Of portals and porridge
Witcher Trick or Treat 2022 October 22 Prompt: Portal
It is no use moaning. As there is no way around it. They will have to use a portal. Even though Geralt loathes portals from the bottom of his heart - and his stomach. However, there is simply not enough time to acquire the rare but vital ingredient for the potion that she has promised her relative, the Duchess Anarietta, without using one. The leontopodium nivale that she needs only grows high up in the mountains surrounding the duchy of Toussaint. And even if there was enough time, hiking up all the way is out of the question. She is not a mountain goat, no. Fringilla could go alone, of course, or ask somebody else to accompany her, Cahir or Regis maybe, the former being a knight and maybe still kind of a friend, and the latter probably quite interested in the fantastically diverse flora of the mountain range. But with those two the excursion would only be about the flower picking while with Geralt she can imagine quite a few other things to do up there. Things that would make the foray into botany so much more rewarding.
Well, her portals are absolutely safe, and it is just a short distance. The Witcher will live. And be rewarded. Besides, it is for the greater good, as, with the potion, everybody will have more fun at the masquerade. Much, much more fun ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Geralt groans. If he had known about Fringilla's plans for today, he would not have eaten the huge bowl of porridge. Although, naturally, he did not consume the bowl but only its contents, his breakfast is still sitting very heavily on his stomach. Actually not sitting on but rolling around in his stomach. Just thinking of the meal makes him queazy and feel close to throwing up. His usual portaling sickness does not seem to combine well with porridge. Not at all, no. Fuck! He collapses to his knees and hurls all over the patches of Aster amellus growing between the rocks at his feet. Not that Geralt would know what the prettily purple daisies are named, but it is what a delighted Fringilla called them just a second before he covered the cute little flowers in porridge ... Well, not so cute anymore. Hopefully, those are not the rare flowers Fringilla intends to collect ...
As it turns out, they, fortunately, are not. As they are neither the right colour nor rare. When the Witcher gazes up and around, he discovers loads more of them next to all kinds of other colourful flowers. A very pretty place and probably very romantic, too. Not that Geralt would know a lot about that. However, taking in the breathtakingly beautiful landscape as well as his equally beautiful companion, the Witcher, once he has recovered sufficiently from the, in his opinion, detestable means of transportation, has very different ideas on his mind than collecting plants. Unfortunately this seems not to be the case for the sorceress who is, at the moment, explaining to him very much in detail what exactly she is looking for. And it is not purple.
"This one?" The Witcher holds out a whitish flower to Fringilla some minutes later. The colour fits the description. The rest of the lengthy specifications he has not paid that much attention to, to be honest.
"No, certainly not! Not even close. That's a common wild carrot!"
"What about these ones here?" Geralt points at a patch of a different kind of equally whitish flowers a little higher up. Hopefully they are it. As he yearns to cut the flower picking part short and get to the promised and certainly far more exciting reward part. He definitely deserves one for agreeing to go by portal. Unfortunately, though, they are not it either.
"Closer," Fringilla explains with an expert glance at the flower patch. "The mountain yarrow belongs to the same plant family, yes, but the blossoms of the leontopodium are much bigger."
Whitish with biggish blossoms then. Got it.
Step by step they make their way up the rocky slope at whose foot the portal has landed them, their eyes firmly locked onto the ground which is dotted with all kinds of flora. However, none of the flowers is the one Fringilla wants. Either they are too tall or too small, too bluish or too orangish, too thorny or not wooly enough ...
Higher and higher up they climb, but not a trace of this blasted plant. With the truly spectacular view of the Toussaint valley and the weather perfect for the end of October it could be a gorgeous day out - if Fringilla was not so single-mindedly determined to find this one frigging flower. So focused on the task that she has not graced him with a single kiss yet. For hours! At least to the Witcher it feels like they have already spent hours searching in vain, and he is growing more and more impatient and morose. If he at least knew what she wants that bloody leopoldium for - or whatever the name of the flower is. Apparently though, it is supposed to be a well-guarded secret. Geralt grunts in annoyance. Now he is getting hungry, too. Fuck. Slowly but surely he starts to not only hate portals but also botany ...
Luckily, Fringilla appears to sense the Witcher's darkening mood. Or maybe she has heard the rumbles of his stomach. Whatever the reason might be, she stops in her tracks at a particularly lovely spot, stands up straight, concentrates and murmurs a spell. And voila, out of thin air appears a checkered picnic blanket together with a basket filled with all kinds of delicacies and, how could it be otherwise in Toussaint shortly after the harvest, a bottle of fizzy fresh wine.
His mood instantly brightening, Geralt plants a big kiss on the sorceress's mouth and pulls her down onto the blanket. Which she lets happen without objections, quite on the contrary. And as their hunger for each other by far seems to exceed Geralt's hunger for chicken legs and pasties, the picnic is unanimously postponed until later. Quite a bit later ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
"Geralt, wake up! The sun will soon disappear behind the mountain peaks and we still haven't found what we are looking for."
"I have," the Witcher mumbles lazily. However, Fringilla tickles him relentlessly until he finally gets up from the blanket. With a quick wave of her hand the blanket along with what is left of their picnic - mostly crumbs and the empty wine bottle - vanish, only leaving behind a patch of thoroughly flattened flora as a reminder of their amorous activities. Predominantly whitish flora with big, somewhat wooly blossoms. They stare at the ruined flowers.
"Is that what I think it is?"
"It is," Fringilla confirms Geralt's suspicion, "the long-sought after Edelweiss." Then, to his surprise, she breaks out into laughter, a quite happy one. "Don't look so dismayed, Witcher, no harm done. They need to be crushed for the recipe anyway. We can still salvage most of them."
And that is what they do. Before Fringilla, now in possession of the precious special ingredient, portals back to Beauclair Castle to start working on her very secret project. Alone. As the Witcher has decided to walk. Not another portal trip for him today, one was definitely enough. More than enough. It was worth it, though, no doubt about that ...