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A manticore.

A fucking manticore, of all things.

"Come on, Geralt, come on" Ciri pleaded, tugging at his limp arm. "The village is just a little further, we'll get there and get you all patched up! You'll be good as new! Come on!"

Geralt, dazed, blinked at her, the girl with dirty pale blonde hair and scared green eyes that were staring up at him pleadingly. She reminded him of something… of someone, but the witcher couldn't put his finger on who.

Caring for a young girl required most of his attention. Ciri was brave, yes, and clever, but she was still just a little girl and Geralt was worried that if he were to take his eyes off her for even a minute then something horrible would happen. But, as it turned out, keeping too close of an eye on her may have been an even bigger issue.

The manticore seemed like it came out of nowhere, swooping down on the pair as they made their way through a less-traveled path to avoid the Nilfgaardian soldiers. Geralt had reacted half-a-second too slow and though the beast was now dead, the witcher felt like he wasn't too far behind.

The bite to the right shoulder and deep slashes on his left thigh made by the manticore's claws were both gushing with blood. If Geralt was a man, he'd already been long dead. But that wasn't the worst of it, the beast venom was burning through his veins and eating away at his muscles. Now it was just a matter of if the effects of swallow and white honey would beat the blood loss and venom.

Geralt fell to his knees, Ciri's panicked voice sounding miles away, and looked up at the afternoon sun. 'Destiny is a fucking bitch.'

The crackling of logs in a fireplace was the first thing Geralt became aware of as he awoke, his sharp ears picking up the soft pops and snaps of the burning wood.

Then came the pain.

"Augh!," he hissed, hand coming up to his wounded shoulder as he sat up, the quilt that had been covering his body slipping to the floor, and his callous fingers sliding over the soft fabric of cloth bandages. Looking his shoulder over in confusion, Geralt blinked and looked around for the first time.

It looked like some sort of inn room, not large but well furnished with a big, comfortable-looking bed in one corner, complete with a matching dresser, vanity, and wardrobe. Geralt had been left sprawled on what was probably a very expensive couch in front of a large, roaring fireplace, woven ornate rug covering the polished wooden floor.

"What?" The witcher wondered out loud as he checked his leg, finding he'd been stripped to his smallclothes and the gashes on his thigh had also been carefully wrapped. 'Did Ciri manage to do all this?'

A door creaked open and Geralt's eyes snapped to the source before looking around for anything he could use as a weapon. A burning log would do in a pinch, but it'd be messy for all involved.

"You're awake!"

Geralt let out a sigh of relief when Ciri came through the door and rushed to his side.

"How are you feeling?" she asked, eyes wide. She had beef stew on her breath and had washed her face recently, her hair was even pulled back with a bit of ribbon.

"Alive," he grunted. Hopefully, death wouldn't come with so much pain. "What about you? Where are we? How did-"

"It's okay,' Ciri cut him off with an earnest smile. "A friend of yours found us and help me drag you here. And don't worry, no one saw us; we're safe."

Geralt doubted that but this supposed safety wasn't what was most confusing, "A friend… Who?"

Eskel maybe? Lambert? Or Even Coen? No, Ciri would have mentioned if it was another witcher. His heart sped up even so slightly… Could it be Yen?

The door creaked again.

"All this time and you're still getting into trouble, eh Geralt?"

His throat went dry and the witcher could scarcely believe his eyes. He took a shallow breath, "Jaskier?"

The bard stood in the doorway, clad in a dark blue dress that was plainer than most anything Geralt had ever seen her wear before, with a bowl clutched in her hands. She gave him a tight half-smile. "The one and only."

A heavy, uncomfortable silence settled between them for an excruciatingly long moment before Jaskier cleared her throat and looked to Ciri. "There is a bath ready for you in the other room and I set out some clean clothes; they might be a little too big but they're better than nothing. You should go wash up."

Ciri looked between the songstress and the witcher, confusion written on her face, before nodding and giving Geralt a stern look. "Don't do anything stupid."

Jaskier watched the girl go, closing the door behind her, before approaching Geralt herself. Giving him the bowl of meaty stew, she knelt down by the couch.

"You should eat," she said. "You'll need your strength to heal."

Words were never Geralt's strong suit and they seemed more elusive now than usual. That left him with the basics.

"Hmmmmm," he grunted, giving the stew a little stir. It smelt good, thick chunks of beef and vegetables with plenty of herbs for seasoning. Silently, Jaskier went to lift the quilt to check his bandages and Geralt flinched away.

