#witcher ficlet

and then she had magic and no need for a skill like sewing. she’s no need for it now, either, but jaskier makes a compelling argument in the way his chest is pressed along her back and his chin is hooked over her shoulder, observing her uneven stitching. he is calm and quiet like this, offering tips and encouragement when he’s not absentmindedly humming in a way that vibrates through her back.

oh absolutely. sorry it took me a minute to fill this prompt but... life hard, author tired

modern au this time, if you want some in canon you can hit me up again with more prompts :)

tw: Geralt deals with some negative symptoms of ADHD and makes a new friend at the gym!

---

Geralt frowned. "I don't want to go, Eskel."

"C'mon dude, please? I need you there to be my spotter... and my wingman."

"Take Lambert."

"Nah, girls like him now. They think he's some kind of Tik Tok sexyman."

"Never say those words in that order to me again. Please."

"Fine. If you agree to come with me tonight."

Look. I did all three of them. And I know you said touching, but I accidently had some kissing too. Some Geraskier cuteness, coming right up!

Thank you for prompting me, I had so much fun writing this!!

On Ao3 here! Prompts: 8. shielding the other one with their body, 18. squishing the other’s cheek and 28. feeling for each other in the dark

Prompt me something? <3 “Geralt? Is that you?” Jaskier looks around in the complete darkness, his hands outstretched in front of him, trying to find something for him to orient himself with. He can hear something rustling in the room, and he hopes to everything holy that that is indeed Geralt and not what Geralt came to kill. Or a bandit or something. Jaskier has a rich imagination.

“I’m here.” Geralt grunts somewhere in front of him, and Jaskier follows the sound of his voice.

His eyes are wide open but still he sees nothing, not even his own hands. Then a hand finds his arms, and Jaskier latches onto it like it’s a lifeline. He pats his way up that hand that grabbed his arm, up over the elbow and oh, that is a well shaped bicep, and up that shoulder. This is most likely Geralt, but he can’t see, and if it was a bandit or a monster he would have been stabbed by now. But just to be sure, he pats all the way until he reaches a neck, and then feels his way up it and onto the face.

He can hear someone sigh, it could be Geralt, it also could be an evil assailant bent on taking all that Jaskier owns in the most inconvenient of ways. Indeed, just to be sure, he squishes that face. He has squished that face to annoy his witcher just a few times before, and he is absolutely sure he would recognize Geralt this way.

“What are you doing?” The someone that could be Geralt asks, sounding tired.

“I'm trying to decide on whether you are Geralt or not. Hold still, Geralt, or I won’t know.”

Another exasperated sigh, and Jaskier grins widely and he flattens his palm over Geralt's cheeks and makes that adorable little squished face that makes him look like a duck.

“Jaskier.” Geralt complains, but doesn’t shove him off. He never does for some reason, and Jaskier won’t ever stop.

“Yes, yes, I know that whiny tone, this is the old, grumpy and oh so dangerous witcher friend of mine.” He concedes, but doesn’t let go of Geralt's face. It’s soft, its lines and edges easier to explore when Geralt isn’t watching him. He pretends the wild beating of his heart is because of the sudden darkness, not Geralt's hands gripping his waist.

“We should get you out of here.” Geralt murmurs, his lips moving under Jaskiers thumb as he explores. It tickles, and he lets his thumb stroke Geralt's cupid bow and along the seam of his lips.

He feels bold, much bolder than he ever thought he would.

“We should.” Jaskier agrees, not moving an inch. He can’t see anyway, and Geralt isn’t trying to escape him. Which is very interesting and absolutely something that spurs Jaskier on like nothing else.

Maybe he would dare to kiss Geralt here? In the darkness away from prying eyes?

As if Geralt read his mind, he can feel Geralt take a step closer, their bodies so close now they are almost touching.

“You are not very good at making me leave.” Jaskier murmurs, his hands sliding upwards, his fingers brushing Geralt's ears as they slide over his jaw and into his hair.

