Archive of Our Own

Jaskier’s only spent two years on the road when his destiny stumbles into the tavern he’s playing in. He thinks back to Oxenfurt and his favourite professor telling him to take care of his heart, for should it be hurt he’ll crumple along with it. Something poetic like that.

But he’s fucking terrible at taking advice.

So he shoulders his lute and swaggers over to meet Geralt of Rivia.

Jaskier’s always been able to see music. Clouds of magenta and teal, or transparent sheets of yellow in swirling orange and chartreuse, puce at its edges, cloaked in a shadow of lavender. His nursemaid’s voice is a thin line of beautiful emerald and copper when she sings him to sleep. The world itself seems to play for him - pale celadon on the wind, whips of majorelle and blush-pink in cracks of thunder. Summer nights are jonquil and cerulean and sweet peach shades, swelling into olive-butterscotch before all settles down for bed.

The lute, he finds, tinges all sounds with its own melancholic sunglow, and he falls in love for the first time. Helpless - hopeless, his mother’s voice whispers - but to follow his heart, Jaskier sheds his name and leaves - runs away - home to take a place at Oxenfurt Academy. The stones creak with centuries of untold tales, seemingly waiting for the right person to come along and tell them.

It’s not him, let’s be clear. He’s busy chasing skirts and getting in trouble for talking his way out of trouble. Jaskier is desirable and well aware of it - big blue eyes, an angel’s hair. He loves love, loves the idea of it pouring out of every ballad and sonnet he’s allowed to devour between his lessons on true bardic traditions.

They’re teaching him how to shape words into stories, and then how those stories can become prophecies of their own. Some of his peers think they’ll learn to control fate this way; he doesn’t tell them it’s all a farce. Not out of pity or fear - he simply cannot find the words to explain how he knows destiny shapes all their lives, so he says nothing at all. The world sings, always, loud enough that should anyone try to listen surely they’d hear the voices telling them which way to go. But others don’t notice, not really. It’s simple enough to believe his prophecies are a little more accurate than other’s. Perhaps he’s a prodigy, more in tune with the tapestries of fate but only by the smallest bit. Sometimes he gets it wrong - purposefully off by a month or two - and sometimes he makes such wild predictions they can only be written off as fanciful tales of an over imaginative mind the day after drinking.

He teaches, too, for a while; he’s their prodigal son and they’re only too happy to keep him for as long as they can. But the voice on the winds turns from celadon to lime to a murky feldgrau the longer he lingers. There’s talk of sending him to serve a king - it’s a prestigious position he would have died for… Yet an itch starts up under his skin, towards his tenth month.

The dean of the Faculty of Contemporary History gets the fright of her life when he… disengages mid garden rendezvous to scream a disgruntled “Fine!” at the sky.

Jaskier learns quickly that it’s too dangerous for him to let anyone guess at his small magics, out on the road. So he reins them in, tucking his prophecies into his book between bawdy songs about pirates and wenches’ bosoms. He’s sure to be far, far away when towns go up in flames or are massacred by a passing army; the most he can save is a family or two with carefully placed warnings. Here and there he leaves the suggestion of skipping town.

He tries not to think of the life he could have had at a court. It’s not his place; he had felt it then, and he felt it now. Something still whispered to him on the winds, small vines of jade, buttercup, and sapphire tugging him forwards, crisscrossing the continent. But... he could have changed the tides of the world with a well-placed word at courts of kings and queens.

You’ll change more for the better like this, an assurance drifting in from the sea.

Jaskier hums, face turned to catch the warmth of the sun. He’s picking out a melody the colour of roof tiles in summer as his feet take him down the road once again.

Whatever his fate might be, it’s close. He can feel it in his bones.

Geralt of Rivia is a study in contradictions, all at once firm and forgiving. The White Wolf growls every hard won word, an explosion of marigold-palatinate-silver, starbursts in Jaskier’s eyes, on his tongue, a million stories condensed into one man not unlike all the monsters crammed under his skin.

What else is there for him? Jaskier follows Geralt and Roach back out on the path, a slave to his own traitorous heart.

He thinks he can hear laughter on the breeze.

There’s a ‘dragon’ terrorising the good people of Biecz, which means a job for Geralt once the guards stop blathering in terror for long enough to spit it out.

Well. Good is a relative term. Jaskier’s less than impressed with the stares and whispers that follow Geralt around like a bad smell. Geralt seems to accept them as a part of his life, and, frankly, that just makes him more sad about it. No matter how long he spends with the White Wolf and his beloved mare, Jaskier’s never going to quit trying to change the rumours behind this baseless hatred. Sure, Geralt can be brusque, and his bedside manner is non-existent, but he’s the one that puts his life on the line to save these villagers from horrible deaths.

“The least they could do is feed us for free.” Jaskier gripes, pushing his half-eaten bowl of soup across their table to where Geralt’s been pretending he isn’t eyeing it like a starving orphan for the last ten minutes. “What? It tastes like dog shit, you can have it.”

“… Mm,” Geralt says, digging in. They’re both politely ignoring the growl of Jaskier’s stomach. “Not playing, tonight?”

Jaskier casts his eyes around the tavern, empty save for the two of them, their host, and a solitary widower, and arches a brow. “I don’t think there’s enough gold to go around, my friend. You can hardly toss a coin to yourself.”

Geralt makes a noise into his soup that passes for amusement, from the witcher.

“So,” Jaskier says, sprawling across the table with his head pillowed on an arm and turned so he can still read the minute changes in Geralt’s poker face. “A dragon?”

“Hm. No, doubt it. Not enough houses burnt down.”

It’s true. A surprisingly large amount of the village remains standing. “Then what?”

“Rotting carcass of a cow on the road in. Smelt like poison.”

Amber eyes are peeking out at him over Geralt’s spoon. They look expectant, somehow - as if this is his cue to interject. Jaskier meets them with a confused half shrug, his nose wrinkled in thought… What could Geralt possibly want… Ah.

“I’m not a witcher,” he gripes, the words softened by his smile and the tingle of glee in his sinuses. Geralt only hums, reaching for more bread to mop his bowl clean. “But you are correct, of course - I am a veritable encyclopaedia of witcher-y things, as any good travelling bard must be if he or she wishes to chronicle such epic hunts! If you’ve so forgotten, dear witcher, of course I shall be all too happy to help you remember that the beast must be, as the signs all point too clearly to such—“ He pauses, for dramatic effect, and flourishes in the air the arm he’s not resting on. “A wyvern!”

“... Royal wyvern.” Yet Geralt’s got that quirk to the slant of his lips, and it speaks volumes.

“How would you know?” Jaskier feigns distrust; fools no one.

“Contract mentioned missing horses. One that big, gotta be.”

“What’s the difference?”

“More cantankerous,” Geralt says, and flashes his wolf’s maw through human lips in what could pass for a grin. “Bit like their namesakes.”

******

It turns out that luring a wyvern, royal or otherwise, is as simple a matter as finding some suitably putrid bait and then waiting for the damned thing to arrive at its own wake. Geralt drags Jaskier - that is, Jaskier catches him leaving their room and tracks him down skilfully, definitely without Geralt turning around and rolling his eyes at the bard within four seconds - out to a nearby field in the early hours of the morning to set the damned carcass up. The stench fills his nostrils until he’s coughing, but Geralt seems sure it’ll do the trick.

All they’ve got left to do is wait for the wyvern to go looking for breakfast.

There’s a long stretch of time to waste before the sunrise. It’s too dark to write, and Geralt had threatened to break his lute over his head should he bring it out. He’s never been the best at staying still or keeping quiet, but there’s something about Geralt’s presence that brings a certain peace. Or, perhaps, that’s the potential for disembowelment by royal wyvern talking. Jaskier is many of the things he’s accused of being - a charlatan, the occasional coward - but he does not carry a death wish.

It’s Geralt, oddly, who breaks their mutual silence.

“Your notes,” he says. “Tell me about them.”