"Calm down," she said, rolling her bright blue eyes -a very familiar gesture that was historically directed at him. "I've seen it all before."

That was true. In the many years they traveled together, Jaskier had patched him up and scrubbed him down dozens of times. He could clearly picture the manic grin on her young face as she dunked his head under the bathwater and went to work cleaning the drowner guts from his hair. Nothing Jaskier saw down there would ever surprise her.

"And besides, you're not impressive enough that I'd go out of my way to sneak a peek," Jaskier added, unwinding the bandages to check his stitches.

Ouch...well that answered the question of if she was still angry with him.

"It looks like the bleeding has stopped but you're going to stay off that leg for at least a day or the stitches may tear," she observed, rebandaging his thigh.

'Another day another scar,' he thought, looking down at the black thread woven into his pale skin. Geralt gave the songstress a little smirk, "A touch thicker than cloth."

The first time Jaskier ever tended to one of his wounds was about three months after they'd begun traveling together… or, rather three months after the teenage girl -thin and pretty but not fully grown into her eyes- began following him around. It had been a deep slash to his bicep left by a particularly vicious juvenile griffin and Geralt had woken to find the wound had been crudely stitched up and bandaged with a handkerchief.

The sutures worked well enough but were crooked and unevenly spaced. When Geralt noted as much he got a glare and a coin chucked at his forehead.

"Well," Jaskier had huffed, "you're a touch thicker than cloth but thankfully the technique is the same."

As the years passed, it became something of a joke between the pair whenever Jaskier would stitch him up. Geralt would say, "A touch thicker than cloth," and she would finish with, "but the technique is the same."

He looked back down at his thigh. The stitches were clean and neat, perfectly spaced apart.

So many years had passed.

Geralt waited for Jaskier to say her part but, instead, the songstress just re-dressed the wound. "Ciri, or should I say, Fiona, is a brave little girl. She and Roach managed to drag you to the main road where I heard her. You might have bled out if not for her."

'And you,' he wanted to say. But the witcher just nodded, "She is brave... and strong too. More so than she should have to be at that age."

The bard just nodded with a hum of agreement and Geralt needed to say something else so he blurted out, "You look different. Your hair…"

The girl… No, not a girl anymore, not for a long time, reached up to touch the hair that Geralt had always known to be dark brown and to her mid-back but now was now cut at the chin and a dark auburn in color. The faded earthy scent of dye tickled his nose.

"I needed a change," Jaskier shrugged, standing up and leaning over to check his shoulder. "That is healing up well, a small blessing, but you still need at least a day of rest before traveling. Thankfully, I have this room booked until the end of the week."

"No," Geralt shook his head, "that is too dangerous, Ciri and I need to say ahead of Nilfgaard; just…get me my things and we'll be on our way."

Jaskier snorted, "Good luck with that."

Then she pressed her thumb down on one of the gashes in his thigh, causing him to hiss in pain.

Having proved her point, the bard gave him a softer look. "The girl deserves to have a bath, Geralt, and a bed, at least for tonight. The Nilfgaardian patrols are a few days away, you just… let yourself rest for a bit."

The pleading look in her eyes, the tiredness on Ciri's face, and the fucking pain coursing through his body… all he could say was, "Alright."

That got an actual smile out of Jaskier; it lasted for all of a second before she pulled away again.

"Oh," she said, doing her damnedest to look anywhere but at him, "are you thirsty? Can I get you something to drink?"

Geralt rubbed his tongue against the dry roof of his mouth. "Ale, if you have it, or wine."

He got milk instead.

Still better than nothing.

"Where were you," he asked, "when the armies came through? How did you avoid them?"

"I got lucky I suppose," Jaskier replied, gathering up some bloody rags and tossing them into the fire. "I was performing at a keep up in the mountains; some storms had blown through recently and the roads were too muddy for anyone to safely traverse, including Nilfgaardian troops."

That was nice to hear but Geralt didn't like the silence that once again lapsed between them.

The bard gave a fake cough, "Try to get some more sleep; I'll look after Ciri."

Sleep sounded good so the witcher nodded and watched as the songstress headed back through the door. "Jaskier," he called out, voice horse and quiet, "I am… glad you're safe."

She didn't say anything back, just gave him a long look -her face infuriatingly blank- and eventually nodded before closing the door behind her.

"This stuff smells weird," Ciri complained, wrinkling her little nose.

"I know, but it's not that bad so just try to bear with it," Jaskier asked as she carefully worked the thick henna and indigo mixture into the girl's freshly cut hair. "It really is such a shame though, your hair is so beautiful, just like your mother's was."

