So Kerrass was delayed another day while he went off and bought another glass beaker, plus a spare in case the same thing happened again.

I still didn’t know what the problem was and I assumed that, given that a solution had been suggested and that the problem was out in the open, that I would be able to sleep that night.

But we were wrong and therefore, I couldn’t sleep.

Or rather, I could sleep. It took me a long time to get there but I could sleep. The problem was that it was far from restful on the grounds that I had nightmares.

I sometimes have difficulty talking to people about nightmares as they normally just don’t get it. It’s a similar conversation to people who have headaches. When someone will say a sentence the equivalent of, ‘I had a headache the other day, you just have to work through it’. Emma and I both have bad headaches which happen when we’ve been working too hard and overwork our minds. One time, I was in so much pain that it was obviously logical to me that standing on my head would alleviate my pain.

The logical process went like this. Rubbing my head helped with the pain. The harder I rubbed my head, the more this helped with the pain. So obviously, if I stood on my head, with all the weight of my body resting on the top of my skull, that would make the pain go away.

If you have a mental image of me, in my university lodgings, half-naked in the late spring heat, sweating with the pain and the heat, struggling to balance against the corner of my room so that I could stand on my head, you have the right idea. Funny isn’t it. It wasn’t at the time.

It’s the same with nightmares. People tell me that they have nightmares and I look at them and want to scream.

“Really?” I want to say. “Really? Do you wake up in the middle of the night with a concerned servant or loved one desperately trying to wake you up because you’ve been scaring everyone. Have you woken up with your voice hoarse and your throat sore from all the screaming that you have done in the night? Have you attacked the person trying to wake you up because you feel so unsafe from the nightmare? Have you thought that the horror was so real that you have doubted the existence of the real world and wondered if it was part of the nightmare? Have you looked into the face of a loved one and wondered why they were smiling on the grounds that you saw them tortured to death before your eyes? Have you seen your soul ripped from your body before watching creatures from beyond the dawn of existence eat your soul before wondering if they could have more like that please so that the things servants turn towards your lover with hungry and calculating eyes? No? Then fuck off.”

I have never said this aloud. Normally, Emma, Ariadne, or Kerrass have spotted the idiot in front of me and managed to steer me off somewhere so that I can have a shake away from all the stupidity.

As my nightmares go though, this one was not particularly graphic or disturbing, more of the disquieting variety.

I was in a clearing in the woodland. I didn’t recognize the woodland or the clearing. It was dark and the brilliant night sky displayed all the stars that could be seen. I don’t know if it was an entirely accurate star scape, but there were certainly constellations and formations that I recognized.

It was peaceful.

There was a stream running nearby that, in that way of dreaming, I knew was clean, fresh, crisp, and refreshing. Indeed, I also knew that there was a deeper section a bit further downstream that would be suitable for scrubbing the road dust from my body.

As I looked around, I was in the middle of fairly thick but relatively well-maintained woodland. I could see Oak, Sycamore, and Yew trees around the place. Small pathways could be seen in the undergrowth that could be places where game had broken through either recently or in the past. My horse was tied up alongside another horse that I knew was going to be belonging to Kerrass.

In the dream, I looked around for where he might be before I realized, he was off in the undergrowth collecting components for his potions. His bedroll was laid out in the way that he wanted it and the camp was all set up properly. I felt full of food, not just full, but satisfied as well.

There is a difference. You can eat canapes and finger food until you are full and I can’t speak for everyone, but I am rarely satisfied by such a meal. I start to crave a sandwich or something elsewhere.

There was a pleasant buzz in the back of my mind and I guessed that Kerrass and I had been passing a bottle of something alcoholic back and forth. Knowing Kerrass, it would have tasted of apples.

It felt good, peaceful, relaxing. I had the ache of a hard days riding in my legs and lower body. The pleasant, numbing kind of fatigue, promising a deep and satisfying kind of sleep that will leave you waking up feeling refreshed. It came to me that I was putting off going to sleep and that I was going to lie down in order to do so very soon. I had spoken to Ariadne recently and we had told each other that we loved each other and all the preparations were done for the morning so there really was nothing else to do other than to lie down and go to sleep. But I was just waiting so that I could watch the heavens for a bit. I wanted to see the stars twinkle in the night sky and see if I could see a shooting star.

I was warm, dry, comfortable, and wrapped in a blanket.

And then I woke up.

Doesn’t sound very nightmarish, does it? And it isn’t, in theory. But when I woke up, it was the middle of the night, maybe a couple of hours after midnight and I was sweating, shaking and I felt sick. All the signs of a good nightmare. I got up and moved around a bit. Doing all the things that long habit has taught me about how to reset my brain after a nightmare. I relieved myself, took a drink of heavily diluted watered wine that is kept in my room for precisely that purpose. I cleaned the sweat from my body and changed the blanket for a fresh one so that I could feel dry and comfortable rather than having to lie back down in clammy sheets.

But then I couldn’t sleep.

In the end, I dressed and went to work with Yennefer for a bit before getting Kerrass to run some spear drill with me in the morning.

I spent a lot of time that day, thinking about that nightmare. It wasn’t a nightmare in the traditional sense. I certainly hadn’t felt anything close to the amount of fear, revulsion, or horror that normally accompanies such a thing. But the nightmare worked its way into my brain and I couldn’t shake free of it.

There have been hundreds of nights, just like that one over the years since I have started traveling with Kerrass. Literally hundreds of them. Nights where I have whiled away the time, talking with Ariadne, making notes, sketching something that had caught my eye over the course of the day before eventually falling asleep. Literally hundreds of days like it. It wasn’t a memory that I could identify, I couldn’t remember that particular clearing although I supposed that it was perfectly possible that it was just one of the many, or it was a combination of many of the clearings that we might have stayed in.

I do not know what it was, nor did I know what it meant.

Ariadne is very interested in my dreams, especially my nightmares, and when I told her about this particular one, she was audibly fascinated by the sequence. She didn’t even have to use her regular catchphrase of ‘fascinating’ in order to let me know that.

“It is entirely possible.” She told me after some moment’s thought We were trying another day of the two of us being separate from each other. We were getting better at it but we were still desperate to talk to each other on a regular basis.

“It is entirely possible that you are beginning to feel nostalgic about your journeys.” She told me. “For you, the beginning of your time with Kerrass is beginning to take on a rosy glow of memory. You are beginning to forget the bad times and only remember the good times.”