Jaskier blinks dumbly in his voice's direction for a long minute, wide eyed. It’s not his style, to look a gift horse in the mouth, but Geralt… Geralt has never asked after him, unprompted, even though the occasions on which the witcher will listen to Jaskier’s ramblings without complaint have grown, of late.

“My notes?”

“Your book.”

“… Yes, I know I carry a book, Geralt. But what are you… why- what do you want me to say?”

Geralt’s the one staring, now - he can tell in the way they glint by the moonlight. Those golden eyes shift from Jaskier’s face - still furrowed, perplexed - to the leather-bound journal in his hands and back again.

“Why bardic tradition,” Geralt finally asks, as lacking in punctuation as ever, and Jaskier feels like he’s been trampled by Roach.

Surprise makes him stupid. “Because stories are the road to immortality,” he blurts out, flushing once he hears himself spill too much in so many words. “History is written by the victors, Geralt, but if we collect the truth, even if it’s embellished a little, surely that’s better than all those small victories being lost to time?” He shrugs, then. “And it’s the only thing I know how to do.”

But Geralt’s only silent again for a short while. “How?” And that head of lank white hair catches light when it tilts to one side, not unlike a curious puppy. Jaskier feels compelled to explain, now. He’s taught before - surely there’s a way to circumvent the glaring, obvious issue in answering Geralt’s question:

How to explain love to a man that refuses to feel it?

“It’s the shape of the words.” Jaskier decides to start with his own truths. “The deft way they sit on my tongue, the weight of them. There’s a cadence to stories, Geralt, and to songs, the same way you feel a rhythm when you fight.”

Geralt nods in understanding. He seems genuinely interested; Jaskier’s the one at a loss for how to react.

“The rest is instinct,” Jaskier continues, slowly, watching Geralt watch his hands move as he speaks. It’s an old habit; he plucks at invisible strings, or taps out beats only he can follow. “Like coming home. The words choose me; I only put them in order. It’s the same for prophecies,” he adds, noting the way Geralt’s gaze flies to his face. “There’s no magic to it - no influence. Some bards are just… blessed with the right words.”

“And you…?”

“I confess to having written a few in my time that might seem like predictions. But I don’t go looking for them. Some… Some bards do, they waste their whole lives chasing an ideal future. I know what you think of me, sometimes, but I’m not that foolish. That way only lies ruin - artistically, you understand? No one wants to wait for you to make one perfect poem in thirty years’ time.”

Geralt ponders this - well. To outsiders, perhaps, the witcher’s face is the same as ever. But Jaskier sees the way he blinks a touch more rapidly than before, the way night sounds intrude for a second when his hands pause in their sure working of a whetstone over his silver blade.

“I don’t think you so foolish,” Geralt finally says. “Oxenfurt doesn’t award summa cum laude to fools.”

Oh, Jaskier thinks, taking his time to savour the pinprick rush of pleasure at a reminder that Geralt does actually remember his ramblings, he was listening. It’s not that he doubts Geralt’s care for him; he’d be dead by now, or at least long left behind. But it’s nice to have evidence that it’s not all in his head, this gradual softening of the White Wolf to his company.

“Geralt?”

“Yes, Jaskier?”

“Why do you ask?”

“…I don’t know.”

Geralt’s discomfort at his question is palpable. I don’t know is one of the worse answers Jaskier has ever heard - and he taught snot nosed teenagers for a year - yet he finds himself reluctant to press Geralt for a better explanation. Instead, it hangs stagnant in the space between them for a long moment, before the witcher twitches and snaps his attention to the horizon.

Dawn has arrived.

“Stay here.”

Geralt’s pinning him with his signature scowl, but Jaskier’s reading concern, mayhap, or something akin to protectiveness - something that’s protectiveness-adjacent, more fond, less annoyance. It’s gone in a blink, and so is Geralt.

In the rising light of day Jaskier can see the setting for his next ballad properly, now. Green heads of wheat are starting to ripen into burnished yellow, nearing ready for harvest. Geralt cuts a dark shadow amongst the fields, even as he circles the feasting wyvern on light feet, his strength deep but true like the deepest rivers running underground. For just a breath, Jaskier could swear a hush settles over them all - lilac birdsong fades from his sight, and even the rustling of the grove where he sits brings no sound. It’s only his heart, hummingbird quick in his chest, and the inexorable closing of the White Wolf to his prey.

Geralt fights with a feral grace unique to him alone; his blade is poetry in motion, a blur of silver amidst the oxblood of the wyvern’s scales. Jaskier’s seen warriors training with duchess’ champions, and bandits scrabbling desperately for their last chance at life, yet all pales next to Geralt in full flight. His is a dance of skill, signs, and witchers’ magics, all interwoven to form an unrivalled tapestry. Like this, Geralt wears the mantle of death; he is a nightmare given a man’s form.

Later, Jaskier will paint a picture of valour and glory for lords and ladies at court. The truth, however is brutal, bloody, gruesome, and all the more beautiful for it. Maybe he has been changed, travelling through the years on and off with Geralt and Roach. Maybe his books contain also the suggestion of motion, of poise, of a witcher in flight, black on parchment, his fingers etching chaos.

Maybe.

The wyvern lets out a roar that shakes the very ground, rumbling cracks of russet-tawny-pine, and Jaskier feels his heart jump in his throat. But Geralt’s rolling away, countering with aard, and wheat ripples around him, a wave of emerald tinted palest gold. The wyvern is a smudge of uncontrolled rage; Geralt’s arrows have hit true, leaving only one great, bulging eye, bloodshot as the creature rears back and leaves a scarring arch of acid upon the field. And for a mere second, Jaskier sees the shifting lines in their battle, as if he were reading the very tapestry of fate.

It’s over as quickly as it began - Geralt spins, turns, blasts chaos from his fingertips. Brings the wyvern low, that terrible head bowing to its master, and in one fell swoop of his blade there is a head lying neatly at Geralt’s feet. Birdsong returns, in cautious refrains, and the earth is still beneath their feet.

With a sigh of relief Jaskier gathers his book up alongside Geralt’s scabbard before scampering down the to where the witcher is busy prying rust-and-old-blood scales from the wyvern’s hide, half-formed questions on his tongue for the symphony dancing in his mind.

Jaskier decides he likes Geralt best crowned by the dying rays of the afternoon. When the light hits Geralt’s hair just so, kisses the pale ends of his silvery lashes, and lovingly curls around the cut of his jaw. He’s reminiscent of a king, imposing and sure, or a lord in his element. King of witchers, perhaps, for Geralt is ever insistent that he is not human, not beautiful, all terror.

They’re parting ways, today - Geralt following a contract deeper North, Jaskier to Toussaint in answer to an invitation to a ball. He already misses the way Geralt looks at him. Half fond, half exasperated - yes, just like that, when Geralt turns his head from Roach and finds Jaskier staring. Citrine cat’s eyes narrow at Jaskier, a single pale brow arching.

“What,” Geralt asks, question-turned-statement.

“Nothing,” Jaskier replies, all wide blue eyes and innocence, laughing when Geralt’s brow rises higher. “Only, my friend, I was thinking I would stop by Zakopane once my business in Toussaint is done. It’s lovely this time of year at the foot of the mountains, don’t you think?”

“Mm,” Geralt considers. He slots his swords in place on Roach’s saddle; double-checks all his bags are secured before turning to study where Jaskier hasn’t bothered to move from his bedroll.

“… Zakopane. Halfway?”

“Halfway,” Jaskier confirms. “You’ve further to travel than me - don’t wait up, darling~”

His cheeky grin earns him a Geralt-laugh, more huff of amusement than any true sound. It’s an incandescent shimmer of gold-crimson. Geralt stalks a little closer as Jaskier sits up. Seems to linger a moment, hesitating under Jaskier’s bright, curious gaze, and then he’s reaching out to tug gently at one of Jaskier’s messy curls.

“Stay safe,” Geralt says.

