Right. I know I said this next fic would provide insight into the actual plot of this series, but I just couldn't help myself.

I know the last fic was a bit heartbreaking, and this one is probably the same exact thing. So, again, please heed the tags and stay safe while reading. The installment is more like an interlude, and the next real fic will be posted later tonight. After that, it might be a couple days until the next one. I hope you enjoy this in the meantime.

CW: suicide attempt, suicidal actions, crying, grief/mourning, regret, witnessing death

Again, read the warnings and exit out of this fic if any of the above triggers you. Your mental health is more important than a story.

xxxxxxx

"Now you're gone,
 I realized my love for you was strong.
 And I miss you here now you're gone.
 Is this the way it's meant to be?
 Only dreaming that you're missing me.
I'm waiting here at home.
 I'll be crazy, now you're gone."

~ Now You're Gone, Basshunter

xxxxxxx

Geralt huffed, his breath lingering in front of him in the cold air as he set about situating Roach in the stable. He had traveled for hours on end, only stopping to give Roach a break once in a while. Being able to travel like that hadn't been possible for a long time, especially not when he had a human traveling alongside him.

But he didn't have a human beside him anymore.

His heart clenched at the thought of Jaskier, but he pushed it aside. What was done was done. He couldn't take back the words he'd said to the bard on the mountain, no matter how much he wanted to. He regretted every insult he spat, knowing deep down it hadn't been Jaskier's fault for any of it. Gods, he was such an idiot. Of course Jaskier had been there for every shitty thing that happened after he'd met the bard.

"I'll always be there, Geralt. It's what friends do."

Geralt gritted his teeth. He couldn't think of a single excuse to support why he snapped at Jaskier like that, didn't deserve an excuse. He lost the one person who never feared him, who loved him unconditionally, who grew feral at any person who even thought to disrespect the witcher.

A huff from Roach ripped him out of his self-deprecating musings. He gave her a small smile, despite the clearly judgmental glare he was getting from her. She'd noticed the loss of the bard's flamboyant presence and associated it with Geralt's grim mood from when he returned from the mountain. She chose to ignore him and gave him attitude any chance she got, seemingly pissed at him. He understood. He was pissed off at himself, too.

"I know, girl," he murmured to her as he removed Roach's saddle and his bags, "I know."

She tossed her head at him and he let out an irritated sigh. He grabbed anything he thought he'd might need and entered the tavern, his hood pulled up and tracking snow on the wood floor. He immediately sensed the somber mood of the patrons, and he thought it to be a bit peculiar, but he assumed they were just upset about the frigid snowfall outside. Geralt made his way to the bar, catching the barmaid's attention, who had a sorrowful look on her face. He resisted the urge to frown, a familiar voice in his reminding him, "You look so dreadful with that...frown on your face. Brood a little less as to not scare people off, why don't you?"

The barmaid tried to smile at him, but it fell flat despite her best efforts. With a sigh, she asked, "Room, dinner, and ale?"

He gave her a quizzical look. In response, she merely said, "A bard came through here asking for the same thing, but he took off before I could give him anything he asked for. Poor thing. He gave us a splendid show."

Geralt hummed. He knew he shouldn't ask - it was really none of his business - but there was a spark of hope in him that he couldn't ignore. "If the show was so great, why is the mood so somber?"

She shook her head sadly. "I've never met someone so heartbroken. The whole tavern hurts for him."

A heartbroken bard? Geralt shifted uncomfortably. That sounded eerily familiar. He hummed again. No. He had to remind himself, there was far more than one bard on the Continent. The likelihood of Jaskier being in this town compared to Oxenfurt or even Cintra was slim to none. But still...

He found his mouth moving before he could stop it. "Which way did he go?"

The barmaid sent him a skeptical look. "Why...?"

Geralt gave a slight shrug. "No one should be in the freezing cold."

She was silent for a minute, giving him an appraising stare, but he didn't crack under her gaze. Finally, she pointed forward and slightly to the left. "He went out the door and took off in that direction."

"Do you know what's that way?"

He heard her swallow thickly and watched her shift her gaze to stare down sadly at the bar top. "A cliff," he heard her murmur.

That answer, combined with the mournful look on her face, had Geralt's heart stopping in his throat. Before he could register the words fully, his body was already bracing against the howling wind biting at his face. He hadn't pulled his hood down, thankfully, so he merely gathered the edges of his cloak and brought them closer together. If it was cold for him, it must be freezing for Jaskier.

