Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jaskier has been at sea for ten days when it happens.

He´d left his home in Lettenhove ten days ago, with a reasonably sized chest filled with jewellery, rare leather bound books, and detailed maps in tow. As dowries go, it is not exorbitant, but decent enough. For the fourth son of a minor noble house, it is more than respectable.

Ever since he came of age, his parents had been at a loss what to do with him. If it had been up to Jaskier himself, he´d have left his home a long while ago. Maybe to study at the great university of Oxenfurt. But, even though he is only a fourth son, the Pankratz name comes with obligations. Jaskier is thankful enough they let him play music and compose songs in the first place. It is a pursuit his family deems unsuitable for a noble son, never mind Jaskier´s secret dreams of becoming a bard of renown.

Not even two months ago, his parents´ dilemma had been resolved when a formal proposal was made. Apparently he caught the eye of a Duke at some ball or other. Jaskier can´t even remember the man´s name, doesn´t remember meeting him for that matter, and was only notified when his parents had accepted the offer. He could have been angry. He could have yelled at his mother and father for deciding to give his life away, just like that.
He hadn’t.

More than anything, he felt relief. Lettenhove may be his childhood home, but it has been a long time since it felt like that to Jaskier. He was always different. Too loud and too colourful. Too interested in things unsuitable for a young nobleman. His parents and siblings love him, but they weren't unhappy to see him go, and he wasn't unhappy to leave.

It´s how he came to be on the Seablade, passage bought for him, dressed in finery, chest with his dowry tucked away under the bed in his private cabin. There is one Lettenhove guard to accompany him. To defend his virtue, so to speak. Secretly Jaskier thinks the guard is only there to make sure he doesn’t run.

There are nerves swirling in his belly every time he thinks of his impending nuptials, but there is excitement too. Finally he has left Lettenhove behind, and is able to see more of the world. Jaskier can only hope that his new husband will be the sort that travels, and that he will take his consort with him.

Eight days Jaskier has watched the coastline pass him by. Watched the gentle, rolling hills of Kerack make way for high cliffs and jagged rocks, the waves of the ocean smashing  against them and breaking up the sunlight into dazzling, glittering golden shards. Every time he sees rainbows form in the spray, he smiles.

On the eighth day they had turned away from the coast, making their way into open sea to cut days off their journey. The shortcut across the open waters should have been straightforward.

It should have been safe.

---000---

He’s been on the water for ten days, when Jaskier notices something change. He’s on the ship’s forecastle, looking out over the endless waves, when the Seablade’s small but capable crew shifts into a higher gear. Their usually laid back voices are tense, and their movements high up in the rigging are frantic. Jaskier knows they’re going for speed when several sails that had so far been tucked away, are unrolled to catch the wind.

The Seablade is a slender merchant ship. Fast for the type of vessel she is, but ultimately trading speed for the capability to carry a heavy load. Even so, she does spring forward through the waves with the extra momentum, the spray fogging up to land on his face, the droplets salty and refreshing. When he turns around, the ship’s captain is hurrying toward him.

“My lord,” the captain addresses him curtly.

So far the man has only spoken to him once, on the day he boarded. Every other time the captain addressed the guard that accompanies him. Jaskier thinks the seaman looks down on him, a minor noble son, being all but bartered away in marriage. He doesn’t care much what the man thinks of him. After this trip he won’t ever have to see him again. That he speaks directly to him now though, doesn’t bode well.

“Captain Bast,” he greets neutrally.

“It’s best you return to your cabin,” Bast states, and Jaskier raises his eyebrows. The captain may avoid speaking to him, but in the last ten days he hasn’t tried to control Jaskier’s movements on his ship either. “There are black sails. They’re on the horizon, but they’re getting closer.”

His breath catches, and he shoots another look at the sails now fully hoisted, the canvas curved like great white bellies, catching the wind. It means they’re at maximum speed. If the black sails are gaining on them, it can only mean one thing. There’s pirates in pursuit, and their chances for survival out on the open ocean have just dropped considerably.

“What good does it do me to hide away in my cabin?” Jaskier shoots back, his hand going to the dagger at his side.

Bast grabs him by the shoulder and turns him around, marching him toward his ship-quarters. “On my ship, you’ll do as I instruct. Noble title or no.” The man’s voice is harsh, but the frown that’s been on his face almost every time the captain looks at him softens. “It’s for your own good, lad. There’s a chance those pirates will just take our merchandise and we’ll get away with our lives. I hate to break it to you, but you’re part of the cargo. If they see you, it’ll be clear as day to them you’re an intended consort from a noble house. They won’t kill you, and they won’t leave you behind, even if they sink us.”

Jaskier frowns, his heart pounding at the sea captain’s words. “What? What will they do with me then?”

Bast shakes his head again. “You’d be lucky to be ransomed, eventually. Other than that, you don’t want to know.”

---000---

Jaskier’s private cabin is small, and doesn’t have the luxury of a window. It’s more than any of the crew have. More than Adrienne has, his guard, dressed in Lettenhove blue and currently standing at his door, steel bared. Jaskier regrets not really speaking to her over the past days. Despite his relatively optimistic outlook on his forced betrothal, he had felt resentful at her presence. She was there to make sure he was no risk to his parents losing face, and Jaskier had felt irked at their continued efforts to control him, even after he’d said he would go.

The woman is tall and muscular. Her greying hair is tied back in a tight braid, and she holds her sword with military precision. Their eyes catch. The worry in her gaze makes Jaskier’s own panic rise that much higher. When she speaks, it startles him.

“Lord Pankratz,” she addresses him, and Jaskier nods to indicate she has his attention. “I heard what captain Bast said. Don’t let it get to that. If they take you, there’s no shame in stepping out. This is a thing all women, and some men, know. Bast doesn’t, not really. There are things worse than death.”

Jaskier licks his dry lips. “Are you saying I should….”  He trails off, unable to  make himself say the words.

Adrienne nods. “If they take you, kill yourself. Step overboard, climb the mast and jump down, find a dagger and aim for the heart.” With those last words she touches just left of her sternum, over the fifth intercostal space.

Jaskier stares at her. “I—I don’t know if I can. You really think it will come to that?”

“If these pirates are who I think they are… then yes. I’ll do my best to protect you, Julian,” she says, suddenly switching to his first name. “I don’t think it’s fair that you were shipped off into a marriage to a man you know nothing about. I have heard you play, you know. My partner, she loved your music. She didn’t think you were meant to live the life of a noble consort, coddled and tucked away. I volunteered to accompany you in case you’d want to run.” 

She gives a rueful smile, and Jaskier gapes at her. All along he could have had an ally in Adrienne. “I’m sorry,” he stammers. “I’m sorry I didn’t speak to you, I thought…well. And now you’re here. In this shit situation.”

Adrienne shrugs. “My name was up the day Dorinn died.”

Jaskier startles. Dorinn had been one of his favourite governesses when he was young. He had begged for her return for months after her sudden replacement. He hadn’t known she had died.

Before he can say anything, from far, far too close, comes the deafening blast of cannons.

---000---

After the cannon fire, comes the sound of chaos. There’s people screaming and wood splintering, and it isn’t long before the definite sounds of boarding reach them. They can hear the metal of hooks biting into the Seablade’s railing, boots landing on her decks with heavy footfalls. The ring of clashing steel is jarring, and there is more than one scream abruptly cut off. Jaskier doesn’t want to think about what is happening above him, on the wooden planks of the deck. He feels like a coward, but all he wants to do is close his eyes and press his fingers into his ears to shut out the heart rending noise of lives ending.

When footsteps come down the ladder, Jaskier knows it’s inevitable they’ll be found. Adrienne looks at him and points to the dagger at his belt, before once again tapping her chest. She turns toward the door, stance confident, the grip on her sword strong.

Adrienne manages to take down three of the pirates that try to force their way through after breaking down the door. The fourth one is bigger, stronger, and quicker than she is. Still, she holds him off for an impressive amount of time, and wounds him twice. Once on the forearm, once by swiping the edge of her blade along his thigh. With a bellow, the bald pirate charges her, and gets inside the defensive circle of her sword. Jaskier screams and looks away when he stabs her with a short blade, and keeps stabbing until his face and bare chest are splattered with blood. When Adrienne slumps to the ground, the sword falling out of her limp grip, the pirate’s dark eyes land on him.

Panicked, Jaskier’s hands fumble at the dagger he wears. He hasn’t exactly mapped out which point to stab on his own chest, but doesn’t think it would matter much, as long as he can make himself press the blade deep enough. Before he can so much as get the weapon out of its sheath, a backhand lands across his face, making him lose all orientation. His ears ring with the force of it, and he can taste blood in his mouth, feel it trickle from where his lip has split.

Before the ringing stops, both of his wrists are grabbed in one of the bald pirate’s large hands, and he can feel the bones grind together painfully. The dagger at his waist is yanked away from him and thrown into a corner of the cabin. Jaskier tries to kick and struggle, but is slammed into the wall behind him, the back of his head connecting painfully and making a wave of dizziness wash over him. When he looks up, the bald man leans into his face and bears his teeth in a bloody grin.

“So you’re the consort they’re transporting, aren’t you?” the pirate breathes, and Jaskier has to turn his face away, struggles to keep from retching at the sight and smell of Adrienne’s blood. “Pretty little thing.” The man’s hand not holding his wrists trapped above his head travels from his neck down his chest, and Jaskier’s blood turns cold. He hadn’t wanted Bast and Adrienne to be right, but there is no doubt in his mind what this man would do to him if given the chance.

“Skell,” another pirate admonishes from behind the man, who drops his hand away from Jaskier’s body and looks over his shoulder. The pirate in the door opening is tall and rangy, long black hair hanging limply to his shoulders. There is a curved cutlass in each of his hands. He too is looking at Jaskier in a way that makes dread curdle his stomach.

The man holding him, Skell, grumbles. “Captain gets first pick. I know. He’d better share this time.” The pirate unceremoniously hauls Jaskier up the ladder, into the bright light above.

---000---

Jaskier is thrown forward harshly into the middle of the Seablade’s deck. He stumbles and goes down hard on his hands and knees, several splinters of wood catching in the skin of his palms. He lifts his gaze and immediately wishes he hadn’t. In front of him, the honey coloured wood of the deck is slick with blood, and he can smell the metallic scent of it on the air. He hears a grunt, and looks to the side just in time to see the corpse of captain Bast heaved over the railing by two bare chested pirates with dark tattoos on their skin, and golden beads tied in their hair.

From behind him, the rangy man speaks, deferent voice clearly addressing his captain, the one in charge.

“Captain Rience, this is the only one left alive, sir. The rest have been taken care of.”

“Get him up,” a deceptively soft answer sounds, and Jaskier is yanked to his feet none to gently. His arms are held in a strong grip behind his back, and he knows it’s futile to try and break free. He grits his teeth and looks up at the man in front of him, the captain of the pirates that boarded the Seablade, and killed everyone on board.

The man is tall and thin, but his movements as he approaches Jaskier speak of strength. He wears a tunic of a grey material that seems to have glinting threads of iron threaded through. On his hands, silver gauntlets flash in the sunlight. Jaskier cannot help but flinch backward when his eyes land on the man’s face. He’d be relatively handsome, deep brown eyes set in a long and narrow visage, framed by shoulder length brown hair, if it weren’t for the burn scar extending all the way from the upper left side of his face and across his scalp. The flesh is healed but ridged, pulled tight, and is an angry red in colour.

A gauntleted hand lifts to trail fingers across the bruise forming along Jaskier’s cheekbone.

“Only one left alive,” the captain repeats softly, and Jaskier can’t stop himself from glaring up at him in challenge. The smile it brings to Rience’s face makes a chill run up his spine. “One left. Pretty, defiant, and wearing a consort’s clothes. Oh, but I do so enjoy finding a surprise like this.”

Before Jaskier can react to the statement, his chemise is ripped open. The buttons pop off with force, and ricochet against the wooden planks. The burned captain doesn’t stop there. He grabs the cloth with his gauntleted hands and rips the lace until it falls away entirely from Jaskier’s body, leaving his torso bare.

Jaskier makes a startled sound and instinctively tries to cover himself. The pirates holding his arms behind his back wrench them harshly, and he groans in pain at the strain on the joints. Slowly, the pirate crew surrounding him starts to jeer. He hears things about his skin, how it will mark up under their touch. He hears things about his nipples, his mouth, and his ass. It’s enough to make all consuming panic rise up in his chest, and he can no longer control his breathing, the speed of it making him lightheaded. Adrienne’s words echo in his ears. There are worse things than death.

Jaskier knows he has only one chance, if that. He tries to remember what little he can from the fencing lessons he’d been forced to take as a teenager. Most of them had dealt with facing an opponent head on, but to go overboard, the first thing he needs to do is get away from the men behind him. All he can remember is someone telling him the back of a skull will always prevail over a nasal bone, and that insteps are surprisingly tender.

He slams his head back into the face of one of the men behind him. It hurts to all hell after his head has been banged into a wall, but he can feel a satisfying crack and hear a muffled scream when the pirate's nose breaks. He pushes the pain and the wave of dizziness and nausea to the side, and stomps down as hard as he can on the instep of the second man holding him. He silently thanks the ridiculous heels on his aristocrat’s shoes when hands fall away from his arms, and he is suddenly released.

He stumbles a few paces, his stride lengthening as he transitions from the momentum of falling into a run. There is a space at the railing that’s open, none of the hostile crew blocking his way. He makes a desperate dash for it, feet slipping over the blood-soaked planks.

Just when he thinks he might make it, when he can see the waves cresting against the Seablade’s hull down below, there is a bruising grip on his arm, pulling him back. Jaskier is dragged until his back is against a lean chest, his wrists caught in one hand before him. Rience’s other hand lands on his throat, tight enough to make him gasp for air raggedly.

“Let me tell you,” the burned captain hisses in his ear, while thrusting his hips forward against Jaskier. “I like it when they run. I enjoy a challenge.”

Jaskier doesn’t even have time to struggle. His only focus is on drawing in air past those clenching fingers on his windpipe. The grip on his throat finally releases, only to shift to the nape of his neck, bending him over the railing. His hipbones dig harshly into the wood, and he cannot see anything other than the waves he was trying to reach, taunting him. That one hand is enough to hold him immobile, and he trembles as Rience’s other hand trails over the waist of his breeches. For one heart stopping moment, he thinks the man will take him. Right here, right now, over the railing, with his entire crew of pirates watching. Jaskier can’t stop the tears that leak from his eyes and drip down his nose, mingling salt with salt when the droplets fall into the ocean.

It feels wrong to be thankful when he’s pulled back up, into the man’s chest again. Just when he tries to gather his courage for another attempt, the captain’s hand clenches around his wrist, holding Jaskier’s own fingers in front of his face.

“I enjoy a challenge, but next time you run, I’ll have to punish you,” Rience says, and snaps his fingers. A flame appears as if out of nowhere. Firemage, Jaskier thinks, and freezes in the man’s hold. The captain laughs at his response. “Ah, you obviously know what’s good for you. Still, let me give you a small demonstration.”

Jaskier tries to struggle out of Rience’s grip as the flame comes closer to the pad of his left pointer finger. As the fire burns the flesh, singeing the sensitive nerves, he cannot hold in the scream that bubbles up out of his raw throat.

Chapter Text

Jaskier’s world is narrowed onto the white-hot pain in his left hand. He can’t stop screaming as the flames move slowly across his flesh, from his pointer to his middle finger. When both digits are burned, the skin blistering in places, the scarred man lets him go, and he falls to the deck. He presses his injured hand to his chest and curls around it, trying to stop the tears from flowing.

“Avast!” Rience bellows, and Jaskier flinches helplessly.

They leave him lying on the bloodied wood as merchandise is quickly heaved over from the Seablade’s cargo hold. Jaskier just shivers with fear and pain. He has no illusions as to what will happen to him, but with his hand still burning viciously, and the firemage’s promise of further punishment, he doesn’t dare to make another escape attempt. Not right now, with pirates all around him, ready to snatch him in his flight if he were to try.

Maybe tonight. After— when Rience is asleep, he’ll dare to try again.

When all goods the pirates are interested in have been transferred, Jaskier is yanked up off the deck and led over a broad gangway onto the pirate vessel. He realises he’s basically the same, just like Captain Bast had said. Part of the cargo, to be taken as another prize off of the ransacked merchant ship.

He looks down to see the waves below him, and debates shoving the man who holds him, taking him along into the churning waters. When he looks up, Rience is standing there, watching. As their eyes meet, the man snaps his fingers, conjuring another flame. Jaskier’s hand aches, and he swallows heavily. He knows he should try, but the threat of heated pain is enough to make him think twice. Rience grins with too many teeth, as Jaskier follows along meekly in the pirate’s grip.

The pirate vessel is longer and narrower than the Seablade, and Jaskier doesn’t need to understand much about ships to know they never stood a chance of outrunning it. The mast is tall and the sails are dark, announcing to everyone they meet on the waves, what kind of ship it is they’re facing.

To his surprise, Jaskier can see fraying at the edges of the black cloth. When he takes a closer look at the state of the vessel, he notices a vast difference with the merchant ship that was supposed to deliver him safely to his husband to be. The Seablade is smaller in size, and had a crew to match, but it was meticulously maintained. This ship, though large and imposing, shows the signs of wear and tear wherever Jaskier’s eyes land. Ropes are thin and some of them are fraying, looking absolutely unsafe. Still, several pirates climb up them like spiders, toward the main sail. What he can see of the hull looks beaten and chipped in places, and a glimpse toward the water shows him a vast host of barnacles and other shelled creatures attached to the wood. He is certainly no expert on the upkeep of a nautical vessel, but Jaskier knows this ship is not maintained.

He thinks it doesn’t bode well for him. If captain Rience can’t be bothered to preserve what keeps them from a watery grave, he will certainly have no qualms about damaging what he has taken as plunder.

Once on the deck of the pirate vessel, the man holding him lets go, and Jaskier sways on his feet. The hostile crew forms a barrier on either side, like a mockery of a guard of honour. He’s facing the stern, and there is an open door he knows leads to a captain’s great-cabin. When he looks over his shoulder, the burned captain is behind him. Jaskier can feel the man’s eyes travel down the naked skin of his torso like it’s something filthy, tainting him. Rience smiles again, and snaps his fingers. Orange flames burst forth, and Jaskier flinches. The smile grows wider at his fear.

“Why don’t you go to my quarters, consort,” Rience says in that deceptively soft voice.

Jaskier can feel bile rise in his throat at the way the firemage speaks the last word. He carefully eyes the flames and sees the threat in the captain’s gaze. Slowly, he turns back toward the stern and takes a tentative step forward.

As soon as he moves, jeers and whistles start up, worse than before. He does his best to ignore the insults levelled at him, the threats that are far too graphic and well thought out for his peace of mind.

The first hand touches him as he takes his second step. It’s a trailing of fingers all along his exposed back, down, until his behind is palmed roughly. He startles with a jerk, and to his shame looks back over his shoulder at Rience, as if the man will help him.

“Don’t run, consort,” Rience says. “You know what will happen if you run.” The flames in his hand swirl and grow larger, and Jaskier imagines he can feel the heat of them. At his side, his hand throbs.

Some part of him hopes that if he can reach the captain’s quarters like he was ordered, the mage will stop his men from going after him. He turns back around and takes another step.

This time it’s multiple hands that touch him, and it’s not just down his back. There are hands all over him, stroking and pinching. When nails scrape over his nipple he tries to hunch in on himself, but keeps walking.

Jaskier is close enough to the dubious safety of the captain’s great-cabin, that he dares quicken his step the barest amount. Before he reaches the door and can slip inside, he is pulled in forcefully by an arm around his waist. It’s Skell, the pirate who killed Adrienne, her blood still flecked on his face. There is lust in the man’s eyes and in his touch, and Jaskier remembers him saying he wanted his captain to share. The bald man holds him in an iron grip, bruises forming under his fingers. Before Jaskier can decide what to do, the pirate hauls him into his body and rubs his arousal against him forcefully. He tries to struggle to get away.

If only he could reach the door.

The buccaneer laughs and lands a hand on his lower back to pull him in even further. To Jaskier’s horror that hand slips below the waist of his breeches and under his smallclothes, and squeezes harshly against the swell of his buttocks. He struggles harder, but freezes when two of the man’s fingers press down harshly against the core of him.
“Nice and tight,” the pirate calls out to his mates, and is met with approving shouts.

“He won’t be for long,” a pirate behind them laughs.

Jaskier panics as the pressure against his rim increases, and renews his efforts to get away. Tears spring to his eyes at the sheer terror of the experience, and it earns him whistles and laughs.

“That’s enough Skell,” Rience says softly, cutting through the ruckus. The bald man lets him go. Jaskier stumbles away from him toward the door.

To his revulsion, he feels thankful.

---000---

Rience’s great-cabin is just as badly maintained as the rest of the vessel. It has large windows at the back and sides, and Jaskier is able to see the wooden corpse of the Seablade, drifting aimlessly on the waves. When he had seen her in the harbour back in Kerack, she had seemed beautiful. A great wooden seagull, white feathered and floating easily on the blue water. Now she is a lame bird. Damaged. Injured. Doomed to sink to the bottom of the ocean.

If Jaskier thought he would be left alone in the great-cabin until night time, he is gravely mistaken. The burned captain enters behind him, and he tries to back away from the threatening proximity.

“Stand still and hold out your hands,” the man says, and even though Jaskier more than understands the consequences of not obeying, the mage conjures fire anyway. He doesn´t move, and closes his eyes against the glow of the flames as the captain approaches. His hands are held out in front of him, one of them burnt, the other still whole. He can’t keep them from trembling.

Rope is looped around his wrists, rough and chafing, and pulled tight enough to hurt. When he is bound, his arms are lifted above his head, and the rope slipped over a hook attached to one of the beams above him. It’s high enough that Jaskier has to lift up on his toes or endure painful strain on his shoulders. He can feel the firemage’s breath on his face, and he opens his eyes to glare at him. He knows he’s being more defiant than he probably should, but he refuses to let the man see any more of his anguish and fear.

Rience touches him, lets the flames lick at the skin of his left hand, just enough for the pain to become close to unbearable before retreating. Jaskier only barely manages to keep his scream locked away behind his lips. The mage intersperses the burn of his magical flames with touches to Jaskier´s body that make him sick. There doesn’t seem to be a pattern at first, but when the captain’s thumb rubs roughly over the split at his lip, he realises he is going over every bruise and injury given to him by the pirate crew’s hands. Slowly but surely the pain and humiliation are starting to add up, and Jaskier feels like he´s dangerously close to breaking.

When Rience conjures flames at his fingers, circles behind him and pulls down fabric below the curve of his ass, he’s unable to bite back a strangled noise of fear. He doesn’t want to think about Rience burning him where Skell touched. If the man burns him there, and still wants to fuck him later, Jaskier isn’t sure his mind would come out of that experience unscathed. Not unscathed enough to find a weapon and take himself out of reach of further harm.  

The pirate captain does touch him there, but there is no heat. The flames have winked out and the mage presses with dry, cool fingers. Jaskier tries to twitch away, but is held in place with a bruising hand at his hip.

“Hm, Skell was right,” Rience murmurs, “that is tight. Oh, we’re going to have some fun tonight, aren’t we, consort?”

“Fuck you,” Jaskier grits out through his teeth, heedless of what punishment it may bring him.

Rience just laughs.

After that, Jaskier is left alone. The sudden quiet makes his adrenaline come down somewhat, and in turn makes the pain all along his body stand out in stark relief. His hand burns where the flames have touched his skin. As if the fire hasn’t left him at all, but is still eating away at his flesh. He catches himself stupidly hoping that his fingers won’t scar, and can’t keep in the hollow laugh that bursts out of his chest. Whether or not he’ll be able to move his hand enough to play the lute won’t matter. He knows the only option left to him. He’d thought to try after Rience had fallen asleep this night.

After.

If there’s a chance to succeed before the mage can take from him that which he doesn’t want to give, he has to try. He moves the fingers of his good hand over the steel of the hook that holds him up. Just along the curve of it, is a slightly serrated edge. The rope is thick and sturdy, but Jaskier has nothing better to do anyway. He rubs against the steel, and as the hemp slowly but surely starts to fray, he dares to hope.

---000---

Jaskier moves the rope tirelessly while already looking around the great-cabin in search of anything that can be used as a weapon. Part of him still doubts he’ll be able to turn it on himself, but he doesn’t know until he tries. The decision to go over the railing on the Seablade had been an easy one, but it had been fuelled by the adrenaline and fear coursing through his veins. Pressing a blade into himself while he’s alone, the danger to him visceral but not actually there in the exact moment, is an entirely different thing.

He doesn’t know how long it’s been when the ship suddenly lurches with speed. It makes him lose his balance, his feet slipping out from under him. His weight yanks against the rope, and while he groans at the pain in his shoulders, he can also clearly hear the soft noise of hemp strands breaking. He licks at the split in his lip thoughtfully while gazing up at his bindings. He’s far from there yet, but nervous anticipation curls in his belly at the sight of the broken strands.

He’s barely standing again when the pirate vessel changes direction sharply. There’s something about the way it goes against the waves that makes it heave from side to side violently, and Jaskier loses his footing entirely, swinging through the air. More strands break before he manages to get his foothold back. His shoulders ache.

From the deck outside he can hear raised voices. He thinks the tone of them sounds alarmed, though he can’t be sure. They’re too muffled for him to make out what they’re saying exactly. He continues his rubbing of the rope, keeping his attention on the shouted words outside. Something is going on. This can’t be how they normally sail. There is something frantic about the way they suddenly picked up speed and changed direction.

On another sharp turn of the vessel, Jaskier manages to keep standing, but just barely. He’s lost his shoes somewhere along the way and tries to claw his bare toes into the wood for purchase. He pants a little and actively yanks on the rope himself. The audible crack of fibres breaking is like music to his ears. Just when he wants to yank again, movement in his peripheral pulls his attention to the windows on the right side of the ship.

A great, sleek vessel overtakes them easily, cutting through the waves seemingly without resistance. It’s close enough that Jaskier can see the mouths of cannons protruding from the gunports, and he tenses in anticipation of a loud blast and the splintering of wood around him. If that ship fires at the captain’s great-cabin, there’s little chance of him surviving.

When there’s no immediate sound of cannons firing, he can’t help supress the idle hope the larger vessel belongs to some king’s navy. Tensely, he searches for a flag. The ship is too close for him to be able to see the colour of her sails. He already has to crane his neck to be able to see at all. When it overtakes them entirely, he gets a view of the banner at the stern, whipping in the wind.

The rippling cloth is midnight black. Instead of a skull, it bears the bone-white outline of a snarling wolf’s head.

“Fuck,” Jaskier curses under his breath, his heart hammering in his chest. He might not know the pirates that have taken him from the Seablade, but everyone has heard of the white wolf and his crew. Comprised of witchers and mages, there’s not a ship in the world, royal navy and pirate alike, that doesn’t fear meeting them on the open waters. If he thought the situation was dire before, he’s sure it’s about to get worse.

---000---

The larger vessel doesn’t fire first. When it cracks through the air, the cannon blast comes from the pirate vessel Jaskier is captive on. He feels it reverberate through the wooden hull, and fears the old planks might just shake apart with the force of it. There is a flash of something in the air after it fires, but no resounding crack of impact that follows. That is, until the ship alongside them opens fire in response. If he thought the Seablade’s or Rience’s cannons were loud, it’s nothing compared to this. The roar of it leaves Jaskier’s ears ringing.

He feels sick as images from the massacre on the Seablade force their way to the forefront. For several long moments he’s not present, tied in the great-cabin as he is, but staring down at Adrienne lying face down on the wood, blood pooling all around her.

He recognises the tell-tale sound of hooks being thrown over the railing, and knows it’s only a matter of time before the ship he’s on gets boarded. He grits his teeth in determination. He won’t let them take him. Not again.

He yanks and wrenches his wrists viciously, until the fraying rope gives him just enough slack that one of his hands slips through the coils. It’s his left hand, the burned one. The rough texture of the hemp scrapes over the injured skin, making him lightheaded with the sudden onset of pain. He bites his lip to hold back an agonised whimper, desperate to keep silent. Jaskier doesn’t know if everything he’s heard about witcher senses is true, but he won’t take the chance of them hearing him if he can help it. When he slips free of the rope entirely he stumbles with the sudden lack of support. When he trips, he lands on Rience’s bed, and he can’t help the horrified scramble off of the man’s sheets. His hand leaves flecks of blood on the dirty linen.

As quickly and quietly as he can, he makes the rounds through the cabin, pulling open drawers and cabinets, pulling out their contents. He’s desperate for anything. A dagger, a dinner knife, even a letter opener. Anything pointed or with an edge sharp enough to cut.

When the door opens behind him, he still hasn’t found anything, and knows it’s too late.

---000---

Jaskier whirls around and presses back against the cabinet he was searching through. The pirate is large enough to fill the entire doorway, and is clearly not one of Rience’s crew. He’s wearing light leather armour, and instead of a cutlass in his hand, there’s the hilts of two swords visible behind his left shoulder. His hair is cropped short, a dark red in colour. There is a scar along the base of his left ear, as if something had taken hold of the cartilage and tried to rip it away from his head. When their eyes meet, Jaskier flinches. The pirate’s eyes are inhuman. The irises are yellow, bright enough they seem to glow, and instead of rounded pupils at their centre, there are narrowed black slits.

Witcher, Jaskier thinks, and holds very, very still.

The man doesn’t move, but averts his gaze and takes in the room around him. The pirate can clearly see Jaskier has ransacked the great-cabin, in search of something. Slowly, a feral smile curls the man’s lips, revealing slightly pointed canines.

“And what would you be doing? Taking the chance to steal from you captain, are you?” the witcher says, and takes a step forward.

There’s no space for Jaskier to back up, but he does slide sideways, closer to the gap of the door behind the man. Yellow eyes follow his movement, and he gets the distinct feeling he’s acting like prey, when he really, really shouldn’t be. The witcher takes another step forward. Suddenly the pirate’s nostrils flare, and he inhales deeply. His yellow eyes narrow on Jaskier, and then, unmistakably, slide to Rience’s bed behind him.

No. Oh, no. Absolutely not.

Jaskier won’t stand here and be dragged into bed. Not without a fight.

The only reason he gets as far as he does, is likely the unexpectedness of the action. Instead of backing away further he sprints forward, straight toward the redheaded man, preparing to dart around him. He’s almost past the witcher, flinging himself at the doorway desperately, when a muscular arm closes around his waist like an iron band.

“NO!” Jaskier yells, and struggles savagely. He tries everything he can think of. He kicks wildly at any part of the witcher he can reach, and viciously drags his fingernails along the man’s forearm. He might as well be a fly annoyingly buzzing around the pirate’s head for all the damage he does.

“Calm down!” the redhead growls in his ear, but Jaskier’s adrenaline surges, and he manages to twist enough to throw an elbow into the man’s stomach. It’s like slamming his limb into a brick wall. The witcher doesn’t even gasp.

“Fuck, slippery little thing. Don’t make me knock you out,” the witcher threatens, and Jaskier trembles. He doesn’t know which is worse. Being taken against his will while he is present and aware, or being unconscious, not knowing what unspeakable things are done to his body. The momentary indecision gives the pirate the opportunity to grip him more firmly, and though the hold is, surprisingly, not bruising, it is firm enough any wiggle room he was left with is no longer there.

For the second time the ship he is on has been boarded, and for the second time Jaskier is dragged out onto a bloodied deck, surrounded by pirates.

---000---

The sun is starting to set, close to dipping her dazzling heat into the edge of the ocean. The sky is a bright canvas of pinks and oranges, and for a moment, all he can see are several large silhouettes. As his eyes adjust to the light, he lets himself go limp in the redheaded pirate’s arms. There is no sign of Rience or his crew. There are no bodies. Just blood. He swallows heavily and flits his gaze quickly from one pirate to the next. All of them are big, armed with swords behind their backs, and look at him through slitted pupils. One of them steps forward, and suddenly Jaskier is very, very certain he just escaped from the frying pan, only to be consumed by the fire itself.

The man’s yellow eyes bore into his, and the expression on his face makes Jaskier unable to supress the trembling of his hands. There is a long, vertical scar that bisects the left side of his face. It stretches all the way from his forehead, across his eye, before sweeping a little to the side over his strong cheekbone. The wind blows back the witcher’s snow white hair, and this can only be one person. The white wolf himself.

Jaskier feels numb with fear, and he’s sure the redhead holding him is the only reason he’s not yet collapsed onto his knees on the wooden planks. The white wolf looks at him, expression unreadable, before he breaks eye contact and raises an eyebrow at the pirate supporting his full weight now.

“Found him in the great-cabin,” the witcher behind him rumbles. “I thought he was a thief, but—” he’s cut off by an elegant scoffing sound.

“Hardly,” a woman’s voice sounds. As she steps forward Jaskier wonders how he could have missed her, even amongst the terrifyingly imposing presence of the witchers. She has long dark hair that spills over her shoulders in waves, and her violet eyes are bright in the light of the setting sun. When she grabs his chin, her hand is gentle, but he still flinches hard. The energy that surrounds her is unmistakable. Mage, he thinks, and prepares himself for the pain that’s about to come. The woman lifts his chin to look at him more closely, but he refuses to meet her gaze, staring studiously at the deck. She sighs and lets go of him, returning to the white wolf’s side. When he dares to look up, the white haired witcher is staring at him again, expression unreadable.

“Certainly not a thief,” the mage concludes. “Not part of the crew either. A plaything.”

Jaskier’s blood turns to ice at her words. If they had thought him one of Rience’s pirates, or even a simple deckhand, they might have chosen to put him out of his misery. That word though, that word implies they see him in an entirely different role of service. One that would not incline them to let him go. The white wolf’s expression suddenly goes impossibly colder than it was before, and behind him, the witcher holding him growls low in his throat.

Jaskier’s heart pounds in his chest, and adrenaline surges through his exhausted body. Adrienne’s words echo in his ears. There are worse things than death.

The hold the redhead has on him has somehow slackened considerably, and in a split second Jaskier decides to try something very foolish. It worked before, and it might work again.
With a force born from absolute terror, he slams his head back against the man standing behind him. The witcher is much taller than the pirate that had held him before. Instead of smashing into his nose, his head collides with the man’s jaw, and pain shoots through his skull. He guesses it’s more surprise than anything that further loosens the pirate’s hold on him. He wriggles his body just so, moving as fast as he can, and slips free from broad hands.

He almost pauses in his bafflement that it worked, but the memory of being hauled back against Rience, so close to the edge of the Seablade’s railing, gives him another surge of adrenaline. He runs.

He runs faster than he ever has before, his bare feet slamming into the rough wood of the deck. He throws himself toward the railing, his hands merely brushing the edge as he vaults over. Instead of looking down at the dark water as he makes the jump, he looks back over his shoulder.

The white wolf is just behind him, a great black shadow with burning golden eyes, looking straight into his. One of his large hands is stretched out to him, his lips peeled back from his teeth in a snarl. As fast as the witcher must have moved, Jaskier knows he is too late. He won’t catch him. As the wolf reaches for him, Jaskier starts to fall.

He crashes into the water mere moments later, and the breath is shocked out of him at the icy coldness of it. The salt stings at his wounds something vicious.

The pain reminds him that the wild waves closing above him are his salvation.

Chapter Text

Jaskier has heard somewhere that drowning is peaceful. That the water envelops you like a loved one’s embrace, makes you weightless, and cradles you as it carries you off to the next life. He has heard it is painless. That it comes with a sort of soothing calm.

He always hoped he would die in his sleep, old, and content with the life he lived, dreaming of his many adventures.  He guesses it’s okay to die to escape a nightmare instead. Even if it’s far from tranquil.

He has to actively fight the impulse to propel himself upward. Jaskier closes his eyes to shut out the light that filters through the salty water from above, letting him know that, here, up here! Here there is breath, here there is life!

Instead of striving toward the surface he forces his body to go limp, and lets his breath escape in small bubbles from between his lips. If he’s lucky, by the time the impulse to reach for the surface and breathe becomes too strong, he’ll have sunk down far enough water will be the only thing sucked into his lungs.

Even underwater, the sea is loud.

He can hear the sound of waves crashing into the hulls of the ships on the surface above him. From his clothes, pockets of air release themselves and bubble upward with small pops. The water passing his ears as he sinks causes a whooshing sound that threatens to overtake everything else.

His body hurts. The cold is soothing on the bruises scattered across his flesh, but everywhere his skin is broken there is a sharp sting that reminds him of Rience’s flames. His left hand is a confusing contradiction of salt burning like the fire that was held against it, and the cold taking away some of the pain.

Idly, Jaskier wonders if his body will wash up on shore somewhere. If whoever finds him will leave him lying there like an empty shell, face down in the sand, or if they will make the effort to bury him. His family will never know what really happened. All they’ll know is that the Seablade shipwrecked, and Jaskier never arrived to meet his prospective husband. He wonders if they’ll think he ran. If they’ll keep an ear out. If they’ll listen for stories of a bard with cornflower eyes, who sings of his childhood home as if it was everything he ever wanted, but not enough at the same time.

Jaskier’s heart starts to pound in an effort to keep his body alive for longer. Long enough for him to start swimming toward the surface. He doesn’t.

He lets it beat out an increasingly frantic rhythm within the cage of his chest. He imagines it as a bird, trying desperately to break free and soar through the skies. In search of a safe place, where it won’t be threatened. In search of kinder people, who will let it flourish, held within the protective cradle of a gentle palm.

His closed eyes don’t let him see anything except how the light behind his lids darkens ever further, as he glides toward the depths of the ocean. It’s how he doesn’t see it coming.

One moment he’s alone with his thoughts, the next a hand closes around one of his wrists like a shackle. The fingers are somehow shockingly hot in contrast to the seawater. Jaskier opens his eyes, but the harsh prickle of salt and lack of light mean he can only see a silhouette. He thinks he should pull his arm away from whoever is gripping him, but his thoughts are fuzzy with lack of air, and his body refuses to obey him. His muscles are heavy, and every movement makes them scream in agony with the lack of oxygen. He is effortlessly pulled into a wall of heat, and has a bleary moment to wonder what could be so warm to combat all that cold liquid pressing down on him.

Jaskier doesn’t really register that he’s being moved up through the water. Not until something in his brain, some hidden, ancient part that deals with nothing but survival, tells him he’s going to die unless he takes a breath right this second. As the last air in his lungs slips away between his lips, he prepares to draw something –anything– into his lungs. Except he’s not surrounded by air. He’s still underneath the waves, the surface beckoning him only a short distance away.

Before he can gasp and drown himself by sucking in the seawater, a hand clamps over his nose and mouth harshly. Jaskier thinks he’ll pass out from the impulse to breathe, and struggles weakly against whoever is preventing him from giving in. The palm over his face is unmovable, even though he finally manages to lift his own hands in a desperate scrabble to dislodge it.

Just when black spots start dancing before his eyes and the sound of the ocean is overtaken by the blood rushing in his ears, they break through the surface.

---000---

As soon as his head is above the water, the hand across Jaskier’s face pulls away, and his body takes in a desperately ragged, gasping breath. A couple more follow in quick succession, painful until he finally manages to violently cough up a mouthful of seawater. Slowly, the dark spots in his vision start to fade, and he can practically feel the oxygen rich blood lightening the weight that settled in his muscles. Coherent thoughts are the last thing to come back to him.

He’s alive. He hasn’t drowned. He is thoroughly confused for a moment, until he remembers being grabbed and pulled into a warm body, an arm slung around his waist, as whoever held him swam up from the deep. He knows the hand across his nose and mouth is the only reason he didn’t drown regardless.

Jaskier coughs again, to give himself some time to take stock of the situation. He’s being held up, moved with the rolling of the waves to prevent water from splashing him in the face. The hands that grasp his waist to do so, emit that startling warmth against his skin, and span almost the entire width of him. He can feel steady breathing against the back of his neck. Jaskier swallows harshly, and thinks of the white wolf snarling close behind him as he leaped overboard.

Slowly, he tries to twist himself around to face the man who plucked him from the depths of the ocean. Surprisingly, the hands accommodate his movement, while still making sure his chin is held high above the surface. The white wolf himself is low enough in the waves that the water comes up to his lips, but there is nothing about him that betrays lifting Jaskier up is costing him any effort at all. The man’s golden eyes burn, but his face remains utterly impassive except for the tiny frown between his white brows. Jaskier feels a shiver of fear travel along his spine. He looks up, and sees they’ve surfaced between the two ships, witchers and that terrifying mage looking down at them over the railing. They´re closest to the Warg, the infamous vessel that bears the white wolf’s banner.

He licks his lips and tastes a trace of blood between all the salt. Slowly, fear thick enough to sit like a heavy knot in his stomach, he moves his hands underwater to curl around the witcher´s wrists where he´s holding him up. As large as the man is, Jaskier’s long fingers barely reach all the way around the joints. Struggling hasn´t worked, running hasn´t worked. All Jaskier has left to try, are his words.

“Please,” he whispers, voice hoarse from the salt. “Please, let me go. Let me sink under the water and disappear. It’ll be like I never existed. You don’t want me. I’m not of much value. Even less so now. I’ll just be another mouth to feed and I’ll be more trouble than I’m worth. Let me dissolve into oblivion.” He is proud his voice comes out steady despite the rasp, but the witcher’s gaze sharpens, and he can’t help the tremulous waver in his last words.

“Hm. No,” the man answers, holding his gaze.

His voice is deep and rumbling, and Jaskier imagines he can feel the vibrations of it travelling through the water, all the way into his midriff. The way the witcher lifts a brow in warning is enough for him to abandon the idea of struggling to break free. His body hurts, and he is so, so tired. Instead he just lets himself be dragged through the water, the white wolf swimming with him in tow as if the extra weight is nothing to him.

When they reach the Warg’s side, a rope is let down from the top, the end just barely in the waves. Jaskier has a moment to wonder how in all hells that’s supposed to help them get up. The ship’s railing is high above them and the rocking movement would dislodge any hold he would have on the rope immediately, not to mention he’s currently unable to grab pretty much anything with his left hand. Instead of pushing him toward the rope, the white wolf rearranges Jaskier against his chest, his face tucked into the strong curve of the man’s neck and shoulder, arm firming in its hold around his waist. Jaskier can’t help but go rigid with apprehension, the fronts of their bodies now plastered together. The witcher releases another low hum, but doesn’t react otherwise.

The wolf grabs onto the rope easily, winding it around his forearm once. Then he releases a sharp whistle in some signal to those above. They start to lift out of the water at a startling rate, flying up past the Warg’s wooden side. Any time they swing toward the ship, the witcher deftly lands his feet against it, pushing away while keeping Jaskier tucked against him. The movement and speed are disconcerting enough that Jaskier grabs onto the man’s linen shirt, fisting his hands and holding on for dear life. It’s almost enough that he doesn’t notice the slow swipe of a calloused thumb across his spine. To his surprise, something in his brain interprets the gesture to be calming, rather than lecherous.

After Jaskier is smoothly lifted over the railing onto the Warg’s deck, the white wolf at his back, he makes a small distressed sound at the circle of pirates, all staring at him. Where before it had been predominantly yellow irises with slitted pupils, there are at least as many human eyes now. Apparently the wolf’s boarding party consists of witchers, but his ship is sailed by a combined crew, men and women, human and witcher alike. Jaskier dazedly wonders what could move someone to join up with the inhuman pirates. The continuous sense of danger would have him looking over his shoulder without pause, his nerves frayed.

As it is, the group of pirates looking at him with marked interest is intimidating enough that he takes a small step backward. It leads him to bump into the wall of muscle and heat that is the white wolf, who settles a hand on his waist to steady him, fingers curling forward across his belly. The witcher behind him growls, loud and threatening. Jaskier flinches helplessly in response, but doesn’t dare move away from the possessive hold.

“No one touches him without permission,” the wolf snarls. As one, the crew in front of him tip back their heads to bare their throats. Jaskier shivers at the implication. The man behind him is terrifying enough to hold his crew’s easy obedience with only a few words. He is also the one who will control who will be able to make use of Jaskier.

He doesn’t know if it is a good or a bad thing.

---000---

Invariably, Jaskier is led to the Warg’s great-cabin. Though there is a marked difference between his reception on the Warg, compared to his welcome on Rience’s ship. There is no jeering or whistling. There are no insults thrown his way, and the crew that looks at him seems to be more curious than anything. Another big difference is that the white wolf keeps his hand clasped over Jaskier’s opposite hip as he walks, as if guiding him. Part of him wants to shirk off the touch with disdain, but even he is not foolish enough to invite the wolf’s ire so blatantly. Another part of him, one he doesn’t want to dwell on, is thankful for the man’s presence. Even if someone would be idiotic enough to ignore their captain’s warning, they won’t dare lay a hand on him as long as the white wolf is close.

When they enter the great-cabin, the witcher makes a quick hand gesture to one of his crew, before pulling the door closed. Jaskier catches it and swallows thickly. Is the man signalling he wants to take his time with Jaskier, and he’s not to be disturbed?

Furtively, he looks around the Cabin. Like most great-cabins, it has widows on three sides, looking out over the waves. It is furnished simply, functionally. There is a large table, bolted to the floor, with a map spread out on top, small wooden ships and army markers in a recessed hollow. Between two beams hangs a hammock, and pinned to the wall are more maps. Some Jaskier recognises, some are detailed depictions of islands he has never seen before. In a cabinet attached to the wall he can see multiple bottles of liquor and glassware, kept from shattering by carved wooden doors inset with coloured glass. Next to it, below the windows on that side, is a long, wide bench that seems to be part of the ship wall. Part of the great-cabin is separated by a hanging curtain, and he suspects there’s some sort of facilities for bathing hidden behind it. The longer he looks, the more little details stand out to him. He has no hope of interpreting what they tell him about the man whose cabin this is though, because inexorably, his eyes are pulled to the large bed off to the side. It too is bolted down to the floor, and covered in simple sheets.

Jaskier swallows harshly, and tears his eyes away from the bed to glance at the witcher who is still just standing there. When slitted eyes meet his, he takes a reflexive step backward. The man hums at him thoughtfully, before pointing to the wall-bench.

“Sit down,” he says, and Jaskier obeys immediately. Anything that takes him further away from the bed is better than the alternative.

