Butcher of Buki. (Part 1)

Buki.

What can traveler tell about this little town on the edge of Kestrel Mountains? Essentially nothing, it was boring and completely normal small town with local populace like everywhere else. They lived their lives and didn't like to be disturbed.

Be it Nilfgaard, war or Scoia'taels, witchers or mages, they didn't even want to know anything about their own king, whom none of the townsfolk ever saw in flesh and blood. All they care about is when and with what to fill their stomach during day, not ignoring where and with whom will be spent their night.

Tanhir, son of a farmer, was like that.

He hated work and preferred to be with Julia, who was local town's widow for hire. Her husband died early and what she did to survive and earn her keep was offering herself for money after a prolonged time of starving without husband's support.

Now she is good.

Good to everyone who pays, and Tanhir was able to steal some crops from the field here and there and spend some nights with the woman. But this day was bound to be different.

As usual, he went to the field for a day of work and hated it. He also hated town's mayor who can fuck Julia whenever he pleases for free and captain of the guards Huntor, who in his opinion was a sadistic ass and sometimes beat him up for stealing if he was caught.

But, as was mentioned, today was bound to be a different day. Because he landed on the outskirts of the fields and saw a lone horseman approaching their borders. He was contemplating to warn the man about Huntor's love to blackmail lone travelers, when a beautiful black horse stopped on the road and rider removed the hood.

The outer appearance of the youth, and it was just a young man of about sixteen to seventeen in age, made him really jealous. But what made him cringe and become even more displeased with the newcomer is swords on his back and medallion of the grinning wolf head dawdling on his chest.

Youth looked at him and Tanhir froze for a moment. Deep purple eyes looked as if they read through him completely, forcing the man to stare at the ground with tinge of fear. They were not the eyes of a human, but a monster.

Tanhir didn't hear how the rider with one soundless move disembarked from the horse, neither he noticed the later approach him like a specter – fast, without disturbing a single blade of grass.

He paid attention to the young man only when he saw his strange but clearly very comfortable black boots right in front of him and a chill ran through his spine. Tanhir raised his head and felt time stop. These eyes had vertical slits like the one of a dragon!

"Oh, shit! Ya monster... don't kill me..." - he jumped back in fright, defending himself with a spade. The youth looked at him and there was only unimpressed boredom on his face.

"I just want to ask couple of questions." - Tanhir heard an even and calm voice. He was surprised and partly relieved, because the stranger didn't sound cold or threatening. It was a voice you hear every day, but his intonations and speech were unusual.

"Ya...ya from'a big city or what?" - asked Tanhir and looked at the youth with attention. He wore strange armor, like nothing he saw before. It copied the structure of a human muscles and have slick armor plating outlining them, coupled with clearly easy to move in cloth coat, with several coattails going down to his knees and a broad belt holding it tight to the body.

'All g'arls will'a be mine if I can have such armor. No! That g'arl will'a marry me, if I have this!' - thought Tanhir with thick jealousy, but now he didn't dare to not speak up, because he could tell from a glance who stood in front of him. A monster slayer, a witcher, who are coldblooded slaughterers and death machines themselves. It is said they eat monsters and drinking their blood and need to kill a person each day to stay sane and sometimes even eat children for breakfast.

"Is this Buki town? Is there a caravan here that recently arrived?" - asked the young man.

"Y-Yes?" - Tanhir was to nervous to talk properly. And he felt fear when he heard a sigh and was ready to defend himself out of nervousness. But then he suddenly calmed down and realized there was nothing to fear and even experienced some warmth inside. He raised his eyes and noticed that the young man was not that scary anymore.

He didn't pay attention to a little light dying down in his eyes.

"So, is it Buki? And caravan?" - asked Alan. He already regretted wasting so much time on the local farmer, could have just went inside and ask the guards.

"Yes, Buki, Buki. And yesterday caravan came, yeah." - nodded young man, he was about twenty five perhaps, not like it matters. Alan gave him couple of coins. - "Come with me, I need a local to show me a way to the mayor house."

'If there is a house at all. This place is very much like Haeudvun, only called a town, but in reality just a village, albeit big.'

"Ya won't regret this! Imma tell ya all things about my town, yeah!" - Tanhir looked at the coins with clear love at first sight, as if they opened some new world for him. - "Hehe, see, we are all good people here, yeah! Come, come... let imma help ya with... oh shit! No!"

'I'm already regretting it.'

"Don't touch my horse. It is trained to not let others touch without my permission." - said Alan, taking the reigns himself. - "Just lead the way. And tell me about the caravan."

"Oh... it's there." - Tanhir waived his hand to the outer fringes of the town. - "Oh. Yeah, they are there too." - he pointed at the town.

"Can you be more coherent?" - Alan asked the man, whose brain got trouble working correctly.

"Corent... wha?"

"Forget it. Just show me the way to the mayor."

"Hehe, yeah..." - the guy rubbed his head dumbly. He never learned how to read or write, even not knowing how to count to ten. All his life was about plowing fields and smuggling some radishes for Julia to suck his dick and rive it from time to time.

He was really simple. Even a brick has more purpose in it's existence than the man in front of Alan.

They approached impoverished town with a simple fence from decomposing beams and planks. The only thing that told about the name of a town was a road sign, that showed direction to Flotsam to the south and Ban Clean to the west. And even it was implanted at the roadside askew, showing negligence in all it's prime.

"Yo, if its not my pal Tanhir! Come here boya, need a lil chat." - a voice came from the side of a burly man in typical Kaedwen colored armor. It was mainly yellow with some tinges of black and neutral gray. He even had a helmet and an halberd, but he left the later by the fence gaining rust from being stick into the moist mud of the road.

"Wha ya need Huntor? I have job to do, yeah!" - Tanhir raised his nose higher to the sky and said cockily, but his knees were trembling and it was clear, both men don't have good history among each other.

Alan took a look at the man without any fascination. But when the later finally came over and saw the former, who simply escaped his line of sight because of Sparky, that's when the man suddenly stopped on his tracks and other guards formed a semicircle at the entrance vigilantly.

"Who are ya?" - he asked taking a step back. Unlike what many might think, Huntor is not your average bloke, he is a bit smarter and what his smarts always told him is not to piss off a witcher. He wasn't new to the folks, as once a witcher actually dragged him out of ghouls claws. That day the man realized how different a mutants like them are from normal people in terms of strength.

"Alan. Witcher. Wolf School." - simply stated the youth and Huntor knew better than disrespect him. It wasn't out of good feelings, if anything he would like to see all non-human shits and mutants burn and get killed. No, it's because he knew the consequences of fighting the witcher and most likely it would be his dismembered body.

Only an idiot wants to be on receiving end of the witcher's sword.

Before anyone can tell anything, Huntor raised his hand to shut them up. He had his own share of authority here, as they listened.

"Witcher, you better go straight to the mayor. He might have work for ya kind."

"I will. Huntor, right?"

The guard nodded. He wasn't that nervous as he knew witchers preferred to stay out of trouble and don't actively seek conflicts if they can be avoided.

"What do you know about the caravan?"

"Mayor, witcher. This merchant shit already caused us some trouble. Goyle and Frank died."

"Fine. Tanhir, lead the way." - he can ask people later if mayor appeared to be ignorant or simply idiotic enough to ignore the issue.

Farmer raised his head high and with a smug look moved forward.

'I bet he will have one hell of a beating after I leave.'

Alan followed, looking around. Mainly Buki was a quite place, far away from main roads and the fact that a caravan arrived here was baffling to the locals. But not to Alan, as he tracked it for several days already.

It all started from the events on the bridge, where he crossed Buina.