Geralt sighed. He wondered if both his cellmates had come around and drawn any kind of lesson from the matter. Or whether he would have to give them another hiding.

What is the city but the people?

William Shakespeare, Coriolanus

CHAPTER FOUR

A stall carelessly nailed together from planks, manned by an old dear in a straw hat and as plump and ruddy-faced as a good witch from a fairy tale, stood at the very edge of the crowded marketplace. The sign above the old dear read: Come to me for joy and happiness. Gherkin complimentary. Geralt stopped and dug some copper pennies from his pocket.

“Pour me a gill of happiness, Granny,” he demanded gloomily.

He took a deep breath, downed it in one, and breathed out. He wiped away the tears that the hooch brought to his eyes.

He was at liberty. And angry.

He had learned that he was free, interestingly, from a person he knew. By sight. It was the same prematurely bald young man who he had observed being driven from the steps of the Natura Rerum osteria. And who, it turned out, was the court scribe.

“You’re free,” the bald young man had told him, locking and unlocking his thin, ink-stained fingers. “Someone came up with the bail.”

“Who?”

The information turned out to be confidential—the bald scribbler refused to give it. He also refused—rather bluntly—the return of Geralt’s confiscated purse. Which contained cash and bank cheques among other things. The Witcher’s personal property—he declared not without spitefulness—had been treated by the authorities as a cautio pro expensis, a down payment against court costs and expected penalties.

There was no point or purpose in arguing. On release, Geralt had to content himself with what he had in his pockets when he was arrested. Personal trifles and petty cash. So petty no one had bothered to steal it.

He counted the remaining copper pennies and smiled at the old dear.

“And a gill of joy, please. I’ll decline the gherkin.”

After the old dear’s hooch, the world took on a more beautiful hue. Geralt knew it would quickly pass so he quickened his step. He had things to do.

Roach, his mare, had fortunately escaped the attentions of the court and wasn’t included in the cost of the cautio pro expensis. She was where he’d left her, in the stable stall, well-groomed and fed. The Witcher couldn’t accept something like that without a reward, irrespective of his own assets. The stableman received at once a few of the handful of silver coins that had survived in a hiding place sewn into the saddle. Geralt’s generosity took the man’s breath away.

The horizon over the sea was darkening. It seemed to Geralt that he could see flashes of lightning there.