Chapter Text
Geralt had told Cirilla to stay hidden, no matter what she heard, but he didn’t know that she could see as well as hear what was happening. There was a tiny crack in the trunk of the fallen tree whose hollow body she was curled in. Geralt had guided her roughly into it after waking her in the dead of night. He had heard what she hadn’t, his heightened senses picking up something that put a sharp gleam in his catlike eyes, she would have called it fear on any other person. On him, she knew it was anticipation.
She could see him silhouetted against their fire, his steel sword glinting as it met with enemy blades. The noise was horrible, the scraping and clashing of metal that only ever ceased when instead there was the wet squelching of flesh being sliced. It reminded her of the night she fled Cintra. She tried to put that out of her mind as she watched Geralt fight. She could only catch glimpses but he was as graceful as a dancer, weaving between attackers and striking them down.
Almost as soon as it had began, it was over. The little clearing where they had made camp fell quiet and Cirilla could see Geralt standing in front of the fire, blade lowered and shoulders rising with his breath.
“Come out, it’s safe,” he said, his voice low and rough.
Cirilla clambered out of the trunk, bits of moss and bark stuck to her clothes and hair. She stepped gingerly toward Geralt, carefully avoiding looking at the dead bodies littering their campsite. The witcher turned to her.
“We should leave, make camp elsewh—”
His voice cut out as a sword suddenly pierced his side. One of the bounty hunters had not been quite as dead as he’d appeared, and from the ground had rolled to stab Geralt. The blade jutted out just below his ribs, now slick with his blood.
Unable to stop herself, Ciri screamed. A desperate and horrified “no” tore from her throat and sent the bounty hunter flying across the clearing. He struck a tree with a sickening crack and fell to the ground, unmoving. Geralt was knocked prone and in a flash Ciri was at his side.
“Geralt! Geralt! Are you alright?” Her hands skittered around the wound helplessly, she didn’t know what to do. The sword was still lodged inside him.
“I’ll be alright. Get me a potion from my bag.”
“Right.” Ciri got to her feet and dashed over to Roach. The horse was breathing heavily, agitated from the conflict, but calmed when Ciri arrived at her side and placed a hand on her neck. The girl rooted through the bag, lifting various vials to the light, but one after the other proved empty to her growing dismay.
“Geralt,” she breathed, her heart hammering in her chest.
“A reddish-colored one.”
“Geralt they’re all empty.” Cirilla kept rooting through the bag, but the flasks clinked hollowly against each other, empty. She looked over her shoulder when there came no reply. Geralt was lying propped on one elbow with his other hand pressed over his wound. Blood coated his knuckles as he took a deep breath.
“Fuck,” he said.
“What do we do?”
Geralt looked up at the girl, his jaw set and his lips thinned.
“We get help.”