Work Text:
1. In a Tavern
There’s something very, very different about being in trouble with a Witcher just around the corner and being in trouble when he hopes that Witcher is far away, both because Jaskier still really doesn’t want to see him and because he doesn’t want him near this utterly deranged mage.
Being mad at Geralt doesn’t change that.
Just as being mad at the situation doesn’t change it, either.
But the thing is – Jaskier isn’t even truly afraid anymore. Sure, he’s scared of the pain, but he’s pretty sure he’s going to die here, and there won’t be a miracle rescue this time. The best he can hope for is that his secrets will die with him.
He would hope for a quick death, but, well.
The sweetly-gross stench of burnt skin fills his nose a moment before the searing pain hits, all-consuming and white-hot and yet not enough to invite sweet oblivion, and still the mage grins like he isn’t fucking burning Jaskier’s fingers. Like they’re just having a chat, and Jaskier can barely scream.
It does have the benefit of removing any chance he might have to spill secrets that aren’t his to share, he thinks a little hysterically, and yells something about the bloody Witcher not having weaknesses when the crash of a bottle breaking sounds.
Inside the tavern.
Jaskier is equal parts terrified and relieved – relieved because the mage drops his flame, except then the words register – and the voice.
“I knew I’d find you here,” Yennefer of fucking Vengerberg slurs, like he didn’t risk his life to put her and her companion on a ship to lands far away. She’s alone, now, and lurching further into the tavern room like she’s drunk. “You lazy lout. Leaving me at home to rot!”
She doesn’t smell drunk, though, when she stumbles closer – even if it’s hard to tell, what with the sewer stench still clinging to her – and maybe, Jaskier should understand what she’s doing here, but mostly, he’s scared. Scared, like the fear had only been waiting for a moment like this and is now crashing into him tenfold, swamping him.
“Uh– Uh – This is–” Jaskier stammers, praying that the utterly deranged mage opposite him will put it down to being scared for his life and not a poorly rehearsed performance. “This is my wife!” She leans in, uncoordinated, but there’s no mistaking the lips pressing to his temple, dry and a little cracked and hers. “She has nothing to do with this,” he pleads before he can think too much about her lips on his skin, “Please let her go–”
Of course it’s not that easy, which means they’re dead, and he didn’t only get himself killed but also Yennefer, who smiled at him like she was happy to see him and who hugged him and who kissed him – just a quick press of dry lips on his face, but still, a real kiss from a witch who viewed him as nothing but a nuisance the last time he’d seen her – and who had come to his rescue here, utterly defenceless, and is now staring down a fucking fire mage while Jaskier fucking pleads for her life and –
The deranged mage goes down screaming, the cloud of flames Yennefer had spat into his face dissipating as she loses all appearances of being drunk, and then scrambles over to where Jaskier is still ineffectually struggling against his bonds, trying to free himself.
Suddenly, the fact that she’d kissed him as part of the pretence seems like the least important fact out of all.
2. On the Run
They scramble through the streets as quickly as they can – which isn’t very quickly at all, considering Jaskier is still shaking from adrenaline and pain and a decided lack of sleep, and Yennefer may seem larger than life, usually, but is actually a head shorter than Jaskier and not really equipped to lug him around, too.
They’re not the least conspicuous pair, so it’s not a surprise when they pick up some… friends who probably think they can have their merry way with Yennefer. It would almost be laughable if Jaskier weren’t quite so winded, to watch her disabuse them of the notion. (Regardless of the pain, it’s hot as fuck to see her so expertly defend the two of them, though Jaskier isn’t quite ready to examine that thought any closer. Maybe the fire fucker has scrambled his brains after all.)
It’s too close a call for both of them, and so Jaskier doesn’t complain when Yennefer grows even more relentless in dragging him along. He mostly manages to steer them in the right direction – towards the outskirts of the Academy where he rents a small set of quarters – but there are definite casualties along the way, which Jaskier mostly notices because of the yelling behind them.
They’re almost at the little alleyway with its little side entrance, when it comes to a head: shouting, and then a woman’s terrified voice giving directions towards the big street the alleyway leads off of.
Fuck.
“Fuck,” Jaskier says out loud.
