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The problem with humans was that their personal scent could be greatly affected by everything. Of course, whatever the human, the odours of anger, hate, and fear stank, something acre and stomach moving. Happiness and curiosity, however, smelt good—sometimes a bit too strong for Geralt, but it was often linked to flowers or food. Sadness was tricky because the scent was often related to something the person associated with sadness; he once met a girl whose sad scent smelt like fir.
Emotions were not the only shifts: whatever changes a body experienced would be reflected, like puberty. The hormone surge transformed their scent greatly. So as time passed with Ciri, Geralt didn't pay much attention to her change of scent.
It did smell a bit weird, a combination of vanilla but with an after-taste of something sour he couldn’t identify. Teenagehood generally brought something more animal to the scent, something rawer, but well — Ciri was far from a normal child, with Elder blood in her veins, so maybe it affected her scent. He rather paid attention to her moods, if she was ever scared or too sad.
Ciri grew on him like he never thought a child could. He had a shit childhood, was surrounded by people with equally shitty childhood and he was sterile, so he never thought of himself as a father nor how he’d make sure to make a child feel safe. It had been a shift, an important one, especially because Cirilla was traumatised and it fell on Geralt's shoulders to guide her through it.
But he managed, through their travel and the prospect of spending the winter somewhere safe, where they wouldn't have to fear whenever a branch cracked or when a human was smelled, could only make it better.
He taught her how to fight and how to hunt.
She'd wake up from nightmares and Geralt would be here; he'd even push through his dislike of being touched and hug her.
She hugged him more and more as time passed and the touch became natural.
The day she pranked him (she hid the lace for his hair), he couldn’t help but smile and just felt proud . Proud of how resilient she was, and proud because Ciri was smart and witty and she felt comfortable enough with him to try some harmless fun and it felt good.
He knew that what awaited them would not be easy, but whatever happened they had each other and Geralt would be here, no matter what, and Ciri would get back up, no matter what.
They were close to the end of their travel, starting to climb The Killer. They were late, almost too late to fight The Killer, but Geralt really needed to get Ciri to Kaer Mohren. Especially because Ciri appeared sicker and sicker. Her smell, too, had grown sourer and the vanilla scent impossibly stronger. He feared he overlooked something , a curse, but since Ciri didn't address it, he pondered it better to talk about it once they were safe and warm and with a full stomach.
However, since Destiny rarely sided with him, a snowstorm started and Geralt was forced to stop them and hide in a cavern. The storm shouldn’t last long, maybe two days and they’ll have to go slower afterwards but they’ll make it. He said as much as Ciri. She smelt mildly worried like he told a thirteen-year-old they'd have to stay blocked on a path named The Killer, but she pushed through it and nodded, starting to settle the camp.
They had enough rations to last a week at least, and they could even use the food they were meant to bring to Kaer Morhen if needed — or Geralt could even not eat for a full week to save rations, he had gone longer without food, and he'd do it again if it meant that his daughter (he still had some trouble to fully name it, but it was true, Ciri was his daughter now) could eat.
“God, I’d kill for a peach,” Ciri whined now that they had settled the camp and they had nothing to do except wait.
“I’m getting worried for my physical integrity,” Geralt replied, with a small smile that she couldn't see because he was turning his back to her, combing Roach. It had been two weeks since Ciri asked for peaches; the month before it was figs, which was a bit easier to indulge, although it was very expensive but the smile spreading through Ciri’s whole face had been worth it every time. She adored fruits, certainly the remains of his noble upbringing.
“Unless your flesh turns out to be peach, you should be safe. Should,” she repeated and Geralt huffed, which stole her a giggle. “Tell me a story,” she prompted.
Cirilla, as Geralt had discovered, loved stories of any kind, but especially the gruesome and the “killing monsters” sort. Geralt never told stories. It was more of Eskel’s and Lambert’s job through winters but he made the effort for Ciri and she was delighted each time. It was a tradition now, and Geralt spent most of his evening time indulging her in stories. She sometimes told her own too, either past gossip from the Court or things she had read.
He was telling her a story about a peculiar gruesome fight against way too many drowners (although he hides the fact it was a trap settled by a vicious earl) when her smell suddenly changed and she whined. Geralt started on his feet and crowded her with concern. The vanilla got stronger but there was something more… organic. Not blood, exactly, but close enough for him to get worried.
