‘Your sword. You claim you’ll give up being a witcher. A witcher is his sword. Throw it into the chasm. Or break it. Then we’ll let you out.’

For a moment Geralt stood without moving. The water dripping from the walls and ceiling could be heard in the silence. Then slowly, without hurrying, he jammed his sword vertically and deeply into a rocky cleft. And broke the blade with a powerful blow of his boot. The blade shattered with a whine whose echo sounded in the caverns.

Water dripped from the walls, dribbling down them like tears.

‘I can’t believe it,’ the korred said slowly. ‘I can’t believe anyone would be that stupid.’

They all fell on him, instantly, without any shouting, noises or commands. Mister Schweitzer was the first to lope across the bridge, his claws extended and baring fangs that wouldn’t have shamed a wolf.

Geralt let him come closer, then twisted his hips and slashed, hacking through his throat and lower jaw. The next moment he was on the bridge and cutting open the kilmulis with a powerful blow. He crouched and fell to the ground, just in time, and the attacking candelabra flew over his head, barely scratching his jacket with its talons. The Witcher dodged away from the pryskirnik, from its thin legs flashing like scythes. A blow from one of them hit him on the side of the head. Geralt danced, making a feint and encircling himself with a sweeping slash. The pryskirnik leaped again, but missed. It crashed against the barrier and smashed it, tumbling into the chasm with a hail of stones. Until that moment it hadn’t emitted the merest sound, but now it howled as it hurtled into the chasm. The howling gradually faded.

They attacked him from two sides–from one the candelabra, from the other the kilmulis, which, although wounded and gushing blood, had managed to stand up. The Witcher jumped onto the balustrade of the bridge, felt shifting stones grinding against each other and the whole bridge shuddering. He balanced, slipped out of reach of the candelabra’s clawed feet and found himself behind the kilmulis’s back. The kilmulis didn’t have a neck, so Geralt slashed it in the temple. But the monster’s skull was like iron, so he had to hack it a second time. He lost too much time doing it.

He was hit in the head, the pain exploded in his skull and eyes. He whirled around, defending himself with a parry, feeling blood pouring from under his hair, trying hard to understand what had happened. He dodged another blow of the claws and understood. The candelabra had changed shape–it was now attacking with its improbably extended legs.