"Clack… clack-clack… click!"
With the last bear trap snapped open and fixed into place, Victor wedged a few碎 pieces of stone into the jaws, splashed on several different alchemical liquids, then covered everything with leaves to hide it.
"Cap… Captain, don't worry about me. You go on ahead!" Slumped beneath an oak, Angoulême's face was paper-white, sweat soaking her from head to toe. "Go to Flotsam and book a room for me. If the Scoia'tael don't catch up, I'll get there and I can finally rest. If they do catch me… I can buy you some time."
It was evening now. The Phantom Troupe's forest run had started before dawn—a brutal cross-country obstacle course that tested not just stamina, but technique. After six or seven hours, the witcher apprentice's physical advantage over the girl was already overwhelming. Once it pushed past twelve hours, the difference became something else entirely: one of them still had fuel in the tank, the other was barely staying upright.
And Victor, no longer needing to hide what his herb bag could do, used every short breathing break he gave Angoulême to pull out bear trap after bear trap and set them along the way.
He walked back to the oak, crouched, and stared at her—blue eyes locked onto brown eyes until the brown eyes finally chickened out and looked away.
"Angoulême Corion, with your intelligence it's hard for me to explain why if you get caught it's basically certain death, while if I get caught I still have around an eighty percent chance to survive," Victor said. "So let's keep it simple. Do you remember the troupe rules?"
"I remember… whatever the Captain says goes…" she muttered.
"Good." The Captain's tone sharpened. "Then here's what I say: it's not time to give up yet. You hear me?"
They held each other's gaze for a beat. Angoulême nodded.
And the Captain of the Phantom Troupe hauled his briefly-rested member to her feet, and they kept running along the river.
They didn't know how long they ran after that. Eventually—faintly—pinpricks of fire flickered in the distance: Flotsam's night lights.
Both of them sped up—
And Angoulême suddenly lunged sideways, tackling Victor to the ground. They rolled together in the mud, and an arrow that would've punched clean through a heart hissed past where he'd been.
…
In the whispering roar of arrow-rain—"shhh… shhh-shhh…"—they scrambled and crawled behind the trunk of a thick beech for cover.
The rustling of leaves wasn't wind. It was elves moving. It was death closing in.
There was no time left for hesitation.
Victor shouted, loud and clear, "Ceádmil, Wedd Dol!"
His voice carried through the trees. The arrows stopped.
But the leaf-rustling didn't.
Angoulême clutched Victor's arm, bright with relief. "Captain, they stopped shooting! What did you say that worked so well?"
Victor shook her off. He wasn't nearly that optimistic. "Just a greeting. Dol Blathanna—hello, Son of the Valley of Flowers."
Then, tight and sharp: "Now shut your mouth and let me think. Or I'm adding 'every troupe member must learn Elder Speech' to the rules."
Angoulême instantly went silent. Between reading and swimming, she had absolutely no desire to add more burdens to her life.
Victor worked his mouth, making sure his tongue hit the right rhythm, then shouted again:
"Caelm, evellienn! N'aen aespar a me." (Calm down. Don't shoot.)
The rustling slowed, then stopped. Maybe they'd halted their advance. Victor's more pessimistic guess was that they'd simply taken positions.
In the silence, footsteps crunched.
"Vort!" (Drop your swords!)
At last—a reply. Deep, powerful, commanding.
Victor leaned out from behind the beech just enough to see who'd spoken.
Under a dark red headscarf was what must once have been a beautiful elven face—except a hideous scar ran diagonally from forehead to brow, across the nose and cheek, all the way down to the chin. Ugly, yes… but it gave him a predatory, hawk-eyed presence.
He was tall—taller than Eskel, even. A longbow was slung on his back. Two elven one-handed swords hung at his waist, still sheathed. A hooked chain-and-leather armor hugged the muscle of his long arms and narrow waist, but couldn't contain the sheer force that seemed to leak out of him.
Purely by appearance, he was the most dangerous-looking man Victor had seen since arriving in this world.
Victor patted Angoulême's hand. "Stay hidden. If I don't tell you to come out, you don't come out."
Then he gently tossed his steel sword and his silver sword out from behind the beech, slow and deliberate, careful not to trigger any misunderstanding.
After that, Victor stepped out with both palms facing outward.
Under the aim of a dozen-plus elves who had stopped hiding—bows drawn, arrows nocked—Victor finally faced Iorveth, the infamous butcher, at close range.
Iorveth glanced at the two swords on the ground, and at the silver gleam Victor had intentionally revealed.
"Vatt'ghern?" (Witcher?)
Then he watched Victor's pupils and said with certainty, "Vatt'ghern wed." (Witcher apprentice.)
Victor didn't answer. His self-taught vocabulary wasn't deep enough.
Seeing the awkwardness, Iorveth laughed.
"Que l'en pavienn, ell'ea?" (You're just a monkey, aren't you?)
The taunt was clearly a Scoia'tael favorite. Laughter rippled through the shade. It was one of the elves' most common jabs at humans, and in the taverns of Vergen Victor had heard enough similar shouting matches to learn the standard counter.
So he fired back without hesitation:
"Nell'ea, T'en pavienn, Aen Seidhe." (No—you're the monkey, Aen Seidhe.)
The elves only laughed harder. It was funnier this way: instead of insulting someone in a language they didn't understand, you insulted them in a language they did understand—and the best they could do was throw words back at you.
Victor ignored the mockery. The only one who truly decided whether the troupe lived or died was the elf in front of him.
Staring straight into Iorveth's eyes, Victor asked, "M'aespar que va'en, ell'ea?" (Are you going to shoot me, or…?)
Iorveth smiled and smoothly switched into Common Speech. "Don't strain yourself speaking Elder Speech, human. If you still have something to say, say it now. Enjoy your last words—before you're gutted."
The moment the sentence landed, Victor knew it was bad.
Sure enough—clang!
Angoulême's steel sword flashed free as she sprang out from behind the beech, landing in front of Victor to shield him.
Thank the heavens—at least she wasn't stupid enough to charge Iorveth outright. Otherwise she'd have been joining Hector, Roland, and Leonidas right then and there.
Iorveth's smile vanished.
"Vort, beanna." Seeing she didn't understand, he repeated in Common Speech, "Drop the sword, woman!"
Victor stepped forward, trying to snatch Angoulême's weapon down—
But Iorveth abruptly drew his left sword and hurled it. The blade slammed into the ground right in front of Victor's feet, quivering upright like a warning nail.
"Stand right there. If he takes one step forward, shoot him!" The last line was an order to the elves surrounding them.
Then Iorveth rolled his neck, drew his right sword, and crooked two fingers at Angoulême with his left hand.
"Come. Beat me—and I'll let you both go."
Victor didn't know what had made Iorveth change his mind so suddenly, but he didn't believe it was an opportunity. Even if Angoulême could defeat a name like Iorveth—and that was a massive if—this challenge was clearly born of anger. Winning didn't guarantee the elf would keep his word.
Angoulême didn't think that far ahead. She lowered her stance, set her guard, and glared murder at the elf who held his sword one-handed—so relaxed he looked full of openings.
And when Victor caught sight of the dark smear on Angoulême's pommel—blood that hadn't been fully wiped clean—
In that instant, he understood everything.