PSL Injuries and Patching up with Monsterbytrade

[whatupbuttercup]

Jaskier was not font of this particular hamlet, he decided. The lands were bleak, the people were bleaker, and there was a pervasive stench of bog that crept into everything. The sheets (the beds were fairly nice, he would give them that, but the feather mattresses all stank of bog water), the curtains, the wood, the people--everything smelled of still water and mold. It was enough to drive him to distraction.

He suspected it annoyed Geralt as well, but the Witcher had only given him a cursory grunt when prompted about it.

The town, apparently, had need of a Witcher to clear some terrible beast from the marshes nearby. Jaskier couldn't hope to pronounce the name of it so, until Geralt felt like describing the thing, he was out on a limb about whether to make a song of it or not. Apparently, it was dangerous enough that Geralt had actually deigned to request he stay behind, instead of just ordering it, and Jaskier had agreed without hesitation.

It was an unspoken agreement. Anything truly cataclysmic or terrible, Geralt would grit his teeth and be cordial about what he required and Jaskier would agree without argument. It was a nicety they both extended...unfortunately, that meant that Jaskier was left standing in the road, staring off into the night, pacing as he waited for Geralt to appear out of the darkness like a spectre of death.

He did not.

The night crawled on and Jaskier's pacing got a little antsier, a little less controlled, he started talking--to himself and to Roach, who waited patiently by the roadside. He bitched about Witchers, about whatever this thing was, about the town, about the smell, praised Roach for being a good girl, damned Roach for not being psychically connected to Geralt (that he could prove), and then sighed and just leaned his head against her neck as he waited.

It was just before dawn that the Witcher appeared on the road. He moved very, very slowly and Jaskier stared in horror as he watched him approach.

He didn't want to pry, to be more of a nuisance than he was wont, but Geralt didn't--that wasn't how he walked. He had brushed Jaskier off before, knocked aside hands and insisted he was fine when he was not...but the bard had never seen him move like that. Had never seen the way his legs seemed to drag, to move ahead only to catch himself. He was falling forward, repeatedly, more than he was walking.

"Damn it all," Jaskier cursed and abandoned Roach to run to the Witcher's side.

The stench of blood was--truly remarkable. It took him aback and that, alone, said something. His armor was destroyed, cut apart and gnawed free, and the dark splotches on his clothing--it was impossible to tell where Geralt's blood started and where the gore of the creature ended. He had one of his swords in hand, held in a tight immobile grip and in the other he held a grotesque severed head of something that resembled a mummified woman made of corn-husks and a layer of teeth stolen from children's heads. He nearly vomited at the sight of it.

Geralt kept walking, almost like he hadn't seen the bard come up, and Jaskier's hands fluttered as he considered how to--what to do.

"Geralt? My friend? Are you--oh you're looking a bit unwell--" His voice was very high all of a sudden. Was that a solid chunk taken out of him? Melitele's tits he could see through that hole in Geralt's side. Could see clear through him. That was very bad. There was a huge gash across his back, across his legs, he was a mess of holes and bites and Jaskier's heart felt very near to stopping.

He made a decision then and snuck himself under Geralt's sword arm. He drew the tense limb over his shoulders and lifted, took some of the Witcher's weight, and tried to lead him to Roach.

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[whatupbuttercup]

The tub was a trick to maneuver into the room, had taken him a bit of shuffling to get it set up, and he'd dashed eagerly, to and fro, bringing up steaming water by the pitcher. He'd just managed the last pitcher he planned on sparing for the tub, itself, when Geralt asked him about the bottles.

"Truthfully?" Jaskier asked and though he sounded rather conversational. Nevermind the faint sensation of fear that clung to his airy tone. "I recalled you drinking it once--after that...bruxa was it? In the mountains?" Jaskier explained.

It had been better than a year ago. Geralt, he'd realized as he thought on it, was generally very sparing with his use of potions. The bottle shape had been different, and it hadn't been a grand and showy thing, and Geralt hadn't told him what it was or what it did, and...frankly, Jaskier was just lucky it had been the same thing. Fortunately, he was too tired to let that guilt and fear over what might've happened, had he guessed wrong, consume him. Instead he reached and dipped his hand in the bath and found it acceptably hot.

"It was practically the same and the only thing I spotted that looked remotely like it could be White Honey."

