Sword of Destiny

The story opens with an introduction. Geralt — called a Witcher in the book, meaning a professional monster hunter chosen as a child, mutated, and magically enhanced — runs into a merchant named Borch on the road. Borch goes by "Three Jackdaws," travels with two women warriors, and is strangely curious. He invites Geralt to eat and starts asking questions: who do you kill, who don't you, what do you even count as a monster?

The conversation seems casual, but the author is really using it to explain the rules of Geralt's profession. He doesn't kill every creature — only ones that threaten people. Borch listens carefully, and the Witcher's cool attitude toward dragons only sharpens his interest.

They want to cross to the other side of the Braa river together, but find the road blocked: a barricade is up, soldiers stand outside a customs post, and a royal banner flies overhead. Without a permit, no one crosses into the mountain territory. Right there, behind the post, Geralt runs into an old friend — Dandelion, a bard who strums his lute, loves turning events into songs, and knows everything about everyone. He's stuck too. Dandelion explains: a dragon has appeared in the Cintra region, the locals' efforts against it have failed, and now a hunt is being organized.

The man who closed the bridge is King Niedamir of Caingorn — young and calculating. His real goal isn't the dragon: he wants to seize the neighboring principality of Malleore, either by marrying its princess or by becoming a hero in the people's eyes. The dragon offers him the second path. So he's gathered hunters — but sealed off the road to keep out any rival claimants. Only the people he's let through can reach the mountains.

One more person approaches the barricade: the sorcerer Dorregaray. He holds the opposite view entirely — the dragon is part of nature too, and killing it means wiping out an entire species. He talks and bribes his way through and joins the group.

By nightfall, everyone gathers at the king's camp. Around the fire: a band of dwarves, mercenaries, local militia, sorcerers, and the knight Eyck — a man who sees himself on a divine mission and views Witchers as unnatural, cursed beings. They haven't even reached the dragon yet, and they're already arguing about how to split the treasure. That's Sapkowski's joke: the biggest danger here isn't the dragon — it's this crowd that's gathered.

The real reason Geralt is here isn't the hunt, though. Yennefer is in the caravan — a powerful sorceress with a shared history with Geralt, and an issue between them that never quite resolves. Their exchanges cut sharper than the entire hunt plot. Sapkowski never says "these two are in love"; he just shows how uneasy two people can be around each other.

The road runs along the edge of a cliff, and there's an old bridge there. As the caravan crosses, the slope gives way, the crowd scatters, and the bridge collapses. Geralt races after the injured Yennefer; with Dandelion and the others' help, they're saved at the last second. The scene isn't just an event — it's a filter: who turns back, who keeps going, who reaches out to whom, all revealed in an instant.

Fewer people make it across the ravine, supplies are gone, but those who remain push on. They finally reach the dragon — and what they see stuns everyone, because it isn't the dragon they expected. From that moment, the story stops being a hunt and becomes something else entirely: who's willing to die for what, one by one, comes to light.

Everything past this point is a spoiler. So we're stopping here, and we recommend you get the book and read it yourself — those last thirty pages are the best part of the story. But if what you've read so far interests you and you can't decide whether to get the rest, you can check the spoiler section below.

• Six independent stories, each 50–80 pages. Easy to put down and pick back up — one story per night.
• Third person, mostly from Geralt's point of view. The timeline is linear, with few flashbacks.
• Sentences are short, dialogue carries most of the weight. Descriptions are lean — no Tolkien-style long world-building passages.
• The humor is dry and bitter, usually buried in dialogue. Some of that tone softens a bit in the Turkish translation (Regaip Minareci).