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Summary: 5 Times Cahir didn’t know how to accept care + 1 time he did. (OR) Cahir is recovering in Kaer Morhen and no one quite knows what to do about it.
Word Count: 4186
AO3 Link
Story:
Cahir Mawr Dyffryn Aep Caellach arrived at the gates of Kaer Morhen in the early light of dawn just mere weeks before the pass snowed over. It was Geralt who saw him first but it was Jaskier, on whom the young commander and demon of Ciri’s nightmares leaned heavily, who brought him through the gates with the heavy declaration that Geralt would need to behead him as well if he wished the Nilfgaardian harm.
It would be three days for the man to wake after he fell into the snow at the White Wolf’s feet. It would not be long before the others in the crumbling Keep took to him, though would be a lifetime before he learned to accept their kindness in turn.
@save-a-witcher-bingo Prompt: At Sea
Characters: Witcher Gerd, Togeir the Red, Jerome Moreau
Torgeir was looking up at the ruins of what had once been his home. What was his home. Is. The flames were spreading quickly, Fort Tuirseach was all but destroyed. Like the Jarl who had filled its halls with laughter and mead- ruined.
He walked into town for there was no horse in Aedirn that could carry his bulk. There was a song in the air that called to him like the whispers of a midnight lover and there was beauty around him that only served to remind him of how clumsy his feet were when moving through the flowering fields. He heard the laughter of young folk, the slow song of an old man crooning of days long passed and a woman who admonished his somber tone. It was the sound of life that he had never chanced to live but was more than happy to observe. Perhaps he could even partake in a meal before being run off from the village’s Beltane festival.
Fill for @rawrkinjd ‘s bingo - third column-second row - I present to you a post apocalyptic modern au!
Love lived here.
Geralt slid his hand over what once had been a mantle filled with photographs and trinkets. There was a trophy, a small bronze thing whose placard proclaimed its owner “Little League MVP” and a shattered lantern engraved with the names of people long dead. Just like the others. They had detoured into Cintra in the hopes of finding survivors, slim though it was they hoped nonetheless.
**Tags:** Soft Eskel (The Witcher), Dom Eskel (The Witcher), Rough Sex, Oral Sex, Choking, Aftercare
**Summary:** Eskel helps Kiyan quiet his mind. for @witcherkinkmeme
“Easy, easy sweet thing.” Eskel ran his hand through the other Witcher’s dark hair. Kiyan knelt at the end of the bed, his chin dipped low to hide his eyes. “Tell me how you’re feeling.”
“Tense. I… I need it to stop.”
“Too many thoughts in that pretty head of yours, huh.” He slipped his fingers beneath the man’s chin. “Do you want me to tie you up tonight or can you be good for me without them?” It was a delicate balance, more so with Kiyan than any other he had danced this dance with before. It was a thin line between pleasure and painful memories. “Need to see your eyes.”
Kiyan had such pretty eyes too, for a Witcher, so dark in their gold they might have been hazel.
He opened his mouth to speak and hesitated, caught in Eskel's gaze. This was a struggle for him; the boundaries.
“I need a verbal answer, otherwise we’ll move over to the fire and I’ll just read for you.” He would get what he needed from it either way. Eskel would make sure of it.
“No ropes. Too… too close.” Too close to the cell… Eskel pet him gently until those honeyed eyes fell closed, “Hands on your thighs then. I’m gonna have you use those pretty lips for me soon.” He folded his pants and set them to the side and took a seat on the end of the bed. Some nights it was fight for the control, hissing and spitting and blood on the cat's knuckles before he could let himself be held. Some nights were like this, easy, Kiyan half gone before Eskel laid hands on him. Sweet.
“One last question, then I’m going to let you slip away; I’m going to finish this chapter would you like me to read to you or just keep my hands on you?”
There were times that the extra senses were hell, the quiet was a necessary component to this, there were other times when the walls and the chains were too close and he needed that extra sensation to tether him. As he fell into his pleasure rather than flew.
“Read to me.”
“Good boy.”
Kiyan’s mouth is warm, his lips soft where they pressed against Eskel’s thigh. Eskel kept his fingers moving through the black locks, careful not to pull.
“And the world fell still, like the first frosted morning…” Kiyan let the fingers in hair soothe him as Eskel’s voice washed over him. The words didn’t matter, it was the rise and fall timber of his voice.
Eskel watched the tension leave Kiyan’s shoulders until he was loose and pliant against the bigger man’s thigh.
He set the book on the floor and tugged lightly on his hair.
“You with me sweet thing?”
A small noise of affirmation was all he received.
“Open up for me.”
Sinking between those plush lips was a blessing each time. He didn’t thrust, barely shifted really, but he did squeeze the back of his neck. “Do as you please.” He urged.
As he pleased turned out to be a slow slide of lips, kitten licks, and the press of a tongue beneath the head. There was no rush, no goal being the exploration and enjoyment of skin against skin and a lover’s pleasure. Eskel simply continued to stroke over his head and neck until the need for something more became nigh unbearable.
“Put your hands on my thighs, kitten.” Another tug of his hair granted the wolf a respite from the sweet kisses placed along his shaft. He was obeyed and Kiyan sought the familiar scars on his thighs that marked his favorite place to rest. “You tap if you need a rest. Understood?” Kiyan blinked slowly. “Show me what you do for a break.” Tap. Tap. Tap.
“Good. Now open up for me.” It started slow and easy, Eskel letting his sub work him over. The first roll of his hips was testing, a controlled flex that earned him a sigh and another inch of his cock enveloped in heat. Kiyan’s fingers pressed into his thighs. Eskel cradled the back of his head in one palm, the other braced on the mattress.
