Chapter Text
29th September 1952, 20 kilometres south of Sodden Hill
“And then these fucking bastards attacked Sodden Hill, as if the devastation they caused in Cintra wasn’t enough. But they did not expect our brave mages. No one expected them, to be honest. But twenty-two of the finest members of the Northern Brotherhood of Sorcerers came to protect the people of Sodden and help them defeat the gazillions of Nilfgaardian soldiers.” Yurga continued on with his ramblings about the battle that took place only days ago.
However, Geralt only paid him half a mind, as he himself had his head full of other things. The fact that he had probably just met his long-lost mother, his still aching injuries from the fight with the pack of nekkers or the fact that he just lost a child surprise he was not yet sure he ever wanted to claim. His mind was full of thoughts on circumstances he now had to come to terms with.
Cintra had fallen and there were no survivors. Had he been there a few days earlier, the heir to Cintra's throne might still be alive. But what would he even do with a little child? He did not know anything about parenting. Also, he never wanted nor even considered it as part of his life before he so stupidly called the law of surprise. Still, he had a strange feeling in his gut he wasn’t sure he could name. It might have been guilt or sadness or a combination of many different feelings. But he did not want to dwell on it. Witchers were not supposed to feel complex human emotions.
“.. it is sad though that so many of them have fallen. Fourteen out of twenty-two, that is more than half of them. The newspapers and the people are already calling them the Fourteen of the Hill. They are talking about raising them an Obelisk in their honour. So they can forever be remembered. I tell you every man and every child will forever remember their names.”
That roused the Witcher’s attention and he stopped in his musing as his heart stuttered a beat. With apprehension he asked the one question whose answer he wasn’t sure he wanted to know, “Do you know the names of the fourteen mages?”
“Let’s see there was Axel Raby, Triss Merigold, Atlan Kerk, Vanielle of Brugge, Dagobert of Vole—”
“Stop, Yurga.”
“What’s the matter, sir? You’re as pale as death and that’s saying something, considering in which state I found you.”
“Nothing, but could we drive up to the battle site?”, the witcher was suddenly filled with a feeling of dread and deep down he knew what he would find up on the hilltop. Still, he needed to see it with his own eyes and confirm his worst fears.
As they were driving towards the battle site the air in the merchant’s beat-up truck was getting warmer and warmer. Soon the warm air was accompanied by the stench of soot and ash. The closer they got to the outpost on the top of Sodden Hill the clearer it became how gruesome the whole battle truly had been. The fields around them were burnt down to the ground and one could easily recognise the remnants of charred up corpses in different uniforms. People were walking around and searching for possible survivors. However, Geralt imagined that there was little to no chance of someone surviving such a devastating outburst of fire, especially as it was clear that it was caused by a strong magical source.
When they approached a roadblock Geralt stepped out of the merchant’s vehicle without a word and started to make his way towards the tents. They were raised only in the last two days after the battle ended and now housed the many injured and crippled that did not have room in the base itself. At the edge of the camp stood a big noticeboard. The Witcher limbed towards the board without hearing any noises around him. He saw the list of names of the fallen people that were identified up until now and right next to it there was a shorter listed pined up. Written on the top were a few short words of gratitude to all the fallen mages. Geralt read the names of them slowly. One by one and with each line he thought about the face of the ones he knew. Triss Merigold, Lawdbor of Murivel, Lytta Neyd, Old Gorazd. He stopped before he could read the last name.
All his life death had followed on his every footsteps. Geralt would never deny that he had always been afraid of it. Always afraid of the terror he would feel if he’d see death following him. Living in fear, up until that very moment he stood on the hilltop and realised that death had taken everything from him. He read the last name and dropped to his knees murmuring the name he had spoken so often in his lifetime. By day, and night, frost, sun and rain…
Yennefer of Vengerberg
“Oi, Geralt, sir! Why did you run off like that? If you wanted to know the names, I could just tell them.” Yurga came up behind the kneeling Geralt and looked at the list the Witcher was just staring at. Geralt got out of his stupor and glanced towards the approaching merchant.
