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“What about….that one?”
“Jaskier….”
“Oh come Geralt it’s been ever so dull we’ve been snowed in for an age the least you could do is tell me about some of the battles I’ve missed.”
Geralt shot a glare over his shoulder, tunic over his arms as he was half-through getting dressed in a clean one. “I’m not obligated to entertain you.”
Jaskier snorted, rolling over on the bed. “No? I’m sorry who paid for this room?”
Geralt flicked his eyes away with a growl and ducked his head, pulling his tunic on the rest of the way and tucking it into his trousers. “Fine,” he said at last, moving to the bed and sitting down with a huff next to the bard. He gestured with both hands. “What do you want to know?”
“Wait, seriously? You’ll indulge me?” Jaskier asked, moving to sit up. The way he lit up both sparked fondness and a deep sense of regret in Geralt.
What was he thinking, giving the bard a foot in the door like that?
“Yes fine. You paid, so I’ll tell you about one--” he held up a finger to reinforce “scar.”
Jaskier’s face fell and he sat back on his heels. “You are a miser, Geralt. With everything that doesn’t matter. This room cost several marks, what if you give me one scar for each mark?”
Geralt rolled his eyes, turning to lever a leg up on the bed and flop down. “Fine,” he sighed, closing his eyes. “But I’m taking up as much of the bed as I like while I do it.”
“Oh that’s fine. I’d rather be up where I can listen anyway,” Jaskier said, excitedly grabbing his lute off the chair with a twang of strings.
Geralt opened his eyes and pointed at the instrument. “And no composing while I talk. I don’t care how much you paid I will go sleep in the snow.”
Jaskier pouted, but he set the lute back on the chair. “Fine. Then I’m sitting next to you on the bed.”
“Fine.”
The bard plopped down, bouncing the stiff mattress just slightly as he crossed his legs like a schoolchild watching a puppet play. Geralt shook his head lightly and then gestured.
“Okay. What do you want to know. You get three.”
“This cost me more than three marks, Geralt.”
“And you’re using my body heat so you don’t freeze to death in this shitty inn, so I’d say that’s payment in itself,” Geralt said, shooting him a sidelong glare.
"Okay...um..okay. This would be a lot easier with your shirt off…”
“You’ve seen me naked,” Geralt said incredulously. “You can’t remember one scar?”
“Have you never had someone ask you what your favorite ale is and suddenly you’ve never had a drink in your life? Besides, I don’t want a scar, Geralt. I want to pick the most interesting ones.”
Geralt rolled his eyes and pulled his tunic up, exposing his side. “Okay. Pick.”
Jaskier squinted, leaning forward with his hands on his knees.
“Quickly. I do get cold.”
“Okay keep your trousers on...that one.” He said, pointing to a puncture on the right side of Geralt’s ribcage.
Geralt tucked his tunic back in.
“Archespore.”
Jaskier waited, almost a comically long time before: “And…?”
“I don’t know why you thought you were going to get an entire performance out of me. It was an Archespore spine.”
Jaskier huffed, throwing a hand up. “Geralt, don’t be thick on purpose. Come on. Recount something from the battle. A location. Anything.”
“Location was a cemetery, since Archespores grow in cursed soil,” Geralt began, and though Jaskier twitched for his lute he restrained himself and started making mental notes instead. “There was a nest of them. A barbed dart from one of them punctured my armor, locked into my ribs, and made it excruciating to finish the fight. They have these hair like little spines that pop out when they latch into something," he said, gesturing with both hands to illustrate "and they dig into the rib cage, tearing up blood vessels and making them impossible to get out without more damage.” He glanced at the bard, raising an eyebrow. “That the kind of detail you were after?”
Jaskier looked a little green, but he shook his head. “Yes. Good. Keep going.”
“Not much else to tell.”
“What? Why do you mean?”
“Because archespore spines are filled with poison, Jaskier. And I passed out.”
Concern crossed his friend’s face then, and Geralt felt suddenly guilty for being snide with him.
“Aren’t you--resistant to poison?” he ventured.