Jaskier arrives in Zakopane first, just in time to discover that there’s a rather unpleasant necrophage issue in town. Not along the lines of the usual ‘necrophages are attacking livestock’ but more along the lines of the unusual ‘there’s a crazed idiot selling necrophages as pets’. He tries to talk some sense into the local populace - tries, because it’s very difficult to focus when there’s a nekker in a frilly dress wanting to eat his shoes as he barters over ink and quills. He could sing them into sense, at least once his lingering cold is gone, except the most important words seem to be avoiding him at present.

Probably on account of the many slobbering necrophages, actually. Is this how Geralt feels all the time? Jaskier’s about ready to break his coin pouch over some dense human heads, doing his level best to not tell the bosom young mayor’s daughter that the new family pet she’s begging her daddy for is more likely to eat her than attract suitors. Or explode - he’s been around Geralt for long enough to know that rotfiends have a habit of grisly endings that do not make for titillating ballad material.

Which is, naturally, when Geralt rides into town.

The White Wolf stinks of guts, and sewers, and forest camping for weeks on end. Or, at the very least, Jaskier can smell him approaching even with his boring human nose.

“Geralt!” He waves, turning, his eyes a touch wild. “Over here!”

Geralt is giving Jaskier a look, nostrils flaring as he scents the air and promptly gains a murderous aura that Jaskier only finds mildly oppressive because he’s used to it. The town square, meanwhile, mysteriously vacates itself within the time it takes for Geralt to arrive at Jaskier’s side, Roach in tow.

“Bard,” the witcher growls. “I thought you said it would be lovely this time of year.”

Jaskier blinks up at Geralt, processing, and then breaks into delighted peels of laughter.

“Was that... a joke?! I’ve missed you too, Geralt, but Melitele’s hanging tits, you reek. Come, I’ve got a room here for us already, and a bath waiting for you.”

He’s nursing the dredges of a sore throat, but he did well for himself in Toussaint, he explains to Geralt, waving off any attempts to split their bill as he nearly pushes Geralt through the door to his room and into the waiting tub. The longer they linger outside, the less chance he has of getting Geralt to rest. The witcher looks dead on his feet.

“Besides,” he says, dumping a bucket of steaming water on Geralt’s head for punctuation, “I owe you for that business in Brugge with the merchant’s twin sons.”

“I’ve told you before, Jaskier, you need to be more discerning with your games of hide-“

“Yes, yes, I’m aware. Although in that case they were the ones hiding sausages, as it were, if you’re catching my drift. Incidentally I’ve a great little poem about that, you know? It was a terror trying to find something that rhymes with— Geralt, you’re bleeding!”

“It’ll heal soon.”

There’s a partially scabbed over gash running from shoulder to elbow on Geralt’s right arm, bisecting scars old and new. Just from the look of it he can tell it’ll leave another scar - he’s not sure what it means that he’s got enough experience to know that, and he’s not interested in examining the thought, either. Gentle fingers reach out to trace the raised flesh where the wound fades from crimson back to ghost-white, the exact colour of a shrike’s cry.

“Did you clean it?”

“Mm.”

“And no infection?”

“Mmm.”

“Will it need stitches?”

“Jaskier.” Geralt’s tone brooks no argument.

Geralt hates being fussed over, he knows, and he’s already forgiven his friend for the perceived sharpness. He forgives a lot, for Geralt - maybe that makes him weak. He just thinks it makes him kind. Whichever it is, Jaskier drops the topic, dropping a bar of soap in the water, too.

“Come downstairs when you stop resembling a sty, I’ll get us dinner.”

It’s not until they’re both fed and watered by the lovely, widowed grandmother Inga that Jaskier crosses the table to slide in next to where Geralt is pressed into a corner. It’s late enough into the night that they’re more or less the only people in the tavern; Jaskier recognises the couple in the corner as having its only other room, and Inga has long disappeared into the backroom. No one who will care to overhear their conversation remains, at least. The witcher spares him a sideway glance, but there’s no disgruntled growl and so he leans in close enough to rest his shoulder against his friend’s.

“Go on,” Jaskier prods, “I know that look, you’re dying to ask me something.”

“Jaskier,” Geralt’s sigh of his name is long-suffering. “Go entertain your adoring fans.”

“Sore throat, remember? That’s out of the question, for now. Maybe tomorrow, though - ah, that’s a surprise, never you mind.”

Geralt’s silent for a heartbeat longer; then he’s bending his head down a little further, enough to murmur into Jaskier’s ear and send shivers up and down his spine at the closeness of that familiar rumble.

“Jaskier, why does this whole town stink of necrophages?”

That’s… Well, he’d been hoping to get a good night’s rest into Geralt before this particular topic was breached. The townspeople had been kind (frightened) enough to stay out of Geralt’s way, too. At least the witcher’s clean, now, smelling of faint, familiar musk under lavender soap, and full of enough food for four healthy men.

“Geralt,” Jaskier turns to pat a bulging bicep, “don’t make a scene, my friend, but there’s a certain newfangled pet craze in Zakopane at the moment. All the range with the upper classes, or so I’m told, you see, to be sporting, well… they’re a sign of superiority, you understand? To be seen ruling over death, you know, that kind of thinking that really gets the power hungry and rich going, it can’t be helped—“

“Jaskier.”

Narrowed slit-pupils and a large ring of gold: Geralt’s unimpressed face, complete with pale brows drawn together in a large v.

Jaskier sighs. “Someone’s selling necrophages as pets to the elite. By someone I’m fairly certain it’s a sorcerer, but the where and the why have eluded me thus far.”

So much for a normal town and some days off.

Geralt’s staring at him like he’s grown two heads and started auctioning off nekkers dressed up in little boy’s sailor costumes. Which, actually, seems to be quite lucrative, except for the part where he’s currently sitting next to a furious witcher.

“Where.” Geralt’s forgotten to use question marks again, and his teeth are bared, more wolf than man - definitely mad.

“The local duke’s mansion. Don’t give me that face, Geralt, I’ve already made my rounds and gotten us an invitation for the duke’s morning party, surprise! Now, aren’t you glad I’m as famed and revered as I am, hm?”

Geralt shoots him a look that is pure, distilled disdain, and Jaskier bursts into laughter.

“Eat,” he says, pushing the rest of their bread and dried fruits across the table. He nabs a few raisin bunches for himself, savouring their sweetness as he bursts them with his tongue against the roof of his mouth, equally delighted by the way Geralt’s gaze darkens. “Witchers have to grow up big and strong to hunt down silly sorcerers, don’t they~?”

He’s still laughing when Geralt (gently) cuffs the back of his head. It’s deserved, probably.

******

Upon meeting Duke Szymon Jaskier decides immediately the man has altogether four whole brain cells to rub together, and it’s evident he’d used all of them getting his lungs to start when he’d been born. Zakopane sat in a valley bordered on three sides by snow-capped mountains; the fourth overlooked a mirror lake whose clarity came second, perhaps, only to Anna Henrietta’s private gardens. And yet Duke Szymon, in his infinite wisdom, had seen fit to erect a ginormous bust of himself smack in the middle of the courtyard’s view.

“Geralt, this is a fucking disgrace! An insult! To both art, and the eyes of all those who have them, save the gracious duke whose eyes I suspect are mere farces glued to his head with boar fat.”

Jaskier pauses in his aggrieved hissing to make sure Geralt’s scowl looks appropriately agreeable.

“And!” He continues, whisper pitched quiet enough the nearest three courtiers cannot hear him, “I’m certain he owns not a single mirror in this monstrosity of a residence, for surely he would have noticed that his britches do not fit. Perhaps it is the peasant they have passing as a chef? Or, or… where was I—?”

“The wine is swill,” Geralt replies, swiping another glass from the nearest table.

“Yes, the wine is swill I wouldn’t feed to an ageing heifer.”

“Mm,” Geralt agrees. “How about an ageing bull?”

Jaskier hums, then nods. “A bull, perhaps.”

