Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

He blinked his eyes open, squinting them in the glow of the lamplight. It was too bright after so much darkness. How long had it been? Weeks? Days? Hours? He couldn’t say. Time had long become a meaningless expanse of time. It’s passing marked only by pain and the jaw clenching kind of discomfort that was impossible to put into words. Geralt attempted to sit up only to realize and half remember that he’d been tied down for these additional Trials. Apparently the others had tried to run, and so it was deemed necessary to restrain all of them going through these new, additional, trials.

He jumped as hands brushed against his skin, the sensation almost overwhelming as he was untied. He was shocked he hadn’t heard them approach but chalked it up to exhaustion and the crash after so much adrenaline. His eyes squinted even in the low light. Everything hurt, even seeing. In part because everything felt so much more than it had before. Light so much brighter, smell, touch. The vibrations already natural from a Witcher felt like electricity. Almost too unbearable to endure, but it was over quickly as it began, his wrists and ankles now free as he flexed them. He could feel them creaking and protesting as he stretched them out. 

It was Eskel who had untied him, he realized as he sat up, grimacing as he moved his sore and aching body. A tin cup filled with cold water was pressed to his hand. It felt like ice. It felt good against the warm skin of his palm. He pressed the cool cup to his sweat drenched forehead. It was almost too cold but his head ached so badly it was soothing more than overbearing. Eskel seemed to watch him carefully. Almost like he was a deer to be spooked. Something about the look made his chest grow tight in a way he wasn’t quite ready to address.

“I’m not a ghost, Esk,” he felt himself say, but he didn’t hear the words even as he knew they left his mouth. He didn’t even hear them in his head as he spoke. He only felt the vibrations of his vocal chords as he spoke, but there was nothing beyond that.

He watched as Eskel said something in reply, looking expectantly for a response, only to have his brows furrow as he seemingly repeated himself. Any sound made though, Geralt didn’t hear. 

He watched as Eskel’s lips moved, brow furrowed, and he could make out his own name being said.

“Geralt?” 

“I-” He felt at a loss for words, “I can’t hear you.” It felt like a half truth, hardly a way to explain that he couldn’t hear anything. Not in any meaningful way. Some of the lower vibrations from the timber of his voice came through but it was like listening through a waterfall, the rush of the waters totally masking any meaningful noise. 

He wanted to laugh at the mental comparison, not hearing was like hearing something loudly. It was the only way to parse in his head the experience in a way he could convey it. Saying that the world was suddenly very quiet didn’t capture it. At least not in a way he’d be able to explain to Eskel. It was hard to put into words what the residual felt like outside of metaphor. 

Eskel turned away from him, towards the doorway to the hall outside of the Trials room, and while he couldn’t hear or see Eskel’s mouth he assumed he was calling for someone.

One of the other Witchers, the administrator of these extra Trials he’d been chosen for came in. At once his face a mixture of relief and delight at Geralt’s seemingly unscathed survival of them. Geralt pushed some sweat slicked hair away from his face, sipping the water he remembered he had, as he watched a totally silent conversation happen in front of him. He caught brief bits of tone but even if he’d tried he wouldn’t know what they were discussing outside of context he could piece together. 

The older Witcher kept glancing at him, his brow creasing as Eskel spoke. Eskel’s back was to Geralt, and he couldn’t make out what the other man was saying in response. Despite his attempts to read lips he just couldn’t seem to do so. He’d never really had to before.

He decided to ignore them, it wasn’t as if they were trying to converse with him, and he was unable to keep up. Besides, Geralt realized he was exhausted. Every part of his being hurt, he was drenched in sweat, his teeth ached from clenching them in agony, and every muscle and tendon had long been beyond the point of being strained. He focused on the cool metal in his hand, the way he could smell everything, even the water. He could smell the frustration on Eskel’s skin, sense the disappointment in the head Witcher.  

He could feel every woolen fiber in the blanket he laid upon, felt the sluggish beating of his heart, the way the cool water passed over his lips and felt icy down his throat as he drank deeply. Everything he saw was in sharp resolution. All accentuated by the fact he couldn’t make out most meaningful noise.

He jumped as a hand touched his shoulder. The touch warm against his sweat cooled skin, and he looked over to see Eskel staring down at him. He spoke, and his mouth moved, but try as he might Geralt couldn’t make out the words formed on his lips.

A pause, a seeming sigh, and Eskel moved to a side table, grabbing a scrap of parchment and a quill, glaring at something said by the other man, seemingly in disapproval. Geralt could smell the acrid iron scent of the oak gall ink, his stomach roiling at the odor but he kept the bile from rising in his throat.

Eskel moved to him quickly, worry writ on his face as he held the parchment out for Geralt to take.

He took it gingerly, careful to not smear the message on it. They think it’s a side effect of your fever. Should come back in a few weeks.

His eyes scanned it several times and he nodded with a heavy swallow. “I understand,” he said. “I’ll manage.” It would just be for a few weeks. He had no reason to doubt what he was being told. Yet in the pit of his stomach was the deep seated feeling that this wouldn’t be resolved so easily. 

He watched as the conversation, in reality a barely contained argument, passed between the two other men in the room. A wave of exhaustion came over Geralt and he just wanted to sleep. To truly sleep, in his bed, away from the room of torture he was sitting in, half dressed, as two people talked about him as if he wasn’t there. In some ways he supposed he wasn’t. He couldn’t be present in the conversation, couldn’t keep up even if he wanted to.