Geralt shook his head. No, he needed to stop that. He didn't know if the bard was Jaskier. It could be anybody, any bard on the Continent. But...

A growl escaped his throat. Fuck. His mind was telling him one thing, but his heart told him another. He needed to check, just to be sure. If it wasn't Jaskier, well, he'd figure out what to do then. He assumed the bard wouldn't want to be in the company of a witcher, and Geralt was exactly one to convey feelings appropriate for heartbreak, if any at all.

That was a lie. He knew two main emotions: rage and fear. He scoffed to himself. As much as Jaskier used to disagree, the people who hated witchers had one thing right: witchers could only destroy. Of all the emotions to feel, Geralt felt the two most volatile ones. Anger scares people away.

Fear scared Jaskier away.

Geralt never thought he could get Jaskier to leave. The bard didn't fear him, didn't flinch away from his anger, didn't show disgust when Geralt drank his potions. He stuck by Geralt through the thick and thin, through every undeserved insult hurled his way, through a wish designed to shut Jaskier up and nearly quieted him forever. And yet, Geralt eventually did as witchers do and destroyed, destroyed Jaskier's heart. He didn't think he could ever forgive himself for that.

Geralt sighed, pushing through his breath floating visibly in front of him as the cliff came into view. He could see a figure kneeling at the edge, but his outline only showed a dark silhouette in the night, the moonlight just barely falling short. Geralt hesitated for a moment - what if he was wrong? - before taking a few steps forward.

In the corner of his eye, he could see a lute case propped up against a tree. Definitely a bard...but was it his bard's-

No.

But was it Jaskier's lute?

Geralt turned his focus back to the bard kneeling at the edge, a little too close to the edge for Geralt to believe this outing to be anything with good intentions. The wind was harsh and frigid. The bard's cloak was wrapped around him, but Geralt doubted it actually did much to shield from the cold.

Moving a bit closer, Geralt's enhanced senses started to take in the barest of details in the pitch-black night. Only slightly louder than the wind, he could hear waves crashing below, and though he couldn't see over the cliffside's incline just yet, he knew there was a body of water spanning in front. Geralt's heart started to sink. This definitely wasn't an innocent visit for the view.

Then his eyes saw it. It wasn't much. A regular human would barely be able to see it if they were standing a foot away in broad daylight, much less several yards away in winter's darkest night.

A small splash of pale yellow stained the dead center of the cloak's back.

White Honey, Geralt thought, breath leaving his lungs in a sharp exhale. It was him. It had to be. There was no way some random bard would have the exact same fucking stain on the same colored cloak as Jaskier's. Geralt could remember how it happened, too.

"Fuck, Jaskier! Careful with those!" Geralt snarled, panting against the toxicity in his veins. The anger wasn't directed purely at Jaskier, but rather at himself. He knew he shouldn't have taken so many potions, but fuck those villagers. They told him there'd only been one cockatrice, not four.

"Sorry, sorry!" Jaskier called back, worry and concern evident in his voice as he sifted through Roach's saddlebags. "You really ought to fucking label these potions, Geralt," Jaskier huffed, frustrated, "I can't tell which is what!"

"The pale yellow one," Geralt repeated, squeezing his eyes shut tight and gritting his teeth, "Round bottle."

"This one?'

Geralt opened his eyes to see Jaskier holding a potion over his shoulder, though the bard hadn't turned around and was still searching through the bag just in case.

"Yes, that one," Geralt growled.

Jaskier immediately whirled around and rushed to Geralt's side. He had laid his cloak on Geralt's body, if only to serve a little bit of comfort to the witcher's suffering. He sat behind Geralt, lifting the witcher's torso to rest on his. Geralt opened his mouth and Jaskier moved to open the cork. Apparently, he opened it a bit too aggressively because a drop of White Honey sloshed out of the bottle and onto Jaskier's cloak.

Geralt let out a huff, but he quickly covered it with a half-assed remark to ease Jaskier's fears that the anger was directed at him. "That's never going to come out."

Jaskier laughed, a shakiness tinging it in a way Geralt didn't like. "Well, that dark cloak did need a bit of color." He tilted the bottle to Geralt's lips. "Really, now. I appreciate the gift - truly, I do - but you should know by now that black is definitely not my color."

