Link to part one, Geralt's POV of the Jaskier nine lives fic before Jaskier wakes up...so yeah, all angst lol
Geralt walked into the dining hall while idly rubbing his aching shoulder. Repairs to the keep were always an exercise in using strange postures and holds to fix the holes and cracks in the old stronghold, and it was the one reason Geralt wished, a very small amount, that there was still a mage or two around to help with the upkeep.
Although, now that he thought about it, he could consider asking Yennefer for help with the more hard to reach areas that had fallen into disrepair in the last decade or two. Falling heavily into his seat at the bench, he looked up, frowning when he realized both Yennefer and Ciri were missing from lunch.
Geralt trailed off, just now noticing how the three other witchers were looking at him. The visible discomfort on Lambert's face, the grim set of Vesemir's brow, the pity and concern practically oozing from—
"What happened?" He asked, glancing quickly from one man to the next, trying to discern what they knew. "Ciri, is she—"
"Your Child Surprise is fine," Eskel quickly assured him, and Geralt simultaneously felt a surge of relief and horror—
"The witch is fine, too," Lambert said, rolling his eyes, though he—Geralt could tell they were both speaking the truth.
He relaxed into his seat, feeling the painful way his heart started beating again as he struggled to pull himself together. Yennefer and Ciri were fine, they were at Kaer Morhen. There would be no monsters, or Nilfgaardians, or anything else to worry about. But then—
Geralt inhaled sharply, realizing—
"If they're fine, what...?"
Geralt fought back a growl at the look Eskel and Vesemir exchanged, as if they weren't sure what to say, as if Geralt wasn't over a hundred years old but still the boy who had just been left behind by his—
He grit his teeth, glaring at all three of them.
For a moment, there was silence.
"It's the bard," Lambert said casually, amber eyes unreadable as he stared deeply into Geralt's own. "The witch needed him for something, tracked him to an abandoned part of the keep. He—" Lambert swallowed, looking painfully uncomfortable for a moment before continuing, "there was an icicle, that fell on him. He didn't make it."
Geralt stared at Lambert, searching for any of his usual tells. Because there was no way that Lambert was speaking the truth, that the other witcher wasn't—wasn't playing some prank on him that the bard devised. He had to be—
"Lying," Geralt hissed, voice raspier than it was a moment ago. "You're—there's no way—"
Geralt pushed against the table, staggering to his feet—
Eskel froze, arm still outreached to grab at him, but Geralt didn't need that, he needed—
"The infirmary," Lambert said, softer this time, like Geralt was—like Geralt needed—
Geralt marched from the hall, practically running as he he made his way down familiar halls. Lambert was having him on. There was no way the bard, that Jaskier, could be dead. He was—there wasn't—
He slammed the door open when he finally reached the infirmary, eyes immediately drawn to the wooden table where—where—
There was a body on the table, with a sheet over it. Yennefer and Ciri stood by it, looking up at Geralt's entrance, eyes red and puffy and—and there was no reason to cry, Jaskier was fine, he had to be fine, he couldn't—
Yennefer and Ciri looked at each other, like Vesemir and Eskel had done only minutes earlier, and the witcher couldn't—he couldn't—
"Leave," he pleaded, voice choked as his eyes never left the table. Never left the form hidden by the sheet, even as Yennefer and Ciri brushed past him, the young princess giving him a hug he couldn't bring himself to return, the mage patting his shoulder once.
He didn't feel his feet walk forward, didn't consciously choose to lift his arms, to pull back the sheet, to—to—
He was pale. His lips were tinged blue, a horrid shade, not at all like the blue of Jaskier's eyes. It wasn't—they were supposed to be bright pink, matching the color that rose high on the man's cheeks, when he was ranting or after a long performance or when Yennefer was teasing him or—
Except there was no color now. The only color was that horrid blue, and the brown of his hair, and he knew, could smell, if he looked further down—
He grabbed Jaskier's hand, ignoring how stiff it was, holding it tightly to his own, and then he—
He choked back a sob as he held it to his face, ignoring the sharp spike of iron on the calloused digits as he cradled it, sandwiching it between his mouth and own, larger, scarred hands.
