Book 2: The Wolf Hunts

Chapter 3

It was well past midnight when the White Wolf strode purposefully out of the Ban Ard inn. He looked up briefly to see thousands of twinkling stars blanketing the night sky and then continued walking through the mostly empty, main square of town. All the while, the conversation with the alderman of Ban Ard was replaying in his mind.

"I know who you are so let me introduce myself. I am Willet Thacker. Welcome to my city. And make no mistake…it is my city. Nothing escapes my notice."

"Is that right?"

"Obviously. I knew of your presence within an hour of you arriving here, and, then…you really grabbed my attention when you decided to visit our fair burgh's only mage. How delightfully surprised I was to discover that you're a witcher."

Thacker then shook his head. "Poor, pitiful Benny. Tried to play the hero, but he eventually told us everything. All men eventually cave, Witcher. You just have to find the right spot to press."

Then, the alderman smiled. "I wonder – will you play the hero, too?" His eyes then moved over to Evie. "I have no doubt that I can find your weak spot."

The Butcher of Blaviken took in the situation with a critical eye. He deliberately peered into the eyes of each man in that small room. He knew that he could kill all of them but probably not without Lydial, Barcain, or both also losing their lives in the process. Thus, Thacker and his men's demise would have to wait, but the monster-slayer was carefully burning their faces into his memory. Finally, his eyes rested back on those of the alderman.

"What exactly can I do for you, Alderman Thacker?" asked the witcher in a low voice.

The smile grew wider on Thacker's face.

"Ahh. It pleases me that you're a sensible witcher. I knew I was taking a bit of risk…I mean, one never can be sure with your kind, heh? But I wouldn't be where I am today without taking some calculated risks."

When Geralt didn't respond, his smile faltered slightly, but he continued.

"What I want is simple. Bring me the head of the monster in the Academy, and then, I'll let your friends go. Until then, I'll provide them with very comfortable accommodations."

Lydial stood behind the alderman with her arms tied behind her, a knife at her throat and another at her back. She noticed that the room was eerily silent. She looked first at Evie and clearly saw fear on her face, her granddaughter's eyes darting everywhere within the small, confined space. Then, she looked at Geralt. She couldn't read any emotion in his eyes, but they were staring straight ahead, boring into those of Thacker for several long moments. Finally, the Butcher of Blaviken spoke - in a voice that sent chills up Lydial's spine.

"Do you promise?"

"Pardon?" the alderman asked, shaking his head slightly.

"Do…you…promise…to let them go…unharmed? the witcher asked slowly.

Thacker paused for a moment.

"Yes. You have my word," he finally replied, the small smile, once again, returning to his face.

The White Wolf nodded his head ever so slightly.

"Then, cross your heart…and hope to die."

The alderman looked into the witcher's eyes, and then the smile on his face slowly and completely faded away.

oOo

"Damn it, Benny. I hope you look worse than you feel," the witcher stated as he knelt down next to the portly mage, who was still tied to a chair.

Both he and the chair were tipped over onto their sides, his right temple resting upon the floor of the apothecary's back room. After sensing no one else in the store, the witcher sheathed his sword and then gently pulled Benny and the chair into an upright position. He cut the ropes around the mage's ankles and wrists and then pulled a stoppered vial from a small pouch on his bandolier.

"Here, drink this. It'll help with the pain and swelling," he said, handing the elixir to the battered sorcerer.

In the last two weeks, since beginning his adventure with Evie, the witcher had found himself carrying a health potion for her at all times. He was very grateful at the moment for that newly-formed habit.

As Benny's shaky hand tipped the end of the metal vial upward to swallow down the potion contents, Geralt quickly looked the mage over. He had a swollen left eye and dried blood covering his nose, mouth and beard. As the witcher's eyes scanned lower, he noticed the sorcerer's bare right foot, and he hissed through his teeth.

"Son of a bitch. What the hell did they do to you? Your foot looks like ground chuck."

"Hammer," stated the mage matter-of-factly through swollen and busted lips.

"Damn it…I'm sorry, Benny. This is my fault. I should have known better than to come into town at all. Hood down and I'm too recognizable; hood up and I look suspicious."

Benny slowly shook his head. "No, Geralt. I'm the one to blame. This isn't your town, and you didn't know what Thacker was capable of. I totally underestimated him. He came in here with diarrhea of the mouth, making me think he was either a fool or that he simply trusted me. I see now it was just to get my guard down. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the damn snake lied about getting the clap those times just so he could get close to me."

