Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jaskier is starving. Leaving the path was not one of his better decisions, it turns out.

There’s not much to eat in the forest, in spring. Some beechnuts left over from the winter. He thinks they are poisonous, unroasted, but he doesn’t have anything with him to light a fire, so has to eat them raw. Not more than a thimbleful at a time, he can hardly poison himself that way, right? The few edible roots he can identify, found in the small clearings, left by fallen trees.

By rights he should long be out of this thrice accursed forest. There’s this tree he remembers walking past at least four times now, in as many days. It is very memorable, gnarled, with lichen hanging from its dead lower branches.

There cannot be that many trees like this, surely? Perhaps he is going insane.

It is cold in the shadow of the ancient trees, though during the day, when he sometimes manages to catch a straying ray of sun, his teeth at least stop chattering.

He is digging another root when it happens. Twigs cracking, dry leaves rustling. Jaskier jumps and sees a man stride towards him with purpose. A man obviously in his best years … and yet his hair is white as snow.

Jaskier doesn’t even think before he turns and runs. His heart races.

Moments later, he finds himself pinned under the man’s heavy body, face pressed into the rotting leaves of last year. His body goes soft and pliant as the conditioning kicks in. The situation is familiar, though the location is not.

His mind separates from his body, as it sometimes does. He is not feeling the vise-like grip of the man’s hands anymore. Suddenly clear-headed, Jaskier knows why he ran.

White hair on a young man. That’s wrong. The man looks human, but not. It has been a while since he last travelled, but he remembers what other travelling bards told him.

If someone looks human, but strange, you run. The naked woman in the forest is not a peasant maid from the next village. Peasant maids know better than to bathe naked where men can see them.

The handsome man with duckweed in his hair is not the miller’s journeyman who just wanted to cool his head in the mill pond.
His hair never dries, and the duckweed is always there, and he’s not your friend.

Jaskier is not entirely sure what they say about young men with white hair, but he is sure he is about to find out. Strange, though, the man is just holding him there, as though he’s human. As though he just wants what men always want from Jaskier. Part of him would rather get eaten.

“You fool”, the man growls, and Jaskier can feel his chest vibrate, suddenly pulled back into feeling everything, from the damp of the leaf-mould to the body warmth of the other man. “This forest belongs to a leshen.”

Wait, what? A leshen … no, it wouldn’t call itself that. So this must be a man. Damn. He had almost liked the idea of dying to a monster.

It would have been nice. To be treated like a human being for a change. Even if that meant to be killed. Perhaps eaten. Perhaps have his organs be used as decoration. Whatever.
Someone, even something acknowledging that he is human. It would be nice. And, most important, it would mean that things would be over, soon, forever.

So, a man.

He knows how to handle men. He just wishes he didn’t have to.

“Will you stay put if I let go of you?”, the man asks, voice an annoyed growl.

“Of course, darling”, Jaskier purrs, pure habit.

The man releases him, Jaskier turns around to get a good look at him, and that is when he sees the yellow eyes.

A witcher. Of course it is the witcher. The one he was trying to flee from.

Ten times stronger than any man, they say. When he was young and naive, that had fascinated Jaskier. Now he knows that strength is never used to protect, only to hurt.

Monster enough to invent tortures he has never had to endure. Man enough to treat him as less than human while he enacts them.
Why couldn’t it have been a proper monster?

Yellow eyes narrow. “I am not about to kill you.”

Jaskier’s stomach constricts. The most brutish men like it least when he doesn’t hide his fear well enough. His mind usually goes blank when he’s with a man, lets his conditioned reflexes take over, but not now. Not when he’s out in the forest and the man is a witcher. “I- I mistook you for the leshen.” Not quite a lie.

“Hm. Take off your shirt -”

“Eager, aren’t you?” He feels calmer now. Soon, his mind will go fuzzy, then blank, he will almost feel like he is elsewhere while his body does as he is told.

