“I thought we understood each other.” Dandelion joined him in the street. “You were supposed to buy any old thing, so as not to look unarmed!”

“I won’t throw away money on any old thing. Even if it’s your money. That was junk, Dandelion. Primitive, mass-produced swords. And little decorative rapiers for courtiers, fit for a masked ball, if you mean to dress up as a swordsman. And priced to make you burst out in insane laughter.”

“We’ll find another shop! Or workshop!”

“It’ll be the same everywhere. There’s a market for cheap, poor-quality weapons that are meant to serve in one decent brawl. And not to serve the victors, either, for when they’re collected from the battlefield they’re already useless. And there’s a market for shiny ornaments that dandies can parade with. And which you can’t even slice a sausage with. Unless it’s liver sausage.”

“You’re exaggerating, as usual.”

“Coming from you that’s a compliment.”

“It wasn’t intended! So where, pray tell me, do we get a good sword? No worse than the ones that were stolen? Or better?”

“There exist, to be sure, masters of the swordsmith’s art. Perhaps one of them might even have a decent blade in stock. But I have to have a sword that’s fitted to my hand. Forged and finished to order. And that takes a few months or even a year. I don’t have that much time.”

“But you have to get yourself some sort of sword,” the bard observed soberly. “And pretty urgently, I’d say. What’s left? Perhaps…”

He lowered his voice and looked around.

“Perhaps… Perhaps Kaer Morhen? There are sure to be—”

“Certainly,” Geralt interrupted, clenching his jaw. “To be sure. There are still enough blades, a wide choice, including silver ones. But it’s too far away, and barely a day goes by without a storm and a downpour. The rivers are swollen and the roads softened. The ride would take me a month. Apart from that—”

He angrily kicked a tattered punnet someone had thrown away.

“I was robbed, Dandelion, outwitted and robbed like a complete sucker. Vesemir would mock me mercilessly. My comrades—if I happened upon them in the Keep—would also have fun, they’d rib me for years. No. It’s out of the bloody question. I have to sort this out some other way. And by myself.”

They heard a pipe and a drum. They entered a small square, where the vegetable market was taking place and a group of goliards were performing. It was the morning repertoire, meaning primitively stupid and not at all amusing. Dandelion walked among the stalls, where with admirable—and astonishing—expertise he immediately took up the assessment and tasting of the cucumbers, beetroots and apples displayed on the counters, all the while bantering and flirting with the market traders.