Chapter Text
The narrow path had run out. His feet, thankfully kept dry by sturdy boots, briefly disappeared into the mud and reappeared with an effort and a squelching sound. He sighed and muttered a curse. The rain, tapping at the leather armour covering his broad back and chest, and plastering strands of his long white hair to his forehead, made him slightly irritable. He did not dislike rain, but simply wondered why it so often rained in the swamps, where it already was more than sufficiently wet. Water probably attracted more water, he decided. Like trouble always attracted more trouble. Such small conclusions made him feel a bit better. Even if they were only insignificant bits of information that filled tiny portions of the vastly empty shelves of his memory.
He was Geralt of Rivia, he knew that much. A lot of everything else he did not exactly know, but was told by others, who claimed to know him. Before he had died. Yeah, well, he had. And now that he was alive, except for his oldest recollections, he could only trust his most recent ones, those that started at Kaer Morhen. Sloshing through mud, he was picking at the tangled mess of his memories, singling out the earliest one since he had woken up in the Witchers' stronghold, and then trying to move further back in time and remember more. That was usually the point where he failed. Now, as so many times before, he grunted with frustration. He felt like kicking something, but the only thing within reach was mud, so he opted not to. Being even wetter and dirtier would hardly be a major mood changer, especially now that he was about to remain in the swamps for as long as… As long as what? He had not planned his escape into the swamps that far ahead, but he decided he would stay until he figured some things out.
Deep in thought, he waded into deeper mud and almost lost his boot as his foot was sucked down. He swore, wrenching it out, and swore even more when all the commotion attracted drowners, who were now approaching seemingly from all directions. Contrary to the common belief, whatever had been hanged could indeed drown. The bodies of previously hanged criminals often ended up dumped into the swamps. Geralt knew that they returned as drowners, and these ones were now walking towards him only slightly unsteadily.
"Damn monsters!" he grumbled under his breath. In truth, he welcomed their appearance. They were something to occupy himself with, and that something was exactly the job he had intended to do.
The familiar ring of metal as he unsheathed his silver sword heightened his focus. His muscles knew this routine well and worked like a perfect mechanism as his knees bent, lowering his body, pushing his left leg into the leading position. The sword swooshed, drawing two interconnected circles in the air, waking up the muscles in his arms and back. Geralt assumed a combat stance, both hands gripping the hilt of the sword high up by his right temple, the sharp point aiming slightly downward.
Instead of waiting for the green watery creatures to reach him, the Witcher pirouetted to his left, swiping the sword sideways, leaving two drowners dead with one motion. The success of the first attack gave him the momentum to plunge right into the thick of them, swinging his silver blade in wide arcs meant to thin the monstrous crowd. He kept dancing around, light on his feet and incredibly fast, ever swirling, parrying most of the creatures' blows and landing his own lethal cuts at all angles. The swift technique allowed him to dispose of the slimy mob quickly, with only a couple left standing. He could now use the simple spell of Aard Sign to knock down the stragglers and finish them with one precise, heavy hit. Being a Witcher was ugly and dirty work, but there was room for a creativity of sorts. The last survivors of such attacks served to perfect the execution of beheadings, or sometimes even complicated choreographed routines, which not only added a flare to the Witcher's style, but were surprisingly highly effective.
Geralt found himself performing just such a string of moves, which concluded with a splash of foully smelling slime on his chest as a drowner's head plopped down into the water. Having made sure all the opponents had been vanquished, he jammed his sword into the sludgy ground and set out to pick up valuable alchemical ingredients off the corpses.
He was bent over the remains that promised to yield not only the acid he would use to prepare potions and poisons, but some gold coins the creature must have swallowed, when he felt his medallion vibrate. Alas, it was a little too late. As his hand reached behind his back for the silver sword that was not there, he felt sharp claws tearing at his shoulder. He rolled away to the side automatically, regrettably not the side where his blade was sticking out of the mud. Still on his haunches, he threw his left hand in front of himself with a murmur that sent the drowned dead aflame. It did not incinerate it though; this most vile variety of a drowner was particularly hard to kill. Relying on the power of the magic sign to stun the monster, Geralt jumped on it, and buried his dagger in its neck.
