Entry 19
I returned home for the urgent errand that Emma wanted me to be there for. It turns out that it was for cake testing. The opportunity to hire a baker who would sort out all of our desert needs. I had wondered why the castle cook wouldn’t be taking charge of that matter and indeed she was. But there was a combination of different cakes and I had to make choices about which cake I wanted and with which wine.
Never have I felt more full having eaten so little. And I must confess that in the end, I arbitrarily chose one based on Emma’s expression. Ariadne was there and discussed things at length and she helped me narrow the matter down but after that, sooner or later, the dreaded question came. “Which do you prefer Freddie?”
And I was forced to answer.
My truthful answer was that I just didn’t care. I was marrying the woman that I love, the rest was just frivolity and an excuse for everyone to get together and have a party. I barely cared. I have never been more tempted to elope.
Apparently, the tailor is coming tomorrow.
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Entry 20.
There is nothing more sure to make you feel inadequate than a group of people, often men, walking around your all but naked form and discussing the proper way in which to clothe you. I swear that my manhood shrivelled up in embarrassment during the entire proceedings. Thank the flame that the castle is warm at this time of year.
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Entry 21
Emma agrees with my publisher and my tutor. I don’t know what to say about that. She thinks it would be good for me to get it all out onto paper. I have no idea if that is true. It feels as though it might be true but that is not as enticing thought as people might think.
I’m not sure if I want to go back. I’m not sure I want to think about the things that I was thinking or the things that I was ignoring in preference for self-delusion.
I’m not even sure if I am making sense.
“I love you,” she told me, and if I have any experience of my sister at all, I know that nothing good ever comes after she has told me that she loves me.
“I love you, but you’re moping. You rallied for a little while but now you’re sinking again.”
“It’s hard,” I told her. A little bit more petulantly than I like. “Keeping things going, keeping my head above… whatever. It’s hard and tiring and… watching myself all the time. It’s hard.”
“I know.” She told me, not unkindly but with enough… vehemence to call things to mind. “I know it’s hard and I know it’s tiring. But I also know that you stay in bed because it’s safe there. You need to pick yourself up and get back out there. You need to get back to work.”
“I rather thought I was doing that,” I told her.
“Yes. And I’m proud of you. But that is not what I mean. You need to get back to…”
“I know what you mean,” I told her. And I did.
“So work Freddie.” She said.
“I don’t want to go back there,” I told her. I don’t want to go back to the woodland of shadows and questions to which I don’t know the answer.”
She considered this for a moment.
“Think of it as a service.” She said. “The Empress is moving her eye southwards. She knows that she and her father spent so much time looking north that they neglected the South. Now the time has come for her to look to the South again. People will be looking at the Black Forest. Delegations have been sent. Imperial forces are deploying. You need to explain why. People already know that you are involved, they want to know how and what you did and what they can do to…”
I glared at her. She took another approach.
“All of that is true.” She said. “It is. And I mean it. But you once told me that history marches on. You tell me that sometimes when there are no answers, all a historian can do is change the context. You put the context into place so that those historians that come after you can answer the questions for themselves.”
“Did I say that?” I wondered. “It sounds too clever for me to have said that.”
“That, or words to that effect.”
I swore at her and she laughed. She knew that she had won, even as I knew that I was going to fight it for a bit longer.
-
Entry 22
I went to see Chireadean today. He looks happy and his wife is pregnant. He looks happy and insists that I eat for free there. I wanted to get drunk but I am self-aware enough to know that that is possibly unwise. I drank just enough to know that I wanted to drink much more and then I made Carys take me home. She has been appointed my shadow now, whether by herself or by some order.
I don’t want to ask her which it is.
I stopped off at the crypt again to talk to Father. I know that it worries people when I do this but…
I went and sat in front of his headstone and looked at the picture of him the headstone carving that has him on horseback, staring off and pointing at some game.
This time, I thought I could see disapproval in the lines of his body and his face. As though he had turned away from me in disgust.
I will start work tomorrow
-
Entry 23
Much to my disgust, things have started off really well. As it always does, it is taking me a little time to get into the swing of things after a long rest between writing these articles and it’s left me feeling a bit… dry. But the early part of the series is planned out and the words seem to be flowing moderately well which is a good sign. It feels alarmingly good to be sitting at my desk and working through it.
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Entry 24
I still feel pretty good about the work. I am left wondering what is going to happen when I run out of things to write. I am dreading the end of this series as I see no other way to address the end other than to describe exactly what happened. It’s far from a satisfying ending for me let alone a reader. And there are too many questions there that…
No,
I’m not there yet. I won’t borrow trouble against a future that has not yet come. I have work to do. Things to write and people to harass.
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Entry 25
Now that I am in the midst of things, I find that I kind of want to defer the pleasure, to spread things out a bit and enjoy writing my last series of articles regarding my travels with a Witcher. This isn’t helped by the fact that the exciting parts of the mystery are very front-loaded in this series. Trayka’s eyewitness accounts, Stefan’s tale of the ghost village and so on. That’s the stuff that sells magazines, or so Dorthan would like to tell me. The problem then is that we go from that and into the village of the dryads where… I’m not sure how to get across the horror of that situation.
It is the primal male fantasy to be with more than one woman at the same time. I have no idea why but it reaches down into the depths of our souls. It’s one of the first dreams that we have about eroticism. The formless female shape, followed by the endlessly willing partner followed by the multiple willing and enthusiastic partners.
The female equivalent, for reasons I’ve never understood which is surely part of the point, seems to be warmed blankets and rugs, preferably sheepskin, in front of an open log fire. There is probably a reason for this but I’ve never understood it.
So there is too much of me worrying that I will write about what happened to us, to me, amongst the dryads, will be seen as some kind of ideal. Something that people will envy rather than something that should be… I don’t know. Something that should be frightening and sickening.
Made even worse by the fact that I miss the pair of them. With this amount of distance and the relatively close contact with Ariadne, I am more aware than ever that I love Ariadne and what I felt for Chestnut-Shell and Apple-Seed was a shadow of that greater feeling. But I miss them. They were good people.
I hope that they are alright.
