“So,” Helfdan continued to refuse to look me in the eye. “You want me, and my crew to take you, your Witcher companion and The Swallow around the islands.” He didn't seem to be asking me a question.

“Yes.” I answered him anyway.

“And the mission must be kept secret.” He had a way of asking questions where he didn't lift the inflection in his voice at the end of the question to make you think that he was asking a question. It was like he was just offering a series of statements that he wanted confirming. The side-effect of this was that you really had to listen to him to make sure you knew when he was asking a question that needed answering.

“We're more keeping it quiet. So far, you know, the druids know and whoever the Queen decides to tell.”

“So just the three of you.” He was staring at a point on my chest, just to the right of the centre and he did so unblinkingly.

“Just the three of us and our horses.”

“There will be no room for horses.” He responded.

“Then we won't be taking our horses then.”

“How long will the journey take?” This was the first time that he had actually phrased something as a question during our conversation.

“As long as it takes to find our answers.” Not a lot of people would be happy with that kind of response and it was foolish of me to say it. But Helfdan seemed to appreciate brutal and simple honesty. Short, sharp sentences that got straight to the point. Most people wanted to be put at ease. To be promised that everything would be alright and that things wouldn't be all that dangerous after all.

But as I was rapidly learning during this conversation, Helfdan did not behave like “Most” people.

“There will come a time when the ice will make sailing impossible.” He told me, as far as I could see, his gaze hadn't moved from where it was focused on my chest. He hadn't blinked either. In all honesty, it was making me a little uncomfortable. “The Wave-Serpent is a strong ship but she cannot stand up to the ice.”

“I understand.”

We were sat at one of the tables back at Kaer Trolde in the main hall. Ciri and Kerrass were off some place doing what they needed to do. My task was to arrange transport around the islands. I had approached Helfdan's table, where I was greeted genially and warmly by most of the men, or at least those who had been present during Helfdan's rescue of me. The exceptions were those men who had not been in the room at the time, and Helfdan himself, who had watched me with calm eyes and no expression.

When I had explained that I needed help and that help required transport aboard a ship, the men fell into place in the same way that a military formation assembles. Helfdan was sat at the head of the table. On his left side sat the man that I had been introduced to as Svein Hardhand who, to all intents and purposes was Helfdan's advisor and second in command. Aboard a ship he would be referred to as a First mate. On the other side, facing Svein was a short, stocky barrel of a man wrapped in a bearskin. He was massively shaggy with a long bushy beard, equally bushy eyebrows and long hair that fell down his back. I was sat next to Svein and the other men arranged themselves around the four of us so that they could listen.

But that didn't mean that their activities stopped. There was a sense of constant movement, that people were always doing something. Some men were working on weapons, sharpening and oiling, another man was drinking, Another was leaning on his long axe and stroked his beard while he listened.

“Please tell us what you need.” Helfdan had said queitly. Then he sat, down, staring at my chest, leaning back with a relaxed kind of attitude but he was rubbing his hands together. It seemed like some kind of nervous habit as he rubbed the palms together before turning one hand over so that the palm could rub over the back of the other hand before switching them over. His face was expressionless and other than his hand movements. He was utterly still as he listened to my story.

Svein was frowning in concentration as he listened but there seemed to be less intense focus than there was from Helfdan. The other man was just sat there. He had a tankard in front of him and was constantly drinking from it. They must have been sips because he didn't finish the tankard in the time it took me to finish what I was talking about.

When I had finished, I had told them about the places that we wanted to go including the temple of Freya as well as the Watchtower of the Skeleton Ship and that we would have further places to go after that. That we might need to speak to many people in order to find the information that we speak.

“What will the Queen say?” He asked after a long moment. He took his time between questions as well. Not asking the next question until he was sure that the previous one had been well thought out.

“We are finding out.” I answered. “Ciri...”

“The Swallow.” Svein corrected me. For some reason, they all had difficulty thinking of Ciri as anything other than her nick-name.

“Sorry, yes, The Swallow is talking to the Queen as we speak. However, one of the things that we are saying is that we will not be moving forward on any permanent course of action until we know what that course of action is going to be. At which time, we will put it to the Queen, and which ever advisers she decides she wants to listen to.”

Helfdan didn't twitch as he listened to my little speech. Just that constant rubbing of the hands. Then he seemed to take a deep breath. “Danger.” He said, seemingly to no-one in particular as he shifted his gaze to a point on the tabletop, equidistant between Svein and the man in the bear-skin.

“Weather is going to be a real problem.” Svein said, he put his hand on my arm as a warning to keep silent. “We're looking at storms as the cold moves in, the sea is going to be angry as we go. Cold will also be a factor. We are probably going to have to camp ashore as we will need fires to stay warm and hot food is going to be vital to survival.”

The other men did not comment but I could almost hear them take that in.

There was another pause.

“Enemies.” Helfdan said. I hadn't realised it before but he was asking for assessments of the situation from the two men on either side.

“Traditionalists.” The man wrapped in a bear skin said. “And any foreigners that make their money from the festival.”

“Other factors.” Helfdan said. He said this shortly after the bear skin's comments which made me think that he had already either thought of that, or that he had dismissed it.

“The mission is to destroy the Skeleton Ship.” Svein said. “We might attract Supernatural attention.”

“We have a Witcher.” I said in response to this.

Helfdan raised his eyes to look at me, the first time that he made eye-contact during our entire conversation. His eyes were a pale blue and he looked at me as though I was nothing. Like the lowest form of life or a speck of dust to be brushed off his cloak. There was absolutely no clue that he was registering me on any kind of level.

I shivered and then his gaze lowered. As though he had seen my reaction and decided that it was fitting.

I was getting more of an understanding as to why Ciri and Hjallmar didn't like this man.

We had just been leaving the Druids when Ciri had brought up her question about who the person might be that I had in mind to ferry us all around the islands and why I had thought about him. Kerrass was riding a little in front of us, thinking furiously and had asked that we leave him alone so that he could think.

“According to Hjallmar,” I began. “He's the best ship Captain that Skellige has. That if Queen Cerys has a job that absolutely must be done, without fail, then she gives it to...”

Ciri had already begun grimacing. “Oh, you're talking about Helfdan.”

“I am,” I told her, smiling slightly at her discomfort. “You don't like him either.”

“I don't like him.” She told me with a certain amount of force before sighing. “Although I'm being unfair really. He brings out that reaction to those people like Hjallmar and myself who have known him since we, and he, were younger. He is a difficult man to like.”

“Why?”

“He's.... not quite right. I don't know how to put it. He's a very intense person. Even when he's relaxed and to all intents and purposes, is enjoying himself there is still a level of intensity that is... offputting. He stares at a person when they talk to him but never looks them in the eye. He never initiates physical contact which is unusual in Skellige. They are a nation of huggers, of men who clasp hands and clap each other on the back. They are a people who enjoy life, who love, live and laugh. To all intents and purposes, Helfdan does none of these things. He's...”

She patted her horse who was tossing it's head at something.

“He's the coldest fish you will ever meet. It's absolutely impossible to tell what he's thinking, but he always seems to know what you are thinking. He's...tricky. He has an eye for detail that beggars belief. His guardian once had him checked for any kind of magical talent, mostly in the hope that his education could be foisted off onto the druids or the academy of Ban Ard. But he was no more magically gifted than anyone else. He's...” She struggled to find the right words and her mouth tightened in frustration. “He's very different from what you expect, you know, from a human being.

“But Cerys and Hjallmar are correct. He is the best sailor in Skellige. He's led raids that others said were impossible. The village that he governs over is one of the more prosperous villages on Ard Skellig and his men are utterly devoted to him.”

“So he's different.” I said, feeling as though I should add something to the conversation. “Why does that mean that people dislike him so much. If he's the best sailor and ship's Captain that Cerys commands, why is his table at the back of the hall?”

“Which is another thing that means people dislike him. He is quite content with that position.” She protested. She was trying really hard to be fair to the man. Really really hard but at the same time she was struggling to contain herself. “The thing about that is that he's a bastard. He doesn't know who his father is.”

“So he's a bastard.” I shrugged. “Skellige doesn't really seem like the kind of place that would care about that kind of thing.”

“You'd be surprised. Bloodline is an important thing sometimes.”

“So what's his history?”

“He was taken as a prize in a raid. He was young, I have no idea how old as I got this story from the other kids when they were bullying him.”

She sighed when she realised that she was just giving me more reasons to feel sympathy for Helfdane rather than to explain her discomfort. “He was taken in a raid but was utterly useless at everything. He was given to an old priest of the Eternal Fire as a kind of mocking gift to honour and tease him. The old man was one of those missionaries that the church had sent out to Skellige, rather optimistically if the truth be told in order to be a missionary and convert the heathen Skelligans. But the priest was old and frail, so he needed someone to help him get about. But the old man struggled to understand Helfdan and Helfdan made matters worse by not being very healthy. He had seizures and fits. He would throw temper tantrums the likes of which you wouldn't believe and would often need to be restrained by strong men. A thing that the old priest was not suited for.

“The old man had hoped that Helfdan would follow him into the church but that was clearly never going to happen. In the end, the old man threw him out as being useless. And like anyone in that particular area of Clan Tuirseach lands, he went into the fishing fleet.”

She sighed again and I recognised that most feared of all spectres, the ghost of memory as it stole across her face.

“I remember him as a clumsy young man, he was terrible at the games they all played, that we played I should say. He would fall, hurt himself and pitch a fit. But it was tricky. If he was calm, the bigger boys would try and fight him and he would just... He had this knack of fighting that meant that he would just win. In prolonged fights then he would lose but a big kid just throwing a punch or lying in ambush. Helfdan always knew what was coming and what to do and how to win.”

“But only when he was calm?”

“Only when he was calm.” She confirmed. “If he could get a blow in, or respond properly, then he could send anyone home crying. He was the kind of kid who didn't know when he had gone too far in upsetting the other kids and would be genuinely surprised when he was scolded for it. And then there was the fact that he was a bastard and technically a thrall, which meant that he was supposed to just deal with the problem. To put up with the torment. Which he didn't understand of course.”

“Neither would I, to be fair.”

“No, I suppose not, and neither would I. But one of the things about it was that Skelligan society is not our society. Skelligans might look like us and behave like us in a lot of ways but they are different.

“But that's what I remember of him from before... Well... Everything started to happen. I'm told that he went off to sea and seemed to find his calling in life, rising to prominence and command of his own Longship. I met him again more recently, both when the alliance was signed with Queen Cerys and when I came here before all of this.” She gestured at the passing countryside. “He's still quiet but it seems that he has fought down his wilder side.

“Now, he is left with the calmer, quieter, reserved part of his character. The part of him that is effortlessly unnerving as he still has that trick of looking at you and making you think that he suddenly knows everything about you. For better or worse.”

“So it's a childhood thing then. That's why Hjallmar doesn't like him, or you don't. Social convention and historical interaction?”

“Partially. He's a very odd man. He doesn't react the way you expect, not least of which is the fact that he seems to spend a lot of time staring at your chest when he's talking, or listening to you. I'm a woman and that says something to me on a basic level but to him? I don't think that there's anything to it. It's just that's how he looks at people because he treats men the same way. There's no attraction there at all it's just.... where he lets his eyes rest when he's concentrating.”

She laughed at a thought. “I remember seeing a woman call him out on it once when I was here for the treaty signing. She suggested that he was ogling her and claimed insult. I remember that he was absolutely astonished. It genuinely hadn't occurred to him that that was what he was doing. He apologised profusely and left the situation. At some speed as I recall.”

