Chapter Text
It has been four months. Four months since he brought her to Kaer Morhen. A laundress instantly takes a shine to the little girl, takes her in, feeds her. He visits as often as he can. At least once a day.
She grows so fast. At first little Isobel could fit perfectly in the crook of his arm. Now she is kicking and giggling and waving every time he comes to see her.
When she starts teething, he holds her despite the cries hurting his ears, lets her chew on his fingers, his hands killed hundreds of monsters, some of them humans, some of them not monsters at all.
At nine months old she calls him da-da. He disappears into the mountain and doesn't come down for a week.
One of the Vipers, Letho corners him as soon as he returns.
"You can't disappear like that." He says, "She missed you, and you missed her."
His legs feel like lead, can hardly lift them on his way to the laundress’s room. He missed her ever since he stepped out of the gates, what if she forgot him. What if she doesn't want to see him. Little Isobel, Isa, shrieks and throws herself forward where she's sitting on a heavy quilt.
"Dada, dada, dada." She babbles.
"I'm sorry Isa," he replies, cradling her in his arms, it hits him how much bigger she has gotten since he first took her from her mother's lifeless arms.
"I promise you, for as long as we both shall live, I will never leave you without an explanation." He murmurs into her soft, blond hair.
When Isobel is about one year old, she takes her first steps towards him. Later that night he stands at the battlements and cries quiet tears. Talking to a woman he only knew for a handful of seconds.
When he goes to bed that night, he may or may not be smiling.
At two years old she starts using him as a climbing structure, knowing he will catch her when she falls. She enjoys helping him in the stables and her foster mother in the laundry. She also starts to become stubborn and loud and using bad words Lambert must have taught her. She hits him in for the first time when he won't let her feed the wild, young colt that still needs to be ridden in. He and Aiden share a bottle of the good ale that evening, spiked with white gull.
"She doesn't know that the colt would hurt her," Aiden says, looking far wiser than he actually is, "You were keeping her safe. Also, kids that age, she will probably have forgotten about it tomorrow."
"The fuck do you know about kids?"
Come morning, she has indeed forgotten about it altogether.
At five years old she is finally old enough to understand when he tells her that he is going away for some weeks. Still, she cries and demands to sleep in his bed the night before he leaves.
"I love you, dada," she says when he lifts her up and carries her back to her room.
"Love you too, kitten." He whispers into her hair; it has gotten darker over the years. Sometimes he wonders if it is a sign. When he returns a month later, he can see her on the battlements over the gate, smell her honey and lavender scent in the air. He walks a little faster, Ivy, his horse, the horse that had carried them both to safety, huffs behind him.
When the gate opens, he hardly has time to drop the reigns when she is already sprinting at him.
About seven years after Gerden first held Isobel. A bard rides through the gates. The lad looks and smells terrified. His steed is laden with very little baggage. He takes the horse from Lambert and Isobel rubs it down.
Gerden leaves again two months after that, the journey takes longer than anticipated. He returns home three years later, footsore and without a horse, it had been killed by ghouls in Rinde.
Isobel runs towards him like she does every time he leaves the Kaer. She is taller, grown at least a foot compared to when he last saw her. Isobel hugs him around the chest, gripping tight and not letting go. Dropping his pack in the dirt, Gerden wraps his arms around his daughter, breathing in honey and lavender and hay and saddle oil.
"I missed you papa."
"Missed you too, kitten."