Castoff: The Hidden Cost (ch. 9) (Patreon)

Guts couldn’t say that he enjoyed the reunion that was going on with Ciri. He felt decidedly out of place, surrounded by people he didn’t know and didn’t know what to make of. He didn’t let the creature Dudu out of his sight, constantly keeping him in the corner of his vision to make sure that he didn’t lunge for him. Having his other eye back was proving to be rather convenient in that regard.

In general, he didn’t know what to make of any of the characters he found himself surrounded by. Dudu was a creature -- a monster. It was a difficult change to make, Guts reflected in silence -- he spent the past few years guided by the Brand on his neck, letting it guide him to apostles. Without fail, when he found one that made his Brand bleed, he killed them. Without fail. It made standing in the room with a creature and not killing it… feel unnatural.

He had to remind himself that Dudu wasn’t an apostle. He hadn’t sacrificed his humanity for the sake of power, enslaving himself to the Godhand. Dudu was never human in the first place. Still, the creature made Guts uneasy, especially when he seemed so unassuming or stole brief glances at Guts before returning his attention to the reunion.

Dandelion was… Guts wasn’t even sure. His outfit was loud and obnoxious -- bright purple, burnished gold jewelry, and white ruffles. It was beyond impractical by any metric. Unless you were trying to be the center of attention in every single room that you were in, and based on what Guts gleamed from the brief interaction he had with the man, that didn’t seem far off. What relationship he had with Ciri was a bit of a mystery, but he seemed to be some kind of parental figure.

Guts wasn’t sure how Ciri managed to talk him into this, he thought to himself, watching the redheaded woman and Ciri hug, both overjoyed to see one another. Triss -- the red head -- didn’t seem that old. Guts would put her in her early to mid-twenties. Her clothing told Guts that she was trying to be discrete and avoid attention, but she didn’t know what it was like to be poor. Her clothing and cloak were finely made, and more importantly, they were clean. A dead giveaway that she had money, and that would bring all the wrong kinds of attention right to her.

“Triss! I- what are you doing here? We were about to start looking for you!” Ciri exclaimed, breaking the hug, but still holding onto Triss by her hands. Triss seemed to drink Ciri in, her dark green eyes lingering on the scar on her cheek, a small disbelieving laugh escaping her.

“I’m- well, I was looking for something. Some of my instruments picked up a magical disturbance, and I thought it might have been a mage. I was here to find them before the Witch Hunters did,” Triss confessed. “Was that you? Wait, no… it was… you?” Triss questioned, sounding surprised by it and her expression grew increasingly surprised as she took measure of Guts.

Ciri looked between them because Guts didn’t respond verbally beyond looking at Ciri with an expression that conveyed ‘you explain.’ Ciri picked up on it with no issue, “That’s actually what we wanted to find you for. This is Guts -- he’s a friend. One that I think I kidnapped from his Sphere on my way to this one,” Ciri explained and Dandelion threw back his head, looking to the heaven as if he were praying for strength.

While Dudu chuckled, Triss seemed contemplative. “That could explain it, I suppose,” Triss remarked, approaching Guts with a complete absence of fear. That either meant that she was an idiot, or there was truth to what Ciri said. Guts had never seen a magician before. In his travels across Midgard, fighting as a mercenary, he had met plenty that claimed to be, but they always turned out to be con artists.

Any thought that Triss was just another con artist in a long line of con artists was brushed away when sparks of light emerged from her fingertips when she came to a stop directly infront of him, something flashing over her eyes. Whatever she saw made her brow furrow, “I don’t suppose you could bend down for me? There’s something on your neck I need to see,” she requested.

She sensed the Brand. More than the little sparks of light, that convinced Guts that Triss had… something. He wasn’t sure if he was willing to believe in magic outright, but Triss had something that was supernatural. Beyond what any regular human would have.

“You can trust her, Guts,” Ciri echoed, offering an encouraging smile. “If there’s anyone that can help you, its Triss,” she added and Guts just grunted in response. Trust. That wouldn’t happen. The days of trust died with the Band of the Hawk. But, Guts couldn’t deny it.