“Gonna fuck your mouth now, sweetheart.” A squeeze. Permission. His pleasure was not the end goal of their arrangement, but my the gods if it wasn’t good.
He upped the frequency of his movements but kept the same steady pace, relaxing into the power he’d been granted. Every puff of breath against his skin was a gift and each time he teased down the cat Witcher’s throat a blessing. Every roll of his hips let him go deeper until he had the kneeling man’s nose pressed to his groin. “Perfect, so perfect for me. I could have you like this every night, spoil you with such soft things that you’d never leave my bed.”
He held there until Kiyan’s breathing became labored. His respite lasted only a moment before Eskel decided to do it again, languishing in the frantic flutter of his throat and how, despite it all, he remained pliant. There was only so much he could take though and soon he set a quicker pace.
He didn’t try to hold his peak back, let it wash over him from head to toe and paint Kiyan’s lips white with each stuttering movement as the man struggled to swallow. It wasn’t necessary. Eskel liked him a mess almost as much as he liked him dolled up.
Kiyan left his hands on Eskel’s thighs as the wolf pulled him back to rest on his heels. A thumb smeared the cum on his lips and, in a drunken movement, he tried to take it into his mouth as well.
Eskel cupped his jaw, forced hazy eyes to catch his own.
“Shall I fuck you?” Lashes fluttered. Eskel laughed, not unkindly. “Alright.” He arranged his Witcher on the bed, arms stretched toward the headboard and fingers curled loosely in the gap there. “You’re going to keep your hands there, if you let go I’ll have to punish you.” He wanted him on his knees, truly, face down and struggling to hold his weight. But not tonight, he may have wanted but he needed to see his eyes. “I’m going to open you up,” he kisses from knee to thigh as he slicked his fingers, “and then make you cry.”
Kiyan was relaxed enough that it took Eskel but a handful of minutes to get him properly opened. The entire time his eyes remained closed and his breathing deep. Eskel rubbed hard against his prostate and enjoyed the arch and gasp it earned him.
He pulled one calf over his shoulder and left Kiyan’s other leg crooked atop the blanket as he slicked his own cock and sank into the blissed out witcher. A few rolls of his hips and he was sheathed, Kiyan’s eyes were open, entirely unfocused. Eskel pressed a kiss to his parted lips and waited for a small nod. The fingers on the headboard twitched, his head rolled, and a high whine came from his throat.
“I want you to nod when I can move.” He waited, hands flexing around Kiyan’s hips until finally the man nodded.
The pace he set was brutal. He pressed bruises into the thigh on his shoulder, held nothing back in the rolls of his hips. Every noise that passed Kiyan’s lips was forced from him, a prize of the conquest Eskel had set out on. It was only his grip on the soft flesh beneath him that kept the Witcher from sliding up the bed.
At the first hint of salt in the air Eskel dropped down to an elbow, cradled his lover’s head as he drove in deep and ground against him. His hair fell loose, a thin curtain that kept them safe from the outside world. “Pretty little thing, aren’t you?”
Hands scrabbled at his back, blunt nails tracking lines of fire that were oh so good.
Eskel slid his palms across bronze skin and up the underside of his arms until they returned to laying above his head.
“S-sorry.”
“Hush,” he wrapped his fingers delicately around Kiyan’s throat. “The only word I want to hear from you is my name or your word. That’s your punishment, you can cry and scream” he resumed his tempo “but don’t you speak.” It wasn’t much of a punishment. His cat wasn’t talkative most days and even less so when floating, but Eskel didn’t want to punish him much. Not then. Next time he would use the riding crop but that was for later.
Kiyan didn’t scream but the tears flowed freely as Eskel set pace. Hitches of his breath that stuttered before they could come close to a word.
The orgasm Eskel wrung from him was almost cruel, featherlight touches along his cock until they disappeared just as he went over the edge, painting them both in his spend. Eskel followed him over.
He pulled away slowly, petting sweat slicked hair and then down over heaving ribs and shaking thighs. There was a bowl of water near the fire that he dipped a cloth into and wiped himself down with military swiftness. Another clean rag returned with him to wipe the sweat and spend from Kiyan’s body.
“There you are, sweet thing.” He murmured, wrapping his arm around the cat’s shoulders. “Jus’ let me take care of ya.” He moved them both to the love seat by the fire, damp cloth abandoned to the corner for the next day’s laundry. He sat with the slighter Witcher in his lap, head tucked against his shoulder while Eskel rested his feet on a stool.
Kiyan would drift for a while, near an hour Eskel would wager, then he’d start to come back to himself. The first sign would be the tracing of quen against Eskel’s breast, just in the center. He would coax him into a sip of water, cool and soothing for his throat, and then Kiyan would open his eyes.
It was near clockwork.
“You with me, Ki?” Not his full name, but not the sweet endearments of their scene either.
“Mmhm.”
There was an orange on the table, it had cost him more than he’d ever admit but the smile received when he held the first slice to Kiyan’s lips was well worth it.
In the morning they would talk about it, or maybe they’d simply pack up and head on. But for the evening Eskel held him close and made sure that he came back to him.
The Wolves had always told him that his heart was bigger than his brain. First it was Geralt; when Eskel refused to let him take the fall for one of their misadventures in the kitchens back in their fourteenth year. Then it was Rennes, swearing him up and down while forcing Eskel to butcher the griffin chick he’d tried to spare. It came softly from Feliks, a tiny kitten clutched in his own paws- too large to be graceful even in his youth. Vesemir said it with a sigh when he was nursing a bloodied nose from his refusal to just “fucking move” from the fight of a Witcher and recruit.