He is so tightly wound that when a knock sounds at the door, he jumps a little. The white wolf hums again, and turns to open. The woman that enters is tall and elegant, wearing a gown with the pleats pulled up in the front to expose her legs and give her the agility that’s necessary at sea. Her hair is a long, curling auburn, and though Jaskier can sense a mage’s energy as she enters, her face is kind.

“Look him over. Let me know when you’ve finished,” the white wolf rumbles and turns to retreat from the great-cabin. Jaskier’s heart starts to pound. Look him over? For what exactly? Does the witcher want to make sure he’s not damaged beyond repair before taking him? and if so, if he’s found lacking, will he be left to the mercy of the man’s crew after all?

Jaskier stares at the wolf’s back as he leaves, and tries to supress the tremble in his hands.

The mage moves slowly through the space and sits herself next to him. Jaskier holds himself tensely, ready to spring away from her should she give him any reason to. When she speaks, her voice is as kind as her face.

“My name is Triss. I’m one of the mages aboard the Warg at this moment. My specialty is potions and healing. I can see you’ve had a— a harrowing experience with a mage recently,” she says carefully while gesturing to Jaskier’s burned hand.

He licks his lips and debates how to answer. “You could say that,” he says neutrally after a long moment of silence. “How do you know though?” When she tilts her head questioningly, he elaborates. “How do you know that this was done magically?”

“Oh, of course. I can sense the magic, just as I can sense it is the injury that pains you most. Can you still move your fingers?” she asks.

There is something about Triss that feels safe to Jaskier, as if she’s genuinely concerned for him and his injuries. Obediently, he bends and stretches his fingers at her instruction. It hurts, and the joints are stiff because of the swelling, but he is able to move them. “Can—can you fix them?” he asks her, afraid to hear the answer. She smiles sadly at him in response, and Jaskier braces himself for a negative answer.

“I can try,” is what she murmurs softly, her eyes on the blistered flesh. “Can I have your permission to touch?”

The question startles Jaskier. He’d thought that the white wolf’s orders to look him over would be permission enough. Hesitantly, he nods and reaches his left hand toward her. When she cradles it between her palms, her hands are somehow cool and soothing, taking away some of the sharp pain. For the first time, Jaskier dares to take a closer look.

Of the fingers of his left hand, only the smallest isn’t burnt. The worst are his pointer and middle fingers, the ones that Rience put the flames to first. Despite his plunge in the ocean, he can still see black charr marks in some places, and blisters filled with liquid in others. On the whole, it looks pretty awful, and Jaskier feels bile rise up in his throat and tries to swallow reflexively. Triss shoots him a quick look, concern in her gaze.

“I think I’ll be able to do much, but I can’t guarantee there won’t be some scarring that might impair the dexterity of your fingers,” she says softly.

Jaskier grits his teeth, and wills the tears he can feel threatening not to fall. “Yeah. Okay. Any improvement would be good. Thank you.”

Over the next long hour, the red haired mage speaks several incantations over him. Slowly but surely, the burns on his hand start to become less intense, until they eventually look like an injury that has had days to heal. When Jaskier flexes his fingers, they’re still stiff, but considerably less so than they were. Tentatively, he looks up at Triss to give her a thankful smile.

The mage keeps his hand in hers, and seems to weigh her next words.

“There’s only so much magic I can subject your body to at one time. I’ll work on your hand more later, if you’re okay with that.”

“Of course, and again, thank you,” Jaskier says hesitantly. “It— It’s more than I expected, honestly.”

Triss gives him a sad smile. “I’d do more if I could. There is some allowance for magic left, that I saved for— for something specific, if necessary.”

“Something specific? Jaskier tilts his head at her curiously, inviting her to elaborate.

The mage sighs. “I saved it in case there is —tearing— I need to take care of.”

Jaskier flushes hotly and jerks his hand out of her grasp roughly, but forces himself to remain seated. Of course. Of course she would save magic for that. The white wolf told her to look him over. Jaskier should have known that meant fixing any signs on his body from a previous fucking. With the possessive words and gestures the witcher has already displayed, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to him.

“That’s not necessary,” he says while averting his gaze from her kind eyes. “There’s no tearing.”

“Are you sure? Sometimes the injury is more on the inside, and not immediately evident. A forced coupling leaves damage more often than not. If there’s any pain, I would like to treat it, just to be safe.”

Jaskier shakes his head, opening and closing his mouth a couple times. He doesn’t need that kind of healing. Not yet at least. “I wasn’t, I— I mean, they touched me, there. But I wasn’t. He just burned me. I think he was waiting until nighttime. You all happened first though.”

Triss strokes her hand over his shoulder. “I’m glad that was the case,” she says gently. “How about we continue on your hand tomorrow then? I know you’ve got some other injuries, but I’d rather let your body take care of those by itself. Too much magic can be dangerous in its own right.”

Jaskier nods at her. “That would be… good. You’ll find me?” he asks. Maybe, if he’ll need that kind of healing tomorrow after all, she’ll be kind enough to offer it again.

Triss nods and turns her torso toward the door. “Geralt, if you’re listening. We’ve finished.”

It doesn’t even take a minute before the white wolf, Geralt, enters the great-cabin, eyes immediately going to Jaskier, and taking him in from toes to crown. He shifts uncomfortably under that golden gaze, and suddenly, really doesn’t want Triss to go. He wonders what the witcher was able to hear of their conversation. Triss’ voice when calling him had been raised only a little compared to how they had conversed.

The mage stands up fluidly, leaving him seated on the bench by himself.

“I’ll have a cabin made ready for him,” she says, looking up at her captain.

Jaskier doesn’t even have the time to process her words. A cabin for himself, does that mean…..

“No,” the witcher growls, finally averting his gaze from Jaskier to look at his healer. “He’ll sleep here.”

Triss looks like she wants to argue for a moment, but there is something in the tilt of the wolf’s head that stalls her words. Jaskier doesn’t blame her. He would have done the same.

“All right then,” she says, looking over her shoulder with a frown, and is gone.

Jaskier is in a great-cabin, alone with the white wolf, the most feared pirate captain traversing the seas. His eyes slide over to the bed, and he swallows painfully.

Chapter Text

Jaskier sits frozen on the bench where Triss left him, heartrate steadily increasing as the wolf stares, a slight frown between his white brows . When the nervous energy becomes too much, he can´t help but tap a jittery rhythm with his fingers against his thigh. Immediately, golden eyes flick to the movement, and Jaskier curls his hand into a fist. He doesn’t know whether he should apologize for making noise. Whether he should speak at all. He’s suddenly very aware he’s wearing nothing more than seawater laden breeches, his torso bare. Slowly, he folds his arms over his chest, not daring to look the wolf in the face while he does it.

“Hm,” the white wolf says, and moves away from him to disappear behind the curtain that separates a section of the great-cabin. Jaskier remains still. Tense. Waiting. When the witcher reappears he gestures to the curtain. “Wash off the salt. Get dressed.”

Jaskier licks at the split in his lip nervously, and startles when there is a low growl that reverberates from the captain’s chest. He makes an alarmed squeak in the back of his throat that he would be embarrassed to have any of his siblings hear, and hurries to comply with the order. He carefully moves past the witcher, keeping as much distance as he can between them, without being obvious about it.

As he passes and slips behind the curtain, he mumbles a soft, hopefully appeasing answer. “Yes, my lord.” What he gets in response is another deep growl, and Jaskier is glad for the curtain separating them, hiding the shake of his hands.

“That’s not—” the white wolf begins, before cutting himself off. “There’s clothes for you there. Come out when you’ve finished.”

Behind the curtain is a large basin of cold water set into a low cabinet, and Jaskier washes as quickly as he can. He tries to keep an ear out for what’s happening in the great-cabin, but all he can hear is the sea and the sounds of a working ship around them. The can’t supress the little shocks of adrenaline that set his heart to pounding every time the Warg crests a particularly high wave. It sends the curtain fluttering, and more than once he imagines the pirate captain stepping through to grab him. Once he’s rinsed himself of salt thoroughly, he finally dunks his head to soak his hair.

When Jaskier takes stock of the clothes the captain spoke of, he comes to the baffling conclusion the man is offering up his own wardrobe. Everything is loose on him. There are soft sleeping braies with laces he has to wrap around himself to hold them up, and a chemise fashioned out of raw linen. The latter garment is big enough that it swallows him, and however much he tugs it into place, the neckline keeps slipping to reveal one of his shoulders. There is no mirror for him to appraise how he looks, and he fidgets anxiously.

Before it can be decided for him, Jaskier steps around the curtain, back into view of the white wolf. He does so softly, his bare feet barely making any sound on the wooden floor, but the man looks up from where he’s bent over the large map, as if his footfalls are announcing him loudly. Jaskier freezes as golden eyes drop from his face, down his throat and over the exposed expanse of his chest and shoulder. Their slitted pupils expand and narrow in a way he distantly registers as fascinating, wondering how much control the witchers have over their cat-like eyes.

“Hm,” the wolf says again. “Triss did not get rid of your bruises.”

It’s a statement. One that makes Jaskier’s stomach swoop sickeningly, while his hands fly to his throat and shoulder. His torso had been bare before, but he supposes the slip of fabric makes the skin it reveals stand out more. There’s places his body hurts worse, but as soon as he presses his fingers into his flesh he can feel the tell-tale tenderness. He has a sudden flash of cruelly squeezing hands as he made his way through Rience’s crew, and tries to take deep, calming breaths.

“I’m sorry my lord,” he says, carefully controlling the tone of his voice and averting his gaze. “She did what she could. She complied with your order fully. My hand took most of her attention. She— she’s not to blame,” he finishes a little stronger, finally looking into those golden eyes again.

The corners of the white wolf’s mouth turn down, and he rights himself from his position leaning over the map. “Geralt,” he growls.

“What?”

“Geralt,” the witcher repeats. “My name. Don’t call me my lord.”

Jaskier’s mouth hangs open for a moment before he realises he’s staring in bafflement, and shuts his jaw sharply enough for his molars to click together. “Yes, my lo— ah, forgive me. Yes, Geralt,” he answers slowly.

The witcher nods gruffly. “She focussed on your hand. The burnt one. That’s good.”

The wolf looks at him like he expects an answer, but for the life of him, Jaskier doesn’t know what the right thing to say is. Uncertain, he just says the first thing that comes to mind. “I’m very fond of my hands. I dare say they’re some of my best assets, I’m glad she was able to do what she did.”

As soon as he says it, he realizes how that statement might sound to a man such as the pirate captain in front of him. Fear is a sharp stab in his belly, and he takes an involuntary step backward. “My lo—Geralt, I— I meant they’re the best of me because they play music. I play the lute, you see.” He trails off uncertainly, hoping against hope that the man won’t see the slip up as an invitation to make use of Jaskier’s hands in a different capacity. Though he supposes the witcher using his hands should be amongst the least of his worries. The white wolf just hums in the back of his throat, and bends back over his map. Jaskier stands there, wondering what the man expects him to do. When he next speaks, the captain doesn’t look at him.

“Did you tell Triss the truth?” the witcher asks, his expression and tone of voice unreadable.

“The truth about what?” he asks very carefully.

“What were you doing in that Captain’s great-cabin?” It is said low and dangerous, and Jaskier tries not to panic. He doesn’t know what the right answer is in this case, so again the words that come to mind first, are the ones that spill out.

“I’m sure you very well know what,” he answers, and winces a little at the bite he can hear in his own voice. What is the wolf playing at? He knows what Jaskier was there for. He’s here, in the man’s own great-cabin, for the same reason after all.

“Your blood was on his bed,” Geralt responds through gritted teeth. “You told Triss you weren’t raped. Is that the truth?”

Jaskier recoils at the blunt words. The man’s obvious doubt of the truth of his statement makes the anger that had so far been cowed by his fear rise. “Do you always listen in on private conversations?” he hisses.

Geralt’s face remains utterly neutral. “I do when taking on unexpected passengers on my ship.”

Jaskier shakes his head incredulously, “passengers,” he says. He can hear the dripping sarcasm in his own voice, and knows he’s playing at something dangerous here. But, the hysteric fear of the day is catching up to him, and though there’s a voice in his mind that screams at him to stop, he is unable to. “That’s an interesting way of putting it. I seem to recall rather clearly requesting you let me go instead.”

It's those words that spur the witcher into action. Within the blink of an eye the man has moved away from the table and is in front of Jaskier. He twitches in fright, but forces himself not to back down, looking up into those slitted, golden eyes. When Geralt’s calloused fingers curl around his chin, the grip is surprisingly gentle.

“You mean the request to let you drown,” the wolf says, soft and low, a barely there growl in his voice. “Again, what were you doing in that great-cabin?”

 “He was going to— I was looking for a knife.”

“To defend?” Geralt asks.

Jaskier meets his gaze in challenge. “To be free.”

The witcher snarls in response, anger in his eyes, lips curling back to reveal his sharply pointed canines. “Don’t try and find a knife here,” he says coldly, and the threat is so palpable, that Jaskier’s temporary flare of anger and courage sputters and dies. He doesn’t dare pull away from the man’s hold on his chin. Instead he lowers his gaze, and tries to hide the shiver of fear that travels along his spine.

It takes a long moment, but the white wolf lets him go, and steps out of his space.

“Get in the bed,” he growls, and Jaskier’s heart stutters and starts beating double time. Geralt frowns and moves away further. “I’m going to get you food. Don’t search for a weapon. I’ll be able to hear.”

With those vaguely threatening words the witcher leaves the great-cabin, and Jaskier releases a rush of breath and tension. He debates ignoring the wolf’s words and seating himself back on the bench instead. He decides against it. Ultimately, the man will have no trouble dragging Jaskier between the sheets if he wants to, and he doesn’t care to make the experience more painful than necessary. He’s disappointed in himself, but neither does he dare search for a blade.

When the white wolf returns, he’s carrying a simple bowl of stew and two slices of hard, crusted bread. There’s also an earthenware jar of water. Jaskier is leant against the headboard, half underneath the sheets, and tries not to flinch away when the witcher approaches. Geralt does nothing more than set the meal down in his lap, before he returns to peer at his map once more. Jaskier remains tense, eyeing the distance between them. When his stomach growls, so does the witcher.

“Eat,” he orders, yellow eyes fixing him in place.

The stew is good, and so is the bread. Jaskier doesn’t realise how hungry he actually is until he starts eating. Within a short time, he’s devoured everything the white wolf has brought him. He looks up to meet golden eyes and gathers his courage.

“Thank you for the meal.”

“Hm. More?” the witcher asks him, and he wonders if the pirate captain would actually go and fetch him more food, like he cares if Jaskier has eaten his fill. He doesn’t dare test the theory, and shakes his head instead.

When nothing else happens, Jaskier scoots down further under the blankets, turning his back to where the white wolf is doing gods know what. It’s almost like the man is standing guard. He’s determined to stay awake, to not let the witcher sneak up on him while he sleeps. He’s in the captain’s bed, and the least he can do is remain vigilant. Not that he can do anything about it if the white wolf decides to join him between the sheets, but still.

Despite himself, the exhaustion born of the continuous terror catches up with him, and he is dragged under the heavy blanket of sleep. Though his slumber is restful, it is plagued by nightmares. They are full of fire, pain, and threats, and when there’s phantom touches to his body, he wakes gasping. It happens a few times, and invariably Jaskier realizes where he is, and who is with him in the cabin. It makes him bite down on the sounds of distress, and surreptitiously wipe at the moisture on his cheeks. He’s afraid. Afraid of the witcher deciding to hold him down and take what Rience had threatened to. He doesn’t entirely understand why the man hasn’t yet.

It's only when he wakes up in the morning, alone, that he realises a soothing rumble had sounded every instance he woke in a panic. The sound had been gentle and calming enough to lull him back to sleep.

There is only one person it could have come from.

---000---

The next morning, when there’s a knock at the door, Jaskier startles. He’s sure it isn’t the white wolf. The witcher would hardly  knock for permission to enter his own great-cabin.

“It’s Triss,” the mage calls through the door, and he heaves a sigh of relief. He calls back for her to come in, and she enters carrying a bundle of clothes.

“Good morning,” he greets her with a tentative smile. She returns it freely, and Jaskier is glad his impression from yesterday seems to hold up where she’s concerned.

“I brought you some more clothes,” the mage says kindly. “Geralt’s are way too large for you. I found some that I think will fit.”

He takes the clothes from her with a few words of thanks, and slips from the bed to change behind the curtain. He doesn’t know how to feel. He’d fallen asleep with the white wolf in close proximity, and not only had the man not touched him, he’d not even joined Jaskier in his bed. He’s confused about it, but decides to make no mention. There’s no reason to look a gift horse in the mouth, after all. The last thing he wants to do is give the witcher any ideas.

When he slips back around the curtain, he’s clothed in a reasonably fitted pair of breeches, and a deep blue doublet. Underneath it, he still wears the too large underclothes. He’d have preferred leaving them behind, but it is chilly enough out on the open sea that he appreciates the extra warmth.

Triss is seated on the bench at the side, looking out to the waves. Next to her is a plate with some bread and a couple slices of cheese. She smiles at him.

“There. Better, isn’t it?”

“It is. I do always say that clothes matter, though I have been accused of overvaluing them more than once.” It’s his nerves that make him share the information. To his relief Triss’s eyes just crinkle at the corners in amusement.

“I’ll let Geralt know. I’m sure we have some more things that would fit you in the hold.”

Jaskier looks at her in alarm. “Please don’t. I don’t require much. I’ll not be a bother.” Please. Please let me be invisible as much as I can, to escape his attention, he thinks.

Triss looks at him with a tilt of her head, as if she’s trying to read him. Eventually she gestures to the bread. “I brought this for you. I though you could breakfast while I work on you hand some more. Can I have your permission to touch?”

There. That question again. Permission to touch him lies with Geralt, doesn’t it? Why is she asking him? He doesn’t ask. He just nods at her, extending his left hand.

---000---

After at least another hour of Triss softly incanting, the crackle of magic heavy in the cabin, Jaskier’s hand still looks like it has been burned, but years ago. The scars are pale against his skin, easy to miss unless one is looking, and when he glides the fingers of his other hand across them, he can barely feel that they’re there. Carefully he flexes and extends his fingers. Not entirely as they were before, but the movement is smoother than he had dared to hope. More than smooth and fast enough to be able to play the lute, after a period of getting used to it.

He looks up at Triss in wonder. “I don’t know how to thank you. I could use all the words in the world and it wouldn’t be enough. You have returned to me the thing that has brought me joy even in days of darkness.”

The mage smiles at him and leans back. He can see the use of magic cost her, a deep weariness behind her eyes. “You use pretty words, and your fingers bear the callouses of strings. We thought you were from a noble house. But, are you a bard?” she asks.

“Ah,” Jaskier answers, debating whether to tell her the truth. He decides to be honest without revealing too much. Who knows what the witchers will do to him if he were to lie. “Not a bard, though I wish I was. I wouldn’t have been on the Seablade.” He chuckles hollowly. “Just a minor noble son who was thankfully allowed to learn the lute, since there was no better purpose for him.”

“You were on your way to marry,” Triss says softly, and Jaskier nods. “We don’t even know your name,” the auburn haired mage continues. It’s not really a question, but an invitation to elaborate. Though Jaskier had been glad when he could leave Lettenhove behind, he’d rather die than give up his full name, not— not when he isn’t certain what the white wolf and his crew would do with the information. His siblings deserve to be protected.

“Jaskier,” he answers with an effort for lightness, and from the flash in her eyes, he knows Triss understands, and won’t press him.

“I’m glad to meet you, Jaskier. I can only hope at some point you’ll feel safe enough to let us know more.”

Jaskier doesn’t say he highly doubts that point will ever come.

---000---

It takes a little convincing, but eventually he lets Triss lead him from the great-cabin, and out onto the Warg’s decks. The vessel is huge. It’s wider than the Seablade, and so much longer it cuts through the waves like a knife. Everywhere he looks there is oiled wood, well maintained coils of rope, and above him there are great swathes of dark grey fabric, pulled taut in the wind. It’s hard to judge when at sea, but Jaskier’s impression is the Warg is travelling at considerable speed, even with only half her sails hoisted. She has three masts, the middle one high enough to make him dizzy just imagining being up in the crow’s nest.

“Why are her sails grey?” he asks Triss. The mage is standing next to him, patiently waiting for him to take the ship’s measure.

She laughs gently. “There’s a reason for it. I think you should ask Geralt though, he’s the one that switched them from black to grey.”

Jaskier slides his eyes over to her, considering. Ask Geralt? She can suggest that all she wants, but he’d rather avoid any and all interaction with the wolf if he can.

Triss walks with him across the Warg’s decks, pointing out little characteristics about the Vessel. Jaskier carefully keeps his attention focussed on the mage, distracting himself from the sailors that move across the wooden planks and in the rigging high above. Every time one of them passes, they do so with a wide curve around him, never getting close.

“Why do they do that?” Jaskier murmurs after a while, when a sailor diverts his path for the umpteenth time to give them a wide berth.

“Geralt’s orders,” the mage answers simply.

“What? Why?”

Triss raises an eyebrow at him. “Would you be comfortable with them getting closer?”

He shakes his head thoughtfully. It’s not entirely an answer to his question. What he really wants to know is, why would the white wolf care?

The longer they walk, the more Jaskier manages to let go of his tension. They’ve made several circuits, more and more sailors noticing him and giving him small, welcoming nods. There are even a couple of cat-eyed witchers, meeting his gaze and inclining their heads in greeting. Every now and again, Jaskier thinks he can hear the same sort of soothing rumble come from their chests as he could hear coming from their captain during his nightmare fraught slumber. He wonders what to make of it.

He isn’t aware they’re being shadowed, until he moves away from Triss’s side toward the railing. All he wants to do is lean his elbows on the smooth wood and peer down the distance to the blue water, when a noise stops him in his tracks. It’s the gentle scraping of a throat, but there is enough warning in it that Jaskier freezes. He immediately curses himself for letting down his guard, for believing the wolf’s order the previous day and the mage’s presence next to him, would keep him relatively safe. Slowly, heart in his throat and his mouth dry, he turns around and comes face to face with another witcher.

“Jaskier, right?” the man says gently, before gesturing to himself. “Eskel. Would you mind stepping away from the railing?”

The witcher is like a dark mirror image of his captain. He’s just as tall and broad, corded muscles on display where his arms are left bare. His eyes are amber where the white wolf’s are golden, and his hair is black. Just like Geralt, Jaskier thinks he is startlingly handsome, if you disregard the general air of danger. Where the white wolf has a thin scar that travels across his left eye, this man has a terrible crescent shaped mark, that takes up almost an entire half of his face. Jaskier does his best not to stare.

“Ah,” Eskel says, momentarily covering part of the mark with a large palm. “It takes some getting used to. Not a pretty sight, I know.”

Jaskier is startled by the self-deprecating tone of his voice, and despite his fear, feels compelled to argue. “Honestly, it’s more the fact that I thought I was taking a private stroll, as private as possible on a ship, really, and then suddenly I’m confronted with the fact that apparently you all think I’m gonna go for another swim.”

To his surprise, the dark haired witcher chuckles. “That’s what you call it? A swim?” The smile disappears from his face, his expression turning more serious, though Jaskier feels reassured when his posture remains carefully unthreatening. “Every witcher on board heard what you said to Geralt when he pulled you above the surface.”

Jaskier flinches. He heard of witcher senses, has already had proof of them even, with Geralt overhearing his conversation with Triss, or this Eskel, who already knows his name tough he’d only just uttered it for the first time. Of course they would have heard him.

“I had reason to do as I did,” he says slowly, carefully meeting the witcher’s amber eyes. Eskel nods at him.

“We know. And you still believe you have that same reason. Can’t blame us for taking precautions, until we can convince you otherwise.”

Jaskier swallows, and takes an unthinking step backward, toward the water. Eskel’s face pulls into a grimace, and he raises a careful hand.

“Come on, little one,” he says coaxingly. “Step away from the railing please, or give me permission to touch you.”

There it is again. Permission to touch. Jaskier has no doubt that if he steps any closer, the amber-eyed witcher will bodily haul him away, but he gets the distinct impression Eskel would rather not, and if he had to, he’d strangely want Jaskier’s consent before laying a hand on him.

“Why are you asking me for permission?” he says slowly, thoughtfully. “And why did you, for that matter,” he continues, eyes flicking to Triss, who stands with her hands pressed together, concern on her face. Both of them look baffled for a moment. “Don’t you need to ask your captain?” Jaskier finishes.

Eskel makes a harsh hissing sound between his teeth. “That’s how you interpreted that? No, little one. Just. No. You decide who gets to touch you. No one else. Not even the white wolf.” The dark haired witcher looks up as he says it, and Jaskier follows his gaze.

High up in the rigging, almost at the top of the middle mast, Geralt is leaning out. He's looking down at them, white hair whipping in the wind.

Chapter Text

After spending most of the day outside, roaming the Warg’s decks with Triss and Eskel, Jaskier is back in the great-cabin by the time the sun starts to go down below the horizon. He’s sitting on the low bench, waiting. By the time the white wolf enters, the sky is an explosion of colour. Jaskier stands up to face him, scraping together his courage, despite the pounding of his heart. Before he can say anything, the witcher’s nostrils flare.

“You’re still wearing my clothes,” Geralt says, eyes quickly dipping down to take him in. Jaskier starts, his hands flying up to the fastenings of the doublet. Are his underclothes showing? But no, the deep blue fabric is still securely closed over his chest, hiding the too large chemise that lies beneath.

“It’s inappropriate to mention someone’s underclothes you know,” he says, tensely awaiting what kind of response he’ll elicit.

“Hm,” the witcher answers, moving toward him. Jaskier stumbles back a pace, but then forces himself not to retreat any further. There’s something about Geralt that reminds him of a predator, and he’s sure that the stupidest thing you can do when faced with one, is run. Geralt bends down beside him, going to one knee, and pulls out a sturdy wooden chest from its secure place under the bench. “For you,” the witcher rumbles, gesturing at it. Jaskier stares up at him, his eyes wide, unable to bring himself to say anything, or take a closer look at the chest. “Hm,” Geralt says again, a slight frown between his brows. “Look through it. I’ll get food.” He turns and heads toward the door. Just when Jaskier thinks the warning won’t come this time, the captain looks back at him over his shoulder. “I’ll be listening,” he growls. “Behave.”

After the white wolf pulls the door closed behind him, Jaskier heaves a sigh to relieve tension, and hems and haws for a moment. He decides he’d rather find out what’s in the chest while by himself, than having Geralt force him to in the man’s presence. He doesn’t really know what he expects the content to be, vague images of restraints and instruments of pain flashing before his mind’s eye.

When he opens it, there’s none of that. Instead, the chest holds clothes. The fabrics are rich and soft, saturated jewel tones with elaborate stitching along their hems, interspersed with more simple, practical ensembles. Jaskier lets his fingers glide over several of the doublets and matching breeches. The styles are different enough that he knows they don’t belong in the chest together. Someone has taken the effort to gather clothing in his size and put this together for him. Triss maybe?

In the corner of the chest there is a pair of soft leather boots and another corner holds several pairs of smallclothes wrapped in tissue paper. He has to swallow when he trails his fingers over the latter. They are made of something silky and slippery. The kind of underclothes he would have been required to wear as a noble consort, to keep his husband satisfied.

Maybe that’s why nothing has happened yet. Maybe the wolf is playing at something here, just like Rience was when he kept calling Jaskier consort. He’s half tempted to throw them away, to signal to Geralt that he won’t be complicit in such a farce. The alternative however, is for him to keep wearing the witcher’s things underneath, or go without entirely, naked and accessible under the provided finery. Jaskier shudders, closing the lid.

He bites his lip as he thinks about Eskel’s words on deck today. True to his word, the dark haired witcher had not laid a single finger on him. If he’s to be believed, supposedly the white wolf won’t either. Jaskier doubts it sincerely, but can’t help the small flare of hope that takes root.

---000---

This time when Geralt brings food, there’s more of it. Jaskier takes it from him with hesitant hands, seated on the low bench, his legs folded under him.

“Thank you,” he makes himself say, looking up into those slitted yellow eyes.

“Hm. You’re welcome,” Geralt responds, and to Jaskier’s disconcertion, seats himself right next to him. The witcher doesn’t say anything more, just watches him eat. It makes him uncomfortable enough that he can’t hold his tongue.

“You’re not eating?” he asks between bites.

“I already ate. We have a mess deck below.”

“You eat with your crew?” Jaskier asks in surprise. He doesn’t think he’s ever heard of any naval higher ups supping with their subordinates.

“Hm. You’re welcome to eat there, too,” the white wolf answers.

Just the idea of it makes Jaskier’s shoulders tense, and he quickly shakes his head, finishing his meal. The thought of exposing himself to so many of the white wolf’s crew at once, makes him decidedly uneasy. It doesn’t matter how much they had kept their distance today, it still makes him think of walking through Rience’s men. “No. I— I’d rather not, if you’ll allow it,” he says quietly. Geralt just looks at him with his intense golden stare.

Just when Jaskier starts to fidget under the witcher’s gaze, the man takes his empty bowl away from him, setting it to the side. “More?” he asks, just as he had the day before. This time Jaskier is quite fully satisfied, but he’s still tempted, if only to get some more time by himself, time where he doesn’t have to feel so on edge.

He shakes his head. “No, thank you.”

Geralt turns toward him, leaning his side against the bench’s backrest, attention again fully focussed on Jaskier. He feels caught in the man’s presence, and has to supress the urge to shift away from him. He knows it would be futile. No matter the distance he keeps between them, if Geralt wants to grab him, Jaskier certainly won’t be able to prevent him doing so. He slowly presses his palms together in his lap, to hide the slight shake of his hands.

“I want to know which one was the captain whose cabin you were in,” Geralt rumbles, lip curling back just enough to reveal the tips of his canines.

“Which— What do you mean? You don’t know which pirate was the captain of that crew?” he can hardly imagine it. Then again, Rience was probably smart enough to hide away amongst his men if it gave him more chance of survival. Jaskier remembers the way the wolf’s nostrils had flared when he came in this evening. How he had been able to smell he is still wearing the witcher’s clothes. “Weren’t you able to smell me on him?” he answers bitterly, looking away.

“Hm. Your scent. It was on more than one of them,” there is a definite growl in the white wolf’s chest as he says it, and Jaskier manages to supress a flinch. What he can’t supress, is the spike of adrenaline in his veins, and the way his heart starts beating faster. Geralt tilts his head slightly, and to Jaskier’s surprise, the captain leans back a measure, giving him more space to breathe.

He carefully tries to control the rate at which he pulls in air. “Ah,” he answers, clenching his fists so hard his knuckles turn white. “Yes. When I boarded that ship, they— they, ah—”

“You don’t have to say it,” Geralt interrupts his strangled words, and Jaskier thinks coming from anyone else, the words might have sounded kind. “Just tell me which of them was the captain that exposed you to that.”

This time it’s Jaskier’s turn to tilt his head, carefully taking in the man across from him. “Why do you want to know?” he asks, dreading the answer.

“Some of them, we let go. Before we knew what they had done. Or planned to do. Triss tells me the captain was a mage. He hid himself.”

Jaskier can feel the blood drain from his face and clenches his hands together more firmly. When the redheaded witcher had taken him from Rience’s great-cabin, there had been none of the scarred captain’s crew left on board. He’d figured they had all died. Figured Rience had died. Though he knows he’s far away, surrounded by witchers and mages aboard the Warg, he can’t help the frisson of utter terror that shoots through him.

“Oh,” he breathes, “I thought— you let some of them go? When they boarded the Seablade they killed everyone. Everyone but me.”

This time when Geralt growls, it’s near silent, as if he a saw Jaskier’s previous reaction and is trying to supress the sound for his sake. “We are not the same as them,” the white wolf says darkly.

Jaskier honestly suspects the witcher is not trying to intimidate him, not this time. Still, he can’t help the way his body responds when Geralt speaks like that, his voice grim and his gaze foreboding. Though he keeps still as carefully as he can, he can’t entirely stop the slight twitch of fear. Again, the white wolf seems to notice, and leans back out of his space. Jaskier licks nervously at the split in his lip, averting his gaze to look down at his hands. “I apologize,” he says, voice tentative.

“Don’t,” Geralt growls.

Jaskier wonders if the man means for him to refrain from apologies, or to hold his tongue.

The white wolf lets a long silence fall, before continues. “The captain?” he asks, and Jaskier can practically feel his piercing yellow eyes.

He swallows harshly, and dares to look up at the witcher. “A tall, thin man. He had silver gauntlets on his hands, and a burn scar across part of his face and scalp.”

The white wolf doesn’t make any sound or movement. Instead, he grows utterly still, his face an impenetrable mask. Just as when Jaskier saw him for the first time, his expression is impassive, emotionless, but his golden gaze burns.

He can’t help himself. He wants to remain strong, to show the witcher he won’t be easily cowed or subdued, but his fear makes it impossible. It’s the same fear that drove him to wriggle out of that pirate’s grasp and fling himself overboard, into the depths of the ocean. A soft whimper escapes his throat as he lifts his hands, prepared to shield himself.

The white wolf starts at the sound, and takes in his defensive posture, inhaling deeply. A frown appears on his face. Slowly, cursing low under his breath, he shifts backward from Jaskier, until he is as far away from him on the low bench as he can get.

Only when Jaskier’s heartrate and breathing have slowed back down, when he dares to lower his hands and look up at the pirate captain from under his lashes, does Geralt speak.
“That man hurt you.”

Jaskier realizes that it’s not a question, that the witcher knows, but he still nods.

“Lambert, when he found you in that cabin, he smelled blood on you. Smelled your blood on that man’s bed,” the white wolf says softly, his voice a low rumble.

Jaskier knows what the man is hinting at, and grimaces. “If you can smell that, then how did you not catch the scent of him, and know who he was?”

“He’s a firemage,” Geralt repeats, yellow eyes flicking down to look at Jaskier’s hand. “He hid his scent from us. He hurt you. You said he didn’t take you. I’m not sure you’re telling the truth.”

It’s too much. All of it. Everything that has happened. Everyone has their limits, and apparently not being believed about this, by this man, for the second time, is Jaskier’s.

The anger is quick to overtake him, and he lets it. Is thankful to the heated emotion for drowning out the fear. It takes his terror and makes it small, stuffs it away in a small corner of his awareness.

He jumps up from the bench and throws his hands up in the air, pacing in front of the white wolf, so the man actually has to look up at him.

“Really?” he hisses between his teeth. “You can smell so many things. You can smell I’m still wearing your clothes even after an entire day. You could apparently smell that— that those vile men touched me.” He whirls to face Geralt, and sees his slitted irises expand and contract as the witcher looks up at him. “You can’t tell if I’m speaking lies? And even if I was, this is the one you choose to call me on? Let me ask you this then, witcher. Can you smell his release on me?” Jaskier folds his arms over his chest, and doesn’t flinch away from that unwavering golden gaze. He tries to keep a hold of the indignation that rages through him, tries not to falter and make himself small before the pirate captain looking at him, assessing.

After a long moment, still holding Jaskier’s gaze, Geralt takes in a very deep, very deliberate breath through his nose. He shakes his head slowly, the frown between white brows disappearing.

“I couldn’t be sure, not after all that seawater. And then— I tried not to smell you after.” Again he takes a deep breath. “I can’t smell him,” he rumbles, and Jaskier sees some of the tension he hadn’t been aware slip away from the other man’s shoulders.

Hesitantly, he sits himself back on the bench, keeping distance between the two of them. “Why did you try not to smell me?”

The witcher tilts his head at him, the expression in his yellow eyes unreadable. “Because I was already so angry, and you were already so scared of me,” he says in a low voice. “I didn’t want to scare you more, by smelling what he had done to you, and letting my rage slip.”

Jaskier gapes at him, and doesn’t know what to think. On the one hand it’s terrifying he apparently hasn’t seen Geralt truly angry yet. On the other, it’s strangely reassuring that the man maybe doesn’t want to frighten him. However unsuccessful at that he may be. “Okay,” Jaskier says, trailing off uncertainly. He doesn’t know what to say. Doesn’t know how to take this new information. How to relate to the white wolf other than to fear him. To give himself more time, he chooses to change the subject. “So, what happened to Rience?”

The white wolf bears his teeth, but turns his face away from Jaskier as he does so. His voice is little more than a growl as he explains letting a handful of the pirate crew go, when they no longer put up a fight. To Jaskier’s surprise, the man seems frustrated with himself he freed Rience so easily. When he asks about Geralt’s reason to engage the Warg in combat with the other vessel, the witcher shakes his head.

“They made the choice. We pulled alongside to see what would happen. There have been rumours about that crew for a while. Rumours they don’t keep to the code.” When Jaskier makes a soft questioning sound, Geralt elaborates. “The code prescribes a great many things, not the least of which is that we don’t use cannon fire on the vessels of other pirates. Unless they fire first, of course.”

Jaskier swallows heavily. “Of course,” he repeats, and hears the ghostly sounds of the Seablade being shot to pieces in the back of his mind. He tries to supress the memories. Tries to push away the sound of splintering wood and of lives ending on tortured screams. He knows it isn’t real, but he can almost taste the metallic flavour of blood in the air.

He doesn’t know if it’s meant as a comforting touch, or something else, but he does know how his body interprets it. When Geralt lifts a hand to lay it gently over Jaskier’s left one, the one that holds the scars of Rience’s flames, he flinches away hard. He can barely supress the fearful noise that tries to free itself from his throat, and pulls his hand to his chest, his other cupped over it protectively.

Geralt frowns. “You’re scared,” he rumbles. “How can I make you less scared?”

Jaskier takes in a shuddering breath, willing himself to be brave. “Obviously I’m scared. The crew I was travelling with was murdered in cold blood, our ship left to sink. I was restrained in a great-cabin with the purpose of— of being a plaything. And now I’m here, in another great-cabin, with someone more powerful than me in every regard.” He bites his lip, wavering, but decides to push through. If that rule Geralt issued regarding his bodily autonomy, does in fact not pertain to the white wolf, he’d rather know now. “Also, that thing about permission before people touch me. What about you? You touch me without asking.”

He sees more than hears the pirate captain suck in a slow breath. Carefully, the man stands, and moves away. “You’re right,” the witcher growls. “You decide who gets to touch you. No one else. Not me. Nothing like what Rience and his crew did to you, will ever happen on my ship.”

Jaskier shrugs his shoulders, choosing his words carefully. “I’m not sure I can believe that,” he says hesitantly.

The witcher takes another step back, yellow eyes gliding over him and the rest of the cabin. It’s as if he is taking in the situation, as it might appear to Jaskier, for the first time.

“I’ll be just outside. I’ll still be able to hear you,” Geralt growls. With another quick step, he is through the door, and closes it softly behind him.

What the fuck just happened? Jaskier thinks, suddenly in the great-cabin by himself.

---000---

Over the next week, a pattern develops, and Jaskier isn’t sure what to do with the fact it feels almost, comfortable. In the mornings Triss knocks on the great-cabin’s door with breakfast, and they talk about everything and nothing. Jaskier is still very careful to not let any information slip that would give them what they need to find out his full name, but he’s slowly but surely letting down his guard and talking more freely.

During the day he walks the decks together with the mage, Eskel sometimes joining them, and Jaskier finds he actually enjoys the company of the dark haired witcher. The man’s presence still makes him slightly tense, but it gives him the opportunity to ask about more of the Warg’s qualities, which Eskel gladly elaborates on. Though like Triss, he also won’t tell Jaskier why her sails are grey.

Eskel also points out every member of the crew as they pass, be they witcher, or human, and tells Jaskier their names. Whenever the sailor in question hears him do so, they smile and nod in Jaskier’s direction, but don’t approach. He wonders if Geralt’s order to keep their distance is like his order not to touch. Maybe they will only engage him if he gives them his permission by taking the initiative.

Almost unnoticed, Jaskier has come to put more and more faith in the safety the white wolf’s commands grant him. Where at first he was full of doubt, now he thinks the crew would not break their captain’s orders, maybe not even if the man wasn’t present on the ship at all. Whenever he spots Geralt interacting with his crew, it seems obvious that their loyalty is absolute, be they human, mage or witcher.

Invariably whenever he moves closer toward the railing, if only to peer down into the water, a witcher approaches and asks him to step away. Most of the time it’s Eskel, sometimes it’s another cat eyed giant he’s just learned the name of, and only once it’s the white wolf himself.

In the evenings Geralt brings him food, and watches as he eats. Without fail, the witcher asks if he wants more after finishing his meal, and without fail, Jaskier declines. Though his trust that the Warg’s crew won’t hurt him is growing in tiny increments, he remains wary of the wolf’s presence. Whenever Geralt speaks too forcefully, or moves into his space a little quicker than Jaskier expects, he can’t supress the small twitch his body gives, or the way his heartrate suddenly triples. Every time it happens, the white haired captain tilts his head, and steps away from him slowly.

Jaskier asks him about the maps pinned to the table and hung on the walls, about the liquor in the cabinet, about the members of his crew, the swords at his back, and the reason for his white hair. More than he asks, he talks. He recites ballads and stories, tells children’s tales from his childhood, and small anecdotes that don’t let anything real about himself slip. He talks about anything and everything, to keep the wolf from asking him things.

Though Geralt doesn’t answer half of the questions he asks because Jaskier is already rambling on, when he does answer, his sentences are concise and to the point. Jaskier thinks that if he wasn’t so scared, Geralt’s low rumbling voice might actually be soothing. During the entire evening they’re in the great-cabin together, the captain’s golden gaze rests on him, taking him in.

Their evenings always end with the witcher stepping out, reminding Jaskier he’s just outside the door, listening.

---000---

It’s one of those times Jaskier steps a little too close to the water, when he is halted by a sarcastic drawl, instead of a subtle throat scraping most of the witchers employ.

“Since we don’t have such a good track record with me holding onto you, I suggest you step back, you wriggly little thing.”

When Jaskier turns, he comes face to face with the redheaded witcher who’d pulled him out of Rience’s cabin. The witcher he’d scratched and kicked at, who’d held him regardless, until Jaskier had slammed his head into his jaw and squirmed out of his hands to plunge himself into the water.

He’s gotten sort of used to Eskel, has been guided back from the railing by the gentle voices of Leo and Lukasz more than once. So far, every witcher that has shadowed him across the Warg’s decks, has made themselves appear smaller, kept their distance, and spoken to him like one wrong word would send him running.

Not this man.

Lambert, Jaskier thinks, remembering Geralt mentioning the man’s name when he talked about him smelling Jaskier’s blood. He tries to supress it, but just seeing the redhead tower over him, closer than anyone but Geralt, Eskel or Triss have been to him, transports him to that terror laden moment back in Rience’s cabin. Before he knows what he’s doing, Jaskier stumbles back until he feels the railing of the Warg press against his lower back. He reaches to grab hold of the wood, and the scars on his left hand stand out in stark relief with the force of his grip.

“Fuck!” Lambert exclaims, scowling, but holding up the palms of his hands. “Fuck, buttercup, I didn’t mean it like that. Shit! I’m an asshole, ignore me, ignore everything I say, just please, buttercup, please don’t jump.”

The man has a thunderous expression on his face, and his voice is harsh and rough. But, he’s pleading. Pleading with Jaskier to please step back from the railing, away from the water. When he meets Lambert’s eyes, he thinks he can see actual dread in their depths. Somehow, he’s certain the witcher is having his own flashback, one of letting Jaskier slip from his grasp, only to watch him drown. He takes a deep, calming breath, and relaxes the death-grip his fingers have on the wood.

“Buttercup?” he asks, tilting his head, affecting the same type of drawl Lambert had spoken in at first, while stepping toward the man.

To his surprise, the large, burly witcher colours in a way that makes his face blend almost seamlessly with his dark red hair. “It’s what your name means, isn’t it?” he growls defensively while rubbing the back of his neck.

The contrast between the tone of his voice and what he presents in his body language is worlds apart, and suddenly Jaskier recalls the image of a puppy that will grow up to be a guard dog. Eager to please, but still unsure when to appear friendly or threatening. The realisation is startling, but enough to bring a wide grin to his face. He nods at Lambert. “That it does. You familiar with flowers, Lambert?” His tone is teasing, and to his utter joy, the man’s blush intensifies and he growls low under his breath. It immediately reminds Jaskier of an angry pup again.

“Only with poisonous ones,” another voice drifts over to them, and Jaskier looks to the side to see the purple eyed mage approach them. Yennefer, Eskel had called her. Despite his best efforts, there is a frisson of unease that crawls up the back of his throat. Without skipping a beat, Lambert steps from next to him, half in front of him, forming an effective barrier between the mage and himself. To his surprise, the protective gesture goes a long way to lessen Jaskier’s tension.

Across from them, Yennefer smiles sharply. “Don’t tell me you’ve tamed this pup already, buttercup.” She pops the p languidly, and her mouth curls in obvious amusement when Lambert gives a low growl in his chest.

“Yen,” Lambert rumbles, “we all know playing nice is hard when you’re an actual witch, but you could at least try.”

Yennefer raises her dark eyebrows. “Like you did, little Lamb?”

Jaskier can’t help the startled snort of amusement that leaves him. It breaks the staring match going on between the witcher and the mage, and both of them turn to regard him. He looks from one to the other, and decides to gamble.

“Right. The both of you are totally harmless, aren’t you?” he says, and lets heavy amusement colour his tone of voice.

“Hm,” Yennefer hums thoughtfully, eerily similar to the way Geralt so often responds to him. “We are to you, buttercup. Isn’t that right little Lamb?”

Lambert grumbles, but Jaskier can definitely hear him say “that’s right,” under his breath, yellow eyes strangely earnest when he looks at Jaskier, even though his face is pulled into a scowl.

---000---

Almost two weeks after he first came to be on the Warg, Jaskier is lounging in the sun just outside the great-cabin, Triss at his side. He’s only half alert, secure in the mage’s presence and the fact that Geralt is somewhere on deck, his orders for Jaskier’s protection still in effect. He also thinks he’s seen both Eskel and Lambert passing by not too long ago. Triss is reading to him from a book on herbs used in alchemy, and Jaskier comments every now and again, when she mentions a plant he actually knows.

From the direction of the helm he can hear Geralt’s booming voice call an order. He doesn’t pay much attention to it, until a shadow falls over his face. When he looks up from where he’d been eyeing the pictures in Triss’ book, he sees the crew are efficiently going about unfurling additional sails at each of the Warg’s three masts. The grey fabric pulls taut in the wind almost immediately, and Jaskier can hear the creak and strain of rope and wood. Unmistakably, the ship begins to pick up speed, gaining velocity as more sails are set.

He makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat, and Triss looks up at him with concern.

“Everything alright Jaskier?” she asks him gently.

He keeps his eyes on the sailors, human and witcher both, working high up in the ship’s rigging. “The last two times I was on a ship being prepared for more speed, I’d rather forget,” he answers carefully, trying to control his breathing. Triss leans forward and reaches a hand to him, a question on her face. Jaskier nods and grabs her hand in his, trying his best not to hold on too tightly. Her thumb slowly rubs over the scarred flesh on the back of his hand.

“It’s going to be fine Jaskier,” she says kindly. “Geralt won’t let anything happen to you.”

Again, he makes a strangled noise, his breath coming in sharp desperate pants, as he looks at the direction the prow is pointing. In the distance, but close enough to see clearly, is a ship bearing black sails.

The Warg’s sails are secured and she cuts through the waves like a blade, and Jaskier’s heart won’t stop pounding. There is the loud thump of someone landing from a great hight. Distantly he registers the white wolf has just jumped down from above, but all he can focus on is taking in his next breath. It’s as if the air is cutting across his vocal cords, his inhales sharp and laboured. He’s holding onto Triss’s hand for dear life, and all he can do is stare at those dark sails, coming ever closer.

Suddenly Geralt is crouched in front of him, blocking his view, golden eyes staring into his. He doesn’t consciously decide to do it, but in his panic and fear Jaskier desperately searches for something that will bring him security. He doesn’t know when that something became the white wolf, pirate captain of the Warg.

“G—Geralt,” he manages to utter in a strangled voice, letting go of the mage’s hand to fist both hands into the man’s linen chemise. “What’s happening?” he gasps. “Are— are we, is there going to be fighting?” There is a tremor in his voice he can’t supress, and he knows he’s still breathing too fast. The witcher slowly lifts his hand, hovering it over where Jaskier’s fist is clenched in his shirt.

Ever since Jaskier has thrown his own command in his face, Geralt hasn’t touched him in a single instance, and Jaskier hasn’t given him permission. Now he’s desperate for it. Desperate for anything that will give him comfort and will take away the knives stabbing his lungs with every breath. He doesn’t think he can voice what he needs, and looks at Geralt pleadingly.

“Give me permission, little bird,” the white wolf murmurs softly, his voice gentle as Jaskier has ever heard it.

He can’t speak. Words won’t form on his tongue and his lips won’t move to make the shape of sounds. All he can do is nod. One of Geralt’s large hands folds over his own, big enough to encompass both of them where they are clenched at the man’s chest. His other hand reaches for Jaskier, very slowly. He only twitches a little when the pirate captain splays his palm over his chest, reaching from the bottom of his pectoral all the way to his collarbone where calloused fingers brush against the skin.

Geralt breathes with him, instructs him with his deep, rumbling voice to follow along. The witcher keeps looking at him as he does, and Jaskier tries his best to do as he says. Slowly, his rapid breathing slows down, and the knives become a little less sharp. It takes long minutes, but eventually he manages to fully exhale, long, slow and shuddering. His hands unclench from under Geralt’s large palm, and the man lets him go without qualm. Jaskier is still trembling, the sweat of panic dampening the hair at his temples and the back of his neck. He swallows tightly, looking down for a moment, before peeks at the witcher through his lashes. There is a low, soothing rumble coming from Geralt’s chest, the same one he had heard that first night, whenever he woke from a nightmare.

Slowly, Geralt raises his hand to gently grasp Jaskier’s chin. “Go to the cabin and stay there, little bird. You have nothing to fear. My crew will keep you safe. I will keep you safe.”

The witcher looks to Triss, still seated beside Jaskier, one of her hands slowly rubbing between his shoulder blades. He isn’t aware when she started that. Geralt tilts his head in the direction of the great-cabin, and he can feel Triss nod in acquiescence, before she helps him rise with careful hands.

When Jaskier chances one look over his shoulder before he enters the cabin, he meets golden eyes. Geralt is looking at him while pulling on black armour, the hilts of two swords protruding behind his shoulder. Behind him, witchers Jaskier has only just started to become familiar with are standing by, waiting for their captain’s word.

Chapter Text

Geralt is distracted.

When the Warg gains on the Black Tide, he thinks about Jaskier’s heartrate quickening as soon as they picked up speed. When they close in, he thinks about the sharpness and elevated rate of the young man’s breathing. As they pull alongside, his thoughts are occupied by eyes the colour of a summer sky looking up at him in fright, pupils large and dark.

Even as he gives the order to throw the metal hooks to anchor the Black Tide to the Warg’s bulk, his eyes shift back to the door Jaskier disappeared behind. The little bird’s heartbeat is calmer than it was, but the rate at which Geralt can hear it thumping in his chest is still much higher than it had been when he was lounging in the sun. Geralt has been keeping an ear out for the young man at all times, and by now it’s a habit to have a part of his attention focussed on him.

At his side, Eskel side-eyes him.

“Something on your mind, wolf?”

“Hm,” Geralt responds. “Lets make this quick.” He gets an amused look from his brother. Eskel waits for his signal, and when he makes the brisk hand gesture, his first mate relays the order. Eskel doesn’t bellow. It’s unnecessary when their boarding party have senses keen enough to pin-point each and every person on the Black Tide, where it sways on the ocean’s waves. As one, ten of his witchers leap across the space between the vessels, easily bridging a distance that would have an ordinary human plunge down into the water below. Geralt briefly thinks about Jaskier choosing to leap down voluntarily, and grimaces.

As he jumps over onto the Black Tide himself, he clears his mind of anything but the task at hand. Still, as he moves over the pirate ship’s decks, flanked by five of his brothers on either side, he can still hear the slightly elevated rhythm of Jaskier’s heart.

The Black tide is one of the ships that anchors at Kaer Morhen often, and she and her crew have made no effort to outrun the Warg. It’s a relief that it’s a vessel they know. It makes it so Geralt can keep this encounter short, provided the Black Tide’s captain keeps to the code. It’s a good sign that the ship hasn’t fired, and they’re received by her captain and crew with their weapons sheathed. Geralt makes another hand gesture, and Eskel verbalises his order for the remainder of the raiding party to remain on the Warg’s decks. Ten witchers would be more than enough to commandeer the vessel. Even so, the added threat of more of his warriors gathered at the Warg’s railing, sharp yellow eyes focussed on what’s happening across the water and ready to respond to any order he gives, goes a long way in discouraging a foolish decision on any pirate captain’s part.

Not that the Black Tide’s captain is foolish.

Rachal has captained the Black Tide for over ten years, and has increasingly anchored at Kaer Morhen for the last four of those. The tall woman steps forward in front of her crew, and tilts back her head to expose her throat. “White wolf,” she says respectfully, and Geralt inclines his head to her. As soon as he does, her crew follows her example, briefly bearing their throats.

“How have you been, Rachal?” Eskel asks at his side.

“We’ve been well. We only expected to see you when we make berth at Kaer Morhen next month. Or are you not planning to return?” The unspoken question is clear. Rachal is inquiring after the reason for their current encounter. She’s right to do so, usually the Warg would have let the Black Tide pass unchallenged, waiting for Rachal to pay respects at their next berth.

“We will return,” Eskel answers. “We’ve just had an encounter recently that has made us, let’s say, more alert.” The woman’s dark brows raise, and Geralt can scent her avid interest on the breeze. He steps forward, and so does the other captain, meeting him in the middle.

“Do you keep to the code?” he rumbles.

Again, Rachal tilts back her chin. “White wolf. We keep to the code.”

Her heartrate is steady, and when he inhales deeply, there’s nothing but truth in her scent.

He nods at her. “Be welcome at Kaer Morhen when next you need anchorage.”

She gives him a calculating look, paired with a sharp smile. “We are grateful for safe anchorage, of course.” Her voice is neutral, like she’s weighing her options. “Any chance you’ll tell us the reason you are, more alert?”

It’s Eskel who answers. “You know the value of information, Rachal. What do you offer in return?”

The woman shifts her gaze from Geralt to his first mate, considering. “We already pay fealty to Kaer Morhen and the Warg, any time we are moored at your docks.”

Geralt growls low in his throat, and sees Rachal’s eyes flick to the warriors beside him and back. His witchers remain impassive. They don’t need to put hands on their blades to be an effective threat. He makes another gesture at Eskel.

“As is the agreement with every vessel that seeks a safe berth. What we provide doesn’t come without a price,” his brother says calmly, with way more diplomacy than Geralt would ever employ.

Rachal nods, tipping her chin up slightly again. “I meant no offense. We appreciate the value of the Kaer. And of information. What can we provide?”

This time, Geralt halts Eskel before he can answer. “Do you have a lute?” he inquires.

Rachal covers her surprise well, immediately sending one of her deckhands below to scour through their plunder. When the hand returns with a lute-case fashioned from plain leather, that seems to be expertly crafted despite its simple appearance, Geralt gives his first mate a nod.

Eskel steps forward to take the case from the swabbie. “We are halting more ships since there has been an increasing number of rumours of captains forsaking the code. Recently we pulled alongside a vessel led by a man named Rience, and were fired upon.”

Rachal’s eyes widen. She’s clearly aware of the idiocy of not only spurning the code, but of firing at the Warg of all ships. She looks at them thoughtfully. “Rience… captain of the Vursnake?”

Again, Geralt growls, louder this time, and is echoed by the witchers beside him. All of them are aware of Rience’s transgressions against the young man currently kept safe in their midst, and of his escape. “What do you know of the firemage?” he grits between his teeth. Rachal does her best not to show it, but Geralt can scent the slight tendrils of fear coming off her in response to the suddenly tense and threatening atmosphere.

“Not much. Mostly things that leave me unsurprised he did not adhere to the code. He’s still alive then?”

“Unfortunately,” Geralt replies curtly.

“Do you have any idea where he might go to lick his wounds?” Eskel enquires, and when Rachal shakes her head, “if you happen to come across such information, we’d appreciate being apprised. For fair compensation, of course.”

Rachal nods. “If I or any of mine come across the information you seek, you’ll be the first to know.”

Geralt is pleased. The words, and everything about how the tall captain holds herself, ring true. He knows that like most pirates who intermittently seek shelter at Kaer Morhen, she walks the fine line between her loyalty being genuine, and based on convenience. With another nod from him, and a quick baring of the crew’s throats, he calls the retreat.

“Fare well, Rachal, fare well Black Tide,” he hears his brother end the encounter formally, as he leaps back onto the Warg’s deck.

His first mate is the last to make the jump back over, lute case tucked under one arm. Geralt signals for his men to unhook the Warg, and calls out the order to make a sharp starboard turn, away from the other vessel. The sails that had been reefed considerably are hoisted back up, and the Warg springs away across the waves. In the great-cabin he can hear Jaskier’s heartbeat leap, and Triss murmuring soothingly. Eskel steps up next to him, holding out the leather case.

“You want to give it to him yourself? His brother asks, and Geralt decides to resolutely ignore the amusement in his tone.

---000---

Though Jaskier feels calmer, secluded as he is in the great-cabin together with Triss, he knows the panic is lurking just under the surface. The takes care to keep his breathing slow and measured, the soothing warmth of Geralt’s hand on his chest quickly dissipating. Triss sits, and pulls him down beside her on the bench. Jaskier clenches his hands into fists, his eyes drawn to the pattern of flames that stands out pale against his skin.

“Do you want me to keep reading to you?” Triss asks him, and when he can’t make his voice work, he gives her a shaky nod.

As she tells him about the different properties of foxglove, Jaskier stares out the portside windows, where he can catch glimpses of what is happening on the pirate ship’s deck whenever the waves dip the railings of both vessels.

He doesn’t want to look. He doesn’t want to see fighting, to see blood drench another ship’s decks in a red flood. He is unable to tear his eyes away.

His emotions are a mess, and when he tries to sort through them, he realizes it’s not just fear for himself, but also an insistent worry about Geralt. A worry about the witchers he saw geared up, prepared to board the vessel bearing black sails. It’s startling, and he’s not entirely sure he’s comfortable with the sentiment.

When the Warg’s railing dips down again at just the right moment, he’s provided a view of the pirate ship’s deck. His eyes hone in immediately on white hair, shining bright like a beacon in the sunlight. Even from the distance, he can tell the confrontation seems to be a weaponless one, so far at least. Triss’s voice fades into the background as he focusses on intently on what’s going on across the water. Geralt had said he would be safe, that he would be protected. He keeps looking. Though it seems impossible, if Geralt falls, Jaskier would rather see it happen and know what’s coming.

As it is, nothing happens. Not a single blade is drawn. There seems to be something handed over from the other crew to a witcher he thinks is Eskel, and then the cat-eyed pirates jump back over, one by one. When Geralt lands back on the Warg’s deck, he hardly dares to believe this is all that’s going to happen, that they’ll just sail away from the ship with black cloth at its masts.

He can hear the white wolf bark an order in his  low baritone, and moments later the Warg turns away sharply. Jaskier can hear sails being hoisted back to full hight and only partly  manages to supress the visceral response it elicits. Next to him, Triss slips her hand in his, and calmly turns the page, going from foxglove to the properties of hemlock. Her voice is gentle, and when Jaskier looks at her, she gives him a reassuring smile.

---000---

That evening, when Geralt brings him another bowl of stew and some sweet buns for after, Jaskier is curious enough to voice the question. He blows on the steaming spoon, Geralt’s eyes following his every motion, and tries to be casual about it.

“So that ship today. It was not the confrontation I expected. What happened?” he quickly stuffs the food in his mouth to keep himself from babbling on, giving the pirate captain the chance to actually answer him.

“That was the Black Tide,” Geralt rumbles. It’s a ship we know well. She berths at Kaer Morhen frequently.”

Jaskier chews while he waits for the white wolf to offer more information. Unsurprisingly, Geralt seems to think what he said is a whole entire answer, as if it doesn’t call forth at least ten more questions in Jaskier’s mind. “If you know that ship well, why go after it?” He shifts uncomfortably. “Did they also not keep to the code?”

“Hm,” the witcher hums thoughtfully, eyes following Jaskier’s movement as he takes another bite. “They follow the code. We went after her to confirm.”

“So if it turned out they—they were like Rience, then what would have happened?” Jaskier asks, casting his eyes down and stirring his spoon through his food, doing his level best to keep his voice steady.

“Little bird,” Geralt rumbles, “I know you’ve asked about it. Our grey sails. Do you know what they stand for?”

“I don’t, Triss and Eskel wouldn’t tell me. Both of them told me to ask you.”

“And you haven’t so far.”

Jaskier licks his lips. “Why does the Warg bear grey sails, Geralt,” he asks, daring to make his voice droll.

One of the corners of the white wolf’s mouth ticks up in amusement. “We bear grey sails, to indicate we are the keepers of the code.”

Jaskier stares at him, waiting for more. “Okay,” he says slowly, gesturing with his spoon. “What does that mean, exactly?”

“It means we protect the line between piracy and progression to a base state of mindless violence. Piracy without rules leads to nothing but destruction. There’s been a code for centuries, but it has not always been adhered to. We used to bear black sails. We bear grey now, because bloodshed and violence were increasing, and it was necessary for a new keeper to take up the mantle.”

Jaskier nods slowly. As a noble son, he’s had an extensive and varied education, and he would dare say he is well versed in history, from official texts and epic songs alike.

“That was around twenty years ago, wasn’t it?” he asks softly.

At that point in time, seafaring trade had come almost to a standstill, merchant vessels unsafe on the open seas, unless accompanied by royal navies. Any vessel caught out at sea without an escort, was never heard from again. Unless the bodies were found washed up on shore. It used to be that pirates treated every vessel they encountered like Rience had the Seablade.

Geralt inclines his head at him. “Yes. We’ve born grey sails for over twenty years now.”

“So if it turned out the Black Tide hadn’t been adhering to the code….” Jaskier lets his voice trail off.

“Little bird, I won’t pretend that we are anything else than what we are,” the pirate captain rumbles, his golden gaze heavy on Jaskier. “If that had been the case, we would have eliminated the ones leading, and anyone who could not swear to uphold it.”

Jaskier swallows. He knows what eliminate means in this case, and can’t help a minute flinch. Geralt leans back from him slowly. “So— so that’s what you did with Rience’s crew.”

“Yes. Though there weren’t many among them who could swear, and we weren’t aware there was a mage. When he swore, he would have been using magic not only to hide his scent, but to prevent us detecting the lie.”

Jaskier twitches a little. “How many of them could swear?” He thinks of the lines the crew had formed, the many hands that had intimately touched him as he made his way past under threat of fire from Rience’s hands.

“No more than a handful.”

He nods, and pushes his bowl of stew away, no longer hungry. Geralt’s yellow eyes follow the movement and look back up at him. For a moment Jaskier thinks the wolf will protest and make him eat, but instead the witcher reaches out and takes the bowl away. The captain raises his hand as if he wants to touch the back of Jaskier’s, but drops it before he gets halfway. Jaskier bites his lip, but does not give him permission.

“Knowing what I know now. I would kill them all,” Geralt growls.

Startled, Jaskier looks up into his golden eyes, and sees the truth of that statement. He thinks a declaration so bloodthirsty should frighten him, should turn his heart to ice with fear. Instead, it does just the opposite.

---000---

Just before Geralt steps out for the night, Jaskier asks him another question.
“What’s Kaer Morhen?”

The white wolf turns back to him, and indicates the largest map pinned to the wall. It depicts an island with a large natural bay, protected on both sides by high cliffs. There seems to be a town edging the bay, and several smaller settlements scattered on the remaining landmass. On the high ground, there’s a symbol he thinks indicates the location of a castle.

“It’s an island,” Geralt rumbles. “Our home. One you’ll see soon enough.”

Jaskier is frozen, and doesn’t manage to react to the statement before the pirate captain turns, and pulls the door closed behind him. It leaves him reeling. The white wolf plans to take him to this island, an island that is apparently the Warg’s home port.

Jaskier is certain. Once he knows the location of Kaer Morhen, he’ll never see Lettenhove again. In the two weeks he’s been on the Warg, he’s felt a little less like a prisoner every day. This though, this drives home that’s exactly what he is, however much the wolf and his crew seem to accommodate him. He shivers, and tries to supress the sudden burst of hopelessness, hugging his arms around himself.

Before he tucks himself into bed, he encounters the small plate of sweet buns, set on the pillow.

---000---

The next few days, Jaskier tries to stubbornly ignore the fact he might very well be trapped with pirates for the rest of his life.

Oddly enough, though he certainly felt confined and claustrophobic the moment the realisation set in, he doesn’t feel that way in the day to day on board the Warg. He’s free to roam the decks, and he  enjoys Triss’ company, as well as Eskel’s. He even speaks to Lambert and Yennefer on multiple occasions, though the latter still makes Jaskier decidedly uncomfortable. It’s almost as if Lambert knows, seeing as how the redheaded witcher manages to appear any and every time Jaskier is faced with the mage while by himself.

When he doesn’t think about it, he doesn’t feel like he’s being held prisoner. What he does feel, is useless.

Everyone on the Warg has a position and a task. The witchers and mages perform a sort of double function, half sailing and half training. The human members of the crew hold various positions sailing the vessel, but even they sometimes join the training exercises being run on the Warg’s main deck. Everyone is involved in her general upkeep. The white wolf captains his vessel and crew with implicit authority, and Eskel is his first mate. Jaskier is not entirely sure how the other’s rank exactly. Triss holds the position of healer and alchemist. Yennefer does….something. There is a cook with a young helper, and there are several inexperienced deckhands who are being shown the ropes by their elders.

And then there’s Jaskier. He doesn’t have a position, or possess any skills that would be of use on a ship. He doesn’t know how to check the rope or rigging. Doesn’t know how to spot cracks in the ship’s deck or hull, or how to repair them. He doesn’t know how to patch up the grey cloth in the unlikely event one of the Warg’s great sails rips.

When it comes down to it, he’s a burden.

He’s another mouth to feed, when food on board a ship is already rationed. He takes up considerable amounts of Triss’s time, and he knows, though he is free to move around, a witcher is still shadowing him at all times, and he’s keeping them away from other tasks.

He pays attention to the everyday proceedings aboard, and tries to find the niche where he will fit. He just hopes he can find it before they get sick of him.

Every now and then, he can hear a sailor sing a few chords from some sea shanty or other, and makes careful note. Jaskier doesn’t know how to make himself useful manning a ship, but what he does know, is how to make music.

---000---

Usually, Jaskier is already in the great-cabin and waits for Geralt to bring him food. He thinks one of these days he might ask to go to the mess deck, but every time he thinks it will be the day, the thought of so many pirates packed together makes the words stick in his throat.

One evening he enters the great-cabin after having circled around carefully, listening to Jon and Marri. They’re two human sailors who he’s heard singing before. Jaskier tried to snoop without being noticed while they sang a shanty, and he’s pretty sure he heard enough to know the melody and words.

When he enters, Geralt is already there, and to his surprise there’s not one bowl of food, but two. So far, the Warg’s captain has invariably eaten his dinner at the mess deck, bringing a singular bowl for Jaskier. This night it’s apparently going to be different. He can’t help the slight swoop of his stomach, his nerves making themselves known at the divergence from their normal routine.

“We’re eating together?” he asks, doing his best to not to sound anxious.

“Hm. If you’ll let me.”  

“Of course!” Jaskier exclaims, a little too loudly even to his own ears. “I wouldn’t expect you to always sit there just waiting for me to finish my meal. I suppose it’s a waste of your time really. You could do so many more useful things, captain-ly things? I —I suppose I’m sort of displacing you from you own space, aren’t I? I really should start eating at the mess deck. That would give you your space for a while at least.” He swallows harshly, eyes flicking from Geralt to the bolted down bed he’s been sleeping in. Geralt’s bed. “I suppose I should have the same sleeping and eating arrangement as all the others.” He opens his mouth to keep talking, but clicks his jaw shut at the soft growl reverberating in Geralt’s chest.

“Jaskier. You’ll eat  in here until you’re ready. You’ll sleep in here until we berth at Kaer Morhen.”

Geralt’s tone holds a finality that Jaskier won’t even try to argue with. “Okay,” he says, ducking his head a little, and setting himself across from Geralt on the bench.

When the witcher hands him his bowl, their fingers glide together, and Jaskier doesn’t even notice.

“I apologize,” Geralt says in a low voice, retreating from him.

Jaskier has already stuck a spoonful of food into his mouth and looks at the white wolf with wide eyes. “What for?” he asks curiously once he swallows. Geralt looks at him, and on an inhale his nostrils flare. Jaskier wishes he could see what is going on behind that golden gaze, what exactly Geralt smells on him, and what the wolf thinks of it.

“I touched you. I apologize,” the witcher repeats slowly, his voice deep and rumbling.

Jaskier looks down to where he holds his bowl of food, fingers curled around it where he had taken it from Geralt. He looks up again, and takes in the way the pirate captain has distanced himself on the bench, giving him more space after the accidental touch.

“That— that’s alright,” he says eventually. “You don’t have to treat me like I’ll break at the slightest contact. That kind of touch is fine.”

“Even from me, little bird?” the white wolf asks him, his head slightly titled and his golden eyes intense as he regards Jaskier.

Jaskier licks his lips and nods decisively. “Yes. I— I don’t think you’d take advantage of that permission,” he says, meeting the witcher’s slitted gaze. “I didn’t even notice this time. When I do, it might make me nervous,” he admits.

Geralt rumbles low in his chest, the sound somehow gentle and soothing. “Permission can be granted, and revoked, Little bird. You can do so whenever.”

Jaskier looks at him, tries to study the witcher’s impassive expression for clues. He can’t pinpoint it, couldn’t say what it is in Geralt’s expression that makes him believe the pirate captain. Even so, he realizes he’s quite certain that the white wolf means what he says.

At first, their meal is shared in a silence Jaskier would almost dare call companionable. To his parent’s and sibling’s eternal annoyance, he’s never done well with quiet. It isn’t long before he can’t hold his tongue. He chats at Geralt between bites, his voice animated.

He tells the white wolf about the book he leant from Triss, and how he thinks he saw flying fish somewhere in the distance. He tells him he had leant over the Warg’s railing far enough, only to catch another glimpse, that Eskel had to pull him back by the collar of his doublet. It had felt undignified enough that Jaskier had squawked and given the dark haired witcher a gentle slap on the shoulder before he realized what he was doing. Eskel had just looked at him with wide amber eyes. The expression on the first mate’s face had been so startled, Jaskier had been unable to hold back his laugh, pointing out the silver glitter of the fish in the distance.

As he tells the story, the white wolf hums in the appropriate places, and when Jaskier looks up to see if the man is just humouring him, the expression on the wolf’s face is more relaxed than he has ever seen it before. It makes Geralt lose some of his sternness, and Jaskier can’t help the fleeting thought that the man really is unbearably handsome, despite, or maybe even more so because of the scar that crosses over his left eye.

Jaskier decides he likes it when Geralt’s face is more relaxed, and distantly thinks that if the witcher had looked like this on his first few days aboard the Warg, he might not have been so utterly terrified of him. It’s a strange thing to realize. Though the fear is not entirely gone, the trust that he’s safe as long as he’s aboard the Warg, is steadily growing.

---000---

It turns out that sharing their food together is not the only divergence from the normal routine. They reach the point Geralt would usually leave Jaskier with the ever ominous statement that he’ll be listening outside the door, but the witcher stays. Jaskier finally lets a silence fall, and fidgets a little when the wolf still doesn’t move. He bites the inside of his lip and thinks about the allowance he gave the witcher for that casual touch. He’d been so sure that Geralt would take it as it was meant, and not as something more. Still, he can’t help the nerves that rise.

The white wolf slowly shakes his head. “Easy, Jaskier,”  he rumbles. “I just want to give you this.” He bends down, and retrieves a large something from under the bench, and hands it over.

Jaskier can feel his eyes grow wide, and he quickly looks between Geralt and the leather lute-case. He takes the case with reverent hands, and feels the quality of the material beneath his fingertips, how it is well oiled and maintained, smelling lightly of rosin. There is a slight shake of his hands when he unclasps the metal buckles on the side, and flips it open.

Inside, is the type of precious instrument Jaskier thought he might never see again. The lute is full bellied, it’s wood warm and shining. The instrument’s face is a lovely honey colour, with a golden inlay curling over it in a motif of vines. It’s the most beautiful lute Jaskier has ever seen, and he feels an unbridled joy surge inside of him when he brushes his fingers over the strings, and it produces a clear, harmonious sound. He lets the notes die out, before he dares look up at Geralt.

The white wolf is looking at him intently, yellow eyes focussed on Jaskier’s.

“Is this— you— you can’t be giving this to me?” he asks uncertainly.

Geralt rumbles, a corner of his mouth ticking up. “It’s yours, little bird.”

Chapter Text

Over the next few days, Jaskier gets acquainted with his new instrument. He learns the warm tones his fingers bring forth when he plucks the strings, and where rhythmic taps to the lute’s belly sound fullest and loudest, or soft like the patter of little feet, when he drums his fingers. When he’s confident he’s gotten a feel for the instrument, he plays the melody of every shanty he’s heard the Warg’s sailors sing. He’s happy to find that the mobility in his left hand is quite enough for him to play, even though the parts where notes follow quick on each other’s backs lead to a slight stiffness in the digits once he’s finished.

One of the evenings he’s holed himself up in the white wolf’s great-cabin, he’s just put the lute to the side to shake the rigidity from his hand when the pirate captain clears his throat from where he is leaning in the doorway. Geralt is holding two bowls of food again, which surprises Jaskier. The witcher had so far only eaten with him that one time when he gave him the lute, choosing to eat at the mess-deck all other times.

Geralt seats himself on the bench, and holds one of the bowls out to him. When Jaskier grabs it with his left hand, he can’t quite supress the tremble of fatigue.

“That from playing?” the pirate rumbles deeply in his chest, yellow eyes pinning Jaskier keenly.

He shrugs, trying to make light. “Not like I’m a trembling old man, Geralt. Playing is hardly enough to sap my strength. I could play for hours, haven’t needed breaks since the first months I learned how to play the lute.” He rubs his right thumb and forefinger together, feeling the string-calloused skin on the tips, slightly rough and thickened.

“Hm. Not the playing itself then. The scars?”

Jaskier flushes hotly, and avoids the witcher’s gaze. He stares at his stew instead, as if it’s the most interesting thing in the room. He stirs a spoon through the food a little violently, and curses under his breath when his hand shakes again. It makes him spill some of the fragrant meal over the bowl’s edge, and he bites his lip while shrinking in on himself a little. He knows by now that Geralt isn’t likely to get angry or violent with him, not without cause. He just can’t yet entirely stop the way he tenses, or the way his heart trips over itself in fearful apprehension. When Geralt does nothing more than wipe away the spill with a cloth, he tries to consciously relax.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, wrinkling his nose. “I know it must be unpleasant for you when I respond like that.”

“Like what?” the captain grunts, taking Jaskier’s bowl from his still slightly twitching hand,  setting it on the bench before him.

“Like I’m afraid of you.” Slitted yellow eyes stare at him for long enough that Jaskier can’t quite supress the nervous twitch of his body. He repeats the movement for emphasis. “See?” he says, “like that.”

“I won’t hurt you,” Geralt rumbles, and he thinks the man might actually be doing his best to make his voice sound gentle. Of course, the pirate is far enough from succeeding that Jaskier lets out an amused chuckle.

“Despite all the growling and looming you do, and those vaguely threatening warnings about you listening in all the time, I think I’m starting to believe that. It’s just that my body hasn’t entirely gotten the memo, I think.”

In lieu of an answer, the white wolf reaches out toward him. “Let me look at your hand?” he asks.

Jaskier hesitates for a half breath, before gingerly laying his hand in Geralt’s upturned palm. “You look with your fingers, do you? Must be a witcher method I haven’t heard of.”

Geralt just hums in response, and Jaskier blows out an amused breath through his nose. The wolf’s touch is surprisingly gentle where it traces over the faint outlines of flames that crisscross over jaskier’s palm, that wrap around his fingers, and continue over the back, all the way toward his wrist. Jaskier holds his breath as the heat that emanates from Geralt soothes some of the stiffness in his joints. He remembers the way the man had radiated like a furnace when he had plucked him out of the ocean. Even under the cold embrace of all that water he had been warm, a shelter from the wild waves far above them.

“It’s alright,” Geralt grunts after a long moment. His gentle massage of Jaskier’s hand has been so soothing that he has to pull his eyes back open, and he jerks a little at the witcher’s voice, forcing himself to alertness and look at the pirate before him.

“What is?”

“If you’re still afraid. I know it takes time. And I’ve been told I haven’t been helpful.”

Jaskier tilts his head and grins. “Who told you that, Triss?”

Geralt’s expression is stoic, but there’s something rueful in the set of his mouth. “Triss. And Eskel. Yen. Even Lambert. And you.”

Jaskier remembers what he’d said to the white haired pirate captain to make him leave the great-cabin every night. He nods sagely. “Good advice, you should listen to them.”

“I’d thought to listen to you, little bird,” Geralt murmurs. “What can I do?”

Jaskier looks down to where the witcher hasn’t stopped gently rubbing his heat into Jaskier’s sorely overtaxed fingers. He gives the big hand around his a tentative squeeze. “This helps,” he says, not letting go.

---000---

The first time Jaskier plays his lute where more people than just the witchers with their supernatural senses can hear him, he’s uncharacteristically nervous. Back home he’d relished playing for anyone who cared to listen, delighting in the way people clapped a rhythm, sang along, or sighed wistfully, if he did it well enough.

Now, when he thinks about a crowd of people looking at him, he inevitably thinks about pirates flanking him, their eyes lustful and their hands grasping. It's why when he decides to play outside of the great-cabin, he does so in the full light of day, in close proximity to it, and with Triss at his side.

When Jaskier settles in the sun just outside the quarters he’s come to associate with relative safety, he does so with his back against the warm wood. The heat of the firm planks behind him is strangely bolstering, and he sets his lute onto his crossed legs, lightly strumming his fingers over the strings. It’s midday, and the Warg’s sails are unfurled, a moderately strong wind driving her across the white-tipped waves. Jaskier carefully doesn’t look at any of the sailors on deck, witcher or human, as the idle strumming transforms into a cheerful melody. It’s the shanty he’d heard Jon and Marri sing the evening Geralt had gifted him the lute. He looks up at the blue sky above him. There are wisps of white cloud passing them by, as if they’re racing the Warg for speed. Jaskier let’s his mind go blank, and plays.

When the shanty ends, a rough voice pulls his attention back to the people on deck.

“Well, don’t stop now, Buttercup!” Lambert calls out, wide grin on his face.

The enjoyment in the witcher’s voice is so genuine, Jaskier can’t help but laugh. “Music and flowers, Lambert? I’d almost say you’re a true romantic,” he teases gently.

Predictably, the red-headed warrior growls under his breath, a slight flush colouring his fair cheeks. “Yeah yeah. You’re the one playing it. Buttercup,” he retorts.

To Jaskier’s surprise, Lambert drops to the deck, adopting a cross legged pose in front of him. He’s clearly intending to stay and listen to Jaskier play, despite the murderous scowl he directs at anyone who dares look his way.

It gives Jaskier the courage he needs, and he starts on the next lively melody. When it’s time for him to sing, he confidently raises his voice. It isn´t long before Lambert and Triss are joined by others. More and more sailors pause in their task, some gathering around, some leaning against the railing, rope and tools still clasped in their fingers. Their faces are smiling, and some of them even sway their bodies to the melody.

The song ends, and Jaskier is met with cheering and applause. He can feel the beginnings of that all-consuming exhilaration and joy he´s so familiar with, and when the call for more sounds, he rises from his seat. He picks up a spirited melody and sees faces light up with recognition. The rhythm he taps with his heel is quickly picked up and carried by his audience, allowing him to add a counter rhythm.

The song is about a ship and its crew, in pursuit of the greatest speed possible, continuously adding sails to catch the wind. It ends with the ship lifting off of the waters, sailing up into the sky, and when Jaskier finishes there is more cheering and laughter. There are several jesting calls to raise more of the Warg’s sails, pirates leaning against each other, punching their friends’ shoulders.

Jaskier ends up singing most of the sea-shanties he knows. The ones he’s heard on board the Warg all get a warm reception, but he’s glad to find he knows a few that seem to surprise the pirate crew. They are met with no less enthusiasm, sailors shouting along with the easier choruses.

Eventually, Jaskier needs to beg off, his left hand cramping. He is met with a tumultuous symphony of approving roars, and he gives the surrounding pirates a cautious grin, flourishing a bow.  

At the back of the crowd, stands the Warg’s captain. Geralt’s arms are folded over his chest and his white hair whips in the wind. His slitted golden eyes meet Jaskier’s, and he feels the witcher’s gaze like a brand.

---000---

Over the next few days, Jaskier takes about an hour each day to sit in his spot just outside the great-cabin and play. Every day, the pirates gather more quickly, until it’s so he’s barely settled with his lute in his lap before the majority of the crew is present to listen to him. It could be intimidating, being surrounded by pirates like that, witchers no less. But Jaskier finds that doing what he loves and having the Warg’s crew appreciate it so wholeheartedly, makes them a lot less scary.

It helps to see Lambert always sitting closest, scowl on his face, but undeniably enjoying the music. It helps to see Lukasz unable to stop drumming his fingers against his thigh while Jaskier sings. It helps that Eskel’s gentle presence is near, a smile on his scarred face as he observes the joy Jaskier’s music brings. Jon and Marri invariably raise their voices along with the chorus, the sound untrained but harmonious.

It helps that when Jaskier moves over the Warg’s decks, the looks he gets are no longer just curious, but appreciative. He’d been unsure of his place on the pirate ship, other than that of a hostage of sorts. There’d still been the fear that they would decide him a burden, only good for one thing.

Day by day, that fear lessens. Jaskier might still be a hostage, but he’s not in any immediate danger. Not from the Warg’s crew, or her captain.

---000---

The first morning he wanders out onto the decks without Triss in tow, there’s a crisp cold in the air that signals they’re approaching the end of fall. The sky is grey and cloudy, and Jaskier wouldn’t be surprised if they got a heavy blanket of rain somewhere in the next few hours. He avoids the Warg’s railing, not so much to prevent a witcher from hauling him back, but more so because he’s cold enough without the sea spray blown onto his skin. He pulls the collar of his doublet closed a little more, and chances a look up, to the top of the middle mast.

Geralt is up there, climbing the rigging like he was born to do so, making his way up to the crows nest. Jaskier keeps looking until the wolf reaches the top, and sees him pull out a spy-glass. He wonders what Geralt is searching for. Last time he asked, the man had said it’d be a while yet before they make their way to Kaer Morhen.

He is startled out of his contemplation by a heavy hand on his shoulder.

“Consort!” the young sailor says happily, moving around to face him. “Are we getting music today? I haven’t heard you play ‘the bottle’s call’ yet. You know it?”

Jaskier stands frozen. He knows he recognizes the sailor. Knows he’s seen him many times. The sandy haired man has never come close to him, but he remembers Eskel introducing him as Oliver. In those first days aboard the ship, Geralt’s order still fresh in every mind, the young man had just waved and smiled at him, but kept his distance. Now he’s close, definitely closer than he’s comfortable with, and his heavy hand is still on Jaskier’s shoulder. He has a smile on his face, faint crinkles in the sun-browned skin around his eyes.

Jaskier desperately wishes to keep it together. The proximity and the friendly touch would not have been so bad, if not for that word.

Consort.

All Jaskier can think of is Rience, fire springing forth from the mage’s fingers to burn him. His left hand clenches at his side, and he stumbles back.

‘Don’t run, consort. You know what will happen if you run.’

Jaskier doesn’t immediately realize the wretchedly fearful noise he hears over the rushing in his ears, is coming from his own throat. He stares up at Oliver, who has his hands raised now, showing the palms, and is slowly backing away. The young sailor’s eyes are wide, and his face is pale under his tan. He can see the sailor’s mouth moving, but he can’t make out the words.

Suddenly, there’s a red-headed blur of movement, hauling Oliver away, out of his field of vision. The sudden lack of someone boxing him in helps unfreeze his body from its petrified state, and he backs away further. Without meaning to, Jaskier distances himself enough that he reaches the railing. He hasn’t dared turn away, so his back is pressed against it, the sound of waves below forming an overwhelming chorus with the whoosh of his own blood.

It's Eskel who approaches him, and he distantly wonders which of the two witchers had been on Jaskier-watch. The expression on Eskel’s face is watchful as he draws close, and Jaskier is relieved to find that the familiar amber eyes settle some of the fear raging through him. Still, his body doesn’t allow him to step away from the railing, toward Eskel’s outstretched hands.

“Jaskier. Buttercup. You’re safe. We’re all here. Nothing will happen to you,” Eskel murmurs softly. Jaskier can see the witcher’s eyes flick to the outstretched vista of ocean and sky behind him, both a dark grey today, intermingling on the horizon. He tries to answer Eskel, but all that comes out is a garbled noise.

There is movement behind the first mate, at the Warg’s central mast. Geralt lands on the deck with an impact no human would have been able to withstand. His face is thunderous and his golden eyes burn. When the witcher captain reaches where Oliver is still standing, eyes horrified, Lambert pulls the young sailor out of the white wolf’s path. Jaskier can see the slight movement of the pirate’s hand against his thigh, the tense and deliberate release, before Geralt strides forward. He gets the distinct impression of an apex predator carefully choosing to chain the violence within, choosing to let his prey go.

Geralt slows when he approaches him, and Jaskier realizes he’s still pressing himself back against the railing, hands in a death grip on the wood behind him.

“What happened little bird?” Geralt rumbles. “Did he touch you?” There is the threat of violence in the white wolf’s voice, and Jaskier’s body, inexplicably, responds to it as an offered lifeline.

It’s as if his strings have been cut. His hands slip off of the railing, and he sags downward until he’s slumped on the deck, leaning back against it. Geralt goes to a knee before him, hands hovering, a frown between his white brows.

“Little bird?” the witcher growls, and when Jaskier doesn’t answer, “ I’ll keelhaul him.”

“NO!” Jaskier suddenly finds his voice. He darts a hand forward to grab onto one of Geralt’s. “No,” he repeats a little more calmly. “Promise me you’ll do no such thing. Keelhauling is somewhat of an overreaction to a friendly brush of a hand over a shoulder, isn’t it?” Geralt’s teeth bare in a snarl, and behind the white haired captain, Jaskier can see Oliver rubbing fingers over his forehead to get rid of a light sheen of sweat. “Geralt,” he says softly, very aware every witcher aboard can still hear him. “It’s fine, really. It wasn’t the touch. That didn’t bother me, actually.” The witcher’s slitted pupils widen and narrow as he looks at him intently.

“Jaskier. Then what was it?”

Jaskier swallows heavily and casts his gaze down, unable to keep looking at the pirate captain. “It— it was that word. It’s what Rience and his crew called me.”

“What did he call you?” Geralt’s voice is lower than it was before, but the underlying growl hasn’t ceased.

“Consort,” Jaskier whispers.

Geralt goes perfectly still for a moment, and Jaskier unconsciously tightens his grip on the captain’s large hand. The pirate blinks, and then offers him another to help him up. When Geralt’s arm hovers, Jaskier moves closer to the witcher. With a curious look down at him, the pirate captain settles his arm around his waist, fingers splayed across his hip. Jaskier is aware the witcher beside him sends a pointed look toward his crew.

Geralt doesn’t need to say it. Jaskier knows that no one on board will use that word where he can hear it again.

---000---

The rest of the day, Jaskier keeps half an eye on wherever the white wolf is located on deck, and contemplates the feeling of safety he’s attached to the man. There’s no denying the witcher is intimidating. Terrifying. Potentially violent. Dangerous. But… maybe not to him.

He’s no longer surprised at that revelation. Though Geralt still holds Jaskier’s fate in his hands very firmly, at least part of that hold is protective. He wonders what it means for his future. Will he be held at Kaer Morhen indefinitely? He’s sure that once he sees the pirate stronghold they’re not likely to just let him go. Maybe, just maybe, he could convince the white wolf to release him before that time. Allow him to return to his family in Lettenhove. Or, more likely, his betrothed, the duke he’d been on his way to marry.

When Rience took him from the Seablade, Jaskier had been sure his life would end in violence. The only thing in his control was if it would happen after long suffering, or quickly, by his own hand. Now, his future is not his own to determine, but not as perilously fraught as he’d thought at first. It’s better than he could have hoped for. Besides, as a noble son, fourth in line and therefore unlikely to inherit, had his life ever really been his own?

---000---

That night, after he finishes his meal under Geralt’s ever watchful eye, Jaskier blurts out a question he’s been wondering about for a while.

“Geralt,” he starts, voice serious. “I’ve basically been hogging your room and your bed. It’s not that I’m not appreciative, don’t get me wrong. I’m not sure I could sleep in a hammock, not with all that swinging. Truly, I think one might have to be born at sea to find that comfortable. But… since I have your bed, where do you sleep?”

The witcher takes his bowl from him and hums. “I don’t sleep.”

Jaskier stares at him. He’s aware he’s probably resembling some sort of deep-sea fish, eyes wide and mouth agape. “Wh­—What?” he manages to stutter eventually. “What do you mean, you don’t sleep?”

The pirate across from him shrugs, his linen shirt tightening over his broad chest and shoulders with the movement. “I meditate.”

Jaskier didn’t know he could sputter indignantly, but he manages quite well. “You’ve got to be kidding me. You meditate? That can’t be as restful as actual sleep, Geralt. Come on!”

Geralt grunts, face stoic. “It’s enough.”

“Aha!” Jaskier exclaims, and points a finger in the witcher’s face. “There we have it. You don’t deny that actual sleep is better. Can’t you sleep where you’re meditating?”

The witcher grunts again. “Hardly.”

“Okay. So where do you meditate then?” Jaskier asks, lowering his finger and tilting his head at Geralt. Something shifts in the wolf’s expression, but he can’t entirely parse the exact emotion he sees reflected in those golden eyes.

“Hm. I sit out on the deck. Same spot you use when you sing.”
Jaskier knows gaping is not attractive. Really, he does. “You sit out on the deck. At night. In the cold. Meditating. What if it rains?!”

The corner of Geralt’s mouth ticks up. “I get wet,” he rumbles.

Jaskier is convinced there’s an edge of humour in his tone. He certainly hopes the witcher is joking. As if on cue, a thunderous rumble sounds from the sky, and the rain that’d been threatening all day pelts down from the dark.

Jaskier looks between the windows and the pirate captain. There are fat drops of water splashing against the great-cabin’s windows, buffeted into the glass by the strong wind that picks up along with the thunder. He folds his arms over his chest and shakes his head at the wolf.

“No. You’re not meditating out on deck. I would say not at all, but definitely not in this weather. I don’t even know if you can get a cold, but that weather might be enough for even a witcher to catch his death.”

Geralt rumbles a low growl from deep in his chest. “That’s not how witchers work, little bird.”

Jaskier just points at the hammock that swings gently from side to side where it hangs between two beams. “There’s a perfectly good hammock over there, and I bet with how witchers work, you can handle the swinging.”

Jaskier is nervous as he gets ready for bed. He hides behind the curtain and quickly washes. He carefully folds his doublet and trousers, placing them back in the chest that holds his things. It seems ages ago since Geralt gave him the trunk. Back then, he couldn’t have imagined ever inviting the pirate captain to sleep in the same room as him, and now he has. He doesn’t’ feel unsafe. He doesn’t regret telling Geralt to sleep in the hammock, instead of meditating out on deck. Still, his heart pounds in his chest as he prepares to slip from behind the curtain in his underclothes. He looks down at the scars on his left hand. Rience had burned his violence into his skin. When the stiffness of his hand had bothered him after playing, Geralt had asked permission, and gently massaged away the pain. They are not the same.

When he emerges from behind the curtain, the white wolf is in the hammock, back turned to Jaskier. He silently slips between the sheets, settling into the big bed. There is thunder outside, and the rain continues to slam into the windows. The great-cabin feels warm. Safer with another person there. With Geralt there.

Jaskier wakes alone the next morning. It’s the first night on board the Warg he hasn’t been disturbed by a single nightmare.