His joints felt like they were filled with sand. Every muscle ached and was sore. His strength was sapped and his thoughts were sluggish. It had been a week since he last slept and while it wasn’t the longest he had gone without, it didn’t mean the effects weren’t wearing him down. When Ciri made her offer, Guts hadn’t put an ounce of stock into it. It was clearly a desperate move, trying to use the closest thing he had to a weakness against him to prevent him from abandoning her and the kids.

Because of it, Guts never really stopped to consider…

Could Triss help him? To get rid of the side effects of the Brand while keeping the reasons why he needed it -- to help him hunt apostles?

Ciri almost seemed to sense his thoughts because her smile took a sadder edge to it, “Come on, Guts. The worst thing that can happen is that she can’t help you, and that just means we try something else,” she encouraged, making Guts scowl at how easily she had been able to read him. Guts couldn’t hear it, but he was sure that Puck was having a laugh in his pouch.

“Fine,” Guts growled the word out, reaching back to unsheath Dragonslayer, making Triss’ eyes widen while Dandelion sputtered when Guts leaned it against the bar.

“No- no! The floor, you’ll ruin the fl- oh, never mind,” he grumbled, dragging a hand over his face as Guts took a seat on a bench, allowing Triss to look down at him. He clenched his jaw when he first felt Triss’ hands lightly touch the side of his neck. Where the Brand was.

He hated being touched. It was a hatred that never faded. There had only been one person whose touch he learned to welcome… and she was more than a world away.

If Triss noticed then she kept it to herself, “I recognize the root of the marking.” Triss remarked, surprising Guts because he fully expected this to be a dead end. “But, I’ve never seen it used like this before. How did it wind up on you? Because this is… it’s incredible magic. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

An image of the Eclipse flashed in his mind, making him clench his teeth. However, it was Ciri that spoke up.

“What do you mean by that? It’s a curse, right?” That’s what it was. A Brand of Sacrifice, marking him for eternal damnation in that chaotic tide of consciousness to suffer for eternity. Guts had no faith in heaven’s existence, but he had seen hell with his own eyes.

“A curse?” Triss questioned and when Guts refused to speak, Ciri spoke for him.

“It attracts monsters to him. And evil spirits. I’ve never seen anything like it, but as soon as the sun goes down, shadows become alive with ghosts that can possess corpses. Guts would know more, but he doesn’t seem to be in the mood for using his words,” she remarked, earning an agreeing grunt from Guts. Triss did seem faintly amused by the byplay while Dandelion paled at the prospect, realizing why they had a deadline to get out of the city.

Triss lightly touched near the Brand, making Guts tense and grit his teeth. “This is preliminary, but that could be a side effect rather than intention,” Triss said, a frown in her voice. “The reason why I noticed you -- that my instruments picked up on your presence -- is because this Brand is… weird, for a lack of a better word. The reason why I noticed it was because it’s drawing a huge amount of power towards it. I almost mistook it for a Source, but it’s the exact opposite.”

What that meant, Guts didn’t have a clue but it did mean something to Ciri based on how startled she seemed. Triss continued without missing a beat, “It acts… almost like a spigot, in a way. It’s drawing power -- chaos -- from this world and funneling it through the Brand.” Guts twitched at that, something that Triss didn’t miss. “Does that mean something to you?”

He didn’t want to tell them. It was his business. And try as they might, they could never understand what transpired that day. “The Brand. It’s a mark of sacrifice,” Guts stated, knowing that he had to offer the information. There wasn’t a point to withholding it beyond his pride and privacy. “It was put on me for the ascension of another.”

“Is someone feeding off of it? Like a parasite?” Ciri questioned, sounding genuinely alarmed by what she heard, a hand going to her sword as if she was willing to fight. Guts felt tired seeing it. A deep exhaustion that seemed to hollow out his bones and fill them with lead.

