#ghost jaskier

Geralt laughs. He's not certain there's anything else to do. And finally, finally as though the wind slaps him on the face, he turns. And faces him. And oh, he's so beautiful. So empty. Standing there, the salt peppered like snowflakes on his hair and Geralt remembers once, when it was snowing, a snowflake floating and resting on Jaskier's lashes, and melting. The salt, he thinks, doesn't melt. And his eyes are still blue, only darker now, as it seems. He didn't remember them so dark. Then again, even the sea would be jealous enough of their blue to steal it.

There's this smile on his face, always there, just like that day. Something to leave behind, perhaps. Geralt shakes his head. "Yet you never leave."

The wind blows his hair in front of his eyes and Jaskier tilts his head. He looks hurt. Complaint carved between his eyebrows like a scolded child. "You want me to?"

"Yes," and Geralt knows his voice is sharp like the blade of his sword and he knows he doesn't want to, knows that if he turns away from Jaskier now, he will never want to see anything else in his life. Any other sight would make him claw his eyes out.

Jaskier knows. And again, smiles. "I love you, Geralt."

Something is flowing down his face. It could be tears or just the sea. The salt burns his lips anyway. "Please," and he begs, voice quivering, and his eyes are blurry now and the more he stares at Jaskier, the more he remembers, the deeper his heart sinks and drowns and the waves roar.

He remembers. Pale skin, just like now. Seaweed over it, stripes on a painting, covered in seaweed, hidden almost, terrifying, and parted bruished lips, and the eyes. The eyes. Wide blue and drained and staring at the sky and Geralt didn't know if it was the sea that his lungs had sheltered, or himself. Slipped off the cliff, they said. He still doesn't know. Only remembers.

And yet, oh, he's so beautiful now.

Bittersweet. Jaskier walks a few steps, feet leaving no prints on the sand, never. Slowly, he raises his hand, and rests it on Geralt's face, trembling, and the wind trembles with him, and it looks like it will rain. It's nothing. Geralt shivers. Nothing, just the wind, warm on his cheek, a caress, and there are tears in Jaskier's eyes and he's so close now. "I'll leave," he whispers and it floats on the wind as though it refuses to reach his ears. Jaskier huffs, his thumb trying to catch a drop on Geralt's cheek, and catching air. "If you promise not to cry."

Geralt laughs. Cries. "You know I can't do that."

The salt is still there, between the cracks of Jaskier's lips. He wants to kiss it away.

Resigned, Jaskier lets his hand fall. And takes a step back. Rain.

Another step and now his feet sink into the water and Geralt remembers when they used to go near the coast and he would take off his shoes just to wet his feet even if the water was freezing. And he would smile, he would smile so wide and Geralt would think that the rays were so charmed that they chose his eyes to mirror rather the sea.

And the salt would be sweet.

"Jaskier." The poet waits, hums. Geralt's fists clench and he's drenched, shivering. The wind on his cheek is no longer warm. "I love you too."

In a way, he feels guilty. Jaskier always wanted to live by the coast.

He got to die by it.

Yet Jaskier smiles, and his smile is so wide, just like then. Geralt pities the sun that doesn't get to see him.

One last time.

Jaskier smiles and reaches out his hand. "Swim with me, witcher?"

One last time. Geralt doesn't cry. He just walks into the sea, and watches as Jaskier walks deeper, and reaches for him and for once, for once he thinks he will catch him. And never let go again.

Jaskier finds himself in similar places for a while, a tavern where Witchers are being cursed, on the road when a Witcher is feeling down. The names start blurring. Aiden, Letho, Ivo. Jaskier helps all of them find a moment of peace.

He runs into another wolf some time later, and he seems to be a little off. Jaskier heard his name, Lambert. Lambert is standing before a cliff, looking down at the ravine, holding a bottle of wine. Jaskier has a terrifying thought that the Witcher wants to die, and jumps in front of him. He shoves uselessly at his chest, runs his hands through his hair and begs “please, stay alive,” and pulls at his armor until Lambert sighs and retreats back to his camp. Jaskier, ghostly tears on his face, follows him, clinging the entire time. Jaskier sits on a log and it clears, just a little, under his weight. Lambert stares at the log and Jaskier sees his pupils narrow into slits.

“What are you, seeing ghosts?” Lambert speaks to himself, and shakes his head. “Could’ve been me. Maybe it was you who got me away from that cliff.” He huffs a breath. “Must not be great for a Witcher in the afterlife.” Jaskier can’t bear the one sided conversation.

“It’s not so bad,” he says. “But the world is better with you here to protect it.” Jaskier kicks a rock, and Lambert watches it scurry away.

