Kain decided against knocking not to wake Ciri, and quietly stepped into her room.
He found her sitting on her bed.
"Can't sleep?" he asked, closing the door behind him.
Ciri didn't hear the door opening, but Kain's voice penetrated her deep state of focus. She opened her eyes.
"There's only so much one can sleep before it becomes redundant." She eyed his side. "How are you?"
He smiled slightly, "Walking, unlike you. Want to change that?"
She glowered playfully. "Don't be cocky. And yes."
He pulled up a chair and sat before her, leaning forward to examine the wound.
"He's been treating you?"
"He was... doing something," she murmured. "Um, yes. There's less pain than there was yesterday."
He looked up at her with interest. "What would you do to heal it?"
She instantly felt nervous. Like she was back at her lessons with Yennefer and had not done the reading she'd been ordered to do.
"I... I tried, but I am not certain it did much. I kept seeing images in my head; of red, raw flesh knitting together."
"There is no certain thing that would work for everybody. You need to figure out what works for you. Some imagine the moment how they got the wound, over and over, trying to see the image without the accompanying pain. As if the wound caused none. And then their body begins to mend itself.
"Others understand that healing comes from love - any form they understand and are able to summon. They invoke the feeling close to joy, or some warm, good feeling that projects on the flesh and makes it heal.
"Or you could do what you did, but add more warmth to it, more good feeling for your body to catch up on it - for it is alive as you are. It understands your emotions. If you feel grateful to it, it will return the favor with total obedience to your healing practice."
Ciri did not want to relive the moment with Eredin. It was far from one of the worst things she had experienced, but she wanted nothing of him inside her if she could help it. That included the image of his face.
And love... Love was complicated. Especially at the moment.
So the third suggestion was the one she opted for.
She closed her eyes again and summoned up the images from before, attempting to follow Kain's instructions by adding this warmth he spoke of. Gratitude. Her body had been good to her. Had always gotten her where she needed to go. Within reason.
She was not aware of the words that slipped past her lips in faint whispers, all of them in Elder Speech, speaking of acceptance for herself, the paths she had chosen, and the ones she had been forced to take.
Behind her closed eyelids, a light grew.
She was getting there. Not as habitually quick as she would have after a few years with druids, but she was doing it, nevertheless. A faster learner than Kain had been back in the day.
Avallac'h doesn't know her as well as he thinks he does.
Arrogantly so, as he stated his race was.
Kain looked at her wound and the beginning of scar tissue.
Time passed. Probably too much. She knew she was working slower than someone who had experience would. But it felt as though it was working. It felt as though she was lighter. Her fever had certainly gone.
"Am I doing it?" she whispered after several more minutes had passed, needing some affirmation that what she was doing was right.
"You certainly are," he confirmed. "But don't overwork yourself. Do it in portions. Let yourself rest. You had a fever, and now it's gone down. It's good work. Let yourself rest."
She exhaled heavily and opened her eyes, letting go of the process she had immersed herself in. She did feel tired.
Her wound looked better. More of a pink color than the raw and angry red it had been before. A true sign of healing.
"See? I'll be back to running in no time," she teased.
"You can get back to running right away - I can help with that. Or you wish to do it yourself in your own pace. Which one you want?"
"Help me," she said. "As long as you have enough energy to spare. I don't want to hurt you."
He smiled subtly. "Not so cocky anymore, princess? Don't trust yourself?"
"I'm impatient. Being confined to this room, to this bed… it hurts the mind. Old memories come out to play because of the silence."
"That's what's worrying - your restlessness. Or rather what you will do once you're up and about."
Ciri frowned. "What do you mean? What are you expecting me to do?"
"Avallac'h and the Lodge have little faith in your discipline, and no matter how much Geralt is defending you, it won't do any good if you prove them right.
"Please, don't do anything rash before talking to Geralt."
He nudged her shoulder to make her lie down, and when she did, he held a hand over her wound and closed his eyes, focusing. His palm warmed up, and her skin began to mend, the pink of the scar began to pale and the scar itself was evening out.
Ciri pursed her lips, the frown deepening on her forehead. She didn't speak while he worked, didn't want to distract him, but the moment he finished, she couldn't hold back any longer. "Discipline? What are you talking about? What is it I am supposed to do that has you all so worried?"
