The Sword of Destiny (10 page)

"Such recklessness!" shouted Kozojed. "We shall certainly see if you'll be as arrogant when my men arrive from Holopole. In their opinion, you..."

Yarpen, with an uncommon agility for his stature, effortlessly pivoted and struck him in the head with the handle of his axe. Nischuka, coming alongside, finished the job with a kick which sent Kozojed to graze on the grass some distance away.

"You'll regret this!" shouted the shoemaker, on all fours. "All of you..."

"Get him, lads!" roared Yarpen Zigrin. "That filthy-faced son of a whore cobbler! Come on, Nischuka!"

Kozojed didn't hang about. He jumped up and took off at a run towards the eastern canyon.

The Reavers of Holopole chased after him. The dwarves threw stones at him, laughing.

"Already the air's got a lot fresher," laughed Yarpen. "Okay, Boholt, let's go and get the dragon!"

"Wait a minute." Yennefer raised her arm. "The only thing you're going to be hitting is the road...You can go back that way: now be off with you. Every single one of you."

"What?" Boholt flinched, his eyes flashed malevolently. "What are you talking about, dear lady sorceress?"

"Get out! Be gone! Go and find the shoemaker," repeated Yennefer. "Every last one of you. I'm going to take on the dragon myself. With non-conventional weapons. Thank me before leaving. Without me, you would have had a taste of the witcher's sword. Go quickly, Boholt, before I get annoyed. I'm warning you: I know a spell which could transform you into geldings. I have only to wave my hand."

"Good grief," exclaimed Boholt. "My patience has reached its limit. I won't be made to look a fool. Ripper, remove the wagon's tongue. It seems to me that I also need a non-conventional

weapon. Somebody's going to suffer, my dear lords. I'm not pointing a finger. I shall simply say that it's a certain despicable sorceress."

"Try it, Boholt. It would make my day."

"Yennefer," asked the dwarf, reproachfully, "Why?"

"Perhaps it's because I don't like to share, Yarpen."

"Oh well," the dwarf smiled, "you're only human. So human that it's even worthy of a dwarf. It's nice to find one's own qualities in a sorceress. I don't like to share either, Yennefer."

He bent over in a movement as short and quick as a flash of lightning. A metal ball, produced from who knows where, flew through the air and struck Yennefer's forehead violently. Before the sorceress came to, Ripper and Nischuka immobilized her arms and Yarpen has bound her ankles with a rope. The sorceress howled with anger. One of Yarpen's boys, holding her from behind, threw a bridle over her head and pulled it tight, stifling her shouts by shoving the straps into her open mouth.

"What now, Yennefer?" shot Boholt, walking towards her. "How are you going to transform me into a gelding without being able to move your hands?"

He tore the neck of her tunic then ripped her shirt open. Trapped in the bridles, Yennefer hurled abuse at him in the form of stifled shouting.

"We have no time at present," said Boholt, groping her while ignoring the sniggering of the dwarves, "but wait just a little while, sorceress. When we've taken care of the dragon, we'll be able to have some fun. Tie her firmly to the wheel, lads. Both hands tied, so that she can't move a finger. And none of you boys dare to interfere with her, damn it. He who stands strongest against the dragon will have first place in the queue."

"Boholt," said Geralt quietly and ominously. "Watch out. I will hunt you to the ends of the earth."

"You surprise me," replied the Reaver, also quietly. "If I were you, I'd keep my mouth shut because, knowing your abilities, I'm likely take your threat seriously. You leave me no choice. I can't let you live, witcher. But we'll deal with you later. Nischuka, Ripper, to the horses."

"That's just your luck," Jaskier wailed. "Damn it, it's me who got you into this mess."

Dorregaray lowered his head and watched thick drops of his blood run slowly from his nose onto his belly.

"Stop staring at me this instant!" the sorceress shouted at Geralt. She writhed like a snake in her bonds in a vain attempt to conceal her naked charms. Geralt obediently diverted his eyes. Jaskier didn't.

"According to what I see," mocked the bard, "you must have used a whole barrel of mandrake elixir, Yennefer. Your skin resembles that of a sixteen-year-old girl. It's giving me goosebumps."

"Shut up, you son of a whore!" the sorceress replied.

Jaskier didn't relent, "How old are you really? Two hundred years? Rather a hundred and fifty, say. And you act like..."

Yennefer stretched her neck to spit at him. It missed its target...