“Would explain the duke, then.”

Geralt looks horrifically pleased with himself when Jaskier splutters wine up his nose, smug bastard.

“Geralt,” he says when he’s finally stopped coughing, “you rogue, you set me up.”

“It’s payback,” Geralt replies, offering him a platter of sweetmeats. He takes one - they look palatable, at least. “Since you’ve insisted once more on having me trussed up for roast.”

“It’s a very fetching blouse on you, dear witcher.”

“I stole it from a nobleman’s corpse leaving Vizima.”

“And the local laundress has done the most excellent job. Not, that is, as lovely a job as she did on my silks, do you see how vibrant the green shines, Geralt? Or my cock, she really did give the most tremendous head, but considering her mouth was— Oh, Duke Szymon, how lovely to meet you at last!”

Jaskier spins on a dime, drawing himself into a tight bow at the duke’s elbow, feather capped hat swooping low enough to brush the tiles at their feet. To his left, Geralt grunts in his best ‘pleased to be here, would rather be dead’ voice. Well. To Jaskier that’s what the witcher is saying, but to the un-educated in witcher-noises… the duke’s guards audibly swallow, and take a step closer to each other.

Cowards.

“Master Jaskier, I presume? And this must be the famous White Wolf!”

The duke, of course, lacks even the necessary brain function to fear Geralt. Jaskier re-assesses his four cells to a paltry two when the man outright leers at the sliver of Geralt’s chest visible in his open shirt neck. He’s fairly certain Geralt’s disgust is about to take physical form.

“Odd travelling companions, a bard and a witcher… Are you for hire, by chance? My larder could use some.. new flesh in it.” It’s a preposterous statement, topped off with a wink that makes Jaskier immediately long for a bath.

“We-“

“Opposites attract,” Geralt interrupts in a deadpan that’s close to plunging into a frozen lake. “Can’t leave such great coin, sorry.”

This is, Jaskier thinks through a fog of opposites attract, a less sincere sorry than the time Geralt ripped his trousers in half rescuing him from an angry fishmonger. He’s fairly certain he’s having a fever dream.

And the stupid, oblivious duke is still talking. “Then I do hope you are not here on business tonight, sire witcher. I have a very special event planned - one I’m sure even you will find surprising!”

They watch Szymon waddle away in shared incredulity.

“Did he…”

“It’s him,” Geralt says, cutting across the bard for only the second time in their years together. “He’s the sorcerer.”

Wait.

“Excuse me,” Jaskier says, elbow flying into Geralt’s ribs by way of disbelief. “What?”

“Smells like magic,” the witcher bites out. “Was hard to tell, under the perfumed oils.”

This is, because destiny has quite the sense of humour, the moment where all goes to hell in a handbasket. The band’s jig swells in a crescendo; someone screams, high enough to shatter glass; Jaskier’s clapping his hands to his ears, his eyes squeezing shut at the sudden assault, jagged lemon flashing over his sight, over the wailing of the wind. Then Geralt’s shoving him hard to the ground, yelling at him to stay down over the ringing in his ears. All else goes black.

In the aftermath, there’s only an empty ballroom, him, Geralt, Geralt’s silver dagger in an alghoul’s head, and the corpse of Duke Szymon, his throat spilling over the tiles.

“Bard,” Geralt says, wiping his blade on Szymon’s trousers. “Can you sing, yet?”

He finds his feet, finally, and meets the White Wolf’s blazing eyes. “I can.”

******

Music is the catalyst, Geralt explains. Whatever Szymon had done to make the necrophages docile would be undone by music, a fact the idiot could have saved his own life with if only he’d had more than a single cell powering his entire body. They stop by their room for Geralt’s armour, sword, and potions, and Jaskier’s lute. He’d passed by a natural amphitheater on his way into Zakopane, he tells Geralt, one with enough space for anywhere from five to a dozen necrophages and a fight. If they set up there Jaskier can call the monsters to them, and they can leave this cursed town with clear minds.

Well. He’s all for running straight out of town and not looking back. But that’s not Geralt’s style, with that bleeding heart hidden behind his glower. All it takes is for the tense lines of Geralt’s shoulders to wind up a little more and Jaskier finds himself agreeing to put his neck on the line anyway. Not that he doesn’t trust Geralt will keep him alive.

It’s still an uncomfortably subdued trek to the amphitheater. An atmosphere that’s no less oppressive once they’re there - Geralt leaves him instructions to find a shaded place to sit, curt as ever when a word of reassurance wouldn’t go amiss, then turns away to oil his blades and down the concoctions that creep like shadows through his veins.

“Yell, if you need help.”

Jaskier startles at the rough burr of the witcher’s voice. Peers up through his lashes, wide eyed with surprise.

“Yell,” Geralt repeats.

Oh. It’s comfort, kindly offered the only way he knows how. Jaskier reaches up to pat his vambraces.

“You’ll hear me,” he says, gesturing outwards. “Now go, be the big bad wolf.”

And then, Jaskier, with the halo of the midday sun aglow in his hair, sets his lute on his lap and begins to play.

At this point, it is important to note once more that Jaskier knows he is beautiful. He feels it when he tilts his head just so, letting the light catch his cheekbones, his jaw, the hollow of his throat, the straight line of his nose. He’s one to spend time on his skin, to work precious oils into his hair and choose outfits with the intention to highlight as much as hide (because he is a performer above all things, and his finery a form of armour).

But Geralt, who cares not a wit for any of these things, has never stared at him like this. As if all the hope in the world is condensed into the siren call of Jaskier’s song .

It’s a mistake.

When they look back on this moment - for they will, and Jaskier will spill apologies enough for them both - he’ll push that it’s really Geralt’s fault everything ends up this way. Jaskier has no quarrel with the world, is content to be witness to its truths. It’s Geralt who decides he is judge and jury, though in the same breath he argues that witchers do not pick sides; Geralt’s lies, however, have always been poor. Either way, it’s not Jaskier’s fault.

Except for where it is.

Because Geralt’s watching him as if he’s a rarity that will disappear with a blink of an eye. The air is suddenly sweet with gentle affection thrumming between them and the scent of a slowly blooming spring seeps into his heart. Jaskier can’t help himself. His smile is a careful, cautious thing, unfurling in stages so his lips curve upwards to twin crescents of cornflower blue until his voice is rising around a foolish grin to match the amusement hinting at the corners of Geralt’s mouth. It makes Geralt’s eyes dance like firelight and Jaskier’s heart soar. He’s singing his joy out, painting his lute strings with love, with fear, with all the hues of heartache.

It’s just... Jaskier’s never woven a spell by accident. Not even as a child - his magic is volatile and so specific it normally requires total focus. So he chalks up the pressure behind his eyes to nerves and a lack of sleep, and ignores how each strand of music gains clarity the longer he sings. He’s tired. It’s been an awfully long day, week, (month apart). He’s here, a pied piper for necrophages so Geralt can behead them all, with half his mind admiring the way Geralt prepares for a hunt. The coil of his body, the deliberate way he handles his sword and witcher oils.

How he’s rising from his meditative pose with deadly elegance. A nod towards Jaskier - his cue to keep playing, no matter what - and then Geralt’s fingers are twisting into yrden, and quen, witcher’s eyes bleeding blacker with every potion downed.

Jaskier thumps his foot on his upturned lute case, downbeats on his heart, an army’s march in his voice, drumming out the rhythm of the world as it spins below them. Geralt’s dancing to it, not a delusion of his mind’s eye, silver sword a whirlwind of death, and that’s his song threaded between the two of them, his voice in the feldgrau-cerise howl of the wind. For a split second he sees the colour of his soul - bold strokes of periwinkle flame, curved with light refractions, he should have known in this moment, he should have - but then there’s nothing but the ice in his veins, his lute strings cutting into his fingers before he wets his lips and sets his blood aflame.

