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Chapter Text

 Geralt had been riding through the Kaedweni woods for hours, Roach’s hooves dull against the carpet of pine needles, when the smell of blood cut through the damp air. He slowed, hand automatically falling to the hilt at his hip.

Ahead, half-hidden beneath tangled brush, lay a body. Young, male. The clothes suggested he wasn’t a peasant, well-tailored doublet, though dirtied, torn, and spattered with dried crimson. Robbery, Geralt thought grimly. Bandits didn’t care much who they bled, so long as coin or valuables fell out.

He dismounted, crouching beside the corpse. The man’s face was slack, eyes glassed over. Pretty, even in death, Geralt noted absently. Stab wounds across the ribs. Throat cut. No saving him.

Geralt exhaled through his nose. “Damn bandits.”

The world didn’t need another restless ghost wandering, wailing at the injustice of its end. Witcher work, whether anyone paid him or not. He gathered wood, murmured a short rite he half-remembered from priests long dead, and set the pyre aflame.

The fire licked high, snapping and popping. Geralt turned to fetch Roach when-

“AAAAAAAAH!”

The scream tore through the clearing. Geralt spun, silver already in his hand. The body was sitting upright in the flames, batting wildly at fire that didn’t seem to consume him. Eyes wide, lungs heaving. Alive.

“Get it off! Get it off! I’m burning, gods, I’m burning-!” The young man staggered free, rolling in the dirt, coughing.

Geralt raised his blade, instincts taking over. “Stay down.”

The man froze, panting. His gaze flicked to the weapon, confusion and terror flooding his expression. “What… What in all hells?”

Geralt didn’t wait. He drove the silver point clean through the man’s chest.

The stranger’s cry cut off in a wet gasp. His body jerked, blood welling. Then he slumped, lifeless once more.

Geralt grimaced, pulling the blade free. He crouched, checking with practiced precision: pulse, signs of mutation, traces of glamour. Nothing. Just human. Dead human.

“Not a wraith. Not a doppel.” He wiped his blade, frowning. “Then what are you?”

He dragged the body out of the ash, laid it down, and sat on a log to wait. Roach whickered, uneasy.

An hour crawled by. The forest shifted with evening birdsong. Then-

A sharp inhale. The young man jolted upright, clutching his chest. The wound was gone. The blood still stained his shirt, but the flesh beneath was whole. He looked around, dazed.

“Wh- where-? Was I drinking? No, this isn’t Oxenfurt. This is-” He spotted Geralt, flinched. “Oh gods, who are you?”

Geralt said nothing.

The man staggered up, brushing dirt from fine sleeves. Finally, he forced a smile. “Julian Alfred Pankratz, Viscount de Lettenhove. But everyone calls me Jaskier. And you are…?”

Geralt frowned. Alive. Again. No sorcery. No memory.

He sheathed his sword. “Geralt.”

“Geralt.” Jaskier rolled the name. “Strong. Very witchery. Not that I’m saying you are one, of course, unless you are, in which case splendid, marvelous, what luck! Though… er, where are we?”

Geralt turned to Roach. “Road’s long. Keep up or don’t.”

Jaskier blinked. “That’s… not exactly reassuring. But very well. Where are we going?”

Geralt didn’t answer.

The bard hurried after him, babbling half-panicked, half-charmed. Oblivious to the fact he should, by rights, still be dead.

Immortal, then. And didn’t know it. Geralt wasn’t about to enlighten him.

By nightfall they reached an inn, smoke curling from its chimney, cabbage soup in the rafters. Geralt planned to dump the bard there, toss a coin, and vanish by dawn.

Inside, Jaskier chattered the whole way to the table.

“Merciful gods, I thought we’d never see civilization. Do you know how hard it is to compose while trudging through mud? No, of course you don’t, you’re clearly the silent, brooding, sword-wielding type.”

Geralt grunted, fetched stew and ale, and returned to find Jaskier scribbling parchment.

“What are you doing?”

“Writing!” Jaskier beamed. “I’ve decided, you’ll be my muse.”

Geralt froze. “No.”

“Yes! A mysterious swordsman, rugged and haunted, smoldering glances, cryptic grunts, the ballads will pour from me like wine at a wedding. You’ll be infamous.”

Geralt sat heavily. “You’re drunk on stew.”

“Impossible. Haven’t touched the ale.” Jaskier raised his bowl. “Besides, fate doesn’t slap a man in the face. You and me? Destiny.”

