#yes I'm unable to let Jaskier die

[thelostgirl21]

OMG! It's never ever even remotely crossed my mind that "A Little Sacrifice" could have been written by Essi!!!

I was a bit confused re: why you said that you'd just realised it was Jaskier that had written the song, because I was like "Well, who else?"

She's a bard, too, so it could have been her!

Then again, I didn't know there was a short story called "A Little Sacrifice" and *actual mermaids* in The Witcher's lore while watching Season 3.

Hence why I initially believed this was a song that Jaskier had written to process his feelings for Radovid, and was almost disappointed finding out that it wasn't about him, but about an upcoming animated movie.

But then, I saw the ending of "Sirens of the Deep" and went "Wait. It doesn't match! So it is about Radovid!"

At the very least, to an extent.

Hence all the headcanons about Jaskier having written a first version of the song after the time he'd spent with Geralt in Bremervoord, and then continued working on it / modifying it to suit his own love story with his own Prince, later on.

About Geralt, makes a lot of sense, actually!

I mean, to Jaskier, Geralt is the one that appears to be sort of "otherworldly". A fantastic creature filled with ancient powers and... hair. Those stupid, stupid hair.

*Spoilers for Sirens of the Deep*

And now, I've just realised how funny it is that they came from the coast, reached the mountains to avoid Yennefer, FOUND Yennefer, and then, when Borch died, Jaskier basically went "Yeah, this idea was shit! Let's return to the coast! Go back to Essi, and look at the two local sirens frolick/fight for a little while, yes? "

One thing I also loved is that Sirens of the Deep sort of confirmed that one of Yennefer's appeals, as a partner for Geralt, is their shared cynism and pain over basically watching the world around them go through all these cycles - witnessing people with human lives having such short memories and repeating the same mistakes over and over again (feels especially relevant now) - while they are basically powerless to change, or truly influence them.

And it can thus be deduced that allowing himself to fully and openly acknowledge how attached he's gotten to Jaskier, and how much he appreciates having him as a life partner or "travel companion", would only bring more pain and loss down the line.

Because unless he's killed by a monster first, Jaskier will continue to age. H4 times at least 4 times 10... And he'll be 5 times 10, 6 times 10... Hopefully 7, 8, and if very very lucky 9 times 10!

But, even before then, he might slowly find it harder and more exhausting to accompany Geralt on his travels and monster hunts, dodge attacks, etc.

One mistake, or one moment of him being unable to come to his aid, is all it would take for Geralt to lose him.

In the story I'm currently trying to finish writing, there's a moment between Radovid and Geralt where he openly acknowledges that he feels relieved knowing that Jaskier now has someone to grow old with... someone that will be able to provide him with more comfortable means of transportation, good food, protection, and softer sleeping arrangements whenever Jaskier wishes to hit the road, amongst other things, tok!

(OK, and now I'm laughing thinking about Geralt traveling the path by carriage with an 80 year-old-bard, flanked by a small private royal army carrying delicious food rations and luxury camping equipment, because the husband of the King of Redania still needs to be where the action is to compose a proper ballad!)

But yeah, I guess that's why, despite how I fully acknowledge the absolutely heartbreaking and unfair impact Geralt's outburst and rejection had on Jaskier, I also can empathize with Geralt's own fears and inability to properly deal with loss at that moment.

His mother abandoned him, Renfri chose revenge over him, the woman he loves - and that he felt could understand his struggles more than anyone else - just abandoned him, too, and Jaskier will inevitably die and leave him behind whether he wants it or not. It's all too much to handle.

It's easier to leave Jaskier now, than eventually be abandoned by him, too. That way, he can pretend Jaskier never would have.

And, just as I believe that Jaskier's happy that Geralt has Yennefer now - someone that shares his almost immortality and can help him carry those burdens - I genuinely like to think that Geralt would be happy that Jaskier would have Radovid to share his shorter life with, while being able to appreciate and fully value the passage of time.