It was a truth of his life, that the Dragon of Kaer Morhen would die at the fault of his stupid heart. He never could leave well enough alone, couldn’t walk away from a creature in pain without his scars burning like a fresh brand. Even when those same creatures hissed and spit at the sight of his face.
“Come now, there’s no need to be nasty.” The Witcher across the clearing snarled, hurled another insult at him that would have made Lambert proud, and pressed closer to the rock face at his back.
“If you’re gonna kill me how about you either do it or get lost.”
“Why would I kill you?” He had to ask, the other man seemed so sure of his intent to harm… he was injured as well. It wasn’t until the Witcher moved just so that the scent of blood drifted far enough for Eskel to catch.
“Don’t play fucking coy, Honorton. Ain’t a fucking person this side of the Pontar that doesn’t know by now.” Oh. Oh yes, Eskel knew. It had been a massacre. The Witcher’s breath was labored and Eskel had assumed it was the anger;
“Honorton was near two weeks ago. You’re not healing, so what happened?” The cat, because the little Witcher was indeed a Cat, favored his left side. “I really do want to talk.”
“Want me to fucking confess my sins? Well tough shit.”
“For fucks sake I want your side of the story you little bastard.” That made the man draw up short. ‘Like fucking Lambert ’ Eskel thought. “You tell me your side and I’ll share whatever I manage to catch tonight. You’re half starved.” He was half as likely to get a knife in his ribs as an answer but the Witcher seemed to give in.
“They hired me for a leshen and tried to give me ten fucking crowns for it. Told them they’d wish they had the beast back if they didn’t pay me what was agreed. ‘We hid some gold sir witcher, it’s in the barn if you insist on taking our livelihoods’. I believed them. Stupidly.” The cat had taken a seat on a stump that was nearly older than Eskel. “They stabbed me in the back with a pitchfork. They’d kill me for a few crowns and I’m supposed to protect whoresons like that?” It was a rhetorical question, but Eskel bit his tongue anyway. “So yeah, I drew steel and didn’t sheath it until the ground was slick with blood.”
Every man, woman, and…. Child. Almost. Eskel knew the rumors. His hands clenched and released. Anger was a powerful emotion and he tried to let it go. There goes the Butcher of Blaviken…
“You heading somewhere in particular?”
“No.” Too fast.
“I’m gonna go check for game. If you’re still here when I get back I’ll share and take a look at your back. Pitchfork is a nasty wound when it is treated right.” There was no response from the Cat but Eskel left anyway, turning his back to the man but listening intently for the event of a betrayal. He was kind, not a fool. Not usually.
He had a choice to make. It wasn’t a Witcher’s place to absolve a man off his sins. It wasn’t their place to pass judgement on men… nor each other. Shit happens on the path, he rubbed at his scars. It wasn’t his place to judge.
Eskel was genuinely surprised to find the Cat waiting for him on his return. The young man had stripped most of his kit off and left it in a careful stack so that he wore his breeches and a stained white undershirt. There was the faint scent of blood in the air and Eskel huffed a breath to clear it from his senses.
“Got two rabbits, you want to skin them while I look at those wounds?”
“Fine.” The witcher hesitated, be it the shock of an act of kindness or wariness Eskel didn’t know, but he pulled the dingy shirt over his head and took the rabbits from Eskel’s hands. “Jus’… if you kill me like this I’ll be pissed.” He turned his back and knelt in the dirt to take up the task Eskel set for him. Eskel didn’t dare speak of honor- no wolf would kill a man with their back turned; and what a sight that back was.
The wounds were nasty. Four punctures that, in truth, should have killed him. Eskel was gentle when he pressed along the edges of the wounds, two were infected- angry red and fevered under his calloused hands. He traced the second highest and whistled through his teeth. “They almost got your lung here, cat.”
“Yeah.” The cat stilled where he was about to place the first skinned rabbit in a bowl. Eskel rummaged through his pack for some white Rafford’s and a bit of white gull.
“I have silver thistle for a poultice that I can use if you want.” The blade scraped at the inside of a pelt and the Cat half shrugged.
“S’okay.”
Eskel skimmed his fingers over the notches of the other’s spine. He wasn’t simply underfed, he was starving. Witchers grew lean in the months nearing winter, as contracts paid less and game grew thin, Eskel had counted his own ribs more than once. It was a fact of their lives. He wondered how often the cat had been stiffed to be so hungry that he wouldn’t heal.
“Drink this, cat.” he pushed the potion into the witcher’s hands as soon as the second rabbit was gutted. Once it was finished the vial was laid near the bag that Eskel rummaged through for his herbal salves.
“Gaetan.”
“Hm?”
“My name. It’s Gaetan.” Those yellow eyes were trained on the ground, his hands twisted in the fabric of the ruined shirt.
It took four years for Lambert to admit that the Cat wasn’t just an acquaintance. It took two more before he acknowledged that in so many words. He would never know when he fell in love with him.It took six months for Aiden to stop sleeping with one eye open - the wolf didn’t have the patience for a long con. It took two years for him to start calling the wolf “his friend” at the Caravan. It took two more for him to think that he might be a little bit in love with him.
It would be a decade before they kissed for the first time.