The Aen Seidhe had had things like Jaskier, once. He remembers paying attention to that lecture in his classes - they’d employed bard-adjacents in their fighting forces, people who wielded magic through music and could give or take strength with a mere rhyming couplet. Jaskier’s no elf, and he’s certain Toruviel’s lute has nothing to do with this other than drawing blood as he flays his fingers open.

But he is weaving, deliberately this time, a fine cloth of incandescent adoration. He knows the shades of Geralt’s voice, the hues and tones of his five signs as newly wrought as the day they first emblazoned themselves behind his eyes, and he knows the well-tread path he’s travelled to get here, both alone and as equal companions. It’s the simplest matter, really, to pluck melodies from Benek, a harmony from Toussaint, counterpoints in Oxenfurt and Novigrad, Lettenhove and Kaer Morhen - it matters little where they’ve been together, and where it’s been apart. He knows Geralt, knows Geralt knows him. So where his witcher ducks, he offers a buffer, and where Geralt pushes he’s right behind him, music a solid weight he wraps around Geralt’s form to protect, to serve, to keep.

Like this, Jaskier bleeds his fingers to the bone, and Geralt clears Zakopane of its necrophages for good.

And, yes, perhaps at the root the blame will solely be his. It’s something to be pondered, torn apart later, when he and Geralt have parted again. For now, however, he only places his beloved lute back in her case, then straightens in time to catch the slump of Geralt’s exhaustion in his arms. They sit for a long moment, simply enjoying the ability to breathe. Jaskier closes his eyes at some point to block out the carnage around them; tilts, until he’s leaning over Geralt’s shoulder and counting his sharp inhalations as they slowly smooth out. It’s quiet. The air stinks of rot and iron-blood that he doesn’t think will ever come out of his clothes, but it’s quiet on the breeze, only uncomplicated celadon.

“… I choose the next town.” Geralt’s voice is a dry slash of burgundy with exhaustion at its heels.

Jaskier barks a laugh. “That’s fair.”

“Monsters,” Geralt says, apropos of nothing, “are the invention of humans so that they may feel less monstrous. I am their butcher so that they might feel better amongst the murderers and thieves they call kin.”

They’ve only just settled for the night; usually he’s the one busy weaving stories or philosophising to Geralt’s captive audience of one, but no matter. Jaskier pauses in his strumming. Watches his half-formed melody drift out of reach, not that he minds - it’s rare that Geralt deigns to break their (comfortable, these days) silence, and rarer still that he can pick at the White Wolf’s thoughts.

“Does that mean you think death is deserved?”

Geralt’s eyes glitter in the firelight. “Hm,” he grunts. “Witchers don’t pass judgement.”

Jaskier snorts, inelegantly. “You and I both know that’s a lie- Geralt, try as you might to not get involved, you do. Don’t bullshit me, now.” He wags his finger, teasingly, a smirk on his face to match the sour glare Geralt’s giving him.

“Jaskier-“

“A yes or no, Geralt~”

He likes to pretend otherwise, but Jaskier does know when to hold his tongue. Geralt is stubborn, occasionally to the point of foolishness, but Jaskier is shameless enough keep his smirk until the witcher gives in and looks away.

“… Yes,” Geralt bites out.

Jaskier sets his lute aside and pads over to sit next to Geralt. He leans in and prods at the rabbit roasting on the spit if only to hide the way he’s glancing at Geralt’s profile from under his lashes. Studying the stern profile of his jaw, the tenseness in his shoulders and how Geralt avoids staring back at Jaskier although they both know he can feel the weight of Jaskier’s eyes on him.

There’s a sweet pine-opal note to the forest, tonight. It feels safer, somehow.

“I’m not about to call you a madman, Geralt,” he chides, settling in close enough to feel the heat of Geralt’s mutations. “Have I ever, on the path? Your heart is true.” He chortles at Geralt’s snort, bumping their shoulders together - carefully - playfully. “Don’t be like that! You’ve got it in the right place, you know. It’s not something to be scared of.”

“Witchers don’t feel,” Geralt reminds him.

“Ah, bullshit!” Jaskier chirps. “Your heart is a compass to your moral north, my friend. You are right, you know? We’re weak, fragile things, us mortals, and often the things that go bump in the night are just the darker desires of our own selves. Although, you do go bump in the night yourself, don’t you…”

“Jaskier.”

The bard only laughs harder, infuriating as ever. “Don’t worry, Geralt. I know you’re not what I should fear.”

For a moment Jaskier’s eyes are too sharp, too piercing for the usually carefree bard. As if he were peering into Geralt’s soul. Searching, tugging at his monsters’ hearts, finding…

“Kindness is not a sin,” Jaskier murmurs.

The moment passes between one breath and the next - Jaskier’s up again and sauntering back to his lute, plucking out a jaunty tune about a mermaid who learnt to wobble on her tail for her prince. Geralt grumbles about how that’s not what a siren does, and Jaskier ignores him.

But Geralt can’t quite forget that look; wonders if Jaskier found what he was looking for.

If Jaskier found Geralt wanting.

“A war is no place for a bard.”

Geralt’s words linger long after the man himself has left their temporary lodgings. It’s another nondescript inn; another forgettable town, made colourful only by the grace of his companion. He knows Geralt is right, in his own way - Jaskier has followed the witcher into life-threatening situations before, but even he is not quite naive or pig-headed enough to charge headlong into a war zone. So he’ll listen, he knows. For once he will pack his bags and ride Pegasus north as he’s been told. He’ll hole up in safe towns, take the best routes, keep his head down, fuck the right people who won’t get him hunted for treason.

But that doesn’t mean he’s going to leave Geralt alone. Not with the hurt he’d seen in that old, old gaze. He’s got a half hour at best - that’s fine, that’s all he’ll need to bless the witcher’s sword. Geralt is no fool. Jaskier knows this - knows the White Wolf will sniff out his blessings no matter how he twists them into something other to hide. He’s got a feeling, really, that Geralt suspects something already - Jaskier’s not the most subtle of men, and he’d more or less stripped his only secret bare in Zakopane - but the witcher hadn’t mentioned it since. It’s become a bit of a stinking fiend in the room between them: Geralt, and Jaskier, and Jaskier’s not-magic, and Geralt’s hatred of all mages.

It doesn’t stop him. He hears his father’s voice in his head, a pleading at least try to be careful, Julian, and he ignores it as he ever does. He’s woven his share of protective nets over the years, but this one is different. Special. He’s not sure what he’ll do if Geralt doesn’t make it back. Not for his destiny or his muse, but because Geralt is first and foremost his closest friend. Because Geralt is a shining point of light in this wretched world and he thinks if he digs a little more he could maybe say he loves-

So.

Seven bars from an old hymn, its melody winding around his heart. Seven from the first ballad he’d ever written, held tight to his soul. For the Witcher, a lullaby of woe. For the man trapped inside the wolf, the tale of a sweet breeze and blossoming winter flowers. Jaskier studies these gleaming threads between strums of his lute, his voice raising in gentle spiral songs until he can see strands starting to coalesce into sigils.

And then... he adds the cloudy amber gleam of Geralt’s growl, the sun glinting off too-wolfish teeth, the flash of cat’s eyes in the night.

“It’s done,” he whispers, watching the spell roll over his fingers when he reaches out. It’ll be good for one hit only, but one hit is one more tale Geralt will live through to tell him, that deep voice keeping him warm on winter nights.

If he cannot fight, at least he’ll be able to keep his Witcher safe.

Months pass.

Jaskier is not a housewife waiting for word of his man from the front lines. (Except for when he lingers too long by recruiters hoping to hear updates on Nilfgaard’s progression north). He certainly hasn’t been dragging his feet from village to village, staying just far enough to not be too affected by the war, yet close enough he’s only a day’s hard ride away. In no way does he begin to avoid performing most of his witcher repertoire a couple months in, no, because he’s not a pining housewife.

And Geralt is not his man.