But again, I am thinking ahead in the story. Not living in the now of what I am writing. Speaking of which, I really should get back to it.
I’m going back to Oxenfurt tomorrow. Time to start bringing in some more of my other professional activities. Writing and lecturing and teaching and the normal day-to-day life of the Academy.
I’m oddly looking forward to it.
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Entry 26
I hate those days when I don’t get any work done. It might not be much, only a few thousand words at best but when I don’t manage it, I somehow feel as though I haven’t achieved anything. Carys, my new shadow, and I rode back to Oxenfurt today. Again, for reasons I did not really understand, I wanted to go out of my way and check out the new memorial stone to those that had been burnt on that dead patch of ground.
I stood there for a long time. Long enough that someone, who I hope didn’t recognise me, came over to stand with me.
“Did you lose anyone that day? They asked, I’m pretty sure it was a male voice.
“No,” I said. “Not on that day. But many before and certainly many since.”
I sensed rather than saw the nod from the person.
“So many fine, good and decent men, plucked away from us too soon.”
It took me a long time for my brain to start catching up to my ears. To my credit, I had been riding in a kind of dreamlike state. The same one that I normally manage to achieve when I am riding with Kerrass. I was thinking about the work that I wasn’t going to be doing because I was on the road. Thinking over the proofs of the book that I still haven’t touched…
I spoke to Yennefer last night. She laughed when I told her that I was going to miss the deadline on that.
“Publishers exist for us to punish them.” She told me with relish. “Learn to love deadlines, I certainly do. I like to listen to the whooshing noise they make as they whistle past you.”
“If I missed deadlines at university, I would have been kicked out,” I told her.
“Yes, but that is because they were telling you what to think. Giving you the building blocks of thinking. That takes time and they need you to take that in in a fixed amount of time so that they can give you the next brick. Whereas now you are older, you can think for yourself, you are required to think for yourself and that takes time. They need you more than you need them. That’s the difference.”
I felt bewildered by that and she knew it.
“The switch is something that always takes people, including me, off guard.” She told me.
.
Fucking tangents.
So my mind had been going over that conversation and the conversation about wine that I had not been paying attention to in the first place. As well as thinking about the lecture that I would be giving in the morning and the academy social that I was planning on attending in the evening. I was still partially lost in that haze while I stood in front of the stone and my brain was struggling to catch up with whatever it was that the man next to me had said. I was just in the process of turning, my mouth opening as I decided what to say when he clapped me on the shoulder.
“I will leave you to your thoughts.” He told me. “My condolences.”
And he walked off. For a long time, I watched him go until he joined the lines of people that were moving along the road between Novigrad and Oxenfurt.
He didn’t look poor, nor did he look particularly rich either. He looked… ordinary. I don’t know what’s more terrifying.
I turned back to the stone and went back to counting the names.
-
Entry 27
Made Dorthan happy today. Turned up unannounced and told him that I had a couple of new articles for him. I love being able to do that and take him by surprise like that. Just walking up and dumping the papers on his desk and saying “There you go, okthanksbye.” The mixture of hatred and joy always makes for an interesting combination on the dwarf’s face.
I normally then have to follow it up with some kind of social invitation so that he can network with the university higher-ups. That always makes him feel better.
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Entry 28
I had a lot of fun today. I gave a good lecture this morning and saw a lot of people engaging with it. The girl that was fighting me over the presence of Griffins in the wild and the benefits of leaving them to run wild is beginning to come round and engage with both sides of the thinking.
Which is the point.
I’m taking great delight in writing out the account of what happened at Piotr’s village, the old man’s account of what happened to Piotr’s wife is good and punchy and also serves to show people that religious fervour is not an evil that is unique to the church of the Eternal Flame.
And today, I had to tell Carys that she would be accompanying me to a formal academy occasion. Ariadne can’t come and I am feeling… I don’t know if there’s a term for it but I kind of have an urge to drive some hypocrisy into people’s faces.
I told her that she would have to wear a dress. She didn’t like the idea.
I have it all planned out. I have written to Rickard who is going to have a word with that Sergeant of his. Carys is going to look amazing. She’s a beautiful woman and the better part of a year of eating proper food, training properly and being taken care of has enabled her to put on some muscle mass as well, so she is going to look amazing.
So we’re going to arrange for the pair of them to spend a night in one of Oxenfurt’s finest inns. I guarantee that the Sergeant… whose name is Padraig, I’ve been learning that recently. Will not have seen her in that kind of finery. And Rickard is going to ensure that he is wearing a good suit as well and has, at least, combed his hair and beard.
It’s nice to do things for those that you care about.
Carys was unhappy with the idea but I think… I hope… that she will enjoy the surprise.
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Entry 29
Ding dong, I was wrong.
Again
You would have thought I would have been used to the idea by now.
I had forgotten what it was that Carys used to do and where she comes from. She had known that I was hiding something from her and she thought I was arranging things to sell her back into pleasure slavery. I found her shivering and shaking in my rooms and then it all came tumbling down around me.
On the other hand. The one thing that I can say about having struggled with traumatic events myself, is that I know how to recognise it in others and know more about how to deal with it.
I sat down with her, talked her through getting her breathing under control and then sat with her until she felt better.
Then I took her to a nice public tavern where I fed her her favourite food and explained the scheme. That night, I arranged that Ariadne would message Laurelen who would be able to come to town to take Carys to Emma’s favourite tailor in Oxenfurt. Not as good as the one in Novigrad but still.
Then I told her that the dress that I would buy for her would be the dress of a woman befitting her station and my strictly platonic affection. I told her that I would pay for her hair to be done and to arrange for jewellery and Laurelen agreed to help with cosmetics. We also agreed that Padraig would still be kept in the dark. She liked that.
I think I’ve saved the situation, I hope so. She deserves better than what was done to her. I am angry at my mistake but in a rare moment of candid talk between us. She told me that it was ok.
Her biggest concern about the dress was where to fit all the knives.
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Entry 30
I write this as I’m sitting in the outside area of the tavern while I drink my spiced wine and waiting for Carys to come out of the Seamstress place. This will be her final fitting. I hope it goes well.
