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Death on His Arm
-
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There came a time in every bard’s journey when the truth settled into their bones, deep and heavy, that a story worthy of song would not simply unravel around them from the reaches of a comfortable court position. Valdo, obviously, was still utterly ignorant of this fact, what with his new appointment to Cidaris, but Valdo was a hack and his self-aggrandized peacocking was the epitome of all gone wrong with the glorious bardic institution.
Additionally, his ugly mustache smelled like lard. No one believed it stayed greased and twisted naturally. It was only a matter of time before it attracted rats in the night and then, oh, then, Jaskier would be there to record every detail for posterity!
Well, no, he wouldn’t. That was rather the point of the whole thing. Jaskier was looking for a grand tale of heroics and wonder , because he was a proper servant to the art. As satisfying as it was to write heckling notes about Valdo’s poor life choices, Jaskier had more important things to do. Well, he would. Soon. Once he went looking for them.
Which he did one crisp spring morning, winter only beginning to lift her skirts for spring, the saucy little minx. It was a bit chillier than he’d prefer - well, honestly, it was a threat to his manhood in his current wardrobe, but indoor comfort would require paying for next season’s board in Oxenfurt and Jaskier was more than a few pennies short to be staying now that he was a graduated student. The moment he went begging the family for gold was the moment he curled in a heap and began to smell like a road side shit.
All-in-all, the whole idea took on a promising appeal when he decided that practice produced results, rolled up his sleeves (in an entirely impractical move considering the weather, but it was illustratively illuminating and ideal for the future accounts of his mindset for the new adventure!) and realized, rather suddenly, that a large slap-dash message had been spilled across his arm in a foreign hand.
First, he licked his thumb and tried to rub it off. Then, he tried to remember when he was last so drunk he wouldn’t have noticed this sort of thing. Finally, he came to the most wondrous conclusion.
His soulmate , his heart cried, reaching across the empty void of loneliness to speak only to him.
Well, and some fellow named ‘Geralt of Rivia’, but he could worry about his lady love asking for another man after they were reunited in romantic bliss.
Also, he really did need to teach her how to spell. Eskelle was spelled with two L’s, my love, and an extra E.
-
“It’s Eskel.”
“Yes, clearly, that’s what I said,” Jaskier huffed, utterly unimpressed by his love’s taste in rescuers. “ Eskelle.”
The very large (no, really, very large. Jaskier hardly a shrinking violet himself and the man was designed to carry him free from danger in his, as stated, very large arms) and foul tempered man quite literally growled at him with a firm glare, “Eskel.” And then had the audacity to just stomp off and leave him surrounded by corpses.
“ Yes, I know. You repeating the exact same thing doesn’t magically change that it’s the same as what I’ve been saying!” Jaskier scampered after him down the awkward incline away from the graveyard where he’d found the fellow. “Also, come back here and stare at me again, your eyes are intriguing, I really must have another look. It’s very important I describe you accurately and I’m not sure if they’re more of a sickly jaundice like your personality or have a beastly glow to match your manners!”
It should be stated in Geralt’s favor that he DID turn around and let Jaskier take another look at his eyes. Of course, he did it as he was lifting the bard off his feet and dropping him head first into the nearby horse trough by the cemetery gates which, ultimately, did rather sully the geniality of it all. Besides, of the two of them, the water would do the witcher a good deal more use than him. He ’ d bathed some time in the last week.
Jaskier did have to hand it to his lady love - a witcher was likely to be more helpful in a rescue if the rescuing involved any sort of sickly monstrous thing that took far more aggression and silver to kill than Jaskier really had any business wielding. It still was a slight on his reputation, but if Geralt’s perpetual sneer was an indication of his overall demeanor, Jaskier held little fear his soulmate would be swayed by his other manly virtues. After all, who really wanted to swoon into the chiseled chest of a strappy barbarian, cold to all around him as he struck an alluring solitary pose in the moonlight? Well, probably plenty, really, but the man was currently covered in the exploded guts of whatever thing lurked in the swampy end of the graves. If Jaskier never experienced that visual again, it was much too soon.
“Anyway, now that you’ve had your little tantrum, I really must insist we head for,” Jaskier squinted at his forearm in the darkness, trying to force his eyes to adjust so he could read. “Bellenue? Bellevue? Damn, I really should’ve memorized the whole thing, but I was rather distracted with the exciting bits.”
