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  Something Ends, Something Begins

  by Andrzej Sapkowski

  Editor's note: Even though this story was written by Sapkowski himself, it's non-canon. He wrote it as a wedding gift for some friends and didn't intend it to be taken seriously as part of the saga.

  I.

  The sun pushed its fiery tentacles through the cracks of the window shutters, sliced the chamber with slanted streaks of light, pulsing in the hovering dust, spilled in bright spots on the floor and the bear skins covering it, and shattered in a blinding flash on the buckle of Yennefer's belt. Yennefer's belt lay on a high-heeled shoe, the high-heeled shoe lay on a white lace shirt, and the white shirt lay on a black skirt. One black stocking hung on the backrest of an armchair carved in a shape of a chimaera. The second stocking and the second shoe couldn't be seen anywhere. Geralt sighed. Yennefer liked to undress fast and elementally. He would have to start getting used to it. He had no other choice.

  He stood up, opened the shutters and looked out. From the lake, smooth as a mirror board, rose haze, the leaves of the birches and alders growing on the shores glittered with drops of dew, the far meadows were covered with low, thick mist, hanging like a cobweb close over the tops of the grasses.

  Yennefer wriggled under the blanket with an indistinct mumble. Geralt sighed.

  "It's a beautiful day today, Yen."

  "Eeeh? What?"

  "It's a beautiful day. An exceptionally beautiful one."

  She surprised him. Instead of cursing and hiding her head beneath the pillow, the sorceress sat up, ran her hand through her hair, and began searching the bed for her nightgown. Geralt knew that the nightgown lay behind the head of the bed; just where Yennefer had thrown it last night. But he was silent. Yennefer hated that sort of comment.

  The sorceress cursed suddenly, kicked the blanket, raised her hand and snapped her fingers. The nightgown flew out from behind the bed and, waving the flounces like an eerie ghost, landed straight in her extended hand. Geralt sighed.

  Yennefer rose, walked to him, embraced him, and bit his arm. Geralt sighed. The list of things he'd have to get used to seemed infinite.

  "Did you want to say something?" asked the sorceress with narrowed eyes.

  "No."

  "That's good. You know what? Today is a beautiful day, of course. Good work."

  "Work? What do you mean?"

  Before Yennefer could answer, they heard a high, long cry and a whiz from below. On the lakeshore, splashing showers of water around, Ciri galloped on a black mare. The mare was thoroughbred and particularly nice. Geralt knew that it once belonged to a certain half-elf, who judged the blonde witcher girl by the first impression and was nastily mistaken. Ciri named the mare Kelpie, which in the language of the islanders from Skellige meant a terrible and choleric spirit of the sea that sometimes took a form of a horse. The name was quite perfect for the mare. It's not been a long time since a certain hobbit learned this the hard way, when he tried to steal her. The hobbit's name was Sandy Frogmorton, but he's been called ???? (a word I have yet to come up with ;-) Meaning something slightly like "kicked by a horse") ever since.

  "One day she'll break her neck," growled Yennefer, watching Ciri galloping in the splashing water, bent, firm in the stirrups. "One day your crazy daughter will break her neck."

  Geralt turned his head and without a word looked into the sorceress's violet eyes.

  "All right, then," smiled Yennefer, without averting her eyes. "Sorry, our daughter."

  She hugged him again, pressing herself against him firmly, bit him in the arm again, kissed him, and bit him once more. Geralt touched her hair with his lips and carefully pulled her gown over her shoulders.

  And then they ended up again in the bed with scattered blankets, still warm and soaked with dreams. And they started to search for each other, and they searched very long and very patiently. Knowing that they would eventually find each other filled them with joy and happiness. Joy and happiness was in everything they did. And even though they were so different, they knew that those weren't the differences that divide, but the differences that bring together and bind, bind so strongly and so tightly, like siting of spars and the roof ridge, siting from which a house is born. And it was like the first time, when he was entranced by her glaring nakedness and intensive desire, and she was enthralled by his finesse and sensibility. And just like the first time she wanted to tell him, but he silenced her with a kiss and a caress and literally took away all the sense of it. Later, when he wanted to tell her, he couldn't get a sound out of himself, and later still the happiness and delight overwhelmed them with power of a falling rock, and there remained only one big flash beneath the eyelids, and there remained something which was a silent outcry, and the world ceased to exist, something ended and something began, something stopped and there was silence, silence and peace.

