#and have a lot of Ciri feelings to work through

[kuwdora]

Snippet Sunday tagged by @witch-and-her-witcher at some point. I have like 30 WIPs but I'm only allowing myself to work on 5 WIPs this month so I can finish stuff. Theoretically. This is a post-book/game canon Ciri thing that is ultimately inspired by @andordean's Blood Ties because that story is still eating my brain. Nevermind I've never managed to finish my other Ciri fic and I've never written Regis before... but hey, there's a first time for everything. Right?

“Are there any memories in particular that have disturbed you of late?” Regis asks. Ciri shrugs and swirls the remaining wine in her cup. She refills it and nudges the folio towards him. “What’s this?” he asks, carefully pulling the folio into his lap but not opening it. “Memories. Or the promise of them, at least,” Ciri says. “Oh?” Regis asks and turns the folio over. Deliberately not opening it. Ciri props her chin on her shoulder and stares at him, wishing she was a little more drunk, but maybe that was just the grief talking. Regis looks up and meets her gaze, politely looking past her thoughts in that vampire way he could do without reading them. He wouldn’t let himself read her mind. Not unless she asked. She should ask. It would be easier than pirouetting around the pain. But whatever titles she now held, she was still Ciri of Vengerberg who always took action, whether it was wrong or right. She was the daughter of Geralt of Rivia, and a witcheress from the School of the Wolf. She understood how to use her accumulated knowledge to assess a situation and attack. It would be better if she got this feeling off her chest herself.

[queen-witcher]

So I keep thinking about Tissaia with epilepsy. Like she's had it since she was a child, but when she came to Aretuza she was able to slowly get a grasp on it through potions and other magical care, to the point that by her accension, she rarely ever had episodes.

But I think it also fed into her obsession with control. There's nothing quite like a seizure to make a person feel out of control, and she hates the way they make her feel... vulnerable, exposed. If she can just recognize and catalog every symptom and trigger, can figure out the exact amount of water she must drink and the exact amount of wine she's allowed to indulge in and the exact amount of time she has to take her potions once the migraines and auras start, well, she can keep them under control - keep herself under control.

By the time Yennefer enters her life, she hasn't had an episode in well over a century. (And hasn't been witnessed by anyone during, in much, much longer). She can almost pretend she doesn't have them, but that doesn't stop the fact that she sees herself in Yennefer from the very first moment she saw her crooked spine and twisted jaw. And she can't tell which urge is stronger, to shy away from her or hold her closer.

All of this to say, I keep thinking about:

A) a post-sodden where the dimeritium in Tissaia's blood and the illness it leaves her with, leaves her struggling with the delicate grasp she has on her control. I think it adds an extra layer to how she interacts with Yennefer. The desperate yearning paired with the pained distance. The anxious need to feel strong for a powerless Yennefer, despite feeling so weak and out of sorts herself. Especially when Yennefer has always been the one to challenge her careful balance in more ways than one.

And B) a post-alzur's thunder where channeling that much electric current has more of an effect than just whitening Tissaia's hair. Electrical injury has been known to cause neurological symptoms, including potentially triggering seizures, and Tissaia channeled enough current to have been vaporized. She should have been. And maybe her control is what saved her, but not without consequences. I feel like she would have been hiding it for days. The faint trembling and unfocused eyes, the other mages can attribute to exhaustion, both magical and otherwise. But Tissaia knows. She knows what's coming, and what's worse, none of her usual preventatives are working.

I think she has a couple minor episodes before anyone else notices. She's always able to retreat to privacy before anything happens. Though there always seems to be a pair of watchful violet eyes staring after her.

Until one day, she just drops. The other mages, of course, panic because they've never seen Tissaia like this, but all Tissaia registers is Yennefer. Yennefer's warm hand gently turning her to her side. Yennefer's voice as it alternates between low soothing tones and commands to the other mages. Yennefer who sits with Tissaia and becomes her balance and control, when all she feels is chaos.

[annmarcus63]

Coën tells Vesemir that he saw something remotely large flying over the old stronghold to the west. Everyone but Geralt is thrilled. Apparently, they've been waiting for an opportunity like this, a chance to take Ciri with them to fight her very first beast as a witcher trainee. 

Lambert, Cöen, Geralt, Ciri and Yen are getting ready to take off the very next morning when Geralt asks Jaskier if he wants to come too. Jaskier tries to hide his surprise under a nonchalant facade, but he can't fool the witcher. The bard accepts the offer not a second later. It seems that his strategy is working after all, Geralt never asked if he wanted to come on a hunt before. It seems, Jaskier thinks with a lump on his throat, that he was in fact the problem after all. 

It's a short walk to the stronghold. Ciri observes the witchers track the beast, she's a fast learner. Jaskier watches too from an unobtrusive safe distance. Until all goes to hell. A royal archgriffin followed by its mate lands on the field taking everyone by surprise. Someone starts shouting orders, one archgriffin traps Lambert under its claws. It's a complete chaos. Suddenly the earth starts shaking, a roar swipes the air, Jaskier's blood goes cold when he sees a big ugly horned creature bolting from the trees. A chort. The new arrival takes everyone by surprise. Ciri ends up cornered by the chort, she has nowhere to go. Geralt is too far away; Yennefer is helping Lambert and Cöen; Ciri has lost her sword and the beast is about to bolt towards her. He acts without thinking. Nothing can't happen to her, he won't let it, even if it feels like he's running to his death. Geralt won't care, but he will if it's Ciri, he'd blame himself. It'd be Renfri all over again.  He won't let it happen. Jaskier shouts with all his might while grabbing Ciri's sword from the grass where she dropped it. He grabs the sword with both hands and plunges it into the beast's rear. Not used to handling swords, his hands slip through the blade, he feels the skin of his palms opening, like butter under a hot knife, followed by a river of blood. Someone it's shouting his name; he thinks it may be Ciri. The chort roars annoyed and turns to the bleeding bard. 

It happens in an instant. He is thrown through the air; a flash of pain explodes in his chest and grows to a cruel entity. He wishes for death.

 

-

He wakes up with a gasp followed by a groan of pain. It seems he's back at Kaer Morhen.

Not dead, then, he thinks with a hint of remorse. 

Triss is there in an instant. The witchers summoned her to help heal him, apparently, he was (is) in a very horrifying shape. He asks her for Ciri and the others, she says everyone is well, just a few bumps and bruises. Jaskier feels relieved.

"You were dead for a couple of minutes" Jaskier doesn't know what to say so he settles for thanking her for saving him. He has two broken ribs and a few more cracked, breathing is an utterly painful experience, but Triss' concoctions help a little. His hands are bandaged, Triss says they need a lot more healing, but she reassures him that he'll be able to play again. In time, at least. 

"I've never seen Geralt like that" she says suddenly "He- he said he couldn't feel you." Jaskier doesn't reply, he's rather immersed in the movement of her hands changing his chest bandages. 

"I didn't know you two were..." 

"No one knows." Says Jaskier feeling tired, body and soul. 

As if sensing the sadness in Jaskier's heart, Triss adds “He was scared.” 

"He would be fine."

"You're his soulmate, Jaskier. I don't think that he’d be fine.” 

"I have never been his soulmate." The bard flinches at his own bitterness. "I've only been a friend. A traveling companion." He corrects. 

“Jaskier…”

"He was never meant for me. Destiny must have got it all wrong, the mark on Geralt's arm should be Yennefer's not mine." He doesn't know why he's saying that to her. Maybe it’s the shock or it’s the pain, but he wants to tell someone, anyone, about another kind of pain he's been carrying all these years. He is crying, Triss hands him a tissue and smiles in a reassuring way.

Jaskier cries silently with intervals of gasps of pain, while Triss finishes his bandages and hands him a cup of fresh water. Jaskier thanks her in a quiet whisper. 

"I couldn't make him happy anyway" he wipes the tears from his eyes and finds that his hands are shaking "She does. She really does." 

"I never take you for the self-sacrificing type" says Triss holding one of his hands and squeezing. He wants to hug her, but refrains from doing so due to her broken ribs.

"I'm not" he clarifies "I'm just realistic. How could Geralt want someone like me when he has her?" 

After a few seconds of silence she says "You are enough, Jaskier." 

He wants to laugh, to disagree but refrains from it. He's only a bard, after all.

There's a knock at the door. They turn at the same time. It's Geralt, he's holding a bowl of stew in one hand and a single yellow flower on the other, and looking at Jaskier with an expression the bard can't quite decipher. 

Jaskier feels his cheeks blushing. Fucking idiot, he must have heard his pathetic monologue. 

"Can I talk to him?" He says to Triss. She stands and says "Of course." She leaves hurriedly, leaving the two staring at each other. Something heavy lies between them.

This is it, Jaskier thinks, this is where my heart will break for good.

Previous here

Next and final

As promised to dear @youknowwhoiam3490-blog (excited for your positive aggressive reading)

@mordoriscalling @dustbunnyprophet @chispy-rar-v2 @strangerzaiah

@help-help-i-need-an-adultlt

@janjan-the-ninth (not a 20 chapter fic but well…)

[ghostinthelibrarywrites]

A kiss like they're trying to convince the other to love them and/or a kiss in front of someone they hold captive

Yennskier

Here's a little bit of both, set in an alternate timeline where they managed to capture Rience during season 3, episode 1:

“We should probably talk about what happened in Kaer Morhen,” Jaskier says in what he hopes is a casual way.

Yennefer looks at him incredulously. “Does now seem like a good time for this conversation, bardling?”

“Why not?” Jaskier shrugs. “He’s not going anywhere.”

