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He grew up on the stories, the nightmares, just like everyone else did.
Eat your dark greens, or a witcher will be able to smell you and skin you.
Don’t hide your mess under your bed, a witcher will come and steal everything you loved.
If you stray from the path, a witcher will gobble you up.
When all his cousins and friends stopped believing in witchers, he didn’t. He maybe didn’t believe that whole eat your dark greens thing, because that was clearly just a mom trying to trick you. But he believed in witchers after everyone stopped, just for a little longer, because he wanted to believe. It was boring to grow out of believing in monsters. He wrote poems about witchers, sagas that he sang until he annoyed everyone around him. Creatures that hid in the dark, all you saw was their yellow eyes, until they snatched you up. And did…things to you.
When he was young the things were bloodthirsty.
When he was older but still young, they were a different sort of bloodthirsty.
Jaskier wrote about the witchers long after he stopped believing in them, because the songs were a hit with everyone. They tugged on those youthful memories, they made great villains. He wrote a whole play about them where the fae went to war against the witchers, and after much heartache emerged victorious.
But eventually he grew a bit bored. Not with the witcher stories, but with his life. There was a sameness to it all, the same conversations and food and songs. He was bored of it all. Jaskier decided he wanted to leave the fae realm and explore the place on the other side of the shimmer called the continent. He mentioned this to his parents and they were horrified. No one had left their kingdom in at least two centuries. “You cannot go my love, the witchers out there will kill you in an instant.”
Jaskier looked at his parents who were staring at him solemnly. “Huh?”
His father reached out, and clasped his hand. “Witchers don’t care that we don’t mean harm, they just see us as monsters and strike us down. We used to go past the shimmer more, but it was too dangerous, too many killed by their silver swords.”
Jaskier began to laugh. “Witchers are real?” His mother nodded, and was almost crying. It just made him laugh even harder. “And I suppose the moon goddess who brought us treats on the winter solstice is real too.” He shook his head. “I’ll be back when winter hits the continent, but I want to see it.” He stood up and kissed his mother’s head. “I’m ready to see what is out there. But I promise to steer clear of witchers. Should be easy to do, after all they hang upside down from trees and ride bears.”
He went to his room and packed a bag of what he thought he would need in the world of men. When he went to the front of the house his parents were waiting, something in his father’s hands. “This will keep you safe,” his father held it out. “Always, always keep this lute to hand. It will hide the magic in you, disguise you entirely. Do not lose it Jaskier. We just want you to not be killed by a witcher.”
“I appreciate the level of commitment there,” Jaskier said. He took the lute though. “A traveling bard will be a good way to see the world. Thank you, Father.” He hugged his parents, and ignored their final pleas to stay. There was a world of adventure out there and he wasn’t going to miss it. Lute and bag strung over his shoulder he left the fae, and joined the realm of men.
It didn’t take long to realize that adventure caused blisters. The moment he had crossed the shimmer, his clothes had altered, and were just more of them. He immediately started to wear that over coat thing undone because it was so hot all buttoned up. Pants were really annoying, but not nearly as bad as the boots. It took a few days to get used to having anything on his feet at all and he had stumbled a great deal as he walked but now he had the hang of it. Sort of. It hurt a lot. He had yet to see what he looked like in the mortal world, he could feel his wings and pointed ears gone, sharp teeth flattened. Jaskier whistled as he walked and held up a hand.
No flowers bloomed on his fingers though because he was carrying the lute that made him seem mortal. He missed his flowers. He hadn’t even run into anything scary, he was sure he’d be fine if he let go a little bit. In secret. He had been walking along a road and when he crested a hill he could see some woods in the distance. Perfect. Jaskier didn’t run, because it was very hard to run in boots, but he went as quick as he could manage and eventually he was in the woods. Jaskier breathed in and a tension in his shoulders eased. The mortal world smelled disgusting in general.