He stood and moved to the bed, offered his arm and shoulder as a crutch. Geralt could have been able to stand, Jaskier had no idea--what he did know was the exact number of stitches he'd put in the Witcher. Nobody with that many sutures could walk well on their own, not even a few feet. (Most people with that many sutures would have died before a much more skilled healer had finished applying them, but that was neither here nor there.)

[monsterbytrade]

Geralt thought that if it hadn't already smelled so dire in the room, he might have been able to pick up the emotion that curled around Jaskier's thin explanation. It had been utterly stupid to pull a potion at random and give it to a sick man-- but it had also been, in this case, the right thing to do. Fortunately vaving to pat Jaskier on the head was waylaid by the more immediate pain of getting off the bed.

He couldn't manage it. Not alone, not in the slightest.

Only with Jaskier taking more than his fair share of his (diminished) weight was Geralt able to stand and he was so glad that the water he'd drank had managed to ease his chapped throat some because he growled almost continuously at the pain of pulling his wounds away from the linens they'd dried to. He was too broken down to be able to lock his reactions away; in fact it was only the outlet of complaint that let him get through the exercise at all. His fingers gripped Jaskier's shoulder as hard as he could and felt humiliated at how badly he was injured. His legs stumbled as they tried to support him. His arms shook from holding on. By the time he was lowered into the tub he was sweating again and wondering if any of this was worth it. There was no pride left to even stop him from putting his head down on his raised knees. He was quiet for a long set of moments but his back moved up and down so he wasn't dead.

"Jaskier." Geralt said it without raising his head. "If you'd given me the wrong elixir there was a good chance of it killing me, but..." But. He didn't remember much but the pain of the purgative was clear enough. It was a very distinct pain. "If you'd giving me nothing I certainly would have died. You made the right call."

[whatupbuttercup]

Jaskier, unlike Geralt, was not a superhuman warrior monk dead-set on fighting the world into submission. He had been injured before, in life, and knew just how terribly humiliating such care could be. He cast his eyes about the room as he helped Geralt up, helped him hobble, and felt the soft growling as each movement pulled terribly at his stitches. He let Geralt settle and fetched a slew of bath supplies from his bag.

Then Geralt had to...congratulate him? It was a mixed message--a reminder of what Jaskier was doing his level best not to think about and a thanks for doing it anyway. He went still as he thought on it and decided, as with most great and stressful traumas, that it was best put off for when he could get very, very drunk.

He stood and it was as if a switch had been flipped behind his tired eyes. He was too exhausted to hide that, but at once he was all cheer and casual ease, as though he hadn't just lowered his--his best friend into a half filled bath so he could scrape the blood and stench from him. Jaskier returned to the side of the tub with an assortment of scented cremes and powders--a half dozen things the Witcher would have been loathe to let him use on himself, let alone on him.

"Nonsense," Jaskier announced and set out his tools along the floor by the bath. He drew up the one stool this room had and plunked himself down along the side. "You may smell like something died, but I had every confidence in you."

It was a lie told as smoothly as the slide of silk. Jaskier rolled up his sleeves, smiled, and broke into one of his nicer and gentler bathing cremes. It was meant for his face--to moisturize and cleanse without so much as stinging the eyes. It smelled of lavender and rosewater and cost ten crowns a container. He used it without hesitation to start washing Geralt's back, skating the rows upon rows of stitches as he gently cleaned the sweat off him.

Just like always.

"You were a bit rough around the edges, of course, but not so poorly as all that. You perked right up after we washed the bog off, and then slept like a newborn babe when you'd had that potion," Jaskier babbled, idly, as he washed. Geralt healed bruises quickly, almost alarmingly so, but even a Witcher's abilities couldn't wipe away the delicate yellows and greens and dark splotches around some of these wounds. This would take time.

"I do think I shall leave the stench out of the final ballad--you sweat like a horse, Geralt--I'm sorry to say. And the vomiting, also, for that matter. That never goes over well with a room of drunks--tempting the hand of fate, as it were."

[monsterbytrade]

Fine. It had been said, it was hard for both of them to talk about it like normal people, so it would suffice. Geralt actually found himself blowing out a breath and being grateful for it. He turned his head to the side at least so that this face were not pressed down against his knees and let his eyes close halfway as Jaskier began to carefully clean his back. It was easy to fall into the comfortable place of listening to Jaskier's words, letting them roll off of him like the occasional bathwater that was brought up for a rinse. Easier than considering what he must have put the man through to make him sidestep a compliment rather than crow about it.

