"This place looks a lot more charming in the dark. You can hardly see all the dirt," Kit remarked, seemingly jovially.
"Talk about yourself, I can see just fine," Eskel commented, eyes flitting, always searching for possible danger.
"Over there." Triss nodded towards the store. "Lights are out. Looks like nobody's home. Guys, can you hear anything?"
Geralt and Eskel listened for a moment but were unable to discern anything but the familiar squeaking noises of the rats.
"Well then…" The sorceress, rather determined now, reached for the doorknob. "Locked. Of course." She mumbled something and for an instant the metal seemed to glow. A familiar clicking noise signaled that the lock had opened.
"After you, my brave men." She gestured for Geralt and Eskel to enter first.
The brothers stepped ahead, walking over creaky floorboards, making barely a sound, examining things in the dark that neither Kit nor the sorceress were able to see.
"Do you smell that?" Geralt suddenly asked.
Eskel nodded. "Whisky. Should we really be so lucky?"
He lighted a single candle with a gesture of his hand. The dim light was barely enough for the women to see among the dancing shadows.
The witchers picked up the trace which led them straight to the counter with the rat cage on it.
"See a trap door? Or maybe the girl's clothes or anything?" Eskel asked as Geralt inspected that particular corner of the store closer, trying to identify the source of the smell.
Geralt shook his head. Kit and Triss, who wrinkled her nose as she was forced into the vicinity of the hated rats yet again, joined in the search for a hidden compartment when Kit suddenly froze. She held her hand over the cage and drew a circle with her finger, just like the old shopkeeper had shown her. She frowned as the few rats, that were awake, spun in circles.
She opened the cage, leading Geralt to said: "Really? You wanna play with them now?"
Kit said nothing but lowered her hand into the cage. One of the rats approached it and let itself be grabbed by her.
"Oh boy," she murmured. "Or girl, I guess."
"Kit, put the rat back…" Geralt grew increasingly impatient. Usually he loved these weird quirks of hers but in that particular moment he found them to be severely misplaced. He would feel better if they were to get out of here quickly without causing a ruckus and making new enemies.
"Remember what I said about the frequency bias yesterday?" she asked unperturbed by Geralt's request. She held the animal in her outstretched arm to show it to him. "The fur, it has a reddish tinge, don't you think?"
"So?"
Eskel and Triss started to look at Kit as if she had lost her mind.
"It's missing an eye, too."
"And?"
"Red hair, missing an eye. Know anyone by that description?"
When the penny had finally dropped, Geralt said, carefully: "No. That can't be…" Knowing very well that, of course, it theoretically could be.
"Yesterday I thought it was a fun coincidence. My bad conscience making me see that poor one-eyed girl in a rat… But with this world being the way it is – maybe I'm seeing something that is actually there."
Kit waited, still holding the rat in her outstretched arm. Geralt looked at the beady eye of the animal that did not move at all, content with being held in Kit's hand, its legs and tail dangling beneath it. The rat simply stared back at him.
Could rats really stare, he wondered?
"Shit," he exclaimed finally.
"Care to include us in your conversation?" Eskel asked. Triss managed to simultaneously look confused and disgusted.
"Kit thinks the rat is a child," Geralt explained with a scowl.
"Actually, I think all of these rats are children. I'm guessing there is one by the name of Delilah that smells like whisky."
"Don't be silly," Eskel cursed but as he did so he took a closer look at the rats. "What exactly does Delilah look like?"
None of the remembered anything about her unassuming appearance that would have helped them to identify the corresponding rodent. But it did not matter as one of the rats approached Eskel, stood up on its hindlegs and stretched its tiny paws in his direction.
"I swear, if this is true then…" He grabbed the rat and sniffed, and for a moment it appeared as if a ridiculously fluffy mustache had just sprouted from his face. "Shit. Triss, can you do something to verify this?"
The sorceress went pale.
"Do I have to?" A pained expression crossed her face. "Put one of them on the counter," she finally ordered.
Kit gently sat her rat down in front of Triss.
"Stay put, okay? This is just a little test, nothing will happen to you. I hope," she mumbled quietly to the rat who, it seemed, observed Kit and Triss in confusion, turning its small head from left to right and back.
Triss looked at the furry animal in disgust before she shoved Eskel between her and the rat. Only her arm reached past her human shield as she softly chanted something. Eskel grinned, Triss went quiet.