“Tell me Yurga, the fourteenth of the hill, what is the name?”
“You an odd fella, sitting in front of the names and asking such questions. The last one is Yoël Grethen of Carreras. Perhaps you knew him?”
Geralt’s eyes shoot up and true to Yurga’s word the last name one the list - Yoël Grethen of Carreras – stood on the list clear as day. “No, I didn’t.” And for the first time in what felt like days Geralt took in a shaky breath of relief.
She saw him the moment he fell to his knees. A person of his statue crumbled into the tiny shell of an utterly defeated man. She did not need to hear the repeated mutterings of her name to know who he was. Even if Yennefer was always restrictive with the amount of information she shared, the songs written by a certain singer gave a pretty good description of the famous White Wolf. Kneeling on the dirty ground with his destroyed clothing, however, he did not look at all like the mighty warrior from the catchy tunes. She took a short moment to contemplate if approaching him was the right decision, but in the moment every help was appreciated.
“Geralt of Rivia?”
The witcher was in the process of standing up when a rather short but extremely authoritative woman addressed him. He immediately knew that the woman was one of the remaining sorceresses and if the way in which she strode towards Geralt was any indication, one with a high position in the hierarchy of the brotherhood or at least immense arrogance clinging to her. Although this seemed to be a prerequisite if he considered all the sorcerers and sorceresses he knew.
“Yes, and who might you be?”
“Tissaia de Vries, rectoress of Aretuza. Might I speak to you in private?” the sorceresses’ suggestion might have been formulated as a question, but her tone did not leave any room to reject the offer. Without waiting for an answer, the woman turned around and headed to a tent in the far corner of the camp.
Although Geralt did not mean to stay at the battleground longer than required something in the sorceresses’ behaviour seemed oddly familiar and it piqued his curiosity. He gave a nod to Yurga and followed her into the tent. It did not surprise him when his medallion vibrated against his chest as he entered.
“Don’t worry the spell just makes sure that no one from the outside can listen in to our conversation.”
“And what is so important that we would need soundproofing for this little chat of ours?”
The rectoress raised an eyebrow which suggested that the answer was so apparent that the question in itself was rather stupid.
“Yennefer, of course. Or is she not the reason you are here all along?”
Geralt did not know what it was about the woman in front of him, but in just a few short moments of knowing her she succeeded in making him feel like a schoolboy who never did his homework properly.
So, she is here, or at least was here? How does she know I am here because of her? And why do we need soundproofing to discuss her? Geralt did not voice the questions but was sure that the sorceress was nevertheless aware of what was going on in his mind.
“Although Yennefer has not told me much about your romance, it is quite clear that the two of you have a special kind of bond. Not everybody stomps into a warzone just to make sure that their loved ones have survived, especially if you have not seen each other in what, three years now? Unfortunately, Yennefer might not yet be on the list of the fallen, but she is not far behind -”
“Where is she?”
“I had to shield her; she is not safe.”
Of course, this was not the answer the witcher wanted to hear, nevertheless she continued speaking without a pause.
“The fight lasted three days. Both sides were incredibly powerful, and the fight dragged on and on. We had our strategies and tactics, but so did the Nilfgaardians. After days of constant combat, it seemed that the additional troops from the Northern Kingdoms would arrive too late. Our defences were broken through and the count of dead humans and mages rose by the hour. It all looked like our fight was for nothing and that also the remaining ones would soon fall by the hands of the enemy.”
The sorceress averted his gaze and fixed her eyes on a random cabinet next to the witcher.
“The charred-up land? You certainly drove through it when you came here - that was Yennefer. Yennefer alone did this to the Nilfgaardian army and saved us all. She used all her remaining energy and lit up half the land around us. Nobody could survive – “
“Where is she?” he said in an almost threatening tone. Geralt had enough of the emotionless recounting of the rectoress. He needed to get to Yennefer and see for himself what the rectoress avoided telling him.