“I wouldn’t say that yet,” Triss stated, withdrawing her hands form his neck. “The Brand itself, in function, seems to be a signal fire and a hole. I can’t be certain if the chaos that it draws to it is being funneled away somewhere else, or if it’s just being released from our world and dispersed. The difference being akin to whether a waterskin with a hole in it is being used to fill up a cup or simply spilling out on the floor.”

Guts grunted, understanding what she meant. “And how could you learn which it is?” He questioned, his voice a low growl at the mere idea that Griffith could be feasting off of him. While he didn’t really understand everything that they were saying -- Sources, chaos, magic -- he understood more than enough to paint a picture. He could be acting as a parasite in this world, leeching away at this ‘chaos’ to feed it to Griffith, making him stronger.

He’d sooner slit his own throat than allow that.

“I… would need rather specialized tools. And help,” Triss admitted after a long moment, her gaze flickering to Ciri. “Just peering past our Sphere is an incredible feat, Ciri. Looking into another would normally be outright impossible. The only reason why I won’t say that it isn't in this case is because of the Brand and… you. If this Brand is connected to another Sphere, then that means there is, in theory, a trail to be followed. Your ability to jump between Spheres, if focused, in theory, could allow us to see where that trail leads. But, to even see if it is possible, we need your help.”

“You have it,” Ciri decided, speaking without a moment of hesitation. Guts felt a pang of… something in his chest. What it was, he didn’t know before he crushed it into nothing. “But if the curse aspects of the Brand are side effects, then can you do anything about them?” She pressed and Guts prepared himself for the no that was coming. He didn’t mind it. If it meant the Brand helped him find apostles, then he was more than happy to trade sleepless nights filled with violence.

Triss hesitated for a long moment, giving Guts his answer- “I should be able to,” Triss answered after a long pause. “Knowing exactly what the Brand is sure would help with that, but in theory a powerful enough suppression charm should suppress the curse symptoms.”

“Meaning what?” Guts questioned, his eyes narrowed, waiting for the other foot to drop. What would it cost him? What would it take?

“Meaning that you can finally go to bed,” Ciri informed him, earning a sharp look from him. “And not have to worry about monsters every time the sun sets. I’m sure that you’ll miss that a little, but you’ll have a lot fewer reasons to be so grumpy.” She remarked, trying to break the tension with a joke. Guts didn’t laugh. It felt like something heavy was sitting on his chest, and the tension was forming a powerful knot between his shoulderblades.

He worked his jaw for a moment, not even knowing what he was feeling. Relief, maybe? Uncertainty, for certain. It wasn’t that he wasn’t… happy that the effects of the Brand would be sealed away, it was that he didn’t trust it. Good things didn’t come for free. It was the opposite. Good things had the greatest cost of all and it could only be paid for in suffering and blood. “How would you do it?” He questioned, not trusting it. Not in the slightest.

“I have a place that I’m staying within the city,” Triss informed. “I should have what I need there. And I think I might even have something that would help in figuring out what that Brand is too,” she remarked, her tone down right friendly. It made Guts trust her less and less with every word she spoke. “I think it would be best if we relocate there as soon as possible. I managed to find you because I was already looking. If someone else happens to be…”

Guts suppressed a twitch at that, unease coursing through him. It could be true. It was even probably true. It was how she found them. Or so she said. But it felt like Guts was being lead around by the nose, something he wasn't at all comfortable with. His gaze darted to Ciri, seeing her mod in agreement. Ciri trusted Triss. What their relationship was wasn't clear, but there was absolute trust there. She knew that she could rely on Triss.

That was the only reason why Guts didn't walk away, he knew deep in his soul. "Fine," Guts bit the word out, agreeing before he changed his mind and rose to his full height. Triss cocked an eyebrow at his tone but Ciri was quick to smooth over any ruffle feathers. "Don't take it personally. He's not a very trusting fellow."

