The Last: Chapter Three

—- PART ONE: An Exchange

Roger flipped a small, glass vial that was encased by an odd knife over his palm and caught it with the tip pointed at Gorm. They were back in the canopied outdoor office that the pit-master had set up, with Roger back in his full attire and Gorm’s bodyguards at full alert. The light from the lanterns hanging on the posts danced across the odd device he held in his hand. At a glance, it appeared like a small dagger or boot knife. Upon closer inspection, there was a small, metal tube smithed into the blade all the way to the tip. It flowed down into the handle of the blade, where the container was socketed into the wood.

“I thought they were simple daggers, if I’m being honest,” Roger said as he inspected the blade-tipped end of the item Gorm’s ringers were hiding in their hands. “Would have made sense, on a short-term basis, to bet against the witcher.”

Roger stuck the end of the tip into his arm and watched as the blood from his vein streamed into the vial. Gorm’s eyes widened in surprise. The guards looked at each other, and then back at their employer.

“However, you wanted something else. That much is obvious,” he plucked it from his forearm and inspected his own blood still swirling in the glass and dripping from the end of the blade. “You wanted this.”

Gorm smiled and sat back in his chair with his hands folded.

“This is nothing,” Roger squinted at the crimson and held it up between them. He took a quick note of the guard’s distance and posture. They were ready, but not prepared for what he could bring to a fight. That comforted Roger and kept his stance relaxed.

“I would have happily given you this in exchange for the information about Packy. You’re interested in whatever secrets you think my blood can give you about my kind.”

Gorm’s eyes squinted.

“I don’t care for what, nor do I have any protection over what you would consider my brethren. It shows how little you actually know about what goes on with my kind,” Roger tossed his collected blood in the air and pretending to barely catch it. Gorm’s body didn’t flinch, but his pupils did.

“I saw you in the crowd. I saw the woman whose face you were helping to…focus,” Roger took a step closer, which caused Gorm’s bodyguards to nervously echo the movement. Roger looked down and tried to hide his smile.

“You’re scheming something. I don’t care,” Roger furrowed his brow and pretended to be interested in something outside the canopy.

Gorm remained motionless with a hateful grin plastered on his face.

Roger rolled the glass in his palm, “I feel as if I want to wipe my hands clean of all this. It’s getting too complicated for my comfort.”

Gorm looked back at his men, then gave a sarcastic grin and leaned forward towards Roger.

“You surprise me, witcher,” Gorm admitted through his large mustache.

“What do you want to know?” Roger shrugged.

Gorm reached forward and grabbed a goblet that Roger had assumed was for decoration. Instead, the pit-master took a large sip and smacked his lips. “I was not expecting you to be so forthcoming.”

Roger sighed and strained his neck to the side. A series of popping noises could be heard as his vertebrae exercised the stress from their joints.

“If we could just cut to it,” Roger offered. “I think you’re anticipating more resistance than is necessary.”

Gorm looked disappointed and borderline irritated. Roger could tell that he was someone who wasn’t used to being interrupted, let alone having any of his diatribes dismissed.

A loud blast of air escaped the fat man’s nostrils causing his mustache to spasm in kind. Gorm wiggled in his seat and smelled the drink in his cup as he contemplated showing his hand. After a deep breath through his nose, he relented.

“I have specific tastes, as you can tell,” Gorm motioned to the table in front of him adorned with lavish foods and trinkets. “You can only make so much on betting after all the costs. Especially if you are looking to do it without slavery. Same for the tavern, and the comfort-house.”

Roger said nothing and waited.

“However, here at the edges of the map, certain things tend to collect. Much like the goop at the corner of your eye or on the edges of a thirsty mouth.”

Roger smirked and turned his ear towards Gorm.

“Are you capable of giving a straight answer? I’m not convinced, given what’s transpired over the last several hours.”

Gorm’s tongue poked under his mustache and stabbed his lower lip. Roger carelessly held the vial shook it in the air gently. The air in the room tightened as the guards felt Gorm’s frustration at Roger’s baiting.

“You’re looking to purposely irritate me?” Gorm asked, who was sitting so motionless that from a distance he would seem unconscious.