Standing up to his feet, he tried to blow his hair away from his eyes, but it was too wet. His gloves were covered in too many unappealing fluids to do it with his hand, so he let it be, cursing at regular intervals. To be fair, among other things, he cursed his own stupidity for leaving his sword a few paces away. He still had the other sword strapped to his back, but using steel against most monsters was like trying to dice a carrot with a spoon: painful, annoying, and dull.
A few cuts and bruises aside, the fight produced good results. The drowned dead tongues he picked up would be the first contribution to one of his contracts. Those Witcher contracts, which required at least partially clearing the area of the monsters that infested it and collecting certain substances off the creatures, were the official reason he was now in the swamps.
Having gathered up everything of value, Geralt stood by his sword, legs wide, hands resting on the hilt. So far his plan had been to get to the swamps and start killing monsters, until all contracts were fulfilled, and until his head cleared out. He was not sure how long it was going to take, but he had secured quite a few contracts, not intending to return to Vizima too soon. The place was currently too much for him, with the Salamandra bandits, regular bandits, missing Witchers and Witcher secrets, the Scoia'tael and the Order, Triss and Shani, and even Dandelion, all requiring his attention. It was trouble enough dealing with all the mess, and the fact that he still had not reclaimed his memory did not help. He felt like many needed his help, but he needed to help himself first. It meant choosing his battles wisely. For now, he had chosen. His sword unearthed a lump of dirt and grass as he jerked it out. He would need to find a place to sit in peace for a while, have a bite to eat, and clean his weapons before moving on. There were always more monsters to fight.
To be honest, though, in his search for monsters, Geralt might have found one too many.
Considering a Witcher's job entailed slaying them, it would be fair to assume most witchers had no love of monsters. They categorized the creatures by how difficult or annoying they were to find or fight, and aside from the time-effort-expense calculations, Witchers did not really care what type they were charged with eliminating. Geralt was quite possibly different from other witchers, as he certainly did have personal preferences, among them a particular loathing for echinopsae. He appreciated the challenge of fighting those huge man-eating plants, but the creatures were simply way too annoying.
At the moment such a plant was thrashing about, covering a surprisingly large territory for something rooted in one place in the ground. Every time Geralt moved even a couple of steps away to escape its bites, the carnivorous plant shot its poisonous thorns at him. And he did have to move away now, because in accordance with his theory, trouble never came along. It brought drowners with it, and a few bloedzuigers for good measure.
He rolled aside and ran a few paces. The echinops thorn in his right arm needed to be removed fast as the pain and the mere presence of that thing protruding from his flesh made handling his sword far more difficult. He grabbed the end and gave it a hard pull, accompanied by a grunt of pain. It came out with a gush of blood, which coloured the sleeve of his once white shirt crimson as he squeezed the arm to stop the bleeding. The moment he took was enough for some creatures to reach him again, and he found a use for the thorn, stabbing a drowner with it. With no time to rest, he rushed back. As he felt a shooting pain of the wound edges slowly closing, he thanked the ruthless training and the mutations his body had undergone for being able to endure this.
He employed the tactics which, although risky, would rid him of the monsters the fastest. He started to run. The speed he could manage with the mud sucking his feet in with each step was almost laughable but sufficient; and he was running in circles anyway. He only needed the stupid monsters to follow him, and ideally, give him a few moments every once in a while to drop down and trace a glyph on a rare bit of firm land, then double back. The glyph would trap and slash through one monster at a time, giving Geralt a chance to round up the others, set them aflame and pick off the rest with his sword. It was working especially well when the sluggish bloedziegers started closing in.
