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Genuinely, Yennefer had no intention of returning to the bard with such haste. It should probably be embarrassing, but she tells herself that the boredom of wintering on one's own justifies it. Though whether it justifies dithering around in this shithole tavern while she waits for him to finish remains to be seen.
"So," Jaskier says, sliding into the seat across from her. He's still flushed from his performance, cheeks pink, hair disheveled from all of his carousing. "How was I? Resplendent? Sublime?" He leans back in the chair and spreads his arms, expectantly. "I eagerly await your shower of praise."
Yennefer stares at him and raises an eyebrow. "What, the praise you've earned with your adequacy?"
Jaskier huffs and grabs a mug of ale abandoned nearby. "I take it back, feel free to say absolutely nothing, because I don't accept criticism from those clearly unversed in the creative arts." He takes a swig and promptly spits it back into the cup. "Oh, fuck, that's awful."
"Delightful," Yennefer says, eyeing him with mild distaste. "And that's certainly an assumption. What if I were to tell you that all of us mages are quite adept musicians? We’re trained in a great many things." It's an absolute lie. There's not a single instrument that she can play with any particular skill.
"You know," Jaskier replies, eyeing her skeptically. "I don't actually know enough about sorceresses to know if that's true, but even if it is, I happen to come by my success through prolific talent and diligent practice, not from what I'm sure is," he waves his fingers at her, "fiddly magic cheating."
Ignoring him, Yennefer hums and makes a show of looking about the room, distinctly unimpressed. "You do certainly have a way with the patrons of these sad little taverns." She lets her gaze linger, pointedly, on one of the women who'd approached him. "Are you always so...available?"
"Not that I expect you to understand," Jaskier says, loftily, "but one of the greatest joys of being a performer is interacting with those whose hearts I've touched with my melodies."
Yennefer snorts. "Oh, is it just their hearts you're touching?"
He ignores her and sighs gustily. "Besides, aloof and unavailable is a good look on Geralt, but not on me."
"Ah, so you went for the only other option available to you: gregarious and sluttish." She looks him over. His doublet is unbuttoned, as usual, and the stretch of chest exposed by his undershirt seems particularly broad.
"As all good bards do!" Jaskier agrees. He shoots her a cocky look from beneath his lashes.
Yennefer rests her elbows on the table. "So then, bard," she purrs, a dangerous edge to it. "Tell me. If I hadn't been here, who would you have taken to bed? The pretty blond maiden in the front? The strapping blacksmith at the back table?"
Jaskier looks at her, as though taking stock of the question and her temperament. A glint of mischief flashes in his eyes. "The barman and the innkeeper's daughter," Jaskier tells her with a sly grin, tilting his head towards a couple conversing at the bar.
"Oh, two in one night?" The bard should be grateful that insolence suits him, Yennefer thinks, eyes dropping to his mouth. "How bold. And presumptuous."
Jaskier mirrors her posture, resting his own elbows on the table and leaning towards her. "Well, more like two at once," he corrects. "I'm fairly certain that they were an item and that I would've been well-received, given that they've spent the entire night looking at nothing but each other and yours truly."
"Oh," Yennefer murmurs. "How mildly clever of you. I suppose that spouse-fucking is far less risky when you're fucking both spouses."
Jaskier swipes his tongue across his lips. "Quite right. Besides, there are much riskier prospects here, and I'd very much prefer to pursue those."
When they crash into the bedroom Yennefer shoves him onto the bed to ride him, one hand fisted in his hair, the other reaching back, angle be damned. Jaskier groans and, on her order, tells her everything that he would've done to the innkeeper's daughter, everything he would've allowed the barman to do to him. Jaskier comes with her fingers buried inside of him, Yennefer just after, shuddering at the feel of Jaskier inside of her and clenching around her, at the shaky, gasping filth spilling from his mouth.
***
It takes just over a week and a half--a truly, embarrassingly short stretch of time--of nightly trysts for Yennefer to crack. It's a bad idea. It's a terrible idea. But the bard's cock has apparently fucked every single iota of higher thought out of her. This must be how Jaskier goes through life--perpetually in the throes of sex-clouded idiocy.
She brings it up the morning after yet another night spent together. Jaskier's sitting up in bed, polishing off an apple he charmed the innkeeper out of, sheets pooled at his waist.
"This is ridiculous," Yennefer tells him, clothing already donned, fastening her choker around her neck. She takes the medallion between her thumb and forefinger, tracing the shape of the star upon it. "We cannot keep doing this."
Jaskier freezes. Disgustingly, a rivulet of juice from the apple trickles down his wrist. Yennefer feels the competing urges to throw a rag at him and to lick it off herself.
She resists both. "Finish and get your things ready. You're coming with me."
A curious tension bleeds from Jaskier's shoulders, but his features melt into a sort of baffled incredulity. “Excuse me? Are you kidnapping me? And, follow up question: why ? Loathe as I am to admit it, if it’s a ransom you’re after, you’re--how do I put this--shit out of luck.”
Yennefer stares at him. Gods, he was so stupid. "Of course I’m not kidnapping you, idiot. I’m tired of having to visit you at these absolute hovels. Do you know what a waste of energy it is to travel here and back? To enchant these miserable rooms and make them suitable for use? If anything, this is your fault for refusing to perform anywhere vaguely habitable."
A smirk graces Jaskier's lips as he puts the apple core on the bedside table and falls back onto the pillows. "Has it occurred to you, O wise and powerful Witch, that you don't actually have to fancy up the rooms? If it's so wildly taxing."
Yennefer shoots him a deeply unimpressed look. "You may be accustomed to fucking Geralt in rooms caked with others' bodily fluids, but I happen to have an appreciation for basic hygiene."