"Yen," muttered the witcher sadly, wiping his saliva spattered ear with his shoulder.

"Make him stop ogling me!"

"I have no intention of doing so," declared Jaskier, continuing to admire the pleasant view of the half-naked sorceress. "It's because of her that we're prisoners. They'll cut our throats. At the very least, they're going to rape her. At her age..."

"Shut up, Jaskier," ordered the witcher.

"Not on your life. I have a burning desire to compose a ballad about a pair of tits. Please don't interrupt me."

"Jaskier," Dorregaray spat out some blood, "be serious."

"I'm very serious, damn it."

Boholt, helped up by a dwarf, clambered onto his saddle with difficulty due to the heavy leather armour he was decked out in. Nischuka and Ripper were already waiting on their mounts, huge longswords at their sides.

"Good," muttered Boholt. "Now to the dragon."

"No," a deep voice answered, the sonority of which was reminiscent of a brass horn. "It is I who will come to you!"

A long bright gold muzzle appeared behind the circle of rocks, followed by an elongated neck protected by a row of spines then long-clawed paws. Menacing reptilian eyes with vertical pupils observed the scene from on high.

"I couldn't wait on the battleground any longer," explained the dragon Villentretenmerth, looking around at them. "I therefore took the liberty of coming to join you. I see that the adversaries eager to fight me are growing fewer and fewer."

Boholt grabbed his reins between his teeth and his sword in his two fists.

"Thatsh gahd," he mumbled indistinctly, biting on the reins. "Ah hahp dat yer're reddy fer combat, monshter!"

"I am ready," replied the dragon, bowing its back into an arch and wafting its tail in the air as a sign of provocation.

Boholt checked what was going on around him. Nischuka and Ripper surrounded the animal slowly, with deliberate calmness, on either side. Yarpen Zigrin and the boys waited behind them, armed with axes.

"Aaargh!" bellowed Boholt, spurring his horse on wildly and brandishing his sword.

The dragon pivoted, rising up and letting itself fall back to the earth; like a scorpion with its tail above its haunches, it struck downward, mowing down not Boholt, but Nischuka who attacked laterally. Nischuka fell with a crash, his horse neighing and screaming. Boholt, approaching at a gallop, attacked with a mighty blow from his sword, the broad blade of which the dragon skilfully avoided. The momentum of the gallop took Boholt on past the dragon. It twisted and, standing on its hind legs, hit Ripper with its claws, disembowelling the horse and goring its rider's thigh with a single swipe. Boholt, leaning in the saddle, managed to gain control of his mount and, still gripping the reins between his teeth, charged again.

Whipping the air with its tail, the dragon swept aside all of the dwarves as they came running up to it. Then it launched itself at Boholt, vigorously crushing Ripper in its passage as he tried to get up again. Boholt, turning his head, tried an evasive manoeuvre but the dragon was much quicker and more agile. Shrewdly intercepting Boholt from the left, cutting off his route, it hit him with its clawed foot. The horse reared and fell onto its side. Boholt flew from the saddle, losing both sword and helmet, and fell backwards before bashing his head on a boulder.

"Run, boys! Into the mountains!" yelled Yarpen Zigrin with a shout which drowned out the howling Nischuka, still crushed by his horse.

Beards blowing in the wind, the dwarves ran towards the rocks at an amazing speed for their short legs. The dragon did not pursue them. He sat quietly and looked around. Nischuka thrashed and yelled under the weight of his horse. Boholt was lying motionless. Ripper limped back to the shelter of the rocks, walking sideways like a crab.

"It's incredible," murmured Dorregaray. "Incredible..."

"Hey!" Jaskier pulled so hard on his bonds, the wagon shook. "What's that? There! Look!"

They saw a big cloud of dust on the side of the eastern ravine, soon followed by a tumult of shouting, rattle and clatter. The dragon raised its head to look.

Three big wagons carrying armed men came out onto the plain. They scattered to encircle the dragon.

"Bloody hell! It's the militia and guilds of Holopole! " cried Jaskier. "They succeeded in bypassing the river Braa! Yes, it's them! Look, there's Kozojed at the head!"

The dragon lowered its head to gently push the small, greyish, chirping creature towards the wagon. It then struck the ground with its tail, roaring loudly, before launching itself like a speeding arrow to meet the inhabitants of Holopole.

"What's that small thing moving in the grass over there, Geralt?" Yennefer asked.

