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Geralt reached for his forehead.
“Have you got a headache?” Yennefer asked. The big wound had been at the back of his head, but there was also that small cut near his eyebrow.
“No.” Geralt dragged his hand across his face. “It’s so dark.”
Yennefer looked up at the nearly cloudless sky. The sun wasn’t straight overhead anymore, but even with her ordinary vision it was hardly dark.
“It’s midafternoon,” she said.
“Hmm.”
Apparently, that was the only answer she would get. She crouched in front of him. He smiled at her, but his mismatched eyes looked straight through her.
“How many fingers am I holding up?”
“Four. I could hear you tuck in your thumb.”
“You can’t see?”
“Please don’t worry about it.”
That wasn’t a confirmation, but probably as close to one as she’d get.
“You’ve suddenly gone blind and you expect me not to worry about it? What is happening, Geralt?”
The head wound. It had to be. He’d seemed fine. His voice had been steady. He hadn’t been repeating himself in his stories. Well, that last one… he didn’t remember it well, so it was normal that he wasn’t as certain in its retelling. His eyes hadn’t changed. Well, apparently they had, because he was now blind.
“I’m asking you to not worry about it. Sit with me. Please.”
“We’re done sitting around. You need a healer. Now.”
“I’m no worse than I was half an hour ago. Trust me?”
That was a low blow and he knew it. Yes, she trusted him. With her life more often than not and with her heart for many, many years. But his tales had certainly not given her any more trust in his ability to take care of himself.
Well, she had told herself earlier that she wouldn’t read his mind unless he got much worse. This recent development, despite his protestations, certainly qualified as getting worse. Much worse.
She reached out with her thoughts to sift through his.
It was… difficult. Reading his thoughts was usually as easy as breathing. It came naturally and often it was more difficult to tune him out than to listen in. But his thoughts were… different, sluggish somehow. Like wading through treacle. Or, to stick with a comparison he’d understand, wading through fiend dung.
There were some tiny, fleeting fragments, impressions more than thoughts. She couldn’t catch them properly. She had to focus.
A slow thought formed into a large, treacly lump.
I love you, Yen.
Well, that was all very sweet, and she certainly didn’t doubt it, but it was very unlike Geralt to think it so bluntly.
She dug deeper, until another one of his thoughts took shape.
I love you so much.
Everywhere she looked, every thought she caught was the same.
I love you. I love you. I love you.
It was like… With some effort she dragged herself out of his mind.
“Are you trying to keep me out?” Because that had to be it. He knew she was trying to find out more about his condition and he was trying to hide his own thoughts between that sweet screen of love confessions. Clumsily done, which was to be expected with his limited magical ability, but she had to admit it was effective.
“Never.”
Which was a lie, of course. Yennefer rolled her eyes. He didn’t comment, which was further proof that he was truly blind.
“Let’s go. If you won’t let me help you then maybe—”
“Sit with me.”
“Geralt, we’ve been sitting for a good long while and I really think—”
“Please.”
They called him her dog. They were hardly subtle about it. Her dog to sic on anyone who crossed her, her dog to come running when she whistled. But when he asked her for something like this it would have taken a much stronger woman than her to deny him.
She sat next to him with a hand on his shoulder.
“What is it, love?”
“I still have to tell you about Lambert.”
“Do you have to?” Yennefer chuckled. “I think I’ve heard quite enough from him directly.”
“No, I…” He seemed to search for the right words. “It's easy with Eskel. And Vesemir. He always did his best. He's a good man. They both are. But Lambert... I have to tell you about Lambert.”
She shushed him gently. He was getting rather agitated.
“You are telling me.”
“About Lambert,” he repeated. “And the others. Even Letho. Don't forget Letho. He saved me. He didn't have to. Nobody knew I was there. Or that he was there. But he saved me. You can't forget that.”
“If I ever did, I’m sure you’d remind me. Though I won’t promise to like him. I can appreciate that he saved you but that doesn’t mean…” A thoroughly unpleasant man, that Viper. She could never shake the feeling that he was double-crossing her, that he had an even more insidious plan behind anything he actually said out loud.
“I have to tell you more.”
It was unnerving how quickly Geralt’s unseeing eyes were roving. There was something that made him restless.
Yet when she dipped into his mind again, his thoughts were unchanged.
Love. Love. Love.