoulder.

‘Do I know you?’