#Witchers have feelings

[cosmos-coma]

Hello My Old Heart- Part 4

A/N: Wow, it’s been a hot minute since the last chapter, huh? This one was maybe a bit rushed, but I really wanted to get it out there! Hope you like soft-hearted sweet Eskel!

Pairing: Eskel x Reader

Warnings:  fem!reader

Word count: 1k

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There are many things in life that are difficult for a Witcher; the trials, the path, the monsters… but the most challenging thing Eskel has done so far was leave you when that night ended. When he mentioned that he needed to move to the next town he could see the brightness in your eyes dwindle away as the real world came crashing down on you. You had urged him to stay the night, ‘It’ll be safer in the morning light’ you tried to argue, but he knew it would only make it harder when the time came.

The forlorn stare you held as he rode off had been replaying in his mind as he traveled and he couldn’t help but begin to dwell on all the ways you looked upon him. You had never looked upon him in fear or disgust, and for that small grace, he was thankful. However, sometimes, when he first surprises you at the door you look at him as if you were a flower seeing the sunrise after another dark night. But quickly after- well, it was almost as if you caught yourself and rethought what you were feeling. You would emanate a certain kind of sadness and… longing in your eyes that made your gaze that threatened to drain all the brightness out of you. He had spent collective hours over the last few months thinking about whether or not he had done something to you but, as far as he could remember your gaze had always held that glaze of grief.  

As of now, It’s been a month since the Flower Festival. A month of hopping around from town to town in the lower part of the continent and trying to be busy enough to live without clouding thoughts. On this night, Eskel had made his temporary home in a bustling inn and tavern just outside Novigrad. The drinks were strong and his stew was warm but Eskel still let out a little sigh as he let his thoughts overtake him.

“Eskel that’s the third time you’ve sighed on my sandwich. You’re warming up the bread…!” Lambert complained from across the table. By pure luck, he and Eskel had happened to cross paths on a contract and decided to stick together for a few days. 

“Sorry, I’m just…” 

“Thinking about that Sorceress again? I swear on Melitele’s tits sorceresses are gonna be the death of you and Geralt…” Lambert grumbled into his pint and shook his head. “Then who am I gonna swindle in Gwent? Vesemir? Yeah, right…” 

When Eskel didn’t immediately roll his eyes or return the jest to his younger brother, Lambert began to maybe grow a little more concerned. “What has you so caught up anyways? What makes her so different from any other? You’ve mentioned she heals, likes to read, has some sheep, but what makes her any better than those women over there?” He said with a motion towards the corner of the room. As far as the young Witcher was concerned, the majority of people will come and go and fill the roles of the ones before them as they went, but it is a rare few who create a role that no others can fill and he had yet to see it personally. 

A pause filled the air as Eskel looked out over the rowdy tavern in quiet thought, “well she’s…” He started, before cracking a hint of a smile. “she’s got a bit of an odd and blunt sense of humor and she always seems very sure of herself when she moves. She loves her work, focuses on it like nothing else, and is more than happy to enforce the care that's needed.” He said with a short snort of a laugh, recalling how you had literally forced him to sleep the first day you met. Hell- he didn’t even think it had been 2 hours at that point. 

“She has a special smile about her, and the conversation comes so easy, And it..” Eskel paused a moment and frowned, looking for the words that would carry the right sentiment. “The first time we touched it was like getting hit with Basilisk venom, but in the best way. Warm and tingling like it's eating away at you… but you don't want it to stop,” he finished and looked towards his younger brother who had his eyebrows raised. 

The marred Witcher quickly shook his head and took a big swig of his cup. “I’m probably just talking stupid though, forget I said anything.” He said in an attempt to backtrack over his words. After all, Witchers weren’t supposed to have feelings, right? 

Lambert slowly blinked and let out a sigh as he took in his brother's words, sandwich being set down so it wouldn’t get any warmer “Eskel… My dear brother, You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Eskel was silent for a moment as he waited for his brother to follow up with some snarky remark, but it didn’t come. 

“I’m pretty sure you're in something people call ‘love’, Eskel…” he stated, his matter-of-fact tone and the statement coming as a bit of a slap to the face. “And just because I don't see a lot of point in it, doesn't mean you shouldn’t pursue it…” He continued. “You’re a good Witcher, Eskel… and, though I'll deny it if asked, you're a great brother too. so, maybe you deserve something nice once in a while….”