"Oh, come on." Jaskier gestures around the room, an impossibly fond look on his own face. "I've fucked my way across the continent in lovely establishments such as these, and I'm certainly not riddled with disease."
"Truly a medical marvel. I would rather perish. Are you coming or not?"
"Already did," Jaskier replies, thoughtlessly, as though purely on instinct. "And wait, no, we are absolutely not glossing over this. You want me to stay with you? Like a concubine ? Am I to be your kept bard?" His eyes shine with hysterical delight.
Yennefer allows herself a moment to fully experience the irritation blossoming deep within her soul. Gods, if only he was worse in bed. "Tread lightly, bard. The offer is revocable."
"Okay, putting the hilarity of this aside--and, truly, I will carry the memory of this moment with me until my dying day--I'm a bard. I perform for a living. For people. Lots of people! People with coin, even."
Yennefer takes a deep breath. She really should've anticipated him being as difficult as possible. "And how much coin will you save from room and board?"
Despite the glimmer of interest in his eyes, Jaskier sighs, dramatically. "Not enough to separate me from my adoring audiences. Who would they have to lift their spirits and brighten their bleak winter evenings? And if you say Valdo Marx just to annoy me, know that you're both wrong--that pretentious fuck would never leave Cidaris--and also in grave danger of losing access to my supple body."
Quite finished trying to reason with the bard, Yennefer sits beside him on the bed and rakes her nails lightly down his chest, humming when he arches into the touch. "I seem to remember being told that bards could be bribed with, what was it? 'Fine goods and accommodations'?" Her fingertips trail lower, toying with the edge of the sheet. "Did you lie to me about that, bard?"
Jaskier eyes her and looks away, chewing at his lip. Oh, he was so easy for it. She should've just tried this approach from the start. "Just for the winter. And I reserve the right to flee the premises should it become truly unbearable."
"I'll consider it," Yennefer says, noncommittal. His lip is a lovely bitten-red from his teeth so she kisses him, pleased with how soft and yielding his mouth is.
Hm. Well, she has absolutely no intention of undressing once more. But, Yennefer thinks, tangling her fingers in his hair and hiking up her skirts, that doesn't mean there isn't fun to be had.
***
They arrive just outside the gates of the manor--the place itself is protected by wards that prevent portals from forming within it. Blessedly, she'll have to deal with that inconvenience far less frequently now.
Speaking of inconveniences, though. "Was it inheritance? Did you murder someone? Did you murder someone for their inheritance?" Jaskier sounds genuinely curious, somewhere beneath the sarcasm and awe.
"The previous owner has vacated the premises and no longer requires its use," Yennefer tells him, frostily.
In fact, the mage formerly inhabiting the manor had a predilection for various types of illicit experimentation. The basement laboratory had been rife with instruments, supplies, and...subjects. What Yennefer had done to them was a mercy; what Yennefer had done to the mage was not.
Jaskier makes a contemplative face, then shrugs, unfazed. "Well, I'm sure he was a perfectly nice fellow before he met what may or may not have been his gruesome demise." He slings his bag over his shoulder once more and tilts his head towards the manor. "Onwards, then?"
Yennefer finds herself marginally impressed by Jaskier's nonchalance in the face of the very real possibility that she murdered someone to live in their house.
She gives him a rather curtailed tour, both because Yennefer herself hasn't explored everything the manor has to offer, and because the undoubtedly... bardic tension building at her temples appears to be reaching a crescendo.
"Where's my bedroom? Or is it our bedroom?" Jaskier flashes her a cheery smile. "Apologies, I've yet to determine the particulars of my impending sexual servitude."
Directing her gaze towards the ceiling, Yennefer mulls over each and every choice that helped deliver her to this current moment. "I will smother you in your sleep."
Jaskier hums, cocking his head with fake curiosity. "Will this smothering take place between your legs? Because what a way to go that would be."
"I loathe you with every ounce of my being."
"Minus the heft of your--"
Yennefer's hand twitches, and the door slams outward so violently that the heavy iron doorknob cracks the stone of the wall on impact. "Bedroom ."
"Wonderful--" Jaskier starts, right before Yennefer cuts him off with a savage kiss, biting at his lips and gasping as he digs his fingers into her sides and fucks his tongue into her mouth.
"Get in it," Yennefer hisses, shoving him away, consumed by the blinding mix of infuriation and arousal that she now experiences on a daily basis. "I need to remind myself of what the absolute fuck makes you tolerable."
Jaskier wipes the back of his hand across his bruised mouth, gaze hot and heavy. "Oh, even better. And no need to remind yourself. I'll do it for you."
***
"I need a favor," Jaskier says, one day, flouncing into the library and dropping heavily into an armchair. It's not one that they've fucked in, yet. Which is remarkable, really, given how many rooms, surfaces, and pieces of furniture they've managed to sully thus far.
Ignoring him, Yennefer continues perusing the shelves, occasionally tugging out a book to flip idly through it. After a remarkable period of silence the sound of him shifting in his seat begins to grate. "Do tell."
Jaskier resumes speaking as though the conversation had never stopped. "Obviously, I would repay it in kind. Possibly with a favor of the sexual variety."
Yennefer turns to shoot him a dry look. "Why would I accept, as payment for services rendered, something I can very easily get for free?" You moron, her expression presumably communicates.
Jaskier looks exceptionally put out. "Well, when you put it like that." He averts his gaze and sighs loudly. The awkward sprawl of his limbs and the twist of his spine in the chair can't be comfortable. "I've clearly been far too generous with my affections."