It was a delicate game that they played, dancing on a knife’s edge in barefoot summer rains.A light push in either direction would send them both into a free fall, anger and violence for months on end until they simmered and cooled enough to embrace and cling to the other’s company like a child to a blanket. A push could be as simple as a beg for another evening or as forceful as a fistfight. It was a dangerous dance that worked in their favor most days. They were determined to make it work; so it did.
*
They rode at each other’s side, horses trotting along toward the next podunk little town big enough to have a decent inn. They hadn’t seen another traveler in days and even Lambert was aching for a good bed to lie in. Naturally it had to rain.
“If you hadn’t insisted we check out that embankment we wouldn’t be in this mess.” Aiden grumbled, his hair was plastered to the sides of his face and neck. He should have looked like a half drowned rat... or cat. It wasn’t fair, he looked like a painting.“I’m sorry that I have some half decent morals!” He added a mutter under his breath of “Fucking Cat.”
“Your morals got you a sprained ankle and no pay for a job that should have gotten us at least twenty crowns a piece, sweetheart.”
He… had a point. It wasn’t even as though the drowners were near a village. They were three hours from the last washing post for Melitele’s sake. But… no. He was not admitting defeat.“Better than a dead kid next summer. Hell, what are you complaining for? You’re the one who's been bitchin’ about a bath.”
“Yes. A bath. A wonderful, warm, lovely bath- not freezing rain and a muddy river. Melitele’s tits Lam!” Aiden was a good man, he was. A damn sight better than Lambert most days but the man could complain for hours . Lambert would be paying some inn keeper for a bath that evening; he simply knew it. Even still… he reached over and flicked water from his gloves at the Cat’s face.
“You’ll live.”
*
“Duck!” Aiden hit the forest floor as an arrow whipped through where his neck had been just moments before. He rolled left and popped back to his feet in time to catch a bandit with his dagger, just under the man’s ribs. He made a satisfying sound when he hit the ground. Aiden didn't have time to revel in it.
“Stupid thing, robbing a witcher. Robbing two? You must have been top of your class.” He spun in time to see Lambert knock the last man in the clearing unconscious before he took off into the trees. Branches broke as the archer took off post haste, seeming to realize that he was now in a very poor position. Lambert caught him before Aiden could take the first coin pouch off their would be assailants.
Lambert was… harsh. He kept his gentle smiles and laughs, all his soft pieces that the world hadn’t yet managed to beat out of him close to his chest. Covered in layer upon layer of thorns and armor. He would cut his way through a hundred men before he let someone see the things he considered his weaknesses. Aiden had, somehow, managed to slip between those defenses at some point. He wasn’t sure when. Despite the rage that he carried in his chest Lambert was a good man; he didn’t take contracts on humans and he rarely killed them outright, a bit of maiming or disfigurement was well within the cards but he refused to make use of a grave. Except where Aiden was concerned. Except where the people who he loved were concerned.
He’d asked, just once, why the death of a human was the line. Why after everything that life had thrown at him and all that he had done in return that was where he put the marker. Lambert had been half asleep and full of good whiskey at the time; so the answer was honest, too much so.
“Cause I’ve got the upper hand no matter what. It’d be like beating on a woman or hitting a kid and I ain’t got any plans on being like my father. That’s if it’s jus’ me though. They wanna hurt someone else and I’m not going to let them get on with that. Might as well put those damn trials to some fuckin' use...”
In the morning he hadn’t acknowledged the information he’d so trustingly laid at Aiden’s feet; and they went on with their lives. Lambert came back then with a recently cleaned steel sword. “They ruined my good boots.”
“We’ll get you new ones.” Aiden promised.
“I’m holding you to that.” A calloused hand was offered to him and Aiden placed his own within it. On his feet he stepped into the wolf’s space, using their clasped hands to pull him into a one armed hug. He ran his hand over the wolf's back for both comfort and to ensure there were no injuries he needed to patch.
“Least I can do for you saving my ass.”
*
They tumbled into bed together for the first time after a bar fight. It wasn’t a bed really; it was a bedroll laid beneath an overhang of rock and they were both too keyed up from their frantic flight out of town to make anything last long. Lambert had a black eye and Aiden had a split lip that protested every harsh kiss pressed against it but neither witcher cared. Pain was routine, a small price for the love and the pleasure- the oh so fucking finally feeling of giving in to what they wanted.
With fumbling hands they brought each other off. Aiden slung a heavy arm over the wolf’s waist and tensed when Lambert’s hand circled his wrist, well expecting to have it tossed aside with a complaint about cuddling like he had in every inn they’d shared a bed within before. He didn’t though.
Aiden woke the next morning with his arm still firmly in place. The grumbling about ‘disgusting dried fluids’ was even worth it.
*
Lambert was in a mood. The birds were too loud, the flowers that bloomed alongside the road were too cloying, and the sun was too damn bright. Even Aiden, the only person on the planet that could stand his company more than a few hours, was distancing himself on their trek. The contract was for a pair of griffins, easy enough, but the alderman had smelled of cheap liquor and the look in his eye said that they would be lucky to get half the promised pay.
“Hey, kitten?” It comes out as a biting thing, no matter his attempts to keep his frustration off the cat's head.
“Yeah?” Aiden looked at him then, eyes that edged on green rather than amber, wide and expecting.
“How ‘bout you go on and get our pay. I’ll probably gut the fucker if I have to deal with him right now.” The cat didn’t reach out for him, having spent too long at the wolf’s side not to realize his mood and the preferences that came with it.
“Alright. You going to be in our room?”
“Yeah, I’m going to try to sleep off the last of this damn potion.”
