whatupbuttercup | PSL Horsetrading with Monsterbytrade

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PSL Horsetrading with Monsterbytrade

To the surprise of positively no one, Jaskier was a bit discerning when it came to purchasing anything of significant value. He picked his cremes and soaps out with care, sampled and carefully balanced the perfumes he carried, gauged and tested the accouterments he kept for the care of his lute--and his clothes, the ridiculous care he took in picking fabric and trim would have driven anyone but the tailor themselves to distraction. None of this had ever been inflicted on Geralt of Rivia directly--Jaskier tended to take the day to shop, whenever they were near a major city and Geralt was suitably occupied with hunting.

This time, however, Geralt had to come with him.

Jaskier had coin enough for most trinkets and niceties--but a horse? A horse was a pricey thing and he would have to encroach into the Witcher's purse if he planned on picking out any creature that could tolerate their particularly dangerous brand of wandering.

Fortunately, for all the sound and fury of Oxenfurt, there were a wealth of horse ranches in the surrounding farmland. They had no shortage of beasts to pick from and, with the market days of the big city, it was an easy task to see the lot of them lined up and ready for sale.

Jaskier picked through the herds (literal and figurative) and examined each horse that caught his eye. He hummed, spoke to them, twined his fingers through their manes, and made clucking noises with his tongue whenever one was deemed inappropriate or unworthy. There were more than a few that he fussed over for long stretches of time, but each failed some unspoken test and was given a sad pat on their long snouts as the bard bade them farewell.

They'd started at dawn, just as the first traders had arrived, and late afternoon was creeping into evening as they wandered. A dozen dealers had their stock sorted through and found wanting and, all the while, Jaskier darted to and fro--eagerly searching for something he couldn't explain.

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The words and tone from the man's mouth did not match and Geralt made a low noise that was the very opposite of pleased. Jaskier's hand on his arm could stop literally nothing and a small voice at the back of the Witcher's head-- ignored-- said that perhaps it was time to show the bard how very little control he really had over any given situation. Ignored, always ignored. Which was how they had found themself here. "You and the word discretion have never been uttered in the same sentence," he growled out into the not large space between them, as he had crowded Jaskier back to make his point--failed--with physical bulk.

Failed, always failed.

"Why must you be like this? Behave like this? Do you think that I'd ever offer your cock another sideways glance if I thought for a moment that this is how you would react? For everyone's sake, Jaskier, grow up." With another shove, this one half-hearted, Geralt shook off the man's touch and moved away. It was that easy, after all.

'Jaskier, grow up.'

Geralt often said things that danced on the line of cruelty. Jaskier had always chocked it up to the fact that the Witcher's most constant companion was a horse and, as such, he didn't get much feedback. As it turned out, that was just how Geralt was. It shouldn't have been terribly surprising, honestly, that once he couldn't deflect or defend against a problem he turned to attack--it was how Geralt dealt with everything else.

It was almost impressive, how good he was with his words when it came to wounding. He used them so poorly the rest of the time that Jaskier never expected the hurts before they came.

'Why must you be like this? --this is how you react? Grow up.'

For all his melodrama about Destiny, Geralt was a lucky shot when he fired blind. Every other word in his little waspish rant struck home and Jaskier flinched back. When the Witcher shoved him and shook him off, Jaskier stayed against the wall, expression the very reflection of how stunned he was.

Geralt had punched him to less effect.

Instantly, of course, Jaskier's fool heart started making excuses for Geralt. He was flustered. He was a private person and didn't take well to flirting. He didn't like shows of affection or words of affection or words of thanks, even, and Jaskier knew it. The last two days had been long and boring for him. He must care, he invited the bard along, bought him a horse so they could travel better. Geralt cared about him.

Geralt cared about him, he knew that--why did that make him so absolutely, blindingly furious?

"Fuck off!" Jaskier cursed, inelegantly, several seconds after it would have been appropriate to deliver a retort like that. The redness of his cheeks went, in that short time, from a flush of embarrassment to a patchy red of anger. He pushed off from the wall and gestured sharply at Geralt with a finger.

"I should grow up?" Jaskier asked rhetorically, all but shouting. If Geralt was embarrassed that someone loved him, if he so desperately wanted discretion so that he could hide their shame, he wasn't going to find reprieve in this fucking town. "I'm not the one who storms off at the drop of a hat and slams people into walls! Can't threaten me quiet so, what? Call me childish? Pretend you're doing me a favor by putting up with me? Call me a desperate slut, in so many words?

