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Geralt hasn’t seen Jaskier in… far too long. Not since the fight on the mountain, when he was still reeling from Yennefer, and he’d turned around and taken it out on his friend. He thought he’d run into him soon; Jaskier never stayed away for long, usually only enough to get a few husbands angry, and then he was back, begging for Geralt’s protection. And he’d grant it. Because he’s a fool. He’ll never admit to anyone, least of all Jaskier, but he enjoys the bard’s company. He talks enough for the two of them, he seems to be able to decipher all of Geralt’s grunts and hmm’s, and, if Geralt’s being honest, he enjoys being responsible for someone. It’s added stress, but it’s sharpened his senses in a way that mutations never could.
Every day, Geralt expects to hear the bard’s annoyingly cheerful voice, calling out for him to wait. And every day, he’s left disappointed, waiting up until the small hours of the night until he at last falls into an uneasy, fitful sleep.
When he does next see Jaskier, the bard doesn't see him. Geralt’s just arrived in a new town, and he sees Jaskier ducking out, looking about him furtively. A moment later, a big, burly man with a red beard comes running down the dirt road. He does a double take at Geralt, clearly not used to running into people larger than him, and then he focuses on Geralt’s golden eyes.
“You a witcher?” he asks, voice gruff and angry.
Geralt lets out an exhalation that means yes, and nods.
“You seen a skinny fellow in a ridiculous blue jacket and a lute somewhere around here?”
Ah. Jaskier has apparently not changed his habits since leaving Geralt. He wonders if the man has some son or daughter or if Jaskier set his sights on the wife. Either way, it doesn’t matter. The end result for Jaskier will be the same: a sound beating, possibly ending in castration and/or murder.
He shakes his head. No need to ruin Jaskier’s life. At least, no more than he already has. “Why?” He wouldn’t normally bother asking, or even speaking, but he hasn’t heard any news of Jaskier for months. He needs to make sure the bard is safe. Maybe happy. He hopes he’s happy.
The man runs a hand down his beard, like he’s trying to calm it. “Went after my daughter,” he replies, eyeing Geralt with distrust. It’s a look very familiar to the witcher.
That sounds like Jaskier, alright, and Geralt finds himself suppressing a smile. His friend is still causing trouble, infuriating fathers and husbands, and generally being a scoundrel.
“Hmm,” he says, and dismounts Roach.
The man approaches him, then, still looking distrustful. “You… fight monsters, eh, Witcher?”
“Hmm.” He gives a single, perfunctory nod. He wouldn’t have to with Jaskier around. No wonder they made so much more money travelling together. Jaskier wasn’t smart with money, but he certainly was good at acquiring it. Geralt starts, realizing he’s starting to think of the bard in the past tense. It’s been nearly a year since he last spoke to the man.
“Do you consider people monsters?”
The red-bearded man brings Geralt back down to reality. He takes a moment to answer, both because that’s what he usually does, and because he can’t quite figure out what the man means, and if he answers wrong, he might be seen out of town by an angry mob.
“No,” he finally answers.
The man’s shoulders slump, and Geralt can smell the tang of disappointment, metallic and cold, coming off the man in waves. “So I won’t be able to convince you to go after the bard?”
Well. He hadn’t been expecting the conversation to go this way. Of course he won’t take the job, but he half-considers it. Not that he would harm Jaskier in any way, but he’d have an excuse to find him, and then everything would be alright. Jaskier would tag along after the bard, writing ridiculous songs that Geralt would never admit he actually likes (even though they’re not bad), talking incessantly, and generally being an annoying little shit. He misses it more than he’ll ever admit.
He sighs and rests a hand on Roach. “Save your coin,” he says gruffly. “I’ll go after him in the morning.” He’ll go after Jaskier, but he won’t kill him.
The man’s eyes widen, and without another word, he turns around, hurrying home. Geralt wonders what came over himself. Why would he try to track Jaskier? Why would he ever want to hunt down his friend?