“I was about to leave you here.”

Jaskier gasped. “Leave me? With all these… suspicious folks?”

“They’re eating dinner.”

“Suspiciously.”

Geralt pinched his nose.

Jaskier grinned wider. “Settled then. Wherever you go, Witcher, I go. For art!”

Geralt drained his ale. “Should’ve left him in the woods.”

At dawn, Geralt slipped out alone. Relief hummed in his chest as Roach’s hooves carried him down an empty road.

“Whew! Do you have any idea how fast you walk?”

Geralt stiffened.

Jaskier jogged up, lute bouncing, doublet half-done. “Nearly tripped over a goose catching you.”

“You’re supposed to be at the inn.”

“Supposed to be. Destiny rarely consults innkeepers.” Jaskier grinned. “You didn’t think you could escape your bard, did you?”

“I don’t have a bard.”

“You do now.”

Geralt rode on without answering.

“I’ll take that grunt as a yes,” Jaskier said cheerfully.

The deaths multiplied.

Once, he fell from a cliffside while trying to rhyme “meadow” with “stiletto.” Geralt reached the bottom expecting to find a shattered corpse. Instead, Jaskier sat dazed among the rocks, complaining about mud in his boots.

Another time, during a tavern brawl, a mercenary drove a dagger straight through his stomach. Geralt watched the blade sink in to the hilt. Jaskier went pale, toppled, and ten minutes later staggered out of the privy complaining only that the ale hadn’t agreed with him.

“Bard,” Geralt muttered that night as he cleaned his sword, “you should be dead.”

“What’s that?” Jaskier chirped, strumming his lute with fingers still smudged with dried blood.

“Nothing.”

Geralt said nothing a lot these days.

Months passed. Any sane man would have left the bard long behind. Geralt told himself that often. But curiosity had its claws in him now. He’d never seen anything like this, not curse, not blessing, not mutation.

And then came the hunt with the wyvern. The beast’s talons opened Geralt’s back in three deep gashes before he managed to hack its head off. He nearly blacked out in the aftermath.

Strong hands caught him before he hit the dirt. Jaskier’s hands.

“Easy, easy, ” The bard lowered him gently, ripping open Geralt’s tunic with more confidence than Geralt thought he had in him. Needle, gut, steady thread. No hesitation.

“You’ve done this before,” Geralt rasped.

“Turns out spending months with a man who bleeds like a sieve is an education in itself,” Jaskier said, lips pressed tight in concentration. “Now stop twitching, you’ll ruin my stitches.”

When he finished, Geralt lay still, staring up at him. This fragile mortal, who should have died a dozen times over, who hummed ballads while sewing torn flesh as though it were mending socks.

Geralt made up his mind.

The next time their path crossed Yennefer’s, he’d bring the bard to her. If anyone could pry open the truth of what Jaskier was, what he couldn’t remember, Yennefer could.

Until then, Geralt kept watching. Waiting for the next impossible death that wouldn’t hold.

Chapter Text

Geralt had, for the most part, managed to keep the bard in one piece. A minor miracle, considering Jaskier seemed to attract death like moths to a flame. If there was a runaway cart, it would aim for Jaskier. If there was a drunk with a knife, he’d stumble straight into the bard’s ribs. And yet, he always got back up. Always.

Now, though, Geralt’s patience was frayed. They’d stopped at a town a few days’ ride from where Yennefer tended to linger. Geralt intended to restock supplies, find a lead, and maybe, just maybe, shove Jaskier into her capable hands and demand answers.

The bard, naturally, had wandered off.

Geralt tracked Jaskier the only way he trusted, by scent. The bard's lavender soap mingled with that ridiculous jasmine perfume he'd bought off a Toussaint merchant, all of it cut with the sharp tang of sweat and the fruity notes of Beauclair wine. Child's play to follow, even through the market's chaos. The trail led him past fish stalls where mongers shouted prices, through clouds of cinnamon and clove from spice merchants, until the scent veered suddenly down a shadowed alley.

That's when he heard it, rhythmic grunts, low and desperate.

Then a heavy thud of flesh against wood.

Geralt stilled, every muscle tensing.

His expression hardened to stone as he moved forward, each step silent as falling snow. The sounds grew louder outside a smithy, its forge cold and dark. He pressed against rough stone, angled toward a grimy window-

And immediately regretted it.