“You rigged a game for your own purposes against my favor. You obviously thought those two at the end would get the drop on me at some point - hence why you gave them these,” Roger held the container higher. He watched the muscles around Gorm’s right eye twitch every time he referred to the fighting pits as a game. “You might find it surprising for me to say that I’m irritated at this point, despite my calm tone. Especially considering I see this as a massive waste of time.”

Gorm’s nostrils flared and he lowered his brow. The lines around his eyes stayed tight as he glared at the witcher.

“You also probably find it surprising that the prize that you worked so hard to scheme for…” Roger tossed the vial in the air. Gorm didn’t move, and his guard to the left lunged forward and snatched it, “…I’m willing to give you. Easily. Just tell me where to find Packy.”

The guard who had snatched the vial from Roger’s throw rushed to Gorm’s side to deliver it. The old pit-master did not immediately grab it. Instead, he maintained eye contact with Roger and slowly held out his hand. The vial was placed in his palm, and he closed his grip around it.

There was a scent in the air. Roger recognized it as Gorm’s sweat. It held a musk of salty vinegar mixed with the pungent aroma of expensive wine, iron, and sweet fruits. The witcher was getting to him.

Gorm finally cast his eyes on the crimson vial between his fingers and gave it an unconvincing once-over. Roger could tell that his focus wasn’t really on the contents of the glass container. Instead, the pit-master was trying to buy time to think.

“Will that be enough?” Roger asked, wanted to push his advantage with Gorm’s delay and hinting in his tone that there wouldn’t be any more.

A small, ornate chest was groaned against the table’s surface. Gorm opened the latch and placed the vial onto a soft piece of satin laid over a cut of thick fur. Despite his care in placing it down, Gorm flicked the lid shut and slapped the latch back shut.

“It’s enough,” Gorm replied without looking up and retrieving his goblet of wine.

“Now, turning to our, dear friend, ‘Packy.’ You are owed for, your, services. And I pay my debts. We are, professionals, yes?”

Roger shifted uncomfortably, “For our own professions, yes.”

“Witcher,” Gorm placed his drink down on the table and began to stand up. His guards seemed surprised by this sudden shift in position and stood at attention. Their eyes snapped between the two men with great anxiety.

“Your powers of observation are astute and worthy of your profession. However, there are things that even your skills would never be able to discover.”

Gorm looked at his guard and waved his hand.

“Go.”

The men left and headed towards the tavern without a second thought, despite how on-edge they seemed moments earlier. Gorm leaned forward over the table, and for the first time all pretense seemed to leave his demeanor. He ran his fingers over the chest holding Roger’s blood between them.

“This has great value to me. Normally I wouldn’t even hint at that, but I appreciate a straight deal. I’ll throw in a bonus.”

Roger, still skeptical, slid a chair from the side of the canopy over with his foot and sat down.

—- PART TWO: Outside the Box

Roger’s nostrils widened as they scooped in the salt from the ocean air blasting around him on the coastal path from Hov to Svorlag. Gorm’s words sat in his ears and repeated every several steps. His yellow eyes watched as the light from the full moon danced and scattered across the waves of the active seas that surrounded the small island of Spikeroog. There was a small outcropping of trees in front of him that provided shelter from the ocean air as it whipped across the coastline. As he passed behind their thin, salt-fed trunks, he caught the scent of their arbor that the wind cut from its bark. Roger leaned his head back and felt his lungs stretch as they inhaled.

In an instant, he was back on the trail that surrounded Morgraig Castle, tucked and hidden in the Kestrel Mountains amongst spires of pine trees and ancient rock. His knees ached and his hamstrings moaned as he forced his feet to land in front of each other on their “Path.” Roger had run this route many times before. However, this was the first time his knees ached instead of shook. He let his arms fall back behind his shoulders as he stretched his lungs with a deep breath.

It was never the uphill sections that bothered him. He’d quickly discovered ways of shifting his weight so that different muscles would bear the load instead of his knees. Instead, it was always the steep downhills that required so much impact, concentration, and damage.

