Chapter Text
“There,” Geralt said quietly to Ciri, sat in the saddle above him. He pointed to a tree off the path, blooming with white flowers despite the lateness of the year. It reeked of rot–a sour smell, distinctive and nauseating. “Hawthorn. The berries and flowers can be used in tonics for inflammation, high blood pressure, shit like that.”
“Shit like that? Very educational.” Ciri grinned down at him. He stared flatly back.
“Witches use it in potions about the heart. Love and such. Sedatives, sometimes, but only very weak ones. Witch ers use it in healing tonics. Hawthorn, veratrum, and spurge. Lay us down and keep consistent in the supply of it and we’ll recover from most things. It’s the most basic, but it’s important, Ciri.”
He looked up to confirm she was actually paying attention, and found her instead sniffing the air and wrinkling her nose.
“Do you smell that?”
“Yes, it’s the tree. It’s worse in the spring. Goes from rot to rotting fish.”
“Not that , Geralt. It’s metallic. Like… steel, or iron, or–”
Geralt sniffed, incredulous, and there was the rot, sure, but also the tang of copper, clinging, cloying, settling at the back of his tongue. The smallest whiff of linseed oil, and buttercups, and–
“Blood.” He stopped, and Roach stopped, and Ciri stopped mid-sentence to look at him with wide eyes. He took a deeper sniff, caught a hint of rosewater salve and chamomile soap. He’d only ever met one person who smelled like that– buttercups and rosewater and linseed. “Wait here.”
She called his name as he ran toward the hawthorn tree, following the wet, sticky scent trail until he realized he’d stepped in a physical trail of it. Still fresh, a bright red, sour like poison and magic. He passed a dropped bag that smelled strongly of that linseed oil, the kind used to polish the wood of a lute. He knew there would be a songbook inside, scribbled with lyrics and notes and nonsense. An inkpot and a peacock quill, frivolous soap, spare lute strings. A broken bottle of that damn oil, by the smell of it.
And then he spotted a man, sprawled limp feet away from the tree. He wore a coat instead of a doublet, his hair was a sight longer than he’d last seen, but it was Jaskier. Geralt skid to a stop kneeling in the chill earth beside him, reaching for his shoulder to roll him over. He went, with a groan, equally relieving and annoying–because how dare he be hurt enough to allow Geralt to manhandle him and yet still conscious, just enough, to complain about it.
A cursory look was all he needed to spot the issue, a bandage rapidly being bled through around his belly, the wound somewhere on his left side.
“Hey, hey.” Geralt tapped his cheek only a little harder than strictly necessary, a meager attempt to rouse the bard, though it worked.
If Jaskier had been asked to describe his worst nightmare last week, sure it would have included running into Geralt of fucking Rivia, but he would not have imagined the current moment. His gut still hurt, damn it, but all he needed was some hawthorn and a few minutes alone to brew. Given, he may have been unable to accomplish this, considering he was coming very sluggishly awake to a witcher’s rude hand on his delicate face.
It wouldn’t be a problem, if his damn stab wound would just heal already. It’d been open and bleeding on and off for nearly three weeks now. He wasn’t entirely versed in human rates of healing, but he was pretty sure that was too long. It should have clotted, closed, something.
“Jaskier, damn it, what happened?” Ugh, Geralt was smacking his cheek again. Damn his hand for being so warm. Maybe he was suffering more loss of blood than he’d thought, he was certain he ran just as warm as the other witcher.
“Melitele’s great heaving bosom, Geralt. I can’t even die in peace, can I?” Not that he was going to die, mind, but he would love to suffer in peace before the bleeding slowed enough again for him to go about his life.
“You’re not going to die, idiot.” That stupid, warm hand was peeling back his bandages now, poking and prodding and ignoring Jaskier’s very manly whine of pain.
He may have blacked out briefly, because then he was being carried. Great trunks of arms were underneath his knees and his back, and a cold medallion pressed against his cheek. The wolf left a different imprint on his skin than the griffon, but the metal was the same, as were the enchantments, and it was a great comfort to press harder into it. The hand on his knee tightened uncomfortably. It loosened when he groaned.
“Geralt!” The bard jerked and shouted and was nearly dropped for his trouble. “Bag! I need my bag, Geralt, please.”
“I’ve got it, don’t worry.”
