New chapter is live.
Settle in, take your time, and let’s see what waits in the dark 🖤
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In the forest, a shallow creek murmured over stone.
Marek sat beside the water in witcher armor, his hair combed into an unfortunate bowl cut, the herb satchel he never left without slung at his waist.
A sharpened steel sword lay unsheathed across his knees.
Today, for the first time, no master had come with him.
Since autumn began, Vesemir had taken him out of the keep every few days to hunt.
The trips tempered his nerves and sharpened his technique.
Kaer Morhen’s kitchen had changed along with them, its meat going from deer and badger to wildcats, gray wolves, and even brown bear.
Now, with enough experience and the books to support it, Marek could track large animals even without a witcher’s heightened senses.
He was waiting for an adult brown bear on the edge of hibernation.
This was a proper hunt.
***
That same day, Kaer Morhen welcomed two wanderers home.
They were skilled witchers returning before the first snow: Lambert, short-tempered and sharp-tongued, his hairline already retreating at the temples; and Eskel, mild in manner despite the disfiguring scars that marked his face.
They rode side by side, dismounted before the hanging bridge, and led their horses through the gate.
“Made it home before the first snow, at least.”
“Dogshit.
I refuse to call a drafty ruin with half-empty rooms and barely any furniture home.”
“Vesemir is here.
That makes it home.”
“When the old man dies, I’m never coming back to this place.”
Their bickering carried them into the stables.
Once the horses were tied off, they crossed into the courtyard.
“Hm?
New apprentice?” Eskel had noticed the comb-like training posts, their wood marked by fresh footprints.
He stepped closer as he spoke, studying the signs of use.
Lambert did not follow him.
Instead, he went straight to the far side of the courtyard to inspect the Windmill and the Pendulum.
“The jumps and turns aren’t bad,” Eskel said after a moment.
“Still too slow.”
“Ha.
His work on the Windmill is nowhere near decent,” Lambert said, rising and wiping a dark smear of blood from his hand against a pile of straw.
“Poor bastard took a hard one this morning.
The blood he spat up hasn’t even dried yet.
Pendulum work is better.
Didn’t get clipped too often there.”
He looked toward the hall.
“Come on.
Whoever it is, he’s been training at least a year and a half to get this far, and I don’t remember anyone like that last winter.”
“I’m more interested in the Trial of the Grasses,” Eskel said.
“If Vesemir has taken in a new apprentice, maybe he found a way to improve the survival rate.”
“That damned Trial should have stayed buried forever.”
***
A roar tore through the trees.
Marek opened his eyes and saw the bear across the creek.
He moved fast, pulling three vials from his herb satchel and drinking them one after another: Blizzard to sharpen his reactions, Thunderbolt to strengthen his muscles, and Tawny Owl to support endurance.
As secret witcher formulas, the potions were powerful, but their toxicity was brutal.
In an ordinary human, even one could cause a coma or death.
Even witchers, with their rapid metabolisms, could not drink too many at once.
When toxicity accumulated, they had to take White Honey to purge it, or the poison would kill them all the same.
For Marek, the alchemist, that limit no longer applied.
Behind a locked door in the middle of the night, he had combined Blizzard with White Honey and synthesized a non-toxic Blizzard.
Thunderbolt and Tawny Owl had received the same treatment.
The effects had dropped sharply along with the toxicity, but Marek knew that was only because his ability was still limited.
As his alchemy improved, he would eventually make versions with no loss at all, or even stronger effects.
Breathing evenly, feeling the potions move through his body, he raised his sword into the Plow guard and met the starving brown bear as it charged.
***
The newcomer’s room looked nothing like the bare, makeshift quarters most witchers called bedrooms.
Plain but practical wooden furniture stood inside.
The bed was decently padded.
A few books rested on the small cabinet.
Four or five cotton undergarments hung from a clothes rack, all of which suggested that whoever lived here understood hygiene and preferred a certain quality of life.
Only two things felt properly witcher-like: the alchemy cauldron beside the hearth, used for brewing blade oils and potions, and the wolf pelt mounted on the wall.
Witchers often decorated rooms and doors with the hides of beasts they had killed.
Lambert stepped out and glanced at Eskel, shaking his head.
“Whoever our new lodger is, he knows how to live better than the princess of Cintra did.
Maybe he’s a king.”
Eskel snorted.
“Kings don’t get hit by the Windmill hard enough to cough blood.”
“Vesemir and his crossbow are both gone.
Looks like he took His Majesty hunting.”
“Then maybe we should put our things down, start a fire in the hall, have a drink, and wait for the roast.”
“I like this plan.”
***
The bear collapsed on the ferns at the forest’s edge.
Five crossbow bolts from the trap mechanism studded its chest.
Its twisted neck lay against mud softened by creek water as it panted in helpless rage.
Then a steel sword drove deep through its left eye and into the brain, ending its fury and pain.
Only its dull right eye remained, staring blankly at the sky.
Marek looked down at the claw marks scored across his armor and cursed under his breath.
He should have avoided that.
His jump-turn was still too slow.
He rolled up his sleeves, drew a short knife, and turned the bear belly-up.
With quick, decisive cuts, he opened it from the breastbone, carefully separating the fat layer before removing the heart, gallbladder, and bezoar.
Then he cut lower, all the way to the anus, circling the genitals before removing what he needed there as well.
Almost every part of a bear had value.
Nothing would go to waste; Marek sorted the useful parts with ruthless efficiency.
The heart could serve as a special catalyst.
The gallbladder had medicinal uses.
The hide could be tanned, the paws stewed, the meat eaten, and even the bear’s more dubious parts had their own old-fashioned uses.
He lifted the carcass and set it on a stone rising from the creek bed, letting the current wash through the opened belly and clear away blood and lingering offal.
***
When Vesemir entered the great hall, the two witchers naturally rose to greet him.
Eskel stepped forward and wrapped him in a tight hug.
“Master.
We’re back.”
“Well, well, look who finally came home,” Lambert said, voice full of mockery even as he moved in for his own brief embrace.
“If it isn’t our great witcher master.
Weren’t you out hunting?
How come you don’t smell of blood and you’re back empty-handed?”
Vesemir smiled warmly.
“Wait a little longer.
Marek is still by the river dressing the bear.
Today was his first solo hunt.
I was worried something might go wrong, so I followed him in secret.
Don’t mention that when he comes back.”
Lambert pulled Vesemir down into a seat and handed him a cup.
“Of course.
But first, maybe you should tell us who this Marek is.”
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Want to keep going?
I hope this chapter gave you another reason to stay with the story.
There’s still plenty ahead, and things are only starting to unfold.