Yennefer rolls her eyes. "Yes, that's exactly what you should take from this." She inspects her nails, conspicuously bored. "That aside, despite the excessive number of words that have left your mouth, you've somehow avoided making an actual request. Out with it, bard, I don't have all day." She does, in fact, have plenty of time at the moment. It's the principle of the thing.
"Fine, fine," Jaskier replies, pouting as he rearranges himself to sit properly in the chair. "I would very, very much appreciate it if you would portal me to the nearest town."
"Would you, now?" Yennefer murmurs, keeping her tone neutral. She hadn't actually expected him to dissolve their arrangement, especially so quickly. Something curdles in her gut. "Have I truly been such a terrible host?"
Jaskier looks at her as though she'd suggested that he eat his own lute. "What? No, obviously not." Yennefer attributes the slight flicker of relief that follows to reluctance to lose such a relentlessly available bedmate.
"This just happens to be an unusual length of time to go without passing through a town, as least as much as I'm accustomed to in my travels with Geralt," Jaskier admits. "And I do, perhaps, miss it slightly."
Yennefer hums. "In case you haven't noticed, you're not with Geralt."
Jaskier flutters his eyelashes at her fetchingly. "But I do happen to be in the company of a lovely, generous, tremendously powerful sorceress, easily capable of transporting anyone, anywhere, anytime."
Yennefer snorts. "Lay it on any thicker, bard, and I'll choke." Curious, though, she pries. "And what do you wish to do there, exactly? I've been to that town, and I assure you, the brothel is distinctly lacking." The slightest hint of a sneer tugs at the corner of her mouth.
Jaskier stares at her as though dying to pursue that statement before shaking his head and gathering his meager wits. "As it just so happens, my beloved instrument is getting dusty with disuse, and that really is terrible for it." Yennefer raises an eyebrow and Jaskier huffs out a breath. "My lute, not my cock, and you know it. That's seen enough use that a lesser man's would've broken in half by now."
Yennefer raises both eyebrows this time, and Jaskier's brain seems to catch up with his mouth. "Not that that's a complaint, per se! More of a general comment. A statement of fact, if you will." The bard shuts his mouth, visibly trying to find a way to salvage the conversation.
Something about it settles her, and Yennefer bites her tongue to hold back a laugh. Oh, hells. "Get your things, bard. I'm feeling generous."
***
Yennefer intends to take her leave of the tavern while Jaskier performs. This is a favor; an indulgence. She isn't here to watch him flounce about. To that end, Yennefer spends the time it takes him to get ready perusing the town, in the futile hope that it's gotten less boring than the last time she was here. Tragically, it hasn't.
Having exhausted the town's meager offerings, Yennefer returns, grudgingly buys a drink, and settles in to watch the bard's set, hoping that at least one of the two will be tolerable. As it turns out, one of the two is; unfortunately, it happens to be Jaskier.
Grimacing, Yennefer turns the fuck-off terrible ale to wine and ponders how remarkably obvious it is that Jaskier doesn't belong here. There's just a particular dullness to the tavern--to the whole town, really. Buildings in neutral hues, dreary weather, inhabitants idle and thoroughly unfamiliar with either glory or relevance.
And the bard is just so horribly vivid. His clothing, so garish that its afterimage lingers on the inside of her eyelids; the vigor of his movements when he swans through the tavern; the easy splash of emotion across his face, rising to the surface for the entertainment of his audience. It’s ludicrous. He should be ensconced in a glittering court somewhere, pampered and lazy. But that's neither her concern nor her business.
The patrons of the tavern appear quite taken with him, Yennefer thinks, lip curling with mild disdain. They ply him with coin, which Jaskier accepts; they flirt with him, men and women alike. Jaskier deflects the offers, though not without flirting in return. It's all very reminiscent of the beginning of their--she wouldn't be so maudlin as to call it a courtship. Arrangement, perhaps.
Annoyance curls in her chest. It begins to lessen only once their eyes meet, and the bard breaks away from his would-be suitors to come over.
"My apologies, kind Witch." Jaskier shoots her a lopsided grin; the spots of color on his cheeks speak to the rush of his performance and the ale they'd provided him afterwards. "Had to tend to my audience. They were quite receptive tonight."
"Indeed." Yennefer taps a fingernail against the rim of her mug and looks him over. "You really are in high demand, aren't you?"
"High demand, short supply," Jaskier quips. "And already spoken for, besides." The bard winks at her, then lets out a dramatic sigh. "They'll survive, though I've no idea how. After all, I don't happen to possess the ability to plumb the depths of a person's innermost consciousness."
Oh, Yennefer thinks. That’s an idea--quite a good one, to her mind. She eyes him, lips curving slyly. "Aren't you curious?"
Jaskier cocks his head. "Frequently. About what?"
Yennefer hums, nonchalant. "About what they're thinking when they look at you like that?" She lets her gaze slide subtly over a cluster of Jaskier’s admirers.
"Oddly," Jaskier says, slowly, "I can't say I've put too much thought into it." Puzzlement and wary curiosity seem to take hold of him.
"Would you like to know?” Yennefer purrs.
"That seems slightly, just a touch, unethi--"
Yennefer cuts him off. "I could tell you everything they'd like to do to you. I could tell you who wanted your mouth; your cock; your hole."
"Do you know what they're wondering?" Yennefer continues, leaning forward and letting her gaze flicker from his eyes to his mouth. "What your lips would look like, dark and swollen from use; how thick you'd feel inside of them; whether the sounds you made as they took you would be just as lovely as your songs."
She looks him over, purposely lascivious. Jaskier eyes are glazed over, and the flush on his cheeks has darkened and spread to his throat, his chest.