He leaned back in his chair, feeling lightheaded. "I trust you, Ciri. Geralt trusts you. Zoltan does. What the Elf and the Lodge think shouldn't matter for as long as you don't attempt to rely solely on yourself in that war. You saved my life back in Oxenfurt, and I'm never going to blame you for it, though you gave me a scare. I don't even want to think of what would be if you couldn't get back to us. We have no means to find you like that. It is scary for all of us. Do you understand?"
"That had nothing to do with discipline. I'm never going to stand by and watch someone undeserving get hurt or taken against their will. I will always intervene. Because it's the right thing to do." She exhaled heavily again, annoyed. "And Avallac'h and The Lodge's problems all stem from the fact I do not blindly follow their orders like they want me to."
"I don't care what Avallac'h or the Lodge want you to do. But I would care if you decided to run off to fight your enemies alone to not put your family in danger. Because it feels like something you could yearn to do. You hate being trouble for those you love. But they hate your thinking like that."
"Just because I yearn for it, does not mean I will actually do it," she pointed out. "I yearn to have you naked in my bed, but I've yet to ravage you, haven't I?"
That wasn't supposed to come out. But it had.
A jolt went through his nerves at her choice of argument, but his face froze and didn't betray it.
Ciri cleared her throat. "My point is, I am not so unpredictable and reckless as everyone thinks."
"What makes them believe you are so reckless?" he ventured. "Oh wait! I've just recalled the striking image of you drowning in the icy sea with sirens flying around the place your boat sunk." He smiled.
She gasped, appalled he would throw that in her face. "That... That was necessary!" she claimed. "I had questions that needed answers."
"I'm sure there were other - safer - ways to get those answers. Ways that wouldn't have you drown or get ripped apart by sirens."
She considered that a moment. Then shook her head. "It would take too long."
He sighed. "That's what I mean. Taking a shorter route is not always the best option. You need to play it safer. Your life means a lot for not just your family, but the world, as well. You need to treasure it a bit more. As well as your body."
"I've been trying my best. Haven't you noticed? Geralt tells me to stay, I stay. Even if it makes me miserable."
"I noticed. I'm here for you - to get you out of this bed. Because I trust you. Because Geralt does."
"Thank you." Her gratitude was genuine.
She pushed herself up to stand, testing her leg. It felt a little stiff but that would soon work itself out.
"Are we going back to Oxenfurt? Surely people there are still in need of help?"
"We get some rest and then we'll go back." He got up, too, carefully. The wooziness wouldn't go away. "Get some sleep. There will be no pain now."
"I told you I have already slept," she said, moving to her wardrobe to find some trousers she could wear until she'd managed to mend her other ones. "Are you alright?" He hid it admirably but his tiredness still shone through.
"Tired," he admitted. "I'll need that sleep. Geralt and Zoltan are downstairs still – in case you want to make that Witcher seek some rest as well as brag your flawless leg."
He smiled and exited her room.
She watched him go with a soft smile on her face, then pulled on her trousers and boots before heading downstairs to tend to the Witcher as suggested.
The inn was still empty of other patrons. Most of the inhabitants of Novigrad had yet to return. Right now Ciri did not mind. It meant she would not have to hide.
She leapt off the last few steps of the stairs and landed after a perilous somersault, mostly to make Geralt and Zoltan choke on their mead.
"She's back!" Ciri declared, arms extended over her head like a circus performer.
Her body ached and she instantly regretted her acrobatics so soon after Kain had healed her, but she was damned if she was going to let that show.
"Gods, ye lass!" Zoltan cried while Geralt was wiping beer off his mouth, both staring at her with surprised wonder.
"I knew he'd do it, but still you got us," Geralt said, grinning. "You feel all right?"
"As fresh as a spring chicken. Whatever that means."
She reached for Geralt's mug. It was almost empty. She drained it in one gulp, then set it back on the table, fixing the Witcher with a stern look.
"Now that you've had your mead, it is time for bed. You need to rest."
The Witcher gave her a long, suspicious look. "It's him, isn't it?"
"Him who?"
Geralt sighed and got up, and headed for the stairs. Zoltan downed what was left in the mead pitcher and stood up, too, beginning to clean the table.
"What are ye gonna do, lassie?" he asked, walking toward the kitchen.
"I am going to see my horse. Give her a good grooming." And avoid Avallac'h and The Lodge like the plague. "I'll be in the stables if you need me," she called over her shoulder as she headed for the door.