“So why does Hjallmar hate him?”

Ciri laughed again and a little more genuinely.

“I love Hjallmar like a brother but he is an arch traditionalist in an era where the age of the Skelligan Traditionalist is dying. Helfdan represents a new breed of Skelligan that Hjallmar doesn't like, warriors that think before they attack and use clever thinking to defeat an opponent rather than just skill at arms. Where personal honour is what we decide it is rather than some kind of code of things designed to make the strong powerful. But that's not all of it, Hjallmar doesn't like Helfdan because he is an older brother of a beautiful woman. Why does any older brother hate another man in the proximity of his sister?” She grinned at me slyly.

“Helfdan and Queen Cerys?” I was astonished at the thought.

“No, not like that. But Helfdan loves Cerys and is utterly devoted to her. If Helfdan has two qualities that everyone can agree on, the first is that he is a ship's captain without parallel and the other is that it would not occur to him to be disloyal. He has sworn his oaths to the Queen and he meant every word of it. When he told Cerys that he would die before betraying her and the islands, he meant ever word of it.

“It's one of the reasons why she relies on him so much although I don't think she does it to take advantage of his feelings. In truth, I'm not entirely convinced that she is aware of how Helfdan feels about her. Nor am I convinced that Helfdan knows how he feels about her although his men are aware of the situation and are gently amused by it. But Cerys does know that he is an honourable man who will do whatever she asks of him. Without question, or hesitation.”

“Does she reciprocate?”

“No. Not because of any particular reason, lack of attraction or love for another. Cerys is in a similar position to me. In that... well... Who could possibly have the rank to marry her? Of those men, who would marry her and not expect to take the ruling of her nation off her? She is not allowing herself to think romantically on any level at the moment. It's a shame really as I sometimes think that she could do with being loved as a person rather than as a crown. Not to mention the fact that I reckon she could do with a good shag.”

“Seeing something of yourself there?” I said slyly.

“A little.” She grinned, not rising to the suggestion.

Not getting a rise out of her, so to speak, I tried a different question.

“How do you know that he loves her?”

Ciri grinned. “He avoided her when we were little and now? Now he doesn't look at her. With me, or you or anyone else talking with him, he looks at their chest, kind of the opposite side to where your hear is. With her, he looks at a point over her shoulder.”

“He doesn't dare look at her.”

“Exactly.”

When I had spoken with Ciri, I had struggled to not feel sympathy for Helfdan. He had been bullied, been an outcast and had been pushed into his role. A role that he performed well but in a way that no-one could understand. But he had found a way to make that work for him. I wanted to like him. To be his friend.

But then he looked me in the eye and I knew exactly why no-one liked him. It was as though he looked at me and knew exactly what I was thinking and that he already knew how to kill me.

Then his gaze lowered back to staring at the table for a while before flicking his gaze towards Svein.

“Arguments.” He said.

“It'll get out,” Bear-skin said. “There's no way that it won't. This mission is going to be impossible to keep quiet. The traditionalists are going to go berserk over this.”

“Since when do any of us care what the traditionalists think?” Was Svein's counter. Both men were watching Helfdan carefully as the man himself continued to stare at the table.

Helfdan nodded.

“It's not just going to be the traditionalists though.” Bear-skin mused. “A lot of merchants from the continent make a lot of money from supplying Skellige during the festival and making up our lost supplies in the immediate aftermath of the ship's passage.”

“But we will be making friends with one of the foremost merchant families in the North.” Was Svein's counter.

Neither man seemed to be invested in their arguments. They presented their thoughts in the most basic and stripped down manner that they could. There was no passion to it, they were just stating facts.

There was another pause as Helfdan didn't move and the two men watched. It was like...

There's always that cartoon that you see in certain areas. The cartoon of the man with the priest and the drunkard sitting on the character's shoulder. Where the priest is telling the character about all the good things that they should be doing. That they should be careful and study and do good things, noble and charitable things whereas the drunkard talks about all of the things that are fun. That the person should get drunk, sleep with the girl and take the night off from what they should be doing.

The truth is nearly always that the character should chart the middle course. They should walk the middle line as a life without fun and rest is a life without joy but if we always do the decadent, lazy and debauched thing, then nothing will ever get done.

Watching Svein and Bear-skin debate the matter reminded me of that. As though Helfdan had deliberately externalised his good conscience and his bad conscience. I spent a bit of time trying to figure out which was which.

Helfdan nodded again.

“Weather is going to be a problem,” Svein commented, stroking his beard.

“We've weathered worse.” Bear-skin countered.

Another pause, another nod.

“The Queen hasn't ordered it. She might need or want us for something else.” Bear-skin told his opponent in the debate.

“Nor has she forbidden it.” Svein responded. “It's being discussed now and if the Queen decides to stop us... She can do so at any time.”

Another pause.

Another nod.

“The men will be unhappy.” Svein said. “I can't be the only one that was looking forward to some time with my family and a few beers.”

“The men will stomach it.” Bear-skin replied. “The ice will render us useless anyway after a certain period of time.”

Another pause, another nod.

I noticed that the rest of the crew, warriors or hangers on weren't reacting to anything said. They just watched and listened. I also noticed something else now that I was “inside the circle” so to speak. I hadn't seen it when I was looking at them from a distance or when I had first met Helfdan and his men. But there were look outs set. They were watching the hall, eyes moving and keeping an eye out. The watch was relaxed and I don't think that it was particularly malicious. It just seemed like it was the kind of watch that was always set and kept going out of habit. But no thrall approached with jugs of ale, no food was brought towards the table without them being thoroughly assessed by the watching men.

The food was tested as the watcher took a random chicken leg before biting into it and nodding it on to the table. Another Watcher had the thrall pour him an ale and tasted it first before nodding them past.

These men were guarding. It was a subtle thing and I don't even know if anyone else had noticed it. I saw it when I saw one of them being relieved. It was an automatic thing. One of the men further down the table rose to his feet, put his weapons, that he had been oiling, into their sheaths and hoops before walking over and clapping the man who was leaning against one of the pillars in the hall, on the shoulder. The two spoke for a while before the man who had been leaning against the pillar walked back and took his place at the table. It looked like a friendly movement. The natural kind of movement that you get when men stand together in a hall. But it wasn't.

I brought myself back to the argument.

“The Empress is taking part in this mission. We might call her “Swallow” but she is still the Empress. That gives us prestige.” Bear skin said this.

“It also makes us, all but black ourselves.”

There was a long pause, longer than normal, as Helfdan didn't move. Someone offered Svein an ale and he declined. Bear-skin accepted a small cup.

Helfdan nodded. Bear skin and Svein exchanged looks, Bear skin shook his head minutely. Svein nodded.

“Do we dare let this opportunity pass us by?” He asked. “This is the kind of thing that we tell our grandchildren.”

“If we survive to have Grandchildren.” Bear-Skin responded.

There was an even longer pause. For the first time since he had last looked at me, Helfdan shifted in his seat and looked up towards the head of the hall. I don't know what he was looking at as I couldn't follow his eyeline. Then he looked up at the ceiling for a moment before looking out the window.

Then he leant forward and used his hands on the table to push himself out of the chair. He settled his belt and weapons into place before turning and heading towards the entrance to the hall. He walked quickly, the walk of a man who has somewhere to be.

The entire table got up with him, gathered up their own belongings. I saw one huge man commandeer the bowl of chicken cuts, another produced a sack from somewhere and tipped a half dozen loaves of bread into it. The pale faced man with pockmarked skin that I had seen earlier gathered up the ale jugs and they all followed their Lord and Captain out of the hall.

I got up with a kind of shocked. “Wait...What?...” to find that Svein had his hand on my arm and pulled me back to a seated position.

“What's happening?” I asked, blinking furiously. “I'm feeling a little...”

“Then you're doing well.” Svein told me with a toothy grin. “Most people feel a lot after dealing with Lord Helfdan for any length of time.”

“So what?” I asked. “Do I need to go after him and convince him or something?”

“Nah,” Svein was pouring me an ale. “He was persuaded and will help you. If he had decided not to help you then he would have told you.”

“Then why didn't he tell me that he is going to help me.”

“Because he sees that as a waste of time and waste of breath. It's far better that he just gets on with actually helping you. Right now he's led everyone down the docks to get everything ready so that we can leave as soon as possible. Here...” He passed me the cup of ale, “drink up. It helps.”

“Then what are you doing here?”

“Ah well, you see,” he grinned, “As you have now found, Helfdan is a peculiar man. So at the moment, I'm here to warn you about a couple of his peculiarities so that you don't upset him or otherwise run afoul of anything that might come up.”

“Does that happen?”

He laughed. “More times than I prefer to admit.”

Svein was a funny man. I never found out his age but he was easily the oldest man in Helfdan's crew. Including Helfdan himself. I would guess that he was somewhere in his late thirties to early forties. He shaved his head bald due to, I suspect, the fact that he was going bald naturally and wanted to preserve his vanity. He did have a little rat-tail of hair at the back of his skull that hung down though but I never found out why he did that.

He also had a tufty little goatee beard. This varied during the time that I knew him. It wasn't a vanity thing, he would just forget to shave every so often so the stubble on his head and chin would just grow out and he would complain that he would need to shave soon as things were getting itchy and scratchy. But then he would be distracted by some kind of crisi, run off to do something else and he would forget for another day or two. Or until Helfdan got fed up with his complaining and ordered the other men to hold him down so that he might be shaved so that he, Helfdan, could get a bit of peace.

As I say, he was a very funny man as well. Like all Skelligans really, he had the gift of storytelling. At a later point, he told me that it was because, when you're cold and huddled together for warmth, trapped in a calm or passing the time in a camp in a strange cove miles from anywhere, the only thing you can do to pass the time is to tell stories.

This is certainly part of it, but I would suggest that it's also a factor of being part of an aural society as well.

Svein had this goofy grin that he displayed often and was another example of the kind of man who was far more clever than his manners, behaviour and attitude would suggest. He would display odd pieces of knowledge when you weren't looking as he came out with old wisdom about how the weather worked, metallurgy, ship building or siege engineering.

He was also a man of barely contained violence. For all of his genial nature he was the most violent man that I had had experience of up to that point. You could only push him so far and he would nod and smile and accept the joke but then something would shift in his posture and you saw the Reaver and raider that he was, just below the surface, in comparison to Kerrass' cold and precise nature when it comes to violent action.

He reminded me a lot of Sir Rickard like that. Except that Svein is loud, effusive and expressive where Rickard is dry, calm and collected until the time for violence is upon them and then... that violence is extreme.

“I have been told,” I said carefully, “that Lord Helfdan is not a very likeable person.”

Svein snickered. “Yes, I saw you hanging around with Lord Hjallmar. The truth is though, that I agree, Lord Helfdan is a difficult man to like. But...” He held up a finger. “He is an easy man to Love. Especially for those of us that serve him and call him our Lord.”

“That's an interesting paradox.” I told him. Quietly testing him to see if he knew what the word paradox meant. Possibly my arrogance showing but sometimes you have to know.

“It is,” he agreed, “and it is the reason for the warning. Are you ready for the warning and I will explain it as much as you like afterwards?”

“I'm ready.”

“Be sure now.” He told me, suddenly serious. “This is not the kind of warning that comes a second time.”

“I understand.”

“Good, then here it is. There is not a man that serves on Helfdan's ship that doesn't owe everything we have to Lord Helfdan. That's not an exaggeration either. Literally everything that I have, I owe that man and I would die for him a thousand times over.”

