“Do you love him?”
The question doesn’t catch him off guard, not the way it should. There’s been a heaviness in Ciri’s presence since she came out here to sit beside him— the same intensity that trails after Yennefer wherever she goes. Like mother, like daughter.
Jaskier wasn’t sure what she would say, or if she’d say anything at all, and now she has. He is unsurprised, but not unmoved.
“I love my father,” she says, “I love him more than anything. I’d give him the world, if I could.” Even if he wouldn’t accept it, is left unsaid. “I think you would, too.”
It’s rare that Jaskier struggles to find words to express himself— he is a bard, after all, expression of self is his entire purpose. He wishes he had come out with his lute, maybe then he’d know what to say.
“I think you love him, not in the way I do, but just as much.”
The lake before them sings at her revelation, and it makes Jaskier’s heart bleed.
“You do, don’t you?” Ciri presses, and Jaskier can feel her eyes on him now.
He focuses on the grass beneath him.
“I don’t think you’d stay if you didn’t. You two… haven’t been well.”
The sun has nearly set, it makes the air cooler, makes chills ripples through him.
“When you’re around one another, you don’t speak.”
There’s a small house across the lake, the lights are out, and Jaskier wonders if anyone’s home.
“And when you do, they’re fighting words.”
It’s dark enough now that the lights coming from the estate behind them glow over their forms. All of them are on, it seems, maybe Yennefer’s making a statement.
“You must love him, because no one else would stay through all that.”
Jaskier wishes he had a witcher’s senses or a mage’s powers, anything that could help him hear what was going on inside. Maybe Geralt’s cursing his name, maybe Yennefer’s calling them both idiots.
“I know what you’re doing, trying to focus on your surroundings to block me out, but it isn’t working, is it?” She asks, and it isn’t goading or cruel. “This matters to you too much. Geralt matters to you too much.”
Far too much.
“That’s why I know you’ll hear me when I tell you that I think he loves you, too.”
The lake.
“He doesn’t understand the way he loves you, yet, but he does.”
The grass.
“And it’s unlike the way he loves me.”
The sun.
“And it’s similar to the way he once loved Yennefer, but… more.”
The house.
“His love for her was destructive, but it didn’t destroy him.”
The light.
“His love for you just might.”
The lake. The grass.
“And it’s not your fault. It’s not even his.”
The sun. The house.
“He doesn’t know what to do with his love for you, but he’s trying to learn, I think.”
The lake. The grass. The sun. The—
“He’s trying to learn how to love you in a way that won’t tear you two apart like it did before.”
The lake, the grass, the sun…
“And I think it’s working, oddly enough. I mean, you two fight, but he hasn’t driven you away. And pathetically, that’s a win when it comes to my father.”
…the house, the—
“He’s working on it. He’s working to become better, for himself, for all of us, but… especially for you.”
The lake. The grass. The—
“Are you done speaking on my behalf?” Jaskier felt his presence before he spoke.
The—
“Are you done being an idiot?” A snort follows, it’s light to the ears, but heavy.
The lake.
So heavy. Heavy enough that the entire world shifts to compromise it.
The grass.
Heavier than Yennefer, and heavier than Ciri. Heavy enough that Jaskier’s head begins to pound as much as his heart.
The sun.
Too heavy to ignore, too heavy to be distracted by anything else.
The house.
“Hi,” he hears.
The light.
Jaskier faces him.