"You knew my mother?" The princess sounded surprised, turning to face the bard with wide eyes.

Jaskier took her by the shoulders and got her to sit straight again, "Not exactly, but I saw her the few times I performed in Cintra's court. I even saw you once, back when you were just a babe."

"Ooooooohhhh, that makes sense," Ciri nodded. "But, if you're the famous bard Jaskier, then where have you been? You haven't performed anywhere for some years now; all the ladies of the court said that you charmed a foreign king and he whisked you away to be his wife somewhere fall away."

Jaskier snorted, "I wish, that would make everything easier. No, I've just been performing under a different name for a while -Czerwona Roza."

She pointed at her dyed hair, "The Red Rose."

"I've heard of you!" Ciri exclaimed. "I love Tears in a Flower Field, it's so pretty but really sad too; I've seen lots of people tear up when hearing it."

The bard chuckled, "Good to know, songs that don't make people feel anything are songs not worth singing."

"But I don't get why you'd change your stage name, wouldn't that make it harder for you to be hired?"

'I didn't want to be hired. I couldn't stand the thought of being known as the Witcher's Bard anymore. I hated being associated with the songs that I was once so proud of. I became ill at the very thought of singing, 'Toss a Coin to Your Witcher.'

Jaskier sighed, "I wanted to see if I was getting hired because I was good or because I was a novelty. I have my answer now."

"So you'll go back to being Jaskier again, Miss…"

"You can call me Juliana, if you wish," she said, slapping more of the mixture into the displaced princess' hair. "Or Rose, plenty of people use that. And I don't know; there are a lot of memories associated with that name, good and bad."

Ciri was silent for a while before nodding towards Geralt, passed out and snoring on the couch. "He hurt you, didn't he? He is one of the bad memories."

'Smart girl,' Jaskier thought, a bit annoyed that she was so transparent. "I met Geralt when I was sixteen, only a little older than you; he has many of my memories, good and bad. Geralt is a complicated man and, while friendships are always complex, they're even more complex when they involve a complicated man. Does that make sense?"

"I...guess so," the girl replied slowly; Jaskier could imagine her little face scrunched up in thought and smiled. "But if you're not friends anymore, why are you helping us?"

"Whatever happened in the past between Geralt and I doesn't change the fact that he is a good man… and that you are innocent in all of this," the bard huffed, a little defensive. She was not a particularly brave or strong or smart woman -Geralt had told her that often enough- but, damnit, she still cared about people -Geralt has complained about her 'foolish, soft heart' often enough- and would have helped any bloody man or dirty little girl she'd come across. It just so happened that Jaskier had come across literally the last man she wanted to see this time.

Well, second last… she'd probably have left Valdo Marx to bleed out in the dirt though.

"I had friends before… before all of this," Ciri whispered, voice turning thick and somber. "They were common folks; I dressed in pauper's clothes to play jacks with them in the street. I thought they liked me too but when I found them in a refugee camp, they told me that they hated me, had always hated me, and tried to sell me to Nilfgaard. So I killed them."

That confession left Jaskier silent for a long moment, not really sure what to say, but eventually, she settled on, "You survived, Ciri, and that is more than many are able to do. Try not to dwell on it."

She wasn't sure her words were any comfort to the girl who went the kind of stiff people did when they were trying not to cry.

"I just can't understand why they hated me for being a princess," she cried. "I didn't think less of them for being the child of a blacksmith or cobbler's son. I brought them treats from the royal kitchens. I gave them some of my pocket money or little things to sell. I never hurt them… or, at least, I don't think I did. So why?"

"I can't answer that, Ciri," Jaskier said sadly as she finished with the girl's hair. "People are difficult to understand and you can never really know what is in someone's heart. Maybe they did always hate you. Or maybe they were cold and hungry and scared and tired and sad and angry. Maybe you were just easy to blame for all that? I cannot say."

The girl went quiet again.

Jaskier faked a cough, slid off her seat on the bed, and, with great flourish, grabbed an old towel and wrapped it around Ciri's head, holding it in place with a clothespin.

"Now, that stuff needs to stay in for at least three hours-"

"Three hours?!"

"- so you stay here while I go down and sing for our supper. I have some books in the wardrobe there, feel free to read them if you're bored. Also, keep an eye on him, give him some of that apple juice if he wakes up."

They both looked over to Geralt who was making a bunch of little snuffling sounds and little growls in his sleep.