“I don’t know,” I replied, taking a sip from the cup of mulled wine that I had brought with me. My habit, when using our link to talk to each other, is to wander out into the gardens of wherever I am at the time in order to get some privacy for the conversation. Close friends don’t care, but servants and other people don’t understand what’s going on when they see this weird northern lord talking to himself. In this case, I had gone out to Yennefer’s garden gazebo and was sitting in the shelter, cupping my hands around a warm cup of spiced wine that Corvo Bianco’s cook makes for cold nights.

“I don’t know,” I told her. “I remember a lot of horror at the time. I remember cold nights, an unfriendly Kerrass, muscles aching from hard training, disliking the food, and constantly having my views challenged by the common everyday things that I found on the road.”

“You had fewer cares.” She replied. She was doing her estate accounts. I had the sense of an abacus and a lot of notepapers. She used to have an estate manager, but the man had thought he could cheat her on the grounds that she was a woman and wouldn’t understand the maths. “When you started your journey with Kerrass, you were just a student in search of a subject of study. You were not yet famous and you didn’t have to deal with public life. Your friends loved you for who you were, you didn’t have to constantly worry about who was being friends with you in order to get to your sister or one of the other important people that you are now acquainted with. Your father was still in your life and none of the tragedies that have since befallen you and yours had taken place. The amount of horror that you had witnessed was still relatively low. Your correspondence was small. You were just a student, with a simple target that needed to be achieved.

“And I may point out, you didn’t have a terrifying vampire engagement to fulfill, a wedding in your future and you weren’t going to be a Count and one of the more important lords in your area.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.” I teased. “You are not a bad thing that has happened to me. You are one of the best things that have ever been put into my life.”

I could feel her blush. Yes, as I’ve said before, vampires blush.

But she had an answer.

“Even good things, especially things like, dare I say it, love and marriage, can be stressful. It was a simpler time for you. Do not be too concerned.”

I took the problem to Kerrass and he laughed at me. Even Geralt cracked a smile. Lady Yennefer was nose deep in a book and I honestly think that Geralt and Kerrass could have been having a sword fight around her and she wouldn’t have noticed.

That’s not true, she would have noticed and glared at the pair of them until they apologized and took their duelling practice elsewhere.

The two Witchers were maintaining their gear. Lord Geralt’s work was reminiscent of a basic movement of maintenance whereas Kerrass had the determined look of someone who was going to be depending on his equipment for their survival very soon. He was making sure that he had the good oils and the clean scouring pads, carefully folded. He was replacing a buckle on his sword harness when I found him.

“Remember all the bad stuff Freddie,” Kerrass told me. “Remember all the small injuries. Remember the cuts and bruises that you suffered at my hand. Remember the thin gruel that we had to eat occasionally. Remember the nights where we couldn’t find a dry patch of ground to sleep in, where the only hope was to wrap ourselves in one of the blankets and hope that the water and the mud didn’t soak through and give you a chill. Remember the times when we were chased down the road by Lord’s guards when I demanded proper payment for my work. Think about the saddle sores and the explosive bowels that we both had after eating some food that wasn’t entirely healthy for us. Remember the fear, and the anger and the mind chilling terror.”

“I know,” I said. “And there’s more. I can remember the stench of marshes, even when we were some distance away. I can remember the suspicion on villagers’ faces and the scorn that they had when they saw me and realized what I was. I remember all the times that we were cheated and there was nothing that we could do about it. I also remember having to go weeks without bathing properly until we both reached the point where our stench became a physical thing that could punch us in the face, and if we did try and clean ourselves up in a river or something which, you kept pointing out, was really stupid anyway, we had to peel our clothing off ourselves.”

I took a breath.

“And I remember those times when I was forced to kill and I remember the feeling of my humanity slipping away. I remember all of those things Kerrass, but there were good things as well.”

He stared at me for a long time before sniffing.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about Freddie. I always smell delightful.”

I had the nightmare again that night.

Kerrass spent the following day, his last full day with us before departing, saying goodbye. It was not as poignant as it might sound. We worked hard on my training and he gave me some drills to perform that he wanted me to practice every day on the grounds that he rather thought I was slipping.

I wasn’t, I was having a bad day after having had two bad nights’ sleep in a row.

Then we went and had lunch with the Knights of Saint Francesca. It was a rowdy affair with lots of throwing of food, oaths of everlasting friendship, including from people that I was pretty sure I had never met before and boasting. It was a bittersweet good time. Especially as they have a tradition of toasting to Francesca at the beginning of every meal and when they depart for “duty” there is a statue of her that they touch with reverence before they depart.

We stayed until mid-afternoon when we were finally able to extricate ourselves from all the well-wishing and gratitude before we rode to the palace where Kerrass was formally thanked, by the Duchess, again, for all of his services. He was given the gift of a grand tournament shield with his new coat of arms. Partially from the small estate that he had been given as his reward for the Jack affair, but there had been some adjustments made. Lounging at the food of the actual design itself was a large black Panther. Kerrass liked it but told the court that he could not possibly carry it on the path with him. He was told that it would be mounted above the hearth in the cottage, for when he returned.

Kerrass looked suitably moved, but I honestly couldn’t tell you if he had any intention of ever going back to that place.

His last stop was a less formal meal at Corvo Bianco. Obviously, Geralt and Yennefer were there but Guillaume and Lady Vivienne turned up with a bottle of wine. As did Palmerin with Natanis on his arm looking as beautiful as only a Succubus at the height of her power can. Syanna and Damien also came, arm in arm and the party soon became rowdy. I even think that Kerrass was particularly moved that so many people had come out to bid him farewell.

I say it was a good night, but I felt sick through most of it and my appetite was utterly lacking and I drank very little.

I didn’t have the nightmare that night, by virtue of the fact that I didn’t sleep. I was not alone though, Damien and Syanna left early to see to “things”, leaving me wondering if Syanna’s desire for a proper courtship had already fallen by the wayside. Palmerin left to escort Lady Vivienne back to the palace, Natanis made it clear that she wanted to thank and say farewell to Kerrass properly which the older knight didn’t want to see or be remotely near.

He would say that he knows that his jealousy is pointless, but that he cannot help it when it flares up.

Lady Vivienne had to rise early for an important meeting. Guillaume had no such commitments and we stayed up for quite a long time chatting.

Apparently, Gregoire was taking to the life of a virtuous Knight well. There were some people that refused to believe that he had been redeemed and there were rumors of his recruitment being a sign that the Knights of Francesca were corrupt. But he was having a grand old time escorting the ducal customs inspectors out to the ships in the harbor. Guillaume told us all a story about how one, famously belligerent sea captain, wanted to refuse certain aspects of the inspector’s craft. Gregoire had stood near to the man, eyes glaring, grimacing, and growling under his breath until the man lost his train of thought.