---000---

The days get progressively colder as they get closer to the start of winter. Geralt has taken to not only gazing out over the waves, but directs his spy-glass at the dark grey sky just as often. Again, Jaskier wonders what he is looking for.

He’s out on deck when the call comes. It’s not the Warg’s captain in the crows nest this time. Instead, it’s Leo’s voice that rends through the air, carried by the wind.

“Ship hoy!”

Jaskier whirls around to look up. He’s just in time to see the witcher facing starboard side before he is climbing down, inhumanly fast, sliding down the rigging. Jaskier nervously scans the horizon on that side. Far away, barely more than a speck on the horizon, the sparse light from the sun that manages to break through the clouds, refracts off of something white.

Jaskier’s heart leaps into his throat, and he moves forward until he’s gripping the starboard side railing. He keeps his gaze fixed on that flash of bright white in the distance, willing it to consolidate into sails. He’s still staring, when a presence behind him cages him in against the railing. He recognizes Geralt’s hands where they land on the wood beside his own, and feels the captain’s warm, solid presence behind him.

“Little bird,” Geralt rumbles, his breath hitting the back of Jaskier’s neck. “What are you doing so close to the water?”

Jaskier scoffs, unwilling to move his gaze from the speck of white to turn around. “I’m trying to see better, obviously. There’s a ship!”

“Last time there was a ship you didn’t respond this way,” the witcher behind him grumbles. “You’re not afraid.” It’s a statement, and it’s enough for Jaskier to finally turn between Geralt’s arms. He’s enclosed, the pirate captain close enough that he can feel the heat radiating off him. He has to tilt his head back to meet Geralt’s golden gaze.

“Last time, the sails were black,” he says, glancing back over his shoulder again. The white speck has separated itself into barely distinguishable sails. “These are white sails,” he says softly. “This is a ship that might— that might…”

“That might take you home?” Geralt says, his voice and expression unreadable.

Jaskier swallows and nods. “Yes. If you’ll allow it.”

“Hm.” Geralt’s fingers carefully curl around his chin, and Jaskier remains still in the wolf’s hold, one strong arm still caging him in on the side, calloused fingers gentle where they hold him. “If that’s what you want, little bird,” Geralt rumbles. Jaskier looks up at him, looks into his slitted yellow eyes, and is at a loss for words.

The moment is broken by Eskel.

“Wolf?” the first mate asks, and Geralt lets go of him, turning to his second in command.

“Make way for that ship,” Geralt orders. “Hoist a white banner to signal we mean no harm, but ready the mages to shield for cannon-fire just in case.”

Geralt stands at the Warg’s helm, the great vessel turning over its starboard side with impressive speed. Eskel gives brusque orders, the first mate’s voice booming and firm. Every hand on deck springs to obey, hoisting sails and securing various pieces of rigging. Out of the corner of his eyes, Jaskier sees white banners hoisted at the bow and stern. He can’t help but notice that the latter is far smaller than the midnight black cloth, bearing a snarling wolf’s head. He bites his lip as the Warg slides swiftly through the water, and hopes they’ll be received peacefully. He considers the likelihood that whoever is manning that ship on the horizon is prepared to take him on board.

The thought of it, however much he thinks it would be the right choice, leaves his stomach roiling with nerves and nausea. Another ship, another crew. The white sails mean they’re not pirates. He knows it’s no guarantee for the type of men that sail the vessel.

When the Warg draws in close to the other ship, Jaskier immediately knows something is wrong.

The vessel does not draw a line through the waves. Instead, the ship rolls aimlessly across the waters. Most of its sails are hoisted to catch the wind, but some of them have gotten loose from their rigging, their edges flapping wildly in the breeze. She looks to be a merchant vessel, quite similar to the Seablade in shape and size. She should have had a similarly sized crew, as well.

The Warg’s witchers line up, a solid barrier to shield the rest of the crew from any potential attack. Geralt is at their head, clad in black, eyes scanning over the ship before them. Yennefer is standing next to him, an aura of power crackling around her. From Geralt’s other side, Eskel bellows a greeting.

Jaskier listens intently, but no answer comes.

There are no sailors in the other ship’s rigging. No one is standing at her helm. There are no voices raised to call out to the Warg. All they can hear is the creaking of wood and rope, as she dips and rises with the waves. Jaskier is afraid to look at her decks, half expecting to see the wood drenched in blood. For a moment he’s convinced it’s the Seablade drifting before them. When he does look, the deck is clean, honey coloured planking, without a speck of crimson.

The deck, just as the rest of the ship, is utterly empty.  

Chapter Text

Eskel bellows a greeting at Geralt’s signal, cupping his hands next to his mouth to amplify his voice. The call is deep and powerful, and carries over the water between, enough that anyone on board the merchant ship should have heard. There is no answer, and there won’t be. They’re closer now, and the lack of heartbeats, the lack of life on the vessel before them is unmistakable.

“Lambert,” their captain growls, eyes never leaving the ship that rises and dips on the waves before them.

“Wolf?” the redheaded witcher asks from his place in the line of warriors.

Geralt doesn’t answer, but the tilt of his head is enough to convey his meaning.

“Right,” Lambert says, turning to where Jaskier is still standing close to the railing, face pale and blue eyes wide. “Protect the buttercup, got it.”

Lambert isn’t one to suffer being left behind, but he doesn’t protest, his usual biting growl absent from his voice. Eskel watches as their little brother moves toward the young man, and sees the way some of the tension disappears from Jaskier’s shoulders at Lambert’s presence.

Next to him, Geralt gives the command, and Eskel is the first to release his metal hook with a great swing, hurtling it through the air. It pulls a sturdy line behind it, like a serpent’s body following its triangle head. When he pulls the line tight, the ridged steel bites into the wood of the strange vessel. Several more thunks sound as the Warg’s witchers throw their hooks in concert, landing beside Eskel’s own.

“Heave!” he commands.

Boots scrape against  the wood of the deck, strong, calloused hands pulling in rope. The formerly rudderless ship rolls over the waves in their direction. When it’s close enough, Geralt is the first to jump over.

Eskel walks next to his brother over the merchant vessel’s deck. Outwardly, Geralt seems focussed on the task at hand, commanding the rest of the Warg’s witchers to spread out. Inwardly, Eskel knows that at least half of his captain’s attention is on the duo standing at the Warg’s railing. Jaskier has grabbed onto the wood again, and is looking out over the waves intently. Lambert is close by his side, seemingly relaxed, though Eskel knows he’s ready to pull the other man behind him at a moment’s notice.

Eskel smells it at the same time as Geralt’s nostrils flare. It’s hidden by the scents of sea-salt and the fresh tar that has been used to seal the ship’s hull. Now that they’ve caught it, it’s obvious. Carried on the breeze is the distinct scent of rot, wafting toward them from midships. Geralt prowls forward, and Eskel follows close behind.

The sight that greets them is a horrific one.

The corpse has likely been there for days, exposed to the elements. He is seated, tied to the base of the ship’s mast. The rope is tightly circled around his torso, leaving his arms free, and his head is lagging to the side, swaying with the ship’s motion. The nails on his hands have ripped off where he’d struggled to get free. Eskel can see some of them, still stuck in the frayed fibres of the rope binding him. The knot that secures the rope is in front, where the man could have reached. His body is bloated and discoloured, as if the corpse has floated in the water instead of remained bound on deck. When his head sways to reveal his face, Eskel grimaces. A swollen tongue protrudes from his mouth, a dark blue in colour. His eyes are opened wide, staring unseeingly, the spirit behind them gone and the corneas occluded. There are tracks of blood streaking down the distorted face. The streaks of rust-red trail from his ears, and have spread with the swaying motion of his head. They reach all the way down to fleck his clothes and the deck around him.

Geralt growls, low and reverberating, and Eskel answers it with one of his own.

---000---

Jaskier is nervously staring out across the water. He doesn’t really expect the witchers to find anyone, though he doesn’t know why he is so sure the merchant vessel is deserted. Sure, the ship’s decks are empty, but her crew could be hiding down below.

There is a pit in his stomach, and the hair on his arms stands on end. Something went wrong on that ship, he’s certain.

He licks his lips and looks at Lambert standing next to him. The witcher has his eyes trained on his fellow warriors as well, but slides them over after a moment of Jaskier staring at him, slitted pupils narrowing.

“Buttercup?” he asks.

“What happened to her crew, Lambert?” Jaskier whispers, his voice filled with fascinated horror.

Lambert shrugs. “No clue. Could be any number of things. There’s more than pirates out here.”

“Sea creatures?”

Lambert bares his teeth in a grin, as if he relishes in the idea of meeting those creatures himself. “Aye,” he growls. “Sea creatures. From the deep, shallows, or reefs. Or winged ones, that soar on the sea winds to swoop down from the sky. There’s many things that could threaten unsuspecting sailors.” He’s looking at the sea and skies as he says it, before hovering his hand over Jaskier’s shoulder. Jaskier presses up against it, and Lambert pats him, brusque but reassuring. “No worries Buttercup. You’re safe aboard the Warg. We won’t let anyone get ya, sea creature or human fuckers alike.”

Jaskier nods, and looks over to the merchant vessel again. The witchers are gathered around the mast, and after a few moments, two of them carry something to the other side, where Jaskier can’t entirely see, and heave it overboard.

---000---

“I would like to see,” Jaskier says stubbornly, looking up at Geralt. The pirate captain stands tall before him, a dark, hulking figure in black armour, swords behind his shoulder. The white wolf shakes his head.

“Why, little bird? There’s no crew to take you home,” the pirate’s voice is dark a he says it, but Jaskier resolutely ignores the slight frisson of unease that still rises whenever Geralt’s voice sounds like this. He scowls up at the witcher, and barely refrains from putting his hands on his hips.

“Exactly. The ship is empty. There’s no danger there, and no harm in letting me have a look. I might find something or see something that will tell us which port she’s from, cause you have no idea, do you?”

“She doesn’t bear a banner,” Geralt answers.

“Exactly what you would look for,” Jaskier snorts. “If there’s goods on board, clothes, jewellery, produce... I’m pretty sure I could tell you from whence she hails.”

“Hm,” the pirate captain responds, golden eyes narrowing. “Fine. But you’ll stay within reach.”

“Sure,” Jaskier says, grinning at his small victory. “I’ll stay where you can grab me.” He looks over to the other vessel, gaging the distance between the ships. “I can’t jump that far though,” he murmurs, eying the ropes that span between.

“I’ll carry you,” the white wolf rumbles, and Jaskier gapes at him, looking from the water to Geralt and back.

“Uhm—,” he says hesitantly, but when Geralt extends a hand to him, he lays his own in the wolf’s.

The next thing he knows, Jaskier is pressed against a firmly muscled chest, the pirate’s heat seeping into him through every point of contact between their bodies. Geralt’s arm is an iron bar around his waist, and when the witcher moves toward the railing, Jaskier slings his arms around the man’s neck, holding on for dear life. When the white wolf jumps, he closes his eyes, unwilling to look at the distance they’re bridging.

The impact of landing on the other ship is not as jarring as he would have thought, and though knows there’s the safety of wooden planks beneath his feet, he still clings onto Geralt. A low, soothing rumble emanates from the man’s chest, and there is the slow swipe of a thumb along the base of his spine. When Jaskier finally lets go, he chances a look up through his lashes, and finds the pirate captain staring down at him, his slitted golden gaze unreadable.

“Right,” he says, a little unsure why his heart keeps pounding the way it does, even after making the jump. “Let’s have a look.”

Jaskier finds more than enough to tell him the ship hails from Cidaris. He says as much to Geralt, the witcher never more than a few paces behind him. He points out the vines in the woodwork, generally only found in Cidari decorations, especially when interspersed with escallop shells. There’s no other people on the continent who’d put those two things together. The cargo itself tells a similar story. Cidaris is a small kingdom that draws its wealth mostly from maritime trade, and the goods stored in the ship’s hull show it. There’s merchandise from all corners of the continent, as could only be gathered in a Cidari trading port.

“Any Idea of her destination?” Geralt asks him after he’s carefully listened to Jaskier listing off the evidence on his fingers.

Jaskier shakes his head. “Could be anywhere, no way to know” he looks back over his shoulder at Geralt. “Not with her entire crew gone.”

The pirate captain nods, and puts a hand on Jaskier’s waist. “Time to head back.”

Jaskier pauses, and tries to hide the slight tremble in his hands. “Do you think that— that it could have been Rience?” he asks.

The white wolf looks at him, as if debating how to answer, and then slowly shakes his head. “No, little bird. This wasn’t a mage’s work.”

“Then what was it?” Jaskier asks, dreading the answer.

“Sirens,” Geralt growls.

Jaskier is held firmly in Geralt’s arms when they make the jump back over. When he thinks of sirens hiding under the surface he shivers, and clings to Geralt with all his might. The idea of creatures capable of decimating an entire ship’s crew without leaving behind any sign of their presence, makes a shiver run down his spine.

This time, he chances a glance at the water below them. It looks dark and cold, and he tells himself he imagined it, but in a flash, he sees a terrible visage under the waves. It’s eyes are a haunting aquamarine, it’s face humanoid. Half of it is edged with dark, purplish scales. The other half is made up out of gnarled flesh, ridged and an angry red in colour, as if it has been burned.

---000---

When they are back on the Warg, Jaskier notices that not every witcher has returned with them. There are a few still on board the merchant vessel. He can see Leo and Lukasz, Ealdred and Thornwald. With them are a few human sailors, and Jaskier wonders if they’ve made the crossing the same way he has, in a witcher’s arms.

He sees Oliver among them, and when the young sailor catches his eyes, he gives him an uncertain wave. Jaskier smiles, hoping it will be visible over the distance, and waves back.

The Warg turns back to her original course, Geralt at her helm and Eskel shouting orders. The smaller merchant vessel follows, falling slightly behind. Her white sails, that had been hoisted but sprung free in places are secured, and the small crew aboard her decks does its best to keep up with the larger, sleeker pirate ship. The Warg in turn lowers some of its sails to allow the smaller ship to keep up.

Jaskier climbs up the ladder toward the raised part of the deck where Geralt has a firm grip on the Warg’s great wooden wheel.

“We’re taking the ship with us?” he asks, settling down with his back against the wood.

Geralt doesn’t look at him, his golden irises focussed on the horizon before them, and hums noncommittally.

Jaskier rakes a hand through his hair. “I mean, I can understand it, a ship is valuable after all. Especially since she still carries her cargo, but it’s just…” he thinks back to the flash of that face he thought he’d seen under the water, and shakes his head.

“Would you rather we sink her?” the white wolf rumbles, turning his intense gaze onto him.

Jaskier swallows harshly, thinking of the Seablade, set adrift just like the merchant vessel had been, albeit with more blood soaked into her planks. He remembers thinking she would sink to the bottom of the ocean. He would prefer her to have been picked up, and given second life.

“No,” he says eventually. “Sinking her would be a waste. Something she doesn’t deserve. It’s just that, how do we know sirens won’t come back for her next crew?”

“Hm,” Geralt responds. “That’s what we’re counting on.”

Jaskier blanches. “What?” he asks, his voice a little higher than he’d wanted it to come out. “You want—Sirens— coming back?”

“This is not normal for them. Sirens are merciless creatures, yes, but they don’t know greed. They take only those they need to feed. Usually, when a ship is unfortunate enough to encounter them, that’s just a few sailors. That they took an entire crew…is aberrant behaviour. We’ll take the ship with us to Kaer Morhen for winter. If they’ll follow the vessel to land, we’ll have the advantage.”

Jaskier opens his mouth to ask more questions,  but the pirate captain continues.

“The Warg and it’s crew are the keepers of the code,” he says, shooting a glance at the expanse of grey canvas above them before his yellow eyes slide down to where Jaskier is still seated, looking up at him with curiosity. “We cull the pirates who don’t adhere. Same goes for creatures. We won’t let a cluster such as this exist.”

“Oh,” Jaskier says softly.  

Geralt just looks at him, slitted pupils expanding and contracting within golden irises.

---000---

That evening, Jaskier finishes his dinner while chatting at Geralt about Cidaris, and what he’s heard of the nation’s different ports.

“You know a lot about them,” Geralt rumbles, taking his empty bowl and setting it to the side. “You’ve been there?”

Jaskier shakes his head. “No. Before this, I’d never even left home. But I’ve read about them, heard accounts from bards and storytellers that visited Letten—” he stops himself from saying the name just in time, and bites his lip. Geralt looks at him intently, but doesn’t comment on the slip. “Anyway, I’d like to visit,” Jaskier continues. “Not only Cidaris, but so many places.”

“You wish to be a bard,” Geralt says.

Jaskier grins at him. “You heard that huh? Is that why you gave me the lute?”

“Hm. That, and you told me you played.”

Jaskier taps his chin. “Did I? when?”

Geralt looks away from him. “Your first night on board.”

“Ah, well. I don’t entirely remember telling you. I was kind of preoccupied with some other things.”

“Hm.” Geralt responds, but follows it with one of those strangely soothing rumbles from deep in his chest.

Jaskier wants to change the subject and opens his mouth, but there’s something in the white wolf’s expression that halts the words on his tongue.

“If you were to go home, is that what would await you, little bird?” he asks. “A life as a bard?”

Jaskier looks down at his hands. “No,” he answers. “No, I don’t think so. If I were to go home, my family would be happy that I’m still alive, but…” He breaks off and swallows harshly, wondering if he’s really going to say it out loud. “But, they’d be happier that the marriage contract to the Duke of Marx could still be fulfilled. They’d send me away, again.”

Geralt looks away from him and bares his teeth, sharp canines glinting, a low rumbling growl erupting from his throat. Jaskier remains silent, and the wolf looks at him again. “Then why did you ask to go?” Geralt rumbles.

Jaskier licks his lips nervously, meeting those intense golden eyes. “Because, I do wish to see all those places. The Marx estate is in Cidaris. The only good thing about that prospective marriage was that it might have allowed me to travel with the Duke. If you take me to Kaer Morhen, that’s—  that’s all I’ll have seen in my life. My home, and your Island.”

Slowly, Geralt’s hand comes up. Jaskier doesn’t halt him, and doesn’t move away. The pirate captain’s fingers curl around his chin. “Little bird,” he says, “You think we would hold you there?”

Jaskier blinks up at the witcher in surprise. “Wouldn’t you?” he asks.

“We winter at Kaer Morhen. The seas aren’t as traversable in the cold season. In spring we head out again. We could make port in some of the places you want to visit. You could play there.” Geralt lets him go and leans back. “I’d not hold you against your will,” he rumbles. “You can leave at any point, if you wish.” He looks at Jaskier intently. “You could also choose to stay.”

Jaskier’s mouth falls open in surprise, stunned into silence.

There are nerves building in his belly. They’re not the kind of nerves that paralyse, or that morph into fear. They’re the kind of nerves that might just spill over into joy the moment uncertainty and doubt disappear. Could he do this? Could he winter at Kear Morhen, and leave on board the Warg in spring? Could he stay among these pirates? And if he no longer wanted to stay, would Geralt really let him go?

Jaskier nods slowly. “I’ll think about it.”

---000---

White sails billow in the wind, their edges flapping against the rigging angrily. The wooden hull creaks like it’s under strain, but the sound of waves is absent. Jaskier turns in a circle, searching. The ship is empty.

“Geralt?” he calls out, hoping a dark silhouette will appear, but nothing happens. When he gazes out toward the horizon, the ocean is endless, but silent.  The merchant ship is strangely familiar, and he walks toward the prow.

Unexpectedly, the weight of a hand falls to his shoulder. Startled, he whirls around, and comes face to face with captain Bast. Jaskier blinks in confusion, and the captain opens his mouth, his fingers pressing harshly into his flesh.

“There are black sails on the horizon. They’re getting closer.”

Confused, Jaskier wants to ask what the man is talking about, but before he can, smoke starts curling up from the captain’s shoulders. He stumbles back from Bast, a horrified cry spilling over his lips as the man catches fire and burns. Skin blackens and disintegrates, flesh falling away to reveal the bone-white skull underneath. The stench of scorched flesh is in his nose and mouth, suffocating him, and he turns around to run.

He slips and slides in his rush to get away from the burning corpse behind him, something slick making his footing unsure. On his next step he hits the deck hard, his chin slamming down into the wood and making his teeth rattle. When he tries to get back up, his hands slide in a warm liquid, and a metallic odour reaches his nose. When he looks down at his hands, he is wrist deep in a pool of blood, soaking into the wooden planks of the Seablade’s deck. He can’t hold back the scream that tears itself from his throat.

The next thing he knows, he’s hauled up by strong hands, and he tries his best to scrabble away from them.

“There are things worse than death, Julian,” Adrienne’s voice sounds next to his ear, and Jaskier turns to her with a sense of relief that slips into horror when he lays eyes on her. Blood is spilling from her lips, and from a multitude of stab wounds. It’s enough that her body should collapse, but her grip on him is strong, the look in her grey eyes urgent. “Black sails are coming.”  

The words have barely made it out, before flames burst from her mouth, licking their way upward. With a strangled cry, Jaskier turns again, unsure where to go. In his panic, there’s only one person he thinks of.

“Geralt!” he yells, desperately searching the horizon for grey, for the Warg’s imposing bulk.

“Tsk, tsk,” an amused voice sounds from behind him, and Jaskier’s heart turns to ice. “What did I tell you, consort? You know what will happen if you run.”

Overwhelmed by fear, Jaskier doesn’t look back over his shoulder, but bolts toward the Seablade’s railing. His running footsteps are loud on the planks, the sound of waves is still absent. He gets close, so very close to the railing.

Hot hands grab hold of him, their fingers pressing to his skin like iron brands heated to a fiery orange glow. Jaskier screams, panic and pain suffusing his voice.

“Geralt!”

---000---

“Jaskier! Come on little bird, wake up!”

Geralt’s voice is loud in his ears as Jaskier’s eyes fly open, meeting golden irises, their pupils blown wide. Geralt’s hands are grasping his upper arms, and the witcher is kneeling before the bed, shaking him.

He gasps for air wildly, half expecting to inhale the smell of blood and smoke. In a panic, he looks at his wrists, at the flesh that had scorched beneath those heated fingers. His right is unmarred, and his left bears pale white scarring, long since healed.

“Little bird?” Geralt asks. His grip slackens, but he doesn’t let go.

Jaskier looks back at the witcher again, and remembers how he had screamed for him. With a soft hiccupping noise, he glides from between the sheets, toward the white wolf. If Geralt is surprised he doesn’t show it, catching Jaskier and cradling him.

The pirate captain holds him for a long time. Sweat is cooling on his skin, and he is shivery with residual fear fuelled adrenaline.

“Nightmare,” Jaskier manages to croak eventually.

“Hm,” Geralt responds, but just keeps holding him, the witcher’s chin resting on top of his head.

---000---

Jaskier doesn’t manage to catch any more sleep that night, the horrible dream still occupying his thoughts. He can’t entirely push away the images of captain Bast and Adrienne, just like he can’t stop thinking about their words. They had died a horrible death in his dream, and he can only hope their souls are at peace somewhere.

Black sails are coming. It had sounded like a warning.

The entire morning, Jaskier feels twitchy and on edge because of it, and it doesn’t help that he holds himself rigidly against the biting chill. The weather is progressively getting colder, and he shivers. He should have put on a coat before going out on deck. There is fine mist that leaves tiny glittering droplets everywhere his skin is exposed, gathering in his hair and on his eyelashes, and his doublet is already damp against his skin. He feels uncomfortably tense, both in mind and in body.

It’s no wonder then, that when a black shadow falls from the sky to land on his shoulder, he shrieks in a way that has several witchers sprinting his way, Eskel practically barrelling into him.

Chapter Text

Jaskier shrieks and waves his arms, causing the large bird to dig it’s claws into his shoulder and extend it’s dark wings, flapping wildly to keep balance. A curved black beak opens, releasing a deep croak next to his ear, almost annoyed in quality. The large raven turns its head to stare at him with one dark grey eye, and Jaskier freezes at the proximity of that sharp beak so close to his face. Eskel skids to a halt in front of him, barely managing to prevent a collision.

“Roach!” the scarred witcher exclaims, amber eyes widening.

“Roach?” Jaskier repeats weakly, trying to move his lips as little as possible so as not to draw further attention from the large bird. That beak looks like it could rend away flesh if so employed. “Pretty sure this is a raven, not an uncommonly large insect.”

The raven fluffs up its feathers, and releases another croak as if to confirm that it is, in fact, far above something so mundane as an insect.

Eskel smiles and sidles up to Jaskier, positioning a broad shoulder next to his in an effort to coax the large bird to hop over. “That she is,” Eskel rumbles. “Her name is Roach. She’s Geralt’s. That she’s here means we’re getting close to Kaer Morhen.”

The birds steps sideways and back on Jaskier’s shoulder, but doesn’t hop over onto Eskel’s, not even when he makes a soft crooning sound and rubs a knuckle through the fluffed feathers on her chest.

“Sorry Buttercup,” Eskel says. “Looks like she’s decided you’re her perch for now.”

Jaskier tries to crane his head to get a closer look at the raven on his shoulder, feeling himself go cross-eyed as he does so. The black bird tilts its head, and her long beak opens without sound. Jaskier can’t help but get the impression that she’s amused somehow.

Behind Eskel, the witchers that had rushed toward him at his shriek, grin and retreat, going back to the various tasks they’d been performing. Lambert remains, crossing his arms over his chest, a scowl on his face.

“How’d you get her to do that?” he directs at Jaskier, yellow eyes drifting between him and the Raven. ‘

“Do what?” Jaskier asks, very gingerly lifting a hand to raise a knuckle to Roach’s chest the way he’d seen Eskel do. The bird gives a soft caw and takes his finger in her sharp beak for a moment, surprisingly gentle, before releasing it and fluffing up her feathers once more. Jaskier takes it as permission, and rubs his knuckle through her bluish black plumage, getting a slow blink from her deep grey eye in response.

Lambert throws his hands in the air. “That!” he exclaims. “Whenever I try that, she just bites.”

Geralt appears from behind Lambert and claps him on the shoulder, releasing a deep, rumbling laugh. Jaskier realises he’s never heard the white wolf make a noise of such carefree joy before. He’s sure the only thing he’s gotten from the witcher that comes close, is air expelled through his nose a little more loudly, a chuckle at best. He can’t help but stare, and he can’t help but think that the pirate captain should really laugh more often.

When Geralt meets his eyes, the smile is still on his face and his eyes are lit up. Jaskier feels heat rising to his cheeks, contrasting against the cold mist dampening his skin. The pirate raises his arm, and makes a low vibrating noise. On Jaskier’s shoulder, Roach tilts her head and opens her wings, winking her grey eye at him once, and takes off with a gust that ruffles his hair.  Cold droplets fall from his locks to drip down his neck, and he pretends it’s the cause of the shiver along his spine.

The Raven lands on Geralt’s outstretched wrist, and then hops along the witcher’s arm to perch on his shoulder. The white wolf reaches to slide his large hand over her wings gently, and Roach releases another soft caw, taking several snow-wite strands in her beak, preening.

It’s an endearing sight, one Jaskier hadn’t expected from the pirate. When Geralt looks back at him over the distance, he can feel his flush spread, and hastily turns around to go look for Triss.

---000---

He finds the mage in her workshop, carefully wrapping a sailor’s wrist in tincture-soaked bandages. The Warg’s crew is beyond capable, but even experienced sailors have a mishap every now and again. Jaskier can tell the joint is swollen, a faint bluish hue lying just under the skin.

“Should I come back later?” he asks, but Triss smiles and the Sailor waves him in with his good hand. Jaskier enters and slides onto a seat next to the mage, taking careful note of the way she overlaps the bandages for added support. “What happened to your wrist, Erik?” he asks.

Erik is an older, experienced sailor. His hair and impressively curled moustache are more salt then pepper, but his body is as strong as any of the younger hands. Jaskier thinks he must have been quite a sight in his younger years.

“Made a stinkin mistake,” he answers good naturedly. “Let meself slide down some rope but didna see the slack one beside it. Curled around my arm. M’ lucky it didna rip my hand clean off.”

Jaskier hisses softly between his teeth, horrified at the idea of a limb being torn away through brute force.

“Ah, sorry, lad,” Erik says. The sailor looks at him with a questioning expression, eyebrows raised, and Jaskier gives a the man a small smile and nod. The seaman raises his good hand to pat him on the shoulder. “I know ya don’t much like the gore.”

Jaskier shrugs. “Can’t say I do, but it’s fine. I’m no fainting damsel.”

Both Triss and Erik frown at his words.

“You surely aint,” Erik says. “Immediately knew you aint no lily liver.”

Jaskier shrugs uncomfortably and shifts his eyes away from the pair. “I don’t know about that,” he says uncertainly, thinking of how he still shrinks away in fear sometimes, of the nightmare that had him screaming for Geralt just last night.

The old sailor shakes his head at him. “It’s easy to be fearless when ya’ve never had to endure anythin. To suffer and keep going, that takes the right kind of mettle.”

After Erik’s wrist has been bound he leaves with another pat to Jaskier’s shoulder, and they can hear the sailor’s cheerful whistle trailing off as he makes his way back to abovedeck.

Triss turns to look at him, slight concern in her expression. “Is everything alright, Jaskier?” she asks in her gentle voice.

He bites his lip, and then slowly shakes his head. “I— I’ve been having nightmares.”

Triss nods, and reaches out to hold his hand. “That’s to be expected,” she says softly. “Do you need something to help you sleep?”

Jaskier inhales deeply and shakes his head again. “No. It’s just, they had lessened, almost disappeared even. Ever since Geralt—” he flicks his eyes to meet hers. “Ever since Geralt started sleeping in the great-cabin again.”

“You asked him to?” Triss questions, and she doesn’t seem surprised when Jaskier nods. “So what’s different about this dream then?” she says, eyes sharp.

He shrugs. “I’m not sure. But it feels…ominous. Like a warning. There were two people in it who were on the Seablade with me. They told me, there are black sails on the horizon, black sails are coming, before bursting into flames.” Jaskier thinks of who else had been in the dream, and his left hand involuntarily twitches in Triss’ hold.

“Was Rience there too?” the mage asks him softly.

Jaskier bites his lip and nods. “He was, but I woke up. Geralt woke me up, before anything could happen.”

“Do you mind if I run a diagnostic enchantment on you?”

Jaskier shakes his head. To him, the dream felt different from those before, and he’s just glad she’s taking him seriously. Triss murmurs soft words in a language he doesn’t understand, while still holding his hand. When she’s done, she shakes her head.

“I can’t find anything,” she tells him. “But come to me again if you have another dream like that.”

Jaskier releases the final vestiges of tension he’d held in his shoulders since he woke from the nightmare. He’s relieved. Triss hasn’t found anything. Maybe it was just a dream after all. “Thanks, Triss,” he says, leaning forward to kiss her cheek. “I will.”

---000---

As soon as he’s out on deck again, a croak sounds from high above. When he looks up, Roach is not much more than a dark shadow swooping down, but this time he’s prepared. He extends his arm the way he saw Geralt do, and instead of a sudden crash onto his shoulder, the raven lands on his wrist, light as a feather, before delicately settling her weight. She turns her head again, regarding him with an intelligent grey eye.

“Hi girl,” Jaskier murmurs, stroking across her dark feathered back, taking in the smooth, slightly oily texture. “Shall we go find your master?”

Roach caws softly as if in agreement, and Jaskier makes his way toward the Warg’s helm.

The sun has finally grown strong enough to break through the morning’s mist, and when he reaches the raised deck, it shines directly upon the white wolf. Geralt’s hair is bright in the late autumn light, and his gaze is a luminescent gold. It lands on Jaskier, and shifts to the raven still perched on his shoulder. He doesn’t smile, but something in his face changes, and Jaskier thinks he looks like some impossibly beautiful sea spirit. Even the scar over his eye appears gilded.

Jaskier approaches him, and as Eskel had done, he presses his shoulder against Geralt’s to let Roach hop over. The raven does so, but not before she takes Jaskier’s ear in the curved end of her beak, gently nibbling at the cartilage.

“Hm. She likes you,” Geralt says.

Jaskier smiles and knuckles through Roach’s feathers, ruffling them slightly. “Could have fooled me at first,” he answers. “I swear she knew what she was doing when she landed on me out of nowhere.”

Geralt’s eyes crinkle, and he produces that same deep vibrating noise. Roach croaks loudly in response. “Possible,” the white wolf concedes, and Jaskier laughs. “She’s a better judge of character than many,” Geralt says.

“Lambert?” Jaskier asks.

“Hm. Lambert can be caustic, but has his heart in the right place. She shows him love the same way he does others, but instead of words…”

“He gets bitten,” Jaskier laughs again. Roach fluffs up her feathers at the sound, and opens her beak, grey eye staring at him. When he glances at the pirate captain, Geralt is also looking at him.

“She liked Renfri too,” the witcher says, his voice soft.

Jaskier doesn’t know who that is, but can sense it’s someone important. He’s learned that sometimes, Geralt will speak more if he’s given time without questions, so he holds his tongue and waits.

“She was an intended consort, like you,” the pirate captain says after a long silence, carefully taking in Jaskier’s reaction.

He feels a little start at Geralt’s use of the word, but he steels himself against the discomfort, nodding for the wolf to continue.

“We picked her up, adrift at sea. The lot that had befallen her ship and crew was not unlike your own, though their vessel had sunk in the confrontation. She’d been clinging to driftwood for days when we found her. She’d been— hurt. She wouldn’t talk about what happened, not at first. We had her on board for a few weeks, before she asked to go.”

Jaskier swallows heavily, fearing how the story will end. “And you let her go,” he says.

Geralt nods. “She’d been on her way to Ebbing, to her intended.”

“What happened?” Jaskier asks softly.

“She married him. He wasn’t a nice man. Not even a year later, she killed herself by jumping off the cliffs.”

Jaskier makes a strangled noise. “She— how do you know?”

Burning yellow eyes meet his own. “We checked on her. The Baron she married tried to tell us she ran, but the man’s lies did not prevent his servants from telling the truth.”

“What happened to the Baron?” Jaskier asks.

“Died then and there,” Geralt growls. “Her misery started with pirates overstepping, turning away from the code. It ended when she freed herself from the cruelty of one who should have protected her.”

Jaskier nods slowly, things clicking into place. “That’s when you became the keeper, isn’t it?”.

Geralt inclines his head. “It is.”

The sudden surge of emotion he feels is overwhelming. “I’m sorry,” he says, stumbling over his words in his haste. “I’m sorry I went overboard. I’m sorry I asked you to let me drown. I’m sorry you had to relive all of that. I’m sorry— that I asked to go.”

Geralt turns toward him at that, Roach balancing on his shoulder, and lifts a hand to cup his chin. “Never be sorry for that, little bird. I’m under no illusion that caged birds are not as happy, and don’t live as long. I just ask that if you go to him, you’ll let us come with you, at first.”

Jaskier curls his fingers around Geralt’s wrist. “You’d let me go to get married?” he asks softly.

Geralt’s fingers tighten minutely against his jaw. “I would,” he rumbles, before the corner of his mouth curves up. “Though I’d prefer not to.”

Another hot flush burns in Jaskier’s cheeks.

---000---

That evening, Roach perches on his shoulder as Jaskier makes his way belowdecks, toward the mess-deck. He takes courage from the weight of the bird almost as much as he does from Geralt’s solid presence behind him.

So far he’s invariably had his meals in the great-cabin, alone with Geralt, and though he’s nervous, he thinks it’s time. He carries his lute with him, tucked safely away in it’s worn leather case, and hopes he’ll feel confident enough to reach for it after the meal. Playing for the crew in the open air out on deck is one thing. It is quite another to do so where he is confined by wooden walls, surrounded by pirates.

When he enters with Roach on his shoulder and Geralt at his back, there is a sudden lull in the cheerful conversation, and heads swivel his way. He’s almost positive that even though he can’t see, Geralt issues a gestured command from behind him, because after only a second of staring, witchers and sailors turn back to their food and conversation. He winds his way through the bolted down tables and chairs, the crew greeting him with smiles, waves, and the occasional friendly greeting. Jaskier can tell they’re holding back for his comfort, and to his relief, he doesn’t feel tense at all.

He is surrounded by pirates, by human sailors and armed witchers.

He knows them though. When he looks around the space, he realises he knows each one of them by name. He has exchanged words with them, smiled at them, and played music for them. He has been under the protective watch of the witchers when they still thought he might harm himself. He has been given space by the sailors, none coming close nor touching him, meticulously following Geralt’s orders. Looking at them now, Jaskier really, truly realises. He is safe here.

There is the sharp sting of tears in his nose, and he blinks furiously to prevent moisture falling from his eyes. Roach turns on his shoulder to nibble at his ear, and Geralt’s large hand lands on his hip.

The captain leans forward to speak next to his ear. “You want to go back?” he offers, his voice low and his breath warm.

Jaskier shakes his head, inhaling shakily. “No. I’m good. I want to be here,” he responds, looking up at the wolf. Geralt’s golden eyes bore into his, but he nods, guiding him to a table set a little apart, with gentle pressure of his hand.

Jaskier is greeted by Eskel, and gratefully settles down into the seat next to him, Geralt claiming the space on his other side. Lambert is seated across from the scarred witcher, and next to him are Triss and Yennefer. Both mages give him a warm smile, and though he no longer fears Yennefer, the palpable aura of power around her still makes him shift in his seat. He knows to read her better now though, and can see the way her purple gaze gentles when she looks at him.

The food is served hot by the cook and her young helper Tobias. At first he thinks he’s mistaken, but he definitely notices that the lad keeps stealing shy glances at him. When Jaskier gives him a reassuring smile and thanks him for the meal, he doesn’t expect the kitchenhand to blush crimson all the way to the roots of his hair, his movements suddenly clumsy. It’s only Geralt’s quick reflexes that save him from a lapful of hot stew, and the lad stammers out an apology. Before Jaskier can tell him it’s quite alright, and no harm has been done, Tobias hurries off to another table, bowls in hand, shooting back furtive looks every now and again.

“What’s that about?” Jaskier wonders out loud, and the entire table turns to stare at him. In his typical blunt fashion, it’s Lambert who answers the question.

“Well hells, buttercup. You’re a beautiful fucking flower. Tobias is used to thistles and thorns. Can’t blame him for taking in the view and getting flustered.” He lets his yellow eyes drop over Jaskier in a quick up and down look, and gives him a mischievous wink.

Jaskier knows if Lambert, or anyone, had said these words to him weeks ago, or looked at him like that, winked at him like that, it would have left him in a state of terror. Now though, he just accepts the heat that creeps into his cheeks and grins back at the redhead.

“A flower compliment? Again?” he teases, leaning forward with his chin in his palm, fluttering his lashes. “You’re not even trying to hide your romantic nature anymore, are you?”

Lambert looks positively stunned for a moment, then a wide grin cracks his face and he opens his mouth to retort. A low growl from beside Jaskier stops him, but Lambert keeps the grin, and winks again for good measure.

When he glances up at Geralt, the look on the witcher’s face is neutral, but the growl reverberates all the way into his diaphragm. It’s Jaskier’s turn to be stunned, when the pirate captain lays his hand on his hip again, and pulls him closer to his side. Geralt lets go immediately, but Jaskier doesn’t shift away from him. During the rest of the meal he remains there, comfortable, tucked into the white wolf’s side.

---000---

When the meal is done Jaskier realizes that none of the crew are preparing to leave the mess-deck. Instead, the murmur increasingly dies down, and heads turn to look his way, expressions hopeful. When eventually a silence falls, Geralt slowly swipes his thumb over the base of his spine and looks at him. When the captain speaks, his deep voice carries.

“We’ve never had the privilege of a bard on board. Would you play for us?”

Geralt looks straight at him while he says it. Jaskier has never been more aware of his heart doing a summersault in chest, and he’s not even sure if it’s the title of bard, or the look in the witcher’s eyes that does it.

Unsure of how to respond to that golden gaze, heat high in his cheeks, he grabs his lute case from under the table, and unclasps the metal buckles.

Jaskier plays, he sings, he stamps a rhythm with his boots, and moves between the tables. Most of the crew is singing the choruses with him. Others are clapping their hands, and everyone cheers loudly in praise when his songs end. When he starts to get tired, sweat beading at his hairline and temples, he decides to finish with a ballad. It’s a gentle, languid melody, accompanied by long, drawn out notes that he knows showcase his vocal range, though that’s not why he prefers it. It’s one of his favourites because of the story it tells.

It’s a fanciful little tale of a maiden caught in a magical forest, cursed to wander about and never find her way out from under the trees. In the original, she befriends a wild horse that eventually carries her out from the forest and into the world.

Jaskier alters it just slightly. He doesn’t quite dare to make the maiden into a man, but he feels bold with the crew’s appreciation of the night’s music. He is filled with warm cheer, and it makes him daring.

Instead of a horse, the maiden meets a wolf in the forest, large and dangerous, it’s canines sharp and gleaming under the light of the moon. The maiden is afraid, because she doesn’t know the wolf, and has been warned to heed it’s teeth and claws. But the wolf is kind, and protects her from the forest’s predators who would do her harm.

Jaskier finishes his song before the completion of the story. He lets it come to and end, just as the maiden has started to wonder if the wolf will lead her to freedom. During the final verse he settles, no longer moving across the deck, leaning against a wall. He allows himself to glance across the space toward the white wolf, still seated at his table.

Geralt is leant back against the wall himself, his posture relaxed. Roach is on his shoulder, methodically preening her way through his long white hair. Their eyes meet across the distance, and Jaskier knows.

Not only is he safe. He has a place on board the Warg.

---000---

A little over a week later, Jaskier is reading in the great-cabin when the call sounds.

“Land hoy!”

It is loud enough that he can easily hear it, and he carefully marks his place in the book before putting it away and scrabbling out from the blankets he had cocooned himself in for warmth.

He has a moment of confusion when he exits the cabin. The call for land had sounded, but Jaskier can’t see anything more than the dark ocean and grey horizon. He looks up to the crows nest, but the witcher that had occupied it is already sliding down. He moves toward the railing and leans over, craning to see the white sailed ship behind them.

High up in merchant vessel’s rigging clings a nimble figure with sand-coloured hair. Oliver points portside, and Jaskier turns around to hurry to the Warg’s opposite side.  

Again, he leans out over the railing, his eyes scanning the horizon, but all he can see are dark clouds gathering in the distance.

A hand lands next to his on the polished wood. The white wolf is a wall of palpable heat every time gets close enough, and Jaskier feels the man behind him like a furnace.

“Look through this,” Geralt rumbles, and Jaskier imagines he can feel it travel from the witcher’s chest, across the sparse distance between them, into his back. Geralt’s other arm reaches around him, holding out a spy-glass.

Jaskier grasps the delicate instrument with careful hands, half afraid it will slip from his fingers to drop into the ocean below. When he raises it to his face and squeezes one eye closed, he expects to see land. It is still just grey. Grey water, grey skies, dark grey clouds.

The pirate captain behind him steps closer, and the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, warmth slowly gathering in his chest, making it’s way up his throat toward his face. He’s very aware of the nearness of Geralt’s presence, and when the man lays his hands over Jaskier’s to direct the spy-glass, his breath catches.

The distraction of it is almost enough that he misses the view, but when he redirects his attention, he sees the Island of Kaer Morhen.

“Oh,” Jaskier says softly, allowing Geralt to move the spy-glass so he can take in the different parts of the island. Though it is far away and under thick cloud cover, he can tell that inland the island is covered with forests and fields of green. Closer to the ocean, it is edged by steep granite cliffs, the colour harshly dark but shot through with veins of a grey light enough to border on white. There is a break in the cliffs, the shore opening up to reveal a glimpse of a pale yellow beach, with beyond… houses.

He can’t make out the entire settlement, but what he can see surprises him. The houses are made of stone, their roofs thatched, and are larger than he expected them to be. There’s more of them too. It’s not as large as a capital city, but it’s a city nonetheless, and he suspects that hidden behind the cliffs there might still be more.

Slowly, Geralt directs his hands upward. The spy-glass reveals land that slopes up high, trees and fields slowly morphing into rocky hills that rise even further until they peak in a trio of snow-capped summits.

“It’s beautiful,” Jaskier says breathlessly. Geralt leans forward a little more, and the words spoken against his ear feel warm and intimate. Jaskier can almost image the pirate’s lips forming them.

“It’s home,” he rumbles. “Welcome to Kaer Morhen.”

Chapter Text

The sky is still filled with dark clouds by the time the Warg pulls into the natural bay, high cliffs sliding by on either side. Every now and again, a beam of sunlight manages to get through, lighting up the grey water in shades of bright blue and green. Jaskier can see fish of all different sizes and colour flit through the water from his position by the railing. There’s several he doesn’t recognise.

When a call sounds from high up on the cliffs, he looks up to see several figures on the overhang either side, clearly sentries of some sort. From the bow, Eskel bellows back a greeting. At this distance, he can see the pale yellow beach on one side of the bay, a rocky outcropping extending into the water on the other. It’s there that several ships bob slightly on the gentle waters, wooden boardwalks extending from the natural rock formation out into the water, to provide anchorage. The sails that are tightly furled against the tall masts and rigging, are invariably midnight black. Jaskier can’t help but clench his hands on the wooden railing, and wills his heart to calm down. He’s safe. He’s on board the Warg, and when he disembarks, her crew will do so with him. He won’t be alone. He’ll be protected.

Geralt will be there.

He startles a little when Roach lands on his shoulder with a soft croak, but takes courage from her weight and the slight prick of her claws through the fabric of his doublet.

He’s still standing there staring at the town of roughhewn stone, it’s streets winding up from the harbour to the sloping hill, when the Warg pulls into one of the largest slots. Her place is about half way along the stone pier, a sturdy wooden dock extending all along her side. It’s close enough she can be reached quickly from the town, but far enough out into the water she can launch straight into the bay, without manoeuvring.

Next to them, the merchant ship with its white sails and tiny crew pulls in, and Jaskier is struck again with how large a vessel the Warg actually is.

He makes careful note of the other pirate ships docked in the harbour, adrenaline surging with each new ship. He knows it won’t be here, but his body is half expecting to see Rience’s ship at anchorage.

There’s a total of eight other vessels, the Warg and the white sailed ship making ten. None of them are familiar. Not even the Black Tide is here, though Geralt had said she berthed at Kaer Morhen frequently.

There’s many more spots along the wharf that are still empty.