She looked at him, horrified.
“Are you okay?” He asked, although he knew the answer was no but he couldn't do anything if he didn't know the cause.
Her heartbeat was impossibly fast and the vanilla smell soon turned into fear. Distress. Some anger, too. And to add to this confusion, she broke into sobs and hid her face between her knees.
His own heartbeat fastened, too, as he tried to understand what could cause his daughter this much distress. There were no monsters around nor any humans; it was only Ciri, Roach and himself. She had this weird smell, but it was not blood, so she wasn't harmed. The story was far from being the most horrible he told, so it couldn't be that either.
“Ciri, can you tell me what’s happening?” He tried desperately to stay calm, not to cede to panic but to be the anchor Ciri could cling to through whatever was happening.
She just continued to sob, and there was something in him screaming to fix things, to stop her cries, but he couldn’t do anything if she didn’t tell him so he stayed close to her, a hand between her shoulder blades, rubbing soothingly.
She sobbed for a long time, and Geralt felt it lasted centuries but eventually, she stopped and sniffed against her sleeve. She still didn't speak, but he let her compose herself. She still smelt like vanilla, so much it was maddening, and there was still fear, so much fear in her smell, but at least she was less frantic.
“Pr—Promise you won’t be mad,” she said, her voice shaking.
If something happened to Ciri, he would be mad, that much was obvious; but the question implied a 'don't be mad at me ' and Geralt wished he had the words to explain that he was never mad at her. He settled for,
“Of course. I want to help, Ciri, and I need you to explain to me what's happening.”
“I think… I think I’m pregnant.”
Geralt’s blood turned into ice at the same time it started burning. He didn’t know what he had expected but it was not that.
“Pregnant?” He could just parrot.
‘Ciri’ and ‘pregnant’ didn't correlate in his mind, and couldn't be associated. How was it even possible? She hadn't had her periods yet, he'd have smelt the blood at some point. Unless…
Unless she had been pregnant before the fall of Cintra. But she hadn't been married and if she met someone, he'd have smelt him or she'd have told him and she was…
She was just so young for that, even for the nobility.
So many questions bouldered in his mind, fought to get out. Why hadn't she said something? Since when did she know? Did she not trust him with that? Who was the father? Did she need anything? He never felt so useless. It already took him too long to wrap his mind around being a father and having a daughter, but getting ready to hear from her that she was pregnant didn’t even cross his mind.
She cut his thoughts by starting to sob again.
It explained the weird scent: it was not just teenagehood but pregnancy. It explained the craving and the emotional volatility and how nauseous she could get and how much she slept every day—everything he just assumed was normal behaviour for a traumatised girl of her age.
“Ciri, I’m not mad,” he tried again. “I’m worried about you.”
She grabbed his arm, the one not drawing circles on her back, in the way she did to tell him she needed a moment. He gave her.
There were two options. Either she had gotten pregnant before the fall of Cintra, in which case… He did the maths. In which case it had been about nine months. It’d explain the smell, this weird mix of bodily fluid unidentified. He had not been around a lot of pregnant women, even less when their water broke, but it’d make sense.
“Did your water broke?”
The question seemed to sober her up long enough to say, “Yes. Yes, I’m so sorry,” and she went frantic again. “I’m so sorry Geralt, I— I—” She took a deep breath, “I wanted to tell you, I swear. But I just… I just... You taught me better!”
It was his turn to take deep breaths, not letting his thoughts turn into anger thinking about what could have happened and focusing on listening to Ciri.
“I’m— It happened back at Brugge.” It had been the 10th or 11th day then, and they were starting to need some money to buy Ciri new shoes so Geralt had had to bring them closer to villages to take some contracts. “You went— You went to your contract, it was an archespore I believe.” She breathed. “You went to that archespore, and I went to the room like you asked. But I… I got so hungry at some point so I went to see the innkeeper and I asked for food."
She made a sound like she chocked on her own spit and he could smell the stench of salt as new tears dripped on her cheeks, "And I know Geralt, I know I should have listened to you and stayed in my room and it was so fucking dumb because I could have been something else than some,” she starts sobbing again, “than some weak, sob—sobbing girl that can’t st—stomach a bit of hunger.”