Anne was out at the Gorgon estates, settling in and putting her stamp on things. She no longer enjoyed Beauclair society, there were too many memories there, too many people to remind her of what she had been in the past and she wanted to wait until such a time as she could move past that before she did much socialising.

So in theory, it was a really pleasant evening that I enjoyed very much.

But I felt sick, physically nauseous, tired, and with a growing headache.

Kerrass left the following morning. Later than he had intended, due to nursing a hangover, the slight limp of the thoroughly shagged and far more disheveled than he wanted to be. As a result, he wasn’t going to make the pass during the day but resolved to stay at the inn near the Southern border. I offered to travel with him, stay the night in that inn before returning to Corvo Bianco the following day. He looked at me strangely before insisting that I remain behind.

I stood there and watched for a long time as he rode away.

Things went downhill for me from there.

There were many problems with what was happening. I missed my friends, Kerrass, Ariadne and so on. Staying at Corvo Bianco was fine but Lord Geralt and I have very little in common and Yennefer was working. Geralt did his best to make me feel comfortable. He gave me some lessons on how to use my new Knightly sword and I don’t think that Kerrass would be offended if I said that Lord Geralt was a far better teacher than Kerrass was.

Both Witchers would argue that learning a second weapon was easier than learning the first, but that is just flattery really. Geralt agreed with Kerrass’ assessment that the sword was not quite the right option for me in the long run and added his argument to the list of people that suggested that I learn how to use Father Gardan’s axe. But that was up in Coulthard castle. So we trained and he helped me out with my dagger work a bit. But beyond that, we have very little in common.

Yes, it is true, that Kerrass and I have very little in common, except all of the shared experience. That makes a difference far more than you would expect.

Yennefer and I are closer, but all she wanted to do was to work. Geralt claimed that she goes through phases like this. She will lounge around for days, weeks, months at a time before something will occur to her, and then she will work solidly from the moment she wakes to the moment she goes to sleep at night. He had a couple of good anecdotes about having to carry her to bed after peeling the working papers off her face or finding her in bed with a book deliberately laid out ready for her the following morning.

And the level of work that she was doing was over my head. My bit of the book on the Elder was all but done. It was little more than an expanded and edited version of the chapters that you will have already read, removing the things about Ariadne and expanding on the behaviors of the other Vampires. And then moving into an annotated transcription of our full interview. It was fascinating stuff, but it was one of those times where the best thing to do was to get out of the way and let the subject speak for themselves.

So I was done. The next job in that regard would be after Yennefer is finished and we start putting the book together in earnest. But even that was going to be months away and Yennefer wanted the first crack at that anyway.

My other friends in Toussaint were busy with their own duties. The Knights of Francesca were increasing their influence, the business of court carried on apace.

I could eat the finest foods, drink the finest wines, attend parties and plays put on by the finest performers on the continent. I even did many of these things, but there was always an underlying feeling that I wanted to share these things with the people that I loved.

Looking back at what was going on, it is easy to see the truth with the benefits of hindsight. The dreams, the boredom, and the longing for something. It’s easy to look back and correctly identify what was happening. But at the time, it was a mystery.

I was longing for something. I felt as though there was something missing in my life and I didn’t know what that was.

The dreams increased in their vividness. It expanded to the point where I would now dream of making camp, cooking the food, doing a bit of training before Kerrass would head off and I would lay down to get some sleep. It often came in small pictures of disjointed processes. Sometimes I would move forward in the story of that little campsite and sometimes I would move backward. The dream Kerrass and I would speak about some topic although I could never remember what we had talked about afterward. The same with the conversations that I had with Ariadne. I knew that I had them, but I couldn’t remember what they were for the life of me.

Then I would wake up. Do some exercises before breakfast. If Geralt was about, we would have some breakfast together before we would do some training for the morning. Then he would depart on business. Often to do with Corvo Bianco or any of his growing business ventures. Occasionally there were things to do with him being the Lord of the Land and occasionally he would be called in to “consult” on a monster infestation.

It turned out that “consult” meant that he was asked to deal with it on the grounds that he was a Witcher and no one else was entirely qualified to walk into a larger Kikkimore nest.

So the afternoon was my own. I would wander up to Beauclair, walk around the same old shops, walk through the same art galleries and the same museums. I even plucked up my courage and went through the display about Francesca once. I finally saw the funny side of things and imagined walking through the paintings and the sculptures of the holy figure that my sister was becoming with her shade next to me. I was finally able to see the ridiculousness of it all and had many a conversation with the imagined shade of Francesca.

It was… healing.

Then, when I ran out of things to look at or things to do, I would return to Crovo Bianco where I would borrow something from Yennefer’s library and read that. This would often result in my trying to read something technical and magical that went straight over my head and was all but impossible for me to understand. Or I would read one of Geralt’s books on Monster Lore.

He has quite a collection. Many of them are annotated in his own hand with comments like “WRONG” and “THIS WILL GET YOU KILLED.” On one of her brief breaks from work, Yennefer found me chuckling at one of the notes that questioned whether or not the man who had written the book would be able to find his own dick in order to pleasure himself.

“He collects them.” She told me. “He pretends to get all outraged, but I think he enjoys it. He claims that he is keeping them from getting out into the wild and spreading their poison into the ears of the naive.”

Then she asked me to look over the latest chapters and our old argument of information versus ease of reading will begin again.

After a couple of days, this self-perceived laziness started to get to me and I started to find chores to do. The servants looked at me strangely but largely ignored me. Geralt and BB’s only comment was that I was a guest and that I didn’t need to contribute.

The cook just handed me a paring knife and a pile of carrots. I think she understood what was happening to me more than anyone else.

When I ran out of chores to do around the Vinyard, I started maintaining my own equipment. Expanding my own weapons training and working on my armor. I didn’t need to. If everything went to plan, I wouldn’t need to do any of these things for quite a while.

And that was how life went. As I said near the beginning of this article, I lasted about a week before something happened in my head and I snapped.

I was wandering around the lower parts of Beauclair. The city has no fears for me now. It is far better patrolled than Novigrad, most of the knights and the guards know me by sight and I was in no danger of being anonymous. I wasn’t going down any dark alleys either.