He liked the look of it, but ugh the smells. In the woods though it was better. Pine and moss. Animals. He found a good spot and knelt on the ground. Jaskier carefully took the lute off and stared at his fingers, willed the flowers and vines to shoot out. But they didn’t, and he almost cried. He checked the lute case and found a letter from his parents explaining that the longer he wore the lute, the longer it would take the protection to fade.
Well, Jaskier could wait all fucking day. He stared at his fingers, so intently focused the whole world faded. He thought he heard something, but it was likely just an animal. That was snarling. With the snarls echoing. There shouldn’t be an echo like that in the woods. Jaskier turned as saw a half dozen wolves, around him. There was something wrong in their eyes. Then the smell hit him. They were dead. Jaskier licked his lips. “I’m sorry, my magic is not the sort that can help you,” he told them. He pressed his hands to the earth and could feel his magic trying to stir, but he doubted that it would rise in time to save him. Jaskier closed his eyes.
A handful of days on the continent was hardly the adventure he had hoped for. His parents would never even know what happened to him. Jaskier was as ready as he could be, but then there was a new noise. When he opened his eyes, it was just a blur of black armor and something propelled the wolves back. He watched a sword fly, and it seemed both so slow and fast at the same time, that the warrior dealt with the dead wolves. Jaskier reached out and slung the lute to his back. He watched as the last wolf died. When the man turned, Jaskier gasped. “Fuck, witchers are real,” he began to scoot back away from the monster. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He paused, though, because for a moment the monster looked wounded that Jaskier was trying to get away. “I mean…thank you? You saved my life.”
“You shouldn’t just take random naps in the woods,” the man said and wiped his sword off against his pants before he put it away. He set to skinning the wolves, and that wasn’t creepy at all. He wondered if he was going to be skinned as well. When he had collected a few pelts, he stared at Jaskier and Jaskier swallowed. “Well?”
“Well, what?” Jaskier asked.
“You need to get going,” the man said. “Dark will be here soon enough and you clearly aren’t prepared for a night in the woods. Town about another two hours walk that way.”
Jaskier could have wept at the thought of walking that much more. “Is that where you are going?”
“No, I am camping over there,” the witcher replied, vaguely gesturing west.
“Then I am camping there,” Jaskier said. He didn’t mean to say that, but apparently he was as stupid as his cousin suggested. Because he had just suggested camping with a monster. The thing he had been scared of his entire childhood. Those yellow eyes were watching him, and Jaskier waited for the witcher to smell that he was fae, he hadn’t eaten his dark greens since he had left home. The man just sort of grunted though and picked up the pelts.
Jaskier thought that was a welcome and followed along. He was quiet, terrified if he spoke too much, the monster would figure it out, but he was quiet too. And didn’t seem to notice at all. The lute was working. Jaskier watched as the monster cooked some squirrel and share it. It tasted disgusting. He didn’t know if that was the witcher’s cooking, or because it was a squirrel. “You don’t have fangs,” Jaskier blurted out. “Or claws.”
“Is that what they say in the cities these days?” the man snorted a bit.
“Cities?”
“You look like a city boy, first time out in the world,” the man said.
Jaskier laughed a bit. “You aren’t wholly wrong. The stories we hear about witchers are…vivid.” That just got a grunt. “I’m Jaskier.” There was just another grunt. “Thank you for letting me camp with you tonight. I won’t be any trouble.” The man stared at the pelts stacked near the fire. “More trouble. I won’t be anymore trouble.” Oh look, another grunt.
Jaskier eventually lay down on the bedroll that the man had given him. He watched, ready to run, but the witcher wasn’t paying any attention at all. He fell into a fitful sleep and actually woke up in the morning, that was a pleasant surprise. He had a thought, that turned into an idea, which slowly became a plan. When the witcher packed up and started to walk out of the woods, Jaskier followed. He followed all day, to the town, and the shops he sold the pelts at, and he followed to the table in the tavern, and he followed for four fucking days.