They both turn to look at Rience, who scowls back at them from the chair they’ve bound him to in dimeritium chains. Jaskier can’t help but feel a thrill of vindication at seeing the fire fucker as trussed up and helpless as he was a year ago in Oxenfurt, even as he keeps catching himself rubbing his fingers together anxiously. It helps that Yennefer is standing next to him and Geralt and Ciri are just in the other room with Yarpen.

Rience sneers at Yennefer. “What’s one of Tissaia’s girls doing, working for a witcher?”

Jaskier snorts. Even if they hadn’t already figured out that Rience isn’t the mastermind trying to capture Ciri, that would have given it away. No one with any sense would think Yennefer a lackey. Leaning closer to Yennefer, he says, “We really should talk about this.”

“About what?” She sighs, clearly realizing she’s not going to be able to evade this. “A lot happened in Kaer Morhen. Do you want to talk about Voleth Meir? All the money you still owe Ciri after all the times she trounced you at cards?”

“She did not…” Jaskier draws himself up, realizes he’s being distracted, and lets out a huff. “About our last night there.”

Yennefer doesn’t visibly react, but there’s a pointedness in the way she turns back to Rience. “Who’s your puppetmaster?”

Rience bares his teeth at her. “I’m no one’s—”

“I don’t believe for a second that you’re the one calling the shots. You’re a one trick pony, aren’t you? You can harness fire, but not much else. That portal wasn’t yours.”

“I just can’t help but notice that you’re acting a bit… off,” Jaskier says carefully, because he and Yennefer may be friends now, but he still doesn’t put it past her to curse his bollocks off.

Yennefer closes her eyes. “Did you learn this interrogation technique from Phillipa?”

“Gods, no.” Jaskier barks out a laugh. “Phillipa wouldn’t let me anywhere near an interrogation.”

“I suppose that’s why Redania is still standing.”

“See? That was almost mean. That was the first mean thing you’ve said to me in three days, and it wasn’t even in your top ten best jabs! Something is clearly amiss. Are you a doppler? Are you dying? Did you hit your head in the skirmish yesterday? Melitele, are you actually plotting my demise? Is this your way of trying to lure me into a false sense of security? Because it isn’t working, Yennefer.”

“If you want him dead, you can just let me out of these chains.” Rience snaps his fingers menacingly and Jaskier can’t help but step back, even though no flames appear.

Yennefer throws out a hand and Rience’s chair flies backward, slamming against the wall and capsizing. He yelps as his head bounces off the ground and lies there, groaning.

“Yenn?” Geralt calls from the next room. “Jaskier?”

“We’re fine!” Lowering her voice, Yennefer hisses, “This isn’t the time.”

“Well, it has to be the time, because you keep avoiding me. Is this about what happened between us? Because you didn’t seem to have any regrets the next morning? In fact, you asked…” He trails off, pieces starting to slide into place.

“I asked you to come with me, Geralt, and Ciri,” she says through gritted teeth. “And you said no. Years of you popping up at the most inconvenient times, bardling, and the one time I want you to stay, you left.”

“But…” Jaskier opens and closes his mouth, at a loss for words. When he recovers his wits, all he can squeak is, “I told you I was needed at Oxenfurt.”

“Bullshit. You told me yourself that the Sandpiper organization would run just fine without you. The only thing you did going back to Oxenfurt was put yourself in Phillipa and Dijkstra’s sights.”

“Well, I’m sorry I didn’t want to come with you just to watch you and Geralt play house while I was just there so you could keep me out of trouble.”

It’s her turn to look taken aback. “What?”

“You said so yourself, you wanted me to come with you so I wouldn’t get myself killed in Oxenfurt. You, Geralt, and Ciri are a family, bound by destiny. I’m not—” He’s getting too close to all the things he doesn’t want to say to her, so he looks away. “I’m happy to play the fun Uncle Jaskier whenever you need me to. But the thing about fun uncles is they show up, let you win at cards a few times, and then they leave before the joke gets old.”

Yennefer doesn’t look exasperated anymore; she just looks sad. That’s somehow worse. “It took Geralt months before he would talk to me about anything but the weather, Ciri’s training, or telling me to duck because someone was trying to stab me. I have never once slept under the same roof as him and Ciri, even when we barely had the coin to afford one lodging, never mind two. It took until the winter before he let me inside to break bread with them. The shadow of what I did hung over us every day. We weren’t playing house, we were on the run, and you should have fucking been there.”

“Yenn—”

She talks over him. “You were the only person who could look at me when we were at Kaer Morhen. I asked you to come with us because I didn’t want to be alone.”

“Why didn’t you just say that?” he whispers.

Her jaw clenches stubbornly, but she doesn’t answer.

Carefully, he reaches out to take her by the wrist, tugging her closer. “Watching the three of you leave Kaer Morhen was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. If I had known you really wanted me there, I would have followed you in a heartbeat.”

Her lips twitch into a half-smile. “Did you really think I was asking you to come just to be nice?”

“Foolish, I know.” He lets out a shaky breath. “I’ll stay this time.”

“What about the Sandpiper?”

“Vespula does most of the Sandpipering these days. I’m being watched too closely by the RSS.” Jaskier brings her hand to his lips. “I’m sorry if I hurt you.”

Yennefer looks like she wants to deny it, because gods forbid she or Geralt admit to being people with feelings, but she nods. “I’m sorry if I’ve been too kind to you. It won’t happen again.”

“Thank the gods. It made my skin crawl.” He leans down to rest their foreheads together. “Let me stay, Yenn.”

She doesn’t answer, but lifts her face so that he can close the gap between them and kiss her. It’s a tentative thing, not like the desperate, hungry kisses they exchanged on their last night in Kaer Morhen, as weeks of longing—well, probably years of longing, if Jaskier is being honest with himself—bubbled to the surface. There will be time for those later, once they’ve figured out who Rience is working for and ensured that Ciri is safe.

Across the room, there’s a noise of disgust. “If you’re going to make me watch this, I’d rather you just gouge my—”

Yennefer throws her hand out, not pulling her lips away from Jaskier’s. There’s a thud, a yelp, then silence.

“Don’t kill him yet,” Jaskier says, breaking the kiss to press his lips against her throat. “We haven’t gotten any answers out of him.”

“And whose fault is that?”

“Geralt’s, the easily distractible fucker. He’s off chattering away with Yarpen while we do all the hard work.”

Yennefer rolls her eyes and mutters something that’s undoubtedly insulting under her breath, but she kisses Jaskier again, so that’s alright.

***

Kiss prompts

Tag list: @kueble @mollymawkwrites @feral-jaskier @geraltrogerericduhautebellegarde @dawnofbards @thisislisa @tsukiwolf42 @mosaicscale @rockysstupidity @fontegagrilledcheese @kuripon @help-i-need-a-cool-username @julek @flowercrown-bard @eveljerome @ladykardasi (sorry, it wouldn't let me tag your Witcher blog)

[artistsfuneral]

p.1 here

Jaskier sighs (he feels like he's doing that a lot lately) and carefully redirects the edge of the silver sword away from his throat. "Geralt, your daughter sends me," technically Ciri is their daughter but the look Geralt sends him shows that the witcher is not in the right mindset to hear about the group project that is Ciri. He meets the witcher's piercing eyes and does his best to convey the seriousness of the situation but he has no idea if it works or if it makes him look like an absolute madman.

He cards his hands through his hair, annoyed by how short it is as he tries to find the right words. He's been pretty much straightforward so far and suddenly taking a step back would probably look really suspicious. Jaskier thinks back to all the other times he's managed to convince Geralt about the truth and honestly it feels like most of it has been sheer dumb luck. "This is not something I would ever joke about. Gods, I wish there was a way I could somehow prove that I'm telling the truth." Maybe it's the desperation in his voice, maybe it's Geralt's witcher senses that let him know the bard in front of him is not lying, (or maybe it's that tiny part hidden deep inside of Geralt's mind that always wanted a family) but whatever it is it softens the witcher just enough for him to resheath his sword and nod his head towards the door. "Outside. Now!"

Jaskier stumbles from his seat, picks up his lute (the one his mother gifted him when he left for Oxenfurt, the one he's played for years and years, the one that will be smashed to pieces in about a day from now) and follows Geralt out the door. Roach is waiting for them outside and a wide smile spreads across the bard's face as he gently greets his dear friend. Roach bumps their heads together as if she knows and if Jaskier is a bit choked up about it he doesn't try hard to hide it. Damn unsuspiciousness, he missed her!

The witcher looks at him with an expression he can't really pinpoint.

[dftea]

Follow me, Eurydice

Geralt is auctioned but Jaskier is there - hurt/comfort, geraskier/geraskefer/family of destiny

[read on ao3]

Geralt jolts awake, the tingle of magic itching at his skin. He is upright, barely, leaning against a cold pillar of stone with his wrists chained around it.

Around him, through a shimmering shield, he can hear a crowd of murmuring shadows, echoing strangely in the cavern surrounding him.

He reaches for the memory of how he came to be here, but it’s blurred in a thick fog, part magical and part related to the clot of blood he feels tugging at his hair. His bad leg is throbbing in protest, and he has a dozen half-healed injuries that speak of an intense and bloody fight.

The shield abruptly falls, and the cavern hushes, but it is still too bright, too loud. He doesn't remember taking a potion but he feels sensitive, disorientated.

“Who will start the bidding at one thousand crowns?”

Geralt thought the underground auction house was merely a rumour, but he should’ve known better than to doubt a story that spread so far and wide.

If Jaskier has taught him anything…

Jaskier.

Where is his bard? 

The memories hit him sharply - the ambush on the road, the sheer numbers of them, telling Jaskier to leave him and not believing for a moment that he actually would.

