“It’s you, Renfri. You’ll reveal a truly princely—what am I saying, royal magnanimity and renounce your revenge. Have I guessed?”

Renfri threw back her head and laughed, covering her mouth with her hand. Then she grew silent and fixed her shining eyes on the witcher.

“Geralt,” she said, “I used to be a princess. I had everything I could dream of. Servants at my beck and call, dresses, shoes. Cambric knickers. Jewels and trinkets, ponies, goldfish in a pond. Dolls, and a doll’s house bigger than this room. That was my life until Stregobor and that whore Aridea ordered a huntsman to butcher me in the forest and bring back my heart and liver. Lovely, don’t you think?”

“No. I’m pleased you evaded the huntsman, Renfri.”

“Like shit I did. He took pity on me and let me go. After the son of a bitch raped me and robbed me.”

Geralt, fiddling with his medallion, looked her straight in the eyes. She didn’t lower hers.

“That was the end of the princess,” she continued. “The dress grew torn, the cambric grew grubby. And then there was dirt, hunger, stench, stink and abuse. Selling myself to any old bum for a bowl of soup or a roof over my head. Do you know what my hair was like? Silk. And it reached a good foot below my hips. I had it cut right to the scalp with sheep-shears when I caught lice. It’s never grown back properly.”

She was silent for a moment, idly brushing the uneven strands of hair from her forehead.

“I stole rather than starve to death. I killed to avoid being killed myself. I was locked in prisons which stank of urine, never knowing if they would hang me in the morning, or just flog me and release me. And through it all, my stepmother and your sorcerer were hard on my heels, with their poisons and assassins and spells. And you want me to reveal my magnanimity? To forgive him royally? I’ll tear his head off, royally, first.”

“Aridea and Stregobor tried to poison you?”

“With an apple seasoned with nightshade. I was saved by a gnome, and an emetic I thought would turn my insides out. But I survived.”

“Was that one of the seven gnomes?” Renfri, pouring wine, froze holding the wineskin over the tumbler.

“Ah,” she said. “You do know a lot about me. Yes? Do you have something against gnomes? Or humanoids? They were better to me than most people, not that it’s your business.

“Stregobor and Aridea hunted me like a wild animal as long as they could. Until I became the hunter. Aridea died in her own bed. She was lucky I didn’t get to her earlier—I had a special plan for her, and now I’ve got one for the sorcerer. Do you think he deserves to die?”

“I’m no judge. I’m a witcher.”

“You are. I said that there were two people who could prevent bloodshed in Blaviken. The second is you. The sorcerer will let you into the tower. You could kill him.”