The witcher said nothing just kept giving him pointed glances and Jaskier smiled. He gave over the money he sometimes earned in the taverns and then they shared a room in an inn. It was late and they were in the bed, sharing common enough in both worlds.
The monster spoke for the first time since that first night. “Geralt. My name is Geralt.”
“Do witchers really turn into the creature of the school they belong to on the full moon?” He didn’t get an answer, but he had had five words, he bet he could get more from the man.
Jaskier was endlessly fascinated by Geralt, because he was like some of the stories that the elders had told and some not at all. And every day he traveled with the witcher he thought him a little less a monster. He was too quiet, too focused on what he called the Path. And a monster wouldn’t let a random stranger just travel with him as he was.
It sealed the deal when they ran into a godling in the woods. Johnny. It was a bit awkward to fall in love in an instant with the theoretical monster under your bed, but he did when Geralt rescued the godling’s voice and then played tag with him in the woods. When they set up camp, Jaskier couldn’t stop staring at him.
“Do I have something on my face?” Geralt rubbed at the stubble that was coming in. A joke.
“You are a monster,” Jaskier said and he caught the way Geralt flinched. “Sorry, grew up on stories it is hard to change how you think. You are a witcher, a job that insists that you kill monsters. You played with him.”
“A godling is mischief at most, and the woods need a godling in them to thrive. He does no harm to people beyond maybe stealing their clothes or a doll. Not going to murder that.”
“I’m going to fuck you now,” Jaskier said and threw himself at Geralt. He waited for Geralt to toss him over his shoulder, kill him, but Geralt just fell back and grunted.
Jaskier had traveled with him long enough to know that grunt was one of acceptance, agreement. He kissed Geralt, and Geralt rolled over pressed him down. They looked at each other. “You aren’t a monster,” Jaskier whispered.
“I am.”
“No, you aren’t,” Jaskier said. He pulled Geralt in for a kiss and nothing else was said that night.
*
They were in a city, Geralt finally annoyed at Jaskier’s lack of supplies for travel, especially as the weather had grown cooler. They both clearly hated the city. It was too loud, too smelly, and the lack of living earth in it was hurting Jaskier’s soul. But Geralt had sort of implied that he perhaps was thinking that Jaskier should stick around. He had idly started talking of where he spent winter, an implication that perhaps Jaskier would see it.
Jaskier was torn between going home to see his family, and spending more time with Geralt. He was debating it as they shopped. Geralt was talking with the blacksmith and Jaskier had seen a stall with pretty doublets. He still wore them open, though now it was mostly because he knew Geralt liked seeing his chest hair. He was looking through the selection when he heard a child cry. Jaskier turned and saw the small girl standing on a corner, sobbing her heart out, and hurried over to her.
He crouched in front of her, smoothed down her wild brown curls, “Shhh, sweet one, what’s wrong?”
“I losth my daddy,” she wailed, lisping through her tears.
“May I pick you up?” he asked and she eventually nodded. He held her close, her heart fluttering madly. “There, now you are taller. Can you see your papa at all?” He moved around so that she could see the crowd and eventually she gasped and pointed. Thank the moon goddess, Jaskier thought. Her tears were breaking his heart. He hurried to the man who was looking increasingly frantic. “Sir, I believe you lost something?” Jaskier kept his voice light, to soothe the little girl.
“Renfri,” the man sounded so relieved. “You know in market, you should not wander. Thank you sir,” the man said. “I turned for just a moment. You must allow me to pay you a reward.”
“Not at all, anyone would have helped.”
“I highly doubt that, you are unique. At least come home with us. You look like a traveler, let us fill your pack with food.”
Oh, Geralt would be impressed with that, that he had gotten them supplies for free. Jaskier asked if he could carry Renfri, he was oddly content with the wee little one in his arms. He hummed to her as they walked, and she grew heavier in his arms; he smiled as she yawned. “Someone needs a nap,” he teased.