It was the impetus Geralt needed to head to his own cell. If voices called after him he certainly didn’t hear them. In fact it was the first time ever that Kaer Morhen seemed eerily without life. There was always some child sneaking about, some teacher up late, usually a group of them in the large hall drinking and talking. While he knew all these things still occurred without his ability to hear it it was strange to wander such silent halls.

How would being a Witcher be without hearing? Though it was supposedly going to come back in a couple weeks. But if it didn’t? He didn’t know how well he’d last on the Path without the ability to hear his surroundings. Witchers with all their facilities were just as likely felled by monsters.

Those thoughts, those worries, those were for a future version of himself. Besides, it was likely that he’d hear again. Right?

There was no sound as he undressed, only the sharp feeling of sweat soaked fabric unsticking from his skin and falling to the ground with what Geralt assumed was a soft damp thud. His braies were similarly discarded and he fell onto the bed he called his own. The rough woolen fibers scratched against his skin and he could smell the way the wool still had its animalistic smell, mingled with his own sweat and drool, and body odor. It wasn’t as if the first trials hadn’t made his senses heightened. It was just that it was even more intense. 

The room was dark, the fire in it long since gone out, days ago, though the smell of smoke hung in the air like a ghost. His eyes, though, saw everything near perfectly. Even without moonlight he saw the craggy edges of stone and the odd rat running along the wall where it met the floor. 

In the dark quiet of his room he couldn’t fight the tears that gathered in his eyes. Exhaustion, overwhelm, and, if he would admit it, survivors guilt bubbled up like an ugly swampy thing in his chest. No one could understand what it was like to be anything like him. A freak among freaks. A broken freak among freaks. 

A shift at the foot of his bed had him leaping up reaching out to grab flesh in his hand and wrench it into a place that couldn’t hurt him. Couldn’t hurt him more. His eyes blurred with tears and it was impossible to discern who or what was in the room with him.

Fingers touched the back of his hand and his senses became overwhelmed with the realization it was Eskel. Eskel whose wrist was on the verge of being snapped by him. 

He quickly released him, taking a shaky step back as he pushed down the bile in his throat as the realization of his actions crashed down around him.

“Eskel, I’m sorry. Fuck, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m-” he knew he was babbling, ‘I’m sorry’ spilling from his lips in a flood of self flagellation. Pleading with a voice he couldn’t hear for forgiveness he wasn’t sure he deserved. 

Hands touched his face, and Geralt felt their warmth spreading across his skin and fingers wipe at the tears that were spilling down his cheeks. Witchers don’t cry. It had been drilled into him from the first day he stepped into the protection of Kaer Morhen, yet he wasn’t sure that he could be a Witcher, despite it being the whole purpose fate had put on his life. 

If Eskel spoke he didn’t hear it. Couldn’t see lips moving, feel its vibration, or even hear the low tones that slipped through the wall of silence now built around him. He wished more than anything he could hear his voice again. 

Lips pressed to his cheek, gentle, tender. 

Undeserved.

He allowed himself to be pulled to his bed, and arms pulled him to Eskel’s chest. Geralt knew he should be able to hear the sluggish thud of Eskel’s heart in his chest, and while he couldn’t hear it he felt it. Each deliberate slow thump. The pressure in his veins increasingly slightly each time, and he could feel the rise and fall of Eskel’s chest. A hand tangled in his hair and rubbed him scalp. It was so surreal to have such tenderness openly displayed. Not hidden behind crumbling columns and under their threadbare sheets in the dormitories.

Life was full of contradictions like that. The uncaring Witchers, unfeeling, still filled with affection, care even. As contradictory as life and death, love and hate, each necessary for the other. 

Eskel tapped on his shoulder and Geralt lifted his head to peer at him in the dark. His fine features softly blurred in the dark even with his eyesight. His lips moved and Geralt watched them carefully. It was hard to understand. Even as he desperately wanted to. 

“I-I’m sorry,” he whispered. “Can you say it again?”

Eskel spoke again, the words forming silently in the night air.

“Again, more slowly?”

Eskel nodded, his words slowing as Geralt watched his lips with intent. 

Frustration, shame, his newfound friends rose up as the words still escaped him. Only the last word alive was clear to him.

“I understand alive, but can you repeat yourself?”

Eskel to his credit didn’t seem perturbed at all, no ounce of frustration or annoyance shone through and he gently touched his chest as he spoke. “I’m,” the next word was lost but he then touched Geralt’s chest as he said, “you’re,” and something and then, “alive.”

Geralt’s face was bright red as he asked one last time, “Again, please?” 

This time as Eskel spoke he focused on the parts that he didn’t glean before, piecing around what he had made out.

“I’m glad you’re alive.”

That made one of them.

***

The hair on the back of Geralt’s neck shifted and he whipped around, grabbing the wrist of the hand reaching out to touch his hair. Pain flashed across the young Witcher’s face, Johann if Geralt remembered right, and he pressed harder onto the soft tendons in his wrist, threatening silently to push in just the right way and snap them like it was nothing. 

He could tell the small group of them loitering in the classroom were uncomfortable as he stood calmly with Johann’s wrist in his iron grip. The air thick with tension as they looked at each other anxiously. He could feel the racing pulse under his finger tips, could even smell the fear and adrenaline coursing through the other man as he stood there, helpless in Geralt’s grip.

“Touch me again, fuck with me again, and it won’t only be your wrist I break.” Geralt forcibly threw the hand down as he turned away before he could see Johann become surrounded by the other young men as they whispered and gossiped about him. Knowing very well that he couldn’t hear them.