"You saying that you didn't check that he actually had it?"

"Hell, no. I didn't want to see his bits. I mean, who would lie about something like that?"

"Thacker," Geralt stated simply.

"Yeah…right. He would," he answered, nodding his head slightly.

"Well, regardless, your face is still my fault. If I hadn't come to your shop…" he said, shaking his head. "Hell, I should've stayed in the mountains. I brought this on all of us with my stupidity," argued the witcher.

Benny raised his hand up to his face and gently moved his nose back and forth to assess the damage. He then lowered his hand and looked at Geralt.

"You know what - you're right. It is your fault," he said jokingly through a bloody, hideous-looking smile.

The witcher looked him squarely in the eye and nodded slightly. "Well, I'm gonna fix it."

"We both will," replied Benny.

oOo

The White Wolf watched his friend struggle to get out of the saddle.

"Stay on your horse, Benny…allow me," stated Geralt as he dismounted Roach.

The witcher, in the early-morning darkness, walked up to a large boulder embedded into the side of the mountain, reached into his pocket, and then began moving his hand back and forth in front him. Suddenly, the boulder vanished to reveal a large, pitch-black passageway. Geralt re-mounted Roach and noticed the look of surprise on Benny's face. The mage peered at the tunnel and then back at the witcher.

He finally asked with a touch of suspicion in his voice, "Since when do witchers have enough magical training to dispel illusions? Have you been taking lessons?"

"Nope," answered the witcher, and then he coaxed Roach forward into the darkness.

After they entered the passageway, the illusion re-appeared behind them, and Benny lit a torch. At that point, the witcher turned slightly in the saddle and faced his friend.

"I've got a cheater," he answered as he showed Benny what he had in his hand.

"An eye of Nehaleni? Where did you get that? They are incredibly rare."

This time there was a lot more than just a tinge of surprise in the mage's voice.

"Really?" Geralt asked with furrowed brows. "A sorceress friend gave it to me. She said that they were a piece of cake to craft so she just gave me hers."

"Well, she lied…because they're not. She must've wanted something from you pretty badly to give you that."

The witcher nodded slightly, thinking of Kiera Metz. "There's no doubt about that. But…could it also possibly be that Aretuza was simply the better magical school than your academy? That they taught their girls better than you taught the boys?"

Benny glared at the witcher. "I know that you're under a lot of stress right now, and it's clearly affecting your judgment. So, I'll forgive you for that remark."

Normally, all of this back and forth with his friend would have brought a smirk to the witcher's face, but at the moment, he was too focused on the task at hand – but also too consumed with both anger and worry - for any mirth to invade his mood. In his century of living, he'd already learned the simple but, yet, deep relationship between one's desires and one's worries, and that evening's events had only strongly reinforced that lesson. Since leaving the inn, his mind had recognized once again just how much his fears were intimately tied to what he valued the most. The last time that he'd experienced such profound fear had been last summer when he had been trying to save Ciri. And, as he looked back now, he saw that, after her death, while he may have been full of a whole host of emotions, fear definitely wasn't one of them. And all because, during that time, he had simply valued nothing, not even his life. He realized that when a man doesn't care about anything, then he doesn't care if he loses anything, either. But once a man's heart starts to cherish something – or someone - then inevitably anxiety will quickly start to creep in, too. If, what he cherishes isn't yet in his possession, then the fear will begin to whisper into his psyche, "You'll never, ever get it. You'll never hold on to what will make you happy. You must strive harder." But Geralt knew that perhaps even more debilitating was what fear could do to the man who actually, eventually, did grasp ahold of what he cherished the most. The sinister voice would continually swirl in the mind, "You'll never keep it. You're going to lose it. You'd better hold on tighter." But, either way, that fear destroyed a man's peace of mind.

The truly ironic aspect of fear was that it, many times, was responsible for bringing about the very outcome the person was trying to avoid in the first place. He'd seen it countless times throughout his life. He'd, of course, seen it in battle – men trying to save their own skin would make incredibly dumb decisions ultimately leading to their deaths - but he'd also seen it in the more mundane areas of life. He'd seen parents who were so afraid of allowing their children to experience the trials and disappointments of the world that they'd keep their kids on the tightest of leashes. Of course, then, when the teenagers eventually left the home and took the punch-to-the face that life would inevitably deliver, they didn't possess the necessary skills to deal with it adequately as an adult because their parents had robbed them of the opportunity of learning how face failure and heartache when they were younger. The parents' fear actually made things worse for their children in the long term. And it was that same insidious voice of fear that had begun to whisper again in the witcher's heart and mind in the last week, ever since he'd first started having feelings for the barmaid-historian from Vicovaro. A voice that sounded like a shout whenever he thought of Evie.