Inside, Jaskier was sprawled across an anvil bench, trousers around his ankles, shirt pushed up to expose the pale curve of his back. The blacksmith, a mountain of a man, gripped the bard's hips hard enough to bruise, while his other hand tangled in Jaskier's hair, pressing his cheek against the wood. The smith's powerful body rocked forward in a steady rhythm, sweat glistening on his shoulders in the dim light as he drove into the bard with punishing force.

Geralt assumed the worse until-

"Fuck, yes- harder!" Jaskier moaned, back arching. "Gods, you magnificent beast, make it hurt-!"

Geralt pinched the bridge of his nose. "Could've been a drowner. Could've been a bruxa. But no. Had to be this."

A metallic crash echoed as tools scattered across the floor. Jaskier's breathless laugh followed. "I swear I'll replace everything, just don't stop-"

Geralt's jaw clenched. He pushed away from the wall, leaving the bard to his... entertainment. Not his problem. Definitely not his concern.

Hours later at a decrepit tavern, the familiar voice called out.

"Geralt!"

The bard approached, impossibly cheerful for someone who'd been so thoroughly debauched. Geralt halted mid-stride.

Through the doorway, Jaskier leaned back, face flushed and hair wild, a visible bite mark blooming on his neck. "Geralt! I've found the most incredible inspiration for a new ballad! Don't scowl like that, come meet-" His words dissolved into a startled gasp as the blacksmith, appearing behind him, slid a possessive hand around his waist.

Geralt turned on his heel and walked away. Quickly.

Behind him, Jaskier’s voice carried out into the night. “Don’t go far, darling! I’ll just be a moment!”

Geralt just stared.

Jaskier returned to the inn hours later, cheeks flushed, curls damp with sweat, and a suspicious number of hickeys trailing down his throat. His wrists bore faint red marks, and the way he lowered himself gingerly into the chair opposite Geralt spoke volumes about his evening.

He beamed anyway, lute slung carelessly across his back like he’d just come from the greatest performance of his life. “Gods, I’d forgotten how very vigorous smiths can be. The stamina of an ox, the arms of a titan- oh, don’t give me that look, Geralt, you should be happy for me.”

Geralt took a long pull of his ale, saying nothing.

Jaskier leaned across the table, lowering his voice as though sharing some secret. “Besides, I think I’ve discovered the true meaning of the word ‘anvil.’”

Geralt set his mug down with a thud. “Spare me the details.”

“Oh, but the details are delicious,” Jaskier insisted, grinning like the cat who’d not only got the cream but written a ballad about it. He waved for food, wincing slightly as he shifted in his seat.

Geralt studied him. The wrist bruises. The limp he tried to hide. The man looked like he’d spent the night in a wrestling pit and come out delighted. Any other mortal, Geralt thought grimly, would at least be sore enough to collapse in bed for a week. Jaskier just kept humming, tapping at his thighs as if his body weren’t covered in proof of yet another brush with ruin.

Finally, Geralt broke the silence. “We’re visiting a friend tomorrow.”

Jaskier perked up instantly. “A friend? You have friends? Oh, this is excellent news! Does she play an instrument? Does he drink? Can I serenade them upon arrival, or should I wait until after introductions?”

“No serenading.”

“Mm, I’ll take that as a yes. What sort of friend are we talking about? An old drinking companion? A fellow swordsman? A-” He leaned in, eyes glinting with mischief. “-long-lost lover, perhaps?”

Geralt didn’t rise to the bait. He just reached for his mug again. “She’s a mage.”

Jaskier froze mid-fiddle with his lute strings, expression brightening. “A mage! Perfect. Do you know how many songs I could spin from a sorceress? The mystery, the danger, the inevitable tragic romance, it’s practically built for balladry. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

Geralt looked at him steadily. “Didn’t see the need.”

“Pah. There’s always a need when romance and sorcery are involved. This will be marvelous!” Jaskier grinned and raised his ale in a toast to himself. “To new muses!”

Geralt only grunted, but his eyes lingered on the bard’s bruised wrists, the flush in his cheeks, the way he bounced back from everything with impossible ease.

Tomorrow, Yennefer would see him. And maybe, just maybe, Geralt would finally have answers.

The sorceress’s cottage stood at the edge of the woods, all white stone and curling ivy, deceptively quaint for someone who could level half the countryside if she wanted to. Geralt knocked once, and the door opened of its own accord, warm lamplight spilling into the dusk.

