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dhwty-writes · 3 years

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Nightmares

This is part 4 of my fic for @heyabooboo for the @thewitchersecretsanta.

Welcome to the the longest (and angstiest) chapter of this fic! Compared to the others that are found in this fandom, this is fairly mild, but please heed the tags. And have fun reading!

Summary: Having braved the nightmare of figuring out the meaning of a near incomprehensible poem, one should think that the nightmares of the netherworld come to an end. Alas, Destiny is not as kind. Retracing their steps, Jaskier is taken to the darkest chapters of his and Geralt's lives.

Moodboard by the amazing @petrificustotaluss

Warnings: canon typical violence, we see Geralt and Jaskier’s shitty childhood in here, and the trial of the grasses, but nothing too explicit. Rated T

Read on AO3

It was, admittedly, a bit strange, to say the least, to keep walking backwards with his eyes affixed on the horizon. He extended his arms to get a better balance, still he tripped and stumbled over rocks and tree stumps and thin air. It probably would've been easier with just a glance over his shoulder. But-

'No,' he decided. 'I mustn't lose my goal from sight.' If he was entirely honest, that was probably the most difficult part.

Many people assume that in a netherworld without a physical body they cannot be troubled by such trivial things such as the paltry ache of keeping your eyes open without blinking. That is untrue.

There are some aspects of humanity that are so ingrained into the core of their very being that they cannot imagine a world without it. Boogers, for example, and armpit hair, or sweat. Or the pressing urge to blink.

And no matter how much Jaskier tried to fight it, there was just no hope of escaping the burn.

He blinked.

The scenery in front of him had changed. "What the fuck?" he murmured quietly as he took in the familiar countryside.

It was late in autumn it seemed; most of the trees had already shrugged off their colourful cloaks of withered leaves, though the first snow was yet to come. In front of him, a beautiful keep rose up at the horizon. The walls of limestone were pristine as ever, the red shingles glistening after a recent rain shower, bright banners flapping in the wind. The whole image looked as if plucked from a nightmarish fairy tale. "Huh," he muttered to himself. "Didn't expect I'd end up here of all places." Self-consciously he tugged at the cuffs of his blue silk doublet. Hadn't he been naked?

He decided not to think about that too much and instead be grateful for the armour that would protect him from piecing stares and cutting comments. He had no time for it either, for within the blink of an eye his vision shifted again and he stood within the empty courtyard.

'Strange.' There should be guards. Servants. The Count or Countess perhaps. Instead, there was nothing but eerie quiet and wisps of fog curling around his feet. It was almost enough for him to feel concern rising within hi-

"Julian Alfred Pankratz!" Jaskier froze on instinct, the booming voice bearing down on him like whip lashes.

‘Fuck.’ Twenty years. Twenty years since he had last returned home, and still— His heart was beating frantically in his chest, as if it wanted to jump right out of it. Given his previous experiences in this place, he didn't consider this impossible. 'Shit,' he cursed silently. 'It just had to be Lettenhove, hadn't it?'

He screwed his eyes shut, to drown out the litany of his father, the words nearly indistinguishable through the thick haze clouding his mind, though still drawing closer.

When he finally opened them again and had managed to blink away the bright lights distorting his vision, he realised he wasn't outside anymore. Instead, he was standing in front of a nondescript double door he knew like the back of his hand and had hoped to never see again.

It stood the slightest bit ajar, just so that he could peer inside. There was his father behind his desk, Lord Lettenhove intimidating as always. And- Jaskier frowned.

A little boy standing in front of him, with a mop of brown hair and a silken doublet that looked much like the one Jaskier was wearing. His mouth formed a silent 'O.' He couldn't see the boy's face, nor betrayed his body a single thing, yet he knew that he was crying.

'This isn't real,' he understood. 'This is a memory.'

"Father, please-" the boy begged, but his voice broke and shoulders gave the slightest tremble, the only hint of the terror that stole his and Jaskier's voices alike. 'For the fearless no success,' he reminded himself. 'Well, I'm fucking terrified. I'm getting out of here.'

He wanted to close his eyes so that this strange world would bring him to another place. But they didn't. No matter how adamantly he ordered them to shut, his eyelids didn't budge. 'Poor boy,' a voice in the back of his mind said. 'Poor me. I can't leave like this.'

"Well, Sir?" his father asked coldly. "Don't you have anything to say in your defence?"

Jaskier screwed his eyes shut, waiting for something to happen. Nothing did. He cursed quietly: "Get it together, Jaskier!" He hadn't dealt with stage fright for nearly thirty years to succumb to fear now. So, he squared his shoulders and passed through the oaken wood of the door.

"Actually, your lordship," he spoke up, "I do."

Lord Lettenhove whirled around and gasped. "You!" he spit out and pointed an accusatory finger at him. "Where have you been? Your mother is worried sick."

"She isn't," he said casually and strolled over to his child self. "She never is. Besides, she's been dead for a decade." He went down on one knee to get on eye level with him. "Hello there," he greeted him with a smile he hoped to be reassuring. "It certainly has been a while."

Julian raised his gaze, his eyes puffy and red with tears, the fear lingering even now. For a moment he couldn't help but stare in bewilderment. 'Was it really that bad?' He hadn't even remembered.

"Who are you?" Julian asked.

"A scoundrel," their father huffed indignantly, "and a coward."

Jaskier's smile grew even wider. "He's right," he confessed. "I am you, little one. Just without- this." He waved his hand around vaguely.

Julian's eyes widened even further, his gaze flicking around nervously. Finally, it settled on the lute case. "Are you a bard?" he whispered secretively.

"A failure," their father commented, "a disgrace upon our name."

He ignored him. "Oh no, little one. I am no mere bard. I am an adventurer, a poet, a minstrel. I am all that you dream to be and more. I am Jaskier, the most renowned troubadour of the Continent. But most importantly, I am alive. I am real. And you, my lord," slowly he rose to his feet and turned to their father, "are nothing."

"Excuse you?" he gasped. "You will take that back, young man."

"No," he answered calmly. "I don't think I will. I was taught to always tell the truth, so tell the truth I shall. And that truth is that you, father, are not deserving of any obedience or respect a son owes his parents. And least of all love."

Lord Lettenhove sneered. "You are no son of mine," he spat out and for a moment those words were enough to make Jaskier tense up. He could well remember when he had heard them—and seen his family—the last time. He could still taste the despair on his tongue, the tears running down his cheeks, the overwhelming urge to beg-

"No," he interrupted the spiral of hopelessness that threatened to drag him away. 'I have reimagined my memories hundreds of times. I can do it again.' He straightened his back and raised his chin. "No, Alfred, I am not. You wish you had a son like me."

"I do not-"

Jaskier scoffed and turned his back to him. He had spent far too much time listening to his father in his life already, he did not plan on doing it any longer. "Hey, Julian," he said instead, "do you want to hear a poem? How about a limerick?"

The Count de Lettenhove gasped indignantly: "Julian, how- Such verses are beneath us."

"And they are above your intellect," he retorted with a wink at Julian. "Let's see, I think I've got a good one:

There once was a Countlet named Alfred,

Whose aim was to cause fright and dread.

He thought himself smart

For he despised the arts,

Alas, he was dumber than bread."

Julian's eyes gleamed and he snickered. Well. He considered that a good start. "Another?" he challenged and the boy nodded eagerly. "How about this?

There once was a Redanian Countess

Who was famed for her martial prowess.

She boasted she taught

Her son to wield a sword,

But was beaten by a pigeon at chess.”

Giggling, Julian almost didn't look scared anymore. "A last one, yeah?" Jaskier proposed and he nodded eagerly. "This one I know from a friend. Ready?"

"Yes!" he exclaimed excitedly.

"Alright." He cleared his throat and said with as much dignity and gravitas as possible: "Lambert, Lambert, what a prick."

By now Julian was laughing openly, nearly doubling over with the force of it. 'There,' Jaskier thought with a satisfied smile, 'that's better.'

He blinked.

The road that led through the early-summer forest was empty except for a cart disappearing in the distance. Jaskier frowned and turned around. What on earth had led him here? As far as he could remember it, he had never seen that place before. Plus, there was no-one around.

Maybe he was just supposed to follow the road. With a shrug Jaskier decided that was as good a guess as any and began walking. He hadn't gotten far when he heard the prattling of tiny feet behind him. "Ma?" a young boy shouted. "Ma!"

Jaskier wanted to keep on walking. He didn’t know this boy, so this hardly concerned him. He rally tried to keep on walking. Really. But something made him turn around. Maybe the fear in the boy's cry: "Ma!" Probably the sob when he yelled: "Visenna!"

The boy couldn't be any older than seven years at most, probably he was younger still, and there were tears glistening in the corner of his eyes. "Ma?" he asked again.

"Sorry, buddy," Jaskier said. "No-one around but me."

"But- She said- She told me to get water," he stammered. "She was thirsty."

"Oh." His heart sank. What was he even supposed to tell him? That she was surely coming back? That was a lie, no mother left her child in the woods with the intention of coming back. He had seen it often enough in the past. Mostly it was because of hunger, or sickness, sometimes just good old poverty as well. Some of the children were believed to be cursed, or changelings, or whatever other thing humans came up with to keep hurting each other.