"A room here, then?" Jaskier breathes. He's shifting in his chair, almost shaking with it. "For old time's sake?"
Yennefer gives him a vicious smile. "A room here."
***
After their trip to the tavern Yennefer slowly, surely finds herself around Jaskier more and more, even whilst they're not fucking. In the kitchen, preparing meals; in the parlor, drinking and cheating at card games; in the observatory, bickering about stars and planets, science and superstitions.
It shouldn't be surprising. As Jaskier himself had pointed out, the bard is a social creature by nature, accustomed by turns to Geralt’s unceasing presence and crowds of townsfolk.
Sometimes Yennefer tells him to fuck off--when she needs to be alone with her thoughts, or if she's doing something particularly deadly or delicate. But those instances grow less and less frequent with time. She doesn't consider herself a good person, broadly speaking, but she isn't so cruel as to deny Jaskier the company and attention he clearly requires. Not when she brought him here, at least.
They're in the laboratory, tonight. Yennefer grinds herbs for potions as Jaskier sits on an adjacent table, strumming lightly at his lute and singing soft, incomplete phrases to himself, occasionally stopping to write something in his notebook. There’s a particular melancholy to the fragments of song that drift to her ears. It breeds annoyance and disquiet in her chest, as though the bard's fingers are playing over her ribcage rather than the strings of his lute.
"Do ballads of regret and heartbreak make for popular tavern fare?" Yennefer snaps, setting down the pestle.
"Not so much in the taverns," Jaskier replies, unfazed. "But plenty of lords like having their heartstrings tugged. Also, shockingly popular with nobles trying to annoy each other. Upper-crust pettiness happens to be a very lucrative source of revenue.
"Besides," Jaskier continues. "Not everything I write makes it to the ears of the masses." His voice turns wry, but there's a touch of sincerity beneath it. "Some of it has a far smaller audience."
Compelled by some cruel, itching urge under her skin, Yennefer pushes. "How old are you, bard? Are you even thirty? Do you truly regret so many things that the subject is fertile territory for your compositions?"
Jaskier pauses. "One or two, maybe." A smile, bittersweet, tugs at his lips. She doesn't have to read his thoughts to know that Geralt is occupying them. To her deep chagrin, Yennefer briefly feels like an ass. A decade of lost time is nothing to her; to a human, it's devastating.
She's pulled from her thoughts when Jaskier puts his lute down, eyeing her keenly. "Do you?"
It's a fair enough question. Yennefer supposes she brought it upon herself, though she genuinely hadn't known whether Jaskier would choose to turn the inquiry back on her.
After all, whether through his own shrewdness or Geralt's word, Jaskier has known better than to ask why she doesn't fret when he spends inside her; why she doesn't bother with the myriad of potions, taken regularly or post-coitus, that women who wish to remain without child do.
"Regret implies that something is over." Yennefer retorts, unflinching. "That nothing can be done about it. I'll allow myself to wallow in regret when I've decided that's true."
Jaskier looks her dead in the eye. Yennefer can't say whether the expression that crosses his face is truly unreadable, or if she's simply uninterested in reading it.
"Well," he says, rearranging himself so that his legs dangle over the side of the table. Yennefer finds herself dreading whatever sympathetic drivel is about to spill forth. A small piece of her already hates him for it.
Jaskier stretches his legs, idly. "If we're going to entertain the general concept of regret, I found a bottle of what may very well be the most powerful spirit known to human, dwarf, and elvenkind hidden in the incredibly fancy study on the second floor. It's a lovely spring green and I'm pretty sure that I started hallucinating after three sips. Care to share? I seem to remember that the carpet in there is particularly luxurious."
Yennefer stares at him, incredulous. Her mounting resentment dissipates. Something prickles at her chest.
Unable to do anything else, Yennefer laughs. "Three sips? What are you, a child?" She favors him with a haughty look, even as her lips quirk up, and holds her arm out for him to take. "Lead the way, bard. You clearly need to learn a thing or two about holding your alcohol."
As promised, the liquor is very green, and very potent. They make it through about a third of the bottle before finding themselves on the floor, Jaskier fucking her slow and deep, unrelenting. The rug is plush enough that the rub of it against her back will leave far fewer marks than the scratch of her nails down the same stretch of Jaskier’s flesh.
There's no obnoxious tenderness to what they're doing, nothing to raise her hackles or spit back in Jaskier's face; it allows Yennefer to laugh with pleasure, meet the thrust of his hips, and draw blood between his shoulder blades.
***
They're in the study again. They could, theoretically, be in their bedroom, but the study is warmer, and Yennefer had been intent on determining how hard she had to fuck Jaskier to get the rugburn to linger on his knees and elbows.
Jaskier lays on his back, fingers intertwined and pillowed beneath his head. She eyes his bare stomach, considering how nice it would look, pink and scratched. He shifts with a satisfied noise, and a bout of curiosity grips her.
Yennefer props herself up and looks down at him. “Why are you doing all of this? Fucking around on the road with Geralt, barely scraping by with the coin you wring from those dingy towns? You could situate yourself in any court you’d like. You’d be spoiled and admired. Safe.”
Jaskier raises his eyebrows. "Oh, is post-coital introspection a thing that we do now? I'm not opposed, per se, but I would've expected there to be a bit more alcohol involved." He glances at the bottle gripped loosely between the fingertips of her free hand. Feeling generous, Yennefer tips it and pours a touch of liquor into his open mouth, chasing it with the warmth of her own.
Jaskier hums in gratitude. "I'm well and truly spent, but if you'd like to come up here, I'd be happy to oblige." He licks his lips, soft and obscene.
