“The prin… cess?”

“The princess is like a princess. Thin. And somewhat dull-witted. She weeps incessantly and wets her bed. But Foltest says this will change. I don’t think it’ll change for the worse, do you, Geralt?”

The witcher closed his eyes.

“Good. I take my leave now. Rest.” Velerad got up. “Geralt? Before I go, tell me: why did you try to bite her to death? Eh? Geralt?”

The witcher was asleep.

THE VOICE OF REASON

I

“Geralt.”

He raised his head, torn from sleep. The sun was already high and forced blinding golden rays through the shutters, penetrating the chamber with tentacles of light. The witcher shaded his eyes with his hand in an unnecessary, instinctive reflex which he had never managed to shake off—all he needed to do, after all, was narrow his pupils into vertical slits.

“It’s late,” said Nenneke, opening the shutters. “You’ve slept in. Off with you, Iola.”

The girl sat up suddenly and leaned out of bed to take her mantle from the floor. Geralt felt a trickle of cool saliva on his shoulder, where her lips had been a moment ago.

“Wait…” he said hesitantly. She looked at him, quickly turned away.

She had changed. There was nothing of the water nymph in her anymore, nothing of the luminous, chamomile-scented apparition she had been at dawn. Her eyes were blue, not black. And she had freckles—on her nose, her neckline, her shoulders. They weren’t unattractive; they suited her complexion and reddish hair. But he hadn’t seen them at dawn, when she had been his dream. With shame he realized he felt resentment toward her, resentment that she hadn’t remained a dream, and that he would never forgive himself for it.

“Wait,” he repeated. “Iola… I wanted—”

“Don’t speak to her, Geralt,” said Nenneke. “She won’t answer you anyway. Off with you, Iola.”

Wrapped in her mantle, the girl pattered toward the door, her bare feet slapping the floor—troubled, flushed, awkward. No longer reminding him, in any way, of—

Yennefer.

“Nenneke,” he said, reaching for his shirt. “I hope you’re not annoyed that—You won’t punish her, will you?”

“Fool,” the priestess snorted. “You’ve forgotten where you are. This is neither a hermitage nor a convent. It’s Melitele’s temple. Our goddess doesn’t forbid our priestesses anything. Almost.”

“You forbade me to talk to her.”

“I didn’t forbid you. But I know it’s pointless. Iola doesn’t speak.”

“What?”

“She doesn’t speak. She’s taken a vow. It’s a sort of sacrifice through which… Oh, what’s the point of explaining; you wouldn’t understand anyway. You wouldn’t even try to understand. I know your views on religion. No, don’t get dressed yet. I want to check your neck.”

She sat on the edge of the bed and skillfully unwound the linen bandages wrapped thickly around the witcher’s neck. He grimaced in pain.

As soon as he had arrived in Ellander, Nenneke had removed the painfully thick stitches of shoemaker’s twine with which they had stitched him in Wyzim, opened the wound and dressed it again. The results were clear: he had arrived at the temple almost cured, if perhaps a little stiff. Now he was sick again, and in pain. But he didn’t protest. He’d known the priestess for years and knew how great was her knowledge of healing, how rich and comprehensive her pharmacy was. A course of treatment at Melitele’s temple could do nothing but good.