The rectoress sighed and avoided his eyes, “Follow me, but be warned she is in a critical condition, and the circumstances here don’t make her recovery any easier.”
She turned towards the opening of the tent and this time waited for the witcher to follow. The two walked past the medical station and headed to the second floor of the outpost where most offices were located. When Tissaia opened a door for the witcher to enter, his medallion unsurprisingly reacted again, but as he looked into the room, he only saw an old supply closet.
He was already in the process of turning towards the sorceress and leaving a snarky remark when she held up a hand in a sign of silence. After she spoke a short incantation the room changed. In the middle of the small room stood a hospital bed with an incredibly small looking body inside. There were several tubes attached to her, cuts and bruises littered her body and her skin was glowing with a thin layer of sweat. Geralt slowly limbed towards the left side of the bed to get a better look.
If someone had told him the day before that the possibility to see the great Yennefer of Vengerberg all broken, beaten-down and small existed, Geralt would probably laugh it off and tell that person that they just did not know her well enough. Yennefer was always in control of every situation she stepped into. And if she wasn’t, she at least was able to fool everyone by playing a certain part. But right in that moment she could not fool anyone.
All Geralt wanted was to offer her comfort, even if her conscious self would probably never let him. He reached for her hand but was immediately staggered by how warm it was. Not just warm, her otherwise notoriously cold hands could probably burn him if he held on to them too long. Just then he noticed that her eyes were bandaged as well. Not bearing to look at her broken form any longer he turned toward Tissaia and asked what happened.
“As I was saying before you so rudely interrupted: Yennefer let her chaos explode and turned the battle in our favour again. She did not only turn it, she won it for us. The remaining Nilfgaardian troops were so few that it was a mere matter of minutes before those would fall as well. But as you know magic comes at a cost and Yennefer drew her power for this last effort from the element of fire, which is the most dangerous of the Four Elements. That she survived the magnitude of her chaos is a miracle on itself. However, the Nilfgaardians or rather their arch-sorceress did not give up at once. She knew that Yennefer was the one who caused the fire and thus she wanted to take revenge. Our defences were pretty low by then and she could easily track Yennefer as nobody had the power to shield themselves or anyone else for that matter anymore. Just as Yennefer was on her lowest point, she found her and wanted to make her suffer. I was in the vicinity but could not use my magic as I was poisoned with dimeritium earlier in the battle. I tried to stop her, but without my abilities as a conduit I could not do much. She managed to blind Yennefer and only in that moment I was able to use the last reserves of my power to bring Yennefer to safety.”
For the first time the witcher truly looked at the sorceress Tissaia de Vries. Although her tone was cold and detached her eyes spoke a completely different story. They showed suffering, worry and love, but they were still so guarded that only a few would ever be able to see. It reminded him a lot of the person lying in the hospital bed. After truly looking at Tissaia he also noticed that her magical aura was still dampened from the dimeritium attack. That her bruises and cuts where not properly healed yet, which was probably due to the fact she used what little amount of magic she could handle to treat others. He saw that her elegant pose was barely held up with all the energy she had left. That even showing him Yennefer and voicing her own failures took a huge amount of pride to overcome, but that she would do anything to help her student, even though Yennefer has long fallen out of grace with the Brotherhood.
“What happened then? You said Yen is not safe, what do you mean?”
“What happened immediately afterwards, I don’t know. I passed out and when I came to myself the Nilfgaardians were already left running. And no, Yennefer is not safe and probably will not be for quite some time. As long as she has not properly healed, she has a big target on her back. No one would dare come after her under normal circumstances, but right now every Nilfgaardian and also every other enemy she made in her lifetime knows that she can’t defend herself. Now is the perfect time to take revenge on Yennefer of Vengerberg.”
“That’s why you are shielding our conversation from possible eavesdroppers and why you are keeping her hidden in a storage room. Why don’t you just heal her and keep her in a safe place until she gets back to strength?”