“Turn it inside out then put it back on.” The witcher’s voice is flat, devoid of emotion.

There is no pleasant fuzzyness.

Jaskier hesitates, confused. He knows what men want when they tell him to undress, but he has never been asked to put his clothes back on.

When he was a travelling bard, he would have laughed at the request. Now … it does not bode well, a man asking anything out of the ordinary. Every fibre of his body is tense as he obeys.

“Good. Now you follow me.”

The man sets a fast pace, Jaskier has to run to keep up with him, though the witcher looks as though to him, this is just a leisurely walk.
Every now and then, the witcher stops and waits for Jaskier to catch up.

He could run away, it occurs to Jaskier after a ridiculously long time. He could. But the witcher would surely catch him again.

At last they arrive at the witcher’s campsite. There is a horse, a fireplace with an as of yet unlit fire, and a bedroll spread out next to the fireplace.
Saddlebags and saddle complete the picture.

It is strangely mundane. Almost like the camps Jasker himself set up, back in the day. But, he cannot allow himself to be deceived. This is not a safe place. Not for him.

“I’m not a monster”, the witcher says, voice level, as though he does not want to show the anger that is boiling inside him.

Jaskier’s father was like that. Still is, for all he knows. Quick to anger, but too well bred to let it show. Noblemen do not need to punch people who displeased them in the face, they have other ways to get their revenge. Worse ones.
So, obviously, do witchers.

“I know. You’re a man.” Which, from Jaskiers’ point of view, does not make much of a difference, really.

Except monsters at least do not get offended when you are afraid of them.

The witcher frowns. He does not believe Jaskier. “Whatever you think of me, believe me, there’s much worse than I out there. I’m trying to protect you, so you’d better not run away. It’d get you killed.”

“I cannot pay for your protection.” He hugs himself, trying to preserve the warmth from the short run.

“I didn’t ask you for money. Could tell you don’t have any.”

Well, obviously. He traded his last good clothes for rags and food before he … ended his career as travelling bard.

“That’s exactly it. I know what you will be asking for instead of money.” And it will be worse, so much worse than usual, because he is still there, in his body, unable to disconnect. He will have to pretend to not be afraid, to not be disgusted … and if he does not pretend well enough … he can only hope the witcher will attribute his trembling to the cold.

“Hm? Hm. You are the first man to worry about that.”

Well, yes. Obviously. Men did not worry – he should not have mentioned it, should not have shown that he was used to it, that he -

“It is usually women who – I don’t – we do not always do that”, the witcher continues.

Not always? Only sometimes then? When the stars aligned in a specific constellation? When the last few towns hadn’t had any brothels?

Jaskier almost let a mirthless laugh escape.

“Don’t worry”, the witcher is not finished, it seems. “You incurred no debt. It is not certain that you were in mortal danger. I just like to be careful.” He sits down next to the firewood and lights it with a gesture of his hand.

Jaskier shivers. Such power would have made him giddy with excitement when he was young and naive. Now it only serves as a reminder of what else the man could do with some flick of his fingers. Not that his hands aren’t bad enough.

“Sit.”

Sitting down next to the fire, Jaskier reassesses his situation. If the witcher doesn’t feel entitled to payment, that is … good. Very good. He might yet get out of this unscathed.
It seems unlikely, but, well, he is still alive.

There is a long silence. Jaskier holds his hands as close to the fire as he can. Fire. It may harm, but it does not mean it. So much more pleasant than the heat of a man’s body. A warmth he can enjoy without bad memories.

The witcher unpacks a ration of beef jerky.

Jaskier cannot take his eyes off it. It seems to be the most delicious thing he has ever seen, even though a small voice in the back of his mind insists it is greasy and looks like it has been sat on.

The witcher hesitates for a moment, then rips off a piece and hands it to Jaskier. “Here. Free of charge.”

Jaskier takes it gingerly. Eats slowly, as an uncomfortable silence descends once again. Does not even thank the witcher, because that would be acknowledging that he owes something.