Recovery was simple for a witcher who was imbued with the genetic alterations afforded to them by a mind-shattering alteration process. Even more so for those that mastered the ability of focus and meditation. Roger enjoyed the mindfulness that the mental exercises provided him, and the calm it brought to his otherwise fury of thought. Now his thoughts turned to the gap that lay before him, and the jump required to complete the trail and back to hot food and a bed.

As early as the previous week there had been a log bridge that had crossed the chasm ever since the witchers had moved their belongings into Morgraig. Roger had always enjoyed the various new strains of plant life that had taken root on the deadwood of the old tree. He knew there was something poetic about it, but he hadn’t the skills to express it at the time.

“Your skills need work,” a careless voice threw in his direction. Roger spun and saw the eery, purple eye of Ivar scanning over him. He felt his legs shaking from not only the idea of jumping but also having to interact directly with one of the “First.”

“The Gryphon is a talented swords instructor, no question,” the same voice continued, “But he tends to see only inside of his own box.”

Roger watched as Ivar Evil-eye leaned his forearms on his double swords hanging from his belt. His dark green gambeson showed signs of fraying and wear, while his lamellar shoulder pads glinted light from the early morning sun.

“You don’t fit in his box. To continue to train with him would be a waste. Despite his skill, he is not like us. He doesn’t possess a Witcher’s strengths, he’s never had to endure our…initiations,” Ivar’s gaze moved around the two, seemingly focusing on something else.

Roger looked down and inspected the tearing leather that made up his own shoddy boots. The soles had worn smooth months before, but they provided enough protection for his feet against whatever stray stone he hadn’t memorized on The Path. The young, ginger-haired witcher adept said nothing and understood that Ivar was waiting for him to respond.

“I’m not sure I understand,” Roger said as he felt the tendons around his knees tighten and strain with each breath from the run.

“Your feet are too quick. It’s the result of an overactive mind,” Ivar posited as he sauntered forward. “Erland scolds against a lack of focus. He too only sees inside of a slightly larger box.”

For a moment, Roger thought that he could see Ivar’s purple eye move in a separate direction apart from his other. His hands moved to his legs and started massaging his aching muscles.

“So, what exact—”

Roger watched as Ivar’s form closed the distance in the blink of an eye. The witcher’s elbow slammed into Roger’s sternum. He felt a nauseating tingle stream through his internal organs that combined with the spiked shock of panic that coursed through his chest.

The chemicals and toxins that had been pumped through his veins in the Trial of the Grasses kept Roger’s brain from going haywire from panic. Instead, he was able to catch a glimpse of Ivar’s follow-up attack: another elbow, but this time cascading down to where his head was sitting as opposed to his chest. Roger shifted the muscles around his waist and pivoted his body’s position to let the elbow crash into nothing but air. He didn’t take a moment to even consider a counterattack of his own. Instead, he scrambled backward and took a moment to let his mind catch up to the circumstance.

“You had a chance,” Ivar began as he stood up straight and removed his posture from one that was ready to attack, “To strike just then. What stopped you?”

Roger was finally able to catch his breath, “I don’t know.”

“Yes you do,” Ivar countered.

“You’re stronger than I am. Faster, too,” Roger replied with an annoyed lack of hesitation as he rubbed his chest.

Ivar squeezed his eyes shut - both the yellow and the bloodshot purple - and gripped the hilts of his short swords strapped to his waistbelt, “And?”

Roger wasn’t sure at first what Ivar was waiting for. Finally, he caught on.

“I was scared.”

“Good,” Ivar opened his eyes and used them to inspect Roger from head to toe. “Everything you encounter from this point forward will probably be stronger than you. That is nothing to fear. I can teach you how to remove the fear from what you see, and to push through it in order to take action.”

“Is that not what the others are being taught?” Roger asked, looking back towards the peaks of the castle poking out from the rocky spires of the Kestrels.

Ivar’s purple eye was focused on something else in the distance, away from Roger.

“No, not always.”

An uncomfortable silence grew between the two.

“Now,” Ivar nodded at the chasm that once held the log bridge, “Jump.”

Roger shook his head and refocused his attention to the dancing light of the moon on the ocean waves. Washed air escaped his lungs as fogged breath. His feet, larger now and protected by toughened leather, moved him further along the path.