"Good to hear that you haven't need to reconsider your occupation, then," Geralt said, voice slow but present. "Considering the state of things, I'd feared that perhaps you'd decided to leave your lute behind and become a tailor." A long-winded joke, but worth it if it contributed to the ease of tensions. He had to lapse into silence afterward, however, and catch his breath.

[whatupbuttercup]

Jaskier's fingers stilled as they moved across Geralt's skin. He drew them away, just slightly, before he did something stupid like letting them tense on one of those rows of sutures. He covered the gesture by reaching for the cleanser for Geralt's hair, this was old hat--this was familiar and not at all risky. The laugh he let out as he did was only slightly forced.

Oh, he did not...have the energy to keep this up. He wanted to be a good friend, to help Geralt feel better about how terrible the situation was...but if the Witcher was going to keep complimenting him, joking about these things, he could not keep up deflecting much longer. He maintained his smile but it was a wan attempt.

"I do have deft fingers, I will admit," Jaskier joked with some humor in his tone as he cleaned the sweat and thin layers of dried blood, of alcohol and salve, from Geralt's hair. This was not how he normally indulged, there was far less combing and scrubbing to be had, here. Jaskier was jittery already.

"I could have been a brilliant tailor...but alas, music calls to me," he prattled and scooped up water between his hands, to rinse the Witcher's hair and the span of his back. Fuck--he was going to have to move where Geralt could see him, next.

He took a moment to touch and examine the bandages in his side--they still had to soak free, but that could be done with focus after bathing. The water was already tinged pink, no need to make it more blood than not.

"I will definitely have to invent an appearance for that gods' awful creature, though," Jaskier continued, only half minding what he said as he drew his stool around to face Geralt's side and take one of his arms in hand. "An eyeless face filled with children's teeth, while memorable, is more haunting than my usual fare."

[monsterbytrade]

Geralt didn't understand the continued treble in Jaskier's voice, the lack of normal, tripping cadence. When the man came over to take his arm, Geralt managed to hold his head up just enough to study his companion's face. His hair was still sticking up in front from where he'd been asleep, the normal fringe nothing so much now as a great cow-lick.

He was distracted by the steer of topic, however. "The Skin-Eater's head. Where is it?" Not that he needed such a trophy for proof of payment for the people of this town. At this point (six days later), he assumed that the room and board had either become his pay or else Jaskier had been dipping into their savings. But with a creature like that, rare and particular, they could pawn it off for decent coin to any number of people specializing in such things.

Perhaps an ivory dealer, even.

[whatupbuttercup]

"The head?" Jaskier repeated dumbly and blinked. His hands stilled on Geralt's arm and his brow dipped as he thought back. "Oh the roadside, I'm afraid--I hadn't the time to--"

Oh.

Oh no.

Jaskier paled and his blue eyes went wide as he looked back and met Geralt's. Contradicting his own assurances was a dreadful faux-pas, of course, but that wasn't the thought that snared his tongue. He gaped a moment and then swallowed.

"Um," Jaskier started, hesitantly. He felt like he was observing his own body from afar. "It's...right across from...your sword."

[monsterbytrade]

Geralt's yellow eyes narrowed with the first admission-- it was not the preferred outcome, of course, but it wasn't the end of the world. Seemed a shame to lose the income but considering that he hadn't lost his life, well. He supposed forgiveness wasn't out of the question. But then.

The word sword had Geralt's fingers twitching and his hand actually pulled away from Jaskier's and made to touch the center of his chest, as if he'd find the belt still strapped there where it always was despite that he was half-dead and naked in a tub-- "on the roadside." Geralt just stared at Jaskier; clearly he'd heard him wrong.

He tried to find his next breath and keep back the anger. Jaskier had saved his life. Jaskier had saved his life. Jaskier had saved his, "YOU LEFT MY SWORD ON THE ROADSIDE?!" It certainly didn't have the force of a normal yell, and Geralt had to lean against the side of the tub to hold himself as he did it, but he managed.

[whatupbuttercup]

"Geralt--" Jaskier started as the Witcher snapped his hand back, his face a storm of fury and disbelief.