Yennefer considers the slow rise of arousal in her gut. "Tempting as that is, I did have a question."
"I'm not doing this nearly well enough if you remember it," Jaskier huffs, trailing his fingers along her ribs, the curve of her hip.
Yennefer rolls her eyes. "Do you dodge beasts as determinedly as you dodge questions? That would explain how you're still alive."
“Fine, fine," Jaskier relents, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He briefly closes his eyes. "Right, royal courts. Not as safe as you’d think, given the long and storied history of spouse-fucking that everyone insists on constantly bringing up." To Yennefer's surprise, his voice grows soft. "Besides, Geralt needs us. And I don't think I could leave him if I tried."
She finds it curious how reticent Jaskier is to just say that he loves Geralt, even now, even to her. But she supposes that the bard kept it lodged so deep within his heart, for so very long, that it makes some sort of sense; that he would still hesitate to allow it to spill unguarded into the open air.
Sweeping her musings to the side, Yennefer scoffs. “I don't appreciate being taken for a fool, and the fact that we're fucking makes it even more annoying.” There’s little bite to it, even before she brushes a stray lock of hair from his forehead. “You were on the road before you met Geralt. Try again."
Jaskier grins and tilts into the touch, showing off the bruises littered along his throat. "My apologies, dear Witch. I should never have impugned your intelligence, nor your insight." He pauses in thought and shrugs. "I had classmates who did that. The whole official court bard thing. Hells, that's practically what they groom you for at Oxenfurt. Want to know what happened to them?"
Yennefer snorts. "Oh, I'm sure you'll tell me all about whatever terrible fate befell them."
For a moment, Jaskier seems to look past her, as though into his own memories. "All of them got boring. I wasn't about to waste away like that, performing nothing but some other bard's songs because they could sing of a world that I’d never seen."
"Besides," Jaskier continues. His gaze turns hungry, resolute; Yennefer suddenly feels pinned in place by the intensity of it. “You know what it’s like. To be meant for more than that.”
***
It's a perfectly normal afternoon, the day that Jaskier saunters into the workshop and right up to death's door.
"I come bearing good tidings and tasteful floral décor," Jaskier announces from the entryway, leaning casually against the doorframe. One hand is clutching something behind his back. "This place needs some brightening up."
Yennefer barely glances up from her work. "How unnecessary. I hope you don't expect me to care for anything living." She refuses to be outwardly charmed by the gesture. It's exactly the kind of frivolousness that the bard loves, and indulging it would set a terrible precedent. For what, she's not entirely certain, but she assumes it would be insufferable.
Jaskier continues as though she hadn't spoken. “I mean, Gods know you complained about how dingy the taverns were, when this particular room is, in fact, dingier than I thought humanly possible."
Yennefer does look up at that, if only to stare at him with a tremendous amount of fake pity. "I see that your ears have begun to fail you in your old age. Tragic."
"Ha, ha," Jaskier replies, hopping down the stairs into the workshop proper. "Once again, my largesse goes unappreciated." He brings a bundle of flowers in front of him, sighing as he strokes their petals. "I suppose I'll have to take these elsewhere, lest they wilt from exposure to your indifference."
Struck with an abrupt realization at the sight of them, Yennefer's blood runs cold. "Bard. Where did you get those?"
Jaskier rolls his eyes. "The garden, obviously." Before she can stop him, he shoves his face into the flower's petals and inhales, immediately coughing. "Oh, that's less pleasant than I'd imagined."
"Jaskier! " Yennefer gasps, reflexively. "Drop them, now." Eyes wide at the urgency of it, Jaskier hurls the flowers away from him, as though they'd suddenly burst into flames. Yennefer grabs his arm and drags him across the hall to her workshop, gritting her teeth as she begins to hear choked noises and desperate, wheezing breaths behind her.
They make it there and Yennefer releases him to rifle urgently through the cabinet holding her various antidotes and remedies. She finds the correct one and turns to see him scrabbling at his throat, face red and swollen.
"Open your mouth," Yennefer hisses. He does, with great difficulty, allowing her to pour the contents of the vial down his throat before it closes. A sigh of relief slips from her as his breathing stabilizes and the swelling slowly recedes.
Jaskier drops to the ground, shivering with adrenaline and lingering terror. She kneels in front of him. "You are, without a doubt, the most idiotic, foolhardy person alive," Yennefer tells him, angry and frustrated, as she checks his pulse.
He flashes her a shaky smile. "That being said, I am, in fact, alive. " Jaskier covers her fingers with his own. "I suppose I'll actually have to pay you back for this one, since Geralt isn't around to conveniently pay my debt for me." He gently pries her fingers from his thready heartbeat and brings them to his mouth, kissing her knuckles. For some unfathomable reason, Yennefer allows it.
Jaskier sleeps deeply that night, exhaustion from his brush with death seemingly taking hold of his bones and weighing down his eyelids. Yennefer sleeps restlessly, waking up every few hours. She tells herself that there's nothing unusual about the way she checks his breathing each time, making sure that the rise and fall of his chest holds steady. After all, should the bard have breathed in enough of the poison his blood may still carry traces of it, even after the antidote. Yennefer just doesn't want to wake up with a corpse beside her.
She doesn't; Jaskier wakes up with the sun, yawning and disheveled. His eyes are soft, and the kiss he presses to her cheek before mumbling something and falling back to sleep is softer. Yennefer has to take a moment to blink away the image of him flushed and suffocating.
To ensure that no more potions go to waste, Yennefer drags him out of bed early the next morning and takes him through her garden, shows him all of the pretty things and all of the deadly things, those she cultivates for potions and those she cultivates for their beauty. Lulled into quietude by the hush of dawn, Jaskier takes in the flowers and herbs, the names and uses she murmurs into his ear, his eyes curious and intent.
