‘You hit someone smaller than you, witcher,’ the knocker said, breathing his foul breath into Geralt’s face. ‘You harmed a small, gentle, innocent creature without cause. We knew you couldn’t be trusted. You’re aggressive. You have the instincts of a murderer. How many of our kind have you killed, you scoundrel?’

He didn’t deign to answer.

‘Ooooh!’ The knocker breathed alcohol fumes harder. ‘I’ve dreamed of this since I was a child! Since I was a child! My dream has finally come true. Look to the left.’

Like an idiot he looked. And was punched in the teeth with a right hook so hard he saw an intense brightness.

‘Oooooh!’ The knocker bared huge crooked teeth from the mass of his reeking beard. ‘I’ve dreamed of this since I was a child! Look to the right.’

‘Enough.’ A loud and sonorous order resounded from somewhere in the depths of the cave. ‘Enough of this fun and games. Let him go, please.’

Geralt spat blood from his cut lip. He cleaned his boot in a small stream of water flowing down the rock. The almost-Pekinese grinned at him sneeringly, but from a safe distance. The knocker also grinned, massaging its fist.

‘Go, witcher,’ it growled. ‘Go to him, since he summons you. I shall wait. For you will have to return this way, after all.’

The cave he entered was–astonishingly–full of light. Through openings in the ceiling, bristling with stalactites, shone criss-crossing columns of brightness, drawing from the rocks and dripstone formations a kaleidoscope of brilliance and colour. Furthermore, a magical ball blazing with light–amplified by reflections in the quartz on the walls–was suspended in the air. In spite of all this illumination the end of the cave faded into the gloom, and black darkness loomed in the vista of the colonnade of stalagnates.

An immense cave painting was in the process of being created on the wall, which nature had seemingly prepared for that purpose. The painter was a fair-haired elf dressed in a paint-smudged mantle. His head seemed to be ringed by a luminous halo in the magical-natural brilliance.

‘Sit down,’ said the elf, without wresting his gaze away from the painting. He gestured to a boulder with a wave of his brush. ‘They didn’t harm you, did they?’

‘No. Not really.’

‘You’ll have to forgive them.’

‘Indeed. I will.’

‘They’re a bit like children. They were awfully glad you were coming.’

‘I noticed.’

Only then did the elf glance at him.

‘Sit down,’ he repeated. ‘I shall be at your disposal shortly. I’m just finishing.’

What the elf was finishing was a stylised animal, probably a bison. For the moment only its outline was complete–from its splendid horns to its equally magnificent tail. Geralt sat down on the boulder indicated and swore to be patient and meek–to the bounds of his abilities.