"Life's too short, do what or who pleases you, while you can," is a sentiment that Radovid can better grasp, understand, and share than Geralt.

So, even when Jaskier was attempting to connect with Geralt and comfort him after having watched Borch fall to his death, he was sadly putting emphasis on the difference between them.

Jaskier's life is too short. Geralt's life has already been too long. Watching Borch fall to his death only brought into sharp focus that people keep dying and leaving him.

Whereas it gave Jaskier a sense of urgency to not miss any moment of his too short existence.

And now, by saying that, Jaskier is sadly reminding Geralt that even if Jaskier hasn't fallen to his death alongside Borch, he'll still be dying and leaving him soon.

Yennefer and Radovid sort of allow Geralt and Jaskier to better handle those differences, because they aren't each other's only love nor source of support and companionship.

They can more fully appreciate the time they share, despite knowing that they might be forced to go on their separate ways, accompanied by a single one of their partners / travel companions (Yennefer for Geralt, and Radovid for Jaskier), for a little while.

Re: Radovid and Season 3, you've just reminded me of something else, too! Radovid knows ALL of Jaskier's songs, right?

So, he would quickly spot any change that would have been made to it, right?

Imagine Radovid catching Ciri singing "A Little Sacrifice" at some point, suddenly hearing lyrics he isn't familiar with, listening to it to the very end, and then excitedly going, in full 'fanboy mode': "Oh my Gods, Jaskier! You've added more verses to your song, and they are brilliant! But wait. I thought Agloval's transformation went well, and he immediately took to being a merman like - well, a fish in the water? What do you mean 'If he sinks to darkest night? I don't underst - "

*Cue him noticing how Jaskier has increasingly started blushing.*

"Oh! Oh... A-hem, yeah... I mean, my swimming was pretty shit..."

*Cue Jaskier blushing even harder.* "Shut up. Your swimming was fine, the currents trying to pull you under sucked!"

Poor Ciri is trying to figure out what's suddenly going on, and Geralt is just going "Don't worry, even I can never tell if they're frolicking or fighting."

@thelostgirl21 your post made me realise that... Jaskier did write A Little Sacrifice. Now my head is spiraling into subtext from every side. I can't keep up lol

For if your goal be paradise

A life with your true love

Ponder all your wants in life

And make a little sacrifice

[belettewrites]

Warnings: Destiny is a bitch and is prejudiced against witchers. And very temporary character death.

There are a lot of reasons why Destiny likes to play games with Geralt of Rivia. The first one is purely spite: the witcher denies her existence a lot, and, well, that would be enough to piss anyone off, wouldn’t it?

The second reason is that he’s a witcher. The fact that witchers exist is an abomination in itself. They're monsters created by men, they shouldn't be here; Melitele didn’t put them here, and though some tried to argue with Destiny that since Melitele had given humans the strength and cleverness to make Witchers and therefore they *had* a place there, she didn’t agree.

The other witchers, she can close her eyes (the ones from the cat school actually manage to entertain her), but this one? The one with the extra mutations who always manages to deny her existence, while he is the one that shouldn't be here? Oh boy.

So when a young bard makes his way toward the brooding witcher, she smiles. That one will be perfect. She’ll plague the witcher with him, make sure that they meet again and again and again. For such a silent man, a bard talking constantly will be unbearable. 

Except the Witcher ends up liking the bard, and the bard has the nerve to repair the Witcher's reputation that she had oh so carefully tainted over the years (her proudest accomplishment being Blaviken).

So Destiny figures out that if she wants the Witcher to suffer, she has to use the bard in a different way: the djinn happens. Jaskier suffers, and Geralt too, and then the Witcher has the fucking audacity to tie his fate with someone else, thus taking Destiny's choice away. She's furious at first, and then she realizes that this wish actually makes the Witcher feel guilty. Bonus point: the bard suffers too, the poor jealous thing.