"Fuck off, Geralt." Jaskier said and finally let his voice drop down to a normal speaking volume. He made a rude gesture at the Witcher and then let his hand fall to his hip. The bitterness that laced his tone was thick. "If I'm so loathsome and childish, I can't imagine how desperate you must have been to fuck me the first time."

"Oh get your head out of your ass," Geralt snapped, angry, just letting himself feel it, not bothering to rein it in as he turned back into the onslaught. The sight of Jaskier almost made him bite his tongue-- he'd never seen the man's face quite that color in the time they'd been together, never heard his voice hit that stinging register-- but drew himself up, his shoulders set and tight. Ready to battle if it would be a battle.

The truth was that the last two days had not been long and boring. He liked horses and despite Jaskier being particular, Geralt had no qualms about spending time surrounded by the smell of leather and manure and the damned hyacinthe that the man bought in his soaps. He wanted Jaskier to have a horse, for them to... to be on more equal ground.

Fuck, maybe this was all his fault.

"I don't care how many people you bed unless it gets a kettle chucked at me through a window by some scorned woman and you damn well know it," he barked back. "And you won't shut up! What else am I supposed to do other than throw you into walls and tell you the truth? Tell me, then, Jaskier. How in the hell do I stop your infernal mouth?"

Had the bard been less livid and ready to shout, he probably wouldn't have decided that his best retort in this particular argument was something so very crass. As it was, the first thing out of his mouth was:

"Did I not just offer to suck your cock, you stubborn jackass?" Jaskier threw his arms over his head and let out a frustrated sound as he rolled his eyes skyward.

"Unbelievable," he added, to Melitele if no one else. "First you can't decide if you hate that I think of you like a lover, that I flirt and treat you like one--and then you claim you don't care how many lovers I have, because you're special and not among them but also fine with them on whole? Clearly, Geralt, you should decide on some designation for us because letting me do it is obviously unsatisfactory--"

"It is!"

Geralt cut him off with words and a menacing step forward. "Because you use three hundred words when three will suffice, Jaskier, always." Two more steps carried him back to the place where he was too close to Jaskier, hedging him back against the wall without touching him. He was aware that his breath smelled like malt and his clothes smelled like horse but Jaskier still, somehow, smelled good enough for the both of them.

"I want you." Three words, simple and direct, breathed against the bard's mouth. He didn't want songs about sucking cock and he certainly didn't want them aired in the middle of the pub. But the floodgates had been opened and there was no closing them now; on their trek down from the hotsprings Geralt had considered several creative ways to shut Jaskier up. "No ribald comments in public." He laid a hand over the bard's sex; the only threat in the touch the pleasure to follow if there was agreement between them. "No woo'ing, we are not lovers and you know it as well as I." And no mention of this to Yennefer. Geralt kept that to himself and instead clarifed: "I want no songs, no declarations.

"Yes?"

Geralt, once again, crowded him back against the wall--but this time, Jaskier did half the work for him, scrambling back just as quickly as he'd surged forward. Geralt loomed like he was made for it and, in a rather macabre way, he was--those amber eyes eclipsed everything else that Jaskier could have focused on and, all at once his heart was pounding so hard he thought it might jump out of his ribs.

He had just been livid--absolutely beyond the pale--Geralt had been--what was happening--

Jaskier's offense was choked off firmly as Geralt confirmed his desires--and then his hand was heavy and pressed right against his groin and Jaskier's breath stuttered a bit. He tried very hard to focus but the smell of Geralt was all around him all at once and the Witcher was growling his conditions--damn it all, he was frazzled. It took quite a lot to reroute himself, to change the flow of his thoughts from fighting to, well, whatever this had become. Fucking wasn't a contest to the bard and the diversion from one to the promise of the other was not a smooth one.

His thoughts jumped but he managed to parrot back Geralt's conditions. Mostly.

"No ribald comments," Jaskier promised idly, his expression shifting to some semblance of shock and somber agreement all at once. He nodded firmly, if only in an attempt to clear his head, and his cock jumped under Geralt's hand. "No wooing, yes, right--no--none of it--"

That oath fell out of him before he thought it over and the moment he said it, Jaskier felt a sinking sensation in his chest. It was foolish, idiotic, but Jaskier was a romantic at heart--to be stripped of the chance to--they weren't lovers? Well, of course Geralt didn't love him, to think otherwise was lunacy--but he couldn't woo him? Couldn't flirt?