“Well, that is the reason I approached you in the first place. It seems that she developed some kind of resistance to magical treatments through her overdose of the fire element. Everything we tried to heal her made the situation worse. However, we also do not know of any conventional ways of treating the aftermaths of her magic use, because there are no precedents for these kinds of magnitudes. We could at least heal some of the wounds that were suffered from conventional weapons. But it is still not much. We put her in a coma to give her body time to regenerate itself, like with a dimeritium poisoning in which case rest is the only remedy. I hope that she can pull through. She has always been a fighter, but this might prove to be too much for her. And as much as it pains me to say I can’t keep her safe on my own. My powers are limited right now. Even if I tried to portal her to a safe place, the magic used might be too much to handle for her right now.”
Tissaia stepped towards the unoccupied bedside and took Yennefer’s left hand into her own. She softly drew her thumbs over Yennefer’s knuckles and seemed to be lost in thought for a few moments.
“You want me to stay here and guard her?”, the witcher concluded.
“Isn’t that what you want to as well?” Again, the rectoress reminded him all too much of the woman lying next to him, fighting for her life in an artificially induced sleep. Answering a question with another question usually grated on his nerves, but in that moment, he couldn’t find anything in himself to argue or disagree.
“I will go talk to Yurga and get my few belongings. Will I be able to enter this room once I leave it?”
The sorceress gave him a curt nod and with that he was on his way to gather his gear from the merchant’s truck and go back to the only place in the world that made sense to him right now.
When he returned with his duffel bag Tissaia was still in Yennefer’s room. She was in the process of mixing a salve and applying it on Yennefer’s heated skin. He threw his bag into one corner and readied a chair to sit beside the incapacitated sorceress’s right side.
“Do you have any more information on possible attackers? What can I expect?”
“If I would know what to expect I wouldn’t need your help, would I?” the sorceress replied without taking her eyes of Yennefer. “I shielded this room and Yennefer’s presence from all detection spells and scans that I know off. However, as already mentioned, the usage of magic does impact her recovery negatively and my powers are not always as steady as one would hope for in a situation like this. If anybody is or will be able to detect her the only way in is through the door you already used thrice.”
While she was talking, she applied the salve on every bruise and cut and then proceed to check on her IV-drop and the machines that were connected to Yennefer’s body.
“As for who we might expect, Nilfgaardian soldier, agents or mages are the most obvious attackers one would think of. But there are many who might wish to harm or get rid of Yennefer. Beside you nobody else knows where she is held. After the medics have done what they could, I tended to her being brought to safety. Most seem to think that I have portaled her somewhere far away and came back to help with the dealings after the battle, however, some might suspect that she is still on the premises.”
While Tissaia was speaking Geralt started to prepare his gear. He put on his holster and slid his revolver with silver bullets into his right side, while his semi-automatic Glock was put in the other side. He never had been particularly enthusiastic about guns, but he had to concede that they had an advantages in situations where velocity and distance between you and your enemy was of essence. Afterwards he pulled out his swords and leaned them on to the wall nearest to the chair he prepared for himself.
Tissaia looked at the witcher preparing his whole armoury for possible attacks. For the first time she was convinced that she made the right decision in telling him about her student. If there was anyone on earth more willing to protect Yennefer of Vengerberg than Tissaia herself, it could only be the witcher sitting in front of her, notoriously reading himself as if going into a battle between life and death. And in that moment it became clear that he would most certainly choose death before letting Yennefer befall any more harm.
“So, what do we do now? Sit and wait?” Geralt ask after he adequately prepared himself.
“Yes, witcher, now we do exactly that. We sit and wait.”
It took five days of sitting and waiting before their peace was interrupted. Five days in which he sat by Yennefer’s side day and night. Tissaia left the two alone during the days as she had to tend to other things going on outside the room. But every night she would sit beside Yennefer in the uncomfortable chair and guard her.