Svein was staring me in the face then, the contrast between Helfdane and Svein was palpable. He said the words calmly and cleanly, making sure that I heard every word.

“And now the reason for the warning.” He told me. “They call me Svein Hardhand. Here is why, Helfdan had only been a Captain of the Wave-Serpent for a couple of seasons...

(Freddie: The crews of the raiding longships like the Wave-Serpent measure time in “Seasons” by which they mean “Raiding Season”. A season lasts from when the Captains dare to set sail on their first raid in Spring until when the last Captain returns in Autumn. The custom is that they have to ask their Jarl as to where they are allowed to raid and then they plan the season accordingly. The Monarch of Skellige is supposed to allocate raiding territories to the different clans and Jarls to avoid conflict. Obviously, this never works.)

“... and we were short. Helfdan is a bastard and some sailors viewed, and continue to view, him as being unlucky, despite the consistent evidence to the contrary,” he sniffed hugely. “So we had to make up a couple of hands and be less choosy when it came to our new ship mates.

“So we took on a couple of Kaedweni. We often get them in Skellige as, almost, colonists when they become upset at the “civilising nature” of the monarchs in that part of the world. So they come to Skellige to “find their fortune” or they might be runaways from the harsh discipline on some of the merchant ships, or criminals on the run in need of some easy loot. But we needed an experienced sailor and had a limited selection of people to choose from. We took on this Kaedweni that Helfdan liked the look of but we needed another so the first man produced a second that he had sailed with before. We went out, it was our turn to patrol the islands when the second Kaedweni turned out to be an idiot. Another raider had turned up and was making a move towards landing and our job was to stop this. The Kaedweni protested Helfdan's instructions and orders throwing out insults and questioning his capabilities as a sailor and a captain.

“They call me Hardhand because I broke his jaw in three places before throwing him over the side.

“In doing so, I saved his life. If he had continued, he would not have woken up the following morning as the rest of the crew were in the process of taking offence. Do you understand the warning that I'm giving you.”

“I take the point.” I told him. “But I would be lying if I pretended that I understood what was going on there. He does not seem like the kind of man that would inspire such loyalty.”

“Yours is not a new question and until you see it in action, or until it happens to you, it's an impossible thing to come to terms with. So here is my story, such as it is.”

“Before I was called Hardhand. Men called me Svein the Drunkard. Before that, I was Svein the unlucky, Svein the stupid and Svein the useless.”

His eyes were haunted as he spoke. Old insults never truly heal. Just as I will never forget my father's accusations of being stupid, lazy and clumsy, Svein would never forget those names. Then he shook himself and poured himself a drink from a separate jug. I noticed then that he was drinking milk. One of those things that I had seen in the past but hadn't thought to take in properly.

“So how much do you know about the fall of Clan Drummond?” He asked me.

“I think I know what the majority of the rest of the world knows. That the Lord of Clan Drummond was driven mad by the loss of his son and an already strong traditionalist became even more so when he saw Queen Cerys elected from a clan that he hated. He rose in rebellion against these edicts and then attacked a peace delegation led by Druid Ermion and Witcher Geralt. He did not survive the process and so his cousin, the only surviving heir was not strong enough to preserve the clan.”

“Just about all true, if a simplification of the process.” Svein agreed. “And I was the War chief of that head of clan Drummond.”

I must have shifted uncomfortably in my seat or something because Svein laughed.

“Do not worry, I am not proud of such things and am well aware of the mess that was involved. I loved my Lord dearly but he was already more than a little touched before everything kicked off after the death of King Bran. There was a reason that we could openly call him “Madman”.

“Bu my job was to implement his orders. So when he refused to bow to Queen Cerys, who was the rightful Queen by the way and I don't care what anyone else from my former clan says, he ordered that Clan Drummond rise in rebellion against the crown.

“It was a stupid idea and I told him so but he was too far gone by that point to listen to reason. He tried to say that other clans would rise to aid us. That traditional men all over the islands would resist the idea of being led by a Queen and that our ranks would swell.”

“I take it that they didn't.”

Svein smiled at me. “Helfdan told me that you were a clever man. Queen Cerys is as clever a woman and she was just as clever during her rise and trials of Queenship. She specifically went out of her way to aid the most conservative clans to gain their votes so that even if they objected to her, which they didn't, then they would owe her and as such would almost automatically vote for her in the election. She's a smart woman that one.”

As far as I could tell, his admiration was genuine.

“Obviously though,” he winked at me, “she's not as clever as Lord Helfdan.”

“Obviously.”

“But Lord Lugos was driven mad, or madder.... Or is it “more mad?”....I can never decide. Anyway, he went truly loopy after his sons death. Blamed the An Craites, despite proof, a son's condemnation and personal confession from Birna Tuirseach that she had arranged the whole mess. Despite all of that he still blamed the An Craites and Crach An Craite in particular, who he hated. And he ordered me to rebel. It was foolish, we were almost certainly doomed, but it was my task to follow my Lord's orders to the letter. And I did so.”

He took a long drink of milk before grimacing.

“Then the stupid fucker died didn't he.”

He stared at the table for a long moment, caught up in the story that he was telling.

“Fuck me, it's five years since all of that happened and it still gets me every time. He was a great man once, a man that I was proud to follow until he lost his mind. But no-one should have to go through what he went through.”

He gave himself another shake.

“But then, there I was, leading a doomed rebellion under a lord that no-one had heard of because he was the lord of a minor village in the back end of fuck knows where. I met him twice. The first time was when he accepted my oath of fealty. The second time was when he cast me out of the clan for being shit.”

Again, an old anger was in him. You could see it in the way that he held his cup, his knuckles whitening and a slight tremble in the grip.

“Freya's tits but I want a drink.” He commented as he carefully poured himself another cup of milk. “So there I was, leading a doomed rebellion at the command of a lord who didn't know what he was doing but who thought he was some kind of military genius. Lugos knew what he was talking about and would just give general orders and leave me to deal with the small details, but this shit biscuit thought he was amazing and wanted to control every little detail of our resistance against “The tyranny of the An Craites”. He would send me dozens of messages a day telling me what he wanted me to do and in what order.

“I've got no way of proving it because I can't read and I had to get someone to read the messages to me. But they were often contradictory, often impossible and most often, dangerously stupid. We would advance on positions that were impossible to hold, retreat across open ground, over-extend marches, and that was without dealing with logistical problems. He completely forgot the most basic rule of warfare which is is that a man cannot fight on an empty stomach.”

Yes, I will admit to being surprised that this man knew what “logistics” meant. Another example of my scholarly arrogance I suppose, if you like to keep count.

“So we got trounced. Rightly so if you ask me. I lost some of my best friends in that war. My best friends, including my oldest son and then I got blamed for it. Because the arrogant little shit couldn't accept that he wasn't strong enough to listen to advice from those people that had been doing this for years. In case you were wondering, my first piece of advice was to sue for peace with Queen Cerys and I was nearly hung for treason.

“But instead I was cast out and blamed for everything that went wrong with the campaign. I was trying to follow impossible orders, but that failure hurt me. My own pride told me that I should have been able to take those forts and positions. That I should have been able to have my men outflank an enemy or sneak across open farm land. I took those failures to heart and I accepted responsibility for it. I would like to say that I did so in order to protect what remain of my men but the truth was that it was my arrogance and bitterness that led me to it. My desire to throw myself on my proverbial sword.

“What I should have done was ignored the stupid fuckwit's orders and just fought as best I could. I should even have considered just taking my axe to the little puke's face and done my best to save what I could of Clan Drummond and if I had, then there might still be a clan Drummond today. But I was proud and arrogant and honestly believed that if anyone could pull off these impossible, contradictory orders, then it would be me. Instead I was kicked out of the clan, made responsible for the fact that we were losing the war...”

He snorted with a bitter laugh.

“War... Hah... Those fuckers wouldn't know a war if it bit them in the dick.”

“But now I was the man that had lost the war. I was stripped of command and ordered to defend an out of the way fort where I was over two men. One was a toothless old man who was serving the clan after his wife had died and his children were elsewhere. The other was a boy of twelve.

“To no-one's surprise, my former lord took direct command of the remaining armies of Clan Drummond and we were trounced. I wasn't there but I'm told that it was a slaughter. The might of Clan Tuirseach and Clan An Craite caught the remaining members of the clan in the open and we were slaughtered. Clan Drummond died on that field and I found myself with no-one to serve.

“I became bitter and angry. I was now the man who had lost the war for Clan Drummond. Those remnants of the clan that still wore our colours blamed me. Madman Lugos was the equivalent of one of your saints to us, despite the fact that he had been the one that caused the mess in the first place. His successor was seen as a brave man, salvaging what he could from my incompetence and was quickly becoming a martyr. So the only person left to take the blame was me.

“My wife divorced me...”

(Freddie: Which was when I found out that women can divorce their husbands in Skelligan society if the priest or lord agree that the marriage is untenable and unsustainable. It often requires some kind of active abuse though. On either side for a divorce to take place.)

“... My mother and daughter spat at my feet and all of the people that I have known since I was little would throw things at me in the street. You know the kind of thing...”

“Eggs,” I said. “Rotten fruit and vegetable.”

“I see that you do indeed know the type of thing. So I took my axe, my shield and my armour and I left, I was, and am, a skilled warrior and I thought I could make my living as a mercenary somewhere or that I could train up some other warriors or something. I might have made it too if I could afford to make the trip to the continent, but my wife had taken most of my wealth in the divorce as I wanted to keep my armour and weapons so that I could make some kind of living. They were the most valuable things that I owned at the time and it was a trade off for my house and wealth. We hated each other at the end and I just wanted to get out of there. I'm sure that you can imagine what happened next.”

“You walked straight into employment and rose to prominence?”

“You're funny.” Svein deadpanned before grinning. “No one would hire the man that had lost the war that led to the destruction of Clan Drummond. So then I tried to turn my hand to Reaving. Tried to find a ship that would take me.... As I say, skilled warrior, I was a fair sailor and still knew my way around a long ship... Guess what happened?”

“Still seen as the man who lost a war?”

“I was unlucky and a jinx. I don't know, maybe I was.

“By now I was having to sell my goods so that I could eat. I took to drinking vast quantities of spirits, I could get drunk quicker on spirits and that way I could forget you see.”

“I understand.”

“I sold my axe, my shield, my torque and my armour. I could still make a living with my fists in the fighting rings but the drink was calling to me too much by that point and I lost my honour when I agreed to lose to an up and coming fighter.”

He sighed.

“All told I spent a season and a half going to pieces, living in gutters and sleeping in doorways. I had lost who I was and forgotten what I was worth. Looking back, I think that I was waiting to die. It might not sound like it took a long time but I had already started my fall when Lugos had died.”

“I'm sorry.”

He grinned again. “Don't be. In order to bounce back as high as I have, you have to fall a long way. I was sat at a table in a shitty little tavern somewhere on Hindersfjall. The kind of place that springs up because the locals like to brew mead and need to sell it in order to make more. I was there because I had already been thrown out of all of the more established drinking places.

“A group of men came in, sailors and Reavers the lot of them. You can tell the type pretty quickly when you get the practise in, the locals were worried, but although they were all loud men and boisterous men, they paid money up front for their food. They weren't a gang who just demanded that the innkeeper serve them in order to prevent having his inn burnt down around his ears. They didn't demand the attentions of the innkeepers daughters but instead they bought a round for everyone in the place. It became clear that they had had a successful raid and were celebrating. They hadn't found the other taverns to their taste and had come here to do that celebrating. I've been back since and that Tavern is called “The Reaver's rest,” and hires two warriors to stand in the doorway and keep the peace on the back of that night.