“Neither are you.” Geralt murmurs back. Jaskier wishes he could see, all of a sudden. Wishes to see if Geralt's eyes would dip and look at Jaskiers lips. If there is a blush spreading, if his pupils are blown wide. If he imagines Geralt's breath on his lips, or if he is just more sensitive here in the dark.

He is not imagining it. Geralt presses his lips to Jaskiers, just a little off. They adjust as they part, and Geralt kisses him again. Jaskier feels like he is flying, his balance is all over the place, but holding onto Geralt, leaning into him, helps.

Somewhere, a door slams, and there is a loud hiss from something with many teeth.

Jaskier loses his grip when Geralt turns, twisting to face the door, placing himself between Jaskier and whatever is down there that Geralt actually came here to kill.

“Don’t leave this room.” Geralt says, and then the soft sound of a sword being drawn.

"Pleased to make your aquaintance, my good sirs. It's not every day that I find myself with such fine company." Jaskier inclines his head, his most charming smile dancing on his lips. "I am sure you've heard of me, but for propriety's sake I shall introduce myself to you fine gentlemen either way." Jaskier sits up a little straighter and spreads his arms wide in one of his trademark dramatic gestures - well. He sure tries to spread his arms, but he gets stopped pretty much immediately by the shackles around his wrists.

He curses silently, but like the performer that he is, he keeps his smile on his face.

"My name is Jaskier, also known as Julian Alfred Pankratz, former best friend and barker of the White Wolf, master of the seven liberal arts and most handsome and most renown graduate of Oxenfurt. With whom do I have the pleasure of speaking?"

There is in awkward pause, then -

"The pleasure is all mine. I am Mr. Whiskers," Jaskier says to himself, in a pitch much higher than usual. The mice sitting at his feet only stare at him in confusion. Yeah. Jaskier would have judged himself too if he had any damns left to give. So he does what any good bard would do when his audience isn't very appreciative of what comes out of his mouth: he continues with an even brighter smile and pretends that he isn't a complete idiot for trying to make friends with mice.

"And I am Mr Whiskers' mouse-spouse," Jaskier says in a deeper voice. He tries very hard not to think about the fact that his pitch now sounds exactly like it had twenty years ago when he had imitated a certain witchers' voice to tease him. "And my name is - uh..."

Jaskier trails off, looking helplessly at the mouse who blinks up at him curiously but doesn't offer any solutions to the problem of Jaskier not knowing any other mouse-appropriate names.

In his normal voice Jaskier says, "Huh. I guess if you're Mr Whiskers' spouse, you'd be Mr Whiskers too? Or Mr Whiskers Two?" The mice exchange unimpressed glances and Jaskier sighs, letting his hands fall back down into his lap.

"Yeah, no I didn't think so. That would get confusing really quickly. I am very sorry, my dear, but I'm afraid I don't know any other mouse names. My creative genius apparently runs dry at one mouse-name per day. That's what I get for pledging myself to one muse and one muse only. As soon as he leaves me, so does all poetry and creativity." He cocks his head. "Oh! But you could be my new muse! So I probably should call you something that I could fit into a song. Something like... In a lovely house/ there once lived a mouse/ with a handsome spouse/ whose name was Klaus - No. No no no, absolutely not. The metre would be all over the place and it sounds like something Valdo Marx would have written in his first semester. No, that won't do at all. Maybe... Hmmm."

Jaskier winces and shuts his mouth immediately. No need to think about how similar he sounded to Geralt for a second there. No need to think about him at all. Then again...

"You know what? My...someone I once knew had a time honored tradition. He could call all of his trusty animal companions Roach. Now of course that is not a good enough name for a noble mouse such as yourself and I will most certainly come up with a better name, but - "

The mouse shuffles closer, making soft tap-tap noises with his tiny feet. Then, it sniffs a little at Jaskier's leg and begins climbing it until it reaches his hands.