Jaskier felt momentarily bereft and lacked the wherewithal to explain.

"Geralt, I--" Jaskier started but, Gods' thinking was hard. He really did let his cock do too much of his focusing for him. Geralt had admitted to wanting him. That was enough--it was more than he'd had before. Friendship and this...was enough. "I want you--please--"

To Geralt, woo was different than flirt-- Jaskier flirted with everyone. Every breath he had flirted with one thing or another. Touching, laughing, joking, constantly. To woo was different, though, that was openly courting someone, confirming that they were... being public and constant and involved. Geralt had no time for that, no inclination either. He and Yen--

Well it didn't matter, that. He still didn't want Jaskier swaning around him like some fool, especially if they were going to be on the road together.

Geralt's fingers slid up the outline of Jaskier's cock through the soft fabric of his trousers. "Then stop talking," he breathed, closer to Jaskier's mouth. It was almost a dare. The heel of his palm twisted and rubbed against the head of the filling sex under his hand. "And do something about it."

"Fucking hell," Jaskier breathed there was something he needed to do--some confirmation he required--how did he always get this deep into things with Geralt before he remembered to ask permission? Geralt wanted him to shut up. Geralt always wanted him to shut up, so this wasn't really any different than usual, except now Geralt was grinding his hand into his dick, daring him to do something about it.

He hadn't been this turned on and eager to show someone what-for since he'd been a teenager. Geralt had only been touching him for a minute or two and already he was rising to the moment--yes, being pushed up against a wall and held there had gotten him going a bit, but that wasn't--look--he wasn't on trial, here.

He also wasn't a shrinking violet.

With Geralt looming and being angry, it was easy to forget, but Jaskier was possibly one of the least shy people on the continent. It was a simple fact and one that he recalled in an odd moment of clarity. He'd charged up here because he'd flustered the Witcher--he'd done it before, even! Geralt was certainly a master of that big, growly, scowling animal magnetism he had going, but Jaskier wasn't a damsel--he'd wanted to push the Witcher down onto a bed and worship his cock.

This whole interlude had been his plan, for fuck's sake--true, he hadn't intended to get into a fight before he did it, but that was beside the point.

The point was: Geralt just gave him permission and a challenge all at once.

He could work with that.

Jaskier was shorter than him, smaller than him, but so was the better portion of the continent. Geralt was built like he made it his personal mission to wrestle mountains into submission--there was no actual contending with that. Fine. Jaskier had never been an especially large fellow--he played an instrument and sang for a living for Melitele's sake--but he had a wiry strength. If Geralt didn't want to talk, fine, so be it, they could be pushy and shove-y.

Jaskier planted both hands on the Witcher's chest and pushed him away. (Or he attempted it, his success did rather necessitate the Witcher's willingness to cooperate.) The bed was opposite him--oh, and it was that gloriously comfortable feather mattress--and if Geralt gave in a few steps he'd have the man's knees against it and he could push him over. Jaskier followed as he pressed and leaned in. A kiss on the mouth felt a bit personal after being told they weren't lovers. Explicitly. He settled for dragging mouth and teeth against the Witcher's neck instead, it was easier to reach anyway.

While he would have been content turning Jaskier's face into the wood and--

well, shutting him up,

but Geralt let himself be pushed back the few steps to the bed, Jaskier's hands a warm pressure against his chest. He let himself be seated, and then spread out beneath the bard's attention. There was something to Jaskier like this, something that the witcher had only ever noticed when the man was-- specifically-- trying to capture a melody that was eluding him. It was a tightening focus, a sort of sharp determination to pry under the surface. The attention was strange when it was turned on Geralt but... strange in a way that twisted a heated knot in his gut and his made his fingers clench into the wonderfully soft mattress beneath him. He tilted his chin up, casually offering Jaskier the length of his neck.

Unlike the bard, Geralt had no problems with kissing. Whores kissed, parents kissed, dogs licked each other when they said hello. It was pleasurable, and, when Jaskier's mouth came close enough-- Geralt claimed it with an appetite.

Geralt was being surprisingly cooperative--well, now he was--and let himself be arranged to Jaskier's convenience. Jaskier's hands worked as he attended to Geralt's neck. The bard let out a short, soft sound as Geralt kissed him--it was too brief to be much of anything, happy or unhappy, but it was uncommon. He stilled a moment as Geralt claimed his lips, but it was only a moment--his fingers found the fasten at Geralt's waist and popped the top clasp. He pressed back, then, as his fingers moved down that row of buttons. He licked into Geralt's mouth with his newfound focus, but the actual act started to rankle before long.