“Not without help. Not much more than you are. I’d taken an antidote before the battle but there’s only so much I can do when the poison starts out that close to my heart. Fortunately, I’d injured it badly enough it bled out while I was writhing in the flowerbed. And Archespores don’t usually show interest in dead flesh once they take root.”
Jaskier grimaced, glancing again at the place he knew the injury to be. “Dare I ask...or will I regret...how long archespore spines are?”
Geralt hummed, planting one finger on the scar, and another an alarming several inches across his chest, mapping the invisible path the spine would have burrowed inside him.
Jaskier swallowed compulsively. “I...oh dear.”
It was far more than close to Geralt's heart. It had to have been touching it.
“Wasn’t fun.”
“How...how did you survive?”
Geralt shook his head once. “Still don’t know. When I woke up the barb was still in place, the other spores were dead, and there was another empty bottle at my side. Best I can guess, another witcher happened along and decided to show me mercy. After that, Nenneke got the barb out and I spent three weeks recovering."
He shrugged one shoulder. “I try not to question when I get a second chance. Leads to bad things.”
Jaskier pursed his lips together, still stuck on the image of a spine that far into Geralt’s chest. Geralt felt the bard’s eyes on him and turned his head, looking at him with a softer expression.
“Jaskier,” he snapped his fingers. “Hey.”
“You’re...very lucky,” he said softly, suddenly disliking the exercise all together. It was fun to imagine epic battles and to romanticize the witcher’s stories, but there was nothing beautiful he could put to this. Geralt could have died years before they’d met...maybe before Jaskier was even on the road himself, and then what? So much joy and light would never have come to him at all and he wouldn’t have even known.
He swallowed, a sudden lump in his throat. Geralt frowned, sitting up slowly.
“Jaskier...hey.” He waved a hand, turning to face him and folding his legs on the bed. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this but...talk to me.”
“Ah..no. Geralt, that’s alright. I’m--I’m sorry to have pushed you.” He glanced at Geralt and immediately looked away, a weak smile flitting over his lips as he got up and moved away. “I...I should go see if they have dinner started yet…”
Geralt’s frown deepened. “Jaskier.”
The bard stopped, working his hands at his side, before turning around to face Geralt, tears he couldn’t quite stop already making his eyes red. “Yes, Geralt?”
“Are you…”
“Yes! Alright,” Jaskier snapped, dashing tears away. Geralt closed his mouth and slowly got up, approaching his friend like he was a spooked horse.
“Why?”
Jaskier scoffed, gesturing helplessly as he avoided Geralt’s concerned gaze. Somehow, that was harder to look at than his irritated one. “Oh, I don’t know. The state of our economy, the fact that I probably wasn’t hugged enough as a child...general racism, and the other fact that my best friend could have died from a demonic plant probably before I even learned to sing.” He gestured wildly, looking at Geralt then, who appeared a little lost. “You know! That’s all!”
“Jaskier...I”
“I know, I know we’re not friends. Well, maybe I’m not your friend but you are mine and you can’t tell me who my best one is so.” He folded his arms in a huff, a gesture rather undermined by the tear that managed to escape to his collar. Geralt’s amber eyes tracked the tear and he looked a little more lost. He seemed to debate for a moment, a twitch sparking through his shoulders before:
“Ah...fuck.”
And Jaskier was wrapped up in the nicest, warmest, most secure hug he’d ever had in his entire life.
More than a little startled, at first he only froze, before slowly, very slowly, turning his head to look at Geralt’s white hair and accept this was actually happening. It was actually happening, and even though Geralt was a little stiff against him, Jaskier wouldn’t trade that hug for anything ever.
Before Geralt could come to his senses, Jaskier hurriedly returned it, burrowing into Geralt’s shoulder. Geralt twitched, but stopped himself from pulling away, and Jaskier smiled to feel the witcher’s heart actually racing against his. By racing, he meant it beat about twice for every four of his own, but for Geralt that was fast and he’d take it.
“Thank you for not dying before I could meet you,” he muttered into Geralt’s shoulder.
Geralt huffed weakly in response, and his posture became a little less tense.