Here’s my (late) contribution to @geraltfluffweek day two! I knew I’d only have time for one, if any, and this prompt was the obvious choice… Contains Geralt doin a snog with many and various folks.
Excuse the long post, mobile, Tumblr, sucks etc. I have posted this as an AO3 link too, but who knows if that’s gonna show up in the tags?
Constellation of the Heart
They meet up with Yennefer in a village too small to have its own blacksmith but large enough to have its own werewolf problem. Geralt deals with that problem and first thing the next morning, as arranged, he contacts her so she can portal to their location and bring all three of them – Geralt, Jaskier and herself – and Roach to Kaer Morhen the easy – well, the quick – way; they’ve left it far too late to get there before the winter reaches its worst without her help.
She appears on the village green about ten minutes after he performs the spell she gave him months ago, and immediately embraces him.
“I’ve missed you,” she says, and her voice is so warm, her arms so tight around him… It feels wonderful. Given the way things started between them all those years ago, he spent so long assuming he could never have this, they could never have this – real, genuine affection and love – but here it is, here she is.
“You too,” he mutters back, and he struggles to infuse his words with the warmth he also wants to reciprocate, but he knows she’ll know he means it. She lets go of him and pulls back so she can give him a brief, gentle kiss.
Jaskier, meanwhile, is standing patiently by, watching and looking utterly charmed by the scene before him. When Yen steps back from Geralt, she turns to him and smiles, and honestly, that never gets old (or much less surprising), the two of them looking at each other with fondness instead of jealousy or derision. Oh, they’ll no doubt bitch and curse at each other whenever Yen is with them over the coming season, but now it would actually be disappointing if they didn’t. Yen kisses Jaskier too and asks him if he’s managed to actually write any good songs yet; Jaskier says that he has, thanks, nearly as many as the amount of children she’s given nightmares since last they met, and then they laugh and hug each other.
Watching them with a slight smile, Geralt feels a tenderness rising in his chest that, even a few years ago, he couldn’t possibly have imagined.
“Do you still have business here, or are you ready to leave immediately?” Yen asks them, looking hopeful – not that she cares much more for Kaer Morhen than she does for middle-of-nowhere villages with absolutely nothing going on.
“We can go now,” Geralt says. “I’ll get Roach.”
“I’ll get her!” Jaskier offers cheerfully and hurries off, and Geralt knows he’s trying to give them a couple of minutes alone together, which is completely unnecessary but still very sweet. He puts his arm around Yen’s shoulders and she puts hers around his waist, and they chat about her plans for the winter while they wait.
A few minutes later Jaskier reappears, leading Roach, who’s already laden with all their belongings and ready to go. Yen lets go of Geralt, creates one of her swirling, nightmarish arcane doorways with a complicated but seemingly effortless gesture, and disappears through it with a quick smile back at them.
“Roach, follow Yen,” Geralt tells his horse, and because she is such a wonderful, excellently trained horse, and far less disturbed by portal travel than Geralt himself, she calmly obeys.
Geralt stands and resignedly watches the vortex swirling for a moment, and Jaskier quickly appears right by his side, taking his hand and lifting it to his mouth for a gentle kiss.
“You know Yen can’t hold the thing open indefinitely, love,” he reminds Geralt gently. “And you know if she has to open another one for us she’ll wait about nine hours first just to be a bitch about it…” he adds, less gently.
“Come on then,” Geralt says with an amused smile, and honestly, despite all that life has thrown at him, he feels like a lucky man as he lets Jaskier lead him home, never letting go of his hand.
Geralt is not entirely surprised to see Lambert on the stone steps of the main hall as he and Jaskier emerge in the courtyard – it’s early, but it would have to be earlier for the wolves of Kaer Morhen not to be up and about. Lambert has his arms crossed and his usual scowl in place, glaring at Yen, who’s mirroring his posture and glaring back with a sparkle in her eye, but he brightens visibly when he sees Geralt and Jaskier.
“Happy winter, Buttercup!” he calls out to Jaskier, jogging down the steps to wrap the bard in an enthusiastic hug. Geralt never saw Lambert hug anyone in his entire life until he first brought Jaskier here, and he’s pretty certain it’s entirely due to his influence that Lambert greets him with a tight hug too. “Geralt, it’s good to see you!”
“Lambert! We’ve missed you!” Jaskier tells him earnestly, and Geralt snorts – only Jaskier would miss Lambert. Well, only Jaskier would admit to it, anyway.