  And enchantment.

  The world was slowly returning to its tracks and again here was a bed saturated with dreams and sunlit chamber and a day...

  "Yen?"

  "When you said that the day was beautiful, you added 'good work'. Does that mean ...?"

  "It does," she confirmed and stretched on her spread arms, clutching the tips of the blanket, so that in that moment her breasts arose in such a way, that it evoked a powerful tremor in the lower part of the witcher's body.

  "Look, Geralt, we created this weather. Last night. Myself, Nenneke, Triss and Dorregaray. I couldn't risk, this day must be beautiful."

  She fell silent and jabbed his side with her knee.

  "Why, it's the most important day in your life, silly."

  II.

  The castle Rozrog, standing on a jut in the middle of the lake, was in a dire need of general repairs, both exterior and interior, and not just now. To put it mildly, Rozrog was a ruin, a shapeless heap of stones thickly overgrown with ivy, wild wine, lichen and moss. It was a ruin standing in the middle of lakes, swamps and marshes swarming with frogs, salamanders and turtles. It was a ruin even back when it was given to the king Herwig. The castle Rozrog and the surrounding marshland were something like a lifelong gift - a goodbye gift for Herwig, who had abdicated twelve years ago in favour of his nephew Brenan, called the Good. Geralt met the former king through Dandelion, because the troubadour stayed at the castle quite often, since Herwig was a pleasant and nice host.

  Dandelion brought up Herwig and his castle when Yennefer ruled out all places from the witcher's list as unsuitable. Oddly enough, the sorceress agreed with Rozrog immediately, and didn't even wrinkle her nose.

  And so it happened that the wedding of Geralt and Yennefer would happen in the castle Rozrog.

  III.

  At first it was supposed to be a small and off-the-record wedding, but in time it turned out - for various reasons - that this was not possible, so it was necessary to find someone with organisational abilities. Yennefer of course refused this; she didn't like organising her own wedding. Geralt and Ciri, let alone Dandelion, didn't have a clue about organisation. And so they charged Nenneke, the priestess of the goddess Melitele from Ellander, with it. Nenneke came immediately, and with her two younger priestesses, Iola and Eurneid.

  And the problems started.

  IV.

  "No, Geralt," huffed Nenneke and stamped her foot. "I will take no responsibility for the ceremony or the feast. That ruin, which some idiot calls a castle, is of no use at all. The kitchen is falling apart, the dancing hall can be used only as a stable, and the chapel... Essentially it isn't even a chapel. Can you at least tell me what god that lame Herwig worships?"

  "As far as I know, he worships none. He claims that the religion is a mandragor
a for the masses."

  "I could've thought that," said the priestess, not hiding her scorn. "There is not one statue in the chapel, there's nothing at all, not counting the mouse pellets. And on top of everything it's such a damned backwater. Geralt, why don't you want to have your wedding in Vengerberg, in a civilised country?"

  "You know that Yen is a quadroon and they don't tolerate mixed marriages in these civilised countries of yours."

  "By the Great Melitele! One quarter of elven blood, is that a problem? Almost everyone has some kind of a mixture of the blood of the Elder Folk. It's nothing but idiotic prejudices!"

  "I didn't make them up."

  V.

  The list of the guests wasn't that long. The engaged couple compiled it together and charged Dandelion with sending the invitations. Soon it turned out that the troubadour lost the list before he could even read it. Because he was ashamed to confess, he used a cheap trick and invited whomever he could. Of course he knew Geralt and Yennefer well enough that he didn't miss anyone important, but it wouldn't have been him if he didn't enrich the list of the guests by an admirable number of quite random persons.