Eskel was next to him, giving him a look that he knew was Eskel’s good nature telling him that he shouldn’t have done that. But weakness was something he couldn’t afford to show. He saw Eskel from the corner of his eye turn around and say something to the other Witchers but Geralt grabbed him, “Leave it, Esk.”

Eskel clenched his jaw and pulled out from his pocket a small wrapped piece of charcoal and scrap of parchment to write on.

They’re saying-

But before the thought could be finished a hand shot out in front of them and ripped the parchment from Eskel’s hand.

Their teacher, Gunter tore the parchment in his hands before throwing it into the fire at the front of the room. His broad, ruddy face was set in a mask of disapproval. “We can’t treat Geralt any different. Can we?” the question was posed to the group in the room. 

It didn’t take much for him to surmise that the room was in agreement with Gunter. 

Furthermore it didn’t take much for Gunter to turn his back to Geralt as he clearly began to speak. Leaving him totally oblivious to what was being said. His hearing should return in two weeks, the thought was completely laughable now. He had improved in lip reading but Gunter was right, he wasn’t given special treatment, and his lip reading only took him so far and it did require him to be able to see the person speaking. 

He looked down at his hands, focusing on his dry peeling cuticles as he picked at his thumb, drawing a little blood. He watched it well up, dark and it tinged the air with a dark irony smell. 

There was a heavy vibration that moved through the floor as Gunter stomped his foot right in front of where Geralt sat, drawing his attention up. 

“I asked you a question.”

Geralt pressed his lips together, holding his face tightly as he pushed his hair out of his eyes and looked up at his teacher. “I’m sorry sir, I couldn’t understand you. Would you mind repeating yourself?” he asked through gritted teeth, each word coming out as politely as he could, though he knew it was still terse. 

The hand that flew out as him he saw coming, and he accepted the heavy strike unflinchingly. Even outside of the training he had long received to quell his displays and reactions to pain, death, and fear, he wouldn’t give Gunter the satisfaction of a reaction. Even as his face smarted like he’d been stung by a very giant, very angry bee.

Gunter’s eyes flashed appreciation at his restraint, his reserve, the demonstration of his training at hand. Even as it mingled so clearly with frustration and anger on his face. “You should have been paying attention.”

“You should have spoken so I could see you,” he replied. “Or said something worth responding to.”

It was insolent, it was rude. Five months ago he didn’t think he’d ever speak to one of his teachers like that. Then they put him through extra trials, took away his hearing, and now treated him as some sort of cosmic error from the universe. The world was cruel enough and he didn’t need to take unnecessary abuse. He could feel the energy in the room had shifted. Supreme anger on Gunter’s face and while he couldn’t hear it he could feel the room had gone unusually still.

 Geralt then did something he would have previously unthinkable, and stood up, walking out of the room. He had no place he was going specifically, no real aim in the moment. If anyone called for him he wouldn’t know. There were few times he felt benefitted by his deafness, but it was certainly one of them to walk freely, unable to be stopped with a call of his name. 

He didn’t know if he’d feel that way forever. But at least for a moment he felt free.

***

Several months passed, and the world remained as quiet as it had ever been for Geralt. It was the thaw, winter giving way slowly to spring. But it was night, the dark blanketing all as Geralt ran the Killer. There was still supposed to be practice, even as a full Witcher, still expectations for him. It was just difficult, and he preferred to be alone more and more as time went on. He already looked freakish even by Witcher standards. And a Witcher who couldn’t hear? Might as well be striga bait as far as the teachers were concerned. He didn’t need the scrutiny, the abuse, or the attention. Since his argument with Gunter, too, most people gave him a wide berth.

It meant that The Killer at night was his domain. He didn’t need to hear to run it. Having long ago memorized its path. It allowed him to practice seeing at night, pushing himself as the night froze everything to a shiny slick glaze. He could test his agility, his mettle, his ability to perceive danger when he lacked a vital sense for most.

It was his third run that he was completing, his lungs and body long past the point of protest. Pushing himself beyond that point came with the job of witcher, even as he reached its final platform and he sank onto his knees, lungs filling with icy breath. He felt alive, felt capable, felt almost like he had before.

Heavy vibrations moved through the wood under his knees, followed by two more distinct thud-like vibrations shortly after. He looked over the side and down at Eskel, cloak pulled around himself with long tracks in the snow. 

Geralt wanted to curse himself, he should have paid enough attention to notice. He’d been too in his head and in his own world. That was the kind of behavior that would get him killed if he wasn’t careful. 

In that moment, though, he pushed those thoughts aside and returned the friendly wave that Eskel sent his way. Then Eskel began to ascend up the platform, hoisting himself up and plopping down next to Geralt.

“It’s late, Esk.” He scolded, though it was half hearted.

Eskel rolled his eyes, turning to face Geralt he replied, “Couldn’t sleep.”

Geralt watched his lips move, Eskel spoke slowly to him. Not so slowly as to piss Geralt off but slow enough to carefully enunciate words. He was getting better at reading lips, though it was easier with some people compared to others. He hummed in reply, trying to think of what to say to comfort his friend. But Eskel didn’t seem to look for a reply, seeming to be content in his presence. 

“I brought-” He caught the first two words Eskel spoke, but then his face turned away and Geralt completely lost whatever was being said. 