Geralt stopped, grabbed his arm, and held it close as if, somehow, he was going to have an easier time seeing jack shit in the middle of the night. Irritatingly, it seemed he could, “Redlewe.”
“What? Really,” Jaskier squinted at it again, “It could swear that’s a B!”
“It’s an R.”
“How can you be so sure? I really think you’re just assuming things,” Jaskier insisted. “She’s my soulmate. Don’t you think I’d have some, some… Intuition about this sort of thing?
“I’ve actually read Eskel handwriting before. Have you?”
Jaskier begrudgingly accepted this fact and pressed on, “Fine, so it’s Redlewe. Of course, now we just have to find the place-“
“Temeria, southern portion, close to the tip, nearer Brokilon than Sodden.”
“Oh,” Jaskier paused, still dripping conspicuously. “Well, that’s certainly helpful. When do we leave?”
Geralt snorted, rather like a horse, and said, “You’re not coming.”
“Of course I’m coming! There’s no story if I don’t come! My love reached across the emptiness of space to summon me to her side, I can’t just not come ,” and, really, who did he think he was to even suggest such a thing? Just because he walked at the speed of a particularly leggy stallion didn’t make Geralt of Rivia the authority on who gets to save whom.
“Actually,” and Jaskier could feel the smirk even before Geralt turned to him, “your love asked for me. You weren’t even mentioned.”
Rude. True, but rude.
-
In the three days since Jaskier tracked down Geralt of Rivia, he’d learned several things.
Geralt of Rivia was synonymous with ‘the Butcher of Blaviken’ and if that didn’t make Jaskier rethink things for a moment or so, nothing would. By which he meant he absolutely did reconsider things, but promptly dismissed them out of hand because true love awaits. Also, for a man so very popular for shameless murder, Geralt hadn’t stabbed him very much at all, yet. And Jaskier was man enough to admit that if he did, there was very little Jaskier could do to stop him, so altogether, it was very nice of Geralt to give it a pass.
Eskelle was not fair of hair, particularly waifish, nor did she have a breathy voice like spring air. Geralt’s hms, snorts, and general scowls were surprisingly illustrative once one got past the whole… thing that was his face. Personality. His general sour and humorless demeanor. He was frustratingly unreadable on the matter of kissing, which Jaskier did take as a rather bad sign. If his love had been running about kissing rude witchers, Jaskier might have to change his wooing game to something more rugged. Add in some unkempt facial hair. Brood. Be unfairly good looking even covered in dirt and nastiness of unknown origin. Honestly, how does a man wash that rarely and still look so lovely?
Lastly and, quite possibly, most importantly, Geralt of Rivia might insult his genitals and noble parentage, but other than the occasional shove, trough drop, or trip, he didn’t actually prevent Jaskier from following him as long as the bard kept up and was - mostly - quiet about it.
In fact, for such a grim fellow who spent far too much time kicking Jaskier out of his bedroll after four hours of sleep - and Jaskier was rather certain those four hours weren’t for his benefit, but the horse - Geralt sometimes even seemed a little kind natured. Not overwhelmingly, to be sure, but Jaskier had yet to dig into his own meager travel rations because of the witcher’s goodwill with his game and the man was considerably more talented with a cooking fire. Not good , mind you, but firmly more edible than Jaskier’s last few attempts. Oxenfurt really did need to expand on their repertoire for bards to include a few traveling hints and tricks on how to avoid starvation and brutal mutilation by bandits.
Oh, yes, Geralt had also kept him from being brutally murdered on the road. Three times. Someone really did need to do something about the bandits, once a day was ridiculous.
“So,” Jaskier interrupted the quiet with his graceless stumble down the graveled hill Geralt and his horse were descending with perfect dignity, “Now that we’ve become friends and bonded over the brotherhood of blood and all that, I was wondering if maybe you could share a few things. Open up. Give me some insight into your mind?”
Geralt didn’t respond. At least the horse flicked her ears at him.
He sallied forth, regardless. “Alright, yes. I can see how that might’ve been a bit of a stretch to expect out of you. Then, if nothing about yourself, how about my love? How old is she? How did the two of you meet? Any idea why she only reached out to me now? Oh! Has she spent her life trapped in a tower with no tools to save her? Wait, if she’s been in a tower this whole time, you knew! And you left her! How could you leave her in a tower, you brute!”