"Who clearly doesn't mind being talked about to his face," Dandelion remarked, earning a grunt of agreement from Guts. "Well, it's a sad thing to see you go so soon, my dear. Just know that the Hall of Rosemary and Thyme shall always open its doors for you. And you as well, Triss, even if I do feel a mit ignored." Dandelion said, throwing in a theatrical bow that had both women rolling their eyes but smiles tugged at their lips.

"You'll be less ignored when you get this place up and running, Dandelion. I only stayed away because of the smell. And because I didn't want to bring trouble to your doorstep," Triss offered, earning a roguish grin from Dandelion.

"Why, I always welcome trouble at my doorstep, Triss. Especially when it's friends that bring it," Dandelion stated, raising from his bow. Guts gave the bard a measuring look that lingered before he looked away, grabbing Dragonslayer to resheath the blade on his back. Flowery appearance aside, Guts could hear the sincerity in the man's statement. He had more mettle than Guts gave him credit for.

With a promise to return, the three of them left the run down brothel, following Triss through the streets. Guts noticed something quickly. Or, rather, it was the absence of something. He was tall and wide. He drew attention genuinely everywhere he went, if only out of a sense of self preservation. However, people didn't give him so much as a glance as they walked through the streets.

"I'm guessing that's how you managed to remain hidden?" Ciri questioned as they walked, proving that she noticed it too.

"A careful bit of spell work," Triss admitted without pause. "It helps you blend in, but it won't stop anyone from seeing you if they're looking for you and have a description. Such as a witch with red hair," Triss admitted and Guts' guard rose with the statement. She was using magic to manipulate people's perception? Their minds? How did he knew that wasn't the case for him as well? Did she make him more agreeable-

"Psst. PSST!" Puck whispered from his pouch and Guts looked down at the e- fairy to see that a pale blue hand was giving him a thumbs up. "She's okay. You can trust her." Puck vouched for Triss and Guts swallowed a scoff. As if. The only reason he was willing to entertain that idea was because Triss shouldn't know about Puck. Then again, he didn't know the limitations of magic, so perhaps she did and she was merely not giving an indication that she did.

His instincts were screaming at him, but they were screaming wordlessly. He felt like he was walking into a situation that he wasn't equipped to handle because he didn't know how to fight against magic. Not this kind.

"In Novigrad, I'm Trancisica Meriden. Lower mobility fleeing the war. I doubt that the cover will last forever, though. The Witch Hunters are surprisingly proficient. Some of us think that they have mages working for them," Triss spoke as they walked through the city. They were entering finer parts of it, that was for certain -- the roads were less crowded, the buildings were made out of fine stone and the area was cleaner. Noble quarters, if Guts had to guess.

"Willingly?" Guts questioned, trying to get a handle on the dynamics of the land. Now that he knew that mages had actual magic, the Witch Hunters’ existence was questionable. He thought they were fools that were grabbing hedge witches, wise women, and anyone else that was a social outcast to take to the torch, calling them mages because they couldn't understand what they did. But, if mages had this kind of power -- to move unseen in a crowd of people… it became a very real question of how they could be captured.

Triss glanced over her shoulder at him, her face a grimace. "Most… I imagine are tortured into compliance, but I'm certain there are a few that would help the Witch Hunters to be spared their wrath." That partly answered his question, but not all of it. It made since that a mage would be able to handle a mage, but not so much how regular men were able to capture and torture mages that they did get their hands on. Did they have their magic stolen? Suppressed? Or was there a hard limit to what magic could do?

“Do you know where?” Ciri questioned, an edge in her voice.

“I have an idea,” Triss confirmed, saying nothing but everything at the same time. However, before Ciri could respond, Triss came to a stop. “This is us,” she informed, pushing open the door to a high-class inn. Marble floors, statues and art lined the walls, the furniture was luxurious and the air was a sickening blend of perfumes. A single cushion was likely worth enough to feed a family of ten for a month.

Guts wasn’t immune to wealth. He fought for years for coin, risking his life more times than he cared to count for a pouch of gold. But, he could never understand this -- the finery and splendor. It felt wasteful and pointless. Then again, he didn’t have a drop of blue blood in him, maybe if he did, it wouldn’t strike him as a complete waste of money.