She's there as Geralt calls on the Law of Surprise. She's delighted to see this happen − and then the fucking Witcher denies her existence one again. Clearly, Destiny has had enough.

Soon Nilfgaard is marching toward Cintra, and she waits for Geralt to find his Child Surprise – no chance he'll deny her existence now. But she's busy; the dumb Witcher gets dumped by the beautiful sorceress, and in exchange he dumps his bard. Truly, a very entertaining afternoon.

She watches as the bard walks down the mountain. He'll have to stay alive, she thinks, so she'll still be able to torture the Witcher more. Sure, his death could be the cause of an extreme guilt and grief to the Witcher, but she has other plans for them.

And then the bard manages to get killed while she wasn't paying attention. Damn humans.

Destiny won't have it this way though; she's fucking Destiny herself, this bard will live. Except she can't bring humans back to life, because of a stupid rule someone edited thousands of years ago. So she can't bring humans back to life, but she can create gods. She's their mother, in a way. A cruel one, but their mother nonetheless. And because Destiny likes to play games, she considers making the bard the god of Witchers. But a god of Witchers would mean that Witchers fit in nature, and they do not (whatever her sisters, brothers, and siblings, say).

She smiles to herself. Witchers hunt monsters, don't they? The bard will be the god of monsters. She cannot wait for the Witcher to realize what his friend has become.

She watches with attention as the bard wakes up in the clearing he died in a month ago. It's a bit cliché, maybe, but Destiny likes the tableau it makes either way. Oh, the confusion on the bard's face is so sweet. She'll give him time to discover what he has become before she puts him in the Witcher's way. She wants him to be eaten by guilt as he reunites with his old friend, unable to tell him what he has become.

Why did she wait a whole month to bring the bard back to life? So that his Witcher would be able to find his body, of course, and think that his friend was dead. Destiny had discovered, that day, that the rumor saying that Witchers don't cry was false. Oh, he didn't burst into tears, but she saw the few ones that fell on the ground as he held the body of the bard in his arms. She had made sure to preserve it, so the witcher would have no other choice but to realize that he had indirectly killed his friend.

The witcher actually finds his Child Surprise after that – Destiny has conveniently placed her on his path. The child is a sweet girl, she thinks, already plagued by nightmares of Cintra falling. She'll spare her, Destiny decides. For now.

The bard learns of his new powers when he actually summons a griffin to his side. The man yelps, scared, and Destiny laughs as he calls for his witcher before remembering their fight. She made the right decision, to turn him into that. Then the bard pets the griffin and she frowns. He's unpredictable, it might cause some problems in the future.

The bard reunites with his witcher when she isn't paying attention. She was busy watching a cat witcher take a contract for a human, then steal the human's gold. Entertaining. She quite likes these cat witchers.

When she realizes that the Witcher and the bard are together again, she pays closer attention, smiles as the Witcher glares at his friend, his silver sword on the bard's throat, the Child Surprise hidden behind him.

Then she screams in frustration, because the bard says something to the witcher that makes him put his sword away, and hug him.

And then they're traveling again, and they both seem happy to be in each other's presence.

So Destiny sends them the ugliest, most dangerous monster she could find, knowing that the bard will have to reveal himself if he wants his friend to survive. And the bard does it, quite dramatically; it's like he knows he has an audience. She always appreciated that from the bard, how he would put up a show even if he was alone – because after all, Destiny was always watching, and he made an amazing actor.

To say that she's disappointed when the reveal doesn't go as planned would be an understatement. The witcher doesn't hurt the bard, doesn't send him away, doesn't snarl at him. No. None of that.

The witcher... smiles softly and says that he expected something like this, since Destiny always likes to fuck him over. And hey, he’s right, but Destiny wanted him to send his friend away, in a repeat of their fight on the mountain. Instead what the Witcher does is-

It's-

It's so unexpected that Destiny forgets to be mad as the Witcher cradles his bard’s face and kisses him softly.