(They weren't lovers.)

He could have savored this were that sentiment not so fresh on his mind. Geralt tasted like the good ale of this particular establishment, his mouth was hot and heady, Jaskier had wanted to kiss him off and on all day, but a line had been drawn. (Jaskier's fool heart wasn't keen to prod at the boundary so quickly.)

Fortunately, it didn't take Jaskier's fingers much time at all to unbutton Geralt's fly. Even when working blind, the bard's hands were nimble and quick.

He broke away from Geralt's mouth and dropped to his knees alongside the bed. He would have asked, any other time, whether Geralt would prefer he suck him or simply fuck him, but they weren't talking. That was the theme for the moment and Jaskier had committed to it. His fingers found the Witcher's cock inside his trousers and, before he'd even pulled it free, Jaskier was mouthing along the underside of it.

Jaskier would have asked and Geralt would have probably told him to make up his own mind and then act on it. Sex was a give-and-take-- if Jaskier sunk between his knees and Geralt wanted his cock somewhere other than the man's mouth, he'd speak up. Why Jaskier needed to codify everything with language was and would always be a mystery to Geralt.

Now he gave a quiet grunt as Jaskier sank back, those clever fingers slipping buttons free and prying at his cock with hand and mouth. Geralt arched his back and shifted slightly on the bed, moving just enough to sink himself down into the weight of the mattress, his thighs flat. His sex twitched with the attention, mostly full and heavily laying in the crook of his hip.

Is this how they'd be, then, from now on? Arguing and then making up with sex? Geralt knew that it was a bad precedent to set but he'd never quite been in such a position before and there was a part of him that would never be able to get the sound that Jaskier had made back at the hot springs when he'd orgasmed out of his mind. He wanted to hear it again. He wanted the silences, too, that came with occupied Jaskier, or Jaskier with his mouth full. Geralt realized that they'd perhaps loosed something that they'd never quite be able to put back again... but at the same time, he felt a gnawing pit of hunger at the base of his gut when he considered the possibilities.

Geralt was pliant in a way that was rather unique to this situation--he let Jaskier do as he would, settled and sank into the mattress, and grunted as Jaskier took him in hand and lost himself in laving attention on the pretty cock in front of him. And, damn it all, there was a sentiment he wasn't going to be able to express--why had Geralt been so firm on declarations? Did praise and filth qualify? Somehow he doubted the Witcher would appreciate him waxing on about the color and weight of his erection.

Jaskier dragged the flat of his tongue up the length of the Witcher's cock, letting saliva smooth the pressure of his hand that chased after. He wrapped his fingers around him and drew the tip of him into his mouth, sucking idly as he traced the crown of his cock with his tongue--and the taste of him. Oh, he hadn't had this before--Geralt's cock tasted like the very distillation of that musk that lingered under the smell of horse and sweat that clung to him. Fuck. Jaskier moaned around him and bent forward so that he could pull him to the back of his throat.

As much as Jaskier was trying not to think about that little nagging delineation (Not lovers? As they both knew?), as hard as he attempted to fall into the moment, his mind drifted. It was frustrating, to be distracted whilst he had a--what was he even supposed to call him? Geralt was still hesitant to use the term friend in casual conversation? Paramour would be right out, Jaskier suspected--focus--Jaskier hummed on reflex, bobbed his head and swirled his tongue around the hot flesh in his mouth. Designations--friend, lover, whatever--those could come later. Surely.

Damn it all.

"--But what, exactly, would you call us if not lovers?"

Geralt's fingers pushed into linens, creasing them under his palms as hips raised with a groan for Jaskier's mouth on him. He was happy enough to let go of the fighting and bickering and semantics and just-- do this. So his eyes were closed, chin tilted up to put his head back, to create a line of pressure down his spine. To let his balls draw up in time to the slow rhythm of his pulse they ached to. His thigh muscles twitched as his cock sank into softly resisting muscles--

A question spilled into the air and his eyes opened, staring at the low-beamed ceiling.

Jaskier was talking.

He was asking a fucking question while Geralt's cock sat hard and cooling in the room's air.

