Chapter 72

With a thunderous rumble the rock face sealing the Mount Carbon wine cellar slid shut, the Witcher and Roy found their retreat cut off and could only press forward, torches held high, feeling their way into the dark.

The Smaerk Mine tunnel was narrow and crooked, just wide enough for two to walk side by side. This man-made passage had long fallen into disrepair and felt unstable; a heavy footstep sent loose stones skittering from the roof, and they had every right to fear a sudden collapse.

Letho and Roy tightened their steps and pushed on, gritting their teeth for roughly five minutes; after a few turns their eyes brightened, torchlight revealing a plain sheathed longsword sleeping quietly against the rock.

“Brovar kept his word after all, then,” Roy said, “worth being the advance party for Mount Carbon.”

Earlier the Witcher had used an Axii sign to wrench the truth from the Dwarf’s mouth.

Brovar Hogg had not decided on outright blood with them, but enraged at his bastard son’s death and unwilling to meet the pair face to face, he had used Severin’s mouth to lead the two into the Smaerk Mine, to clear any monsters there and to vent his own grievance.

Let the banquet be their private amusement.

The Witcher had no taste for flattering cold shoulders, he preferred the mine.

With the sword recovered, Roy felt his dislike for the Mahakam High Elder soften a little; the Witcher only snorted. “Don’t flatter yourself, kid, he merely thinks owning Gwyhyr lets him squeeze more value out of us.”

“Still, a blade suits a hero, and with it we’ve a better chance getting through the mine!” Roy stepped forward and seized the hilt.

It felt a little heavy in his hand; his face tightened, he tugged, and a strip of blade, polished to a flawless sheen, slid free from the dark scabbard.

The edge lay like a pool of autumn water, faintly blue; the blade hummed with an uncanny note, as if a spirit sealed in the scabbard rejoiced at release.