“I later found out that the other taverns were taken up with crews that hated Helfdan and had threatened him and his crew with violence. Helfdan hadn't wanted to cause trouble for the locals so had eventually found my little tavern.

“They ordered food, a couple of them started playing music, the families of the other patrons were summoned and a good time was being had by all as the assembly made a dent in the Wave-Serpent's plunder. I was slumped in a corner. There is no way that anyone should have noticed me. The men were making loud noises of praise about their Captain, about how the monastery had no idea that they were coming and that the fat, overly rich thieves had deserved what they got.”

Svein suddenly realised that he was talking about pillaging a holy place. “Er.... no offence...”

“None taken. Some of those abbots are greedier than your average robber baron. They steal more as well.”

Svein grinned. “But I remember that they were singing the praises of their Captain. About how he had taken them to a place that no other captains had raided before. How he had seen through the deceptions of the monastery and how he had found the hidden wealth amongst the pretended paupers. About how they were rich. I thought nothing of it. Such stories are not uncommon after a successful raid. Captains are praised because a good Captain is a lucky Captain and crews want a seat on the oar bench next time that Captain goes out. So they flatter the Captain's ego in order to be remembered. I had picked out the man who I had thought was the Captain who had pulled a happy girl onto his lap and was pouring mead into her cleavage.

“He wore jewellery, expensive mail, a long beard and was throwing gold around as though it was salt.

“I remember being jealous as I had once been that man when my luck was in and had married the girl who's cleavage I had drunk mead out of.”

“I went to turn away and realised that there was a young man standing nearby who was looking down at me. He was frowning in thought and he wasn't looking me in the eye, which I thought was strange and a lot more insulting. He was clean shaven, which was odd for a start and wore a simple, slightly ragged woollen tunic over a plain shirt. He had left his weapons at the door in line with hospitality so I had no idea that he carried a sword instead of an axe. So I thought he was some younger son of the village, or maybe a young man who was back from his first raid but now wanted to pick a fight in order to make a name for himself. I wasn't feeling receptive to the idea and I went to turn away.

““You are Svein the Unlucky,” he said. It was a statement, not a question. But his voice was deeper than I was expecting.

““Some men call me that.” I answered. I was reaching for my anger in an effort to be able to respond to the fight or the insult that I was expecting.

““May I sit?” He asked, gesturing at the stool opposite me.

“I looked for a reason to turn him down but I couldn't think of anything and I gestured. He sat and stared at me, looking me up and down.

““You were the warlord of Clan Drummond.” Another statement, not a question.

“I shrugged. “I was.”

“He stared at my chest for a long time.

““You have fallen on hard times.” Another one of his statement questions.

““What gave it away?” I snarled at him but my anger washed over him like a wave over a rock.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“Someone dropped something and the crowd laughed and jeered good naturedly. But the young man winced in discomfort. “I struggle to hear you.” He said. “And I do not like the noise. Can we speak outside?”

“It was the first question he asked me. I was still kind of expecting a fight and his refusal to look me in the eye was getting to me. So I nodded and staggered to my feet and we walked for the door.

“The man who I had chosen as the Captain yelled out. “Are you going somewhere Captain?” as my new companion took his weapon belt from the innkeeper.

““Fresh air.” My companion answered with a slight smile. “Enjoy yourselves for me. I won't be long.”

The assembly cheered. I gaped as the younger man settled his sword and axe at his side and then gestured for me to precede him out of the door.

“We got outside and the young man took me over to a bench where I sank to a seat gratefully. He stood over me frowning. It was impossible for him to miss the fact that I was dirty, sick, drunk and weak as a kitten. “I have a need of a Warmaster of your skills and experience.” He told me. “Are you currently free from obligation?”

““Errr. What?”

““Are you currently free from obligation?” He asked, slightly louder as though I might not have heard him.

““I am but...” I reached for something to say. As though I was trying to come up with a reason to turn him down. As though there was some kind of reason that he shouldn't work with me.

““I am a skilled sailor and ship's captain.” He told me. “But when it comes to land combat I have no idea what to do. I need someone who can lead men in battle. Tell them where to stand and how to fight. I need someone who knows when to attack, when to retreat and when to stand firm. I need someone who knows why arrows are bad for us and good for them. I need someone who knows how to defend a camp and organise watches. I was told that you were the best at doing that.”

“I was...” I told him, I remember being horrified at the tears in my own voice. “I was once, but I am not the man that I was.”

“He shrugged as though this was unimportant. “No.” He told me. “You will need to be better.”

“He still didn't look me in the eye.

““You will train the men, and me, to be better fighters on land. I give the orders at sea. You give the orders on land. Can you do all of that?”

I nodded, I could do that and I knew it.

And that was the beginning of things. He asked about my gear which was when I had to admit that I had sold all of my weapons. He didn't react at all, instead he took me into town and told me to choose an axe, a shield and a dagger. The most important weapons. He also bought me some boiled leather armour and apologised....” Svein shook his head in remembered astonishment. “He apologised that he couldn't afford anything better and that I could loot what I wanted at a later date. Then he bought me some blankets, some more clothes and some boots. He promised me a helm when we got back to his village and that was that.

“That night, I slept my first night aboard the Wave-Serpent. Since then I have trained every man that has fought for Lord Helfdan. I still wield the axe that he bought me that day but I needed a new shield after that season. He also bought me a suit of mail for use when we fight on land. I was expecting some kind of arrangement similar to what happened in Clan Drummond, where I was just handling details. But here, my responsibilities are much wider.

“He expects me to order him around as well as he freely admits that he simply doesn't really know about land tactics. He literally gets me to tell him where to stand and who to attack.

“I was accepted readily and didn't need to prove myself which is also unusual. It was enough for the other sailors that Helfdan had chosen me and they took that from there. He had me a house built in his village which is where I live with my wife. A woman that he introduced me to and suggested that we might be a match. She's a spear maiden that guards his stockade and commands his household guard and I love her more than I can say. She has given me a beautiful daughter and a baby son who will be seven months old now.

“At a time when I was at my lowest, he picked me up and gave me responsibility. He didn't ride roughshod over me. He just trusted me to get on with it. Leaving aside the fact that everything I have, he gave me. It is that trust that I value the most. That trust and my family.

“I admired the Madman. But looking back, I would not have died for him. He had my every loyalty but I would have lived to fight another day. But for Helfdan?” He shook his head. “For Helfdan, I owe him my life and I would gladly and cheerfully lay it down in his service.”

I nodded.

“My story is not unique in the crew of the Wave-Serpent.” Svein told me. “He has taken the rejects and the downtrodden of the other clans and he has forged us into a ship's crew that I would put against any other ship on the waves. I would think nothing at all of taking on two or even three to one odds. His village is prosperous, his hall is rich and his people are proud. We are only a small village but we stand tall amongst the other villages on our islands and the other ships captains dislike us so much for just how good we are. When games are called, the crew of the Wave-serpent and the villagers that come with us often place highly or win, feats that are well above our standing and station.

“And all the time, Helfdan dresses in the poorest clothes and sleeps on a small cot in a tiny room in the back of his hall or in a small hut, hidden in some nearby woods. I asked him if he wanted a bigger room and a better bed once. He asked me why he would want something like that and wondered whether it would help him sleep.”

He sighed a little sadly.

“He gets nightmares you see.”

“I understand.” I told him. “So what's his story then? Why is he this way?”

“Damned if I know.” Svein told me happily. “But listen, do me a favour, if you ever find out what it is, and it turns out to be boring. If it's something like “He's just born that way,” could you not tell me or any of the lads?”

“Why?”

Svein grinned. “It's more fun to guess and tell stories. You know, build a myth around the man. To say that he was brought up by mer-people or something which is why he's so good at sea. Or that he was born as a result of a love affair between a siryn and a sailor. A forbidden love affair that neither could admit to, that she fell for the sailor that she had lured onto the rocks. That kind of thing.”

“Ok, if you like...”

“But he is a little strange.” Svein admitted. “So here's a couple of things to expect and be aware that he is going to struggle with the Empress being on his ship.”

“Why?”

“Because he can remember her laughing at him when they were younger. But here's how it works so you don't overwhelm or upset him.”

“Ok?”

“If he asks your opinion. He wants a short, to the point statement. Extended arguments tire him out and frustrate him.”

“Right.”

“Don't let the thing with the eyes put you off. We like to tell people that he only ever looks in your eyes when he's kissing you or when he's trying to kill you.”

“Kissing you?”

“Yeah. According to a nice young lady I know, he knows exactly what he's doing in the bedroom and is a highly skilled lover. But like everything he does, he does so with an intensity and a focus that was off-putting. She said it was the single, most intense night of her life. That includes the fact that it was the most intensely pleasurable. But when he looked into her eyes, she felt as though he was looking at her soul. She wasn't prepared for that.”

“I can understand that. But he looked me in the eyes. Is he going to kill me or kiss me.”

Svein laughed. “It could go either way. Of course he looks people in the eye occasionally. Normally when he's weighing them up a bit. But it's rare. It's just more fun if we say that he only looks people in the eye when he's kissing or killing them. Now, let's see. What else?

“In training, he expects to be pushed and worked hard. But he will abruptly just turn and walk away. Do not follow him as he is getting overwhelmed and needs to calm down.”

“Right.”

“On board ship, he will only speak to give orders. Some of those orders might seem strange but just accept that he knows more than you and do what he tells you. You will soon get used to my commanding voice compared with my joking voice, so don't worry about that.”

“Ok.”

“Do not assume that he is emotionless. Ever. He just works with it differently than you or I do. It will take you a while until you get used to him in that regard. If he gives you advice, listen to it. Especially personal advice. As I say, he introduced me to my wife and occasionally makes a hobby of playing matchmaker with his crew. He is enormously successful at this.”

“Anything else?” That last comment was going to take some processing.

“Yes. The Empress is to be called “The Swallow,” or “Swallow” under all circumstances.”

“I will tell her, but why?”

“So he can differentiate her from the Empress and from Ciri, the girl who used to bully him.”

“That doesn't sound like her.” I felt myself bridling in defence of the woman.

“Not to you or me she wouldn't be. But when the other kids were picking on him. She laughed.” Svein winced. “I would laugh at what happened, you would laugh. They are funny stories. But he never forgets how much it hurt him then. Working with Helfdan has certainly given me a different outlook on some of my activities when I was younger. Oh, and don't tease him about the fact that he reads and writes. I haven't learned the trick myself but he finds it useful to calm himself down.”

“I would never do that.”

“No, I suppose that you wouldn't. Also, the Swallow isn't allowed to work while she's aboard ship.”

“Why not?”

“Well she's a woman isn't she.” He seemed appalled. “Unlucky to have a woman as part of your crew, soldiers, guards and anything else, then yes. I would gladly stand next to a woman in the shield wall. Fucks sake, you try and stop them if their blood's up. But aboard ship. Passengers only. I'm not saying that she couldn't row or pull a rope, just that she mustn't. So there.”

“Fair enough, but you get to be the one that tells her that.”

“And I will. Just warn her in advance so that it doesn't become a problem.” He sniffed.

“I will.”

He nodded in response.

“So... If you could let The Swallow and your Witcher friend about these rules then I would appreciate it. Just come down to the docks when you're ready. Normally we would be birthed at the end of the docks out of everyone's way. But today, I suspect that we are the only ship being put out on the docks.”

