‘Summing up, I prefer legends that cleave more strongly to legendary convention, do not mix fables with reality, and don’t try to integrate the simple, elegant morality of the story with deeply immoral historical truth. I prefer legends to which encyclopaedists, archaeologists and historians don’t add epilogues. I prefer it when a prince climbs to the top of the Glass Mountain, kisses the sleeping princess, she wakes up and they both live happily ever after. A legend should end like that and no other way… Who painted that portrait of Ciri? That full-length one?’

‘There isn’t a single portrait of Ciri.’ The voice of the little sorceress was so matter-of-fact it was almost cold. ‘Not here, nor anywhere in the world. Not a single portrait has survived, not a single miniature painted by anybody who could have seen, known or even remembered Ciri. That full-length portrait shows Pavetta, Ciri’s mother, and it was painted by Ruiz Dorrit, court artist to the Cintran monarchs. It is known that Dorrit painted Ciri’s portrait at the age of nine, also full-length, but the canvas, called Infanta with a Greyhound, was lost, regrettably. Let us, though, return to the legend and your attitude to it. And to how, in your opinion, a legend ought to end.’

‘It ought to end happily,’ said Condwiramurs with conviction. ‘Good and righteousness should triumph, evil should be punished exemplarily, and love should unite the lovers until the end of their days. And none of the heroes should bloody die! And the legend of Ciri? How does that end?’

‘Precisely. How?’

Condwiramurs was struck dumb for a moment. She hadn’t expected a question like that; she sensed a test, an exam, a trap. She said nothing, not wanting to be caught out.

How does the legend of Ciri end? But everybody knows that.

She looked at a dark-hued watercolour which depicted an amorphous barge gliding over the surface of a mist-shrouded lake, a barge being plied with a long pole by a woman visible only as a black shape.

That’s exactly how the legend ends. Just like that.

Nimue read her thoughts.

‘It isn’t so certain, Condwiramurs. By no means is it certain.’

‘I heard the legend,’ began Nimue, ‘from the lips of a wandering storyteller. I’m a country child, the fourth daughter of the village wheelwright. The times the storyteller Pogwizd, a wandering beggar, dwelled in our village were the most beautiful moments of my childhood. One could take a break from the daily toil, see those fabulous wonders, see that far-distant world with the eyes of the soul. A beautiful and marvellous world… More distant and marvellous even than the market in the town nine miles away from us…