Did he run for his life, like Geralt demanded? Was he another lot in this perverse auction? Or was he lying dead in the road, abandoned by the auctioneer’s mercenaries as not worth the effort?

He tries to look around, but the lights are blinding and he cannot get his bearings. The auctioneer is taking bids, but Geralt has lost track of how much these cretins think he’s worth. Of how much they think Ciri's location is worth.

He will die first, of that he is certain. A slow and painful death, but he endured the Trials as a mere human child - he can do this for his daughter, for his family.

If Jaskier is gone, it will make it easier to die.

“Who will give me–”

“Fifty thousand crowns.”

The voice is loud and resonant, cutting straight through the muttering and excitement - and Geralt would know that voice anywhere.

He’s going to kill him for this - after he's finished crushing him to his chest like a drowning man.

At least he’s alive to pull this stupid stunt.

Geralt tries to follow the sound, but he can only make out the silhouette of a ridiculous hat adorned with long feathers - the master bard is putting on a show for the crowned heads of the Continent, for the Emperor who hungers for his prize.

The auctioneer is momentarily stunned, not expecting such an escalation in the bidding, but he smoothly recovers.

“In coin, you understand, sir. The coin in your possession, tonight.”

“Oh, I am good for it,” Jaskier says, confidently, and Geralt doesn’t need to see him to know that he is giving the eye to every one of the competition. Impressing upon them the degree of their stupidity if they failed to account for him.

Geralt could kiss him. And then lightly shake him for a fool, for robbing whichever bank gave up that kind of money.

“Fifty-two thousand,” another voice calls - a mage, if Geralt isn’t mistaken, but he cannot place which one. Of course, the nobility hadn’t come themselves - it’s the surviving court mages and spymasters who are playing this game.

“Sixty thousand,” Jaskier says, easily.

Another silence, the soft jingling of coins in pouches. Trying to scrape together something to match that outrageous bid.

“Sixty-one?” comes a tentative venture, even as a hissed whisper tells the man to wait.

Jaskier scoffs. “Sixty-five.”

Geralt senses the defeat, the quick calculations regarding potential alliances - all dismissed. They have the money back in the palaces and vaults, but not here in this cavern, not tonight.

“Going once… going twice…”

Geralt feels the surging anger, the crackling of undischarged chaos - and whatever is holding it all at bay. An ancient dimeritium mine, perhaps.

The mages could probably break through its effects if they worked together - but they won’t, and they can’t burn their bridges to this place and its valuable treasures.

“Sold, to the Viscount de Lettenhove. If you will just bring your coffer, sir.”

The solid thud of a wooden chest hits a slab of rock, and Geralt hears the counting commence, by magic and by hand.

If he listens carefully, he can hear Jaskier humming, the gentle strumming of his lute. He vaguely recognises the song, he thinks, and that is likely the point. Jaskier is reminding him that he’s near, that he’s still able to breathe, to play. 

“It is all verified genuine,” the auctioneer declares, clearly a little surprised. “You may remove the lot now.”

“And the auction house guarantee?” Jaskier says, a little sharply. 

The auctioneer sighs, before reciting the words dully. “Not for ten years may the same lot pass through this house, dead or alive.”

“Quite right,” Jaskier says, and he’s clearly intimidating the other bidders again, heedless of their relative power.

The wind don’t cower to powerful men.

The bindings release, and it takes everything Geralt has not to collapse to the ground. Jaskier may be strong, but he can’t carry him out of there. They cannot afford to show any weakness to these predators and their masters.

The auction guards clear a path between him and his new owner, who he still can’t see all that clearly. Is he well? Favouring injuries? Everything within him longs to know.

Someone laughs in the crowd. “He’ll fall before you’re free, little bard. And then we’ll have him.”

Suddenly, Geralt feels something descend over him, very like a cloak. The light and sound is muffled again, and the crowd roars as if deprived of a spectacle.

“The lot will be concealed for ten minutes only,” the auctioneer intones. “After that, the auction will end and all participants may depart.”

Jaskier, apparently unperturbed, bows to his audience - and turns his back on Geralt. And he walks away, playing the same tune again and humming, not even glancing back over his shoulder.

Geralt stumbles after, concentrating on keeping his feet under him. He thinks it must have been some time since he was rested and fed, because his body would usually tolerate magic and deprivation better than this.

The tunnel is narrow ahead, and he bumps against the walls occasionally, keeping his eyes fixed on Jaskier. The bard is singing now, and Geralt finally recognises the Song of the Seven. Because Jaskier cannot help but prod the lions in their dens.

Every step feels like an eternity, but Jaskier doesn't speak to him, doesn’t run - he just swaggers onward, playing and singing as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

At first, he thinks he imagines the faint glow of light ahead, but as it grows, he recognises the silvery fall of moonlight. They are nearing the end, their escape. 

He hopes Jaskier has a plan, because he isn’t sure he could fight a kitten right now.

Jaskier steps out into the full night, but still does not turn. He plays a few more notes, as Geralt doggedly follows, step after agonising step until he is just behind the bard.

A roar of sound rushes up the tunnel behind them, and Geralt feels the cloak of magic fall away. 

Jaskier finally turns, his face lighting up as he sees Geralt, naked relief on his face and infusing his scent. 

He steps forward, an embrace and a necessary intervention to stop Geralt falling to his knees.

Geralt hears the urgent whisper - “Yen, I have him.” - before the telltale light of a portal opens before them, lilacs and gooseberries spilling out into the clear night.

Jaskier drags him forward, all but carrying him, and Geralt feels Yen’s lips brush his cheek with the briefest touch.

But it does not stop there - another portal, and another, and yet another, each carrying a different scent and another dizzying, nauseating blow to Geralt’s self-control.

Finally, he stumbles into a room that radiates safety, Jaskier hauling him over to a bed he calls his own.

“--barely conscious, could hardly–”

“--risk with potions. I would need–”

“--promised she’ll be back before I could miss her, and she always–”

The fragments wash over him, and he allows his eyes to close.

When he opens them again, he finds himself propped up in bed, with Jaskier’s chest for a pillow and Ciri’s hands warming his, as she sleeps in the chair. Yennefer is busying herself by the table with Vesemir, sorting through various ingredients and tinctures, quietly debating what will and won’t work for whatever ails him.

A gentle kiss brushes against his ear. “Welcome back,” Jaskier murmurs.

His voice draws Yennefer and Vesemir’s attention away from their alchemy, and Ciri stirs at their movements. Geralt feels minutely scrutinised and overwhelmingly loved, which he doesn’t quite know what to do with.

“How…?” he rasps.

“Drink first,” Yennefer says, producing first water and then a series of potions in consultation with Vesemir, before he leaves to prepare…breakfast? Geralt has no idea what hour it is, what meal he should eat, or even what day or month.

The potions all taste awful, but he can feel them working within him, knitting him back together from the inside. Still, Yennefer hovers close by, sitting on the edge of the bed to watch over him.

Jaskier is back to humming, rocking him very gently, and Geralt can smell the stale fear, exhaustion, and guilt on his clothes.

He means to tell him that he did the right thing in running, that he was unbelievably stupid to come and rescue him, and that he’s glad to be home.

Instead, he says, “Sixty five thousand crowns.”

“We actually had sixty-seven,” Ciri pipes up, excitable in a way only a child could be when discussing the budget of a small kingdom. “So I think you were a bargain, really.”

“How?” he says, again, because he doesn’t know how to ask why?

“Oh, this and that,” Jaskier says, evasively, as if this were the kind of spare change one found in the bottom of a pack.

“I sold four manor houses,” Yennefer said, rolling her eyes at Jaskier, which slightly dulled the blow of four manor houses. “And I called in some favours of a financial nature.”

“Yen…” he says, though it comes out rough, his body fighting fatigue and foundering with it.

Her hand strokes over his arm, catching on a bandage, and he belatedly realises he’s bare-chested save for bandages. A great many bandages.

“Please. What need have I for manor houses when I have a winter holiday home in the mountains?” She gestures to the room, which Geralt’s brain sluggishly informs him is his bedroom at Kaer Morhen. Their bedroom.

“But Jaskier…” Ciri begins, then trails off. 

Geralt can almost feel the intensity of the look Jaskier is shooting her from beside his ear, and he tries to turn his body to catch sight of his bard’s face. 

But he really is too tired even for that small movement, and instead submits to drinking more water and some kind of bone broth that uncomfortably reminds him of recovering from the Trials.

“I think they kept you in some kind of cursed sleep for the past two weeks,” Yennefer says, with distaste. “Not a proper stasis, which is why your body has barely healed and you’ve lost so much strength - amateurs.”

That’s why it feels as if Jaskier is holding him up, why that familiar embrace feels so much more like support.

That, and the sum of sixty five thousand crowns smothering him.

“He’s brooding,” Yennefer teases, fondly, directing the remark over Geralt’s shoulder. “You’ll have to tell him.”

“When he’s better,” Jaskier says, firmly, trying to shut down the conversation again. 

But that comment only worries Geralt more - what can’t he be told now, in his present state? Is he really so frail, or is Jaskier’s secret so terrible as to destroy him?

“He looks pretty upset now,” Ciri says, dubiously.

Jaskier sighs deeply, knowing when he’s outnumbered. 

“I sold my title,” he says, blandly, as if talking about some cheap trinket. “The title, the holdings, my place in the succession for the Earldom. It’s not like I was doing anything with them anyway.”

Geralt knows very little about Jaskier’s noble life, but he knows enough to see that this is not some trivial thing. A noble title is currency, power and privilege. “I’m sorry, Jask.”

“Oh, really, Ferrant will be a much better Earl. Don’t get all emotional on me again.”

Geralt still can’t see Jaskier’s face, but he can see Yennefer and Ciri well enough. He’s missing something here.

