Chapter 226: Brand

It was late at night. Not a soul was out on Vizima's streets. Even the patrols were nowhere to be found. A grating sound suddenly came from the corner of a street. A hunched silhouette was dragging a stretcher, moving forward slowly. There were two bloody, unconscious men on the gurney, and the silhouette was also holding a man with one arm up all by himself.

He was pulling the weight of three men all by himself, and sweat had drenched his body. His chest was heaving, his breathing as loud as a blower blowing into a furnace.

"Why don't you put us down, Mr. Roy?" the knight he was holding up asked weakly. His face contorted in pain.

"We fought the fleder together. You're my comrades." Sweat stung the witcher's eyes, and he blinked it out. Roy gave the knight a weak smile. "I won't leave my comrades behind."

"Comrade, huh?" Mars looked a little stunned. He had never thought this butcher would call him a comrade. Witchers aren't as aloof as the rumors say.

"Hold on. We'll be there in a moment!"

"Yeah"

Before the young witcher exhausted himself, he finally saw some familiar faces. The four witchers came down from upstairs and took them into the rooms.

***

"How are they doing?"

"Still alive." Berengar took off the apron and bloodstained leather gloves. "The guys who had their limbs broken"

"Agorn and Zerrin."

"I've reattached their bones and stitched their wounds. They'll be fine in a few months. The last guy broke a few of his ribs, but he's lucky that the bones broke off cleanly, so I didn't have to clean up, and his organs aren't hurt or bleeding." Berengar sighed. "Pity we're not in a better place. All I can do is treat his wounds and keep him alive. You must tell Adda to get a professional for this first thing tomorrow morning. It'd be great if the Lady of the Lake could help out."

Roy said, "Thank you. Never thought you were a doctor too. I thought you were just a blacksmith."

"I'm not exactly a doctor. I'm a mercenary, and I always get hurt, so I eventually picked up a few tricks." Berengar looked at the witchers. "So, kid, what happened in the sewers? These guys almost died."

***

The witchers gathered around a rectangular table, and two mangled, bloody heads sat atop it. They were trophies Roy took after killing the fleders. Their maws were open, and ugly canine teeth filled them. Someone pulled their tongues out and tied them up, hanging them under the chin. Their eyes were like rotten pomegranates. The monsters could not even close their eyes because of the immense pain they felt before their deaths.

Letho brushed his hand across the horns on their heads and moved downward. Their heads felt like a cross between leather and the skin of a lizard. When he moved his hand to their maws, he stared at their teeth as if they were horses. "Judging from this one's teeth, it wasn't even five years old when it died. The other one's more than twenty years old. Your luck's even more rotten than Kovir's rotten fish. Two in a row?" Letho looked at his apprentice again. After confirming he was in one piece, he said gratefully, "How did you do it? You only had three weak knights aiding you, and yet you bested two fleders. This is a miracle!"

"I bet they didn't even last five seconds!"

"These guys are on my list of monsters I hate the most.' They're fast and insanely powerful." Serrit crossed his arms, and he had a grim look on his face. "Even I have to be careful around these guys, or they could kill me."

"A marvelous achievement, Roy! Nicely done!" Auckes patted the young witcher's shoulder in approval. "From what I know, nobody in our school had ever defeated a fleder at your age. Not even the founder himself! And taking two out at the same time? You're the only one I know." He gave Roy a thumbs up.

Their attention was turned to the young witcher, who was leaning back on the chair. The witcher was rubbing his dog's belly and back. Gryphon closed its eyes, its whiskers trembled, and it gurgled. "There was only one fleder at first," Roy said. "I tossed a Dragon's Dream at it like Letho said, and I worked with the knights to take it down."

"So there were four of you, and you guys had the element of surprise," Letho said. "It's not impossible to kill a young fleder if you work together. They're lower vampires. Mindless creatures, but still, the older one is not to be trifled with."

"It joined the fight too late. Its brother was dead when it showed up, but it took out all the knights in one blow, and I" Roy paused for a moment and looked at the little beast. "Gryphon saved my life," he said gently. "That's how I managed to kill this beast."

"The dog saved you? That's a joke. The fleder could have swallowed it whole. It couldn't have saved you." Auckes did not believe it one bit.

