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Jaskier has never been good at keeping his thoughts to himself. Whether in song form or just at random during conversation, most of the thoughts that hang around in the back of his mind are eventually expressed. Usually this is good, seeing as bards constantly need material for new songs, and it’s easiest to get that material from one’s own life experiences.
This has been perfect for his songs ever since he started traveling with Geralt. However, recently it’s become a bit of a problem.
The thing is, Jaskier really, really wants to kiss Geralt. At first it was relatively easy to ignore--okay, so the man is handsome, nothing wrong with acknowledging that--but the thought just keeps returning.
I want to kiss you, he thinks as he glances over at Geralt, who is gently feeding Roach an apple. His heart does a funny little twist in his chest when Geralt smiles faintly at the horse as she butts her head against his.
I want to kiss you, he thinks as he catches Geralt’s eye while he’s singing in an inn. Geralt just blinks at him, soft and slow, but his face is open and relaxed, not tense like he so often is in towns. If he didn’t know any better, Jaskier would say the witcher is enjoying hearing Jaskier play, and the thought makes him stumble over his words.
I want to kiss you, he almost says as Geralt cuts up the hare they’re going to be eating for dinner. His brow is furrowed in concentration as he carefully cuts it into neat parts, putting some on spits over the fire to cook and setting the rest aside to dry, and Jaskier thinks he has never seen anything so endearing in his life. He is barely able to stop the words from escaping his traitorous mouth.
Geralt continues cutting up the hare, blissfully unaware of Jaskier’s inner turmoil and realization of how close he came to spilling his guts and ruining what he has with Geralt.
I can’t do that again, he decides. I have to get rid of this before it actually does slip out.
...Does Geralt speak Elder?
His Elder speech is a bit rusty, and it takes him a moment to compose the sentence in his head. When he’s done, he sits up a bit straighter.
“Geralt?”
“Hmm?”
“Caen me a’baethe?” he asks, keeping his voice purposefully light and teasing. Give me a kiss?
And this is where his plan goes sideways, because Geralt doesn’t even so much as look up from his task as he says, “Aefder.” Later.
Later? What the fuck does that mean?
Geralt doesn’t say anything more on the subject, and Jaskier--well, Jaskier is so much of a mess at the moment that he can’t say anything even if he wanted to. A few moments pass in silence, and then Geralt crosses the camp to hand Jaskier his portion of hare.
“Eat,” he says quietly, sitting down on the grass across from Jaskier. Usually dinner is a peaceful affair, but now the atmosphere is charged with tension. It’s not necessarily bad tension, but it certainly is difficult to eat when nearly every time Jaskier glances up at Geralt, his intense golden gaze is already staring back.
Geralt is polite enough not to comment when Jaskier chokes on a mouthful of hare. He is also polite enough not to comment when it happens more than once.
Soon, the hare is gone, and all they are left with is the two of them sitting by the crackling campfire.
“I, uh, I just wanted to say that if you don’t want to do what we discussed earlier, we could just…” Jaskier swallows. “Forget about it. If you want.”
Geralt frowns. “Did you mean it as a joke?”
And here is the way out. Geralt is practically handing it to him; it would be so, so easy to just say yes and pretend that this never happened. But the thing is--Jaskier doesn’t want to pretend it never happened. Geralt doesn’t seem angry, far from it, and if he doesn’t take this chance, it’s extremely likely that it’ll just come up again later.
“No,” Jaskier says. “I didn’t.” He steels his nerves, meeting Geralt’s eyes, and there’s a note of something in his gaze that he’d say was soft if it weren’t, well, Geralt.
Geralt starts to cross the camp, and Jaskier stands to meet him, and now they’re standing so close that they’re practically breathing the same air.
“I want to kiss you, Jaskier,” Geralt murmurs, his voice barely more than a murmur as he takes Jaskier’s hand in his own large, calloused one.
“Then do it,” Jaskier says breathlessly, and he does.
It’s… softer than Jaskier expected, somehow. They’re both dirty and worn-down from the long day on the road, but there’s a gentleness in the way that Geralt kisses him. There’s a tenderness there, in the way that he slides an arm around Jaskier’s waist to pull him closer, in the way that when they break apart their foreheads rest together and it takes a moment for both of them to open their eyes again.
“We’re going to be doing this more often,” Jaskier informs Geralt, and Geralt chuckles, his golden eyes crinkling at the corners.
“Anything you want,” Geralt says, leaning in to kiss him again. There’s passion behind it this time, and… well.
Let’s just say that there isn’t a lot of talking after that.