The sigh was really more exasperated than necessary, but at least Geralt was acknowledging him now, “ Eskel ,” he started with that same irritating emphasis as if Jaskier couldn’t read his own bloody arm, “is older than you are. Didn’t want to deal with some annoying dead weight and didn’t write because you weren’t wanted . We grew up together and no one is trapped in a tower. The only reason you’re here now is if another note shows up on your arm. Otherwise, I’d throw you in the bloody river and let the drowners have you.”
Correction.
Geralt of Rivia was not very nice at all.
-
Soulmates were gifts given by the gods to blessed mortals specially selected for their virtue and meant to be an example for courtly affections across the continent. At least, that’s what the old stories used to say. The fact that the occurrence of soulmates seemed rather destitute in the majority of ruling families these days meant that the ‘godly chosen’ and ‘virtue’ aspects were greatly downplayed unless all involved parties were conveniently wellbred and literate.
It had occurred to Jaskier that, if he had a soulmate - he’d always been rather sure he did, despite lacking all the signs - that they may come from common blood and be unable to read his lovingly laid notes entirely. So, by the time he was released from his tutors to join the academic elite in Oxenfurt, he’d stopped waxing lyrically on his arms and moved to the rather more practical leather bound journal. Not only did it prevent bruising on his knuckles from a firm rapping with a wooden switch, but it also gave him the chance to fine-tune his offerings. One day, when he sat face-to-face with his one and only, after they’d finished rescuing her from her tall tower and terrible fate, he was going to recite poem after poem he’d written thinking about the very idea of her while Eskelle swooned in romantic bliss.
Geralt was not invited. Geralt could kill a mood with his stench alone.
So, it was a surprise to find that Eskelle could write, albeit imperfectly, but perhaps she’d started learning so she could read his notes? Reply, even? The idea was so very sweet, his heart couldn’t take it.
Struck by sudden inspiration, Jaskier rolled out of bed and fished through his pack, ignoring the single cracked eye that peered at him from near the fire. Ink and quill were hard to master on the road, leaving Jaskier largely to graphite or fine tipped charcoal to make his notes. But, deep in his pack and carefully wrapped, he did carry a small supply. Anything he wrote on his arm in charcoal wouldn’t last the night and by morning, his love would see nothing but a smudge to read by the light of day. Ink was the way.
Carefully, ever so not to drip or smudge, he wrote, ‘A day away.’
-
When it came to the rescue portion of his Grand Tale of Love and Lawlessness, Jaskier expected a few things.
Firstly, that he would be involved. It seemed obvious to him at the time that he would, clearly, be part of the vanguard charge to dash towards the portcullis and sweep the jewel of his heart off her feet and down to freedom. Perhap, even, exchanging a sweet longing kiss as their eyes first met and yet, all but strangers, they knew one another.
Secondly, that there would be a portcullis or at least a moat involved. A fortress? Some darkly enchanted tower? Something more than another wide stretch of infinite nothing that was maybe a bit boggier than the other stretch of infinite nothing they left behind at the last crick in the road. So far, it was a whole new world of hideous smells and not much else.
Thirdly, and perhaps this was the most important, he expected the grand battle to be climactic. The final foe, the last daring bridge between two lovers to be crossed with courage and devotion! But, as Geralt stormed back into camp, an ugly head nearly the size of a horse’s ass dangling in one hand, silver sword glinting in the other, Jaskier was starting to realize absolutely none of this was going according to plan.
“Where have you been?!” Excuse him for being a bit shrill, but it was hard on the nerves when a witcher snarled loudly, handed you the reins to his horse as he vaulted off, and spat an indistinct garble one could only assume was either some amalgamation of ‘stay here’ or ‘run for your life’.
Geralt, of course, of course , didn’t give him an answer, instead roughly tossing the head aside with a stomach rolling splat Jaskier was never going to properly express in words. Then, he sheathed his sword - a good sign! Nothing ready to immediately kill them, hurrah! - and began rifling through Jaskier’s saddle bags without so much as a how do you do.