Yennefer rolls her eyes and fumbles with the strings at the neck of her cloak before shrugging it off and reaching for Jaskier’s coat. Jaskier is too busy staring at the pool of purple fabric at her feet and the once-glittering facets of her dress to be of much help until she shoves at his shoulder a little and hisses, “Take it off!”
Whatever stupid joke Jaskier might have made in response dies on his lips when she drops his beautiful leather coat, kicking it behind him and then spinning him around so his back is to the street and he is caging her in against the wall. Rising on tiptoes, she pushes one hand into his nape, balancing herself with the other.
“C’mon, I’ve seen you act – pretend I’m one of your many lady friends and fucking kiss me.”
And, well.
Jaskier has never been one to deny a beautiful lady – something which had gotten him into many a hot water over the years – and even covered in remnants of sewer, Yennefer of Vengerberg definitely qualifies as beautiful, loath as he is to admit it.
He leans down, cradles her face in his good hand, and stares for a moment – too long, for her tastes; she pulls him down the last inch with an impatient sigh and kisses him.
Seems like the peck in the tavern wasn’t a one-off, Jaskier thinks, and then unfreezes himself and kisses her back.
The kiss is unfairly good, all things considered – especially since it’s only pretence.
It is marred a little by how his heart is still racing in fear, his mouth tasting of metallic adrenaline and lungs burning from their flight. To his chagrin, it’s only a little, though, because Yennefer’s lips are dry and a little chapped and soft in their movements against his.
The guards mutter and jeer when they peer into the alleyway, but they don’t linger.
Jaskier and Yennefer stay like that a minute longer, and it feels – intimate. Too intimate, since this is still Yennefer of Vengerberg, the witch who used to be Geralt’s, and he is still Jaskier, the bard who also used to be Geralt’s. Maybe, he thinks as he straightens, it’s not so unbelievable.
Being ruined by the same man can forge bonds you wouldn’t believe, apparently.
Yennefer cranes her head while he bends to pick up their coats again, carefully checking his lovely beauty for scuff marks from her uncouth treatment.
“I can’t believe that worked,” he mutters, mostly to himself, because – well, it feels like it shouldn’t have worked.
“Neither can I,” Yennefer says distractedly, and for a moment they stare at each other before they both start laughing.
Jaskier slings their garments over his arm and offers her his free one. “Good thinking, my lady,” he says, because it’s easier than thinking about anything that has transpired over the past twenty-four hours.
“Couldn’t have done it without you,” she says in a rare show of graciousness, and maybe, sticking with her isn’t such a terrible idea after all.
Especially not if it comes with more kisses.
3. In a Dingy Inn Room
They don’t linger in Oxenfurt, not even with Jaskier’s well-stuffed bed with its down pillow and blankets staring so invitingly at him. They have to leave, before the mage recovers from his injuries and starts hunting them, and so Jaskier directs Yennefer into packing his essentials and pries his emergency stash of coin out of its hiding place.
“Secretly rich?” Yennefer raises an eyebrow, in the middle of packing non-perishables into a backpack.
Jaskier narrows his eyes at her. “I’ve been a professor here,” he says slowly. Did she not know? Judging by the look on her face, she didn’t, but even he has to admit that they don’t really have the time to hash this out now. “Be thankful – this is our ticket out of here.”
The plan they settle on is to stick together – she saved his life, and even if he didn’t have enough coin for two horses, he wouldn’t just leave her here, not without a way to get out – and make their way to Ellander. Nenneke might not be too enthused about Jaskier, but she’d never turn away friends of Geralt's, and besides sanctuary might be able to help with their wounds, both physical and Chaotic.
Things happen quickly after that: they scrub down to the best of their ability in the privy, dress in the most unassuming clothes Jaskier owns, and make their way to the market to procure horses and further provisions, and then they’re on their way.
By the time night falls and they haggle for a room – and a proper bath – in a small town on the Pontar, Jaskier’s hand throbs with the pulse of his heart. It’s all he can do grit his teeth and smile and hope the innkeeper puts it down to anything else.
For once, luck seems to be on their side – or the lure of their coin is too strong, but either way, they have a key and a meal and two strapping young men carrying a huge tub into the room, the innkeeper’s daughters scurrying after them with buckets of steaming water.
