Chapter Text
Jaskier scrambled across a clearing, almost on his hands and knees. He fumbled for the short sword he had been given and stood, eyes wide as Geralt stalked towards him.
“Geralt, I really don’t see-”
“Sword up!”
Jaskier flinched and barely raised his sword in time to meet Geralt’s swing. The impact was enough to make his hand go numb, and he gasped, stumbling back. He looked down at his hand, thankfully still holding the blasted blade, eyes wide.
“My god, you’re not even trying, are you?”
“Up!”
Jaskier parried again, the clash of their weapons ringing through the clearing. Roach, tied to a branch, flicked her ears back and then forward again, more interested in the grass growing at the base of the tree.
“This is absolutely ridiculous,” Jaskier said, backing up against a tree. He managed to fend off another attack from Geralt, doing his best not to be too impressed as the man spun around, and instead focused on his own life being inches away from over. “Absurd! Geralt, the most I’ll do in a fight is provide a distraction and that-”
With another great swing, the Witcher disarmed Jaskier, who shook his hand out, looking affronted.
“This is my strumming hand! Do you know what happens if I can’t pluck a tune, huh? My entire livelihood is-”
Jaskier’s eyes widened, and he ducked just in time, the length of Geralt’s sword dug deep into the tree, splinters and bark showering his hair. His mouth open, heart racing, still clutching his hands to his chest, Jaskier looked up at Geralt with huge eyes.
“Was that entirely necessary!?” Jaskier would have liked to think that his voice wasn’t any higher than normal, but he was, sadly, very reedy.
Geralt crouched down, staring flatly at the bard.
“We’re going into bandit country,” Geralt said, his voice shamefully even. Did he ever lose his breath? Jaskier was reasonably sure that Geralt couldn’t sweat if he wanted to. “You need to learn how to hold a sword.”
“I know how to hold a sword,” Jaskier grumbled.
“And you have no idea what to do with it.”
Jaskier blinked. Fair. Very fair.
“Well, you don’t know how to play the lute.”
“We only have one lute,” Geralt replied, reaching over for the short sword and pressing it back into Jaskier’s hands, which were calloused from strings and not sword handles, and he was going to be pissed if he spent all that time handling the neck of an instrument just to have his artist’s hands turned into meaty Witcher-paws. Geralt stood, taking ahold of his sword and expertly levering it out of the tree.
“That’s no excuse for ignoring your artistic side.” Jaskier stood up, still leaning against the trunk. At least his voice had returned to normal and he wasn’t squeaking like a teenager. Geralt was heading across the clearing.
“Sword up.” Geralt growled over his shoulder.
Jaskier sighed, eyes drifting. Honestly, he could watch that ass walk away all day. God bless leather pants, they did wonders for Geralt’s shape. It was too bad that when Geralt turned around his expression was less ‘come hither’ and much more ‘have at thee.’ Jaskier steadied his shoulders.
“Now, I honestly believe we should take a few seconds to reflect on-”
Geralt sprung forward again, and this time Jaskier swore that he could see muscles through the man’s shirt that Jaskier had never seen before. It was unjust that Geralt displayed such fantastic pectorals just as he was jumping towards him with a sword in hand.
Jaskier got his own blade up just in time for Geralt to literally slap it away and shoulder check him into the ground. What a pity such a magnificent creature had the personality of an aging hedgepig.
He coughed, groaned, and wished for death.
“Get up.”
“No,” Jaskier wheezed, closing his eyes. “I get up, you demand I lift a sword, you hit me.”
“That’s what sword practice is.”
“Fuck off, Geralt.”
Leaving Jaskier curled up on the ground, Geralt walked back to Roach, checking her tack. Jaskier opened his eyes, sitting up slowly.
“What are you doing?”
“If you’re not going to learn we might as well head back south. I won’t take you to Novigrad when all you are is dead weight.”
Jaskier picked himself off, dusting his bright clothing off. He glanced up at Geralt, eyebrows raised. “Aye, dead weight, but not dead,” he said, jogging around to stand on the other side of the horse, holding onto the saddle and ineffectively blocking Geralt from taking care of his duties.
“Geralt, my friend, is it truly so bad that I have faith in your abilities? That I find you so capable, so...surefooted and resourceful that I feel no need to use a sword?” Jaskier said, ignoring it when Geralt pushed his arms off Roach’s saddle. Jaskier scrambled around the horse.
“I find it idiotic,” he growled. As Geralt pulled back to pick up the saddlebags, Jaskier slid in between the Witcher and his horse. Geralt set his jaw, glaring at Jaskier, who resolved that he’d have to compose a ditty dedicated to the amber-gold of his eyes immediately, or it would be a crime against art and beauty.