After the second day Tissaia insisted that Geralt took a shower and get some rest. Reluctantly he left the disguised storage room to get himself clean. However, he came back to the room immediately after washing himself with the intent to further stand guard. After some persistent and scolding words from the rectoress which urged him to get some sleep, he conceded to taking a nap on the floor beside Yennefer’s bed without as much as a pillow to lay his head upon.
On the third day Tissaia managed to cramp a little cot into the already small room Yennefer was occupying. It was far from the luxurious beds the two sorceresses were normally used to. Still, the small cot proved to be way more comfortable then the chairs standing on either side of Yennefer’s hospital bed.
On the fourth day, after several long debates about self-care and the benefit of being if not well-rested than at least an a-little-rested human being, the witcher even succeeded in convincing Tissaia herself to use the cot on occasion as well.
On the fifth night their routine was disrupted. Then again not by some enemies trying to attack, but rather by Yennefer herself. Without any warning her body violently spasmed and her skin started to heat up as if she was about to start throwing flames again. The air in the small room was getting hotter and hotter before the two even had a chance to think of a possible solution. Her unconscious body started to prepare for an attack and both Geralt and Tissaia could feel that her hands were getting ready for a magical outburst. Without really knowing what to do the witcher grabbed both of her hands to try to prevent any spell from being formed.
In that moment Tissaia was pulled into Yennefer’s mind, because Yennefer suddenly started projecting her thoughts as if she was crying for help. The distraught thoughts captured Tissaia’s mind for a moment before she understood what was going on and ran to the cabinet beside the door.
“What’s going on? What is happening to her?” Geralt shouted as he was struggling to keep Yennefer’s trashing body still. Her skin starting to burn his hands where they pinned her arms down to the mattress.
“Just hold her as still as possible! Where in hell is that damned thing?” Tissaia replied as she was frantically searching through the drawers. Keeping Yennefer still was becoming harder by the second. The air around her became laden with magic and the machines she was connected to started to produce irritating noises.
“Tissaia!”
“Got it!” Just when the room started to smell of burned skin the rectoress turned around and ran towards the hospital bed with a syringe in her hand. Without further ado she jabbed the syringe into Yennefer’s thigh and within seconds her body started to calm down and was soon lying as tranquil as just few minutes before. The witcher held on to her for a few moments longer than strictly needed, before withdrawing his burned hands.
“What was that?”
“It seems that her subconscious mind reached a state of panic that was somehow not subdued by the anaesthetics which were supposed to keep her in this comatose state. She was having a kind of nightmare and she relived the final moments of the battle. It looks like she still has to much magical residue from her absorption of the fire element in her system. I gave her another sedative to calm her restless mind down.” Tissaia replied as she was checking on Yennefer and the attached machines. When she was satisfied inspecting the medical equipment, she turned back to the witcher and commanded:
“Show me your hands!”
“It’s nothing” the witcher did not know why he did not want to show his injured hands, but he withdrew them, nevertheless.
“Nonsense! You were burnt to the point the room stenches of your burned flesh. Now show me your hands, witcher, or I will make you do it.”
The rectoress left no room for arguments and so the witcher stretched his hand towards the sorceress. Opening his palms to be inspected by the sorceress, he only just realised the extent of the burn. If the slight grimace of the sorceress was any indication, she did not expect such a nasty wound either. However, Geralt’s eyes were drawn past his trembling hands to the bed underneath them.
“How is it that I was burnt while I touched her, but the bed and the sheets did not even warm up a little bit during her outburst?”
Having looked at his wounds enough, Tissaia stepped to the cabinets to mix up a salve for the witcher’s hands. “You of all people should know that magic does not affect everything in the same way. In our case the supernatural heat Yennefer emitted just reacted to living organisms. It did heat up the air around us and burned your skin, but none of the medical equipment or any other inanimate object was damaged by it.”
She turned back to the witcher and applied the salve before muttering an incantation that left his hands prickling and his wounds healing. They stood in silence for a few minutes, contemplating their situation, before Geralt spoke again.
“If this happens again, it will get easier to track her down, won’t it? Even if they are shielded such outbursts leave a noticeable mark on magic scanners. The tracking technologies are becoming better by day. She won’t be safe here for long, am I right?”
