Book 2: The Wolf Hunts

Chapter 8

The witcher opened his eyes and rose up slowly from next to Evie. They'd fallen asleep in his bedroom located on the third floor of the tower and had left the balcony doors wide open, enjoying the cool, mountain breeze. He sat very still, listening quietly, and then, almost immediately, he heard the familiar noise again – the noise that had stirred him from his sleep. It was a noise that he'd heard a thousand times in his life so it was unmistakable. It was the sound of the main gate being raised. He quickly shook Evie awake.

"Get up. We've got visitors," he said before he grabbed his clothes and weapons and ran down the circular staircase.

Geralt leapt over the last few steps of the staircase, landed on the ground floor, ran through the kitchens and then out into the main hall of the castle. Except for Nikolai and Rien, everyone else was sleeping on cots or on makeshift pallets on the floor on one side of the large commons area near a very large, open fireplace. The wood within was still burning brightly, with the flames casting light and shadows on the castle's walls. He woke Benny and Barcain and told them what he'd heard. As they went about waking and warning the rest, the witcher hurried to the other side of the vast room to the small armory. His eyes hastily scanned the tables while he snatched up a few random materials, and then he headed for the front doors of the castle. He approached the doors and paused for a moment to listen. Hearing nothing on the other side, he cracked the door open just a hair in order to peer through. He cursed to himself as he saw more than a dozen, heavily-armed figures lurking through the courtyard gate and heading his way. He barred the doors shut and then began assembling some on-the-fly explosive devices from the different parts that he'd picked up from the armorer's table and from the bombs off of his bandolier.

oOo

After arriving at the lowered gate of the main entrance, Philippa Eilhart had changed into her owl form and had flown over the high wall of Kaer Morhen. As she landed, she converted back into her human body and then quickly found the lever that would open the gate, allowing her brother and his men entry.

Five minutes later, the large group made its way in the darkness through the outer grounds and courtyard of the fortress and towards the castle itself. As they approached the steps that led up to the front doors of the keep, five men moved forward while the rest fanned out behind them on the steps below. Oran slipped into the shadows and then cast his best spell – the one that would conceal his presence. Philippa had made it clear to him earlier that he had only two main objectives – find the historian and her book and, if possible, kill the witcher. Those were her objectives, too. The rest of the men were there to simply cause death, confusion, and mayhem – in other words, to keep the witcher occupied. The point-man approached the front door, slowly turned its handle, and pushed but with no success. He looked back at Philippa and shook his head. The sorceress walked slowly up the steps, and the five men near the doors immediately and swiftly moved behind her. She positioned herself fifteen feet in front of the doors, and for just a moment, she stood completely still – as if purposefully building the tension. Then, she began moving her hands and arms in an intricate pattern while uttering – to the men around her - unintelligible words. She was planning to cast the most powerful spell that she knew.

oOo

Geralt had just finished making and placing some hastily-constructed booby traps when his ears picked up a sound from the outside. He then heard someone trying to push open the heavy wooden doors. He quickly swiveled his head to assess the situation behind him. Since he couldn't see them anywhere, he assumed that Lydial and Gretel had taken the five youngest kids and hidden out of sight, but the three teenagers and the remaining adults were all standing in a line on the far side of the main hall, all holding various weapons at the ready. He sighed, wishing that the teenagers had hidden, too. He was afraid that they'd just get in his way and complicate matters.

Suddenly, he heard the unmistakable sounds of a spell being cast coming from the other side of the doors. He immediately cast a Quen Sign and started sprinting away from the doors. A second later, the witcher felt and heard an incredible explosion coming from behind him – an explosion that shook the entire castle and caused cracks to emerge throughout the ancient, run-down edifice. A large chunk of the wooden door hit the witcher in the back, knocking him off his feet and slamming him into a nearby stone column. He groggily got to a knee and looked back at the front door of the castle, but there was nothing to see. Smoke and dust filled the air.

oOo

Philippa cast her spell towards the front door, and to her surprise, the entire front wall exploded, blowing her and the closest men backwards and down the steps. Little did she know that the witcher's explosives on the other side of the door had greatly added to the blast. She got to her feet – her ears ringing - and felt a stinging sensation coming from her face. She reached up with her left hand and felt a very large splinter impaled in her cheek.

