The Witcher: Elder Blood

Full story at:

patreon.com/FanFictionPremium

***

Leaving the walls of the academy, I headed outside its grounds. It was forbidden to open a portal on the academy grounds without the rector's permission, and I didn't want to become an exception to the rules for the sake of being able to shorten the journey from the portal to the rector's office by five minutes.

I'd grown too accustomed to the portals lately, so much so that I was likely to feel discomfort from the long journeys of the highs.

- Time to go home, only took an hour, the portal is the best and fastest delivery, heh,' I laugh at my simple joke.

On horseback it would have taken a fortnight to get to Ban Ard from Wengerberg and back. All that remains is to say a big thank you to Geoffrey Monk for discovering modern portals. Before the ninth century - that's when Monk was able to create the initial version - they were used only by the Knower of the Elves, and as Hela Gedymdeith told me, they were much more complicated, and even a bit like my way of opening them with the Elder Blood, but without the ability to travel to new worlds.

Now the portals are available to any trained spellcaster, and each of them is given differently, but the fact of such a fast movement is impressive.

Stopping a little away from the academy grounds, I open a portal to the backyard of my house, there's even a special area set aside.

Over a circular area of flat stone, the portal opened on the other side. I was looking at a familiar plot of land, planted with flowers and other plants needed for alchemy and capable of growing without individual care.

- I'll check on Ian first,' I looked down at the book in my hands. - He might want to start studying together.

There were three ways into the house: The main entrance, where people came into the shop on the ground floor; the side door that led to the basement and was always closed, except on days when we needed to bring something in or out. From the cellar there is an internal staircase upstairs; And, the last door is at the back of the house, where I was - I headed for it the next moment.

There was no one on the ground floor and the front door was closed. Next to the door on the bedside table was a sign that read 'Open' - hang it on the opening in the front door during office hours. The only exception when Jennyfer agrees to work after hours is when someone in the neighbourhood goes into labour. But in such cases, she has to walk to the woman's house, so there's no need to hang up the sign.

No longer paying attention to the ground floor, I decide to look for the girls upstairs. The relationship between Jennyfer and Galanthea has improved lately, I've stopped being pestered with ridiculous outbursts of jealousy, and the two girls have begun to talk to each other often, and walk around the city together, sometimes visiting the sorceress's family outside the city.

Climbing up to the first floor, starting at the very top of the stairs, I could hear voices coming from the bedroom. At first I thought it was just the usual chatter between the bard and the sorceress, but when I got closer, I could hear a third female voice, with the familiar voice of Jennyfer and the unknown woman clearly sounding cheerful.

Knock. Knock.

Just to be on the safe side, I decided to announce my arrival, and ten seconds later I opened the door.

- Eren! - exclaimed a drunken Jennyfer. - You're back so quickly. Sabrina, my friend from Arethusa,' the sorceress extended her left foot towards a woman sitting across the table from me with red dyed hair, which in my experience looked unusual in these parts.

At first I detained my attention at such a dismissive gesture. Yen held a goblet in one hand, and with her other hand controlled a bottle of red wine with telekinesis as she filled her goblet. All within limits, she didn't want to interrupt this action, so she decided to just point at the other woman with her foot.

Then at pace I shifted my gaze to the table where a single empty bottle rested, a plate of sliced cheese lying next to it. I shifted my gaze further to the left, straight to the sorceress amoebic in the other chair. Both of their faces were slightly flushed from drinking and probably from laughing.

The second sorceress, Sabrina, stretched her lips in a long, sly smile. She also had a goblet in her hand, but unlike the first sorceress, she held it with her fingers on top, placing it on the armrest. With her other hand she tossed a single piece of cheese with telekinesis into her mouth, chewed slowly, and raised her voice:

- Sabrina Glevissig, silly girl still can't remember my last name,' she slowly rose, setting the goblet down on the round table in the middle of the two chairs.

Standing up straight, the sorceress returned her previous smile and performed an almost perfect curtsy, only the alcohol letting her know which made her twitch slightly.

Wonderful, a lady of high society, the kind I had little contact with, literally confining myself to mercantile matters. I was not familiar with etiquette, so I only had enough to nod my head in response, and then I said: 'I am not a nobleman, you don't have to bow to me.

Only now I could notice Galanthea sitting on the bed, watching with interest, like two wizards, she also had a goblet in her hand, but at least she was not playing with food unlike them. But there could be a lack of magic at play here.

- Well, Eren, every warlock is on the same level with the nobles,' she came closer and poked her finger on my cheek.

It should be said that by wizard she meant a mage trained in academies. Such people actually received a special document that put them on the same level as nobles, only landless, of course. But it is quite possible to get land, but here it is necessary to somehow negotiate with some boyar or directly with the prince. I have no 'land', of course, only a plot of land with a house.

