Work Text:
The Phoenix Song
How it began
Every morning, without fail, as soon as the sun rose, the archway added to the Bakers’ building burst with activity. The stalls of the bakers, pastry chefs, and others cooks were kept at night in the building, behind heavy doors made of wood.
The stone archway in itself was tall and large enough to shelter the stalls and their clients. The Bakers’ building, or Bakers’ houses, was a two floors building. On the ground floor, behind the wooden doors, stood the kitchen and the pantries. It was the business’ floor. The first floor housed the families and, sometimes, the apprentices.
This is where you could find Jaskier the Bard, or Professor Pankratz, most of the mornings. During school’s days, he bought cakes to share with his students for their fifteen minutes break. During the off’s days, he played for the people there.
Playing the White Wolf’s songs didn’t hurt that much anymore. It would always be heart-breaking and full of ‘what-if’ but he wasn’t the raw hurt that he felt at the beginning, on this blasted mountain. For Jaskier, returning to his Alma Mater did him good.
Oxenfurt was like a home to Jaskier, Bard Extraordinaire. This is were he let go of Julian Alfred Pankratz, Heir to the Viscount of Lettenhove and became who he always meant to be.
He graduated ‘Summa Cum Laude’, with the highest score since Oxenfurt’s beginning. Valdo Marx was green with envy and red with anger (not a good combination, except for winter’s celebration).
He gave lectures to Oxenfurt’s brilliants young minds when travelling the Continent and now, he secured a place as Professor of Musical Arts. He got a broad range of pupils, from the newest beginner to the most talented.
It was different, teaching all year-round. A little bit more challenging, since he had to get his students interested for 10 months. But it was also more rewarding.
He found the routine relaxing. He hoped that it was a sign of maturity. Gone, was the time of youth’s foolishness. It got him only heartbreak. Now, that didn’t mean he was going to be a boring adult! He would be the most, how did they say it? Ah yes! He would be the most ‘à la page’ 1 adult of the Continent!
One year went by, then two. The exams was over and students (and their teachers), decided to let off the steam. He was invited to parties, flirted by ex-students, asked to play his songs in taverns and inns.
It was late at night, after playing for two of his students who decided to tied the knot. He was going back home when he was called by two young men. Under the minimal light of the archway, he saw, to late, the trap. One of the men had a hand on his mouth, to stop him to call for help and the other around him, so he couldn’t move freely.
“You’re going to come with us, Jaskier the Bard, and you’re going to tell us everything you know about the Butcher and his Child-Surprise. Then, maybe, maybe, you’ll get your life back. Now, sleep well, Professor Pankratz.”
He didn’t remember a lot after that. He woke up in a cell, without traces of moistures, Melitele be blessed, and with a little opening, more a hole, really. But he could see light so, he supposed he could count the days.
The first week, they were kind of nice. Asking him about Geralt and Ciri.
“You… the Nilfgaardian army who took Cintra… YOU ask me where Princess Cirilla is? Don’t you think it should be the contrary? I played for Pavetta’s Betrothal, that’s true and let me tell you that, maybe if betrothal’s feasts were all that fun, the marriage in itself would be happier. Of course, Calanthe was pissed that Duny invited himself to ask for Pavetta’s hand but really, she liked him better once Cirilla was born.
Now, Cirilla’s Birth’s Feast, THAT was something. Of course, I was invited to play, as well, and Cirilla was such a cute babe. Not so much for crying, not like others children of the same age anyway. I kid you not, once I heard a child crying so much and so hard that he perforated his poor mother’s eardrum.
Well, he was a little bit spoiled too, so tamper tantrum was expected. Cirilla, she was a good baby. I sang lullabies for her. Her favourite, when she was a baby was “Sòm, sòm”. She absolutely loved this song. Pavetta, Eist and even Mousesack learned this one so Cirilla had always someone to help her fall asleep. You couldn’t have guessed that Eist had such a beautiful voice…”
He prattled, and went on and on and on. But this tactic could only go so far. By the end of the second week, the beatings began. First, some slaps, here and there. A kick or two. But he got worse, and worse, and worse. And Jaskier only did one thing.