The last few days have been busy. The first fitting left Carys feeling nonplussed. She told Laurelen that she felt on edge having people look at her like that. The second fitting left the Elf woman in tears. At first, I was really worried that it was all falling apart around me but then she hugged me hard and fast before she went off to pretend that she was ok.
I hope this one goes well as the formal is tomorrow.
The writing is going well. The chapter regarding Piotr’s past is now in the hands of the publisher and the printer is just working on getting the first chapter out. There are flyers, literal flyers advertising another adventure of “Witcher Kerrass and Professor Frederick” in the latest issue of the University magazine. I can’t remember the last time I was in town when an article was being published. I don’t like it. People are looking at me. Some sourly and some adoringly.
It won’t be long before I am unable to walk down the street before someone thrusts a book in my face to sign.
Including books that I didn’t write, have never read and are on topics that I could care less about.
Emma has trained me well though. Never sign anything that you don’t know the providences of.
Oop, she’s coming out. Judging by that grin, it went well.
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Entry 31
There is something in the wind. I have no idea what it was but for the first time, my courtier instincts have been firing in the University and I have no idea why.
I was working in my office. I think I was critiquing some essays as a break from working on the latest articles when the Dean of history and Anthropology turned up and asked me to give a series of lectures.
“Now that we know that you’re in the neighbourhood for the foreseeable future.” He began.
“Or at least until the wedding.” I retorted. All of the deans and the faculty of the University are invited to the festivities. This dean is not the least. I have always got on with him but he looked nervous for a reason that I wasn’t immediately clear.
“Yes, quite. But still. We were hoping we could persuade you to do a series of lectures. You know, now that you will be around to finish them off.”
I sensed the critique, something that I rather felt that I deserved. Getting made a professor and then swanning off around the continent for months on end has not been great for my status as a Professor.
“I’m game,” I told him. “Do you have a topic in mind? Or should I feel free to…”
“On Witchers.” He said, the verbal equivalent of snapping my hand off. “Definitely on Witchers.” He laughed at his own eagerness. Again, that nervous edge to the laughter put my nerves on edge.
“Is everything ok?” I ask him. “Can I get you something to…” I was reaching for my brandy. I keep a small stock of it in the office to help calm nervous students when they are panicking about things that I couldn’t care less about.
“No no, it’s fine.” He laughed again. “We were thinking… five lectures. Maybe once a fortnight?”
I did the arithmetic in my head. That would still leave me plenty of time between the end of the series and the wedding to do… whatever needed to be done. Every time I ask, it seems that more tasks are being added to the list of things that I am absolutely essential for.
“Standard length?” I wondered
“Hour-long, yes.”
I could do that. The truth was that I could probably go for longer than five hours on the subject.
“This, as well as your other work. Could you fit that in?”
“I don’t think that would be a problem.” I watched him carefully.
“Good, Good. Then I will make the bookings and send you the time scales. First one next week?”
I nodded. He was relieved.
Something is in the wind.
The formal is this evening. I would write more but I should go and get ready.
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Entry 32
The formal was a disaster.
Not for Carys, thank the flame. That couldn’t have gone better. She looked amazing in the dark green dress. Formal, commanding and powerful. It was a noblewoman’s dress and there was no denying the fact that this woman was an Elf. She wore her hair high on her head which meant that there was no hiding her raised cheekbones and the upswept ears.
At first, she was shy and I could understand why, given everything that has happened. I found myself in the position of protector for the first time in a long time as she would occasionally try to hide behind me when we were making formal talk with different people.
Watching people, I will admit to finding it entertaining when people didn’t know what to make of it. They would be talking to me, have noticed Carys, make some joke about how they thought I was marrying the Countess of Angral. But then their eyes would be dragged back around to the pointed ears and then they would lose their path of thought in a mix of spluttered confusion.
It was amazing.
She was not the only Elf there as it turned out. Emma’s concerns are bringing a few more of them out of hiding and more than one has expertise in some of the fields that are being taught in Oxenfurt. So she soon disappeared into the crowd and found her confidence. She found a friend in Dr Shani who was there in her position as Professor of Field Surgery and the two were wandering around looking amazing and throwing it in the face of everyone.
I would dearly have enjoyed spending the majority of the evening watching the pair of them walking around and puncturing the pomposity of the people around.
But sadly it was not to be.
There is always a risk at these things that people that don’t like me will turn up. I normally ignore them. And the first couple of versions of “How dare you show your face?” were ignored.
But then it was from a fairly rich-looking man and his wife. Older couple, gold chains, expensive clothes, the normal kinds of things. I would be prepared to swear on the symbols of the sun that I had never met them before.
And he spat in my face.
I felt my eyebrows raise. It has been a long time since someone has given me such a direct insult and I was working out what to do when the Dean of History turned up out of nowhere and led the man and his wife off.
Then my old tutor arrived and handed me a small cloth to wipe my face which I took and he steered me away. I wiped my face with the provided towel.
“What was that about?” I wondered, still waiting to see if I was angry about it.
“Nothing.” He told me and I looked up at him sharply. He was turning to walk away and I grabbed his arm.
“People don’t challenge people to duels over nothing,” I told him. “And that is what he did. No one could blame me if I…”
“You shouldn’t have brought the Elf,” he told me.
I stared at him, feeling the anger building up.
He saw it too.
“Look, nothing against Elves, truly, nor do I have anything against the Lady…”
“Something something, anything said before a ‘but’ something.” I felt the anger rising.
“These people don’t need another excuse to hate you.” He told me.
I stared at him. He was embarrassed, looking around. And he was sweating.
I felt like I was on a battlefield.
“Alright,” I said. “What the fuck is happening? Where has this new lecture series come from and…”
“The chancellor and the deans are having pressure placed on them by city officials, certain other members of the administration and important alumni to remove you from the faculty. They want to strip you of your Professorship and have you kicked out of…”
I laughed at him.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll go. I give it a day before I’m offered a professorship in the secular divisions of Ban Ard or the Imperial Academy. I’ll publish in either of their presses in absentia and I will still be able to…”
He has known me for a long time and knows the warning signs of an eruption from Mount Freddie. Again, he took me by the elbow and steered me off. We went to his office in the end where he poured me a drink and sat facing me as he filled his pipe.