That night, resting on a bed in the inn, Geralt can’t stop mulling it over, the thoughts tumbling through his mind and keeping him from sleep. He remembers his last conversation with Jaskier, if conversation it could be called, and his shoulders tense subconsciously.
That’s not fair.
He can still hear Jaskier’s voice, clear as day, as if he’s standing in the room right now. The slight shake in his voice, the trembling of his lower lip, the way his posture changed.
That’s not fair.
The bard never once disputed any of the accusations Geralt threw at him. He didn’t argue, didn’t protest, didn’t do any of the things Geralt had been expecting him to do, from years of getting to know his behavior. He didn’t have a clever retort, or a shitty retort, he didn’t do his Ah-ah-ah-ah-ah protest, or argue any of the points.
Geralt has lived for a long time, and he’s had more than a few shitty days. That day in Blaviken, for example, when he killed Renfri. Or when he was abandoned to become a witcher. Or his entire time training to become a witcher, being subjected to harsh, unforgiving teachers, cruel training, and painful mutagens. He’s collected more than his fair share of worst days ever, and he does his best not to think about them. It doesn’t do to dwell on the past. It takes your attention away from the present, and that endangers your future. Geralt has gotten good at suppressing feelings and not thinking about regrets.
But he can’t get over this thing, just like he can’t get over the child surprise. Or being known as the Butcher of Blaviken. He’s haunted by the mountain, and what surprises him is that he’s more haunted by Jaskier than Yennefer.
He supposes he shouldn’t be surprised by that. His attraction to Yennefer, and hers to him, was the result of a wish. He’d only been intending to save her life, and he’d ended up destining the two of them for each other. It wasn’t what he’d been expecting, or even wanting, but now that attraction was there, and they’d both acted on it multiple times. He doesn’t blame her for leaving him up there on the mountain. Not after she found out about the wish. In fact, he rather admires her resolve. He doesn’t know that he’d be able to walk away from the person he’s desperately in love with, no matter how angry he is.
Oh.
But he walked away from Jaskier, didn’t he? The bard who’s been with him for so long, who’s managed to turn him from being hated, spat on, and stoned to the hero of the Continent. The one who made sure he took care of himself and paid for most of their room and board with money he’d made from singing. The one who’d encountered monsters along with Geralt, no matter how scared, because he wanted to write another ballad praising the heroic Geralt of Rivia.
He walked away from the only friend he’s ever known, the one who–
No. Not the only friend he’s ever known. The only person he’s ever fallen in love with without the help of destiny or magic wishes or anything else that takes away from the meaning of the word love.
He doesn’t know when he first realized he’s in love with Jaskier, and he still hates thinking of the bard in those terms, using words that evoke feelings, especially nice feelings like love and happiness and warmth. He’s used to dealing with the altogether more unpleasant feelings, like sadness, discontent, anger, guilt. A lot of guilt. It feels wrong to feel things that are nice, especially after so many years of feeling things that are the exact opposite of nice.
Of course, now that Jaskier is gone, and gone for good, he’s gone back to the not-so-nice feelings. Despite the fact that the bard is perhaps the most annoying person to ever live, he’s one of the only people who can actually make Geralt smile. One of the only people who can evoke warm, happy sensations.
He remembers his conversation with the red-bearded man, his promise to go after Jaskier. What was he thinking? Jaskier doesn’t want to see him, doesn’t need to see him. He’s probably having the time of his life, not burdened with a grumpy, stoic companion who scares people just by walking into the room, before Jaskier can turn on his charm.
Jaskier is probably happy. And more than anything else, Geralt wants him to be happy. Even if it means never seeing him again. The bard has probably bounced back from that argument on the mountain, with his That’s not fair and his trembling lower lip and the look in his eyes like he’s a puppy who’s just been kicked and he can’t understand what he did wrong.
He sighs heavily and rolls over, trying to fall asleep, wishing he could get that scene out of his mind. After all these years — after twenty-two years — the thing that finally got Jaskier to leave him alone wasn’t some terrifying monster or death or the bad conditions of travelling or the death threats or any of that. The thing that finally got Jaskier was Geralt’s temper.
