‘The fact remains a fact,’ the Witcher repeated in an angry, metallic voice. ‘Oh, yes! He yelled that fact in my face on Thanedd, and his voice stuck in his throat from terror, for he was staring at my sword edge. That fact and that cry were supposed to be the arguments which would stop me murdering him. Well, it did and I don’t think it can now be undone. Which is a pity. For a chain ought to have been begun then, on Thanedd. A long chain of death, a chain of revenge, about which tales would still be told after a hundred years have passed. Tales which people will be afraid to listen to after dark. Do you understand that, Dandelion?’

‘Not really.’

‘Then to hell with you.’

That conversation was hideous and the Witcher’s expression had been hideous too. Oh, I did not like it when he was in a mood such as that and went off on such a tack.

I must, though, confess that the vivid comparison with the cormorant had played its role. I began to worry. The fish in its beak, taken to be clubbed, gutted and fried! A truly nice analogy, joyful prospects…

However, good sense belied such fears. After all, if we were to continue with the fishy metaphors, then who were we? Small fry. Small, bony fry. In exchange for such a meagre haul the cormorant Cahir could not count on imperial grace. In any case, he was far from the pike he wanted to be thought of as. He was small fry, just like us. When the war was raking both the earth and people’s fates like an iron harrow, who was paying the slightest attention to small fry?

I am certain that no one in Nilfgaard remembers Cahir now.

Vattier de Rideaux, chief of the Nilfgaardian military intelligence, listened to the imperial reprimand.

‘So,’ Emhyr var Emreis continued scathingly, ‘an institution which devours three times as much of the state budget as education, culture and the arts taken together is incapable of finding one man. This man simply disappears, goes into hiding, although I spend astronomical sums on an institution from which nothing has any right to remain concealed! One man, guilty of treason, blatantly mocks an institution to which I have given so many privileges and funds as would give even innocent men sleepless nights. Oh, trust me, Vattier, when the council next speaks of trimming the funds for clandestine services, I shall prick up my ears. You may trust that!’

‘Your Imperial Majesty,’ Vattier de Rideaux croaked, ‘will make, I have no doubt, the right decision, after weighing up all the pros and cons. Both the failures and the successes of the intelligence service. Your Majesty may also be certain that the traitor, Cahir aep Ceallach, will not escape punishment. I have taken steps—’

‘I do not pay you for undertakings, but for results. And those are miserable, Vattier, miserable! What about Vilgefortz? Where the hell is Cirilla? What are you mumbling now? Louder!’