Eskel bit back a smile and the urge to rub it in, taking another sip of his drink instead. “So, you’re saying-”

“I’m saying you should go after her, dumbass! If you don’t tell her how stupid she makes you feel then she might just up and leave one day.” Lambert grumbled and took a more aggressive bite of his sandwich than necessary before continuing with a full mouth. “And don’t make me say it again. I know you heard me…. Asshole.” Even Lambert with a bit of a grin.

With the wise words of his brother, Eskel set off for you the next morning. 

It was time to stop avoiding the subject and just say something. Even if you told him you hated him, that your heart had changed over the past month, he wouldn’t blame you. But… the hope that you might say yes is what kept his nerve. The thought that he, a scarred mutant with far too much blood on his hands, could possibly turn and see your smiling face every morning… it filled his heart with the same Basilisk Venom he had felt before.

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Taglist: @writingmysanity @open--till--midnight @dark-academia-slut @arcana-greenleaf

[spielzeugkaiser]

[MASTERPOST] Being a witcher is not always easy - but what is, really? Still, Geralt feels bad that Jaskier is now living through something he never wanted him to experience again. (What is a spielzeugkaiser post if there isn't hurt/comfort, honestly-)

[onlypartiallyarts]

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(click for better quality)

[corrodedbisexual]

GERALT & JASKIER - THE WITCHER S03E01

[pokeberry5]

For the shirt cut meme, maybe Geralt or Yennefer in either of these? 🥵

both. BOTH.

i combined your suggestion with this lovely anon's:

[pixlatedvampire]

It’s been ten years since I finished a drawing so please enjoy these two idiots I drew all the way back in 2021 😭🤣

[tielmamon]

"The White wolf himself! It's an honor to finally meet the man Jaskier never shuts up about." Radovid gracefully presents his hand for the witcher to kiss. Geralt does not. Instead, he stares at the prince with an eerily blank expression and takes a step forward. Then another. Then another. Until Radovid feels the rough, painfully jagged texture of the cave wall against his back. He looks at the witcher, now looming before him in the shadows. Bright yellow eyes- those of a predator pierces through the darkness like a knife and stab through his chest like a cold chill.

"I'm sure you are well aware of my...fondness for Jaskier. We've travelled together for almost 25 years now. He is, in his own ridiculous words my very best friend in the whole wide world."

Radovid chuckles, which seems to be the wrong response because Geralt's eye twitches and the hand near Radovid's side curls into a fist so tight he hears the leather of the man's glove whine.

"S-Sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"Now, with that I must lay down a few things for you to remember, your highness. Lest you overstep and find yourself upsetting my bard." Radovid swallows, blood running ice cold.

"If I ever catch wind of you mistreating, manipulating, or abusing Jaskier in anyway, a few things will happen to you."

"First, I will find you, wherever you are on this continent and I will kill you. It will be a very sudden, painful and very violently death. A coach suddenly pushed off a cliff, an unexpected kikimora loose in the castle, poison in your morning tea that feels like acid down your throat. I don't know, haven't really decided yet."

"Then after that, I will watch as your spirit becomes vengeful and restless, transforming into a wraith- a monster born out of gruesome, untimely deaths. Then I kill you again, for the second time. This time not by my blade, but by my fire. I will burn you, and watch as your spirit, your very soul wails in agony, turning to ash at the sight of your charred, desecrated bones." Geralt leans in close, stopping just shy of the pale prince's hear and whispers.

"And that's not even mentioning what unspeakable horrors my daughter and her mother are sure to do to you beforehand." Radovid shakes under the cold intensity of Geralt's gaze. They both hear the bard in question singing just an earshot away from where they stood. Radovid flinches so hard that his back is scratched by a particularly sharp rock. Geralt, on the other hand mearly turns to the sound, smiling softly for a moment before facing the prince once again.

"Have I made myself clear, your highness?" His smile never leaving his face, Geralt bares his teeth to show the sharp canines that look more lion than wolf.

"C-Crystal." Radovid stutters.

"Geralt? Have you seen- Oh! There you are, dear."

"Hmmm" In a blink of an eye, the witcher is a considerable distance away from the terrified prince. Already walking toward the bard, Geralt claps a hand on his shoulder as he passes him to reach Roach. Radovid watches Jaskier lean against the friendly touch, beaming.

"How are my two favorite men in the world? Getting along well, I hope?"

"Oh, we get along just fine. Don't we, your highness?" He looks at him now with casual disinterest, but there was a glint in the man's eye. It sends a shiver up the prince's spine and he all too suddenly remembers the moniker the man used to have before Jaskier came along.