Triss’ entrance didn’t go unnoticed by a well-dressed man with graying hair, his gaze flickering to Guts. It seems that he had been looking for them. Guts wondered if it was going to be a problem until Triss easily dismissed the man by claiming that Ciri was a noble friend while Guts was their mercenary bodyguard. A lie that the man easily swallowed and allowed them to enter Triss’ quarters with no further issue.

Guts wasn’t sure what he expected, but it wasn’t to be greeted by the smell of old books and ink. The apartment was fine, equal to anything he saw in Midland during his brief tenure as a knight. However, it was completely cluttered with books and odd instruments that Guts couldn’t even begin to guess the purpose of. It struck him as more of a storage room than it did a bedroom.

“Ciri, I need a drop of Ghoul’s blood, ground Nostrix, and a vial of Arachas venom to start,” Triss informed, navigating the mess while Ciri was left gaping at it for a long moment.

“Started hoarding, I see?” Ciri remarked as she followed through with the instructions, recognizing them amongst the mess of alchemical ingredients. Guts had visited an herbalist back in Oxenfurt to create more blackpowder, but he hadn’t seen many of the reagents that were in the room in the shop. Telling him they were far more specialized and rarer in nature.

“Not by choice,” Triss answered as she started to take stacks of books apart, looking for something in particular. “I’m looking for storage for most of it, but with the refugee crisis, it's become next to impossible. I was smuggling it out where I could, only for the men that I used to get hanged by the law.” Meaning that she couldn’t just outright mind-control people? Guts stood silently by the door, watching the two women work at their own tasks.

“Have things really gotten that bad for sorcerers in the city?” Ciri questioned, gathering another list of ingredients and begining to prepare them with practiced ease. From Guts’ view, the mixture was becoming a thick paste.

“Things have gotten that bad in general,” Triss admitted, a sigh in her voice, grabbing a book and setting it to the side before she took over making the paste. “Don’t tell Yen this, but she was right. The Lodge overreached and now everyone is suffering for it.”

Ciri perked up, “Have you heard anything about her? Dandelion told me that she was missing.”

To that, Triss shook her head. “The last I heard, Geralt was looking for her.” There was an odd tone in her voice. Almost like she was nervous about him finding her. “I’ve heard rumors on the occasion, but mages have learned to keep hidden. Even from each other. I’m sorry, but I don’t know any more than you do.” Triss told her, and she did sound genuinely sad about that.

Guts got the impression that the relationship between Triss, Yennifer, and Geralt was complicated in nature.

“Now,” Triss spoke up while Ciri looked sad momentarily, “despite the Witch Hunters best efforts, I think I may have something about that Brand.” Triss said, picking up the book that she set to the side. Guts felt doubt well up inside of him but his curiosity got the better of him. He never cared about the answers of who and what or even why in regard to the Brand. He only cared about what it could do. Now, answers were being offered and he found himself wanting to know.

“I don’t have any talent for mystic languages, but I managed to rescue this from a book burning,” Triss informed, flipping the heft tome open and Guts saw that it was ancient. “It’s a theory proposed by a Magnus Pemberton two centuries after the Convergence about the nature of language.”

Guts frowned at the book while Ciri cocked an eyebrow, also not seeing the connection. Leaving Triss to elaborate. “Guts, you’re from a different Sphere, correct?” She questioned, earning a curt nod from him. “Yet, here we are, conversing without any difficulty despite all the rules of linguistics and local dialects. By all means, you should be hearing gibberish from me. We shouldn’t be speaking the same language, yet we are.”

His eye narrowed, understanding exactly what she was getting at while Ciri’s face pinched. “I… I’ve never had any difficulty communicating. Some places have additional languages, but I’ve never been to a Sphere where I couldn’t talk to anyone.” She admitted, earning a small laugh from Triss.