"I'm so sorry--there wasn't any time!" Jaskier defended and whipped back, standing up and thrusting his wet hands forward in the process. His posture was all surrender. "I had you on one side, and you were bleeding everywhere, and Roach was all but nipping at me, and you weren't really breathing, and I had to get you on the horse and back here--the head was mocking me, I swear, it might even still be there, the awful thing!

"The sword--it--you almost drove it into the dirt when it fell, it sounded like you even bent it--I can't recall, honestly I wasn't looking at the sword, not at all--I forgot it until this very moment! It--uh--maybe it is--not gone? I can go see--I swear I will go the moment we're done, Geralt!"

Jaskier, for all his reported skill with wordsmithing, babbled like an idiot when panic gripped him. He spoke a hundred words a minute, tried to speak them all at once, desperate to explain. They both knew that sword wouldn't be there--the thing was solid silver. Even drenched in blood and bent (even broken) it was worth more than any other single thing they carried.

Oh--wait, maybe it wasn't.

Jaskier kept that realization behind his teeth, somehow, and just stared helplessly at Geralt before him.

"We can replace it! We can head to Novigrad or Oxenfurt and find a good smith!"

[monsterbytrade]

"It's a sword," Geralt growled-- and oh, he managed to find a little pep there even if his fingers were white-knuckling the edge of the tub-- "it doesn't bend." He tried to even his breathing as Jaskier prattled onward and most of the words slipped in one ear and out the other as the edges of his vision went a little black. His pulse was thick and loud against his eardrums.

Jaskier was right, of course, he could have another sword made. But they needed money for a sword even if they happened to have base materials to forge, which they didn't, didn't have either. And without a silver sword it would be twice as hard to get either. "My fault," Geralt muttered, shoving the flare of anger back where it belonged. "You had enough to deal with." That wasn't even forgiveness, or thanks-- just a statement of the facts. Jaskier was not responsible for Geralt's sword, Geralt was. If there was any blame to be had then it was his own. He should have sheathed the damn thing. He should have been more prepared so that he wouldn't be in this position in the first place.

[whatupbuttercup]

Jaskier was given to stupid choices even when he was well-rested and had all his wits about him--he was an impulsive thing by nature and that often meant that he would let the full force of his reaction carry him through a poor decision without stopping and thinking it over. When he was tired, well, there was no hope for him. Jaskier watched Geralt and--okay, the objection to his piss-poor excuse? That was normal, that fit the mold of the narrative--but then--then the Witcher took the blame.

Jaskier knew Geralt's penchant for negativity, he'd always been this way, and it didn't help that random fuckoff people tended to encourage the Witcher's self-image problems. All it took was one or two people calling him Butcher or Monster and (despite being a model Witcher, immune to human emotion, etc,) Geralt would be pissy for a week. Jaskier's natural response had become aggression, at least when Geralt wasn't around to overhear it, and for some insane reason, that was what Jaskier's mind defaulted to when Geralt took the blame for the loss of his sword.

Geralt was clinging to the tub and looked ready to pass back out, which would be catastrophic, frankly, and he gritted his teeth and took the blame and Jaskier went from terrified to furious in a single breath.

"Oh--oh, no, no, no--I know that look," Jaskier said and leaned back in, his supplicant pose shifting as one hand gripped the tub rim and the other started wagging a warning finger at the Witcher. "Of the two of us, Geralt," he continued, angry and emphatic, "one was out fighting that damned nightmare beast and the other was talking to a horse all night--

"The loss of that sword is absolutely not on you," Jaskier defended with all the vehemence of a man who would get into a fight with the person who had done the deed, even if it was himself. "I'll go look for it and if it's not there, so be it, I'll pay for the replacement myself! But I'll not have you going all grim around the edges when we've still got to get you cleaned and sewn up.

"There's plenty to brood about without resorting to taking blame that belongs to me!"

[monsterbytrade]

Self-image problems? Geralt would have fought that notion to the death. No-- he knew exactly what he was and had fully come to terms with being slightly less than something human. To say that that he got pissy about being reminded about such a thing was insulting. (The truth-- which was neither here nor there-- was that he absolutely did, but instead of calling an apple an apple he would simply walk around like he'd been sucking on a lemon while condemn the town, the beer, the height of his stirrups, the direction of the breeze... and so on and so forth, until the insults stopped lingering.)