“First of all,” he said. “You should know that we are on your side.” He considered this for a moment. “Well, maybe not the poetry and arts faculty but…”
“Cut to it.” The anger was still flickering through my blood. “I’m not falling for the scatty old man routine.”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“But I am a Scatty old…”
“Professor,” I warned.
He sighed and seemed to age in front of me.
“This is why I never wanted to be a dean.” He told me before looking up and continuing.
“The university is being put under pressure to expel you.” He told me.
“What?”
“It’s the same group of merchants that are outraged by your sister being who she is and charging a fortune for the use of the docks…”
“That she built.”
“You have been away too long Frederick, and Oxenfurt is changing. So is Novigrad for that matter and although I don’t like it. There is little we can do to…”
He realised that he was getting angry himself and took a deep breath.
“I’m not on their side.” He told me. “But dammit if it isn’t easy to fall into that role.” He took a deep breath. “You and your sister have changed Oxenfurt and Novigrad over the last couple of years. And although I and anyone with an ounce of intelligence would admit that the change was coming anyway, people see you both and want to blame you for it. They think it all started with your Father’s death and then…”
He sighed and took a large drink from his cup.
“Your sister is a woman and better at being a merchant than most of the average men put together. This threatens them. She has removed the monopoly of the Novigrad docks, meaning that people can dock their ships here to get a head start on the roads heading south. Meaning that those men that owned the Novigrad dockside warehouses have had to lower their rents to remain competitive. They hate her for that. The Novigrad dock inspectors have seen a reduction in the amounts of bribes that they receive because those shipmasters can just come to Oxenfurt.
“Those merchants that do use your sister’s docks are angry because she charges them rent and docking fees. And she has her own warehouses which she charges fees for. Those fees are competitive with Novigrad, by which I mean that they are lower. But because it’s your sister, therefore a woman, who loves another woman and can therefore not be married to a man more open to persuasion. And an Elf lover and magic lover to boot. They hate her.”
“It sounds like they resent the fact that she is better than they are…”
“Nobody likes to be beaten at their own game.” He said to me sharply. “And being beaten by one who you have been taught to believe, from birth, is lesser than you makes it even worse. So they hate her and therefore they hate you.”
“Ok but…”
“And they hate you because you are famous. You have made it more acceptable to like Elves and to approve of Magic users. You are marrying a monster. You have advocated for the rights of workers and peasants and women. You have promoted education when the majority of these people depend on keeping their workers down and uneducated. But you have started to spread the message that this is not alright.
“You have created a new Knight Errant movement.” He went on.
“That’s down in Toussaint though.” I protested.
“I’m not talking about the Knights of Francesca. Those younger sons and daughters… which is another thing they hate your sister for. Your family has proven that daughters are just as good as boys in doing… whatever. So now daughters are refusing to marry who they have been told to marry. They are coming to University and then going travelling. They are denying husbands, Fathers and older brothers and they are doing it because you told them that it was ok and then your sister proved it.
“But I’m talking about those people that are wandering the countryside righting wrongs and making a nuisance of themselves, pointing out to the villagers that they are being victimised. They do it with paper, quills, ink and mathematical tools rather than breastplate, shield and sword.
“You did that. You are powerful now. You have the ear of the Empress, the Queen of Skellige as well as being friends with some of the most feared men of the sea. These merchants spread tales of how… the reason that Coulthard shipping is avoided is that you were sent and you went there.”
“I went there and was a decent human being.”
“I know that and you know that. These changes were coming. All of them were. It’s just that you and your sister are the visible spearpoint of those changes.
“The university used to be a place where people could come and learn to write poetry, sing and learn about the properly approved history. Then, when they got here, they would learn about things like subjectivity, and objectivity and could make their things. But you have taken the art of critical thinking and elevated it. Some are even saying that the administration had to make Dr Shani a Professor because of your advocacy of the woman.”
“She’s deserved that role for longer than I’ve been studying…”
“I agree. But those outside the university see the woman being elevated over their sons, want someone to blame for it and they find you.”
“That seems weak to me. I mean, I can see my sister’s kind of… But me?”
“The university is failing Freddie.”
I was shocked for a moment. He said it brutally and without compromise.
The most powerful man in any debate is a man who knows how to use the weapons of debate and believes in his cause.
“Radovid hurt us.” He told me. “I mean, he really hurt us. We smuggled a lot of our professors away and we managed to hide a lot of our vital texts and even the most diligent of book burners would not have been able to get everything. Overnight, we became a resistance cell against our own government and we became cells of knowledge. That is not helped by those books remaining being the ones that he, Radovid approved of.”
“I know this.” I retorted. “Radovid kept all the books that argued for the supremacy of royal power and the ones about how Kings were close to divinity. Thus securing the power of him and the church. Any texts that argued for anything else were among the first to be burnt.”
“You know it but you don’t see the way it leads us.” He snapped before sighing. “I’m on your side Freddie, I really am, but you have to understand what’s happening. That means that the books that are left argue for traditional values. The divine rights of Kings. Magic is evil, anything that isn’t human is called a monster. And although there are plenty of arguments to go against this, the fact remains that any student that wants to back up those arguments cannot refer to old texts because all of those ones were the ones that were burnt. While those that argue for the status quo have religious texts, histories, legal arguments and Flame knows what else to back up their arguments. And that weight is telling.
“And we are not alone now. We used to be the premier learning facility in the North. But now there is a new one up in Kovir and the Imperial academy, who knows that they are ahead of us, are opening their doors to all comers without the historical prejudices of Anti-Elven sentiment and the church fanned flames of magical loathing.”
“That’s not true,” I argued. “The Imperials hate magic just as much as we do.”
“Do not be a fool.” He snapped. “There is a big difference between a doctrine of service and a desire to burn them all as they come.”
I had nothing to say to that. Our teachers, like our parents, have the ability to reduce us to the children that we once were.