This child, however, did not seem to fit any of the categories. He looked almost disturbingly boring. He was well-fed and properly clothed as well, a healthy blush on his cheeks. Jaskier had no idea what had led the mother to abandon him out here. "I'm sorry," was the best he managed. The boy's lower lip wobbled dangerously. 'Please don't start crying,' Jaskier begged whichever higher power was listening. He was shit with children; he couldn't handle a crying one. "What's your name?" he asked, trying to prevent the inevitable.

"Geralt," the boy answered with a frail voice.

"Oh," Jaskier said again. 'Oh, fuck,' he thought. No wonder he didn't recognise the memory—it was taking place over half a century before he was even born. "Geralt," he repeated stupidly. Geralt as a child. Geralt before the trials. Geralt who had, presumably, just been abandoned before heading to Kaer Morhen. Geralt who was just about to cry.

'Shit.' He had to do something. And fast. "Well, Geralt, I'm glad that I stumbled upon you here. I couldn't imagine braving the way through this wilderness on my own."

The boy frowned—an expression that looked much cuter on this Geralt than on the one Jaskier was acquainted with. "I know you," he decided after a few moments.

"Yes," he agreed. "You will. Come, I tell you a story while we walk."

He started walking into the direction the cart had left. Boy-Geralt hurried to catch up with him and slipped his hand in his. "You look funny," he remarked.

Jaskier snorted. "It's called fashion, thank you very much." He regarded him with a fond, wry smile. "I'm glad not everything about you changes once you grow up."

"Are you a prince?" Geralt asked as if Jaskier hadn't said anything at all. 'The selective deafness isn't new either, I see.'

"Not quite," he answered honestly. "I am a Viscount, but that's unimportant. You will know me as a bard and the most annoying creature in existence."

"A bard?" he asked excitedly, skipping along next to him. "I will know a bard? Will you sing songs of me? Will we be friends?"

"All of that and more," he chuckled. "Although you won't always be grateful for it."

"I can't imagine that." They walked barely two paces in silence before Geralt asked: "Will I be a knight? Will I slay a dragon? Is that why I will know you?"

"No," Jaskier answered as kindly as he could. "You will save a dragon. As a witcher."

"A witcher?" Geralt's eyes went wide in horror. "No, that can't be! Witchers are scary!"

"Well, you can be very scary," he agreed. "But most of the time you aren't. You see, there was this one time when we were travelling and you found a dog. It was old, and had a broken leg and had been left to die in the woods. But instead of killing it, you set its bone, heaved it onto your horse's back and found a place for it to stay. You weren't with me then, but a few years later I visited the same town and it was still there, hale and hearty."

He glanced down at the boy to check if he had the boy’s attention. Of course, he had; Geralt was practically hanging on his lips. "Oh, or that other time when you were hired to slay a troll and we chose to remigrate him instead. Sounds easy enough, right?"

Geralt nodded.

"Well, it wasn't. You see, while trolls are certainly smarter than... drowners, let's say, they are not terribly intelligent. We tried talking to him, wasted half a night while doing so—because we couldn't remigrate him during the day, since you were supposed to kill him—until we managed to explain to him that he should get up and follow us. It worked until we reached another bridge where he had lived previously, as it seemed. He decided he might just as well live there again, and then we had to remigrate him again." Jaskier laughed at the memory. "I think we repeated that four times at least. And didn't even get paid in the end, can you believe that?"

"Another," Geralt begged eagerly. "Please, tell another one.

"Alright," Jaskier agreed. And so, he did what he did best: singing Geralt of Rivia's praises. He talked until his throat was raw, and kept on talking after that. Only when the sun set and Geralt fell almost asleep on his feet, did they seek out a place to rest.

They found a nice dry spot next to a stream, just like Geralt would teach him almost a century from now. Jaskier dug a pit to start a campfire, as Geralt collected firewood, and dug out some dried rations from his pack, that had miraculously appeared along the way. Once they were both sated, he laid his bedroll out for the boy and took the first watch. Well, the only watch, more like it.

He leaned against a log they had dragged onto the clearing together, plucking idly at his lute strings to accompany an old lullaby he half-remembered his nursemaid singing. Satisfied, he watched as the boy fell asleep and only then, finally, did exhaustion wash over him. He felt so drained, from walking for what felt like weeks without a break. He'd just set his lute down and rest his eyes for a little bit and—

He blinked.

"Get out!" the innkeeper barked and Jaskier sprung to his feet. "Get out, you useless bastard! And don't bother coming back in."

"Fuck," he cursed quietly as he lunged to catch the man—boy, really—that was about to land face-first in the mud. Too late. The Oxenfurt graduate was already eating dirt. And not moving. Well, that was concerning. "Are you alright?" Jaskier asked.

"Ow," the boy groaned, still without so much as lifting his head.

He flopped down next to his younger self with a sigh. "Yeah, I know. Bruised ego hurts like shit. But no broken bones at least, eh?"

"This time."

He winced. He'd forgotten how shitty it had been before he had become famous. "You need to get up," he told him without too much empathy. Whining would get them nowhere. "You'll ruin your doublet else, and we both know that you don't have the coin for a new one. No-one likes a dirty bard." Besides, they had to greet a witcher in the very same get-up not quite two months from now.

"I hate you," Julian-Jaskier grumbled as he got himself into a sitting position.

"You hate the world and think that's the same as hating yourself and everyone around you," he corrected him. "There's a difference." He had also forgotten his dramatics of his teenage years, it seemed. Not that he was keen to remember them.

The bardlet rolled his eyes and huffed in annoyance. "What do you want? I really had a shitty day and don't need a visit from... what even is this? Future me?"

"Something like that," Jaskier grumbled. "Believe me, I'm not thrilled to be here either."

"Then go away."

"Can't," he explained. "Not until I help you... or something."

"Help me?" He snorted. "How are you supposed to help me?"

The thing was, Jaskier wasn't quite sure either. There really was no helping him; he had no money to give and besides, that wouldn't make much of a difference either. It never had, not until he stole the lute from the drunk disgrace of a bard in a month, at least. Wait a minute-

"A lute!" he exclaimed.

"Huh?"

"I have a lute, I can give it to you," Jaskier babbled excitedly and scrambled to his feet.

"And how's that going to help me?" Julian-Jaskier asked sceptically.

"Performances, you idiot! No-one wants to listen to just a bard; everyone loves bards with lutes. It's right— shit." He grabbed his lutestrap to find— nothing.

"What?" he scoffed. "Lost it or something?"

"What? Lost it?" He laughed nervously. "No, that's ridiculous. I just, um—" He started patting down his breeches, as if he might have hidden it there. "—misplaced it, that's it." He turned on the spot, searching the ground. He had just put it down when Geralt had gotten tired and— "Fuck!"

"You lost it?"

"I lost it."

Julian-Jaskier laughed. Actually laughed. "What?" he asked when he saw Jaskier's resentful glare. "Don't tell me you've stopped looking on the bright side of life."

"How is this the bright side?!"

"Oh, I don't know," he flashed him a wide grin. "I actually consider you losing the lute you wanted to gift—"

"Lend!"

"—yourself rather funny."

"Ughh!" Jaskier exclaimed and pointed an accusatory finger in his direction. "You are a brat." He had no time for that. He needed to go back to Geralt and get the lute. He blinked. Nothing happened. He blinked again. And again, and again, and again, and again. Nothing. "Fuck!"

Julian-Jaskier grinned even wider. "You do realise the comedic potential in this scene, right?"

"I don't care about the comedic potential! I just want my fucking lute!" He turned away from the annoyance—really, how Geralt had allowed him to travel with him was beyond him. Oh right. He hadn't—and stared at the sky. "Hey!" he yelled at the top of his lungs. "You there, looking at all of this! Coram Agh Tera? Wade? Well, whatever your name is, you wanker, take me back to the previous one! I need my lute!"

Nothing. Well, not exactly nothing, there was the barely stifled snorting laughter of Julian-Jaskier in the background, but he decided to ignore that, so it was basically nothing. "Come on, mate! I just forgot my lute! How am I supposed to help this one without a lute?"

Still no answer.

"You know, I don't really think this is going to work," Julian-Jaskier quipped.

"Shut the fuck up, you midget. I know that!"

He sighed and finally got to his feet, grimacing as he took in the ruined fabric of his breeches. "I'm sure there's another way to help me besides conjuring up your lute from thin air."

"Well, probably," Jaskier hissed, "but in any case, I'd really like my lute back. It's my lute, alright, I'm attached to it. I get it three months from now and I want it back! Right now! Right here in my hands!"

The weight was sudden and entirely unexpected, so Jaskier actually stumbled a bit. Flabbergasted, he stared down at Filavandrel's lute in his hands. "Oh," he said simply. "I suppose that works."

Julian-Jaskier looked very stupid when surprised. 'Gods, I hope I don't look like that,' Jaskier prayed. Given that his looks had barely changed since that day, however, he didn't have all too high hopes. "How did you do that?" the bardlet asked.

"I don't know," he admitted truthfully. "I just wished really hard to have a lute."

"Brilliant." His eyes gleamed. "Do you think I can do that, too?"

"No," he answered simply and thrust the lute into his hands. "Just go and do your fucking performance. I have places to be."

"Alright, alright!" Julian-Jaskier agreed and took off running towards the tavern.

'I should really do something about the dirt,' Jaskier thought as he took in the mud-caked seam of his pants.

He blinked.

The dirt was gone.

Julian-Jaskier looked down at himself and grinned. "Thank you!" he shouted back over the pristine shoulder of his doublet and vanished inside.