Summer has wilted slowly into Autumn by the time Jaskier finds himself in Benek, home to one windmill and a gene pool from the last century. It’s the kind of place Jaskier wouldn’t be caught dead in, only he’s run low on supplies and the days are getting ever shorter. He’s not looking to push his luck travelling at night; it takes a good hour of songs to ply the inn’s only room from its ancient owner’s grimy, pig-shit stained hands, and the bed is stuffed with straw he wouldn’t feed Valdo Marx’s horse, but it’s a goddamn roof over his head whilst the sky pisses down outside.

He’s only just settled into his dinner - potatoes, he’s not even going to think of touching whatever’s meant to pass for beef out here - when, with appropriately dramatic lightning splitting the sky apart, the inn’s door flies open. Jaskier shrinks in his seat, fervently praying it’s not the brothers from his last stop still on the hunt for him. Destiny can be a bitch like that, and it would be just his luck—

The shadow that falls over his dinner has a familiar outline to it. When he glances up, wide baby blues are met with the impression of amber tinted warm with relief.

“Jaskier,” Geralt murmurs.

“Geralt,” Jaskier breathes.

It’s lovely, it truly is - there’s a ballad in there somewhere, four stanzas of a heart-wrenching epic about the romance of war that will surely please crowds of nobles who have no concept of its cost. Jaskier’s already composing it in his head - he’ll make a killing if it’s in the Toussaint tradition, all sweeping descriptions and noble deeds and getting lost in the slitted pupils of his brave witcher’s monster eyes.

They’ll be the only people in their tiny world, something something star-crossed lovers... well, he’ll make it work, definitely. Later. When Geralt’s not tugging at one of his curls again with that soft, fond tilt to the corners of his mouth.

Saying, “Jaskier, you look hale,” with a gaze of liquid gold, smiling as though he’s come home from a long trip away and he’s never seen a sight as glad as Jaskier alive in front of him.

Jaskier, whose traitorous mouth runs away from him. “You’re a sight for sore eyes, Geralt. Or are you a sore sight for eyes… well, doesn’t matter. You’ve made it safely, I see. Did the... did the contract go well?”

He never gets an answer; their lonely world of two is only that, an illusion. Suddenly, there’s a tomato flying at Geralt’s face. It’s followed by stale bread, an orange, a stone.

“Mutant! Your kind’s not welcome here!”

Geralt’s ducking, swatting the rotten fruit aside with one hand and the other going to draw his hood over too recognisable hair, but it’s Jaskier who gets to them first. He knows some of these faces - he’d bought provisions for the road from some just that morning. Alijca, with a daughter at the front and another on the way, worried she’ll not make it through the year-end if the Nilfgaardians pass through town. To her right, Mirco, his mare needing a new shoe, and his missus, Fiona.

They might as well be dirt under Jaskier’s shoe.

“How dare you,” Jaskier snarls, and he’s baring his blunt human teeth in echoes of Geralt mid-hunt, drawn to his full height, blue eyes ablaze. “He’s a warrior, a better one than any of you here, one that will hunt down what’s lurking in the woods in wait at night while you’re all running scared, tails behind your legs.” Jaskier’s aware his nails are digging welts into his palm, but all he hears is the static white of their stuttered breathing.

He’s seen it, now, the way Geralt’s open smile had twisted into something too close to resignation, to acceptance that it was his lot in life to be treated this way. He’ll not stand to see it again.

“Jaskier.” It’s Geralt, tugging him away with a hand on his shoulder.

Jaskier, his arse. “I’m not done,” he says, but he doesn’t shrug the witcher off. Instead he’s sneering at this tavern of little-minded people, weaving a little warning of hyacinth and indigo. “With those hearts of stone, might no witcher ever come to your aid ’til you atone.”

Then he’s flouncing up the stairs, dinner forgotten, his rage a cloud about his ears. It’s not the first time, he knows. It won’t be the last. The world is sadly full of those blind to the light of dusk playing on treetops, and the soft hearts of monster hunters hidden under their leather layers. Doesn’t mean he’ll stand for it when it’s in front of him, when it makes that shuttered, haunted look darken Geralt’s eyes. His songs and his little miracles cannot change a continent’s worth of baseless hate, but he’s trying the only way he knows how, words against words.

“I’m sorry,” Geralt starts once they’ve made it to Jaskier’s room, “that it’s like that out there. I manage because I’ve no way out, but you shouldn’t have to shoulder their hatred for simply standing by my side. That’s not—“

“Geralt,” Jaskier interrupts, fondly. “Will you kiss me or not?”

It seems as if he’s really done it this time, for Geralt’s only standing there, gaping at him like a fish. Or a drowned kitten, given the state of his hair. It hits him, then, his heart swelling with the truth of his realisation: Jaskier’s never loved anyone more in his life than this stupid witcher with his inability to follow any sort of common sense or emotion. Oh, Jaskier’s fallen in love, before - he’s fallen out of it just as quickly, as hard and fast with his own heart like he is with others. Yet he’s never felt this tightness in his chest before, this mixture of fear and worry and awe and excitement, a veritable maelstrom that threatens to choke the voice out of him. He’s not exactly sure why he’s surprised, in truth. Maybe it’s because this time he’s been caught off guard, and the affection has unfurled in his mind as if it were a slowly blooming dream.

“Geralt,” he repeats, stepping close enough to reach up and run the pad of his thumb under the soft skin of Geralt’s cheek, wiping away remnants of rain. “I would very much like to kiss you.”

Geralt leans ever so slightly into his palm, trusting, and asks, “Are you certain?” Insecurity is an ill-fitting skin Jaskier will do anything to never see on Geralt again, and he can’t help but to close the rest of their distance and place the merest brush of his lips over the tip of Geralt’s nose.

“Always.”

Geralt kisses as if he were an all-consuming sun. Jaskier’s not sure what else he expected, really; he’s dreamt about this for years, if he’s being honest with himself, from that first glimpse of Geralt’s heart of glass under all that bluster, from the first time those monster’s eyes looked at him and truly asked if he was safe, as if he were something precious to be kept so. And he is - he’s never felt safer than when he’s with Geralt, even if the massive paws cradling his head could easily crush it into so much mush. Jaskier only melts into Geralt’s damp armour and commits the low hum of satisfaction in his veins to memory.

It’s Geralt who pulls away first, pupils blown, his mouth slick and red with the imprint of Jaskier’s teeth on his lower lip. Jaskier wants to devour him whole. Never mind that the wolf will eat him up first, with that too-big heart in its human skin and those claws on his waist. He’d felt those fangs against his tongue, and he wanted it all.

“Jaskier,” Geralt snarls, almost sub-human. “Tell me again.”

Jaskier flirts close enough to that fire to burn in it and replies, “Try me, witcher.”

And then it’s Geralt’s hands grasping at the width of his waist, his thighs, hoisting him up like he’s nothing more than a sack of wheat. Jaskier wraps his legs around Geralt’s hips, laughing, his hands sinking into damp bleached-bone hair, tugging until he meets golden cat’s eyes and a slash of pink on paper white skin. Geralt’s scenting him, he realises - nostrils flaring, pushing close enough to nuzzle into Jaskier’s pulse.

“The scent of you,” his witcher rumbles.

“The scent of me,” Jaskier agrees, cupping Geralt’s jaw and pushing his thumb up against one too-sharp canine. “Getting drunk off it, witcher?”

Geralt shudders against the hollow of Jaskier’s throat, his breath fanning hot over pale, unmarked skin. “Don’t want to hurt you,” he bites out, wolf’s fangs flat on Jaskier’s fluttering breath. “But the scent of you, Jask-“

“You won’t,” Jaskier replies, sliding his hands over Geralt’s jaw. “You’ve never before.”

Geralt’s faltering where he was (very nicely) kneading Jaskier’s arse, but that’s okay - Jaskier’s prepared for it, shoves his thumb harder against those wolf-teeth until there’s a pinprick of blood sliding down one canine, until Geralt’s snarling at him, sandpaper rasping over sensitive skin and lute calluses.