“I didn’t catch that,” he said after a beat, allowing Eskel to at least finish speaking. It didn’t take much for him to glean that the end of the sentence had been ‘white gull’ based on the bottle emerging from the depths of Eskel’s cloak and offered out to him.

“I said I brought white gull,” Eskel replied, his face once more to Geralt for him to read. 

He wanted to flush, having surmised the thought on his own, he hated having to ask people to repeat themselves. Though Eskel never seemed to mind no matter how hard it was at times. Sometimes, though, covert notes were written to him, even if it had been expressly forbidden to coddle him in that way. 

Instead he took the bottle and uncorked it, taking a long swig from it and handing it back to his brother. It burned, it warmed him, not that he felt cold terribly strongly. But being warmed from the inside was pleasant. Sharing it with Eskel under a clear night sky even more so. 

They stayed like that, passing between each other the bottle until only a few drops remained. Geralt felt only a slight fuzziness from it, his senses dulled slightly. Nice, he decided, it felt nice to not feel everything so strikingly. Geralt and Eskel lay sprawled on the platform next to each other, watching the stars dance in the sky. He wondered if it was quiet as he remembered night often being. Surely it was. It was just that his world was always quiet now.

He felt a vibration next to him, a low rumble that he knew was from Eskel. He wanted to smack him, remind him that he couldn’t hear him and he knew better. But he didn’t. Eskel was much more drunk than he was, so he propped himself up on one arm and leaned over to look at Eskel, face lit in the moonlight, flushed and warm, and scared. 

He looked so very scared.

“Esk?”

His lips trembled before he spoke again, “Promise me you won’t die this summer. That you’ll come back.”

Drunk Eskel spoke less clearly, his words slurring. He picked out words he knew well: me, die, summer, come back.

“You’re not going to die on the Path,” he assured. “There’s fewer monsters than ever. Fewer still every year thanks to us.”

Eskel shook his head vehemently and moved to sit up, forcing Geralt to back up before being headbutted. “No,” he said emphatically, “You. You can’t die on the Path, Geralt.”

He paused. The look on Eskel’s face was so starkly raw. Fear they weren’t allowed to display normally. They were so young, they only had each other. He’d known, had it drilled into him since his youth, that he would live and die on the Path. Maybe it was the gull or the stupidity of youth but he assumed that wouldn’t be for many years. 

Even with his hearing loss it hadn’t occurred to him that he really might die. Yet the pleading desperate look on Eskel’s face told him that Eskel very much thought he might. 

He sighed softly, his resolve softening on his face as they sat in the cold quiet of the night. “I promise, I’ll come back next winter.” He softly punched Eskel on the shoulder, “You better be here, too.”

“I will, I promise.”

There was a moment of hesitation, Geralt could see it in how Eskel stiffened as if debating what to say, if there was anything more to say. “You know I love you, right?”

The feeling Geralt had in his chest in that moment was one he knew he could count on his fingers the number of times he’d felt it. It was the only feeling he could equate to love. Bittersweet, aching, intense. Attachment wasn’t something that came easily to him, never had, and frankly it hadn’t been taught to him either. It was messy, too human, too sentimental. But what he felt was all those things. Complex and messy and oozing in sentimentality as he looked at Eskel in the night air.

“Yeah, I love you, too.”

***

Sleep was evading Geralt. He had long since abandoned trying to actually rest. His mind was running with the knowledge that tomorrow he and his brothers would set out into the world for the first time since they’d been brought to Kaer Morhen, to hunt monsters and to survive. He only could hope he’d manage the latter. 

It was a certainty that the others were likely awake with the same fear and anxiety that was making itself known to him. He didn’t blame any of them. Some of them would die, that much was certain. The worst part was not knowing who. Whose life would be cut short. Almost everyone seemed certain one of them would be him.

Hell, he was certain he was going to die. No matter his promises to Eskel.

He jumped at a soft thud at the foot of his bed, and there stood Eskel, who had tapped the straw mattress to get his attention. One of the few who tried to accommodate his deafness. 

“Couldn’t sleep?” he asked.

Eskel only shook his head. Though Geralt could see him in the dark quite clearly, sometimes it was difficult to lip read and so often Eskel found other ways to communicate his wants or to converse with him. 

“Scared?”

Eskel nodded.

“Me, too.”

There was a telltale hesitation in Eskel’s body that Geralt knew too well, the stiffness in his shoulders, the unwillingness to meet his eyes. He saw Eskel’s mouth open and knew words spilled out but he couldn’t parse it.

“Come again?”

Geralt could tell Eskel’s face flushed, he could sense the way blood was flowing into Eskel’s face and could smell the embarrassment and… something else he wasn’t fully certain on.

“Sleep with me?” Eskel asked. He couldn’t meet Geralt’s eyes as he asked it.

“What?”

“ - Geralt.” Eskel said quickly.

“What?”

“Sex,” Eskel said slowly. “Fuck me.”

His breath caught as understanding dawned on him, “Esk-”

“What if we only have tonight, what if we never see each other again? I want to have this, with you,” Eskel sat down on the edge of Geralt’s bed. He stared down at his hands, and Geralt could feel every tense muscle in Eske’s body, each tendon and ligament held ready to spring up, to accept denial, to flee before Geralt would be able to see his humiliation.

Sitting up he leaned forward until his lips met Eskel’s neck. He wasn’t experienced, but he knew the rough steps. He at least knew to kiss Eskel’s neck, dragging his teeth along his sensitive skin. 