“No, if this should happen again, we will have to move as fast as possible. Though I fear that we have to prepare an escape plan of conventional means. An escape through a portal would probably destroy all the little progress she made, and I fear that it would leave her blinded for ever.”
At that, the witcher looked up into the worried eyes of the rectoress.
“I thought the Nilfgaardian sorceress blinded her with a conventional dagger.”
“With a dagger, yes. But it was by no means conventional. The blade was forged through a combination of silver and dimeritium and it has the intent to make all magical creatures who have the displeasure of getting into contact with it suffer. That is why I cannot heal her eyes right now and why more magical use would only make the injuries worse.”
Geralt felt that every time the rectoress opened her mouth just more bad news came out. Up until that point he just though that she did not tend to Yennefer’s eyes because she was too exhausted to work with magic on such complicated things as the human eye. But the reality was of course always grimmer than what he imagined. As if reading his mind, the rectoress continued with a softer voice.
“This outburst brought one good thing though. It proved that by letting her body recover on her own, she is fighting her way through this overdose of chaos. Even if it happens way slower than I would hope for.”
They had three days to prepare for their departure from the outpost at Sodden Hill. When Yennefer started to show the same symptoms as a few days earlier, the syringe with the additional sedative was already at hand and as soon as she calmed down the rectoress of Aretuza and the White Wolf started their plan of action.
Under the disguise of a masking spell and the pretence of a supply transport they snuck Yennefer out of the campsite and into a truck Tissaia managed to plant on an unnoticed location. After a few stops while driving out of the guarded battle site they managed to get on the highway and drive towards the north without a hitch.
After a few hours of driving Geralt dared to speak again.
“This doctor of yours, are you certain he is trustworthy?”
“No one is really trustworthy in times of war. But he will be helpful in facilitating the healing process of Yennefer’s eyesight and that will hopefully allow us to use magic and thus make it easier to get her to safety as soon as possible.”
“And you really think the only safe place for her, is the one place she hates the most?”
“Do you have any better idea?” the sorceress asked him a tad annoyed. “Because as much as she does not like Aretuza, the school is under my supervision, nothing happens there without me knowing it. There is no way of entering the school without me allowing it. It is the only place on the continent where I can guarantee you that she will be safe.”
“No, I don’t.” he reluctantly agreed, and he truly could not think of any better place, although he had tried to find a better alternative for the last few days. “Still she won’t like it that we took her to the place she absolutely loathes the most.” He muttered while directing the vehicle in the direction of the meeting point with the doctor.
They met the physician in a large room on the third floor of an office building in Maribor. As it was a Sunday the building was empty, but the room had already been prepared for a surgical procedure. While the doctor, Tissaia and a nurse operated in the office area Geralt stood guard before the door. For two and a half hours the three remained in the office turned surgery room while Geralt secured every possible entry point. After the procedure was finished the nurse called him in and told him that the surgery has been a success. While the doctor and the nurse packed up their things, the witcher stepped beside the rectoress and started to whisper only just audible.
“How much did you pay the doctor?” he whispered.
Without giving any visible reaction she replied with the same volume, but with a barely restrained irritation “What kind of question is this?”
The witcher started to look out of the window and continued. “It was obvious not enough because on the other side of the building there are two cars which have been standing there for the last hour and their four occupants have been staring at the window of the operation room for the same amount of time. On the roof top diagonally across a sniper set his aim approximately 10 minutes ago and if I had to guess a tactical unit is setting up on the ground floor of the neighbouring building waiting for the signal of the medic that should leave this building any minute now.”
Tissaia decided for this to be the best moment to switch their conversation on to a telepathic level.
“What do you suggest?”
“There is only one way out without causing at least a dozen casualties. Is she stable enough to be portaled out of here?”
“It is not optimal, but she should be able to handle being portaled once. I thought you hated portals, witcher.”
“There are situations were personal preferences should not intervene. This is one of them.”