“Run,” she said.
“No, running about for you, you have had enough adventure, I think.” He couldn’t help himself and kissed her head. “You have the sweetest girl here,” he said to the man. “I’m Jaskier by the way. A traveling bard.” It was a nice house, not in the rich part of town, but well kept. They stepped inside and Jaskier could smell the magic. And more - the blood. He didn’t think, but put the girl down and behind him. “You should let us go, my travel companion will not take kindly to whatever you have planned.”
“That implies he’ll find you before you are a corpse,” the man said.
“Stegbo, he nice,” Renfri said.
“And his niceness will help us make you not be a monster,” the man said.
Jaskier tried to dodge the blow coming at his head, he did dodge it, but it was a ruse and the blast of magic knocked him cold.
When he woke, the air was damp, below ground he thought. He slowly opened his eyes, found himself bound to a table, naked, but a sheet covering him. He could see Renfri playing in a corner. “Hiya,” he whispered.
“I’m sowwy, Stegbo mean.”
“I think I might agree with you,” Jaskier coughed. “How long was I out?” She just shrugged. “What is he going to do to me?”
There was another shrug, but also a sniffle. “Last one not right, no fix me.”
“You don’t look like there is a thing wrong with you.”
“Monster,” she said. “He fix. Lots of blood to fix.” She pointed, and Jaskier decided he really didn’t want to look over. “I’m sowwy I twicked you.”
“How old are you, love?”
She held up 3 fingers. “A bit ago? I got a biscuit!”
“Biscuits are wonderful,” he agreed. He heard a door open and the man came in. “You are making a very large mistake.”
“I don’t think so,” the man replied, “I listened at the market no one is looking for you. Whoever your travel companion was, they clearly traveled on without you. I’m Stregobor, a sorcerer and a scientist. And you will help fuel my work. I have a calling you see -” The man went on and on and Jaskier completely tuned him out because he couldn’t think of anything but the fact that Geralt wasn’t looking for him. It was logical he supposed, witchers walked their path. He was the one who strayed from it, so Geralt had continued on. Jaskier felt a tear slip down his cheek.
One word though in the sorcerer’s prattling seeped through Jaskier’s sadness. Monster.
“I’m not a monster,” Jaskier glared at him.
“No I know that is why you are perfect. We will bathe that monster there in your blood, to heal her.”
Jaskier frowned. “I don’t understand, what monster?”
“Me,” Renfri nodded. “Stegbo found me. Told Mama I a monster, so she gave me. Now I get all fixed.”
Jaskier was horrified. “You are not a monster, sweet one.”
“Oh she is, it is foretold, females born on the -”
“Fuck you, you fucking -” Magic slapped against his mouth, quieted him, but he glared for all he was worth. The man went back to prattling on, and Renfri went back to playing with her doll.
The magic hand on his mouth eventually moved away and Jaskier spit at the man. “You are the only monster I have ever met.” In saying that he remembered something. Geralt, the witcher, the monster under his bed, the monster who was going to gobble him all up, was no monster. Had never been, and since he wasn’t a monster, he was absolutely looking for Jaskier.
Because he wasn’t a monster, he was a hero. Jaskier looked at Stregobor. “Why me?”
“Easy, you responded to her cries. And I need pure souls for this experiment. The last several weren’t quite good enough.”
Jaskier vomited in his mouth. “You’ve bathed this child, this sweet one in blood, countless times?”
“Not at all. I can count all eight, well nine soon enough perfectly well.” Stregobor went to a table and clearly was prepping implements. A flick of his hand picked Jaskier up and had him hanging from a hook, hands tied together. He was relieved that at least for now the sheet stayed on. He looked up at his fingers and there was the smallest green sprout at his fingertips.
At least a day, maybe two or even three if he was about to bloom like that with how close he had kept the lute over the months with Geralt.
“Hmm, I left the book upstairs,” Stregobor muttered and disappeared.