He didn’t manage to sleep at all. Aiden came in with two plates of food and two tankards of ale to find him pretending, face down on the mattress.
“Come on, asshole. I got food and most of our promised coin for you… I also got a new gwent deck last month that I’m gonna kick your ass with.”
“Like you could win without cheating me, pretty thing.” he forced himself up, toward the food that made him want to be sick with the thought of it on his tongue. He needed it. He knew it, Aiden knew it. Just like Aiden knew that he wouldn't win without cheating.
“Let’s see about that.”
*
Cats were unstable. Dangerous. They were as quick to change from laughter to anger as a summer sky was from blue to storm gray. Cats were not to be trusted. Every witcher and human child was taught that from the moment they could walk. Lambert was never good at following instructions.
“Aiden?” The carnage was… extensive. A dozen bodies torn apart with the strength of a hurricane and the care of a starving drowner. “Aiden, love?” Endearments, true endearments, were rare to pass his lips. They meant one of two things- he was well fucked or he was scared out of his ever loving mind.He stepped over a butchered arm, half cut and then torn, towards the figure in the middle of the room.
They had split six weeks before, Aiden going to take on a contract that Lambert wanted to know nothing about. He wasn't naive, he knew Aiden didn't have the same qualms he did about humans and human contracts but he had asked in their third year not to know about them. Aiden respected that. Aiden respected him.It was the blood that gave them the chance to meet then, so strong even from half a mile through the forest that Lambert was helpless not to investigate. Cats are unstable. Their mutations make it inevitable that they’ll snap one day.
His hand wrapped around the cat’s wrist, firm and without fear. He expected him to lash out, was willing to take whatever scar or pain that came in order to simply touch. To ensure that Aiden was real. That the frozen figure wasn’t a lie, a cruel trick played on his mind. Aiden turned, Lambert tensed, but the dagger in his cat's left hand dropped to the floor rather than bury itself in his chest; and Aiden collapsed against the wolf’s chest. He was soaked in blood, Lambert realized dimly. Not just covered but he was dripping in it. Aiden’s hair was matted with it and his blue armor hardly showed through the red. It was old- turning black and crusting. How long had he stood there?
“I’ve got you, kitten.” the hand on his wrist shifted to hold the cat’s waist, Lambert raised his other hand raised to clasp Aiden's neck. A feeble attempt at making it all better. “I’ve got you.” Fourteen bodies. Most wore some sort of uniform, a lesser lordling’s colors or some shit but... some did not. There were three men in commoner clothes, a torn scrap of pale lilac fabric, and a small pair of shoes not unlike… Oh gods.
“What happened here?” This is Aiden. He’s yours, he's good. There’s a reason for this.
Salt was in the air, nearly lost beneath the copper of blood, and the body in his arms began heaving with sobs.“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”Cats feel too much. Lambert shifted his grip to half carry the other witcher outside, he needed away. He needed fresh air and dirt under his feet. He took the sobbing man around the back of the shack to a well where he could rip one of his undershirts into strips and begin to clean the blood and gore from the man’s skin. The armor, the clothes, they were lost causes but he could make sure that the only stain on his skin would be salt.
He started with his hands, coaxing his fingers to uncurl with soft and even pressure. He took care around the nails, more than one of which were broken. Then up his arms with broader strokes. By the time he started on his neck the sobbing had quieted down to shuddering breaths, hiccups that ended before they finished. Ignoring his eyes which were red rimmed and half void of the emotions that wracked him so thoroughly just moments before, he was nearly calm.Lambert wiped at some splatter on his cheek. He tossed the cloth aside and took up another.
“Back with me, kitten?” He needed to be gentle. He had to be gentle for him.“Yeah.” His voice was like sandpaper.“Gonna tell me what happened?” Lambert asked, afraid of the answer.“... yeah.” Aiden swallowed, took a deep breath- shuddered and had to try again. Lambert waited. He could wait for Aiden. Only for Aiden.
“Contract was for some kid- not to kill. No, gods no. Someone kidnapped a mayor’s daughter or a lord’s… I don’t know. Titles weren’t important. I just was supposed to find her and bring her back home but... but I tracked them up here after a few weeks. Gal had a lover and a kid no one knew about... I guess the dad's family couldn't stand a bastard kid running around or some shit and I thought that it would be easy to find her and she jus' would agree to keep it quiet but when I got here they were” his hands clenched, rage twisted his lips into a snarl but he didn't try to rise. “They were too distracted with her to realize I’d even gotten inside. They used her as a bargaining chip, Lam. She was half dead, held up here for all that time and... and they offered her to me. Like I was a- I didn’t kill her Lam, I didn’t touch her or that kid in there… that was all them. I tried so save them but it didn’t fucking matter and they... they... Please, please believe me that I wouldn’t- even as angry as I was I didn’t touch them. I didn’t do that to them. I tried. I didn't- I couldn't...” he was rambling, losing it once more and the longer he spoke the more rage built in Lambert’s chest.“I know you wouldn’t.” He pours every ounce of conviction into the words.“I blacked out, Lam. I… I don’t remember it all but I wouldn’t have” he was breathing fast again- panicking. He was losing him again.
“I know, kitten. You wouldn’t. I know that, you know that. You’re too good for that, love.” He dragged the cloth over his eyelids, gentle, and then he tossed it into the bucket. He was as clean as he could be without a full bath. “Do you want me to burn it all?”“No, the girl and the kid. They deserve better. I’ll make a pyre for them if you’ll deal with the others.”“I can do that.”So Lambert gently squeezed the cat’s hands, kissed his forehead, heedless of the blood in his hair, and set to work.