“I thought that only the small boats sail into the dock at Kaer Trolde?” I asked.

“They do. Unless we are beaching the ships for the winter or for the Skeleton Ship.”

“Fair enough.”

“In which case.” He finished his milk. “I have work to do. We'll send word when we're ready.”

I waited until he was out of sight before leaping out of my seat and sprinting off to my room to write all of that down. It struck me as something that was so fascinating and so unusual that if I didn't write it down now then I would run the risk of it being forgotten, or driven out of my mind by other things. I left word with someone that Kerrass and Ciri should find me here, or send word before they went anywhere or wandered down to the docks.

I sat at a desk and scribbled furiously for a while, mostly using a piece of goat hide rather than wasting any paper on it as I was writing too quickly to be entirely careful and paper is rare on the islands. Something to do with the damp air making it hard to preserve.

Eventually word was sent that I could meet Kerrass and Ciri in the hall. Kerrass was wearing some travelling clothes and Ciri had her hood up, sitting with her back to the room so that people would struggle to see who she was. A precaution that I found a little ludicrous as who else would be sat with a Witcher with a single sword in a red scabbard strapped to her back. But the Skelligans and the various other dignitaries that were in the hall respected her privacy and stayed out of her way.

It might have been something to do with the large and burly Skelligan warriors that were lounging around the place and glaring at anyone that went near her. But I'll let you be the judge on that.

I wandered over and sat down next to Kerrass.

“Did you get passage?” Kerrass asked.

“Lord Helfdan has graciously agreed to carry us where we need to go on the proviso that we follow his rules.”

Ciri snorted.

“Not unreasonable.” Kerrass said with a surprised glance over at Ciri who hid her face in a cup of something.

“What did the Queen have to say for herself?” I asked.

“The Queen is beside herself with fury.” Kerrass told me with a slight smile.

“At us?”

“Not really. More at the fact that she has so many questions that she wants answering. She has sent word that Ermion is to attend upon her immediately and fast horses have been sent to help him on his way.”

“He'll love that.” Ciri commented with a sly smile.

“He will,” Kerrass said. “But I would be surprised if he didn't see it coming. She honestly seemed surprised by the whole affair. She told us that it honestly never occurred to her that the Skeleton Ship could be got rid of. It was just a fact of life to all Skelligans so it had never been dreamed of that the thing could be dealt with in any kind of meaningful way.”

“She has a lot of questions.” Ciri put in. “She did say that she wants more information before she makes any kind of decision, so the other thing that she's done is to send word to the other Jarls that they be summoned to Kaer Trolde. Unusual at this sort of time as most of the Jarls prefer to stay in their own halls during the passage of the Skeleton Ship. It is a time of crisis at the end of the day but they have been known to make the journey to Kaer Trolde for the final passage. But still... Times are changing.”

“Let's be fair though.” I said. “How often has that been said about Cerys since she took the throne.”

Ciri shrugged.

“There are still all of the questions that we want answering.” Kerrass said. “Why now? Why not earlier? I will admit that I think that that question really is going to turn out to be “because we are here to be taken advantage of.” I want to know more about that Lennox man. I want to know when he joined the druids and more about what he did before he got to the druids. What else has he done? What else has he been up to?”

“Why didn't you force the answers out of him at the time?” I asked.

“Because it would be all very well to call him out on his lies, which were many, but I have no proof with which I could catch him out. So the questions remain.”

“So many questions.” Ciri groaned comically.

“Yes. Many of those questions are going to be put to Ermion by the Queen. She is furious that this situation has come up and doesn't know who to be mad at yet though so that's something. It's unlikely that she's going to turn around and blame us for the entire situation.”

“Well at least there's that.”

“She also warned us about some of the problems that we will face.” Ciri put in. “She warned us that it will be impossible to keep this entire situation secret and as such, we will need to fight our way through certain obstacles. That we are going to be attacked and we can expect various people to pick fights with us. Basically, it's a lot of stuff that we already knew about.”

“Traditionalists, pirates, interested parties from the continet.” Kerrass added.

Ciri nodded. “But her opinions confirmed it. She also said that if we hadn't already thought about Helfdan and the crew of the Wave-Serpent then she would have recommended them as guides and companions.”

“She likes them then.”

“I think she does.” Ciri said but didn't want to add any more to that.

“But, in short, she has agreed that we can search for answers. We can look for a solution to the problem of the Skeleton Ship and we are expected to bring that solution to her before implementing it. She gave us permission to defend ourselves with deadly force should anyone attempt to try and stop us.”

“Reassuring.” I commented.

“But necessary.” Ciri said. “Legal matters around self-defence can get complicated if we're travelling from place to place and between different clan territories. If one Jarl agrees with the necessity then he will support us defending ourselves whereas another might have us left out for the harpies. But the Queen says that we can defend ourselves on these matters and as such we can do so.”

“Still a little off-putting that she feels as though she has to say these things in advance.”

Ciri shrugged. “She even gave it to us in writing.”

“A lot of help that's going to be. Many of these people take pride in the fact that they don't know how to read.”

“But it's a nice gesture.” Ciri commented.

“Very nice.” Kerrass said drily. “I want to know more about this Helfdan that we will be travelling with. More about him and his rules.”

In relatively short order I told the two of them about the rules and everything that I had been told.

“Interesting,” Kerrass had been fascinated all through the story.

“Ridiculous.” Ciri snorted. “Utterly absurd.”

“Which part?” Kerrass wanted to know. “The fact that these men seem to like him or that he wants to call you Swallow?”

“All of it. What possible reason could he have for objecting to the sound of my name.” I couldn't have told you why but although she said that angrily I thought I could see some pain in the depths of her. She was hurt by that.

Kerrass looked at me. “Is there a problem with being called “Swallow?” He asked her.

“I've gone by worse in my time,” She said. “But I don't understand why that would be a....”

“Ciri...” Kerrass began. “Swallow, I would say, if we're getting used to it. It seems pretty clear to me. If half of what Freddie tells us is right, this Helfdan doesn't work like you or I do. He doesn't have the same priorities or the same way of thinking. I don't doubt that, to you and to anyone else watching, it was just harmless childish games. But to him, those scars run deep and still hurt. Hurt enough that he has to force himself to think of you as a separate person. Yes, it's ridiculous and strange but if it gets us through what we need to get done, then so be it.”

“But he was a funny kid.” Ciri protested. “He was clumsy and useless at games and things. He was so comedically bad at things that it was hard not to laugh. He would fall over and throw a tantrum, screaming, shouting and flailing about. It was funny. Everyone was laughing.”

“Except him.” I told her, a little too accusingly if I'm honest. “He wasn't laughing.”

“But then he would...” Ciri was actually upset by this. “Then there were times that we would make a joke and he would run screaming at the person making the joke. We were just teasing him about the fact that...he didn't have a father....everyone was doing it and we.... Am I a bully?”

Kerrass and I took the time to exchange glances.

“Did you do it to hurt him?” I asked carefully. I remember some bullying when I was younger. Before tutors had gotten involved and when Father was trying to get Sam and I to socialise with other lords children. Also, there was always Edmund when he wasn't tormenting those people less fortunate than themselves. “Did you do it deliberately to get him to...”

“No...” Ciri wailed quietly. There were suddenly tears in her eyes. “No, I don't think so, I mean... He was funny. But I didn't stop them from... Oh Goddess.” She covered her mouth with her hands. “He was always so... So violent. Someone would crack a joke at his expense and he would just go off. He would say something in return so hurtful and offensive that a fight would start. Or if someone pushed him or bumped into him while we were all playing, then he returned with such violence.

“We used to play this game that we called Skelligan Ram. Where you had to run across a field and one person would try and stop you and bring you to the ground. When you were brought down then you had to join the side that were trying to bring the runners to the ground. It was a hard game and we would often get cuts and bruises. But I remember that he joined the game. I don't know why. But he was the man who was in the middle and we were running circles around him as he was.... he was so bad at it.... Then he lashed out and brought a kid called Solumnd down and broke three of his teeth. He would just keep going too far. Then when Solmund and his friends yelled at him about it, he threw a tantrum, fell down, screaming and shouting and yelling.”

“They put him in the middle because they knew that he couldn't do it.” I said. “They put him there to torment him.”

Ciri was actively horrified. “Why would they do that?”

“Did you laugh?” Kerrass asked.

Ciri gaped at him.

“That's why they did it.” Kerrass told her. “To make their friends laugh. If any other kid had been put in that position then they would have refused to be drawn into the situation, or they would have seen the funny side of it fast enough to make people feel uncomfortable and then someone would have taken pity on him and let him bring them down. I know that game. In Temeria they call it “Temerian Wolf-hound.” Soldiers play it. Any other kid would see the funny side of it. But not him. He took it to heart and then, he never stopped remembering it.”

“You talk like you've seen this kind of thing before.” I told him, trying to divert things away from Ciri's discomfort.

“I have. Sometimes we would get kids like that at the school because the villages didn't want them. They were seen as useless to the community and we would get them. Or sometimes, the trials of the grasses would cause things like this to happen when the brain and the nervous systems would start to change.”

“So there was something wrong with him?” Ciri asked, trying to find a way into the situation.

“Wrong is a strong word. He processes things differently. It's hard to explain and that's partly because we don't know what it means. We didn't study it because we were so focused on producing viable Witchers. But kids like him get overwhelmed easily. They...they process things differently and in different ways. That's why he looked clumsy, it was because he saw the world differently but was being taught how to do things according to our perception of the world and the two were not compatible.”

Ciri nodded, calming down.

“His tantrums?”

“His body and his systems were being overwhelmed and there were bits of him that were shutting down.”

“Goddess, we were so cruel to him.”

“You weren't to know.” Kerrass told her. “I know it, because I've seen it before. But I would suggest that you look at the way he behaves in a different light.”

She nodded absently as she frowned in thought. Already thinking furiously if I'm any judge.

“I will admit that I'm rather fascinated.” Kerrass continued. “He seems to have found a way to navigate the world despite these things and look forward to seeing him in action. But you will need to be careful not to see his strange behaviour as offensive or upsetting. To him, it's perfectly normal to think and behave the way he does. Indeed, it might be the only way that he can behave without losing his sanity.”

I nodded.

“Am I a bully?” Ciri asked us both quietly and out of nowhere as she came out of her thought process.

“No.” I answered. “Not to my mind anyway. You would have been a bully if you were doing it to deliberately torment him.”

She nodded relieved.

“But you were to him.” Kerrass told her, a little harshly I thought but at the same time, I think she needed to hear it. “From his perspective, you were a bully. It's entirely possible that he is aware of the difference. That he is aware, on some level, that his reaction is extreme but he cannot help himself. The calling you by a different name is his way of coping with it. For the record though, I agree with Freddie. You were not a bully. Your crime, is that you didn't stand up to those people that were bullying him.”

She nodded, sad and a bit beaten down but then she straightened and smiled. “The things that we learn about ourselves. I will see what I can do to make it up to him.”

“Just don't pressure him.” Kerrass told her. “Remember that he possibly finds the very sight of you overwhelming. He seems to function well enough to be a respected and powerful man though so... He might have methods of dealing with people from his childhood. Calling you Swallow is just one of them.”

Ciri subsided a little, frowning in thought. “I will remember that.”

We talked for a little while longer as we both asked questions of Kerrass about men that he had seen like this before. We chatted about plans and where we wanted to go first before a messenger came back from the harbour to say that the Wave-Serpent was afloat and was ready to sail.