“Please.” Jaskier’s voice was soft, he was smiling, his hands up. He was trying to placate Geralt and it was almost, almost working. Just a little nudge and the old hedgepig would be ready to curl up and accept his fate. “There are many towns on the way north, many people who have gone months, nay, years without the help of a witcher.”
“Then they’ll last a while longer,” Geralt growled. “Move.”
“They don’t know what they’re missing!”
“All the more reason I’m not needed.” Jaskier was shoved out of the way, and Geralt settled the packs on Roach’s back. Jaskier ran back around the horse (said horse did not move, bless her, Jaskier owed her an apple) and pulled the packs off before Geralt was able to fasten them down.
“Do not test me, bard,” Geralt snarled, baring his teeth. Honestly, those teeth should not make Jaskier’s heart beat so fast, but there is obviously no God nor fairness when it came to what turned Jaskier on. It usually didn’t take much, and when it came to Geralt it took basically nothing at all. It was an absurd and terrible situation and Jaskier wasn’t entirely comfortable with the fact that very sharp pointy teeth did things to him.
“No, no test! Look!” Jaskier put the saddlebags back over the branch and ducked under, coming face to face with Geralt. “I’m asking, as a friend-”
“We’re not friends.”
“That’s a lie, Geralt, but I’ll take it as a compliment,” Jaskier continued on, ignoring the sting. “What about a compromise? It’s obvious that I can’t learn to hold a sword in a day, or-” Jaskier noted the look on Geralt’s face, “even a week, I get it. But we’ll practice every day.”
“I don’t have time to teach you every day.”
“That’s another lie, my friend, we’ll go slower, but we’ll spend more time on the road! Securing your reputation, making your way through the small hamlets. We get home-made meals, easy work, and you continue to clear the land of monsters, as is your wont, destiny, desire, what have you.”
The look at the Geralt gave him was haunted, and Jaskier tucked that away for a rainy day or an evening at a bar when he could finally press a third drink into Geralt’s hand. He supposed that for a man like Geralt destiny had a way of getting into your step like a rock in your boot.
“And,” Jaskier added, turning to get the saddlebags, holding them out to Geralt. “I’ll learn how to poke people with the pointy end of the sword. Cross my heart.”
Geralt remained silent. He looked around the clearing, at the sparse area where Jaskier’s non-existent footwork had destroyed the grass. Jaskier smiled a little. He turned and put the bags on the horse’s back himself.
“Do you know what we’re going into?”
The magic word - we. Jaskier grinned as he turned back to Geralt, eyebrows up.
“I’ve seen it on a map..”
“It’s nearly eighty miles through mountains and the barrens,” Geralt growled, pushing Jaskier out of the way to fasten the rest of the tack. “Bandits. Sparse populations. Beast-holds.”
Jaskier grinned, picking up his lute. “So we’ll stock up on jerky and whetstones!” He refused to be disappointed after getting his way, even if the road ahead was sounding worse and worse. This was the price he paid for art. And beautiful, pliant men and women. He dusted off his green pants one more time and looked up at Geralt, who was sitting on Roach with a resigned expression.
“This is going to be a bonding experience for us, I know it.” Jaskier pulled his lute around, plucking at a few strings. Geralt rolled his eyes (the handsome devil) and nudged Roach northward, towards a new area of the world. “I think we should commemorate this moment.”
“Don’t.”
Too late. Jaskier grinned, turning around, humming. Geralt avoided looking directly at him, but Jaskier knew, hoped, sometimes even prayed, that Geralt at the very least found his tunes enjoyable. Maybe not that Geralt enjoyed them, per se, but perhaps the Witcher didn’t hate them.
“The odds were against us,
when we went north to Novigrad,
Through the rocky valleys,
the known bandit-land.
The wolves were fearless,
at our heels in the woods-”
“Bard-”
“Don’t tell me it didn’t happen! I saw a wolf just the other day, and I’m not convinced there aren’t more,” Jaskier called over his shoulder, still strumming. He hummed a bar again, tilting his head as he thought.
“It was a dog-”
Jaskier groaned, “Geralt!”
The witcher, wisely, stopped talking. Jaskier looked over at him and grinned. He rather enjoyed giving Geralt orders. It was really only after a few years of traveling on and off with the other man that he had finally wormed his way under his skin.
“At the very least,” Jaskier acquiesced, turning forward again, “it was a very large and mangy dog.”
Behind him, leather armor creaked. Jaskier grinned, tilting his head up.
“Through the woods, the wolves were fearless,
at our heels, fierce and bold.
They hid behind the trees,
eyes glowing dark and gold!”