Nenneke felt the wound, washed it and began to curse. He already knew this routine by heart. She had started on the very first day, and had never failed to moan when she saw the marks left by the princess of Wyzim’s talons.

“It’s terrible! To let yourself be slashed like this by an ordinary striga. Muscles, tendons—she only just missed your carotid artery! Great Melitele! Geralt, what’s happening to you? How did she get so close to you? What did you want with her? To mount her?”

He didn’t answer, and smiled faintly.

“Don’t grin like an idiot.” The priestess rose and took a bag of dressings from the chest of drawers. Despite her weight and low stature, she moved swiftly and gracefully. “There’s nothing funny about it. You’re losing your reflexes, Geralt.”

“You’re exaggerating.”

“I’m not exaggerating at all.” Nenneke spread a greenish mush smelling sharply of eucalyptus over the wound. “You shouldn’t have allowed yourself to get wounded, but you did, and very seriously at that. Fatally even. And even with your exceptional powers of regeneration it’ll be months before your neck is fully mobile again. I warn you, don’t test your strength by fighting an agile opponent during that time.”

“Thank you for the warning. Perhaps you could give me some advice, too: how am I supposed to live in the meantime? Rally a few girls, buy a cart and organize a traveling house of ill-repute?”

Nenneke shrugged, bandaging his neck with quick, deft movements. “Am I supposed to give you advice and teach you how to live? Am I your mother or something? Right, that’s done. You can get dressed. Breakfast’s waiting for you in the refectory. Hurry up or you’ll have to make it yourself. I don’t intend to keep the girls in the kitchen to midday.”

“Where will I find you later? In the sanctuary?”

“No.” Nenneke got up. “Not in the sanctuary. You’re a welcome guest here, witcher, but don’t hang around in the sanctuary. Go for a walk, and I’ll find you myself.”

“Fine.”

II

Geralt strolled—for the fourth time—along the poplar alley which led from the gate to the dwellings by the sanctuary and main temple block, which merged into the sheer rock. After brief consideration he decided against returning to shelter, and turned toward the gardens and outbuildings. Umpteen priestesses, clad in gray working garments, were toiling away, weeding the beds and feeding the birds in the henhouses. The majority of them were young or very young, virtually children. Some greeted him with a nod or a smile in passing. He answered their greetings but didn’t recognize any of them. Although he often visited the temple—once or even twice a year—he never saw more than three or four faces he knew. The girls came and went—becoming oracles in other temples, midwives and healers specializing in women’s and children’s diseases, wandering druids, teachers or governesses. But there was never a shortage of priestesses, arriving from all over, even the remotest regions. Melitele’s temple in Ellander was well-known and enjoyed well-earned fame.