I was just walking along the dock front. I had a skin of wine in my hand that I had bought from one of the dockside taverns and had ordered it heavily watered down. I still had my spear over my shoulder and my dagger in my belt, because I’m not completely stupid.

There was a horse merchant there. It was not a fancy horse merchant. The proper knightly, war or hunting horses do not get bought from a stable, they turn up to your estate or to your posting with the horse trader. You tell them what you are interested in, in advance, and they bring several examples from which you choose.

This was a stable for workhorses and riding horses.

What happens is that the wagon trains come in by ship and that often means that the horses come with them. Also with passengers when passengers want to ship their own personal horses along with them. It happens in Toussaint regularly when knights come to tournaments.

The problem with that is that horses, sometimes, don’t do well at sea. Normally due to a lack of expertise in the caring of the horses. Diet, and stimulation, and so on. But also weather and things can make a horse sick or cause them to be lost overboard rather than them panicking and causing more damage than anything that the storm can do.

So when these Merchants make port, they need to get replacement horses. Either to pull the wagons or to ride themselves. There was a cooper and a wagon maker nearby as well that performed similar services.

For the interested, the horse trader didn’t have any of the warhorses or hunting horses. Those steeds are specially trained and any Knight will either look after his horse properly or will have brought minions with him to do the tasks for him. If a Knight lost a horse at sea, which does happen, then he would just turn around and go home on the grounds that any lent steed or new horse would not be properly trained to the correct signals. Hunting steeds can be loaned.

But that afternoon, I was wandering backward and forwards next to the dock and I had stopped to look at one particular horse.

Kerrass has told me off about my talking down about my own expertise with horses. It’s one of those things. My father insisted that all his children learn how to ride, ride well, and know how to look after horses. It was a passion of his and the Coulthard stable was, and still is, famous for its quality. I grew up thinking that I knew relatively little about horses because of the condescending nature of the expertise of the castle stablemasters, my tutor, and my father’s passion. The truth was that I don’t love horses. I can see why they’re useful and I have grown attached to the various horses that I have ridden over the years. But they are still a tool first in my deepest heart of hearts.

But all of my tutoring paid off and I know a good horse when I see one. I also know what I’m paying for.

Like when I proposed to Ariadne, I have no conscious memory of deciding that I was going to do what I did. I didn’t set out to go down to the market to buy a horse. I didn’t need a horse. I don’t remember waking up that morning with the idea in my head. But as I was walking around the docks, I was walking past this stable and I saw this horse that was being exercised in the small yard attached to the stable.

I leaned against the fence and watched for a moment.

In the way of horse traders everywhere, the merchant saw me and approached.

“You know your horses, sir.” He said with a carefully professional smile. “Good stock that one. As fine a riding horse as has ever come through my stable.”

I watched her walk for a while before nodding and enquiring as to the price. And then we were haggling. Everyone knows how this game is played so I won’t go blow by blow. I did all the usual things, checked her feet, teeth, and her breathing. I had a short ride with her around the yard to see if we could be friends. I haggled the man down, chose a saddle, some riding gear, and instructed the merchant to have the horse reshod before I picked her up in the morning. I gave the man my note, which he could have cashed in at the bank, and I walked away with a strange lightness in my heart. I did some other shopping before returning to Corvo Biance with a smile on my face.

Geralt was away, Yennefer was working and no one really noticed as I packed.

I continue to swear that I had still not made any decisions.

The following morning, I wore my traveling clothes and armor, packed the rest, and arranged to have them taken north to Coulthard castle with the next shipment. Then, all there was left to do was to collect my horse and ride out of Beauclair, stopping at the bank to withdraw some cash for the journey. Money lending notes are fine, but sooner or later, Innkeepers and food vendors start to want to see the color of your money.

The horse was happy to be out of the stable and snorted as I let her have a little trot to stretch for a bit before I set off South.

I traveled through Toussaint in the middle of their planting season. I rode easily, taking my time, still not really knowing what I was doing. I bought a slice of bread slathered in butter, a leg of chicken, and an apple at one of the vineyards that I rode past and simple food had never tasted sweeter. I would be prepared to swear that it tasted better than some of the feasts that I had had at the palace.

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I made it to the inn that is at the foot of the pass that leads South before I realized what I was doing and suddenly I was drenched in cold sweat.

I saw to my horse, paid for my room, took a bath to clean the sweat off me, and had something to eat before retreating to my room to wait for the inevitable.

I sat next to the window, looking out into the night sky, listening for the sounds of the horses that I was convinced would be sent after me when I felt the gentle tickling on the edge of my mind that lets me know when Ariadne wants to talk to me.

“Are you running away from me?” She asked in a quiet voice. There was a terror in that voice and I felt awful.

“What?” I exclaimed. Normally, I hate the word ‘exclaimed’ but here it was rather fitting. “No. Of course not. It was just…. Why would you think that?”

“Oh.” She said in a small mental voice. “I just… You disappeared without warning and I thought… Since we had…” The mental equivalent of a deep breath seemed to drift over. “I thought that you had run away from me. You vanished, you didn’t tell anyone where you were going and Yennefer called me, and when I didn’t know?..”

There was another long pause.

“Yennefer said something,” Ariadne went on. “She probably meant it to be off-hand and something but it really got to me, it really scared me. She said “I thought that the pair of you talked about this kind of thing. I know that she didn’t mean to say that there was anything wrong with our relationship. I know it was just an assumption that we would have talked about whatever it was that you were doing. But it hit home a bit closer than I thought it would.”

I took a deep breath. The sinister, uncomfortable part of me wanted to say that of course, I didn’t want to leave her in a kind of angry, condescending way. I loved her, how could she think that. But I was also aware that this wouldn’t achieve anything. And further to that, it suddenly occurred that if I was allowed to react irrationally, then so was she. After that, it occurred that any admonishment I delivered was based on what I knew inside my own head. Ariadne didn’t have that luxury.

I took another deep breath.

“I am sorry,” I told her. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. That wasn’t what I was doing, I love you, I haven’t stopped.”

“So you’re not running away from me?”

“No. I told her.

“Right.” Then she asked me one of those questions that shows just how insightful she could be. And also how well she knew me. “So who are you running away from Freddie?”

I had no answer to that and the shock of the question kind of drove the words out of my mind.

“Because if it is your sudden fame,” Ariadne went on. “Or if the pending hugeness of the wedding, or the pressure of working with Yennefer, or any of all of that was getting on top of you, then we can go elsewhere. I don’t care Freddie. We can go to the moon if you like.”

That caught me up short.