“Let me see your hands,” Yennefer demands once they’re safely ensconced in their room, bellies full and bones heavy with exhaustion. Only the promise of the bath keeps Jaskier from collapsing face-first into the bed right then, though Yennefer’s eyes boring into the side of his face makes him reconsider it.
With some reluctance he puts his injured hand into hers. She is gentle in her movements as she inspects the rope burns on his wrists and the marks on his fingers, clicking her tongue. At no point does she close her hands around him, which is the only reason Jaskier doesn’t take a nose-dive into the tub after all.
“Mother Nenneke should be able to heal these,” she finally declares, casting around for a saddlebag and resurfacing with a small pot that brings tears to Jaskier’s eyes when she opens it.
Not because of the pungent smell – though it’s far from pleasant – but because of the associated memories of – of Geralt frowning over the small injuries that were unavoidable on the Path, tossing Jaskier his general all-purpose healing salve (human safe) to speed up healing.
Somehow, the memories make Yennefer’s gentle fingers even more uncomfortable as she carefully cleans out the burns and then dabs the salve on them. That, and the realisation that she must have picked the salve up for him in Oxenfurt, because he certainly hadn’t owned any of it.
“Can’t you do it?” Jaskier asks to distract himself.
Yennefer rolls her eyes. “With what Chaos? I’m afraid all I can offer is the magic of kissing them better.” There’s derision in her voice, yes, but also something soft underneath, and Jaskier doesn’t really think.
“Are you?” he asks. “Offering, that is?”
Yennefer’s purple gaze is inscrutable as she looks at him, his hurt hand still cradled in hers. “I am,” she finally says softly, and then leans in and presses a kiss to his wrist before pulling a roll of bandages from the same saddlebag.
Jaskier’s heart doesn’t stop racing until he is sliding into the by now lukewarm bathwater, Yennefer curled up on the single bed already, and his hand keeps tingling like her kiss did, after all, speed up the healing.
4. In a Busy Marketplace
“Should we split up?” Jaskier asks, casting a dubious eye around the bustling stalls of the Vizima market. Every day is market day in Vizima, with its prime location for both travellers and traders on the way to Oxenfurt, but he could swear that there used to be fewer people out and about.
“What happened to take no risks?” Yennefer’s voice is low enough that Jaskier can only barely make the words out from the shapes of her lips.
He snorts a little and finally remembers to tear his gaze away from her pretty mouth. “The faster we’re in Ellander, the less risk we’re taking.”
“Splitting up here won’t make much of a difference.” She frowns at the chaos ahead of them. “At least not with how little organisation they appear to have.”
She is right; the stalls seem set up all over the place, which means the most efficient plan is probably actually sticking together and buying things as they happen across them.
“You are wise as always.” Jaskier sketches a bow, which makes her laugh before she sobers abruptly and whirls around, kicking the – the fucking scoundrel who just fucking grabbed her butt in the shin.
“Get your hands off my wife,” Jaskier snarls and steps in front of her to physically shield her, puffing himself up to the best of his ability. It’s pretty good, if he says so himself, because he knows very well that in an actual fight, he won’t stand a chance.
“Shh,” Yennefer says and steps closer to him – close enough that she can press a kiss to his throat like it’s something they do every day. “I’m sure it was an accident.”
There’s the soft snick of the blade she acquired from somewhere (Jaskier was too afraid to ask, and it’s never come up organically) dropping into her palm, and the would-be-harasser blanches visibly.
“It– It was.” He stumbles back a step. “It – won’t happen again,” he blurts, and then turns tail and flees into the busy market streets.
With another snick, Yennefer folds the blade once he is out of sight and makes it disappear up her sleeve again.
“Gods,” Jaskier breathes, and basks in the satisfied smirk she turns on him in response. “You’re so sexy.”
It makes her giggle, of all things, and then she rises on tiptoes again and kisses the curve of his jaw that is now in reach because he somehow is leaning closer to her like he is a sunflower and she the sun.
“You were adorable, trying to defend me,” she says, and then strides into the market proper while he is still sputtering over her daring.
5. In a Bedroom
“Jaskier the bard…” Nenneke casts a critical eye over them that has Jaskier straightening up on instinct despite temple school having been behind him for several decades. “And who is that charming lady by your side?”