'Just like a real white wolf,' she thought, an amused smile creeping up on her face.

"Leave it to me," Ciri said with a determined jut of her tiny chin.

When Geralt came too again, the first thing he became aware of was a strong, earthy smell. It wasn't a bad smell, per se, but it was uncomfortably heavy.

"Here, drink this."

A tiny hand put a tankard under his nose, which, not smelling poison, he immediately grabbed and gulped down.

'Ahhh...apple juice,' he thought, rolling his injured shoulder. Good, it was already healing; the pain wasn't so bad anymore.

"Feeling better?"

He turned to answer Ciri… only for one word to tumble out of his mouth.

"Red."

Ciri's pale blonde hair had been cut to her shoulder and was now an extremely vibrant shade of auburn.

She instinctively reached up to touch it, grabbing a strand between two fingers. "Do you like it? Miss Juliana dyed it for me, said it would help me hide from Nilfgaard. Look, she even dyed my eyebrows."

The girl leaned down so he could get a good look at her colorful eyebrows and Geralt recoiled from a smell of the dye in her hair.

"Juliana… oh, you mean Jaskier?" he grumbled. "Yeah, she did. Did it have to be such a bright color though?"

"It'll darken over the next few days," Ciri replied, shooting him an annoyed glare. "Plus, Miss Juliana says that is part of disguise; people will remember the red hair so clearly that they won't be able to connect me with the famously blonde Lion Cub of Cintra."

There was… a lot of sense to that.

"Smart," he grunted. "Make sure you thank her for that."

"I did." Her face turned stern, "Did you?"

No… he hadn't.

Taking his silence as an answer, Ciri gave him a cautiously curious look, "Why did you two have a falling out?"

After a few months of stubbornly refusing to think of that day, Geralt had replayed the events that unfolded on that mountain top over and over again in his mind; he recalled the pain of Yennfer's departure on his heart, how that pain turned venomous anger, and how he chose Jaskier -the only other person he'd let close- as a target for his cruelty.

"I was angry," Geralt admitted, "and I said… many things that I shouldn't have."

It was doubtful that it was a sufficient explanation but Ciri didn't press harder. Instead, she just continued to stare down at him, her face grave. "You hurt her."

Three simple, little words and yet…

"I know," he said softly.

"Then you should apologize."

Geralt had wanted to; he wanted to take it all back the moment those words left his lips. But by the time he plunked up enough courage to actually do it, Jaskier had been gone. Usually, he'd have just tracked her by scent -milk, honey, and chamomile- but the wind hadn't been on Geralt's side that day and when he finally caught up with the dwarfs they'd were so deep in their cups that each had given conflicting reports on were the bard went.

Soon after that Geralt managed to convince himself that it was safest for everyone that they keep to their separate paths.

"I won't know how."

Ciri gave him the most incredulous look he'd ever seen on a small child's face. "You could start with, 'I'm sorry I was such an arse.' I bet that would help."

It probably would, but the words, 'I'm sorry,' had always seemed so hollow to Geralt, meaningless platitudes given by violent husbands and inattentive parents. Geralt wasn't a pleasant man but he didn't want to take the easy way out either; he'd snapped at Jaskier many times before and usually, they rolled right off her like water on a seal's back but on the occasion that they stuck, his apologies were nonverbal things -a more detail account of a hunt or agreeing to attend some party with minimal grumbling. It has always worked for them… right up until it didn't.

"I'll… try."

The third time Geralt came back to the land of the living it was night and the pain was almost gone. Instinctively, his feline eyes slid from the fire that illuminated the chilly room to wear Ciri slept curled up in the bed, breathing slow and steady.

A grunt drew his eyes from his slumbering charge to a small nest of blankets on the floor between his couch and the fireplace. Geralt watched as the nest shuffled, its occupant trying to get comfortable on the small bit of patting that the rug offered the hard wooden floor.

He reached out and nudged it. "Jaskier? Jaskier, are you awake?"

A bleary, blue-eyed glare greeted him. "Well I am now," she snapped, dyed hair sticking out around her head like a curly lion's mane.

"Oh." When had talking to the songstress become so difficult? "Why are you sleeping on the floor?"

The bard huffed, "Well, where else am I going to sleep?"

"... On the bed? It's more than big enough for you and Ciri both."

"I'm not forcing that girl to share a bed with someone she barely knows," she said, rolling her eyes, "and it would look suspicious if I rented a second room."

"Well then just sleep on the couch," Geralt replied, the answer coming so plainly in his mind.