“My very own ghost,” Lambert says. “Nah, It’s the wind.” He eyes the bottle in his hand. “Well, Maybe...” Jaskier Can see the indescision. Lambert looks up. “Eskel and Geralt are going to think I’m crazy,” he huffs, and sets the bottle right where the rock had been. “If there is someone there, well...” Lambert sniffs. “Thanks for watching out for me.” Jaskier cries again, and when Lambert goes to bed, is pleased to find he can still drink the wine.

- -

Jaskier doesn’t expect to get to Kaer Morhen, but he finds himself there in the winter, peering over familiar white hair. Geralt. Jaskier hadn’t really gotten to say goodbye, though he knew Geralt had visited his grave. He could sense the sadness in his mind, but then he listened to the conversation. He recognizes Lambert and Eskel. Eskel is listening to Lambert, whose talking about a suspiciously empty wine bottle, and Eskel talks about being sung to sleep. Oh. Geralt must have been thinking about him. Jaskier has gained some strength in the world, likely as the Witchers he assists have acknowledged a presence that helped them. He starts humming Toss a Coin in Geralt’s ear, running his hand through his hair, rubbing his shoulder. “I’m still around,” he says, knowing Geralt still can’t hear him. But the sadness exits his eyes as he sings, and instead he smiles lightly.

“What are you grinning about?” Eskel Asks. Geralt shakes his head.

“Jaskier,” he says. “He would’ve sung for you.” Eskel looks pained.

“I’m sorry, I know you miss him—“ Geralt rises abruptly.

“Bet it was his ghost or something,” he says. “Seems like him, right?” And Geralt sounds so fond. “Reminding Witchers of their worth when they feel like shit.” He looks around and Jaskier finds himself in tears again, clinging to Geralt, saying his name,

“You are worthy, every one of you.”

“It’s like I can almost smell him.” Jaskier kicks him. He May have been stinky in his life, but he is a perfectly clean ghost! Geralt shifts his foot and looks down at it.

“Do you think...” it’s Lambert who speaks. Everyone looks at him, surprised by the meekness in his voice. “Maybe it was him?” Jaskier feels a surge of something in his chest. He hugs Lambert from behind, and his shoulders ease. “Maybe he’s come back as a ghost to help out Witchers. Aiden told me he saw someone who was shouting about mutants pass out at a counter last summer, and Coen said that thing about having a nice room...” Geralt and Eskel both look surprised. “It’s stupid but...” Jaskier remembers the sadness in Lambert’s eyes when he stood on that cliff.

“It could be,” Eskel said. “Some kind of spectre. They exist.” Geralt looks down at the ankle Jaskier had kicked.

“Guess he’s still mad at me then,” he sighs. Eskel puts a hand on his shoulder.

“He’ll come round.”

- -

Jaskier calls out to Geralt as a warning, hoping he can be heard, when he sees a monster leap at him. His senses must have alerted him, as Geralt whips around and slices with his silver sword— Jaskier feels a surge of energy in his body as he watches Geralt heave for air and stumble back, whipping his head around.

“Jaskier?” He calls. Geralt looks down at the sword and pulls it from the monster. “Thank you,” he says. Jaskier smiled, but is tugged away by another Witcher in need.

- -

Jaskier gains more abilities, he discovers. With every encounter he seems capable of doing more to help, finding that he can scream warnings, or move very small things, and make sound when he walks— his feet crunch over gravel sometimes when he’s concentrating on it, and he sees Witchers look down from their horses in shock. He can also sing, though he doesn’t have his lute, and he doesn’t know what he sounds like, but it seems to ease Witchers into sleep. Jaskier also learns—

It’s their swords. Since he watched Geralt sink his sword into a warg he’s paid more attention, always found himself directly behind a walking Witcher, or standing by their gear when they left it in a room in an inn. Jaskier is connected to the silver in a Witcher’s sword. He knows they can’t kill him— has been run through more than once with it, and when they’re used with his added existence he feels the power surge through him. It’s incredible.

Jaskier continues helping, and he finds more Witchers regularly, until he’s met all the ones he think exist, and run back between them a few times. He’s been called names: the wolves call him Jaskier, but he gets “buttercup” a lot, sometimes “friendly ghost,” sometimes “friend,” and it’s always in gratitude. Jaskier also gets gifts sometimes. Lambert always leaves him something, a drink, a coin, a carved instrument. But he gets other gifts, like the buttercups he apparently leaves when he’s lingered. And he hears Witchers talk to each other about him. He catches a conversation between Lambert and Aiden and Aiden learns his name. Letho and Geralt chat and Letho starts calling him Jaskier. Jaskier gains a reputation as a helpful spirit, and sometimes Witchers will cal on him directly, seeking a little emotional support. Jaskier is happy to provide.

