Reality painfully challenged the venerable sorcerer’s fantasies. None of his inventions—intended to popularise and democratise magic—moved beyond the prototype phase. Everything that Ortolan thought up—and what in principle ought to have been simple—turned out to be horrendously complicated. Everything that was meant to be mass-produced turned out to be devilishly expensive. But Ortolan didn’t lose heart and, instead of discouraging him, the fiascos aroused him to greater efforts. Leading to further fiascos.

It was suspected—although, naturally, this never dawned on Ortolan himself—that the cause of the inventor’s failures was often sheer sabotage. It wasn’t caused by—well, not just—by the simple envy of the sorcerers’ brotherhood, the reluctance to popularise the art of magic, which sorcerers and sorceresses preferred to see in the hands of the elite—i.e. their own. The fears were more about inventions of a military and lethal nature.

And the fears were justified. Like every inventor, Ortolan had phases of fascination with explosive and flammable materials, siege catapults, armoured chariots, crude firearms, sticks that hit by themselves and poison gases. Universal peace among nations is a condition of prosperity, the old man tried to prove, and peace is achieved by arming oneself. The most certain method of preventing wars is to have a terrible weapon as a deterrent: the more terrible it is, the more enduring and certain the peace. Because Ortolan wasn’t accustomed to listening to arguments, saboteurs who torpedoed his dangerous inventions were hidden among his inventing team. Almost none of the inventions saw the light of day. An exception was the notorious missile-hurler, the subject of numerous anecdotes. It was a kind of telekinetic arbalest with a large container for lead missiles. This missile-hurler—as the name suggested—was meant to throw missiles at a target, in whole series. The prototype made it out of Rissberg’s walls—astonishingly—and it was even tested in some skirmish or other. With pitiful results, however. The artilleryman using the invention, when asked about the weapon’s usefulness, apparently said that the missile-hurler was like his mother-in-law. Heavy, ugly, totally useless and only fit to be taken and thrown in a river. The old sorcerer wasn’t upset when this was relayed to him. The weapon was a toy—he was said to have declared—and he already had many more advanced projects on his drawing board capable of mass destruction. He, Ortolan, would give humanity the benefit of peace, even if it would first be necessary to destroy half of it.

* * *

The wall of the chamber where he was led was graced by a huge tapestry, a masterpiece of weaving, of Arcadian verdure. The tapestry was marred by a stain, somewhat resembling a large squid, that hadn’t been completely washed off. Someone, thought the Witcher, must have puked up on the masterpiece not long before.

Seven people were seated at a long table occupying the centre of the chamber.