“Didn’t know you were coming too, witch,” Lambert finally greets Yen.
“Didn’t know you’d managed to survive the year, idiot,” Yen shoots back, but then they grin viciously at each other. Geralt knows these two don’t entirely trust each other, but he still likes it that, in their own way, they get on now.
“What happened?” Geralt hears Vesemir’s disapproving voice from the main door. “You leave it too late to get back the normal way? Again?”
Geralt’s instinct is to feel embarrassed at his tone, but then he thinks of the people he would not have been there to save had he been more disciplined in his schedule, of how proud Jaskier was, always is, of the work he does, and it dissipates quickly. Vesemir looks pleased, anyhow, despite his words. He doesn’t hug Geralt, but he grips his upper arms, looking intently at him as if he’s inspecting him, and nods as if happy with what he sees, and it feels a lot like being embraced anyway. Vesemir turns to Yen and bows respectfully, then to Jaskier to shake his hand politely, a gesture Jaskier always finds charming in its over-formality.
“Where’s Eskel?” Jaskier asks, just as Geralt spots him approaching at an irregular pace, as if he really wants to get to them but doesn’t want to seem too eager. Geralt’s chest aches slightly as his heart beats faster, and if he could blush he feels like he would be. Eskel seems to have eyes only for him, and when he reaches them he doesn’t even say a word, just gives him that broad, handsome smile, takes his face in his hands and kisses him deeply.
“What the hell, Geralt? Him too?” Yen’s voice interrupts their sweet moment together, and when they separate he sees her looking at him, her hands on her hips, looking both indignant and amused. Lambert looks as surprised as Geralt has ever seen him, while Vesemir looks not at all surprised but is rolling his eyes as if they were misbehaving children again.
“You didn’t tell her?” Eskel and Jaskier both exclaim at exactly the same time.
“I meant to tell you,” he says, addressing Yen and ignoring everyone else. “It’s, hmm, a recent… development…”
She looks like she’s trying to look displeased, but it’s not convincing, not to him, not now.
“I can’t keep up,” she complains teasingly, taking his arm as Eskel takes the other. “I shall have to find another lover. Maybe two.”
“You fucking disgust me. All of you. Except you, Buttercup,” he hears Lambert bitching behind him as the two of them lead him up the steps, following Vesemir, who has clearly had enough and disappeared inside already. Catching himself by surprise, he laughs, a quiet laugh he would once have fought against with all his might. He feels so warm, so cared for and loved – he feels like he’s home.
“I feel very… fortunate,” he says to Jaskier later that day. It’s just the two of them, for now, wrapped up in front of a roaring fire – it’s acceptable to laze about in comfort for the first day or two after arriving, but it won’t be for long, and they’re taking full advantage of it.
Jaskier, of course, seems to know exactly what he’s talking about and understand the feelings his few, ineptly used words are intended to express.
“We’re the fortunate ones, darling,” he says with a sleepy smile and a sweet, chaste kiss. “Everyone whose life you’re a part of is incredibly fortunate. We – Lambert and Vesemir too, but Yen and Eskel and me even moreso – we must be the luckiest people in the whole world, to get to be closest to you.” He sighs happily and, although it’s physically impossible, makes a valiant effort to snuggle even closer to Geralt under their blanket of quilts and furs.
Jaskier absolutely believes what he’s saying, no doubt. Still, Geralt thinks he’s wrong. After all, he’s the one with a loving, if unconventional, family; he’s the one adored by three beautiful, amazing people. It seems pretty clear that all the luck in the world belongs to him.
Bonus: extremely important notes I added on the AO3 version as part of a game I like to call: Headcanons for Your Own Fic!
- Eskel is absolutely without a doubt going to be directly involved with Jaskier and Yen too, soon if they have anything to say about it
- Yen is blatantly lying when she says she can’t keep up; she has at least five other lovers besides Geralt and Jaskier
- Yes, Lambert definitely does want to spend some “quality time” with Jaskier
- Yes, he’s almost certainly going to get to
- Vesemir wishes they would all go away (but not really)
- Vesemir is involved with an insanely attractive and accomplished husband and wife who live in the first town you come to when you leave Kaer Morhen (nobody has any idea about this)
- Yen would bang Vesemir without hesitation if he offered (he will never offer)
- Jaskier would… strongly consider it
