Crossing a belt of hills dotted with sparse, twisted trees, they continued through spacious fields of tall grass that reached their waists.
Braenn stopped again and looked around with a frown. Taking advantage of the pause, Geralt sat down on a fallen log, resting his forearms on his thighs.
And then he heard a scream.
Braenn immediately knelt down. She pulled two arrows from her quiver at once, holding one between her teeth, nocking the other on the bowstring and drawing it in a single fluid motion, aiming blindly toward the source of the voice.
—Don't shoot! —Geralt shouted.
He leaped over the log and pushed through the undergrowth, parting the branches with his hands.
In a not-too-large meadow, at the foot of a small limestone cliff, there was a small being dressed in a grey dress, pressing her back against the dry trunk of a tree. In front of her, about five paces away, something moved slowly, crushing the grass with a moist crunch.
At first, Geralt thought it was a snake. But when he saw the yellowish, agile little feet like hooks, and the flat segments of the long articulated torso, he realized it was not a snake. It was something much worse.
The small being pressed against the trunk let out a shrill scream. The enormous myriapod raised trembling tentacles above the grass, with which it detected heat and smells.
—Don't move! —the witcher shouted, and stomped hard against the ground to divert the myriapod's attention toward him.
But the myriapod did not react. Its tentacles had already detected the scent of a closer victim. The monster moved its countless legs, bent into an "S" shape, and lunged forward. Its claws, of a shrill yellow color, gleamed among the grass.
—Yghern! —Braenn shouted.
Geralt reached the meadow in two strides. As he ran, he drew the sword from the sheath on his back, the steel glinting for an instant under the milky light of the forest. With the same momentum, with a hip check, he knocked aside the small being still petrified in front of the tree and threw it to the side, into the brambles.
The myriapod crushed the grass as it stepped, extended its front legs, and threw itself at him, raising the anterior segments of its body and snapping its venom-laden pincers with a metallic click. Geralt began his dance: he leaped onto the monster's flat body and, in a half-turn, delivered a slash with his sword, aiming at a soft spot between the armored plates of the tentacles. But the monster was too fast. The blade struck the chitinous carapace without penetrating it, and a thick carpet of moss cushioned the blow. Geralt jumped back, but not quickly enough. The scolopendromorph coiled the rear part of its body around his foot with monstrous force. The witcher fell onto his back, twisted, and tried to free himself without much success.
The myriapod arched, turning over to reach him with its pincers. It clawed violently at the tree trunk with its claws, clinging to it for leverage. At that moment, something whistled over Geralt's head. An arrow pierced the carapace with a dry crack and pinned the monster to the tree. The myriapod doubled over itself, broke the arrow, and freed itself, but immediately two new projectiles pierced it. The witcher kicked the creature's abdomen aside and rolled away.
Braenn, kneeling a few paces away, fired her bow at incredible speed. Her fingers flew from the quiver to the string with the precision of a clockwork mechanism. The myriapod broke the arrows and freed itself, but the next projectile pinned it to the tree again before it could advance. The creature, furious, tried to reach the enemy that was wounding it.
Geralt sprang to his feet and brought his sword down in a wide, decisive slash. The blade traced a silver arc and ended the fight with a single blow.
The myriapod's body collapsed onto the grass, its countless legs still twitching in a spasm. Braenn approached slowly, bow still drawn, and kicked the torso that writhed in the grass.
—Thank you —Geralt said as he crushed the myriapod's head with a heel stomp.
—Huh?
—You saved my life.
The dryad looked at him. In her blue eyes there was neither emotion nor understanding. Only coldness.
—Yghern —she said simply, stepping on the still-twitching body with her boot—. It broke all my arrows.
—You saved my life and that little dryad's —Geralt repeated, turning his head toward the brambles—. Hey? Where is she?
Braenn agilely parted the bramble branches and thrust her arm among the thorny stems, as if the scratches didn't matter to her.
—Just as I thought —she said, pulling the small grey-clad being from the thicket—. See for yourself, Gwynbleidd.
It was not a dryad. Nor an elf. It was an ordinary human girl. In the heart of Brokilon, the least ordinary place in the world for ordinary human girls.
Her ash-blonde hair was tangled with twigs and dry leaves. And her huge, intense green eyes looked at Geralt with a mixture of terror and wonder.
Judging by her appearance, she could not have been more than ten years old.
—Who are you? —Geralt asked curiously, crouching in front of the girl—. Where did you come from?
The girl did not answer. She stood still, her green eyes fixed on the witcher's amber ones.
—What are you doing in… in this forest? How did you get here?
The girl lowered her head and sniffled.
—Are you deaf? Who are you, I ask? What's your name?
—Ciri.
Ciri sniffled again and replied in a timid voice, lifting her eyes.
Geralt turned toward Braenn. The dryad was still examining her bow, running her fingers along the string to check the tension.
—Tell me, Braenn…
—What?
—Is it possible… —the witcher hesitated for an instant— is it possible that she escaped from Duén Canell?
—Huh?
—Don't play dumb —Geralt's voice sparked with a flicker of fury—. I know you kidnap girls. And you, did you fall from the sky? I'm asking you if it's possible that…
—No —the dryad cut him off, her tone flat as a board—. I had never seen this girl before.
Geralt contemplated the girl. Her ashen hair was disheveled, full of pine needles and tiny leaves, but leaning closer he perceived that it smelled clean. Not of smoke, nor stable, nor rancid grease. Her hands, though incredibly dirty with earth and scratches, were small and delicate, without the scars or calluses that betrayed manual labor. The boy's clothes she wore—a grey doublet with a little red hood—revealed nothing special at first glance, but the high boots she wore were made of soft, expensive lambskin, dyed a dark red. From her appearance alone, the witcher was sure she was not a village girl.
—Where are you from, brat?
—How dare you speak to me like that!
Ciri threw her head back with pride and stomped the ground hard.
—Ha —a crooked smile curved on Geralt's lips—. A real little princess. At least by the way you speak. You're from Verden, aren't you? Do you know they're looking for you? Don't worry, I'll take you home.