“Excuse me, those are my private items, what do you think you’re - be careful with that!” The goon was manhandling his inkpot and quill, entitled as a king, only to grab Jaskier’s arm and wrench at his sleeve. After a ripping sound, Jaskier decided it was better to join the man’s mad plans and started on the buttons himself in hopes to have a doublet left by the end of the day. “Fine, fine! Here you are! The gods clearly skimped on manners when they gave you all that muscle instead. Ripping the clothes off a man might give one ideas and I, as you very well know, am spoken for! Now, what is the meaning of - what are you doing?!”
The ink was cold and the quill itched as Geralt wrote on his arm in fury. Where are you, it demanded. After a moment, Geralt flipped his arm over, deciding once was not enough, and began scrawling his question over and over. Jaskier’s right hand, then his left. Tearing his sleeve without asking and scrawling it up and down the left arm. There was a glint in Geralt’s eye Jaskier didn’t know what to do with. It was sharp, kinetic, almost frantic.
Nothing changed. Eskelle hadn’t responded to any of Jaskier’s tiny notes since the first message. It would hardly change just because Geralt was abusing him as his personal school slate.
Finally, Geralt snarled again, winding his arm back to throw the ink pot against a tree before Jaskier lept in his way, “I would beg you not to destroy my things!” A quick grab and he scrabbled the items away, resealing the pot carefully before burying it deep as he dared in his bags without properly repacking. “Now, would it be too much to ask for some sort of explanation? Not that the theft and vandalism hasn’t been fun, but I’d rather like to know what the hell you’re trying to accomplish and what is that?”
The head, face down in the mud, wasn’t any easier to identify sitting still than swinging in Geralt’s fist. Jaskier wasn’t sure he’d be able to tell what it was even if it were set right side out and staring him dead in the face. Ghastly.
But, Geralt ignored him, pacing back and forth. His breathing, normally silent, gnawed in his chest, fighting to escape. As abruptly as he started, he turned on Jaskier again.
“You look,” Geralt demanded, fist in his doublet pulling Jaskier to his toes. “You look and you don’t come back without him.”
“Without who?” Jaskier exclaimed. “I thought we were here for Eskelle-!”
“ ESKEL,” Geralt roared, spittle hitting his face. “His name is bloody Eskel. And you will find him , or I’ll leave your carcass to rot with the rest of this fucking pit, do you hear me?”
Eskel. Esk-elle. Oh. Eskel.
Not a misspelling then.
“I can’t search if you’re choking me ,” Jaskier reminded him hysterically. “And I certainly can’t help him if I’m dead.”
Geralt dropped him, panting in anger. “If I was too late. If you - I swear by every god on this despicable sphere, I will gut you and leave you for crows.”
Which was enough motivation for Jaskier to find his feet in the mud and depart. His bag was still tied to Geralt’s horse and his rations were stowed with them, but if the choice was ‘gutting by witcher’ and ‘potential starvation in an ugly bog’, Jaskier was willing to risk his neck with the vines.
Besides, surely Eskel was out here somewhere. Maybe he wasn’t the delicate maiden Jaskier assumed, but if Jaskier was utterly terrified of Geralt right now, it wasn’t far-fetched Eskel took one look and felt the same.
So, approachable. Friendly. But confident and capable. He could do this. It was true love, after all. Just Jaskier, a bog, and the boy he was meant to love. Man. Oh dear, what if he was a child? That would certainly explain Geralt’s nastiness. But, no, Geralt said Eskel was older than Jaskier. So, yes. Man.
Older man. Huh. Jaskier hadn’t realized that was an appeal, but apparently, bogs were the place for sexual revelations. It was also the place to lose his boot and if it wasn’t for the hideous smell, the bard would sacrifice his footwear to the sludge just to escape the wrestling match to free it one more time.
But honestly, the smell. Thick, almost oily on his palate, and hideously sweet. As if someone handed him a long strip of sugared fat, but with a clinginess that stuck in his throat. It made him gag. Gods, it reminded him of the sick beds near the Oxenfurt infirmaries. That nasty miasma of vomit, sickness, and gangrenous -
Rotting flesh.
He froze, slowly eying the dripping greenery around him. The smell sat thickened in the still air, yet the carrion birds were quiet. Everything was quiet.
Carefully, he moved on ahead, dread weighing his feet heavy in the mud. Every audible squelch set his nerves on edge, but still the silence continued. If something was watching him, it gave no sign and, finally, he was forced to accept he was alone.