“Oh, thank god.” He relaxed back into the hold of the larger man, letting his head loll back. It made his vision swim and dance in the most interesting ways. “With my shield or upon it.”
“Do you have a shield, then, bard?” What a ridiculous question, Jaskier thought. Bards don’t have shields.
“Not anymore, I suppose. ‘S up on a wall, somewhere, prob’ly.”
Geralt hummed at him. Infuriating.
“Fuck, Ciri.”
“What’s a Ciri? Is that… oh, your. The child. Baby.”
“Can you hold him upright?”
“Not especially,” Jaskier answered.
“Probably, if he’s behind me,” Ciri answered.
“Lute!” Jaskier yelled, and sat up again, to be almost dropped again .
“I have it, calm down . Gods have mercy. Brace yourself.” Then he was lifted, propped on a saddle with his hands held around someone’s middle. He leaned heavily on whoever it was, Ciri probably, and apologized. His words slurred. A heavy hand rested on his thigh briefly before they started moving.
Riding with a gaping gut wound sucked , he had to say. Every so often he would black out again, come awake with a jerk, and nearly unseat both himself and Ciri. He couldn’t even get the moment of wakefulness to last long enough for him to bully Geralt into properly packing the wound. Lucidity was a fleeting thing, slipping between his fingers like water, like blood, only lasting when he managed to cup his palms together for a moment.
“Geralt, Geralt.” He mumbled into the furred cloak upon which he rested his face. “One part milk, thorn… um, bite! Geralt. Two parts jointfir.”
“You make no sense. Just rest, we’ll be at the pass in a day.” That hand fell to his knee again, squeezed once, and disappeared. Kaer Morhen, Jaskier thought, somewhat hysterically. Of course, he was going to Kaer Morhen, that was just his luck. And led there by the wolves’ golden child, no less, a man he’d thought was his friend, a man he’d lied to for years. The idea made him ill. Or maybe that was the wound again.
“Gods, I was that close? Thought I was in Redania.” At least that wasn’t a lie. He must have been wandering northward on instinct. He sometimes wintered in the empty remains of Kaer Seren, but any self-respecting witcher still living bunked down at Kaer Morhen five months of the year. “Geralt, you lug. The jointfir. Don’t distract me.”
“What about the jointfir.”
“You’re hopeless. Two part jointfir. I’ll suffocate otherwise, I’m allergic to mayflower, wolf.”
“Sure, Jaskier. Don’t call me that.”
Then he was unconscious again. He roused, briefly, when Geralt pulled him off the horse and laid him on the ground. It was cold, and he complained loudly. Someone stuck something soft underneath his head, and he let the sounds of Geralt setting up camp lull him to sleep. It was familiar, and safe. He always slept best with other witchers.
Something whiffed under his nose, the rancid scent of blizzard, and he started. One hand snatched the wrist in front of him, the other propping him up. He was certainly awake now. He nearly made to swallow it from the hand offering, but shoved it away instead, aided by the violent jerk Geralt made away from him.
“You’re trying to kill me with blizzard? Honestly, there are quicker ways to go. Just let me bleed out.” The other man looked at him quizzically. He belatedly remembered that perhaps bards didn’t know witcher potions by smell. Oh, well. He was going to Kaer Morhen anyway. The cat would certainly be out of the bag then. “Going to offer me a swallow, next?”
“I needed you awake to eat. So eat, before I put you back to sleep.” One large hand grabbed the back of his coat and pulled him to sit against a tree, and the ashen-haired girl on his other side put a bowl of stew in his hand.
“Oh, well. Thank you, I suppose.” He dug into the food. Bland but salty, of course. It always was. This was as alert as he’d felt in days . Mayhaps there was something to taking his potions again. Even if it would break his glamour for good, it would be worth no longer feeling like shit.
At least the bleeding had stopped again, when Geralt checked while Ciri washed the dinnerware.
“What happened?” He asked, pulling clean bandages from a saddlebag.
“Well, I was having a very nice time with a young lady, boxum, soft, delightfully adventurous. Turns out, her regular lover is a mage, and he did not find me nearly as charming as she.” In reality, the mage had sensed his glamour somehow and assumed he’d tried to enchant the young woman. “He stabbed me. I left posthaste. Wandered a bit, and now I’m here. In Kaedwen, somehow, apparently.” Stabbed him with a likely cursed, maybe poisoned dagger. Although, he had been getting weird feelings from the glamour lately, so maybe it was just wearing off. He should have had a good two more years, but alack and alas.