“And the doctor?”
“We let him get out of here to not rouse any suspicion and hope that you can get a refund.”
Simultaneously Geralt and Tissaia turned around to give the nurse and the doctor their greetings.
Three and a half minutes later the medical stuff stepped out of the building and gave the waiting agents their signal.
One minute and twenty second later the tactical unit burst through the door of the office room but found nothing more than a few left behind surgical supplies.
When she came to herself, she was not even sure she was still alive. Somehow everything hurt and at the same time she could not feel anything. When she focused all hear energy into hearing, he could make out some voices debating with each other.
“Haven’t we been through this enough times already? She is safe here and you need to rest. You have not slept properly for more than a week and even before that your general health situation was far from being fine.”
“This is more than just a little hypocritical from the woman who almost killed herself by portaling three people all the way to Aretuza, even though she is still suffering from a dimeritium poisoning and is now refusing to get some sleep herself”
“That woman is…”
But before she could hear anything more her consciousness faded back to black.
.
.
.
The next time her thoughts were far more violent. She remembered the desperation she felt standing on the battlefield at Sodden Hill. To her left and her right fallen soldiers, but also fallen sorcerers and sorceresses. The view was horrifying it let her feel emotions she had long ago buried. Still, what truly made her knees weak was the sight of her mentor, her saviour lying on the grass broken and not able to go on. Never in her life had she seen Tissaia de Vries so shattered, she dragged herself and fell on her knees right next to the rectoress, hoping Tissaia could make all of this pain go away. Like a mother who puts a band-aid on the scraped knee of her child and kisses the wound to forget the injury all along.
“The sedative.”
But instead of making everything better, the whole situation just became worse and the only thing left to do was letting the fire burn them down to the ground. She stood on that rock and stretch out her hands...
“Now!”
It all seemed to drift back to black… Fringilla Vigo…
“Watch out!”
.
.
.
She felt as if all the energy in the world has left her. The only thing grounding her to reality were two big hands clasping hers. She knew these hands, ruff, with calluses, but always gentle when touching her. She focused on their joint hands and started to recognize a voice.
“Geralt, she will be fine. I know it looked bad, but she actually is on the way of recovery. The doctors even suggest that we get her of the anaesthetics in the next few days.”
“Hmm.”
“She is a fighter. You know it as much as I do.”
.
.
.
Everything started to feel. Still numb but everything started to feel. Like she came out of hibernation.
“So, you stopped using anaesthetics. How long will it take before she wakes up?
“It should take approximately twenty-four hours. Maybe more, maybe less. We will see.”
She heard the sound of a chair scrapping the floor.
“You know you saved her. Don’t give me that look. I am not talking about the battle. Although you did save her there too. No, I was talking about her time here, or actually even before she came here… Yen is not always the best sharer, but she told me some things about her time here. She might not have mentioned your name, but the few not bad things she told me were mostly about you.” The male voice paused for a moment, reaching for the hand that was not occupied by the rectoress. He traced the scars on her wrist when he continued.
“You did not let her die twice already and if it ever came to a third time, we both know that the situation would not be any different.”
“It is just what anyone would do.”
“Not true. But it is what every good mother would say.”
.
.
.
“You really want to go? You looked over her all this time and now hours before she wakes up you just leave?”
“I know you don’t believe me, but she would not want me to be here.”
“Pardon me, but that is bullshit. I did not approach you, just to leave before she even wakes up.”
“My job was to keep her safe. She is in the safest place on the continent now and she needs peace and quiet to be able to recover. If I am here, she will not have that.”
“You are just as stubborn as she is.”
He pressed a soft kiss onto her forehead and whispered into her ear.
“I knew you would make it, Yen.”
.
.
.
When she finally awakes, he is long gone. As her unfocused eyes open for the first time in two weeks she needs a few seconds to adjust to brightness of the dimly lit room. But soon she is able to recognize a familiar figure with a warm smile on her face siting in the chair next to her bed.
“Welcome back, piglet”