Picking up our things we walked down to the harbour. Ciri was still travelling a little incognito with her hood up but in all honesty, the only people that she was really protecting herself from were the other Nilfgaardians and Northerners. As far as the Skelligans were concerned, she was still on her “quest” and as such, they all but ignored her. It would seem that everyone is equal when they are on a quest.

So she and Kerrass had their travelling packs and bags on, mostly blankets, weapons, stuff that they needed for maintaining those weapons and Kerrass had his alchemy gear as well. I had my spear and a couple of notebooks as well as these things although my spear was broken down and in it's scabbard. It's a kind of black, soft leather bag which keeps the two halves of the spear separate and protects them from the elements and I carried it across my body when I was just moving it from place to place. I didn't think we were in any danger as we moved. We were in the middle of Kaer Trolde, surrounded by guards and the only time that we would be moving among people would be among the docks. Not something that I was particularly looking forward to if I was honest. So when the incident happened, I had my mind on other things.

Here's a thing that I haven't really talked about before because it's never been particularly relevant.

Generally speaking I avoid large scale merchants places. Small Markets are fine, those places where individual stall holders, craftsmen and artisans are trying to attract people to buy their wares. I'm also generally a bit safer in shops and things because, again, the shopkeepers are trying to attract patrons and as such, as a nobleman, I am a potential patron. Try as I might, I am still pegged for a noble in these kinds of places.

Villagers who might not see a noble in weeks or months, there I can blend in. It's generally a case of allowing myself to become a little dirtier, smellier and more ragged. But in shops and things, especially in the larger cities where these things matter, it is all but impossible for me to pass myself off as being anything other than what I am. But they never really give me any trouble.

The places that give me trouble is on the sides of docks, where there are warehouses and large scale mercantile situations. Places where grain, cloth, wood and stone are traded. Where cranes are needed to move goods and product needs to be stored and moved on wagons. I'm talking about those kinds of places where herds of animals are moved. Where barrels and crates are stacked and things are bought and sold in bulk.

Generally I need to move through this kind of area with some kind of alacrity, because it's in this kind of area that I get noticed and recognised. But not in a good way. Mostly, this comes in the form of some good natured haranguing about “coming down to see where the real work goes on” as people recognise the younger son of the Coulthard trading company. But most of the time, it comes in the form of insults thrown, shouting and the odd piece of thrown vegetable matter and dung.

My preference of dealing with this kind of thing is to ignore it. Nine times out of ten, these insults are thrown by sailors and employees who have been put up to it by their employers, or that they are trying to garner some form of favour with their bosses for “sticking it to those Coulthard fucks”. So if I retaliate in any way then I am only punishing those people that are just trying to get by. It's not their fault that they are working for Emma's competition. The bosses of those companies deserve everything that they get but the average person who makes their wages stacking crates? Those people? They don't deserve my wrath.

The remaining times, the incidents fall into one of two categories. The first is the disgruntled former employee of the Coulthard trading company.

Emma holds the company to very high standards. As such, any person that works for us is expected to follow a certain moral code. They are expected to be sober while at work and be able to turn up to perform their jobs without being influenced by alcohol or narcotics in any way. They are also expected to be fit and healthy.

Emma will help anyone who is made sick or injured as a result of the work that they do for us, but if that injury is self inflicted then we tend to have less sympathy. For instance, someone who works for us but likes to get into fist-fights for money are generally not welcome. Criminals of any stripe are not allowed and anyone that tries to lie to us in order to secure employment can expect to be thrown out.

Occasionally these people get employed by our competition and take out their perceived victimisation on whoever they can find.

Me.

These are the incidents that tend to get more heated and threaten violence. In these kinds of cases then I tend to leave it to the proper authorities. You would also be surprised at how quickly people tend to back down when Kerrass smiles at them.

The other, slightly more dangerous occurrences of this kind of thing happen when it is an actual merchant, or a ship captain that has been defeated by my sister. Maybe the ship captain lost out on a lucrative transport contract. Or a merchant was undercut by her, or his product was proven to be of a lower quality or they were caught cheating us or something.

One of the problems of being a merchant is that your reputation is everything. Like being a mercenary, if you are found to be going against your word then the trust that you have accrued from other people will vanish in a moment and it is all but impossible to get back.

This is why all of the stories about mercenary companies that go back on their contracts are generally false as a mercenary who betrays their master is unlikely to be hired again.

But a merchant who delivers shitty stone after they promised premium product is also, likely to never be trusted again.

But a merchant makes their profits from these kinds of margins. The faster they can get things into port, the better quality their goods, the more money they can make from otherwise substandard stuff.

Emma does none of those things and if she ever catches anyone doing that in her name then she makes a special point of seeing to it that this person in question is then destroyed. She can be a ruthless woman my sister.

These are the more dangerous people that I need to avoid when I head towards any kind of dock. Why? Because they often come with a horde of employees that are willing to join in on their behalf. If a merchant or a ship's captain decides to pick a fight with me, then all of his mates are going to do the same, the captain's crew will join him because they don't want to risk their birth aboard ship. The merchant's guards and workers will have the same motivations.

It is not a pleasant prospect.

Again, having a grinning Kerrass next to me has gotten me out of more problems than I care to mention. The presence of guards is also a strong deterrent and the threat of my sending a letter back to my sister to let her know that this Captain or that warehouse owner is being an arse, will normally get me through the more dangerous situation. It is well known in those circles that Emma can easily absorb the loss that it would take to put an individual Captain or warehouse out of business. Not that I ever really make good on these threats, but I could and they all know that.

That day though, it was the perfect storm of catastrophe. Not least because the Captain in question sailed out of Talgar, one of the smaller nations and part of the Hengfors league. That might not sound like much, but being from there meant that he had no idea who Ciri was. Her ashen hair was still behind her hood and even if she had her hair down, it would have been inconceivable to a lot of people that Ciri would have been walking around in plain leather trousers, shirt, leather armour and with a sword on her back. Such things would just not be happening in their world view.

So we got to the dock, coming across the bridge that spans across the entrance into Kaer Trolde itself where we could see a single Longship being prepared with men carrying bags and crates aboard. I recognised Svein from the red colour of his jerkin. He was stood directing things and pointing. I was surprised by how small it was but it was easy to see the shields that had been places along the sides of the ship with the symbol of a black boar emblazoned across the front.

“And that must be the Wave-Serpent.” Kerrass commented.

“Smaller than I thought.” I said.

“Cerys told us that it's the fastest longship in her fleet.” Ciri agreed.

“She will need to be.” Kerrass put just the slightest hint of an emphasis on the feminisation of the ship. A worthy reminder though.

Oh to be a person that can refer to Kings and Queens with their first name in casual conversation. I struggle enough with Ciri but that is hardly her regal name. It's not as if I'm calling her Cirilla.

There were a couple of other small boats that were being prepared for departure and a couple of other longships that were being prepared for the coming cold.

We took a moment before Kerrass turned and led us along the bridge and down into the harbour. It was noisy down there, there was a small covering of slush on the ground as the rain had started to include hailstones and become closer to snow by the day. You could see people pulling their wool and fur cloaks around them that little bit tighter. Men and women were gathering around fires and passing bottles to each other. Loads were deposited quickly at dockside before fingers were blown on in order to warm them up. It was the kind of weather where people stamp their feet and rub their hands together.

It was also busy. I had forgotten how busy it was and it was made worse by the fact that I was walking the distance now, rather than being on horseback. There were other smells as well. The smells of unwashed human mingled with the smells of being so close to a cold sea. You could taste the salt on the air. But there was also the smell of roasting food as people cooked things over the fires. The kind of thing that always tastes really really good but you never want to ask what the food is actually made out of.

We were pushing our way through to the longship, turning sideways to get through the crowds, dodging things and staying out of the paths of people that were carrying heavy loads.

It was at some point during this part of the journey that the first call was made. I imagine that it went something like “Oi Coulthard.” It normally does, and in my defence, I am so practised at ignoring these kinds of calls, that I honestly didn't hear it.

The three of us had been seen by the Wave-Serpent. There was a man who had climbed up the central mast who had obviously been posted to keep an eye out for us and I could see him waving and shouting, pointing our direction of approach to the person beneath us.

So we were pushing onwards when I finally heard the voice.

“Oi Coulthard. Fucking stop when someone's talking to you, you piece of shit.”

Charming words, but not unusual. Especially amongst sailors.

You always look back on these times and try to decide what you should have done instead. It's one of those ways that we can just choose to pass the time by discussing what could have happened if we had just done this or just done that instead of what had actually happened. The truth, though, is always the same. What would we have done differently? It's easy to look back on these situations with the benefit of hindsight and say what we would have done differently. But at the time, and in that place, what we knew was what we knew and there was little, if anything we could do differently.

I ducked my head, endeavouring to avoid notice and continue with my progress. This was nothing new. As I say, I don't talk about these things often because, what's the point? It only encourages people and those people that actually do this kind of thing are just idiots anyway. Rather than examining the circumstances that led them to this situation with a bit of self-examination, they seek someone to blame.

I have no idea what I had done, or Emma had done, or one of the other agents of the Coulthard company had done in order to annoy this particular merchant Captain. I can certainly say that I did not recognise him and when I did eventually learn his name, I didn't recognise it or know anything about it or his family.

Neither did Emma when I wrote to her on the subject.

So I suspect it was just one of those things where a man decides to blame his own failings on other people. Maybe his ship was too small for what we wanted or maybe it was the wrong shape or was going in the wrong direction or maybe one of our agents and warehouse managers just didn't like his face or his attitude. I don't know.

What I do know, is that he pushed his way through the crowd with the help of his bigger and burlier men who were looking for some free entertainment and maybe some violence.

Skelligans long for stories. Again, maybe it's something to do with it being an aural society but they long to have a story to tell over the dinner table in the evening. Or in the tavern that night and some kind instinct told them that a story was brewing here and they parted to let him through.

I knew none of this. Instead, as I say, I had hunched my shoulders a little and was forging forward in an effort to get to where I was going and pretend that I hadn't heard the idiot. So the first I knew about the matter was when someone grabbed me by the shoulder and spun me round.

“I told you to stop.” The man yelled in my face. His breath smelt of fish, garlic and mint. I know this because of how close he was to me and the stench wafted over me.

“Did you? I didn't hear you.” I responded automatically. Internally I was sighing while sizing him up. He looked... Well, I thought he was sober which was one thing. He was a big man, not particularly fat but muscled in the arms. His clothing was rich looking but relatively cheap once you examined it a bit closer. Glass jewels and fraying seams rather than actual wealth. All part of the game of merchants, the school of thought that you have to spend money in order to make money. That if customers see you looking wealthy then that means that you must be successful, skilled and trustworthy.

He was also very angry about something. The other sailors that were with him were boggle eyed and grinning, but there were only a few of them. Men who, presumably, had come into the port to help him get the goods taken out to his ship out in the harbour, to help load the small boats that the Skelligans were using to take people in and out of the harbour. They wore the usual signs of their profession. Powerful arms and legs but with the puffy nose and slight gut swelling that comes with binging in port.

That might come across as unfair but it's a true stereotype. These kinds of long haul sailors are often at sea for a long time where they eat crap food and stale water, using rum to keep warm and purify everything drinkable. Which means that when they get back to port, the first thing they do is spend a fortune on eating good food. ALL the good food and who can blame them. Unfortunately, such practices, not to mention the diet at sea, does not lead to long and healthy lives.

“What do you have to say for yourself?” The man demanded angrily.