“Jaskier,” and it’s a rough, shattered snarl of his name, heliotrope at its endings, its beginnings, muddled by Geralt’s entire presence pushing him harder against the wall.

“You’ll never harm me,” Jaskier repeats, because he doesn’t have time to prepare his speech on how he loves Geralt for both his too-human kindness and his non-human instincts, and, anyway, he has a feeling Geralt’s picked up on it by now even as dense as he can be. Instead he winds his free fingers into Geralt’s hair, tugging, smearing his thumb red over Geralt’s lips with a smirk curling at the corners of his mouth.

Says, coyly, “what’s the best you’ve got, White Wolf?”

The words are barely out before Geralt’s swallowing his breath again. He’s going to write six songs about the way Geralt’s tongue slides against his own, and the way his huge hands circle the breadth of Jaskier’s waist to easily lift him higher up the wall. Jaskier hasn’t spent years helping Geralt out of his armour to be stopped now; he’s flinging that gambeson off into the distance somewhere, burying his hands into the coarse hair on Geralt’s broad chest, groaning, “that’s fucking hot, Geralt, sweet Melitele kiss me, kiss me again, witcher,” when Geralt runs out of patience and simply rips through Jaskier’s clothes.

Geralt claims him again like a drowning man, nips at Jaskier’s lips as if he’s determined to leave as much evidence as possible, as if the bruises that will bloom where he’s gripping Jaskier’s thighs aren’t enough. Jaskier’s pretty sure he whites out for a moment, because where did Geralt get oil? And when did he- “yes, yes, fuck me, Geralt, more—“

And, “Jaskier—“ growled into his ears, crimson-gold-fuschia with lust, Geralt’s fingers pressing into him, made for both swordplay and gently opening up Jaskier for Geralt’s cock. Jaskier’s scrambling at the wall, twisting, catching his nails on Geralt’s shoulders. He’s not sure where he ends anymore, if he’s even a solid shape or just a melted puddle of witcher-putty being manhandled so Geralt can kneel and put his teeth to work on Jaskier’s thighs. By chance he glances left where destiny is laughing at him and sneaking in to place a mirror. He’s transfixed. A painting - they’re a painting, Jaskier with one long, pale leg hitched around Geralt’s shoulder, the other hanging wide open, his toes curling against worn wooden floors as Geralt groans and drags the hot, wet flat of his tongue over Jaskier’s balls. Works his fingers in deeper, muscles shifting under scarred skin—

“Geralt, please, if you don’t get that cock in me I’ll fucking scream and find someone else to do it, I’m swearing on Melitele’s perfumed right arse cheek, fuck—“

All at once Geralt’s lurching upwards to press a sharp, smug grin to Jaskier’s cheek. He even licks up Jaskier’s jaw to his ear, nibbling at the lobe for a moment whilst Jaskier pants right into Geralt’s ears and draws deep red welts down his ribs.

“Getting desperate, Jaskier?”

But Jaskier’s barely got his glare prepared to reply before Geralt’s shoving his leg up higher, higher, pushing thigh to stomach and then he’s, fuck, slowly pressing his cock in with no intention to pause until he’s sliding flush against Jaskier, splitting him in two, he thinks, not an exaggeration, and it must be his whimpers that’s are filling the air as their foreheads lean together so they can take a moment to just breathe. The room reeks of sex already, thick with the pure longing of it.

This close, Geralt’s eyes burn like the sun. Jaskier thinks of the melody of the stars wheeling above them, all the thousand lyrics he’s yet to write for Geralt, and whispers—

“You’re a heavenly way to die, my dear.”

But Jaskier’s smiling as he cups that sharp jaw and claims Geralt’s lips again. Geralt’s a blur of crimson-white-gold-azure joy, steady when he lifts Jaskier off the wall to lower him onto the (terrible) inn bed. There’s a pause where Geralt is nuzzling into Jaskier’s neck, waiting for Jaskier to stop whining and squirming to get his cock deeper, as if he can’t already feel the ache it’s going to leave behind. He’s full of Geralt to the point of bursting; he wants more, until there’s not a thought left in his pretty head but the ache of his lower back and a catalogue of every mark on his body.

Jaskier says, demanding as ever, “Geralt.”

Geralt’s snarl is a twist of cloudy fuchsia-cerulean, and then he’s shoving Jaskier’s legs up to his chest, his eyes a wide ring of gold around pitch black. Jaskier feels every thrust in the back of his throat, jerks and cries out as much, a never-ending stream of “Geralt” and “fuck” and “please” and “harder” because he’s always egged Geralt on. Geralt’s nothing if not obliging, happily sinking too-sharp teeth into Jaskier’s chest, letting his legs go to wrap one calloused hand around Jaskier’s dick and, lords, that’s Geralt’s thumb pushing into the drooling slit of his dick, smearing precome all over both of them until Jaskier is near ripping out handfuls of ghost-pale hair and tearing at the sheets in turn.

Jaskier feels like he’s the one who’s half-feral - can’t help himself wrapping his legs around Geralt’s slim hips, memorising the way it burns where they touch under his skin. He’s finding the rhythm, the rush of it, only for Geralt to rip it out from under him. Geralt’s grabbing hold of Jaskier’s biceps and pulling, now, turning them until he’s got Jaskier off the bed, kneeling, his spine an elegant, obscene arch from head to where Geralt’s rutting helplessly against his arse.

“Jaskier,” Geralt snarls, utterly inhuman, the sound going straight to Jaskier’s dick, which, yes, he might have a problem there, though he is in love with a witcher, “gonna make you come like this, only like this.”

And that’s... he can’t move, can only give in and take it, squirming on the end of Geralt’s cock when he pulls out to the tip only to slam home and rip a wail from Jaskier’s throat. His world narrows to Geralt’s ruthless pounding into his pliant body, Geralt’s teeth in his shoulder, the maddening drag over his prostrate on each calculated thrust, the heat of him, Geralt, Geralt, Geralt, and he realises, faintly, that he’s the one calling Geralt’s name like a mantra, filling the room with the shape of it, carving it into their bones.

Maybe he’ll write a ballad about this, too. Hymn for the Witcher’s Dick, it’s got a catchy ring to it.

“Fuck, Geralt,” Jaskier gasps in lieu of voicing his prayer for life-changing cock, “you’re so fucking huge, so thick, yes— yes, fuck, please, darling-!”

He chokes off on a keen, high and desperate, bucking and sobbing and coming absolutely everywhere because Geralt’s leaned in and growled “come for me, sweetheart,” in his ears right down to his balls, to the tight, hot clench of his arse milking around Geralt’s cock.

Jaskier does actually white out with pleasure for a few seconds, then, as Geralt lets him flop back down on their bed. Only to plant one hand between Jaskier’s shoulder-blades, the other digging into his hip where tomorrow there will be a purpling bruise the exact shape of Geralt’s palm, and then his witcher is a mass of supernova heat forcefully grinding him into this awful inn’s mattress, leaving deep imprints of wolf’s fangs on his nape, “Jaskier“: a benediction whispered between clenched teeth to the tune of Jaskier’s broken whimpers until Geralt groans, just the once, and finally goes collapses onto him.

It feels like an age before Jaskier finds the strength to unfurl his fingers from where they’re knotted into the sheets. His legs twitch when Geralt rolls off; he can feel blood rush to his face at the lazy trickle of cum from his sore hole, knows he’ll be feeling this for days and yet can’t bring himself to do much more than shuffle enough to rest his head on Geralt’s shoulder.

He’s going fall asleep, sticky and sated—

There’s a thumb rubbing circles of cum into his skin.

“Geralt, are you…?”

“Not a word,” comes the grumbled reply. “Don’t you dare.”

But when Jaskier shifts to peer upwards the furrow between Geralt’s brows is all but gone. He looks younger, somehow; more beautiful, and yet no less the monster that haunts the villagers’ dreams. Geralt’s eyes are still that otherworldly golden glow when they notice Jaskier’s staring, though they’re crinkled at the corners as his witcher tugs him closer and pushes sweat-damp curls aside to scent at his pulse.