Jaskier held out a small hope for Geralt’s arrival, but he knew it was a false hope. Renfri was playing but kept looking at him. She knew whatever was to come and was terrified. “I’m magic you know.” That seemed to scare her even more. “No, not like him.” He wiggled his fingers and a small daisy shot up out of one. He wiggled his toes and she gasped as they shed daisy after daisy from his nails. “Pretty magic, for the pretty girl.”
“Monster,” she reminded him. “Bad.”
“I think he’s the only bad one here,” Jaskier whispered. He felt the magic in his veins, loosening up, as it chased the bit of freedom it had been given. Soon the dozens of daises at his feet became a pile and vines slowly grew out all his fingers and toes. “Oh dear,” he said, not quite controlling it, just as when it had begun when he was becoming an adult. “Sweet one, you might want to hop up onto the table,” Jaskier suggested as more flowers fell, as the vines began to travel off his body and around the room. He could feel his ears reshaping, the wings pulling out from under the human skin. His eyes switching from mortal blue to a colour that was almost impossibly bright and deep at the same time. “I think that monster is going to have a surprise when he comes back down,” Jaskier told her.
She just sort of nodded and began to suck her thumb. Jaskier sang to her to calm her, fuck to calm himself, because he had never been this out of control of his gifts before. The vines were pulling all the damp in the air and growing. They grew and pulsed so much. Jaskier didn’t try to stop them. He just hanged there, and let his gift pour out.
They both heard a noise above them, the shattering of wood, a bellow of rage.
“What’s that?” Renfri asked.
“Well this story has a prince in disguise, who was kidnapped by an evil monster, a fair maiden in need of rescue. So of course, what we are hearing is a hero.” Jaskier winced as he heard Where the fuck is Jaskier you fucking shit stain pustule? “A hero with perhaps a bit of a rough vocabulary.” He smiled at her. “Time for the dashing rescue. Just like in the stories mama’s tell you at bedtime.”
“No stories for me,” she told him.
“I’ll tell you a million.” He could hear tumbling down the stairs. “Close your eyes, sweet one.” He was happy that she listened to him. There was Geralt attacking Stregobor, but Stregobor was making it difficult; his magic an equal match to Geralt’s strength. It was an ugly, brutal fight, and Geralt was good but Stregobor was insane, which gave him an edge.
Geralt had an edge too though.
Jaskier focused and at first the vines wouldn’t listen to him, they just wanted to grow and grow. But Jaskier poured out his energy and they listened. Soon Stregobor couldn’t move his arms. And then the vines slid around his neck. “Sorry, you bastard, don’t think I quite have the pure soul you thought I did, because I am really going to fucking enjoy murdering you,” Jaskier snarled and the vines tightened and tightened, just Stregobor fell down. Geralt cut his head off to be sure he would stay dead.
Jaskier watched Geralt slowly approach him. “You found me.”
“Of course I did,” Geralt replied and eased him down from the hook. He was so gentle as he untied the ropes on Jaskier’s wrists. “How hurt are you?”
“The hero saved the day in plenty of time,” Jaskier reassured him.
“You have wings. And flowers…growing…everywhere.”
“Not out of my ass or throat?” Jaskier offered. “Had a cousin who shat roses. Actual roses fell out of his butt.” Jaskier smiled at the way Renfri giggled at that. “He can’t hurt you anymore sweet one.”
“Can I look?”
“Only at me or our hero,” Jaskier said. He gestured, and the vines carried the flowers over, covered up the corpse. “This is Geralt.”
Renfri opened her eyes and screamed. She scrambled back and rolled off the table, to hide under it.
“What the fuck?”
“Stegbo said, witcher find me, he’ll eat me up! They eat monsters.”
“No, sweet one, you aren’t a monster,” Jaskier crouched down.
“Actually…she may be,” Geralt said. “My medal is responding to something in her.”