  And so there arrived old Vesemir from Kaer Morhen, Geralt's tutor, and together with him the witcher Eskel, a childhood friend of Geralt.

  There came the druid Mousehunt in a company of a bronzed blonde called Freya who was one head taller and a couple of hundred years younger than him. Together with them arrived the earl Crach an Craite from Skellige in a company of his sons Radnar and Loki. When riding a horse, Ragnar's feet almost reached the ground. Loki resembled a delicate elf. After all, it was no wonder - they were brothers, but their mothers were two different earl's concubines.

  The reeve Caldemeyn from Blaviken reported with his daughter Annika, a quite attractive but terribly shy girl. The dwarf Yarpen Zigrin showed up, without - which was interesting - his usual company of bearded bandits, whom he called "ogars". Yarpen was joined on the road by elf Chireadan, whose status among the Elder Folk was not quite clear, but indisputably high, accompanied by several reticent elves, known to no one.

  There arrived a clamorous troop of halflings, of which Geralt knew only Dainty Biberveldt, a farmer of Knotweed Meadow, and by hearsay his quarrelsome wife Gardenia. To this troop belonged also a halfling who was not a halfling - the famous businessman and merchant Tellico Lunngrevink Letorte of Novigrad, a changeling, doppler, acting as a halfling under the assumed name of Dudu.

  Baron Freixenet from Brokilon appeared, together with his wife, the noble dryad Braenn, and five daughters called Morenn, Cirilla, Mona, Eithe and Kashka. Morenn looked fifteen and Kashka looked five. They all had fiery red hair, even though Freixenet was black-haired and Braenn honey blond. Braenn was visibly pregnant. Freixenet claimed quite seriously that this time it must be a son, while the flock of his red-haired dryads looked at each other and giggled, and Braenn added with a light smile that the said "son" will be called Melissa.

  There also came Jarre Onehand, the young priest and chronicler from Ellander, ward of Nenneke. He came mainly because of Ciri, whom he secretly loved. Ciri, as it seemed to the embittered Nenneke, took the shy flirting of the crippled young man too lightly.

  The list of unexpected guests was began by the prince Agloval of Bremervoord, whose arrival was considered a miracle, since he and Geralt openly despised each other. Even stranger was, that he came in the company of his wife, the siren Sh'eenaz. Even though Sh'eenaz once sacrificed her fish tail in exchange for a pair of uncommonly beautiful legs, it was known that she never moved away from the seashore, because she was afraid of land.

  Few expected the arrival of other crowned heads - who weren't invited anyway. Nevertheless the monarchs sent letters, gifts, messengers - or all at once. They must have arranged it, because the messengers traveled in one group and became friends. Knight Yves represented king Ethain, castellan Sulivoy represented king Venzlav, sir Matholm represented king Sigismund, and sir Devereux represented queen Adda, the former striga. The trip must have been cheerful, because Yves had a cut lip, Sulivoy's arm was hanging on a band, Matholm was limping and Devereux had such a hangover that he hardly kept himself in the saddle.

  No one invited the golden dragon Villentretenmerth, because no one knew how to invite him and where to look for him. To the general astonishment the dragon turned up, of course incognito, in the form of the knight Borch vulgo Three Jackdaws. Of course, where Dandelion was present, one could not speak of any incognito, but even so, few believed when the poet pointed at the curly-haired knight and claimed it was a dragon.

  No one expected nor invited the colourful rabble, which was marked as "Dandelion's friends and acquaintances." It was mostly poets, musicians and troubadours, plus an acrobat, a professional dice player, a crocodile-breaker and four over-made-up dolls out of which three looked like prostitutes and the fourth one, who didn't look like a trollop, was undoubtedly one, too. The group was complemented by two prophets, out of which one was fraudulent, one sculptor, one blonde and ever-drunken female medium, and a pock-marked gnome who claimed his name was Schuttenbach.