Geralt knew that worry, in and of itself, wasn't an entirely negative emotion. One positive aspect was that it could lead a person to prepare – physically, mentally, emotionally - in order to avoid whatever potentially unpleasant outcome they feared may come their way. That said, the monster-slayer also knew that fear was responsible for as many deaths as the most dangerous monster found in any bestiary. Fear could definitely interfere with one's ability to use the rational part of the mind. It could paralyze a man, cripple his ability to think and to, therefore, act – to act quickly, decisively, and perhaps, most importantly, accurately and logically. Fortunately, if there was one skill the witcher had learned in eight decades of facing monsters and his own death on a very routine basis it was how to compartmentalize and overcome any fear he felt. Like any sane man, he, at times, felt fear. He had even learned to recognize and accept its presence, but he'd be damned if he let it affect his actions in any area of his life anymore. He hadn't let it keep him from giving his heart to Evie, and he wasn't about to let it stop him from saving her now. Those thoughts kept the witcher company as he and his sorcerer friend made their way down the hidden passageway through the mountain and towards the magical academy.

By that point, an hour had passed since Geralt had found Benny bound and beaten in his shop. The mage needed a cane to help with walking, but just the fact that he was mobile was a testament to both the power of the witcher's healing potion and also his own magical healing spells.

After hearing Geralt's summary of his interaction with Thacker, Benny had asked, "Do you honestly believe that he'll just let your friends go after you kill whatever monster is inside the Academy?"

"Hell no," the witcher had answered. "We'll just have to make sure that we've got a Scorch card up our sleeve to play. Tell me everything you know about the man – even if it's just rumors. I want to know what he holds most dear."

"Well, there's his horse," the mage had replied.

The two men had discussed their plan all the way into the forest outside of the magical academy, with Benny leading them to one of the secret passageways that led in and out of the school. With the plan in place, all that was left was the execution, and the first step to it all was finding the monster. But the witcher knew that step, typically, wasn't very difficult. In fact, it was usually the easiest part of the plan, for the monster, more times than not, found him first.

oOo

"Are you sure you don't want to head to my lab to grab the concealment ingredients?" asked the sorcerer in a whisper.

"Not a priority right now, Benny," answered Geralt. "Monster first."

"Right. Of course. We can go there afterwards…if there is an afterwards," stated the mage nervously.

The witcher looked at his friend but didn't say anything in response.

The two men had just exited from a hidden doorway located in an academy building that housed random supplies. Metal cauldrons were piled together in a corner. Disconnected bed frames and head boards lay against one wall, and extra tables and chairs were stacked everywhere within the room. They headed through the maze of equipment and furniture and approached the door that led to the academy grounds. Instead of reaching for the door knob, though, Geralt turned to his companion.

"Last chance to turn back, Benny. No need for you to come along. My friends…they aren't your friends.

Benny furrowed his brows. "Not yet, but you are, and friends help each other. So, not another word, got it?"

The witcher locked eyes with the mage. "Thanks, Benny."

They continued to look at each other for just a moment longer before giving the other a slight nod of the head. Then, Geralt opened the door and led them out into the still-dark night. The witcher stopped on the cobble-stone pathway and surveyed the academy grounds. It had been many years since he'd last been inside the school's walls, but other than the random gardens being overrun with weeds and the lawns being knee-high, not much looked different to his eyes. He recognized the dozen or more large, stone buildings situated in an orderly manner around the grounds. He knew that the multistoried structures housed the adepts' living quarters and most of the classrooms and labs while the single-story buildings held the more functional aspects of the school – i.e., the dining hall, the laundry facility, the greenhouses, and the stables, where a variety of animals – both magical and non - had been kept back when the school was operational. The appearance and structure of all of these edifices were quite uniform. They were all plain and utilitarian, not possessing a lot of personality.