It was absolutely nothing to get a knee under Jaskier's stomach and jerk the man far enough forward that Geralt's arms could help follow through with the rest: the bard was tossed up onto the bed like a sack of grain in just a few quick, efficient uses of muscle. His face ended up down in a pillow, his arms locked high behind his back, and Geralt's knees pressed into the back of his, holding him down beyond any ability he might have other than death to get away. That Geralt's still-hard cock was pushed against Jaskier's ass seemed neither here nor there in that moment-- the insistent pressure was less present than the rough breath against the bard's ear.

"Why," Geralt growled, "do you need to know?" Each syllable rode the edge of danger. By all means, it implied with hissing sarcasm, let us continue this conversation.

Jaskier talked quite a lot, even he would have acknowledge that. It was part and parcel of being a poet, a bard, but also just his own personal inclination. He was full of words and very much enjoyed talking--he especially enjoyed talking to the people he bedded. The most obvious reason for that was, of course, that he liked the people he bedded. The less obvious reason for that was that he had been bedded by people that he--did not like. It was, at once, courtesy and self-preservation.

Part and parcel of being a wandering bard, really.

He trusted Geralt to his very core--the Witcher had saved his life more times than he could count. (True, he put himself in jeopardy more often than not, but the life-saving was legitimate.) Geralt might be inclined to punch him if he said something especially off color or prodded at an excruciating old wound, but by in large the Witcher was rough in the way a big dog might be. He was big and he was fast and he was strong and, above all, Geralt was used to being able to use these attributes to solve issues.

Crowding argumentative people spared him having to fight them, spared everyone some hurt in the long run, saved lives really. Moving Jaskier around when he needed him out of the way was a small indignity for safety. This--this was not that.

He knew Geralt wouldn't hurt him. Knew it to his very core. Geralt, for all his grousing and grumpiness, was a good person, better than most--

Jaskier went very, very still beneath the Witcher. The fear that coiled through him, then, was paralyzing--Geralt wouldn't hurt him of course, he knew that--his hands were between his shoulderblades and he had no hope of twisting free without breaking or dislocating something. His heart was racing--this was silly, it was just Geralt being Geralt, rough and tumble as it were--he couldn't breathe. The mattress was soft enough that he wasn't having the breath crushed from him, his lungs had room, he just couldn't fill them. He was still dressed, not even slightly disheveled really--there was a cock against his ass and there were teeth near his ear, near the back of his neck. His legs were pinned.

Panic warred with terror in Jaskier's chest, his heart was racing--idiot, this was too dramatic, far too dramatic--Geralt had...asked him a question. All parts of him knew he should answer--why not answer when Geralt asked him a question--it was easier to answer than to stay quiet.

"I--" he starts and it's breathy, an airy sort of tone, intentionally disaffected. "I don't know? C-curiosity?"

Edited (How did I preview this twice and still forget a phrase???) 2020-04-08 17:49 (UTC)

By the time Jaskier managed that idiotic answer, Geralt was hardly listening.

The position he had put the bard into had held the man still but a witcher was made to sense the minutiae. He had pinned Jaskier down with no intent other than to turn the question into some stupid, airy answer-- which the man was sure to give-- and then hopefully more kissing and, positively sweetly, an orgasm for both of them. But underneath the captivity of Jaskier's limbs there were different questions being asked and they had nothing at all to do with what Geralt and Jaskier should call each other now that their relationship had turned sexual.

It was a shallow skip of a heart borne of low oxygen, not arousal. It was the quick pulls of lungs that weren't inflating properly when there was no reason to do otherwise. It was the utter stillness of the muscles, a prey response.

No, Geralt did not hear whatever words Jaskier muttered-- and there was no answer given. Instead, fingers around wrists opened slowly and Geralt's chest pulled slightly from Jaskier's back to give him room. The witcher rolled his weight back onto his toes in order to take it off the back of the legs he knelt on; instead he gave his knees to the bed. So the curl of his body was still present but suddenly far less ominous.

Geralt pressed his face lightly against the back of Jaskier's shoulder. There were things he wanted to ask but he knew how the man was bound to answer. The heat of true anger curled in his gut alongside his lust and his erection diminished. "Friends," he said instead, his tone civil. "Friends who are fond of taking advantage of each other when the correct opportunity arises."

With a sigh, he slipped away just enough to fall onto his side, rolling onto his back and again-- staring at the ceiling.

Geralt's released him slowly, carefully, and Jaskier managed to keep himself from trembling as he did. He was so keenly aware of how the Witcher gradually shifted his weight, as he moved to a safe pantomime of their previous position, as his head dropped against Jaskier's sholder, just barely--Jaskier hated himself for flinching there. It was foolish. Geralt answered him, which he hadn't honestly expected the Witcher to do--he'd hoped, of course, but an answer and one given so clearly was not--he hadn't--

Fuck.

