System of the Beast Slayer [litrpg Adventure]
Copyright© 1999 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 257: Audience with the Broken Baron
“Roy, how did you come to La Valette all of a sudden?” Aveline rested a hand on the Witcher’s shoulder with some effort, moving slowly under his support.
She bore too many wounds. Every step threatened to tug at one of them, and each pull made her press her red lips tight with pain.
“We need to cross the White Bridge and head for Novigrad...” The Witcher gently wrapped an arm around her slender waist, steadying her gaunt body as he studied the line of her face beneath the dark red hair, the sharpened chin grown thin with suffering.
The elven lady’s injuries were grave. The endless beatings, together with malnutrition, had ruined her body.
From what Roy knew of medicine through herb-lore, even if the wounds on her skin healed in time, she would still be left with lingering troubles, rheumatism and the like, unless a sorceress skilled in Healing Magic intervened.
Aveline, however, had no notion of any of those grim prospects.
“Novigrad in Redania? I’ve heard the headquarters of the Eternal Fire are there. They are not kind to nonhumans.” Aveline was quietly studying the Witcher as well. He had changed indeed, and had none of the boyish, unformed air he once carried.
“It ought to be called the Free City of Novigrad...” Roy waved a hand before her eyes and explained, “Though Novigrad lies within Redania’s borders, after Temeria’s envoys negotiated with Radovid III years ago, it became a free city, belonging to neither side. That let both kingdoms save face.”
“As for the Eternal Fire...” his tone cooled, “if those religious madmen leave me alone, fine. If they come looking for trouble, my companions and I will teach them that Witchers are not folk to be bullied at will.”
Without Radovid V and his iron madness behind them yet, the Eternal Fire was nowhere near as rampant as it would become later.
“So you mean to make your mark in Novigrad?” Aveline glanced around. Apart from more than a dozen soldiers and the officer keeping watch, only Witcher Letho remained with them.
Orin and Kael, along with Flavius and his apprentice, had been persuaded by Roy to find an inn, settle the horses, and see to the practical matters. This was investigation, not battle. There was no need for so many people.
Aveline had seen six Witchers together in one place. It was the first time in her life.
“That is not far from the truth,” Roy said after a moment’s silence. “But there’s something else I must do. I need to see my parents. Since I set out traveling with Letho, it has been more than a year since I last saw them. I don’t even know how they are faring in Novigrad.”
“I remember you saying your parents were dead?” Aveline’s lovely eyes remained fixed on him without blinking.
“Well ... that ... just take what I said back then as a kindly lie...” Roy stammered for a bit, and Kantila, walking beside them, could not help but cut in, neatly steering the talk elsewhere.
“Witchers have parents too?”
The proud and stubborn woman of Zerrikania had refused the Witcher’s help. She dragged her battered body forward on those long, strong legs of hers. She had no shoes, and the bare soles of her feet were chafed raw against the cold rough ground, crusted over with dark blood, yet she paid it no mind.
“What did you think?” Roy asked with a smile of relief. “That Witchers sprang from cracks in stone?”
“Laugh if you like...” Kantila barked out two sharp laughs, then pulled at one of her wounds and ended up with an expression halfway between pain and delight. “I used to think Witchers were made in some sorcerer’s laboratory, mutants without feeling ... now I know I was wildly wrong...”
Kantila turned to glance at the impassive bald-headed Letho, then looked straight at Roy with those black bright eyes. “Most Witchers only look cold and stripped of normal feeling. In truth, you’re flesh and blood like anyone else...”
“You knew helping us would put you in danger with the baron, and you still came.” Kantila slapped the Witcher on the shoulder. “Roy, thank you.”
“It was chance, mostly...” Roy thought it over seriously. “I never expected to hear news of The Sea Scorpion’s Enigma by the gate. But we did know each other. I couldn’t very well stand by and watch you burn to death.”
For a moment, no one spoke.
“We never thought The Sea Scorpion’s Enigma would end like this either...” Aveline said at last, sadness on her face. “It feels as though we fell from heaven into hell in a single night...”
Aaron’s death had led, in one way or another, to the troupe’s misfortune. Roy kept that thought to himself.
Along the original course of events, Aveline would, years later, take the name Stoat and aid Geralt in stealing Maximilian Borsodi’s house from the auction.
But now, had Roy not happened to arrive in time, then under the old baron’s fury every remaining member of The Sea Scorpion’s Enigma might well have died, Aveline included.
Her future would have been snuffed out entirely.
A strong feeling rose in him without warning.
Some people’s fates had already changed because he had stepped into them.
Adda, Ciri, Baron Verrieres of White Orchard, the Ladies of the Wood, Angoulême the Heart of the Tree, The Sea Scorpion’s Enigma troupe.
He thought of the butterfly effect, and a faint unease stirred in him. If he altered too much, he would surely lose the advantage of knowing what was to come.
But what use was brooding on that now? Roy drew a breath and forced the scattered thoughts down, then pressed them for more detail about all they had suffered lately.
After Amos fled “out of guilt,” the baron turned his wrath on the four remaining members of The Sea Scorpion’s Enigma. He had them thrown into the dungeon and tortured mercilessly, demanding Amos’s whereabouts.
“But how were we supposed to know where Amos had gone?” Aveline stretched her neck like a swan’s, tears bright in her clear eyes, misery all over her delicate face. “The guards in the dungeon knew only how to torment us each day, with whips, hunting knives, and irons heated red.” Fear welled deep in her gaze as she spoke.
“And the little bastards never even let us eat properly,” Kantila said furiously. “Every day they gave us one bowl of filthy water and a hunk of bread hard enough to crack teeth. I didn’t even have the strength to break out.”
“Witcher, what are you muttering about with those two women?” The officer ahead threw them a suspicious look.
“Do not worry, Lord Dillon. I’m only learning the details of the case ... By the by, are we nearly there?” The Witcher had already noticed that the surrounding walls were growing thicker, ordinary townsfolk fewer, and patrolling soldiers more common.
“Five minutes more...” Dillon gave one last warning. “Behave yourselves. Don’t try any tricks.” He had already taken the Witcher’s coin and could not press the matter too far. After that, he left them be.
...
“They kept us in the dungeon for half a month and learned nothing useful, because we knew nothing at all. The baron’s fury only grew hotter.” Aveline lowered her voice and went on. “So he became crueler still. He had us hauled out into the square in broad daylight, day after day, to be despised by passersby, humiliated before all, our spirits ground under heel.”
Sometimes torment of the mind hurts more than torment of the flesh.
Roy let out a faint sigh. “And Fire Breather Collins?”
“Collins had to watch his lover Frozz humiliated. You cannot imagine the filth those people shouted at them.” Aveline said. “He lost his temper and cursed the baron himself, the very man behind it all. So the baron ordered him burned alive.”
“He was gentle. Kind. He did not deserve such an end.”