He blinked.

His surroundings melted away once more and rebuilt themselves in a town square. Jaskier frowned, trying to remember if it looked familiar. He didn't think so, though it was hard to tell. After the first hundred or so, they all started to blur together.

What was strange, though, were the people. There were quite a lot of them and he didn't recognise any of them. 'Weird,' he thought. Come to think of it, he wasn't quite sure he had even seen their clothes before. It reminded him of the garb his parents and grandparents used to wear when he'd been a child. It had to be one of Geralt's memories, then.

The faint ringing of swords filled the air as terror gripped him. "Oh no," Jaskier whispered hoarsely as his surroundings shifted again in a nauseating whirl.

He blinked.

Even before he saw the woman's corpse he knew exactly where—or rather when—he was. Geralt had never told him of this story, not really, at least. But he had heard rumours, and then, after meeting the witcher, had gathered as many stories as he could to find, to get to the truth at the core of it.

"Incredible," an old, bearded man said as he knelt at her side. "Marilka," he said and stumbled to his feet. "Marilka? Marilka! Get me a cart. We'll take her to the tower for an autopsy."

Jaskier felt the overwhelming urge to punch Stregobor in the face. He probably could have. He probably should have. But before he had a chance, there was a bloodied blade at the mage's throat. "If you touch a single hair on her head," Geralt growled, "yours will be on the ground next." It was Geralt, quite obviously so. Still, he looked different. Younger, in a way. Much less guarded than the man he knew, with a wild look in his eyes Jaskier had never seen before.

"Have you gone mad?" Stregobor asked. "Her mutation, it influences people. That's how she got these men to follow her." His eyes narrowed just a bit. "She got to you, too, didn't she?"

"Do not," Geralt snarled, "touch her."

"Witcher," the mage answered in the most condescending voice imaginable and, oh, Jaskier definitely would punch him now, "you butchered bodies in the streets of Blaviken."

"You're a beast," a man called from the crowd.

"You endangered the girl," a woman added and Jaskier decided that all of them could bugger off, thank you very much.

"I think this is quite enough," he said calmly as he stepped forward, shifting in front of Geralt as time came to a halt. "Lower your sword, dear. Please."

The witcher stared down at him in confusion. "What-" He blinked a few times and his gaze cleared. "Jaskier," he whispered.

"The very same," he said and bowed with a flourish. "The sword, love." He squeezed his hand lightly and watched with relief as Geralt did as he was told. "Let me take care of this mess for you."

The witcher nodded and the world started spinning again. "Good people of Blaviken," he began and opened his arms. The familiar weight of his lute appeared much faster than the first time. "You can count yourselves lucky, for on this day you are in the presence of not only the White Wolf, Geralt of Rivia, but also the master bard Jaskier. Truly, you are in for the performance of a lifeti-"

"Jaskier," Geralt hissed quietly.

"Yes, dear?"

"This is not really the place for a performance." He pointed at the corpses and the townspeople who stared at him as if he'd grown a second head. Ughh. Right. And then there was also-

"Who do you even think you are?" puffed Stregobor.

"Jaskier, the bard, and I don't like repeating myself," he quipped. "So, I suggest you shut the fuck up, old man." Immediately, his mouth snapped shut. Still, Jaskier wasn't finished: "You are a bumbling idiot who keeps babbling about some mutation nonsense. It's not her fault that you have the charisma of a wooden spoon and lack any kind of imagination. Really, it is not that hard to believe that a woman could inspire people. You are a pitiful creature."

The people around him still stared in open-mouthed bewilderment. "Close your mouth, dear, I'm not done, yet," he told Geralt and tipped his jaw up. He really should do something about all the bodies.

Jaskier frowned, concentrating hard. Shrouds appeared from thin air and covered the corpses and the blood vanished from Geralt's face. "Jaskier," the witcher growled, annoyed. Alright, maybe he had overdone it with the flower crown, but this was a dream world; when would he ever get such a chance again? "Focus."

Right. Not his strong suit, but he had a performance to deliver. And that was very much his strong suit. Gently, he plucked at the lute strings, the notes almost manifesting before he did so. "When a humble bard," he began; the song came as easy to him as breathing.

The audience didn't seem too enthusiastic. It took him until the end of the first refrain to realise why. "Oh," he said, his lute making a dissonant twang. "I suppose I'm just about two decades early with this, aren't I?" Of course. How could he have been so stupid? 'Well, only one way to change that.'

"Toss a coin to your Witcher," he sang loudly, "Oh, valley of plenty

Oh, valley of plenty, oh

Toss a coin to your Witcher

Oh, valley of plenty!"

He blinked.

The wind tugged at him to the tune of a camp being set up. Jaskier knew where he was even before he opened his eyes. "Ah," he breathed, taking in the silhouette of Geralt sitting on the rock. And his own self approaching him. "Shit." He winced in sympathy for his heartbroken, aching self. Well, not heartbroken yet, but soon to be.

He wasn't surprised, to be honest. Not really. But fuck was he afraid of it. With all the other scenes he'd had at least a semblance of an idea of how to fix them. But this? He couldn't really change himself, could he now?

In the end, it had all worked out just fine, of course. Geralt and he had found each other again and after a bit of awkwardness and a muttered apology by Geralt they had continued travelling with each other again. While his witcher definitely wasn't a man of words, Jaskier could see his remorse just fine. He was fluent in all of Geralt's silences, and the plethora of gifts and smiles he got was better than any spoken apology in the world.

Still. It hurt.

Geralt shifted a bit, hearing his footsteps. Jaskier had to do something, and fast. "That's not really going to cut it," he muttered. His blubbering, yearning self wasn't going to be of any more assistance now than the last time. "Sorry, mate, but you have to go." With an ever so quiet pop the other Jaskier vanished.

It earned him a gruff Geralt grunt. "Jaskier," the witcher said without even turning around. "What do you want?"

'Alright, so we're doing this,' he thought and did his best to steel himself. "Nothing but a chat, old friend," he tried to say as casually as possible and sat down next to him. "Just like the good old days, hm?"

"Hmm."

"Funny. I thought you'd say that," he replied in a feeble attempt at comedy.

Geralt rolled his eyes, but didn't manage to hide the smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth quite fast enough. "Jaskier."

"Not helping?"

"Hmm."

He huffed a quiet laugh. "Yeah, didn't think so."

He waited with bated breath for his witcher to say something, but apparently, he considered their conversation done. 'Looks like I have to talk myself out of this mess,' he thought. 'Like always.'

Time to put his money where his mouth was: "Look," he said and wet his lip with his tongue. "I know how it feels when people die. It's always hard. And it doesn't get any easier the more it happens."

"Your point, bard?"

He closed his eyes. He still didn't have any fucking clue on how to solve this. Only one way to go, then: "I have a proposition for you I already know the answer to. But—" He took a deep breath in a futile attempt to calm his violently beating heart. "It's all been a bit much, lately, yeah? All these... djinns and children of surprise and dragons. So, why don't we get away for a while? We could head to the coast."

Geralt snorted. "Never took you for the maritime type."

"Well, I'm not," Jaskier answered, glad for the tension to lift, if only a little. "I get horribly seasick, you see? But that's not the point."

"Then what is?" They were going for the fond annoyance, apparently. It certainly was an improvement to last time.

It also loosened Jaskier's tongue; he could barely keep himself from babbling and that really wouldn't make it better. "Life's too short to spend it being unhappy. You should do what pleases you while you can."

"Composing your next song?" And there it was. The moment he'd inevitably fuck up.

"No, I just, uh-" He let his head drop. "I'd say I'm just trying to figure out what pleases me, but that's a lie. I figured that out a long time ago."

"Sleeping with other people's spouses is not really a life goal, Jaskier."

"Oh, ha ha," he retorted. "Very funny. But that's not— That's not what I'm talking about."

"What, we still haven't reached the fucking point?" he asked with the slightest hint of a smirk.

"No, I— Gosh, this is harder than I thought. It's you, Geralt. You're what pleases me."

The witcher turned to him with incredibly wide eyes despite the frown. As if he was surprised. As if he couldn't fathom why Jaskier would say that.

He shrugged. "It's true. I'm never as happy as I am at your side. Just spending time with you. You're the most important person in this world to me. In any world, really. I couldn't— I cannot bear losing you. Maybe it's selfish, but I just— I just want to have you for myself for a bit. Not share you with those who are hellbent on killing you. Not share you with anyone."

"Hmm." Geralt tilted his head to the side, a curious look Jaskier couldn't quite decipher in his eyes. In all the years of their acquaintance he had never, ever looked at him like that.

"Just— let me show you?" he begged. "Please? I know it's not what-"

But Geralt didn't let him finish. "Alright," he interrupted him. "Tomorrow."

He blinked.

Geralt stood a few feet away with Borch and Yennefer. "The sorceress will never regain her womb," he caught the last remnants of their conversation. "And though you didn't want to lose her, you will."

"He already has," Yennefer answered with a frail voice and stormed away. Jaskier scrambled to his feet when she passed him, catching Geralt's longing gaze.

'Shit,' he thought. This would be heartbreak all over again. 'It always was going to be.'

Geralt looked down at Borch. "Hmm," he said and trudged over to Jaskier. "The coast, you said?"

"Y-yeah," he stammered.

"Hm." He shouldered past him and grumbled: "They better have some good fucking ale there." After a few steps he realised that Jaskier wasn't following him and turned around. "You coming?" he asked with an outstretched hand.