*
As the days grew colder the men took to curling tighter around each other’s bodies. They were only a month off the incident when Aiden set his lips against Lambert’s neck and said“I love you.”It wasn’t the first time the Cat had said those words but Lambert brought clasped hands up to his lips and whispered against them, for the first time.“Love you too, kitten.”
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He wakes to fingers tracing over his scars. They’ve paused over the heavy knot near the base of his spine, gently caressing the raised edges. He would pretend to sleep, though the attempt is futile with the wolf in his bed, so he shifts and pulls the pillow further into his arms.
“This is new.”
“Not really.”
“It is to me.”
The wolf drags his fingertips up Chris’ spine, coaxes him to turn his head. “Tell me whatever it was is dead.” Even blind those eyes are piercing, full of something akin to love, that rare little word.
When they re-did the street like ten or fifteen years ago, they decided that the spot also needed a stop sign. But this addition seemed to have been something of an afterthought, as rather than doing the sensible thing and placing it on a protective traffic island, they simply stuck the sign right into what was essentially the middle of bare street. Where any passing car could easily drive right over it.
Which they did. No less than three times. In rapid succession.
This stop sign used to be seven feet tall. Every time it got hit (and consequently flattened flush to the ground), the repair people simply sawed off the bent part of the post and stuck it back into the street. (If you look closely, you can still see the rusted remnants of previous placements at the foot of the sign.)
After a while, and continued impacts (and sawing), they seemed to realize that they were eventually going to actually *run out* of post. In desperation, instead of putting it back in the ground, they filled a five gallon bucket with concrete, set it on the road, and put it in *there*, presumably with the thought that they’d just be able to set it back up if it got knocked over.
(Yeah, that didn’t last long.)
But then, finally, someone came up with a solution: they mounted the sign ON A COMICALLY LARGE SPRING.
As you can probably guess from the warped angle at which it stands, the sign continues to be flattened at regular intervals to this day—but it pops back up every time, a true inspiration to us all.
(I can only hope that it’s accompanied by a hilarious ‘BOING’ sound effect).
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. It wasn’t supposed to end like this. He wasn’t supposed to watch him die. He wouldn’t.
But the man, the reckless, insane, stupid man, just didn’t know when to quit. When he should have been running away instead of toward. Be that Geralt or the fucking bruxa he’d been fighting. Had been, as the creature had knocked his sword aside and dug her teeth into his flesh, rending his armor into pieces with her fingers. He was okay with dying. Jaskier shouldn’t be. The bard was far from helpless, riding so long at a Witcher’s side has taught him more than one trick, but watching him dive for the discarded silver blade was more than Geralt could handle.
He struggled under the weight of it, that much was clear but he still swings it true. Imbeds it in the bruxa’s shoulder in a strike half luck and half desperate fury. Geralt would be impressed later but it happens too fast to be so then. Not when he watches Jaskier’s body go flying toward the rocks in the next breath, not with the sickening crack of bone ringing in his ears.
The sound that leaves his chest is primal, it might have been a word with the magic that flung the monster away from the human. More likely it was nothing but raw emotion- the kind he would swear not to feel. The kind he knew others swore he couldn’t feel. He stagers up and rushes, and in a few short minutes the creatures head drops from her body. The satisfaction is brief, swallowed by the… worry. He was a Witcher. Witchers did not panic.
“Jaskier!” He was conscious, a small comfort in the grand scheme but a comfort still to Geralt’s mind. “Jaskier, look at me.” His leg was bent in an ugly fashion and when Geralt went to help the bard lift his head his fingers came away wet with blood. “Why would you do that? Stupid- you’re so fucking stupid!”
“Saved you, didn’t I?” The words are weak, pained- they cut worse than any blade. Pierced through where no arrow could.
“Come on, we need to get somewhere safer.” He wishes briefly that Jaskier was smaller, not of a height and so damn awkward to carry in his arms. At least like this. When his vision was swimming with blood loss and his body was screaming just to rest . He tries to keep them stable, tries to keep Jaskier stable and out of more pain than necessary. He doesn't know how far they make it before Jaskier’s hand lands on his jaw, forces him to look.
“Stop. Geralt, stop .” It’s only then that he realizes the slight tremor in his arms. He casts his gaze around, there’s an outcropping of rocks a hundred yards west.
“Okay.”
It’s somehow worse than he expected. When he cuts the pants leg loose he can see the fracture, the way skin distorted over bone. It's a wonder the bard hasn’t passed out from the pain.
“How bad is it?”
“You’ll be fine.”
Jaskier levers himself up with a grimace which only gets worse when he lays eyes on what Geralt is seeing. “Oh gods. Oh that’s- that’s not good. That’s not fine, Geralt .” He starts to drop back down and Geralt has to lunge to keep his head from hitting the rock again. Stars float across his vision but Jaskier doesn’t notice the tremor. Small mercies.
“Jaskier, I’m going to have to set the bone.” The response is a whine. He takes a strap of leather from his bag along with a potion. The strap he folds over; “Bite down on this.” He makes sure Jaskier is stable, laid down and as prepared as possible. The potion he downs himself. Something to kick the healing up a notch and to steady his hands. The blood loss, the exhaustion, it was all second to fixing his friend. He knows his eyes go black when the liquid hits his system but Jaskier is too focused on breathing to notice. That’s good. He doesn’t need fear alongside the pain. “Ready?”
“ Mmhm.”