"That gods-damned witcher," she said through gritted teeth as she pulled it loose. The thought flashed through her mind that, perhaps, she should finally stop underestimating him.

She looked around her and suddenly felt fortunate that the splinter was the only damage that she'd sustained. Two of the men were on the ground with large shards of wood and stone protruding from their bodies, blood pouring from their wounds.

She looked again at the front of the castle and immediately began casting another spell. A few seconds later, a gale force of wind erupted from her hands and headed towards the front entrance. As the smoke and wind blew into the castle, Philippa and the rest were able to get a clear view of the castle's front facade. The explosion had not only blown the doors to bits, but it has caused severe structural damage to the entire front wall. The majority of the wall and even parts of the roof had fallen down into a large, ten-foot tall mound of stone and mortar.

She turned around and spoke to the men in front of her.

"Well…what are you waiting for?"

As the bandits started forward, she grabbed two men by the sleeves of their shirts.

"You two, with me," she ordered. "We'll attack them from both sides."

She quickly transformed into an owl and flew upwards toward the balcony high on the tower. She landed cautiously and listened closely to determine if there was anyone within. Not hearing anything, she changed back into her human shape and peeked her head inside to confirm that she was alone. In the middle of the bedchamber, there was a lit, oil lamp on a table which allowed her to see that the room was indeed empty. She then cast a portal on the balcony, with its "twin" opening on the ground below. The two men immediately entered the portal, and unbeknownst to them, Oran followed right behind. After the two outlaws, per the sorceress' orders, headed down the stairs to join the action below, Philippa looked around the room. Oran, still concealed, heard her laugh.

"It can't be," she exclaimed with surprise.

She walked over to the bedside table and picked up an expensive-looking, leather bound book. Opening it up, she laughed again.

"It appears that she's translated the tome into Common. It looks, dear brother, as if we may not need to keep the historian alive, after all."

oOo

The dozen men from Hengfors crawled over the high mound of rubble. The cloud of dust was still in front of them, filling the main hall of the castle and hindering their ability to locate their prey. They all stepped off the pile of rocks and back onto the smooth, solid floor and started to fan out, and it was at that point that they began to see something glowing coming towards them. Out of the smoky fog walked two men, both wielding swords. But the eyes of all were focused on the man on their right. The witcher, having just cast the Quen Sign, was covered in an orange shimmer. He paused for just a moment, his eyes taking in his enemy, and then he grabbed a bomb from his bandolier and tossed it in their direction. And the battle began.

oOo

Oran's two men had followed Philippa's directive and raced down the tower's stairs. Halfway down the staircase, they heard a bomb detonate from somewhere in the castle, followed by the familiar shouts of hand-to-hand combat. They reached the bottom floor and stopped momentarily, for in front of them were two doors. The one on the left was open, and it seemed as if the noises of the fight were coming through there, but the two could clearly hear sounds emanating from behind the second door, as well.

"Think someone's hiding in there?" asked one.

"Only one way to find out," answered his partner.

The two stepped lightly across the room that was barely illuminated by moonlight coming from some small windows in the tower. They reached the door, and as one grabbed ahold of the handle, he turned to the other and they nodded their heads in unison. The first tried to jerk the door open, but it wouldn't budge. At that point, the second noticed that there was a key in the lock. It never even crossed their minds why – if there was someone hiding inside the room - the door would be locked from the outside. They simply turned the key and then threw the door open, their weapons at the ready.

They stood in the doorway for just a moment, peering into the interior of the completely, pitch-black room. Suddenly, with a startling roar, a monster leapt out of the darkness and onto both men, knocking them to the ground. Their screams filled the air as claws and teeth tore at their flesh. An instant later, a second monster dove into the first and knocked it off the two men. The two creatures tumbled and rolled across the stone floor before both springing nimbly to their feet. Rien quickly looked over at the two corpses in the doorway and was both relieved and confused to see that they were complete strangers. He then sensed a movement from his left, and when he turned his eyes back in Nikolai's direction, he just caught a glimpse of the werelion's tail disappearing through the doorway and into the common area of the castle.

oOo

Evie and Benny were crouched behind a tipped-over table, with Evie shooting her crossbow at the various intruders from Hengfors who were preoccupied with either Geralt, Barcain, or the three teenage orphans. She just missed hitting one of the men with a headshot, and upon hearing the bolt whistle past his ear, he looked up to see its source. Spotting Evie's head behind the table, he started running towards her. Benny looked at the attacking man and then over at Evie, who was doing her best – but struggling - to re-cock the bowstring. He looked back at their attacker to see he was going to get to them before she was ready to fire again.

