"Who loosed that arrow?"
Iorveth's voice is a furious roar as he drops from the branch and lands nimbly on the forest floor, barely even rustling the leaves. His glare turns on the rest of the scoia'tael emerging from their hiding places among the trees, some of them glancing at each other while others gaze at the body lying prone on the ground in front of them with an arrow in its back. They all avoid looking at him.
"Go on. Which of you was it?"
Timidly, a blonde elf with her hair twisted in elaborate braids raises a sheepish hand, still clutching the offending bow.
Iorveth rounds on her. "Did you hear me give the order to shoot?"
"No, but I thought…"
"What did you think? It's Geralt of Rivia. Or is your mind so addled by fisstech you've already forgotten Vergen?"
She swallows silently, turning red as she stares at the ground. "I wasn't at Vergen. I only joined your unit a couple of weeks ago."
Iorveth throws up a hand in frustration. "And what? Didn't think to read up on it? Just because you want to join the Squirrels doesn't mean you need a brain the size of one." He sighs heavily. "How many men with white hair who carry two swords do you know of? The one dh'oine I actually don't hate and you go and shoot him in the back." Shaking his head, he dismisses her with a wave. She's young and over-eager. If Geralt's alright, he'll go easy on her. If he's not…
Iorveth crosses to the body and kneels beside it, slipping a hand inside the witcher's collar to feel his pulse. It's there, tapping against his fingertips, shockingly slow but nonetheless strong. Geralt doesn't appear to be bleeding heavily. The arrow has missed his spine, entering a few inches left of centre, and with any luck his armour will have absorbed most of the arrow's momentum and his ribs prevented it from punching deep enough to pierce a lung. Iorveth moves a hand in front of his face, feeling for breath, then lightly taps Geralt's cheek. "Gwynbleidd?"
It gets a response. Geralt moans, stirs, and despite Iorveth being able to feel how shallow his breaths are, opens his eyes. He squints, vertical pupils narrowing as they focus on the elf. His lips move, but he's too breathless to speak.
"Don't panic, Gwynbleidd," Iorveth says. "Some bloede idiot shot you, but you're going to be fine." He leans in, grasps the arrow shaft in two hands to hold it steady, then snaps it off as close to Geralt's armour as possible. He's not pulling it out yet. Not when there's still a chance the witcher might bleed to death.
Geralt grunts quietly in pain, but doesn't try to stop him.
Iorveth glances round at his men. "You, help me with him," he shouts at the largest elf in the unit, Orym, who has more than enough muscle to take Geralt's weight. "We're taking him back to camp." Between them, they manage to help Geralt to his feet, and a trickle of blood runs down over the witcher's back to splash on the floor.
It would almost be a relief when Geralt draws a deep breath, if it weren't for the coughing that follows. No blood sprays, Iorveth notices, and takes comfort from that. It might not mean much. He hasn't forgotten that scoia'tael arrows are tipped with poison.
Despite the strength of two men holding him up, Geralt still sags, struggling to find his feet. His head inclines towards Iorveth, a breath hissing through gritted teeth that the elf feels on his cheek. "Ploughing squirrels," he grunts.
Iorveth looks over at the young, blonde-haired archer watching them nervously. He isn't going to disagree.
The wound, it turns out, isn't as bad as it seems. Geralt had screamed horribly when they'd pulled out the arrow, the tip having embedded itself in his scapula, but other than that, he has no trouble breathing and it seems the worst of the damage is superficial.
As night falls on the camp Geralt sits by the fire, shirt off and knees tucked up to his chest while Iorveth kneels behind him, pushing a needle and thread through the wound.
"What are you doing here, vatt'ghern?" the elf asks as he works, "I thought you'd left Aedirn."
Geralt grimaces slightly as the next stitch pulls closed. They'd had to push a knife in to open the wound enough to get the arrowhead out, and Iorveth is closing up the inner layers of tissue before he even gets to the skin. "I'm looking for someone," Geralt answers, and reaches for the flask of vodka on the ground beside him. The contents seems to have ended up in equal parts in his belly and on his back. "She was last seen in Nilfgaard. I'm following the army, looking to see if I can pick up any clues." He takes a drink. "What about you, Iorveth? I thought you'd stay close to the Pontar. What are you doing this far south?"
"The Black Ones are marching for Vergen," the elf answers. "We've been spying on them from the forests, ambushing their supply trains to slow them down."
Geralt clenches his jaw grimly. "It won't be enough. There's too many of them, and they're getting good at catching squirrels. You'd be better off retreating to the city and defending it from there."
"We will, if it comes to that."