He places hands on the bard’s leg and takes a breath of his own. “On three. One, t-“ crack. Jaskier cries and the leather does little to muffle the scream. “It’s over, it’s over, breathe in. Here let me-“ he gentle the strap from his teeth and runs fingers through the sweat dampened hair. “There’s a stream nearby, I’m going to get you water. At the first sign of anything you scream . Do you understand?” A shaky nod is all the response he gets but it’s enough for him to go.
He fills the canteen in but a minute and high tails it back to the outcropping of rocks. All is well when he returns and Jaskier even manages a weak, strained smile. He shouldn’t be smiling at Geralt. Not after what happened. Not with how he knew he looked. Like a demon with blackened eyes and skin too pale, bloodied everything.
“Are you hurt?” The bard trembles, nothing but concern in his voice. Are you hurt? How could he ask that of him? But he did and he’s expecting an answer.
“I’m alright. Nothing I haven’t survived before.”
“You… you should sit. With me. Yes. You’re tired too.” Geralt props his swords against the rock in easy reach and settled back. After a moment he feels pressure on his thigh. Jaskier has shifted, head pillows on the witcher's thigh. He didn’t ask permission but Geralt would have freely given it no matter.
“Don’t fall asleep, Jaskier.”
“Then tell me a story.”
“That’s your area, Bard.”
“And? You have more to tell.”
It’s a long moment, several too slow heartbeats before he begins to speak. His voice is slow and deep, unsure how to begin.
“In Kaer Morhen, where all Witchers are made, there’s a lake...” He talks until Jaskier shifts again with a hiss of pain where he stills even further, even the rise and fall of his chest stops. He talks until Jaskier parts chapped lips and says words that Geralt is sure no Witcher has had directed at them in their long history. Certainly not him.
“You’re very pretty. Your voice.”
“That’s the blood loss.”
“It’s not.”
Jaskier does sleep, when Geralt is no longer so concerned that new problems were going to arise and the woods are relatively safe. He sleeps through most of the night and wakes just before dawn with a start, a hiss of pain, and then a groan.
Geralt packs their things and they make their way back to town in a slow progression of half supporting Jaskier and growing frustrated with the bard’s stubbornness and simply carrying him much like a bride. By the time they reach the inn where they- Jaskier- had insisted on staying Geralt can almost pretend the eve hadn’t happened. That everything after setting the bone back in place was a half baked dream brought on by blood loss. Almost. If not for the lingering of touches on his arm and shoulder, the brush of fingers as he washes blood from Jaskier’s hair, they way he can’t stop himself from tucking the blanket just a little higher to wrap Jaskier more firmly when he shivers, the way Jaskier looks at him from his cocoon like maybe he’s not what the rumors that followed him everywhere said. Well, Jaskier had never been one for those rumors in the first place but he’d never seemed to think of Geralt as much more than inspiration, maybe even a friend in recent years. But the stories were always what came first.
Stories were what made the bard travel. Songs were how he made himself known. Songs were what Jaskier lived for, and stories were just songs without melody. Or so he said.
Geralt climbs onto the unoccupied bed and closes his eyes; he pretends he doesn’t hear the soft humming that would become the bard’s next ballad. Pretends he doesn’t know what it’s about. A love song seemed like such silly things. After all, Witchers weren’t loved. Even in song.
The sun was beginning its descent when he heard it. The tiny sound from beneath the abandoned cart. The tiny rapid fast heartbeat that made his own steps slow. Keep walking, Geralt.
Then it comes again and he doesn’t have much choice but to move closer. He kneels and edges himself halfway beneath the wagon, hand outstretched. “Come on…” he closed two fingers around the creature’s scruff. He drags it closer and backs out, tiny teeth dig into his finger.
“That’s rude.”
*
“How much for the mare?”
“You don’t want that one, trust me. She’s temperamental and as likely to buck you into a river as get you into town.”
“How much?”
“Fifteen marks.” Geralt narrows his eyes but passes the coin over.
The mare snorts when he takes her reins, the leather of them barely in piece anymore. That’s fine though, he doesn’t need it. She fights him most the way out of town but that’s fine too. Or it is up to the point she butts him in the back and send him stumbling to a knee. He turns and glares, usually creates feared him- human and animal alike. This one stared back and he huffed.
“Work with me here, girl.”
*
Geralt didn’t do well with crying. Even without his training He would never have been the person to be someone’s shoulder to cry on. He wouldn’t want to be. It was intensely uncomfortable. Even so, here he was with tears on his armor and a body at his feet. She’s shaking harder than a leaf in a thunderstorm, hands balled into fists against his chest.
Slowly, unsure of exactly what the plan was that his body had begun to act upon, he curls an arm around her shoulders and it is as though she breaks beneath the touch.
“I’m sorry- please don’t- I’m sorry…”
“I’ll take you home.”
*
He still had guts on his boots and blood in his hair when he knocked on the door of the little house. Andrea was an elderly woman, her children having left her with the farm, only two having stayed to help run it.
The monster that had taken to killing their livestock was nothing much to take care of. Andrea opens the door and takes in his appearance with a critical eye. “It is done?” Her accent his heavy like the callouses on her palms when they close around his forearm to pull him inside. “Come. Have food before you leave. I will get your coin.”
The purse is heavy for its small size but it may as well be a boulder for how it sits in his chest to take it. Blue eyes stare up at him and he finds himself pressing the coin back into her hands with a smile he's sure is half grimace.
“Keep it. The food is enough.”
*
“Don’t move, you’re wounded.”