The bed bounced just a bit as Geralt rolled away and it was several seconds before Jaskier could make his stupid, traitorous limbs move. For as easily as he'd been pushed into the position, unwinding his arms from behind his back was an ungainly and difficult affair. He laughed as he did but it was a hollow, poorly acted thing.

Of course Geralt wouldn't have hurt him. He knew better. He had been playing at roughness--that was just his way. Jaskier took a deep breath and sniffed. It wasn't much to push himself up on his elbow, to drag a hand through his horribly rumpled hair.

"Friends? How positively sentimental, Geralt--" Jaskier mused distantly as he pulled himself back together. He hoped the Witcher would let it go, his tone and his mocking, he couldn't seem to help himself. It was just how he'd always--it was habit. A very bad habit. Geralt was safe, he was being stupid. Geralt was his friend. He shifted and darted a glance at the Witcher--his expression was the same as it ever was. He didn't stare long enough to make out the subtleties of it and, instead, twisted until he could sit upright.

"Well," he said and, at long last, sounded back to himself. If rather unhappy. "Sorry I drove you away from your dinner for naught at all. It's not--I'm not usually that easy to catch by surprise. It won't happen again."

Edited (well fine typos, be that way) 2020-04-08 19:00 (UTC)

"Yes, sentimental," Geralt sighed, in as much of a I couldn't care, this is all ridiculous anyway tone as he could manage for feeling quite the opposite. The still-simmering anger was kept absolutely from face and the lines of his body; he sprawled without much care, his wilted cock still half-out of the buttons that had been undone earlier. He scratched the back of his neck and pulled his hair from underneath him where it was pulling.

His mind was trying to recall the times that he'd been with Jaskier-- in inns? Villages?-- when the man had seemed off, particularly in the mornings, and he'd written it off. Told himself it was just a mood that would pass as they all did. Convinced himself that Jaskier was fine instead of following the problem to the root. Had there been times when he had swept some awful and real trouble under the rug of Jaskier's ability to reclaim a sunny, if annoying, personality?

Geralt blinked at Jaskier as the man found a sitting position, having missed the entirety of whatever he'd just said. He tucked himself away and then touched the bard's nearest elbow with just two fingertips. He waited until Jaskier looked at him and quieted. Both. As long as it took.

"I have an iron sword to dispatch the monsters who are less than supernatural," he said, his cat-eyes direct on Jaskier. It was only after the words were out that Geralt realized that something had shifted between them-- though maybe it hadn't exactly coincided with the sex. Or with the horse.

The horse--

Geralt sat up with a jerk, all the attention he'd had on Jaskier a heartbeat before now out the window across the room. "Fuck." He smacked Jaskier lightly on the back as he climbed off the bed. "Jaskier, your damned kelpie is loose!" And how. The view from the room was of buildings across the street, including a small square set up for dancing and festivals around a large center fountain-- in which, at that moment, the gold horse was in, prancing and snorting.

Geralt took all this surprisingly well, his irritability faded quite quickly, nearly as quickly as he'd left off pinning Jaskier to the mattress. He relaxed and sighed and Jaskier had a moment to collect himself. This hadn't been a conversation he'd ever intended to have with the Witcher and, thankfully, Geralt looked to be sparing him the indignity of it.

He took a deep breath, ready to get up and fetch his pack, but a touch at his elbow stopped him--he waited but Geralt didn't say anything, not until he turned and looked him in the face. His heart could have stopped dead with how tender the look on the Witcher's face was. He certainly found himself holding his breath as he held that gaze. He was sure he looked a wreck, then, but there was nothing for it.

The reminder fell heavy between them and Jaskier had no idea what to say--fortunately, or unfortunately depending on how one viewed tender admissions or the sanctity of fountains, there was a commotion going on outside. Geralt, as though he'd remembered he left his stove on, jerked upright and away as he moved to the window. Jaskier watched him, dazed, and heart a high whinny of delight and a great deal of splashing outside.

Kelpie?

"Cantata?"

A moment later, Jaskier was scrambling up and dashing to meet him, crowding the window with the Witcher. There were a dozen people in the square--only about four seemed eager to put a stop to the goings on, the other eight or so were content to point and jeer. (Except for a couple of children who seemed entirely enchanted by the sight.)