Fitting, Geralt thinks, as he covers his eyes with his arm, that Jaskier spent twenty-two years of his life trying to convince the world that witchers, and Geralt in particular, were heroes, only to be horribly mistreated and driven away by the witcher he was so devoted to.
It’s a near-sleepless night for Geralt, all in all, and he rises early in the morning, when the sky is still dark, leaving some coin on the bed and sneaking out of the inn before anyone else is awake. He’s promised to go after Jaskier, and he can’t back out of that. (It’s not like he has to kill Jaskier or anything; all he promised was to “go after him.” Geralt never enters into a deal he can’t fulfill.)
He doesn’t have any trouble picking up Jaskier’s trail. Witchers have heightened senses, and the familiar scent of the bard still lingers on the road out of town, heading southwest: towards Verden, and the coast. With Roach, he might even be able to overtake the bard before the next town.
But the day goes on, and he still sees no sign of Jaskier, although his familiar smell, that scent of wood polish and rain, grows stronger as the day progresses.
Towns in this part of the Continent are generally a day’s easy ride from each other. It ensures that help is quick and easy to come by, cuts down on bandits, and makes for good travel. There is always a tavern in each town, sometimes more than one. When Geralt gets to this next town, it’s afternoon, the autumn sun bathing the world in golden light. This is a small town, so there’s only one tavern, and he can’t judge how high the quality of the ale will be, but it’s the best place to get a halfway decent meal, a drink, a room for the night, and a stable for Roach.
And as he steps inside, his eyes adjusting almost instantly to the dim light of the tavern, he hears a familiar voice, singing some song about fucking magical creatures. How is that not a surprise?
He tries to stay out of sight, as usual, not just because he doesn’t want to interrupt Jaskier’s performance, with its usual flamboyance and gratuitous winking at anyone in the tavern who looks like they might reciprocate. There’s plenty of cheering, and a few jeers as well, and Geralt makes a mental note of the hecklers, almost without thinking. He gets some bread and meat and ale, then finds a small, low table in the corner of the room for him to sit at, hunched over it like some sort of giant. He’s enjoying Jaskier’s performance, no matter the level of secondhand embarrassment it’s giving him. (Jaskier, he’s found, doesn’t feel much by way of embarrassment. He’s the one who walked up to Geralt with a line about having bread in his pants all those years ago, and never once felt any shame for it.)
The evening continues, and Geralt feels like luck is on his side, for the first time in over a year, because Jaskier still hasn’t noticed him. He’d promised to go after Jaskier, and he’d had some idea of talking to him, seeing if they could travel together again (certainly not kiss him until both of them were thoroughly out of breath, and then kiss him some more once they’d gotten a few gasps of air into their lungs, that wasn’t part of his plan at all, and he drove the thought from his brain with something almost like ferocity.) But now, seeing the bard, he doesn’t know that he can do it. Jaskier looks happy. Happy without him. Happy to be flirting with the townsfolk and singing songs and performing, getting all of this attention.
The patrons of the tavern begin trickling out, slowly, as the time wears on and the hours drag into the night, and Jaskier’s songs become slower, quieter, sadder, sweeter. He’s sitting now, and in the firelight, his silver-blue eyes dance and flicker.
The fairer sex, they often call it, but her love’s as fair as a crook–
He begins a new song, and now there’s maybe only a dozen people left in the tavern other than Geralt, still sitting in his corner, looking very broody, still watching Jaskier.
It steals all my reason, commits every treason of logic with naught but a look–
Geralt’s never heard this song before, but he remembers Jaskier being in the process of writing a song with a similar tune right before the dragon hunt. It’s only to be expected that Jaskier has written songs since the… fight, but Geralt can’t help but wonder at the look on Jaskier’s face. It’s the same look that he wore on the mountain, that same kicked-puppy look, like he’s hurt and scared and can’t figure out what he’s done wrong.