“The Moon?” I asked.

“Well, not literally the moon, there is nothing for you to breathe there and you might… It was a figure of speech Freddie.”

The small question was hiding the fact that I didn’t know what was going on with me. “I don’t know Ariadne. None of that sounds right… I mean, Yennefer is not the easiest person to be around. I don’t know how Geralt stands it long-term…”

“He goes off on his hunts,” Ariadne told me. “And the two of them are not jealous now that an actual commitment has been made. You haven’t seen it yet, but Geralt occasionally likes a soft, gentle love and Yennefer is obviously not that. And Yennefer’s taste for dominance occasionally goes beyond what Geralt is comfortable with. And they go and find these things on the condition that they go back to each other afterward.”

“How do you know that?” I was appalled, the thought of such a system was shocking to me. I thought about it later when my shock began to dissipate and it seemed more pragmatic than I was entirely comfortable with.

“Yennefer told me. I was asking about marital relationships and how it works, especially for long-term relationship systems and I was curious how it worked with the pair of them, especially with Geralt’s famous promiscuity. She promptly told me that it wasn’t all one-sided and that they both occasionally had needs that the other couldn’t provide.”

I considered some of the interactions that I had seen between the pair of them in a whole new light.

Then I shook myself.

“I mean, as I say, Yennefer isn’t the easiest to be around, but she’s not that bad and she always apologizes after she’s snapped at me for getting into her eye line accidentally. The marriage… I don’t know… I mean, I want to marry you. I really do and I genuinely can’t wait. But I also can’t wait for it to be over. Does that make sense?”

“It does.”

“I mean, I can’t wait to see everyone there. The Wave-Serpent crew. I want to see Rickard meeting Helfdan, that will be a meeting of minds. Seeing Father Jerome again, I need to thank that man for everything he did for me. I want to sit and drink in the courtyard. I want to see Ciri and I want to … I don’t know. But I have the growing feeling that we are incidental to the whole thing. That we aren’t really needed and that if the two of us snuck off somewhere, then the entire thing would carry on without us.”

“Probably true.” Ariadne admitted “And the thought of eloping is a pleasant one. But we can’t do that…”

“That’s not what I mean. I feel like a soldier in a grand campaign. I’ve read all the books by Coehoorn, Natalis, and the rest and they all say that the most important post in the army is the logistics officer. The person that makes sure that the arrows and the food and the clean water all turn up in the places and at the times that they are meant to. That without that person, then the entire thing falls apart.

“I feel like the Logistics officer in all of this. That we are the logistics officers, that if we just walked away, it would all be for nothing. But that this wedding is happening anyway and that we are being dragged along for the ride. I am looking forward to marrying you. I am. I’m looking forward to the moment when I can change my thinking about you and stop thinking of you as a fiancee and start thinking of you as my wife. I am looking forward to not having to guard myself too closely when I am with you in public. So I don’t need to worry about showing my love and affection and… desire for you to others. Where we have to carefully ensure that our clothes are not rumpled after any time that we spend in private in case we accidentally give people the wrong idea.

“But I am looking forward to that more than I am looking forward to the wedding itself. I am looking forward to a quiet evening in Skellige, just the two of us while you pretend to like my watery fish soup and we can work out how we fit together in a bed. That strikes me as a wonderful process that I am really looking forward to.

“I am looking forward to that too,” Ariadne admitted.

“I am looking forward to our wedding in a sense that I am looking forward to it being over. I want it to be done. But I am not afraid of it. I would rather run towards it so that it can be done and over with as soon as possible.”

“So are you running from something?” Ariadne asked. “Or are you running to something?”

“I don’t know,” I said and I could feel some hysteria climbing up my throat. “I know that that isn’t useful. I know that it isn’t satisfactory but I don’t know that either. I don’t know and I’m sorry that I keep saying that.”

“It’s alright.” She said, her voice more confident now. More confident and soothing. “It’s still an answer. People only yell at you for saying ‘I don’t know’ when they think that you do know the answer.”

I considered that for a moment. “My experience is different than that,” I said. “My experience suggests that people get angry at that response when they think that a person should know the answer despite all possibilities to the contrary. Even if it was impossible for the other person to know the answer, people will still yell.”

It was Ariadne’s turn to take a moment to consider. “You have had some very bad tutors over the years.” She told me.

“I don’t think I would argue with that,” I admitted.

I took yet another deep breath. This entire conversation seemed to be a series of deep breaths.

“I don’t know Ariadne. I swear I didn’t decide to do this. I promise I didn’t. I certainly didn’t mean to hurt either you or anyone else in doing this. All I know is that I was standing in front of the horse trader and suddenly I bought a horse and was on the road. I didn’t mean to do it. I didn’t want to do it, although to say that suggests that I hate this. I didn’t not want to do it either. It was all… as though I was doing things without thinking. Like when Kerrass describes the basic force of fighting. When you practice the movements over and over and over again until they become second nature to you. It was like that. It was as though the movements, buying the horse, arranging supplies, and the rest. It was like they were the basic moments of simply surviving. The same way that I would eat in the morning or take a shit.”

“So do you know where you are going?” She wondered.

“I don’t…” This time the response was an automatic one. And I realized that it was a lie. I did know where I was going but I couldn’t have told you that before that precise moment.

“I’m going after Kerrass.”

I could feel the emotions that Ariadne felt at that moment. I felt her disappointment, a touch of anger, a certain embarrassment, and then acceptance.

“I should never have left you alone.” She said. “I should have seen this coming.”

“You can’t…” I tried.

“No, I could. It seems to be the most obvious thing in the world now that you say it aloud. I should have known that Kerrass’ departure would trigger something in you. How long ago did he depart?”

“A week, I think.”

“Then I think you have done well to last a week. I should have been there with you and I should have told you to wait for me.”

“What would you have done.”

“I would have been there Freddie. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. I should have arranged for you to stay with Yennefer, I could have warned her that this might happen. I could have taken you with me when I left or insisted that Emma take you home. Or I could have taken you to Coulthard castle when I left.”

“Yennefer and I were working on…”

“And she can teleport.” Ariadne retorted. “It would have made her life inconvenient, but then she would have gotten over it. But we should have seen this coming. We should have. Alright, I’m going to ask you a question right now and I want the first answer that comes into your mind. The first thing that occurs to you. No right or wrong answer.”

“Right?”

“Are you ready?”