"Where are you going?" Geralt asked, bumping into Kain in the corridor.
"Need to wash it all off me before I can sleep," Kain said. "And I need to see Griffin. He needs to see me all right."
Geralt clucked his tongue in disapproval but made a curt nod. "Make it quick. We should leave before night falls."
Kain nodded, and they parted, Geralt going to his room, and his brother jogging the steps down and walking out of the inn.
Geralt didn't bother undressing, merely shrugged his jerkin off along with the sword belt, and lay down on his bed. Yennefer was not there, but the scent of her perfume lingered. He closed his eyes, imagining her being in the room, brushing her hair in front of the mirror. He slept shortly after his eyelids drooped closed.
The griffin met Kain a mile off his cave and couldn't contain both joy at seeing him and worry that was still there. He jumped around his human friend like an excited dog, croaking, nipping. Kain laughed, just as happy, and stroked the beast's shoulders and neck, hugged his head when Griffin pressed his forehead against Kain's chest and stilled.
"Your love humbles me," Kain murmured into his feathers. "Your dedication puts me to shame for letting you be in danger. I don't want you to get hurt for me ever again."
The griffin croaked softly, then withdrew and looked at Kain with his very wise golden-brown eyes.
They went together, first to the lake, then to the cave Griffin had been residing. Kain made a campfire, and they huddled together like in their favorite times.
Kain drifted off feeling like he was back home.
Yennefer was taking a slow stroll around Novigrad. The point was to make sure there was no change around the city concerning the Wild Hunt, but her mind was restless and shifting between the current attack alert and Geralt.
Geralt being many miles away from her. Again.
Geralt being in Fringilla and Triss's company, of all people.
And Yennefer was alone. Again.
Given the circumstances, it wasn't unusual that Geralt had no time for her. But it didn't make her feel any better about the whole situation. She had never felt so unstable and uncertain before, and it was driving her insane every moment when Ciri being in danger didn't.
And now Ciri was injured. It concerned Yennefer how easily this Elven King stabbed the very one he – supposedly – wanted unharmed. But what to do about it? Ciri had already stated in no uncertain terms that they were holding her down like a prisoner at times with their smothering concern.
Ciri had given Kelpie a good brush-down and cuddle, had whispered secrets into her mane about her concerns about Eredin and asking questions whether or not she was wasting an opportunity by not seeking him out now he was on his own and more vulnerable than ever.
The mare had not given any answers, of course, but had made Ciri feel a little better nonetheless.
When she left, she ran into Yennefer who appeared to have just returned from a stroll.
"You should be resting that leg."
"All healed up," Ciri assured her, flexing her leg for emphasis and smiling. "Kain."
Yennefer glanced down at the leg in question. The fact that Kain had healed it was the least he could do considering he'd put her in harm's way to begin with. Not that he'd asked her to do that, but he must have known she would.
"Geralt's back, too?"
Ciri nodded. "Yes. Just put him to bed. He's been running around Oxenfurt all night doing damage control. We're going back when he wakes. I believe Philippa and Margarita will stay behind. Zoltan, too, probably. But the rest of us should go. Plenty of work to be done, I am sure."
"He does know how to push himself too far."
Yennefer was grateful, at least, that Ciri had taken care of him. She might have suggested the same in her position. Not that he'd have listened.
"Zoltan told me you were running a pretty high fever with your injury sometime in the night. You sure it's been taken care of properly?"
"Avallac'h treated me. He did something." She reached for Yennefer's hand and placed it on her forehead. "Check for yourself."
Yennefer obliged, turning her hand over so that the back of it could graze the Ciri's forehead to check her temperature. She looked healthy, like she'd shaken the fever and was able to stand on her legs unhindered. Didn't matter.
"Hm. You got really lucky."
"Kain is a very skilled healer. He is teaching me but I can't work as quickly as he does yet," she admitted. "I am lucky to have him."
"I guess you are."
Yennefer smiled but it didn't quite reach her eyes.
"You can't afford to rely on luck. You've got to learn to do for yourself as well."
"As I said, I am working on that." Ciri eyed the sorceress, tilting her head. "Do you not like Kain?"
"I don't know him." Yennefer had only spoken to him briefly, he'd also gone so far as to knock her out. She rarely—if never—allowed people that upper hand. "Does it matter?"
Ciri wasn't sure if it did. It certainly didn't change the way she felt about Kain. But she supposed it would make her feel better if the sorceress at least didn't dislike him.