As the sword-wielding man got within ten feet of them, he yelled, "Evie, close your eyes," and then immediately cast a spell that shot forth the brightest of white light.

For the approaching mercenary, it was like staring into the sun, and he was completely blinded. He instinctively stopped running and brought his hand up to his closed eyes.

"Now, Evie!" yelled Benny. "Shoot him now."

Evie raised up, pointed the crossbow at the still-blind man, and put her bolt right through his chest.

"Yes!" exclaimed the mage. "Let's get another," he shouted with a smile on his face.

While none of Oran's band of hoodlums and outlaws were novices in terms of killing, none could compare to the witcher. For that matter, none had the swordsmanship of Barcain either. The battle was actually going in the defender's way until Nikolai appeared with a loud roar. In his animal state, he could not distinguish between friend or foe, and what had once been a simple – though still deadly – two-sided affair, suddenly morphed into absolute chaos despite Rien's best effort to rein in the out-of-control werelion. Then, the situation worsened even more as a portal opened on the far side of the hall, near the multitude of bookcases.

Out walked the Eilhart siblings – though, none could see Oran in his invisible state. Immediately, Philippa began casting lethal spells about, with a gleeful smile on her face. She saw the witcher, fifty feet away surrounded by a handful of men. Knowing that any spell she sent the witcher's way would be inadvertently blocked by his attackers, she cast an explosive lightning spell towards the ceiling directly above where the group was fighting. Geralt heard the explosion above him and looked up to see chunks of stone raining down. He quickly cast a Quen Sign and dove out of the way as the heavy debris crashed to the floor. The sorceress then caught a glimpse of Evie out of the corner of her eye and cast a spell in her direction. Benny saw the bright wave of energy heading towards Evie and leapt in front of her. He took the spell in the chest and then fell to the floor with a thud. His body lay motionless.

oOo

After being shaken awake by Benny, both Lydial and Gretel had grabbed the five youngest kids and had hidden behind the first thing they noticed – the numerous thick, heavy bookshelves that were on one side of the great hall. They all sat on the floor, with Lydial and Gretel holding the two youngest in their arms while the other three were crouched down, hugging their own knees. When the door exploded and the battle began, they all crowded even closer together, most of them crying in fear. But, eventually, Isaac – the curious lad that he was – began to peek around the edge of the bookshelf. He could see bodies and swords clashing, but in the darkness, he was unable to distinguish one person from the next. He was looking for Geralt, and then suddenly, across the way, he noticed a glowing orange light encircling one of the combatants, and he knew that was the witcher. Soon after, he heard a small thunder-like noise coming from nearby. He craned his head out further to see a fiery, oval ring flashing a few feet away. A woman he'd never seen before stepped out of it and commenced to casting spells at Geralt and the rest of his friends. He looked back and forth from her to the armory several times. In the darkness and the chaos, neither Lydial or Gretel noticed Isaac get to his feet and run towards the weapons rack.

oOo

"Oran, grab the historian!" Philippa yelled at her brother before continuing to cast a barrage of spells about the castle.

She could feel her energy draining, but she knew she had another five-minute's worth of fight still left in her. Suddenly, she felt a semi-painful blow against her hip. She turned around to see what she thought was, at first, a halfling. But, peering closer, she saw that it was a skinny, little boy holding a large sword. She noticed the determination in his eyes as he awkwardly swung the much-too-heavy weapon back and above his shoulder for a second strike. Then, he swung it forward with all of his might, but the sorceress simply took a step backward and avoided the attack. Having missed his target, Isaac lost his balance and fell, the training sword slipping from his hands and clattering across the floor. He scrambled over to the dull weapon, struggled to pick it up by its hilt, and turned to face his enemy again.

"You won't hurt my family!" he yelled defiantly, a fierce expression on his face.