The suddenly wagging finger in his face had the same ability to pull that sour look onto his face, his lips pinching together and his full eyebrows drawing dangerously low. "Idiot," he finally managed, seemingly to sink a little as he excepted the scolding. He breathed in slowly, and then out.

"Send someone to fetch it at least," he said. "I think you need sleep more than I do. You look like shit."

[whatupbuttercup]

Jaskier squawked with offense and his hand drew back to press against his chest. Well. He. Never.

"I'll have you know I look positively fabulous, all things considered," Jaskier defended but his waspishness softened as Geralt acquiesced to his point. Or, at least, that's what he figured had happened--Geralt's 'idiot' array was almost as encompassing as his 'hmmm's. Jaskier knew what most of them meant and this one sounded resigned and very vaguely fond. (Ergo: acquiescence.)

"I'll send someone and fetch some more hot water," Jaskier volunteered and stood up, smoothing down his trousers as he did. He absolutely looked like shit, rumpled and stained with varying water-spots and bits of pinkish faded blood. "I don't think I can pay enough to have them bring that head back, but I'll see if I can't find someone brave and foolhardy."

He looked down at Geralt and the array of things next to him and his brow pinched just a bit. He knew the Witcher wouldn't be inclined to use any of it, but it would certainly make him feel (and smell) far better.

"Feel free to take as you like while I'm gone--and no brooding."

[monsterbytrade]

Spoken as if he felt like moving. Geralt only grunted (he didn't brood) and watched Jaskier leave. He doubted that anyone would retrieve the head or in fact that it would be there at all. There were animals everywhere who did not share Jaskier's same squeamish nature. Tough hide could be peeled or plucked away and carrion birds rarely cared at the taste of the things they dined on. Dust to dust. Ironic-- much like a Witcher. Send a monster to deal with a monster. The sword had not been special, just a means of dispatch.

Geralt stared down at the water in the bath. It was cloudy with dirt, blood, grime. He rested his head on the back of his hand still holding the tub and closed his eyes. A Skin-Eater! and he had challenged it for nothing but the sad faces in a pitiful town who was losing its children. Vesemir would have tanned him. Still would, if Jaskier actually did decide to make it into one of his ballads. Surely the song would paint Geralt as a soft but courageous touch, the savior who had gone into battle with nothing but a handful of elixirs and a silver sword. And despite the obvious, Geralt knew what else he'd had but would go unmentioned:

He had Jaskier.

"Fuck," Geralt breathed-- and then tensed in a way that made his body snarl as a feminine shriek came from behind him. He lifted his head and the woman shrieked again before shoving two large, steaming pitchers onto the floor near the bath and picking up her skirts in order to flee as fast as she could. She almost ran over Jaskier as he was coming in the door and it was a sight enough that Geralt would have chuckled if he could have been sure that it wouldn't have hurt.

[whatupbuttercup]

The innkeeper's wife was a lovely woman, always helpful, always with a sympathetic look to the bard when he went to request this or that. He'd thought she'd be elated to see Geralt up and...well, not about, per se, but awake and alive. She'd been one of the ones who helped haul him onto the table when they'd arrived back in town--honestly, she'd seen him in a far worse state than nude and in a tub.

And yet, after he'd paid the blacksmith's son (a teenager with a grand sense of adventure) to go and search for Geralt's sword, and returned, he had expected to greet her by the door, to smile and chat a bit as he got that water. He hadn't thought she'd have taken the water up herself (the dear) and was absolutely staggered as he came back up stairs--he heard her shriek and then she blew past him, running down the hall in a blind fright.

His first concern, off course, was Geralt and he charged into the room to find...that the Witcher was precisely where he'd left him. What?

He stared, then looked at the pitchers of steaming water, and then glanced back out the door. His expression went a touch sour.

"Rude," he declared and kicked the door shut as he fetched up one of the pitchers.

"She was just in here the day before last! Said you looked much better! You'd think she'd be happy to see you out of bed!"

He dumped the warm water into the tub without thinking overmuch and set the empty pitcher aside. If the sudden heat was a shock to the Witcher, Jaskier didn't notice--he was too busy shooting a glare at the closed door. He retook his seat with a huff and, as he did, plucked up a bar of castille soap from his supplies and dug back into that creme cleanser.

"Some people," he huffed and held the bar out for Geralt--oh, who was still leaning against the side. He retracted the bar a bit and his expression softened. "Are you alright, my friend? Do you need more water? Something to eat? I can hurry this along if it's taxing for you."