“You should have gone to a healer, bard.” Geralt grumbled. He wound the bandages a bit tighter than strictly necessary.
“Well, that’s what the whitethorn is for, isn’t it? I’ve got the sneezeweed and hellebore already.”
Geralt touched his forehead as if he had a fever. He might actually have a fever. He didn’t know if the glamour let him get infections. He assumed he didn’t, because Geralt frowned deeply at him, then left to tend Roach. Ciri sat next to him, a good few feet of space left. Silly, considering he’d bled all over her for hours.
“So you’re Jaskier?” She asked softly, looking at him with interested green eyes, wide like her mother's.
“Yes, my dear. Julian Alfred Pankratz, Vi-”
“Average bard and thorn in my arse.” Geralt interrupted.
“Geralt, please. I’m trying to make a good impression, and I am also a viscount.” He was. Once. Fifty years ago.
“Sure you are.”
Jaskier sighed, long-suffering in the face of Geralt's incredulous distrust.
“You met my mother, didn’t you?” Her voice was even softer, her knees now drawn up to her chest.
“I did,” he replied, just as quiet. “At the same feast Geralt claimed you, actually. It was quite a sight, even if he looked like–what was it? A sad silk trader?” Geralt sighed and muttered something to Roach.
“ You dressed me.”
“Yes, well, you said I was a eunuch.”
“ After you dressed me. It saved your hide, anyway.”
“It did do that. Can’t say the same for my dignity.”
He looked back to Cirilla, giggling into her crossed arm now, face lit and flushed with mirth. He grinned at her, and saw Geralt smile at the both of them, just a little. Or Roach. Each was equally possible.
“I’ll sing you what I sang to your grandmother, once I’m able, little lion. If Geralt allows you to hear such bawdy things as tavern songs. For now, we should both sleep.”
The boost the whiff of potion had given him was rapidly wearing off, leaving him tired and dizzy again. Water in his fingers, again, he thought. Maybe he said something aloud, because Geralt was giving him a drink of water and laying him down. The cloak under his head smelled of sword oil, and onions, and horse. He turned his head to the side to snuffle deeper into it. It smelled stronger than usual, the one Geralt had been wearing.
Jaskier was once again delirious when he woke. He remembers faintly muttering about lilies and corn.
“Poor Annie, the madwoman, cursed to dine only milk, bread, and cheese.”
Ciri asked if Geralt was sure he’d make it more than once, which was heartwarming and concerning. He could only imagine how bad he must look.
“Bet my favorite sword I’ll be fine in a day, lion pup. Wolf cub? Sweetheart.”
“You haven’t got a sword, Jaskier. Not sure you’d know what to do with one even if you did.”
“Well, I’m certainly better at it than Jonaton , aren’t I? Lazy arse of a witcher, I tell you. Belongs with the books.” He could feel Geralt’s heavy gaze on him, but he didn’t know how to stop. He was overcome, all at once, with the reality of his situation. He’d stepped off the Path for a reason , and it was this wretched grief bubbling in his chest. “Did he burn with them, Geralt? I don’t remember.” Didn’t remember where they’d uncovered his body, didn’t remember which body was his, left with the rest to the griffons and the elements. A shudder wracked his body, or maybe a sob, he couldn’t tell. He didn’t remember what sobs felt like, honestly. He didn’t want to die having forgotten.
“Jaskier, are you–” Geralt cut himself off, like he couldn’t bring himself to ask, like tears and sorrow atop the blood and fever were too much to deal with. His big hand gripped his knee again, warm and steady and ever-present. He couldn’t remember why he was supposed to hate that hand, right now. He wanted it to grip the back of his neck like Keldar would when he came home.
“Will you take me home? When I die? I don’t want to die in fucking Kaedwen , gods.”
“You’re not going to die, Julian.”
Geralt had never called him his full name before, but it was comforting as he slid back away from awareness.
He had little but glimpses, then. Passing dreams and foggy colors.
A glimpse of the starry sky, beauty tempered by the bite of the strong mountain cold. He tried to say something and croaked instead. Someone haloed in moonlight and soaked in petrichor gently held a cup of broth to his mouth. His mind slipped away into the snow.
