Work Text:
When Geralt’s soul found its way back to his body, the images of the visions he’d seen had already begun to dull a little, the colours less sharp, and the sounds less deafening. The things he’d seen had left him trembling a little, the weight of them heavy on his young mind.
Eskel had already stumbled to his feet by the time Geralt was able to raise his head. They staggered together - always together, each propping the other up - toward the fires.
It was Aubry who thrust tankards into their hands - more White Gull than mead - a huge grin on his face.
“You’re true witchers now, brothers,” he said, clapping them on their shoulders. “May Death and Destiny guide your steps for many long years.”
Geralt shivered at the words, recalling the strange figures from his dream, and the weighty words they had spoken. Did all witchers feel such awe at the duty placed on their shoulders by entities older than imagination? Geralt knew that not all visions were the same. Artur had described formless shapes, swirling in a nonsensical pattern that he had been slowly puzzling over for years, while Olach had told them of nightmarish scenes of violence and destruction. Geralt’s own visions had been different still, with glowing paths criss-crossing the Continent, the threads of the pattern snapping and fraying in places, and his own pale face staring back at him.
Death only kept one of their number that night, cradling Joren close to her, his lips turning blue as the sky turned grey with the coming dawn. The rest, minds still spinning with the fantastic visions they had been shown, knelt before the fires at the first light of dawn, while their brothers cut their hair close to their scalps, throwing the strands into the flames.
When Geralt returned from the Path the following year, before Saovine arrived, his hair nearly brushed his shoulders with a single tiny braid hanging on one side.
As the years passed, and Geralt’s skills grew, the braids grew larger and more intricate, until the only one who could hope to recreate the delicate work was Eskel, carefully learning each new braid every winter, his calloused fingers gentle in Geralt’s moon silk hair.
Blaviken changed everything.
Geralt returned that winter looking haunted, gaunt and underfed, with his hair loose and tangled. He was no longer worthy of the vision he had been shown, and so he did not dare wear his hair in Death’s style.
For years, Geralt’s hair was worn loose, not even bound in a single tail. He did concede to wearing a band to keep his hair from falling in his face during hunts, but the braids did not appear again, no matter how Eskel’s hands itched to weave the intricate patterns once more.
The first time Geralt wore a braid again was the bard’s fault. He’d been fussing over Geralt after a difficult hunt, tending to his wounds and had finally resorted to brushing through Geralt’s hair while he meditated.
It took a moment for Geralt to parse the movement, his consciousness rising through the fog of meditation.
“What are you doing?” Geralt asked, feeling the light tugging at his scalp.
“Braiding your hair,” Jaskier replied, a bright grin on his round cheeks. “It’s so long and soft.”
“Why?” Geralt rasped, turning his head despite the way it pulled on his hair. He tried not to feel disappointed when Jaskier dropped his hold. The feeling of hands in his hair was so familiar that Geralt couldn’t help but take comfort in it, though the callouses caught differently, and Jaskier’s hands were not as large or warm as Eskel’s.
“Well, because it looks nice,” Jaskier replied, still smiling softly. “Your hair should look nice. It’s beautiful, and you should show that off.”
Geralt hummed, but said nothing. The braid remained until morning though.
Geralt woke to Yennefer scowling at him, inches from his nose.
“Your hair got in my mouth,” she said accusingly, as though he’d conspired to ruin her sleep.
“Sorry,” he rumbled, combing his hair back so that it was away from her face.
Yennefer shook her head, smiling just a little. “Why not just tie it back? You’re always catching it.”
Geralt had no words to explain what it meant for him to tie his hair into beautiful patterns, and the ache in his heart knowing that he had proven himself unworthy of the path Destiny had set before him in his youth.
Geralt leaned back against Eskel’s legs, basking in the feeling of warm fingers carding through his hair. Here, whiling away the winter in Kaer Morhen, he had begun to feel steady again. Years had passed since Blaviken, and while it would always leave a mark on his soul, it no longer defined him the way it once had. He might, one day, be the witcher that Death had chosen for him to be.
