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“You moron!” Lambert hissed, sword still bloody and dripping with viscera as it cut across the air.
The griffin was dead but it had been a close call. For one terrifying moment, Lambert was sure that the beast would quarter his best friend, the talons caught in the dark blue of the cat witcher’s armour. Unlike Lambert’s armour, Aiden’s was built for ranged combat. It enabled him to move faster, dancing around his opponents like a leaf on the wind. Aiden would attack at close range and then flee back before the monster could counter. His sign proficiency was high too, blasting all manner of beast with incinerating flames, or throwing them back with a gust of Aard far greater than the wolf witchers.
It made fighting side by side an intricate and yet well balanced dance. Vesemir had always told Lambert that balance was the key. There was no point in having a good attack but a shoddy defence. You could be an excellent swordsman but it was useless if your opponent flew high in the skies. Swords, crossbows, signs, potions, you needed them all in moderation to succeed. Aiden was different. He was a brilliant witcher, but he had never beat Lambert when they sparred.
And yet the blasted man had decided he was going to engage the Griffin in the way Lambert usually would- head on. Lambert wasn’t sure if it was pride, or maybe arrogance… but the change in tactic had not gone well and his friend had been quickly overwhelmed before Lambert had managed to strike the beast, killing it with great difficulty as he tried not to hurt Aiden in the process.
“What?” Aiden spat, wiping the griffin’s blood from his cheek with the sleeve of his armour.
“What the fuck was that about?” Lambert gestured to the corpse behind them.
Aiden just shrugged. “Thought I’d give it a try, can’t be that difficult if you can do it.”
“You- you idiot! I thought you were gonna get killed,” Lambert yelled back, his fists clenched by his side. “I don’t know what I would have done.”
The emotions that washed over Aiden’s face flitted around, confusion, anger, sadness… hope? Lambert wasn’t sure. It was a mess of feelings all happening too quickly for him to process, but suddenly Aiden’s arms were around him, tight but not restrictive.
“You sap,” the cat murmured in his ear before pressing his lips to Lambert’s cheek.
Fuck.
What the hell was Lambert meant to do with that? Why was his heart racing? And his cheeks felt hot too hot.
Fuck, fuck, fuck!
“Hnnng,” he grunted and buried his face in Aiden’s neck, grumbling as his friend started to laugh but neither of them let go of each other. It was far too soon for that.