Emhyr var Emreis, Imperator of Nilfgaard, accompanied Yennefer and Geralt all the way to the bathroom. Almost to the edge of a large, marble pool, full of steaming, fragrant water.

‘Farewell,’ he said. ‘You don’t have to hurry. I’m going, but I’m leaving people here who I shall instruct and to whom I shall issue orders. When you’re ready, just call, and a lieutenant will give you a knife. But I repeat: you don’t have to hurry.’

‘We appreciate your favour,’ Yennefer nodded gravely. ‘Your Imperial Majesty?’

‘Yes?’

‘Please, as far as possible, don’t harm my daughter. I wouldn’t want to die with the thought that she’s crying.’

Emhyr was silent for a long time. A very long time. Leaning against a window. With his head turned away.

‘Madam Yennefer,’ he finally answered, and his face was very strange. ‘You may be certain I shall not harm your and Witcher Geralt’s daughter. I’ve trampled human bodies and danced on the barrows of my foes. And I thought I was capable of anything. But what you suspect me of, I simply wouldn’t be capable of doing. I know it now. So I thank you both. Farewell.’

He went out, quietly closing the door behind him. Geralt sighed.

‘Shall we undress?’ He glanced at the steaming pool. ‘The thought that they’ll haul me out of here as a naked corpse doesn’t especially delight me.’

‘And, can you believe it, to me it’s all the same.’ Yennefer threw off her slippers and unfastened her dress with swift movements. ‘Even if it’s my last bath, I’m not going to bathe in my clothes.’

She pulled her blouse over her head and entered the pool, energetically splashing water around.

‘Well, Geralt? Why are you standing there like a statue?’

‘I’d forgotten how beautiful you are.’

‘You forget easily. Come on, into the water.’

When he sat down beside her she immediately threw her arms around his neck. He kissed her, stroking her waist, above and below the water.

‘Is it,’ he asked for form’s sake, ‘an appropriate time?’

‘Any time,’ she muttered, putting a hand under the water and touching him, ‘is the right time for this. Emhyr repeated twice that we don’t have to hurry. What would you prefer to spend doing during the last minutes given to you? Weeping and wailing? That’s undignified, isn’t it? Examining your conscience? That’s banal and stupid, isn’t it?’

‘That’s not what I meant.’

‘So what did you mean?’

‘The cuts will be painful if the water cools down,’ he murmured, caressing her breasts.

‘It’s worth paying in pain—’ Yennefer put her other hand in the water ‘—for pleasure. Are you afraid of pain?’

‘No.’

‘Neither am I. Sit on the edge of the pool. I love you, but I’m not bloody going to do it underwater.’