"You like the name Roach, huh?“

The mouse let's out an adorable little squeak that makes Jaskier's lips twitch.

He holds his breath and watches with almost embarrassing excitement as the mouse puts one tiny foot on Jaskier's hand, looking up at him with big black eyes. Black like Geralt's eyes after drinking one of his potions. Jaskier had never been able to deny those eyes anything.

"Fine," he sighs and lifts the mouse in his hands up so they can better look each other in the eyes. "You can be Roach. On the condition that if you ever meet Geralt, you won't snitch on me and tell him that I'm no better at coming up with names than he is."

Roach gives another squeak and curls up in Jaskier's hand, as if there was no place more comfortable.

Maybe, with enough patience, Jaskier will be able to train his new mouse friends to bite through his shackles. Or maybe he could send them out like messenger pigeons and find Geralt for him.

I’m on a train to and from NYC for most of the day (god i hate work travel. hate it hate it hate it) and have a ridiculous amount of free time that i’m itching to spend with the fandom.

Send them to me via my ask box or reblog. I’ll even go first.

Jaskier’s love language (or at least, one of them), is definitely acts of service, right? So over the two decades he travels the Continent with Geralt, Jaskier notices the Witcher is rather abhorrent at taking proper care of himself. And that’s entirely unacceptable to the bougie bard, self-proclaimed lover of all the finer things in life. Especially because it’s Geralt, who is worthy and deserving of care, even if the Witcher might not think so.

So Jaskier sort of, just, takes over.

Characters: Geralt of Rivia

Fandom: The Witcher

Tags: Reader Insert, Gender Neutral Reader, Angst

Warnings: Swearing, sad

Word Count: 1,1k words

Requested by @the-mechanical-angel​: Hello dear! I'm so glad you're back! Now I would like to see what to will do with this: headcanon reaction of Gerald and the Fwarrior (yes, a sequel of the one I requested you) when they meet again in a tavern after she recovers, she's still hurt about his behavior and when he asks her to join him in another mission she declines coldly, telling him that he made clear that he doesn't need her and after telling him good luck she leaves him alone at the table. I love your additions to the fandom 🥰

A/N: Sequel to the headcanon I wrote here ;)

A/N2: It had been a while since I wrote pure angst! The other request was more from Geralt’s POV, and this from reader’s. There’s not a whole lot of dialogue on this one, but I kind of like how it turned out anyway. Hope you like it!!

Recovery was a slow and arduous progress, and Geralt didn’t make it any easier for you. Ridden with guilt, he stuck by your side. He insisted on looking after you to make amends for pushing you away and ultimately being responsible for your injury. Contrary to what he was trying to achieve, he was smothering you. It only made you feel more helpless. In any case, having him around after your argument was the last thing you wanted.

Needing to get away from him, you sneaked out while he was gone to gather supplies. While he rode on Roach, you left town. You hid yourself in a tavern, far enough from him without exhausting yourself in your injured state. Then your loneliness’ company made you thoughtful.

You still vividly remembered what happened, even through the passing of time (only two days had passed, yet they felt like weeks) and the haze of your injury induced fever. Your skin still felt warm, and it only seemed to burn more intensely at the thought of that moment.

the movie “enchanted”, but witcher-fied (sorry this got away from me a bit)

there’s a stereotypical medieval fantasyland where jaskier julian alfred pankratz is the prince of lettenhovia. he’s got the looks, voice, and affinity for attracting woodland animals of a disney princess. also, the tragic backstory: his parents died in a freak accident when he was young. but don’t worry, his creepy “uncle” stregobor took upon himself the burden of ruling in their stead, until julian grew up and became ready for the throne.