Well, except for the horse.
He paused, blinking at the sight. Still a horse. Or, to be honest, most of a horse. Something of a piebald if the markings were true and not just some sign of additional horrific disfigurement of unknown origin. Though, honestly, what sort of thing could bleach a hide like that without any burns?
With a laughing sigh, Jaskier ran his hands back through his hair and gave a tug to help shake the fear off his spine. A horse , he chuckled. Nothing but a dead horse in a bloody bog to send him ready to bolt. Some adventuring hero he was, spooking at a headless carcass with a few extra arms sticking out the middle like some…
Arms?
Arms.
Oh. Oh, that… wasn’t good.
Horses were not meant to have arms. Certainly not large burly ones in red gambesons. Corpse pale arms, wrought with black twisting veins, stripped of gauntlets so Jaskier could read…
Could read.
Oh.
Where are you?
Where are you?
Where are you?
Jaskier didn’t realize screaming could sound so far away when it came from deep inside.
-
Geralt came.
Jaskier was vaguely aware that surprised him. Geralt didn’t seem the type to come running to Jaskier’s rescue over a scream, but maybe he misjudged him. After all, he’d been misjudging a great many things over the last few days.
Adventures, for one. He was beginning to think he didn’t much like them. Or soulmates. Someone perfect, tied to his own heart, someone meant to grow old with him and… die horribly, devoured by a monster and his remains shoved in a horse. God, was he in pieces? Jaskier wasn’t even twenty and his love had already been destroyed.
Love. That was another thing he’d misjudged.
Geralt didn’t pause when he saw Jaskier unharmed. He didn’t scream when he followed the stare to the headless carcass and the arms. The arms, barely visible in the gore and offal of the horse’s belly. Geralt moved with every ounce of his inhuman speed for those arms and he pulled, hand-over-hand, each grasp heaving more of a man out from under the gore and into the sunlight.
Eskel was a broad man. Not waifish at all. Dark hair. Very unlikely his voice was anything but a rich timber with a chest that size. He was also garish white along every inch of his exposed flesh. An expensive statue, expertly crafted, made of the finest granite with thick black veins crackled across the surface.
Geralt didn’t care.
He was speaking, low and urgent, hands wiping mud and muck from Eskel’s face. It was there, in the taut bend of his back as he carelessly knelt in the rot. It was there, in the gentle dip of Geralt’s forehead as it pressed to match the cold one below. It was there, in the hand that grasped Eskel’s - limp and lifeless - and pressed it against his chest. It was there in the man who raced to his side because of a note written on the arm of a stranger destined to steal his lover’s heart by whims of the gods.
Oh, Jaskier realized. This is love.
It was childish to join a story and assume the love was meant for him. Maybe it could’ve been, if things had been different. But Eskel hadn’t wanted to find him and Jaskier didn’t know to try, and now it was too late.
There was love here, but it was a broken, dying thing, shaped in the shards of a pale witcher with golden eyes - fierce eyes, loyal and bright, true as a lighthouse in misty seas, waiting for a ship that would never return home.
Jaskier didn’t belong here. He never did.
-
The road was an excellent distraction. Between bandits, lusty barmaids, their angry husbands, and the scarcity of decent coin, Jaskier found himself easily distracted from circling thoughts of witchers, love, and loss. But, Oxenfurt was not so kind.
It was a proper homecoming after a long season of wandering, with familiar halls and friendly faces waiting for him outside his apartment door. Sadly, it was also comfortable. His travels hadn’t made him rich, but the last of his coins covered a campus room and his experience promised him an assistant position for the year to cover his food and replace his worn clothes. It left him entirely at odds, without a single niggling concern to keep him from his thoughts.
It was terrible. Really.
But, he was a bard and much as he might like to push himself onward without a glance back, it wasn’t in him to forget. So, after a long spring and a longer summer, he pulled out the notebook and the same little inkwell and finally set himself down to write the song he’d avoided all year.
-
‘Death on His Arm’ debuted at the midwinter showcase, a tale of love both deep and tender, learned in boyhood and never forgot. He never named the witcher or the man with someone else’s words, but the names didn’t really matter. It was the story of Geralt and Eskel, but it was the story of every love the gods didn’t grant. It was love unprotected, grown in difficulty and trial, and cherished all the more for the fragile strength.