“Good?” Geralt asks.

“Are you asking if I’m good, or if the sex was good? Because I’m exceptionally well, and the sex, really Geralt, shouldn’t you know?”

Geralt nips his collarbone in gentle… reprimand? It’s odd, affectionate, and entirely Geralt enough to startle quiet chuckling out of Jaskier.

“It’s the first time with you.” For a few seconds Geralt’s familiar huff-laugh fills the stunned silence between them. And then they’re both laughing, Jaskier muffling himself in Geralt’s throat, a warm weight made entirely of joy.

It’s not that destiny and Jaskier are feuding, exactly. If anything, it’s destiny and Geralt who are feuding; Jaskier’s just unhappily caught in the middle, somehow forced to be a mediator between them.

This was…

This was a safe place. Supposed to be, that is; a safe place to rest, a stop, a nowhere port at the end of the continent before the long stretch of sea to Skellige where Jaskier had a standing invitation at Kaer Trolde to spend winters wiling away the bitter cold with good grog and rowdy company. He had even convinced Geralt to come along with him, loathe to part when he read reluctance in the way his witcher’s eyes had lingered on him longer as trees turned to rust and the promise of snow crept into the world.

A simple request, Geralt had said. Witcher’s chores - a few sirens terrorising the harbour, and disposing of them would ensure smoother passage to Skellige, plus free room and board for the night. No matter, he’d said. Don’t wait up.

And Jaskier hadn’t. Had gone to bed, so easily reassured, only to wake in the early hours to find candles burnt to the wick with no Geralt in sight.

Fool.

Over the horizon, day begins to break, bringing a weak sun and the slowest caresses of light on this godforsaken battlefield. Jaskier kneels next to a crumple of black-and-silver on the frostbitten ground, his hands clasped in prayer, his head bowed as if a great weight has settled upon his brow. He’s not certain what’s happened here - the sirens are dead, their nest still smoking from one of Geralt’s bombs, and the snows should be far, far off yet, weeks away. His head spins with questions no one has answers to give him, and he is ill to his soul with the knowledge he may never hear them from the one person who knows.

Because Geralt— Geralt is still, the fog of his breath dissipating with every second Jaskier wastes here doing nothing. He’s a bard, a poet, a prodigal son wielding more than lovely ballads at his fingertips. A man that’s made the mistake of loving too deeply.

This should not be his choice. Yet... What use is he if he cannot… if he refuses-

Jaskier takes in a deep, shuddering breath.

Closes his eyes.

First, the fading witcher-slow thumping of Geralt’s heart under his palm. He imagines it strong and steady; clings to memories of faded autumn nights finding excuses to press close to Geralt’s warmth. Second, the celadon-voice that’s always guided him on the winds, sweet as ever like a lover’s caress, a mother’s embrace. He weaves to Geralt’s beat a careful blessing; takes his time, a condemned man tiptoeing to the precipice, more than aware of the swirls of colour rising from his soul.

A spell he never meant to cast, and yet here they are.

If this is to be the last song he sings, it will be endless.

It feels as though the world inhales with Jaskier; the swamp is hushed, blank slate-grey, pausing with him, sighing with him. At last: four lines from his lament for the dearth of life, soft and slow, whispered to the winds.

Spring will return, on the road the rain will fall

Hearts will be warmed by the heat of the sun

It must be thus, for fire still smoulders in us all

An eternal fire, hope for each one

And then.

Nothing.

And then—

There’s sudden screaming, and, distantly, Jaskier realises it’s coming from him. High and desperate, twisting off into wails of sharp, pure white. His blood boils in his veins, bubbles out of his eyes and still Jaskier holds on, his hands more like claws over Geralt’s chest. He’s curved, he thinks hysterically, in a protective arch over his witcher’s prone body. The spell rips from his voice until he’s sobbing in great, heaving bursts, still singing between wails.

There’s only one thought left:

I can’t die here.

He can’t leave Geralt alone. Not yet.

In the end it’s only a tug. Between one heartbeat and the next, as easily as he’d begun it all: they’re surrounded by silence again. With just the slightest of touches; so simple, for he’s only closing the loop.

“Geralt,” Jaskier rasps, pressing his hand to his witcher’s too-pale cheek as his vision fades. “Come back to me.”

Jaskier wakes to lazy patterns traced along the jut of his hips and the sound of a crackling fire.

Jaskier… wakes.

That’s a surprise, if he’s being honest.

“Don’t say it like that.”

Geralt. He must have been speaking aloud. Geralt’s concern is the sky at dusk, who would have known?

“I don’t know what you’ve done, but I’m thankful.” A pause, and if Jaskier weren’t so tired he’d be filling it. He can’t, though, still feeling as if this were a waking dream and he is about to pass on, as it goes.

“Not a dream,” Geralt murmurs. He sounds sleepy - it’s cute, a sleepy witcher. Like a puppy. “Not a puppy, either,” comes the grousing. Despite it - in spite of it? - strong arms tug him to Geralt’s firm chest. There’s some nosing at the soft skin behind his ear, and his back is vibrating with what might be purring. “Jaskier.” Geralt’s voice is a rumble travelling down to his toes. Warm, calloused fingers stroke carefully through Jaskier’s curls, pressing to his temple, the nape of his neck, his pulse. “My shrike.”

It hurts to breath, let alone speak, though at least now he feels vaguely conscious. Never may it be said Jaskier is not a stubborn fool.

“Shrike?”

Geralt shushes him with soft lips to the corner of his mouth and that amused huff-purr when he startles at it. “Shrike,” his White Wolf confirms. “Vicious little songbird.”

“Afraid I’ll impale you on a thorn?”

“Afraid?” Geralt’s setting wolf’s teeth to his collarbones. Snarling, the same way he does when Jaskier’s pushed too far - only Jaskier can feel Geralt’s heartbeat like a physical presence alongside his own, witcher-slow, calming him. Geralt’s joking… most likely. “Shouldn’t you be running from me?”

It’s an opening, Jaskier realises. Yes, there’s the glint of a joke in Geralt’s tone. But he’ll wager that he knows the witcher better than anyone else, perhaps even better than Geralt himself does, because Geralt lies to himself (poorly) and Jaskier simply sees the truth of the world. The truth is that Geralt finds a monster in the mirror - Geralt is the reflection of those monsters humans dream up to feel less monstrous, as he’d once told Jaskier, the demons in the night shielding rapists and bandits from their own guilt.

It’s tempting to joke this away. Normally he would, except they’ve just nearly died. Jaskier’s owed some sentiment, surely.

Geralt is owed that kindness.

So he cups his witcher’s scarred cheek in one cold hand. Nudges their foreheads together as best he can. Says, “Every blessing I have ever sung is woven for you, who walks long nights alone. Even when the sun has set behind this world’s last scene and the stage is all empty dust, I will be there to sing your lullaby. So that after the dark of winter a dreaming flower might bloom for you once more.”

Geralt’s mouth works, though no words are forthcoming. They’re not needed, not really - Jaskier’s more than able to read the bewildered gape on his face, even suppresses his own chuckle before Geralt’s tugging him close enough to crush his lungs a little.

For a moment the world shifts, twists sideways and more to the right. Geralt disappears, his edges wavering like a mirage until he’s iridescent in Jaskier’s mind. He thinks of all the things he hasn’t said yet, the explanations that are Geralt’s right to hear. But those golden eyes keep watching him, glimmering from behind silver lashes and deathly pale skin, something warm in their depths.

Jaskier thinks, I’ll love you forever.

Jaskier says, out loud, “Geralt, you buffoon, stop brooding and fuck me.”

And Geralt’s showing off the wolf’s jaws crammed in his human’s mouth, his neck a long, pale totem of scars, his hands rough but tender on Jaskier’s hips, his laughter a symphony of marigold-crimson-silver right before he rolls Jaskier over on the covers and swallows the rest of their words.