"I am," he replied and scrambled to catch up with him. "In my experience, they also have excellent vodka," Jaskier joked and grasped Geralt's hand tightly.

He blinked.

It was a clear day on the cliffside. The ocean stretched out to the horizon in all its deep, dark blue glory, its waves crashing gently on the rocky shore. "Oh," Jaskier simply said.

"Hmm," Geralt replied and draped an arm around his shoulders to pull him closer.

'This is so much better than being here alone,' he thought. "It's beautiful," he said.

"It's nice," Geralt said. From the witcher that was probably as poetic as it got. And, oh, that curious look in Geralt's eyes looked even better with a smile accompanying it.

A warm feeling filled his chest. 'I really could get used to this,' he thought. "There's another thing, Geralt," he blurted suddenly. "I lo-"

He blinked.

The world turned upside down. He cursed himself for being so fucking stupid. Because, of course, he had not only ruined the probably single-most romantic scene to confess his feelings for Geralt, the worst also, apparently, was still ahead of him.

Jaskier had never been to Kaer Morhen before. Geralt hadn't even trusted him enough to betray so much as the smallest detail of its location. Still, there could be no doubt as to where he had ended up this time. Not with the vials and jars and jugs full of dubiously coloured liquids. Not with the witcher and mage looming over the scene, whose presence Jaskier barely registered.

All he saw were the wide, terrified, hazel eyes of the boy straining against the shackles tying him to the table. "No," Geralt begged, "please, Vesemir, I can't."

"Yes, you can," the old witcher answered. "It'll be over before you know it."

"No," Jaskier whispered, his eyes widening in horror. "No, I won't let that—"

He blinked.

Vesemir was gone, though Jaskier thought he might hear the distant sound of retching. The mage was still there, mumbling quietly in Elder.

"No!" he shouted again and leapt forward to push him back, to get him to stop, to- His hands passed right through him. As if he wasn't even there. As if he was a ghost. "No, stop, I won't-!"

He blinked.

The pain hit him completely unprepared, punching the air from his lungs. Wheezing, Jaskier staggered on his feet. He felt himself reminded of his first meeting with Geralt. Only that this time it didn't stop.

He could feel the burn of the toxins in his veins as his blood rushed, his body twisting, fighting, transforming. The boy on the table strained against his shackles, his mouth open with a silent plea he could not utter.

Jaskier could, though. Blinding pain ripped through his body as his knees gave out beneath him. A horrible scream erupted from his mouth, agony consuming any semblance of humanity.

After what seemed an eternity the pain ebbed off again; the burning fire in his body still pulsing, threatening to come back.

"No," Jaskier whispered, his vision still clouded from agony, but Geralt was still there. Had to still be there. "I won't let you suffer."

White hot pain surged again. "No!" he commanded, cried, sobbed. "No... Please—!" He screamed. He screamed and screamed and screamed, until his throat was sore, raw, burning. He screamed and screamed and screamed until he could no more and Geralt and he were coughing up blood.

The pain flared and Jaskier's voice gave out. 'I can't do this any longer.' He didn't- He couldn't- He couldn't talk. 'But I don't need words to imagine.'

With a trembling hand he reached out, strained until his fingertips grazed over Geralt's arm— And collapsed. Jaskier sobbed, and thrashed, and curled himself up into a little ball, suddenly wishing for the same chains Geralt wore. That way he had at least something to hold onto. Jaskier had nothing.

Nothing but pain.

An agonised whine sounded from above him. Jaskier whimpered. He wanted to reach out, wanted to soothe him, wanted to— But he couldn't. He couldn't speak, he couldn't move, he barely could think as the world flickered around him. He wasn’t strong enough.

He sobbed. ‘No,’ he thought. 'No, it can’t end here, I can’t wake up yet, I need to stay— I need it to make it stop for him. I need to, I have to, I must.'

He braced himself. The world flickered again. A soft sound of music floated down to him, a chant in Elder. For the next onslaught he was ready. As ready as one could be. He breathed in, let the pain fill him until it almost became too much. 'No,' he decided. Then again, more forceful: 'No! This is not who you are.' The pain twisted and churned in his gut, like liquid fire, but he would take it. He would take it all, if need be.

'You are human.' A second voice joined the first in its chant. He ignored them both. His eyes shut as tightly as he could, Jaskier imagined, flickering reality be damned. An incredible feeling rushed through him. Like flying. Suddenly, it was almost easy. He didn't imagine the pain away, that was far beyond his capabilities. But he could imagine it differently instead. He could imagine rightful anger, or heartfelt grief; and even a tiny sliver of hope.

'You are kind.' He could imagine laughter and tears, embraces and kisses and smiles. He could imagine songs and poems and jokes. Friendship and love and family. He could imagine dragons, knights and mages, queens, kings, and children of surprise. He could imagine bards and horses, elves, selkiemores, djinns.

'You are worthy of all good things in life and more.' He couldn't imagine the pain away. That was far beyond his capabilities. But he could imagine so much else that the pain became insignificant.

He didn't know when it stopped, or why. Jaskier opened his eyes and looked at his hands. He tilted his head to the side. Something had changed. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but something was different. He hadn’t even noticed how transparent he had been before. But he wasn’t anymore. He looked just as real as his surroundings.

Jaskier looked up to meet Geralt's eyes, glaring gold in the dark. "Thank you," he whispered.

He nodded shakily and rose up on his knees.

He blinked.

A voice behind them spoke up: "Again."

Jaskier stood on his trembling legs. "No," he commanded. "Enough."

The mage attempted to step forward. Jaskier glared at him and the man stopped, frozen with one foot in the air. "No," he repeated, "you have no power here. You are a memory, a dream, a fantasy. And I do not want to continue this dream!" With every word the air around them began vibrating, as the feeling filled him again. It felt like floating.

"Get lost!" he yelled. The door flung open, frozen air coasting in. "You are not welcome here."

He took a step forward and the mage stepped back, his form flickering. "You never were, and never will be. Get lost"

"Who do you think you are?" the mage scoffed. "With what magic do you think you can best me?"

Jaskier laughed hoarsely. "I am Geralt's friend," he declared. The ground shook with every step he took. "I am no mage, no witcher, no Child of Elder Blood. Just a bard with a lute. Just a man with an imagination.” The calm feeling within him dissipated, a storm brewing within his stomach. Not like liquid fire, but like frozen lightning. The air around him thrummed, wind swirling through the laboratory. “And I told you to get. LOST!"

"No," the mage wheezed, "you can't-" His body flickered again. And flickered. And blinked out of existence.

"How dare you?" the Count de Lettenhove boomed, looming up dangerously before him. "My own-"

"GET LOST!" Jaskier yelled. He vanished and his mother appeared in his stead. "Get lost, get lost, get lost, get lost, get lost!" With every word he said another ghost appeared in the chamber. Stregobor, Yennefer, Renfri, his brother, his sister, Queen Calanthe, Visenna. Faces he knew like the back of his hand and others he had never seen before blurred together before his eyes in a nauseating whirlwind of impressions.

He sobbed and thrashed and laughed as he banished each and every one of them to whatever circle of hell they had crawled forth from. Floating, flying, his mind clawing at the edges of the reality he rewrote. The castle around him trembled and shook like his knees, stones and memories collapsing, falling, vanishing before crushing them. He was at the eye of the storm, clouds of wind and darkness swirling around him, interspersed with lighting. It hurt, it burned, it stung, but he did not stop. Could not stop. Would not stop.

Until it was over.

Jaskier hadn’t even noticed it. He probably never would have noticed if not for the boy tugging at his hand. "It's pretty."

"What is?" Jaskier mumbled weakly. Slowly, his eyes fluttered open. It took him a while to process the beautiful winter landscape that stretched out before him. It looked like it had been plucked straight from a storybook. It had everything it needed: a lake, covered with a thick layer of ice, an orchard adorned with icicles, a hill to go sledding. Picture-perfect.

Well. A storybook where the snow was green, the trees purple and the sky orange, eternally stuck in sunset with no sun to be seen.

Still. It looked beautiful. Serene, even. Even more magnificent than he had imagined. "Thank you," he answered, his voice much quieter than the enthusiastic child's on his other side. "I'm Jaskier," the boy said.

The boy on his right smiled widely and extended his hand: "Geralt."

"That's a nice name." Child-Jaskier shook it excitedly. "I can already tell that we're going to be the best of friends."

"That would be nice," Geralt answered.

"What do I do now?" Jaskier and Jaskier asked.

"Hmm." Geralt frowned, apparently thinking hard. "Do you know how to build a snowman?"

"I do," they replied.

"I never built a snowman."

"Come," child-Jaskier said and tugged on his hand. "I'll show you."

Jaskier watched the two boys slip down the hill on their butts. He watched them run to the lake, watched them build a green snowman. He was relieved, he realised. Relieved, to see them happy. Still, the question remained: 'What do I do now?'

"Man," a bored voice next to him made him whip around. The dandelion yawned. Made a yawning sound. Whatever. "I already told you what to do."

"You!" he raised an accusatory finger. "What are you doing here?"

"I don't know, man," it sighed heavily. "This is your dreamworld."

"Fuck," he muttered. "Can't you at least help me figure out the rest of the poem?"

"I already did. Just follow the instructions. Follow—"

“—your heartbeat to the horizon, then take the second turn right after the battle field, I know,” he grumbled. “Have I reached the horizon yet?”