The Warg is too high above the water for a gangway to bridge the gap to the wooden dock, which isn’t a problem for her witcher crew. One by one, witchers start jumping over her railing only to land on light feet beside her, the impact hardly making a sound. Jaskier notices that the non-witcher crew all attach themselves to one of the fearsome warriors, hitching a ride on the fall down.

Jaskier wonders if Eskel or Lambert will let him cling onto them, but he hopes Geralt will be the one to carry him for the leap. He reaches his fingers up toward Roach, and gets a small nibble from her sharp beak.

“Now where is that captain?” he murmurs, and her grey eye blinks once while staring at him.

“Here, Little bird,” Geralt rumbles from behind him, and Jaskier about jumps a mile into the air.

He shoots an accusatory glance at­­ the raven on his shoulder. “A little warning next time?” he addresses her, and gets an amused curve of Geralt’s mouth in reward. The witcher slides his palm over Roach’s back in a light caress, and she soundlessly opens her beak. Jaskier snorts. “In cahoots to scare me, the both of you.”

Geralt’s nostrils flare, and Jaskier knows the pirate is taking in his scent. “Not scared,” he murmurs, a note of satisfaction in his voice. “Nervous though.”

Jaskier swallows, glancing at the pirate ships before looking up at the town again. “Yes,” he confirms. “I know I don’t have to be, but…” he lets his sentence trail off, unwilling to verbalise how uncomfortable he actually feels at the prospect of disembarking the Warg.

“Let me?” Geralt rumbles, his hands landing lightly on Jaskier’s hips.

Just like Roach’s weight on his shoulder is a comfort, so is the heat of those large palms seeping into his skin. Jaskier swallows, and nods. Geralt pulls him into his hard body, and he’s painfully aware of the rush of blood going to his cheeks, of the way his heart starts beating a faster rhythm in his chest.

He doesn’t know if he imagines it, but when they land on the wooden dock the pirate captain is slower than usual in pulling his hands away, almost as if he’s reluctant to let him go.

---000---

There is a flurry of activity, and Jaskier observes it all with wide eyes. There are a myriad of dockworkers going to and from the Warg and the smaller merchant vessel next to it, loading up carts to carry goods into the town. The sheer amount of stuff that’s hauled out of the Warg and the smaller ship is just mind boggling.

Geralt issues a few orders, but to Jaskier’s relief, the wolf doesn’t leave his side. He can see the dockworkers eyeing him, but as soon as they spot Roach on his shoulder and Geralt at his side, they give him respectful nods, giving way for them to pass.

A large part of the Warg’s human crew moves into the town individually, and Jaskier sees them welcomed by friends and family, received with warm embraces, kisses to cheeks, and the press of lover’s lips to mouths. A good few human sailors and all the witchers stay though, and when they move into the town, the warriors form a loose barrier between Jaskier and the townspeople. It’s not really necessary. The people look happy, their faces bright and their smiles exited. They call greetings to the white wolf and his crew, and the witchers greet people as they go.

There are many eyes that linger on him, and he can tell that the people wonder, but just Roach’s presence on his shoulder is enough for them to keep a respectful distance.

So the barrier really isn’t necessary. Until suddenly, it is.

Jaskier is sure it’s just another bout of back luck.

Geralt has turned away from him slightly, to answer a question from one of his warriors, and at the same time the two witchers closest to him on his other side pause to lift a cart where its wheel has gotten stuck between the cobblestones.

Jaskier hadn’t noticed the man in the crowd before that, but as soon as dark eyes meet his own, he knows what he is. A pirate. A bully. A thug.

Jaskier wants to back away, but the man grins, and makes a grab for him. He really, really wishes his body wouldn’t freeze at moments like this, but right now he’s not entirely in control. The man reaches out his hand, and Jaskier just stands there.

On his shoulder, Roach screeches loudly and opens her wings. She darts forward at lightning speed, her sharp beak breaking the skin over the back of the man’s hand, pecking at vulnerable tendons. All Jaskier can see is how red the blood is that wells to the surface, and the way the man’s expression morphs into something vicious, dark eyes flashing in anger. When the man tries to grab at him again, despite Roach’s threatening croak, there is someone blocking his way.

“Tokar!” Oliver shouts, physically putting himself in front of Jaskier. “The fuck you think you’re doing? Back off!”

Tokar huffs at Oliver, still staring at him over the sailor’s shoulder, and Jaskier remains frozen.

“He’s part of the goods, isn’t he?” Tokar says slyly, averting his gaze to look at Oliver. The set of the young sailor’s shoulders looks like he’s going to punch the man, and Jaskier feels horrified at the way he’s still standing there, immobile.

“You better listen to my deckhand.”

The growl is low and threatening, coming from directly behind him, and Jaskier is able to take his first breath since the man reached for him. He hadn’t realised that along with the rest of his body, his breath had frozen in his chest.

Tokar very wisely takes a step back, eyes going from Oliver to Jaskier, to Roach, to Geralt standing behind him. Jaskier can see the fear and comprehension making its way across his face, until it morphs into a sly mockery of subservience.

“White wolf. I didn’t realize he was yours,” Tokar says. “I’ve heard you’re generous with your plunder. I can be useful to you. Maybe you’re willing to share? I’d be okay waiting for the leftovers.”

Jaskier wonders if the man is stupid, or just has a death wish. Thugs and bullies though, they invariably conclude that others view the word the same way they do. He can hear Eskel and Lambert growling threateningly, both of them flanking Oliver in the barrier he still forms between Jaskier and Tokar. Eskel looks back at his captain for instruction. Geralt has an arm around Jaskier’s waist, and is pulling him in protectively.

“Get him off my island,” the white wolf growls.

“Aye,” Eskel responds, gesturing to Lukasz and Leo. Both witchers step forward with thunder in their eyes, muscling Tokar between them. This time, the man wisely doesn’t open his mouth.

Jaskier thinks it was this close, or Tokar wouldn’t have gotten away with his life.

---000---

Oliver enters his small but cozy room in the keep, and throws his canvas bag against the wall. It lands harder than he expects, and he winces when an audible crack sounds upon impact. He knows there’s a glass box in the bag that’s the likely source of the sound, and he curses under his breath. He rakes his hands through his hair, and thinks back to the confrontation they had in the town.

He should have known that his fears about Tokar would turn out to be true. The man had supposedly deserted the royal navy of Nilfgaard, and had joined a pirate crew until it landed him on Kaer Morhen. The Kaer does not turn away those who seek shelter, as long as they keep to the code. Oliver should have known better about Tokar though, especially after what happened at the end of winter.

He’s still standing there when a knock sounds at his door, and he whirls around to face the witcher coming through.

Lambert’s yellow eyes on him are sharp and focussed. He’s in his armour, swords at his back, and Oliver can’t help but feel slightly intimidated as he stands in front of the man, even after his third season on the Warg. At least it’s not Eskel, or Geralt.

He knows the white wolf is a fair captain, and so is his first mate. He feels honoured to serve under them, but after his mistake with Jaskier where his captain had briefly threatened keelhauling, he still feels nervous to be in the wolves’ presence. Lambert though. Lambert had hauled him out of the white wolf’s path, away from his anger.

The witcher closes the door behind him, and leans against the wall casually, folding his arms over his broad chest.

“Want to tell me what the fuck that was, Oliver?” Lambert says casually.

Oliver grimaces and wipes a hand over his face. “That was some asshole accosting our bard,” he answers curtly.

Lambert’s eyes narrow at him. “I was fucking there, I know that. What I mean is, how do you know his name? None of the others were aware of him before this, and I’m sure it’s not the first time he’s been an absolute shitbag. You know him?”

Slowly, Oliver lowers himself to sit on his bed. It’s to give himself time to think on how to word his answer, but has the added benefit of making himself smaller, and he can see how some of the aggression bleeds out of the wolf’s posture.

“He arrived here at the end of last winter. Just before we set out for the season.” He can see Lambert think, sharp intelligence in those golden eyes.

“On that small ship that came all the way from Etolia?” the witcher asks, and Oliver nods. “That ship never berthed here before. Did any others stay behind?”

“No. Tokar was the only one that stayed. He— he seemed nice, at first.” His voice breaks a little on the last word, and Lambert’s eyes widen, the witcher standing up straight from his previous lean against the wall.

“Oliver,” Lambert growls, and his voice sounds dangerous. “What the fuck did that man do to you?”

Oliver squares his shoulders. “Nothing like that,” he says, shaking his head at the witcher. “It’s just that I should have known he was rotten.” He inhales deeply before continuing. “We played a gambling game. Tokar lost, badly. I goaded him, since I was in high spirits, having won. I’d also had a few drinks.”

Lambert nods at him, and for once doesn’t say anything, letting Oliver gather his thoughts.

“He jumped me while I was on the way back to the keep. I—I was surprised. I thought he was a friend, so I wasn’t prepared. He took his money back. The next day he begged me not to say anything. Said he’d been drunk. Said that his life depended on staying at the Kaer.” There is horrible comprehension on Lamberts face, and the witcher moves closer, standing over him.

“This was de evening before we launched. You said you fell down some steps! We assumed you tripped while drunk. Fuck! Oliver. You had broken bones!”

Oliver winces and looks up at Lambert. “I did fall down a set of steps. Just— not through my own fault.”

Lambert growls loudly.

“I know. I should have said something. What happened just now made it clear I should have told the truth. I just—”

Lambert’s hand lands on his shoulder. “You’re just loyal to your friends, and you believed him.”

Oliver nods, pressing his hands together, hanging his head. “I’m sorry. Is the captain…. displeased?”

Lambert crouches in front of him, slitted eyes searching Oliver’s face. “The captain will get over it,” he grouches. “Especially since you put yourself between that piece of shit and the little Buttercup. Besides. We should do well to remember you don’t have our senses. And you’re so fucking young still.” The witcher rises, giving Oliver’s shoulder another squeeze, and strides toward the door.

“Where are you going?” he asks.

The redhead turns to look at him over his shoulder. “Gonna make sure they send out that fuckwit in the smallest boat possible,” he growls, and leaves Oliver behind.

---000---

Night has fallen, and Jaskier looks around the room he’s been given. They’re high up above the town, at the same level of the cliffs that towered above them as the Warg had pulled into the bay of Kaer Morhen. The keep seems ancient, the thick stone walls weathered, the stone an austere, foreboding grey. Still, the room he’s been given is cozy enough. There’s a window that faces the bay, looking out on the town below them, the cliffs and the ocean just beyond. The way he can see the lights of the dwellings blink up at him is rather charming. The bed he’s seated on is comfortable, even though every time he closes his eyes he feels like he’s rocking on phantom waves. Somehow he’s more instable on land now, than he had been on the Warg. Geralt had laid a supportive hand on his back, as they made their way up to the keep, and told him the feeling would disappear within a few days.

The room is warm, comfortable, and entirely his own, but still Jaskier can’t get to sleep. Every time he thinks about laying down and closing his eyes, his mind flashes back to Tokar trying to grab him. He thinks about Roach using her sharp beak to defend him, about Oliver stepping between them as a human shield, about Tokar being hauled away between Leo and Lukasz. He himself had done nothing.

He feels utterly useless and helpless, and the knowledge that he just freezes in the face of a threat makes him feel unsafe. It also doesn’t help that on board the Warg he had gotten used to Geralt’s presence. The captain’s absence while Jaskier feels so vulnerable just serves to heighten his unease, and the adrenaline that comes with it is keeping him awake.

He doesn’t know how long he sits there before he finally stands up from the bed. What he does know is that the night is pitch-black, and the moon is high in the sky. Determined, he makes his way out of his room and into the hallway. He’s pretty sure he remembers Geralt had said his rooms were close, and he’s pretty sure he can find them.

---000---

If Jaskier thought he’d be able to reach Geralt’s room unnoticed, he’s quickly disabused of the notion. There’s a stairwell to his right, and when a large shadow soundlessly appears in his peripheral vision, he makes a soft squeaking noise before pressing himself to the keep’s wall.

“Buttercup?” Eskel speaks to him softly, and Jaskier presses a hand to his chest, trying to calm his hammering heart.

“Eskel! I don’t understand why you don’t just wear bells. Really. I suppose you can all hear each other coming, but what about us poor humans? Don’t tell me you have an unreasonably high rate of death through fright?”

Eskel grins at him, laying a calming hand on his shoulder. “Why don’t you just perk up your ears, little flower?” he says, his tone teasing, and Jaskier just grumbles.

He realizes Eskel only just now came from down the stairs, and looks up into his slitted amber eyes. “What did you do to Tokar?” he asks hesitantly. Eskel glowers, and in the sparse light, the shadows make his scar stand out starkly. For a moment, Jaskier thinks he looks truly dangerous. In his belly, there is not the slightest frisson of fear.

“Put him in a dinghy. He’s lucky we gave him oars and water. Hell, he’s lucky Lambert didn’t kill him outright.”

“That’s… harsh. Not even Lambert’s temper is that bad.”

Eskel looks at him. “It is when this wasn’t a first offense. Tokar has hurt one of our own before.”

Jaskier hisses between his teeth. “What? Who?” He feels a surge of protectiveness. Tokar had grabbed at him while he was surrounded by witchers. Jaskier had never been in any actual danger. If Tokar had managed to get someone alone, that person might not have been so lucky.

“Oliver,” Eskel answers him.

The stream of low curses that leaves Jaskier’s mouth is enough for the amber eyed witcher to raise his brows.

“Didn’t know you even knew those types of words, Buttercup,” he says.

“Yeah, well, you can thank a contingent of Kerack soldiers for that,” Jaskier answers. He folds his arms over his chest. He doesn’t think Eskel will judge him, and blurts out what he really wants to say. “If he hurt Oliver, I hope he drowns.”

Eskel shrugs, his mouth curling in a feral smile. “There’s a good chance,” he growls.

---000---

Eskel walks him the short way to Geralt’s room. His own is apparently adjacent, and when they reach them, the scarred witcher bids him goodnight and retreats, leaving him standing if front of Geralt’s door. Alone. Suddenly, Jaskier doesn’t feel so sure anymore. He’s about to retreat the way back to his own room, when the door opens.

Geralt is out of his armour, dressed in nothing more than breeches. His chest is bare, wolf medallion hanging in the centre of it, and Jaskier can’t help but look at the expanse of pale skin stretched over muscle. His eyes catch on several scars, but they do nothing to detract from the beauty of the white wolf.

“Little bird?” Geralt murmurs.

Heat floods Jaskier’s cheeks as he realises he’s been unabashedly staring. “Geralt,” he squeaks, desperately trying to regain his composure, looking everywhere but at the witcher’s bare chest. He licks his lips, looking up into those golden eyes, seeing the slitted pupils expand and contract. “I don’t mean to intrude. I’m sorry. You should totally have your privacy now that there’s a whole perfectly good room with a bed I can make use of. I mean, you have slept in a hammock long enough, and before that, you weren’t sleeping at all and—”

“Jaskier,” Geralt interrupts him, calloused fingers curling around his chin, and Jaskier realises he’s babbling. “Can’t sleep?”

He swallows, and shakes his head slightly in Geralt’s grip.

“Nightmares?”

“No,” Jaskier breathes, achingly aware of the way the witcher’s fingers seep heat into his skin. “No, I just haven’t been able to. I— I don’t feel entirely safe, by myself,” he murmurs, casting his eyes down.

“Hm,” Geralt responds, and opens the door wider to guide him inside.

The room is much the same as Jaskier’s own. There’s another window facing the cliffs and ocean, and the space is dominated by a large bed. Off to the side, he is surprised to see there’s a hammock, hanging just right to catch the breeze from the opened window. As there’d been in the great-cabin, there are several maps pinned to the wall, the largest of which depicts the island of Kaer Morhen. There’s several oil lamps that provide light, and the room is warm enough despite the draft, a banked fire in the low hearth. Jaskier notices that there’s a thick rug in front of it, and has a flash of himself, lying there in front of the fire, lazily strumming his lute.

He pinches his own nose, and internally berates himself.

“Take the bed,” Geralt rumbles, and moves toward the hammock himself.

 Jaskier waits until the pirate captain is situated, lying back, golden eyes following him through the space. He quickly takes off his doublet and breeches, leaving himself in the silky, slippery smallclothes Geralt had gifted him with when he gave him the chest with his entire wardrobe. When he looks over his shoulder at the wolf, Geralt is looking out the window, his jaw clenched, and Jaskier wonders if the witcher is irritated he has to share his space once again.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, slipping between the sheets.

Geralt looks back at him. The hammock and bed are oriented in a way where they can easily see each other, and Jaskier feels caught in his golden gaze.

“If you feel the need for safety, you’re always welcome to sleep here,” Geralt says.

Jaskier knows it’s the truth. Just as he knows there isn’t a safer space in the keep than right here, next to the white wolf.

They’re silent for a long while, but Jaskier knows the witcher is still awake, and so is he. He turns over to his side, facing toward Geralt.

“I don’t feel safe by myself, because I freeze,” he says softly.

From his position in the hammock, Geralt turns his head toward him. The light breeze from the window picks up strands of his pale hair and Jaskier wonders how the witcher isn’t cold, while he himself snuggles further down into the blankets for warmth.

“Hm,” Geralt says. “You don’t always freeze.”

Jaskier snorts, remembering the times anger had overwhelmed his fear in those first long days on board. Those were the times he had spoken to Geralt through gritted teeth, making his words come out as a hiss.

“I guess not. You were not an actual threat though. When it’s actually unsafe, like it was today. I just—”

Geralt nods at him. “It’s not an unusual reaction,” he rumbles.

Jaskier knows what he means. Freezing is not an unusual reaction in those who have experienced horrors, who have been subjected to them against their will. He knows. He just wishes it was different. He says as much, and Geralt looks at him thoughtfully.

“Kaer Morhen is safe. We keep the code. But, we can’t always know who slips through the cracks. Like today. It’s still an island full of pirates with… questionable pasts.”

Jaskier shakes his head. “That’s not only pirates, Geralt. That’s just humans. What happened today could have happened anywhere on the continent. I have no illusions about that. I just want to— unfreeze, I guess.”

“I can help with that.”

Jaskier cocks his head to the side. “How?”

“We have a training hall. Experiencing a threatening situation, recognising how your body responds, how it freezes, and being prepared for it and overcoming the body’s reaction, it’s something that can be practised. Trained.”

Jaskier stiffens on the bed, his eyes wide as he looks at the witcher. He knows what Geralt says is making sense, but his body’s reaction is visceral.

“Only if you want, Jaskier.”

“I­— yes. Yes. It sounds hard, but I think It’s something I want.”

“Tomorrow, after breakfast,” Geralt says.

Jaskier nods, tucks himself further in the blankets, and closes his eyes. There’s a soothing rumble that vibrates through the room, and within moments, he’s fast asleep.

Chapter Text

With every stroke of the oars, the dinghy slogs its way over the waves. The water is midnight black, the reflection of the stars and moon the only thing that’s visible.

Tokar knows there’s more hiding under those waves, and grits his teeth. He only needs to get out far enough for the damn creatures to find him.

With his every pull on the poles, the bruised muscles of his torso pull painfully over his battered ribs. Three witchers had relentlessly pushed him through the town toward the wharf, where this godforsaken excuse for a boat had been found for him. Tokar had protested loudly. How was he supposed to know the white wolf was so possessive of his entertainment.

The witchers hadn’t responded, just muscled him toward the dinghy with anger on their faces and threats in their eyes. It was only when the redheaded witcher  joined them that Tokar had gotten punches to his ribs with fists that might as well have been made out of iron.

Lambert.

Tokar wants to kill him. Just as he the witcher had wanted to end his life. He could see it in those unnatural yellow eyes. The only reason Tokar had survived was the other three witchers pulling the redhead back. Lambert had roared in fury, and Tokar had stepped into the dinghy. Before he was pushed out to sea, Lambert had smashed the earthen jar of fresh water, baring sharply pointed canines at him.

It doesn’t matter. Tokar doesn’t plan to be alone out on the ocean long enough for it to become a problem. Still, his ribs pull painfully on every backward movement, and he thinks with satisfaction of what’s coming. He’s sure he’ll be able to drive a knife into the witcher’s heart eventually. But before he kills him, he’ll make sure that Lambert suffers.

Tokar is just starting to get irritated with the length of time he’s been rowing, when the stern of the small dinghy dips down toward the water. He pulls in the oars and turns around, facing the creature. He grimaces at the ugly burn on its face. Nothing more than it deserves though.

It’s eyes are an unnatural aquamarine, and the purple scales never fail to remind him of something cold and slimy. Its voice is beautiful though, and he can feel the lilting vibration of it in his eardrums and diaphragm when it speaks.
“You seek Rience?”

Tokar shakes his head to get rid of the slight buzzing sensation behind his eyes. “Don’t use that fucking voice on me, you fish,” he bites out. The creature just blinks at him, and he curses under his breath.

“Yes, I seek Rience. Get to it.”

The Siren bares it’s pointed teeth for a moment, the sheen of pearl gleaming in the moonlight. It clearly finds complying distasteful, but the redness of its burn is fresh enough to remind it of the consequences, should it refuse. With a slithering movement that gives Tokar the creeps, the thing slides back into the ocean, disappearing under the waves as if it was never there.

It’s another thing he can’t wait for. Exterminating the vile scaled creatures once they’ve had their use will be his pleasure.

It takes a couple of seconds, the dinghy floating aimlessly on the waves, and then there is the sensation of the small boat being taken up, half floating, half carried across the surface. Tokar leans back in the boat, and grins as the water rushes by.

Within hours he reaches the constellation of jagged rocks protruding above the ocean’s surface. They form a crescent shape, and the distance between the two closest points is just large enough for a ship to pass through. For a dinghy, it’s an easy feat. The sirens have used the Crescent as a birthing ground for centuries, it’s rocks jagged and inhospitable, but the waters within sheltered from ocean storms.

Now it’s no longer theirs.

Tokar sits up as he passes into the calmer water, the dinghy propelled forward by the fish creatures. The magical barrier leaves him with an unpleasant heat in his stomach when he passes through, but he knows it will dissipate soon enough. Around him, more of the slimy, purple scaled creatures are clinging onto rocks, regarding him with their aquamarine eyes before dipping under the surface.

Wise. Tokar doesn’t like them staring. Neither does his captain. There’s a reason most of the Sirens bear burns on parts of their scaled bodies.

At the Crescent’s centre, a small fleet of ships lie anchored. In the middle of them, largest by a margin, is the Vursnake.

The dinghy moves until it bumps into the bulk of the ship’s hull, and Tokar deftly climbs up the rope ladder that hangs down it’s side. On deck, he only recognises a handful of faces. He’s not surprised. While climbing up he noticed the damage to the Vursnake’s side. Cannonfire.

“Tell the captain I’m here,” he snarls.

He’s led to the great-cabin and left alone for a while. When Rience enters, he stands up.

“Captain,” he greets the firemage.

“Everything went according to plan?” Rience asks, and Tokar can hear the underlying threat of violence. It’s true he’s here earlier than he was ordered, but he hasn’t come without information.

“Yes. They brought the merchant ship with them.”

“Good. So you haven’t bungled our years of planning. Now tell me, do they still have my consort?”

Tokar doesn’t understand at first, but then he knows exactly who his captain is talking about. The colourfully dressed man with summer blue eyes, part of the white wolf’s plunder. He bares his teeth in a grin.

It looks like he’s going to get his chance sampling the pretty thing after all.

---000---

It’s after breakfast and Jaskier is following Geralt toward the training hall. He’s nervous. The food he had is an uncomfortable weight in his stomach, and he almost regrets the extra pastry he’d indulged in. After so many weeks on board a ship, the food in the keep is one of its most welcome surprises, and Jaskier has been glad to eat his fill.

When they reach the training hall it is empty but for Thornwald and Ealdred. The two witchers are engaged in a hand to hand sparring match that’s almost too fast for his eyes to follow, and it does nothing to settle the nerves in his stomach. Geralt reaches out and places a large hand on his lower back. It’s seemingly to guide him toward a corner of the hall, but Jaskier smiles at the wolf gratefully.

The hall is large and filled with racks of all sorts of weaponry. The corner they’re in feels private enough that Jaskier can ignore the two warriors on the other side of the space, and he breathes deeply to calm himself. The floor is covered with thick mats to blunt any impact, over an area of ten by ten paces. Geralt takes off his boots and Jaskier follows suit. The both of them are dressed in light clothes, and through the V of Geralt’s shirt he gets a glimpse of the witcher’s chest. The silver chain of his medallion disappears behind the fabric, and Jaskier swallows when he thinks about the way he’d seen it lay against bare skin last night. He averts his gaze, and steps up to the middle of the covered ground, following Geralt’s example.

He only realizes he’s staring at his feet when the pirate gently lifts his chin. Golden irises meet his, their slitted pupils focussed on him intently. He curls his fingers around Geralt’s wrist.

“I’m totally fine,” he says. “Just nervous. Last time I was in a space like this, an instructor tried to teach me fencing. Quite unsuccessfully I might add. After that I sneaked off for most my lessons, to play the lute instead. I know it’s stupid that I don’t know how to defend myself and—”

“Hm,” Geralt interrupts him. “It’s not stupid. We are all different, little bird.”

Jaskier swallows. “Yeah. Yeah okay. I’d still like to not be so helpless.”

“First, let’s see what happens when you freeze,” Geralt rumbles, letting him go. “Then we’ll see if you can reverse it.”

Jaskier nods, nerves flaring. “Okay, but how are we going to do th—”

Geralt steps forward swiftly, and his body language changes in an instant. The witcher suddenly seems so much bigger than before, and instead of his usual calm his bunching muscles give off an impression of barely contained power. His large hands dart forward, and close around Jaskier’s wrists like shackles.

Jaskier knows it’s Geralt. He knows the pirate won’t hurt him.

Apparently his body doesn’t know the same. He can practically feel the adrenaline rushing through his veins, icy cold climbing up his spine. His limbs go rigid, and there is the rush of blood in his ears. The longer he stands there, frozen, the more lightheaded he gets, until he realizes he’s not actually breathing.

Distantly, he becomes aware the hands around his wrists have gentled and are no longer restraining him. One of Geralt’s hands releases him to splay on his chest.

“Breathe, little bird,” the witcher rumbles soothingly.

With a supreme effort of will, Jaskier gasps a deep, painful breath, quickly followed by a few more. Geralt’s hand on his chest shifts to his waist, and he can feel the witcher support part of his weight.

“O—Okay,” he says unsteadily. “I guess I felt what happened there.”          

“Talk me through it,” Geralt tells him, and so Jaskier does.

Over the next few hours Geralt grabs him again and again. Every time Jaskier is quicker to recognise his body’s response. He can feel his muscles seize up, feel how he stops breathing and just stands there. It takes more than a dozen tries before he is swifter starting up his own breathing than Geralt can put his hand on his chest and tell him to. The first time he manages it, the wolf is still holding onto his wrists and Jaskier gasps in a lungful of air, consciously unlocking his shoulders in preparation to pull away. When he pulls, it’s without much force behind it, but Geralt lets him go. When Jaskier meets the witcher’s eyes, surprised and happy with his progress, Geralt is smiling.

“Good,” Geralt rumbles, and Jaskier knows the swoop he gets in his stomach is not solely to blame on the adrenaline or euphoria of success.

He smiles back at the wolf, but he still has his doubts. “You don’t think it only works because you do the same thing every time? That it’s sort of numbing me to that one specific thing?” he asks. Geralt hums thoughtfully and Jaskier should have seen it coming, really.

This time when Geralt reaches for him, Jaskier recognises the surge of adrenaline almost before it hits his nervous system. Instead of going rigid, he pulls away as quick as he can, trying to step out of the witcher’s reach. Geralt of course, is much, much faster than him. Instead of his wrists, the wolf’s arm slings around his waist, hand landing on his hip to turn him around. Jaskier ends up against Geralt’s chest, the heat of the witcher all along his back, his muscular arms around him, caging him in. Geralt’s palm splays on his chest again, high up this time. High enough to give the illusion the witcher will curl his fingers over his throat. The pirate’s breath is hitting the shell of his ear, and suddenly Jaskier’s body has a wholly different reaction.

It’s…. not entirely unexpected, but Jaskier still startles at the sudden and insistent heat that pools low in his belly.

“Geralt!” he squeaks, embarrassment elevating his voice and colouring his cheeks at what the witcher must smell on him. “Let me go.”

Geralt releases him slowly, hands sliding off his body, the line of heat disappearing from along his spine. Jaskier stumbles forward a few paces, and carefully keeps his back turned to hide his physical response.

There is a long silence.

“Forgive me, little bird,” Geralt speaks from behind him, and Jaskier can hear the man step away.  

“No! No, it’s totally my fault,” Jaskier says, face burning. “I’m sorry.”  Geralt doesn’t say anything more, and when Jaskier feels calmed down enough to turn, the witcher is looking at him intensely. His face is impassive, but Jaskier doesn’t miss the way one of his hands is balled into a fist at his side. Somehow, he knows Geralt is not upset with him, even though the fist means is the witcher is holding something back. He reaches forward to curl his fingers over the clench of Geralt’s hand.

“It’s been enough for today, maybe. We could pick back up tomorrow?” he asks.

“Hm,” Geralt responds, and leads him away from the training hall.

---000---

Life on Kaer Morhen falls into an easy routine far quicker than Jaskier expects.

Every morning after breakfast Geralt takes him to the training hall. To his relief it’s often deserted, though it sometimes has a few witchers and sailors training. They go to their own little corner with the floor covered by mats, and they practise.

Well. Jaskier practises.

Geralt comes at him from every possible angle, for as many times as it’s necessary for Jaskier to see the freeze reaction coming, and counteract it even before his body has time to grow still. He gets quicker too, and though the witcher still catches him every time, Jaskier can see the proud curl of Geralt’s mouth. It makes butterflies explode in his stomach, and he makes a valiant effort to hide the way he blushes. He thinks the witcher might see it anyway, but Geralt doesn’t mention it.

When they take their practise down onto the mats, Jaskier gets Geralt’s large body pressed over him, under him, and to his side. He even ends up held in the witcher’s lap one time, large hands folded over his hips, holding him in place. Jaskier can’t help it. With all the closeness and the lessening of his freeze response, his body reacts. He involuntarily shivers, staring into Geralt’s golden eyes.

“Alright, little bird?” Geralt rumbles, and Jaskier can feel the vibration where his palms are pressed against the witcher’s chest. Slowly, he pulls away his hands and leans back, but he doesn’t break eye contact. He nervously licks his lips.

Geralt’s eyes drop to his mouth.

“Yes,” he says softly. “Alright, I think.”

The white wolf looks back up at him again, slitted pupils expanding, and pulls him in a little further. Behind them, Leo and Lukasz choose that moment to refuse to yield to the other, and crash into a rack of swords together, the sound harsh and jarring.

Geralt lets him go.

After those mornings spent in the training hall, Jaskier joins Triss in her lab, sometimes with a book, sometimes to help. He enjoys the mage’s company, and she seems happy every time to have him intrude on her space.

Other times, he composes, up in the room he doesn’t sleep in, where he’s not likely to disturb others. Instead getting used for its intended purpose, the bed’s surface slowly gets cluttered with sheets of music and notebooks filled with lyrics.

Still other times, he visits the town together with Triss to hand out salves and tinctures and to call on those with ailments. He visits with Eskel when he feels like it, tagging along when the witcher goes down to oversee repairs to dwellings and ships. When he goes with Eskel, Geralt is often there, and he enjoys the steady presence both witchers bring. He realises that what they’re doing is governing. Like he’s on the Warg, Geralt is at the head of Kaer Morhen, and Eskel is his first mate.

Sometimes, he goes with Oliver and Lambert, without any specific reason, just to look around and get to know more of the people. Always when he goes, Roach sits on his shoulder and nibbles the shell of his ear.

Dinners are taken in the large hall that is used for communal meals, much like the mess-deck on the Warg, but bigger. The Warg’s crew holds a long table for themselves, but there is more than enough space for other pirates to join, and every evening there’s different ones that do.

Yennefer and Eskel explain to Jaskier that not every pirate moors during winter, but there are many that berth at Kaer Morhen at some point in the cold season. The colder it is, the larger the number of ships and pirates in residence on the island. Whenever a pirate ship arrives, the captain and the first few in their chain of command are required to come up to the keep. They’re there to pay tribute to the Kaer and the Warg, in exchange for a safe berth.

Geralt asks them if they keep to the code.

The first time it happens, Jaskier startles regardless of the heads up he’s gotten. An older, rotund man with a goatee stands up and approaches the table where he sits between Geralt and Eskel. His hair is entirely dark grey, and his eyes are black enough to make distinguishing the pupils impossible. Within the grey strands of his hair, there are several golden beads.

Jaskier remembers Rience’s pirates wearing similar beads in their hair, and his heart quickens in his chest. He recognises the first tendrils of fear and adrenaline trying to paralyze him, and takes a few deep, deliberate breaths, relaxing his muscles. Next to him, Geralt glances at him, and Jaskier thinks he looks pleased. The witcher slides a hand over his opposite hip, pulling him slightly into his side.

“White Wolf,” the grey pirate says respectfully, only barely shifting his eyes over to Jaskier before focussing back on Geralt.

“Viktor,” Geralt rumbles.

Jaskier knows that most pirates pay tribute in goods such as oil’s or fabrics, pickled fish or sugared apricots. What Viktor lays on the table in front of Geralt is something different. It’s a small velvet bag, no bigger than Jaskier’s palm. Eskel reaches forward, loosening the strings to upend its content onto the table. A few different things spill out. There are some lovely, cut gemstones, their colours rich and saturated. What really catches Jaskier’s eye though, is a thin but sturdy golden chain, a tuning fork at the end of it. He knows that Bards graduating from Oxenfurt often receive a piece like this, if their families are well off enough. He’s had many a dream in the past where he wore one himself. He thinks he makes some sort of noise, since both witchers beside him lean slightly toward him. By now, Jaskier can tell when he’s being scented. They’re not exactly subtle.

“This is an unusual tribute,” Eskel says, and Geralt hums in concurrence.

“Our season was a difficult one.” Viktor responds. “We’ve had to eat a lot of our plunder. I offer this as an alternative for the Silverfish’s safe berth.”

Geralt inclines his head.

“The Kaer accepts,” Eskel says formally. When he gathers the gemstones back into the bag, he leaves out the golden chain, handing it to Geralt. Jaskier thinks it’s over, but there’s one thing he has forgotten.

“Do you keep to the code?” Geralt rumbles, and suddenly a hush falls over the hall, his deep baritone voice reverberating off the walls.

Behind him, Viktor’s first and second mates and four more of his crew stand from their seats. Together with Viktor, all of them tilt up their chins, baring their throats to the white wolf.

“We keep to the code,” Viktor says, and Geralt inclines his head.

When the pirate captain that just paid tribute is seated once more and the meal continues, Geralt leans toward him to murmur in his ear. Goosebumps rise over Jaskier’s skin at the tickle of the wolf’s breath.

“It’s for you, little bird.”

Jaskier starts when Geralt holds out the chain to him, the tuning fork deceptively small in the palm of his hand.
Slowly, he grabs the small instrument, his fingers dragging along the witcher’s hand. The metal is warm to the touch, already carrying some of Geralt’s heat. Jaskier knows his face is stretched into a wide smile at the same time as his eyes prickle with moisture. His feelings are a confusing mix of happiness and melancholy, and he sees the tiny crinkle appear on Geralt’s brow when the captain’s nostrils flare.

“Put it on me?” he asks breathlessly, gratified to see the frown on Geralt’s face disappear. He turns around to put his back to the witcher. Calloused fingers brush over his nape, and when the tuning fork lies over his doublet, Jaskier carefully tucks it under the fabric to rest against the bare skin of his chest.

In the evenings after dinner, Jaskier plays.

As always, the Warg’s crew is more than happy to join in, and Jaskier thinks he could never get enough of their cheerful exuberance. He’s happy whenever the human members of their crew come up from the town to join them. He knows they’re at least in part there for the food, and to be near their captain and witcher crew-mates. But, when they greet him with just as much warmth, and are the first to request he plays, Jaskier realises in some part at least, they’re here for him too.

So he plays and sings and moves through the hall, dancing more than anything. He tries to pay people individual attention and gets more than a few flushes and winks in response. He can’t help it though, he looks back at Geralt more than anyone, tuning fork warm against his chest.

---000---

Rachal curses low under her breath.

It is well into winter, and she had wanted to be at Kaer Morhen weeks ago. Their last chase of a trading vessel had taken them further than they had expected. At least the loot had been worth it. Now though, they’re in a winter storm, half their sails reefed for fear of tearing them, the Black Tide’s hull battered by wave upon wave. They’re not too far out from the Kaer, but the storm is gaining in strength.

“Captain?” her first mate asks.

Rachal turns around to face Azure. There are wisps of blonde hair flying out of the woman’s tightly coiled braids, and the colour in her cheeks is high from the cold. Her lips have a bluish tinge to them, and Rachal knows she’s been above decks too long.

“Go inside,” she orders, her own dark hair whipping in the wind and her hands tightening on the wooden wheel. “I’ll pilot her. The storm is picking up so we’re placing our bets. I’m going to guide her past the Crescent.”

Azure blinks and shakes some of the salt spray out of her face. Rachal can see her first mate wants to protest, so she raises an eyebrow.

“Aye, captain,” Azure capitulates eventually, her voice barely audible above the roaring of the wind.

“Make sure everyone has earplugs close by,” Rachal orders, and gets another quick nod.

Before Azure leaves her, her first mate leans forward to press a quick kiss to her lips. Rachal dares to let go of the wheel for a second, palm landing on the chilled skin at Azure’s nape. She deepens the kiss until she feels the pull of the wheel in her palm. She lets go of the blonde woman, wresting the Black Tide back under her control. Her eyes follow Azure all the way across the deck until her first mate ducks inside, out of the wind.

The Black Tide is a reliable ship. It’s not the fastest among pirates, but it’s faster than most trading vessels. One of her great advantages is that she stays true to course in any but the roughest weather. Rachal has captained her for long enough that she’s weathered these kinds of storms before, and she manages to make good time with just a handful of her hands above decks, the men and women listening carefully for their captain’s shouted orders above the tumult of the winter storm.

Though she is taking a risk by passing the Crescent, Rachal is no fool. She’s taking the shortcut to the Kaer while still keeping her distance from the jagged rock formation. With any luck the sirens themselves will be sheltering within their calmer waters, and won’t bother to come out and chase the Black Tide. Rachal keeps an eye out anyways.

The Crescent is almost impossible to spot in the low light of the storm, the dark clouds blocking out most of the light, sheets of rain now obscuring further sight. Rachal is cold to the bone and her hands have lost most of their feeling where they are cramped around the wheel’s wooden knobs. Every now and again she takes the spy-glass from the loop on her belt one handedly, and looks into the distance.

When she spots the Crescent she’s relieved to see the tumultuous waves around the great, jagged basalt boulders. No sirens swimming out in those conditions, she tells herself. She feels the wind turn slightly, and shouts another order to adjust course a fraction to starboard.

It’s that decision that makes all the difference. The Cresent is far in the distance, but Rachal keeps an eye out through her spy-glass. The slightly adjusted course means the Black tide sails by the opening between the horns, just so. Even then, she has to look twice, the dark sky and rain obscuring a silhouette she knows very well.  It’s sails are completely furled, but is unmistakable. Through the spy-glass, Rachal sees the silhouette of the Vursnake, swaying on the calmer waters within the Crescent.

She’s frozen for a moment, the glass pressed to her eye. Suddenly she’s distinctly aware of how cold she is, her long black hair sticking wetly to her face and neck, the rain soaking her through.

“Fuck!” Rachal curses, and slams the glass back through the loop at her belt. She lifts her boot and stamps her heel on the deck as hard as she can, five times.

Within moments her entire crew is on deck, getting buffeted by the winter storm. She spares a short look at Azure, glad to see her first mate looks considerably warmer than before.

“ALL HANDS!” she bellows. “Get us to Kaer Morhen! NOW!”

Chapter Text

Geralt doesn’t know how long he can keep training Jaskier.

Every morning it gets a little harder to hold himself back. They still start off with Jaskier stiffening at the threat Geralt presents his instincts with, but he unfreezes quickly now, and whenever he holds Jaskier close, the sweet scent of the bard’s arousal reaches his nose.

The first time it happens he is still half surprised by it.

Sure, he sees Jaskier looking at him more and more often. He more than enjoys the charming blush that spreads over the bard’s cheeks as their eyes meet and Geralt holds his gaze. He knows Jaskier is not averse to his touch, not anymore.

Jaskier allows him to carry him down from the Warg, Geralt’s hands on his waist and their bodies pressed together, and whenever Geralt pulls him in by his hip, Jaskier just stays there, close to his side.

When Jaskier comes to his door because he can’t find sleep, Geralt sees him staring, and knows the bard is attracted.

The first morning working on Jaskier’s freeze response is the first time the scent of arousal is strong enough to drown out all others, and the first time Geralt is so close to it. He has Jaskier pressed against him, back to chest, one hand on his hip and the other up high, almost against his throat. He can feel the skip and stutter in the bard’s pulse. When Geralt inhales, it’s from right behind Jaskier’s ear, and the scent of him hits him hard.

He keeps hold of Jaskier, and grits his jaw against the urge to pull him in further. He can feel the bard’s body against his own from thigh to shoulder, his hips cradled against the curve of Jaskier’s ass, his arms enveloping him and holding him there. Inevitably, he thinks about what it would be like to have the bard under him like this, naked and in his bed, desperate and trembling. He imagines sliding into Jaskier’s oil slicked body, and how he would press his teeth into the bard’s shoulder, enough to be felt, never enough to break the skin.

“Geralt!” Jaskier squeaks, and Geralt can scent the tinge of embarrassment to the bard’s lust. “Let me go.”

Geralt does, of course, but it is slow, and his reluctance is like a physical weight holding his hands to Jaskier’s body.

“Forgive me, little bird,” he says, stepping away.

Then there’s the time he has Jaskier in his lap. Geralt is holding him by his hips, and Jaskier braces himself against his chest. The bard’s eyes are wide, and his lips part on a soft breath. When Geralt swipes his thumbs in a slow stroke over the tender skin beneath his hands, Jaskier gives a full body shudder, and Geralt can see his pupils expand.

“Alright, little bird?” he asks, and stares when Jaskier’s tongue comes out to wet his lips. The scent of him is incredible, and when he gets an affirmative though still uncertain answer, Geralt pulls him in. He’s just decided to reach up to Jaskier’s nape to haul him closer so he can taste his lips, when Leo and Lukasz crash into a rack of weapons.

It’s enough of an interruption that Geralt’s rational brain takes over again. He shouldn’t be doing this. Not in a space Jaskier is relying on him to help him overcome his freezing. Geralt should not take advantage of their physical closeness like this.

He lets Jaskier go.

To make matters harder on him, Jaskier sleeps in his room every night.

The evening after having Jaskier in his lap, he meditates, the bard´s presence enough to keep him from true slumber. The hammock sways gently in the wind from the open window, and Jaskier is sleeping mere metres away, warm and safe, tucked into his bed.

Geralt closes his eyes and thinks about what he would give to slide between the sheets next to the bard. He imagines stroking his palms up Jaskier’s thighs, along the tender skin on the insides of them, until he reaches that damn silky fabric of his underclothes, thin and clinging, revealing so much more than the little bird would be comfortable with, if he only knew.

If he knew how ravenous the sight makes Geralt, how much it makes him want to take, Jaskier might not be comfortable sleeping in the same room, attraction or not.

Despite himself he inhales deeply through his nose, savouring the scent of him. He should know better. Having had Jaskier so close to him in the training hall has him on edge, and scenting him doesn’t help.

He can vividly recall the press of the bard’s lithe body and the sweet scent of his arousal, and it stokes the fire within him. There is desire, hot and barely under the surface, looking for a way out. He knows it would spill over, if only he would let himself look or touch. If only he could believe the little bird would not be frightened by it.

Across the room Jaskier shifts between the sheets and releases a little noise. Just that sound from Jaskier’s lips is enough to have him imagining what other sounds the bard would make, what he would sound like when Geralt fucks him.

He grits his teeth and closes his eyes. He is insistently hard between his legs, and there is a heavy thrum to the beat of his heart and the blood flowing through his veins.

He hasn’t lain with someone since before the end of last winter. He refuses to fuck any of his subordinates on the Warg, unwilling to put anyone in a position where they might not feel free to deny him.

It has never been a problem before. Geralt has no issue satisfying his needs with his own hand, but Jaskier has been sleeping in the great-cabin for weeks, and is now sleeping in his bed.

He knows he could go to the town. He knows he could go into one of the taverns for a drink, and take someone warm and willing to bed.

He opens his eyes to look at Jaskier’s sleeping form, and knows he won’t go. He doesn’t want to leave the little bird by himself, not when he’s so clearly stated he feels unsafe when alone. He knows he feels more than just the urge to keep the bard protected. It isn’t exactly unexpected. It has been building for a while now.

Geralt doesn’t want just anyone, he wants Jaskier, and not just between the sheets either. He wants his laugh, and the way he dances across the Warg’s decks. He wants the soothing timbre of his voice when he talks about anything and everything, quicksilver mind making connections that surprise Geralt every time. He wants the way his witchers and crew light up when they see the little bird. He wants the joy he brings to the faces of those around him when he plays and sings. He wants the vibrant and joyful presence of him, so far removed from the frightened little thing that had asked Geralt to let him drown. He wants Jaskier’s courage, and the way he fights against what holds him back. He wants his relentless determination and strength.

He wants the way those blue eyes look up at him. He wants the way Jaskier sees him and responds with a smile, and the way he smells of trust.

Even if the bard will never feel comfortable giving everything of himself physically, Geralt would want him. Still, he hopes Jaskier might find himself to be comfortable and ready, eventually.

Geralt knows it would be a gift.

---000---

Jaskier walks over the rocky wharf onto the wooden boardwalk. The winter wind is cold across his exposed cheeks, though it is dampened significantly by the natural barrier of the cliffs. He looks out across the bay, toward the open ocean in the distance. Far off, there are roiling black clouds in the sky, a flash of thunder revealing them in stark relief every now and again. The winter storm looks fierce, and Jaskier is glad he’s on Kaer Morhen, and not out on the open water, however great a ship the Warg might be.