“Yennefer of Vengerberg,” Jaskier says before Yennefer can give the alias she has been using on their flight. “She’s… a friend of Geralt’s.”
Yennefer scoffs but doesn’t actually protest. The tension isn’t lost on Nenneke, and for a moment, Jaskier is certain she will demand further details. But then she just smiles. “Ah, you’re the mage he was rather stupider about than usual?”
Yennefer starts and backs a step away, bumping into Jaskier.
Before she can actually flee, Jaskier wraps his arm around her and pulls her into her side. He is probably most surprised out of all of them when she actually lets him.
“Geralt has been here?” he asks, which makes some of the tension dissipate from Yennefer’s frame. They’d talked, vaguely, about how to contact him to let him know of the danger; it seems like fate, once again, has dipped her fingers into their affairs and meddled.
“And he will be, again,” Nenneke says and gestures for them to follow her deeper into the temple. “Come, you must be famished.”
Yennefer is clearly reluctant, but Jaskier is too keyed up to do more than drag her along with him. If Geralt was here – if Geralt was here and will be again, then there’s a decent chance he hasn’t shown up alone.
And true enough: when they get to the mess hall, there is a blond head at one of the long tables, clad in the temple’s typical garb but still unmistakable.
“Is that –”
Nenneke follows his gaze and chuckles. “Ah, yes, little Fiona.” She sighs, but Jaskier barely hears her, already crossing the hall now that he knows how to address her.
“Fiona?”
Her head whips up, face moving from bored to surprised to overjoyed in the blink of an eye, and then she’s scrambling up and out of her seat. “Master Dandelion!”
She meets him halfway, jumping into his arms like she’s still eight years old, and only very quick thinking saves Jaskier’s burns from rather painful contact.
“Squirt,” he says softly, burying his face in her neck and breathing in the scent of her, alive, in his arms.
“Not a squirt,” she mutters, but she can’t quite get the smile out of her voice or off her face when he sets her down again.
“I go by Jaskier, these days,” Jaskier tells her, and casts a look around for Yennefer before motioning for her to come over to him. “And there’s someone else I’d like you to meet.”
Ciri grows tense during introductions, which Jaskier doesn’t understand until he suddenly does: Ciri pulls a pendant off her throat that isn’t quite a Witcher’s medallion but a wolf mid-leap, gleaming silver. Jaskier has no doubt that it is cast from that very metal, and doesn’t protest when Ciri demands he grasp it in his fist.
He makes sure she can see it touching his skin, and only when neither he nor Yennefer show a reaction does she relax.
“Oh, squirt,” Jaskier says again, his breaking heart leaking all over his voice.
Ciri crosses her arms and scowls. “It seemed too good to be true. I would be a fool if I didn’t account for that.”
The shards of his heart settle heavily in his stomach, and only slowly dissipate as Ciri starts chattering throughout the remainder of dinner. He doesn’t miss the fact that she only talks about things that are either from the years he visited the court during the cold season or from the temple; he can well imagine how she found Geralt, and it’s bound to be a sad tale.
Jaskier sings her to sleep that night, and again the next day, and the day after that she requests Yennefer do the honours, who does with a halting voice that still sinks into Jaskier’s heart and soothes the stitches he has carried since that day on the mountain.
It’s Yennefer who tucks Ciri in, who presses a kiss to Ciri’s forehead.
Ciri smiles, soft and warm with sleep.
“And now Dandelion,” she requests, face pulling into an adorable frown when Jaskier bends down to kiss her forehead, too. “No – Yennefer needs to kiss you good night, too. It’s how this is done.” It’s the first Jaskier has heard of this, but he isn’t sure what she’s getting at, and neither is Yennefer. “Otherwise the nightmare ward won’t work,” Ciri says confidently through a yawn. “And I can hear you, you know? It’s not fisstech-alchemy to know you have more than enough fodder for nightmares, too. So. You won’t let him suffer, will you?”
Yennefer’s face is soft, just like Jaskier’s heart feels at that moment.
“I won’t,” she promises, and Jaskier’s eyes burn because the moment is tender above all else. It would take a stronger man than him to remain unmoved in the face of such concentrated concern and caring and sheer softness.