“I don’t know,” it responded. “Have you?”

“Probably not,” he sighed. “Will you come with me while I continue?”

“Can you imagine that?”

He smiled and began walking again. “I guess I can.” They journeyed in silence for a while. But try as he might, the horizon didn’t seem to come any closer. Jaskier groaned loudly; he really should have guessed that there was another mystery to that. "Hey, you!" he shouted at the sky. "Coram Agh Tera, can you hear me? Wasn't I done with the nightmares?"

No response.

Well, almost none. "He really is an idiot," Valdo-larkspur mocked. "The sky talks as little as the trees."

Jaskier chuckled and raised his finger. "For the record, I knew you'd say that."

"Alright, braggart, don't flatter yourself," Jaskier-larkspur joined in.

"That, too," Jaskier said but the two of them didn't hear him, already too engrossed in a discussion about some trivial nonsense.

'Alright, focus, Jaskier,' he told himself again. He had been forcing the brain fog from his mind entirely too often in the near past; it was getting harder and harder every time. And the noise of two bickering idiots behind him didn't make it any easier. On the contrary, with all the distractions he could already feel the fidgety-ness approaching.

'Ughh.' He'd never figure it out at this rate.

What Jaskier didn't see, of course, was that he already had done so a rather long time ago. But like I said, mortals are, first and foremost, fundamentally blind. Their imagination reaches only as far as the horizon, even that of a poet as accomplished as Jaskier.

In hindsight, his blindness was truly a blessing. If he had discovered that there was absolutely no need for him to brave the latter stages of his nightmares, his rage might have been sufficient to shake him from his slumber. And then where would we have been?

So, he had no choice but to figure out the mystery that was no mystery at all all over again.

"Could you two shut up?" he snarled at the larkspurs. "If you're not going to help me, you can at least be quiet!"

"Well, someone got off on the wrong foot," Valdo-larkspur quipped.

"Yeah," Jaskier-larkspur agreed. "And for the record, we did help you. We gave you instructions. It's not our fault if you're too much of a fool to follow them."

Jaskier frowned. "Fool?" he breathed. 'And when they’re gone the fools remain,

A garden grows with no sustain.'

"Hey!" the buttercup complained. "You shouldn't be so mean to him. He's doing his best."

"Oh, yeah?" the larkspurs taunted. "His best isn't very good then, huh?"

"Man, just leave him alone," the dandelion joined in and before he knew it, the four of them were arguing viciously.

Jaskier paid them no mind. He glanced around warily, trying to parse out whatever 'no sustain' meant. It couldn't be anywhere around the lake, then, nor the lilac forest. The blue mountains were an option, but he didn't think it likely.

'Come descend into the sky.'

He tipped his head up to the sky above. 'It's empty,' he realised. No sun. No clouds. No nothing. But descend into the sky? He couldn't imagine that. Could he?

A faint smile spread on his face.

'How to find my mighty throne?

The answer’s plain: you don’t.'

"So, it was that simple, huh?" he said to no-one in particular as he stretched out a hand to touch the invisible barrier of the horizon, still impossibly far away. “The second turn to the right, is it?” he murmured and turned into the direction of the blue mountains, keeping one hand still on the skyline.

"Well, would you look at that," a gruff voice said as the lark landed on his shoulder, "the weirdo actually knows how to follow instructions."

"You again," he deadpanned. "How did you get here?"

"I flew. Obviously."

"Obviously," Jaskier echoed stupidly.

"So," the lark said and picked at the feathers under its wing, "have you figured it out yet?"

He huffed a quiet laugh and shook his head. "It's really quite easy, isn't it?"

"You tell me."

"Why," Jaskier said and closed his eyes, "you flip the world upside down. Obviously."

"Obviously," the lark replied stupidly.

Jaskier opened his eyes and as the sky stretched out beneath him. It was an easy thing for him to take a step. And another one. And then, let himself drift into that bright realm of uncertainty.

And so, he did.

He had already gotten quite far down into the sky when suddenly his descent was cut short. "The fuck?" he muttered. He took a few experimental steps to the left and right, eyeing the fog curling around his ankles warily. But try as he might, he couldn't descend any further. "Are we there yet?" he called up to the flowers that were still waiting on the surface.

"Almost," the lark replied, gliding down to him. "Just open the door."

"What door?" He could see nothing but orange sky. He turned into the direction he had come from and marched forward. He hit the door face-first. "Fuck!" he cursed, holding his nose that should be bleeding by all rights.

"You found it!" The flowers cheered from the ground. It was weird, seeing them hang from the ceiling like this. Or the ground. Whatever. This was already weird enough without wondering about semantics.

Besides, he had more important stuff to do. Like opening an invisible door.

"Shit," he cursed, blindly scrabbling at the solid surface that had materialised out of thin air. "Is there a handle or something? A knob? Or— ah, fuck!" He turned the knob and immediately stumbled through, falling a solid foot before landing in soft powder snow.

Jaskier groaned and turned onto his back, staring at the solid wooden door hovering in the air above a wintery garden. "Sure," he muttered and got to his feet with a resigned shrug. "Why not?" He started dusting off his clothes. "I'm already talking to birds and flowers, why not a door in a fucking—"

"Jaskier?"

#my writing #For You I'll Always Wait #FYIAW #geraskier #geralt of rivia #jaskier #julian alfred pankratz #geraskier fanfiction #the witcher fanfiction #geraltxjaskier #geralt/jaskier #the witcher secret santa #renfri #stregobor #vesemir

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supremeuppityone · 4 years

Text

This is a sequel to Chapter 81: Part 8 — Klarosummer Bingo in my Klaroline series, A Beautiful Symmetry. This was written for Klaroline Bingo @klaroline-events. Prompt: Working. As con artists, Caroline, Bonnie and Katherine knew the risks, but when the Mikaelson brothers conned them, their fight AND flight response kicked into overdrive.

Chapter 122: The Hamptons — Part 2

“It is safer to beg than to take, but it is finer to take than to beg.” ― Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man Under Socialism

Nothing was more satisfying than pushing Klaus’ shiny Jaguar over the cliff. It was the final item on Caroline’s to do list as she, Bonnie and Katherine left the Hamptons. Caroline stood with her friends, refusing to flinch as the sound of shattering glass and screeching metal collided with the jagged rocks below. She got sloppy. She should’ve realized a mid-market convertible less than $100,000 would never have been the vehicle of choice for a jet-setting playboy whose family money went back generations.

“Fucking Mikaelsons played us,” Katherine snarled, brown eyes flashing angrily. “We set up the perfect con, a final score so we could retire, only for it to blow up in our faces when we found out they were trying to con us!”

Bonnie opened the cooler at their feet, twisting off the top of the beer bottle and taking a deep gulp. “We got them in the end, though. Posted all their fake identities on that stupid Hamptons gossip site. They’re burned in the Northeast now — I even tipped off the highway patrol to be on the lookout for Kol’s Rover.”

“Did we use cornstarch or flour to mimic the coke the cops will find in the back,” Caroline asked with a mocking grin, clinking her bottle with Bonnie’s in celebration.

Katherine chuckled darkly. “Flour. But only on the bottom. The top are a few kilos courtesy of our old Markos connection.”

The women shared a laugh, but Caroline found her gaze straying back to the wreckage below. It had been years since a man had tricked her. Since she’d let a man get close. Still seething over Klaus’ betrayal, her tone was fierce as she said, “The Mikaelsons no longer matter. It’s time to move on to our next job.”

“Working shouldn’t be this hard,” Caroline muttered, her voice muffled behind her mask as she polished the alabaster jar on the lathe equipment. She carefully smoothed the sides, ensuring the machine work wouldn’t be visible.

Green eyes narrowed behind her goggles as Bonnie advised, “You should use the bow-drill next to ensure modern tool marks aren’t detected.”

“Seriously?!” Caroline rolled her eyes, certain that underneath that mask was her friend’s signature scowl. “Do you want to do this instead? It’s not like I’ve ever painstakingly crafted forgeries from five different ancient civilizations. Oh, wait — I have.” She hated how shrill her voice sounded and she knew Bonnie and Katherine were dealing with the same anger and disappointment about what happened in the Hamptons. It wasn’t fair that she was taking her misery out on them. As Bonnie started to storm out of the workshop, Caroline called after her, “Wait. That was shitty. I’m sorry.”

Bonnie sighed, distractedly running a hand through her sleek bob. “You miss Klaus.” At Caroline’s indignant snort, she shook her head. “Lie to yourself all you want, but I see it and Kat would too if she pulled her head out of her ass. And I miss Kol with his stupid limericks and crazy stories that somehow always start with skydiving and end in the back of a police car.”

“Kat’s avoiding thinking about Elijah by memorizing campus security and building schematics at Berkeley.”

The women shared a look of commiseration, knowing that Katherine’s hyper-focusing was almost as dangerous as when she spent too much time at the gun range. She didn’t forgive or forget. Elijah was fortunate that were on the other coast.

Picking up a steel file, she carefully ran it across the wide base of the jar. “I trust she’s working out the reason why there’s a huge lag time in the security guard patrols on Tuesday and Thursday evenings in the Hildegard Building?”

Bonnie chuckled, “Figure drawing classes are on those nights. Nude figure drawing. The pervy old guards are trying to make some Girls Gone Wild fantasy happen.”