[monsterbytrade]

What? Geralt was still huffing from the sudden influx of heat and hadn't even seen the soap proffered him before it was being used against his back. This time around things weren't so awkward aside from the injuries; whatever tone had been between them before-- whatever the hell had been wrong with Jaskier-- seemed to have passed. It was fine. It had been tiring. He was tired. "Water's already working," he muttered as he leaned, his eyes drooping. He meant drinking it-- he felt much improved.

He didn't fall asleep but he drifted, grunted at whatever Jaskier was saying. The turn of the soap across him was too soothing to fight, the wash of the water every time it was scooped up and poured over him. Geralt hummed. He didn't mind this. He never truly minded when Jaskier made a fuss about grooming him, though he'd never say it. Maybe he mumbled something about it. Perhaps. At some point the someone was trying to lift him... and then he went, gamely, one foot in front of the other. The pain was there but far away.

Perhaps he was actually asleep.

There was the vague sense of being lowered into bed, of warm hands on him and a lilting voice. Geralt felt warm. He might have smiled even though his body felt like it weights were attached to his limbs. He tried to reach out and hold onto the voice but he couldn't, quite, it slipped through his fingers. It slipped and then he sank into darkness.

When Geralt woke he knew two things: one, that the light through the windows was late morning and two, that he was ravenous.

It was still hard to move, to try and push himself up as he looked for water, for Jaskier, for anything.

[whatupbuttercup]

Geralt drifted, comfortable and sleepy as Jaskier worked. The bard let him but, despite the Witcher not being able to answer him, continued to chat at him as he cleaned, as he carefully rinsed across his stitches, as he changed the bed linens, and peeled the soaked bandages from his side. By the time he had the Witcher settled in bed, spread out over a set of pink stained towels, he was talking about the weather in Oxenfurt during winter. It was the most inane conversation he'd ever had at Geralt, but speaking to fill the air felt correct and the Witcher, well, he wasn't aware enough to object.

He could tell when the man finally passed out--his body went perfectly limp, sank into the feather mattress, and even his breathing failed to catch as Jaskier tried to tend his exposed wounds. He gave it his best, rinsed them with clear water, cleaned the edges gently with clear alcohol, cleaned his tools as he worked, but he was hesitant to flush anything les he wake the Witcher up. When he'd done what he could (which was less than should be done, frankly), Jaskier wound a few rolls of fresh bandage around his legs, around his side--and that had been a trick to pull off, but with a bit of struggling he'd done it--and tucked the Witcher in.

Jaskier ran out of words by the time he was done--it was getting late in the day and he debated going down for food, for drink, but gave up on the idea as soon as it came to him. No, he settled for planting himself, face-first into the bedroll on the floor and was out the very moment he was horizontal.

He woke once before dark--the teenage boy he'd sent to look for Geralt's sword was standing over him, looking pleased as punch, holding--fucking shit--no, not a sword--that was the creature's head. The creature's half eaten head, peeled by crows and rats, brackish meat exposed beneath the surface of teeth and rot, was what greeted Jaskier as he woke. He would have retched but, thankfully, he hadn't eaten a bite. He congratulated the eager youth, paid him, and demanded he put that thing in a sack and put that sack somewhere else. The boy had agreed with relish and run off, coin in hand, to do as he asked.

It took a while after that to sleep again and, when he did, that stupid eyeless bag of teeth haunted his dreams. He did not wake before Geralt, even though he'd planned to, but he had left water nearby in the event the Witcher woke.

[monsterbytrade]

The water was found and (while his arm was shaking badly, it was managed) finished in its entirety. There was no dealing with the pitcher to get a refill and anyway, the first had winded him. So Geralt just lay back, panting quietly and happy that his stomach was not trying to rebel for being full while looking out the window onto a view that was not whatever this awful fucking life boasted for an afterlife. Seemed that destiny was not done with him yet.

After a moment, his gaze shifted to Jaskier. The man was hardly a pretty sleeper. Lips parted, limbs akimbo, hair askew. And yet... the soft curve of his cheek, the way his fingers curled loosely under his chin. It wasn't as if Geralt hadn't had more than enough opportunities to see Jaskier sleep over the years, he just never bothered. Sometimes the bard talked in his sleep (the lack of surprise when he'd discovered that had been astounding) and there was the one night that Geralt had literally dragged him into a lake to make it stop, but...