"Damn, you're ugly!" was Geralt's admittedly truthful greeting to the blood suckers. Grouping them with other monsters gave him the advantage. When killed, bloedzuigers exploded with clouds of acid, which helped take down other creatures as well. The Witcher just had to be particularly agile and evasive himself. And Geralt actually enjoyed the exercise. All until he got too close to where the thorn-shooting echinops was rooted and it sprang out of the ground again. Only this time there were two of them, and that made Geralt angry.
The battle had proved so draining, he had to hide behind the shield of a magical sphere for a few moments to drink a second restorative potion during the same fight. The effect meant he traded his rapidly depleting health for the blurred vision and the thumping of his heart in his ears that came with a high toxicity level. It was time to go all in. He did not wait for the flames of his incineration attempt to die out before coming slashing at the stalk of one carnivorous plant with full force, rallying himself with an uproarious battle cry.
The sound, coupled with the shriek of the finally wilting echinops attracted more beasts. As he turned to weeding out the second man-eating plant, he became vaguely aware of drowners flopping down dead into the water around him. He thought he had seen an arrow cut through the head of one, but he could not afford to spare them a good look. The next moment though, his suspicion was confirmed, as an arrow flew not a palm's width away from his chest and drilled itself into the plant. He did not step aside, but hacked even stronger with his sword instead, both grateful for and apprehensive of the arrows that were now thumping into his opponent in quick succession.
"Look out!" The shout came slightly ahead of a hissing ball he recognized as a bomb just in time to dive away from its trajectory. It landed in front of the echinops, but to Geralt's surprise, simply continued hissing. He looked in the direction it came from but could only see a vague outline of a slight hooded figure, an archer nocking an arrow. That arrow hit the middle of the curious bomb, which exploded in a violent burst of flame. Mentally congratulating his unexpected assistant on their perfect aim, the Witcher scrambled to his feet to deliver the final killing blow.
As soon as it was over, he fell to his knees in the mud with exhaustion. The wound in his right arm was seeping blood again, and most of his body was bruised or covered in cuts. He jammed his silver sword, dripping with ichor, into the ground and used the hilt as leverage to get up. The unknown person, who had helped him for unknown reasons, did not show any sign of intending to attack him next, so he let that mystery be for now. He had to deal with a more pressing matter. The toxins running through his blood were making it more and more difficult to control his body. It was not the time or place for meditation, and he had run out of White Honey potions, which could purify his blood. At this point, drinking any other potion could kill him. Only one last solution remaining, he stumbled towards the place of power he remembered feeling nearby. A purifying ritual was the fastest way to get back into fighting condition. He would heal the rest later.
The wolf's head of his medallion tugged at the silver chain around his neck as it vibrated in response to the concentrated magic of the intersection. Geralt slumped down on the ground with a groan, crossing his legs and shutting his eyes to gain enough focus for the ritual of purification. He felt a wave of raw power surge through him, cleansing his body and clearing his mind. When his yellow eyes flashed open a few moments later, their vertical slits dilated, signalling his instantaneous readiness for attack. His right arm flew up behind his back to draw a sword, and the metal ring of the blade leaving its sheath accompanied the jolt to his feet. He stood almost relaxed though, sword in one arm, eyeing the hooded figure apparently staring back at him. He could not actually see the face under the hood, although the slight but shapely body wrapped into well-worn leather was unmistakably feminine. In his state back during the fight, he had not realized the voice he heard belonged to a woman. He could see the bow behind her back and a half-empty quiver strapped to the left side of her waist. Now, she was holding a curved dagger in each hand, both bearing witness to the lives she had claimed. Geralt shifted his weight from one leg to the other.
"There were more of them?" The woman shrugged her shoulders.
"Just one or two drowned ones. What sort of magic was it you just did? Don't know what exactly it did to you, but you still look like you're in a pretty bad state." The Witcher half-sighed, half-growled in irritation at having to admit he had indeed come too close to the edge this time. Before responding, he sheathed his sword, took a potion off his belt, gulped it and threw away the vial.
