A campfire's burning and a dwarf is just going to bring some medicine for… For your stomach.'
'Geralt,' sobbed Triss, trying to disentangle herself from the blankets. No… no magic elixirs, remember…'
'I remember. Lie peacefully.' I've got to… Oooh…'
The witcher leaned over without a word, picked up the enchantress together with her cocoon of caparisons and blankets, and marched to the woods, into the darkness. Ciri sighed.
She turned, hearing heavy panting. Behind the wagon appeared the dwarf, hefting a considerable bundle under his arm. The campfire flame gleamed on the blade of the axe behind his belt; the rivets on his heavy leather jerkin also glistened.
'Where's the sick one?' he snarled. 'Flown away on a broomstick?'
Ciri pointed to the darkness.
'Right.' The dwarf nodded. 'I know the pain and I've known the same nasty complaint. When I was younger I used to eat everything I managed to find or catch or cut down, so I got food poisoning many a time. Who is she, this Enchantress?'
'Triss Merigold.'
'I don't know her, never heard of her. I rarely have anything to do with the Brotherhood anyway. Well, but it's polite to introduce oneself. I'm called Yarpen Zigrin. And what are you called, little goose?'
'Something other than Little Goose,' snarled Ciri with a gleam in her eyes.
The dwarf chuckled and bared his teeth.
'Ah.' He bowed with exaggeration. 'I beg your forgiveness. I didn't recognise you in the darkness. This isn't a goose but a noble young lady. I fall at your feet. What is the young lady's name, if it's no secret?'
'It's no secret. I'm Ciri.'
'Ciri. Aha. And who is the young lady?'
'That,' Ciri turned her nose up proudly, 'is a secret.'
Yarpen snorted again.
'The young lady's little tongue is as sharp as a wasp. If the young lady will deign to forgive me, I've brought the medicine and a little food. Will the young lady accept it or will she send the old boor, Yarpen Zigrin, away?'
'I'm sorry…' Ciri had second thoughts and lowered her head. 'Triss really does need help, Master… Zigrin. She's very sick. Thank you for the medicine.'
'It's nothing.' The dwarf bared his teeth again and patted her shoulder amicably. 'Come on, Ciri, you help me. The medicine has to be prepared. We'll roll some pellets according to my grandmother's recipe. No disease sitting in the guts will resist these kernels.'
He unwrapped the bundle, extracted something shaped like a piece of turf and a small clay vessel. Ciri approached, curious.
'You should know, Ciri,' said Yarpen, 'that my grandmother knew her medicine like nobody's business. Unfortunately, she believed that the source of most disease is idleness, and idleness is best cured through the application of a stick. As far as my siblings and I were concerned, she chiefly used this cure preventively. She beat us for anything and for nothing. She was a rare old hag. And once when, out of the blue, she gave me a chunk of bread with dripping and sugar, it was such a surprise that I dropped it in astonishment, dripping down. So my gran gave me a thrashing, the nasty old bitch. And then she gave me another chunk of bread, only without the sugar.'
'My grandmother,' Ciri nodded in understanding, 'thrashed me once, too. With a switch.'
'A switch?' The dwarf laughed. 'Mine whacked me once with a pickaxe handle. But that's enough reminiscing, we have to roll the pellets. Here, tear this up and mould it into little balls.'
'What is it? It's sticky and messy… Eeeuuggh… What a stink!'
'It's mouldy oil-meal bread. Excellent medicine. Roll it into little halls. Smaller, smaller, they're for a magician, not a cow. Give me one. Good. Now we're going to roll the ball in medicine.'
' Eeeeuuuugggghh!'
'Stinks?' The dwarf brought his upturned nose closer to the clay pot. 'Impossible. Crushed garlic and bitter salt has no right to slink, even if it's a hundred years old.'
'It's foul, uugghh. Triss won't eat that!'
'We'll use my grandmother's method. You squeeze her nose and I'll shove the pellets in.'
'Yarpen,' Geralt hissed, emerging abruptly from the darkness
with the magician in his arms. 'Watch out or I'll shove something down you.'
'It's medicine!' The dwarf took offence. 'It helps! Mould, garlic…'
'Yes,' moaned Triss weakly from the depths of her cocoon. 'It's true… Geralt, it really ought to help…'
'See?' Yarpen nudged Geralt with his elbow, turning his beard up proudly and pointing to Triss, who swallowed the pellets with a martyred expression. 'A wise magician. Knows what's good for her.'
'What are you saying, Triss?' The witcher leaned over. 'Ah, I see. Yarpen, do you have any angelica? Or saffron?'
'I'll have a look, and ask around. I've brought you some water and a little food-'
'Thank you. But they both need rest above all. Ciri, lie down.'
'I'll just make up a compress for Triss-'
'I'll do it myself. Yarpen, I'd like to talk to you.'
'Come to the fire. We'll broach a barrel-'
'I want to talk to you. I don't need an audience. Quite the contrary.'
'Of course. I'm listening.'
'What sort of convoy is this?'
The dwarf raised his small, piercing eyes at him.
'The king's service,' he said slowly and emphatically.
'That's what I thought.' The witcher held the gaze. 'Yarpen, I'm not asking out of any inappropriate curiosity.'
'I know. And I also know what you mean. But this convoy is… hmm… special.'
'So what are you transporting?'
'Salt fish,' said Yarpen casually, and proceeded to embellish his lie without batting an eyelid. 'Fodder, tools, harnesses, various odds and ends for the army. Wenck is a quartermaster to the king's army.'
'If he's quartermaster then I'm a druid,' smiled Geralt. 'But that's your affair – I'm not in the habit of poking my nose into other people's secrets. But you can see the state Triss is in. Let us join you, Yarpen, let us put her in one of the wagons. Just for a few days. I'm not asking where you're going because this trail goes straight to the south without forking until past the Lixela and it's a ten-day journey to the Lixela. By that time the fever will have subsided and Triss will be able to ride a horse. And even if she isn't then I'll stop in a town beyond the river. Ten days in a wagon, well covered, hot food… Please.'
'I don't give the orders here. Wenck does.'
'I don't believe you lack influence over him. Not in a convoy primarily made up of dwarves. Of course he has to bear you in mind.'
'Who is this Triss to you?'
'What difference does it make in this situation?'
'In this situation none. I asked out of an inappropriate curiosity born of the desire to start new rumours going around the inns. But be that as it may, you're mighty attracted to this enchantress, Geralt.'
The witcher smiled sadly.
'And the girl?' Yarpen indicated Ciri with his head as she wriggled under the sheepskin. 'Yours?'
'Mine,' he replied without thinking. 'Mine, Zigrin.'
The dawn was grey, wet, and smelled of night rain and morning mist. Ciri felt she had slept no more than a few minutes, as though she had been woken up the very minute she lay her head down on the sacks heaped on the wagon.
Geralt was just settling Triss down next to her, having brought her in from another enforced expedition into the woods. The rugs cocooning the enchantress sparkled with dew. Geralt had dark circles under his eyes. Ciri knew he had not closed them for an instant Triss had run a fever through the night and suffered greatly.
'Did I wake you? Sorry. Sleep, Ciri. It's still early.'