“Help me braid it?” he asked, voice soft and low as he turned to look at Eskel. Only Eskel could ever hope to understand the full weight of meaning behind his decision. Only Eskel knew what his hair meant to him, what it symbolised.
The soft smile Eskel gave him, cupping his cheek in one large hand, spoke his understanding. Geralt was ready to try again. Ready to take on the burden Destiny had set before him.
Geralt wore a single braid all winter, a simple three-stranded thing. When he rode out in spring, it was held with a red-dyed leather tie.
“Come here, let me help you,” Geralt said, motioning for Ciri to sit beside him.
She paused in her tugging at the tangles in her hair, eyeing Geralt’s comb as though it might bite her. She turned her gaze to Geralt’s own hair for a moment, considering the smooth, soft look of it, tied away from his face in a four-stranded braid, then glanced at the dry, frazzled ends of her hair, biting her lip when she spotted a small leaf tangled into it.
“You have to be gentle,” she told him, sitting primly by his side.
They had the time to sit while Geralt slowly picked out the snarls, no pursuers nearby to catch them unawares. They could afford the small rest.
“Shall I braid it, too?” he asked, smiling at her soft humming. It was good to see her so at ease, when life had been so cruel to her as of late. “It will stay clean for longer, and keep it from tangling. It will also make it harder for your hair to get caught in things.”
Ciri thought for a moment, considering his advice.
“Yes, I think you should braid it. Like yours, please?”
Geralt gave her a small smile, and set to braiding her hair.
“Where did you learn to braid hair like that?” Ciri asked, watching as Eskel wove moonlight strands into a web-like pattern. It was one of Geralt’s favourites, specifically for the length of time it kept Eskel’s hands in his hair.
“Geralt taught me,” Eskel replied, tugging lightly on the strand of hair in his hand with a small smile. “Brought back all these new styles he learned, and we kept trying new things with them.”
Ciri turned bright eyes on Geralt next. “And where did you learn?”
Geralt carefully considered his answer before speaking. The blunt answer was that he learned it mostly from whores he visited on the Path, but that seemed… crass to say in front of a child.
“Sometimes… if I saw a woman wearing a beautiful braid, I would ask her to teach me. Once or twice I even took my payment for a hunt in lessons.”
Ciri tilted her head to the side, pondering that for a moment.
“Can you braid my hair too?” she asked, turning back to Eskel. “Something pretty?”
“Of course,” Eskel said with a grin. She didn’t flinch from the way it tugged oddly at his scars, and Geralt felt warmth rise in him at the knowledge that his Child of Surprise had come to see his family as her own, saw them as being the warm, kind hearted men that they truly were. “How about a butterfly?”
Geralt watched contentedly as Eskel began to comb through Ciri’s hair, smoothing it out and braiding through sections of it, weaving a pattern that was sure to delight her.
“Why do you like to braid your hair so much?” Ciri asked, settled comfortably on the bench in front of Eskel.
That was a much easier question to answer than the previous one.
“I braid my hair because of the vision I saw during my Trial of the Veil,” he said, looking up from his mending. Her frown at his words reminded him that the details of witcher Trials were unknown to most. “The Trial of the Veil is the last of our Trials before we go out on the Path for the first time,” he explained. “We drink a special potion which brings us to the brink of death, but not over it. While under the effect of the potion, we… we dream. The dreams we have show us what is, or was, or will be. Sometimes we’re shown things we need to change, or things we need to do, or be.”
Lambert snorted from the other side of the room, distracted from his alchemy notes.
“Mine showed me a bunch of bullshit,” he said, shaking his head. “A whole lot of nothing. If it told me anything, it was that the world is shit, and I didn’t need to drink a potion to know that.”
Eskel shook his head, sighing as he rolled his eyes at Geralt. Lambert had never truly believed that the Trial of the Veil set their souls on a journey. He’d once described it as ‘an oxygen-starved brain projecting meaning onto the strange images created by the brain’s desperate attempts to continue in a near-dead state’. Lambert was always a cynic though.
