Having eaten and given thanks to the goddess Melitele for the harvest, the people retired for the night. That year people had, as usual, celebrated the autumnal Equinox with a solemn family meal, during which all the kinds of fruits from that year's harvest had to be arrayed on the table, even if only a little of each. Everyone is now accustomed to such phenomena and they seldom evoke a great sensation. No longer is anyone astonished by the magical phenomena and mysterious occurrences that accompany the eight dates, in particular the Equinoxes and Solstices. It was not–and is not–a secret that the eight dates are days and nights during which the enchanted aura is greatly intensified. They stood out from the other dates as a lone tree stands out in a meadow. Adopted from the elven calendar, Imbolc and Lughnasadh, Samhain and Beltane, both Solstices and both Equinoxes became important holidays, sacred tides for human folk. But although people divided up the year and reckoned dates differently, they accepted the elven wheel and the eight points around its rim. When they landed on the beaches in the vicinity of the Yaruga and the Pontar, people brought with them their own calendar, based on the moon, which divided the year into twelve months, giving the farmer's annual working cycle–from the beginning, with the markers in January, until the end, when the frost turns the sod into a hard lump. These dates divide the circle into eight parts–and so in the elven calendar the year is also divided up like that.
There are also the two Equinoxes–Birke, in spring, and Velen, in autumn. Also marked on the wheel are the two Solstices, the winter one called Midinvaerne and Midaëte, for the summer.
These points, lying on the rim in pairs directly opposite each other, include Imbolc, or Budding Lughnasadh, or Mellowing Beltane, or Blooming and Samhain, or Dying. A wheel on whose rim eight magical points are etched, making a complete turn the annual cycle. Translated from original Polish by David French Read ExcerptĪs is generally known, the Universe–like life–describes a wheel. Both sides of the war have sent brutal mercenaries to hunt her down. Geralt, the Witcher, has assembled a group of allies including Dandelion, Milva, Regis, and Cahir, to rescue her. Hunted by friends and foes alike, she has taken on the guise of a petty bandit and lives free for the first time in her life.īut the net around her is closing. Ciri, the child of prophecy, has vanished. The Witcher, Geralt of Rivia, races to find her in the fourth novel of Andrzej Sapkowski’s groundbreaking epic fantasy series that inspired the hit Netflix show and the blockbuster video games.
The world is at war and the prophesied savior is nowhere to be found.
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