The Traveler: Part 1

Chapter 2

Ciri woke just before dawn. She dressed quickly and went downstairs. She knew no one would be up considering the night the innkeeper and his daughter had had, but she couldn't sleep. There was too much to ponder about the events that occurred a mere four hours ago.

She made her way to the front porch, if you could even call it that, and leaned against one of the main posts supporting the roof with an exhausted huff. It was a quaint, small inn with four rooms upstairs and a tavern downstairs. Mostly it was just some wood thrown together and was never meant for a large number of travelers. Nathaen sustained his business serving drinks to the locals and providing room and board for the rare merchant who came to Udnaryk to buy the refugees' goods. They, like all the elves on the isle, were truly destitute which is why she had insisted to Lambert they not demand payment when Nathaen asked for their help the previous evening.

"Sometimes you just help people because it is the right thing to do." Ciri exclaimed.

"Yeah, and that's how you end up in the poor house with a rusty sword on your back and boots filled with swamp shit because your soles are falling off. How are you supposed to get a contract then? Tell me, oh wisest lioness. How do you convince a lord to pay you 1500 florens to kill a striga or a pesta when you look like every other chump that came before you claiming they can kill a monster and then getting torn apart when they try?" retorted Lambert.

"Crowns." she said.

"What?" he answered annoyed.

"You mean crowns. Nilfgaard lost the war. And last I checked, the only major swampy area I know of is north of Nilfgaard. I expect it certainly would be rather difficult to convince a noble of the Northern kingdom to pay you 1500 florens." she said with a cocky smirk while watching him puff out his lower lip as we was wont to do when annoyed.

She continued, "And to answer your question, I would kill the striga or the pesta with a rusty sword on my back and no soles on my boots, take the 1500 crowns and buy me some new boots and a proper sword, all the while having gotten food and drink from people I once took pity on who then returned the favor. But since I can only convince you with a cold-hearted bastard argument: we didn't charge Nathaen because he could have simply told us we couldn't stay at his inn 'til he found his daughter, which would have left us in the same situation we are now."

"We could have forced him to let us sleep there." retorted Lambert.

"And what would that have proven? Now is the time not to reinforce the stereotype that witchers are brutes and savages and not to be trusted."

He wanted to point out that she wasn't a witcher; at least, not like he was. But he knew it would be futile. She was as stubborn as she always was and through the years had become more cunning with her arguments. Besides, she had a point. Every time she took and completed a contract to lift a curse or kill a monster she was recognized as a witcher. Every time she was seen with a second sword on her back made of silver the word "witcher" was whispered. She was representing Lambert and the rest of his cat-eyed species even if she had never gone through the Trial of Grasses herself.

*

Ciri felt the first rays of sunlight hit her face as she replayed the scene from the previous night.

One set of footprints up the mountain leading to the center of the circle ending at Yaennin. A trail leading from Yaennin to where we found the random she-elf on the wall as if she had dragged herself there. No traces of active magic. No signs of trauma. No physical injuries. Partial memory loss to Yaennin and what appears to be complete memory loss to the she-elf. Could be a sorceress whose spell went wrong. Could be the victim of a mage who erased her memory. But how did she get there? Portal? Portals leave traces for at least a few hours. They may have arrived too late for Lambert's necklace to detect a trace. Could something have dropped her there? A dragon? Or was it something else. What is missing?