A storm breaking on the horizon–
There’s pain in his voice and on his face now, written across his features plain as day. Geralt feels a familiar pit in his stomach, one of anger, and he wonders who Jaskier fell in such desperate love with, only to be hurt like this. He’d like to talk to them. Have a few words about hurting the bard like that.
Full of longing and heartache and lust–
Jaskier’s eyes shut, like he’s remembering a hundred close memories, a thousand near-kisses.
He continues singing, his eyes full of that pain, that sorrow, that immense hurt, the type that Geralt has only seen once before, a year ago, on that mountain, and as Jaskier sings about Her sweet kiss, Geralt thinks he’s begun to realize what the song is about.
Because really, it’s the only thing that makes sense. Jaskier doesn’t get this way about lovers. But he’s never liked Yennefer, and he’s always been skeptical of Geralt’s feelings for the mage, always warning. He’s singing about what happened up on the mountain. He’s singing about Geralt and Yennefer. He’s singing about being left behind for destiny.
Geralt has spent his entire long, long life suppressing his emotions, helping feed the rumors that witchers don’t have feelings, but just this once, he can’t help it. He stands up, golden eyes full of fire, and sadness, and longing, and heartbreak.
The red sky at dawn is giving a warning, you fool, better stay out of sight–
And as he sings the word fool, his eyes find Geralt’s. The word gets stuck in his throat, just for a moment, and he continues, his eyes still stuck on Geralt’s, that mesmerizing silver-blue, like the sky at daybreak on the morning of an early spring day.
He takes a breath, opens his mouth to sing, but I’m weak, my love, and I am wanting, come out like a gasp, like a prayer, like he’s about to collapse, and his eyes are star-bright with unshed tears.
When he finishes the song, the remaining dozen or so people clap for him, and he bows. Or maybe the correct way to describe it is more of an incline of the neck; he’s very careful of his lute. He offers a wave, and blows a kiss to the one remaining woman, who’s been making eyes at him all evening, picks up his mug of ale, and makes his way to the corner, where Geralt is sitting.
The smile has disappeared from his face, replaced with a worried look, his mouth so small that it looks like it might disappear completely.
He sits across from Geralt and takes a sip of his ale, winces, and sets the mug down. “What are you doing here?” he asks, his voice low. Without waiting for an answer, he continues, “I asked around before staying for the evening. There’s nothing here for a witcher. No monsters. No mages. No curses or spells or djinn or madmen. There’s no reason for you to be here!”
Geralt’s heart sinks. He had been on the verge of smiling for the first time in months. But Jaskier’s still upset. Still hurt. Well, Geralt couldn’t exactly blame him. “You’ve been avoiding me?” he asks.
Jaskier’s face widens in surprise, his mouth forming an O. A few years ago, it might have been shock over a question from the notoriously silent witcher, but now, it’s probably surprise at the nature of the question. It’s a stupid question, Geralt is already aware of that, it would make sense for Jaskier to be avoiding him, but it’s too late to take the question back.
“I–I–I haven’t been avoiding you,” Jaskier says, stammering, like he does when he’s uncomfortable, or maybe nervous. Geralt can smell the anxiety coming off of him in waves, but no fear. At least there’s no fear. “Well, maybe I have, but I thought you wanted me to, I mean, the last time we spoke, you made it perfectly clear that you never wanted to see me again.”
“Hmm,” Geralt says, because he doesn’t know what to say. He’s feeling so many things, but he can’t make his brain come up with the right words to say those feelings, to talk to Jaskier about them. The bard was remarkably adept at translating his grunts once upon a time, though, so he hopes those skills of translation haven’t gotten rusty.
“Well, what did you expect me to do?” Jaskier asks, his voice somehow managing to be both intense and remain quiet enough not to disturb the few people who are still hanging around. “I spent twenty-two years as your friend, Geralt, and you know what? I spent twenty-two years patching you up after you got into your fights, writing songs about you, making sure you took baths and washed your hair and repaired your clothes. I was the one who smoothed over any problems innkeepers had with housing a witcher overnight, I was the one who put up with your insults and your–your–your fucking teenage angst, and I never complained about it, because it was you. I spent twenty-two fucking years following you around, because you’re Geralt of fucking Rivia, and that’s how you treated me.”