Another eye roll, "I'm not making you sleep on the floor, Geralt. You're still injured."

"No, just… share with me."

"What?"

"We've shared before."

"A bed, Geralt!" Jaskier hissed. " We've shared a bed before, not a couch!"

"What is the difference?" he asked as he leaned down, hooking his hand around her stomach and pulling the bard towards the couch.

She tried to squirm away, "Let go!"

"Stop wiggling!"

"No, you're acting mad!"

"Would you stop being so difficult? I'm trying to help you!"

"I said, get off of-"

They both froze as Ciri murmured something in her sleep before coughing and turning over before snuggling deeper under the covers. Geralt used this opportunity to tug Jaskier up onto the couch, shifting onto his side (fighting the urge to wince at the pressure it put on his thigh) so he could set the bard against him, her back against his chest with his arm around her waist to keep Jaskier from falling off the couch.

"Brute," she huffed.

But she settled against him all the same.

A long time passed, the two of them just staring at the crackling fire before Jaskier's breathing slowed and evened out. Geralt rested his chin against the bard's shoulder. "Thank you, Jaskier," he whispered, "for everything."

"That's so like you, Geralt!" Jaskier snapped. "You only open up when you don't have to take responsibility for it."

"I…"

"After that day on the mountain I didn't want to see you again, Geralt," she confessed. "I didn't want to hear from you. I didn't want to hear about you. I didn't want to sing about you. I didn't even want to… think about you. I changed my appearance, I changed my name, and I walked away from my reputation just so I could get away from you... but here you are all the same."

Geralt tucked his nose into Jaskier's hair; milk, honey, and chamomile, that hadn't changed at least. "I expected to hear songs about how awful I was; the Cruel, Dirty Wolf, I thought you'd say, unworthy of trust or respect."

"Angry as I was, you didn't deserve that," she replied, "you or the other Witchers out there."

He smiled, so she hadn't completely written him off. "Are you still angry?"

A long pause. "No, I tried to be… Gods, I tried to be, but I couldn't say angry," Jaskier admitted, soft and sad. "But that doesn't change the fact that you hurt me, Geralt. You hurt me because you were angry and wanted to hurt someone and I was the closest available target."

Geralt flinched like he'd be slapped.

"I know," he whispered. "I knew it while I was saying it and I said it anyway because I want to hurt you. But I regretted it right away, I just wasn't brave enough to face you afterward."

Another long silence.

"I'm not sure if that makes me feel better or worse."

"Here, take it."

Geralt looked down at the coin purse Jaskier was holding out; it was heavy and full, probably a few weeks worth of earnings.

"I can't accept this, Jaskier," he shook his head, pushing it away.

The bard shoved it back.

"It's not for you, it's for her," she replied, nodding towards Ciri as the girl fed apples to Roach. "She is a little girl, Geralt, a little human girl. Winter is starting to settle in; she'll need warmer clothes, better boots, a thicker bedroll, and more food. So take it."

Reluctantly, he took the purse, feeling its weight in his hand. Three days had passed, the Witcher's wounds had healed and Nilfgaardian patrols were nearing; it was time for him and Ciri to head out.

"Where will you go now?" he asked, watching as she saddled her dun gelding.

Jaskier shrugged, "Not sure. I was thinking of heading back to the university to teach but that might change. Lord Chmiel has always been fond of my company."

Geralt didn't like the idea, didn't like the thought of her wandering alone and unprotected or stuck under whims of some fat, useless lord. He didn't have the right to ask but… "I'm taking Ciri to Kaer Morhen, when the snow comes all the paths will be blocked; it will be the safest place for her. You should come with us."

The bard's eyebrows shot up in surprise, "What?"

"The war has made the roads more dangerous than ever… bandits, ghouls, and deserters will be out in full force. Nilfgaard will be searching for Ciri and me; our relationship is well-known, they might go after you looking for information. You'd be safest with me… with us in Kaer Morhen," he explained, pleading edging into his voice.

Jaskier was a woman; strong and clever with a dagger, yes, but a woman all the same and all the dangers of the world were twice fold for her.

Jaskier gave him a soft look before sighing and staring out into the bleak, gray early morning sky.

"The roads have always been dangerous for me, Geralt, and I've survived just the same," she said, climbing up onto her horse as Geralt braced for rejection. "But I suppose it wouldn't hurt to travel in the same direction for a while."

It took a few moments for Jaskier's words to register but when they did he had to duck his head to hide the smile on his face.

"Alright then, we should be going."