"It's what the dragon protected," replied the witcher. "It was just recently hatched in a cavern in the northern ravine. It's the offspring of the female dragon poisoned by Kozojed."

The baby reptile, stumbling and hugging the ground with its rounded belly, came up to the wagon with a halting step. It chirped, stood on its hind legs and unfurled its wings. It suddenly went to snuggle up against the sorceress. Yennefer sighed deeply, looking puzzled.

"He likes you," murmured Geralt.

"He may be young, but he's no idiot," added Jaskier, fidgeting enthusiastically in spite of his bonds. "Look where he lays his little head. I'd like to be in his place, damn it. Hey! Little one! You should run away. This is Yennefer, the bane of dragons! And witchers! At least of one witcher in particular..."

"Shut up, Jaskier," shouted Dorregaray. "Look at what's happening on the ground over there! They're going to catch it! Plague upon on all of them!"

The wagons of the inhabitants of Holopole, rumbling like chariots, rushed at the attacking dragon.

"Hack it to pieces," shouted Kozojed hanging on the driver's shoulders. "Hack it to pieces until it's dead, my friends! Don't hold back!"

In a single leap, the dragon evaded the first wagon, but found itself trapped between the two following, from whence a big double fisherman's net, tied with ropes, was thrown over him. The entangled dragon fell, struggling, then curled into a ball before lashing out its legs. The net ripped sharply, torn to pieces. The first wagon, which had now managed to turn around, threw another net, immobilizing it completely. The other two wagons made a u-turn and charged the dragon once again, rattling and bouncing over the potholes in the ground.

"You are caught in the net, carp!" yelled Kozojed. "We're not going to delay gutting you!"

The dragon roared, fire billowing out into the sky with clouds of smoke. The Holopole militiamen jumped down from their wagons and rushed towards it. The dragon roared once again, a desperate, resounding call.

An answer came up from the northern canyon in the form of a piercing war cry.

At a full on gallop, their blonde braids flitting in the wind and blades flashing, there suddenly appeared from the ravine...

"The Zerricanians!" cried the witcher, struggling to free himself from his bonds.

"Oh, shit!" exclaimed Jaskier. "Geralt, do you know what this means?"

The Zerricanians cut through the mass of militiamen like a hot knife in through butter, leaving in their wake heaps of slashed bodies. They dismounted from their horses before running flat out towards the imprisoned dragon. A militiaman tried to intervene. His head rolled from his shoulders. Another one tried to stab Vea with a pitchfork, but the Zerricanian, holding her sword with both hands, disembowelled him from his perineum up to his sternum. The others took to their heels.

"To the wagons," shouted Kozojed. "To the wagons, my friends! We shall crush them with the wagons."

"Geralt!" Yennefer shouted suddenly. Stretching her trussed up legs, she managed to move them under the wagon, very close to the witcher's hands which were tied behind his back. "The Sign of Igni! Burn my bonds! Can you feel the rope? Burn it, damn it!"

"Without looking?" Geralt protested. "I'll burn you, Yen!"

"Form the sign! I can take it!"

Geralt obeyed. He felt a tingling in his fingers, forming the Sign of Igni just above the sorceress' ankles. Yennefer turned her head to bite the neck of her tunic, stifling a moan. The young dragon nestled his wings against her, chirping.

"Yen!"

"Burn the rope!" she wailed.

The bonds finally gave way as the foul smell of charred meat became intolerable. Dorregaray issued a strange sound before fainting, sagging in his bonds against the wheel of the wagon.

The sorceress, face twisted with pain, sat back and extended a freed leg. She cried out in a voice full of rage and suffering. The medallion Geralt wore at his neck trembled as though it were alive. Yennefer shifted her hips and gestured with her leg towards the wagons of the Holopole militia and called out a spell. The air vibrated and filled with the smell of ozone.

"Oh! By the Gods!" Jaskier moaned with awe. "What a ballad it will be, Yennefer!"

The spell cast by her pretty leg did not quite succeed. The first wagon and everyone inside it took on a shade of buttercup yellow which the warriors Holopole, blinded by the heat of battle, did not even notice. The spell was more effective on the second wagon: all its crew were instantly transformed into huge pimply frogs which fled, croaking comically, in all directions. The wagon, deprived of a driver, turned over and smashed onto the ground. Dragging the torn off tongue behind them, the horses disappeared into the distance, neighing hysterically.