"Not a normal rat," she concluded.
"How so?" Geralt wondered.
"There are traces of magic on it. Something out of the ordinary."
"The question is: Should we worry about how to turn them back into humans or should we worry about who turned them into rats in the first place?" Eskel wondered, his arms folded in front of his chest, Triss still holding onto his shoulder as if she was about to faint any second now.
"Transforming a living creature is difficult, not even talking about the amount of energy it costs. And there are nearly 20 rats in this cage. I don't know anybody with that kind of power." Triss knitted her brows. "Whoever did this…"
"Quiet, someone's coming," Geralt warned them. But it was too late, the door was already opening.
"What on earth is going on?" The old shopkeeper, who had greeted them from behind the counter the last time they had been there, was now standing in the doorway. Except she did not look quite as old anymore. Her posture was different, she was standing taller. Her face was no longer obscured by the shadows of a hood, revealing the face of a woman who was not old but merely past her prime.
"What are you doing here?" she repeated.
"Late-night shopping?" suggested Kit who had found her voice first. "Love those human rats you got there. Are those for sale too?"
"Don't be silly and leave my rats alone," the woman hissed. "And while you're at it, leave my house." Something sinister crept over the woman's face.
"Turn those children back and we'll leave," Geralt demanded.
"And finally give me my amulet," Triss added for good measure.
"This is your last warning. Leave, now!" the woman repeated, deaf to their demands.
"Two witchers and one sorceress – you've got nothing on us or you'd have done something already," Eskel challenged her.
Her lips, just a moment ago pressed into a thin line, now curved back into a smile. She slowly lifted her hands which had been buried in the wide pockets of her cloak, in one hand she held a squeaking rat, in the other one a small, delicate dagger that in any other situation would have passed as a letter opener.
"Well then, you got me. Leave now, let me and my children go. If not, the blood of this one will be on your hands." The rat squeaked even more hysterically and tried to wiggle out of the woman's firm grip. Geralt, Eskel and Triss exchanged looks, neither of them sure what to do. It was one thing to fight but this had become a hostage situation.
Geralt suddenly perceived Kit's agitated heartbeat next to him very clearly. She was going to do something, he knew that from experience. But what?
"You know how I've always hated that part of the James Bond movies where the villain reveals their grand plan?" she whispered only for him to hear.
It took Geralt a moment to get the hint but suddenly he understood and nodded.
"What's your story?" Kit asked, now directed at the shopkeeper. Unnoticed by her, Geralt scanned the room.
The woman's face switched from annoyed to confused and back. "Story?"
"Every villain has an origin story, what's yours? I bet you don't go around stealing children and turning them into rats for fun."
"I'm not stealing them, I'm saving them." The woman was angry, her face red. "They have no future here. I'm doing them a favor."
"But did they consent to this favor?" Kit cocked her head, putting all of that modern woman attitude, as Geralt liked to call it, into her voice.
"Consent? What on earth are you talking about?" Geralt smiled to himself. He understood the woman's confusion all too well. It had taken him years to grasp where Kit's sometimes seemingly odd priorities were based.
"I just want to know how you became… whatever you are. A rat catcher?"
"What did you call me?"
"The rat catcher. Every villain has to have a villain name."
"I'm not…" she was about to protest but was left unable to complete her complaint as Geralt used a well-aimed blast of igni to burn the ropes of the flower pot that was suspended over her head. The woman, too distracted by Kit's silly questions to step aside in time, promptly collapsed as the pot shattered on her head, a squealing rat running away from her.
"Well, as far as diversion goes, this was pretty neat," Eskel acknowledged. "Where did you learn that?"
Kit's smile turned smug. "TV. It teaches you a lot. But what do we do now?"
Triss conjured up some ropes to tie the unconscious shopkeeper with.
"We should check her pockets, see if there are any more rats, children, whatever…"
Triss shuddered, stepped back and promptly bumped into the rat cage, which made the small animals squeal. The sorceress, startled, squealed herself, and jumped aside. Eskel who had watched her odd dance, sniggered.
Geralt and Kit busied themselves patting the woman down.
"What do we have here? Some coin, string, a tissue…" Kit listed the items she had found.
"A flute?" Geralt wondered, holding up a white and exceptionally delicate flute made from wood. He turned the thin instrument between his fingers before handing it to Triss who stepped forward again, still shuddering.