Destiny realizes then what she has done, what has happened, why her plan didn't work. She made the bard immortal. Now he and the Witcher will be together forever, because, apparently, they love each other. And it makes sense now, it all makes sense because of course they'd choose to defy her again by falling in love.

Of course her plan wouldn't work then, because the witcher would choose his bard even if he was the god of the things he hunted. 

What has she done, now they'll be able to live forever, to defy her forever-

No, actually, you know what? Good. Because that means that Destiny will be able to play with them a little longer.

[flowercrown-bard]

A Happy Man

(@thingr2 you might like this? It kind of has 'birds still sing' vibes. Please tell me if I should stop tagging you in stuff)

"Are you happy?" Geralt asks. He's pretty sure he already knows the answer, but he needs to hear Jaskier say it.

Jaskier's spoon stops half-way to his mouth. Soup is drizzling back into the bowl but Jaskier doesn't seem to notice. He's too busy staring at Geralt like he had just asked him to sell his lute. The steam rising up from the soup fogs up Jaskier's glasses and obsures his eyes, but the bewildered expression is no less effective for it.

"What's brought this on?" The spoon clatters, as Jaskier let's it fall back into the bowl. Some of the soup splashes onto the woolen jumper he's wearing. He hadn't worn the extravagant doublets in a long time, said there's no need for that anymore and that he prefers comfort over luxury.

Geralt shrugs. He wants to avoid Jaskier's eyes, but he had unlearned how to tear his eyes away from him ages ago. It had been even longer since he had wanted to.

"I don't know," he says. His fingers drumm on the table - a nervous habit he had adopted from Jaskier. "It's just. You always wanted to have adventures."

A laugh tumbles from Jaskier's lips at that. He reaches out and takes Geralt's hand; a way to share the laughter with him, even if sometimes Geralt still struggles with laughing as loudly and freely as Jaskier does.

"Oh dear heart, I'd say I had my fair share of adventures," Jaskier says, when his laughter dies away. "All these years you try to tell me not to run after you on hunts and now you want me to go on adventures again?"

"I want to know if you're happy," Geralt corrects him softly.

"And why would you think I'm not?" Speaking makes the wrinkles around Jaskier's mouth even more apparent. They come from years of laughing and singing and loudly proclaiming his love for Geralt and yet Geralt can't help but wondering.

"You always wanted to travel. There is still so much of the continent left that you didn't see."

"There is," Jaskier agrees. With his free hand, he gestures towards the painting of the coast hanging on the wall, the collection of knick-knacks on the window sills, that Jaskier had bought on their travels and the stack letters on a shelf, that Geralt had sent to him over the years whenever he had left their home for a little while. "And how lucky I am that I have someone by my side who has seen every part of it and can tell me all about it."

He lifts Geralt's hand and presses a lingering kiss against his knuckles. He doesn't lower their hands back onto the table again.

"You wanted an exciting life," Geralt says.

Jaskier sighs softly and presses his cheek against their joined hands. "And what makes you think I don't have the most exciting life I could imagine?"

There are so many answers to that. So many ways in which Jaskier could be leading a better life, but the way he is looking at Geralt makes all words die away on his tongue.

"Are you happy?" Jaskier asks, when it becomes clear that Geralt won't reply.

Geralt takes in the small room that is filled with mementos of their life together. And he looks at Jaskier, well-fed, healthy and still smiling despite the way his bones would sometimes creak in the morning.

Yes, he is happy. Of course he is. How could there be any other answer, when he gets to be there by Jaskier's side, as he is growing old?

Unable to put any of that into words or even say a simple 'yes' out loud, Geralt simply nods.

Jaskier's face lights up, just the same as it had that time Geralt had told him he liked his songs.

"See?" Jaskier's thumb caresses a small circle into the back of Geralt's hand. "There you have your answer."