Geralt's Arc

Chapter 3 of 17

By afternoon the trail vanished. Fresh snow had buried the path in a smooth white slope, and ice glazed the rocks beneath. Geralt stopped his horse and looked up. The lair waited somewhere above, its runed door still a day's climb away. But the way ahead was gone. Wind bit through his cloak. Rain pulled her arms tight against the cold. They could not camp here. They could not ride through this. If they lingered, the mountain would freeze them both. "We climb or we die," Geralt said. He tied the horses in the lee of a boulder. Then he studied the slope for footing. Bare rock showed in a few places, where the wind had scraped the ice thin. "There. We follow the stone." Rain looked at the drop below the slope and did not move. "One slip and we fall." "Then don't slip." He cut a length of rope from his saddle and knotted one end around his waist. He held the other out to her. "Tie on. If I go down, you hold. If you go down, I hold." She stared at the rope. This was the same woman who had once come to stop his hunt, who had doubted his hands could be gentle. She took the rope and knotted it at her waist. Her fingers shook, but they did not stop. Geralt went first. He drove his boot into a crack in the rock and pulled. Ice cracked under his glove. He tested each hold before he trusted it. Behind him Rain followed his line, hand for hand, foot for foot. Snow stung their faces. The wind tried to peel them off the mountain. Halfway up, a slab of ice broke under Rain's boot. She dropped. The rope snapped tight and yanked Geralt sideways. He jammed his arm into a crack and held. Pain shot through his shoulder. She hung against the rock, feet swinging over open air. "Reach the ledge to your right," he called. His grip was slipping. "Now, Rain." She swung, caught the ledge, and pulled herself onto it. The rope went slack. Geralt breathed and worked his arm free. They rested a moment, both shaking, then climbed the last stretch together. They hauled themselves over the top onto a flat shelf of stone. Ahead, carved into the mountainside, stood a cave mouth ringed with old runes. The lair. They had reached it. Geralt lay on the cold rock and let his heart slow. Rain sat beside him, close, her shoulder against his. She did not pull away. "You held me," she said. "Your arm could have torn." "You held first," Geralt said. "When I told you to." She looked at the runed door, then at him. The distance between them was gone. But the runes glowed faintly in the dusk, and Geralt knew what waited behind them was awake.