In the harsh northern reaches of Kaedwen, where the Buina River carved its way through mountains touched by ancient magic, a soul from another world found itself reborn into circumstances that would test the very nature of destiny itself. This is the tale of one who carried memories of a previous existence—a life where The Witcher was merely entertainment—and how those memories would reshape the fate of both mother and child in ways no prophecy could have foreseen.
Nestled in the foothills of the Blue Mountains, the village of Buina existed as a forgotten outpost along the ancient trade routes that connected Kaedwen to the northern wilderness. The settlement took its name from the river that sustained it—a rushing waterway that began high in the Kestrel Mountains and flowed eastward through valleys carved by millennia of ice and stone.
The village itself was modest by any measure, consisting of perhaps fifty souls who made their living from the river's bounty and the forest's gifts. Wooden houses with steep-pitched roofs lined the riverbank, their foundations built from the very stones that the Buina had polished smooth over countless seasons. Smoke rose from chimneys in the early morning mist, carrying the scent of pine and hearth-baked bread across the settlement.
In the winter of 1211, as snow began to blanket the northern kingdoms and the Buina ran black beneath its coating of ice, Visenna felt the first stirrings of labor in her small cottage overlooking the river. The sorceress had chosen this remote location deliberately—far from the political machinations of courts and the watchful eyes of the Brotherhood of Sorcerers, where she could practice her healing arts in peace and prepare for the birth of a child she knew would be extraordinary.
The labor came hard and fast in the depths of a winter storm that howled down from the Dragon Mountains to the north. Visenna, drawing upon her considerable magical abilities, eased her own pain while maintaining the protective wards she had woven around her dwelling. As the wind rattled the shutters and snow piled against the windows, she brought forth a son whose appearance would mark him as different from the very first breath.
Where legend would later speak of white hair and cat-yellow eyes, this child emerged with locks of deep auburn that caught the firelight like burnished copper, and eyes of such brilliant blue they seemed to hold the very essence of summer skies. These were his mother's features, unmarked by the mutations that would typically transform a witcher's appearance. In this incarnation, Geralt of Rivia bore the face of love rather than alchemy.
Visenna wept as she held her newborn son, not from the pain of birth but from the overwhelming surge of maternal love that crashed over her like a tide. She had known this moment would come—her prophetic abilities had shown her glimpses of a red-haired child who would carry the weight of destiny—but the reality of holding him, of feeling his tiny fingers curl around hers, exceeded every vision she had experienced.
"My beautiful boy," she whispered against his damp hair, her tears falling freely. "What fate awaits you, I wonder? And what choices will we make together?"
As if in response to her words, the infant opened his blue eyes and seemed to look directly at her with an intensity that spoke of awareness far beyond his hours of life. In that gaze, Visenna glimpsed something she had not expected—recognition, as if this child knew her not from the womb but from somewhere else entirely.