However, there was one academy building that stood out from the rest. A dark castle, several stories high with three traditional-looking towers, was off by itself, separate from all the other buildings. It was a true architectural marvel. Because it was built right into the side of a sheer rock face of the Blue Mountains, it was impossible to tell where the castle ended and the actual mountain began. Originally, the castle had been the only building of the Ban Ard Magical Academy, and it had remained so for several centuries. However, as the human population grew and more and more magical users were discovered, the castle had to be supplemented. Thus, the reason for the other structures and the eventual wall that had been built around the entire grounds. In recent years, the castle had served as a location for graduations, special meals, and other prestigious events. However, it wasn't just used for ceremonial purposes only. Almost all of the senior faculty – except for Benny and a few others - had lived in the castle, and the advanced mages, especially those dealing in the most arcane areas of magic, had conducted their most dangerous experiments in the castle's labs, found either in the towers or the dungeons.

Benny watched the witcher breathe in deeply several times. The monster-slayer, with his silver sword already in hand and several elixirs already coursing through his veins, began to turn his body in a slow circle.

"What do you smell?" asked Benny.

Geralt shook his head. "Something feral. There's definitely something not human here."

"Great. Thought so. Can you tell its location?" whispered the mage.

He shook his head again. "The scent is all over the place," he answered in a low voice. "But maybe I can track it."

"Great. Thought so," responded the sorcerer again sarcastically. "I'll be right behind you."

Over the next fifteen minutes, Benny followed the witcher as he made his way through the academy grounds, occasionally bending down to inspect the pathways and lawns and routinely pausing to sniff the air. The mage had extinguished his torch but was still able to see Geralt well enough from the illumination from the stars and the half-full moon that hung low in the sky. Eventually, they realized that they were heading in the direction of the dark castle, at which point the White Wolf stopped in the middle of the narrow, cobble-stone road.

"Our monster apparently likes clichés. Looks like it's in there," the witcher stated, nodding towards the ominous-looking edifice.

He looked up at the tall spires of the centuries-old structure. The castle looked like it was right out of a ghost story. As his eyes roamed over all of its darkened windows, he couldn't pick up even the slightest trace of light coming from within, but the odor was definitely coming from that way.

"Of course, it is." Benny then sighed. "Hell, I didn't particularly care for this old castle even when I worked here."

"Why's that?"

"Just gave me the creeps. I always got the sense that it was alive. Always full of odd sounds. Made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. Strange things always happening – suits of armor would disappear and reappear at some other location. Never figured out if someone was moving them as a lark or if they were doing it on their own. And there was no telling what my colleagues got up to in there."

"Swell."

"Exactly. So…lead the way," stated the sorcerer. "Like I said, I'll be right behind you."

The two men walked toward the steps of the castle. However, before actually getting there, Geralt suddenly stopped. He bent down and peered at both the ground in front of him and the steps that led up toward the castle's front doors.

"What is it?" asked Benny.

"Blood stains. Lots of 'em. Some weeks old…but some fairly fresh, too."

"Human?"

The witcher bent down even lower and inhaled deeply.

"Mostly animal…elk or deer maybe. But I am picking up a trace of human blood, too." He turned to look at Benny. "Do you know exactly where on the grounds the attacks took place?"

The sorcerer shook his head.

Geralt stood up, his eyes focused on the castle's entrance. Before moving towards the large front doors, the witcher looked up at the night sky one more time and noticed the faintest touch of light coming on. He could tell that morning would be arriving soon. The monster-slayer ascended the steps up to the front doors, being careful not to step in the drops of blood. He slowly opened the doors, but instead of entering, he paused and turned to Benny.

"Do you hear that?" the witcher whispered.

Benny shook his head. "No, but let me guess – creepy sounds?"

The White Wolf nodded in the affirmative.

The sorcerer nodded his head, as well. "Great. Thought so."

The witcher was a little confused by what he was hearing. The noises actually sounded like the roar or growl of some large feline creature, but he was pretty certain that neither mountain lions nor panthers lived in this area of Kaedwen. At least, it had been years since he'd seen any.

They moved carefully inside the castle, at which point, the witcher stopped again while Benny relit his torch. He looked around the large, main foyer - with its many hallways leading elsewhere - and breathed in deeply.

"What is it? Lost the scent?" Benny asked in a whisper.

Geralt shook his head. "Just the opposite. It's everywhere…so there's no trail to follow."

"So, what's next?"

"Follow the noise…or the blood," answered the White Wolf as he carefully moved forward.

Within a minute, the witcher paused and looked closely at the floor. He turned and whispered into Benny's ear.

