“Farewell, strange human,” Filavandrel said quietly to Geralt. “You’re right. Words aren’t necessary. They won’t change anything.”

Geralt remained silent.

“After some consideration,” added the Seidhe, “I’ve come to the conclusion that you were right. When you pitied us. So goodbye. Goodbye until we meet again, on the day when we descend into the valleys to die honorably. We’ll look out for you then, Toruviel and I. Don’t let us down.”

For a long time, they looked at each other in silence. And then the witcher answered briefly and simply:

“I’ll try.”

VII

“By the gods, Geralt.” Dandilion stopped playing, hugged the lute and touched it with his cheek. “This wood sings on its own! These strings are alive! What wonderful tonality! Bloody hell, a couple of kicks and a bit of fear is a pretty low price to pay for such a superb lute. I’d have let myself be kicked from dawn to dusk if I’d known what I was going to get. Geralt? Are you listening to me at all?”

“It’s difficult not to hear you two.” Geralt raised his head from the book and glanced at the sylvan, who was still stubbornly squeaking on a peculiar set of pipes made from reeds of various lengths. “I hear you; the whole neighborhood hears you.”

“Duvvelsheyss, not neighborhood.” Torque put his pipes aside. “A desert, that’s what it is. A wilderness. A shit-hole. Eh, I miss my hemp!”

“He misses his hemp,” laughed Dandilion, carefully turning the delicately engraved lute pegs. “You should have sat in the thicket quiet as a dormouse instead of scaring girls, destroying dykes and sullying the well. I think you’re going to be more careful now and give up your tricks, eh, Torque?”

“I like tricks,” declared the sylvan, baring his teeth. “And I can’t imagine life without them. But have it your way. I promise to be more careful on new territory. I’ll be more restrained.”

The night was cloudy and windy. The gale beat down the reeds and rustled in the branches of the bushes surrounding their camp. Dandilion threw some dry twigs into the fire. Torque wriggled around on his makeshift bed, swiping mosquitoes away with his tail. A fish leapt in the lake with a splash.

“I’ll describe our whole expedition to the edge of the world in a ballad,” declared Dandilion. “And I’ll describe you in it, too, Torque.”

“Don’t think you’ll get away with it,” growled the sylvan. “I’ll write a ballad too, then, and describe you, but in such a way as you won’t be able to show your face in decent company for twelve years. So watch out!

Geralt?”

“What?”

“Have you read anything interesting in that book which you so disgracefully wheedled out of those freemen?”

“I have.”

“So read it to us, before the fire burns out.”

“Yes, yes”—Dandilion strummed the melodious strings of Toruviel’s lute—“read us something, Geralt.”

The witcher leaned on his elbow, edging the volume closer to the fire.

“ ‘Glimpsed she may be,’ ” he began, “ ‘during the time of sumor, from the days of Mai and Juyn to the days of October, but most oft this haps on the Feste of the Scythe, which ancients would call Lammas. She revealeth herself as the Fairhaired Ladie, in flowers all, and all that liveth followeth her path and clingeth to her, as one, plant or beast. Hence her name is Lyfia. Ancients call her Danamebi and venerate her greatly. Even the Bearded, albeit in mountains not on fields they dwell, respect and call her Bloemenmagde.’ ”