Jaskier stood in between Geralt and Renfri. “So, what does that mean?”
“Jaskier, I follow the path,” Geralt said calmly, but Jaskier noticed the faint tremor in his hands. The tremor was hidden when he tightened his grip on his sword. “Stregobor was wrong with whatever he was doing here. But there is something about her.”
Jaskier gestured, “There is something about me too,” he pointed out. “Fae in fact. And I just killed a man.”
“Jaskier,” Geralt sounded like he wanted to plead, beg, but all he said was Jaskier’s name.
“Geralt,” Jaskier’s voice had the exact same tone.
Neither man said anything as they stared at each other. Waited. The only sound in the room was the sniffs of Renfri under the table.
“You aren’t a monster,” Jaskier whispered, “and neither is she.”
“How do you know?”
“I suppose I don’t,” Jaskier said and closed his eyes.
A Couple Years Later
Jaskier hid in the house with Renfri tucked under his arm. He held his hand to his lips and she did the same. They were quiet, in the dark. It was so dark in the house, but a light would give them away. They could hear footsteps, stomping.
They were being hunted.
“Be quiet my sweet one,” Jaskier whispered. “Promise me you’ll be very very quiet. You have to be quiet or the witchers…” He realized how exactly like his mother sounded. He missed her so much. But he couldn’t take Renfri home and he would choose her every day. His mother would understand that.
“Or the witchers will what, Papa?” Renfri asked. “What will the witchers do?”
“Shout that it isn’t fair that their family didn’t wait to build a blanket fort until after training was done,” Geralt called out.
“Father, you found us! We were super hidden!”
“Yes, you were, a huge blanket fort in the dining hall was so very easy to miss,” Geralt agreed. Jaskier looked up as a blanket moved and Geralt peered down at them. “How many blankets did you use?”
“Tons,” Renfri stood and held up her hands, and Geralt picked her up. She growled, “Rawr, I’m a monster.”
He spun her around in the air until the roars became giggles. “Hmm, a laughing monster. I’ll have to consult the beastiaries. Vesemir what do we do with giggle monsters?”
Vesemir was cleaning off sword oil from his hands. “Well, that explains where the horse blankets went. Giggle monster, eh? Last I checked the only thing you can do is build them an even bigger blanket fort, with more pillows. Spend the night in the fort even. Only way to defeat them.”
“Grandpa! Can you help me find more blankets?”
“I think I can manage.”
Jaskier watched Geralt hand Renfri over to Vesemir, and then he crawled into the blanket fort. Jaskier had the medallion that the sorceress Triss made him on, it let him hide his wings but retain a small bit of his gift. He grew a flower on his hand and tapped it against Geralt’s nose. “I should not encourage you.”
“About what?” Geralt asked.
“Letting her call herself a monster,” Jaskier said.
“She owns it now, or will when she is older. Jaskier we’re all monsters here, just not the ones under beds.” Geralt smiled a bit. He had laughed so much when Jaskier told him the witcher tales he had grown up on. “We’re the good monsters. She’ll be a good monster.”
Jaskier drizzled a few more flowers on Geralt, and enjoyed the way the man tried to swat them away. “Be careful how you treat flowers, or a fae might haunt you the rest of your days.”
“Is that a promise?” Geralt asked. Jaskier found himself under Geralt, and being thoroughly kissed.
“Is that what Papa means when he says to mind your manners or a witcher will gobble your toes up, because Father isn’t gobbling Papa’s toes.”
Jaskier snickered against Geralt’s mouth.
“It is so gross, isn’t it?” Lambert asked.
“Yup,” Renfri agreed.
More blankets were dropped on their heads, and Jaskier pushed Geralt away. “Blanket fort, and tomorrow you can gobble me up when she is studying her letters.”
Geralt nuzzled his neck and Jaskier sighed happily.
He had grown up believing be careful or a witcher will catch you.
He wished he had known sooner how very wonderful it was to be caught.