Jaskier lifted his head from a broad shoulder just enough to watch a little girl lead a mare over treacherous rocks. The sun glinted off her hair and the snow in equal measure, and he hummed a few nonsensical bars. He didn’t recall fading away, but he woke bundled into a pup tent and pressed between two warm bodies. He imagined, for just a moment, someone running a gentle hand through his hair and shushing him.
He came back in Geralt’s arms again, looking up at the grey sky, listening to the sounds of Ciri running ahead and calling for help, the chickens in the courtyard, the hunting dogs. Geralt was hurrying, but he couldn’t run without shaking the bard.
The numbness that came with blood loss was fading, but that meant the pain crept back in at the edges. He moaned, pitifully. Geralt shushed him.
“Geralt, what’s– hell .” Someone else came up, then abruptly turned and left, shouting for Vesemir. Oh fuck, Jaskier thought, Vesemir . Vesemir was going to kick his ass, bring him back just to kill him. He owed the bard 30 bezant, maybe he could call it in in exchange for his life. Was he worth that much? Probably not to Vesemir, after this. He hoped and prayed that sixty years was enough to fade the memory of a fresh, teen witcher’s face.
Geralt laid him down on a shitty cot, in the dank basement lab of Kaer Morhen. Honestly, wolves needed to get windows. An ancient, sour smell was seeped into the very wood beneath him, and all he could think of was the fucking Trials. He’d nearly busted his vocal cords screaming, he hadn’t been able to speak for days afterward. He woke sometimes, still thrashing against bindings and instructors' hands, screaming loud enough to wake the dead. He gripped tightly to Geralt’s closest arm, trying to make it a threat.
“If you bury me here I’ll haunt you, Geralt, so help me.” Someone he couldn’t see laughed at him, and someone else peeled back the bandaging. He winced, and blacked out again, briefly. It had been crusted to his wound. Not any more.
Someone hissed in a breath. He zoned out thinking about what they would think to do with his body, but yelped and kicked out when something prodded his belly. His boot met flesh with a meaty sound, and someone stumbled audibly away.
“Shit! Your bard has some fucking legs!”
“Let him fix you up, Jaskier. Couldn’t you give him something, knock him out better, or something for the pain?”
“He’s lost too much blood, it would kill him.” Ah, there was Vesemir. He managed to squint blearily at the man bent over his gut.
“You’re old.” That same person guffawed, deep belly laughs to his right. Vesemir looked at him, unimpressed. It probably was funny, to look at a man you’d never met and call him old. But he was. He hadn’t seen him in decades, but gods, he was aging. Grey and wrinkled and soft around the middle. He imagined calling him round to his face and giggled deliriously. Someone poured something across his bleeding belly and it turned into a scream.
Someone held his shoulders and the line between delirious memory and reality blurred. Suddenly, again, he was twelve years old, burning up from the inside and trying not to vomit.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he babbled, unaware, both clinging to the hands holding him and trying to squirm again. “I changed my mind, I don’t want it, please. Please, please .”
Someone whispered apologies into his hair, and a part of him acknowledged that this was necessary, the chemical burning of the poison in his wound. Still, he tried to flail. When that failed, he bit down on the arm holding his chest and locked his jaw.
“Ow, fuck ! Let up, Jaskier!” Geralt swore colorfully in Elder, and blood flooded Julian’s mouth, but neither moved and so he bit down harder. “Shit! Eskel, fucking Axii him or something!”
One large hand moved in front of his face, and he had just a moment of indignation before everything fell to the back of his mind. His jaw clicked when he relaxed it, and all his limbs fell limp. Another potion poured into his wound, but all he could do was hiss and clench his hands.
“Let me see to that, Eskel has the bard,” Vesemir said, voice deep and rumbling and comforting. Julian felt something vibrate in his chest, just barely, in fits and starts. The glamour kept him from self-soothing, but only just.
Finally, finally , Eskel gently packed damp cotton into the wound and the burning eased. Someone helped him sit Jaskier up so the bandages could be wrapped tightly around his stomach. His head lolled back and he stared at the rafters. Geralt grumbled and yipped somewhere to the side, like a puppy with a splinter.
“Shut up, you big baby. You’re fine.” Jaskier managed to mumble.
“Fuck off and pass out already.”