Jaskier talks to them a lot, even though they can’t hear him. He finds Geralt walking down a road in Redannia and starts telling him about the Witchers he’s helped that day. He tells him about the gifts he’s been given. The excellent wine that Lambert left him the other day. He rubs Geralt’s back and tells him how much he values him.

Mages can see him now.

Nearly all the Witchers know him by name, and he’s become quite a presence in their stories to each other. They even make some up, and wonder what he gets up to when he’s not helping Witchers. The answer? Well, Jaskier isn’t sure what he does either.

He first encounters his mage issue when he’s with Geralt, appearing where he’s rested his swords by the door of Yennefer’s cottage. They’re talking, and Jaskier strides over.

“Yennefer again, Geralt? I should have known you’d still be in touch. She’s not good for you, you know.” Yennefer looks right at him. Geralt is still looking at her.

“Geralt?” Yennefer asks, turning back to him.

“Hm?”

“How long has Jaskier been a ghost?” Geralt looks around.

“Can you see me?” Jaskier asks, looking at his body. It’s a little more solid now, after years of existing. Yennefer nods a little. Jaskier claps a hand over his mouth.

“Since his death, likely,” Geralt mumbled. He sounds sad again.

“Look at that, you’ve gone and made him sad again.” Yennefer scoffs.

“Not my fault Witchers can’t see spectres.”

“He’s here? It’s him?” Geralt’s questions for ignored, and Jaskier starts bickering with Yennefer.

“You’re looking young, Jaskier... I know. Yes, I’m hilarious aren’t I?” Jaskier tuts at the insensitive joke about his death.

“Well I’m going to go, since you two are clearly occupied. Since you can talk to Geralt, do tell him I miss him, won’t you? And that I don’t hate him?” Yennefer’s eyes soften.

“Alright,” she agrees. Geralt looks confused. “Bye, Jaskier.” Jaskier tilts his head, listening for any summons. None come, so he decides to travel with Eskel so he can rant. Eskel’s always been good at interpreting him.

- -

Jaskier continues to gain power, and manages to figure out his connection to Witchers swords. It’s easy now, to lock onto large bulky silver and manifest. He manages to find their daggers too— viper school is more fond of the smaller ones. Then he can get around by sending their medallions— though it was riskier, as he discovered it made them vibrate when he concentrated on them. Jaskier has been met more than once by a Witcher whirling around for a fight, and had to calm them down by moving dirt and stomping his feet for them to discover it’s just him.

After that he can teleport to anything silver, not just on Witchers. He finds himself freeing an elf prisoner from silver handcuffs. Rescuing a woman wearing a silver necklace from bandits by shouting in their ears. Comforts a recently widowed man wearing a silver ring. He was proud of that one, seeing him cry out his feelings and telling him his wife was in a good place. He had gone to sleep satisfied.

Jaskier was also given more gifts— he liked the wine a lot, but a Kadewen town where he’d helped several people near Kaer Morhen started bringing silver coins and buttercups to a fountain in the square. Jaskier was pleased, liked to sit and sing to passerby. They’d pause sometimes, almost as if they could hear him. And Jaskier gained more power.

- -

The fountain turned from stone to silver where he sat, when the offerings of silver coins grew, and Jaskier seemed to just bring it lut. It was a miracle, people said, but the Witchers who came in for supplies just before winter knew, had figured out where Jaskier came from.

Jaskier starts to turn more things into silver. Plated earrings into solid metal, cheap gifts from husbands turned into expensive indulgences for their wives, and it wasn’t long before that little trick was discovered and people started putting things in the fountain to purify. Jaskier discovered by accident the water had been purified, and upon following the source found a whole stream of pure freshwater. He didn’t know what it was, but Jaskier was happy to be helping. He couldn’t do it on command at first, but his ability grew until he could.

More often than not of course, Jaskier traveled with other Witchers. He only took reprieves to inspect his fountain. (Because undoubtedly it was his fountain. The Witchers called it his, the townsfolk called it an offering to “the silver being” and Yennefer called it a sham.

“You realize,” Yennefer said one day, sitting beside him on the fountain. “You’re a god?” Jaskier’s jaw dropped.

“I’m just a ghost!” He said. “And a lot of people know I exist!”

“Jaskier,” Yennefer shook her head. “You’re sitting on your shrine.” Jaskier blinked and looked at the fountain.

“This is just a fountain,” he said sheepishly. But people put things in it as gifts to him. People called on him for aid. There were stories about him. “Oh,” he said. “I’m a god.”

“Congratulations,” Yennefer said jokingly. “But what are you the god of?”

“Witchers?” He suggested. “Turning things into silver?” No, he had turned water fresh, not into silver.