He bends obligingly as Yennefer strides over, her hands cool and gentle on his face as she pulls him close enough she can press a kiss to his forehead, lips lingering just a few beats too long.
Jaskier’s heart is pounding when they part, something fluttery in his stomach that’s either a swarm of butterflies or a herd of harpies. The only thing keeping him tethered is Yennefer’s gaze, burning and heavy in the softly illuminated room, and a tension so thick he almost expects it to be palpable.
“You like each other,” Ciri says with a soft giggle and then yawns again.
By the time Jaskier has turned to her, face burning and heart kicked up another notch, she’s fast asleep, the edges of her smirk still lingering at the corners of her mouth.
“I’ll blame the forced sticking together during our travels,” Yennefer says behind him, a chuckle in her voice, “if you do, too.”
“Anything for you,” Jaskier replies as dramatically as he can and hopes it hides just how sincere he is.
+1 Surrounded by Flowers
The temple gardens are vast and beautiful, filled with a variety Yennefer hasn’t encountered outside the greenhouses in Aretuza.
It’s easy to lose herself in the winding paths among them, trying to feel for the Chaos she almost burnt out of herself in Sodden. It’s easier to lose herself in her own thoughts – about Geralt, who is bound to show up any hour now, about his annoying side-kick who is really annoyingly handsome and competent in his own right, even though he tries to appear anything but, about the little girl who has already snuck her way into Yennefer’s heart in record time.
The thoughts about Geralt she expected; the other two, not so much. Is it a wonder, though?
“I get a feeling the roses are not what holds your thoughts.” It’s Nenneke’s voice, calming even when it should be surprising, that draws her from her thoughts, guiding her gently back to the present in a way few people have been able to with Yennefer.
She smiles despite herself, and then shakes her head. “You would be correct.”
The silence rests easy between them, and when Yennefer starts moving again, Nenneke falls into step beside her without hesitation. “I know I tell you to focus on your Chaos, but sometimes chaos in the head needs to be untangled before we can find who we truly are.”
Yennefer huffs a small laugh, suddenly understanding why Geralt holds such fondness for the woman. It should be irritating, to have her fish for information, but instead it lands as an invitation to share her burdens. One that Yennefer is surprisingly tempted to take.
“If you’d asked me two weeks ago, I would not even remotely have anticipated this,” she finally says, fingers brushing against an out-of-season lilac. She misses her favoured perfumes; at the rate she’s progressing with reestablishing contact with her Chaos, it might be worth to ask Nenneke for use of the laboratory that goes beyond teaching Ciri the basics of alchemy and potions making.
Not that she doesn’t have her work cut out for her there, too; Ciri has acquired a most concerning hodgepodge of knowledge from one of Geralt’s brothers-in-arms, and were it not for the girl’s raw power intent on keeping her safe and Yennefer’s tremulous link with her own Chaos, she would have long since ported to Kaer Morhen, unplottability be damned, and read thrice-damned Lambert the riot act.
“Is that a bad thing?” Nenneke asks, and Yennefer almost says, it is; Geralt would be ever so cross with me if I maimed his brother until she remembers what she said out loud.
“It’s unfamiliar.” Unfamiliar, but not bad.
Nenneke’s knowing smile suggests she’s aware of that distinction. “You’re good for the scoundrel bard, too,” she says, almost offhandedly.
Yennefer bristles even though she knows she shouldn’t. There is old bad blood between him and Nenneke, and though it hasn’t affected the hospitality they have been afforded, it still rankles. “He’s not a scoundrel,” she says firmly, which makes Nenneke smile like Yennefer passed some sort of test.
“I wouldn’t have believed it either, had you told me a month ago I would defend him,” she says ruefully.
“You sound like Geralt,” Nenneke remarks and pauses to look at Yennefer. “It is good you all have such a network of people who look out for you and for whom you look out in return.”
Yennefer is still trying to come up with a suitably scathing reply for the notion of her looking out for Geralt, when Nenneke cocks her head and excuses herself, hurrying down the branching path.
Yennefer stares after her and then shakes her head. Well, Nenneke will soon enough learn the errors of that belief – at the latest when Geralt shows up again. With a silent sigh, she turns down the other path until she finds a small pond with a conveniently shaped boulder, but her thoughts are no more settled after the talk than before. Less, really.