"I suppose not," she said eventually. "He is Geralt's family, though."
"He is," Yennefer agreed.
She also knew from experience that blood family rarely meant anything. Yennefer had only felt and received comfort in those she'd adopted over the years. They did seem to get on well enough and for a time Kain was taking over Lambert, Eskel and Vesemir's position in his life. Also, made sense.
"What do you know of healing yourself?"
"I've found the way that works for me. Internal visualizing. But I work slow and it tires me out. I need more practice. How do you do it?"
"Potions, poultice and magic. A combination depending on severity." Yennefer would love to show her, rehash what she was sure Ciri had been taught in the past, and dig around to make sure she was fully prepared again.
There would be time for that later, though.
"If you're going to Oxenfurt a little later, you should get a bit more rest."
A privilege they sometimes didn't have.
Yennefer touched a hand to Ciri's hair, brushing a strand behind her ear. Yennefer wanted to ask her to be less reckless, to not risk herself for others, but how, when that's what they were all doing and in theory what she always wanted?
"I'll speak to you in the morning."
With that, she headed inside and slowly started for Geralt's room.
Ciri did not waste her free time resting or sitting idly. After Yennefer left her, Ciri returned to her room and rifled through her wardrobe, tearing apart one of the dresses that had been left behind by one of the previous tenants.
With a strip of the cloth and her sword on her back, Ciri opened her window and climbed outside, moving to the highest top of the roof where it gathered in a pointy line, making it perfect for balancing exercises. Just like back at Kaer Morhen.
She blindfolded herself with the cloth and pulled her sword, beginning her battle with her imaginary enemies, all her worries and stresses falling away with the familiarity of the exercise.
When she entered and took a survey of the room, Yennefer found him in bed, he was stretched out on top of the covers, still semi-dressed, his features a mask of restlessness she hadn't seen in a while. Was that because they didn't have one another to anchor each other? Because the spell had been broken?
Yennefer crawled onto the bed beside him, brushing an index finger across his brow, attempting to soothe it, to take a moment to enjoy the time when he wasn't looking at her as if he was scared she was there to take something from him he couldn't offer.
Geralt stirred, but the dream kept him in. It was dark and buried in uncertainty, but all the Witcher knew was that Yennefer was in pain and suffering while he didn't know where she was. Her voice reached him like a distant wind, her scent was faint yet lingering around him, but he couldn't focus on how to find her while there was someone else… She smelled like Yennefer but looked so different. Geralt was confused.
He gradually surfaced from the slumber, feeling disoriented. He sighed, trying to open his eyes and make sure it wasn't a dream – that scent around him.
"Yennefer…"
"It's me," Yennefer added, relaxing her arm on his chest, her index finger and thumb brushing his brow, soothing away the continued displeasure that had temporarily taken a hold of his features until it disappeared. "I didn't mean to wake you." And yet she continued to touch him as if she had.
He hadn't rested, he figured as much: his eyelids were heavy, and his muscles still ached. He forced his eyes open, and her blurry face slowly came into focus. Like a vision of cold beauty. Her eyes seemed so brightly violet, so shiny.
He smiled a little. "What did you mean to do?"
Yennefer was still hurt by the thought of him with someone else, knowing that it happened a night ago, that he hadn't even thought twice. She was also at a complete loss at how to stop it the next time.
And there would be. It's not as if he was without his admirers.
She slid up along his body and pressed a kiss to his mouth. A kiss that conveyed passion, need and, more importantly, what she now knew was considered love.
"That."
His smile widened, and the need to slumber shifted a bit into the background while his lips buzzed with her kiss.
"Is that the whole intention or merely a part of it?" he asked, studying her hypnotizing eyes.
"Part," she elaborated, pressing another kiss to his mouth, lingering there longer than necessary as if she were afraid that once they separated she'd forget how to do it. "Our girl took a huge risk with Eredin. Today could have gone a completely different way. Thoughts?"
The smile disappeared from his mouth, as well as traces of sleepiness. "What am I supposed to say? That she shouldn't have? I would've done the same in her stead. She was saving a life."
"It's different where we're concerned. Eredin doesn't want us. He wants to kill us."
"None of us have a power to escape him like she does," he reasoned. "What would you like her to do? Sit in a basement while everyone is fighting without her? It's impossible to demand that from her, unless you aim to lose her trust for good."