He could smell the blood rushing to Eskel’s face, could feel it pulsing under his lips as he kissed along the artery, and he could finally place the other unusual to him scent in the air: lust. 

Eskel nearly collapsed in relief under his touch, his breath came in airy bursts and there were vibrations Geralt could feel as his hand slipped under Eskel’s shirt and ran across his broad chest that told him the other man was moaning under his touch.

At it’s core sex was a welcome distraction from his worries. From both of their worries. The world was just the two of them, only Geralt and Eskel and the rats scuttling in the walls. And to have this, to know Eskel in the most intimate way possible, it was a gift Geralt would be forever grateful for.

Eskel pulled back enough to shift his body and met Geralt’s lips with his. They were chapped and rough and salty like Eskel had been crying. Had he been crying? Maybe. 

Likely.

Geralt’s tongue licked at his lips, licking at the remnants of his tears and wrapped his arms around the man and pulled him close. If he concentrated hard enough he could have sworn he felt their hearts beating together as their chests touched. Whatever he was doing seemed the right thing because Eskel’s hand was in his hair and his free hand was grabbing his ass as they continued to kiss.

It was obvious to Geralt that Eskel had more experience in this stuff. He’d have a few tumbles with some other boys, but nothing beyond a sad handjob or mediocre blowjob. Eskel though, knew how to touch, and how to kiss. Geralt could tell with each press of fingers through his clothes and the teeth biting at his lips. He wanted it all and more, wanted to bottle the feeling, the smell, the taste, the whole moment down and save it to savor later. 

Moments, though, couldn’t be saved. Could only be experienced. He let Eskel push him backwards onto the bed and pulled at the ties on his braies. 

Eskel looked up so Geralt could see his face as he said, “I want to ride you.”

He couldn’t hear his own moan but he felt its strangled sound leave his throat at the mental image and at the warm hands touching his hips and pulling down his undergarments. There was a self satisfied smirk plastered on Eskel’s face as he reached into his own pocket before shedding his own undergarments.

“What is that?” Geralt asked as he saw the bottle be uncorked and poured into Eskel’s palm. Before the answer came he could smell it. Medicinal and wet, earthy to its own detriment. “Saddle oil?”

“It’s better than spit, trust me. And if you want me to fit that monster in my ass I’ll need all the help I can get.”

Geralt’s face flushed at the mention of his size. He didn’t consider himself large at all but Eskel would definitely know. Any response he was going to make was cut off by a sob as a warm slick hand grabbed him and began to stroke the length of his cock. 

The hand was large and warm and soft with saddle oil that made Geralt want to weep in relief as he was being touched and that it felt so good.  Before he could even begin to get close the hand was gone and quickly replaced with the heft of a Witcher straddling his lap and slowly lowering himself onto his cock. 

He’d never felt anything like it. It was tight and hot and indescribably good. And seeing Eskel on top of him was a sight he knew he’d never bore of. The man’s brow was furrowed, likely in discomfort and in pleasure. His own erection was waning with his concentration on taking Geralt all the way. He reached out, stroking Eskel slowly and rubbing the dripping precome over his length. 

The shudder Eskel gave went right through his cock buried inside of him and vibrated electrically against his skin. Geralt watched his lips part and his adam’s apple bob as sound came from him. Geralt wished he could hear the moans coming from Eskel’s lips because of him. He rarely missed hearing. There were times it was difficult to adapt to or inconvenient but he didn’t often miss hearing. Yet seeing Eskel on him, throwing his head back as he began to ride Geralt, moving up and down along him, Geralt wished he knew what Eskel sounded like. The different ways he could elicit sounds from him, the way his moans would change as he approached orgasm. His imagination would have to suffice. 

He had an idea and his fingers gripped Eskel’s hips, dragging him down as he thrust up against Eskel. It caught Eskel by surprise clearly as he leaned forward and pressed his hands to Geralt’s chest, his hair falling around his face, sticking to his chin with sweat as his chest heaved. He did it again and grinned as Eskel gasped, his face twisting deliciously in pleasure as Geralt repeated the action, his hips meeting the firm meat of Eskel’s ass and bringing them both closer to their climax.

He came first, with little warning, his hips stuttering suddenly as he was overcome with his orgasm. Eskel’s lips suddenly met his as he swallowed Geralt’s moans that he knew were likely much louder than intended.

Eskel ground his dick against Geralt’s abs as they stayed locked together in their searing kiss, until Geralt felt him moaning and felt warm stickiness between them and every tense muscle in Eskel’s suddenly went slack. It was less holding up a man and more holding a waterskin in the shape of a man.

Their kiss slowed, their lips shifting to gentle pecks and eventually Eskel buried his face against Geralt’s neck and slid to the side, staying within the gentle hold, and only wincing slightly as Geralt’s now soft dick slid from him.

“Sorry if I hurt you,” he said into the darkness. “This was my-” he couldn’t bring himself to say ‘first time, really’ because that felt almost too embarrassing.

Eskel, though, didn’t seem to comment on that, or react to it. For which Geralt was grateful.

“It wasn’t as… difficult as I thought it would be since I can’t, y’know… hear,” he said the last word softly as if it was dangerous to voice. He didn’t often give name to his deafness, he found it easier to pretend it wasn’t really affecting him.

Eskel pushed himself up to look at Geralt. “Probably easier because we know each other. If you have sex with people out in the world it might be harder if they want specific things.”