“So there we are.” He went on. “We don’t have the resources that we had and we don’t have the ability to expand. Whatever else might be the case, we live on an island and Oxenfurt grew out of the need for us to have some kind of service for the university, food, housing, clothes and whatnot. That doesn’t change the fact that we cannot expand into new facilities. Therefore we cannot expand into new fields. The only thing that we have going for us is loyalty and geography. In that, we are closer to the population centres than having to send a child up to Kovir or all the way south to the Academy.
“So what do we do?
“There are two schools of thought. The first is that we double down onto our foundations. We concentrate on the fencing and the medical schools. We go back to the great seven art forms and we rebuild using traditional values and traditional systems. We go back to the foundations of what and who Oxenfurt academy is and re-emphasise what our name is and why it’s famous. We cannot compete with the Imperial academy on any other basis and like the academy, the one in Kovir is new and is therefore untested and untrusted.
“Therefore we need to remind people that Oxenfurt is the oldest, and therefore best, centre for advanced learning on the Continent. Tradition and experience will be our watchwords.”
“Old thoughts.” I sneered. “Old facts, old thinking. Learning will again be the province of old men with long beards and grubby robes. An exclusive club that only those with the right amount of money or the right name will be able to gain entry to.”
“Precisely.” He told me. “And it will work. Oxenfurt will survive. We cannot compete with the South or the growing knowledge factories of the north. Therefore we must fall back to our place of strength.”
I felt anger and loathing in the pit of my stomach. I have lived with that shit for as long as I could remember.
“But we also know that this doesn’t work.” He went on. “You of all people have proven it. But you are a controversial figure. Your sister is your sister. Your Father is a jumped-up son of a merchant.”
I have never quite been able to figure out if my mentor really thinks that whenever he talks of my father.
“And you have seemingly made it your mission to murder noblemen and their children.”
“I have only killed evil men who use their blood and their title to think that they are above all…”
“I know that and you know that. But you are also the only credible source on those matters. Think like a historian Freddie. We only have your word for it that Lord Cavil in the North was an evil man.”
“And the Church.”
“Who will say whatever the Empress, a woman, will want them to say to survive. You might be pro-Empress and she has done wonders. But many people remember that her Father conquered us and that we were sold out to the White-Flame by the Temerians. Already histories and analyses are being written that argue that Kalayn, Cavill and all the other Lords and Ladies that were deposed and destroyed by your Brothers, Samuel and Mark, and your sister, were martyrs to the old Northern rule. Men who might have been threats to the Imperial rule. Then you go in, “find heresy” which your brother confirms and then the anti-Imperial lot are murdered.
“But I’m getting off-topic. You are the exception that proves the rule. Nobles from all over have been refusing to send their sons and daughters to Oxenfurt because you are a professor here and you promote dangerous thinking. Things like critical thought, questioning the purpose of nobles and the rights of the nobles.”
“I’ve never done that.”
“You argue for the obligations of nobles.” He told me. “You argue that nobles have a duty to their people as well as the other way round. People hear what they want to hear, or what they fear to hear so what they hear is ‘nobles have a duty to their people’. And then they fear that the peasants will hear that and get ideas.”
He was right about that as well.
“So they don’t want daughters to think that they can get away with anything they like. They don’t want their sons to question the rights of the Father. So they don’t want to send their children to be educated here. They take the education upon themselves and hold the children back. Hiring tutors that agree with their way of thinking. So people see our student numbers fall and our fees decrease. There is the prestige loss of these names no longer coming to Oxenfurt to study which then has a knock-on effect. Lord Such-and-such isn’t sending his children here therefore Lady thinks-too-much is not sending her daughter. And so on.
“All because you come along with your dangerous way of thinking. Named on the faculty and these powerful men with their rich deep pockets and their old, prestigious names, want you gone before they send their sons to be educated by us.
“But it’s not lost on us, especially here in the history dept as well as the medical and anthropology departments, that every time you publish a series of articles, applications from rich merchant families goes up. Your lectures are amongst the highest attended lectures that we offer. We are getting return students that want to learn from you. Other departments are expanding because people want to talk about what you have brought in from the world. People want to discuss the things that you have learned and others are going out into the continent to see if they can find some of the things that you talk about. The small pieces of knowledge and wisdom that exist out there, not in our musty old libraries.
“So we need you. We do. We are never going to get rid of you. We can’t. You are one of the pillars that hold up the entire edifice of the university. But nor can we ignore the fact that you and your family have many, many enemies. Including Queen Regent Adda herself. And you make more of those enemies every day just by existing, flaunting your wealth, your powerful friends and your ascension to higher rank.”
“And then I walk into the room with an Elf on my arm”
“A startlingly beautiful one at that. Not least because we all know who she is and what her history is. And not one of us, not a one of us honestly believes that she has anything other than every right to be here. But there is also not one of us that doesn’t know someone, or love someone or is friends with someone. That wouldn’t argue that she is a murderer for buying her freedom on the point of a dagger. They think she should have attained her freedom legally and I know…” He held his hands up to fend off my outrage. “I know that she couldn’t and that there was no avenue for that. And I know that the Empress has declared the practice of non-human sex trafficing illegal and has pardoned all such victims for their past crimes as well as the Elves that helped you in particular. But you see why that’s a thing?”
I did.
“I was just wanting to do something nice for some people that saved my life once.”
He deflated.
“I know.” He said. “Which is why my anger is unfair. If you had brought her here to annoy people or provoke people we would be having a very different conversation. As it is, this has gone far more accusatory than I wanted it to. I don’t want you to tone down your behaviour. I want you, and your sister to be clear, to be the people that you are. You both deserve it. Even while the part of me that is an old, dusty man with a long beard hates that I am losing my membership in the club.
“The change you bring is vital. It is. I know it and those of us that study history… Really study it, not just learn the facts of what happened. We know that a return to the past will return us to the problems of the past which will lead us towards doom and end us right back where we started. People like you and your sister are dragging us forward. And we need that. But people hate you for all that you’ve been doing and we are having to fight them for it.”
I nodded and finished my drink. I wanted to go home.
“I am sorry for causing you problems,” I told him.