"Absolutely. "

[wren-of-the-woods]

I’m thinking about the parallels between Jaskier and Valdo Marx. I’m thinking about how Valdo plays a silly song about romance and sex at a ball just as Jaskier did all those years ago in Cintra, and I’m thinking about how Jaskier now sings songs about love and life that are incredibly full of feeling. I’m thinking about how, when the monster attacks, Valdo runs and Jaskier helps.

I’m thinking about how Jaskier has grown to be so much more than a simple bard, and how Valdo Marx highlights that.

[bluedillylee]

made myself sad thinking about how much stuff Geralt and Jaskier don’t talk about with each other😭

[ID sketch of Geralt siting on the ground with his back to Jaskier as he looks over his shoulder at Jaskier. They both have melancholy expressions. End ID]

[thunderboltfire]

I have a lot of complicated feelings when it comes to what Neflix has done with the Witcher, but my probably least favourite is the line of argumentation that originated during shitstorms related to the first and second season that I was unlucky to witness.

It boils down to "Netflix's reinterpretation and vision is valid, because the Witcher books are not written to be slavic. The overwhelming Slavic aestetic is CDPR's interpretation, and the setting in the original books is universally European, as there are references to Arthurian mythos and celtic languages" And I'm not sure where this argument originated and whether it's parroting Sapkowski's own words or a common stance of people who haven't considered the underlying themes of the books series. Because while it's true that there are a lot of western european influences in the Witcher, it's still Central/Eastern European to the bone, and at its core, the lack of understanding of this topic is what makes the Netflix series inauthentic in my eyes.

The slavicness of the Witcher goes deeper than the aestetics, mannerisms, vodka and sour cucumbers. Deeper than Zoltan wrapping his sword with leopard pelt, like he was a hussar. Deeper than the Redanian queen Hedvig and her white eagle on the red field.

What Witcher is actually about? It's a story about destiny, sure. It's a sword-and-sorcery style, antiheroic deconstruction of a fairy tale, too, and it's a weird mix of many culture's influences.

But it's also a story about mundane evil and mundane good. If You think about most dark, gritty problems the world of Witcher faces, it's xenophobia and discrimination, insularism and superstition. Deep-seated fear of the unknown, the powerlessness of common people in the face of danger, war, poverty and hunger. It's what makes people spit over their left shoulder when they see a witcher, it's what makes them distrust their neighbor, clinging to anything they deem safe and known. It's their misfortune and pent-up anger that make them seek scapegoats and be mindlessly, mundanely cruel to the ones weaker than themselves.

There are of course evil wizards, complicated conspiracies and crowned heads, yes. But much of the destruction and depravity is rooted in everyday mundane cycle of violence and misery. The worst monsters in the series are not those killed with a silver sword, but with steel. it's hard to explain but it's the same sort of motiveless, mundane evil that still persist in our poorer regions, born out of generations-long poverty and misery. The behaviour of peasants in Witcher, and the distrust towards authority including kings and monarchs didn't come from nowhere.

On the other hand, among those same, desperately poor people, there is always someone who will share their meal with a traveller, who will risk their safety pulling a wounded stranger off the road into safety. Inconditional kindness among inconditional hate. Most of Geralt's friends try to be decent people in the horrible world. This sort of contrasting mentalities in the recently war-ridden world is intimately familiar to Eastern and Cetral Europe.

But it doesn't end here. Nilfgaard is also a uniquely Central/Eastern European threat. It's a combination of the Third Reich in its aestetics and its sense of superiority and the Stalinist USSR with its personality cult, vast territory and huge army, and as such it's instantly recognisable by anybody whose country was unlucky enough to be caught in-between those two forces. Nilfgaard implements total war and looks upon the northerners with contempt, conscripts the conquered people forcibly, denying them the right of their own identity. It may seem familiar and relevant to many opressed people, but it's in its essence the processing of the trauma of the WW2 and subsequent occupation.

My favourite case are the nonhumans, because their treatment is in a sense a reminder of our worst traits and the worst sins in our history - the regional antisemitism and/or xenophobia, violence, local pogroms. But at the very same time, the dilemma of Scoia'Tael, their impossible choice between maintaining their identity, a small semblance of freedom and their survival, them hiding in the forests, even the fact that they are generally deemed bandits, it all touches the very traumatic parts of specifically Polish history, such as January Uprising, Warsaw Uprising, Ghetto Uprising, the underground resistance in WW2 and the subsequent complicated problem of the Cursed Soldiers all at once. They are the 'other' to the general population, but their underlying struggle is also intimately known to us.