Philippa cocked her head slightly to the side as if she could not quite discern what she was seeing in front of her. Isaac half-ran and half-stumbled towards her, and just before he reached her, the sorceress cast a quick spell, and lightning jumped from her hands and impacted the little boy's chest. It knocked him off his feet and threw him backwards, the sword flying through the air and bouncing off a nearby bookcase. She then turned her attention back to the main battle, and she was just about to cast more destructive spells when she heard a roar in front of her. She immediately cast a simple, defensive spell right before a lion-like monster leapt in her direction. The werelion crashed into the shield, causing it to shatter and propelling both of them backwards several feet. The monster was instantly on its feet again, but when it searched for its prey, it was no longer there. Philippa, now in owl form, was flying towards the front door.

The werelion's eyes followed the owl in flight and briefly considered chasing it, but then its sensitive nose picked up the smell of nearby humans coming from behind the bookcases. As it pounced that way, it was suddenly hit from behind by Rien. The two crashed into the damaged stone wall, causing the scaffolding attached to the wall – a scaffolding which housed three or four additional heavy bookcases - to crack. Lydial and Gretel heard the ominous snap of wood above them and immediately grabbed the remaining orphans and fled the area. As the two werelions struggled with one another, the scaffolding broke and fell, bringing down not only a portion of the stone wall but also the thick, book-filled cases on top of the two beasts.

oOo

Evie bent over and shook Benny.

"Benny, are you okay?" But the sorcerer was unresponsive.

The historian was about to check his pulse when, suddenly, her eyes went wide. She grabbed the knife from the scabbard on her thigh, dropped to one knee, and she spun to face what was behind her. As she spun, she swung her knife in front of her. She felt the sharp blade make contact with something, and then she immediately heard a cry of pain. She was confused, though, because she couldn't see anything in front of her. Then, she heard a cruel voice.

"Bitch, I was just going to take you, but now…I'm going to hurt you bad for that," the mysterious voice hissed.

Evie screamed as loud as she could. "Geralt!"

The witcher heard his wife yelling his name, and without a moment's hesitation, ran in her direction. He saw her blindly swinging her knife back and forth in front of her. He hurdled the turned-over table and stood in front of her, casting a Quen dome around them both. And then his medallion vibrated. His eyes scanned the darkness around them.

"There's somebody here, but he's invisible," she blurted out.

The witcher nodded. He immediately dropped the Quen and cast a stream of fire from his left to his right. They both instantly heard a yelp and saw the flames catch ahold of the invisible man.

oOo

Philippa stood atop the rubble near the front door and, with what little magical energy she had left, began casting more explosive spells around the Kaer Morhen castle. She blasted away at both load-bearing columns and parts of the ceiling. Finally, as she started to feel light-headed and blackness began encroaching on the edges of her vision, she cast a portal, with the other opening near her brother, and yelled, "Oran, we are leaving!"

Oran rolled on the floor trying to extinguish his flaming clothes. He got to his feet and immediately threw his knife at the witcher, who had his sword raised and in front of him. As soon as the knife left his hand, the concealment spell ceased to work on it. Geralt's eyes picked up on the metal blade and had just enough time to raise his left forearm a fraction in front of his face. The tip of the knife plunged into Geralt's arm, but his armor stopped it from penetrating too deep. The attack distracted him just long enough for the Ghost to leap through the nearby portal, which then closed an instant before the witcher could jump through it himself. Geralt turned around and saw the other portal near Philippa. He began running towards her, but she was too far away. Before he was halfway there, she cast another portal and a moment later, she and the invisible man were gone.

"Damn it," cursed the witcher, but then he turned and rushed back to Evie.

He found her kneeling beside the still unconscious Benny.

"Evie, are you okay?" he asked, pulling her into a tight embrace.

"Yes, just scared to death," she answered, finally feeling safe now that she was in her witcher's arms. "Your medallion saved me. I felt it vibrate…so I just took out the knife and started slashing like a crazy person."

Before they could say anything else, the witcher picked up some low growling coming from the other side of the large hall. He looked over to see both part of the west wall and all the bookcases in a giant heap.

He got a grim look on his face and said, "Stay here. Nikolai may be over there, okay?"

She nodded and said, "Please be careful, Geralt."

The witcher, with his silver sword drawn, approached the rubble, but he noticed he wasn't the only one. Gretel, too, was walking slowly towards the noise.