Jaskier finds her like this, staring at the perfectly still surface of the pond and – fittingly – pondering the strange chain of events that has brought the two of them, together, here.
“Fancy finding you here,” Jaskier says and drops down onto the ground next to her boulder, heedless of his outfit. Not that there’s much to heed; he’s still wearing the simple garments he chose for both of them to blend in on their journey here.
She snorts in reply and shifts so her calve ‘accidentally’ brushes his shoulder. He wraps his hand around her ankle and cranes his neck so he can smile up at her. Why he didn’t just sit down next to her, she doesn’t know, but if there’s one thing she’s learned over the years, it’s that his mind works in very strange ways.
“Were you looking for me?”
His smile softens. “Maybe I was,” he says, which both is and isn’t an answer.
Her fingers are itching to bury themselves in his soft hair, freshly washed now that they have access to easy warm baths in the temple’s bathing house, and it’s self-preservation more than anything else that makes her slide off the boulder and join him on the ground. The moss covering the ground is surprisingly comfortable to sit on, and the boulder gives a nice backrest. Damn. Maybe he has a point, sitting on the ground.
“Lowering yourself to my level, for once?”
“It’d be unfair, otherwise,” she says haughtily.
He laughs, harder than the moderately funny exchange warrants, until he starts listing into her. He doesn’t make any move to right himself once his laughter has tapered off, but then, neither does she.
“Is it true, what – Fiona said yesterday?” he asks after a while. His hand is back on her ankle, and the contact alone is distracting enough she almost doesn’t register the question.
When she does, her heart quickens its pace, but she doesn’t pretend to misunderstand. “Do you really have to ask?”
“No, I enjoy humiliating myself greatly at every opportunity,” Jaskier says drily.
She laughs. “That explains so much.”
He swats at her, which turns him so he’s facing her properly. His eyes are a piercing blue from so close, speckled with grey, though his pupils push his irises further back the longer he looks at her.
“You’ve been kissing me,” he says softly.
“That I have.” There is no use denying him. The memories haunt her when she should be focused on getting her Chaos back, and they’ve both been there. She only barely stops herself from licking her lips.
“And I think I know what that means, but –” he drops his gaze, and a weight lifts off her chest with it. “I’ve been wrong before.”
Yennefer almost climbs into his lap right then – anything to chase that forlorn look off his face, the sadness she can just barely feel with her Chaos still mostly off-limits.
“I’m not –” Geralt, she almost says but catches herself at the last second. Most of their interactions have been about Geralt, yes, but this one isn’t. This one is about them. “– that cruel.” She waits until he meets her eyes again. “I’m not… good at this,” she says, because she isn’t, and he deserves to know. But, maybe, he already knows. Sometimes, it felt like he saw all her flaws better than anyone else. The gravity of him still sticking around despite that – it’s not lost on her.
“Neither am I,” he says with a self deprecating smirk, rising onto his knees. “But – I’d be willing to try. With you.”
“So am I,” Yennefer says softly, and then has to surreptitiously wipe her suddenly sweaty hands on her pants.
“My darling wife,” Jaskier starts, still so dramatic. It makes her giggle, which is probably why he’s done it. He’s always been good about diffusing tension. Almost always, except when he needed it most, as he’s told her. “May I kiss you?”
“You may,” she replies as magnanimously as she can, and it’s fitting, in a way, that their first real kiss tastes like laughter and easy comfort with each other; that Jaskier overbalances and catches himself on her shoulder with his good hand and sends them both toppling over; that he lands heavily on top of her in a position that would be inappropriate were it not for the helpless giggles welling up between them and the fact that they’re both still fully clothed.
It feels… inevitable. But inevitable by choice rather than Destiny’s meddling hand, inevitable because of who they chose to be instead of what binds them.
And Yennefer knows it won’t be this easy. There’s a war still going on out there, and Geralt of Rivia will be barging into their lives again any moment now, and there’s a young, traumatised girl attached to him who would probably burn the world down before she was separated from either Geralt or Jaskier again – and maybe Yennefer, too, the more they get to know each other.
Things are about to get complicated. But this, between them? This feels like the natural, easy conclusion to the trajectory of their journey, and Yennefer can’t wait to see where else it will take her.