That was something he hadn’t quite thought about. It might be easier then to go to the brothels rather than sleeping with just anyone who wanted to. He could prescript the encounter that way, know exactly what he was going to do and not have to converse all too much. “I suppose you’re right,” he replied.

Gentle fingers pushed Geralt’s sweat slicked hair from his forehead and held his cheek gently. It was so soft, so Eskel that it made his chest ache.

“Do you think,” he started slowly, “That there’s others like me?”

Eskel smiled softly, “I’m sure of it. I hear some of them speak with their hands.”

His brow furrowed, “How? Hands can’t speak.”

Eskel just shrugged, “I don’t understand it either, all I know is some have found a way to communicate with their hands since most can’t speak.”

It hadn’t occurred to him that most who couldn’t hear likely didn’t lose it suddenly, but instead had it from birth, or very young and couldn’t speak as he did. He didn’t know how he’d communicate as someone who spoke and read lips with someone who couldn’t also hear. If he ran into anyone maybe they could write back and forth, but maybe, like his teachers, that would be frowned about. Or maybe they could teach him their language. He didn’t hold out much hope, the world wasn’t exactly hospitable to differences.

“Maybe I’ll run into someone, and if you do, maybe you can tell me about them next winter, when we come home,” he eased Eskel back down into their messy embrace, his hand resting in Eskel’s hair and stroking it gently.

Neither of them slept that night. Eskel’s breathing evened out but it never slowed into the gentle sort of breathing only found with sleep. His head stayed on Geralt’s chest, ear pressed to where his heart was and he stroked Eskel’s hair. It was another moment to catalogue in the hopes of never forgetting. How each strand of soft hair felt against his fingers, the smell of sex, of Eskel’s sweat, his slow gentle pulse, the warmth of his skin. 

They needed something to cling to as they faced their uncertain future. At least they had each other.

***

He didn’t die that summer, or the summer after, against all odds he survived. Through the raid, through the changing world, he supposed Destiny hadn’t yet decided that his time was up. Which was how he found himself at a small inn in a nondescript town. They all blurred together, yet this town’s inn, unlike many others, was alive and thriving with life. 

A youngish man sat on stage, leading the crowd in song. He looked no older than his early twenties, full of life and the joy of youth. Clearly his musical talents were more than most as the crowd seemed enamoured with him. He leaned over, his lute held tightly, and smiled at a pretty young woman with her breasts spilling from her dress, Geralt assumed that was his draw to her, and she flushed quite prettily as the young man sang some part of his song to her. 

Music had little appeal to him. Outside of feeling the beat when a room was participating in a particularly rousing number, when he could feel the thrumming beat, it was pretty words that were impossible to parse. He had no time for pretty words, even less in trying to parse them. 

“An ale,” he put a coin on the counter for the barmaid and she snatched it quickly, as if he was going to cut her hand off if she took his coin. He was used to it. Soon he had his beer in hand and picked the empty secluded corner where he often preferred to hide to finish his drink as he carefully watched the bard prance around the room.

People watching had become a bad habit. Often people were unnerved by his obtrusive gaze, but being stared at meant he’d grown used to staring back and challenging people on their rude behaviors. It also allowed him to exercise his lip reading, trying to understand conversations people were having where their mouths were partially obscured, or only half the conversation was visible to him.

A couple at a table across the way, in fact, the same couple with the attractive young woman the bard had sung to, were now arguing over the attention being paid to her. 

It wasn’t fully clear, but he read their body language and could see her speak, following her lips as she said, “It’s not a big deal! He’s a - just doing his job. Why are you being so -”

The man replied, “How do you think it looks with you - over him in public! You’re —”

Even the words he was able to understand were pieced together through context. Some words escaped him, either difficult to decipher with people he didn’t know or words he was altogether too unfamiliar with.

Hearing wasn’t necessary though for him to get the sense of a room. Despair from the man at the bar miserably sucking down his pint, lust from the amorous couple in the corner of the room across from him, the joviality of most who were warm with good song and decent drink. It was all there in smell, in sight, in the energy he could feel and almost taste surrounding him. 

A sea of blue and red suddenly filled into his vision range, blocking the rest of the room from view. It was fine velvet and brocade and it clothed none other than the young bard who seemed to be finished playing for the night, though Geralt hadn’t been paying attention that closely. 

Something was said surely, based on the inquisitive look on the young man’s face as he finally tiled his head up to look at the man before him. He could tell his heart was still pounding from the acrobatic performance, his chest moved quickly, and his face was flushed a delicate shade of red that made his blue eyes transfixing and his lips appear almost rosy. 

Geralt pressed his lips together and hummed as he shrugged. It was a simple way to not reveal that he hadn’t heard someone. He didn’t like to let on anything, especially weakness. Not to strangers, he barely allowed it in the winters at Kaer Morhen, and there it was what remained of his brothers, a rudimentary and fucked up close family. 

Lost in his own head for a moment he hadn’t noticed that the bard had begun to speak. Babbling clearly about this or that thing, likely making polite small talk. He caught only the end of what was being said as the bard faced him more fully, arms slung over the back of his chair as he seemed to relax. 

What an odd person.

“Anyways, where are my manners, I’m –”

Names were the worst. If it wasn’t one he was familiar with he was often out of luck. It wasn’t just the knowing of the name it was his uncertainly in pronouncing it.

He warily eyed the hand of the bard as it was extended to him and instead brought his ale to his lips as he replied, “Geralt.”

Only a moment’s hesitation showed on his face before the hand was retracted smoothly and the bard smiled at him easily, a practice suaveness to his behavior that Geralt could respect. They were each performers, presenting a certain version of themselves to the world.