“That…doesn’t add up,” he says, quietly. Even with the addition of the manor houses, he doesn't see how a minor Earldom in Redania could raise that kind of capital.

A quieter, more subdued sigh. “And Valdo Marx paid an extortionate sum for me never to play in a tournament or court again.”

Geralt cannot help his involuntary gasp, searching Yennefer and Ciri’s faces for the truth of it.

“You didn't.”

“Geralt, I don’t care about accolades half as much as Valdo does. I haven't entered a tournament in three years. No court will pay me after I just swiped you out from under their noses.”

“We got what we wanted,” Yennefer says, softly, her eyes boring into his to make him understand.

“And we wanted what we got,” Jaskier adds, quietly, pressing another kiss to Geralt’s ear and drawing his arms tighter around him.

“It’s too much,” Geralt whispers, brokenly. “I’m not–”

“If you dare say you’re not worth it,” Ciri says, sharply, “I’ll remind you of all the times you've told me never to say that or to even think it.”

They close in around him then, Yennefer and Ciri enfolding him in their arms, as Jaskier continues to hold him. His family, a fortress greater than any built of stone or silver.

He feels his breath hitch in his chest, even if the tears that should fall deserted him long ago. 

“How did you know…I was there?” 

“The auction house broadcast their finds–,” Yennefer begins, but Geralt shakes his head, trying to find the right words.

“After, with the spell?” He turns his head slightly towards Jaskier. “You knew I was there.”

To his surprise, Jaskier huffs out a laugh. “I’m supposed to say something grand here about true love and destiny and that sort of thing. But the truth is that I could hear it. I was playing so I could hear the echoes in the cavern - I knew there was a solid something blocking the sound behind me and I just hoped it was you.”

“That is appallingly clever, bard,” Yennefer says, clearly impressed.

“That was scarily complimentary, witch.”

“I love you. All of you.”

It takes him a moment to realise that he’s the one who’s spoken, but then they fold themselves around him again, closer. And he feels that perhaps he could be worthy of it.

[limerental]

here, have a half-finished witcher americana retelling I've been sitting on for years now. I didn't quite have the gusto to go everywhere I wanted with it but here she is. I got in my yenralt & ciri feelings mostly :')

It did not go like this:

Yennefer was born the unfortunate eldest daughter of a local farmer of dairy goats and hogs, the sort of farm built into a gully that boiled up with mud and shit when it rained. Born all twisted up in the womb, her spine curved in a permanent hunch. 

Some devil got to her mama, her daddy always said, leaning on a fencepost, hard-eyed and jeering as he spit tobacco into the dust.

Some devil had likely looked a lot like the young man her mama fancied just a few months before she was married quick to her daddy.

The devil long vanished off to the city. 

Yennefer was no good for farm work, but she could do well enough bussing tables at the diner off the main road. She worked there more hours than not for less than scraps, but she did her work and ducked her head and kept mostly quiet about it. If she was just patient enough and careful, she could find her way out of there in time.

Yennefer kept a secret. 

She'd been born with witchcraft hidden in her crooked body, the sort that ran in rich veins through the land itself. The kind that sang in the creek-carved ravines and thrummed through the gnarled roots and swaying branches of the forest. 

She could call the animals to her and find anything lost and drive out the snakes from the chicken coop with a word, and she'd heard stories about things like that all her life so wasn't surprised by the possibility at all. Except for the fact that no one had ever taught her those things, and nobody knew she could do it.

In only a few short months she'd come into the full depth of her magic and the Witch would come for her and changed her life for good.

Before that, she met Geralt.

Yennefer'd long given up fantasies of being spirited away, thinking about strangers' lives with the kind of detached daydreaming of a girl who did dull work for ceaseless hours. 

She wondered who this man was, old enough to have seen the war but younger than her daddy, who had been exempt from the draft on grounds of being a farmer. Which was good fortune, because he would have made a bloodthirsty soldier.

Geralt was a simple man who worked in travelling pest control. His beat up company van coughed over the miles, tools of the trade rattling in the back, big cartoon rat grinning evilly painted across the side. 

Geralt kept a secret.

He knew every trick and gimmick to eliminate a rodent problem, could give his usual spiel about baiting and trapping to any fellow who asked, but had never employed anything that mundane even once. The pests he controlled and catalogued tended to be bigger and meaner and not as pretty splashed over the panels of a van.

Monsters were real, and he knew them by name. Kept tabs on the quiet ones and put down the loud and messy ones.

 Always respectfully, that is.

 Most of them weren't evil, just creatures as old as the land or older, the growing civilizations on this Continent encroaching more and more on the wild places they had once owned.

The war was many years over, and they said the future was bright. The future was now. Geralt didn't know by what metric they measured those things, because to him the world looked the same as always. 

He'd done pest control enlisted in the war too, chasing the sort of monsters that paled in their wretched cruelty in comparison to men. Most of the things he sought out were just trying to survive with shrinking odds in a world rapidly forgetting them.

Geralt got that. 

Got it in ways rural poor America did, living the same rusted out life they always had, going on in the usual quaint and tragic ways.

Yennefer didn't quite get it yet, but she was going to.

She poured burnt coffee for the grey-haired  stranger in the far booth, a typical dusty midday silence settled over the diner. The slanted cartoon eyes of the rat on his sepia-toned van stared at her from where it was parked beside the pumps. 

Places in towns this small wore many faces, general store, filling station, and diner in one. The main road was a common route north, and Yennefer liked to wonder where passersby were going, what lives they led. Imagine what faces they hid from the world, same as her. 

Geralt had a job out this way with a few hours left to drive, hoping the company van didn't shit the bed again before he made it there, and he watched the waitress' hands shake as she poured him his coffee. Crooked through the shoulders, she limped when she walked and seemed to have trouble with the weight of the full carafe. Geralt smiled at her, an ugly, little smile on a face unused to such gestures, but the girl smiled back. He hoped they paid her fair. She had nice eyes, sharp and a cool violet.

Yennefer brought him a slice of apple pie and wondered where the stranger'd got his scars. He had a number of them on his face and hands alone, pink puckers and angry mauve ridges and was sure to have more hidden by his dark coveralls. Probably the war. If it had been the other waitress working, the chatty one, she would have asked, mister, did you get those in the war, must have gotten half blown to hell, but Yennefer didn't ask.

She smoothed her hands down the front of her starched apron and got back to work filling salt shakers, and neither spoke a word to the other.

Geralt didn't make much of a living on the road, but he lived simple and didn't need much anyhow. The pie was an extravagance, tart and sweet. The girl had working hands, calloused. He thought of saying something to her, making conversation, but he didn't. There was the sound of flies humming against the dust-streaked glass, the occasional rumble of traffic on the road, the quiet noise of his fork on chipped china.

He didn't stick around to watch his dollar tip fluster Yennefer's cheeks red. Didn't look back at all. If he had, he would have seen her pause in the screen door to watch him drive off, wondering about what sort of work he did in a strange vehicle like that, what sort of man he was. 

The van's ignition choked and then caught. He had some miles to go.

*

Neither left a lasting impression on the other at that first unremarkable meeting, but when Yennefer next saw him two decades on, she knew him at once in the way that witches always know those sorts of things. 

How fascinating it was to see that the stranger looked exactly the same despite the years. Same greyed hair, same dour expression, probably same pale orange van parked at the edge of the festival grounds. Witchers didn't age the same as men, after all, and that's the sort of thing she saw he was. Perilously slow heartbeat, calculating look in his newspaper yellow eyes, scars curved by talon and tooth and not shrapnel.

Geralt had known what she was by her description, whispered low and reverant like something holy, that this woman was no ordinary medic. Knew before he parted the canvas flap of a shabby tent in some muddy, over-trodden field and stepped into an opulent throne room, the stone walls hung with erotic tapestries, the high ceiling shimmering with a cloud of stars. 

The witch herself sprawled perfectly naked on a high-backed throne with a seat of red velvet. Alone, she looked on in detached interest, still as a statue, a haughty and omnipotent sentinel. Geralt thought her ethereal, beautiful, enthralling. 

Trouble.

In truth, Yennefer was wretchedly hungover after a riotous orgy the night before and could avoid the throbbing of her temples if only she kept perfectly still.

It was by her eyes, shrewd and violet, that, with a jolt of surprise up his spine, Geralt recognized her as the crooked waitress from the diner many years past.

There'd always been witches hidden behind any great power, old world or new. King Arthur ruled by the guiding hand of the wizard Merlin and JFK by a blonde starlet in a snow white dress, though none would ever have taken the latter for a sorceress.

How tiresome it was, thought Yennefer, how empty, how thankless.

Geralt sighed and adjusted his hold on the unconscious Dandelion's thighs, hitching his friend higher across his back as he wheezed into Geralt's ear. Would have rather gone elsewhere. Would have rather the idiot had not offended the ancient, moth-winged creature Geralt had come to reason with into making less noise.

But there was no talking sense into Dandelion. Damn lucky the creature the locals here called Mothman hadn't thought to curse him with something more severe than whatever ailed him. 

It didn't take kindly to flirting.

Dandelion was a poet and a philanderer and a starchild and a balladeer and a free spirit and a scholar and a conscientious objecter and a right pain in Geralt's ass, except that he was also good to talk to and steadfastly humorous even all these years on and the sort of friend who remembered little details like your brand of cigarettes or your favorite candy, who Geralt liked even for his numerous flaws because Geralt liked most people truly and was a good man and loved deeply and loved consistently with his whole damn too-big heart.

"A friend?" asked Yennefer and Geralt shrugged.

What happened next happened the way it always did in every version of the story.