"Medallion says it's magical," Geralt briefly informed her.
Triss nodded in agreement as she examined it. She looked around the store, grabbed various items and herbs from their jars and proceeded to draw a five-pointed star on the counter with a piece of chalk, placing one candle on each point and the flute in its middle.
In the meantime, Kit put the one-eyed rat as well as the formerly escaped rat from the shopkeeper's coat pocket, who had hidden in a corner, back into the cage.
"Not for long," she assured the rats who had now all woken up and had started to squeal in a rather heartbreaking fashion.
Once Triss had stopped tinkering and murmuring incantations, all eyes were on her.
"The flute is cursed."
"Can you un-curse it?" Kit wondered.
The sorceress shook her head. "Not without help, this is much too complex."
A faint moan from the corner of the room drew the group's attention. By the looks of it the shopkeeper had quickly figured out what had happened in the meantime as she went pale seeing the object on the counter.
She mumbled something to herself, then grumbled: "What are you going to do now?"
Geralt walked towards her slowly, holding the small dagger she had lost in his hand.
"Would love to see you turn those rats back into children." He hunkered down next to the woman, who did not even try to fight her restraints, playing with the knife in his hand. "Are you going to help us voluntarily or do I have to force you?" With the tip of the blade he drew a line from the corner of her eye to her cheekbone – without breaking the skin. At this and his menacing stare she started to shudder.
"I'm helping them!" she insisted, now trying to loosen the ropes around her.
"How is turning someone into an animal helping them?" Geralt cocked his head, pointing the small blade at her still.
The shopkeeper growled. "Those children all come from abusive homes. I'm doing them a favor!"
"By keeping them in a cage?"
"I feed them, I keep them warm. They'll have a couple of good years instead of having a few bad ones and then die, starving somewhere on the street."
Uncertain Geralt looked at Kit. Triss observed this act with surprise.
Kit crossed her arms in front of her chest and walked a few steps towards the tied-up woman.
"Can you turn them back?" she wondered.
"Can I... Of course, I can. But why would I? I just told you…" the shopkeeper snapped.
"Then let's ask them," Kit interrupted her, motioning at the rat cage. "Let's ask their opinion on this and if you are right, you turn them back into rats. But if you're wrong, you let them go."
As the woman stared at her, Kit continued, calmer now: "You've got nothing to lose if you're right. And you seem to be very convinced, so what's the harm?"
"They are children, they don't know what's best for them!"
"Maybe," Kit pondered. "Under normal circumstances I'd agree with you. But these are their lives that you've been messing with. This is too big of a decision to leave to anybody else."
Finally, the woman nodded grudgingly. Whether out of conviction or due to a lack of options nobody knew.
"I need to play the flute. You need to untie me," she informed them.
"Wait, how do we know she won't be turning us into rats?" Eskel interjected suddenly.
The woman huffed. "It only works on children. And besides, adults cannot even hear it. Otherwise I would have long turned myself into a rat…"
"That makes sense, I suppose. When we get older we lose the ability to hear frequencies in the higher range," Kit confirmed. "I'd still suggest that everybody with superhuman hearing covers their ears."
"And I will cast a protective circle." Triss glanced at Kit. "I don't mean to undermine your theory but I'll kill myself if I end up as a rat. No offense."
"None taken." Kit smiled.
As Triss busied herself covering a part of the floor in runes and lighting a few more candles, Kit took the rats out of the cage and set them up in a neat row on the counter. Not one of the furry creatures moved but some were shaking with what Geralt assumed was fear. One seemed to have a particularly hard time. Kit said nothing but started to pet the little creature between its ears.
"I hope your promise still stands – that you'll love me even if I get transformed into… something," Kit said.
Geralt smiled. "I think a rat would be better than a slug – you'd be much easier to transport and I wouldn't have to worry about accidentally spilling salt on you."
"You actually thought about life with me as a slug?" Kit wondered.
"A little." Kit shook her head, a smile spreading across her face.
As everything had been prepared the shopkeeper was rid of the ropes that bound her and given the flute. She hesitated but then started to play. Or so it looked. Neither Geralt nor the others were able to hear even a single note.