Cantata, in all his golden glory, had somehow gotten out of his stall, escaped the stables altogether, and had pranced right into the center of the square. It was a hot day, to be sure, but the stables hadn't been unpleasant? Still, the golden horse had clearly decided the carved marble fountain was a far cry better than simple shade and delighted both in the full sunshine and the arcs of cold water that sprayed up from the carved spouts. It jumped through the basin, happy to splish and splash, and ducked its head under the water whenever it neared any that was tumbling downward.

"How in the world?" Jaskier asked, dazed, and tried to recall--he'd shut the stall, he knew he had. He always did, didn't he?

Ah, yes. The horse has a name. Geralt had forgotten. He watched the thing for a moment longer, prancing-- frolicking-- and wasn't comforted to realize that his gut instincts about the horse were already proving to be the correct ones: this horse was going to be trouble. "Get," he said, fingers curling around the window frame for a moment to help ground the thoughts that were reminding him that he'd given up a ruby for that idiotic gold devil, "downstairs. Now." And then he was turning around to do the same, shoving his shirt-ends into his pants and throwing open the door to the room before he'd even rebuttoned them. He dealt with the buttons as he took the steps two at a time.

No one was on the steps, unsurprisingly, because they were all gaping like beached fish at the windowpanes in order to get a look at Jaskier's new horse. Geralt put his shoulder to the door with perhaps a little too much force, spilling himself out into the early evening light. There were a few more opportunistic men closing in on the fountain with smiles on their faces and their arms out. Not one of them looked like they were upstanding citizens in even the meanest of senses. "Away from the horse," Geralt snarled out in front of him, across the square. He didn't have his swords and his fly was done up wrongly but he didn't look any less menacing for it.

Alright, perhaps he was driven on a little more forcefully by the lingering ache in his balls, but certainly the men deserved it for the attempted horse theft.

Jaskier stumbled after Geralt down the stairs, a half step behind in his confusion and wonder about the stables. The group of rough looking fellows about the square were closing in, despite Geralt's best warnings, and Cantata was prancing delightedly in the fountain with nary a care in the whole world. Jaskier considered the three rough fellows and decided his attention was probably best spent on wrangling the golden horse from the water.

His lute, unfortunately, had been left up in their room.

"Cantata," Jaskier sing-songed and dashed to the fountain. "My mischievous fellow, oh, how did you get out?"

His scolding, while good-natured, was tempered quite a lot by the tall, thin fellow with the knife-blade smile who looked a bare moment away from...let's say: offering to help him. The horse, as Jaskier approached, jumped and splashed in place, and immediately flipped its lovely, sopping wet mane and doused the helpful Samaritan. He must have been wearing his finest shirt because the face he made was rather frustrated.

"It's quite alright, gentlemen, I've got it, no need to fret--" Jaskier assured him at a distance and, helpful man that he must have been, he persisted on getting closer. "Geralt?"

Unfortunately, it looked like the Witcher was going to have to have a firm conversation with the slim man's two helpful friends. They, too, seemed terribly ardent in their desire to help remove the gold horse from the fountain. (And then, ideally, from Jaskier and Geralt's possession.) Why, one of them had even brought a knife--unfortunately both his mates appeared to have forgotten any apples to cut to tempt the creature.

Damn it all.

It was better off that Geralt wasn't the mind-reader that Yennefer was-- he might have thrown Jaskier into the fountain and shook the hands of horse-thieves before going back to the inn and getting stunningly drunk. Instead he stood opposite the two thugs who decided to physically bar the larger man from their fellow at the fountain and exhaled slowly. "Jaskier. Just--"

But just what was left for another moment, because the man with the knife took Geralt's words to mean that he was distracted, and lunged at him with a knife. His lunge was too long, sloppy in its overstretch, and the witcher moved liked water. A step to the side seemed slow for its precision and as the knife and the man's arm slipped into the space that he had occupied a moment before, Geralt brought an arm down from above. The thief screamed as his ulna snapped and the knife he dropped in pain was caught off-handed before hitting the ground and launched cleanly at his gaping friend even as Geralt was using his crouch to shoulder check the injured man off his feet and onto the ground. The knife stuck into the other's hip and he too dropped with a cry.

It all took less than twenty seconds. Geralt straightened without bothering to retrieve the knife and started toward the third man who was still being very helpful.