Two broken, fragile-hearted people and something close to tenderness.

*

It didn't happen like this:

Somebody had a pest problem, a wealthy widow with a pretty young daughter. Somebody'd cursed a poor son of a bitch into beastly form. Said he roamed the hills howling by night and walked the streets a man by day. 

The curse broke in the usual way, just as Geralt said. The daughter's kiss on a full moon. True love and all. Happily ever after.

Except a new war broke and in time, it widowed the daughter too and her poor heart couldn't take the grief, and then the market turned sour and the wealthy widow lost her fortune and hung herself in the pantry. Geralt got a letter naming him next of kin by some questionably legitimate legal twist of fate and then, he sighed deep and resigned and drove north to pick up the girl.

It wasn't so unusual in his line of work, strange orphans scattered all over like grisly flotsam. But he didn't usually see to raising them. He'd never had a father besides the old man, and he'd never thought much of having his own children. 

He couldn't know the true dark web of conspiracy around her and would never know the whole of it. The sort of man her daddy was to bear a curse like that in the first place. The old and intricate magicks, bound up in blood and circumstance. The sort of woman young Ciri would be.

Even if he'd known, Geralt would have drove to get her even so. He found the girl buck-toothed and scrawny and lugging a too heavy briefcase down the slumped front stoop of the elderly neighbor who'd been putting her up. Hair the pale color of woodsmoke, eyes like her mama, green as a copper kettle.

And just like her mama, young Ciri had some whisper of something else in her. Something carried over from older lands than this and bolstered by the ancient things here, passed on like the detritus of trauma gained generation to generation. Something tainted and bigger than he had the know-how to suss out.

Geralt sat down and fumblingly wrote a letter.

*

Meanwhile, young Ciri passed an idyllic summer and cold as tits winter on the isolated Morhen ranch in the rural mountains. She'd never worked a farm before and never even seen a farm animal up close, especially not a ranch like that one which was straight out of some pastoral fantasy. 

A painted red barn and swaying, golden fields and a willow tree with a swing beside a white farmhouse on the ridgeline and a little cliche collection of animals. A black and white cow and a billy goat and a pair of checkered chickens and an old, whiskered horse and a little, scrappy dog. 

Keeping up appearances, old Vesemir said and made her go muck out the pen. She wished they'd keep up appearances with mucking too and when she said that, the old man's eyes bugged out his head and Uncle Eskel wheeze-laughed folded over smacking his knees. 

But the others didn't come until later into fall when the harvest needed brought in. For many long, humid, dust mote days of summer, it was just Ciri and her new, mysterious guardian and the old man who trundled on his tractor with a pipe dangling from his lip, mowing grass and cussing when the tires dipped into a whistlepig hole.

Most days, Ciri was expected up early to feed and muck and clean, which she did with a healthy amount of complaining. Her little pink hands sloughed red with oozing blisters, and Geralt held them in his rough palms to apply salve, feeling like he wished he could give this girl something more, something grander, but this was what they had, this was what he knew.

But Ciri liked the idea of it, her hands going rough and calloused and big like his, her body going hard and lean. She wondered about his scars and his lined face and how strong he was when he lifted her up in his arms.

The lightning bugs came out over the fields each night, so numerous that she could cry over it, and Geralt taught her how not to be afraid when catching them cupped in her hands, kneeling before her with the flickering light held out like a solemn offering. 

He prayed it would be enough, the small things he could give her, but Ciri had never known anything bigger. Her daddy sitting on the creaking edge of her bed in the attic to tell her a bedtime story. One with the true monsters and evils smoothed out into a fairytale. 

Geralt told her many stories. Long ago, there were elves and giants and wizards and queens and all of them tangled up together in mysterious and elaborate ways. Ciri reminded him about the knights, and he said, ah yes, the knights, and told her about the quests and the riddles and the labyrinths and the dragons. Ciri liked the dragons best. And the swords that slayed them.

When she asked about his own monsters, he said only that there were things in this land older than all of them.

Sometimes the land itself resisted occupation.

And if she was ever on a dirt road along a field of corn or alfalfa at night, never stray in, no matter what beckoned. And if the screams of the coyotes took on a different pitch, don't go looking. And if the cicadas and the crickets went silent all at once and the woods gathered a hush, run home and run fast and don't glance behind your shoulder.

She brandished a pitchfork out in the animal pen, playing at killing beasts, and Geralt watched from the front porch of the farmhouse wishing he could make it all true for her. Heroes and legends and noble truths.

Instead, he whispered a prayer to the wind rattling through the corn fields and held tight as he could to her little, calloused hand.

*

It all went more or less the same in the end.

*

"And that's it!" says Ciri, waggling her fingers in a dramatic flourish. "Well, it didn't happen like that." She keeps her voice low and steady in the manner of storytelling, perched up on a fence rail,  hands dangling between her legs. "Well, it all did happen. But not like that. Not in those places at that time."

The farm boy she is speaking to looks at her with big eyes, dumb as a newborn lamb. He doesn't know where this America is or half of the words she uses. 

Ciri yawns. She doesn't think she'll tell that version again. Or else be choosier with her audience. The sky has started to go red with fading light, and the bats loose themselves from the eaves of the barn to take wing over the fields.

"Don't you have evening chores to do, boy?" she asks, and the boy startles as though awakening from a dream. "Those sheep won't feed themselves."

Later, when his mama cuffs him over the head for his tardiness, he will not be able to explain the reason for the dawdling. He remembers the dark silhouette of a stranger on the border of the fenceline and a peculiar sort of hollow sadness.

In all the darkest and strangest days of his life afterward, his thoughts will return sometimes to that shape in the cradle of dusk.

 And one night when his own young, sleepless daughter asks to hear a story, he will close his eyes and draw a breath and tell her one.

[hanzajesthanza]

So I watch videos about games to vet them before buying them cause I don't want to spend time and money on something I dislike or disagree with and came to the conclusion that I would like the Witcher 3. However when I tried playing it initially I was stuck on who Geralt was and not who other people said he was so I set the game aside and read all the books expect season of storms (I knew it came out after the game) because I figured it would help me play the game. I love reading so this wasn't a problem and I love the books and am now making my way through the game.

What I have to say is that I do not understand how someone could get the maximum amount of Witcher experience from the game alone. Geralt learns and changes in the books and you need to know him and his companions to make that games make sense.

What are your thoughts on this cause I have a friend who loves the games but hasn't read the books and yes I have told her to read them for her own benefit.

what i've found is that it really depends on the individual, what they define "the witcher experience." for some people, that's only going to be the games, for others, it will be the books first, then games, and for others still it will be just the books, and so on. i've been all three of the above, and there's even more, for instance, people who want to consume every single media that gets produced with the "witcher" name, because... witcher!

the games trilogy stands by itself as its own cycle of storytelling, apart from the books, so i can understand how some fans feel that the books aren't needed to have a "full" experience. i think even xletalis expressed this in one of his videos (i used to watch them way back when), where he said that he felt "satisfied" or "complete" after playing the games, so he didn't feel any need to read the books.

it's also up to the individual on whether or not the books will help or hinder their game experience. some context is helpful, but if you focus too much on the books while playing the games, it begins to detract from the games experience (at least, it did for me).

i really couldn't go back to witcher 3 the same way i did after i read the books, because the thing i enjoyed the most in witcher 3, and which also took up a lot of the time—riding around the map on roach—had become depressing and dull. whereas when i first played the game, it was like freedom for geralt to ride with swords on his back, doing witcher things, when i came back to it after reading, all i could think about was how alone geralt was, riding alone, with no one to talk to, no one to fill the silence. i kept thinking about the hanza's shallow graves... i missed dandelion with his banter and his lute... and i felt the weight of the swords, the desperation and frustration of losing ciri...

and this made me realize that between different medias, there are different priorities for the audience.

in the books, it's the dialogue, the characters, in short: the writing, which is the focus. and this writing is not always "fun" to engage with. yes, it's enjoyable to read, but is often about really heavy topics or feelings, bringing to light some unsavory truths, bringing you to strong emotions. and it's a dialogue with the author, whose tendencies and ideas about the canon i'm trying to figure out as i go. and the witcher largely focuses on the suffering of its characters, and though they retain their hope, their lives are not exactly power fantasies or figures i'd like to live vicariously through.

for instance, geralt as a witcher in witcher 3 feels powerful and cool, but in the books, though he has badass moments, in the storytelling it's exactly the opposite. his "witcher's work" is quite literally just his day job, one he doesn't really enjoy but has to do because otherwise he'll starve, and which often brings him to dark places and fills him with regrets and doubts.

witchering in the books is not presented as something fun and game-like, and this difference in approach makes it difficult to transition back into playing a game for enjoyment. the books, though they depict violence, are really anti-violence and usually (usually, although it's very satisfying sometimes) depict killing as a brutal necessity and not something to aspire to. ciri's story as she struggles with revenge is really best encompassing this, but it's also present in geralt's storyline.

another example is that of regis, as when i first played blood and wine i thought he and dettlaff storming dun tynne was totally badass, but after i read the books, it felt... bad. i saw him as having an incredibly complex relationship with violence and bloodshed, and self-defining as a coward... (blood and wine, though it acknowledged his sobriety, had him break it again and didn't really take the time to explore the effects of this). it didn't feel like it aligned with his character motivations and conflicts from the books.

that was how it was for me playing from a books perspective. but from a games perspective, it's different.

though there are many ways people interact with video games, and i'm not knocking witcher 3's storytelling or saying that you can't engage with video games as stories, i'm only speaking from how i personally engage with video games: i like to maximize the "fun" out of them, the interactive play element.