(basically, stregobitch is like rasputin, and had tricked and slimed his way into the crown’s good graces before, surprise surprise, killing off the king and queen. he left julian alive to take some of the heat off of him with that extra distraction of grieving child. alas, poor little princeling that he can play the benevolent guardian to.)

and things are gr8 for good ol streggy, julian seems more inclined to sing and wander than become bogged down with the responsibility of becoming king. everything’s comin up stregs.

and then, of course, there’s a prophecy about how julian will be his doom or whatev and he needs to get on that shit STAT like he’s never heard of a self-fulfilling prophecy before (to be fair, fantasyland doesn’t have ancient greek tragedies to learn from so rip stregosaurus). but before he can implement his sophisticated plan of julian dying in an “accident”, our dear jules wanders too far and falls down a magic well into the Real World.

and he’s like, sweet, look at all this stuff! this is great and - oh hello, very attractive man with silken white hair and eyes as golden as the dawn light falling gently upon newly blossomed lillies and thighs that can crush his head and his heart, what up. and geralt is very confused and frustrated and oddly and begrudgingly charmed by this loudly dressed and loudly singing idiot accosting him outta nowhere, but his daughter ciri seems to like him so i guess we can keep him for a night but if he pees on the rug he’s out.

cue fun family bonding, musical numbers, shenanigans, all that jazz; julian, now jaskier cuz new world new him babey,, exploring and learning and having the time of his life and trying to get this broody man to open up and show that kindness his scowl can’t quite hide.

aaaaand cut back to streginald throwing a fit that the prince has cleverly evaded his dastardly plans, he has underestimated him it seems, and he can’t just let this massive loose thread keep flappin in the breeze, so he sends yennefer to deal with him.

now, yennefer is streggo my eggo’s daughter in this, and he’s raised her to be his right hand woman, his evil apprentice, the (much smarter) kronk to his yzma, and she’s been promised power once her dad fully claims the throne, so ofc she gets right on tracking that crafty twunk down to kill him. in the process, she comes across roach, julian’s horse and bff talking animal companion, by the magic well, gathering up the fucks to go after her wayward idiot. a struggle ensues, and yen and roach both go through the portal.

so now we got the side plot of these two trying to find jaskier, yen to kill him and roach to huff reproachfully at him for getting into this mess and if anyone is gonna kill him she will for dragging her across realms (she does not like portals, okay, they feel weird) not some uppity witch. so they got their tomfoolery of yen almost killing an unaware jaskier but then roach foiling her plans. she also tries to kidnap ciri as bait for a trap, but she can’t hurt this kid she’s too precious, ow ow ow, why does her chest feel weird?? she’s actually starting to find the boundaries to her thirst for power and it kinda sucks and feels nice at the same time??? 0/10 do not recommend

during this, geralt’s quiet life is being upended by this weird dude and he’s never danced so much in his life and his child is conspiring against him to set him up with this clearly deranged but very nice and pretty man but he’s not staying ciri we have to get him back to .....wherever tf he came from i don’t even like him, what are you talking about,,,

it all comes to a head at the costume ball, where geralt and jaskier are dancing and making eyes at each other until roach bursts in and tries to charades her way into warning her idiot to run motherfucker but she can’t talk in this realm so ugh and geralt horsegirl rivia is just like omg ur best friend is a horse that’s so fucking cool i love you even more.

and then yen bursts in; she’s kinda struggling to fulfill her mission, cuz she’s been watching jaskier and geralt and they just seem like two idiots that couldn’t possibly threaten anything, let alone her father’s power grab. she’s also made frenemies with roach, she’s the only motherfucker who can handle her in this city. so she just tries to scare jaskier into never returning, which works pretty well because she is v v scary, and then stregobonkers comes strolling in like wtf why is this taking you so long just kill him!! and yen is like i’ve kind of grown this pesky con- 🤢 consci- 🤢, wait, just, give me a min,,,, conscience!! yeah, that’s the bitch! anyway, stop telling me what to do dad and stregobego drops a bomb and goes i always knew you had a weakness to you, just like your parents!

and it’s just,,

silent.

what? what do you - my parents?