“Psshhh.” He waved it off. “Just five years ago, I would have relished the fight. But I’ve been feeling old lately. You have come back, and it looks like you’re staying this time rather than swanning off all over the continent, which is another thing they hate. We have given you far too much leeway to be away from the university and not putting the work in for many’s comfort. Even while that work has made you, and therefore us, more famous and therefore more powerful. But as I say, you and your energy make me feel old.”
I went back to the party.
I made some good noises and now that I knew what the battlefield was, I made sure to put my efforts in. I hope that I helped, even a little bit
And I certainly mean to put some effort in.
It is strange. I honestly believe that I could not have done other than that which I have done. I believe that my old tutor is honestly on my side and that he means to help me. But I cannot deny that I feel as though I have been told off in some way. I can’t go back tomorrow for any number of reasons but I’m going to head back to the castle at the end of the week and see if I can work with Emma to help in some way. I have no idea what.
At the appointed time, I took Carys off to the inn and along with Rickard, Shani and Chireadean, we saw Carys and Padraig catch sight of each other across the room.
It was everything I could have hoped for.
I miss Ariadne.
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Entry 33
I woke up this morning feeling as though I was hungover. Which I think is monstrously unfair given that I had, at best, two cups of wine which were heavily watered as it was.
But I woke up this morning feeling like hammered shit. An interesting saying that Rickard introduced me to. And even though I always thought it was something of an exaggeration to talk like that, I must say that it is quite accurate to how I am feeling in the here and now of the thing.
I feel like hammered shit.
I have a desperate desire to hide away from everything, not emerge from my bed and just wrap myself in a blanket. I can’t do any of those things. I have a new series of lectures to plan for. My word count on the latest series of articles is falling badly behind. I can’t go out as my bodyguard is, hopefully, still wrapped in the arms of the man that loves her and I promised Laurelen that I would go nowhere without her.
So I have nothing to do other than to climb into the seat behind my desk and work.
But I don’t want to.
I love Oxenfurt. I love the wooden walls and the thatched rooftops. I love the little alleyways and the small gardens with the little fountains and things. I even love the smell of the slow-moving river that eases its way around and on both sides of the island that the place that we laughingly refer to as a city sits.
It’s not a city, it’s far too small to be a city but dammit if I won’t stand on the walls and die on that hill if I have to.
I love Oxenfurt. I love the little shops that you will find nowhere else. The shops that sell things that only the residents of Oxenfurt could ever possibly want to own. The knick-knacks. The learning aids, the special ribbons that you can mark your books with. The rebinding places that will rebind beloved old books with the weird designs that you have been obsessing over. That can mark your books with colour schemes and gilded writing and all of the other pointless little luxuries that only students can get excited about.
I love the feel of the place. The desperate grabbing on of life. The feverish hold on that part of our lives where we began to grow up and decide who we were. I love the little cafes and taverns. The market stalls and the open cooking areas. The kinds of places that are little more than a repurposed old military breast place, hammered flat with a fire lit underneath to make it hot. Then food is cooked on it.
The stalls that sell warmed drinks can only claim to be called a cafe because they have a few tables out the front and a couple of stools to serve as seating.
I love that feeling that you can sit in a tavern and hear an argument, along with an open invitation to join that debate. I love the people here. The constant feeling as though we might be changing the world. That we can solve things and turn the world back to its correct path if we just think hard enough, love hard enough… live hard enough.
I have never felt more alive and more carefree than when I was a student at Oxenfurt. The most I had to contend with was unrequited love and the looming threat of deadlines and exams. I miss those times and sometimes, on my darkest nights, I find myself wishing that I was still there. Still in the midst of things.
So it cuts my heart out that although I love Oxenfurt. And I do. It wounds my soul that Oxenfurt might hate me.
I have work to do.
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Entry 34
It is not an uncommon phenomenon where I have to stare at a blank piece of paper for a long period of time. This is no different.
I have been asked a question several times “What is the hardest part of writing the articles, what is the hardest part about writing a book or writing a lecture?” I lie, every time I lie. I tend to say things like “deciding what it is that I want to say.” Or I might make a joke about cutting down on the waffling. The truth though is that the hardest part of doing this. Is the starting of it. I’m not talking about the blank page at the beginning of an article or the blank slate where I plan the lectures. I’m talking about starting. Every day, where I sit down at the desk, turn to the relevant page and get the words from my head, down through my arm, into my hand and onto the paper. It’s hard. Just deciding what it is that I want to say.
Every time. Starting is the hardest part.
Trying to recover the previous train of thought, trying to remember the passion that you had at the end of the last writing session before fatigue and lack of inspiration dry you out.
Starting is the hardest part.
I don’t know what to do.
There is a not small part of me that wants to chuck it all in. I’m going to be married in a few months anyway at which point I will be moving off to take up residence in Angral and my work rate is going to suffer for it. I know that, everyone knows that. I can write books in absentia, I do not doubt that they will be published and if not by one of the Oxenfut presses then I’m sure I can find another one.
But I don’t want to hurt the University that I love. I can’t…
So there is a part of me that wants to give up. To resign my place on the faculty, to surrender my lodgings in the city which I’ve been tempted to do for a while now anyway, and just walk away from it all.
Sometimes I think about doing that out of anger… How dare they think that of me. How dare they consign me to the same places that those other fuckers want to… How dare they say those things about Emma and me. So fuck em.
What do they know, they don’t deserve my help.
But then the other side of things swings into view.
The hurt. I love Oxenfurt and the prospect that I might be causing that place pain… I don’t want that. I don’t want to be remembered for that.
So I want to quit. I want to walk away, take all of my stuff and dump it in the river as I ride over the bridge back towards the castle and never set foot in this place again. I will look for another home.
Someone, I can’t remember who, but someone once told me that you can have more than one home. Someone else said that home is the people, not the place. And that is true, Ariadne, Kerrass, Rickard, Helfdan, Svein and the rest of the Wave-Serpent survivors those friends from university
(Dorthan’s note: Freddie has, on multiple occasions, obfuscated the names of his university friends. He wrote their names here but we have honoured his overriding wish in case those people need to be protected. As far as I know, they are all staying in Novigrad anyway after the wedding was delayed so they can’t have been involved… And they are well known to many. So…)
Still, others insist that home is wherever you choose to hang your hat.