On his shoulder, Roach caws softly and preens her beak through his hair. Behind him, Eskel calls up to Geralt, the captain high up on the Warg’s decks, before swiftly climbing a rope up her side. Jaskier smiles at the ease of it. The witchers are effortless power and grace, and they make feats that would have regular men struggling look simple.

There is a soft thump as Geralt lands next to him, one of the pirate’s hands briefly landing on his hip, pulling him into shelter from the wind behind the wolf’s larger body. Jaskier smiles up at him and lifts a hand for Roach to hop on, and transfers the large raven to Geralt’s shoulder.

“How’s she doing?” he asks, inclining his head toward the Warg, the ship large and imposing, bobbing slightly on the water beside them.

“She’s been oiled and tarred. The headsail has been replaced. We still need to check part of her hull, but the water is too cold right now,” Geralt rumbles, and Jaskier grins as the witcher keeps talking about the Warg’s upkeep while stroking Roach’s back. The white wolf never says so many words as when he speaks on the things that will keep his people safe, whether that be his crew, or the residents of the island.

While Geralt talks Jaskier’s eyes are pulled to the small, white sailed merchant ship on the other side of the boardwalk. She reminds him so much of the Seablade it’s still a shock every time he lays eyes on her. The honey colour of her wood seems less vibrant in winter, and her decks are as empty as when they happened upon her.

Geralt had told him they would take her with them to see if the cluster of sirens who took her crew would follow. They’re deep into winter now, and no sirens have come.

He realises he’s been quiet for a while when Geralt steps close to him.

“What’s on your mind, little bird?” the wolf rumbles in his ear, and Jaskier feels gooseflesh erupt on the back of his neck and arms.

“The sirens haven’t come back for her,” he answers. “I thought she might be destroyed if they did, but they haven’t come and here she is.”

“Hm,” Geralt answers. “The cluster behaved erratically by taking an entire crew, but if they’re not entirely feral they would have known not to follow her to Kaer Morhen. We’ll keep an eye and ear out when we launch in spring, and we’ll go see the sirens at the Crescent. I don’t think the cluster will come here if they haven’t yet.”

“Oh,” Jaskier sighs. He can’t help but feel relieved. The empty ship, rolling along the waves with its sails up but without anyone to steer her had been nightmarish to behold. The idea that the sea creatures caused an entire crew to perish makes him glad they never reached the island and the town with its vulnerable, human population. “What’s the Crescent?” he asks.

“Siren birthing grounds. It’s where they raise their young ones. It’s not too far from here,” Geralt says, and nods his white head toward the winter storm raging on the horizon. “We have an understanding with the Sirens of the Crescent. They might be able to help track down the cluster.”

“So not all sirens are dangerous?” Jaskier asks.

“Hm. They’re still dangerous, little bird. Especially out on the waves when they’re hungry. But they’re not feral, and they don’t kill for the sake of killing. Something is off with the cluster that did this, and the Crescent will want to know about it.”

Jaskier shivers at the idea of sirens compelling sailors to step overboard through their voice alone, dragging them down into the depths. “This understanding, it means they won’t attack us?”

Geralt bares his teeth briefly, pointed canines flashing. “They still might. But they’re not unintelligent, and they know what they have to lose.”

Jaskier is still thinking about sirens as he looks at the merchant ship again.

“Can you take me on board?” he asks, gesturing to her decks.

Geralt raises his eyebrows at him, but doesn’t comment. Instead, the white wolf lays his hands over his waist and pulls him in. Jaskier grabs onto the pirate’s shoulders and braces for the jump. When they land, he manages to keep his flush to a minimum, and briefly curls a hand around Geralt’s wrist where the witcher’s palm is still pressed to his side. He opens his mouth to say something despite his brain not having come up with the words yet, but Roach ruffles her feathers where she is perched on Geralt’s shoulder, an annoyed croak breaking the heavy silence between them before Jaskier can. She clearly didn’t appreciate being jostled unexpectedly and blinks her grey eye accusingly. Jaskier laughs and turns toward the raven, stroking a knuckle though her feathers when she fluffs her chest expectantly.

He makes a slow circuit around the decks, Geralt following. Roach has taken off from the witcher’s shoulder and is circling in the air somewhere high above them.

“She won’t be destroyed then,” Jaskier says, pausing at the stern and stroking a hand over the smooth wooden railing. “She reminds me of the Seablade.”

“Bad memories?” Geralt asks carefully. The witcher is behind him, and like he’s done before, he plants his hands on either side of Jaskier, caging him in.

Jaskier turns around, back against the railing, and looks up at the white wolf. “Not necessarily. When I saw the Seablade for the first time I,— there was a sense of freedom in it I had never experienced before. I remember that feeling when I look at this ship.” He flicks his eyes over to the large pirate vessel across from them.

“What feeling do you get when you look at the Warg?” Geralt asks, not having missed the look.

Jaskier smiles. “Freedom. Adventure. Safety. Friendship, and— and maybe more.”

“More?”

Jaskier feels nerves roil in his stomach, but he thinks what he’s about to say won’t be unwelcome, not if he’s interpreted the look in those golden eyes correctly. “More than friendship. Just— more,” he says, smiling tentatively. When Geralt doesn’t respond, he gathers his courage. “Though that’s mostly when I look at you.”

As if in slow motion he sees Geralt’s slitted pupils expand, the witcher’s eyes suddenly dark. His large hands squeeze the wooden railing beside Jaskier, the wood creaking ominously. It thrills something deep inside him, and he remembers comparing Geralt to a predator. Maybe he wouldn’t mind so much if he was the prey the pirate would hunt.

“Little bird,” Geralt murmurs, lowering his head until his lips are almost touching against Jaskier’s ear. He can hear the witcher take a deep breath of his scent, and slightly tilts his head to the side to give him space. “I don’t want to frighten you,” Geralt says, and his voice is more growl than Jaskier has ever heard it.

“You don’t frighten me,” he whispers, heart beating loudly in his ears, achingly aware of how close they’re standing, of Geralt’s arms bracketing him, of the witcher’s breaths against his throat.

Geralt slides his nose along his jaw, and Jaskier makes a soft sound that has the wood creaking under the wolf’s grip once more.

It’s Jaskier who tilts his head so their lips brush together. It’s soft, barely there, and innocent. Geralt doesn’t move at first, instead holding very, very still. It’s only when Jaskier reaches up to thread his fingers into the wolf’s long white hair that one of Geralt’s arms winds around his waist and hauls him in until their bodies align. The witcher’s other hand comes up to cradle the back of his skull in a wide palm, his fingers sliding through the soft locks there before he grips them, holding Jaskier still.

It’s then that Geralt takes over the kiss, and Jaskier feels like he might lose himself in the wolf’s embrace.

Geralt’s mouth is hot and insistent, slotting over Jaskier’s in a way that takes his breath away. He can feel the slick slide of the pirate’s tongue against his lips and parts them on a soft gasp. The witcher doesn’t need more of an invitation than that, and he delves into Jaskier’s mouth. There is a low vibrating he can feel all the way in his diaphragm, and he realizes Geralt is releasing a continuous, low-pitched growl as he explores Jaskier’s mouth. Every now and again Geralt’s sharp canines scrape over the tender skin of his bottom lip, and Jaskier whimpers helplessly. When he pulls slightly on Geralt’s hair, the kiss deepens further, and he can’t help but think that the wolf might devour him. He’s surprisingly okay with the idea.

Jaskier doesn’t know how long Geralt’s been kissing him when good natured cheering and whistles break through his haze. He unwinds his hands from Geralt’s hair and presses his palms against the witcher’s chest. For a second Geralt seems fully prepared to ignore the noise, his grip tightening the slightest amount. Then, with a final deep kiss, he let’s Jaskier go. The arm around his waist unwinds, and Geralt moves his hand to his lower back instead, his thumb slowly swiping over Jaskier’s spine.

He looks toward where the noise is coming from, and finds a handful of witchers and sailors on board the Warg, all of them at the railing, all of them looking at them with grins on their faces. Jon and Marri bring their fingers up to their mouths to whistle, Eskel grins, and Lambert cups his hands over his mouth for volume as he shouts.

“About time Buttercup!”

Geralt bares his teeth and growls, but Jaskier just laughs.

Before they make their way off the ship and back to the keep, Geralt bends his head toward Jaskier.

“We don’t know what she’s called and can’t leave her nameless. Any ideas?”

Jaskier thinks about the resemblance between the Seablade and the merchant ship, and how he had likened the former to a white gull, floating on the waves.

He grins brightly at Geralt and doesn’t miss the witcher’s hand tightening on his hip. “Lets name her Gulliver,” he says.

---000---

That night when he gets ready for bed, Jaskier gets nervous. He’s been thinking about the kiss between Geralt and himself for the entire day, reliving the memory and enjoying the squirming warmth of it low in his belly. He’s not sure though, what Geralt will expect of him.

For once Jaskier is in bed first, alone between the sheets, as Geralt takes off his chemise. The witcher is half turned away from him, and Jaskier admires the play of muscles under his skin, pale in the moonlight. He sees Geralt’s nostrils flare, and the pirate looks over his shoulder to regard him. There is heat in that golden gaze to match the heat in Jaskier’s cheeks, and he thinks he should offer.

“Do— do you want to sleep in the bed?” he asks, but can hear the uncertainty in his own voice. Geralt turns toward him, and Jaskier can’t help but track the sinuous, powerful movement of him.

“Do you want me to?” Geralt asks.

“I—Yes?” Jaskier says, and can practically feel the skip of his heart the witcher will be able to hear.

“Hm,” Geralt responds, moving closer until he can lean over Jaskier, their faces close together. “When I get in bed with you, little bird, it will be because you want me there. No other reason.”

“I do want you,” Jaskier says. “But we’ve only just kissed and it’s only been one time, and I think I have to get used to the idea of — of letting someone, you know? It does make me nervous. I know my body reacts and you can smell it, and I don’t want to deny you something you want and—”

“Jaskier,” Geralt growls low, cutting him off. “You think I would enjoy laying with you if you weren’t ready for it?”

Jaskier gapes up at the witcher, feeling stupid he’s never thought about it like that. He shakes his head vigorously. “No! No, I’d never think that,” he says vehemently, and the corner of Geralt’s mouth ticks up. “You…could share the bed with me regardless?” he hedges.

Geralt cups his chin and kisses him then. The kiss his hot and insistent.

“I’d control myself, little bird,” Geralt growls. “But I wouldn’t get any rest.”

“Oh,” Jaskier responds breathlessly. “Okay then.”

Geralt kisses him again, and Jaskier thinks he really should have known he’d have no cause to worry.

---000---

There are stars high in the sky, reflecting off the dark water. Wind blows through Jaskier’s hair, stealing the heat from his skin and leaving him ice-cold in it’s wake. It’s the wind of a winter storm, and when he looks to the sky there are dark clouds, pouring down rain, lit up every now and again with flashing thunder. It’s only when he looks that he realizes the rain is pouring down on him, soaking through his clothes, sticking the fabric to his skin. He starts to shiver, and looks around.
The Gulliver rolls over the wild waves, rudderless, as there is nobody at her helm, and no crew to sail her even though her white sails are hoisted. Jaskier whirls around, a knot in his stomach as he realizes he’s all alone.

There is a flash of lightening illuminating the world around him, quickly followed by the crack of thunder. He stands there, heart beating in his throat, waiting for something to happen.

Crack!

Thunder and flash come simultaneously this time, and Jaskier jerks in fright. The light is gone almost as soon as it appears, but in the brief moment of brightness he sees something off the Gulliver’s starboard side. There are rock formations above the waves, tall and Jagged, the water foaming wildly at their base. The shadows behind them are darker for the bright light cast upon them, and in that split second Jaskier thinks he can make out the formation of them. He thinks the large rocks, so far out at sea, might lie in the shape of a crescent.

Crack!

It hasn’t been dark for more than a few seconds before another flash illuminates the ocean around him. This time, Jaskier sees more than rocks in an unruly sea. There’s another ship, further away from the rock formation than the Gulliver, buffeted by the waves and the strong, icy wind. She pulls past the Crescent, gaining speed, and in a split second Jaskier can see sailors crawling across her decks, hoisting her sails. He’s no sailor himself, but he knows that to do so in a storm like this, can only be to desperately outrun something. He doesn’t get to look for long, before he’s plunged into darkness again. He thinks he might recognise the ship, the silhouette burned into his mind through fright the first time he saw it, after the Warg went in pursuit. The Black Tide.

Jaskier runs toward the railing, feet slipping on the planks slick with rainwater, prepared for the next flash of light.

Crack!

The world lights up around him, rain continuing to pour down from the sky, drenching his hair and sliding down his nape. Jaskier blinks the water out of his eyes furiously. His attention is pulled away from the shape of the black tide, back to the jagged rocks on the other side. As he looks, squeezing his eyes to keep out the rain and see better, there is movement from within the Crescent.

Jaskier’s heart freezes in his chest and his breath stutters. Though he hasn’t ever really seen the ship from a distance, he would recognise it anywhere. Within the cradle of the basalt boulders, the Vursnake is turning, unfurling it’s sails. Jaskier wants to yell, wants to scream for the Black Tide to get out of there, before it’s too late, but no sound leaves his lips. Not even when he breathes carefully, pushing the adrenaline down as Geralt taught him, does he manage to make a sound. The light disappears.

Jaskier trembles, and looks around the Gulliver’s decks again. If he can’t make a noise, he can’t call for Geralt. Instinctively, he looks up at the sky, looking for the silhouette of a raven.

Crack!

The Vursnake is no longer in the middle of the Crescent. Her sails are fully hoisted, and she’s picking up speed, waves cresting at her bow. At the distance he’s at, Jaskier can’t see anyone on board, and when the Vursnake turns its prow toward the Black Tide, leaving the Gulliver behind, he’s filled with guilty relief. He hopes against hope that the Black Tide will be able to outrun her, but as he watches, he sees the distance between the two ships getting smaller and smaller, until suddenly the distance has been eaten away. The Vursnake has caught up.

Darkness returns, and Jaskier clenches his hands on the railing and grits his teeth, waiting for the next flash of light.

Crack!

Jaskier’s eyes are focussed on the distance, where two pirate ships with all their black sails hoisted despite the storm pull up next to each other. His heart is in his throat, and if he could make a noise, he would offer up a prayer to whatever sea-god is willing to listen to let the Black Tide get away. Focussed as he is, it’s only the sudden uncomfortable feeling of someone watching him, like something cold slithering down his spine, that tells him he’s no longer alone.

Jaskier doesn’t even try to scream. He thinks about Geralt, and manages to keep breathing shallowly, pulling in oxygen in rapid gasps. He turns around.

He fully expects to see Rience standing there, but it’s something different altogether.

The creature is tall and slender, it’s proportions just off enough to mark it as other. It’s body is covered in dark purple scales, their hue myriad and subtly different. There are webs between its fingers and toes, and Jaskier thinks he can see fins along its back. Its eyes are an intense aquamarine.

When Jaskier looks at it, it starts to speak, and he can see the pearl shine of sharp teeth behind its lips. The creature’s voice is lovely, and despite the situation, Jaskier feels a strange sort of tranquillity settle over himself.

“Black sails are coming. Get ready, little cousin. Black sails are coming and we cannot hold them back. Not without losing our children.”

Jaskier wants to open his mouth to speak, to ask the creature what it means and what he should do. Before he can, the bolt of lightning has tracked its way across the sky and disappears, plunging him back into darkness.

Crack!

There is someone on the ship with him, and this time it’s not the siren.

“Hello, Consort,” Rience says, snapping his fingers. Flames are conjured in the firemage’s hand despite the rain, and Jaskier screams.

Chapter Text

Rachal’s hands clench on the wooden helm and her heart pounds in her chest as the Vursnake pulls out of the Crescent. Every few heartbeats there is another flash and a loud crack of thunder, briefly illuminating the churning waters around them. Far behind, the Vursnake’s sails unfurl, immediately pulling tight in the wind. She knows that between the two ships, her Black Tide isn’t the faster one. She looks at her crew, cold and soaked through, but still springing to do her bidding.

She has to try, for them.

If only they manage to reach the Kaer, to be close enough for the sentries to spot them, they’ll be safe. The Warg will come out to aid them, if only they manage to be close enough to call upon that aid.

“Full speed ahead!” she bellows over the roar of the wind.

Ropes are tightened and sails secured while Rachal herself battles to keep a firm grip on the helm. The Black Tide barrels across the waves, coming up high out of the water only to plunge back down with a splash great enough that salt water flows freely across her decks.

“All hands, secure lifelines!” she orders, and hears the command picked up and repeated.

Lines are secured to belts or around hips, the other ends attached to knobs at the masts or designated places on deck. If anyone goes overboard right now, they should be able to pull themselves back over the railing instead of drowning in the dark ocean waters.

She can’t help but let her eyes find Azure. Her first mate is helping one of the swabbies attach his lifeline, her own around her hips but not yet secured on the other end. Rachal curses under her breath. She really ought to have a conversation with Azure on this. The woman takes great care of those under her command, and Rachal has promoted her to the position of first mate for that exact reason, but she really should make sure she herself is safe, before helping others.

Rachal yanks the wheel to the side a little, her arms straining against the resistance, steering the black tide away from the Crescent, toward Kaer Morhen. Lightning bolts snake their way across the sky, the cracks of thunder that follow loud enough to leave her ears ringing. When the next flash comes, she chances a look behind her.

“Fuck,” she says under her breath, blinking the rain out of her eyes as it pelts her in the face. Though all their sails are hoisted and set to optimally catch the storm’s wind, the Vursnake is gaining on them. Rachal quickly turns back around and takes in the angle of the Black Tide’s sails and the course they’re taking over the waves.

There’s nothing more they can do.

A stream of curses leaves her as she debates giving the order. She looks back over her shoulder again. With the next crack of sound the sky illuminates with another flash of bright light, and the Vursnake is closer again by several leagues. She has no choice but to engage. If they keep going like this, Rience will pull alongside them and they won’t be ready.

“Get ready for battle!” she yells. “Half crew above decks to sail, half crew to the gun deck. Ready the cannons!”

“Aye, captain!,” is the collective answer, and though the situation is dire, Rachal feels that quick burst of pride in her chest when her orders are followed without question, her crew moving seamlessly to obey.

Half of her hands disappear below decks, and Rachal turns the wheel just so, angling so the Black Tide’s cannons will aim true, just as the Vursnake pulls alongside.

In the end, they never get a chance to fire their cannons.

The order to release the first salvo is on her lips when she hears it. The song is hauntingly beautiful, the most incredible thing she’s ever heard, and once it reaches her ears the sounds of the raging storm fade away until the otherworldly melody is all she can think about.

Calm, the song says, be calm, be tranquil. Follow along, and all will be well.

Rachal feels one of her hands slip off the helm against her will. With a great effort she steers it toward the pocket of her trousers, feeling around for the earplugs. Could it be? Is it possible she’d ordered Azure to make sure everyone had their plugs, but she herself doesn’t have them on her?

No need, the song says. Stop looking, stop fighting. Just listen, and all will be well.

Rachal’s hand closes around a pair of plugs in her pocket as the song reaches a crescendo. She knows she should pull them out and stuff them in her ears, but at the same time she can’t quite feel the urgency she should. She’s distantly aware that what she’s feeling isn’t real, that the Siren song is compelling her into calm complacency.

Rachal is still battling with herself when iron hooks sail through the air to secure the Black Tide to the Vursnake. Her hand is clenched around the plugs in her pocket tightly enough to press them out of their original shape, and to have her nails biting into the palm of her hand. Pirates from the Vursnake climb aboard, and Rachal can do no more than watch. as they go from one member of her crew to the next, skipping those who seem to be frozen like herself, subduing the ones who have managed to put in their plugs, snatching them away from their ears until the entirety of her crew stands there, docile and unmoving.

Let go, be calm and tranquil, all will be well, the song echoes in her ears, and Rachal tries to fight it. It results in a blinding headache, and she can feel something wet slide down the side of her face, different from the rain, hot in temperature. She knows it’s blood, streaking from her ears, the result of her resistance to the siren-song.

Stop fighting, all will be well.

The song is overwhelming, the melody of it surging in her chest. She grits her teeth and tries to keep resisting. From the Vursnake, another pirate transfers himself over onto the Black Tide’s decks. Even through the rain Rachal can see that half his face bears a burn scar, as silver gauntlets reflect the light from another bolt of lightning.

Rience makes his way over the deck, while from the ocean below a figure emerges to climb up over the railing to walk at the firemage’s side. The figure is covered in purple scales, and there are fins along its spine. It seems reluctant to get close to Rience, but the mage conjures fire at his fingers, and the siren obeys.

She’s still standing there, frozen, locked in a battle of wills, as the captain of the Vursnake and the siren he controls reach the Black Tide’s helm.

“Rachal, how very good to see you again,” Rience says, his voice a mockery of politeness. Like her, the firemage is soaked through, his hair clinging wetly to his skull, but still the fire burns in his hand. “Fighting against the song, I see. How long do you think you’ll be able to keep that going?”

Next to Rience, the Siren blinks its intense aquamarine eyes. “We can’t push harder. If she keeps resisting, she’ll die,” the siren says.

Rience smiles cruelly. “Come on, Rachal. Just give in. I’m adding the Black Tide and its crew to my fleet. Commandeering, if you will. I’ll allow you to stay on as captain. All you have to do is give in to the song.”

Rachal grits her teeth and manages a minute shake of her head. She’d much rather spit in the man’s face. She’s not entirely forced into compliance by the song, but she’s still held immobile, the melody still threatening to overwhelm her will, while blood keeps leaking from her ears.

Rience sighs dramatically. “Fine. If the song is not enough, I know what’ll incentivise you,” the firemage says.

The Vursnake’s captain makes a gesture to the siren next to him, and the song changes slightly. Rachal looks on in silenced horror as from the deck below, a blonde figure starts to move toward them, climbing up to reach the helm-deck.

Azure has a blank expression on her face. She looks just as cold as she did before, but this time it doesn’t seem to bother her. It’s almost as if her eyes are fogged over with something cloudy, and she ignores Rachal entirely, coming to stand next to Rience.

“You see?” the firemage says. “Your first mate has given in. If you do too, nothing will happen to her.” The smile on his face is wicked, and he pulls a sharp knife from a sheath at his belt, pressing the blade to Azure’s throat. Her first mate does nothing but stand there, water dripping across her skin, mingling with a slight tinge of red where Rience cuts into her.

Slowly, Rachal bends her head, and stops resisting. The siren song surges within her.

Good, it says. Good. Be calm, be tranquil, all will be well.  

She feels a dense fog enveloping her thoughts, blunting fear and emotion, until the song is all she knows. Why would she resist? Why would she do anything but follow along with whatever the beautiful melody requires of her?

For the life of her, Rachal can’t think of any reason not to, and so when the melody tells her to take up her position at the helm and turn the Black Tide around toward the Crescent, she obeys.

---000---

Jaskier wakes screaming. There are hands on his wrists, holding his arms still, and for a moment he’s convinced it’s Rience. He freezes for a fraction of a second before the ingrained response from his mornings training with Geralt pays off, and he desperately twists in the firm grip to free himself. He kicks out with one foot and his heel connects with something solid, the impact resulting in a slight grunt from a familiar voice.

“Jaskier, it’s just me. I can’t let you go. You’re hurting yourself. Come on, wake up!”

Jaskier realizes he’s kept his eyes firmly closed, not wanting to look into Rience’s face. He stills and inhales deeply, trying to regain some semblance of calm. When he manages to open his eyes he’s met with Geralt’s frown, a wrinkle between his brows, his mouth a tight line.

Months prior, Jaskier would have interpreted the expression as threatening, but now he can see the concern in the pirate’s golden eyes. Now he knows he has nothing to fear, and Geralt is holding him not to hurt him, but to keep him safe. He blinks a few times, and notices the reason the witcher won’t yet let him go. In his nightmare he’d been trying to get away from the firemage by any means possible, and in his fight against a phantom presence, he’s scratched long furrows into the skin of his arms. Some of the scratches are bleeding.

Instead of gasping for air he forces himself to take another long, steady inhale. Slowly, Geralt lets go of one of his wrists, and lays his warm palm across his chest. They breathe together for a while, until Jaskier sags forward, leaning his forehead against Geralt’s shoulder.

“Little bird?” the pirate rumbles gently, and cards his fingers through the sweat soaked hair at Jaskier’s nape.

Jaskier shivers in the white wolf’s arms. “That was not a normal dream, Geralt.”

“Hm. It was a nightmare. You’ve had them before,” the witcher responds.

He lifts his head from Geralt’s shoulder to look him in the eye. He sees the way the pirate captain’s expression has eased, but doesn’t miss how his normally slitted pupils are expanded, and the way he keeps his hands on Jaskier’s body. The witcher’s large form is poised between Jaskier and the rest of the room, shielding him.  

He shakes his head. “This was not a normal nightmare. I— I saw things, Geralt. Things I think are real. I think it’s the sirens. I think they’re trying to warn me. Please, you have to believe me. This wasn’t just a dream.”

His voice has taken on a pleading note, and he notices he has one hand clenched around the tuning-fork necklace, the angles of the metal pressing into his palm.

Geralt looks at him, the line between his brows returning. “I believe you, little bird,” he rumbles, and Jaskier sags in relief. The pirate turns his head toward the door to speak. He doesn’t raise his voice. “Eskel,” he says. “Get Yennefer and Triss, Lambert too. Meeting room in fifteen minutes.”

---000---

Jaskier sits at a round table in a round room at the base of one of the keep’s towers. There is a high fire built up in the hearth, and though Jaskier is on edge, he’d only twitched a little when fire had sprung from Eskel’s palm to light the heavy logs.

“Sorry, Buttercup,” the scarred witcher murmurs softly, taking a seat next to him. “I should have warned you.”

“It’s okay,” Jaskier answers. “It’s you, so I know the fire won’t hurt me.” He doesn’t miss the small, pleased smile on Eskel’s face.

On his other side Geralt snakes his arm around his waist, hand landing on his hip and pulling him slightly closer, into the heat of his body.

Lambert, Triss and Yennefer come in a moment later, all three of them alert and without any signs of fatigue, as if they haven’t just been woken in the middle of the night. Once they are seated, Geralt speaks.

“Jaskier’s had another dream.” The white wolf inclines his head to Triss, “It might be a warning.”

Geralt’s words are serious, and so are the others’ faces, and Jaskier can’t help the sudden surge of affection he feels for all of them.

It would have been easy to dismiss him. The traumatized noble son they’d picked up, who’d been burnt and assaulted, and has nightmares as a result. Instead, all of them are here to listen to him tell them about the second dream he’s had.

He takes a deep breath, and starts to talk.

---000---

“Little cousin?” Lambert asks incredulously when Jaskier has detailed both dreams to them.

Only Triss had known about the first, though the mage had evidently told her captain about it. Jaskier finds he doesn’t mind. He hadn’t asked her to keep it a secret after all.

He shrugs. “I don’t know what it means, but that’s what the siren called me.”

Lambert tilts his head. “It might explain why meals at he keep are busier than ever. You luring them up, Buttercup? Do you have creature blood in you?”

Jaskier snorts. “I hardly think so. My family was very— concerned— with keeping the line pure. And there are no great musical talents in my family.”

“Hm. Just you,” Geralt rumbles next to him, his fingers squeezing gently over his hip, and Jaskier feels his cheeks heat at the compliment.

“No,” Yennefer says. “If our Buttercup had had siren blood flowing through him, Triss and I would have known, and he wouldn’t have been able to sing. While we’re out at sea the Warg bears enchantments against siren-songs.”

“So what are they fucking on about then? Calling Buttercup little cousin?” Lambert asks.

“Sirens have always felt kinship to bards,” Yennefer says, looking at Jaskier thoughtfully. “They recognise it like a claim when a ship has a bard on board. They will leave those vessels be. As for the dreams, I think it’s easiest for them to contact someone who bears a connection to song and melody the same way they do. The little cousin, It’s an acknowledgment of sorts.”

“Still, warning him through dreams like that,” Triss says slowly, “It’s a connection that’s hard to make, and it’s one I couldn’t trace when I tried after that first nightmare.”

“Hm. Have you ever seen a siren, little bird?” Geralt asks him.

“Just a glimpse would have been enough,” Eskel ads.

Jaskier starts shaking his head no, but pauses after Eskel’s words. Just a glimpse would have been enough.

“I think maybe I have?” he says uncertainly. He’d almost forgotten about it. Had convinced himself at the time it was a trick of the light across the water, that his imagination had run away with him. He looks at Geralt. “When we jumped back over to the Warg after we found the Gulliver, I think I saw one under the water.” A chill travels across his spine as he remembers what he’d thought he’d seen on the siren’s face. “I made eye contact with it. Half of its face had been burnt.”

Yennefer and Triss have thoughtful frowns on their faces. “The eye contact would have been enough to make a connection,” Triss says. “A connection I wouldn’t have been able to trace days after the dream.”

Geralt growls low at the back of his throat. “So the sirens at the Crescent are warning you, and us,” he says to Jaskier. “Rience is there with a fleet, and he’s gathering more. Going after the Black Tide would prevent Rachal from reaching us with information, while at the same time bolstering his numbers.”

“Why does he need the sirens though?” Jaskier wonders.

“I don’t think the Gulliver’s crew has perished, little bird,” Geralt says.

Jaskier pales, and starts shaking his head, but he can’t deny the truth of it. “He has them crew the Vursnake after he lost his own crew to the Warg,” he realizes with horror. “They are under the influence of the siren’s song. Just like those other ships are, just like the Black Tide might be now.”

“What does Rience hold over the sirens of the Crescent though?” Eskel asks, fingers worrying at his scar. “They’ve kept to the code for the last twenty years. Why would that suddenly change?”

“Even though Buttercup saw a burn on that siren, just the firefucker’s magic wouldn’t be enough,” Lambert agrees.

Jaskier shakes his head, remembering the siren’s words. Slowly he repeats them.

‘Black sails are coming and we cannot hold them back. Not without losing our children.’

The witchers in the room growl.

“The waters within the Crescent are their birthing grounds, aren’t they?” Jaskier says. “That must be why the sirens comply. He’s threatening their children.”

---000---

If Jaskier had any doubt about how quickly the keep could mobilize to send the Warg off to launch, the demonstration he gets would permanently erase it. Suddenly it seems like the entire castle is up and awake. There’s a quick breaking of the fast, and then witchers and mages stand ready and equipped. Jaskier can’t help but notice that though there’s plenty of human warriors amongst the Warg’s crew, they are all staying behind.

He stands out of the way in the great hall, looking on with wide eyes as the witchers assemble. There are those who hadn’t been on the Warg’s crew this season, whose names Jaskier is still learning, not all of them bearing wolf medallions. Some have medallions depicting cats, griffins, bears, or a snake like creature, and he thinks there might be more, but he’s not close enough to see.

While he watches, Roach lands on his shoulder, her claws careful not to pierce the fabric of his doublet, her beak preening through his hair as if she wants to reassure him.

When Geralt gives the order to head for the Warg, it’s clear to Jaskier he’s being left behind.

“Geralt,” he calls softly, knowing the witcher will hear it. Across the hall, the pirate captain turns, and golden eyes meet his. When the witcher reaches him, he puts both hands on Jaskier’s waist, slowly pulling him in.

“I can’t take you with me, little bird,” Geralt says gently. “Lambert will stay with you, and a few witchers will hold the keep, but we have to provide aid to the Crescent and the Black Tide, and it won’t be safe for you or any humans to tag along.

“I know,” Jaskier says. “You’re the keepers of the code. I just—” he can hear the waver in his own voice, and he looks up at the white wolf imploringly. “I just want you to be safe. I’m afraid of what Rience can do.”

Geralt lays his palm against the side of Jaskier’s throat, his fingers curling around to cradle the back of his skull.

“I’ll not let him get away a second time,” the witcher growls, and Jaskier shivers in the pirate’s firm hold.

He reaches up to thread his fingers through Geralt’s long white hair, and though all his warriors are present, the white wolf lets himself be pulled down into a kiss. Jaskier tries to convey into the contact all his worry, gratitude, and hope for the future, and Geralt briefly pulls him closer, a low growl reverberating in his chest.

“Stay safe, little bird,” he says when he finally lets Jaskier go.

And then the witchers leave, armed and armoured, following their captain.

---000---

Jaskier is playing Gwent with Lambert and Oliver and losing rather spectacularly when he decides to ask.

“How long do you think it will take them?”

Lambert shrugs. “No telling exactly, Buttercup. But I’m guessing it won’t be too long.” He grins, “the white wolf has reason beyond his role as the keeper to want Rience dead, after all.” He winks as he says it, and Jaskier feels a heat rush into his cheeks.

“Does it bother you that you’re not with them?” he asks the redheaded witcher.

Lambert shrugs. “I wouldn’t mind exterminating the firefucker once and for all, but I’m fine staying behind to keep you safe, Buttercup.” While he says it, his eyes briefly slide over to Oliver, and Jaskier thinks he’s not the only one Lambert feels the urge to protect.

Oliver clearly hasn’t missed the look either. “I’m not helpless. I can protect myself,” the young sailor says through gritted teeth.

Jaskier remembers what Eskel had told him. How Tokar had apparently hurt Oliver, and how Lambert had had to be restrained from killing him.

He shrugs and grins at the sailor. “Just let the wolf, Oliver. He’s clearly feeling protective.” His tone is teasing, but he sees the radars turning behind Oliver’s eyes. Next to him, Lambert grumbles under his breath, carefully keeping his gaze on the cards in his hands.

“Oh,” Oliver says after a few long moments of looking between Jaskier and the witcher, and he suddenly looks shy, biting his lip.

Jaskier thinks it’s absolutely adorably heartwarming, and absolutely something that’d be good for Lambert and Oliver both. He is just debating excusing himself to leave the two of them by themselves, when Lambert’s head tilts. Both he and Oliver recognise it as a witcher listening to something in the distance they themselves can’t hear. Lambert frowns and stiffens.

“What is it?” Jaskier asks, worried.

Lambert stands in a fluid motion, and bellows an order Jaskier knows all the witchers still in residence will hear. Oliver stands too, hand falling to the sword at his hip. Jaskier hadn’t even noticed the sailor carrying a weapon before. He scrambles to stand with them, and feels his heart rate pick up. He tries to carefully control his breathing to keep from panicking. He has the irrational urge to call out for Geralt, even though he knows the pirate captain isn’t here but far out at sea.

Lambert looks at him. “The town’s bells are tolling,” the witcher growls, baring his teeth. “We’re under attack.”

From the rafters of the hall, Roach swoops down, a silent black shadow. She doesn’t land on Jaskier’s shoulder this time, but on Lambert’s outstretched wrist. The Raven doesn’t bite him for once, but croaks loudly, blinking her dark grey eye.

“Get Geralt,” Lambert says, and Roach croaks again, before taking of with a single beat of her wings.

---000---

When Jaskier strains to listen and the ocean wind carries the sound just right, he can hear the tolling of the bells through the open window. He is sitting in Geralt’s hammock, surrounded by the scent of him, and trying to take comfort in it. Lambert had ordered him up to the room and to stay there, safely tucked away, while he assembled the remaining witchers and human warriors. Jaskier knows they’re going to the town to help, to defend against those who have dared attack the Kaer.

Kaer Morhen is supposed to be a safe. The home berth of the code’s keepers, of the Warg and the white wolf who captains her. The island is protection to those who can attest they keep to the code and pay tribute. The Kaer is strong enough that no one would dare attack.

If someone wanted to strike regardless, they would best do so when the Warg and it’s captain, together with a full crew of witchers, have left the island behind to do battle elsewhere. Jaskier carefully tries to keep his panic at bay. He know who that someone is likely to be.

He stares out of the window toward the town, though it is far away enough he can hardly see what is going on. The bells waver in and out of his range of hearing, and he strains, until he picks up a sound that makes all the hairs at the back of his neck stand on end.

Black sails are coming

That had been the warning all along. The Warg has gone out to meet the Vursnake at the Crescent, but that was never how Rience planned for it to go. The Crescent was never where the confrontation was going to take place.

Black sails are coming.

Everything in Jaskier is certain. The black sails he’d been warned about have come to Kaer Morhen.

The sound that reaches him more surely than the ringing bells is beautiful, and distantly, he can appreciate the haunting quality of the melody and the voices that sing it. He remembers what Geralt had told him about siren-song.

Witchers are more resistant to it than normal humans, but not entirely immune. Now though, there are only a few witchers left on the island, its defences left mostly in the hands of human warriors.

Don’t fight, give in. All will be well. Be calm, be tranquil.

Jaskier can clearly make out the words that drift toward him, twisted through the otherworldly melody. He feels it pull at something inside of him, but he doesn’t feel compelled. Not at all. All he hears is the different notes, and how the voices weave together into a tapestry of sound.

Somehow, he knows that’s how it is for him, and not how the others are hearing it.

He can’t stay here, holed up in Geralt’s room, while the people of Kaer Morhen are compelled by siren-song. The witchers will be resistant, and if it comes to it they will fight, but Jaskier knows it will break them, maybe beyond repair, if they are made to fight the people they have kept safe for over twenty years now.

His breath catches. Oliver has gone with them. Oliver had put his hand on his sword, and left with the witchers and human pirates at Lambert’s side. If Oliver is compelled to fight Lambert, the witcher will either let himself be killed, or he will kill the young sailor, and the light in him will dim.

Jaskier tumbles himself from the hammock and races out of the room and down the steps. When he reaches the training hall, he grabs a long, slender dagger and weighs it in his hand. The heft and balance of it remind him a little of a rapier, and he decides it will have to do. He doesn’t know what makes him do it, since it makes no rational sense, but when he streaks back through the hall, he snatches up his lute from where he’d left it behind after playing the previous night.

The siren-song is still loud in his ears as he sneaks out of the keep and down the path toward the town. He holds a dagger in one hand, and his lute in the other.

Chapter Text

There’s only so much that can be done when the numbers are overwhelming. 

There’s twelve of them, and it should be more than enough to protect and hold the keep. More than enough to join the town’s population in a fight and hold the bay, especially together with the human fighters. With the humans under the influence of siren song however, twelve is a frighteningly small number. 

The sirens don’t start singing until the witchers are at the edge of the town, and by then it’s too late to send back the ones susceptible to it. 

There are the human warriors from the keep and those from the town who have not hidden away in their houses with their doors and windows boarded up, but have come out to help. Then there are the pirate crews from the vessels berthing at the Kaer this winter. For the witchers to end the conflict without human casualties, the numbers are simply… not in their favour. 

—000—

Lambert curses and snarls against the compulsion from the song, buffeting against his resistance. He holds his blade in a two handed grip and easily steps around a man he recognises as the Silverfish’s first mate. He lets the but of his sword swing back to land against the base of the man’s skull, incapacitating him and taking him out of the fight. There’s twelve of them, and they are taking out as many humans as they can without permanently injuring them, but it feels like battling upstream. The humans are fighting viciously, though they do so with a sort of foggy, hazy look in their eyes. He thinks it’s only a matter of time before the first fatal injury is dealt, and his heart is heavy. As he fights, he looks up at the sky every now and again, hoping to see the silhouette of a raven. 

He’s lost sight of Oliver within the first moments after the sirens started singing, and he’s making his way through the throng of people desperately, trying to find him. He regrets bringing him. Did so as soon as he heard the first lilting tones of the siren song, but he knows there is no way Oliver would have been okay with being left behind.  

When a large sailor blocks his way and stabs toward his stomach he has to suppress the reflex that wants to have his sword swing around to cleave the man’s head from his shoulders. “Fucking fuck!” he bellows, slamming his weapon against the blade to divert it instead, swinging a fist to land at the sailor’s temple. “We need to break the influence of this blasted song!”

“Not a clue how though,” Ivar grits from a few metres away, dodging before grabbing a man and a woman by the scruff of their necks, slamming their skulls together and lowering them to the ground with a gentleness that’s almost jarring in contrast. Lambert nods at Ivar before taking out the next pirate that comes barreling his way, and they get separated again into their own fights. 

He struggles his way into the heart of the town eventually, following his nose and incapacitating as many as he can. 

Not all humans are under the spell of the sirens. Some of them have been able to plug their ears in time, and there are fights everywhere he looks. The sirens are singing, but the lilting harmony is confusing, going up and down in volume enough that it’s impossible to determine the direction it’s coming from.

Lambert shoves a woman against a wall, a cutlass in each of her hands, and she slides down it to the ground, unconscious. When he catches a stronger whiff of Oliver’s scent, he breaks out into a run, skidding around a corner into a quieter side street. 

What greets him is the sight of the young sailor fighting Thomas, one of the burlier town barkeeps. The man’s age and experience balance Oliver’s youth and greater speed. As he watches there’s a close call where Oliver’s blade just misses drawing a line down Thomas’ shoulder.  He can’t immediately tell which of them is under the siren’s compulsion, until the barkeep spots him. 

“Lambert!” Thomas bellows, narrowly avoiding another swipe by jumping back. 

“Coming,” Lambert yells back at him, already running. And then he’s between them, his back to Thomas, growling at the man to get away. The barkeep doesn't hear it. The man wears plugs in his ears to keep out the siren song, but the message is clear, and he quickly turns to run to help others. 

Lambert focusses on Oliver, facing off against him. The young sailor isn’t making any noise, and hasn’t reacted to the sound of his voice, or the fact he’s suddenly facing a very different opponent. Lambert grits his teeth at the way his light brown eyes are staring, as if at something a great distance away. “Come on, Ollie,” he growls, letting the tip of his sword sag to the ground in a gesture of peace. “Come on, fucking recognise me. Snap out of it.”

Oliver tilts his head, and hope breaks open in Lambert’s chest as he thinks he sees a flash of recognition, a flash of resistance. Just then the siren song swells, and Oliver attacks. 

—000—

Jaskier runs all the way down to the town. He’s careful he doesn’t misstep in the sparse light of the moon, grateful that there’s any light at all. The long dagger is securely girded at his hip and his lute is slung over his back. Both the weapon and the instrument bang into him as he moves. He can hear the sirens getting louder as he approaches the town, and when the sounds of fighting reach him, he puts on an extra burst of speed. He just knows the sirens are compelling those susceptible to violence, and he feels the desperate need to help, though he’s not entirely sure how he’ll be able to. 

There is fighting everywhere in the town. Jaskier can see witchers battling with humans, townsfolk and pirates alike, knocking them out as carefully as they can. He’s relieved the fighting doesn’t seem to have gotten grim enough to warrant more permanent injuries, though he does see several people with wounds, blood drenching their clothes. 

Jaskier tries to stay out of sight, and he moves toward the harbour, toward the ocean, some inimitable conviction that he needs to be there guiding him. He encounters bodies every now and again. Some of them are clearly still breathing, and some of them he’s not sure about. 

He’s too afraid to check.

When he turns a corner he’s close enough that around the next bend he’ll be able to see the wharf. He’s stopped in his tracks though, at the horrible, heartrending screech of a woman.

She’s not been knocked unconscious, and Jaskier thinks it’s not a witcher’s work. It might have been done by one of the townsfolk who hasn’t fallen under the song’s spell. She’s of middle age, and her kind face is crumpled in desperate agony as she lets out another scream. Jaskier feels chills travel down his spine at the sound of it. She’s bound to a wooden fence, the posts sturdy and sunk into the ground between the cobblestones. Her wrists are secured to it, but the rest of her body is free, and she writhes as she pulls and screams, trying to get out of her restraints. Her struggle is fierce enough to rip away the skin from her wrists, and Jaskier feels sick as he catches the white flash of bone where the hemp is digging in.   

When he looks at her, her eyes are wild and terrified, but unseeing. She turns her head to scream again, her vocal cords breaking, and he finally sees the blood that’s streaming from her ears. It drips down her neck to pool in the hollows of her collarbones, flecking down the front of her dress. 

She’s being sung to, and she can’t comply. The song is hurting her, unlike those who aren’t conscious. Someone has tried to protect her, but it’s harming her instead. It’s killing her. 

He looks around, but the street is empty. Not far away there are sounds of people struggling, overlaid by the haunting melody. The woman is whimpering now, and Jaskier thinks she doesn’t have a lot of time. He swallows hard, and bends down to let his fingers slide over the cobblestones. When he finds one that’s slightly loose, he wriggles his fingertips down into the gap between it and the next stone, and tries to get a grip on it. It takes him a few attempts to pull it out, and when he finally does, he almost falls backward on his ass with the force of it. 

The stone is heavy. Solid. It's worn smooth on the top, from all the feet passing over it. Jaskier wonders how hard he’ll have to hit the woman to knock her out, and feels the uncomfortable prickle of dread travel over his skin. He weighs the stone in his hands as he looks at the woman, who screams again. He doesn’t have a choice. 

Jaskier firms his grip on the stone, wiping away some of the clay that sticks to it, rubbing the material between his fingers. The clay has a rich scent, and is sticky with moisture. He looks down at the gap he took the cobble from.

He lets the rock slip from his grasp, and falls to his knees to take a handful of the clay from the hole. He has to hook his fingers to scrape it loose, and hisses a little between his teeth when a sharp shard of rock digs its way in under one of his nails. He’s stupidly grateful the winter storm has brought clouds with it, making the temperature rise to just above zero. The clay is still icy cold though, and the chill leaks into his fingers as he tries to warm it up between his hands. 

His heart is hammering in his chest as he approaches the woman. He’s half afraid to have her unseeing gaze snap suddenly toward him, but she remains unaware of his presence, caught in her own mind. She keeps screaming, and blood keeps leaking from her ears, slowly dribbling down the sides of her face. 

Jaskier moves carefully behind her. The idea of clobbering her over the head with the stone is awful, and he can only pray that his alternative plan will work. He separates two small lumps from the ball of clay he has formed in his hands, shaping them into small cones. He leans forward, reaching for the woman’s ears. 

As soon as he touches her, she is aware of him. The screech she lets out becomes higher, and grates against Jaskier’s hearing. Her thrashing becomes wilder and she swings her head from side to side. For a moment he panics, convinced he won’t be able to stuff her ears if she keeps moving like this. Then he mentally kicks himself for acting timid while someone desperately needs his help, and grabs a handful of her long brown locks. The woman shrieks and cries, and Jaskier can practically feel the hair ripping from her scalp. 