"The blood trail's split. Looks like the older human blood heads in that direction," he said, pointing in one direction of the castle's first floor. "The fresher, animal blood seems to be heading in the same direction as the noises," he finished, pointing towards a staircase that only went down.

"Of course. The dungeons," replied Benny, to which the witcher simply nodded.

A few moments later, the witcher and mage were traversing down a circular set of stairs that led to the dungeons below. By this time, even Benny could pick up the strange noises. There was the occasional thumping sound that sent vibrations through the floor, as if something heavy was being slammed hard against a wall. This was interspersed with other muffled noises that the mage just couldn't discern. The noises got louder and louder the lower they descended. They paused as they reached the ground floor. There was one hallway straight ahead while another ran into the darkness towards their left. While still on the first floor above, the sorcerer had informed Geralt that the main hallways of the dungeon formed the shape of a square, with multiple rooms located on both the outer and inner walls of the hallways. However, branching off the main hallways, there was a maze of smaller corridors where one could easily get lost.

The witcher once again took in a deep breath. Given that they were down in a confined, unventilated space, the odor of the unknown beast was incredibly potent. Then, he noticed several torches housed in sconces along the dungeon wall. That, in and of itself, wasn't unusual. However, what was strange was that in one of the torches he could just detect the tiniest, visible burning ember on the tip of a piece of straw. He walked closer to the torch and was able to pick up a distinct burning scent, as if it had held a flame several hours before. He furrowed his brows at the discovery, for this clearly changed his assumptions with regards to what he was about to face. The witcher didn't know of any non-sapient beings that used torches, much less knew how to light them.

The two men continued to walk down the darkened hallway, getting closer and closer to the door, behind which originated the mysterious noises. Geralt's back was to the wall as he side-stepped down the wide corridor. As he approached the door in question, his medallion vibrated for what seemed like the twentieth time since entering the castle. The wolf-head was picking up a lot of residual magic from the centuries-old edifice. There was no telling how much magic had just seeped into its walls over the years. Either that, or maybe Benny was right, and the castle itself was actually a sentient, magical entity. Geralt had seen stranger things in his life. Just last year, outside of Urialla Harbor on An Skellig, he had come across a magical tower with a defense-system that actually spoke. Made it seem as if the tower had a real mind of its own.

When the monster-slayer got to within fifteen feet of the door, he suddenly stopped.

Benny heard the witcher whisper, "What the hell?"

The sorcerer looked down and saw three kids sleeping on the floor right in front of the door. To his eyes, they looked to be teenagers. It appeared as if they had been leaning back against the wall opposite the door and had, at some point, fallen asleep. The oldest of the three looked to be in the middle, and he was still, more or less, resting upright, though his head was slumped forward. One was curled up in a ball on the stone floor with her head resting in his lap. The third was sitting next to the oldest and had fallen over, his head leaning against the shoulder of the first.

The witcher looked at the scene and then moved forward slowly with stealth. As he approached the iron door, he noticed that there were several metal bars across it, ensuring that whatever was in the room stayed there. His medallion vibrated lightly as he stood in front of the door. The witcher was fairly certain that it was twitching from whatever was in the room and not from the three, mysterious teenagers sleeping in front of it. In spite of that, he still gripped his sword at the ready as he gently kicked the heel of the middle kid's shoe.

"Wake up," he commanded as he kicked the boy's foot again.

Suddenly, the teenager opened his eyes. Upon seeing Geralt - and particularly his cat eyes reflecting in the light of Benny's torch – he yelled and scrambled to his feet, causing the other two to crash to the dungeon floor.

"Relax. I'm not here to hurt you," stated the witcher, and though he didn't sheath his sword, he did lower it to his side. By this time, the other two were awake and were both standing next to, and slightly behind, the young man.

"What's behind the door? And how in the hell did you trap it?" the monster-hunter asked.

Before the boy in the middle could answer, the girl to his left blurted out, "Who are you? Why are you here?"

Geralt wanted to keep things calm so he decided to answer her questions.

"I'm not going to harm you. I'm Geralt of Rivia…a witcher."

"A witcher?" she asked rhetorically with fear in her voice. "Lukas, he's here to kill them. You can't let him."

"Please, sir, you don't understand. Please don't go in there," the young man – Geralt assumed Lukas – implored.