"Gretel, back the hell away," Geralt growled at the girl.

"He may be hurt. We have to save him," she replied with a desperate tone.

The witcher didn't bother to answer her. He just grabbed her by the back of the collar and yanked her backwards and behind him. He stepped forward cautiously and heard what sounded like the heap of stones shifting as rocks were being moved, tumbling down the pile and falling to the floor. The wolf-head medallion that had been worn by both his mentor and his daughter twitched against the monster-hunter's chest as a werelion stood up from behind the rubble. There were several bleeding wounds on its body.

"Rien?" the witcher asked hopefully.

The werelion answered with a menacing growl and crouched low, as if getting ready to spring forth.

"Damn it," he said in response.

Geralt immediately cast an Axii at the werelion, but it simply shook its head back and forth as if shaking water from its face, and then it let out a ferocious roar. The Sign obviously had no effect on the beast.

"Swell," he replied, gripping his sword tightly with both hands.

"Nikolai, please, don't. It's me, Gretel. We love you," pleaded the young woman from just beside Geralt.

The beast turned its head towards Gretel and stared at her for just a moment – a moment in which Geralt thought, with the smallest seed of hope, that maybe she had actually gotten through to him. But, then, the monster roared again and leapt forward with jaws open and claws extended. Gretel screamed, and the witcher swung his sword with all his might.

oOo

Just before sunrise, storm clouds rolled in, and torrential rain poured down into the Kaer Morhen castle, splattering off the rubble and washing away the copious amount of blood that covered the stone floor. Over half of the front and west walls had fallen during the battle, and much of the ceiling over the great hall had collapsed as well. To the witcher's eyes, the castle now looked like the ruins of an old elven palace. Geralt scanned his surroundings and saw that the Wolf-School guild's library was completely destroyed. All of the valuable tomes were either buried under mounds of rock or soaked wet from the rain.

The witcher slowly walked through the carnage, hand-in-hand with Evie. The shock of killing a man had finally worn off after Geralt had held her and consoled her for a long while, but the tears still rolled down her cheeks. Though, now they were indistinguishable from the heavy drops of rain that plastered her hair to her head and trickled downward, soaking her blouse. They walked along inspecting the bodies strewn about – ignoring, for the time being, those of the enemy while looking for those of their friends. As they moved over towards the bookcases, Evie suddenly stopped, her hand coming up to her mouth.

"Oh, no…Geralt, no," she whispered.

The witcher didn't say anything. Evie rushed forward and knelt by the body, but he just let go of her hand and simply stood where he was. As he looked at the scene before him, he sighed deeply and slightly shook his head. Eventually, he approached and stared down at Isaac's tiny body, the boy's chest clearly showing evidence that he'd been on the receiving end of a lethal, magical spell. With his clothes drenched by the rain, he somehow looked even smaller and more helpless than he normally did. Then, he heard his wife crying so he knelt down next to her and pulled her into a hug.

"This is all my fault," she said through sobs that were wracking her body. "He's dead because of me."

Geralt didn't say anything. He just held her tightly as she cried. He didn't agree with her statement. Clearly, all of this was the fault of Philippa Eilhart, but he knew that, at that point, simply holding her was the best thing he could do. They could argue later, after she wasn't so overcome by emotion, about who held the blame. One thing was sure, though. Philippa Eilhart had just replaced Emhyr var Emreis as the person that Geralt wanted to end the most. And the witcher made a promise to himself, then and there. When this was all sorted out, if the sorceress was still alive, then he was going to find her, and justice would be done.

oOo

Vizima, Temeria

Under the cover of darkness, Emperor Emhyr watched as hundreds of men loaded fifteen enormous, wooden boxes into wagons. Given the weight and size of the boxes, it took his men all night to complete the job. Emhyr sat atop his favorite steed, a dark black Nilfgaardian gelding. He was no longer in ceremonial dress but, rather, wore his military uniform, including a sword on his hip. As the sun peeked over the eastern horizon, he looked about. In addition to the loaded-down wagons, several companies of his men – both cavalry and infantry – were awaiting his orders. He looked at the Vizima palace, his home for the last two years, and he knew, one way or the other, he'd probably never see it again. He would either push forward or be repelled back, but he was no longer going to remain stationary. He gave the order, and the military cavalcade began moving west.