“Maybe...” Yennefer said softly. “Maybe you’re the god of purity.” Jaskier snorted. “Think about it,” she said again. “You remind Witchers of their worth. You turn stone into silver. You turn a dirty stream into freshwater.”

“I’m no pure god,” Jaskier repeated. “I just see the good in everything. The value. And the water was an accident.” Yennefer smiles brightly.

“That’s it then,” she says.“The god of the pure within the impure.”

That made sense, actually. There was silver in stone. There was humanity in mutants. There was freshness in water.

“Can I also be the god of Witchers?” He asked. Yennefer laughed, but Jaskier was serious.

“Jaskier, you’re a friend to Witchers. You’re the god of their weapons. Just as you’re an enemy of their critics, but a god of their critics’ jewelery.” Jaskier smiled, content with the explanation.

A ghost to a god.

Well, there was some purity in his spirit after all.

“Geralt, fuck, help.” He shook as he looked down. There was far too much blood. Even Geralt seemed to go pale as he looked down at the damage. Most of their packs were back where they had been ambushed. The only thing left to them was what Geralt had grabbed, Jaskier’s own pack with only his notebook, a spare shirt, and a salve for minor cuts. 

“Hold on, Jaskier, hold on.” Geralt moved quickly, making quick work of the spare shirt, tearing it into strips and tying above the wound. “Here, take my hand,” he whispered, his voice gentle, his eyes wide with fear. 

 “Geralt- Geralt, dear heart. Listen…” Jaskier swallows and takes Geralt’s hands, lacing their fingers and squeezing as tightly as he can. “If I don’t make it, if you have to go on-” 

Before he could finish his thought, Geralt pulled the arrow from his leg in one smooth motion. Jaskier screamed through clenched teeth, his body shaking from it. Geralt was quick to bandage him up, all the while murmuring softly to Jaskier. 

“There’s an oversized bed with your name on it at the keep, you just have to stay with me,” Geralt said, his eyes never leaving the wound. 

Jaskier took back Geralt’s hand after it was done with the bandages and squeezed it again, this time barely having the strength to press down into that firm palm. 

“Always, dear heart, always going to stay with you.” He licked his lips and gave a wet laugh. It was now or never or he was going to go to his very early grave regretting it. 

“I know where we are. This is the tail end of the path into the Blue Mountains. We’re so close I can smell Eskel’s goats.” Geralt was worried. He only talked like this with sick children and shriveled old women he couldn’t save. 

Jaskier only swallowed and nodded. They set camp that night and in the morning began the long and painful trek into the mountains. 

~

Three days. They had been on the move for three days. Every hour, Jaskier could feel his strength leaving him and every hour he tried to make Geralt face him, to hear the words he needed to say before…

Jaskier sat against a cave wall, shivering as sweat soaked through his shirt. His leg had been itching like mad since he had woken up and he feared that there had been more to that arrow than just steel. He wondered if Geralt had smelled it on him, if that was what was causing the Witcher to climb as quickly as they could into the mountains, to where there might be safety. 

He looked across the small fire where Geralt cooked two winter-thin hares. He looked haggard with the closest thing Jaskier had ever seen to true fear on his witcher. 

“Geralt?” He croaked, his voice cracking. 

“Hmm?” Geralt didn’t even look up, seeming to instead find anything else to look at than Jaskier’s fading body. 

Jaskier gave a sad smile and weakly patted the bedroll next to him. “It’s going to be cold tonight. Why don’t we have those for breakfast and you come get some sleep?” 

Geralt looked up at him then, his face drawn into something he couldn’t interpret but took the rabbits off the flames and nodded. 

He crossed the small space and slipped in next to Jaskier, pulling him gently down until they were tucked in the bedroll, his arms winding around the bard with barely a word. He felt rigid and unsure under Jaskier’s hands as he shifted, careful of the wounded leg. 

Jaskier pressed in close to Geralt’s chest and timed his breathing to the sound of the witcher’s heartbeat under his ear. Geralt, for his part, wrapped his arms around Jaskier and held him close, burying his nose into his hair. He thought with a faint chuckle that he must have reeked but Geralt didn’t seem to mind, only pressing in closer. 

Sleep came for Jaskier sooner than he thought it would. He did not dream, nor did he really notice the pain. All he could feel as he drifted off were warm, though chapped, lips pressing to his forehead and words he couldn’t quite catch. 

They sounded like “Stay with me”.

~

When morning came, Jaskier couldn’t explain what he was doing standing near the entrance of the cave, looking in where Geralt was still huddled with his back to him. His head felt foggy like he couldn’t quite remember what it was he was doing. 