and it turns out he saw the power she held and wanted it under his control, so he killed her parents (it’s like, his signature move at this point) and groomed her to be his obedient little weapon. and, understandably, yen is pissed off and hurt and goes to lash out at him, but he just smirks and clicks his fingers while muttering under his breath, and everything stops for yen a second time as her mind blanks.

sneaky streg had put in a fail safe, in case she ever got out of line, and the amulet he gave her “for protection and focus, you must never take it off” lights up and puts her under his command and she turns into a sickass dragon that starts tearing up the dance floor, literally, in her rampage to kill jaskier.

geralt and jaskier go oh shit and dodge for their lives and things are looking pretty dire, but then jaskier looks at the suits of armor set up for decoration and goes wait a minute and grabs a sword to toss at geralt and just goes cover me boo and aim for that amulet and if you miss we’ll probably all die so no pressure!! and just sprints out and distracts angry dragon!yen and geralt goes goddamnit jaskier and sneaks around until he can jump at her and do a completely improbable matrix leap to stab at the amulet, and because this is a romcom and i get to choose my coping mechanisms, he makes it and yen is free from streg egghead’s power and she turns to him, still a dragon, and smiles wide with all them sharp sharp teeth and he goes ohhhh shiiiit and tries to run, but jaskier very helpfully trips him up and goes eat up my lady and dragon yen does, with great relish.

in conclusion, everyone lives happily ever after except streggles. geralt gets over his baggage and professes his love for jaskier, jaskier goes i’m not that easy geralt there needs to be wooing! i deserve to be wooed!! before heavily making out with him in the next five seconds. jaskier gives yen his blessing to become queen of lettenhovia, because he never really wanted the job anyway and she deserves it after what she’s been through. she still comes back every sunday for brunch and to teach ciri how to fight (she’s mine now, i’ve adopted her so she needs to learn the fine art of pointy things geralt) and geralt, jaskier, and ciri take holidays to fantasyland and roach is free to roam wherever she wants and becomes an advisor to yen.

the end

"Rest, Jaskier."

The witcher took the wet cloth from lax fingers.  Jaskier stirred, protesting.  He pushed himself up in the chair.

"...her fever, Geralt...s'rising...."

Rough knuckles brushed Jaskier's cheek.  A palm fitted itself over his eyes and he leaned into the touch.  His whole body ached and the touch was so pleasant and strong and blessedly cool. 

"Her fever is broken, Jask."

"...Hasn't...can't you feel it...she's on fire..."

"You're on fire, you fool," the gentle voice corrected.  The impossibly large hand moved to the back of Jaskier's neck and squeezed. Then he was being man-handled to his feet.  He put one hand on Geralt's large shoulder, trying to ground himself against the sudden spinning, the other hand clasped tightly in Geralt's.  A preposterous thought bubbled up unbidden and he laughed even as misery lanced it's way through his limbs at the shift.

"...may I have this dance..." he slurred, grinning.

"Buy me a drink first," Geralt rumbled, his voice reverberating through Jaskier's fingers, through his bones. He wasn't helping very much as Geralt hauled him over to where the bedrolls stretched out on the floor.  Geralt's grip was growing tighter. Grounding him even as he felt himself slipping.

"Easy," Geralt murmured.  He lowered the other man carefully, gently, as though he might break.  Maybe he was breaking, he thought, as pain radiated through his joints, washing over him as he laid back against soft blankets on hard floor.  He must have made a face or a sound because suddenly Geralt's hand was pressed firmly against his cheek and his concerned chalk-pale face was looming over him. 

His eyes closed and he swore he felt the hard press of dry lips against his forehead, far away and getting farther. That couldn't be real, he thought, unless.... 

"Am I...m' I dying?"

"No," Geralt spoke close enough that Jaskier could feel the breath in his hair.  He was drifting now...the voice a quiet and firm anchor in the dark.

"Not tonight, you're not."