- Oh, that's true, I'm just not used to it.

- I wonder what Yennifer told you about me, I hope it was good? - More like bad...

- Of course, I couldn't believe what she said before we met, but I'm pleasantly surprised to see such a wonderful sorceress among her friends,' I moved away from Sabrina to go to my bedside table. I needed to put away the things I'd received from the rector.

As I moved the discharged artefacts into the bottom drawer along with the book, I noticed a tense glance between the two sorceresses. God, from what Yennifer had said about Sabrina, it seemed to me that she might be an exact copy of the sorceress who lived with me, and now I just had to confirm my hunch.... They manage to get along somehow, it's weird.

- How long have you been resting here?

- Since you left,' replies Galantea, who is closest to me at the moment.

- Honey, come join us, we were just discussing the academies, it'll be interesting to hear about the second one,' Jennyfer levitated the bottle back onto the table and stood over the chair, tapping her palm on it, showing me where I should sit.

At first I'd planned to try and deal with one of the artefacts I'd been handed, but given my woman's guest, that could be postponed until the next day. In a way, I'm interested in hearing about the Arethusa myself, and given their groggy state, there's a lot more to learn than a normal conversation. And let's face it, in such a heated state, Yennifer always gives me a passionate night without a word.

- It's true, you haven't said much about your days at the academy, Eren,' Galanthea backed the sorceress up and put a stop to my decision at the same time.

We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening eating - they'd only had a small snack before, and they'd been blown away by a two-litre bottle of wine for the three of us, not counting Galanthea as she'd only drunk half of it - and talking about their days at the academy. It was a bit like a reunion of university buddies who had decided to reminisce about some amusing moments during their studies.

For example, the first one had to tell me about the time when the wizards weren't quite blown away. I told them two stories.

The first story was about the day Detmold and I decided to take the order for the Utopians, mentioning the money he lost at the races.

The second story was about the later days: in the penultimate month we went into town as usual, and a sickly-looking man, one of the local hunters, came running to us. While hunting with his son, they had been attacked by three wolves, but had managed to fight them off with knives and bows, except that the man was unlucky - one wolf had chewed off his penis before he died. One of the town mages was able to save him by sewing up what was left so that he could relieve himself. So he turned to us in hope, thinking we could help... all we had to do was dash his hopes by telling him that at least he'd had time to have a son. Seriously, a trained healer couldn't help him, what did he expect us to do?

I didn't think the second story was funny, it just stuck in my memory, but the two sorceresses, who had finished half of the second bottle by then, laughed a lot.

Then it was time for them to tell us about interesting incidents in Arethusa. They were more strict there, so they were not allowed to freely visit the nearest port city on the island of Tenedd - Gorse Velen. Incidentally, the city is considered one of the most influential trading cities in Temeria, not least because of the warlocks and Arethusa themselves.

Sabrina decided to tell the first story, speaking with a lilting tongue about one of the students studying with them, named Assire van Anagyd. The two had little interaction with her, but the story was not about their interactions at the academy, but about the enchantress' love of cats. Once, back in the early days of her training, Assire had tried to sneak a cat from Gorse Velen into her room, which Tissaya had noticed and subsequently reprimanded in front of the other students. For the next two days, Assire sulked at the Rector in her room.

Then it was time for Yennifer to reminisce about her training days, and the choice was a new student who had entered Arethusa a month before the sorceresses talking to me graduated. Her name was Keira Metz, and somehow her undisguised aversion to rats came up in conversation with her. One of the older students decided to play a trick on Keira by conjuring up an exact illusion of three rats in her room, then closing the door from the other side when she went inside. According to Sabrina, she nearly went hoarse from screaming.

Listening to the stories of the two sorceresses, I noted to myself that they had been somewhat streamlined in their information about their days at the academy, and only recounted funny stories about the others.

By the end of the second bottle, and hence of our sit-down, Sabrina was pecking her nose, and Jennyfer was falling asleep on my lap, so I decided to call it a night.

- Snowy, is there any bedding in the room next to you?

- Yeah, there's some in the wardrobe,' she took my hint, retreating to one of the spare rooms.

I put Jennyfer on the bed first, whispering for her to change, but I got a mumble in return. Then I picked up Sabrina, who had fallen asleep, and carried her to the spare room, where Galantea had made the bed.

- They like to talk about other people, they're real gossipers,' Galantea said with a chuckle before heading out. - I'm going for a swim, should I wait for Ian?

- I don't think so, she's probably asleep,' I put the red-haired sorceress on the bed and covered her with a blanket.

- Okay,' she yawned. - Then conjure up some water for me in a tub, I don't want to carry it myself.

Thus the day came to an end, the meeting with my friend Yen went smoothly at first glance, and tomorrow the artefacts await me. Unfortunately, a passionate night with the enchantress did not happen - she managed to finally fall asleep.