Yennefer fucks him there, too, a careful way from the bloodroot and the foxglove, the larkspur and hemlock. If she rides him with uncommon gentleness; if emotion grips at her chest, unbidden; then maybe it's just the soft curve of Jaskier's breathless mouth, the reverence in his eyes, the stroke of his thumb along her bare hipbone. The blood rising in his cheeks, flushed and alive.
***
Under the late night sky, the view from the platform on the observatory tower is breathtaking. Yennefer uses a spark of magic to keep the air around them warm. Illuminated by the stars and the mostly-full moon, Jaskier tries to tell her of the constellations. Every word out of his mouth is patently false.
Yennefer rolls her eyes at a particularly egregious claim. "Were you not a university professor? Because I was under the impression that one needed to actually know things to be a professor."
"You see," Jaskier says, loftily. He appears unearthly, bathed in the pale glow of moonlight, though Yennefer has already verified his humanity--subtly, of course. "I'm no longer a professor, which means I'm no longer obligated to know anything at all." A grin tugs at his lips. "Besides, stories aren't meant to be true."
There's quiet for a while, after that. Occasionally, they break the silence with soft murmurs, Yennefer's genuine knowledge of astronomy traded for more of Jaskier's tales, and the tales of where he learned those. For all of Jaskier's rambling chatter, the bard speaks little of his own past, before Geralt. Yennefer hoards those stories, greedily, oddly smug at the prospect of being their sole audience.
After describing in great detail the bodily harm to be inflicted upon him should he breathe a word of it, Yennefer tells him of Aretuza; of wilted flowers and bottled lightning; of eels and ballroom dances. It jars something loose inside of her--uncomfortably so--but the stars above them are mirrored in his gaze, and she can't quite bring herself to regret it.
It takes quite a while, but Jaskier falls asleep first. Yennefer still wakes before him, the sun rising much sooner than she'd imagined. Jaskier stirs, kisses at her collarbone as consciousness returns to him. He's compelling like this, quiet and sleep-soft. Yennefer quickly finds herself hungry, aching for it. She murmurs her desires into his ear; Jaskier opens his eyes, dark and hazy with lust, and slides down her body to settle between her legs.
He eats her out, slow and easy; she comes with his tongue pressed to her, fingers tucked inside of her. Shaking and panting, Yennefer buries her fingers into his hair and drags him upwards. He kisses her throat and fucks into her, mouth shining and wet.
***
Winter is nearly over.
Yennefer knows what it means. They had an arrangement. Soon, Jaskier will return to his travels, reuniting with his dusty roads, and his dingy taverns, and his beloved audiences. Those, and Geralt.
Her mood is absolutely foul. It hardens like a carapace around her, tough and brittle all at once. Frost gathers on her words and shoulders, even as it thaws from the leaves and ground outside. Though he doesn’t push the issue, it very much doesn’t escape Jaskier’s notice. The concern visible in his eyes chafes at her like cheap fabric.
Of course Jaskier knows that something's wrong, Yennefer thinks, bitterly. Of course. She's grown sloppy. He's somehow learned to look right through her, smiling easily at her as though what he sees isn't terrible and twisted at odd, sharp angles.
Yennefer loathes it. The bard has insinuated himself so deeply into her life that the prospect of his absence is foreign and unsettling. This wasn’t meant to happen; there must be a way to fix it.
And so Yennefer avoids him. It's difficult, but not impossible, aided by magic to alert her to his whereabouts. It isn't cowardice. Familiarity is useless, a detriment to both of them. Severing their ties early is a mercy.
***
A few days later, Yennefer makes the mistake of treading the path that cuts through the courtyard between the manor proper and the greenhouse. She’s lost in sullen thought, as has frequently been the case as of late. There’s work to be done, but focus has abandoned her. It makes her frustrated, spiteful.
She almost startles when his voice reaches her ears. "I see that the resident Witch has finally decided to grace us with her presence," Jaskier calls out, casually. He’s sitting on the grass of the courtyard, legs crossed, lute to his side. Oh, hells. She'd forgotten to place the alarm wards meant to prevent this very encounter outside of the manor itself. Her chest aches, hurting and hateful, at the sight of him.
Yennefer lets her gaze slide over him, making a show of boredom. Her voice is tremendously snide. "I happen to be quite busy, bard. Do you have a request? Or do you just want attention? Forgive me for having better things to do with my time than tending to that particular sinkhole."
Jaskier stares at her, mouth agape. Yennefer ignores the hurt that flickers through his eyes. She doesn't care--she doesn't. Besides, she’s in the right. It’s better this way.
His expression closes off, the quick flash of emotion replaced by affected nonchalance. "I happen to know that you're fond of my cock, historically," Jaskier says, lip curling, "but forgive me for assuming that you'd also become accustomed to the pleasure of my company."
"I don't know what could've possibly given you that impression," Yennefer sneers. "I'm not Geralt." And oh, isn’t that the crux of it.
"You're right," Jaskier agrees. It's ugly, vicious. "You're much easier than he was. A touch more desperate. One could only imagine what for."
Yennefer stills. Every single blade of grass between them withers and dies.
"Guess that's my cue," Jaskier says, calmly. He gathers his things to leave, and rage sweeps through Yennefer. The bard should be awed and cowering, just like every other idiot would be. Driven by the furious urge to get it, to get him, she breaks her vow and reaches into Jaskier's thoughts, recoiling immediately at the crush of emotions, of fury, and frustration, and hurt, and regret. Dizzily, Yennefer wonders if Jaskier always feels like this, swept up and dashed against rocks with the brute force of his own emotions.