“I think so, I mean…”

“If I came and got you now in order to take you home, would you…”

“No,” I responded. It was a sudden and visceral response. “No, I need to…”

“It’s ok Freddie. It’s ok. Right… I have another question to ask. And I want you to think long and hard about this one alright?”

“Alright?” I felt myself frowning in concern.

“Seriously Freddie, I need an honest answer.”

“I get it, what…”

“Is this about Francesca? I know what the kind of thing Kerrass is looking for. I know that it was on your list of people to talk about that might be able to tell you some more things about what happened to Francesca in the past. Is this about her? Hunting down answers to a puzzle that’s already been solved.”

I took a deep breath. “No,” I said. “Or being a bit more honest, I don’t think so.”

“Right.”

“I want to sleep under the stars, Ariadne. I want to travel through villages and argue with innkeepers about the prices of rooms. I want to…”

“You want a last hurrah,” Ariadne said before taking what felt like a final, decisive breath.

“Then I have a deal for you my love, are you ready?”

“I am.”

“You can go and have some fun with your friends. I will take the heat with Emma and whoever else is going to be disapproving of this and you will go. But when this adventure is over, you are coming back north. One last adventure.”

“I agree,” I said promptly.

“I’m not done. If it gets too rough, or it gets too risky, then I will come and get you. Kerrass has a week’s headstart. If you can’t find him, I expect you to get back to me and I will come and get you.”

“Right?”

“And finally, if it turns out that this is about Francesca after all. If there’s even remotely a hint that that might be the case. You are to tell me and I will come and get you. Do you understand?”

“I do.”

“Do you agree?”

“I do.”

“Good. Then have fun with your friend and make sure you come back alive. Or I will ensure that you regret it.”

“Just out of curiosity.” I began “What would have happened if I had admitted that this was about Francesca?”

She thought about this for a long time before giving me my answer.

“Then even if it meant the death of your love for me, I would have spelled you to sleep and taken you home.”

“Fair enough,” I said.

We spoke for a while after that, talking about small things and each other’s day. She asked about the horse that seemed to have triggered this whole thing and I asked about the small business of what was going on in Angral. It was all very... not romantic... normal was the easiest thing to admit.

When she was gone, I allowed myself a hot meal on the grounds that it was the last that I would have for some time. Even in the height of summer, the mountain passes into and out of Toussaint are famously cold, and then I slept better than I had done in quite a while. Something about the harder, lumpier beds of the inn being better than the soft, gentle sheets of either the palace of Beauclair or Corvo Bianco.

The food tasted better too. I went for dinner late in the evening so all that was left was the kind of watery, traveler’s stew that was served to late-coming travelers.

It was strangely delicious.

The following morning, I woke early to take advantage of joining one of the formal guides through the pass. It’s one of those rocky things where it is easy to get lost. The likelihood of that was not great, but at the same time, why risk it. There was a wagon train leaving Toussaint and I paid my fee to take advantage of it. The journey over the mountains would take a couple of days and I thought I would be glad for the company.

It was alright. I was invited to join the head of the column so I wasn’t riding through the mush that the other wagons would make of the road. On the downside, Merchants only really have one topic of conversation and that is trade. And because I was a Coulthard, it was assumed that I would know all about trade and therefore be interested in it. I was soon introduced to everyone as “Freddie Coulthard, yes of that Coulthard family.”

It was an uneventful trip although there was an incident towards the end of the journey when a wagon master who had fallen afoul of Emma’s machinations at some point in the past, tried to take his vengeance out of my hide. I doubt that Emma ever knew the man’s name but he came with a couple of his wagon teams on the first night after the wagon train and I had parted ways. They were heading for a coastal city and the markets there while I was heading into the deep South.

That night, I had set my camp and these three men walked into the firelight. I had partially been expecting them and my spear was assembled nearby. They had clubs and knives and I wasn’t concerned. I stood to greet them, let them air their grievances for a while while I leaned on my spear, and then they went away again. I waited a bit before following them to make sure that they were really gone and listened to them complain about “I thought you were going to attack him, and then the merchant complaining that his henchmen hadn’t done their jobs while the henchmen complained that he wasn’t paying them enough to die on the end of a spear. It looked to be getting ready to devolve from there so I made my escape and moved my camp into somewhere a little more concealed.

And that was how the journey went. After the slow start, I stepped up the pace. Kerrass had a week on me and I needed to catch up. The other problem was that I knew roughly where he was heading but not the precise location, so I needed to be careful not to miss him. It was Spring and I was traveling South so it was perfectly pleasant to camp outdoors. I was only forced to find an inn on a couple of occasions. Particularly when I was riding through an especially bad storm and as a result, the chances of finding a safe, dry campsite were slim.

Kerrass was not that hard to track as Witchers are rare enough to elicit comment. I found a village where he had refused the payment of the village virgin instead of the coin that he had been promised. I met the girl and I would have refused too.

She was not bad-looking as these things go, but the reason for that was that she was thirteen and even in the most backward of places, she would only just have started to come into marriageable age. In that part of the world, they are rich enough to wait until a girl is in her later teenage years.

Kerrass had thrashed the girl’s father which had left her in tears and had taken his payment in some goods which he sold in a nearby village. This kind of interaction is not unusual for a Witcher on the road.

I found other signs of him hunting on the road. He had been hired by a small, local merchant concern to destroy a Wyvern that had decided that a particular trade route was on its hunting territory. I found a cave system that had needed to be cleared after the inhabitants of that cave, a pair of trolls, had refused to be moved to make way for a mining expedition. That had not ended well.

I traveled through a city and found the palace where Kerrass had stayed, where he had eaten and otherwise enjoyed himself. I did not partake of the carnal parts of the excursion, but I did enjoy the food and the company while leaving a considerable tip.

I did have to kill a couple of people when they thought that a lone traveler was easy pickings. The problem was that to get news of Kerrass I had to spend money on bribes and things. Which meant that people thought, not unfairly, that I was rich and that I would be worth mugging or ransom. But Kerrass’ training proved true and although I was not the best I had ever been. I was more than enough for common city footpads and a set of bandits on the road.

Kerrass’ choice of my weapon worked well. Men with knives look concerned when you can keep them at bay with a spear and I had no qualms about using that extra range. Both times, I killed a couple and seriously injured a couple more and the rest fled in search of an easier mark.

And then I moved on. Just as the town guards will use a traveling vagabond like a Witcher in order to “solve” whatever crimes that they can’t be bothered to investigate properly, they will also arrest a traveling nobleman’s son. This is because they, like the bandits, figure that he will be good for some bribes in order to get out or to get a ransom paid in order to have them avoid the noose. I was unable to avoid paying a bribe of twenty marks before I collected my gear and camped just outside of town.