It’s a struggle, and he has to battle through his hesitance and the continued jerking of her head. Eventually, he manages to turn her head to the side and clumsily stuffs one of her ears with clay. He ends up smearing half of it across her cheekbone, but there’s enough that he’s able to close her ear off to the siren song. The woman’s struggle lessens, and Jaskier thinks it’s working. When he turns her head to the other side he still has to pull, but barely. He stuffs her other ear with clay as well, and she stills entirely. 

Jaskier moves back around to crouch in front of her. She has her eyes closed and all the tension has drained out of her face. For one heart stopping moment he thinks she’s not breathing. Then she opens her eyes. Jaskier’s breath catches and he’s almost lightheaded with relief to see the lucidity in them. Slowly, he reaches for the ropes, letting her see what he’s doing. He murmurs soothing words to her, even though he knows she can’t hear him. Her eyes look at his mouth though, and the woman gives him a slow nod. 

Once she’s freed from the ropes Jaskier helps her up and she lets him slice a few strips of cloth from her underskirt with his long dagger. He carefully binds her wrists, swallowing when he sees how he’d been right about the bone. They’re quiet since they can’t talk, and all around them Jaskier hears the siren song resonate. Through it, like a horrific backdrop to the haunting melody, he hears the continued sounds of struggle, and of people screaming. 

“Here,” he says, speaking slowly as the woman looks at his mouth again. He presses the lump of clay into her hands and points at her ears and then his own. “Go help people. Stuff their ears.”

The woman sways a bit on her feet, and for a moment Jaskier thinks she’s going to faint. Instead, she takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders, a determined set to her mouth. “Yes,” she answers, firming her grip on the clay. “I will. Thank you.”

He watches her as she turns and moves in the direction of the fighting, thankful for her strength and bravery. Then he returns to the hole he’s made in the street, and scoops up more clay, quickly stuffing his pockets. He’s got no better plan than this. He can hardly fight people to get clay in their ears, but he can find those who are hurting, and help them. 

—000—

He finds a few more people who are similarly bound, and successfully blocks out the siren song by filling their ears with the clay from his pockets, sealing them shut. All of them are delirious before he does it, blood leaking from their ears.

He frees them, and pulls up more loose cobblestones from the street, gathering clay to press into their hands, telling them what to do with gestures, and by enunciating clearly. He thinks they understand when they nod, take the clay from him, and move into the rest of the town. Some of them move slowly, like they’re still hurting. Some of them walk briskly, and some of them run. 

Though he pauses frequently to help others along, Jaskier keeps moving through the town, making his way to lower ground, to the water’s edge. He’s still sure he’ll find something there. The pull in his chest is growing rather than lessening and he spares a moment to think he’s being influenced by the song after all. He makes himself consider it might be the melody that’s luring him down, but he dismisses it almost instantly. Despite the current situation, he’s still quite certain the sirens don’t mean to hurt him, but to warn him. To help him. 

He slinks past a side street that leads slightly upward, hearing the sounds of ringing steel. He expects a witcher to be there, and prepares to call out for them to use clay instead of knocking out whoever they’re fighting. He opens his mouth, and then the moonlight glints of sharp blades clashing against each other, and he sees a large red haired witcher fighting a younger, human pirate. 

“Lambert! Oliver!” he calls, and scrambles his way into the narrow street, half slipping on the cold cobblestones. 

“Buttercup!” Lambert shouts at him without so much as glancing at him over his shoulder. “Stay back. What in all hells are you doing here? Geralt will keelhaul me. Go back to the keep!”

The witcher still doesn’t look at him, whirling away from Oliver’s sword strike instead, bringing his own weapon around in a powerful arc. Jaskier holds his breath and looks on with wide eyes as the sharp edge of Lambert’s blade unerringly moves toward the inside of Oliver’s thigh. At the last possible moment, the witcher flips the blade in his hand, giving the young man a strong tap with the flat of it instead. The strike would have been deadly, had Lambert sliced through the great femoral artery.

Jaskier realises he’d been right. Lambert is unwilling to take the chance of harming Oliver. They’re fighting, and all it will take is one mistake, one moment of diverted attention. The witcher will not hurt Oliver to defend himself, but he’ll let himself be hurt. Jaskier curses under his breath, and knows that Lambert can hear him. 

“GO BACK, Buttercup!” Lambert yells, his voice booming with a thin veneer of anger, fear lurking just below it. 

Jaskier shakes his head silently at first, not wanting to distract the witcher as he blocks a blow aimed at his throat. Then, he decides to yell back. “I’m not going. I’m here to help! I’ve been stuffing people’s ears with clay. It works, Lambert!”

“What?” the redhead says, and turns his head to look at Jaskier for the first time. Their eyes meet over the distance between them, and he holds up a hand filled with clay. A feral grin breaks out over Lambert’s face. “Of fucking course! Who needs earplugs!” he smacks his own forehead as if to emphasise the words, and then barely ducks out of the way of Oliver’s blade. “Alright, I’ll hold him, you stuff his ears. Okay, little flower?” Lambert grits as he manoeuvres himself back between Oliver and Jaskier.

“Yes. Ready,” Jaskier answers, and Lambert explodes into motion. It’s clear he’d been holding back, and Jaskier briefly wonders how long this dance between the two of them went on before he arrived. He doubts the witcher would have let it continue, and he’s glad to have spared Lambert the pain and guilt.

With Lambert’s next strike he disarms Oliver, the blade flying out of the pirate’s hand to scatter away over the cobbles. He’s a blur of movement as he twirls around the young man to stand at his back. In the same motion he smoothly sheaths his sword behind his back, before wrapping his arm over Oliver’s chest, immobilising him. 

Oliver cries out, and his face becomes anguished. Jaskier startles and freezes, realising Oliver is reacting the same way as those restrained by rope. The pirate scrabbles at the witcher’s arm wildly, his nails raking over Lambert’s skin, leaving deep scratches that start healing before they even have a chance to well with blood. 

“Jaskier!” Lambert growls, bringing up his other hand to grab onto Oliver’s jaw to hold his head still. “Come on, Buttercup. You can do it,” he continues more softly. 

He has to take a couple of deep breaths, and consciously pushes down the waves of adrenaline that threaten to overwhelm him and hold him in place. He manages to unfreeze after only a few seconds, and puts his hand in his pocket as he approaches. He rolls two small cones of clay between his fingers. Shaping them is easier now, the warmth of his body having made the material more malleable. Oliver screams loudly as Jaskier lays his fingers against his face, and pushes the clay into his ears. 

—000—

It isn’t hard to convince Lambert to head to the bay, and when Jaskier asks about it, the witcher reaches up to softly pull on his ear. “You hear the song, Buttercup. But you hear it differently from us. If you say we need to see what’s there, then we need to see what’s there.” 

Oliver can’t hear either Jaskier or Lambert, but is accustomed to hand signals since the pirates use them to signal to each other when high up in a ship’s rigging. He looks at Lambert’s and Jaskier’s hands and mouth carefully whenever they speak, and nods along. 

Jaskier stands on his toes to kiss them both on the cheek, and when Lambert flushes, Oliver laughs despite the fact he’s still wiping the blood off his face. Then the young man leans over to kiss Lambert's other cheek, and Jaskier doesn’t miss the way the witcher’s hand comes up to gently cradle the back of Oliver’s neck.

Before they leave, Lambert cups his hands around his mouth, and bellows. “Clay from under the cobblestones! Put it in their ears!” 

Jaskier has no doubt that every witcher in the town has heard him, even over the ever present harmony of siren song, and for the first time since he heard the melody carried on the wind, hope flares in his chest. 

Both Lambert and Oliver accompany him to the wharf, and Jaskier is thankful. This part of the town houses more folk, and more than once the witcher and pirate wrestle people to the ground and hold them still for Jaskier to stuff their ears. He repeats the simple gestures and words to each one of them, and sends them off with their hands full of clay. 

When they eventually reach the open space before the natural rock formation that extends out into the bay, Jaskier is suddenly pulled down by Lambert’s hand on his shoulder. He’s crouching between the two of them, Lambert on his left, one hand still pressing down on him, sword out in his other. Oliver is to his right, eyes fixed on the ships floating on the water, his mouth tight and a frown between his brows. 

“Fuck,” Lambert growls, and though Oliver can’t hear him, he seems to sense the sentiment, because he nods and repeats the curse. 

Carefully, Jaskier lifts his head enough to peer over the barrels they’re hiding behind, his fingers curling in the netting that covers them. His heart is beating wildly and he’s silently thankful that only witchers are able to hear how it pounds. 

The Warg’s place at the wharf is empty, but across from it, there is a flurry of activity on the Gulliver. 

The merchant ship’s sails aren’t hoisted but furled away for winter, dark coverings hiding away the bright white of the cloth. Thick clouds are obscuring the moon now, and the light is low enough that the crawling figures on her decks are no more than dark silhouettes. The greenish light between her two masts is clear to see though, and illuminates those who stand in its immediate circle. 

Between the Gulliver’s two masts, there is a large, swirling portal, and pirates are streaming through. 

Jaskier feels bitter fear flood his mouth as he lets his eyes rove over her decks. They are filled to the brim already, and pirates are starting to jump onto the boardwalk as more and more of them appear. 

Movement in the water catches his eye, and when he looks more closely, he imagines he can see flashes of purple scales and bright, aquamarine eyes. He wants to open his  mouth to let Lambert know, to tell him that he thinks the sirens are hiding in the water below the Gulliver, when the witcher’s hand grips his shoulder more firmly. 

He looks back up, and sees the man that has just arrived through the portal. It’s as if the moon wants him to see, as if it wants him to recognise the burn scar that covers part of the man’s face and scalp. The clouds leave a gap in the sky for the pale light to peek through, and it glints toward him, bright in the darkness. Moonlight on silver gauntlets.

“ Shit ,” Jaskier whispers, and Oliver grabs onto his other shoulder. His voice is tight with fear, and the scars on his left hand stand out starkly as he clenches his fist in the netting. 

Rience is here. 

—000—

The raven climbs high into the sky, soaring up until it reaches the clouds. Every beat of her wide black wings carries her further, and she catches the wind below them to gain speed. For long moments she sees nothing but grey fog. She’s flown up into the clouds, and only the oily sheen of her feathers keeps her from getting bogged down with moisture. 

When she bursts out of the cloud cover, the blanket of night is as dark as she is. There are tiny droplets caught on her feathers that reflect the light of the stars, and she would be a mirror image of the night sky if it weren’t for the large, pale face of the moon hanging far above her. 

She’s left the man with the blue eyes behind. He’s hers. 

She wouldn’t have done it, but the one with the red hair had spoken urgently, and she knows her blue eyes could be in danger now that her witcher isn’t here. Her island might be in danger too. Hers. 

She’ll find her witcher, and guide him home to protect what is theirs. 

The large raven keeps soaring above the clouds, grey eyes blinking down every now and again when the great, swirling mass of evaporated moisture lights up from below. The flashes are followed by loud cracks of sound, but she doesn’t let it deter her. The beat of her wings is steady, and she knows where to go. 

There is a flash of warm, yellowish light that breaks through, and it’s different from the cool, white-blue light from before. She croaks, waiting for the sound of cannonfire. When it comes, she tucks her black wings into her sides, and lets gravity take her down. 

A raven is a bird of prey, and so its eyesight is unrivalled. 

She is barely out of the heavy, water-saturated air when she spots the ships on the waves far below her. There are more flashes of yellow light, firing from their sides. One of the ships is burning, the orange heat of it bright against the colours of night. Another seems to be falling apart, and another is slowly sinking below the waves. The largest of the group has a blanket of shimmering air around it, and the flashes of yellow light can’t reach it. 

She blinks once, twice, and spots the caress of light across moon-pale hair. Her wings snap out to change her course. She makes a pass overhead, and croaks. Her witcher turns his face up to the sky, and an arm is held out for her. On her next pass, she dives down, and lands on Geralt’s wrist. 

“Roach?” her witcher growls, and she croaks, blinking one grey eye at him slowly. 

Chapter Text

It is a difficult thing, to fight those you don’t want to harm. 

At Geralt’s command, Eskel divides their crew of witchers into four. One to sail, one to fire the Warg’s cannons, one to jump over onto the other pirate vessels if they get close enough, and one to swim down into the dark waves and get people out. All of them bear pouches filled with earplugs, and he has to actively resist the temptation to plug his ears himself. 

Witchers are more resistant to the siren song, true, but it doesn’t mean they don’t feel the pull. He needs to be able to hear though, needs all his senses if they’re going to save as many people, and sirens, as they can. 

The siren song swells, audible even through the firing of cannons, and Eskel grits his teeth. There’s more and more pirates in the water now, as one of the ships slowly sinks below the dark surface. Some of his brothers dive into the waves, chests bare and without weapons strapped to them, to prevent getting more waterlogged than necessary. 

Saving someone who is drowning isn’t an easy task to begin with, but saving someone who is fighting back under the influence of siren-song, doing their level best to drag you down to the depths with them, is another thing entirely. Eskel is glad it’s just witchers in their crew. Glad the more vulnerable humans have remained behind on Kaer Morhen. 

He glances at Geralt, standing at the helm, keeping the Warg true to course. His hands are gripping firmly around the wheel’s wooden knobs, and the corded muscles in his forearms shift under the skin. The sails in the Warg’s three masts are hoisted fully, and it’s only the white wolf’s careful manoeuvring, confidently commanding the part of their crew that clings to rope high above her decks, that keeps the sleek vessel from crashing into any of the other ships, or into the great basalt blocks that form the Crescent. 

Their eyes meet over the distance. “We save the Black Tide,” his captain growls. “The other ships go down, but we get their crew.” 

Eskel gives him a sharp nod. Above them, the sky brightens with lightning every now and again, followed by deep, rumbling thunder. Drenched pirates are deposited on their decks whenever one of their brothers climbs up the Warg’s side, only to dive back in again. The pirates’ eyes are huge and confused, as if they’ve just woken from a long, drugged slumber. He directs Gweld and Thorvald to guide them below decks, out of the storm, where their soaked clothes won’t continue to sap their warmth away into hypothermia. 

His captain issues another string of sharp orders and turns the wheel against the force of the winds, adjusting course to guide the ship at a sharp angle, past some Jagged boulders that protrude just above the water. 

They’re making for the Black Tide, and Eskel gets ready with the rest of his brothers, letting the rope with the steel hook attached at the end of it slide through his hands. One of the smaller ships fires at them, the crack of cannonfire reminiscent of the rolling thunder above their heads. It cracks against the magical shield Yen and Triss are pouring their power into, and the shot doesn’t reach them. He can hear Geralt give the curt order to return fire, the witchers below on the gun-deck easily hearing it through the tumult of sounds, and then the Warg shivers on the waves, as her cannons unload. 

The shots hit home, and there’s a small explosion on the smaller pirate ship. One of their shots must have hit a barrel of gunpowder, and despite the rain, warm yellow flames spring forth along the vessel’s decks. Eskel issues a warning to his brothers in the water, and sees how some of them have already swum over to the now burning ship, and nimbly climb up her sides. They don’t need to look for the ship’s crew, the compelled pirates attack as soon as they’re on deck, and it’s easy to throw them overboard, away from the now raging fire, toward their brothers still in the water. 

The Warg pulls away sharply to avoid sailing over where there’s witchers and pirates among the churning waves. Geralt issues another sharp command, and foaming salt-water crests along the bow as they move in alongside the black tide. 

—000— 

As the Black Tide comes into reach, Geralt hands the wheel over to Kolgrim, and stands amongst his brothers at the railing. Eskel is at his right hand, metal hook already swinging on its rope. He wants to issue the command to anchor the Black Tide to the Warg and board, when he hears a familiar sound from high above. 

He clenches his jaw and looks up to the sky. It shouldn’t be. If it is, something is wrong. He sees the dark shadow pass overhead, and lifts his arm to the side. On her next pass over, the raven dives down to land on his wrist.

“Roach?” He growls, and every witcher in the line next to him turns toward him. They all know what this means. Something is wrong at the Kaer. Roach wouldn’t be here other than to call them back, and suddenly Geralt deeply regrets not leaving more witchers behind, leaving Jaskier behind. Roach blinks at him and opens her beak in a soft caw, spreading her wings briefly before she folds them again. 

Geralt looks at his brothers, all pairs of slitted eyes directed at him, waiting for his command. 

“We end this now!”  he growls. 

—000—

Rachal thinks she should be doing something else. She thinks she should not be steering the Black tide so the Warg can pull up alongside, in range of their cannons. She thinks she should not let her crew and those who have been added to it make their way down to the gun deck and get ready to fire. She thinks she should be looking for a blonde head with braids, and make sure it’s still there, still safe. 

She can’t remember why.

Come now, something tells her brain, and she thinks it might be the ever present song she hears. Don’t resist, isn’t it easy to go along? Just do as we say, and all will be well.

Part of her wants to question it, to resist, but the melody swells, and she forgets that part exists. 

—000—

Azure feels as if she’s just woken up from the world's worst hangover, only to be splashed in the face by icy cold seawater. The salt stings in her eyes and nose and she coughs violently. Her limbs feel heavy, and she would definitely have gone under with the next wave, if it weren’t for the strong arm of the witcher holding her up and above the water. 

“Eskel?” she asks weakly as she manages to turn enough to see the face of the white wolf’s first mate. “What’s going on?” 

The witcher bares his teeth as he swims, pulling her along. Azure feels something shifting in the water below them, and Eskel makes a quick jab downward, the flash of steel visible even below the dark surface.

She sees the witcher’s mouth move, but she can’t hear him speak. Only then does she realize she can’t hear anything. She slowly lifts a hand to her ears, and feels the plugs that have been stuffed inside, blocking out all sound. There are flashes of light all around them, the reflection off the dark water giving the impression that the world is on fire. 

Azure feels too weak to aid Eskel in swimming, and just lets herself be dragged along. Slowly, memories start to come back to her. They were late in heading to the Kaer, making their way through a winter storm, and Rachal had guided them past the Crescent. Rience had been there, and— and sirens. The rest of her recollection is hazy, as if viewed from very far, through fogged up glass.

She looks in the direction they’re swimming, and realises Eskel is dragging her along to the Warg. They’re swimming away from the ship she’d been fighting him on, her cutlasses cutting through the air as the sirens sang at her to move faster, turn quicker, slice at the witcher with deadly intent. Eskel had had many opportunities to kill her and be done with it. He’d thrown her overboard instead, dove after her, and plugged up her ears. They’re swimming away from the Black Tide, witchers and pirates fighting on her decks.

“Wait!” Azure calls out to him, trying to twist in his grip. 

“What?” she sees his mouth move, slitted amber eyes flicking to her face. He doesn’t pause in his swimming. 

“Rachal, I have to get Rachal!” Azure knows she’s yelling. The lack of sound makes her increase her volume in an effort to hear her own voice and she feels the raw scrape of salt in her throat. 

Eskel looks back at the Black Tide. His mouth moves again, and he points. “Geralt has her,” Azure thinks she can read from his lips, and uses the strength she has left to turn in his arms.

High above the waves on the Black Tide’s decks, witchers have subdued her crew. Azure can see she’s not the only one who’s been plunged into the cold water and is being hauled away by a witcher, but those still on board her ship are getting plugs pressed into their ears as well, and she heaves a sigh of relief before she realises she doesn’t see her captain anywhere. 

Before panic can grab her by the throat she follows where Eskel is pointing. The witcher has stopped dragging her away for now, steadily holding her up above the water instead. There’s two moving figures, one large and imposing, the other slighter, steel flashing in the light of the flames. 

Rachal is attacking the white wolf, and Azure tries to bite down on the sound of distress that wants to leave her. Her captain has drawn her cutlasses and charges, seemingly without thought for her own safety. Azure knows it’s the sirens that make her do it, but she can’t help the flare of terrified anger at seeing her lover throw herself into battle with a witcher who could cut her down in a single move. 

The white wolf doesn’t draw his blades though. She sees him move faster and more agile than one would expect from someone his size, and he never draws the blades from his back. He sidesteps Rachal deftly, putting himself behind her while he twists one of her wrists until she drops a cutlass. Azure can see her captain’s mouth open on an agonised scream, but can’t hear any noise either because of the plugs or the distance. She holds her breath as Rachal twists around and flips the blade in her free hand to bring it around with a swing toward the witcher’s neck. 

Geralt doesn’t even duck. He just barely tilts his head out of the way, and the sharp edge of the blade misses him by mere millimetres. The white wolf uses the momentum of his opponent's missed strike to unbalance her, and twists her other wrist. The second cutlass falls to the deck, and Azure stares, transfixed, as she sees the Warg’s captain call out something to one of his witchers. 

Azure imagines she can see her captain’s ears getting plugged, and when she sees Rachal sag in the white wolf’s grip, she does the same in Eskel’s. The relief is heady, and suddenly the ocean’s salt on her cheeks mingles with that of her tears. She doesn’t know how many of her crew have survived. She doesn’t really want to think about it. But Rachal has. She has. They’re both still here. 

—000—

“Lilaea!” the white wolf bellows, loud enough that she can hear it even under the water. 

She twists around with a simple stroke of her webbed hands, and looks toward the Crescent. When thunder flashes it lights up the sky, and enough of it penetrates into the dark water that her light sensitive eyes easily see the debris that’s sinking to the seafloor all around her. 

She looks to the underwater gap between the two large basalt borders that form the entrance to the Crescent, and sees the shimmer of magic, still in place. They have done everything Rience asked. They’ve betrayed the keeper, in trade for their children’s lives. They’re sacrificing their own now, and Lilaea knows that the keeper will have to exterminate them if they keep this up. Rience holds them under threat, and now the point has come she has to evaluate which threat is more pressing. The firemage and his spell, or the keeper of the code, the white wolf of Kaer Morhen. 

She thinks about the dreams she sent their little cousin after she saw him above the waves in the keeper’s arms. The second dream had led to the keeper coming here. It’s time to show they’re still allied with the Kaer, now that they know which way the coin will fall. She should have known, really, but the urge to protect their young had been too strong. She hopes the white wolf will understand, and will see how they tried to help. 

Lilaea sweeps her webbed feet through the water, and feels the coolness of it slide past the fins at her back. She cuts through the ocean, fast as any creature of the deep, and makes her way toward one of the two vessels still afloat. One is the Warg, it’s hull smooth and sleek, not unfamiliar, as she swims under it. The keeper is on the other, on the vessel that had only so recently been added by Rience. 

“My family” , she sings. “ Cease your song. We have to choose a side, and we’re not choosing fire. Have faith that our little cousin will help us break the spell. We’re choosing the code.”

—000—

Geralt is standing aboard the Black Tide. Eskel is dripping wet with seawater at his right side, and on his other is Rachal. The woman is soaked as well, but with rainwater, like he himself is. She’d insisted on being there for the confrontation, despite the quick beat of her heart and the way she sways slightly though her feet are firmly planted on her ship’s deck. She remains staunchly upright, her mouth tight and her dark eyes angry. 

After she’d come back to herself, the dark haired captain had frantically searched through what’s left of her crew, panic and fear wafting off of her until Eskel had climbed back on board and sought her out, letting her know her first mate is safe on board the Warg. Rachal had sagged for only a second, and Geralt had held her up with a strong hand on her upper arm. 

He can feel the woman’s anger rising as she stands next to him, a mirror of the rage that’s cresting higher and higher within himself, buoyed by the pit of dread in his stomach. He’d almost given the command to retreat to the Warg as soon as they’d gotten all pirates plugged up, but he needs information. If Rience is at Kaer Morhen, he needs to know how he got to be there, and what they’re going to find when they return. 

Geralt knows Lilaea has heard him when suddenly, the siren-song ceases. The slight headache behind his eyes wanes, but it only serves to make his anger rise.  Roach croaks where she’s perched on his shoulder, impatient, and he strokes her black feathers, sluicing rainwater off her wings as he pushes down on his own increasing agitation. 

He grits his teeth and narrows his eyes as a purple scaled, webbed hand closes around the Black Tide’s railing, and the queen of the sirens hauls herself on board. 

Lilaea is tall and slender, her body covered with purple scales, and her eyes the haunting aquamarine of her species. The last time Geralt had seen her she’d been pristine, her body made for slicing through the water, her fins a translucent plum colour with silvery veins running through them. Now though, she’s far from unblemished. He can see that some of the webs between her fingers and toes are frayed, as are the fins that run down her sides. Their edges seem strangely blackened. When he meets her eyes, there’s another flare of anger, bright in his chest. 

Half of her face is no longer scaled, but consists of scarred, gnarled flesh, ridged and angry red in colour. He remembers what Jaskier had told them. How his little bird had spotted a Siren with a burn mark on its face when they jumped back over from the Gulliver, and how Yen and Triss think that’s when the connection had been made. If that was Lilaea, the siren queen has been playing both sides in an effort to keep the Crescent’s cluster alive, until forced to make a choice. Geralt can understand. But it doesn’t mean he has to be happy about it.

“Did you send dreams to my bard?” he growls, baring his teeth. 

“Yes, keeper,” the siren responds, and in his peripheral Geralt sees Eskel’s hand go to his sword.

“The Vursnake is in the Crescent, but there’s no one on board. Where is Rience?”

Lilaea blinks at him, and points to Roach. “The raven knows,” she says in her layered, lilting voice, and Geralt bites back a curse. It’s confirmation. The firefucker is on his island. The island he left his little bird behind on, to keep him safe. And Geralt isn’t there to protect him.  

He gives quick orders for his witchers to retreat to the Warg and prepare her for speed. He looks at Rachal at his side. 

“We’ll find our way,” the Black Tide’s captain nods. “Just, my first mate is on board with you. Keep her alive?”

“No worries, Rachal,” Eskel says from his other side. “We’ll keep her safe.”

The black haired woman nods gratefully, something approximating a smile on her face as she briefly lays her hand on Eskel’s shoulder. “Thank you,” is all she says, before she, too, starts issuing orders. 

As his brothers start to make their way over onto their own ship, Geralt steps closer to the siren queen. “How did he breach the Kaer’s defences?” he asks curtly. 

“The merchant ship,” the siren answers. “It has a portal stone embedded between the masts. The ship is in your harbour, that’s how they got in.”

Geralt curses low under his breath. He jerks his head at her before he jumps back over to the Warg. She disappears under the waves, but climbs up the Warg’s side mere moments later. Geralt stands at the helm and bellows the order, and his witchers fly across the rigging. Thunder is loud in his ears, and bright lightning flashes in his eyes. 

“Go,” he tells Roach. “Let them know we’re coming.”  

The Raven blinks her grey eye at him, and briefly takes a few strands of his wet hair in her beak before she takes off with a mighty beat of her wings. 

Eskel climbs to the helm deck, herding the siren queen along, a grim expression on his face. 

“Tell us everything,” Geralt growls, as he turns the wheel and feels his ship slide across the waves, setting course for Kaer Morhen.

—000—

Tokar grins as he steps through the portal and is suddenly no longer on the Vursnake’s decks within the Crescent, but on deck of the smaller merchant ship, floating in the harbour of Kaer Morhen. 

He shakes the rainwater out of his eyes, and hears the rolling thunder of the winter storm, now far in the distance. The siren-song is loud in his ears, but it’s not aimed at him, and he’s not affected by it. He sees the filthy creatures in the water below, and curls his lip in disgust. Not long now, he says to himself. After they take the Island and eliminate the Warg and its witchers, the sirens are next. 

First though, first he’s going to see if he can find that one special person. He’d promised himself he’d hurt Lambert before he kills him, and he knows just how to do it. Besides, Oliver and him didn’t leave off on such a good note, did they? The sailor is the main reason he’d gotten Lambert’s fists slammed into his ribs. It’s high time Tokar lets him apologise. 

—000—

There’s a seemingly endless supply of pirates that come through the portal on the Gulliver. Oliver can see how some of them are under the siren’s spell. Those that look like they’re in a trance and seem to stare at something in the distance are the ones that don’t deserve to be killed. 

There’s fighting all around him, and he knows it’s impossible for all of them to survive. He manages to actually subdue a few of them, stuffing their ears with clay Jaskier had slipped into his pockets. Then there’s the ones not under the siren’s spell. The ones here because they hold allegiance to Rience, or a grudge against the Kaer.

Those are the ones that fight viciously, and have experience doing so. More than once he has to call out to a witcher for help. He manages to hold them off until that help arrives, and tries to handle it himself when he can. There’s only so much twelve witchers can do, and he knows the warriors are spread thin. 

He’s fighting a tall, thin pirate, with lank black hair hanging to his shoulders. The man’s eyes are sharp, and he grins at him every time he lunges forward. There are golden beads in his hair that swing with his every move. Oliver debates opening his mouth to call for Lambert, but the witcher has only just moved away from him minutes ago, responding to a cry for help a few streets over. 

The pirate strikes at him, and Oliver is just a smidge too slow lifting his blade to deflect it. He groans as the man drags his blade along his left forearm, his skin splitting and heated blood welling to the surface. The wound isn’t deep, but the pirate evidently expects it to distract the younger, more inexperienced fighter. 

Instead, Oliver doesn't let it slow him down and pushes through the pain and the slight out of body sensation at seeing his own blood, and changes his counter strike into a smooth, stabbing motion. The tip of his sword slides into the man’s chest, just beside his sternum, and when he hits bone he grits his teeth and charges forward, putting his weight behind it. The steel is caught on the pirate’s rib for a moment, but then slides over it, and into his heart. The pirate barely has time for his eyes to widen before he’s dead on the ground. 

Panting, Oliver pulls his blade free from the corpse in a state of shock. He feels sick at the sight of blood on his blade, and almost wants to throw the weapon away from him. He’s never killed before. 

Unknowingly, he’s traversed his way up higher into the town while fighting, farther away from the water. The street he’s on is empty, and he doesn’t know where Lambert went. He doesn’t know where Jaskier is. 

“Well, well, well,” a voice says from behind him, and he manages not to freeze in surprise before he whirls around, his blade in a defensive form in front of him. “So you do know how to fight,” Tokar says, a cruel smile on his face. “What was it then, Oliver, that made breaking your arm and taking back my money so, damn, easy ?”

And suddenly his arm hurts infinitely worse. It’s not the shallow cut, but more so the remembrance of the bones breaking under Tokar’s hold. 

“How did you get here?” Oliver snarls, taking a step back, and Tokar’s grin widens. 

“Through the portal, of course,” the pirate shrugs, and Oliver wonders how he could have ever believed the man was a friend. 

“What, you’re part of Rience’s crew?” he bites out, backing up another step without realising it. 

Tokar takes a step toward him, keeping the distance that separates them the same. “Hm, finally realised that, did you? You were very trustful, Oliver. It was kind of fun. Until you told Lambert our little secret. And that’s not what friends do, is it?”

“I’m not your friend,” Oliver bites out, trying to stand his ground. Tokar eyes the way he lifts his blade, and the pirate licks his lips and laughs, making chills travel down Oliver’s spine. 

“No. I guess not. Which is why I don’t feel bad about what I’m going to do to you, at all.”

Oliver grits his teeth and doesn’t respond, holding his defensive position. There’s a wall at his back, preventing the pirate from getting behind him. He thinks he can hold Tokar off, but the temptation to yell for Lambert is strong. Tokar is stronger than him, and has already overwhelmed him once before, back when Oliver still trusted him.  

“He likes you, you know. That’s why he almost killed me instead of merely kicking me off the island. A man only threatens like that when protecting something he holds dear. And that’s why this is going to hurt ,” Tokar says. 

The words are unexpected enough that they distract Oliver, and the pirate sees it. Tokar charges. The man is quick on his feet, quicker than someone with injuries to his ribs has any right to be, and Oliver is barely in time to turn away the cutlass that swipes at his face by sweeping up his own blade. 

Though he manages to deflect the attack, Tokar doesn’t slow, and Oliver only realises what the man intends when it’s already too late. The pirate slams him back into the wall behind him, and his breath rushes out of him at the impact. He tries to suck in air, to get oxygen back into his lungs, when the hand holding his sword is slammed into the wall, forcing him to let go. He struggles and tries to yank free from Tokar’s grip. He’s strong enough to give the pirate a run for his money, but he’s not as experienced. Tokar moves quickly, and before Oliver knows what’s happening, fingers are gripping his hair and his head is slammed into the brick. 

He doesn’t pass out, though it is a near thing.

He opens his mouth to call for Lambert, for any witcher who’s near enough to hear him. Tokar’s hand closes around his throat and cuts off his air, and Lambert’s name comes out in a whispered gasp. Oliver is forced to his knees, his back to the wall, Tokar towering over him. 

“Now, what do you think Lambert will make of it, when I tell him how I enjoyed your mouth?” the pirate says with a cruel grin. “I almost can’t wait for the Warg’s return to tell him.”

Oliver feels sick as the pirate standing over him releases his throat, only to press a blade against it instead, forcing his chin up, and fumbles his belt with his other hand. The buckle doesn’t open easily, and foolishly enough, Tokar takes his eyes off of him, to look down at what he’s doing. It lets Oliver slip the small, but sharp blade from his boot surreptitiously, and he waits for the man to lower his pants. 

As soon as he does, pulling his trousers down his thighs to expose himself, Oliver darts the blade forward, angling himself away from the sword at his neck at the same time. He aims for the base of the man’s cock, and hot blood spurts over his hand. To his surprise, Tokar doesn’t scream. All he hears is a strange sort of gurgling sound, which cuts off as abruptly as it began. 

When he looks up, the pirate’s head is no longer attached to his shoulders, and the dead body is hauled away from him. 

Lambert’s gaze is directed at where he’s flung Tokar’s body, halfway down the street. There is a sticky residue of blood dripping off his sword, and his slitted yellow eyes are filled with fury. When he looks back at where Oliver is now sitting on the ground, sagging against the wall instead of kneeling, his expression softens. 

“Hey there, Ollie,” Lambert murmurs to him, and Oliver is only half aware he’s staring at the blade in his hand, at the way it’s covered in more blood. The witcher crouches in front of him, and he sees the redhead take stock of him, eyes briefly pausing on the cut at his arm, before returning to the small weapon he's holding. “Guess you got him good, Oll. Didn’t need me after all,” Lambert says. 

Dazedly, Oliver nods at him. When he looks at where Lambert threw Tokar, a wave of dizziness overtakes him. He drops the knife from his hand, and reaches for the witcher. Lambert cradles him to his chest for a moment, hand stroking through the hair at the back of his head. The gesture seems tender, but he knows Lambert is doing it to check for injuries. When the witcher pulls back his hand, it comes away wet with blood. 

Lambert’s lip curls back from his teeth. “Let’s get you somewhere safe,” he growls, and Oliver can hardly find the energy to protest when he can barely find it to stay conscious.

—000—

Jaskier has lost track of Lambert and Oliver. Both of them had told him to hide and make his way back up to the keep after seeing Rience step through the portal. He can’t do that though, not when he can’t shake the feeling he’s still meant to help. 

So, instead of slinking back up toward the castle he skirts along the town’s edge, away from the fighting and the large rocky pier, away from Rience, toward the far edge of the bay. He thinks he’s been called here by the sirens, thinks they want to speak to him. He doesn’t know how to call upon them though, how to let them know he’s here to listen. 

He sits himself behind a large boulder that protrudes halfway into the bay, the waves lapping against it with a slight rushing sound. He washes the remnants of clay off his hands and tries to shake the cold out of them. When he balls his left into a fist, the scarring pulls slightly, and he looks up at the sky, searching for the silhouette of a raven.

He closes his eyes and thinks of his white wolf. When the image of Geralt comes to him, it’s of the witcher high up in the Warg’s rigging, moonlight hair whipping in the wind. It’s of him bent over a map, eyes following Jaskier as he moves through the great cabin. It’s of him stroking his broad hand over Roach’s back, of the rare times he smiles. It's of the way he always lays his hands on Jaskier’s hips and pulls him in. It’s of the way he lounges in his hammock, posture relaxed, listening as Jaskier talks himself to sleep in his bed. It’s of the golden sheen of his eyes, when he leans down to kiss him. 

Jaskier keeps his eyes closed to keep the images at the forefront of his mind, as he swings his lute case to his front and undoes the buckles by touch. There is a song, his favourite, of the maiden stuck in an enchanted forest and the horse that leads her out, to freedom. When he’d sung it on the mess deck, he had sung of a wolf instead, but hadn’t dared change the maiden to a man. He hadn’t finished the song either, but now he knows how he wants it to end. 

He strums his fingers over the strings softly, the sound of the lute clear and harmonious, and starts to sing. He knows it’s only a matter of time until the sirens come. 

Chapter Text

Lilaea knows that the keeper is angry. She can see it in the tension of his shoulders, the clench of his hands around the ship’s wheel, and the way his golden eyes flash. She can understand the anger. She thinks the white wolf’s fury is made worse because he doesn’t have his bard. Geralt is angry because Kaer Morhen and its occupants are in danger, but she thinks the sharpness of it is due in large part to the danger the bard is in. Their little cousin.

There is anger all around her, not just from the keeper himself, but just as strongly from his men. Lilaea wonders if it was all worth it. She’d made her decisions based on what would help her family survive, but in doing so, she betrayed the code. She knows every witcher on board is aware of her presence, and she can almost feel how the predators’ senses are keeping track of her. Usually it’s her that’s at the top of the food chain. She never is, when witchers are present.

Right now though, they need each other. They need their little cousin to help break the spell, and Geralt needs information. Lilaea is going to give him everything he wants. She has betrayed the code, and though she had no choice at the time, she still wishes she could go back. She can only hope that once all this is over, she’ll be the only one to bear the consequences. Her family did nothing more than protect their own, following her orders. Her daughter is young still, but wise. Wiser than she herself is, maybe. If there is to be retribution for her betrayal, she will ask Geralt to kill her as the one responsible. She thinks he’ll listen. After she is gone, her daughter will be the next queen of the Crescent.

“Tell us everything,” Geralt growls, and Lilaea is glad to not bear the brunt of his complete focus. Half of his attention is on the sailors in the rigging, the set of the Warg’s sails, and the open ocean before them. Next to him, Eskel crosses his arms over his chest.

She takes a deep breath, spreading her fingers to show how some of the webs between them have been burnt away. “When Rience came, it was with magic. We fought, and we were going to win. We were going to drown every last one of them, and drag the mage down to the deep. He tricked us. We sang, but somehow he had found magic to capture our voices.”

Both witchers raise their eyebrows at her, and Lilaea lets them see the anger she feels. The fins along her sides and back lift and flatten themselves, the movement of the spines showcasing to any siren that she is furious. She thinks the witchers know, too.

“We teach our children to sing by letting them participate. He did not capture the voice of any adult siren. He captured the voices of our children . He controls their song now. We had no choice, keeper. They will die without their voice. Our children are at Kaer Morhen now. He’s using them to sing.”

—000—

Jaskier keeps his eyes closed until the song’s final verse. When he finally sings about the young man climbing onto the white wolf’s back to be led out of the enchanted forest, he lets his gaze track over the water before him. There is a shock of adrenaline to his system when he’s met by a pair of aquamarine eyes, but he manages to keep it from resonating through his voice. 

Just the part of the siren that’s above the surface is visible, the rest of it is obscured by the dark water. He can only see its forehead and eyes, and the way long black hair spreads wetly around it, the locks drifting with the current like an octopus’ tentacles. When he finishes, they stare at each other. The sound of the waves lapping at the edge of the bay is strangely soothing compared to the noise of fighting and violence from the town. 

Jaskier carefully puts his lute back in its case, snapping the buckles shut, and shifting it to the side. Then he scrabbles to stand, wet sand clinging to his clothes and hands. He faces the siren in the water and tilts his head. “Won’t you come out to talk to me?” he asks. 

In response, the siren disappears under the surface. Jaskier clenches his fists and wants to let out a frustrated yell, but then the siren surfaces again, closer this time. It’s only the top part of its head again. And though Jaskier has no idea how he can tell, he gets the feeling that this one is young. Just a girl. Her Aquamarine eyes are large and otherworldly, and he thinks she’s afraid. 

Slowly, he spreads his hands in a gesture of peace. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he says. “I just want to talk. I want to help you. One of you has been sending me dreams. Your song— I think it called me here?”

The siren stares at him for a little longer, and just when Jaskier thinks she will disappear under the surface again, she approaches, slowly rising out of the water. Her scales are a lighter purple than the siren he’d seen in his dreams, and he thinks it supports his assessment that she is young. 

When she stops before him, he can’t help the pounding of his heart, and has to keep himself from flinching back from her. Large aquamarine eyes track over him, and he thinks she can tell he’s also afraid. She blinks once, and then she copies the tilt of his head, and the spread of his hands. 

“Oh, okay,” he says on a breath. “You’re not going to hurt me. Did you call me here? What can I do?” It’s impossible to tell the siren’s age exactly, but if Jaskier had to guess, he’d put her just at the precipice of adulthood. He’s grateful to see she has no burns to her body. He wonders why one so young came to him, and not one of the adult sirens, like the one who’d come to him in his dream. 

The siren opens her mouth, and he can briefly see the pearlescent shine of her sharp teeth. No sound comes from her throat. In the distance, he can still hear the lilting melody of the siren song. He looks between the town where his people are being controlled, and the siren before him. “ Can you tell me how to help?” he asks.

Slowly, the siren lifts her hand, and taps webbed fingers to the base of her throat. Then she shakes her head, and points toward the town. She taps her throat again, and opens her mouth. No sound comes out. 

Jaskier feels the hair on his arms stand on end. “You don’t have your voice?” he says, horrified by the realisation. The siren shakes her head, and points toward the town again. Jaskier follows the line of her arm, and sees she’s actually indicating the Gulliver. The merchant ship is no longer lit by the glow of the portal, and there is a stab of fear in his stomach. It probably means that all of Rience’s men have come through, those who have come willingly, and those that are being controlled. All of them are on Kaer Morhen now. 

The siren clicks her pointed teeth together to get his attention, and Jaskier focusses back on her. She taps her throat again, and this time, the point is a little more aggressive. 

“Rience took your voice?” Jaskier asks her, and gets a few quick blinks from her large eyes, and a nod. He sucks in a careful breath. If this young siren has had her song taken, maybe the others have too. They’re here, but they’re not the ones singing and controlling people. If they can get their song back, it might well turn the tide of this fight into a victory for the Kaer, with as few casualties as possible. “So how do we get it back?” he asks. “How do I help get your voices from Rience, if you can’t tell me how?”

The siren steps forward to grab his hand, lightning quick, and before Jaskier knows what’s happening, he’s dragged into the water.

—000—

The water is frigid and dark, and he barely manages to suppress his gasp at the shock of cold, as his head is pulled under the waves. The siren might be young, but she’s terrifyingly strong. Her fingers around his wrist are firm, and seem to be even colder than the water. He can feel the panic encroaching from all sides. If she wants to keep him under, she’s perfectly capable of it, and Jaskier doesn’t want to drown. It’s not surprising it takes a while for him to realise the siren is talking to him under the water. As soon as he does, his panic starts to fade. 

“I’m sorry, cousin,” she says. “Let me get you up for a breath, now that you know why I pulled you under.”

She pushes him up, and surfaces with him. Jaskier gasps for breath and tries to keep from shivering. “How come you can talk to me below the water?” he asks. When the siren flicks her aquamarine eyes down, it’s a clear question if he’s ready to go back under. “My name is Jaskier, what’s yours?” he asks, before he gives her a nod, and lets her pull him back down.

“I’m glad to meet you. Though I wish it would’ve been under better circumstances. I’m Skylla, daughter of Lilaea,” the siren says. Her voice doesn’t have that strange, hypnotising quality the siren song has, and is remarkably soft under the water. 

Jaskier blinks at her through the murk, to signal he has understood. 

“I can only speak to you under the water. The firemage’s magic is of heat and flames. It is weakest under the surface, though it’s not gone.” 

Jaskier nods again, and points upward. Skylla propels both of them to the surface easily, with a single, powerful kick of her webbed feet, her long fingers holding onto his upper arms. They surface again, and he shakes away the salt water, his eyes stinging with the pain of having them open while submerged. “You’ve been calling to me, haven’t you? I want to help, but I don’t know how.” Skylla smiles at him, her teeth pointed like a predator’s, and though she hasn’t given any indication she would harm him, Jaskier feels his heart rate increase. He nods at her again when she tilts her head, and goes back under again. 

“Yes, we’ve been calling to you. With our voices being controlled, we weren’t sure you would understand. We do need your help. Rience has captured our voices, mine, and the other young ones’. He’s using us to compel. He wants to take over the Kaer. If he succeeds, the oceans won’t be safe. Not for anyone, creature or human.” 

Jaskier nods, and signals to Skylla that he needs to surface. “I understand,” he says once they come up again. “You’re being forced— to force others. How? How do we stop it?”

This time when they dive back under the water, Jaskier keeps his eyes closed against the burn of salt. It takes some trust, going down into the water with the siren while being unable to see her, but he guesses that if Skylla wanted to hurt him, she could do so even with him keeping an eye on her. They’re in her domain, after all. 

“ We can’t stop it. The magic the firemage used to capture our voices is ancient. It turns our song against us, against others, and we stand powerless. If we don’t get our voices back, we’ll die. If we attack Rience, the magic will throttle us, and we’ll die. Our only chance is to have someone break the magic, and that’s where you come in, cousin.”

Jaskier’s eyes are closed, and he doesn’t see Skylla as she talks, but he can hear the anger and fear in her words. She propels him upward again, and he meets her aquamarine gaze after he blinks away the salt. “That’s where I come in? I want to stop this as much as you do. We have to stop him, to save Kaer Morhen and its people. I’ll save you if I can. But Rience— I’m no match for the firemage,” he says, and his voice takes on a strangled tone, his fear evident. “Is it our only option? Is the only way to stop the song and free both you and our people through Rience? How many of his pirates are there that you don’t control?”

Skylla looks sad and nods, dragging him back down again. “I’m sorry, Jaskier,” she says, and he thinks she means it. “There are not so many that we don’t control. If the magic is broken and our song ceases, the firemage will be easy to overwhelm, and your people, and mine, will be safe.” 

Jaskier gestures at her to keep going, holding his breath, his heart pounding with dread. 

“The magic must be broken by someone who understands what it would mean to have their voice taken away, someone who understands that music and melody is life. The magic must be broken by killing the one that cast it.”  

Jaskier’s eyes fly open under the water, despite the salt, and he sees Skylla staring at him. He thinks she looks pleading. 

“Rience has to be killed, and for us to be free, you have to be the one to do it.”