“Jaskier?” Geralt called suddenly, “Jaskier!” 

“I’m right here,” Jaskier took a step towards Geralt and found that his legs felt sound under him. 

“Jaskier…” Geralt sat up, leaning over something in front of him, his shoulders shaking. “No, no no, you fucking idiot, no. Not like this, Jask, please.” There was panic in Geralt’s voice and he was on his knees leaning down. 

Jaskier stood frozen behind him as he watched over Geralt’s shoulder, where he, Jaskier, lay, pale and blue-lipped. 

Geralt leaned down, trying to breathe life into his body, Jaskier's name a chant on his lips between every curse and promise he could make. Jaskier touched his own lips as they seemed to tingle for a moment but then the feeling was gone. 

Geralt only pressed against his chest a few times but seemed to quickly give up before gathering Jaskier into his arms, his nose pressing back into his hair. 

“Jaskier, no. I’m sorry, I’m so… I…” There was a choking sound echoing in the cave and Jaskier realized it was broken sobs as Geralt only held his lifeless body closer. 

“Geralt, dear heart, I’m still- You don’t have to be sorry, Geralt. You’re safe, that’s all I could ask for.” Jaskier came around the other side and dropped to his knees, his hands reaching out for Geralt as he sat there, rocking back and forth on the frozen stone floor. “It wasn’t supposed to go like this. We weren’t supposed to end like this.” He wanted to scream.

“You were supposed to stay, Jask. You were supposed to stay with me.” 

“Always,” Jaskier promised, “I’m always going to be here. I’m not going anywhere, Geralt. I love you, I’ll stay.” 

Geralt laid his body down gently, bringing the bedroll they shared over Jaskier’s face. “I’m sorry I failed you. I’m sorry I got you killed.” He looked away, swallowing, tears streaking down his face as his eyes slid right over where Jaskier’s ghost knelt in front of him. “I love you. I’m sorry I never told you.” 

Jaskier was sure if he still had a heartbeat, it would have skipped right before he shattered into a million pieces. There was nothing left for him to do but to keep his promise. He followed Geralt from that cave, watching as Geralt cast an aard that closed the entrance, burying Jaskier inside, his face completely void of any emotion as he did so. 

The rest of the journey to Kaer Morhen was quiet, Geralt barely stopping to eat or sleep until he had finally reached the keep. Jaskier trailed behind him in the halls, catching the looks that Geralt missed from his brothers, from Vesemir, from Yennefer when she showed up with Ciri not three days later. 

He followed his witcher into his rooms and watched as he drank himself into a stupor that still couldn’t bring him sleep. 

“You don’t have to do this to yourself, Geralt. I’d die for you a thousand times if it kept you safe,” Jaskier whispered. He couldn’t brush back the silver hairs that fell into Geralt’s face as he slumped over his writing desk. 

He looked down at the book that was open and recognized it as his journal. He was sure he’d blush if he could. It was a page towards the back that Geralt had opened to, where Jaskier had done a rough sketch of Geralt grooming Roach. It hadn’t been his best work, but he kept it with him anyways. 

“Oh, you were never meant to see that,” he winced, sliding up onto the desk beside Geralt’s outstretched arm. He reached down as if to grab his hand and sighed when his fingers only managed to slide through it without so much as a twitch. 

“Should have protected you, should have saved you. Always losing you,” Geralt slurred, his eyes closed. “Always losing the ones I should have protected.” 

“Oh, dear heart,” Jaskier leaned his elbow onto his knee, wiping a hand over his face. He wondered how long he would be like this, not that he was complaining. He had promised. He was still going to follow his witcher.

~

The years slipped past them, Geralt witchering, Jaskier following. The only difference seemed to be that Geralt had finally found it in himself to start talking to Jaskier, only when Jaskier couldn’t respond. 

That first season out, Geralt found a contract on a notice board. 

“Looks like a cockatrice, Jask,” he murmured quietly, reading over the paper. “They’ll swindle me for sure, always with fucking cocatrices.” He gave a small smile looking up. “You know, the only time they didn’t was when you’d come flying at the alderman like a cockatrice yourself, all color and spit and barbs.” 

“You always stopped me though.” Jaskier leaned against the board, his head resting on the worn wood as he watched Geralt fondly. “I worry you’ll never see a proper payment again unless you find another bard.” The idea twisted something where his chest used to be. Geralt travelling with anyone else always seemed to do that, even before his untimely demise. “But at least now I can follow you into battles without you having to worry about me getting hurt, eh?”

Jaskier followed Geralt like he always had, trailing behind him as he met with the alderman, to his room at the inn, watching as he checked over his potions. 

“Come back in one piece.” Jaskier winced at the old habit that hadn’t seemed to die with him. 