But for me, I have two homes. I hope that I will be able to call Angral my home soon. Ariadne’s presence will help with that. But my two homes are Coulthard castle… My Father’s castle.
And Oxenfurt.
I don’t know what to do. I feel wretched.
Back to the castle tomorrow.
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Entry 35
I lost my temper at Emma today. It sometimes seems as though our entire relationship, brother to sister, is a series of fights where we argue with each other and then make amends with the other. I suspect that this time will be no different.
She knew about all the problems that were happening in Oxenfurt. She knew about the issues that the faculty were having regarding having my name on the lists and she knew about the threats that we had been receiving. She knew about the pressure that was being brought to bear and she knew about all of the people that hate us. It was why she was so insistent on sending some bodyguards with me.
I was furious.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I demanded.
“Because it wasn’t important.” She told me. “It isn’t important. And I didn’t want to frighten you. I didn’t want you to be driven away or think that you were doing anything wrong. You were fragile when you came home and I didn’t want you to think that you needed to do anything to protect me. I was worried that it might be the straw that broke the donkey’s back, to know that these people, whom you love and respect, hate you so much. I wanted to protect you.”
“So why didn’t you tell me when I started to feel better?” I demanded.
That was when the shame hit her I think.
I’m in my rooms now and I’m trying to decide if I’m the asshole here. It’s a constant debate. Being ill or being outraged or hurt can be an explanation for shitty behaviour, but it is never an excuse. So when I lose my temper or get angry or have a fight with someone, I must check myself to make sure that I’m not being an asshole.
Am I being an asshole? Emma was doing it out of concern. Was she right about being concerned? Was she right to keep things from me?
At first, I think she might have been right to do so. I think it might have been better if she kept these things from me. But later?
I think it was a mistake. I feel as though I was thrown into the monster's nest without knowing which monster I’m facing. Without the proper weapons or the proper venoms on my blade or the proper methods for the destruction of the beasts.
But she was right about the fact that if she had told me all of this early on, it might have destroyed me.
I still don’t know what to do.
Ariadne was no help. She told me that just giving up on the University would be something that I would regret. Which she’s right about. But she thinks that both Emma and I have made mistakes here. We are both right and we are both wrong. That we should just apologise to each other, hug it out and come up with a way to fight back against our enemies.
I mean, when I write it out like that, it makes a lot of sense.
.
I should go and find Emma.
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Entry 36
Ariadne was right. She’s going to enjoy that a bit too much. She’s taken a certain delight in tallying all of the things that she has been right about and that I have been wrong about and occasionally likes to bring that tally out. It is disturbingly sparse on my side.
Emma and I are going to hold a war meeting tomorrow.
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Entry 37
Kerrass came by this morning. He seems well. A couple of injuries and an arm in a sling. Apparently, he strained his arm muscles and is keeping the arm in the sling for a period to rest it from the strain. He was going off for a bit longer and wanted to check as to how I was doing. I told him that I was getting there and was feeling better but not BETTER.
He took that well, gazed at me for a long time before taking on supplies, hugging Emma and then riding off.
My best friend and my sister have formed an unholy alliance against me. I’m not sure how I feel about that.
Emma and I sat for a long time and we formally made friends again. Apologising to each other for the things that we have done wrong. All the things that we said and did not say and now we are hoping to move forward.
The Coulthards are going to war. We have decided that it’s time to make all of these friends that we have made, all of these contacts and things… It is time that we start making these things and these people work for us.
It starts with me. I am going to write and deliver the best damn lecture series on Witchers that I can deliver. I am going to pack those halls full of students, lecturers and authorities on the subject. I’m going to get Ariadne to come and to see if she can persuade any of the movers and shakers to arrive as well.
I’m going to get it to the point that even if we book out the largest lecture theatre on campus, then we are still going to have people being turned away at the door.
From there I’m going to do a small book tour, signing the books and giving talks on the topics that have been talked about.
Emma is going to make a significant donation to the University. By now she owns, or at least has a share, in various of the buildings in Oxenfurt itself and as well as money, she argues that those buildings can be used for academic purposes to expand the university itself. If the faculty are going to argue that the city exists to service the University, which is not an unfair statement. Then we must ensure that there is more university to service. That will aid the city in expanding. It will bring in more trade for all the movers and shakers and all of those people, including our enemies, will owe their new wealth, status and power to the Coulthard family.
We are helped by the fact that a lot of powerful and important people are going to be coming to the area for my wedding. So we’re going to use that as well. We can have Helfdan bemoan the fact that he had to go to Temeria for the siege engineers that have helped him begin his rebuilt fortress at Holmstein. We can have Queen Cerys tour the docks to look for different ways and different processes that she can take to the docks of Kaer Trolde to bring more modern processes and ideas to the fore.
As well as all of those dignitaries, Sam is going to be there and we are planning to roll him out as the next defacto Lord Coulthard. I am going to write to him and explain the situation. Given that he was there when we talk about the cult in the North, there are plenty of human eyewitnesses to the horror that happened up there in order to disprove all of the nonsense that is being talked about. And with my older brother being a powerful man in the church, as well as all the powerful people that will need to be preached at, we can expect a lot of those self-same inquisitors to be around to spread that word and make it clear what really happened in the North and what the cult that Edmund and Cousin Kalayn were a part of.
Shani, who was here visiting Rickard, is also on board. She immediately came up with a list of things that the medical school has needed and wanted since flame knows when and that was just regarding the traditional medicine schools.
By traditional, she meant that aspect of medicine which is about fixing people that are hurt, the curing of diseases and the prolonging of life. She came up with these things as well as a whole bunch of ideas that she and her fellows had asked for and been asking for, for longer than Shani had been at the University, all put off with the excuses of… we simply don’t have the money for that.
It was almost as though she carried the list around on a piece of paper. She and Emma got all excited and spent some time poring over a map. They were talking about partnerships with the hospitals in Novigrad and all over the place, Shani was almost fizzing with excitement.