It’s nothing that Geralt hasn’t told himself before, but somehow, hearing Jaskier say it, accuse him of it, is worse than anything he could have told himself.
That’s not fair.
It’s still there, the Jaskier of a year ago, hurt, haunting him, lower lip trembling, and the Jaskier in front of him has his mouth set in a straight line, and there’s that same pain in his eyes now as there was a year ago, but this time, there’s anger to match it.
“I–” Geralt pauses. What can he say? I missed you? I care about you? I’m in love with you? Your singing was good? It’s all pointless, all stupid.
He settles for, “I’m sorry.”
It’s difficult to get the words out, to talk to Jaskier, and he hopes that Jaskier will do what he always does, and read into it all the other things that Geralt wishes he could say, but never does.
Jaskier pauses, his mouth forming that O again.
There are many times over the past twenty-two years that Geralt has wished Jaskier would shut up or be somehow rendered speechless. He didn’t realize that an apology was what would finally accomplish it.
Finally, after a very long pause, Jaskier takes a deep breath and says, “You still deserved everything I just said.”
Geralt nods once, slowly. “I know.”
Jaskier takes another long swig of ale, with another grimace. “All those things you accused me of — the child surprise, the djinn, fucking Yennefer of Vengerberg — that wasn’t all my fault.”
“Hmm.” Geralt could argue some of those, that the blame has to at least be shared, but he doesn’t want to ruin everything by saying something stupid. Jaskier’s eyes are losing their anger, and his mouth isn’t quite as firmly set.
There is another long pause. Jaskier seems surprised, and Geralt is by nature taciturn. And right now, he’s feeling too many things to say anything.
But he’s missed hearing Jaskier’s voice. He knows he’s just heard him sing all evening, but he hasn’t had someone talk his ear off in something like a year, and he’s actually found himself missing it. So he finally says, “That last song?”
Jaskier looks up from his ale. “I’m calling it Her Sweet Kiss,” he says, then looks back down at the table quickly, not meeting Geralt’s eyes. “I was working on it before the dragon.”
“I remember.”
Another quick glance up at Geralt, then back down to the table. “It haunted me, Geralt,” he says, and his voice breaks when he says Geralt’s name, and oh no, he’s feeling more emotions. “That song haunted me for weeks afterwards.” He blinks, and suddenly his blue eyes are shining again, star-bright. He shakes his head, and tries to swipe at his eyes in a way that seems natural, but Geralt knows him well enough to see that he’s in tears, that he’s feeling every bit as much as Geralt, only he’s showing it more.
He doesn’t say anything, because he’s Geralt of Rivia, and he doesn’t like talking, because talking always ends up being trouble, but he reaches out across the table and takes Jaskier’s hand in his own.
“Just…” Jaskier keeps talking, but he gives Geralt’s hand a squeeze, a silent thank-you. “Everything that happened up there. You and Yennefer. The dragon. Everything.” He takes a deep breath. “You remember the old man? The one we thought had died, but somehow survived?”
“He was the dragon, Jaskier.”
A weak smile twitches at Jaskier’s lips, and then they begin trembling again. “Yes, him. He–he told you that there was part of you missing, but you could still find it.”
“Hmm.” This time, he’s telling Jaskier that he remembers, and that it’s still a painful subject.
“I spent my whole life — well, most of it, anyway — not knowing what I wanted. From life. What I wanted to do, what I wanted to be. Well, I knew I wanted to be a bard, obviously, but that’s not what I mean. I was lost, for so much of my life, just following you around, because when I was with you, I felt like my life had some meaning. And–and–and then, then I realized what I wanted in life, what I was missing, the–the–what was missing from me.” He says it all very fast, very rambling, full of stammers. It’s perhaps the least-eloquent the bard has ever been in Geralt’s presence.