The slavic monsters are an aestetic choice, yes, but I think they are also a reflection of our local, private sins. These are our own, insular boogeymen, fears made flesh. They reproduce due to horrors of the war or they are an unprovoked misfortune that descends from nowhere and whose appearance amplifies the local injustices.

I'm not talking about many, many tiny references that exist in the books, these are just the most blatant examples that come to mind. Anyway, the thing is, whether Sapkowski has intended it or not, Witcher is slavic and it's Polish because it contains social commentary. Many aspects of its worldbuilding reflect our traumas and our national sins. It's not exclusively Polish in its influences and philosophical motifs of course, but it's obvious it doesn't exist in a vacuum.

And it seems to me that the inherently Eastern European aspects of Witcher are what was immediately rewritten in the series. It seems to me that the subtler underlying conflicts were reshaped to be centered around servitude, class and gender disparity, and Nilfgaard is more of a fanatic terrorist state than an imposing, totalitarian empire. A lot of complexity seems to be abandoned in lieu of usual high-fantasy wordbuilding. It's especially weird to me because it was completely unnecessary. The Witcher books didn't need to be adjusted to speak about relevant problems - they already did it! The problem of acceptance and discrimination is a very prevalent theme throughout the story! They are many strong female characters too, and they are well written. Honestly I don't know if I should find it insulting towards their viewers that they thought it won't be understood as it was and has to be somehow reshaped to fit the american perpective, because the current problems are very much discussed in there and Sapkowski is not subtle in showing that genocide and discrimination is evil. Heck, anyone who has read the ending knows how tragic it makes the whole story.

It also seems quite disrespectful, because they've basically taken a well-established piece of our domestic literature and popular culture and decided that the social commentary in it is not relevant. It is as if all it referenced was just not important enough and they decided to use it as an opportunity to talk about the problems they consider important. And don't get me wrong, I'm not forcing anyone to write about Central European problems and traumas, I'm just confused that they've taken the piece of art already containing such a perspective on the popular and relevant problem and they just... disregarded it, because it wasn't their exact perspective on said problem.

And I think this homogenisation, maybe even from a certain point of view you could say it's worldview sanitisation is a problem, because it's really ironic, isn't it? To talk about inclusivity in a story which among other problems is about being different, and in the same time to get rid of motifs, themes and references because they are foreign? Because if something presents a different perspective it suddenly is less desirable?

There was a lot of talking about the showrunners travelling to Poland to understand the Witcher's slavic spirit and how to convey it. I don't think they really meant it beyond the most superficial, paper-thin facade.

[anya-chalotra]

GERALT + CAT POTIONS Season 1 ▸ Season 2 ▸ Season 3

[justaz]

need background noise as i write and started to watch the witcher. i find the found family funny. three parents all divorced from each other (simultaneously somehow) raising their daughter. good for them. the coparenting dream.

[spielzeugkaiser]

You know how much I love the h/c trope of 'Geralt is in sensory overload because of the potions' and with bear Jaskier that one goes both ways 🙏

[twistedappletree]

[thelostgirl21]

Unpopular opinion : I really hope they'll have Joey wear a wig in S4 and S5, to continue to keep his hair longer regardless of his real hair's length, because having Jaskier suddenly go back to his S1 short hairstyle would feel like he would have suddenly regressed as a character, somehow?

I dunno...

It's like I've associated the long hair with a more confident, grown, and mature version of his character, and it would feel odd to suddenly have Jaskier go back to looking like he's that 20 year old kid struggling with finding success in his career, love and acceptance from his friends, and trying to figure out what pleases him in life...

Like, don't get me wrong! Joey's hair looked fantastic during that reading! I'm not saying short hair doesn't suit him!

But Joey physically looked like Joey, or a very "baby version" of Jaskier.

Just like Hugh physically looked like Hugh.

Radovid, in my mind, has those soft, long, wavy reddish-blonde locks.

And 40+ y.o. Jaskier has long silky hair.

If they somehow go "Hey, so in our story Geralt now looks like Liam and, BTW! Jaskier also suddenly has short hair again!" there's a very big risk I'll suddenly be thrown off by the sudden "blast from the past" thing happening...

I mean, it took Jaskier almost 2 decades to outgrow that S1 look! Having him suddenly go back to looking the same as he did from age 20 to his late 30s would feel so bizarre to me, somehow...

Like, he doesn't need to have his hair styled like S2 or S3, but keeping a longer hairstyle on Jaskier as a character would be really nice.

[basims]

We made it. Found our happy ending. Who would have think?