"Gryphon pounced on the fleder and stopped its attack."

"Are you sure?" The witchers looked at the beast in a new light.

"Of course."

"Then that's one good dog." Auckes wanted to pet it, but Gryphon turned away. "It's brave, loyal, and managed to escape a fleder. Tough dog. Once we get ourselves some land, Gryphon's gonna guard it for us."

"I'm not sure if it's really a dog," Roy whispered. "But I did use a special skill to kill that fleder."

"I never knew you had a special skill." Auckes cracked his knuckles and approached the witcher. "I taught you all you know about swords, you cheeky little brat. I know how you move very well. There's no way you could have taken down this fleder all by yourself. Tell me the truth."

"I had two Dragon's Dream, and with my spatial abilities, I have the element of surprise on my side."

Auckes was happy with that answer, and he shot Roy a look of challenge. "I see you've improved. Wanna spar again once you heal up?"

"Sure!"

"Where's the fleder's mutagen? That's its most valuable part!" Serrit said. "You couldnt have tossed it away like you did the corpses, right?"

"I would never waste anything that valuable." Roy held the chair down and pushed himself up. He put the mutagen on the table. It was elliptical and about the size of a fist. The mutagen was a regular one.

"You can keep the mutagen, Roy. And as for the heads" Auckes squinted and looked to the side. "I'll dry them up and hang them around the saddlebag."

Turning monster heads into specimens and hanging it on saddlebags was a hobby shared by witchers. They could show their power and keep fools away from trying to rob them. Roy did not like it, however. It was too flashy. "Sure, you can have one."

"Pity it's not a garkain head." Auckes looked at the head of the beast, and he seemed a little sad. "Those fools would never try to attack me if I hung that around the saddlebag."

Garkain and fleders might both be lesser vampires, but the former was a few times more dangerous than the latter. It could even kill veteran witchers like Auckes and Letho.

"Are you stupid?" Serrit reminded Roy grimly, "Can you tell the difference between a garkain and a fleder? If you run into the former, just run. Use your spatial ability and run. Don't fight it."

"Alright."

Berengar, who had been studying the fleder's head, suddenly beckoned at them. He pried open the mouth of one of the fleders and turned its tongue around.

"What the hell is this?" Roy huddled closer and could vaguely see a line of runes underneath the tongue.

"You didn't notice?"

"I was trying to save everyone, remember? Of course I had no time to look." Roy confirmed that the line under the fleder's mouth was written in common speech. "gray ba. Grayba the Black Grayba the Black"

The witchers looked at one another, but they were all confused. Berengar quickly pried open the other fleder's mouth and checked its tongue. As expected, there was also a line branded on it, though it was a different one this time.

"Coram Agh Tera Coram Agh Tera."

Roy asked Berengar if he knew what it meant. He had no answer, and the Viper School witchers shook their heads as well.

Roy voiced his guess. "Grayba the Black sounds like a title, and that second line is a name. Judging from the grammar, the names sound like ancient aristocrats. These names must belong to two different people. They left their own brand on these fleders, just like"

"Just like what a master would do to their slaves?" Auckes asked weirdly.

"Wait. You think someone is living in the sewers and keeping these monsters as pets?" Berengar had a look of horror on his face.

"It's impossible." Serrit sounded hesitant at first, but then he was sure of himself. "Everyone, the Almanac of Creatures clearly states that fleders have little to no intelligence. They're ruled by their desire to kill and devour. There's no way someone could keep them as pets."

"Don't speak in absolutes, Serrit. Exceptions happen," Letho said. "I have a feeling Roy did not run into the fleders by accident, nor was it because of his bad luck. Someone was controlling them."

"How about this?" Berengar said, "Some powerful sorcerer kidnapped these fleders and branded them by force, enslaving them with magic. From what I know, some anesthetics and sorcery can turn fleders into servants."

Everyone was silent. There were too many questions and possibilities about the brands. They had no definitive answer yet.

"We're going to the sewers next time together, Roy."

"Yeah, but now we have to see Princess Adda." He had run out of trump cards. Roy would not enter the sewers without any protection. Who knows what kind of dangers lurk down there? There might be monsters more powerful than those fleders hiding down there.

***

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