“About what?” I asked automatically. My mouth was just talking automatically because the rest of me was assessing just how much danger I was really in. This struck me as the kind of situation where the man just wanted to have his say and then beat me up a bit. He wanted to take out his frustrations on someone and that person was going to be me. I have no problem with accepting a tongue-lashing but I resent it going on for too long. The trick would be to head it off before the violence starts because violence always, and I do mean always, escalates. So all I could do was to just hope that someone in authority would notice and I would be rescued.

As I say, I could tolerate being yelled at for a minute or two but I would resent being punched in the face.

The man laughed. “About what, he asks.” He laughed but his eyes were angry. “Two thousand Kovirian Shillings you cost me.”

“Me?” I asked, as calmly as possible. “How could I have possibly...”

“You and that whore-bitch of a sister of yours.”

“Alright, hold off.” I reserve the right to leap to the defence of my sister. Yell at me all you like but... “There's no need to....”

“You stole that contract off me. I was going to be carrying those goods and you undercut me.”

“Alright first off...”

“Shut the fuck up.” He shoved me in the chest. The first move of the bully. He didn't want to throw a punch, but shoving someone..? That's ok.

“Right, that's enough.” I told him. “I'm not a merchant and I know absolutely nothing about how the business works. If you have a complaint then you should....”

“I should take it out of your hide, that's what I should do.”

As I say, this is not an unusual exchange. Normally the local guards have spotted this happening and are making their way over to where this is all taking place in order to intercede. That and the general deterrent of Kerrass' grinning face.

“Look,” I said, trying to calm the situation down. “That's not going to happen.”

“Oh yeah, and what are you going to do to stop it?” He took a step towards me, he was getting red in the face now. Not yet utterly dangerous but he was in the process of trying to psyche himself up for the fight. He didn't want to be the one to throw the first punch because that would get him into trouble. This is the most common form of things. They want me to get angry and to start things with them. So in many ways, it's a game of chicken as we are both sizing each other up, trying to decide who is going to blink first. It's tricky because that line about who is going to blink first is not a metaphor. If I blinked or turned away then he might be tempted to kick me or attack me from behind.

Again, I speak from experience.

“Freddie are you...”

“Piss off, freak.” The man didn't break eye contact with me although I could see some movement in my peripheral vision. Again, Kerrass has seen this kind of confrontation between me and some idiot so many times that it's almost routine.

“What's going on here?” A dead, featureless voice intervened into the situation.

“And you can fuck off and all, bastard.” My opponent snarled.

Our surroundings were getting quiet now, more and more people were edging away from us. In some cases because they didn't want to get involved in the pending confrontation. In some cases because they wanted to let others see better.

The owner of the voice sighed loudly. “I'm afraid that I can't do that.” Helfdan said. “This man is a passenger of mine and as such, he is under my protection.”

Apparently, Skelligan longship captains can act as the authorities under most situations. On land as well as at sea because they are considered minor Lords in their own right. Their decisions can be overrulled by the ruling Lord of the land that the incident takes place on in case they disagree with whatever the “man on the spot” decided. But the Captain would never be punished for making a decision in order to keep the peace.

“This man,” The merchant, captain or whatever he was had really worked himself up into a temper, “is a coward and a criminal and a...”

“I assume that you have proof in order to make these charges.” Helfdan had moved to stand next to me and I took the opportunity to take a couple of steps to get well out of the way. “They are rather serious.” He was still speaking with a flat, emotionless tone.

“Listen, bastard freak...”

The crowd hissed, Helfdan didn't react. I found that I couldn't go too far back and shifted to the side. The sailors that had accompanied this man initially were looking at each other and licking their lips. In the ways of those that accompany bullies everywhere, this was no longer as fun as it had been a matter of seconds ago.

“This is between me and Coulthard who, I notice is now hiding behind your skirts like the cowardly piece of shit that he is. Does it help you Coulthard?” He called. “Does it help you? To hang out with freaks and deviants. I bet you're a deviant as well you utter cowardly...”

“That's enough.” Helfdan said quietly. There was some rattling and looking around I could see Helfdan's crew was pushing others gently aside, weapons were being fingered, sly smiles were being exchanged with those men that had accompanied the merchant towards his picking a fight. “As I say, if you have criminal matters to pursue against this man then I suggest you make them known. If not, then I require you to back away and go about your business.”

“Fuck you.” The merchant growled. “You have no authority over me...” He waved his fist in Helfdan's face, who didn't move. “I can slap you in the face and there's nothing you could do about it. You're a bastard and a coward. You're so cowardly, you haven't even done anything about being insulted... Now get the fuck out of my way. My business is with that bastard that hides behind you. I see you there, Coulthard you yellow bellied bag of puke.”

“This man is under my authority and is not going anywhere.” Helfdan maintained. “Now step. Back.”

Ciri pushed her way to the front.

“And what if I don't?” The idiot insisted. “What are you going to do about it then? Eh? Bastard? What are you going to do about it then? Shit your breeches?”

The target of his wrath had shifted. I was surprised. My mental image of Skelligans was that they wouldn't stand for this kind of thing but Helfdan was remaining calm.

“Actually I am wearing Brigga,” He said, “A different name for woollen trousers.”

“Fuck off with your...” He raised his hand as if to strike.

Ciri stepped forward, I think Kerrass would have liked to as well but he was obstructed by someone. Ciri put her hand on the man's arm to restrain him.

“Fuck off Cunt,” He snarled and back-handed her across the face.

I think she was more surprised than hurt. The man had clearly got no idea who she was. To be fair to him, he was from a different country that wasn't under the rule of the Empire, and even if he was, what would the Empress of Nilfgaard be doing on the docks. She would be in a carriage and escorted by knights. Not walking alone with a bedroll over one shoulder and a sword over the other.

But the blow caught Ciri off guard and off balance. She staggered backwards, slipped on something and fell backwards into a barrel of fish, which shattered.

Because of her hood, most of the other Skelligans also, didn't know who Ciri was but the shock of the assault changed the feel of the crowd. They went from a group of people watching an entertaining piece of street theatre to a group of people watching something more serious.

Ciri yelped in anger and shock as she fell.

Helfdan glanced down at her. I saw his face. There was still absolutely no emotion in it at all. Then he looked back up at the merchant.

“Now apologise to her.” He intoned in his calm and quiet voice. There was nothing about the way he spoke to suggest that anything had changed. But events were moving quicker now

“What? Why the fuck should I?”

Helfdan looked back over at where Ciri was being helped to her feet by Kerrass and another man who I thought I recognised as a man from Helfdan's crew. They were struggling as the fish had made the floor, and Ciri, slippery and they slithered around a bit.

There was still no emotion in Helfdan's face.

“You will apologise.” Helfdan informed the merchant, “or face the consequences.”

The Merchant laughed as Helfdan turned his gaze back to the progress that Ciri was making in getting to her feet. “Why? What are you gonna do to me? Was she your whore? Was she your slut you useless piece of...”

Ciri was on her feet now, brushing fish bits from her. She looked awful, her eyes blazing with a rage that I was terrifying to behold.

“Apologise.” Helfdan said. “Now.”

“Fuck you.” The Merchant Captain bellowed with relish.

Then he died.

Ciri stood there, her mouth hanging open with the beginning of a shouted challenge or whatever. Her right hand was still rising towards her sword hilt as she watched her assaulter fall backwards.

With Helfdan's small axe buried in his fore-head.

I remember almost laughing. He had looked so surprised.

Helfdan didn't react. His face was still a mask as the weight of the body pulled the axe out of his hand, there was a small blood spatter across his face.

To my eyes the movement that he had used to kill the man was almost leisurely. He had just taken two steps forward and almost nonchalantly buried his axe in a man's face. An axe, a little longer than a hatchet with a curved grip and a solid flat weight behind the axe blade.

For a moment Helfdan almost looked disappointed, cross about something. Then he stepped forward, placed his boot on the dead man's chest and pulled the axe free.

I was watching him carefully. He wiped the worst of the blood and brain matter off the axe with a piece of sack-cloth before putting it away. He was muttering to himself. Then he looked up and seemed startled to realise that he was looking at the other sailors that had accompanied the dead man.

“Oh,” he seemed surprised. Then he sighed and turned his back on them to walk over to Svein. Svein passed him a small leather purse which Helfdan then tossed to the Sailor in front. “See to your friend.” He told them. I thought he was shaking a little but I might have been wrong. “Svein.” He said.

“I'll get this sorted out Lord,” Svein told the much younger man. “Don't worry.”

“I let my axe get trapped in bone again didn't I Svein.” Helfdan said, his voice suddenly small and almost timid.

“Yes.” Svein chided him gently. “You would have been better tearing his throat out.”

Helfdan frowned as the entire crowd watched this exchange. “But that would have prolonged matters, the death needed to be quick.”

“Quick is not always better. You needed to be ready for what came next.”

Helfdan nodded, absorbed the point before visibly dismissing it from his mind. The trembling stopped and suddenly he was sure of himself again. He turned and started walking back towards the Wave-Serpent, followed by most of his crew.

I turned back to see Kerrass staring after Helfdan, his eyes wide and a look of delighted surprise on his face.

“That was amazing.” He said to me.

But Ciri was not as easily calmed. She stormed after Helfdan in a fury so that Kerrass and I had to run to catch up. She grabbed him by the arm and tugged so that he spun round. The change in him was total. Suddenly, he was sweating, wild eyed. He staggered and a couple of his men stepped forward with glared before others held them back.

I looked for Svein but he hadn't seen. Another crew-member was running back towards him, calling his name. I turned back and like Kerrass I got ready to intervene.

“You didn't have to do that?” Ciri snarled at Helfdan.

“Do...d...Do what?” He asked, blinking a little stupidly.

“I am more than capable of fighting my own battles. You didn't have to defend me like I was some damsel in distress.”

Helfdan calmed, again, instantly. He straightened. Then he frowned in concentration and confusion.

“I didn't do that.” He said slowly, as though he was puzzling it out.

“I was perfectly capable of challenging that man and destroying him myself.” Ciri declared.

“But then you would have started a war.” Helfdan told her. “He was a foreign Captain from the Hengfors league. If you had killed him, the Empress of Nilfgaard has just killed a foreign merchant and started an international incident. Whereas I am a Skelligan who has killed a bully.”

Then he frowned again. “Of course you would have killed him.” He told her. “You are a far better fighter than I am.” He looked confused, tilted his head to one side before, again, just turning his back and walking off towards his ship for a moment before turning back.

“Do you need a fresh sleeping roll?” He asked Ciri abruptly “We have spares if you need them as well as spare clothes although they might be a bit big. Just let Svein know if you need anything.” Then he turned away, leaving Ciri to gape after him. Kerrass and I moved to stand next to her.

“What just happened?” She asked us before chewing on her lower lip.

“I think.” Kerrass began very carefully. “I think that a certain someone might have forgotten that she's the Empress for a moment or two.”

She grinned a little sheepishly, “I mean apart from that. And I will also thank the pair of you for not asking me how amazing forgetting that felt.” She switched her gaze back to Helfdan who was now walking along the jetties, peering closely at his ship.

“Helfdan.” She said to us both after a long moment. “Helfdan of all fucking people. Helfdan stopped a diplomatic incident on the wharfs of Kaer Trolde.” She shook her head. “He saw it in that moment. He was checking on me wasn't he. He was looking over at me to see where I was and whether I had climbed to my feet yet.”

“He was.” Kerrass agreed.

“He waited until the last possible moment to kill him. The last possible moment. He gave that moron every possible chance to back down and apologise before taking the necessary steps. Brutal steps and a little...” She tailed off.

