a wolf's care in the wolves' lair
The witcher winces at the painful tugging sounds emanating from Ciri's direction. He looks towards her, and finds her running a metal comb through her hair with a fury he would have thought that she would only save for the Nilfguaardian army. She's standing across the room, her arms held high above her head and bent at the elbows as she tries and fails to move the brush down her hair.
"By the gods, you trying to make yourself incognito by going bald?" He asks, getting up from the uncomfortable wooden bench and walking over towards his child of surpris,e, who is indeed struggling mightily.
"Shut up." She hisses, still unable to relieve her hair from its metal occupant.
"Come here, girl." Geralt touches her ribs and turns her around. "Let me have a go."
"Do your worst." Ciri sighs as ahe lowers her arms. "Not even nannies Emerson and Nivella could get it free when it got bad like this. Had to soak my hair in coconut oil for days. Grandmother wasn't impressed that the Duke of Sovingen couldn't meet the heir, he wanted to marry me, did you know that?"
"Hmm?" He humms, but he's not happy at those words. His voice is lower than usual, which is really saying something.
"Yeah. But he was older than grandmother. And she really wasn't happy about that. Tanned his hide and threw his bare arse out when they were both drunk on ale."
Geralt rumbles a laugh as he gets to work, slowly removing the comb, before making a fist towards the end of her hair, leaving only the ends free.
The comb slides through smoothly, and the higher up the golden hair he goes, the tighter his fist gets, and the gentler he is with the comb. His strokes are slow, humming every time Ciri stops speaking of Calanthe or Mouseack or Eist.
Geralt continues to brush her hair, taking his time when a large boulder of knotted hair requires him to bite down on the comb and undo the knot with his fingers. He tries his best to be gentle, knowing full well the pain of the scalp whenever Vesemir would roughly comb it and rip half of it out to get it into a band for training whenever he dodnt have full mobility.
He continues to brush her hair, feeling oddly comforted by the soft sounds that get quieter and quieter with every knot that gives way, until nothing remains but a head of long, slightly fluffy golden hair.
"Gods, how did you do that?" Ciri spins around to face him. "It barely hurt!"
"Patience. Patience and cunning." He rumbles, a smirk on his face as he hands the comb back. "Now, want me to braid it before we train?"