—- PART THREE: A Shared Drink

Roger felt the urge to leave the tavern as soon as he had entered it. He could still feel the night air pushing against his back encouraging him to move towards the hearth that sat on the adjacent end of the room. However, the wide-eyed and concerned gazes of the patrons were pushing him back out the door. Hunger was the ultimate tie-breaker, and he made his way towards the countertop near the hearth.

The fire popped with fresh wood and was only interrupted by the dull thuds that Roger’s boots made as he strode across the old planked floor. He did his best to ignore the eyes at each table as he passed, but there was no point in pretending he didn’t see them watching him. Instead, he did his best to not draw more attention from any individual by engaging them. It wasn’t the locals’ aggression he was concerned about. After his day at the pits, it was his own.

“Alright then,” said an enthusiastic-looking innkeeper behind the counter. His thinning, silver hair bobbed back and forth as his head nodded with excitement at Roger’s approach, “The Hound appears.”

“Is that the new one?” Roger asked as he pulled out the stool and sat down, “Last I heard it was just the Red Dog.”

“Yes!” the innkeeper snapped his fingers, “Red Dog! Sorry, I knew it wasn’t right.”

“Glad we got it straight,” Roger sarcastically added, “Give me a plate of whatever you have with meat, and your stiffest drink.”

“Oh yeah,” the man nodded again, “We only got one drink. Is that okay?”

Roger looked around the tavern and noticed the golden liquid that sat in the cups of those sitting around him. He recognized a few faces from the pits that had been sitting in the crowd. A few others seemed to be too old to make the short-but-arduous trek from Svorlag to Hov.

“That’s fine,” Roger said as he squinted and wrinkled his forehead. The innkeeper moved to a small window carved into the wooden wall behind him.

‘Oy! Maeve! Any roast left!?”

Roger heard a woman’s voice in the back brush against the wall but wasn’t able o make out the specific words. The innkeeper leaned back towards Roger.

“It’s cold, is that alright? I can stick it over the fire for you.”

“Was it cooked today?” Roger asked. The innkeeper stuck his head back through the hole in the wall and then pulled it back out.

“This morning.”

“That sounds fine,” Roger replied. The innkeeper relayed Roger’s order and made his way to a large barrel at the corner of the room.

“Coming right up!”

Roger nodded his thanks and stuck his hand in his coat. From inside, he produced a small, jade figurine in the shape of a soldier and placed it on the countertop in front of him. The amber light from the fire slid over the smooth surface of the jade and for a brief moment made the sculpture seem alive. Using his teeth, he pulled his leather glove from his hand and then blew hot air only his fingers to relieve some of their stiffness from the cold and the strain from the earlier fights. One night is all he needed to recuperate. One night and a belly of food.

His lithe, boney digits twisted the jade figure around so he could get a look at every angle. There was no mark of commission, no artist’s emblem or symbol of any kind. Greyleaf had been right, It truly was the work of a master. What could it possibly be doing being transported by some backcountry laborers across a desolate mountain peak?

The stool next to him ground against the wooden floor, and a tall, lanky, soot-covered man with two black eyes and a swollen nose gently landed in the seat. Roger looked him up and down, making sure to keep an eye on his hands and feet for any sign of aggression. Instead, the newcomer refused to look up from the counter and just glared at the wall in front of them.

“Ulvarr,” the friendly tone of the innkeeper sat between the awkward air, “Didn’t think you thought much of this place after last year.”

Roger heard the air scrape against Ulvarr’s nose as he exhaled. His yellow eyes darted between the men and could feel a long history unfolding between the two.

“Mead, please,” Ulvarr didn’t look up.

”Sorry,” the innkeeper smirked and leaned against the countertop, “Didn’t quite catch that.”

Ulvarr slowly looked up through his eyebrows and was apparently trying to kill with his thoughts. Roger severely doubted Ulvarr had any prowess in sorcery, especially considering that it was only causing the innkeeper to smile.

Ulvarr finally turned to Roger, who averted his eyes forward. He found the muscles around his mouth tightening to keep his own smirk hidden.