“Geralt.” Yennefer’s voice was cool, but her mouth curved into a faint smile. “Finally decided to stop brooding in the wilderness and visit me?”

Before Geralt could answer, Jaskier swept forward, hat in hand and bow at the ready. “And you must be the legendary Yennefer. Jaskier, at your service. Your beauty is only eclipsed by the mystery in your eyes, oh, I could compose an entire ballad in just the time it takes you to frown at me.”

Yennefer blinked, then flicked her gaze to Geralt. “You brought me a stray.”

“He followed me,” Geralt muttered.

“I do that sometimes,” Jaskier said brightly, already making himself at home by poking curiously at the shelves lined with books and bottled herbs. “It’s destiny. Or perhaps just poor impulse control. Hard to tell the difference.”

“Don’t touch that,” Yennefer snapped, sweeping a dangerous-looking flask out of his reach.

Jaskier gave her a sheepish smile. “Noted.”

Geralt caught her eye, then jerked his head toward the door. “Need a word.”

Outside, the evening air was sharp, the forest alive with crickets. Yennefer crossed her arms. “Well?”

Geralt hesitated, then said low, “The bard’s immortal.”

Yennefer’s brows arched. “Excuse me?”

“I’ve seen him die. More than once. Horse kick. Blade through the gut. Fall off a cliff. He just… wakes up. No memory of it. Thinks he’s lucky, or sturdy, or both.”

She studied him a long moment, dark eyes searching. “And you didn’t leave him behind because…?”

Geralt’s jaw tightened. “Curiosity.”

Yennefer gave a humorless laugh. “Of course. Curiosity. You always did have a talent for attracting the impossible.” She glanced toward the cottage, where Jaskier’s muffled humming could be heard as he tuned his lute. “Immortal, you say. That’s not a gift. That’s a curse.”

Geralt said nothing.

Yennefer’s smile thinned. “Fine. I’ll take a look at him. But if he starts singing about my hair, I’ll set his lute on fire.”

Yennefer didn’t waste time.

The moment Jaskier sat down at her table with a self-satisfied grin, she flicked her wrist. The bard stiffened, eyes going wide as an invisible grip clamped around his throat.

“Wha- wait, hold on, there must be some mis-!” His protest choked off as his body went limp, slumping to the floor.

“Yen!” Geralt barked.

She ignored him, kneeling gracefully beside the corpse. Her fingers pressed to Jaskier’s neck, searching. “No pulse. Dead. Just as you said.”

Geralt crouched, jaw tight. “You could’ve warned me.”

“He wouldn’t have agreed to it,” Yennefer replied briskly, already summoning a faint violet glow to her palm. She passed her hand over his body, muttering incantations. Nothing. She sliced a shallow cut into his arm, examined the blood. Human. She opened his eyes, checked for glaze, for any trace of enchantment. Human. She pushed her magic deeper, searching for wards, curses, bonds, nothing.

“He’s just a man,” she said at last, sitting back on her heels. Confusion flickered across her face, rare and unsettling. “No alterations, no curses, no signs of resurrection magic. His body is ordinary. Fragile. Mortal.”

“Except it isn’t,” Geralt said.

Yennefer glanced up sharply. “If you hadn’t seen it with your own eyes, I’d call this a joke. And a poor one.”

Geralt folded his arms, gaze fixed on the slack body on the floor. “Wait.”

They did. The fire in the hearth cracked, the silence stretching long and taut. An hour crawled by.

Then-

A sudden, rattling gasp.

Jaskier sat bolt upright, clutching his throat, eyes wild. “Gods-! What in the hells was that? Did I fall asleep standing up again? No, no, I was just, wait, why am I on the floor?”

Geralt stared. Yennefer’s mask slipped just enough for astonishment to flicker in her eyes.

Jaskier scrambled to his feet, brushing dust from his doublet. “Well, that was unpleasant. Anyone fancy explaining why you’re both staring at me like I’ve grown a third arm? Oh, unless I have-” He patted himself down, finding nothing out of place. “No? Splendid.”

Geralt said nothing.

Yennefer rose slowly, her expression unreadable. “You should not be alive.”

Jaskier blinked, then laughed nervously. “Well, forgive me for being resilient. Comes from good stock. Hardy family, the Pankratz line.”