Whatever the answer, she did this. The thought rankles at her. Gods. Something terrible and weak has become of her. Yennefer can't fucking stand it. Just like that, her resolve shatters; she traipses across the courtyard, over the dead grass, and sits astride Jaskier. He flinches, but she just takes his face in her hands, kisses him forcefully to smooth the furrow of his brow and keep a hundred pathetic truths from slipping out of her mouth.
The last time I was in the garden, buttercups bloomed in the dirt beneath my fingertips. I ripped them out so you wouldn’t see them, and now they’re pressed between the pages of a Temerian legal treatise, because you'd never read something so dull.
I want to be able to see you like you see me, you silly fucking bard, and I want it to hurt you the same way it hurts me. I want to bruise parts of you that you forgot existed so you have to decide if the ache is worth having found them again.
This idiotic, ruinous endeavor started because I wanted to know what Geralt could possibly see in you. I wish I’d never found out, because it’s unfair.That he has you, and I don’t. Not really.
Yennefer bites back every single one of them as Jaskier kisses her back, fierce and raw, arms coming up to wrap around her. She tells herself that it’s okay--just for a moment--to bask in the warmth of him.
***
Winter is nearly over; but this time, for this last stretch of it, Yennefer begrudgingly lets herself appreciate it. There's clearly no use in trying to do otherwise.
Jaskier starts playing songs of spring; she catches him lazing about the garden, singing his silly ditties to the flowers, as though to welcome them into the season.
One such afternoon Yennefer wanders over, kicking at his ankle to get his attention. “This certainly seems like a good use of your time.”
Jaskier shields his eyes against the sun with his hand and grins up at her. "It aids growth, or so I've heard." He sits up, lute cradled in his lap, and sighs loftily. "Honestly, I should be basking in the light of your gratitude at this very moment, seeing as I’m attempting to ensure that you have the finest of ingredients for your concoctions.”
"Much appreciated," Yennefer tells him, dryly. "Bask away." She thinks for a moment. "Did you compose a different song for each and every species?"
Jaskier sweeps his arms out and gestures to the flowers around them. “Well, I'd hate to make anyone jealous."
“Ridiculous,” Yennefer scoffs, trying to keep her lips from curving upwards.
Jaskier leans back on his elbows and eyes her. "You're welcome to come by and have a listen." His voice is casual, but there's a touch of hesitance to it.
Yennefer rolls her eyes. "How very generous of you, to allow me entry into my own garden."
Waving her retort away, Jaskier picks up where he left off. "And--solely on this occasion and in these very specific instances--I'll even take factual corrections. Gods forbid I serenade any of these beauties with falsehoods about themselves. It would be an artistic disgrace."
Yennefer snorts. “Oh, that is something. Had I known that you'd experience such shocking personal growth I would’ve considered sequestering you away before this.”
"Tread lightly, Witch," Jaskier says, a glint in his eye. "The offer's revocable."
Without quite intending to, Yennefer sits down with him, eventually. Surprisingly, the bard largely doesn't require corrections. He'd paid attention, then, when she'd taken him through the garden all those months ago.
Something oddly content rises in her chest. Yennefer instinctively goes to push it aside, to take her leave of this garden, and this manor, and this disastrous human. Instead, she leans in and kisses him, pleased when Jaskier carefully sets his lute to the side and winds his hand into her hair. The press of his lips is soft and aching--on her mouth, and then on the rest of her.
***
Winter is over; Jaskier is gathering up his things and leaving for good.
Yennefer listens with half an ear as the bard chatters away, just as much to himself as to her. "--did not, in fact, miss sleeping on the ground, but such is the price of traveling with a Witcher." His complaining is undermined by the distinctly cheery air about him.
They're in the bedroom; their bedroom, Yennefer supposes, far past pretending otherwise. She leans against a low dresser and watches him. "Where did you arrange to meet him?"
Jaskier looks up from packing his clothes with surprising care. "Montecalvo, in Redania. Not too far from Kaer Morhen. I might even be able to get him to swing down to Oxenfurt from there. He hates the bigger cities, so it'll take some convincing, but I have my ways." He grins, bright and cocky; it leaves a bittersweet taste in Yennefer's mouth.
Looking at her curiously, Jaskier pauses, sitting on his bag. "Are we going to, you know. Tell Geralt? About this?" He gestures vaguely between them and takes a moment, as though acclimating himself to the feel of the words on his lips. "About us?"
"Jaskier," Yennefer replies, flatly. "We've been fucking each other for months. Geralt will smell it the second he gets within a thousand feet of either of us." Possessiveness curls in her chest at the thought of it--Jaskier smelling of her affections, of lilacs and gooseberries. She crushes it before it chokes her.
Jaskier flushes. "Ah, right, hadn't thought of that. Makes sense, I suppose." He absently picks at a loose thread, lost in thought. "How do you think he'll react? Do you think it'll be all, you know," he waves his hand, "weird about it? Gods know, this sort of thing isn't exactly his forte. Truly, I've never met someone so terrible with interpersonal complexity, or what have you."
Yennefer almost laughs. It hardly matters. This is over, and Geralt's reaction, whatever it may be, can't undo any of it.
But the question is still sore. She very much understands her position in this, how poorly her affections would fare if pitted against Geralt's displeasure. After all, the bard isn't like her, or Geralt; he doesn't have the luxury of taking hundreds of years to parcel out bits and pieces of his affection. He loves like what he is--a man with just one lifetime to give away every drop of that love.