  In a magical amphibious ship, resembling a swan crossed with a giant pillow, arrived the wizards. There was four times less of them than had been invited, and three times more than expected, because Yennefer's colleagues, as the rumour went, disapproved of her marriage to a man outside their brotherhood - and a witcher on top of that. A part of them ignored the invitation, and a part excused themselves because of lack of time and a necessity to participate in the annual world convent of magi. So onboard the - as Dandelion named it - "pillowbird" was only Dorregaray from Vole and Radcliffe from Oxenfurt. And there was also Triss Ranuncul with hair of colour of October chestnuts.

  VI.

  "Was it you who invited Triss Ranuncul?"

  "No," the witcher shook his head and silently praised the fact that the mutation of his blood system didn't allow him to blush. "Not me. I think it was Dandelion, even though all of them claim to have learned about the wedding from the magical crystals."

  "I don't want Triss to be present at my wedding!"

  "But why? She's your friend."

  "Don't make a fool out of me, witcher! Everyone knows you slept with her!"

  "That's not true."

  Yennefer's violet eyes narrowed dangerously.

  "It is true."

  "Is not!"

  "It is!"

  "All right," he turned around angrily. "It is true. So?"

  The sorceress was quiet for a moment, playing with the obsidian star on the black velvet ribbon around her neck.

  "Nothing," she said at last. "I just wanted you to admit it. Never try to lie to me, Geralt. Ever."

  VII.

  The wall smelled of wet stones and sour herbs, the sun shone through the brown water in the ditch, drew out the warm green of the growth on the bottom of the marshes and the sparkling yellow of the beaver lilies floating on the level.

  The castle was slowly awakening to life. In the western wing someone flung open the window-shutters and laughed loudly. Somebody else begged in a weak voice for the sauerkraut brine. One of Dandelion's colleagues, visiting in the castle, a blind man, sang while shaving:

  "Behind the hay barn, on a fence

  A cock there very loudly sings

  I'll get right back to you, lassie

  When I vent myself a bit"

  The door creaked and Dandelion came out into the courtyard. He stretched and rubbed his eyes.

  "How are you doing, bridegroom," he said in a tired voice. "If you want to get away, now is your last chance."

  "You've become a morning bird, Dandelion."

  "I actually didn't even go to bed," grunted the poet, sitting down on a stone bench next to the witcher and leaning on a wall overgrown with vines. "Gods, what a night. But hey, friends don't get married every day, we had to celebrate."

  "The wedding party is today," Geralt reminded him. "Are you going to make it through?"

  "Are you trying to ins
ult me?"

  The sun was burning and the birds chirped in the bushes. From the lake could be heard splashing and squeaking. Morenn, Cirilla, Mona, Eithe and Kashka, the red-haired dryads, Freixenet's daughters, were swimming naked, as always, in the company of Triss Ranuncul and Mousehunt's friend Freya. Above, on the disintegrating battlements, the royal messengers, knights Yves, Sulivoy, Matholm and Devereux fought for the telescope.

  "Did you at least have fun, Dandelion?"

  "Don't even ask."

  "Any bigger scandal?"

  "Several."

  The first scandal, as the poet reported, was racially based. Tellico Lungrevink Letorte suddenly proclaimed in the middle of party that he's had enough of the halfling disguise. The doppler pointed at the present dryads, elves, hobbits, a siren, a dwarf and a gnome who claimed that his name was Schuttenbach, and said that it was a discrimination that everyone could be themselves, only he, Tellico, had to be dressed in someone else's skin. Then he changed for a moment into his natural form. At that sight, Gardenie Bibervelt fainted, the prince Agloval almost choked on a lobster and Annika, reeve Caldemeyn's daughter, went into hysterics. The situation was saved by the dragon Villentretenmerth, still in the form of Borch Three Jackdaws, who calmly explained to the doppler that being able to change forms is a privilege, which, however, also obligates the changeling to always acquire a form that is acceptable to society, and that is nothing else than a mere politeness towards the host.