But all of the rats stared at the flute as if hypnotized. Suddenly they began to tremble and squeal. Within seconds they all started to grow and change their shape. Just an instant later a bunch of younger and older children, all dressed in ragged clothing, were where the rats had been. Some had fallen off the counter as with their growing mass there was not enough room for all them. Others hugged and started to talk in hushed voices.
"I was right!" Kit exclaimed as she saw the one-eyed girl with the red hair. She was sobbing and shaking. She went over to the girl to console her. In return, two small arms gripped her tightly.
Most of the other children had made it through their transformation without tears. Delilah stared at her hands in confusion, as if she could not quiet grasp what had just happened.
When Geralt recognized her, he asked: "Delilah, do you remember me?"
She looked up to him and finally, after a moment, replied: "Master witcher! Are we safe now?"
At that, most of the children went quiet and cast Geralt anxious glances.
Geralt examined the shopkeeper who looked distraught. There was no denying that the children had not enjoyed life in her care at all.
As if all energy had left her body, her shoulders sank and she dropped the flute on the floor.
"You're safe, girl," Geralt finally replied.
Hearing that, most of the children suddenly seemed to have found their footing again. As if the devil himself was hunting them, they scrambled out the door, some shouting for their parents even. There was a telltale cracking sound as one of them stepped on the flute. So much for lifting the curse, Geralt thought.
Only Delilah, the one-eyed girl and two young boys were left.
"What's your name?" Kit asked the shopkeeper who was now crouched on the floor. Geralt had not heard her cry but her cheeks were stained with tears anyway.
The woman sniffed. "Piper," she finally said. Then, without being prompted, she continued, her voice broken: "I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought they would be happier in my care."
"Mind telling us how you got this flute?" Geralt asked.
Piper sniffed. "It's a long story."
"Got nowhere else to be…"
Piper had been in love with a boy. And then, one day, they had married. When Piper was expecting their first child, her husband died, leaving her to fend for herself. But it seemed she was out of luck and living on the streets the moment she had given birth. As chance would have it, a rich couple had heard of her misery and offered to take in her daughter as their own – the woman had never managed to carry a pregnancy to term but wished for a child in her house so dearly.
Hoping for a better future for her daughter and receiving just enough gold to start over, Piper gave her daughter a last kiss on the beautiful crescent moon-shaped birthmark on her cheek before she handed the baby to her new parents. She regretted it every single day and her only consolation was that her child would have it so much better than she would have ever in her care.
She travelled the continent in search of something to fill the aching hole in her heart and wandered restlessly for years for that hole could never be filled.
One day she returned to her hometown to find a young woman in the local tavern who carried the same birthmark as her daughter once had. By asking around, Piper learned that the young woman, Annabelle, was indeed her daughter. She had been given up by her adoptive parents at the age of two when, by a miracle, her adoptive mother had finally managed to give birth to a healthy girl. From that moment on, Annabelle was not wanted anymore and had been left at the orphanage. Just like her mother, Annabelle had not been blessed with luck and now made her living serving the men in the local tavern – sometimes beer, sometimes herself.
Unable to breathe, Piper had left the town immediately without ever talking to the young woman. Her guilt that had been suffocating her all her life was now joined by shame as she realized what she had done to her child.
At a crossroads she finally caved and screamed her pain out into the world. A lone travelling merchant found her and tried to console her. Piper confessed her feelings of guilt and how she wished she could make up for her mistake.
The merchant smiled, a terrifying smile as Piper remembered much later, and gave her the flute.
"To free those who deserve better." The flute, if played in a certain way, would help her save children, would help her make up for her mistake.
Shortly after the incident, Piper found herself in Novigrad. When she used the flute for the first time, she was shocked to see what happened. But then she realized that a small rat was easier to house and feed than a child. And were not a few happy years as a rat better than a life in misery, she asked herself? She then decided to hide in plain sight, pretending to be small and weak, so that no one ever might suspect her in case the absence of her children was eventually noticed.
"I see," Kit said when Piper had ended her story. The girl in her arms had fallen asleep. "I'm sorry you had to go through this."
"I don't deserve your compassion. I've made things worse for everybody." The woman had her face averted, not daring to look at anybody.
Suddenly a timid voice piped up. "I liked staying with you." It was one of the small boys who had not run away like the other children. "You fed me, you played with me. Don't like being a rat but you were so nice."
At that Piper lifted her tear-streaked face to look at the boy.