He was so cold. Jaskier always hated being cold, complained of it constantly come late fall, right before they parted for the year. He'd steal Geralt's cloak, inch himself impossibly closer to the fire, to the point that Geralt would stay up late watching to make sure the bard didn't accidentally burn himself until the flames turned to embers and the witcher could finally rest.
And now Jaskier was cold, and even as Geralt pulled the bard into his arms completely, rubbing his hands up and down the man's back, he wouldn't warm. He wouldn't—couldn't—
Still, he repeated the motion over and over again, eyes clenched tightly shut as the strands beneath his head became saturated with his tears.
He didn't know how long he sat there, Jaskier becoming warmer as he leached heat from the witcher's own body, before he heard the door creak open.
He didn't move, recognizing the scent that was as familiar to him as the blood now soaked through his own shirt.
A moment passed, then two, before he spoke.
"It should have been blocked off."
"That area was dangerous. He never should have—we should have years ago, why didn't we—"
"...you couldn't have known, Geralt."
"I could have warned him."
"No, I could have—I showed Ciri and Yennefer around," Geralt realized suddenly, inhaling sharply and almost tasting the blood. "If I'd shown him where it was safe, if I'd—"
"—this is my fault, I never should have—"
"No!" Geralt snarled, finally looking up. He whipped his head around, glaring into emotionless, golden eyes. "That is—he—do not call me that." He finally choked out, the words like shards of glass in his throat.
"Geralt," Vesemir said in easy acceptance, voice a tinge softer. The old witcher stepped closer, and Geralt resisted the urge to growl as he settled his hand on Geralt's shoulder.
"He seemed like a good man," he said after a long moment, and that wasn't—Vesemir didn't understand, didn't know—
Because Geralt hadn't told him. Because Geralt never once mentioned Jaskier to the others, never talked about him despite Eskel's and Lambert's ribbing about the songs they'd heard about the great "White Wolf". Never spoke of the brunet with the other witchers, partly out of embarrassment that he wasn't able to chase one human bard away, and later, because—because then he would have to admit that he liked having the bard around. That Jaskier had become as much a staple of his life as Roach, a constant in the way so few things in a witcher's life ever were.
The sun set in the east, the tide would ebb and flow, and Jaskier would always follow him, steadfast and loyal, no matter how badly Geralt screwed up, no matter how hard Geralt tried to push him away, to hurt him, and now—
Now he was gone. And Geralt felt foolish, for having never mentioned Jaskier to any of the others, out of some misguided fear that speaking of the bard would somehow make it real, and therefore something he could lose. It did nothing to change the way Geralt felt like there was a wild beast clawing its way out of his chest, except that no one else seemed to understand what a horrible loss this was, would never understand how much good Jaskier brought into the world, because Geralt had denied them that. Geralt had told Jaskier, every winter, that the keep was no place for humans, that he would never be welcome here.
Geralt gently laid Jaskier back down. He grabbed the shirt someone had left behind for the witcher at some point, and carefully dressed the bard in it, doing his best to ignore the still gaping wound.
Jaskier would—he'd never liked wearing dirty clothes, and Geralt couldn't—Jaskier would want to be clean. It didn't matter if the shirt was meant for Geralt, if his own stuck to his chest from the dried—
Slowly, so slowly only a witcher could be sure he was moving at all, Geralt replaced the sheet again. Pretended like he didn't feel something crack irreparably as Jaskier's hands, his mouth, his nose, his eyes, and finally his hair, were covered once more.
He sat down heavily on the chair by the table, head bowed as he listened to the quiet drip of his tears on the stone floor. He cried for the voice he'd never hear sing again, the eyes that would never again light up giving a performance, the hands that would never play even a single note more.
And perhaps, worst of all, he cried for the friend who had died in an unfamiliar place, in agonizing pain, cold and alone and knowing that—
