Night Blunder.

It was nearing nighttime and sun already colored ambiance in red tones of ruby and crimson. World relented to the change with cacophony of forest sounds and bird songs, making fresh, slightly cold breeze, all the more in harmony with descending darkness.

She sat there almost unmoving. One time the girl will sigh. Another lean her head forward as if fighting sleep, other than that she will shift uncomfortably, or open one eye to peak at the two statues of an old man and a youth sitting by her side completely still.

"Are they made of stones? I'm so terribly sore." - she mumbled but preferred to not voice complains aloud, still remembering Calante's caning. Not like Geralt ever did anything like that to her, but she was discouraged to take any chances, as she saw the only thing he can use to do the deed – a belt.

And oh my, she was really afraid of it. Witchers belt is not your everyday goods, it is wide and heavy with a big lock. She firmly believed that it can be used as a weapon in extreme cases of need.

Ciri tried with all her might to meditate. To enter 'a special depth of mind to acquire inner vision and revolve mana inside the body' like what Alan said, but failed. It was just too boring and uneventful! She sighed, shifted, fidgeted and made many small movements that she thought are unnoticed by the duo. Than she finally opened her eyes with exasperation and looked at them.

"Are they sleeping?" - she wondered in whisper. - "Geralt, are you asleep?" - she asked, but received no answer. She stood up and came up to the old witcher, poking his cheek with her little finger. - "Hehe..." - then she ran to Alan, thought for a while and mischievously greened with revenge all over her face.

'You should have let me ride you! Now you will regret it! Terribly regret!' - she thought in glee and high spirits.

Turning around with a tongue to the side of her lips due to deep thought process, she saw a pile of ashes inside the fireplace they created out of rocks and dug out mud.

Without any care for her queenly image, she took a whole hand of cinder and drew several lines on Alans face. Than, observing her artistic invention pressed index finger on the end of his nose and smiled happily, satisfied to no end. She threw away ash, rubbed her eyes as they got a bit teary because of the smell of fire and traced the space under her nose while nodding.

Alan opened one of his eyes slightly and nearly laughed his head off. One can't even start comparing her face after all the touchings she did with his accurate drawings. It was a question in itself who will win the contest of the most dirty one.

"He-he," - she laughed not noticing his antics and ran out of the camp to seek adventure nearby in the forest.

Geralt and Alan sighed simultaneously and looked at each other.

"You or me?" - asked Alan while snapping his fingers to clean the messed up face.

Then they stretched an arm each without talking and waved them.

"Damn, you won again." - said Alan looking at the paper figure. Geralt just looked at him apathetically, but one can see a shadow of a smile in the corner of his mouth.

Alan moved in his dragon wolf form, making it no bigger than normal dog. As currently it was nearly all black, he was very stealthy at nighttime, almost like any other shadow in the forest.

Meanwhile Ciri ran to the bank of a river where she spotted lots of fireflies illuminating the surroundings.

'There is a village nearby and war just ended, many bodies were thrown down the rivers all day long, and she actually went to the river bank at night not minding it at all. Ah... the girl is a piece of work alright. Hope she will grow up soon.'

Ciri was very careful around people and even suspicious of their every move, but she really lacked awareness when it comes to other dangers, like monsters.

Alan made himself small and crawled forward without her noticing so that she can enjoy herself but on the other hand he will have time to take care of any attack. He casted Protego around the girl and she didn't even paid heed to it!

He lay there looking after her in silence.

Ciri, after all she has been through, still can smile so innocently and brightly, finding happiness even among the simplicity of nature. This visage of a little girl who mischievously painted his face and was now dirtier than him, dancing around under the moonlight and giggling, was burned into his memory like everything else. Still, he felt at piece, for the first time in his life that he can remember, Alan felt drowsy!

Perhaps it was her aura or innocence unperturbed by the cruelty of the world she saw and endure, but Ciri was the only one who made him feel so much at ease. Not even Fleur was able to do that and Alan himself never knew he actually needed it like air!

However, it all was broken in a second, just a flash of a moment and a blur of a creature, jumping from the river.

Scream of a startled girl, who started to regret her disobedience and recklessness, that inspired her to run away to have fun. She was craving for power, but she never saw how meditating can do the trick and Geralt didn't even give her a wooden sword.

And now she was here, alone and in grave danger.

That were her thoughts during the first moment. The next one she will remember for her whole life.

He appeared out of thin air on the shift of turquoise light and unsheathed his silver sword in one fast move. Spinning in front of her, Alan aimed for the neck of a drowner and the creature never expected to be slain like that – during it's jump at defenseless girl.

Ugly head separated from the slick and agile body, while inertia of it jump sent it flying further in the air and down the hill right onto the woods.

"Mommy!" - squeaked guilty girl behind his back.

"Go away from the river!" - Alan commanded in a very domineering and strict voice. It was very new for Ciri to hear him talk like that. Normally he was approachable and soft on the ear, albeit didn't talk much. But now he was like... Geralt.

Ciri nodded and crawled away never breaking her gaze from a figure of a youth, standing on the bank in front of a river that now boiled all of a sudden. And the cause of it was anything but temperature.

Alan went for a stance of engaging a swarm of human-bodied enemies and shifted his center of gravity lower. Ten or so shadows ran out in quick succession.

An explosion went off like the one from a detonated land mine.