“Stay out of trouble while I’m-” Geralt turned and frowned at the empty room. “Right then.” He only growled and slung his swords over his back before stalking back out of the room. 

They had stopped on the edge of a ravine and Geralt looked down the craggy face, scowling. He downed his potions without a second thought and began the climb down. 

And then-

Jaskier was suddenly back in the room at the inn, Geralt with his back to him, grunting as he curled in on himself. 

“What the fuck just happened?” Jaskier asked. He came around the other side of Geralt. There was a nasty cut along his arm but it wasn’t anything Geralt couldn’t handle, he knew. 

“Bollocks! Really!? Finally, a way to follow you into battle and, what? I can’t? Why?” Jaskier threw his arms in the air in frustration. 

Geralt made a low sound, the needle shaking in his hand as he stitched his arm. His eyes kept flicking up to his potions, lined across the low table. Jaskier looked him over, watching the last of the toxicity fade from his veins. 

“You know, I keep asking why am I here, but I’m starting to wonder.” Jaskier tried to run his hands through the muck that still clung to Geralt’s hair, sighing as his fingers simply faded through him. “Am I here because you’ve chosen to let me haunt you?” He clucked his tongue. “Foolish witcher, let me go. You don’t need to punish yourself.” 

“Hmm.” Geralt stood, crossing to the basin to wash away the remaining blood on his arm and hands. 

Jaskier climbed into the bed and waited for Geralt to take his usual position beside him. He sang quietly as his witcher drifted off into his usual restless sleep, Jaskier’s name never far from his lips. 

~

And so it went for several seasons, Geralt fighting battles Jaskier could not witness, only able to linger beside him when the nights grew quiet and Geralt would try to drown himself in women and liquor and the desperate pace of travel. 

After one fight, Jaskier returned to find Geralt hunched over his potions, muttering to himself as he pulled one from the bag with surprisingly shaky hands. 

“What are you doing? Did you not kill the beast?” Jaskier was kneeling in front of him, unable to reach out, unable to be heard. He looked between the bottle and Geralt’s face and frowned. 

“I see,” he whispered softly.

It had been a long time at this point and Jaskier was realizing that the only time he was not with Geralt was when Geralt didn’t think of him, so far only when he gave himself over completely to his witcher senses and instinct. 

“Does thinking of me hurt you so deeply, Geralt?” If he were able to cry he would. Instead all he could do was look on as Geralt slowly uncorked the bottle. “I do not blame you for wanting to outrun your ghosts, but please. Not like this.”

Geralt brought the bottle to his lips and for a moment it felt like his eyes had flicked to Jaskier’s, wide and wounded. He pulled the bottle away, corking it and shoving it back into his bag. 

“You’d think me a coward, I know.” Geralt pulled out his flask instead, taking a hard pull of the White Gull he kept with him constantly now. 

“Still the bravest man I know.” Jaskier smiled sadly. 

~

As years went on, Jaskier noticed he was starting to lose time. Slowly there would be a day missing where he started with Geralt in one place and ended up somewhere else completely. Usually when he would appear again, Geralt was already settling into a room or brushing down Roach, idle things that let the witcher’s thoughts wander. 

“Would you have written new songs by now? You’d be what, sixty?” Geralt hummed. “You’d hate old age, vain as you are- were.” 

“Oh, back to this are we? Haven’t been insulted in a while. Though kind of you to say sixty. I think we’re coming up on eighty easily, dear heart.” Jaskier murmured fondly, leaning against the stall to watch Geralt work. 

The time between these moments was clearly growing. Every time he saw Geralt he looked more worn, more weary. New scars were cropping up between his visits. He especially hated when he came back to find Geralt sewing himself back together after a particularly bad fight or when he was being chased out of various towns. 

It felt like that was when he thought of Jaskier the most, when there was no one there to defend him. No one to care for him. He showed in the moments Geralt felt most alone in the spaces Jaskier used to fill. His gaunt face still holding the same disappointed scowl it always did when villages turned on him. Jaskier knew it made Geralt feel like a monster. It filled him with a rage so powerful, it nearly vibrated the medallion on Geralt’s chest. 

“You’re not, Geralt. I know you’re not! I wish you listened to me then or could hear me now.” Jaskier pleaded, pacing in front of the witcher, his arms thrown wide. “You’re still a hero.” He would have wet his lip the way he used to if he could feel it. “Still my hero, witcher.” 

“Maybe they’re right. I just bring death wherever I go.” Geralt murmured as he set up camp. 

Jaskier felt himself slowly fade, flickering as Geralt knelt for meditation, every breath blurring his vision until the void took him again. 