“Wounded?” In true fashion, she ignores his request and tries to sit. She makes it a few inches before biting down in a cry and hitting the bed once more.
“I said don’t move.” He comes to her side, rags in hand. “You’re healing fast but it’s going to scar.”
“What’s a few more to the collection?” There are dark circles beneath her eyes and her hair is plastered to her temples with sweat. “Yen…” He Shakes his head, simply reaches out and brushes the hair back from her face. “Rest until morning at least. I’ll keep guard.”
*
Geralt wasn’t practiced in this. The way hands explore his skin not with a purpose but in the unhurriedness of a wanderer. No intention except to feel and to learn and to be alive. It’s strange and terrifying but welcome even more so.
In the half-light of morning he’s inclined to feign sleep if only to avoid the chance his bedmate might quit. “G’ morning, Geralt.” Is mumbled into the spot between his shoulder blades and he knows he’s been caught out. He twists, slides an arm under Jaskier’s waist, and pulls him to they are pressed chest to chest.
“Morning.”
“Do we have to pack now?”
Geralt takes him in. His hair is mussed and there’s a sleepy smile on the bard’s lips. The string calloused fingertips start again their journey, spotting the necklace and sliding over his rib cage. It’s with a smile he would never show the world that he presses a kiss to the man’s forehead, lips lingering.
“You know I can’t carry you, Geralt. Come on, get up! Get up because I am not ready to write the song of The White Wolf’s Demise and if you make me do it I’ll kill you.” Black eyes crack open but no words come from the parted lips. At least, not on the first try.
“Jas…”
“Yes that’s me, your best friend who trudged through this muck to rescue your very fine ass. You could show some appreciation by being less- oh dear gods all mighty- heavy!”
Geralt had left before dawn without so much as a by your leave. No note. No knowledge of what nasty creature he was off to slay. No common courtesy. And when nightfall came and the Witcher had not come back… well. Sometimes that happened. But by noon the next day no amount of lute playing could distract the bard from his Witcher’s absence.
Now he wished he had left after the man earlier. Perhaps then he might hold himself up even a bit.
They stumble their way through the muddied forest, boots sucked into the ground like greedy hands drug at their heels and limbs dragging at their clothes. “You’re going on a diet. I swear, the moment that you are better it is nothing but berries and, oh no you don’t Witcher. It’s not much farther so keep walking.”
Not much further turned into “almost there” and then into “keep moving you silent, white haired bastard please”. When the air swirls and a familiar face steps from the portal Jaskier nearly weeps- for that is the moment his legs give put and it takes every bit of strength left within him to keep both he and his companion from hitting the dirt face first.
“What happened?” Yennefer sweeps forward and drops in front of them, ignoring Jaskier in favor of Geralt.
“He left yesterday and didn’t come back. I don’t know what he was after or when, I just found him… I’ve never been glad to see you before but please get him up and save him.” Together they manage to get back to an inn and Jaskier finds himself fetching water and bandages and then worrying at the bedside like a fretful midwife. It’s far too long before Yen joins him with two glasses of wine.
“Here, drink. He’ll live, it’s just a matter of when he wakes up now.”
Too long is the answer.
Geralt wakes with a pounding in his head and fire in his side. He feels a lot like what he thinks the kikimora he’d fought outside Blaviken felt like. He clenches his fist and finds soft sheets rather than leaves and dirt. It’s shocking enough for him to open his eyes.
“Where-“ his voice cracks and he’s suddenly aware of two other heartbeats.
“I could kill you for scaring me like that!” Ah. Jaskier. Of course. It was odd to find another’s presence such a comfort. But somehow the bard had become a… friend. That was stranger a thought than the sheets. “You’re lucky the witch found us because let me tell you there are boulders lighter than you, sir.”
“Jaskier.”
“Yes?”
“Stop talking.”
It is blissfully quiet for a few minutes.
“Good you’re awake. You owe me ten marks for the antidote I wasted getting your heart to start beating again.” The bed dips and this time he’s met with the sight of Yennefer over him, a fresh cloth in her hands.
“Good to see you too, Yen.” Lithe fingers stroke his hair back from his temple, a gentle movement with which he’s unsure how to respond. She seems to know this and smiles as the cloth is draped over his forehead. “You have the room for three nights. Roach is in the stables. And don’t think that you’re getting out of payment, I’m just across the hall.”
He watches her leave without a word.
“How did I get here?”
“Well after I drug your lovely bum from the woods our dear Yennefer portalled us here and we managed to keep you from dying which you’re welcome for by the way.”
“You followed me? You could have died!”
The bard has the gall to simply raise a brow at him.
“You could have let me know where you were heading.”
“So that you could get yourself killed?”
“So I could help you! You don’t have to do this alone, you have me now! And Yen, crazy as she might be, you have her too. Geralt, please- oh no lay down or I’m going to tie you to the bed and not in a fun way either.” That startles a smile to his lips but it fades quickly enough. “I ruined my favorite pants for you and this is the thanks I get!”
“Jaskier,”
“And another thing!”
“Jaskier.”
“You don’t have an ounce of thought for my reputation!”
“Jaskier!”
“What?!”
“Stop talking. You have circles under your eyes darker than a striga lair… come lay down.” If pressed he would say it’s the blood loss that made him offer. But he couldn’t deny that a warm body against his own was nice, even if the bard squirmed too much for his liking at first. The pain was an afterthought when Jaskier’s hand settles hesitantly on his skin.
“You must have really hit your head.” Jaskier mutters, breath puffing against his bicep. “Maybe you’ll be nicer now. That would be a miracle.”