Drowners were met by a buish hot flaming spell, that engulfed a sphere area in front, spreading on a shockwave of the blast.

Air went insane with seething temperature stopping most of them and slamming away in different directions. Aqua flames were sticky, tremendously hot and deadly, making the foes caught in them holler in pain.

Still, they all attacked relentlessly, in a manner of the ones who didn't even know the concept of death. The first one who approached carelessly was cut by the waist, however it didn't die immediately and clawed Alan's ankle while on the ground, forcing him to move sword downwards for a second strike on the head.

'Don't cut horizontally, vertical one or at the angle is more preferable. Noted.'

That blunder gave others time to attack. Alan evaporated into a dance of turquoise lightning and appeared by the side of the furthest one, chopping him in two from shoulder to waist. Dearg Aeann was a silver blade of an origin witcher from Dragon School not for show. It was sharper than razors edge and way more deadly.

Bluish silver glowed with slight powerful mana, that seems to refill and strengthen itself every time he slew the enemy. It was a function of devour, that one of the runes granted. It seems to work on many things and monsters were just a part of it.

Sword became lighter and cut through foes easier, but the effect won't last long, it needed to be fed to be active.

However, there were as many as ten drowners and they attacked like wolves, even the ones who constantly burn with aqua flames, jumping with tremendous speed that actually was slightly above Alan's own.

They were very agile!

Alan shifted again, but this time monster avoided his blade in unbelievable speedy action and several of them attacked from all sides. He just stomped on the ground, sending them back and controlled shadows to bind them, but they again avoided the magic like specters.

'Damn they are fast! Never though drowners are such a pain to take care of. Hm... looks like I need more functions to my magic, like homing or attraction and maybe something similar to slowing flow of time.'

Actually, a pack of them as large as that one is a challenging task to kill even for a seasoned witcher.

Alan then created an area of high gravity and when they caught into it, cut down several more, sending a space ram for the crowded assault and a gravitational jackhammer to the sole on the right.

Drowner was hurled at the sky with huge alleviation velocity, but in a couple of seconds descended back with a break neck speed of free-fall plus spell acceleration and that is under the enhancement of gravity nearly tenfold for a couple of seconds.

It really resembled a strike of a jackhammer of enormous proportions, as drowner was literally squashed and dismembered all over the hill with a resounding blast and creaking of bones being shattered.

But he was a bit careless. He didn't notice the last one until it dug it's claws directly into his left shoulder blade.

'Protego is useless after all. It's great against magic, but actually very weak in front of monsters and their claws. I need to find alternative, or fuse more meanings with physical protection, but it is easier said than done.'

He felt pain and twitched in annoyance while immediately waving his sword behind, severing the limb and made a quick teleport to the back of the attacker, beheading it with a swipe of a silver blade.

It's limb didn't stay in his wound falling to the ground with a trail of crimson blood, that have a strange purple-gold luster, albeit it disappeared nearly immediately.

When he was about to face remaining foes with determination to kill in exchange of receiving more wounds, a sudden change happened on the shore. A shadow barged straight into the crowd of drowners, making short work of them with deadly efficiency.

Like a hurricane of silver and wind Geralt went on without any usage of signs and elixirs. Poor creatures never had a chance. It was one hell of an eye opener! Alan never saw anyone move that fast! Damn, he didn't even register Geralt's figure clearly this time.

'I have much to learn and gain here. Just with this speed Geralt can easily decimate any crowd of Death Eaters. It is not like the later can't take him on, they simply won't be fast enough to do that. One don't need to dodge a bullet, but a man with a gun, same goes for spell casters of Harry Potter, as most of their spells are a target based and shot from their wands, making it very predictable in combat.'

"You did well." - he went to Alan and take a quick look at the wound. - "Need help?"

"No. Just a scratch." - shook his head Alan.

"First scar?"

"Got couple more of them before that." - Alan sat down and removed his armor. It really can't stand against monster of witcher world, yet without it at all he would have been run through for good.

Ciri went out with her head down and hands tightly clenching the hem of a blouse. Her forest green eyes were sprinkled with tears, while she gave a very guilty look at the back of Alan, where a horrible bloodied claw mark was very eye-catchy.

"Do you know what you did wrong?" - Geralt asked in a very strict manner, while looking at the girl from above with his cat eyes narrowed to slits.

Ciri nodded.

"I can't hear you." - said Geralt.

"Y-Yes..." - she said weakly, chocking on her tears of fear, guilt and regret. - "I-I'm... sorry... terribly sorry... very, very..." - she tried to hold it, but eventually cried.

Geralt seeing this stood on one knee and hugged her little weak body.

"Never go alone. The world is dangerous. You saw it then. And you see it now." - the girl nodded and looked at the far away figure of a boy, who used magic to smear a healing potion on the wound, that was already healing with fast rate due to some spell he used before.

"Alan..." - Ciri said without a clear understanding what she actually wanted to do.

"It is his job. Just like mine. Wounds and scars are just there to be a reminder of mistakes. He will be fine, otherwise he is not a witcher." - said Geralt, while standing up.

"He is a witcher. A true witcher." - Ciri said with a spark of unknown feelings ignited in her eyes while looking at the boy. There was a mixture of many. It was so complex that it will take years of interactions for both of them to figure it all out.

"Indeed." - nodded Geralt and sighed. - "Indeed he is."