“Eww. Also, perfect — I can have the other three jars ready by next Tuesday and Kat can make the switch then.” Caroline was responsible for the main part of the Berkeley con — carve perfect copies of the ancient Egyptian alabaster vessels that Katherine would swap out for the real artifacts. Bonnie already had been hired by Berkeley to authenticate their latest archaeological find. She’d forged impeccable credentials as an Egyptian art authenticator with an emphasis on Old Kingdom artifacts.

Once Bonnie declared Caroline’s work as authentic, the girls would skip town, leaving Berkeley officials none the wiser that their ‘ancient Egyptian’ artifacts displayed were less than two weeks old. It was a familiar con, one they’d pulled off successfully multiple times across the States. They needed this win. The Mikaelson debacle had shaken their confidence, and the women were desperate to get things back to normal.

“I’ll leave you to it, then.” Heaving a heavy sigh, Bonnie added, “I should probably go check up on Kat in case she decides setting something on fire would make her feel better.”

Shaking her head, Caroline got back to work, fervently wishing she knew what would make her feel better. She kept thinking back to the argument she overheard between Klaus and Kol.

“Don’t tell me this is just another job for you,” Klaus replied angrily, “You got too close to Bonnie and Elijah’s all but forgotten the rest of the world exists thanks to Katherine.”

Kol scoffed, “And Caroline? I saw that ring — don’t think I’m not aware of what that means to you.”

She stupidly kept the ring on a long chain around her neck, tucked away under her blouse so her friends wouldn’t see. Why did she do this to herself? Because she heard Klaus’ desperation. However the brothers’ con had begun, somewhere along the way, they’d caught feelings and everything had changed. Just like it had for Caroline and her friends.

But she also kept recalling little details that she should’ve picked up on, things that could’ve unraveled Klaus’ con sooner had she not been so distracted by how she felt about him.

With a dimpled smirk from Klaus, Caroline kept forgetting she was in the middle of a con. Despite his seductive smiles, she couldn’t help but notice the genuine excitement he showed when she surprised him with a trip to the art museum. From her extensive research into his background, she knew he had an affinity for art, including a graduate degree in art history. “Isn’t it breathtaking,” she asked, pointing out the beautifully preserved Madonna and Child canvas.

“It’s an impressive Caravaggio,” Klaus said dismissively, already eyeing the next exhibit.

Frowning, she asked, “I thought this was a Verrocchio? You’d mentioned he had been your focus when you studied Italian Renaissance art?”

A slight flush creeped up his neck, and he kissed her knuckles as he purred in his accented voice, “I appreciate a woman who can identify the rebirth of classic antiquity.” There was an endearing hesitancy in his tone as he said, “Actually, I’d like to share my latest passion with you.” With an excited twinkle in his eye, he guided her toward the next gallery, one filled with vibrant colors and bold brush strokes that instantly captured her attention.

“These are powerful,” she murmured, admiring the series of abstract portraits.

He squeezed her hand, whispering excitedly, “I discovered GyoBeom An at a low point in my life; his work is an explosive blend of constructing and deconstructing images using a bold, contemporary palette. Even though the brush strokes are strong, almost violent in places, to me, it feels like the art reveals what’s hidden in a whisper rather than a shout.”

His impassioned speech struck a chord with her, and she was alarmed to realize she’d started to tear up. There were so many things she was hiding from Klaus. So, she told him the only thing she knew to be true. “I’m honored you’d share this with me.”

Klaus looked nervous, but the sincerity of his tone seemed genuine. “You’re special, Caroline. I wouldn’t share this with anyone else.” And then he kissed her until they were both breathless.

It was a beautiful memory. And it was all a lie. Just two cons lying to each other, Caroline thought bitterly. She pushed aside the flood of memories that kept trying to break free, and instead bent her head to her work once more.

____________________________________

Caroline’s expectations for the buyer went up a notch when she got her first look at The Bitter End over on Clement Street. Not only did the bar’s name match her mood, but the grimy, threadbare atmosphere made her feel at home. Better than the pretentious clubs in the Hamptons. Her contact informed her that the dive bar was in a quiet neighborhood away from tourists — the perfect spot to negotiate terms.

The con was nearly complete — Katherine effortlessly swapped out the ancient artifacts for Caroline’s forgeries and Bonnie had done such an outstanding job ‘authenticating’ that Berkeley had offered her a coveted spot on their latest dig in Karnak, examining a newly discovered series of tunnels underneath the Temple of Amun-Ra. (Katherine was still trying to convince them it was a sign they should take their skills to the exclusive spa in nearby Luxor and run either the Heiress Special or the Desert Rose cons.)

She crossed the threshold, eyes quickly adjusting to the dim light inside the dive bar. She was there to settle the final part of their con — agree on the price for the ancient Egyptian alabaster jars. Something brushed across the back of her neck, and she turned sharply, ready to deliver an elbow to whichever drunk decided to get too gropey. But no one was there. Suddenly on edge, she headed toward the back booth, where the buyer waited in the shadows.

The scent of leather and cedar flooded her senses, making her heart pound. He was here. Bonnie would tell her to run. Katherine would tell her to break his nose and then run. Caroline’s curiosity was piqued as she contemplated a third option.

“Hello, sweetheart,” Klaus greeted her, lovingly caressing the syllables of her name with that seductive accent of his. “Are you armed?”

“Perhaps. You?”

Gray eyes twinkling, he replied, “Only with righteous indignation. My brothers and I nearly emptied our bag of tricks calling in favors to make that spot of trouble with the police and the coke disappear.” Leaning forward, his lips curled into a dimpled smirk as he added, “And then there was that unfortunate accident. Going after the car — you certainly know how to cut a man to the quick.”

Arms crossed in front of her, Caroline asked defiantly, “Clearly, you scared off my buyer, so you must want something — what is it?”

“Answers. From you and your cohorts’ actions, it was obvious you figured out what we were up to. You three don’t strike me as cowards — why not confront us?”

She scowled, not appreciating how close he’d become. He was trying to force a connection. Bastard. “A good grifter knows when to cut her losses. It turned out we were all just con artists trying to scam each other. There was nothing to be gained from staying.”

A hint of steel entered his gaze as he growled, “Or, there was everything to gain. I thought I fell for a woman that forever would be beyond my reach. The little fictions we told each other gave way to something real. And then we discover we’re even more perfectly suited than we could’ve imagined.”

Blue eyes widened at his words. What Klaus was suggesting was insane — there could never be trust between cons. “Seriously?! Are you out of your mind? We’d constantly be suspicious of each other, waiting to be screwed over.”

“Details,” he answered with a careless shrug. “Tell me you haven’t missed me every day since you ran off.”

“I haven’t,” Caroline answered flatly, refusing to give into this insanity.

She was prepared for him to lash out, but instead, he flashed her a knowing smile while digging in his pocket. Suddenly, he dangled her long silver chain between them, complete with the beautiful ring he’d made her. That he’d stolen right off her neck.

Klaus’ desire-filled gaze was intense as he told her, “Good thing for both of us you’re a terrible liar.”

#kcbingo2020 #klaroline fanfic #uppity bitch fanfic #klaroline #thanks for the ask to write a sequel!

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lullabyes22-blog · 5 years

Note

Would you mind starting off the new year with a Saya and Haji headcanon with them at the Zoo? I love the way you write their relationship during that time and I like your headcanons :)

Thank you so much anon

And, heh heh. You’re actually in luck. I’ve finished a little snippet for a future BMR chapter, with Saya and Haji up to some mischief.

NSFW, btw, so tread wisely >3

“The Birth of Venus.”

Saya aims a finger at the reprint on the expensivefolio.

She and Haji are in the glassed-in library thatoverlooks the gardens, all sunlight and artfully-arranged antiques. (By 2037,it will be converted into an indoor jacuzzi). Joel seldom permits them in here.His priceless object d'art are everywhere: burnished-woodstatuettes and gold-rimmed ceramics and Oriental-lacquered showpieces worthyof The Mikado.

But today, Joel is away on business to Paris. LeavingSaya and Haji to trespass, unafraid and unrepentant.

Saya, anyhow.

Haji keeps apart, anxiety in his ganglysixteen-year-old outline. “Saya. We shouldn’t stay long.”

“Will you stop whining?”

Saya is on her hands and knees in front of a bookcase,tracing the spines. She has finished everything the downstairs library has tooffer—philosophical tracts, penny-dreadful thrillers, classic anthologies. Nowshe is on the prowl for juicier fare. She’d overheard the chambermaidsgossiping about histoire d'horreur in the shelves. She wantsto confirm it for herself. She is no novice: tomes such as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein havebarely stirred a shiver. What she dearly hopes is that the library disgorgesworks by Mary Wollstonecraft, or Harriet Martineau. They must’ve writtensomething truly scandalous for Amshel to dub them homewreckersand harridans.

“Harridans?” Hajiasked. “Really?”

“Mm-hmm. He said their writings wouldmake a ‘febrile mess of the female mind’.”

“Surely not yours?”

It is a gentle tease. His eyes linger on her profilein the late afternoon sunlight: furrowed brows and lowered eyelashes in a studyof fierce concentration.

It is an expression he’s well-versed with. It alwaysappears right before catastrophe.

“His, more like,” muttersSaya, the frilled rump of her dress in the air as she eyeballs the collection.“Joel says it’s because his mother was a bluestocking who never paid himattention as a boy. So he’s angry at any lady with a pen.”

