The summit had drawn every crowned head of the North to the castle, and with them came soldiers enough to garrison a small war. Pikemen lined the outer walls. Men-at-arms paced the battlements in shifts that never seemed to end. It was said, not without reason, that there was no safer place in the world that night than these old stones, which was precisely why Triss had chosen it.
She led Seb down a servant's stair, past a tapestry that hid a door that should not have existed, into a chamber lit by a handful of floating witchlights. Four women were already waiting.
"You're late," said the one nearest the door dark-haired, sharp-eyed, dressed like she owned the room even though it belonged to someone else. Philippa Eilhart.
"We had to lose some people," Triss said, shutting the door behind them. "Everyone, this is Sebastian."
Sabrina Glevissig looked him over the way a woman looks over a horse she's already decided to buy. "Oh, we've met," she said. "I had the pleasure of his company just last night."
Seb blinked in confusion.
"Sabrina!" Triss said.
"What? I'm only stating what happened." Sabrina's smile didn't move an inch.
Margarita Laux-Antille, arms folded, glanced between them with open amusement. Sheala de Tancarvill, seated furthest from the light, said nothing at all she rarely did until there was something worth saying.
"We don't have time for this," Triss said, and some of the warmth left her voice. "He needs our help. To find Ciri."
That did what nothing else could have. The room went silent.
"Princess Cirilla?" Philippa said slowly. "The Emperor of Nilfgaard has half his army looking for that girl. You cannot possibly expect us to.."
"Emhyr doesn't have her," Triss cut in. "She was taken. By an Aen Elle sage, an elven sorcerer, from beyond the borders of this world."
No one spoke. Sheala's eyes had gone very sharp.
"He took her to their world," Seb said. "You know what runs in her blood as well as I do. I don't have to explain to any of you what that means, or why the Aen Elle want her or why none of it favours us. Their world is dying. They mean to take ours in its place, a world that would die long after theirs."
"The White Frost," Sheala murmured. "You are describing Ithlyn's prophecy."
"I am. And it's real, and it's coming, whether any of us like it. Ciri is the only one who can stop it."
Philippa's mouth thinned. "Troubling, if true. But what would you have us do about it? Time and space are not a magic any sorceress living has ever mastered."
Seb reached into his back and set the mask on the table between them. Pale, elven-wrought, its edges carved with lines of script that caught the witchlight strangely.
"This is theirs," he said. "An artifact. It's said to open a door between worlds. Triss has already coaxed part of the inscription awake I saw it glow under her hands. With the four of you working together, it could be done faster. Fast enough that I reach Ciri before it's too late."
Philippa studied the mask for a long moment, then looked back up at him, and something in her expression shifted.
"A noble task," she said. "But saving the world was never really the Lodge's business, was it? And this threat of yours is a very distant one. I imagine the Aen Elle need the girl alive to carry on that bloodline of hers. Perhaps with their king." She let that sit, watching him. "Oh. That's it, isn't it. That's what you're truly afraid of. You care for the princess." A soft, needling laugh. "It really is heartbreaking, watching young love get in the way of good sense. But this isn't Lodge business, and I won't be part of it. You've already risked enough, Triss, telling him what we are."
"She didn't tell me anything," Seb said. "I already know you're planning to kill kings. King Foltest included. For the Lodge's own ends, or rather yours."
Triss's head turned toward Philippa so fast her hair caught the light. Margarita and Sabrina went rigid. Sheala and Philippa traded one long, unreadable glance.
"Or did Triss tell me that too?" Seb said.
"How," Philippa said, very quietly, "could you possibly know that. Only Sheala and I.."
"Is it true?" Triss demanded, rounding on Philippa fully now. "Regicide, Philippa? You're planning regicide?"
"That's.. " Philippa started, and found nothing to finish it with.
"King Radovid is already hunting for an excuse to burn every mage in the North," Seb said, before she could recover. "You're about to hand him one wrapped in silk. I meant to ask nicely, you're Triss's sisters, whatever else you are to each other but if I have to, I will bring your whole plan down around you to get what I need."
"And who," Philippa said, chin lifting, "would believe a witcher's word over ours?"
"Radovid doesn't need to believe me. He just needs a reason. You know that better than anyone."
A long silence. Then Seb added, quieter: "Help me, and I'll even owe you a favour. My word on it."
It was Sheala who spoke first. "I see no reason to refuse him now. But be warned, witcher, the favour we ask in return may well concern your precious princess."
"If Ciri chooses to help you with whatever it is, so be it," Seb said. "Right now, finding her alive and bringing her back comes before anything else."
Philippa exhaled through her nose, some of the venom draining out of her. "So be it, then."
"This is not the end of this conversation," Triss said sharply. "We are going to talk about the regicide."
"Oh, hush, Triss, not here, not now." Philippa waved a hand as though swatting away a fly. "You'll understand, later. for now, I'll help him. Don't make me regret it, witcher or the Lodge will hunt you the way we'd hunt any other loose end."
Seb held out the mask. She took it.
Philippa turned it over once in her hands, tracing the strange script with a fingertip, and when she spoke again her voice had dropped lower "Time is a river to men. Space is a wall to all. To the Elder Blood, it is neither." She looked up. "Elven work, this. Human mages never cared to make artifacts like it, not seriously." A thin, decisive smile. "Very well. Let's get to work. We have two days in this rotting castle while the crowns upstairs argue about nothing. That's more than enough time."
Sabrina tilted her head at Seb, considering. "So that's why you were sulking on the balcony all last night, looking like the world had ended."
"I only learned of this after," Seb said.
Margarita glanced sideways at Sabrina. "I thought you two actually fucked.."
"Margarita!" Triss said.
"What? She said it herself, practically."
Seb pinched the bridge of his nose and thought, not for the first time that day, 'how in every hell did Geralt manage to handle sorceresses.'
Philippa was already sweeping toward the door, the mask held aloft like a torch. "Enough. Stop thinking with your veginas, all of you, and let's get to the laboratory."
/-\
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