In the meantime, I must adjust my thinking. I have been treating the University as this immovable rock that I can rest on. The oak tree that was there before I was born will be there long after I have left. It was my fallback point and my guiding light. The place where I remember being happiest. So I have treated it as though it hasn’t changed in all of the years that I have been away.
It has changed, of course, it has. And I have changed with it. Neither of us is the same and I need to remember that. Oxenfurt is different and I have been taking it for granted. I need to adjust my thinking on that.
In the same way that the Coulthard family has a residence in Novigrad for when it has business there, I will buy a small townhouse in Oxenfurt. I will pay taxes and therefore have a permanent base for when I am working there.
Obviously, my primary residence is going to be in Angral, but for those times that I am going to be lecturing or when Ariadne is away seeing to feudal duties or whatever, it will become important for me to have a base where I can work from.
It is a symbolic gesture as much as anything. Just a receiving room on the bottom, a sleeping room, a working room at the top and a transport circle for Ariadne to move me in and out. She is absolutely for the idea and already has some ideas as to how to work it.
Shani has promised that she will help me find the right place for it. We mean to head back to town the day after tomorrow.
I feel… rejuvenated by this. I don’t know if it says something about me that I feel better knowing that I have someone to fight. A battle to win and something to do.
It probably does and I am going to crush them for their temerity in daring to cross us.
That sounded a little bloodthirsty.
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Entry 38
Now that the decision has been made and the fight is on. I have been putting together the brief outline of my lecturing course on Witchers. I’m hoping that Kerrass can come back at some point to go over it and make sure that I am not going to anger any members of his caste by what I am going to say.
In the meantime, I have invited Lady Yennefer as well as lady Eilhart to attend on the grounds that they are working on the new mutations that are being proposed as well as those old members of the council that the Empress formed with regards to reforming the Witcher schools.
I want the debate and I want it to happen inside the halls of Oxenfurt. Lady Eilhart can’t go anywhere without pissing someone off and Lady Yennefer is similar so that will cause some arguments. As well as the other members of that council who are still debating things.
The last time I heard anything was that Lady Eilhart was close to a breakthrough on the matter but that’s immaterial. I will be lecturing on the history of the Witchers and the future will only be a postscript at the end of the final lecture.
I have also written to try and convince Professor Dandelion to come down and attend. If we add that he will be performing some of his more famous works on the subject of the Witchers then that will be guaranteed to up the attendance.
I am going to start with the stuff that we all know. The mythical figure of the Witcher, standing or sitting on his horse on the edge of the town or the village. Two swords on his back armoured against whatever might come towards him. His medallion twists in the wind as he levels his yellow gaze down at the population centre as he waits for the next soul who is going to approach with the offer of work.
From there I will move into the different schools and the ancient history, or what we know of it anyway. Starting with Alzur and the original mutations and purposes of the Witchers before the various breakings and foundings of the new schools and what we still know of each.
The third lecture will be about the trials. That will almost completely be taken from my own experiences that were provided by Letho in the north. And over and over again, I can take it back to the fact that I am a young, healthy, fit person. Whereas the children of the Witcher schools were starved, mistreated and so on. This is the tricky one as there is no getting away from the fact that the Witchers mistreated their young charges.
The fourth lecture will be about the various attacks on the Witcher orders. What caused them, who attacked and why. I will have to be careful not to go too deeply into this. The art of this lecture is going to be in being brief. I must be careful not to get too distracted and caught up in the details of the matter. Give the watcher and listener enough to be able to perform their own research rather than having to depend on my own.
The final lecture will be on the philosophical questions that Witchers bring. How dare we put others before ourselves. How dare we demand others do our fighting for us. And then, I will be able to talk about why all of the orders stopped making new Witchers and what that means. Why did they stop? Because they chose to stop inflicting this on themselves and others.
That is the ending. That is what makes Witchers heroes. They broke the cycle of their self-inflicted trauma and abuse. They did that, not us, they did that. And then a brief word about the future of Witchers and that will be it. I think that there’s some tweaking to do, some things to think about and some work to be done. But I think there’s some real promise here.
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Entry 39
Emma and I are going to Oxenfurt together. Running out the colours and marching with a purpose. Putting on the full and proper regal behaviour. We’re going and we’re declaring to everyone in a big voice that this is what we’re doing. Unified front and all of that.
Rickard is enjoying himself, putting together an escort. The bastards will be doing the outrunning, deliberately riding in advance, on either side and bringing up the read with bows ready and evil expressions on their faces. The Knights that provide the close escort will be led by themselves and the armour will be polished and glittering. Emma will be formally dressed and although she hates it, she and Laurelen will be riding side-saddle.
I will be riding with Carys, behind Emma and Laurelen.
Unfortunately, Ariadne can’t make it.
I think Rickard is looking forward to the possibility of showing off what he can do for Shani who is also riding with us. Thus telling everyone where she falls in the matter.
“It is time to pick sides.” She said with a glitter in her eyes. I think she is looking forward to this as much as Emma and I are.
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Entry 40
That was more than satisfactory. Emma went to her meetings with the Chancellor and the deans and it is like the sun has risen over the university again. I saw the Dean of history smiling and the Dean of medicine walking around as though he had been slapped across the face before being kissed. A kind of bewildered, shocked smile plastered across his face.
The only person that seems unhappy is my landlord. Poor man. But he’s had several years of rent out of me and at the end of the day, I suppose that if I get to be really famous. He can put up some kind of plaque or something.
The University will not change overnight. It is going to take a lot of work and effort. But I think we made a good start today. And I did enjoy seeing the movers and shakers of the city council go running up to the University in a terror.
For now, I will be staying in my faculty rooms on campus while a house is chosen for me.
I have work to do. Letters to write and lectures to prepare.
Busy busy.
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Dothan’s note: It’s me again. That is as much as we can get out easily. As I say, I have no idea how much of this is important or is just Professor Coulthard waffling into his diary. There is more to come that is still being translated and the printers are still being set. But we thought it important to get, at least, the first bit out there. Stay safe everyone and I will hope that you will hear from me soon.