“So I started writing a song,” he continues, still anxious, still talking fast. “It was going to be for you, Geralt. Because I thought–I thought–I thought that you were what was missing from me. I mean. I mean, I need you. The only time I’ve felt complete, like I was doing something with my life, like I wasn’t a total disappointment to the world, was when I was travelling with you. And I know I wasn’t a good–a good travel companion and I didn’t help fight monsters, but Geralt, I was doing what I loved and I was doing something that–that–that had some meaning. I was filling a hole that was somewhere inside of me.” His blue eyes meet Geralt’s golden. “I–I needed you.”
“Fuck.” Geralt feels something tight in his chest, something that’s been tight for years and years, loosen up a little bit. And all he can do, all he can think, is what a damned fool he’s been all these years, uncomfortable with loving Jaskier, but loving him anyway, because training be damned and destiny be damned, but never, never in all his many years alive, did he ever think Jaskier would ever love him back, not like that, not in that same intense, desperate way, not in that you-complete-me sort of way, not in that I-need-you sort of way.
Jaskier lets out a shaky laugh. A nervous laugh. “And then Yennefer showed up again, and you and she went at it like rabbits — and I can’t blame you, I suppose, I mean, she’s beautiful, I just think she’s terrifying and possibly evil — but then that ended badly, and–and–and–and–and we ended badly, and–” His voice breaks off, then, and tears begin to spill down his cheeks now, and fuck, Geralt doesn’t know what to do about any of this.
He settles for gently squeezing Jaskier’s hand, which is still warm in his own.
“And my song,” Jaskier continues, wiping at his cheeks and his eyes with his free hand, “my song, the one I was writing for you, it wouldn’t leave me alone. I couldn’t get it out of my head, I was singing the melody constantly, humming it as I walked, and I had to get it out, but I couldn’t write it for you, not the way I’d wanted to, so it ended up… vastly different than how it had started, and I haven’t been able to write a single new song since then.” He eases his hand out of Geralt’s, sticks his face in his hands. “My muse left me.” He peeks at Geralt through his fingers. “Just like you did.”
Something in Geralt’s stomach clenches and unclenches, and he leans forward, across the table, and he gently moves Jaskier’s hands down, away from his face, and he leans in, and he kisses Jaskier.
It’s not something he would normally ever even think about doing, but this is Jaskier, who’s forty and still has the same baby face he had when he was eighteen, the famous bard who decided that his stage name should be after a fucking buttercup, the man who’s taken care of Geralt, who makes sure his clothes are always repaired, who tends his wounds after he’s killed a monster, who makes sure he takes a bath whenever possible, who’s managed to turn him into a hero across the continent with a single song. This kiss has been long in the making, and if it hadn’t been for Geralt and his temper and his unfair accusations, it could have been so much sooner, so he may as well make up for lost time by initiating it.
When at last they break apart, Geralt notices Jaskier’s blue eyes still shining, brighter even than the stars, and he wipes across the bard’s face with a single calloused thumb, wiping any tears away.
“I’ve missed you,” he says, even though he hates how needy it makes him sound, like he can’t cope without Jaskier, like his world will end if he doesn’t have an annoying, talkative bard following him around.
Jaskier finally smiles, for real this time, not a stage smile, not a weak, shaky smile. This is the one that Geralt remembers, the one that lights up the whole room like the sun lights up the world, like he is the sun, and Geralt is his world. “Next time, it won’t be so easy to get rid of me,” he replies, his voice low, almost breathless.
Geralt can’t help but smile at that, and Jaskier reaches out to brush strands of white hair back behind his ear, and the sensation makes a shiver run down Geralt’s spine. “There won’t be a next time,” he says. “Not if I can help it.”
“Then I guess you’re stuck with me,” Jaskier says, and before Geralt can think of any sort of reply, even a hmm or a fuck, Jaskier is pressing a kiss to his lips, and that’s all he can think of, because he’s feeling things, and he doesn’t think he’s ever felt this way before; not about anyone or anything.
Destiny can go fuck itself. He has Jaskier.