"I never said that's what I expected her to do. I know that's an impossibility. Can we at least acknowledge how dangerous it was? That today could have turned differently?"
Geralt winced, confused about her intentions with this conversation and its point. "We all know it was dangerous. She knows - she got stabbed. How many times do you need us to acknowledge that simple fact? Her whole life was dangerous, starting with Cintra. It still is, as well as my life and yours and everyone else's around us. So what about it?"
"What are we going to do about it? That was the second time. Are you sure we're going to get a third? Given what he knows she's willing to do, and how – he'll use it against her."
He frowned, put an arm under his head, peering at her. "What do you propose I do about it? Forbid her to save the people she loves? Forbid her to breathe to not alert Eredin?"
"So you think she loves him?" Yennefer asked, letting the hand she'd been exploring his brow with come to rest in the middle of his chest, a lazy smile twisting onto her mouth. "Kain, that is. She told you that?"
His lips twitched in subtle amusement. "I didn't mean him specifically. More like all of us. Any one of us could have been in that situation, and she'd do the same."
"I did," Yennefer corrected. "And that may be so, but, we weren't and it wasn't." She wasn't blaming either of them for it. Love was love. Unless it was infatuation. Didn't mean she wouldn't worry about Ciri. "I'm allowed to worry."
"I was in that situation before, and she sacrificed her safety for me. You can blame me, too, then, if you want.
"Worrying about things you cannot change is pointless, Yennefer. You can ask her how she feels if you wish, and she'll tell you. But you won't be able to change it."
"I don't want to change it, I want to change what we're fighting, and I want to know that she'll be safe. That I can keep her safe. I'm not used to feeling helpless, Geralt." And it wasn't only in that regard. Not that he would know. "Has anything changed over the last few days? Between us?"
He frowned. "It's not really about Kain and Ciri. It's about me, isn't it."
Yennefer didn't feel it necessary to say yes, she simply smiled.
"My memory's not back," he said simply, feeling it unnecessary to beat around the bush. "It's still strange to me to have you around every day, to see you worried about Ciri and treat her like your daughter. Because I don't remember how it came to be."
"You've also been sharing a bed with me. Does that feel peculiar?"
He smiled. "If you want to know whether you are special, you are. You have been on that first day that we met, as well, which I do remember."
"How'd that go?" Yennefer asked. She drew an idle pattern on his chest, encouraging him to fill her in. "Tell me in detail." She wanted to know how it varied from her own.
Geralt laughed. "I didn't think you had trouble remembering."
"You don't know a good many things about me, Geralt. Share. Tell me a story."
"What can I tell if I don't know so many things about you? It's you who should be telling me stories."
"I'm not asking you to recite what I like. I'm asking you to tell me your version of how we met so that I know how it differentiated and where it changed."
"You saved Dandelion from the djinn's curse and then almost died yourself trying to tame the creature. I made the same wish that banished it the first time, and it worked again. Though the djinn was so pissed it almost buried us under the thrashed building."
"How do you know that it was the same wish if you don't remember me?" Yennefer's lips twitched into a small smile. "What was it? What was the wish?"
"It was a curse in some strange elven tongue a priestess from Huldra's sanctuary taught me a long time ago. I didn't know what it meant until the priest enlightened me about it. It did make the djinn retreat, nevertheless. At the time, it was all that mattered."
"An elvish curse? That's it?" Yennefer had heard part of the wish before and it hadn't been that complicated. At least not in tongues. She supposed it proved that the wish was the thing that connected them. "You saved me that day. And many after."
"It was an incantation that turned out to be a highly inappropriate direction for the subject to go plough themselves. No wonder the djinn was as mad as it was."
"You think that's why?" Yennefer asked, chuckling softly. "You don't think I had agitated it by trying to trap it?"
"You certainly had," he laughed. "But it was mad to begin with, and you wouldn't relent. I couldn't let you die after you saved my friend. It would be a waste of such insane potential as yours, as well as your beauty."
"And that's the only reason? Because I saved your friend and happened to be beautiful?" Who didn't like hearing the latter? "It wasn't because of some unspoken… draw?"
He thought about it, watching her face with a glint of both fascination and warmth. "I wouldn't go into the crumbling house if I didn't feel any draw. But you did save my friend, and I couldn't let you pay with your life for it, even if it was your choice to be so reckless. Much more reckless than you blame Ciri to be." He smiled, brushing a finger across her cheek.