unlike in a book, i'm often not looking for long and drawn-out philosophical discussions, but witty exchanges or great one-liners. i want cool fights and interesting questlines that lead me somewhere as a player. storytelling is more cause-and-effect than contemplative narrative. and witcher 3 does everything about a video game really well, it's very fun to play.

when i first played witcher 3, riding on horseback with a silver sword as bright as a lightning bolt is all i ever wanted. then after i read the books, i came from this area where the witcher-ing reality was purposefully questioned. it wasn't just like "yooo, endrega nest! blow this shit up!" it was like, "i wonder what the ecological effect of destroying this nest is... oh god... did those rotfiends back there have families..." because... well, the books just make you think like that.

so, i wouldn't say that you necessarily need the books or the games to enjoy either, because for me, they're quite separate: separate attitudes, separate approaches. the books will help you understand what's going on in the games, but can also distract from what the games do well. the games are good because they're good at being games, the books are good because they're good at being books. so it's fine to want to just have one-or-the-other; just don't expect them to translate over.

however, from a cohesive "storytelling perspective," i.e., continuity's sake, i do think it makes sense to read the books to understand character relationships, as you mentioned.

for instance, i did not really understand geralt and dandelion's friendship until i read the short stories and got a better look at why they are friends (though it's also my fault for only playing the third game, they're much better in the first two i know).

i also didn't get geralt and yennefer as a couple until i read the books twice (it's more of a longer story there. but basically, i couldn't read rivia and be like 'nah they shouldn't be together'... like she died on top of his dead body. they're kind of together forever whether anyone likes it or not lol). this was also due to a lot of yennefer slander i read from more game-based fans who didn't read any of the books, but swore that she was cruel and abusive to geralt, and i made the mistake of trusting their word for it since "they know more than i do!"

at the same time, it might be more confusing for an audience, because some characters in the game get reduced to their un-developed character state from the books, so they can then arc within the game.for instance, yennefer in witcher 3 is less like the lady of the lake yennefer, and more like the sword of destiny yennefer.

additionally, some characters are just straight up changed in personality, for instance, triss who has become more brave and assertive in the games, a "pseudo-yennefer." though you can chalk this up to character development occurring in the space of time since the books ended, i think it is confusing to try and pawn it off as the same character with continuity, since we don't see any of that development happening it feels like an abrupt change.

even with characters that cdpr got really "right," i prefer to see them as entirely separate characters and canons (this is about regis. lol) because it's disturbing to see some of the changes and try to take that as a "canon continuation".

this was all kind of a ramble, so i hope i answered your question!

tl;dr my answer would be that it really depends on the player/reader and what they want to get out of the experience; if they feel satisfied with having the knowledge they have or if they want more depth and explanations, if they care to deal with the complexity of marrying two canons with each other, or don't want to get too deep into the multimedia universe.

in my own space, i like to think about the books as a complete cycle, and then engage with games/other mediums with an "i'll entertain it, if it's entertaining" attitude—so i really can't judge if someone wants to only look into the games, that's just the mirror-reverse of what i do.

however, i think it's worth it to look into the other medias, even if it doesn't end up being something you're primarily interested in. like, just read the first book, or play a little of the third game (i choose these because they're the easiest to get into). try to talk to fans who like those medias most, see what they like about it.

i think this can not only help you think about what you enjoy about your own "witcher experience," but also start to understand why other fans like this other media so much, which can then help you have, or understand, more conversations.

[bardcore-jaskier]

♡ My thoughts on Yennskier + headcanons ♡

(Edited post)

- What makes this whole thing so funny and exciting to me is that Yennefer used to think that Jaskier was just some annoying sing songy twit before. While Jaskier's dramatic arse used to consider Yennefer an enemy until she saved him from Rience XD XD XD

- I adored the everliving FUCK out of their scenes together in season 2! Their dynamic is so fucking good! AAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!

- Yennskier, the ship we didn't know we needed, but definitely deserved! Their chemistry is so fucking perfect and their dynamic works so well!

- Personally I think that this ship is actually, currently, THE healthiest and most wholesome one of all my Jaskier ships! At least as of season 2! (Even if Geraskier remains as my OTP)

- In Oxenfurt, when Jaskier and Yennefer got to know eachother better without Geralt's presence to distract them both, ever since they saw the real, raw and vulnerable sides of eachother and became friends, I couldn't help but notice how absolutely toothrottingly perfect they are together!

- Legit, and I kid you not! I can't picture Yennefer and Jaskier having anything other than that deep kind of connection where you know that you are loved, appreciated and adored, despite all your flaws. The kind of love where you know you're not alone, that this person is your family and will always have your back no matter what.

- Yennefer, despite being one of the most powerful sorceresses on the entire continent, treats Jaskier as an equal by the time Ciri gets possessed. (Bro, like even Geralt doesn't do that! Jaskier is his friend, sure, but I've never seen Geralt treating him as an equal.)

- Yennefer and Jaskier have a mutual respect for eachother, they trust eachother, they enjoy eachother's company. All of those things are A CRUCIAL part of having a solid foundation to build a honest, sturdy, long-lasting and happy relationship upon.

- From compatibility POV, they work together a lot better than Geralt and Yennefer did. With Jaskier, there are no djinn related consent issues, there wouldn't be any communication issues and he would probably be a positive influence on Yennefer's mental health.

- Whereas her relationship with Geralt was quite frankly chaotic, explosive, sometimes even toxic. It was built upon a shaky foundation of lust, djinn magic and exchanged favors. Like c'mon, their time together as an on-and-off couple mostly consisted of having kinky unicorn sex, trauma dumping, dealing with magical, gorey and insanely dangerous situations, then talking about said situations until they have a fight! Leaving eachother every time in the end because they can't seem to make it work long-term. They're incompatible because in canon, the only thing that finally made them stick together for good, was an orphaned girl in need of protection. It's not right, kind of like parents who are postponing their divorce until their daughter grows up :/

- Jaskier on the other hand, despite his magic-less ordinary humanity has a hilariously witty, optimistic, stupidly brave, highly empathetic, loyal and supportive personality. Yennefer would have an understanding partner who loves her, cherishes her, acceptc her for who she is without judgement nor pity. A partner who would make it his life's mission to help her see the good things this world has to offer, to make her happy because she deserves it!

- Damn it all, they both have been through enough, they both deserve a break. They actually GET eachother. I can already feel a drabble forming in my brain, set a week or so after the whole Voleth Mier shebang, Jaskier is struggling with PTSD and nightmares about Rience, Yennefer is struggling with guilt and shame because she put Ciri in danger. So while Geralt is too busy with Ciri's training to be there for Jaskier and he feels too betrayed to be in Yennefer's company, neither Yen nor Jask have anyone to turn to in Kaer Morhen, except eachother. Three months confined to a witcher keep together? Now that is a LOT of time to spend with someone you can be openly vulnerable around, bond with, heal and share joy with, unexpectedly falling in love....

- Yennefer too is an extremely good match for Jaskier, it's almost uncanny how much she completes him! Jaskier would finally have an understanding and loving partner who truly saw him when others didn't bother. And Yennefer liked what she saw, the familiar face of a simple human bard who offered kindness and compassion to strangers even if it could kill him. She saw courage, honesty, forgiveness and so much good, a collection of rare qualities she had never thought could exist within one single person all at once. After Voleth Mier, all that goodness was given to her so freely, it is still being given to her everyday, so she knows a treasure when it looks her right in the eyes with such easy warmth. She would make it her life's mission to cling onto him with everything she's got, to love and cherish him the way he deserves, to protect the only person she deems worthy of holding her heart!

- They have a lot in common too. From both having a knack for fashion, both being mischievous little shits at heart and both having high standards when it comes to personal hygiene. To also having similar tastes in both alcohol, humor, luxury and entertainment.....if Yennefer's kinky orgy party and Jaskier's reputation as the biggest slut on the continent is anything to go by.

- Speaking of sex, both of them having a high libido and exceptional skills in bed aside, they're fucking GORGEOUS people! Why wouldn't they find eachother attractive?

- Yennefer is basically a Goddess, beauty personified! She is elegant and breathtaking, everyone knows it.

- However, since a majority of the Witcher fandom usually dismisses Jaskier in favor of simping for Geralt, I can, I must and I WILL gush about how pretty Jaskier is! Cuz clearly some of them bitches be blind, Yennefer is one lucky witch!

- Jaskier is like only 1,5 inches shorter than his grouchy snowman friend. Meaning he is tall as all hell and he definitely isn't lacking in the muscle department either, that bard is jacked yo. His voice is soothing and his vocabulary is extensive enough to make the most experienced of whores blush from pillow talk. He has VERY soft looking hair and he has one of the most angelic fucking faces I've ever seen. His eyes are the clearest shade of blue and his expressions + mannerisms are absolutely adorable! Ok, I'm done gushing, onto the next point....

- Unlike Jaskier, I don't think I have a dummy thick enough of a vocabulary to express how much dopamine Yennskier fanfics give me, more specifically when their husband and wife act from Oxenfurt becomes an inside joke for them, leaving the rest of Kaer Morhen's inhabitants confused as fuck.

- Geralt getting a bit jealous? His brothers wondering when that could have happened? Ciri feeling bamboozled as well?

- It's all shits and giggles until somebody giggles and shits. It won't take long until their inside joke is no longer a joke. They already bicker like a married couple anyway XD

- I can not help but also headcanon Jaskier as not fully human. It would be sad if he up and died on his dear immortal wife. I don't necessarily picture him having chaos or other powers in this scenario, but when I do, I think that they would discover them together on accident.

[lassieposting]

God though, reluctant single dad Vesemir. Vesemir who openly dislikes children, Vesemir who leaves a kid in the woods with the remains of his dead family even though he knows there's something else out there, Vesemir who refers to baby witchers as "abandoned little tragedies", Vesemir whose response to being told he's to teach them to fence is "Am I being punished?"