And Jaskier loves Geralt with every beat of his stupid, human heart. He prattles on about monsters and magic and Witchers in a way that speaks to how he hangs on Geralt’s every word; follows Geralt through the woods, to the furthest reaches of the continent, for as long as Geralt will have him; writes Geralt songs that bleed want and ache and love so profusely that the fact that it took an explicit declaration to get through to the Witcher is absurd.
But morbid curiosity outweighs the tightness in her chest. "Does it matter? Do you intend to apologize for this all? Repent for your indiscretion?" The sting of it is, perhaps, making her a touch unfair.
"Well," Jaskier says, "I have no idea what you're on about, but whatever it is, come off it." Yennefer gapes at him, taken aback at both the words and the sheer audacity of Jaskier implying that she is being too dramatic.
Oblivious, Jaskier leans back on his elbows. "I figure the whole thing will take him some getting used to," he muses, as though Yennefer had asked the question of him, "but I think he'll be fine." Jaskier shrugs. "We'll figure it out if we come to it, I suppose."
The words rattle around in Yennefer's mind and coalesce into the belated, absolutely baffling realization that Jaskier believes that their--interaction, arrangement, relationship--truly, she has no fucking idea, at this point--has yet to run its course.
Yennefer can't even begin to imagine what her face is doing. It must be concerning, because Jaskier looks at her with fresh, rapidly mounting horror, eyes wide and panicked.
"Ah. That is. If it remains something to be figured out, which would imply that it's still a thing that's, uh. Happening." Jaskier quickly stands and adjusts his sleeves, making a pathetically obvious attempt at nonchalance. "It may have been a touch presumptuous to assume your continued interest in myse--" Jaskier trips over his words, "--my company, given that we'd previously established a very firm, ah, timetable for this." He eyes the door, as though weighing the prospect of making a break for it.
Yet again, Yennefer almost bursts into laughter. The idiot. The incorrigible moron. The sheer, unmitigated gall of the bard to presume that he'd proven himself so worthy, lodged himself so deeply into her life and heart, that she won't simply drop him on Geralt's doorstep and wash her hands of him. The absolute audacity of him, to be right about it.
Looking anywhere but at her, Jaskier continues rambling, taking not a single breath between words. “If nothing else, I’m sure that Geralt will be thrilled that we’re marginally less likely to attempt to murder each other as a result of this tryst, the fleeting nature of which I--for one!--entirely comprehend."
Gods, he's so stupid. Yennefer beckons Jaskier closer, biting the inside of her cheek to hold back a smirk. Visible confusion flickers across his face. Still, he comes, eyes fluttering briefly shut when she reaches up to cup his cheeks.
Yennefer is many, many things: selfish and sharp-tongued, harsh and unyielding, quick to form grudges and slow to forgive them. But she's never been a coward. Now seems the time to prove it.
"If you'd like my personal opinion on Geralt, that idiot man does need all of the love he can get." Yennefer brushes a lock of hair from Jaskier's forehead, then decides to run her hands through it, unable to keep herself from touching him. Using her grip on his hair, she tilts his face down until he meets her gaze. "But I can’t imagine him objecting to us keeping a bit for ourselves. And if he does, he can very well fuck off about it."
Yennefer watches Jaskier, patient and smug, waiting for the words to penetrate his thick bard skull. It's quite clear the moment that they do; his eyes widen, the soft curve of his lips parting in surprise. His gaze sweeps over her face, as though looking for traces of mockery or insincerity. He's shit out of luck. Yennefer knows what she said, and has no intention of taking it back.
Jaskier lets out a breath, his relief almost palpable. “Well, that’s good, then." He chews at his lip, eyes bright. "I've been working on some things, and I'd hate to lose my inspiration partway through. It'd be very challenging. Artistically."
They look at each other for a long, uncommonly silent moment. The stillness between them is abruptly shattered when Yennefer throws her arms around Jaskier's neck and allows him to swiftly hoist her onto the dresser, his hands firm on her thighs.
Yennefer isn't entirely pathetic, not yet, so she won't admit to being enamored with the feel of them. "I dearly hope you don't expect me to start taking part in your grimy little adventures," she breathes.
Jaskier's hands slide further up her thighs, skirting the hemline of her gauzy robe. "I'd have to be a fool to assume that."
"Oh, but you are," Yennefer informs him imperiously, digging her heels into the small of his back to pull him as close as possible with the damned dresser in the way. His fingers slip under fabric, just a bit; her own fingers twitch desperately with the effort of not grabbing his wrists and yanking them higher. "That aside, perhaps when you find yourself somewhere a bit more civilized, I'd be amenable to dropping in--"
Jaskier kisses her, deep and fierce, then nuzzles at her temple. "We should probably establish a proper definition of civilized, then."
Yennefer laughs and grabs his face to kiss him back. "Hm, yes, your standards are so very low."
"They really aren't," Jaskier murmurs, bringing his hand up to wrap a lock of her hair around his finger. "Regardless, Oxenfurt? Gorgeous coast, fancy parties. They're hosting a music competition soon, so there may even be rivals to eliminate." He mouths along her jawline, up to her ear, kissing the shell of it. "Figuratively, not literally, I'm clearly a better person than that."
"No, you're not," Yennefer scoffs, unable to keep some sort of terrible fondness out of her voice. "It's part of your horrid charm."
Jaskier draws back to gaze at her, eyes wide with fake astonishment. "If I'd known this was what it would take for you to acknowledge my devastating charm, I would’ve let you sequester me away ages ago. You've no idea how gratified I feel right now.”
"I loathe you," Yennefer says, eyes alight.
Jaskier beams, as bright a smile as she's seen from him. "Feeling's mutual. Now, there's a bed right there, so how about we get you off this fucking dresser and make use of it."