He smiled at his captors. They could beat him black and blue, never he would tell them where Cirilla was (not that he knew) and the fucking idiot of a Witcher that was her surprise father.
After a few months, it was the end, he knew it. He wanted a lot of things, in these last moments: kick Geralt, kiss Geralt, hug his little cub. But he knew he was dying.
The Nilfgaardians didn’t came to interrogate him anymore, they didn’t bring him food and water (as much as it could be called food). It was the end. He closed his eyes, knowing that he would never open them again.
He did, in fact, opened his eyes again and surely, he was dead? How could everything be so bright, so loud, if it wasn’t some sort of afterlife? He closed his eyes again.
“Can you hear me?” A woman asked, gently. But still too loud.
“Loud and clear.
- Could you tell me your name?” Her voice was quieter.
“I thought than everyone knew about everything in the afterlife.
- You’re not dead. We saved you in time. But it was a close call.”
Jaskier frowned.
“What?
- You’re safe, Sir…?
- I’m Jaskier, the bard, at your service!
- Oh, it is so nice to meet you! Your songs are very popular around here.” Jaskier preened. His hard work was rewarded! “I’m going to dim the light so you can open your eyes.” She closed the curtains of the windows that light directly the bard’s bed and left the others half-opened.
“Can I open my eyes now?
- Try it.” Jaskier was happy to see (literally) that light didn’t hurt his eyes anymore.
“I thank you, my Lady!
- No, not this Lady stuff. I’m Amara. You’re a guest of the Haut-Conseil du Château de la Renaissance.
- High Council of the Castle of… rebirth?
- Yes, with a Capital R for Rebirth.
- I don’t think I’ve ever heard of it. Are we in Toussaint?
- Nope! We are on the Floating Island of Phoenicia.
- The what?” Amara laughed at his face.
“The floating Island. Chaos permitted this fact after some people tried to eradicate our people.” She sit on his bed and took his hand in hers. “I’m not going to sugar-coat things. To save you, we had to give you potions that boost your body via mutations. You are now an enhanced human.
- Like a Witcher?
- It is the same process. Except that, contrary to the Mages of the Continent, we give the potions to the people they were made for: the dying one with no chance of survival.
-What? Wait! Are you telling me that the kids who survived the Trials were…
- Dying? Yes. It is not obvious sometimes. Malnourishment often left a body trying to compensate what it lacks. But, in long term, it just slow the failure of some organ or another. A family illness that it’s not yet activated is also a factor o f survival. You are the Bard of a Witcher, aren’t you?
- Yes… I was.” Jaskier began to be lost in thought. Geralt would have died if he didn’t became a Witcher. And that made Jaskier very sad but also very glad that he was given to Kaer Morhen (and he felt like an ass for that).
“So, what’s happening now? Am I going to learn to be a Witcher? Do you have a mirror so I can see what I look like?
- Now, you are going to have some time off because the last part of the mutation has not came out yet.
-Came out?” Jaskier saw her coat moving and she suddenly had two wings, with white, grey and black feathers.
“Then, yes, you’re going to learn to be a Witcher but we do hope that it is more to add another string to your bow. We’ll never ask from you to renounce at your vocation, as a bard or as a teacher. And for what you look like.”
She went to the desk and opened a drawer. She gave him the hand mirror that she got out.
He didn’t change that much. His pupils were cat-like but his eyes were still blue, with just some flakes of gold. All in itself, that made his eyes even more amazing and captivating.
“We don’t do things like the Mages on the Continent. We’re going to introduce you slowly to our History and to our people because we don’t want you to be overwhelmed. For today, I’ll be your only company, I hope you don’t mind and I’ll teach you some of our early History. If it’s okay with you.” Jaskier could only nod.
It was overwhelming but he thought he could handled this well enough. He wanted so hard to learn how to be a Witcher, or how and why this people are different from the others Witchers.
He always loved to learn new things and here, he could learn to be strong, maybe wiser than he already was.
And he couldn’t wait.
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