"That was my choice. As it is hers." Yennefer reached out to press her fingers to the back of his hand, running it down his arm slowly, toward his elbow where it stopped before making its way back. "And after that? When did we next meet?"
"On the dragon hunt. You were with some haughty knight, and you gradually set nearly everyone in other teams against you. They wanted to do nasty things to you when we got captured. But you managed to turn most of them into toads. I've seen many things in my life, but that was something unique. I have to admit."
"They deserved it," Yennefer supplied. She did think of that time fondly and a bit confusedly. Afterwards had been good for them, long and comfortable and at times complicated. "After that? Nothing more? You don't remember living with me for a year?"
"No. We parted after the djinn story. And then we parted after the dragon hunt, as well. You had business somewhere, and I had my work."
"Who were you with during that time? I'm not talking about your frivolous whores. Triss?"
"I've never been with anyone constant. Being on the road is my constant."
Yennefer was placated. So, it's not as if the spell had aided in keeping him from some other relationship that would reflect and twist the rest of his life as it had done theirs. And not with Triss. "Fringilla?"
He chuckled softly. "It wasn't a long one. Someone like me is not made for long-term affairs. Nor is someone like her."
"If that's the case then why did it work for me and you?" Yennefer arched a brow, challenging, wanting him to think and itch his memories for the answer.
"You say so. It's not what I know."
"Are you calling me a fibber, Geralt?"
The Witcher sighed and gave her a lenient look. "You talk too much." He drew her down to him for a kiss, slipping his arm around her waist and groping her behind as he did.
Yennefer shifted her legs until her knees touched the cover on either side his body, her hand fisting into his hair as her lips fused to his own, indulging in his attempt to distract her for a few seconds. He'd always been good at it. However, this time she had thoughts and issues that needed dealing with. Her fingers tightened in his hair and she broke the kiss, speaking against his mouth but making it temporarily impossible for him to continue kissing her.
"Answer me. Do you think it's a lie?"
He peered up at her, amused; his hands roamed her back and settled on her ass, squeezing. "I don't know what to think, so I don't think."
Yennefer rocked against him with the encouragement of his squeezing hands and then sat up abruptly, making no move to lessen the hold she had on his hair. "Unacceptable. Aren't you curious?"
"What does my curiosity have to do with what I don't remember? What you and Ciri and Dandelion tell me sounds like someone else's story."
"In what way does it feel like someone else's story? You can't imagine yourself with someone in the long term?"
"You. When I remember us parting ways when neither of us considered any long term, it sounds bizarre to hear another story. I don't recall anything about you that would tell me you wanted to stay with me. I was all but an episode in your life."
"You've never been an episode," Yennefer stated, accentuating her argument by rolling her hips and grinding down on him. "You've always been chapters. Multiple chapters. Some of them were really good."
He smirked. "Even if I've filled a few chapters, I could never make a whole tome."
"That's not true. It's what you wanted."
Yennefer's hand slid from his hair, letting him relax as her fingers moved to wrap themselves around his throat.
He watched her for a moment, then one of his hands found her throat in one quick motion, and next moment, he was hovering over her while she lay pressed into the mattress beneath him. Her fingers tightened reflexively on his neck.
He smiled. "Right now I want you to stop talking." He leaned down into her, claiming her mouth in a kiss.
Yennefer didn't fight the change in position, instead, she indulged in the kiss, parting his lips with her tongue, deepening the sentiment until both their toes had curled and they were breathless. And then she was pulling back again as she could, twisting her upper body slightly and tightening her hold on his throat, wrapping her legs around his waist to keep him in place.
"If we won't talk about this now – we never will. I know you don't need answers, but I do."
"I have no answers for you, Yennefer," he said. "I cannot summon something that doesn't exist in my mind."
"But it does exist. It's there—it was there. For years." Yennefer raised a hand to his face and touched his brow, sweeping her thumb over it affectionately once more as she'd done while he was resting. "You have to reach for it. At least try."
"What if I don't know where to reach? There's only what I told you I know. I cannot invent anything else. I won't lie to you, not even to make you feel better."
"I'd rather you didn't. I don't know what's true then, what's getting through and what isn't." Yennefer relaxed the hand on his throat, letting it rove down along the center of his abdomen. "How do you feel when you're inside me? Does it feel unexplainable, like we're able to shift worlds? Or does it reflect everything else you've experienced with other people? Do you miss me when I'm not around?"