Yennefer arched a brow. “You are very special. But not in a way you’d like.”

Jaskier blinked, affronted. “I beg your pardon?”

She leaned down, close enough he could see the glint of steel in her violet eyes. “You should not exist. And yet you do. If I can’t unravel why, then I will tear apart the entire weave of your being until I find the answer.”

Jaskier swallowed audibly. “...Geralt, darling, remind me why you brought me here again?”

Geralt sighed, “you're immortal.”

The fire popped, throwing shadows across the walls, and for the first time since meeting Yennefer, Jaskier’s smile faltered.

Chapter Text

Jaskier spent the night pacing Yennefer’s sitting room like a trapped bird, his usual chatter broken into nervous bursts.

“Immortal,” he muttered. “What a word. Rolls off the tongue rather nicely, doesn’t it? Perhaps I could write a ballad, no, no, what am I saying…” He rubbed his face with both hands, his voice muffled. “This is absurd. Completely absurd.”

Yennefer watched him without expression, quill scratching across parchment as she filled another page of notes. Runes and diagrams spilled across the desk, circles layered within circles.

“Sit,” she ordered.

“I’d rather not,” Jaskier said.

She flicked her fingers. The bard was yanked into the chair, his yelp echoing through the chamber.

 She had already drawn a new circle of salt and ground gemstone, her lips moving in an incantation so old it rasped like stone on stone. The air grew heavy, sharp with ozone.

The runes flared under Jaskier’s chair. He flinched. “This doesn’t feel particularly safe-”

Yennefer’s magic struck. A searing light enveloped him, cutting straight through flesh, blood, bone. His scream was swallowed by the wards, muffled into nothing. His veins lit like rivers of fire, his chest glowed as though some hidden star burned inside it, then went dark again, leaving him slumped and gasping.

Yennefer staggered back, her own breath unsteady. For a long moment she just stared.

“What did you see?” Geralt asked.

She shook her head. “Not what. Where.”

Geralt’s eyes narrowed. “Explain.”

Her gaze snapped to Jaskier, who was trying to peel himself off the chair, hair singed at the edges, doublet scorched. “Something ancient. Older than elf-sorcery... Whatever binds him...”

Jaskier gave a breathless, incredulous laugh. “Splendid. I’m not just immortal, I’m mysteriously immortal. Am I to sprout wings next? Tentacles?”

Yennefer silenced him with a look, but her voice was lower, quieter, almost reluctant. “The sigils in his blood… they weren’t made by mortal hands. Not human. Not elf. Not even druid. It’s something else entirely. A signature I can’t read.”

Geralt frowned. “And that doesn’t happen to you.”

“No,” Yennefer said sharply. “It doesn’t. I can unravel anything given enough time. But this, this is like staring at a language that doesn’t exist. Like someone scribbled nonsense into the fabric of his soul, and the universe agreed to it.”

Jaskier swallowed hard, looking between them. His voice came out small. “So what does that make me? A bard with a… a footnote in the stars? A joke to the gods?”

Yennefer didn’t answer right away. She looked at him like a puzzle piece that didn’t fit any board she knew. Finally, she said, “It makes you dangerous. To yourself. To us. To anyone who learns the truth.”

Geralt’s expression darkened, but he didn’t argue.

Jaskier gave a thin smile, trying to hold the fear out of his voice. “Well then. Best keep it between friends, eh?”

The wards still glowed faintly around him, like they knew better.

Night fell over Vengerberg with a thick silence, broken only by the steady crackle of Yennefer’s hearth. Jaskier had collapsed on a pile of cushions in her study, still muttering to himself in half-coherent verse about stars, fate, and terrible luck. The wards flickered faintly around him, a cage more elegant than iron.

“He’s asleep,” Geralt said, voice low.

“No,” Yennefer corrected, glancing up from her notes. “He’s pretending. He wants us to think he’s coping.”

Geralt grunted. “He isn’t.”

“No one would.” She closed the tome, rubbing her temple. “What’s inside him is… older than anything I’ve touched before. Not elven, not druidic, not even tied to the chaos I wield. Something outside our world slipped its hand in, and it’s using him like- like parchment.”

“Dangerous parchment,” Geralt said.

She allowed herself a tired laugh. “Exactly.”

For a moment, they just watched Jaskier’s sleeping form. His chest rose and fell steadily, lips parted slightly, a hand twitching as if in dream. He looked harmless, soft, mortal. But both of them had seen otherwise.