Just then, Geralt heard several knocks coming from the metal door behind him and his medallion vibrated again. He noticed that the three kids looked nervously at one another. He listened closely and realized that all of the other noises coming from the room had ceased. Moments later, the knocks were repeated. It was clear from the cadence of the knocks that they were some type of signal.

"Move down the hall," he ordered to the three. "Benny, watch them."

The sorcerer moved toward the three. "Come on, this way."

The Butcher of Blaviken then turned to face the room. After the third knock, he reached forward with his left hand and unbarred the door. After lowering the last barrier, he quickly moved to his right and raised his weapon as the door slowly opened into the hallway. As the witcher's medallion vibrated hard against his chest and a large, hairy creature on two legs exited the room, the girl ran past Benny and began yelling.

"No! Don't kill him!"

She ran past the monster and stood in front of it, facing the witcher, her arms spread out wide. The beast turned and upon seeing the White Wolf, with sword drawn, let out a menacing roar. But with the young woman between them, it didn't advance toward the monster-slayer. Geralt stood still, staring into eyes that were quite similar to his own. The creature stared back for several tense moments, during which time the witcher's eyes scanned the beast. It stood well over eight feet tall, with short, tan hair covering its entire body - a body spotted in several areas with fresh blood. At the end of each appendage were wide paws with visible claws. Its hair fell down past its shoulders like a lion's mane, its snout had long whiskers on the end, and its snarling mouth was filled with a set of intimidating, clearly carnivorous teeth. The witcher could see that the monster was obviously a cross between a man and some type of large, predatory cat. Finally, Geralt broke the silence.

"More blood doesn't have to be shed. I'm willing to talk."

The creature let out a low growl. It continued to stare at the witcher before finally, slowly turning towards the door that it had just exited. It glanced quickly at Benny and then shut the door and barred it closed. Then, faster that the sorcerer thought possible, the creature moved like a flash. It pounced at the mage and then sprang up behind him. Suddenly, Benny felt his head in the monster's vice-like grip. He felt five sharp claws digging into his scalp, pulling his head slightly back, and the other five claws were at his throat, breaking the skin of his neck.

In a strange, deep voice, the monster replied, "I'd have been more inclined to believe that if you had sheathed your sword. Make one move, and I'll rip his throat out."

The hallway was deathly quiet except for the four humans' heavy, adrenaline-fueled breathing.

Benny was trying to make eye-contact with the witcher, but the monster-slayer's eyes were transfixed on the beast. The mage finally broke the silence.

"I've lived a long life, Geralt. So, screw it…do what you gotta do."

At that, the Butcher of Blaviken locked eyes briefly with the sorcerer, gave a slight nod and then glared at the beast. He twirled his sword to his side and then gripping the hilt in both hands, brought it up to his right shoulder.

"Remember this," growled the monster-slayer, staring into the beast's eyes. "I gave you a chance to parley…so everyone's blood will be on your hands."

"Wait! Wait!"

The yell, coming from the other side of the monster, echoed throughout the hallway. The eldest teenager, Lukas, jumped from behind the beast, moved quickly past it and the girl, and stood in between Geralt and the rest.

"We don't have to do this!"

He then turned and faced the monster.

"Let him go, Rien. Please," the young man implored. "What you did for us will be all for naught if we die in this dungeon. And you know that you're about to change…any moment now."

The eyes of the lion-like monster shifted back and forth from the boy to the witcher, as if deciding on which course of action to take. Several tense moments passed and, then, suddenly, Benny decided that if he was going to die down in that dungeon, then he was going out his way and not as a whimpering hostage. He quickly raised his right hand and thrust the torch over his shoulder and into the face of the beast, who howled and jumped back. Seeing this, Geralt instantly cast an Aard Sign forward, blowing the two teenagers off their feet and into both Benny and the beast. The four bodies fell to the floor in a heap. Immediately, the witcher was on top of the monster, and just as he was about to thrust his sword downward and through the creature's face, he saw that it had transformed. No longer was there a monster but a young man of average height, with long, blond hair and a completely nude, muscular body.

Benny disentangled himself from the pile of bodies and brought his hand up to his neck. He examined it, and seeing only a few drops of blood, he let out a sigh of relief. He smiled weakly at the witcher.

"I thought I was going to lose more than a finger that time."

Geralt nodded at the comment, but he never took his eyes off the man beneath him. And his sword was still poised at the ready, the tip of the blade just inches from the man's neck.

"Feel like talking now?" the witcher asked with a snarl. "Or, do I have to beat your ass?"