‘ “Sorry, Fringilla,” ’ she repeated, sneering furiously. ‘How curt, how economical, how unpretentious, with such attention to style. The letter you left for me, I’m absolutely certain, is doubtless edited just as elegantly. Without excess lavishness as regards ink.’

‘I must ride,’ he uttered. ‘You can guess why. And for whose sake. Please forgive me. I intended to flee stealthily and silently, because… I didn’t want you to try and come after me.’

‘Your fears were groundless,’ she drawled, bending the crop. ‘I wouldn’t have gone after you even if you’d asked me, grovelling at my feet. Oh, no, Witcher. Ride alone, die alone, freeze alone in the mountain passes. I have no obligations towards Ciri. And towards you? Do you know how many have begged for what you had? And for what you’re now contemptuously rejecting, tossing away?’

‘I’ll never forget you.’

‘Oh,’ she hissed. ‘You don’t know how much I feel like making sure you really won’t. Even if not using magic, then using this whip!’

‘You won’t do it.’

‘You’re right, I won’t. I wouldn’t be able to. I shall behave as befits a scorned and spurned lover. Classically. I shall walk away with my head high. With dignity and pride. Swallowing back the tears. Then I’ll howl into a pillow. And then I’ll bed another!’

By the end she was almost screaming.

He said nothing. Neither did she.

‘Geralt,’ she said finally, in quite a different voice. ‘Stay with me.

‘I think I love you,’ she said, seeing he was delaying his answer. ‘Stay with me. I implore you. I’ve never asked anyone nor thought I ever would. But I ask you.’

‘Fringilla,’ he answered after a while. ‘You’re a woman a man can only dream about. My fault, my only fault, is that I don’t have the nature of a dreamer.’

‘You are,’ she said a moment later, biting her lip, ‘like an angler’s hook, which once it’s stuck in, can only be pulled out with blood and flesh. Well, I’ve only got myself to blame. I knew what I was doing, playing around with a dangerous toy. Luckily, I also know how to cope with the effects. In that respect I have an advantage over the rest of the female species.’

He didn’t comment.

‘In any case,’ she added, ‘a broken heart, although it hurts greatly, a lot more than a broken arm, heals much, much more quickly.’

He didn’t comment that time, either. Fringilla contemplated the bruise on his cheek.

‘How was my amulet? Does it work well?’

‘It’s quite simply wonderful. Thank you.’

She nodded.

‘Where are you riding to?’ she asked in a completely different voice and tone. ‘What did you find out? You know where Vilgefortz is hiding, don’t you?’

‘Yes. Don’t ask me to tell you where that is. I won’t.’

‘I’ll buy that information. Quid pro quo.’

‘Oh, yes?’

‘I have information,’ she repeated, ‘that is valuable. And to you quite simply invaluable. I’ll sell it to you in exchange for—’