‘It’s so cold here,’ said Dandelion, shuddering and making the branches they were sitting on creak under him. ‘We could get a fire going—’
‘Don’t even think about it,’ muttered the Witcher. ‘Have you forgotten where you are?’
‘Are you serious . . . ?’ The troubadour glanced around timidly. ‘Oh. No fire, right?’
‘Trees hate fire. And they do too.’
‘Dammit. Are we going to sit here and freeze? And in the bloody dark? I can’t see my hand in front of my face . . .’
‘Keep it by your side then.’
Dandelion sighed, hunched forward and rubbed his arms. He heard the Witcher beside him breaking some thin twigs in his fingers.
A small green light suddenly flared up in the dark, first of all dim and faint, then quickly becoming brighter. After the first one, many others began to glimmer around them, moving and dancing like fireflies or will-o’-the-wisps above a marsh. The forest suddenly came to life with a shimmering of shadows, and Dandelion began to see the silhouettes of the dryads surrounding them. One of them approached and put something on the ground near them, which looked like a hot, glowing tangle of plants. The poet reached a hand out carefully and took hold of it. The green glow was totally cold.
‘What is it, Geralt?’
‘Rotten wood and a special kind of moss. It only grows here in Brokilon. And only they know how to weave it all together to make it give off light. Thank you, Fauve.’
The dryad did not answer, but neither did she go away, remaining squatting alongside the pair. She had a garland on her brow, and her long hair fell to her shoulders. Her hair looked green in the light and may actually have been green. Dandelion knew that dryads’ hair could be of the weirdest colours.
‘Taedh,’ she said melodically, raising her flashing eyes to the troubadour. Her fine-featured face was crossed diagonally by two parallel dark stripes of painted camouflage. ‘Ess’ve vort shaente aen Ettariel? Shaente a’vean vort?’
‘No . . . Later perhaps,’ he answered politely, carefully searching for words in the Elder Speech. The dryad sighed and leaned over, gently stroking the neck of the lute, which was lying nearby. She rose nimbly to her feet. Dandelion watched her as she disappeared into the forest towards the others, whose shadows showed faintly in the dim light of the small green lanterns.
‘I trust I didn’t offend her, did I?’ he asked softly. ‘They have their own dialect, and I don’t know polite expressions . . .’
‘Check whether you’ve got a knife in your guts,’ said the Witcher, with neither mockery nor humour in his voice. ‘Dryads react to insults by sticking a knife in your belly. Don’t worry, Dandelion. I’d say they’re willing to forgive you a good deal more than slips of the tongue. The concert you gave at the edge of the forest was clearly to their liking. Now you’re ard táedh, “the great bard”. They’re waiting for the next part of ‘The Flower of Ettariel’. Do you know the rest? It’s not your ballad, after all.’
‘It’s my translation. I also embellished it somewhat with elven music. Didn’t you notice?’
‘No.’
‘As I thought. Fortunately, dryads are more receptive to art. I read somewhere that they’re exceptionally musical. Which is why I came up with my cunning plan. For which, incidentally, you haven’t yet praised me.’
‘My congratulations,’ said the Witcher after a moment’s silence. ‘It was indeed cunning. And fortune smiled on you, as usual. They shoot accurately at two hundred paces. They don’t usually wait until someone crosses onto their bank of the river and begins to sing. They are very sensitive to unpleasant smells. So when the corpse falls into the Ribbon and gets carried away by the current, they don’t have to put up with the stench.’
‘Oh, whatever,’ said the poet, clearing his throat and swallowing. ‘The most important thing is I pulled it off and found you. Geralt, how did you . . .’
‘Do you have a razor?’
‘Eh? Of course I do.’
‘Lend it to me tomorrow morning. This beard of mine is driving me insane.’
‘Didn’t the dryads have any? Hmm . . . I guess not, they don’t have much need for them, do they? Of course, I’ll lend it to you. Geralt?’
‘What?’
‘I don’t have any grub with me. Should ard táedh, the great bard, hold out any hopes of supper when visiting dryads?’
‘They don’t eat supper. Never. And the guards on Brokilon’s border don’t eat breakfast either. You’ll have to survive until noon. I’ve already got used to it.’