He'd never just. Watched him. There was always something to do. Always some pressing matter-- camp to wrap up, a monster to waylay, a road to get on. Now he couldn't get himself up if he'd wanted to, he ached from head to toe and had nothing better to do than to lay here and watch the crawl of the sun across the prone form of the bard, still in yesterday's clothes.

And then Geralt's stomach apparently finished parsing the water and gave a mighty lurch and yowl to remind him that it had been days since he'd eaten.

Ah, well.

Geralt threw the empty leather cup in his hand at Jaskier.

[whatupbuttercup]

The leather cup smacked Jaskier soundly across the face. The bard, finally caught in tangle of sleep proper, didn't start awake so much as let out a plaintive groan and roll onto his back. But there was water on his face, and now his nose hurt, and the room didn't smell of that horrible head anymore--he smeared his hand across the dampness on his cheek and blinked, blearily, brows furrowed, into the morning light.

"What day is it?" he asked no one in particular and did not expect an answer. His brain caught up to his waking a split-second after he asked and he jolted upright. His head whipped back and--there was Geralt. Awake and deadpan and very much alive still--Jaskier was, quite abruptly, overjoyed.

"Geralt! Nice of you to join me!" Jaskier greeted and stood up, sleepy and unstable in a truly ungainly way. His hip was still asleep and that wasn't fair--he stumbled a bit but caught himself halfway to the bed.

"How are you feeling? Better? You look better--also smell better," Jaskier told him, rapid fire, as his energy returned. It was true, Geralt didn't look ready to die and that was nothing short of miraculous.

[monsterbytrade]

He didn't feel like he was ready to die-- aside from perhaps hunger-- and it showed in the way he dropped annoyed eyes to the tent in Jaskier's trousers, clearly as peppy in the mornings as the man himself, and simply closed his eyes with a groan. "Just stop... talking. It's the morning of whatever day it happens to be. I need something to eat." He'd thanked the man the day before, hadn't he? Then he certainly didn't need to do it again.

He opened his eyes slowly. "I didn't... say anything. About your singing last night. Did I?" Geralt thought he had dreamed about it, though nothing he could clearly recall. He'd been in Oxenfurt and it had been snowing, or else the song that he had been listening to was that awful ballad the bard had named Winter that was about nothing but the properties of love's tendency to freeze. Jaskier had spent almost a month of the road trying to write that; it had been a taxing month. But in the dream he'd definitely been in Oxenfurt.

[whatupbuttercup]

Jaskier was torn for a moment, between delight and the realization that his morning eagerness had decided to make a show. He glanced down and palmed himself, a bit firmly, to try and crush the thoughts of that from his mind--it was an indelicate procedure, this, but necessary. He moved to the side of the bed, looked for the pitcher of soup--but that had been...fuck, two days ago? If it was here, it was congealed terribly.

"Right, right," he muttered and was distracted by Geralt's question.

"About my singing?" Jaskier repeated and tried to recall--no, Geralt hadn't said much of note. Some passing comments, his usual fare, a hum here and there. The bard was tired, but not so tired that he'd have forgotten either insult or compliment about his singing. He hadn't even sung to him, had he? That, he couldn't remember--it was entirely possible he had.

Fuck and he was still standing here palming himself like a teenager. Unsexy thoughts--ah! Speaking of!

"No, not that I recall," he admitted in a slightly strained voice and withdrew his hands to settle them on his hips. "But I did have some news--the boy I sent to look for your blade came back with the head of that...thing."

And that was an image that could kill an erection so quickly it was staggering.

[monsterbytrade]

Geralt took great pains to ignore the way that Jaskier seemed to want to idly hang onto himself-- as if he were wielding a club which he might be prone to begin bludgeoning an unsuspecting subject with quite suddenly-- until the man spoke up about the head. He shifted slightly so that he could see the bard. "A boy." Leave it to Jaskier to send a child to fetch a nightmare.

"At least there's that." Geralt tried to gather a large inhale and then winced as his side objected sharply. "We can find someone who'll buy it." He snorted and then cursed as his side objected that, too. "Hell," he said in more of a monotone once he could breathe again, "Yen might want it, and you know how she is about throwing money at things she wants. Maybe she'll crush all those teeth down into a face powder, or lotion." Now if he could just get out of bed. Geralt looked at Jaskier. "Two breakfasts," he said, determinedly working his way up the headboard into a sitting position. "And get something for yourself as well. The sleep hasn't improved your palor."