And on the journey went.

I was enjoying myself immensely.

As I say, I was traveling hard, but not too quickly for fear of missing him. Kerrass would be delayed by his insistence on paying his own way. He would want to stop and hunt things that would delay him and that started to be proven right when I started to get news about him that was more direct. People would start to say that the Witcher was only a couple of days ahead of me which meant that I was right on his tail.

In theory that was a good thing but it also meant that I was following his trail directly. Whereas before, I could make some educated guesses as to which way he was heading or going before taking a shortcut, now I needed to stick to his trail in order to not overshoot him and lose him altogether.

The landscape was becoming more and more dominated by trees now. Towns and cities either were, or had grown out of, logging concerns and the timber that had been sent.

The only time that Kerrass sped up his march considerably was when we moved past the road you take to go to Dorne and the land of Sleeping Beauty. The heart of the Black Forest which is where we were going, is somewhat North of Dorne itself but at the same time, it was clear that Kerrass didn’t even want to be tempted to carry on that way.

And so we went and the signs of Kerrass’ passage became clearer and easier to follow. I came to a village that was in the process of weeping as they laid a couple of young men to rest. Kerrass had hunted a wraith there, had found out that the woman who had become the wraith had been betrayed, raped, and murdered by one of the men’s fathers.

Kerrass had told the relevant authorities of this and the young man and his best friend had accosted the Witcher, demanding an apology. When Kerrass had informed them that that was the truth, it was what he had found, and to pretend otherwise would be to endanger the village further. The father was long dead and couldn’t defend himself so the son and his friends attacked Kerrass with predictable results. Kerrass had still demanded payment and although he had got it, the village was still in the process of cursing his name.

They assumed that I was some kind of Bounty Hunter, coming after the Witcher. They gave me food and lodging and told me all about how evil he was. I filed away the stories to produce in order to amuse Kerrass later.

He went through another nearby village and destroyed an Endrega infestation before he took a detour to a nearby town which surprised me. Kerrass normally operated on a recognizable rhythm and he wasn’t due to go into a town for a couple of days’ debauchery for a bit yet. But I followed him anyway. The detour proved to me that I was making the right decision in following him closely. I had been tempted to take a couple of shortcuts a couple of times but that would have meant that I would have missed this.

Sure enough, in the town, he stopped and stayed at an inn for a little while, where he was seen talking to a series of shady individuals before moving on.

He went to another smaller village where he cleared a set of old, Elven ruins of Gargoyles, ruins that I was sorely tempted to stay and explore, but I didn’t have time and I followed after. Then he went back to the town and left going south. I would have assumed that he would spend the day in the town but it seemed that he just passed through before heading South.

I was a day behind him, maybe half a week after this when the same thing happened again. He was in the town, spent a day there meeting with people before he headed off, performed a tricky hunt, collected his pay, and then came back to town to travel off again.

In total, It was maybe just shy of a month after I left Toussaint that I finally caught up with Kerrass. And although we would laugh about it later, that meeting did not go well. The problem was that I did not even think about what Kerrass might have been doing in those towns. I was so fixated on catching up with him that things nearly ended in disaster then and there.

It was a country lane like any other. Built on a slight embankment and the road was a little twisty and turny due, I guessed, to providing borders between the lands or different fields. The countryside was pleasantly rolling and the various communities had hacked their lives out of the local woodland. It had, by my estimate, been a long time since there had been anything like a large-scale war in this part of the world and as a result, the people were fairly settled in their lives. The roads were well maintained and although the patrols were not common, they did happen. I had been stopped a couple of times in order for officers and knights to inspect my paperwork, despite the fact that one of them blatantly couldn’t read it and had to get an educated soldier to read it for him.

The locals were all armed and I was riding along, generally having a good time in looking around myself and engaging in my sense of curiosity when out of nowhere there was a twanging sound and an arrow slammed into my horse’s flank.

The horse reared and another arrow struck followed by another. The horse was staggering now and it was going to fall. I have fallen off enough horses in my time that instinct took over. I kicked my feet out of the stirrups and leaped free, making sure that my spear was in my hand. I landed hard and rolled, nearly off the embankment and into the ditch next to the road.

Someone was shouting something but I was too busy seeing what had happened as well as having the wind knocked out of me by the fall.

Two archers had reared up next to the road. A man and a woman by the look of them. He was older than her by a considerable margin with a long beard and scraggly unkempt hair which was kept under a fur-lined hat. As I came to my feet he was putting his bow aside and picking up a large woodcutter’s axe from next to him as she fitted another arrow to her bow. I had enough time to see long brownish hair and a scowl.

I ducked behind my horse that was still thrashing about. Somewhere in my mind was the thought that my horse was dying.

“Stand Villain, stand and face me.”

Yes, people really do talk like that.

From the other direction on the road, from ahead of me, came a man carrying a large sword, similar in length to Kerrass’ blade, and looking at him, I could see that he knew how to use it. He wore black armor that protected all the important bits as well as a suit of chainmail. His helmet had a plain nose guard as he jogged to intercept me. Next to him but running in a way that suggested that he planned to flank me was another man, grim-faced and scarred who carried a long sword and a buckler.

I had time to glance into the fields but it was clear that there was no cover from archers and they would shoot me down if I tried to run.

It was a strange group of bandits to be sure. Not many bandit groups have women in them that young and what little I had seen of her would suggest that she was not bad looking. And certainly, a man who called another “villain” was not usual in such a band.

I waited, hunkered down behind the cover of my dying horse until I had no choice but to leap into the attack. I needed to get past the armored man and buckler so that I could use them to protect me from the arrows so I feinted one way, darted the next, and leaped the other, trying to get round and past them.

They were wise to me though and the first thought that this might be where it all ended started to cross my mind.

I wasn’t dead yet though and I did my best to remember Kerrass’ lessons. The danger was the buckler really, the other weapons could be parried and the armored man could be outrun. Then it would be a case of finding some cover to avoid the archers and to just get away while the bandits cut their losses with the contents of my saddlebags.

I leaped towards Buckler, trying to make him put his back to the edge of the embankment and the road so that I could push him off or cause him to lose his footing. He saw the ruse though and backed off, backing enough so that armor could join the fray.

I had room for a glance backward and I could see that axeman was advancing a bit more cautiously, covering the archer woman who had an arrow nocked and ready. If I attacked back that way then I would quickly get an arrow to the face and there was another man climbing up the side of the embankment with a sword in his hand.