“Geralt,” he said with a smile. “OId name.”

“Older person,” the corner of his lip lifted into something resembling a smile of amusement. He didn’t usually interact with people like him, and he seemed unafraid, something equally unusual in his experience. 

“Where are you from?”

“Rivia.”

“Ah, to the north?” the bard’s face showed confusion and perhaps a little disbelief at the location he claimed.

He simply nodded.

Silence fell between them, though Geralt wasn’t one to say whether it was awkward or not. Not because he couldn’t tell based on body language or things like that, simply that he didn’t particularly care. He couldn’t spend his life coddling others to be uncomfortable. He just wanted to drink his beer, get Roach, and go to sleep hopefully without being rained on. 

The bard seemed to gather his thoughts. His gaze a little distant and he tapped his fingers on the table restlessly. He wondered in that moment if the bard was humming, surely he was. But all he felt was the tapping against the table and the rumble in the floor of others moving around him. 

He looked out at the crowd watching the nightlife as it happened around him. People going about their lives, finding some relaxation or solace in the darkened cover of night.

The bard’s mouth opened and Geralt assumed that he had begun talking. He tried to not whip his head around quickly, to play off his need to watch the man’s lip in a cool manner.

“-chase, would you like to have sex with me?”

Sex was certainly a word he’d figured out quickly enough in his life. Taught to him calmly by Eskel when he’d had sex for the first time after losing his hearing. It had come in handy at times such as this.

“If you’re expecting an inhuman cock I’m afraid you’re barking up the wrong tree, bard.”

It was pleasing to see the flush of red across the man’s cheek. Even someone as clearly well sexed as this man appeared had a bit of shame. 

“On the - You seemed lonely, and I, honestly, am too.”

He scoffed, “You aren’t without admirers, clearly.” He could see eyes watching them around the room, some curious, other jealous, and even a few disgusted and afraid at their beloved bard conversing with a filthy Witcher.

There was a pause and Geralt could have sworn in that moment that he did see a heaviness around the bard’s face. A world weariness that he knew all too well. “I’ve had my fill of admiration. All I am asking is for the company of someone who understands.”

Geralt considered him. He was young, but not overly so, and attractive. Clearly muscular despite his bardic bearings. He would do just fine. It was such a peculiar ask as well that he felt nearly compelled to find out exactly what the bard desired. 

“On one condition.” He replied. The bard seemed to perk up at the acceptance of sex and intrigued, likely, at a request that a Witcher might make of him.

“Anything.”

“Write your name out for me, I’m curious about the spelling.” It wasn’t a particularly good lie, but he couldn’t have sex with someone he didn’t even really know the name of. 

The bard’s brow furrowed in confusion but he said nothing about the rather unusual request. Rummaging through a small bag he’d carried with him, the same fine velvet and golden brocade as his doublet, charcoal and parchment were procured and he scribbled on it before handing it over to Geralt.

Jaskier.

“Jaskier.” He said, feeling the word on his tongue as he hoped he wasn’t grotesquely butchering it. 

It seemingly was passable as Jaskier, now he knew the bard’s name, smiled at him flirtatiously. “I like how it sounds on your tongue.”

“I’m sure I’ll like how you sound on mine.”

Sex was luckily doable through feeling. He didn’t need to hear the moans slipping from Jaskier’s lips to know that he was close. He pushed aside the part of him that did wish he could hear those moans. Instead he satisfied himself with feeling the bard’s breath come in more and more frantic waves, catching in his chest as he was close to orgasm. Geralt could feel the rapid pulse, smell the sweat and musk and desire rolling off of his perfumed skin. It didn’t take much to understand what the hand tightening in his hair meant or the way Jaskier’s hips bucked up into his mouth as he finally came, and Geralt swallowed him down readily. It was salty and bitter and he dragged Jaskier into a kiss even with his spend still on his lips. He couldn’t hear the moan but felt it on his lips as Jaskier was surprised at the salty taste of himself. 

A calloused hand slid down his chest and to his aching cock, pulling Geralt off embarrassingly quickly. He wasn’t ashamed to get off on giving good head, and it had been a while since he’d had sex with another person last, but he’d had hoped to last longer than he did given the beautiful young man beneath him. If he could have gotten hard again in one night he would have as he watched Jaskier lick his hand clean of Geralt’s cum, his soft gorgeous tongue languidly lapping up every drop. It was a private show just for him and one he knew he’d replay many times on many nights to come.

“Sorry, I’m rather one and done these days. Not you, just my body.”

Jaskier’s mouth opened and seemed to laugh, not at him, Geralt could tell that much, just amused. Geralt wished he could hear it. Rarely did he miss his hearing. The world happened whether he heard it or not and it kept him from very few experiences. There were times, though, where he could only distantly recall laughter or song, and in those times he found he did miss it. 

“No worries, I have had a long day myself.”

Geralt hummed and began to gather his clothes, pulling them on enough to be presentable in public. Trousers and linen shirt for the summer night air and he pulled his hair beach to tie it off.

A hand touched his shoulder and he turned, seeing the still naked Jaskier there, arms crossed. “I asked a question.”

He took a breath and finished tying his hair up. The breath was held for a long time before being released. Those words, the way frustration was writ across Jaskier’s face, all brought too easily to the surface memories he’d rather forget.