After he won, Jaskier came home and rolled up his sleeve, writing words down his arm one last time.
-
In hindsight, telling the tragic tale of one man’s deeply personal anguish without his consent was, perhaps, a questionable idea. Impolite, at the least. Inconsiderate. Which was becoming incredibly obvious to him now that he was face-to-face with Geralt of Rivia.
“Oh, balls ,” Jaskier squeaked, making it half a turn before the witcher grabbed him by the scruff.
Oh, look. Another horse trough.
-
“Well,” Jaskier started, trying to break the tension with something other than the sticky slick-snick drip of his clothing on the tavern floor. “I’m sure it’s lovely to see me again, but I really should be going.”
Geralt humed, somehow managing to be both ominously threatening and irritatingly nondescript at the same time.
Jaskier waited a long, pointed moment for more. He cleared his throat. He raised a brow.
Geralt sipped his tankard in silence.
“Yes, good, this has been terrible and I highly recommend we never do it again,” the bard decided, slapping his hands on his thighs as he stood. “I’ll avoid you, you’ll avoid me, etc etc, though I suppose, realistically, it will really just be me avoiding you because I really don’t enjoy being upended into the nearest pot of stale water and equine slobber while you disregard any possible measures of respect you might otherwise take for someone because that’s just the sort of man you are and we’ll both end up moderately miserable instead of in one another’s company. Agreed? Agreed.”
Geralt hummed again, but just as Jaskier turned to leave, he spoke. “It’s a good song.”
“What?” He turned back hesitantly.
But, Geralt was sitting there, same as before, nothing like mockery in his face. “It’s a good song.”
Nervously, Jaskier cleared his throat and picked at nothingness on his clothes, “I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about. A song? What song. I didn’t write a song.”
“You wrote this song.”
“Well, alright, I have written a song before. Dozens, actually. But this song, I’m sure I didn’t write. Haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about. Never heard of it.”
Geralt, the cad, had the nerve to crinkle his eyes at him. The bastard was enjoying this. “I haven’t even mentioned which song.”
Jaskier sputtered, “Yes, fine, you didn’t, but I’m sure that any song you like I just simply can’t have written. Your tastes are horrible. Look at what you’ve done to your hair, it’s hideous.”
“That’s because he hasn’t bathed yet,” a voice said behind him, low and slow. “He lost a bet and has to make due with my leftovers.”
And Geralt, gods above, smiled. His smile was a luxuriating cat, stretching out each paw towards the corners of his mouth. It was easy, comfortable, an expression that expected to be there at any time of day. For the first time - ok, perhaps not the very first - Jaskier looked at him and thought, this is a man I could fall in love with.
“Jaskier,” Geralt said, with that same taunting glee he’d had before, “Allow me to introduce you. This is Eskel.”
Jaskier knew he was staring. He knew, even as he spun around, his face was unattractively slawjacked. And, as he set his eyes on dark hair, lively amber eyes, a long set of scars, and a twisted smile, he knew they were bugging out of his face, but it didn’t matter.
“You-“ he fluttered his hands helplessly, looking at Geralt. “He-”
Finally, he just stared. After a long moment, Jaskier swallowed his jaw again and settled back to full height, “You were dead!”
“Ah,” Eskel replied sheepishly, rubbing his hand through the hair on his nape. “Not yet, no.”
“You most certainly were dead!” Jaskier insisted. “I saw you! You were dead! And rotting! And shoved in a horse.”
“Are you going to help,” Eskel snapped, eyes sliding past Jaskier to the witcher behind him, “or just laugh.”
Geralt responded, quick as a whip, “Laugh.”
Eskel glared. Geralt sipped his ale.
“No one beat you enough as a child,” Eskel finally muttered, then sighed. “I’m sorry, I promise I’ll explain. Sit with us?”
And, honestly, what sort of man would Jaskier be if he abandoned his soulmate at this venture? His soulmate! Alive! Tall, broad, scarred, and rather intimidating, but standing there in perfectly healthy shades of colors! Mostly, anyway.
Amber eyes.
“Oh!” Jaskier exclaimed, “You’re a witcher!”
And that, for whatever reason, broke Geralt. He spat out his ale and wheezed into the table, choking as he fought to catch his breath, and pounded his fist on the table.
