Lightning flashed again.
A black horse stood between her and the cliff. And on it sat a knight in a helmet adorned with the wings of a bird of prey. Its wings suddenly flapped, the bird took flight . . .
Cintra!
Paralysing fear. Her hands gripping the reins tightly. Lightning. The black knight spurred his horse. He had a ghastly mask instead of a face. The wings flapped . . .
The horse set off at a gallop without needing to be urged. Darkness illuminated by lightning. The forest was coming to an end. The splash and squelch of swamp under the horse’s hooves. Behind her the swish of a raptor’s wings. Closer and closer . . . Closer . . .
A furious gallop, her eyes watering from their speed. Lightning sliced the sky, and in its flash Ciri saw alders and willows on either side of the road. But they weren’t trees. They were the servants of the Alder King. Servants of the black knight, who was galloping after her, with raptor’s wings swishing on his helmet. Misshapen monsters on both sides of the road stretched their gnarled arms towards her; they laughed insanely, the black jaws of their hollows opening wide. Ciri flattened herself against the horse’s neck. Branches whistled, lashed her and tore at her clothes. The distorted trunks creaked and the hollow jaws snapped, howling with scornful laughter . . .
The Lion Cub of Cintra! Child of the Elder Blood!
The black knight was right behind her; Ciri felt his hand trying to seize her long hair. The horse, urged on by her cries, leapt forward, cleared an unseen obstacle with a powerful bound, crashed through reeds, stumbled . . .
She reined it in, leaning back in the saddle, and turned the snorting horse back. She screamed wildly, furiously. She yanked her sword from its scabbard and whirled it above her head. This is Cintra no longer! I’m no longer a child! I’m no longer helpless! I won’t allow it . . .
‘I forbid it! You will not touch me again! You will never touch me!’
Her horse landed in the water with a splash and a squelch, belly-deep. Ciri leaned forward, cried out, urged her mount on with her heels and struggled back onto the causeway again. Ponds, she thought. Fabio talked about fishponds. It’s Hirundum. I’ve made it. I never lose my way . . .
Lightning. Behind her the causeway, ahead of her a black wall of forest cutting into the sky like a saw blade. And no one there. Silence broken only by the howling of the gale. Somewhere on the marsh she could hear a frightened duck quacking.
Nobody. There is no one on the causeway. No one’s following me. It was a phantom, a nightmare. Memories from Cintra. I only imagined it.
A small light in the distance. A lighthouse. Or a fire. It’s a farm. Hirundum. It’s close now. Only one more effort . . .
Flashes of lightning. One. Another. Yet another. Each without a thunderclap. The wind suddenly dropped. The horse neighs, tosses its head and rears up.
Against the black sky appears a milky, quickly brightening ribbon, writhing like a serpent. The wind hits the willows once more, throwing up clouds of leaves and dry grass.
The distant lights vanish. They disappear and blur in the deluge of the million blue sparks which suddenly light up the entire swamp. The horse snorts, whinnies and charges frantically across the causeway. Ciri struggles to remain in the saddle.
The vague, ghastly shapes of riders become visible in the ribbon sliding across the sky. As they come closer and closer, they can be seen ever more clearly. Buffalo horns and ragged crests sway on their helmets, and cadaverous masks show white beneath them. The riders sit on horses’ skeletons, cloaked in ragged caparisons. A fierce gale howls among the willows, blades of lightning slash the black sky. The wind moans louder and louder. No, it’s not the wind. It’s ghostly singing.
The ghastly cavalcade turns and hurtles straight at her. The hooves of the spectral horses stir up the glow of the will o’ the wisps suspended above the swamps. At the head of the cavalcade gallops the King of the Wild Hunt. A rusty helmet sways above his skull-like face, its gaping eye sockets burning with a livid flame. A ragged cloak flutters. A necklace, as empty as an old peapod, rattles against the rusty cuirass, a necklace which, it is said, once contained precious stones, which fell out during the frenzied chase across the heavens. And became stars . . .
It isn’t true! It doesn’t exist! It’s a nightmare, a phantom, an illusion! I’m only imagining this!
The King of the Wild Hunt spurs on his skeleton steed and erupts in wild, horrifying laughter.
O, Child of the Elder Blood! You belong to us! You are ours! Join our procession, join our hunt! We will race, race unto the very end, unto eternity, unto the very end of existence! You are ours, starry-eyed daughter of chaos! Join us; learn the joy of the hunt! You are ours. You are one of us! Your place is among us!