Archive of Our Own ^beta

Lambert groaned with pain as he tried to move. Everything hurt.

The hunt had gone well, which left him in a surprisingly good mood. To be honest, any kind of good mood was surprising when it came to Lambert. But hey, he got to use his bombs, and the monster exploded with a satisfying bumm after he chucked a grenade down its throat. And he got paid in full – another surprising thing about his day. He was considering staying another day at the inn – he had the coin to do so, and it was nice to sleep in a bed once in a while. Lambert wasn’t a fan of roughing it outside, in the mud and dirt, no thank you. Of course, he wasn’t going around voicing that, not if he didn’t want his brothers calling him weak. He wasn’t weak. Well, except now he was, so weak he couldn’t even stand up, no matter how hard he tried. Each attempt only made blood ooze from his chest, where he was stabbed with a pitchfork. A fucking pitchfork. He didn’t see that one coming.

People weren’t exactly nice here, they never were when it came to Witchers or little children who begged for food because their father drank away all his money again. People were assholes, he had long accepted that and vowed to be an even bigger asshole in return. So it shouldn’t have surprised him when he woke to the smell of smoke, and the angry yells of a mob coming from outside. The flames were already in his room, spreading quickly. A quick look at the door, which was engulfed in fire, told him that exit wasn’t an option. Lambert hated fire.

One time, he broke a bottle of whisky. It was deliberate, maybe because he was an asshole even back then, or because he wanted his dad to just stop drinking. It didn’t matter in the end. His father found out and he was furious. He made Lambert hold his hand above the flames of the fireplace, striking him each time he pulled away, and he had to choose between the pain from the flames or the pain from his father’s hands. Eventually, his mother couldn’t bear to watch it anymore and yanked Lambert away. She was nursing a broken arm the next day, but she still smiled at her son and told him it didn’t hurt. The flames that threatened to kill him were even hotter than what he recalled. He couldn’t even dress, just grabbed his bag and jumped out of the window. He landed wrong, breaking his ankle with a loud snap.

“He’s there!” cried one of the villagers, and they ran at him, with pitchforks and clubs.

He couldn’t exactly run away – cue broken ankle. And he didn’t have his swords with him, only the daggers he always slept with. Still, he put up a fair fight. Killed as many of those bastards as he could, but eventually, there were too many of them. They dragged him outside the village, stabbing him again and again in a blind rage, before leaving him in the pool of his own blood. Stupid move, really, leaving a witcher alive after such treatment. If only he could move, he would burn down the village as revenge. He could even use his bombs again. That would be fun. He just had to get up and find his potions. Then everything would be alright, and he could hide somewhere safe, licking his wounds.

Aiden would be pissing himself laughing if he saw what happened, how he let himself be skewered by a bunch of villagers. Not even a monster, but fucking villagers. But Aiden was dead, dead and gone, and although Lambert killed that bastard Jad Karadin, that didn’t make his grief any lesser. Poor Aiden. Fucking bastard, how dare he leave Lambert alone. If there was an afterlife, he was going to kill Aiden there for being the first one to go. But he shouldn’t be thinking about death, not yet, not now. He had to pull himself together. But everything hurt so fucking much. Maybe if he just rested a minute more, gathered his strength, then he could go and find his potions. He hoped they didn’t kill Horse. He hoped…Fuck it, hope was useless. He learned that withering in pain on the mages’ table, wishing he could die, but still surviving.

Fuck the mages and their mutagens. Fuck the villagers. Fuck this miserable fucking life. Fuck-