"Tell Saskia to be careful. They have ballistae. They won't fear a dragon."
"She knows. And they will." Iorveth smirks slightly as he ties off the last stitch and moves on to suturing the outer layer of skin.
They're interrupted by the presence of one of Iorveth's elves, approaching the fire yet nonetheless hanging hesitantly back.
Iorveth glances up over Geralt's shoulder to see the girl from earlier, and scowls. "What do you want?"
"I'm sorry." She's nervous, fidgeting with her hands and struggling to look at the witcher. "I just wanted to know...will he be alright?"
"He'll be fine, thanks to your terrible aim," Iorveth grunts, gesturing at Geralt. "His spine and heart are here, and you shoot him in the shoulder blade."
"Iorveth." Geralt's voice is perfectly calm, yet he nonetheless looks put out. "Could you not tell her how to kill me more efficiently?"
"Fine. Not him, but if you want to kill dh'oine, you'll have to get better than that."
The girl's eyes flicker down, then up again, making a point of meeting Geralt's. "Gwynbleidd, I know what you did for our commander, and I wanted to tell you I'm sorry. I shot before thinking."
Geralt waves a hand and gives a single shake of his head as it to tell her to forget about it. "What's your name?" he asks gently.
"Rhoenna."
"You're forgiven, Rhoenna. I'll live. No harm done."
Geralt doesn't see the roll of Iorveth's eye. "There, the witcher's gone all soft and gooey on you," he barks. "Feel better? Now go make him something to eat."
Rhoenna nods, hurrying off to tend to the hare stew cooking across camp.
Iorveth's attention turns back to Geralt. The witcher's skin is clammy, damp beneath his fingers, and it makes him anxious. He finishes off with the stitches then moves to face Geralt from the front, placing his palm on the witcher's forehead.
Geralt pulls a face and withdraws just a short way, then lets Iorveth do what he will. "You still worried about me?"
Iorveth gives him a somber look. "I don't know how it will affect a witcher, but scoia'tael arrows are poisoned. Aen Seidhe are immune. I don't have the antidote. It could take a couple of days to find the ingredients…"
"No need," Geralt interrupts, and sighs. "Won't be pleasant, but it won't kill me." He gestures at the belt containing his potion pack lying with his clothes. "I'll take Golden Oriole. Should have the poison neutralized in a few hours."
Iorveth nods, and reaches for the pack to hand it to him. Geralt finds the right potion and gulps it down, Iorveth's concerned gaze still on him as he puts the empty vial away. He can't quite figure out why the elf is looking at him like that until Iorveth reaches out and grasps his wrist, feeling his pulse.
A look of realisation spreads over Geralt's face. "It scared you, didn't it?"
Iorveth feels the thrumming in his wrist in silence a few more seconds, his shoulders hunched. "Is it always that slow? I thought you were dying. After everything, some idiot girl with her fingers too quick on the bowstring had finished you off."
"It's always that slow," Geralt confirms, and frowns. "Don't call her an idiot. She was only trying to impress you."
Iorveth ignores that. He moves his hand and instead places it on Geralt's chest, leaning even closer. "It's slower than a dh'oine's," he murmurs after a few moments, and there's something in his eyes Geralt can't quite define. "Slower even than an Aen Seidhe's."
Geralt watches him closely. "In case you needed any more proof I'm not human?"
Iorveth shakes his head. He seems unsettled. Conflicted. "I always thought dh'oine hearts were pathetic. Like vermin's. They race too fast and burn out too soon, while Aen Seidhe hearts can beat nobly on for centuries." He smiles sadly. "Yet yours is slower still. What must you think of mine?"
In the quiet, Geralt listens. His witcher senses are more than enough to hear it: the steady beating of Iorveth's heart in his chest, indeed slower than any human's but considerably faster than Geralt's own. "It's what keeps you alive," he says plainly. "Nothing more, nothing less. But then, I'm not the one comparing myself to people I claim to hate. Don't see the sense in judging someone for their physiology."
Iorveth finally pulls his hand away, turning away with a scowl. "Well, dh'oine have never had any trouble judging us for our pointed ears, nor you for your viper's eyes," he says irritably. "You're right. Senseless."
He gets up and brushes himself off, suddenly feeling like he has to get away, out of range where Geralt can no longer hear his heart. The witcher won't judge him. That's all in his own head, but it does nothing to make him less uneasy. "I'm going to find out what happened to the food," Iorveth says tersely. "You should rest, Gwynbleidd."
He leaves Geralt by the fire while the witcher listens to the fading beats of his heart as he walks away, suddenly much faster than before.