Fine then.

I attacked Armor. He was good. I have fought better but normally that would fall under the umbrella of people that have fought in wars and whose only job was to train and practice and keep themselves in top shape. He was certainly much better than the average bandit. I advanced quickly, lunging at his face and pushing him backward. He parried and blocked with a healthy respect for his own safety, which is rare in this kind of encounter. Most people want the fight over and done which leaves them taking too many risks.

Buckler came back in and I was fighting defensively.

I darted towards one side of armor, pushed his blade aside, and drove my spear butt into his groin area. I connected with something but I have no idea what as I was turning to worry about Buckler who was swinging his sword towards my head. I had room enough to sway aside from that and I could have continued to fight defensively, but Axeman was behind me and closing along with the other man that had climbed up the embankment. I was covered by a bowshot and it wouldn’t be long before I would be forced to surrender and hope they didn’t just kill me.

I drew my dagger and slashed out at Buckler’s sword arm as it passed me. I felt the blade bite into the body and I saw blood but I was too slow. I turned and saw the pommel of a sword coming towards me, I ducked, but not fast enough and the pommel struck my temple. Blood flowed from the injury and ran into my eyes.

I staggered and slashed about with my spear in an effort to drive my assailants back and give me room to clear my vision.

“STOP,” screamed a familiar voice and I felt the huge cushion of air knock me from my feet, sending me flying and staggering into Armor who staggered as well. But I was falling and landed on my back, my head bouncing off the ground.

I blinked and I saw Buckler standing there with a familiar dazed and confused look on his face which he was shaking off.

It seemed to be over and I wasn’t dead. My head was swimming, leaving me feeling dizzy and nauseous.

A face swam into my view.

Of course, it was Kerrass. The man that had climbed up the embankment.

“Dammit Freddie, we nearly killed you.” He was not smiling. In fact, he looked furious.

The entire fight, from the moment the first arrows struck the horse to when I took the blow to my head, was less than a minute. I have no idea how long it really was but it was certainly less than a minute. So to you, it might have been obvious what happened, but to me…

And the adrenaline just dropped out of my system and I blinked at Kerrass stupidly.

“You killed my horse,” I said

Then I vomited and burst into tears.

Battle reaction can take you in a number of ways and it hits hard, especially when you weren’t prepared for it. Strong hands helped me into a sitting position and I felt a waterskin at my lips, from which I drank freely. My weeping moment finished as quickly as it started.

I looked around for Kerrass who was arguing with Buckler. Something about “If you ever use your Sun blasted tricks on me again Witcher then I’m going to remove your testicles.”

“So you are the famous Scholar?” The Armoured man said as he helped me to stand. A cloth was pushed into my hand and I pressed it to the head wound. “I am Brother Stefan of the order of the Blazing Sun.”

I nodded to him before regretting it and having to take a couple of deep breaths.

“Easy there.” Came a heavily accented, older voice. “Let me have a look at you.”

I felt the cloth taken out of my hand as the injury was examined.

“Your healer,” Brother Stefan smiled, “is called Henrik, and his daughter, the lovely Trayka is behind him.”

“Call me lovely again Stefan and I’ll cut your fucking balls off.” Her voice was harsh and unpleasant. There was only a little bit of anger in her voice though, it sounded like an old argument.

“Language,” warned the older man who was examining my head. “Speech like that is not going to attract a proper…”

“Fuck off Father. I have told you and told you...”

The older man sighed. Brother Stefan, or whatever his name was, caught my eye and rolled his own. I found myself liking him as Kerrass finished his argument with Buckler who’s name, I would later find out was Piotr. Kerrass stamped over to us and glared down at me. “Will he live?”

“He’s going to have a cursed bad headache for a day or so.” The old man Henrik said. “And there’s no telling with head wounds. But nothing is broken and he doesn’t need stitches and I can make him a drink for the pain.”

“Fuck that.” Kerrass snarled, “Let him suffer. Walk with me, Freddie.” He ordered.

It took me two attempts to climb to my feet and some deep breaths to fight back nausea. But Kerrass was relentless and led me a little way down the road.

“You killed my horse.” I protested.

“Fuck your horse.” Kerrass growled, “And fuck you too. We had heard there was someone following us and asking after us but it never occurred to me it could be you. What the fuck are you doing here? I swear that I am one cunt hair of the Goddess away from letting Piotr slit your throat.”

I stared at him in shock.

“ANSWER ME FREDDIE.” He yelled at me.

“I just…” I began. “I couldn’t stay behind.” I felt the tears of reaction threatening at the back of my throat again and felt the shame of them.

Kerrass, for his part, sighed.

“Freddie, look at me.”

I did as I was told.

“Is this about Francesca? Is this about your sister?”

“No,” I said.

“Because I swear on the Goddesses perfect ass-cheeks that if this is about your sister then…”

“It’s not Kerrass. I swear to the Holy Flame, it’s not about that. I just… I had nothing to do, my bits are finished and all that is left for me to do is to wait for the wedding. I’ve not felt this useless since the early days of traveling with you. I wanted to do something and I wanted the open road so bad that I could taste it. And I missed you, is that so bad?”

He stared at me flatly for a while. “Does Ariadne know?”

“She knows. She said that she should have seen this coming.”

“So should I,” Kerrass admitted, finally losing some of his anger before he found it again and turned on me. “Listen closely, Freddie. We are not just you and me here. We are a team and I am in charge. Do you get that?”

I nodded.

“You will have to play your part as we go and hunt the Schatenmann and we are all here for our own reasons. But you? Let me make a couple of things clear. If you have just lied to me, even if you didn’t mean to lie, then I am going to tie you up and send you to the Empress. I mean it Freddie, And I will indulge myself a bit and knock the fuck out of you first. Do you understand?”

I nodded, a bit too eagerly for Kerrass’ comfort.

“And I will not be the one that carries news of your death to Ariadne.” He said. “If I tell you, you call in her and any other Sorceress that she can find. And if all else fails, she comes to get you to take you away, you understand?”

I nodded again, feeling the first stirrings of excitement.

“I mean it, Freddie. The Schatenmann’s no fucking joke. This is not a nest of Nekkers or a Cave Troll that we’re dealing with here.”

“I get it…”

“Do you? Because if you endanger the rest of the team, more than one of them will slit your throat in order to save their own skins. Good people, but they have other priorities than either of us. Do you understand?”

I nodded. What else could I do?