“Yet ladies with pens are what youseek.”

“If I find any,” Sayamutters, as she pulls a folio of handmade foxed leather from the bookcase. Itslides smoothly open in her lap, parted down the middle by a tasseled velvetbookmark in blue. “Oh!”

Curious, Haji peers over her head. He expects toglimpse blocks of text (English, German, Italian, Spanish, Latin—he and Sayaare fluent in all five). Instead he sees drawings in colorful ink. They areexquisitely detailed, and very beautiful. The first is done in a Botticellistyle: a nude woman with half-moon eyes and flowing honey-colored locks, posingwith demure lassitude on the pastry-pleats of a seashell.

“The Birth of Venus,” Saya says.With a fingertip, she traces the flowing lines of the figure. “Areplica of the original painting.”

“It is good,” Hajiconcedes. “But hardly scandala—Ah.”

Saya has turned the page. There is only one drawingper leaf: the back of each sheet is lined in embroidered rag to preventseepage. The second paper shows the same Venus. But she has abandoned hermaidenly pose. One hand no longer starfishes across her breast, but cups it.The other hand lifts from its figleaf at her mons to expose the arrowhead ofher pubic hair. Her head is still cocked to one side. But a look of defiancereplaces the faraway gaze.

“What on earth…?” Sayaflips the page.

On the next, Venus reclines on her shell, with herlegs parted, one knee up. One palm caresses her breasts. The other is betweenher thighs, spreading her pinkish parts open. Her eyes are a half-mooningdelirium now, her mouth open in a swoon.

Saya’s and Haji’s own mouths hang disbelievingly ajar.

They’ve both seen dirty pictures before. Sex, then andin the future, is a pervasive theme in art and literature. But there is alwaysan element of satire to those works. Body proportions exaggerated; genitalscaricatured or blurred out.

Not like this.

These pictures are intimate rather than voyeuristic.They illustrate all of Venus in loving detail. The soft scrim of hair; thedarkish folds of inner labia; the pink pearl of clitoris. It seems less pornographythan a paean to her whole self.

Years later, Haji will wonder why the sight seemedalmost …deviant. He’ll rationalize it as framing. After years of the femalebody framed by the male gaze—in art, in poetry, in prose—its exposure asanother object d'art was quotidian. So the sight of it now, byitself and for itself, felt weirdly transgressive.

And thrilling.

Decades later, as lovers, he’ll ask Saya to recreatethe pose to her fancy—and to forget he’s in the room. She’ll acquiece, shyly,then with abandon, and it will be a quiet revelation for him.Saya-under-his-watch. Saya-by-herself. The differences of each. The way sheinhabits her skin more fully. The way she owns her own space. A culminationthat is wildly arousing—in part because he is neither the subject nor theobject of her attention.

Because she is so whole.

With trembling fingers, Saya stirs the folio’s pages.In each one, Venus grows more frenzied. From stroking between her thighs tocorkscrewing two small tapered fingers inside. From holding the reader’s gaze withher half-moon eyes to disconnecting utterly, lost in her own bliss.

For Haji, it is all indefinably discomfiting. Hisinstinct is to turn tail and flee. Propriety dictates it.

Saya, meanwhile, is in a peculiar, intense state, asif she’s crossed past shock to whatever sits directly beyond. Sitting on thecarpet, the fragile old folio in her lap and her head bent towards its ivorysheets, a strand of dark hair stirring with her breaths, she seems almostentranced.

From the tall windows, late afternoon sunlightglitters. It seems to melt and soften the energy in the air: a stirring, a blossoming.

They are very close together, Haji realizes. No raritythere: since childhood, they’ve been inseparable, practically living in eachother’s pockets. Être cul et chemise, as Amshel sometimessneers.

This is different. Her lovely profile is inches fromhis lips. The light falls through the windows and catches at the dusting of finehairs on her cheek. It reminds him of peach-fuzz. Her scent is the same, asweetish whiff with fruity and floral undertones. The same scent she’d wornwhen she’d first hugged him as a child, her body-warmth seeping into himthrough the expensive fabric of her clothes.

It had felt like a balm then. Now it is abrushfire, her closeness electric, sparks seeming to pop in the space betweenthem.

Then Saya turns her head. Their eyes lock, and Hajisees different things. The shared humor of the moment. A childish sense ofdisbelief. But also something hidden, secret, uncertain. Like she wants toreach for Haji’s hand but doesn’t quite dare

Then she scowls and lobs the folio at his head.

“Ow!”

“Dépraver!”

“What—what did I do?” Hesnatches the folio out of the air. “You are the one who foundit!”

“That’s no excuse to go breathingdown my neck!”

“I wasn't—” Heducks to avoid her swat. “You were staring as much as I was.”

Saya sweeps to her feet. Her eyes are burning-dark andthere are high spots of color on her cheekbones. A strange heat courses throughthe sunlit room. It is like an unblocking of channels, two magnets tangled inopposite polarities.

“You were supposed to help melook!” Saya shouts.

“I was!”

“No you weren’t! You were—youwere—” She balls her fists, struggles forwords, fails to find them. “Pig!”

“Saya—”

She flings another book at him. Haji ducks.

Her temper-tantrum bewilders him. This is hardly thefirst time they’ve perused a nude figure together: solemn, sophisticatedappraisals of Greek nymph-statues in the three-dimensional world, orexchanging jokes and dirty limericks in the manner of schoolchildren, the actitself reduced to either epithet or abstraction.

Epithets and abstractions were about all Haji couldtolerate. At least in those days. It’s not that he wasn’t attracted to women.He was. And to Saya: inordinately, indelibly. But what he knew about sex as achild was brutal and painful and disgusting. He would be happy never to go nearit for the rest of his life. Happier to spare Saya the worst of it.

Saya, who is stubborn, naughty, impulsive, rebellious.But who is, inherently, the most innocent person he knows.

When he was newly brought to the Zoo, Joel told him,in blunt terms, what was expected of him. He’d hinted at a sizable reward ifHaji approached it the right way: a ring, a duchess’s dowry, a standing in highsociety. Barely a year afterward, Saya had confided to him, her little hands ananxious wringing, how afraid she was of married life. Wedding night pains.Childbirth pains. Pains of limited agency or options.

He’d sworn there and then to spare her that too.

Now, she glowers. And Haji can’t fathom thetransmutations her presence wreaks inside his body with nothing but her eyes.

He can’t think of what to say, either, but he reads itin her face. In her gaze, mirroring his own discomfiture strangely back at him.The relation of his body to hers. Space. Molecules in the air between them.

I am a woman, hereyes say. You are a man.

The knowledge seems to leave her silent and stunnedand dismayed.

“Saya…”

Suddenly Haji has the urge to fold her up in anembrace. Yet what was effortlessly simple a moment ago seems all at once fraughtwith subtext.

Then she snarls a litany of swearwords—each moreunladylike than the last—before shoving past him and out the room.

“Saya, wait!”

Helplessly, Haji takes off after her.

~~*~~

Bits and pieces may change as the chapter itself takes shape. But I hope it’s satisfied some Zoo-era hankerings :)

#blood+#bloodplus #blood plus #asks #fic #fanfic #blood moon rising

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cilldaracailin · 4 years

Text

Under Pressure

This story is on AO3 here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23570293/chapters/56548318

“Sometimes the greatest adventure is simply a conversation.”

“So, did I hear Maggie say you were going home tomorrow?” asked Taron breaking the silence the four had been sitting in for the last few minutes. “Have you just been here on holiday?” He really needed to start the conversation going again because not only was the constant hammering from Frankie and the others trying to break into the bank from the aisle across from them not doing anything for his pounding head, he could feel his head lolling and his eyes closing as sleep threatened to take him over. Sitting down, just gave his body, his battered and bruised body, a moment to rest and after four months of intense filming, it was a rest his body ached for. However, the throw he sat on and shelf he leant against was not his idea of a comfy place for a sleep and as he sat, he was definitely starting to feel his injuries but even his current uncomfortable circumstances couldn’t stop him from feeling heavy-eyed and drowsy.

“Oh no, I have been working here for the last six months. I work in a creche and but companies can apply do this exchange programme where you switch with a staff member from a creche in a difference country and work there for a period of time to experience how the other runs.”

“Oh, right that is pretty cool.”

“Yeah I was very excited to come here to Clearwater. I have been before on holiday and I love it here so it was great to come back and actually get to live here for a while.”

“She’s a bit obsessed with dolphins.” Chipped in Maggie.

“And although it has been an amazing experience coming to work here, there were challenges.”

“Christina,” Added Maggie. “Definite challenge.”

“Jesus Maggie.” Said Robyn looking at her friend.

“And she was planning on watching Rocketman this evening too to take said challenge from her mind.”

“Maggie!” Exclaimed Robyn as she brought her hands to her face.

“While eating lots of turtles.”

Taron felt the shelf move as Robyn hit her head against it, a frustrated sigh leaving her lips.

“Oh, I see that sunburn on your cheeks that you were talking about earlier, now.” Laughed Maggie as she watched her friend grow more embarrassed. “I am just making conversation, Robyn.” Added Maggie when Robyn gave her one of her teacher stares.

Robyn adored Maggie most of the time, but when she got into these giddy moods, Robyn got annoyed pretty quickly. She had already had a ridiculously stressful day and the events of the last two hours has been seriously burdening on her and she really needed Maggie to be less giddy and more aware of people’s emotions at the moment, particularly her own. Robyn had been strong for herself, Richard and Taron and had hoped her friend could have shown a little consideration and less flighty behaviour.