“I’m Geralt. Of Riva. You?”

It is an awkward attempt at conversation. Men sometimes do that, in order to ease themselves into what they are going to do to him …

Jaskier remembers how adorable he thought shy people when he was young and stupid. He always wanted to coax them out of their shells.

Shy young men have lost their charm. Once they fuck him, they are like every other man.

“Jaskier. Pleased to meet you.” He is everything but, yet the familiar words come to his lips easily. “So, what do you …” At last, his mind realizes that the question he was about to ask is inane. He knows what the witcher does for a living. “How has the hunting been?” Monsters, animals, whatever.

“Fine, thanks.” The witcher – Geralt – frowns in concentration. “What do you do for a living, Jaskier?”

If he were not afraid for his life, those awkward attempts at polite conversation would be hilarious, Jaskier thinks distantly. Behaving as though they were introduced to each other at a ball, instead of him being the witcher’s prisoner. “I, ah … I’m a travelling bard. Or was, before bandits took my lute.” He does not mention how long ago that was.

“Hm.” Geralt looks at him intently. “Not a good time for bards?”

The rags. Of course. “Well I … I am sure, once I would have made a name for myself … getting pelted with dry bread and half-rotten apples isn’t all bad, some days I ate pretty well despite no one liking my music …” It feels like ages ago. He made good coin when he stuck to the well known drinking songs, but he always wanted more. Wanted to write his own. Make a difference in the world.

And the time he tried out a song that had a witcher as the hero – oh how naive he had been! - people made their disapproval very clear.

A hero. As if any man who can snap another in two like a twig would ever feel like protecting people. Or saving them. If he does such things, there is a price. There is always a price to pay.

Jaskier is starving. The little bit of food only made the hunger worse, but asking for more is out of the question. He tears his gaze away from the witcher until the man is finished eating. It doesn’t take long.

The witcher hands him a waterskin. “Drink your fill. It’s just water. You owe me nothing.”

Is he … trying to reassure Jaskier?

It isn’t working, not really, because Jaskier knows what men will do in an attempt to not feel like monsters when they very much are … there’s an underlying need, even in the worst of men, to feel like they aren’t bad people.

For every small kindness, there is a price to pay. A price that, perhaps, will be asked for quite nicely.

What might a witcher ask of him?

‘May I please have one of your eyes? You only need one, really.’

But no. That is silly. Witchers don’t use human body parts for their potions. That is just a rumour, surely.

Though it feels safer to imagine that, than to face the reality that the witcher is just a man like any other, and thus more likely to rip out a piece of Jaskier’s self, until only an empty shell remains.

He doesn’t do that, though. Not yet, at least. He tells Jaskier to sleep, lets him curl up next to the fire.

When Jaskier wakes, it is dark, still. The witcher is tending to the fire. It cannot be very late, then – or does he intend to keep it going through the night? To keep the leshen away? Does that work?

Whatever the reason, Jaskier is grateful for the warmth.

The next time he wakes, it is shortly after dawn, or at least the forest sounds like it is. He is cold, despite the first rays of sun filtering through the canopy of leaves.

“Did you have a camp somewhere?”, the witcher asks.

“No. I – I lost everything to the bandits.”

“Hm. Thought so. We should be out of the forest before night falls.”

The witcher is slower while leading his horse than he is on his own, a small mercy. The horse must be a normal one. Are there witcher horses?

Jaskier would be asking question after question, if he still were a travelling bard. If he had not been told, again and again, that his mouth will be put to a better use, if he doesn’t shut up. (Not that his mouth wasn’t put to that use anyway.)

Now it is just his thoughts providing the running commentary. The questions remain in his head.

It is hard, though, to keep them from spilling out. What are those herbs the witcher stops to pick at the wayside?
And the decidedly deadly looking mushroom – is it picked for use in a poison, or is it actually edible? If the latter, is it edible to witchers, or to humans, too?