~

It was dawn or maybe dusk, but all Jaskier knew was that it had been a long time since Geralt last thought of him. There were too many scars along his wiry arms where his sleeves were pushed up, his feet dangling into the water of a stream. He sat on the edge of a rock, his head in his hands. 

Jaskier went to say something and found that he couldn’t, his mouth opening and closing but no sound came forward. 

“A hundred years,” Geralt swallowed. “A hundred years and I’ve forgotten the sound of your voice.” He sounded wounded, his voice cracking with sorrow and age. “I’d give every single one of them back if I could just… remember.” He pressed his palms over his eyes and shook. “The world keeps changing, and you’re still gone and I’m still here.” 

Jaskier dropped to his knees beside Geralt, his hands reaching out to touch the man that would not let him go. 

It was his hands that caught his attention. They were barely shadows at the ends of his arms. Jaskier looked down in silent panic as he realized he was fading. Geralt was forgetting him. A mixture of relief and agony tore through him. All he wanted to do was scream but all he could do was sit there in silent horror as he watched Geralt fall to pieces. 

Rest, witcher. He thought, swallowing down the silent tears he was no longer able to shed. Rest, my love, your path is almost at its end. Do you know all the good you’ve done? 

Geralt took a steadying breath, looking up and out over the river, his once brilliant yellow eyes dulling around the pupils. 

I’ll stay, Geralt. I promise. As long as you’ll have me, I’m going to stay. Jaskier silently promised. He leaned forward as though to press his forehead to Geralt’s shoulder. He could have sobbed when the world tilted and he simply passed through him, unable to even comfort him from the other side. 

Beside him Geralt took another breath before pulling his feet from the stream. He turned and gathered his swords and once more, there was nothing. 

~

Time had lost meaning. There had only been brief fleeting moments where Geralt seemed to remember his bard, unable to perceive the ghost that followed him still. Jaskier’s own memory was starting to grow fuzzy. Why was he here? Why did he want to protect this man sitting alone by the fire? Where was his voice? 

He remembered having a lute and a book of songs and an amazing adventure filled with heroics and heartbreak, with destiny and death. He could remember the taste of wine and the smell of sea salt and the feel of a calloused hand cupping his cheek as he laid in a cave decades upon decades ago. 

Jaskier stood in the door of a dusty stone room, the window overlooking a mountain range he could not name. 

“Toss a coin to your witcher,” came a voice, cracked and ancient and so very very tired. 

Jaskier followed the voice to a pile of deteriorating furs. He knew that face, scarred and weathered as it was. He knew that song. Something in him flared as he reached out with almost solid fingers. 

“Geralt?” He whispered. 

The pile rose with a shaky breath and then the man, the witcher, his witcher, drew no more breath. 

“Oh dear heart, you took so long.” Jaskier chuckled sadly. “I’m so glad you thought of me. I’d never be able to live with myself if you died alone.” 

“Can’t live with yourself anyways,” came a rumbling voice from behind him. 

Jaskier whipped around and gasped. Geralt stood only a few strides away. His body whole again, the scars faded to fine silver lines, like threads of moonlight caught under his skin. Around him was a warm glow and it called Jaskier home like a beacon.

“Geralt!” Jaskier stood frozen on the spot.

“You stayed.” Geralt hummed, taking a small step forward. 

“You asked me to. Besides, what was I going to do, let you go on without me?” Jaskier laughed, his arms itching to reach out, to see if he could just…

“Stubborn,” Geralt growled but there was no heat to it as he stalked closer. 

“Yes you are, dear heart. Come here.” 

“Two hundred years, Jaskier.” Geralt took another step, his chest seeming to heave. 

“You took so much longer than I thought you would.” Jaskier shot back but he was grinning. 

“Jaskier.” It was the same old warning bite that Geralt used when he was treading on thin ice. 

“Hello.” He was beaming. The room around them had been dim when he appeared but now it seemed to glow. 

“Hard-headed.” Geralt surged forward, his arms wrapping solidly around Jaskier, lifting him easily as he buried his face into Jaskier’s neck. 

“Are you going to kiss me, witcher or just keep throwing-”

He was cut off when Geralt pulled back just far enough to crush their mouths together, warm and perfect and bright as the sun. 

“Absolute bastard.” Geralt smiled as he pulled back, pressing a soft kiss to the corner of Jaskier’s mouth. 

Jaskier laughed, throwing his arms around Geralt’s neck. “I’ve missed you too.” He felt tears, actual tears slide down his cheeks as he clung to Geralt. The room around them seemed to vibrate as they clung to one another, filling with a warm light once more before falling forever dark again, the wind whipping through where they once stood.

They say deep in the Blue Mountains, if you are brave enough, there is a keep that once belonged to the witchers of old. For many years, they said it was haunted by the ghosts of all the ones the witchers had lost. 