"Too many questions, and I haven't slept nor drunk enough to talk so much."
He kissed her again, demandingly, eagerly, with all the pent-up yearning she had awakened in him. His hand roamed up her hip, her side and to her breast.
Yennefer let the hand shift to their side, to grasp his hip once he started kissing her, letting him once again manhandle his distraction, until she'd been reaching for his breeches. She hadn't been planning to have sex with him, she'd been hell-bent on the opposite and making their conversation work, and yet, just having him nestled between her thighs had been enough to kill her resistance.
Unrelenting with his kiss, set on keeping her from talking, Geralt found the laces of her corset and pulled at them, untying and loosening it. What he hadn't taken a chance to mention to her was that she, indeed, was unlike the other women he used to be with. He would never be able to explain why. He didn't want her to make him try.
Not today.
Yennefer slid her hand into his pants, found his cock and proceeded to stroke him, to arch against him so that he could free up her laces and push and pull the corset to where he needed it to be. She was desperate, too.
He dealt with the corset rather quickly and it fell on the floor, then her torn skirt followed. Her actions told him she was scarcely inclined to proceed with the interrogation, and he let her breathe while his mouth traveled down her neck, along her collarbones and to her breasts.
She groaned in appreciation, her upper body following the movement of his lips until she appeared to be rubbing herself against him like an animal in heat, her lower body drawing aside to make space for her hands so she could free him of his pants. A task she'd used her knees to help with until she'd managed to undo his fastings and pushed it toward his ankles.
Geralt toed off his boots and got rid of his pants restraining his ankles, then swiftly pulled his shirt off over his head and dropped it on top of her discarded clothes on the floor. His lips and tongue and teeth explored her body anew, eagerly, as if he had her for the first time. Every patch of her skin was like water to him, the man dying of thirst. He pinched her nipple with his teeth and directed himself inside her, thrusting in to their joined groans.
Yennefer softened beneath his skilled exploration, wondering if he was even aware of how well he knew her body. Did he question it? Think about how easily he was able to derive sound from her and twist her into a temporarily submissive mess? She groaned when he finally slipped into her, filling her in that delicious way that made her feel complete and had her clutching at his hips, drawing him closer, deeper, falling into a steady rhythm.
Geralt wondered briefly what kind of power her scent held over him. Every time he smelled it, she didn't have to be around to make him crave something he couldn't put to words.
As they began to fall into their hungry, frantic rhythm, thoughts were wiped out of his mind replaced by all things her. He caught her lips in a passionate kiss, enjoying the things she made him feel so intensely and how her nails dug into his sides and back drawing blood, how she couldn't hold her moans and cries and shivers when he found the right angle and drove her onto the top of the precipice where the blast of pleasure blinded her.
Yennefer held him close, drinking in his scent, the familiarity of his body that had been bringing her to tears over the last few weeks, a wash of emotion forgotten amidst the ecstasy of their joining.
"Yes, oh, yes, Geralt!"
She squeezed him with her legs, contracting around him, coming undone within minutes.
His heart returned back to its slow pace and Geralt languidly trailed a path of kisses across Yennefer's heaving chest, her rapid pulse beating so closely beneath her skin as if her heart would burst out under his lips.
She allowed her hand slide up his back, soothing the nail marks, some of which she was sure she'd made bleed, her eyes closing slowly. "Tell me," she added, breathless.
"That you're magical?" His mouth teased her nipple, her neck beneath her earlobe, placing tender kisses that buzzed on her skin when his lips withdrew.
He lay down beside her, his eyes closing to savor that peace and warmth she gave him.
Yennefer used his relaxation as an opportunity to probe his thoughts, to take a glimpse like she had in the past, for years accepting his 'I love you' in such form, so much so, that when he'd said it out loud she hadn't even reacted because she hadn't thought that he'd aired it. The realization had been a surprise to both of them then, but she hadn't hesitated to say it back.
"You know what I mean," she stated, rolling onto her side to fix him with an attentive look.
The Witcher didn't respond; a subtle smile was lingering in the corners of his mouth, his face relaxed and peaceful as he drifted off.
She loved that smile, loved that she was the cause. She moved to situate herself on his arm, her hand coming to rest on his face again, letting him sleep this time, prepared to continue the conversation a bit later once they'd woken.