Geralt, as expected, thoroughly trounced the two thugs who'd come at him. Jaskier hadn't watched but there was a whole plethora of terrifying sounds as Geralt snapped a bone or two, as he made a grown man shriek like a little girl, as he was flung to the ground--then another shriek and thud. Really it was grand little tune, very catchy. Jaskier, in the twenty odd seconds that required, had been faced with a then panicky gentleman who was more than eager to not be stabbed.

He'd moved in, ready to rearrange the bard's face, when Geralt had started thrashing people. Fortunately, he only got one off kilter punch off before he realized his erstwhile friends were not on the winning side. His meaty fist put a rather impressive series of wrinkles into the front of Jaskier's doublet, but he let go as soon as Geralt swung around. Indeed, the moment the Witcher had eyes on him, the fellow was more than happy to back up and let them handle the horse themselves.

"That's right! Get out of here!" Jaskier cried after the man as he bolted, terrified, from the square. Jaskier's glower was a bit cocksure--it was the adrenaline he was sure--but he felt it was earned. It wasn't every day someone took a punch to the face without so much as stumbling. His jaw barely hurt at all. (He felt rather rough and tumble, considering he hadn't done anything at all.)

The horse, in the interim, had stuck its head beneath the fall of water at the center of the fountain and was luxuriating in it. When all the kerfuffle had ended, it pulled its head out and shook it, either oblivious or uncaring of the violent scuffle that had happened in its immediate vicinity.

Geralt waded into the fountain, ignoring both the man running and his friends on the ground. He took Jaskier's chin in a hand carefully to lift it for a look-- the bard was clearly high on adrenaline-- but it seemed that at worst he'd have a bruise in the morning. Geralt turned his attention then to the horse.

The horse who shook a mane-full of water in his face.

With a dark sigh, Geralt lifted a hand to wipe his eyes and brought his fingers to his lips to give a quick and piercing whistle. The kelpie's head whipped in his direction, ears pricked (as probably had most of the horses in the neighboring barn) and Geralt held up a palm for it to look at as he turned to Jaskier. "Sing to it," he hissed. "Get it back to the barn, Jaskier. Now."

Unfortunately for Geralt, Jaskier all but gasped with delight when the Witcher demanded he sing. This made twice in one day! Jaskier was still high on the delight of winning a fight (technically), so he threw his arm up and drew a deep breath. He grasped the first song that came to mind, a delightful ditty about a milkmaid and a merchant, and broke into bright and cheerful song.

The gold horse stared at Geralt's hand for a moment and then its head swiveled with delight as Jaskier started singing. It bounded out of the fountain and shook itself off, flinging water droplets across anyone and anything in the surrounding space, and then all but skipped after Jaskier as the bard walked back to the stables.

In a very, very odd turn of events: Jaskier found the stable doors both closed and latched. The stalls were closed properly as well. Not a single thing was amiss, apart from the golden horse being on the wrong side of the walls. Fortunately, Cantata was more than happy to listen to him sing as he opened the stable doors, led the horse in, and went about resettling it in its stall.

Roach, however, was less enthralled by the music and seemed rather annoyed on whole.

To Jaskier's shock, as he walked the stallion past her stall, Roach leaned her head out and snapped at him. (Cantata, not the bard--his heart might have broken if she'd snapped at him.) She caught some of Cantata's mane in her teeth, a bit rather close to his ear, and gave him a sharp tug. The distracted fellow didn't react quickly and his poor head clunked hard against the door to Roach's stall. She let him go then and huffed, irritably, as he gave her a dazed look.

The stallion appeared...both confused and duly chastised as he meandered back into his stall.

The song definitely made Geralt want to dunk Jaskier, but the impulse was pushed down and he gave the pair room before following after out of the fountain, dripping water behind him on his way to the stables. It seemed that no one was in a hurry to assist with the horse now, which was well enough, and also no one seemed keen to help the two men still crying on the ground-- which was better. He watched Jaskier undo the stable door... which was odd. Perhaps the stable boy had closed it after the horse had gotten out? He supposed it was a possibility except that the fountain was in clear view from here and he thought that a blind man would probably be hard-pressed to forget such a mount.

He was standing and examining the latch when he heard the commotion; he caught the kelpie's head jerking back from the post and the release of Roach's teeth--

And all of a sudden, as wet as he was, Geralt was feeling much better. Hay stuck to his wet boots as he came into the barn and stopped in front of Roach's stall. She hung her head and he scratched behind her ears until he got a nudge in the chest. "Good girl," he murmured, his voice low and positively sweet.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

PSL Horsetrading with Monsterbytrade

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