“Sometimes,” Kerrass mused as Ciri perched on a barrel. “Sometimes we need someone to jump to the end of the logic. He could have started a fight or pushed the guy away or arrested him. But that might have escalated matters. Probably would as well.”

Ciri shook her head. More out of leftover amusement at herself apart from anything I think. She was also, visibly, going through a combat comedown. She had been ready for a fight, looking forward to a fight and now it was done. Violently and suddenly.

“I remember Helfdan as a clumsy, stammering, young person. Younger than his body was. He got confused and would run away from a fight. The others called him coward. He would shake and sweat and... And then, after he was knocked down he would grab someone and bite them, hard. I dare say Hjallmar still has some scars from some of that.

“That, that Helfdan would register higher political issues while under attack and in a physical situation.” She shook her head.

Everyone deals with combat reaction differently. Ciri was coming down by thinking through the problem.

“But he didn't react to any of the insults directed at him?” She wondered.

“Mostly because those things are true.” Svein had crept up behind us. “He is a bastard. So when people like that sack of mouse droppings try and provoke him by calling him a bastard, he agrees with them. He doesn't know who his father is so to him, it's not an insult.”

Ciri nodded. “I should.... I should apologise to him for all the.... I've been wrong before and I was only young at the time but.... we were so horrible to him.” Her teeth were chattering now.

“Don't.” Kerrass told her. Svein was passing her a flask which she took a long drink from. “He will consider those matters closed if I am any judge.”

“I agree with the Witcher.” Svein was surprised at Kerrass' insight. “You are his passenger and he would have done the same for anyone else. Those of us who have been with him the longest spend a lot of our time trying to guess what he's going to do next but there are some things, in his head, that are unassailable and that we can depend on. Those things are his ship, his crew and those people who he considers as “his people.” That tends to be his passengers as well. If you thanked him he would get confused. If you apologised for past transgressions he would get upset. In the meantime...”

He clapped Kerrass and I on the shoulder, giving us a gentle push towards the ship.

“One of the other side-effects of allowing you to pursue a challenge against that Northern idiot is that we would have missed the tide. And you would be kidding yourself if that wasn't also in Helfdan's mind when he killed that man.” Svein grinned as he spoke.

Ciri nodded and took another long drink from the flask before climbing to her feet. Svein was already walking past us towards the ship where Helfdan was yelling at someone and pointing at his ship.

“Freddie?” Ciri asked and I caught up.

I was in my own little daze from everything that had happened. The sudden violence had been shocking to me. Not that I hadn't seen such things before but because of the contrast between the two states. Helfdan didn't seem to travel between mental states and moods. Whereas most people have to work themselves up into anger, or sink into sadness. Helfdan went from Calm and quiet to shocking violence without a pause for a break. Then he had been like a confused and hurt child before moving past that into the calm and quiet Ship's captain and leader of men. I shuddered to think of what his rage would look like. Or what he might be like when he was in serious pain.

I resolved to walk quietly around him and wondered if I could become his friend. Something told me that he wouldn't have many of them. Svein had seemed to appoint himself as some kind of big brother, almost parental figure to Helfdan. Almost as a filter between Helfdan and the world. But I struggled to imagine Helfdan trusting anyone enough to let them get close to form a friendship.

“Freddie.” I realised that Ciri was trying to talk to me. “You alright in there?” She grinned at me.

“What? Sorry I was just...” I tailed off.

“Yes, I'm in a similar state. Listen though, in case I forget at a later date. I wanted to thank you again.”

“What for?”

“I shouldn't have made that mistake earlier. I should have stayed out of it. You are more than capable of handling yourself and Helfdan was there. But I nearly made matters so much worse.” She took a deep breath.

“You really don't like the nobility do you?” She asked me suddenly, it seemed like a continuation of her thought processes though so I let her continue with it.

“As with so much in life, I enjoy individuals.” I told her. “Individual nobles tend to be calm, kind, understanding and educated. You are one such, Duchess Anna-Henrietta is another and Princess Dorn is an angel walking on the continent. I respect and like the Duke and Duchess of Angraal and I would like to think that my family are good examples of the ilk. But as a whole?” I shook my head. “I think it would do every single one of them some good to come out here at some point and see what the world is really like outside of their castle walls. To work a shift in the mill or to spend a day cleaning out pigs.

“Nobles, as a class are relatively pointless and see the entire world as a game board for their own amusement. They see themselves as superior. As better than everyone else when the only reason that they can, is by an accident of birth as well as the blood and sweat of those people that work their lands.”

Ciri was nodding at this. “I think you may be right. I can name a list of people who are good people and who I would trust with my life or any kind of governing position. But when I take a step back I look at our class and wonder why I don't just have them all drowned.”

I must have coughed or something because she grinned to show me that she was joking. “Although I do think that occasionally. I also worry that people are showing me a false face. Showing me someone and something that they know, or think, that I will like. They are often, not wrong either.

“But you are right. I have spent far too much time in my ivory tower. I haven't travelled amongst the people, or seen what life is like out here for far too long. I should have seen the danger there. I should have been worrying about what happens, or what the consequences could be for me losing my temper on the wharf of Kaer Trolde. But I didn't and instead I was saved, and as a result, the wrath of a nation will now descend on a man that I have disliked since childhood. A man who, I'm beginning to think, I have disliked because of flaws that I was told about rather than what he actually has.

“Even if I ride back to the castle now and return to work, I would still need to think about that. Seeing what I have been shown rather than what I have actually seen. I wonder if he could be convinced to take some kind of governmental role. Where he occasionally steps out and yells at me whenever I'm about to make a stupid or presumptuous mistake.”

We were walking towards the ship now. Helfdan had vaulted aboard. And was inspecting the sail while Svein saw to the last of the loading.

“I think he might hate you if you did.” I suggested.

“No he wouldn't.” Kerrass countered, butting into the conversation. “He would do it. He would hate every minute of it and he would be desperately unhappy. Then someone would push him too far in one direction in order to get a reaction out of you, or him, and then there would be several dead courtiers. Then you would have to have him executed. Never was there a man less suited to the Imperial court than that man.”

We all stopped as we thought about that.

“I dunno,” Ciri said. “Lambert maybe?”

Kerrass laughed. “Nah, despite everything, he knows when to keep his mouth shut . Helfdan knows Skelligan society. He works well here and has made himself a niche,” He shook his head. “What a Witcher we could have made of someone who can think on those different levels at the same time.”

Ciri turned back to me as Kerrass handed his pack over to one of the waiting Sailors who passed it over the rail carefully. Kerrass followed it into the ship with a quick vault.

“Still Freddie, thank you.” Ciri told me as she passed knelt down and extracted a clean shirt and set of leggings from her pack. “I had thought that this journey was going to be some kind of holiday. But I've also had my eyes forced back open again. I am seeing things that I had forgotten and feel as though I have had my eyes opened.” She shook out the shirt before stopping suddenly. “I wonder when I fell asleep. Hold this blanket up while I change.”

“What?” I began to panic.

“I need to change. I stink of fish guts. Hold the blanket up as there's even less privacy on the longship than there is here on the docks behind, these crates.”

She climbed over the boxes and I did as I was told. I also turned aside and closed my eyes for good measure. You know, just to be sure that I didn't see anything I shouldn't.

“In Toussaint?” I wondered aloud.

“What?”

“Was it Toussaint when you lost that part of yourself?”

“Maybe.” She had changed with astonishing speed. A red woollen shirt and chain shoulder guards had replaced the white cotton and leather. “Or shortly after when the last hope had left me about Francesca.”

I grunted. She took the blanket off me and we both climbed aboard along with the last of the goods. Kerrass had found himself a space out of everyone's way where he could watch Helfdan move around the tiller, so Ciri and I wedged ourselves in next to him. It was not a large ship but there was room to move around and we watched as the other members of Helfdan's crew climbed aboard.

Helfdan looked at Svein who nodded and started to call off the orders. Ropes were thrown to us, coiled and the Wave-Serpent left Kaer Trolde like an arrow leaving a bow.

Helfdan stood like a statue, legs braced against the shifting of his deck, occasionally calling orders to those men who would pull ropes and things, singing while they worked. A catchy tune about a harbour masters whore. I was momentarily embarrassed until I realised that Ciri, not only knew all the words, but also knew all the harmonies that went with the song.

We raced under the bridge, through the stone gully and out into the open sea. I had time to realise that and then the false shelter of the harbour was torn away and the rain came lashing down.

An oilskin was pulled over us so that the crew had shelter and it was actually quite warm under there as I realised that I felt pretty good. There was a song in the air and we were on a quest.

A quest out of legend to remove an ancient terror from the isles of Skellige.

I thought that that might be worth a poem or two.

At the very least.

(A/N: Groan, Squeak, Grumble Ok. I reckon I've got my soap box in the right place now.

Ahem.

I'm going to talk about Helfdan for a bit. If you want to know more then please read on. If not, then that is fine by me. As always, thank you for reading and I will see you in the next chapter.

Still with me? Good.

This is another one of those situations where Freddie, Kerrass, Svein, Ciri and everyone else do not have either the science or the language in order to address what's going on in Helfdan's head. But I do.

Helfdan is somewhere on the Autistic spectrum. I don't know how severe his Autism is or where he falls on the spectrum because I am not qualified enough to be able to quantify such things. I did enough research to be able to give him the characteristics of someone who lives with Autism but my accuracy is possibly/probably way off.

So why have I done this.

I have actually been waiting to find a proper place for an Autistic character for a long time. I didn't want to just crowbar in an autistic character just for the sake of things. We all know what I mean by that, a character who is a one-note thing who only has the purpose of showing how autistic/gay/disabled/mentally ill/ethnic/female they are before they are quietly shunted off to the side to never be spoken of again.

I felt, and feel, quite strongly that if I'm going to make a point that a character is “different” from the norm then that difference needs to be part of the story. That if it doesn't feed into the story or otherwise teach our characters something about themselves, (in this case, Freddie and Ciri primarily) then the character is pointless. That or the sentiment is.

No, I'm not going to give you any examples of things where I think that this has been done.

So in the same way that Emma's sexual preferences were part of that story and taught Freddie something, or that Gardan's mental illness was a part of the story and, again, taught Freddie something about his own mental state. It was important that Autism be treated in the same way.

Why did I want to address Autism?

I don't know anyone who personally struggles with Autism. However I do know people who work with people who are learning to live with Autism to a varying degree which is one of the sources that I have used for my research on the subject.

But I was once reading an interview with one of my favorite authors (David Gemmell in case you are interested) in which someone was asking him where he got the inspiration for one of his characters. He recalled a situation where he was chatting with a psychiatric nurse who dealt with mentally ill children. People that struggled with some heavy duty psychoses. He was moved by some of the stories and he asked what he could do to help, expecting to be asked for a donation or something.

Instead the nurse told him that he should write a heroic character who lives with, has accepted and works with their condition. Conflict and struggle is fine but someone who could be seen as a positive role model for the mentally ill kids on her ward. At the time, mentally ill people were almost universally portrayed as bad guys in media. That representation is improving and although we still have a long way to go, this was several years ago when things were much worse.

I was once telling this story to someone who I knew who supported families with severely autistic children. That person told me that a similar situation happens with autistic people. That they get portrayed as social outcasts quite a lot. So it would really help if there were more positive role-models of autism in fiction.

So I saw an opportunity to portray an autistic character and do something a bit different. I hope that I have done a good job and done justice to a character that I like an awful lot.

As always, thank you for reading.)