Harry Potter In The Witcher

1264, Deep Mountain Pass Close to Kaer Morhen

Triss's POV:

Triss covered her eyes with a gloved hand, trying to shield them from the heavy, relentless onslaught of snow she was currently wading through.

She couldn't be quite sure, but she was pretty certain the blizzard was actually getting even worse.

She didn't ponder it for long, though, as she was currently focusing all of her magical and mental energy on just keeping herself warm enough not to freeze to death, and shielding herself and her poor, exhausted horse with as much protective magic as she possibly could.

Sadly, even her considerable magical abilities had their limits, and she was pretty sure she was rapidly closing in on them.

"Blast it all," she murmured to herself, her breath frosting in the frigid air.

She had been so close, so sure she would make it to the ancient Witcher keep before the worst of the storm hit. She had either timed her journey poorly, or the storm had sped up with unnatural ferocity.

Either way, she was now well and truly stuck in it. She patted her mind-numbed horse on its icy side and urged it to keep moving forward, which it did, albeit at an extremely, agonizingly slow rate.

However, just as quickly and as inexplicably as the blizzard had seemed to descend upon her, it was suddenly… gone.

Triss looked around in utter confusion. The storm was still raging all around her, a howling, white-out vortex of wind and snow, yet there seemed to be some sort of invisible, magical dome she had just entered, a dome that was keeping the blizzard completely at bay.

She knew the spell that could do this, of course, a powerful, advanced version of a weather-warding charm, though she herself wouldn't have been able to hold it for very long, and certainly not long enough to make it all the way to Kaer Morhen.

She looked around, searching for the powerful sorcerer or sorceress who could have possibly put up such a massive, stable dome.

She looked up at the shimmering, invisible roof of the dome, then back down to the ground.

Where there had once been a treacherous, snow-covered path, there now sat a man, comfortably situated next to a roaring, cheerful fireplace, which she was absolutely positive had not been there a mere moment before she had looked up. Nonetheless, with little other choice, she cautiously approached the man.

If she were to be completely honest with herself, the very first thing she noticed about him was that the man looked like the complete and utter opposite of Geralt.

Where Geralt had tough, rugged features and more of a roguish, world-weary look to him, this man had softer, almost boyish features, and a kind, friendly face.

Where Geralt was built with solid, hard-earned muscle in every place that could possibly have muscle, this man seemed to be much skinnier, though a closer look revealed that he possessed a more lean, swimmer's type of muscle.

The hair, however, was probably the most obvious, and most striking, difference.

Geralt had his signature, shoulder-length ashen-white hair, whereas this man had short, impossibly messy hair that was blacker than any hair she had ever seen on anyone, save for perhaps her friend, Yennefer.

After she had finished her brief, initial observation of him, she decided to walk up to him, her boots crunching softly on the snow-free ground.

"Hello, stranger," Triss said, trying her best to sound polite and non-threatening. "I never thought I'd find another mage this far up in these desolate mountains. May I ask what you're doing so far North?" There was nothing up here for miles and miles, besides the crumbling ruins of Kaer Morhen, and she wondered, with a flicker of suspicion, if this man had perhaps been summoned by the Chapter to "check on" Vesemir and the other Witchers as well.

The black-haired, deceptively young-looking man looked up from the crackling fire and smiled charmingly at her, a warm, disarming smile. There was something almost… familiar in that smile, though she couldn't quite place it.

"Hello to you as well," he said, his voice pleasant and clear. "Oh, you know, I just happened to be in the neighborhood when I saw you slugging your way up this mountain, right through the heart of that nasty storm. I thought I would give you a little, magically-created rest stop before you keeled over from exhaustion and froze to death. Triss Merigold, am I correct?" the man asked, his green eyes twinkling with a strange, knowing light.

Triss's eyebrow twitched at his overly casual explanation, and she was instantly

suspicious of the man.

While he sounded honest enough, there was absolutely no way a mage of his apparent power just happened to be up here, in the middle of nowhere, for no reason. Could he be some sort of spy? Or perhaps an assassin, sent to intercept her?

"Ah, you're giving me the 'Is he a spy?' look," the man said, his smile turning into a wry grin. "Gods, you wouldn't believe how many times I have received that exact look over the years.

That's why I generally like common folk so much more. You tell them that you're doing something nice for them, and they usually, without question, just believe you."

"You do that with a noble, or a mage, and they immediately assume you either want something from them, or you're secretly planning to kill them. What a terribly exhausting way to live one's life, don't you think?" The man said, his tone one of light, detached amusement.

As he spoke, he reached into a snow pile next to him and, impossibly, pulled out an ornate, expensive-looking bottle and two crystal glasses. She realized, with a jolt of surprise, that the bottle was a very fine, very expensive vintage of wine.

"That's because they are not educated enough to realize when they are being taken advantage of," Triss commented, though she decided to sit down on a log near the fire, figuring, for the moment, that the man probably didn't actually mean her any harm.

Hopefully.

"Can't argue with that in the slightest," he said with a nod.

"Their ignorance, their simplicity, tends to be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they tend to not be so distrusting of the world around them, which gives them an innocent, almost sweet demeanor at times. Yet," he added, his expression not changing but his voice taking on a harder edge.

"I also know, from first-hand, personal experience, the sheer blackness that can hide in their souls. I know how easily they can turn from simple farmers and merchants into a jeering, hateful crowd, cheering with glee at watching a fellow sentient being be lit on fire for no other crime than simply being… different. Truly, utterly disgusting."

While his topic of conversation had gotten considerably darker, his expression and his light, conversational tone did not change in the slightest.

While he talked, he expertly uncorked the bottle and poured her a glass of what looked like a rich, dark red wine.

When it was close to a quarter full, he stopped and handed it to her. She took it, but did not drink any of it just yet. She wanted to see him drink from the bottle first. A simple, but necessary, precaution.

"Yes, well," Triss said, her voice a little defensive now, "they are simply products of their environment, are they not? They only know how to be what they were raised as, what they were taught."

She knew the common people weren't all good and kind, that they could, in fact, be downright despicable at times.

But how could you expect someone to be better, to rise above their station, if you didn't give them the tools, the education, to do so?

"That excuse can only go so far, in my book," the man said, shaking his head slightly. "I don't think it takes a great deal of education or enlightenment to realize that killing innocents is just… wrong. But, enough about all that dreary stuff. Let's talk about you. How have you been, Triss?" the man asked, as he took a sip of the wine directly from the bottle.

Triss looked at him in open confusion, her guard lowering slightly now that she had seen him drink. "I'm sorry," she said, finally taking a small, tentative sip of the wine herself. It was, as she had suspected, absolutely delicious. A fine Beauclair vintage, clearly. "I… I don't recall us ever meeting before."