[ Time feels as though it's moving very slowly. Somewhere overhead, the bird screeches out a warning note.
In the dusty shadows of the waning sunlight, the silhouettes of roughly half a dozen men stand out against the bare landscape. Some sit around the campfire, with the scent of tobacco smoke and meat rising in the air, drinking and carousing. One is a short ways from the camp, by the stream. A couple more are crouched or standing around a pile of unclear, dark shapes on the ground, which solidify in a rush as reality snaps back into place. Saddlebags, blankets, a sheath.
The gleaming blade is free from it, catching the light. The hand that holds its hilt doesn't belong to its owner.
Between one heartbeat and the next, Ciri remembers only seeing the scene stretching out beneath her, and then descending upon the camp like a storm. She doesn't remember drawing her sword.
Not until the screaming starts.
The man swinging Geralt's sword around like a prize toy is her first target. Digging her heels into her horse's flanks, Ciri charges at him without slowing, her blade swinging from the side and up in a vicious arc that divests the bandit of his stolen weapon -- and about two-thirds of his arm. ]
cw gore, dismemberment
In the dusty shadows of the waning sunlight, the silhouettes of roughly half a dozen men stand out against the bare landscape. Some sit around the campfire, with the scent of tobacco smoke and meat rising in the air, drinking and carousing. One is a short ways from the camp, by the stream. A couple more are crouched or standing around a pile of unclear, dark shapes on the ground, which solidify in a rush as reality snaps back into place. Saddlebags, blankets, a sheath.
The gleaming blade is free from it, catching the light. The hand that holds its hilt doesn't belong to its owner.
Between one heartbeat and the next, Ciri remembers only seeing the scene stretching out beneath her, and then descending upon the camp like a storm. She doesn't remember drawing her sword.
Not until the screaming starts.
The man swinging Geralt's sword around like a prize toy is her first target. Digging her heels into her horse's flanks, Ciri charges at him without slowing, her blade swinging from the side and up in a vicious arc that divests the bandit of his stolen weapon -- and about two-thirds of his arm. ]