"The Witcher kind. Why did you follow me?" Geralt crossed his arms over his chest, while the woman kept both hands occupied by daggers. She started playing with one now, twisting it between long slender fingers. She had fingerless gloves on, but they revealed enough for Geralt to notice her hands were marked by calluses one could only get by years of experience in either wielding weapons, or else doing some kinds of manual work.
"I'd say because you ran from the site of the battle even though you won, but it was more of a...waddling." She must have owned her calluses to weaponry, Geralt decided, as she made just a tiny little show of her dagger mastery by sending them into a flurry of motion before sliding them into the scabbards suspended from the weapon belt on her hips. "I wanted to see what was going on. You looked like you'd die any minute."
"Mhm." was the only answer he gave for a while. They stood there, waiting for the other to make the first move or say the first word. She snickered.
"And now you seem quite fine. Thanks to the Witcher kind of magic and apparently Witcher kind of drink." He was far from being fine, but he had to admit she was right. He did owe her some gratitude.
"I guess you expect me to thank you for your...intervention?" To make the conversation more bearable, he took out his sword again, produced a dirty cloth from one of his pockets, and started wiping the blade clean. She kept quiet, her hands resting on her hips in what seemed an expectant pose. It bothered Geralt that he still had not seen her face. "I need to get back there." He gestured towards the spot where the fight had taken place, and she took it as an invitation to join him. Walking through the mud that slurped around his boots, he looked himself over. One sleeve on his shirt was torn, his armour was caked with dirt and blood, and his skin was probably no better. He realized that now when he would welcome the rain to wash off some of the blood and gore, it had stopped.
"Typical," he rasped. The woman kept following a little behind, and not a word more was spoken until they reached the site of the battle. The silence, which he normally enjoyed, started to get on Geralt's nerves. He felt like it was a sign of her subtly and silently judging him. He stopped to face her, only to find she was not where he expected her. She was busy plucking her arrows out of the drowned dead bodies. Which were dead again, now permanently, thanks to her exceptional aim. At the moment she had one foot pressing against the skull of a monster, pulling the arrow out with both hands.
"It might not look like it, but I'm not trying to be arrogant." He started, and she lifted her head, so he knew she was listening. "What you did was stupid. Brave, impressive even. And stupid. This," he used his narrow blade to gesture at the bodies, or rather body parts of several varieties of monsters strewn around him, "is what I do, it's my job. You, on the other hand, could have easily got yourself killed. For what?"
"For a stranger in danger?" she declared with an audible smirk." Or will you tell me you had it all under control?"
"I had most of it under control." That answer apparently had her surprised but pleased enough, as she gave a short throaty laugh.
"An honest one!" With that remark, which could be a praise and a mockery in equal measure, she lifted her arms and pulled back the hood, revealing her face. A bandanna wrapped around the head hid her hair, but left her pointy ears visible. An elf. The fact took care of unravelling the mystery of her superior archery skills. He had thought her a curious character before, and now she became even more so. Geralt had an inkling her elven origin was not the only thing her hood was hiding. The proud, elegant features of her face were quite remarkable, but they were outmatched by her eyes. Those were of incredibly bright colour, almost like the blue meteorite that had gone into making his steel sword. And there was a steely glint to her eyes too. He blinked to stop himself staring, and turned away for a second.
"Thank you. Not many would venture to help a Witcher." His cat-like yellow eyes were fixed back on hers, as if displaying proof of his profession. She held his gaze easily and with a little smile that seemed genuine, replied with a simple "You're welcome." Her eyes were searching the ground again, Geralt noticed, and then she surprised him anew with the next question.
"Can I help myself?" She meant a few coins she found peeking out of a drowner's entrails at her feet. Geralt felt confused, but figured he could share that small bit of the loot with her, since she had helped him more than he wanted to admit aloud. He waved a hand at her, giving his permission with a gesture.