"Me too, Mrs. Piper," the other boy joined in. "Can I stay with you? I also don't wanna be a rat but I got nowhere else to go." At the boys' sad faces Piper started to sob hysterically and nodded.
"You stay with me, you both stay with me," she finally said when she had found her voice again. "Boys, not rats."
Geralt, Eskel and Triss went outside to discuss what to do but then they all agreed that the woman posed no more danger. In the end she even gave Triss the amulet she had been coming for in the first place.
"I wanted to sell it, make sure I could feed the kids," she apologized meekly.
As the group, Delilah and the still sleeping girl in tow, was about to leave, Geralt stopped. Something had been bothering him for a while now. And he had a bad feeling.
"That merchant who gave you the flute… Care to describe him?"
Piper shook her head. "I don't remember what he looked like. He was quite friendly but at the same time… There was something odd, something threatening about him. I didn't realize it at first because I was out of my mind. It only occurred to me much later. Too late."
"Hm," Geralt answered. There was nothing to be done here anyway. "Stay away from the likes of him in the future. They don't have a habit of actually helping people."
Piper shrugged.
"Every villain has a story, huh?" Eskel had taken the sleeping girl from Kit and carried her as they walked back to the Chameleon.
"I was trying to buy time. Just like James Bond would do."
"Who's James Bond?"
"I can answer this one!" Geralt interjected with a bit of pride. "He's a spy from a series of novels and movies, working for the government. In every story there is a villain whose plan gets a great reveal…"
"And I like to complain about how every time he, be it Bond or any other spy, is buying time by appealing to the villain's vanity and making him explain his motivation in detail so Bond has time to get out of whatever lethal situation he's in," Kit chimed in. "Making the villain talk is always a good distraction."
"The future sounds like fun," Eskel said, visibly confused.
As they reached the Chameleon in the middle of the night, it was quiet. Delilah was sent to bed with Triss as everybody had decided that none of the children should be alone tonight. Geralt and Kit took the other girl, who went by Edith, up to their room.
"For someone who doesn't want children, you are pretty good with them," Geralt said as they were lying in bed with Edith cuddled up against Kit.
"You are forgetting that I basically bribed this one into liking me a few days ago. This doesn't count."
"What are we going to do with her?"
The girl had told them that she had no family to go back to. Her father was gone and her mother had died of something that by her description had sounded like typhus. Edith had lived on the street with other children that tried to take care of each other. But as the baby of the group she had never really fit in and did not like the other children very much.
"That sounds like a problem for tomorrow-Geralt and Kit to solve."
Geralt woke up when Edith started to stir and accidentally kicked him in the nose, making him hiss in pain. Somehow, she had turned upside down during the night, now resting between him and Kit.
The little girl yawned and rubbed her eyes. Geralt was only mildly surprised to find that she had two eyes again. Later, when Kit gave her a bath, he asked: "Did you do it on purpose or did it just happen?"
Kit shrugged. "I tried. Very hard. I figured that if I was able to make your tooth grow back by accident, I might as well try with an eye. But I didn't get my hopes up because I didn't believe that I could do it. I thought an entire eye was way too complex…"
It soon turned out that it was in fact too complex. While Edith's eye looked normal from the outside with only the color of her iris being less intense compared to the other eye, they realized that she could not actually see with it. Neither was she able to move it nor did the pupil react to light.
When the three of them went downstairs, Dandelion was already awaiting them, a small breakfast spread in front of him. He raised an eyebrow at the trio.
"Not another case of law of surprise, is it?" the bard questioned as he nodded his head towards the little girl.
"Dandelion, this is Edith. She can't go back home. We need to find a place for her to stay," Geralt informed his friend. "Found Delilah as well. She's here too."
Hearing that Dandelion exhaled audibly. "That's good news. Where was she? Is she alright?"
"I think the right question in this case is: What was she? And yes, she's fine," Kit informed him.
"I'm not sure I can follow…"
Geralt gave a brief summary of the previous night's event.
"To recapitulate: A woman tries to rescue children from abusive homes by turning them into rats and then takes care of them. She then turned them back, most ran off and now you've got…" he gestured towards Edith who seemed bored by the grownups' talk. "And you just let her walk away?"
Kit nodded. "What's the point of punishing her? She had good intentions, we managed to undo any harm and she realized her mistake. I'm certain that she will give a much better home to those two boys than what they had before."
Dandelion looked at Geralt for confirmation. He shrugged.