[whatupbuttercup]

He would have objected to Geralt's assessment, that he had sent an actual child, but a teenager wasn't a far cry better. He held his tongue as the Witcher twisted and shifted to sit--thet he could manage that much was, in itself, a grand improvement but it had Jaskier glowering before long.

"Yes, yes," Jaskier agreed and, now that his cock wasn't about to be announcing him as he entered every room, he picked past the bathtub and headed for the door. He cast one last, assessing look at the Witcher--if he tore out any stitches, Jaskier would go positively feral, that he knew--before ducking out into the hall.

The innkeeper's wife gave him a terrified look when he came down, like he was being followed by some grim spectre, but dutifully nodded and went about cooking as Jaskier made his requests. The boy he had sent to fetch the head was downstairs, crowing about the whole experience with his friends--you'd think he'd fought the damn thing for how he spun the story. (Still, Jaskier was fond of tales of heroics and listened while he waited.)

When the innkeeper's wife finished, nearly half an hour had passed, and the plates she had piled up were heavy enough that he had to ask her to help him take them up. She declined, made some excuses about cleaning, but that boy jumped right to service and all but clamored up the stairs after the bard.

Jaskier returned with three plates, one with a whole stack of bacon and eggs, one with two loaves of bread and a bowl of butter, and one with cold smoked fish and hot slices of ham piled high--which so happened to be the one carried by his helper.

[monsterbytrade]

Geralt examined his stitches while Jaskier was gone. He folded back mercifully clean sheets to his stomach and pushed fingers lightly against the bandage-- stained, but not badly-- and then smoothed calluses over a long line of new stitches and pink, healing flesh in a line from his mid-stomach to near under his armpit.

(Nails like talons, curved ivory that had no moon to flash in and thus give themselves away; he hadn't felt the cut until the blood had stuck his jerkin to his skin and slowed him further.)

There was a slow breath given to the silent room. There were noises of life in the village outside the window and even the house itself but the Witcher didn't need any such sunlit reminders to banish things that crept in the dark. He'd been made not to feel horror the way normal people did. His fingers slowed on the stitches. Lucky him.

The stitches were small and mostly even. Those with no mind to be physicians who were thrust into the position often skewed one of two ways-- too few stitches, because they were scared, because they were sick-- or too many, out of worry. Geralt was proud to see that Jaskier had done neither and wondered if it was simply borne of the vanity in the man that had forced him to learn to mend his own clothes once he began following Geralt further and further from towns. Had repeated practice become muscle memory?

When the door opened, Geralt's hand slid back to the bed. That he was impressed by both the handiwork and the fact that Jaskier had actually given up expensive thread to mend him didn't need to be aired. The smell of the food filled his mouth with saliva and if his reflexes had been in tact he would have grabbed a herring off the plate as it passed him-- as it was his stomach growled. Loudly. The boy stared at his stomach and then at him.

"Boo," the Witcher said, wondering if he'd scatter.

[whatupbuttercup]

The teenager wasn't squeamish, Jaskier had realized that much when he'd woken him up with that grotesque head in hand, beaming like he'd felled a prize buck. He did seem a little terrified of Geralt, though, which made less sense. He set the plate down on the stool by the tub and, when Geralt made a faint joke at him, actually did hustle out of the room.

It was a confusing reaction and Jaskier made no attempt to hide his feelings as the boy darted out into the hall. He looked back at Geralt as he set the other plates on the bed, and shook his head.

"I have no idea," he professed vaguely and it was half a sentiment. Whatever pep he'd awoken with had begun to fade as he waited for food. (Thirty minutes sitting in silence would do that, wouldn't it?) He was still tired--he'd probably feel tired for days. The smell of food helped, however, and he picked up a slice of ham the moment the plate left his fingers.

Jaskier didn't bother sitting on the bed and just resigned himself to plunking down on the floor next to Geralt. The side of the bed was a decent structure to lean against and this kept him closer to the ham and herring.

"If you need something, dear Witcher, do tell me," Jaskier requested as he idly ate his ham. "You're more thread than skin at the moment, and I'd rather not sully all of the sheets in this establishment. Not with blood, at least."