"Just don't get greedy." It sounded rougher than he intended, but he was not about to lose sleep over it. As he circled the patch filled with remains though, his eyes kept darting in her direction. It was not so much to check that she did not pick anything too valuable, but rather because he was curious. A lone female elf in the swamps, too good with weapons to be there by accident, and too civil to be a member of the Scoia'tael. Geralt could not remember if his gut feeling was to be trusted about first impressions, so he delayed forming an opinion of her yet, except for her being masterful with weapons, and beautiful. But those were just plain facts.
The next time he looked up at her, their eyes met for a moment, her brows raising and her mouth twitching slightly in an expression of mild disgust. He followed her gaze to his left hand, in which he was holding a drowned dead tongue he had freshly cut off a corpse. He shrugged and immediately felt stupid for even thinking of justifying what he was doing. He rummaged in his leather pack with one hand and produced a canvas sack. He shoved the tongue into the sack meant for the alchemical ingredients and tied it to the side of his belt.
Geralt's medallion gave a little jolt, making him turn around, sword immediately in hand, in search of the source of the disturbance. He saw no monster anywhere close but kept his guard as he started walking towards the elf. She was poking at some remains with an arrow, when the mass of the body twisted of its own accord, and the monster gave a hiss followed by a screech. The fat, leech-like creature was still alive. The elf's daggers were out in a second to finish it. Geralt was running towards them, but he would not make it in time, so he yelled.
"Don't! It's a bloedzuiger!" He leapt at her just as she cut through the flesh, both daggers sweeping in a downward arc. The Witcher shoved her down, trying to roll them both clear, but he was not fast enough. With the dying yelp of the creature, a viscous green liquid sprayed them both as they hit the ground. The elf gasped at the loss of air on impact and pushed Geralt off her chest to take a breath.
"Why didn't you listen?" he growled angrily. She seemed oblivious to the cause of his anger, which made her angry too.
"To what?! How was its bloody identity going to be of any importance to me at that moment?" He sighed as it dawned on him. She truly did not know.
"Because it wouldn't have poisoned you had you stayed away." He gestured at the green slime on the bare skin of her shoulder and neck. She looked incredulous for a moment, then laughed.
"No-no-no. You're not telling me I'm going to die having saved a mysterious handsome stranger. Or, for an even better tragedy, are you going to die too?"
"I'm not going to die. Witchers are highly resilient. This poison has little effect on me. And I'm glad you find me handsome 'cause you're not going to die either. This poison probably won't kill you, and I can provide a potion to help."
"And? Not because?"
"I'd love to debate semantics with you, but maybe another time. The poison itself isn't lethal."
"A Witcher with the love of semantics. I am intrigued. So I shouldn't be worried then? Why do you look worried? If that," she raised a finger in general direction of his face," is your worried face." His facial muscles rearranged a little, and she had another go at guessing. "Slightly disconcerted?" He made an annoyed grunt, but could not help admitting to himself he was somewhat enjoying the verbal exchange.
"Because I will need to effectively save your life nonetheless." Her single raised brow signalled that she was sceptical but required more information.
"You've seen me fight. I can take care of myself."
"Not when the poison makes you weak, nauseated and feverish in the next few hours." She sat up and Geralt caught her arm before she started trying to brush the poison off her skin. "Don't. You'll just rub it in." She listened, at once this time.
"Oh. So can I have that potion then?"
"I'll have to prepare it. Make some adjustments. You can't drink the potion I already have. My recipes are meant for Witchers, which means it might kill you. Leave you in a worse state than before anyway." He noted that she was looking at him intently, soaking up all the information he gave, but did not show any signs of panic. She truly was brave. Or stupid. He rubbed at his forehead and sighed. "Do you have any good spirits on you?" She raised an eyebrow at him and snickered. She was not stupid.
"I've been told my spirit is unbendable, but I suppose it will not serve in this case?"
"Precisely. I was hoping for a better potion base than the cheap rye vodka I have."