“Not everyone believes their visions hold any meaning,” Coën said, very obviously fighting back a smile in spite of Lambert’s scowl.
Ciri frowned in deep thought, growing quiet while Eskel continued his work.
“So, what did you see, Geralt?” she asked after a long moment.
Geralt smiled, setting his mending down to settle in for a longstanding witcher tradition. Since the Founders themselves first woke after glimpsing behind the Veil, witchers had shared drinks and dreams by the fire. They were known to spend entire winters riddling over the more puzzling aspects of their visions.
“When Wolves undertake the Trial of the Veil,” he explained, “We lay around a bonfire, a sword in each hand to defend against what dangers we might find beyond the Veil. The flames of the fire overtook my vision, painting the world in shades of red and yellow.”
The others began to set aside their own tasks, caught up in the story, in spite of having heard it many times in winters past. Only Eskel continued his work, his large hands never once pausing while he braided Ciri’s hair.
“Slowly,” Geralt continued, trying to bite back his smile at Lambert leaning forward in his seat, “I came to realise that, beneath my feet, was a map of the Continent, golden threads woven across it, following roads and paths across the land, showing me the winding trails I would walk through my life. Much of what I saw was… strange, and confusing, at the time. I understand much more of it now that the symbols have been made real. Wolves and shrikes and flowers that all meant nothing at the time, but now bring to mind people and places and times that shaped the man I am now.”
Ciri’s eyes sparkled with awe as she listened, entranced by Geralt’s tale.
“As I traversed these golden threads, a figure appeared on the horizon,” Geralt went on, gesturing as he spoke. “It seemed to take years for me to reach the figure. They dressed all in black, and wore their bone-white hair in braids more elaborate than you could imagine. I knew that it was Death I was approaching, and she had a duty for me to fulfil. Have you ever had a dream where everything is strange, but there is something which you know must be true, as illogical as it might be to believe it?”
Ciri nodded, eyes wide. She looked much the same as adepts had in past years, absorbed in the stories told by their elders, leaning forward with eager anticipation.
“It was that certainty with which I pursued the figure, eager for her blessing. When I reached her, she turned to speak with me, wearing my own face.” Ciri’s gasp was gratifying, and Geralt gave her a smile.
“What did she say?” Ciri asked, voice near a whisper.
“She told me that my choices would shape nations,” Geralt said, reaching out for Ciri’s hand. She gave him a wide smile, and placed her tiny hand in his larger, scarred one. “She said that my footsteps would lead me to those who needed direction, though she would give me no guidance when those times came. When she finished speaking, she led me by the hand, back to where my body lay, and told me to serve her well. She placed a blessing upon my brow, and then her sister, Destiny, did the same, and bade me heed her power. Then, I watched as they turned to my brothers, and paced the perimeter of the fire, stopping at each to bless them in turn. After that, I woke, and became a witcher in spirit.”
The end of his tale was met with awed silence, only the crackling of the hearthfire and the soft susurration of ribbon being tied to break the stillness.
“Wow,” Ciri breathed, a faraway look on her cherubic face, her mind likely conjuring images to fit Geralt’s words.
Eskel smiled softly at Geralt over her head, knowing almost more than Geralt himself did that his love had built much of who he was as a witcher on what he had dreamed that night.
“There, your hair is finished,” Eskel said, a large hand moving to Ciri’s shoulder. “I’ll fetch Geralt and I’s mirrors, and you can see for yourself how you like it.”
Ciri’s hand flew immediately to the intricate braids at the back of her head, feeling the shape of them, testing out the shape without sight, and grinning when she could clearly find the wings of the butterfly.
“Thank you, Uncle Eskel!” she cried, turning to fling herself at him for a warm, gleeful embrace. “I love it!”
Geralt knew, watching his child laugh, that his choices were not the only ones that would shape nations. Every witcher in the keep would have a hand in the shaping of the Continent’s future, all because of their kindness and love for a young, lost princess.