Countless incidents with his now dead Witcher brothers and teachers, oftentimes done expressly to fuck with him or be cruel. It was hard to remember that this was a stranger, someone who had no way of knowing the irritation invoked by that statement alone. Yet he couldn’t help the involuntary frustration at being met with an irritated person annoyed he couldn’t hear them. Jaskier, though, didn’t know that and would assume that after sex he was being tacitly ignored. 

It was evident in his crossed arms, and the way his lips were a thin pressed line. Whatever softness had been there when they’d been having sex was gone in an air of frustration.

“Sorry,” Geralt replied. “I was in my own world. Can you repeat yourself?”

It didn’t take much for him to glean the annoyance Jaskier clearly felt at repeating himself. He was all too familiar with that particular look and the heavy sigh that came from the young man. Under normal circumstances he wouldn’t have tolerated that sort of treatment, but given the brevity of their relationship he chose to take it in stride. “Why are you leaving? It’s late,” Jaskier asked. 

“I need to tend to my horse, and I leave at dawn.”

Jaskier’s lips pressed even more tightly at the excuse before saying, very quickly and with a great amount of irritation based on his face, “Fine.”

Bards, Geralt thought with annoyance. They all wanted to be coddled and held and told they were so special. “Maybe our paths will cross again,” he said to Jaskier’s back.

Any reply was impossible to parse and he focused on surveying the room and not leaving anything behind with Jaskier. A tap on his should pulled his attention back to the bard who stood in front of him as he spun around with his arms still crossed and his face now shifted into anger. “I’m talking to you!”

Geralt sighed heavily, “This would be better if you said whatever you wanted to my face.”

Jaskier rolled his eyes and the fight seemed to seep out of his shoulders as exhaustion hit him and likely the need to rethink his words beyond the immediate heat of the moment. “Why don’t you tend to your horse and - for the night? You deserve a - to sleep in -.”

“I don’t stick around, I’m not sentimental. You should forget about me.”

“- me. The room was free for the night, and I hate to kick out my -” Whatever word ended the sentence was beyond Geralt. He didn’t want to stay, he would have much rather left Jaskier and slept on his own terms. A warm bed and a roof though were extremely tempting and he figured he could slip out before the bard ever woke up. 

“Okay,” he acquiesced. “Let me take care of Roach and I’ll share the bed with you.”

He warmed as Jaskier’s face was suddenly filled with mirth as he burst out laughing. “Roach. That’s your horse's name?”

The twinkle in his blue eyes was entrancing if Geralt would admit it, and he would. “Yes,” he replied, “All my horses share the name.”

“There’s been more than one? I-” Jaskier cut himself off there, and simply covered his mouth as he laughed. “Well, tend to Roach and I’ll make room.”

Geralt hummed and left the room, trying to close the door behind himself quietly. He should just leave with Roach, never return, but something about Jaskier made him want to stay. He hadn’t felt anything similar to how he felt then since Eskel when they’d been just young stupid kids together. When they would fumble together in bed and were so afraid to lose each other each summer. That fear never went away. 

So instead he took Roach to a nearby stable and paid the small fee to board her for the night and made his way back to Jaskier’s bed. In the interim Jaskier had since laid down and fallen asleep, the oil lamp still flickering on the desk and it cast shadows on Jaskier’s face. Geralt couldn’t help studying it as the bard dozed. Unlike most, whatever youth and carefreeness existed upon his waking was long gone in sleep. Instead Geralt could see the wear of time, of hardship, of the harshness of life on his brow. He looked at peace, but there was clearly more to the man than Geralt had given him credit for. 

At least they didn’t need to talk any further. He extinguished the lamp and was grateful for the dark and the calm that night often brought. In the dark alone he didn’t need to pantomime hearing, didn’t have to read lips and try to keep up with conversation. He could exist in his world, his very peaceful world, and he pulled off his shirt and trousers, down to just his braies and climbed into the bed next to his partner for the night and quickly fell asleep.

When he woke the next morning the bed was empty and an already dressed bard was hunched over a notebook as he scribbled away furiously.

“Morning,” Geralt groaned. He wiped the sleep from his eyes and blinked in the early morning light. 

A small blip of sound slipped through the wall of his deafness, just a tone from the deeper part of Jaskier’s register that told him the bard had likely replied in kind.

“I’ll be dressed and gone soon so you don’t get into trouble with the inkeep.” Throwing the blankets off himself he was met with the chilly morning air. It was brisk and woke him up through the discomfort. He grabbed at his shirt on the floor and dressed himself quickly. It was time to go, he didn’t like staying anywhere for too long.

There were vibrations in the floor that made him look to see Jaskier standing up from the desk. It was the legs scraping on the floor that had drawn his attention as the man had moved quickly. “I’m coming with you.” 

“The Path is no place for Witcher’s to have companions.” He hoisted his pack over his shoulder and sighed, “Jaskier-”

“One week,” he bargained, “Give me one week and if it’s a terrible idea we’ll split ways.” His face had that same boyish charm from the night before. Any of the harshness and weariness Geralt had seen while he slept had long since disappeared behind the pastiche and mask the bard donned every morning.

Perhaps they weren’t so different.

Geralt looked into the pleading eyes, the sweet face he was met with and he felt his resolve melting away rapidly. “Fine. One week, and you don’t get to ride on Roach.”

The glee that spread on Jaskier’s face was far more than Geralt would have expected for telling someone they were going to be on the Path with a Witcher. It was clear, though, that this bard was unlike many others. He just hoped he wouldn’t regret his choice.