"That woman has punished herself for her past mistakes more than enough…"
"Out of curiosity – Kit, what would have happened with her in your world?"
"Hard to say, we don't have magic so this could not ever happen. But let's say we did with everything else remaining the same. She would have been tried, probably found unfit to plead and received mandatory therapy or something. Likely some prison time on top of that."
"And you'd be fine with her walking around after?" the poet wondered.
Kit nodded. "Where I come from, prisons are not supposed to punish. They are meant to make people fit for reintegration into society. But this is a pointless discussion. Had this woman had the help she would have received in my world, she likely would have never ended up homeless, would have never given her daughter away. It seems unreasonable to measure what we do here by the standards of a society that has an entirely different approach on things and other means." She sighed. "I admit, I am a little worried but I really want to believe that things will take a positive turn for her."
A little later Triss, Delilah and Eskel joined them.
"Whatever happened to the Grape?" Eskel asked with his mouth full of bread.
Dandelion who had seemed absent suddenly jumped a little. "I completely forgot. Congratulations, you came in third!" He rummaged in his coat pockets and threw a small purse on the table as well as a neatly rolled certificate. "For the fruity aftertaste or… something like it. And here," he rummaged in another pocket and pulled out a crumbled piece of paper, "is a list of orders for your wine. Seriously, I think I deserve a cut for suffering through that in your stead."
Kit ignored Dandelion's comment, took the crumbled paper and smoothed it out. "Well, if that wasn't worth listening to the sounds that guy made, then I don't know." She pushed the paper towards Geralt.
"What are you going to do now? Going back to Toussaint immediately?" Triss asked, playing with the amulet around her neck. It was made from dark, polished wood and shaped like a fish. She smiled as her fingers traced the shape.
Geralt leaned back and folded his arms across his chest.
"Still need to figure out what to do with the girls."
Delilah and Edith were playing in a corner, rolling marbles around that Triss had created for them.
"I would like to keep Edith for a few more nights, see if I can figure out how to make her eye usable again," Kit thought aloud. Geralt pulled a face at the thought of having to share her for the nights to come but he said nothing.
"The two of them can stay here until we find something more permanent for them," Dandelion offered. "I think I owe Delilah that…" Conscience-stricken the bard looked at his folded hands.
"Sure you can handle this? After what the girls have been through, I don't think they should be around someone who is quick to lose his temper," Triss chided in the softest way possible as there was no need to make the bard feel even more guilty.
Dandelion sighted, for once not trying to make up an excuse.
"Again, I'm not proud of it but it's not going to happen again, circumstances have changed. If all goes well, the two might even benefit from it."
"How so?"
"There is a guest house, a really nice one, up north, the Silken Feather. The owner died recently, no heirs. It was supposed to be auctioned off but I managed to get a foot in the door, had a deal to buy it cheaper, much cheaper than if the auction had actually taken place."
"And by foot in the door you mean?"
"A bribe of course," he grinned, suddenly becoming much livelier as always when he told a story and had his audience's attention, "I am now a previously unknown heir to the estate of late Gunter de Posy. I got a little nervous when it seemed like the city council had gotten wind of it and my plans were ruined. The place is profitable already but I'm sure that, with my artistry, I can elevate it even further. The chameleon will profit from it was well." Dandelion paused, paying no mind to eye-rolling his bragging had incited. "Delilah managed to run into me when things were tense, all my dreams hinging on one single meeting. And then she smashed the bottle of whisky, took me ages to find that particular one, that was going to sway my contact to put in a good word for me. I had been told it was his favorite. Luckily, he liked money much more than alcohol…"
"You've become a great land owner then?" Kit asked mockingly.
"Something like it. The Silken Feather is mine now. It's frequented by the richest of the rich and famous. I was thinking I could put the girls in pretty new dresses, have them learn a song or two. Maybe there will be a couple among the guests to adopt them or at least foster them."
Geralt crossed his arms over his chest. "This is… as close to a reasonable suggestion as you have ever made one."
Dandelion grinned.
"It doesn't solve the underlying issue though," Kit sad, looking weary. "What about all the others who still live in the streets? Who's going to help them?"
Geralt's heart broke a little seeing her so defeated. He put his hand on her back, wanted to say something but he did not know what. Poverty was not a monster he knew how to fight, he reminded himself again.