When they surface, Jaskier sputters and coughs, salt water coming out of his mouth and nose. “I have to kill Rience?” he says, his voice coming out close to hysteric. “I don’t know how to do that. I can’t do that. You don’t understand, Skylla. I’ve met Rience before and I have no chance against him. He’ll win and he— he’ll hurt me.”

Though she takes him down again, she doesn’t immediately speak. “He hurt you? And he’ll hurt you again?” She grabs his left hand under the water, her webbed fingers tracing over the burn pattern delicately. “I understand. I won’t ask this of you then. You have no obligation to us. It just— means the Crescent is lost.” Skylla doesn’t say anything more, and she looks strangely tranquil for a moment, her long black hair floating around her like seaweed. Then she takes him back up.

Jaskier studies her as they surface. The siren looks sad and scared at the same time, and it strikes him again how young she appears. Younger than he himself, certainly. She’s holding him above the water, and slowly swims them back to shore, back to the boulder where he deposited his lute. When they reach it, he wades out of the water. Skylla follows behind, but eventually stops and remains in the bay, water coming up to her knees. She looks back over her shoulder for a moment, in the direction they can hear the flowing melody of the siren song. She shrugs helplessly as she turns back to him, before lifting her fingers to her throat again. She then lowers them to rest over her heart, before she turns away.

Jaskier bites at the inside of his lip, and tries to regulate his breathing as Geralt taught him. He knows what he’s going to do. What he has to do. “Wait!” He calls, and the siren turns around. “I’ll try,” he says through gritted teeth, trying to keep a hold on his fear. “I’ll try to kill Rience.”

In the water, Skylla tilts her head at him, lifting both hands to her heart, and slips under the surface. 

—000—

Jaskier runs back toward the town. There was never a choice, really. If the sirens are being forced into this, he’s going to do everything he can to get them out of it. He still thinks they’re rather frightening, but Skylla had been scared, for her own life and that of her family. Jaskier can relate to that. 

He has to find Rience. If the siren is correct, killing the mage will give them their voices back, and all those who are still under the influence of their song will be freed. He has to find Rience and be the one to kill him to break the magic. But, that doesn’t mean he has to face him alone. He runs toward the village, intent on finding Lambert. 

When he enters the town he stays in the shadows. He sees the people he knows from the town fighting. He’s heartened to see that there are many of them who are apparently fully cognisant again, and defending themselves and others from Rience’s pirates. He very carefully doesn’t look at the bodies he spots, lying unmoving on the cobblestones, and can only hope those aren’t people he knows, and aren’t people who’d been forced to fight by siren song. He doesn’t see Lambert, or any other witcher for that matter, and briefly debates calling out to the redhead. He decides against it though, not wanting to attract attention to himself.

Instead, he slinks through the town, keeping to the sides of the streets, ducking away behind crates or carts, or into an alleyway every now and again, to avoid detection. There are small groups of pirates roaming around, cutlasses in their hands, clearly looking to overwhelm the townspeople of Kaer Morhen by numbers. Those compelled by sirens remain solitary, but they are just as dangerous. Jaskier grips the long dagger at his side more than once, ready to defend himself, but thankfully remains unseen. All the while, he keeps a look out for Lambert’s dark red hair. 

—000—

In the end, he should have known his luck would run out eventually. 

It’s not Rience who finds him, but a pirate from his crew Jaskier abhors equally as much. He can vividly remember how the man had grabbed him, as he walked to the dubious safety of Rience’s great-cabin. He remebers how he had pulled him in, and put his hands in intimate places. What he still dreams about though, is how the bald pirate had stabbed Adrienne, and then smiled at him with her blood in his teeth. 

Jaskier is quietly running away from a small group of pirates a street over, looking back over his shoulder, when he all but crashes into the man. He is disoriented at first, but Skell recognises him immediately. He grabs onto him, and as soon as Jaskier hears the man’s voice, he freezes. 

“Well, I guess this is my lucky day. Hello, consort ,” the bald pirate grins at him. 

Like the last time Jaskier saw him, his face is flecked with blood, and his dark eyes are cruel. To his horror, he feels the adrenaline surge through his bloodstream, and is aware of how his muscles lock up in response, holding him still in the pirate’s grasp like a frightened rabbit. He sees dark spots dancing in his vision, and knows he’s not breathing. All he can do is stand there, and look up at the man who’d killed his protector on the Seablade. The man who had gripped him until he bruised darkly. A man Rience might have shared him with, eventually. 

His first instinct is to fight against his freezing, but he has learnt that doesn’t work. Has learnt because Geralt taught him. He focuses on his breathing instead, and manages to take in a few shallow breaths. Skell is looking around in the meantime, as if he’s checking no one is nearby. Jaskier has just returned to himself a little, and is preparing to try one of the method’s he’s been taught to slip away, when the pirate turns back to him, and his grin widens. 

He knows what that grin means, and Jaskier yells, as loud as he can. He doesn’t care that it’s just as likely for him to be heard by some of Rience’s pirates, as it is for a witcher to pick up on his scream. He wants to form words, but instead, nothing more than a loud, terrified sound rips from his throat. He has time to spare half a thought to the dagger at his belt, before Skell drags him along, and into an alleyway. 

He can admit he’s surprised when the pirate doesn’t stop in the alley. He’d fully expected Skell to finish what he started on board the Vursnake all those months ago. Instead, the thug just keeps dragging him along. He has one hand wrapped around both of Jaskier’s wrists, and is walking at a pace that makes him stumble. Whenever he does, his knees drag harshly over the cobblestones until he manages to get his feet back under him. He hasn’t lost his dagger yet. The pirate did not even make the effort to take it from him, but with the way he’s being hauled along, he has no chance of grabbing the weapon, let alone make use of it. 

He remembers Geralt’s words. If you can’t free yourself immediately, conserve your energy for when you can. If they haven’t silenced you, wait for the right moment, and yell for me, or for any witcher.  So, Jaskier tries to keep from getting hurt while being dragged along, tries to bide his time, and takes in his surroundings in an effort to determine where Skell is taking him. 

Eventually, the pirate hurls him forward in a way that’s strangely reminiscent of the way he’d been thrown out onto the Seablade’s deck. His hands scrape over cold stone, and his knees bear the brunt of the impact. 

There is one big difference compared to all those months ago. This time, he doesn’t wait to be hauled to his feet, his arms held behind him by Rience’s crew. This time, he rises on his own, and pulls out the long dagger from its sheath. He’s sure he can’t defeat Rience by himself, but what he can do, is fight for survival until he gets help. He’ll fight to live, fight to keep Rience from violently taking what he wants to give to his white wolf with all the love he has.

He’s surrounded by Rience’s pirates, though he only recognises a handful from his time on the Vursnake. He’s aware of Skell’s presence behind him, but most of his focus is on the man in front of him. 

The firemage looks just like he remembers. Shoulder length, brown hair, burned away from part of his scalp, the scar extending over the upper left part of his face. Deep brown eyes that look at Jaskier in a way that sends a shiver of revulsion down his spine. Silver gauntlets on his hands. As he looks, a slow smile slides onto Rience’s face. 

“Ah, Consort. I’m so glad to have found you. I regretted that we were parted so soon last time. Thank you, Skell. You’ll be rewarded accordingly,” Rience says, and Jaskier doesn’t want to think about what the mage means by that. Rience’s voice sounds like he’s casually conversing, as if Jaskier in turn should be glad to see him. The mage looks at the dagger in his hand, and snaps his fingers. The bright orange flame that appears is almost blinding in the darkness, and Jaskier can’t help but clench his hands, his left into a fist, scars pulling tight, his right around the blade’s hilt. “Do you want to drop that, consort? ” Rience says, his tone sardonic. 

Jaskier shakes his head, dividing his attention between the pirates around him, Skell behind him, and Rience right across from him, fire in his hands. “No,” he says, and his voice comes out strong, more confident than he feels. “No, I don’t think I will.” 

He sees the way Rience’s rage takes over his expression, and tries to keep his hands from trembling, tries to stand his ground. He holds the dagger like Geralt taught him, and focuses his attention on the mage in front of him. He doesn’t think Rience will let any of the others attack him. He’ll want to subdue him himself. 

Just as Jaskier can feel the tension crest, when he thinks it’s about to break, there is a sound from high above, and a black shadow swoops down to land on his shoulder. Roach’s nails dig in through the fabric of his doublet, but he’s wholly, intensely grateful for it. Her grey eye blinks at him as she ruffles her feathers, and she croaks loudly. 

Geralt is coming.

Chapter Text

It takes too long. Geralt wishes the Warg could sail at the same speed that Roach flies. Every time they need to adjust course to make the most of the cold winter wind, they travel additional distance, and he curses the fact Kaer Morhen’s wards prevent Yennefer from opening a portal directly. He’d asked her if she could make use of the portal stone on the Gulliver to circumvent the island’s magical protections, the way Rience had, but it’s apparently attuned to the magical signature of the firemage. 

Eskel is right next to him, and he knows his first mate shares the tension that is coiling in his gut, the anger and fear in his heart, and the violence building in every tautened muscle of his body. When Kaer Morhen finally appears on the horizon, he doesn’t really need to issue the command, but he does so anyway. The Warg turns sharply, sails set at an angle, making straight for the opening of the natural bay. 

Next to them, Lilaea makes a soft trilling noise that’s barely audible over the sound of the waves, and blinks large, aquamarine eyes at him. He gives her a curt nod, and the siren slips away from the helm deck and over the railing, disappearing beneath the dark surface of the ocean. 

Geralt grits his teeth as they get closer and the sounds of fighting reach his ears over the distance. He sees the echo of awareness ripple over his crew, sees how they are prepared for violence, and knows that those on the island with loyalty to Rience, are not likely to leave it alive. 

Geralt doesn’t make the effort to have the Warg pull into its berth, but orders his witchers to lower the sails and drop anchor in the middle of the bay. He knows there are sirens in Kaer Morhen’s waters, but Lilaea will have let them know of their arrival. If any of them will impede them in spite of it, their lives will be forfeit. He orders three witchers to remain on board, and the rest of his crew quickly checks over their armour and weapons, making sure everything is secured before they take the plunge. Both Yennefer and Triss cut away their skirts as they get ready at the railing, standing between the warriors. Both sorceresses have determined looks on their faces, and Geralt knows they will do their utmost to weave incantations to weaken the siren song, and the firemage’s magic.

He bares his teeth while he looks at his crew. “We take back our home. We protect our people. Go. ” 

He isn’t met with shouts or the banging of weapons, but his warriors nod as one, and he knows every last one of them is prepared to lay down their lives to protect what they hold dear. He turns to his brother as their crew jumps over the railing, plunging into the water down below. 

Eskel squeezes his shoulder. “Let's find the little bird,” he says, and Geralt tries to keep control of the fear in his heart. 

—000—

Roach shifts on his shoulder, settling, and Jaskier is intensely grateful for her presence. He is the one that’s going to have to end Rience’s life, and if Geralt is coming, his chances of being successful have increased dramatically. All he needs to do now is stay alive until his white wolf actually gets here.  

In front of him, fire dances above Rience’s palm, and some of the rage has left his expression to be replaced by careful calculation. Jaskier hefts the long dagger in front of him, and adjusts his stance as Geralt taught him. He knows he can’t win, not surrounded with hostile pirates as he is, but maybe he can keep the scarred captain distracted and talking long enough for help to arrive. 

“Final chance, consort,” Rience says, and his voice has lost all its previous casualness. “Final chance to drop the dagger. Drop it, or I roast that bird.”

Jaskier’s breath hisses between his teeth, and he moves his free hand up to Roach reflexively, betraying just how much that threat hits home. Rience’s lips curl in response, and he knows the mage fully expects him to comply. He keeps his gaze locked with the firemage’s, but instead of obeying he softly pets over Roach’s feathers before letting her hop onto his wrist. The large raven twists her head to regard him, and croaks softly. She takes a few strands of his hair into her beak, and when Rience’s face twists, Jaskier hefts his arm to give her a boost up into the air. He’s just in time for the blast of fire to find empty space, but he can feel the scorching heat of it on his face as Roach spreads her wings and her dark form blends into the night sky. 

Rience looks unbothered by the raven getting away, but Jaskier can tell that it’s a carefully maintained facade, and the mage is angry. He holds the dagger out in front of him. 

“So the bird is saved, but how will you save yourself, consort? Have I not told you before? Though I like a challenge, if you keep disobeying me I’ll have to punish you.”

Jaskier grits his teeth. “Don’t call me consort,” he bites out. 

Rience’s eyebrows raise. “But that’s what you are. And that’s what you will be. You bear my mark,” at that, the mage nods toward Jaskier’s left hand, where the scars stand out starkly, ghostly white flames against his skin. “You’re mine, and I’ll call you whatever I want. I think you need a reminder of who is in charge here.”

Jaskier knows it’s coming, and even if he didn’t, the words are warning enough. Fire erupts from Rience’s hand and hurtles toward him. He can feel the approaching heat of it, and forces himself to take a deep breath. Now is not the time to freeze. He knows Rience wants to burn him, but the mage won’t do it where it matters, not where the scars of it will mar his appearance.

The flames don’t hit him. Instead they encircle him, separating him from the surrounding pirates. There is heat from all sides now and getting closer, but he keeps his eyes on the firemage, staring across the orange flames. Rience grins, and then he steps through. 

It’s the two of them now, encircled by the mage’s magic. Rience’s crew is still there, but they’re separated from them by the magical fire, and Jaskier is actually relieved by it. Rience by himself is bad enough, of course, but it seems the captain is so confident in his ability to subdue him that he’s actually given him a better chance of delaying everything, a better chance of survival. Rience grins again, and there is a cruel edge to the smile that makes his stomach turn. The mage starts to circle him like a predator, and months ago, this would have been enough to have panic raging through his system, freezing him in place. 

The panic and fear is still there, and Jaskier knows that if he lets it, it could encompass everything. He has practised though. He’s spent time in the training hall with Geralt nearly every morning. He’d hoped he would never need to make use of it, but now that he does, he’s going to be damned if he’s going to let Geralt down. He takes deep, slow breaths, holds his ready stance, and slowly turns, keeping the firemage in his sights. 

From high above, he thinks he hears Roach release another low croak. 

—000—

Geralt has taught him the changes in stance and muscle tension that signal an attack. It’s how Jaskier knows Rience is coming for him, just before it happens. He sees the minute shift of the mage’s weight onto his front foot, sees the muscles roll in his shoulders and his eyes shift over him quickly. It’s a split second warning, but it’s enough. 

The firemage moves quickly, closing the distance between them, and with his hand still shrouded in flames makes a grab for him. Jaskier sees it coming and twists to the side, stepping and turning at the same time, swiping the long dagger at the pirate’s outstretched arm. He thinks he should have tried to stab the man’s torso, but he doesn’t dare step in close enough to do so. His counterattack won’t be enough to seriously injure the firemage, but it might be enough for the scarred captain to be wary of his weapon, and keep his distance long enough to buy Jaskier time. 

To his relief, the sharp edge of his blade meets skin above Rience’s gauntlet, and he hears the man curse. Jaskier retreats as far as he can, the fire behind him hot enough for it to sting the skin of his back. His eyes are drawn to the blood dripping down the silver covering Rience’s hand, and he feels a fierce satisfaction, more than he thought he ever could at the sight of blood.

When he looks up at the mage again, the pirate has a smile on his face, and he looks deranged. Jaskier feels the hair on his arms stand up in response, and harshly bites the inside of his lip, using the slight pain to remind himself to keep breathing. 

“You’re going to pay for that, consort. We’ve taken over Kaer Morhen. The keeper is gone. This is my island now, and I am its king. I can’t have my consort attacking me. You’ll learn though. I will teach you.”

Jaskier grits his teeth and takes long, slow breaths, keeping his ready stance. The mage’s words have fear clenching around his heart like a fist, and he desperately reminds himself that it won’t happen. 

It won’t, because the white wolf is coming. The true keeper of Kaer Morhen, and the one Jaskier trusts with every fibre of his being. 

Rience keeps moving forward, and Jaskier barely manages to evade him, time and again. He tries to swipe at the mage with the blade in his hand, but Rience is now aware he will fight back, and he doesn’t come close. His hair is wet with sweat, and droplets are dripping down the back of his neck, the fire around them seemingly increasing in temperature every time he comes close to it. 

Jaskier knows it’s only a matter of time before he makes a mistake. However much he has practised with Geralt, he is not a seasoned fighter where Rience certainly is, and the mage has magic to boot.

When the pirate finally grabs onto him, it is because Jaskier is too slow to react. Rience is suddenly there, within the protective circle of his dagger, grabbing onto his wrists with hands hot like molten lead. He cries out at the pain of it, and to his horror his hand loses all strength, and the dagger drops to the ground. Rience hauls him in against him, and distantly he can hear shouts and jeers from beyond the circle of flames. The scarred captain bends his head to speak in his ear. 

“Maybe if you beg, I’ll only burn you a little.”

The words are enough to make the fear Jaskier has been keeping under control so very carefully swell into an insurmountable wave, and he’s distantly aware he’s stopped breathing, his body frozen in Rience’s grip. The mage has him. Jaskier is in his hold, unable to break free, and the only weapon he had has fallen to the ground out of reach somewhere. Stark images of his time on board the Vursnake flash before his eyes, and he can feel himself tremble. There is a frightened noise that threatens to burst from his chest, and the heated sweat on his body has suddenly turned cold with terror. He has tried so hard to be strong and to fight, but he’s caught within himself, back to being nothing more than the spoils of this conflict, to be taken by the victor.

Though he can’t really process what is happening around him, he does notice the way Rience smiles.

Jaskier is pressed down into the ground, the cold cobblestones against his back a strange contrast to the surrounding fire uncomfortably heating the rest of him. Rience is holding him down easily, a knee pressing harshly into his sternum, and he can’t really find enough breath to even try struggling free. The mage’s other knee is pressing into the bicep of his right arm, pinning it down, and then he grabs Jaskier’s left. 

The firemage pulls his hand toward him, inspecting the pale scars that crisscross the skin of his palm and fingers, all the way up to his wrist.

“No,” he says, but it comes out as nothing more than a whisper. 

“Yes,” Rience says, looking down at him, conjuring fire.

—000—

Seawater drips off of him as he follows his captain up the beach and into the town. Every now and again Geralt lifts his face into the wind, nostrils flaring, and Eskel knows he’s desperately trying to pick up the bard’s scent. It’s nigh impossible though. The coppery tinge of blood is heavy in the air, and so are the rich scents of clay, of so many people pumping out adrenaline, and further away, the hot-ashy scent of fire. Eskel lifts his face too, but doesn’t find a trace of the Buttercup. His brother looks back at him.

“Anything?” Geralt asks. His expression and tone would seem impassive to those who don’t know him, but Eskel knows better. He can see the anger and fear in the clench of Geralt’s jaw and hear it in the way he asks. He grabs onto his brother’s shoulder.

“Just fire and blood, wolf,” he says. Geralt bends his white head, and his mask breaks for a fraction of a second. Eskel squeezes him more tightly. “We won’t stop until we find him,” he growls, and his captain’s stoic expression slides into place as quickly as it had fallen. Neither of them says anything about how long it might take them, and what Rience might be able to do in that time. 

They quickly make their way up into the town. All around them the ongoing fights are suddenly decided when the witchers of Kaer Morhen join the fray. Eskel distantly registers that the scent of blood gets stronger around them, and the way some heartbeats suddenly just, stop. He can also hear the bewildered questions and cries of people being freed from the influence of the siren song. Despite the quick progress, it will take a while before they have the island back under control and their people are safe. 

Eskel looks at the tense line of Geralt’s shoulders as his captain moves ahead of him with singular intent. He desperately hopes the bard is unharmed. For the little bird’s sake, but for his brother’s, too.

“Geralt! Eskel!” a familiar voice bellows, and they turn as one. Lambert skids to a halt in front of them. He is splattered with blood, droplets of sweat leaving clear tracks in their wake. “Thank fuck you’re here.”

Their little brother wipes a rough hand over his face, and Eskel watches Geralt step close. Lambert’s spine stiffens for a moment, his posture at attention, and this is a subordinate reporting to his captain and first mate. Though Lambert has a penchant for being obstinate, he never is when it matters, and he does nothing more than give them a quick report on the conflict during the time they have been gone. 

“Oliver?” Geralt asks, and Eskel sees a myriad of emotions pass over the younger wolf’s face. 

“He’s okay. He’s safe,” Lambert says, his voice tight. “Held his own better than I ever could have fuckin hoped. Took out Tokar. Turns out the bastard is part of Rience’s crew.”

Eskel growls at that, and feels a momentary stab of regret at holding Lambert back from killing the pirate who’d accosted Jaskier at the beginning of winter. “Dead?” he asks, and Lambert nods. 

“Good,” Geralt growls, before looking up at the keep. “When did you last see Jaskier? In the Kaer?”

Suddenly Lambert looks uncomfortable. “No. He was here, in the town. The siren song doesn’t affect him. If not for him, we would have lost so many more. We’d have been forced to kill our own. He came up with the idea to stuff their ears with clay. After we saw Rience and his pirates step through, I sent him back up to the keep. I don’t— I don’t know if he went.”

Eskel can hear the doubt and guilt in Lambert’s voice, and sees momentary anger flash in Geralt’s eyes. He prepares to step between his captain and their little brother, but it isn’t necessary. He should have known better. Geralt’s anger might be quick to rouse when it comes to their bard, but the white wolf has more forbearance than he lets on, especially when it comes to those he loves, and their little brother definitely falls into that category.

“He didn’t go,” Geralt says. “Not if what Lilaea told us is true. He’d have tried to help.”

Eskel sees dread tighten Lambert’s expression, and the redhead turns to face in the direction of the orange glow of fire in the distance. “That fire has only just started. I’d say that is where we find Rience.”

The three of them exchange glances. If Rience is there, they all hope it’s not where they’ll find Jaskier, but it’s the first place they’ll look. They don’t need to exchange words, their purpose singular. As they barrel down the streets, Roach is suddenly above them, croaking loudly, urging them on, and Eskel curses more vehemently than even Lambert on his worst days. 

When they reach the location of the fire, there is a ring of it with pirates all around the outside. In the centre of the blazing circle Jaskier is on the ground with Rience holding him down, grasping the bard’s left hand, about to put flames to his fingers. Eskel glances over at his brother. 

There are stories about the white wolf. Stories that have ships trying to outrun them as soon as they see the black banner with the snarling wolf’s head at the Warg’s stern. He knows half of those stories aren’t true, but right now, even he would believe every last one of them. 

Geralt looks like something out of a nightmare.

—000—

Jaskier doesn’t really register when the sounds of jeering and whistles change to something else entirely. He doesn’t really notice that Rience is suddenly distracted, his scarred face turning away to something happening beyond the circle of flames. He is too focussed on the grip around his left wrist, and on the flames hovering just under the scarred skin of his fingers. His mind is consumed by the burning heat he can already feel, and the anticipation of the pain that will soon follow. 

What he does register, is the heat suddenly disappearing along with the weight of Rience’s knees pressing him down. 

He blinks up at a sky that is no longer black, and sees the dark silhouette of Roach flying past. Slowly, deliberately, he pulls in a breath, the movement of his ribcage finally allowing in air now that the weight on top of him is gone. He takes another and another, and finally realises what the racket reaching his ears means. There is fighting. The noise is violent and screams are quickly cut off. He knows it can only be witchers fighting the pirates, dealing with them efficiently. He is flooded with relief and briefly closes his eyes,  feeling the sting of tears in his nose. 

He opens them just in time to have dark wings obscure his vision as Roach lands on his chest. She caws softly as she folds them across her back and tilts her head, one grey eye focussed on him. He reaches out a hand to her, and she gently grasps his fingers in her beak. 

“I’m okay,” he manages to say, his voice hoarse, petting over her dark feathers with his other hand. “I’m unhurt. I’m fine.” 

He says it for himself, for Roach, and for Geralt. If the Raven is here and Rience isn’t burning him, it means Geralt has to be here . He prays it isn’t idle hope. Jaskier sits, transferring the large bird to his shoulder, taking strength from her weight settling, and then stands to take in his surroundings.

He swallows heavily. The pirates are dead. There is no circle of fire surrounding him. Instead, he’s standing in the middle of a ring of slain bodies, all of them killed with ruthless efficiency. There is enough light to see the trickle of blood slowly seeping down the sloped street, flowing between the cobblestones. 

Lambert is there, sword in hand, and so is Eskel. Both witchers look at him with concern on their faces, slitted pupils tracking over him carefully, looking for injuries. Heart hammering in his throat and hope fracturing in his chest, Jaskier asks them. 

“Is Geralt—?”

“I’m here, little bird,” his wolf’s voice rumbles from behind him, and Jaskier turns. 

He meets the witcher’s golden eyes, and feels weak with relief. Geralt is here. He’s here, and it will be alright. He’s held out long enough to survive, even though he hasn’t yet managed to free the sirens from the firemage’s spell. 

Geralt stands tall, large and imposing in his black armour. There is the hilt of a sword behind his shoulder, and the other is in his hand, pressing against Rience’s throat. His eyes are soft on Jaskier though, and he can see the concern in the wrinkle between those white brows. 

“I’m okay,” he repeats, and has to smile when that wrinkle only deepens in response. Then he looks at the man crumpled on his knees at the witcher’s feet, facing him. 

Rience is nearly unrecognisable. The mage looks like he’s been keelhauled several times in quick succession, battered and bruised. Jaskier thinks that if it weren’t for the silver gauntlet on his right hand, he might have thought him someone else entirely. When he follows the line of the mage’s left arm, the gauntleted hand is missing. Instead, it ends in a bloody stump, the limb hacked off at the wrist. He meets Geralt’s eyes.

“It’s your choice, little bird,” the witcher says, and Jaskier knows that if he would ask, Geralt would end the life of the man in front of him without a second thought. 

He shakes his head. It would be the easy way out. A way that would harm the sirens of the crescent. He knows the creatures made mistakes, that they should have immediately turned to the keeper in their plight. Then he thinks of Skylla, who had no part in deciding how to handle the threat, just like the other young sirens hadn’t. Rience took their voices against their will, and they at least deserve another chance to live in peace under the code. 

Roach caws softly, nibbling on his ear. Jaskier slowly moves to where he’d been forced to drop his dagger, and picks it up off the ground. One of Rience’s eyes is swollen shut, but the other follows his movements. The firemage opens his bloodied mouth, and Jaskier knows exactly what word will fall from his lips. Rience never gets the chance to speak though, a quick slam with the butt of Geralt’s sword breaking his jaw. 

Jaskier knows the quickest way to kill a man. Geralt had shown him. 

When he finally presses the blade into the mage’s heart, he is flanked on either side by Eskel and Lambert, and Roach is a reassuring weight on his shoulder. In front of him, holding his gaze over the dying man between them and haloed by the rising sun, is the white wolf, keeper of the code and Kaer Morhen, captain of the Warg. 

To Jaskier, Geralt is so much more than that.

Chapter Text

Geralt keeps a careful eye on Jaskier as the bard drives the dagger home into the mage’s heart. He knows it will be the first time his little bird has ended a life, and half of him wishes he would have taken the out he offered. The other half swells with affection and pride. Jaskier has come so far since flinching away from everyone who came a little too close. He’s come so far since the word consort was enough to have him panic. To have faced Rience and come so close to being burned once again, and then still have the strength to do this to give the sirens their voices back, is astonishing.

He looks at Jaskier, and carefully listens for the firemage’s heartbeat. The exact moment it finally stops, the haunting song in the distance does too. The sudden silence seems almost deafening. Roach is still perched on Jaskier’s shoulder and croaks, loud and jarring, the sound breaking the spell of quiet that held all of them. His little bird’s eyes lift up from the dead man at their feet to meet his, and he stumbles forward. Geralt catches him easily, cradling him to his chest with gentle hands. Jaskier presses his face into the hollow of his neck and shoulder, and he can feel the tears even before he smells the salt of them. 

Behind the little bird, Eskel and Lambert step close, the three of them forming a momentary barrier between their bard and the rest of the world. 

—000—

Jaskier feels like he’s dead on his feet. The only reason he’s standing upright and isn't stumbling to the ground, is Geralt’s large hand settled on his hip, supporting him. He’s pulled into the witcher’s side, the pirate’s bulk sheltering him from the cold wind. The winter storm might have passed and the sun has risen, but the bite of frost is in the air and he can feel the sting of it in his cheeks. 

They’re on the far edge of the bay outside of the town, close to where Jaskier had sung his song and first met Skylla. The Warg’s witchers are standing behind them like a guard, those of the townsfolk and wintering pirates who are hale enough after the night-long battle, standing just beyond. Roach is settled on his shoulder, and preens her beak through his hair every few seconds, as if she wants to make sure he’s still there. Next to him, Geralt makes a low, vibrating noise, and Roach fluffs up her feathers and caws as if to say she will damn well stay on Jaskier’s shoulder if she so pleases. He laughs and rubs a knuckle through the feathers on her chest when she fluffs them up expectantly. 

His attention is pulled back to the water in front of them when there is a disturbance in the pattern of the waves. Slowly, sirens start to surface, and he can’t help but lean against Geralt a little more heavily when he sees how many of them there are. 

Their hair is dark and wet, plastered to their skulls, dripping water down their shoulders. Their eyes are large and aquamarine, otherworldly and unblinking. Their scales shimmer in the sunlight, highlighting the different shades of deep purple. It is unsettling to realise that all of them are looking at him. 

Jaskier swallows and searches until he finds her. When his eyes meet Skylla’s, the young siren is mostly out of the water, the sea lapping at her knees. She tilts her head at him and opens her palms in the same way they had silently communicated before. Jaskier takes a deep breath, and nods at her. 

When Geralt commands them to approach, a small group of sirens detaches themselves from the cluster. Jaskier is surprised to see they actually do step out of the water, and thinks it signals their willingness to atone for their part in Rience’s attempt to take over the Kaer, even if it was under duress. 

He recognises the siren in front. She is tall and covered with dark purple scales, the fins along her sides a rich, translucent plum colour with silvery veins. He swallows when he sees the scar across half her face, and knows it is her visage he saw in the waters below the Gulliver. 

“I’m glad to finally meet you,” he says to her, and can practically feel the ripple of surprise travelling through those around him. Geralt’s hand exerts a little more pressure before it relaxes again, the pirate captain’s thumb tucking just under the edge of his doublet and swiping softly over his skin. Jaskier knows it’s encouragement, and is glad Geralt will let him talk. He might not be the keeper, but he belongs to Kaer Morhen now, and he will play his part in keeping those under the code in harmony with one another, wherever he can. 

“I know what Rience did to you,” he says, and knows the people behind him will be able to see the burns to the siren’s face and body. “Even under threat you tried to warn me, to warn us. I want to thank you for that.”

Skylla stands next to the siren who’s clearly in the lead, and though it’s a rather unsettling baring of pointed teeth, Jaskier thinks that what she directs at him is in fact the siren version of a smile. 

“Little cousin,” the tall siren says. “My name is Lilaea, and it is an honour to finally meet you.” She bends her dark head while she keeps hold of his gaze, and Jaskier squares his shoulders.

“Well met, Lilaea,” he says, and offers his name. 

He’d been nervous about how this would go. His dreams had been a clear warning, and meeting Skylla had shown him the sirens are so much more than predators of the deep. They can still sing to compel humans though. They can still make a meal out of them. Jaskier knows the sirens of the Cresent have adhered to the code for as long as Geralt has upheld it, and he wants that to be the case again. 

To his relief, the sirens seem to want the same. 

There are a lot of words exchanged. Most of them spoken by Eskel and Lilaea herself. Geralt adds a curt word or gesture every now and again, golden eyes sharp on the sirens in front of them. Jaskier catches himself almost nodding off, until the white wolf’s next words pull him sharply from his drifting thoughts. 

“The sirens of the Crescent are welcome to renew their fealty to the code. But we will deal with the next in line, Lilaea. I’m sure you understand.” It’s spoken in a heavy rumble, the underlying threat hard to argue with. 

Jaskier looks at Lilaea in surprise, and wonders how she’ll react. The siren queen trills softly and inclines her head, seemingly unperturbed. “My daughter Skylla,” she says. 

When Skylla steps forward she comes to a halt not in front of Geralt, but in front of both of them. She reaches forward and Jaskier meets her, laying his scarred hand in her webbed palm. The bay is entirely silent, just the sound of the waves and the gulls calling overhead breaking the quiet. 

“Thank you for saving my family,” she says, stroking her fingers over the scars as she had done under the water. “The Crescent owes you a great debt. We owe you our voice.” Jaskier squeezes her softly before he lets go, and Skylla holds her head high as she meets Geralt’s gaze.

“Do you keep to the code?” Geralt rumbles, and Skylla briefly tilts back her head to expose her webbed throat. 

“White wolf, we keep to the code. We will be loyal to its keeper. We are loyal to the Kear and the Warg. We are loyal to the bard of Kaer Morhen.”

—000—000—000—

The Warg’s sails pull taut in the wind, and Jaskier leans over the railing to look at the water below and catch the cold salt spray on his face. It’s the beginning of spring and the Warg is only a month out into the season, but they are far south enough for the sun to be bright in the sky. It certainly isn’t hot, but it’s warm enough that Geralt and most of the other witchers go bare chested while they work, and Jaskier can’t help but sneak glances whenever he can. 

The ocean is bluer here too, and jaskier grins at the idea that next time they’ll make land, it will be in a place he’s never seen before. 

When he looks out toward the horizon in an effort to spot the coast he knows has to be there, the reflection of the sun off the waves is too bright for him to see. He shelters his eyes with his hands, but the moving water shimmers enough that it doesn’t help. 

“Are you having some trouble with the light?” a voice asks next to him.

“It’s too bright. I’d like to see the coast, but I can hardly keep my eyes open. If I do, all I see is coloured spots,” he answers Yennefer. 

The purple eyed mage taps her chin thoughtfully. She isn’t looking into the distance like Jaskier is, but up toward the Warg’s middle mast, to where Geralt moves across the rigging, fast as a spider in its web, securing ropes. “Follow me, Buttercup,” she says. “ I have just the thing.”

It’s how he ends up below deck, in the reasonably spacious cabin Yennefer shares with Triss, both mages cooing over him. Jaskier was doubtful at first, but now that Triss holds up the mirror for him, he grins.  

“What do you think?” Yennefer asks him, a smirk on her face while Triss’ eyes sparkle mischievously.

“This will help against the glare?” he asks, and tilts his head as he inspects himself. Triss and Yennefer have lined his eyes with a rich, black kohl, and even if it does absolutely nothing against the brightness of the sun, he can admit that it makes the blue of his eyes rather stunning.

Yennefer’s smirk widens. “It will. Though I dare say you might not see much of the sun for the rest of the day if a certain captain spots you like this.”

Triss laughs gently and Jaskier can feel heat rise to his face. He looks between the mages and the mirror and smiles back at them. “Then it’s absolutely perfect. Just what I was looking for.”

He spends the day outside on deck, composing, and the saturated black colour really does help reduce the sun’s glare. When Eskel and Lambert come striding by, both witchers stop dead in their tracks to look at him. 

“Damn, Buttercup. Looking good,” Lambert says and winks at him, and Eskel just nods, amber gaze fixed on Jaskier's kohl lined eyes. He smiles at them, and lets his fingers dance over the strings of his lute.

The rest of the day many of the crew shoot him appreciative looks, and he grins back at them unabashedly. The slight nerves he feels aren’t coming from a place of unease, and though he doesn’t mind the others looking, there’s only one person who’s gaze he really wants. 

—000—

That evening, when Jaskier enters the great-cabin and closes the door behind him, strong hands close over his hips and press him back against the door. Geralt is looming over him, golden eyes intense, and a pleasant shiver makes its way down his spine. The pirate captain has his torso bared from the waist up, and he can’t help quickly track his eyes over the expanse of exposed, scarred flesh. Geralt leans in and drags his nose up his neck and along his jaw, breathing in deeply. Jaskier reaches up and lays his hands against the witcher’s heated skin carefully. 

“Do you have any idea what you look like, little bird?” Geralt rumbles in his ear, and all the nerves in his body seem to suddenly be perfectly attuned to the man in front of him, to where their bodies are in close proximity or touching. 

“Do you like it?” Jaskier asks, and he can hear the smile in his own voice. 

Geralt steps in even closer, and presses him further back against the door, his large body a line of scorching heat against Jaskier’s front. He takes a tremulous breath, and lets his head tilt back against the wood, looking up at the witcher from under his lashes. He can see Geralt’s slitted pupils expand, and feels his body answer the thrill of it. 

One of the wolf’s hands slides from his hip to the small of his back, and then down to cup the swell of his ass and pull him in more firmly. It’s unmistakable how much the witcher in fact, likes it, the evidence pressing against him insistently.

“This okay?” Geralt asks him in a soft rumble, and though it’s no longer strictly necessary to ask, Jaskier knows that the witcher most likely always will. 

“Yes,” he gasps. “Don’t be daft, love. It’s more than okay. I’ll let you know when it isn’t. Now come down here and kiss me.”

Geralt’s smile has a feral edge to it as he leans down to obey.

Jaskier will never get tired of Geralt kissing him. He’ll never get tired of the way his wolf cradles the back of his head to gently grip his hair and hold him still. He’ll never get enough of his mouth sliding over his, of the rumble in the witcher’s chest as he does so. The sight of the white wolf, so close to him as they break their kiss, something tender in his expression despite the now only narrow ring of gold around his pupils, is something that Jaskier will want to see till the end of his days. 

It isn’t long before he’s naked, on his back in the bed with his hands fisting the sheets, his only adornment the kohl around his eyes and the warm metal of the tuning fork against his chest. He knows his mouth is open and there are sounds spilling over his lips, and that even on a ship as large as the Warg, there’s nowhere far enough that her witcher crew won’t hear. Jaskier finds he doesn’t mind too much. They’re not the only ones, after all. 

His briefly drifting thoughts are quickly pulled back to the here and now when Geralt drags his tongue over his nipple and then leaves it with a soft bite, making his way down Jaskier’s body. 

“Look at me with those eyes, little bird,” the witcher rumbles, and Jaskier groans and does his best to comply and keep from closing his eyes at the sight of the large witcher lying between his spread thighs. The light in the great-cabin is soft, and gentle shadows shift over Geralt’s body as his strong muscles move under his skin. The witcher looks up at him and smiles, baring his pointed canines, his eyes dark with hunger. Jaskier has thought Geralt looks like a predator from the very beginning, but his reaction to it now is wholly different. Now, he doesn’t mind being prey. 

“Geralt,” he pleads, and to his relief, the pirate obliges. His entire body lights up with pleasure, tingles of it racing up and down his spine as scorching heat closes around him. He can’t help but arch his back, pressing into where the witcher is holding onto his hips. Slow swipes of Geralt’s thumbs across his skin are a constant reminder of how gentle his wolf actually is, as he sets a pace that has Jaskier shouting his release so much sooner than he’d counted on. 

He sags back into the sheets limply, trying to catch his breath. There is a light sheen of sweat covering his body, and Geralt looms over him and drags his tongue over a nipple softly. He moans and twitches, and twists his hands into the witcher’s long white hair to pull him up for a kiss. He can taste himself on Geralt’s lips, and the combination of the two of them is heady. 

“You better not be done with me,” he says breathlessly when he lets go of the pale locks between his fingers.

Geralt hums thoughtfully as he sits back, lust darkened gaze never leaving Jaskier. One of his hands reaches down, and he feels slick fingers press their way between his cheeks. He knows Geralt wants to ask, and he answers by spreading his legs as far as they can go, and tilts his hips in invitation. 

It has the desired effect, as Geralt takes his mouth in another bruising kiss, and the first of his fingers finds the centre of him, rubbing oil across the tender skin before it breaches him. Jaskier releases a soft, desperate sound at the electrifying feeling. Even the slightly uncomfortable twitch of his cock trying to get hard again feels good right now.

As Geralt works him open, he takes the opportunity to look at him. His long white hair is loose around his shoulders, a little wild from Jaskier’s hands. There is a slight flush in his pale skin, and the black of his lust-rounded pupils makes the gold of his irises even brighter. Muscles shift in his arms and shoulders as he moves, preparing Jaskier, even as his own cock is hard enough to be pressed against his belly, leaving behind slight drops of moisture. Jaskier can see how much Geralt wants, and it's enough to fill him with an answering surge of desire. When the witcher presses in more deeply with his fingers, and finally, finally brushes over that spot inside of him, Jaskier is done waiting. 

“Geralt,” he says softly, and when the witcher’s eyes drag up to his, Jaskier stretches out and puts himself on display. 

—000—

Jaskier is a sight to behold, and if Geralt was hungry for him before, now he’s absolutely ravenous. All day he’s had to deal with those intensely blue eyes looking at him from their kohl lined rims. All day he’s had to hold back, has had to keep the urge to drag Jaskier into the great-cabin and into their bed at bay. 

He won’t deny he always wants the bard, but so far he’s been very careful to follow the little bird’s lead and keep his own desires on a leash. But with Jaskier spread out before him like this, legs accommodating and so clearly letting himself be seen for Geralt’s benefit, that careful control frays.

“Little bird,” he rumbles, and sees the bard shiver at the tone of his voice, dark lashes briefly hiding away the bright blue of his eyes. “Tell me when it’s too much.” He sees Jaskier bite his lip, sees the pounding of his pulse at the base of his throat, and doesn’t move until he nods. Then he leans over Jaskier, and the man under him shifts his thighs to cradle Geralt’s hips. The surge of lust that rages through him urges him to take, but instead he leans over to whisper into his bard’s ear. 

“I know your body, little bird. I know how much you can take, and I’m going to give it to you. I’m going to find that spot inside of you and use it to give you pleasure until it’s all you know. I’ll fuck you until you can’t help but squeeze around me and beg for more. I’m going to show you exactly what I've been craving to do all day, exactly how much you make me want .”

Jaskier’s eyes are wide as he looks up at him, pupils blown with lust. While talking, Geralt has snaked a hand underneath the small of his back, lifting him up. On the last whispered word he presses his cock against the bard’s opening, and pushes inside.

His little bird babbles, incoherent with the feeling of being breeched, and Geralt is gratified to find he’s pliant enough that he takes him easily. Still, he pauses once he’s fully seated inside, giving Jaskier time to adjust. 

“You said— you said,” Jaskier gasps and opens his eyes when he doesn’t move. It’s what he’d been waiting for, and the bard has just enough time to register his feral grin before he pulls out and thrusts back in, hitting that spot inside him dead on.

Jaskier bows beneath him and cries out, thighs clenching around Geralt’s hips, hands grasping onto his biceps. He’s beautiful like this, and Geralt stares as much as he wants, as he surges forward again and again. He knows the signs of Jaskier getting close, and slows down eventually, brushing his soft brown hair away from his forehead. The kohl around his eyes is slightly smudged by now, and Geralt thinks he’s never held anything worth as much as the man underneath him. Achingly slowly, he pulls back, dragging himself over that spot inside, and the bard keens high in the back of his throat. 

“Jaskier,” he says tightly, both checking in and asking for permission. 

“Yes,” Jaskier answers him, hand coming up to cradle his jaw. “Go ahead, show me.”

Geralt can’t hold back anymore then, and kisses him the way he wants to, the way that will let his little bird know what he carries in his heart. 

Jaskier is flushed and gasping as he takes him in long, powerful thrusts, and it isn’t long before his little bird begs for him. Geralt wraps a hand around his cock and it only takes a few strokes before he reaches his peak with gasping breaths. It makes the hot clutch of his body tighten where they’re joined, and he groans as he fucks him through it, until Jaskier’s body returns to being soft and pliant underneath him. He winds a hand into the soft hair at the back of Jaskier’s head, and the bard lets himself be kissed. 

When Geralt comes, he presses in as deep as he can and shudders, and feels Jaskier’s hands stroke through his hair and over the back of his neck.

—000—

Jaskier is at the railing, watching Redania’s coastline disappear into the distance. He thinks he can still see where the Pontar river breaks up the rocky shoreline, but he isn’t sure. The Warg’s sails are fully raised, grey bellies taut in the wind, and the ship slices through the water like a blade. Closer to the coast he thinks he can see a couple of white sailed merchant vessels, but he knows they’re not going after them. Not now.

Not when the Warg has just spent a week lying anchored in a hidden bay while Geralt took him to see Oxenfurt. Jaskier has always dreamt of seeing the city and its famed academy, and now he has. He sighs wistfully as he looks out, and leans his chin into his palm.

He knows the witcher is behind him even before Geralt’s hands land on the railing on either side. It’s midsummer now, and Jaskier is wearing little enough that the pirate captain is free to drag his nose up the back of his neck, and place a gentle kiss just below one of his ears. The gestures are affectionate and intimate, despite their being on deck where anyone can see. 

“Little bird,” the witcher rumbles, and as always the nickname is accompanied by the slight swoop of Jaskier’s stomach. There’s tension in the wolf’s voice though, and he twists around between Geralt’s arms to look up at him. 

“What’s wrong?” he asks. Geralt just looks at him, a rueful set to his mouth, and Jaskier knows to wait him out. 

“I was hesitant to take you to Oxenfurt, but I’m glad you got to see it,” Geralt says eventually. 

“Why were you hesitant?” Jaskier murmurs, and sees Geralt’s slitted pupils expand and contract. 

“If you want, you could stay in Oxenfurt. Go to the academy, maybe,” the witcher says, his voice carefully neutral.

And that— that floors Jaskier. For a fraction of a second there is the fear that Geralt doesn’t want him on board anymore. That he doesn’t want him on the Warg or at Kaer Morhen. But no, nothing in the white wolf’s demeanour toward him has even remotely suggested that before. Quite the opposite, in fact. Then Jaskier remembers what Geralt had said to him when he was still afraid he would never see anything other than Kaer Morhen, ever again.

I’d not hold you against your will, but you could choose to stay.

He has a choice. Staying on the Warg, staying with Geralt has always been his choice . He smiles up at his wolf, and threads his hands into his white hair.

“I might enjoy seeing it again, sometime,” he murmurs. “But my place is here. I am the bard of Kaer Morhen, and I belong on board the Warg with you. I belong to the wild waves.”

—000— The end —000—

Chapter Text

For those of you who subscribed here and might be interested to follow along, I've made this into a series.
The next part is called "Calmer waters" and is set both before and after the events of "The wild waves".
I plan for it to focus on Oliver and Lambert, and Rachal and Azure :)