“I have heard that Rocketman is a decent movie.” Helped Taron when he saw Robyn’s shoulder’s rise and fall with annoyance as well as hearing the exasperated sigh that left her lips. He knew from the brief conversations he had had with her, that Robyn was definitely able to make a joke as well as take one, but could understand her reaction to Maggie, who he felt had taken the joke a little too far, as Robyn tried to answer his question. He knew that she had recognised him when he dropped his phone on the cashier desk earlier on, her surprised look giving it away but she had not once mentioned it or treated him any different because of who he was, not that she really had a choice given the situation they had found themselves, Taron not being able to put in words how much he appreciated how she had selfishly came and helped him without question, not knowing if he would ever be able to say it but what he did know was that it was a nice relief that she hadn’t done what Maggie had done and made a deal of sorts about knowing who he was and he was actually genuinely interested in getting to know the young woman who had not thought twice about helping him. “Not too sure about the guy who played Elton though.” As he gently nudged her leg with his.

“Yeah he really wasn’t that great, was he.” She nudged him back.

“And I am partial to a turtle myself.” He laughed a little.

“He had just run out.” Pipped up Richard, feeling for Robyn as Maggie called her out, glad to see that Taron was doing his very best to help her.

Feeling relieved that Taron was trying to lighten the mood she turned to look at him. If it was at all possible, the bruising on his cheek had darkened and his green eyes carried more fatigue then before. “Let’s take that pulse again.” Taron willingly moved his arm over to her and Robyn took his pulse once more, writing it down again. Still a little fast but Robyn knew Taron was hiding his pain so took that into account.

“You are going to have to show me how to do that,” Commented Taron as she put the pen down in-between them. “I am guessing because you work with children you have to be first aid trained.”

“Yeah and I happen to be first aid officer back home too so I get to do that extra training every now and again.”

“Well I am very grateful for that extra training. Now how do I do this? I know the basics behind it but can never get it.” Taron explained hoping his distraction would also distract Robyn.

She let Taron place her left arm on his leg and he looked at her waiting. “Two fingers at the top of the wrist almost in line with the thumb, not actually in the middle of the wrist and then you should feel the heartbeat.” Robyn guided Taron’s fingers into the right place on her wrist and watched as his eyes focused on what he was doing.

“Oh, I got it.” He said excitedly. “Now how do I count it.”

“Count the beats for thirty seconds and then double the number you get and you should get my rate of my pulse.” Robyn placed her other arm on Taron’s leg so he could look at her watch and again watched as he visibly nodded his head to each beat of her heart.

“So, eight-six beats per minute then. That good or bad?” he asked

“That is fast, faster than normal for me. Not bad.” She added quickly when she saw Taron’s face frown. “But then a lot has happened in the last two hours so it would be expected that my pulse is a little fast.”

“Pen please and the paper!” Said Taron holding his hand out.

“What?”

“I want to write it down for you. Doctors may need it.”

“Taron you are right-handed.”

“I can write two numbers with my left hand.” He countered. “Gimmie.”

Robyn handed the noted pad over to Taron and he settled it on his knee and taking the pen he awkwardly wrote eight-six on the page. When he was done, he handed it back to her.

“Satisfied?”

“Yes.” He answered contently.

“So, we are going to just skip over the whole Rocketman thing?” Asked Maggie as she sat up.

“The whole Rocketman thing?” Repeated Robyn looking to Maggie, finding it almost hard to believe that she was bringing Rocketman up once again, starting to feel very annoyed with her friend. “How it is a movie and it’s a wonderful movie that tells a heartbreakingly sad story about a man who just wanted to be loved and have love in his life with an outstanding soundtrack to go with it? About how it showed an utterly devastatingly sad relationship between a mother, a father and their son? A movie that showed a man who spiralled downhill only to build himself back up to feel loved and worth something?”

“Well yeah.” Said Maggie taken aback by the slightly abrupt tone in Robyn’s voice.

“Then what else do we need to say. It’s a beautiful movie and it just makes me want to listen to Elton John songs afterwards.”

“Which Elton song is your favourite?” Asked Taron wanting to break the tense atmosphere between the two friends beside him. He couldn’t even bring himself to tell Robyn how much he appreciated how she spoke about the movie he had been in, focusing on the story rather than anything else.

“I don’t think I have a particular favourite one, I quite enjoy them all but Are You Ready for Love always puts a smile on my face, mainly because I have a story behind it and of course Your Song is a classic.”

“What’s the story?” He asked. “About Are You Ready for Love?” He finished when he saw her confused look.

“Oh right. Well my friend, Claire and I drove to Limerick, in Ireland, a good few years ago to see Elton John in concert in a rugby stadium and it was so bloody cold, like freezing cold and raining and a bit miserable but then he played that song and the whole place just started to dance and it was amazing to watch and be a part of. It makes me smile when I hear it.”

“I like it when songs have stories like that and you sing?” He asked.

“Sorry?”

“You sing?” Asked Taron again. “When you were showing me how to control my breathing you seemed to know about warming up your voice before you sing, especially for those high notes. So, I am figuring you sing.”

“I sing,” Replied Robyn slowly.

“Uh-huh.” Taron raised an eyebrow to her urging her to go on.

“Back home, I am part of a gospel choir.”

“Oh really? That must be good fun. What kind of songs does your choir sing?”

“Yeah I love it and we sing everything and anything. Well I haven’t been in a while, obviously but I shall be back in rehearsal on Wednesday. I definitely miss it.”

“Have you had to sing a song by yourself?”

“Yes, I have.”

“Do you get nervous beforehand?” Asked Taron with interest. “Because now with Rocketman, I have had to do a lot more singing in front of people and I get so nervous.”

“I definitely get nervous, with that horrible butterfly feeling. You get that?”

“Yes, it’s definitely horrible.”

“For me, it’s not so much the singing part, that’s ok it’s more remembering the words. I have definitely had a big freak out before going on stage before, panicking that I was going to forget the words to the song I had to sing. I also stupidly got talked into doing an X-Factor style competition back home by a member of the choir. That was the most nervous I have ever been before singing. I almost didn’t go on stage but once I was up there, I was grand.”

Taron grinned at her. “X-Factor?”

“It was for a local musical society and I got roped into doing it.”

“What did you sing?”

“Hello by Adele but about three keys lower.”

Taron was immediately impressed. “Adele. She is amazing. The other time, when you thought you were going to forget the words? What song did you sing that time, with the choir?” Robyn looked to Taron with wide eyes. “What song Robyn? It was an Elton song, right?”

“Actually no. It was a Queen song. Somebody to Love?”

“Seriously? That is big powerhouse song.”

“Yes, it is.”

“You must have a great voice.”

“I can hold a tune.”

“So, when we get out of this, we are going to go to a bar that has karaoke and you are going to sing that for me.”

“Yeah absolutely not.”

“I will sing some Tiny Dancer in return.”

“Deal.” Replied Robyn immediately holding out her hand for a handshake, which Taron accepted and they awkwardly shook hands, Taron using his left and Robyn her right.

“Maybe we should have to have a sing off?” Suggested Richard.

“I don’t think so.” Replied Robyn quickly.

“No?” Asked Richard raising an eyebrow to her.

“Could pass some time for us.”

“Let’s not start something we can’t finish.” Grinned Robyn winking at Taron. “And I would have an unfair advantage as Taron is nursing some badly bruised ribs. He won’t be able to get those deep breathes in to hit those high notes, where as I can belt a note out here and now.” Taron started to laugh but on feeling his ribs protest knew exactly why Robyn had said what she said. He definitely would struggle to sing at the moment. “I mean I can hit that start note to Somebody to Love every time!”

Holding his side, Taron enjoyed the grin he felt on his face. A proper one since he had been in the car with Richard earlier.

“Ok well I don’t want to lose on grounds of bruised ribs, so let’s wait until we have hit that karaoke bar then.”

“I agree. So now that we have secured our second deal, how about I give your arms a once over? And Richard’s too and then maybe somehow I can get to your back?”

Taron’s grin gave way to a small smile. He had been enjoying the light banter with Robyn as it kept him distracted and he was needing some serious amount distraction at the moment. With a woozy stomach and groggy head, the talking was keeping his reality at bay.

“Taron?” He heard a soft voice call him name. “We can sit for another while if you want. I don’t mind. It won’t make any difference really. The little scratches on your arms are easily cleaned. We can torture Richard for a while first, while we keep chatting about music. I feel it is my turn for an interrogation. Or I can teach you the song about Tiny Tim the Turtle.” She suggested, glad to see that Taron lifted his eyes to look at her, the green shade changing to reflect each emotion he experienced. She decided she enjoyed the sparkle in his eyes much more than the gloomy apprehension she saw now.

“Tiny Tim?”

“He’s a turtle.” She said.

Taron couldn’t understand how she did it, but every time he was brought back to the uncertainty he facing, Robyn managed to lift his mood.

“I also have one about an alligator called Alfred.”

His left hand moved to rub his eyes as they stung with tiredness but it was a natural reflex that caused him to smile at the same time.

“So, Richard first?” Asked Robyn holding up the q-tips.

#Taron Egerton #Taron Egerton Fanfiction #Richard Madden #Angst #Friendship #Blood and Injury

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