… a steel tang edged with silver… Runic characters along the entire length…

“I can see them,” he whispered aloud, squeezing Lytta’s hand. “I can see my swords… Really—”

“Quiet.” She responded with an even stronger grip. “Be quiet and concentrate.”

The swords vanish. Instead of them he sees a black forest. An expanse of stones. Rocks. One of the rocks is immense, towering, tall and slender… Carved into a bizarre shape by strong winds…

The water foamed briefly.

A grizzled man with noble features, in a black velvet jacket and a gold-brocaded waistcoat, both hands resting on a mahogany lectern. Lot number ten, he declares loudly. An absolute curio, an exceptional find, two witcher swords…

A large, black cat turns around on the spot, trying hard with its paw to reach the medallion on a chain swinging above it. Enamel on the medallion’s golden oval, a blue dolphin naiant.

A river flows among trees, beneath a canopy of branches and boughs hanging over the water. A woman in a long, close-fitting dress stands motionless on one of the boughs.

The water foams briefly and almost immediately becomes calm again.

He saw a sea of grass: a boundless plain reaching to the horizon. He saw it from above, as though from a bird’s-eye view… Or from the top of a hill. A hill, down whose slopes descend a row of vague shapes. When they turned their heads, he saw unmoving faces, unseeing, dead eyes. They’re dead, he suddenly realised. It’s a cortège of the dead…

Lytta’s fingers squeezed his hand again. With the strength of pliers.

A flash of lightning. A sudden gust of wind tugged at their hair. The water in the basin churned up, seethed, surged with foam, rose in a wave as high as the wall. And tumbled straight down on them. They both leaped back from the fountain. Coral stumbled and he held her up. Thunder boomed.

The sorceress screamed a spell and waved an arm. Lights came on throughout the house.

The water in the basin, a moment earlier a seething maelstrom, was smooth, calm, only being moved by the languidly trickling stream of the fountain. Even though a moment earlier a veritable tidal wave had poured over them, there wasn’t a single drop of water to be seen.

Geralt breathed out heavily. And stood up.

“Right at the end…” he muttered, helping the sorceress to stand up. “That last image… The hill and that procession… of people… I didn’t recognise it… I’ve no idea what it could be…”

“Neither do I,” she answered in an uneasy voice. “But it wasn’t your vision. That image was meant for me. I have no idea what it could mean either. But I have a strange feeling there’s nothing good in it.”

The thunder fell silent. The storm moved away. Inland.

* * *