Chapter Text
Jaskier didn't notice the awful stench until he opened his bedroom door and stepped out into the cozy living area of his cottage, rubbing his eyes with a knuckle, yawning widely. The stench pervaded his nostrils, then his lungs. He gagged and slapped a hand over his lower face.
What was stinking up his home so badly? What the hell was that?
"Ugh!" He shuffled forward. Gagged again when the stench worsened. "Oh gods, what—"
It wasn't just any sort of stench: it was the foul reek of rotting blood and flesh, in copious amount. Where was it coming from?
There was certainly nothing in his pantry that could spoil and smell to high heaven like this. Whatever meat he had was salted, purchased in the market in town mere days ago. Which meant—the source of the reek was outside.
He slinked to the front door, hands over nose and mouth.
"Ugh!"
The malodour was almost unbearable as he opened the door with one hand and held his breath behind his other hand. His facial features were scrunched—and so it took him longer than he should have to see the horrifying, scaly, massive corpse blocking his front door.
With slitted eyes, he glimpsed row upon row of iridescent scales splattered with drying blood. Long, thin spikes on a humped back. Sharp, conical teeth in gaping jaws. Very sharp, deadly teeth—
He screamed at the top of his voice. Slammed the door shut and staggered away.
He shrieked, "Monster!"
He smacked both hands over his mouth. Wheezed for a few seconds, his shoulders hunched, his eyes wide open.
"Monster," he whispered into his palm. "There's a monster on my doorstep."
The monster didn't deign to respond. It didn't stop stinking either.
Jaskier slowly lowered his trembling hands. He pressed them to his chest that trembled as much, clenching them into fists.
"Okay." He sucked in a deep breath. "Come on, Jask. You can do this."
He slinked to the front door again. Gripped the knob with both hands, then turned it. He pulled back the door, just enough to peer over its wooden edge with even wider eyes.
By Melitele, the monster was still there, and so were its teeth, and its claws, and its spikes, and its eyes were open—
He screamed at the top of his voice and slammed the door shut again.
He dashed to the kitchen and grabbed the first weapon he could find. He then dashed to the back door, flinging it open to scurry out and around the cottage. The dew-wet grass crunched under his bare soles. Morning sunshine caressed his flushed cheek and dazzled his squinted eyes.
He stumbled to a halt once he reached the front garden, whipping up his weapon so its metal blade pointed at the sky, panting with terror. He tottered around the monster sprawled on the ground. Stared at it all the while, his eyes flitting here and there, grimacing in disgust.
The monster was even uglier perceived in its entirety under the sunlight: it looked like a dragon. It had one leathery wing that was ripped, and another missing. It had thick, sinewy legs. A long tail with an odd, three-pronged tip. A snake-like head and neck that seemed—broken.
It was in this moment that Jaskier realized two things: one, it was probably not the wisest decision to confront a monster with a butter knife while dressed in nothing but a flimsy nightgown. Two, the monster's neck was not only broken, but torn open to the bone in a fatal wound.
Jaskier lowered his arm and his very lethal butter knife to his side. He stared wide-eyed at the motionless, silent monster. Then he flung his arms up in the air, and shrieked, "Where the fuck did you come from?!"
The monster didn't deign to respond to him this time either.
It was in this moment that Jaskier realized two more things: one, the monster was the very definition of dead, and two, its aforementioned state was quite the hindrance to it holding a conversation with him, much less give him any answers to how it arrived on his doorstep.
"Of all the places on this blasted Continent—you had to drop here! My home! Uuuggh!" He flung his arms up in the air again and glowered wide-eyed up at the pellucid sky. Then he gave the dead monster a narrowed-eyed glare, his arms akimbo, his lips pursed. "I am not happy."
The dead monster wisely did and said nothing in the fierce aura of his very justified wrath.
"I had a lovely day planned, you know. I was going to have myself a nice, little breakfast, and then I was going to tend to my flowers—" Jaskier jabbed the butter knife in its direction. "Which you crushed under your grotesque bulk, you insensitive beast! What do you have to say for yourself?!"
The monster was sprawled with its long neck twisted back, parallel to its blood-spattered body. Its haunches and curled tail faced Jaskier.
Its bloated belly swelled.
And with a tremor of iridescent scales, the gases that had built up in it trumpeted out as a prolonged fart.
Jaskier leapt back and averted his face with a cry of repugnance. He lurched away and gagged. Then, with a louder cry of outrage, he hurled the butter knife at the monster. The knife bounced off the scales on its forehead like a pebble off a placid lake's surface. He watched it tumble across the grass to land on its side, a fallen, valiant warrior that had done its best.
Oh, wonderful—now he had no clean butter knives to butter his bread with.
He bowed his head and let out a heavy sigh. He trudged around the cottage to the back door and through it into the small kitchen where he paced its immaculate floor. He crossed his arms over his chest. Nibbled on his lower lip, his brow creased.