At length, Yennefer pushed back from the desk. “I’ll need more time. And stronger wards. If anyone else discovers him…”

“They won’t,” Geralt said simply.

That quiet certainty tugged at something in her. She sighed, rising. “Come. You need rest as much as I do.”

Her bedchamber was dim, perfumed faintly with lavender. Geralt stripped down with his usual brusque practicality, laying steel and silver blades carefully within reach before climbing in. Yennefer slipped in beside him, cool silk against his rougher skin.

For a while, they lay without speaking, listening to the wind outside. Then Yennefer murmured, “You’ve softened.”

Geralt turned his head slightly. “How?”

“You let yourself care. Once, you’d have left that bard in the woods without looking back.”

He exhaled, not quite a laugh. “Maybe I should’ve.”

“And yet here you are.” She shifted closer, her fingers tracing the scar at his collarbone. “Still playing shepherd to strays.”

His hand covered hers, firm and warm. “And you?”

“What about me?”

“You’re just as caught in this as I am.”

She didn’t deny it. Instead, she kissed him, hungry, sharp with exhaustion and unspoken worry. He answered in kind, the tension of the day burning off in the press of mouths and hands. They had always fought, always clashed, but when the fire between them turned this way, it was something fierce, grounding, almost necessary.

Later, when they lay tangled in sheets, her head on his chest, Yennefer whispered into the dark: “If I can’t solve him… if I can’t understand him…”

“You will,” Geralt said, heavy-lidded but sure.

She closed her eyes. “And if I don’t?”

Geralt’s hand smoothed down her back. “Then we keep him close. Watch. Wait.”

Neither said the other truth aloud, that watching Jaskier meant watching something impossible. And things impossible rarely stayed quiet forever.

By the next morning Jaskier was different. Not outwardly, still all bright smiles, silk doublets, and chatter, but something had shifted behind his eyes. The panic of the night before had been replaced by a kind of glittering defiance.

They were riding along a jagged mountain pass, the wind tearing at their cloaks, when Jaskier reined in his horse and stared over the edge. The drop plunged hundreds of feet into a rocky gorge, mist swirling at the bottom.

“Quite the view,” he said brightly. “You know, some would call it inspiring. Perhaps even… liberating.”

Geralt gave him a side-eye. “Get back on the path.”

“Oh, come on. You two spend so much time glowering about my condition and yet not once have either of you stopped to consider the potential.” He gestured grandly at the abyss. “What if this is freedom? I mean, think about it! No fear. No limits. I can go anywhere, do anything, be anything-”

“Jaskier,” Geralt warned.

Yennefer’s eyes narrowed. “What are you doing?”

“Demonstrating.” Jaskier swung one leg over the edge, his grin reckless. “You two keep telling me I’m immortal. Well, perhaps it’s time I started believing you. And if this works-”

“It’s a mountain,” Geralt snapped. “This isn’t a tavern brawl. This is rock and wind and a thousand feet of-”

“Details, details!” Jaskier sang out. And before either of them could move, he threw himself forward.

“JASKIER!”

Geralt lunged, too late. Yennefer’s hand flared with violet fire, but he was already gone, vanishing into the mist below. A faint echo of his voice floated up - “Hahaaaa-!” - then nothing.

The silence that followed was brutal. Geralt’s jaw clenched, his knuckles white on the reins.

Yennefer exhaled through her teeth. “Your pet bard is insane.”

“You think I don’t know that?”

They waited. One minute. Two. Five.

Then, from far below, a distant shout: “I’M FINE!”

Yennefer closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Gods help me, he’s actually fine.”

A moment later, impossibly, Jaskier emerged from the mist at the base of the trail, brushing dust from his doublet and waving up at them as if nothing had happened. “Shortcut!” he called cheerfully. “Beat you two by at least an hour!”

Geralt muttered a curse under his breath. “I should have left him in the woods.”

Yennefer’s lips twitched, halfway between fury and disbelief. “He’s going to get himself killed.”

“He already has,” Geralt said grimly. “Over and over.”

Below, Jaskier started to climb up onto a rock outcrop, striking a pose like a conquering hero. “Did you see that, Geralt? I’m practically a legend already!”

Geralt stared down at him, something unreadable in his yellow eyes. “Legends bleed,”he muttered.

Yennefer heard him. “And eventually,” she added, “even legends end.”