“Jesper, a mead, please,” Ulvarr growled at Jesper to Roger.

The innkeeper held his hands out to his side in a welcoming gesture and beamed a brown and yellow grin that could still pass as charming to many.

“As you wish!”

Ulvarr said nothing and stared back down at the counter. Roger’s tongue fiddled with the roof of his mouth before his impatience caught the better of him.

“Looking for a rematch?” Roger asked, sitting sideways in the stool and turning to face Ulvarr while leaning on the counter. “You might have wanted to make your strike while I wasn’t paying attention.”

“You’re nothing more than a bully, I believe,” Ulvarr hissed under his breath as his broken nose muffled the annunciation of his words. “You like using whatever unnatural ability those heretics gave you to prey on the weak, am I right?”

Roger clucked his tongue, looked up at the ceiling, and held up his finger, “You’ve got it backward, body-burner. I am a predator to those that prey. I meant what I told you earlier. You and I serve the same purpose. I’m sorry I did that to your face - for what it’s worth.”

Ulvarr’s fingers delicately traced the broken bone in the middle of nose. His eyes winced and watered as they found the sorest spot from Roger’s blow.

“What do you want, Ulvarr?” Roger pushed. The cremator reached into his apron. Roger’s reflexes were ready but remained motionless. Any premature movement would have brought unneeded attention to where he was sitting. That is the last thing he wanted. He just wanted a roast. He definitely wanted mead.

“I -” Jesper returned and placed two mugs of mead on the counter in front of them. He smirked at them both and went out to visit some of the other tables. Ulvarr followed him with his eyes, and when he was far enough away he continued, “I found something on one of the boys from the mountain.”

“Something I missed?” Roger asked incredulously.

Ulvarr shook his head and slowly placed his closed hand on the counter. Roger heard something hard slide against the grain of the wood as Ulvarr moved it in front of where the witcher was sitting. When he removed his grasp he saw a small, wooden box with no intentional markings on it other than years of wear and tear. The box was tiny enough to fit in Ulvarr’s large grasp, and as he pulled his hand away Roger became irritated that it was left to him to open this parcel.

“No ribbon?” Roger smirked as his own jab back at the cremator.

”Please just open it. I would like leave before I finish this drink, if possible,” Ulvarr took a long draught from his mug and looked nervously around the room.

The witcher inspected Ulvarr with an air of suspicion, then peered down to the small parcel in front of him. He pressed the lid open with his thumbs, completely unsure what to expect. There was a part of him that was expecting a finger or toe, but he knew that he would have smelled that before he’d ever seen it. Instead, he found multiple shards of what appeared to be silver metal of different sizes.

“What’s this then?” Roger asked rhetorically. His teeth clamped down on his other leather glove and dropped it on the counter. The tips of his fingers crawled through the box and picked up the largest of the pieces that had the most texture variations on it. As he brought it to his face, his thumb traced over the surface and felt evenly spaced bumps. Once his eyes were able to get a better look, he saw that they were designed to be scales.

His fingers went back to the box to see what other parts he could make out in order to determine what type of reptile or fish. When he found the piece, he held it up between the two men.

“A snake charm. What of it, Ulvarr? Does this mean something on Spikeroog?”

Roger dropped the pieces carelessly back into the box and started sliding them back to the cremator. Ulvarr’s soot-covered hand stopped it in its tracks and nervously looked around again. When he was certain no one was watching them, he spoke.

“You know this?” Ulvarr reached back into his apron and produced a large, human-shaped root.

“Mandrake,” Roger said, still not able to find enough energy to pretend to be interested. Instead, he drained half of his mead in one swig, and wondered how long it took to put cold beef on a plate. When he slammed the mug onto the counter he followed up, “What else do you have in there?”

Ulvarr ignored the comment and placed the mandrake directly next to the small box. Roger sighed deeply and opened his mouth to start chastising Ulvarr. Instead, he was cut off by a soft jingling and vibrating from inside the box.

Roger pressed the lid slightly open again and watched the metallic scraps jump up and down inside the wooden box.

“Fuck off,” Roger said to the metallic items in the box. “This is a medallion.”