And suddenly he's the last wolf left. His whole pack is dead and he's got a litter of already-mutated pups to look after that won't get taken in anywhere else. He's completely responsible for the next generation, and children need so many things. He has to learn on the fly that it's not just feeding them and clothing them and teaching them to fight. It's getting up every night for Geralt's night terrors about the Trial and the Sacking, because he's five and he doesn't know how to self-soothe and nobody else is going to do it. It's watching Lambert hurt himself and the other boys in his rages, because he's so mad at the hand life dealt him and he doesn't know how to handle it, and having to figure out how to teach him to channel his anger some other way because that kind of blind fury will get him killed. It's answering a thousand and one "But why?" questions without putting a sword through Eskel because he wants to be good and that is a quality that needs nurturing even if it's annoying as fuck.

None of this is natural to him. He's not a kid person. He's grieving, too, for everyone he ever cared for and the trust he gave his father figure who betrayed him. He's sarcastic and impatient and he fucks up badly, so many times, with these lonely, traumatised little boys. He has to learn to apologise, and forgive, and love them even though he never wanted them to be his responsibility, even though they've basically taken his life from him - the adventuring, the monster-slaying, the coin and the women and the fame - because raising brats is a 24/7/365 job that keeps him tied to Kaer Morhen. He has to learn not to resent them for a life they didn't choose. He has to learn to make them feel like part of a family, because he can't afford to have them abandon Witchering at the first opportunity.

And somehow, it works. His pups grow up, and become Witchers themselves, and he sends them out into the world and breathes a sigh of relief every time one comes back safe. Grieves as best he can whenever one doesn't. Geralt makes him a grandfather, which is not something he ever thought he'd want even with a Witcher's long lifespan, but he loves the bones of that girl. He sees Geralt trying so hard to do better by Ciri than was ever done by him - he's not sure where the hell Geralt got that from, that soft streak that training never quite beat out of him - and the other boys rally round to help him raise his lion cub as a wolf so much faster than he thought they would, and he knows he did something right. And more than that, he's somehow managed to do away with some of the stigma the generations of Witchers before him passed down. Geralt isn't afraid to be gentle with Ciri. He's kind and understanding and supportive towards her, he has to be reminded not to prioritise her wellbeing over finding Leshen!Eskel, he's calm and patient and comforting when her trauma is playing up. It's such a far cry from the completely detached, "numbers game" attitude of the generations before Vesemir, and even from Vesemir's own attitude towards recruits as a young man. He's done exactly what his mentor asked him to do. He raised better, more scrupulous Witchers. He raised better men.

idk man I just have a lot of feelings about Vesemir after NOTW okay

[fangirleaconmigo]

Hi! Sorry to bother you but I'm currently looking for like 4 different fics, which are all geraskier:

- The first takes place after the mountain breakup and Jaskier encounters another Witcher, who I believe is Lambert?? Basically he becomes Lambert's new travel companion, even creating some new songs for him. He eventually takes Jaskier to the keep, which Geralt is at as well, and they just kind of try to make Geralt jealous, even going as far as to pretend they had sex in the room next to him. Yeah, he's hurt... but they work through it.

- the second I'm not sure when it takes place, but Jaskier had died. It's a non-human/creature Jaskier. He sprouts up in the middle of a field and basically begins wandering around. we follow him as he goes through this and begins to relearn everything he once knew. There's a scene where he (unintentionally) terrorizes a family at a camp, and as they flee, the father feels for Jask, despite him being well... a monstrous being.

- The third one is kind of a modern au. Since witchers get to live long, he and the rest of the gang (including Ciri, Yen, Regis, etc.) have just lived through everything until the 21st century. Jaskier, having been mortal, died a long time ago. But recently, his body had gone missing. Julian is a professor, I believe he's a uh History professor? Nonetheless, all i remember is that Roach is a van and they got hunted by vampires at some point. I think Geralt owns a villa at a town in which Yen is the mayor. Julian's parents do NOT like Geralt because he's a witcher.

- The last i believe is an established relationship fic. But basically, Jaksier is hit with a curse or something, but it's causing him to age backwards now. So of course this leads to him forgetting about Geralt. That's just kind of it, they're trying to enjoy the time they have left with each other and their memories. It ends when Jaskier turns 18 once again, the same age at which he met Geralt.

Anyway thank you sm and I'm very sorry about the incredibly long ask 😬 (you very much do not need to answer)

Hi Nonny,

I'm going to put this out there for my followers. None of those sound like any fics I've read (shockingly enough, because I've read a lot of fics) so I'm hoping someone else can ask. They sound very cool though. (Jaskier growing in a field? I want to know what that one is)

Also, I'm tagging in @wren-of-the-woods for the last one, because they love fics with curses, so maybe they can help with that one.

[my-jokes-are-my-armour]

Normally im anti gatekeeping but can we make a rule that if you just read the headline of an article and don’t read the whole thing and/or check its source, your not allowed to be a witcher fan, how am I supposed to believe someone read a 7 book series if they can’t even read past a headline

This is common sense to check and verify but in the ere of social media, the truth is "feelings". And headlines and short reads are sadly the norm. And they (those who write these articles) know it. Basically if they get your affect they win. Because it is way easier to believe your heart than try to work out your head. And a good title is sometimes just all they need.

Personally, I can't believe someone has read the 7 books saying that this season is not book accurate enough. Of course this isn't 100% book accurate. There are deviations (some bigger than others) and inventions. But for the big parts, the framing, and even some details, this is.

You know, I clashed with an internet friend who told me she read the books and was saying things like I see on hater posts. I just learnt after few precise questions that she stopped at Blood of Elves. She was repeating just other hater stuff because they pushed every buttons that triggered her about what she knew. She is a witcher fan but for the frame she knows. She still doesn't like the show and I respect her real arguments for that but I just saw here the work of confirmation bias.

We have a tendency to believe more someone who say something close to our own feelings or inner belief. And if you made your opinion beforehand there is no way you get out of the pit easily. It needs work and patience to compare and verify, and read the books to check again etc.

Also when you play the games, the experience is very different and very compelling in its storytelling. I knew the games before the series and the books, through let plays and I loved it. So I bet there are a lot of gamers in the frustrated mass. They are fans also, of course, but through a different lence. And they probably want a different experience from the show. Experience they will never get since the framing stays the books. So ... frustration again.

And I can give a "funny" example for people don't read but say they have just to push the cursor on the down level.

When you see people downrating episode 7 to the worst episode ever with so many complaining about the source material, you know that they have not read the books. The 7th episode is the worst noted ever and this is the most book accurate thing of the whole series, period !

They downrate it mostly because there is not enough of what they want in it. Again. Feelings and frustration are speaking not the head.

And that is exactly what those articles do or what attracts people to the hater videos. A lot of people are frustrated since S2 and locked on that frustration for months, so they were already willing to burn the season before hand. They find here and there other people that express frustration and anger and each deviation from the source material is more commented than what is correct. And I don't even go to the place where this is only to deguise shady discourses.

Bonus :

I just put that picture here again since it's lost in my big review of S3 and it amuses me a lot to play dumb to confront people to reality. Too much politics, mages and Ciri... Well this is the books... You're welcome 😅

I am sorry if I deviated in my answer but I need to say things clearly. And I am sure that conclusion won't be read by those who believe I agress them.

For me there are different kind of fans. All valid. But in terms of opinions about the show I discard almost immediately the headline burst of anger ones and I value those who can articulate both positive and negative points of view.

[islayhawkin]

Cirilla Riannon x sister! Autistic! Reader headcanons

Request: Can you write some HCs for bring Ciri’s (whichever 3) autistic sister please? Just wondering what their dynamic would be like?

A/N: I can only speak for my own experience so i hope mine isn't too far from yours. I tried to keep the backstory of reader kinda neutral.

Ciri is very protective. Whether or not she's the older or younger one. No one messes with her family. She lost so many people she's not ready to lose you.

But she can be harsh and hurt you unwillingly. She was trained at Kear Morhen and spent much of her life surrounded by witchers. She was taught how to fight and bite back but her training lacked human emotions. Especially if you react emotionally to things that aren't a big deal to her doesn't she know how to comfort you. In fact, she doesn't understand a lot of your views which sometimes leads to small arguments or hurt feelings.

She tries to do her best though. Observes all your quirks and stands up for your needs. Will drag anyone to the side and threaten them if they deny you something you need. The witchers at kaer morhen all had their scolding from her already and hold their hands up innocently whenever you are disstressed.

Doesn't mean that you're the damsel in distress though. You and ciri are sisters after all. You throw out the truth in peoples face. Which can be offensive or brutal but well...it is true. More than one time did you say stuff that would be considered scanalizing between the townswomen out in public. And very loudly. Ciri loves it and whatever warrior boys decided to join you in the tavern will hollor impressed with laughter.

Ciri doesn't shy away from being direct either but rather makes sarcastic jokes and comments. If you don't understand them she'll explain it to you in a whisper.

To put it simply: the people learned to stay out of your and ciris line of trouble.

Ciri drags you out of your comfort zone A LOT. The life she lives (or is forced to live) isn't excactly comfortable. Everything in her life is changing constantly. Always on the run or traveling across the continent on the next quest to save a friend. You struggle a lot with that and often choose to not accompany her and stay at kaer morhen to try and build some kind of routine with the witchers.

But if you both happen to have a semblance of a normal day she'll try to convince you to come with her to the tavern, join a horse race or search for a monster. You are kept on your toes.