They say Jaskier had stayed. He had stayed and waited, doing in death what he had done in life; following his witcher. That only when his witcher followed was he able to finally leave, hand in hand.

“No!” Geralt shouted, pulling Jaskier against his chest and tucking his nose against the bard’s mop of silky brown hair. He tried to ignore the scent of blood, too much blood, as he searched for the calming smell of Jaskier’s honeysuckle hair oil. “No, please, no!”

“Geralt, we need to leave,” Yennefer urged, yanking at the back of his armor. 

“We have to take Jaskier with us. We can’t just leave him here. He’s-” the Witcher stared down at the body in his arms. “We have to bury him properly.”

“I’m sorry, Geralt,” the sorceress muttered. There was a bright flash of purple light, a tingling sensation, and then darkness. “But we really have to get going.”

---

Jaskier sat up suddenly, alone at the side of the road. He stood and tried to walk towards the town where he and Geralt had promised to meet Yennefer. Before they had been-

The bard whipped back around and took a nervous step forward. He leaned over the edge of the ditch and saw, to his horror, his own bloody face staring back at him. Fuck. But then, how-?

He wracked his consciousness for whatever kind of monster he’d turned into. A ghost? A wraith? Certainly not a noonwraith, although the sun was shining rather brightly down upon his new incorporeal form. Could he still sing?

“Halls of the stone tower in the foothills;

Why should we hide from anyone?

Held you in my arms for the first time that day,

Felt like god’s anointed when you didn’t push me away.”

Yes, he could still definitely sing. But could anyone hear him?

---

Geralt’s heart began to beat a stuttering, up-tempo tattoo in his chest the closer he got to his latest contract location. The side of the road outside one particularly familiar village. 

He couldn’t be sure that this was Jaskier until-

“Small chambers shrinking ‘til they vanish, 

Wolves in the hallway gaining ground;

Think back to the moment when I should have said something true...

Shadows and their sources now stealing away with you.”

Geralt picked up where he knew the song went next, his breath catching against something hard and painful in his throat:

“Gold light shining on so many things,

In the age of kings.”

The shimmering form of his friend appeared from around a tree and sauntered forward. “I knew they’d send one of you after me eventually,” he laughed. “Didn’t think it would be you.”

“Why not?”

“Didn’t think your tender heart would be able to do it,” the ghost of what was once Jaskier reached out and ran a cool, intangible finger down Geralt’s cheek. “I feel nothing, Geralt. I hate it. I need you to do this for me.”

“I-”

“Geralt,” the bard smiled sadly. So sadly that it shattered whatever was left of the Witcher’s heart. “I’m sorry for failing you.”

“No, Jaskier,” he half-sobbed. The knot in his windpipe was finally being expelled in the form of little shivering sobs and he hated the way they made his voice crack and tremble. “It was me who failed you. You shouldn’t have had to die like that. You shouldn’t have died at all! I should have been able to keep you safe, to keep you alive!”

“I always knew I was destined to die at your side,” Jaskier shrugged. “I just thought I’d be a little older. I’m not angry, though.”

“So why are you still here?”

The bard smiled again and the Witcher wondered how even in death, Jaskier’s guileless grin was the brightest thing he’d ever seen. “Unfinished business, I suppose!”

“Hmm.”

“You see,” the specter explained, coming closer. Floating closer. “I never got to tell you how I felt before I died and I-”

“I love you, too,” Geralt admitted. “I miss you more every day. When I see your lute, when Ciri hums your songs, when Yen looks at me with that knowing sense of pity in her eyes I just-” 

The ghost of Jaskier watched with growing confusion as the Witcher broke down into dry-heaving sobs. He collapsed to his knees and the bard realized, for the first time, that Geralt wasn’t wearing his armor. He had come as Jaskier favored him in life, in his shirt and trousers with his hair loose around his face. He had come to usher the bard into true death dressed as Geralt. 

Not the White Wolf. 

Not the Butcher of Blaviken.

Not the fearsome Geralt of Rivia, Witcher of Kaer Morhen.

Just Geralt. 

His Geralt.

“I always did,” Jaskier pressed a ghostly kiss to the Witcher’s cheek and watched him shiver. “I always will love you, I suppose. I don’t know what’s waiting for me in the next life, dear heart, but I do know that if I’m allowed, I’ll keep an eye on you and Ciri and that blasted sorceress. And your brothers, who I’m still rather upset I never got to meet.”

“Someday,” Geralt smiles sadly. “We’ll join you.”

“Not for many years, I hope,” the ghost shook his head. He was beginning to fade. “Goodbye, Geralt. I love you.”