“Poor Pemberton. Born a few centuries too early,” Triss remarked, flipping through the pages with great care. “What he purposed was that all languages, throughout the Spheres, had a single root language. He called it the true language of men: Babel. He spent the entirety of his life searching for signs that his theory was correct -- he was a real adventurer in his time -- but he never found concrete evidence. What he did find is a working theory,” Triss continued, flipping to a page before stopping.

Guts couldn’t read a single word on the pages, but he did see one thing that made his heart clench in his chest. It wasn’t the Brand that was on his neck, but it was damn close. The only difference was there wasn’t a line through the intersection or a third prong. “How did he find this?” Guts growled the question, his Brand throbbing with a phantom pain. A pain received when it seared itself into the side of his neck.

“I wish I knew,” Triss answered him, sounding apologetic. “If Pemberton ever wrote it down, then the Witch Hunters burned it. If he didn’t, then he took the secret to his grave. But, he did theorize that if you find ruins old enough in any Sphere, then you could find evidence of Babel."

"Okay," Ciri muttered, taking the book while Triss seemed to be placing the finishing touches on whatever it was that she was making. "So… we… what, exactly?" Ciri asked, sounding at a loss on what to do with the information.

The Eclipse flashed through his mind, all of it. "The only types to use it would be gods," Guts grunted, earning a puzzled look from Ciri. "Making it powerful, right?" He ventured and Triss seemed surprised that he arrived at that conclusion, and he could see that she started to have questions of her own.

"Exactly," Triss nodded. "I believe I can suppress the Brand, but it is a question of how long or even how much. The only way to completely suppress it would be to use Babel. The language of the gods," she remarked, narrowing her eyes at him. "I don't suppose you would happen to know anyone-"

"No," Guts snarled the world with enough force that Triss took a half step back, her eyes widening a fraction. Her gaze flickered to Ciri, who simply sighed before Triss looked back to him. The only one he could think of would be Skull Knight, but that was a reach.

"I- very well then," Triss decided, letting the topic drop. "Take a seat then and I can apply the seal. It won't take but a moment," she requested and Guts stilled. He had to make a decision. He didn't trust Triss in the slightest before, and what he knew of magic made him actively distrust her now. His gaze slid to Ciri, almost of their own will to see that her expression was excited. She was feeling anticipation for him.

Against his better nature, Guts took a seat, setting Dragonslayer to the side.

In one hand, Triss carried the bowl and with the other, she began to shift through the air before she spoke. Guts didn't understand the words, but he could feel them humming with power. A thick black ink rose up from the bowl, leaving a dried out paste before the black ink moved forward. He felt it circling near the Brand before there was a slight pinch and a flash of warmth. "There, all done," Triss said, setting the bowl down. Ciri drew her sword and offered the blade as a reflection so Guts could see the seal. Around the Brand was a chain of what looked like letters in a language he couldn't read that formed three rings.

A hand went to it to find smooth skin. A tattoo, in practice.

Even seeing it, Guts didn't believe it would work. He wouldn't until the dead left him alone when the sun set. "What about getting me back to my Sphere?" He questioned, raising back to his feet. Ciri did seem a bit disappointed that he wasn't happier, but also didn't seem very surprised. Triss cocked an eyebrow, clearly expecting a thank you. She was left wanting.

"As I said, to even make an attempt to guide you back to your Sphere, I would need a lot more resources than I have. Sorcerers, to start with. Yen would be ideal, but the only other one I would trust with something like this would be Philippa Eilhart, but I haven't seen her in about a year now. And when I did, she was focused on regrowing her eyes." Triss stated, crossing her arms over her chest.

He knew exactly where this was going. "How can we get you the resources that you need?" Guts questioned and Triss gave him a slight smirk of approval. He preferred it. A give and take. To be helped, he had to help her first. He trusted that a lot more than the kindness of her heart.

"I can think of a few things… but it is going to be rather difficult for you," Triss said, her smile widening and Guts was reminded of a cat that was about to swallow a mouse. "It involves a lot of smiling."