In social settings this ease and confidence can seem annoying to you sometimes when all the attention is always on her. It's not her intention but it's just the way she is. The special child with the talent. Her importance can make you feel unseen.

But your differences complement eachother greatly. You think before you act. A bit too much sometimes. And ciri acts before thinking. You can see the world in childlike wonder while she sees the gruesome side and doesn't believe in great love and such. She goes seemingly with ease in the world while you struggle with everything outside your four walls. So she's able to help you in the outside world while you are able to pull her down from the high of her adventure.

So you're an amazing team. If it's working together in their personal life or for a quest. You balance eachother out. You note things she doesn't through your hightend sensibility of senses while she gets the bigger picture.

[nataliescatorccio]

'my ugly one' / 'why do you call me that' / 'cause i promised i'd be sincere'

ahhhhhh can you please explain this because i don't get it and i am confused! i love yen and ciri's relationship its my favorite part of the books and im so happy we're finally getting in the show! but yen callig her ugly doesnt sit right with me and i dont understand the explanation cause ciri is like really pretty? idk im not trying to be a hater i swear i just do not understand this.

it comes directly from the books! personally i don't think they adapted it very well on the show, because it felt sort of shoehorned in there and therefore came across as sudden and out of place, but in the books it's what yennefer calls ciri almost from the moment she meets her, throughout blood of elves and time of contempt. why is a bit more complicated, i've always thought that yennefer calls her that because when they meet, ciri has been living with the witchers and therefore has put zero effort into her appearance. she's very much a 'wild' kid, matted hair and covered in dirt and caring more about fighting. which ciri in the show is, but i think we forget because freya always looks so stunning. this to yennefer, who so perfectly presents herself, is seen as ugly.

but i also think it's kind of used to get under ciri's skin a little bit. yennefer and ciri don't get on when they first meet (the show sort of changes their arc that they do bond, and then they fight, and reconcile, whereas the book is more dislike and then they learn to respect and love each other). yennefer doesn't really think ciri is ugly, it's more by how she has been raised to view beauty, as by this excerpt: 'You still keep on calling me ugly one! You know how I don't like it. Why do you do it?' 'Because I'm malicious. Wizards are always malicious.' 'But I don't want to… don't want to be ugly. I want to be pretty. Really pretty, like you, Lady Yennefer. Can I, through magic, be as pretty as you one day?' 'You… Fortunately you don't have to… You don't need magic for it. You don't know how lucky you are.' 'But I want to be really pretty!' 'You are really pretty. A really pretty ugly one. My pretty little ugly one…' it's also a bit of a nod to the ugly duckling, there are a lot of little fairytale-type teases in the books and this is one of them. in time of contempt, yennefer says this: '‘Be quiet, my ugly little duckling. I made a mistake. No one’s perfect.’' ciri is the ugly duckling who becomes a swan as she grows. ciri in the books is also a bit different, she's described more of a snot-nosed brat more often than the confident girl we know in the show, so ugly one sort of refers to her more bratty awkward child stage, where she then grows into it. again, it's difficult to get this from the show because we've seen so much more of ciri and seen her grow. i get being confused by it because honestly i found it a little jarring in the show despite expecting it! it's such an integral part of their book relationship that i understand why the writers felt like they needed to include it, but also it didn't feel like it worked in how they'd already established their relationship.

[mantra4ia]

I mean no offense to the people who enjoyed "The Witcher" Season 3: Vol 1 on Netflix. No judgement. And also no offense to the cast and crew who I am sure worked hard to bring this to the screen.

I love the Witcher, mostly from the books and some gameplay, so from my own personal perspective...

What in the actual hell did Netflix do?!

There's so much eloquent dialogue in the source material to draw upon and this steaming pile of ****e is what they came up with? It telegraphs so much without a whiff of subtlety or craft— not unlike Sabrina in 3x5— that I want to puke, the only exception being that Yarpen Zigrin is still no nonsense and true to form.

Emhyr, as is evidenced by his cringe, overlong speeches and dull drawl, is not written as cunning or menacing by any stretch of the imagination as he ought to be, and the lack of a strong villain does nothing to drive the pace of the season.

Why are we waxing on about Vissena to try and strum up audience feels? We don't need to revisit that unless it serves a purpose for the characters. It doesn't. If the audience has been watching any of the previous two seasons, we don't need Geralt's childhood memories of his mother to impress upon us that he takes newfound parenthood seriously and would spill blood and make sacrifices for his family.

If that weren't painful enough, Yennefer — who we know is cunning when she schemes— lacks all of her razor edged wit when "groveling" before the Brotherhood to form a conclave. The recycled dialogue with Tissaia about chaos and control has lost its potency, as lukewarm as the mages' council of armchair tapping, and even her speeches to Ciri like "my ugly one" have so much wasted potential because there's a speed run montage about how much Yen and Cirilla care for eachother in episode 1 rather than letting us growing into the emotions ourselves, so that by the time we get to Yennefer disclosing her past, the emotion is lost. Also, Cirilla is supposed to be in a little awe of Yen and her power of influence, which is what makes "ugly one" so endearing, because it's the ends way of saying that Cirilla is powerful but magic isn't all she is / she doesn't need to rely on it like the mages rest on prolonged youth. It's her way of saying I love you, and for all the exposition that season three uses to elaborate feelings, this most essential part is completely lost. It's like we're playing house with emotions that haven't been earned their screen moment. "Lilac and gooseberries, now that I can tolerate," but I cannot abide these trash conversations.

These were the action sequences, the fight choreography, and the monster concept visualization they came up with? Like, for example, a failing mass of conjoined limbs and disembodied heads! The idea of Ciri's doppelganger from the books has been so corrupted.

On top of that, the cuts from scene to scene are so rough it's like whiplash. Chase scene - recycled Geralt /Ciri hug - dark portal nonsense - crash through ceiling. No finesse.

The Belletyn festival, which is so meaningful and beautifully described in the books, was butchered in execution of costume (Yen's is a season 1 throwback but never underwhelming way), with ridiculous "masks" (it irks me so much that Yennefer tells Cirilla had to cover her eyes and hair for a low profile and then we speed cut to the next scene where neither occurs and the costume department decides that they aren't even going to attach Cirilla's mask to her face, she just carries it around in her hand because that makes sense), unnecessary mazes to separate our characters and engineer a sense of peril, the whole lot. They used Belletyn as a setup to engineer a subsequent bait scene, which was an appallingly insult to intelligence and fight choreography. PS: Yen can I do more than throw a knife, can we please utilize her a little better?

Speaking of choreography, Ciri descending from mid air to stab the CGI aeschna in 3x4 with the overlong shot pull of monster blood on her face was so poorly edited I wanted to fast forward the entire episode thereafter.

Lastly, this farce for humor is what they came up with?! They made layered source characters like Dijkstra into single line fodder, and they wasted so much time on sitcom rubbish like Queen Hedwig's Redanian funeral, and Phillipa's bedroom shenanigans, and Fringilla as a drunken poison tester. I want to slap someone. It's as if the whole of season 3 thus far is a live-action adaptation of Ciri and Jaskier's satire of Yen and Geralt. Except that no one left the audience in the joke.

Also, for a series called The Witcher there is surprisingly little in the way of meaningful dialogue and action for Geralt to do, and that's a shame

I'm angry.

Season 1 was fantastic, season 2 was good but with notable divergence to character integrity, and Season 3 so far is the refuse pile of Aedd Gynvael. The only highlight was Ciri telling Valdo Marx to shut up, like I wish I could do for the rest of the dialogue in the series. After "Sherrawedd" I kept thinking to myself, it will get better. Ironically Sherwood was probably the best episode so far because at least it kept the essence of idea in "dear friend" from the literature as a foundation. After which it kept sinking down into chaos.

But more than angry, I'm disappointed. I'm sad that the Yennefer/Jaskier frenemy dynamic ("Hello again witch) —a highlight of season 2— has been shirked; the only decent byproduct of which is the Ciri/Jaskier relationship. And I'm depressed that this is Henry Cavill's sendoff as Geralt.

[inexplicifics]

Hi Inex!!

I am beyond thrilled to have a new accidental warlord fic! I'm already falling in love with Aiden and Sasha's dynamic, and with Sasha; as an autistic person, I see so many of my mannerisms and thought patterns in him. Major kudos.

I already said it in an Ao3 comment, but I'll have squealed myself hoarse by the end of the week, I know! I mean everything else I said in that comment, too - you really do sound like someone I'd like to know better. I hope that's not presumptuous.

Incidentally - I read through some of your smaller series at work today. (I get very attached to Coen's speech patterns - can you tell?) Your writing has become something I turn to when my fibromyalgia gets too awful to power through, and I'm eternally grateful for it. Rather like Aiden was grateful for Julek pulling him from the river.

And lastly - you may not understand what this means, but I promise it is a compliment, and meant well - and if you want to understand, please don't hesitate to ask. I'm the host of a plural system. One of our members is Ciri. Your Ciri, to be precise. She's overjoyed to have her memories written so beautifully, especially the bits she's hazy on. If you're ever planning to write her year receiving their medallions, that would be incredibly well received.

Lots of love - Cad

I'm so glad Aleksander resonates with you! He's a dear anxious bean with some interesting neurodivergence going on, and I love him.

I am reasonably friendly but very shy - if you want to come reach out on Discord, or in the messages here on Tumblr, I am happy to chat! I'm just very, very bad at making the first move.

I'm so glad my writing brings you comfort; that is honestly my main goal in putting my work out into the world, and it delights me to achieve it.

And I am very flattered that my writing feels "true" to your Ciri. I do want to do at least one trainee-centered fic at some point, though I'm not sure yet whether it will feature them getting their medallions. I hope you continue to like my work!