What was he going to do now?
He wasn't strong enough to move the corpse on his own. He would have to go to the town and hire some men to help him lug it away, perhaps even some horses—and that was on the assumption anyone would actually help him once they knew it was the corpse of a bloody giant monster.
As was his wont whenever he was anxious, he fidgeted with his fingers, rubbing their callused pads together.
Perhaps he could seek out one of those—witchers. Wasn't it their livelihood to hunt and kill monsters? Surely they'd know how to dispose of one after the job was done—
A loud, scraping noise erupted from beyond the shut front door.
With a harsh gasp, Jaskier jolted. He darted into the living area to stare wide-eyed at the door, his shoulders taut, hands shaking fists at his sides. He jumped at the next loud, scraping noise, heart hammering.
The monster—was dead. He was sure of that. The stubborn reek of its decaying blood and flesh was irrefutable proof of that. It was dead.
So what was moving out there?
What was dragging the massive, scaly corpse away from his doorstep?
His breaths turned erratic and shallow. He slowly turned his head to the left, to follow the trail of scraping noises outside. If he was right, the corpse was being dragged away into the dense woods surrounding his cottage. If he went to the window and peeked through it right now, he could—see what was out there.
He bit his lower lip. Hugged himself with both arms around his midriff, and shivered.
It was morning. The sky was cloudless. The sun was smiling upon the world. Whatever was out there, big and strong enough to move that monster, it couldn't be that frightening in the sunshine.
He sucked in a tremulous breath. Then another shorter one.
Then, with wary steps, he approached the nearest window, the one that overlooked the left side of his cottage and its lush flower garden. He heard yet another scraping noise.
He pushed aside the thin curtain—and looked.
For what felt like a century, his mind couldn't comprehend what he was looking at. He stared with a slight frown at the truly gigantic being lugging away the corpse with just one hand digging into the base of its long neck. The being appeared like a man—but it couldn't be one.
Its muscular, well-proportioned body and limbs were covered in what seemed to be short albeit profuse, white fur. The fur was longer and thicker at the scruff, and also on its luxuriant, straight tail that flowed out from above—
"Oh," Jaskier murmured, his cheeks heating up.
Whatever this furred, gigantic being was, it had the most ample, pleasing set of buttocks he'd ever laid his wide blue eyes on in his whole life.
What was it doing here?
What was it?
He was no closer to an answer when the being turned its blatantly non-human head towards him.
"Oh, my goodness," Jaskier whispered, his cheeks still warm—while a frisson of shock, of something else zigzagged down his spine.
The being had the incredibly muscled body of a man, but the large head of a white wolf. It had furry, triangular ears that pointed up and flicked. It had a broad forehead, and a blunt, long muzzle tipped with a black nose. Jaskier had no doubt that if those strong jaws opened, they would reveal substantial teeth that could splinter his bones with a bite.
He wanted to run his fingers through the long tufts on its cheeks.
He wanted to drown in those huge, golden eyes that stared at him.
He blinked.
He blinked hard—then gasped and jumped back from the window, his heart hammering again in his chest. He wasn't sure if it was fear or something else entirely that sped his heartbeat.
The curtain fell.
He stood in place, shivering, his face hot, his chest and lower belly hotter. He didn't know what he was waiting for: to wake up in bed and discover this had all been a dream, or to push away the curtain again and find the gorgeous, wolf-headed being right there at the window.
He staggered to the window.
Shoved aside the curtain with one hand and glanced out.
His breath hitched in his throat at the sight of—nothing. Nothing except his familiar flower garden, the verdant grass, the dense woods beyond.
The wolf-headed being and the monster were gone.
He darted to the front door and flung it open. He stood in its wooden frame, his breath leaving his lungs as a quivering sigh.
The monster's corpse was gone—but its putrid blood remained as garish swaths of blackening red on his stone steps. It had been here. It had been real.
Which meant the wolf-headed being had been real, too.
But where did it go? Why did it take the monster's corpse with it?
Jaskier turned his head from one side to the other, surveying the forest around him and his cozy home. He sucked in his lower lip. Fidgeted with his fingers.
He'd assumed the monster had fallen out of the sky and landed on his doorstep in some stupefying incident. But the noise alone would have awakened him. What if it hadn't fallen out of the sky? What if—
"Did you drag the monster to my doorstep?"
Only the birds replied him. They chirped and warbled from their high perches on sturdy branches. Their songs stayed a mystery to him. So did the answer to his murmured question.
He glanced down at his soiled steps and let out a long, inaudible breath. Well, at least that was one problem solved this morning. He didn't need to go to the town after all. He just had to wash this gore off first.
Then he could have his nice, little breakfast. Tend to his poor, crushed flowers. Work on more necklaces, while screaming nonstop in utter terror in his mind.
Just another typical day, really.