Despite that comment, however, Jaskier never traded away the stained cloak or bought another one. He claimed it was because the stain was hardly noticeable and the cloak was in otherwise perfect condition. Geralt didn't argue.

Geralt shook himself out of the memory, the thought bringing back a tight feeling in his chest he didn't want to think about. Instead, he focused back on the figure at the cliff, who was now undeniably Jaskier. Geralt's mouth went dry.

He's too fucking close.

Jaskier was standing now, dropping his cloak to the ground. He took one, two slow steps forward. Geralt's heart leapt to his throat.

"Jaskier?" he called. The bard showed no signs of hearing him.

"Jaskier!" Geralt bellowed, lurching forward, feet carrying him as fast he could towards Jaskier.

He was too late.

Geralt could only watch in horror as Jaskier took the final step, his body falling over the edge and out of Geralt's line of sight.

"No!"Geralt cried in anguish, finally reaching the cliff's edge, arm held out uselessly as if reaching for something. He peered over just in time to see the water ripple at the bottom, the distant sound of something colliding harshly against the waves reaching his ears.

He couldn't breathe. Geralt sunk to his knees beside the discarded cloak, positioning himself in a way unlike Jaskier had been before...before he...

"No..." Geralt whispered, staring disbelievingly at the water. "No. No, no, no, no!"

He pounded his fist against the ground. He squeezed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth. He felt his breath hitch. Growling, he punched the ground again.

"Fuck!" he roared, slamming his fist once more against stone, sure that his knuckles were bleeding under his glove.

Before he could stop it, his breath hitched again. Opening his eyes soon turned out to be a mistake. His eyes burned, and something wet cascaded down his cheeks. Raising his fingers to his face, Geralt stared in disbelief as his glove came back wet with tears and not snow. When had been the last time he cried? The Trial of Grasses?

Geralt scoffed, closing his eyes again and letting the tears flow silently. He couldn't...Jaskier...

What was he supposed to do now?

Jaskier, the only person to never fear him. Jaskier, the only one to love him unconditionally. Jaskier, the only one to grow feral at any person who even thought to disrespect him.

Jaskier, Jaskier, Jaskier.

The only one to stick by him, to care for him, to love him.

And he was gone.

Geralt craned his head to the side and locked his gaze on the black lute case. With shaking legs, he stood, grabbing the cloak lying just inches away from him, and stumbled over to the tree, knees giving out once he was in front of it, only now noticing the coin purse resting beside the case. His normally steady hands trembled as he reached for the little purse, feeling how heavy it was. Geralt let out a choked breath. Jaskier had money. He could've spent the night warm in an inn, stomach stuffed with food and ale. So why? Why did he...? Why?

Geralt bit his lip as he set the cloak aside and took the lute in his hands, cradling it with a care he never did before. He could practically hear Jaskier in his ear.

"She's delicate, Geralt! My whole life rests in that case! You can't just toss her around like one of your swords, you brute!"

"Jaskier, it's just an instrument."

"'Just an instrument,' he says. That instrument is paying for this room, so show her some respect!"

Fresh tears flooded his cheeks as he opened the case. Sure enough, whatever tiny tidbit of hope he had still remaining was crushed. Geralt ran delicate fingers of the carvings on Filavandrel's lute. No, Jaskier's lute.

"Jaskier..." he whispered, voice cracking, "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

The wind whipped around him, threatening to pull back his hood and expose his skin to its ferocity. Geralt could hardly feel it. No amount of torture could ever make him feel a pain greater than the one in his heart.

Jaskier, Jaskier, Jaskier.

He missed the sound of Jaskier's voice rambling behind him as he stoked the campsite's fire. He missed Jaskier's singing from beside him as he rode Roach. He missed Jaskier's smile, his laugh. He missed joking with the bard. He missed the extravagantly colored clothes he wore, offsetting Geralt's monochromatic black outfits. He missed the way Jaskier's fingers strummed over his lute, playing the raunchiest songs Geralt would ever hear to the softest lullaby made to calm Geralt from a nightmare. He missed Jaskier.

Jaskier was all he had left to care for in this world.

And now you're gone.

Geralt buried his face into Jaskier's cloak, breathing in the mixed scent of lavender, vanilla, and chamomile.

The wind drowned out the witcher's sobs.