Chapter Text
The corridors connecting the different parts of the castle were long, Jaskier had learned that much his very first day in Kaer Morhen. And the rooms were all cold, due to a lack of continuously intact wall structure. He had learned that, too. So when he joined the witchers for breakfast the morning after their fight with Voleth Meir, he was beyond relieved to finally feel the warm air of an oven-heated room with no visible holes in the wall.
“Bard! It is good to see you,” Vesemir greeted him with surprising vigor. It was the first time any of the witchers had directly addressed him at all, and Jaskier immediately turned towards Geralt’s mentor. “Can you mend clothes?”
“Uhm… Possibly?” Jaskier replied a little hesitantly. “I can certainly give it my best try.”
“Good.” Vesemir nodded his head. “There’s a pile in the laundry room.” He vaguely gestured towards somewhere deeper in the keep. “There’s also a pile of dishes in the kitchen sinks. Finish both and you can eat.”
“Uh… Of course, yes, I will… get to that right away. I will see you all later,” he awkwardly glanced into the round, then left the room again towards where Vesemir had indicated.
He didn’t get to eat that day.
Repairing all of the clothes had taken him hours, both due to a lack of practice and due to the fact that the fingers on his dominant right hand were still stiff from the burns they had received courtesy of the fire mage who had tortured him in Oxenfurt. The acute blisters had all more or less healed by now, but the new skin was hyper-sensitive in patches, while other parts had scarred over making it difficult for Jaskier to move his index and middle finger. And so it had taken him until hours after lunch to finish his first task and by that time, the double amount of dishes and kitchenware had accumulated in the sinks. And when he was finished with those – his injured hand by now burning with pain – dinner had already been served and all that was left were a few slices of bread he now eagerly collected. It reminded him of his time before Geralt when bread was sometimes the only thing thrown at him after a performance. He had lived off even moldy pieces for days on end, so this didn’t really faze him.
The next morning, no breakfast at all had been served. Instead, Vesemir had prepared some food in the kitchen that he had Ciri bring out to the training grounds, so that the wolves could eat during their respective breaks. Yennefer had huffed at that and mumbled something about replenishing her powers, so Vesemir had begrudgingly provided some food for her as well. And for Ciri, of course, who was still growing and also a witcher in training (of sorts), so – naturally – she needed food, too.
And Jaskier had been fine as well because he had been assigned to care for the animals that day, which meant that he had been able to steal a carrot and an apple from the horses’ share, which was alright in his book with the amount of treats he had provided to Roach over the years...
On his third full day in Kaer Morhen, however, Jaskier finally confronted Vesemir.
“I really don’t mean to be a bother, but… Would it be possible for me to join you for one of the meals today?”
The older witcher regarded him calmly. “Of course. But you’re human and I don’t much know about that anymore… We need to somewhat ration our portions this winter. – How much do you need?”
“Uh…” The question both shocked and surprised Jaskier, who immediately decided to backtrack a little. “Not… much, certainly? At least a lot less than any full-grown witcher, I suppose… Would some soup and bread be asking too much?”
“No, that’s fine,” Vesemir responded calmly. “I’ll prepare some for lunch – join us then.”
And so he had finally had the chance to eat something… well, more or less normal… that day. And while the others had all additionally gotten some meat and what looked like a hearty pie to go along with their soup, Jaskier had received the requested bread, and so his stomach felt not-empty for the first time in days.
“Are you feeling sick?” Geralt asked him with a small frown towards the end of their lunch.
“Uh… No? Why do you ask,” Jaskier replied neutrally.
Geralt nodded towards his comparatively meagre meal. “Soup and bread? You eat like you do when you’re sick.”
Jaskier felt Vesemir’s gaze rest heavily on him.
“I…” he started, but then hesitated. How to put this without potentially causing an unnecessary discussion? “…just felt like it was a bread and soup kinda day.” He gave Geralt a small smile. Then, when the witcher was still eyeing him critically: “I’m fine, Geralt. I’m not sick.”
“Are you fine enough to help with clean-up in the main hall today?” Vesemir gave him a long look.
“Of course,” Jaskier immediately replied. “Wherever you think I’m most useful.”
“That a good idea?” It was Lambert who voiced his concern this time. “That’ll be some heavy lifting. Boy looks like – between him and any one of our chairs? – he’d lose.”
A round of chuckling among the witchers.
“He’s fine,” Vesemir calmly stifled the discussion. “And he can just scrub the floors if the lifting gets to be too much for him…”
And so an afternoon of heavy lifting and scrubbing it was. By the time the sun set, Jaskier almost couldn’t lift his arms anymore and his hand had taken on a steady throb that was only interrupted by sharper stings of pain whenever the abused skin of his fingers came into contact with anything. So he was beyond relieved when Vesemir finally called it a day for all of them. When Jaskier then made to retreat to his room to just finally get some rest, the older witcher called after him:
“Bard! You did some hard work today… Do you need some dinner tonight?”
“Uhm… It would maybe be preferable? But not strictly necessary,” he added quickly. “Do you have any to spare?”
“We can always spare; it just comes out of everyone else’s meals, of course.”
The look on Jaskier’s face turned stony at that. Message received… “Then some bread will do. I’ll just get some from the kitchen? I’m tired anyway.” No way he would get away with just nibbling on some bread again with Geralt around…
Vesemir nodded, but frowned slightly now.
“You’re welcome at the table; you don’t need to eat by yourself in your room, you know.”
“That’s… fine,” Jaskier managed a weak smile. “Have a good night.”
With that, he was off to find some bread and finally get some rest. – It was going to be a very long winter.