She clapped her hand around his arm harder and it hurt a bit but Geralt knew he was a physical anchor right now. He had to think about the pain in his arm because there was a scenario he envisioned and he refused to think about it.
“He told me to come in—into the kitchen, and so I followed because I believed there was food b— but they were two and I tried with the knife, I swear Geralt, I tried to fight them off,” she murmured the last part, "I even tried to use my powers, but they chose that moment to let me down."
She breathed and breathed again and Geralt, Geralt was so focused on not reacting that he didn’t do anything.
His whole mind went blank with a single thought: Ciri had been raped.
He forced himself to say it in his mind, not to shy away from the words, from the horror of what happened, because if the thought physically pained him, it could never be more than a fraction of what Ciri endured.
How could have he been so blind? How could he not have seen anything? How could have he failed her so badly?
Ciri continued, “And I didn’t know right away I was pregnant. I realised it a few months later because my periods weren't coming. But I never… never found the strength to tell you, never found the right time. I’m so, so sorry Geralt,” she wept again.
Geralt wished words came easy to him in that instant because he didn’t know what to say to comfort her. What do you say to your daughter? Ciri was already forced to grow up too quickly, but he thought he had done a decent job of protecting her since then, not to add too many nightmares.
He was faced with how miserably he failed.
She hadn't even been hurt by some powerful mages, by some strong monsters, but by mere humans, by people Geralt would have been able to kill in a matter of seconds.
He wrapped his arms around her. Geralt was not physical, but he knew Ciri loved hugs, and she deserved them, now more than ever.
Questions continued to invade his head, mostly about his obliviousness.
He remembered the aftermath of his fight with the monster. Archespores were a strain to kill and he had used too many potions. When he had come back from the hunt, wounded and intoxicated, the faint smell of sex he sensed in the morning didn't alarm him because it was no surprise to smell sex in an inn. He had been more focused on keeping his insides, well, inside him and sparing Ciri from that gruesome view than analysing his surroundings. The first mistake. He should have focused on the fear and the tears and the sex that must have been present in the room. He should have been more cautious. He knew women and children were at risk when travelling, that humans were a bunch of assholes, and several times he had had to lead Ciri elsewhere because men's eyes had wandered on her, smashing a skull on one memorable occasion. But he had thought he did an alright job. He had thought that the fear Ciri reeked whenever it happened was a fear of possibility, not of memory.
And the pregnancy. How would he have been oblivious for nine months ? Sure, Ciri being pregnant was not an eventuality he prepared for because he didn't even think it'd be an eventuality, but now that he knew, everything was so obvious. Ciri's frail frame had hidden most of the belly, he guessed. He had noticed, distantly, that she had gained a bit of weight around her middle, but again, she was going through puberty and it wouldn't have been the weirdest thing. Nausea – nausea had been the less easy to explain, but nausea caused by anxiety was far from the less heard thing too. But he should have put it all together. He was supposed to be smarter and more observant.
On top of all, there was the knowledge his daughter suffered alone. That she didn't feel comfortable enough with Geralt to tell him, to seek comfort, a comfort she must have needed so desperately. Bitterly, he's faced with how accurate her discomfort had been: he was useless, he didn't know what to say, he didn't know what to do.
He forced himself to act because now was not the time to dwell on his inadequacy. She deserved better. He hadn't beeb able to protect her, but he had to make her safe now .
“I'm here, Ciri, it's going to be alright, whatever happens, we'll make it right,” he managed to murmur, as much for her than for himself.
She breathed through her sobs as she nodded. His heart swelled knowing that she was strong but shouldn't have to be so strong.
She whimpered suddenly, her whole body tensing and pain crowding her smell. It must be a contraction.
He froze when he came to the realisation that she was due soon. Soon as in tonight. When they were stuck in a cave and when Geralt had never helped anyone to give birth. He knows the basics of medecine, the theory of giving birth, but that was all.
It'll have to be enough.
He compelled himself to breathe. He had to stay strong and focused. If he was suffering from the situation, then he has no idea what Ciri was going through. He had to be the adult, the father of the situation and do everything. He'll make things alright.
“It's going to be alright,” he repeated because someone had to say it, even if he only half believed it.