Eskel, with a roll of his eyes, settled into his chair, cleared his throat, and started his tale, “I am a witcher. And witchers have potions…”
-
“Wait,” Jaskier interrupted, “What do you mean I left because I saw your face?”
Eskel paused, flat footed, “Ah. I admit I wasn’t awake, but Geralt noticed you left soon after he pulled me out of hiding -“
“ Yes , because Geralt is an unparallelled source of trustworthy information,” he replied.
“You’re the one who spent the whole trip calling him a fair maiden ,” Geralt shrugged. “You seemed like the vain and poncy type.”
Jaskier gaped at him in outrage, “I am the vain and poncy type, but what has that to do with anything?
“He’s a witcher.”
“My scars.”
The two witchers blinked at each other in surprise, but Jaskier just nodded.
“Oh, perfect, the two of you can’t even agree on why I’m a terrible person who’d abandoned their soulmate over - honestly, I can’t even tell. I don’t dislike Geralt because he’s a witcher. I dislike Geralt because he’s an ass. And you ,” He eyed Eskel carefully, “I’m not sure who told you scars were unattractive, but they clearly made a living as a charlatan and crook.”
“Like a bard,” Geralt chimed in helpfully.
Jaskier glared, “See? Ass .”
-
Eskel pat Jaskier on the back as he groaned drunkenly into the table, “No. Just leave me to die. My dignity is gone.”
“It wasn’t that bad,” he tried to reassure him.
“It was supposed to be a gesture . It was poetic . I was mourning the loss of what we never had ,” Jaskier lamented, nose smooshed against the grain. “You weren’t supposed to read it.”
Eskel sighed, “It was for the best. I’m not sure how we would’ve reacted if we’d heard the song first, without knowing you wrote it. It was… a little personal.”
“I would’ve punched him,” Geralt said.
“You threw me in a trough, anyway!”
“I could’ve done it harder.”
Eskel waved down the barmaid for another round.
-
Jaskier was drunk and he knew it. He knew it three rounds ago when he tried to poke Geralt in the chest and nearly nailed the man in the nostril instead. He certainly knew it now, after being peeled off the tavern table and carried over someone’s shoulder like a child.
He gave it a sniff. Eugh. Definitely Geralt.
A soft chuckle followed them up the stairs, “You still need that bath, Wolf. You should see his face, even in his sleep.”
“At least this way, you don’t need another one if he pukes. My things already need a wash.”
“Charitable.”
His hum rumbled all the way through Jaskier’s chest. It almost tickled.
The world swam a bit as they fumbled with a door and turned around to lower him onto the bed, but his stomach was still politely adhering to drunken rules of conquest that promised him at least another few hours before regretful queasiness set in and ruined his entire demeanor, so he only sighed happily into the pillow and snuggled in for rest.
The bed dipped next to him and all was still for a long moment before Jaskier felt tentative fingers petting his hair out of his face. Oh. Yes, his nose was itching a bit, wasn’t it?
“Look at him,” Eskel spoke quietly, a hint of regret in his voice.
Geralt said nothing, the clink of buckles speaking for him.
“He’s so damn young, Wolf. What business have we got ruining him with our messes?”
Water splashed, matching the seasick sensation in Jaskier’s brain.
“He’s a mess,” Geralt responded. “You’ve just met him, but I promise. He’ll manage to find trouble all on his own without us.”
“And that makes it better?”
“Nothing makes it better.”
“I make it better,” Jaskier mumbled when they stopped talking. “ I am a… a… um.” He rubbed his nose to chase the shadow of an itch, “I am a delight.”
“You,” Geralt responded, “Are an eavesdropper.”
“Yes,” Jaskier agreed. “Absolutely. My eaves.”
“That I am,” Eskel sighed. “That I am.”
-
That morning, Jaskier regretted his entire life.
“ Why ,” he whined to the room at large. “Why would you let me do this?”
The room was a terrible conversationalist. No one replied.
It was also notably empty except for his bag and lute, propped up against the wall, and an empty tub.
“Oh,” Jaskier hissed. “Those bastards .”
But, as he reached to rip the blankets off of him, he noticed a message scrawled on his hand.
On a hunt. Meet you in White Orchard, two days.
And below, in a decidedly different hand.
Stay out of trouble.
.