Triss took note of Geralt's inability to console his loved one. While she was not exactly happy seeing the man she desired be with her, she sympathized with Kit.
"This is not your problem to solve," she finally said.
"I know, it's a systemic error. But I hate that I can't do anything about it." Frustrated, she poked the purse of prize money in front of her with a finger. "Sorry," she finally said. "I don't mean to ruin the mood. It's not like these problems didn't exist in my old world but I had been so far removed from them that they never really bothered me…"
"There will be better times," Dandelion said suddenly. "It has always been like that. There is misery, then there is recovery, and misery again. It's an endless cycle. So, stop wracking your brains or you'll end up with wrinkles. Which you don't want to because Geralt prefers his women to be youthful looking. Ouch!" His outcry was prompted by a kick, courtesy of Geralt, against his shin under the table. Kit laughed.
"If you could have just shut up a little earlier this would have been such a nice speech," Kit said rolling her eyes. "And just for your information: You'll be the only one to wrinkle, I don't do that, I have fantastic genetics! While we're at it: I see two gray hairs that you forgot to pluck this morning!"
At this everybody laughed.
Geralt smiled when he saw the spark return to her eyes and kissed the side of her head as the others started tossing age-related insults around.
Triss examined the two of them, how Geralt held Kit closely and how she looked up to him with so much love in her gaze. She thought of the odd way they had communicated the previous night, how they had worked together on a basis of something that was beyond Triss' understanding. She remembered how Geralt had looked at Kit for advice, for her opinion.
She suddenly realized that the witcher had never been that way with Yennefer. There were moments when their love had made Triss envious, but they had never lasted long. Triss had always tried to recreate these peaceful moments, not ever disagreed with him, hoping it that if she managed to create a relationship without fights, without any resistance, she would eventually win him over.
But now she had to admit to herself that it would have never worked.
When Geralt looked at Kit for confirmation, it was an action born out of trust – worlds away from the way Yennefer had dominated him. And Kit returned the favor in her own way, making sure the man was happier than Triss had ever known him to be.
For a brief, fleeting moment something changed. Triss felt herself let go of something. She was not quite sure what it was but there was relieve in that, brief and small as it might have been. For the first time she was able to be happy for Geralt, truly happy, despite her own unfulfilled desire.
For an entire week little Edith disturbed Geralt's sleep. Then finally, one morning after she had delivered yet another swift kick to his face, Geralt grabbed the child, took her downstairs, placed her on Dandelion's lap with the words "your responsibility" and then went back upstairs to make up for the time lost.
"Geralt, you can't…" Kit started, a bewildered look on her face when he returned to the bed, but was promptly interrupted.
"You wake up with that girl's feet in your face every morning, then you can tell me what I can and cannot do," he grumbled and then grabbed his chuckling wife to be to silence her with a kiss. He did not want to add that he thought the entire thing pointless as the state of the girl's eye had not improved beyond her being able to move it a little but still not being able to see out of it.
"Looks like I'm not the only one who doesn't like sharing," she whispered as she wrapped her arms around him.
"You really don't want children of your own?" Geralt asked suddenly, holding her tightly against his chest.
"No. Where's that coming from all of a sudden?" Kit wondered, her tone dumbfounded.
"You didn't seem to mind the kid. We're not married yet, you can still get out - if this is what you want."
She wiggled free from his grip to look him in the eyes.
"I told you, I don't want children. And if," she raised her voice as Geralt had opened his mouth already to argue, "if I really wanted children, I'd rather adopt. If the past few days have taught me anything then it is that there are enough children in need of a home. There is no point in adding to that." She sighed, seemingly shrinking a little in his arms. "There is nothing I can do about this. I can't help them all. Helping Edith is me buying myself out of my guilt. You are witnessing egoism in its purest form and nothing else."
"Why would you feel guilty? You didn't cause this problem."
Kit shrugged.
"But I'm also not contributing to solving it."
"Neither am I."
"You save lives."
"And you save me. All the time."
At that Kit remained silent, cupping her lover's face, examining it.
"It seems I'm in need of a distraction until I've come to terms with all the things I cannot change," she finally said.
"And what would that distraction be?" He smiled suggestively.
"Finally preparing that wedding."
Geralt huffed playfully.
"I was hoping the answer would be me."
"The answer is you, you fool."
Note: So I guess a wedding chapter would be reasonable?