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When he was born, the World was not happy. It screamed at him and raged against his existence, and for all his Mother tried to whisper to him that it was alright and that nothing was more correct than his being here, he knew she was lying. It wasn’t her fault. It wasn’t the World’s fault. It wasn’t even his fault. It simply was how it was.
He was the first. Not the first of his Mother’s kind, the kind that would be called Gods, that came from the World at its beginning. Instead, he was the first of that second kind, the children of the Gods and not the World, that kind had no place carved out for them but were instead thrust into an already filled bowl, that kind that made the World writhe against their Wrongness. It wasn’t that the World did not want him there. The World liked him, for all that mattered. The World simply was not meant for him, and he was not meant for it, and there was nothing to be done about it.
Jaskier was not always Jaskier. He was born to a name long given up, discarded in the tearing apart of a World into many. The World screamed less but it was ever-present. He left his name when he left his mother, and chose a new one. He chose many new names, but the one that seemed to settle into him the most was Dandelion.
Dandelion brought flowers and joy and life with him. He felt freedom and love and heartache and he bathed the World in hues of blues and greens and yellows and reds and purples. He’d have continued to do so, but his flowers were less appreciated, his plants were less needed, and welcome turned to suspicion turned to fear.
(He was not pleased when he had to retire that name, but when the screaming of the World was joined by the screaming of fearful people, Dandelion no longer fit. He dropped his colours with it.)
Jaskier was an accidental name. He’d had no intention of a new name, was in fact considering returning to his first name and that first place with his Mother, when he’d seen the man in the corner. That introduction had saddled him with a name he did not want, too close in meaning to Dandelion for his comfort, but his curiosity about the man had not yet been settled.
It was not a man, as it turned out. A Witcher. A Wolf, at that. White Wolf, it was said.
(It might have meant something to Dandelion, but that did not matter now.)
The Witcher was Wrong in a similar way to Jaskier. Not by choice, or by design, or by a curse of the World upon their souls. They simply existed in ways that the World had not meant for, and that caused confusion. They were a creation born of the World’s creations, rather than the World itself, and thus they did not fit correctly.
Jaskier stayed with the White Wolf for as long as he could. He did not dare be bright, not yet. He throttled the flowers and drowned the screaming with music. He pulled stories of the World from the Witcher, spun them into song to be spread. The Wolf called him fanciful, the people drank up his every word, and Jaskier felt the World scream louder.
(The World might have liked the White Wolf and Jaskier, but its human creations did not like them so much. Jaskier got used to spending time among trees rather than hearths.)
Jaskier wandered on his own too. He’d travelled the World before, for a time longer than living memory. He heard his Mother’s name in prayers, heard people ask for peace and prosperity and healing, and in some cases, war and death and destruction. He did not pray to his Mother.
(He’d heard his first name only once. He left before the prayer could be finished.)
This time, the wandering was accompanied with singing and music and joy. His songs and stories travelled farther than Jaskier did, and by the time he arrived in a new place, his songs had gotten there first, and he was greeted by name. He brought forth flowers and traded them to lovers for food and pleasure. He made his way to new places, draped himself in cloth of blues and greens and yellows and reds and purples, bright as the colours of the blooms that followed in his path. He climbed higher in the world, swathed himself in finery and riches and people. He was chased out of towns, brought into new ones with open arms, and he loved and lived like he had never done so before in the World.
And for whenever the travelling got to be too long, too hard on his weary soul, his Witcher waited for him. He’d drag Jaskier into mud and blood and darkness and grime, and for all it was dimmer than the brightness of the Life he’d found, wholly unsuited for his blooms, Jaskier decided this was better. He did not seek of his White Wolf what he took from the people in his travels, rather, clung onto his companionship in an experience of a World that did not know what to do with them.
(The World still screamed, but it was at its quietest when he was with Geralt. Jaskier hardly took notice of it at the time, but it was true nonetheless.)
Jaskier met a Queen in Cintra. It was an event so drowned in blue it made him dizzy, but his yellow at least varied the palette. The Queen’s daughter screamed, but not of Wrong, but faintly. His Witcher made a mess of the feast, turning it red, interfering with Destiny and Surprises, and the Queen’s daughter screamed the scream of the World. Jaskier fled with his Witcher, and a few months later, the World screamed louder than it had in eons. Jaskier felt it echo through him, and he had a feeling his Wolf had too.
The Djinn, that poor, trapped wish granter, nearly killed him. He had never been concerned about that before, but it was a refreshing change of pace. The pair of searing Violet eyes was less welcome, even if they had helped save his life. Jaskier did not know what to make of this Violet Witch, but he did not like it. He liked it even less when his Witcher fell into her with reckless abandon. The Witch had a sense of Wrong permeating from her, but she did not appeal to Jaskier as a companion with whom to share the World.
(The World did not scream louder when Geralt and Yennefer coupled, but Jaskier felt like it should have. It might not have been Wrong, but something about it was wrong, tugging on strings of Destiny that should have been left to hang loose.)
He stuck closer with his White Wolf, barring their separate winters. They did not encounter the Violet Witch for many seasons, but he had the sense that they were always on her trail, never quite able to catch up. He made sure to steer them away, and if there were more plant monsters than should have been in this region, that was not Jaskier’s business.
Jaskier felt the World’s scream resonate in his soul when the Violet Witch locked eyes with his Witcher, and he knew then that things were about to change. The Dragon recognized something in him as Wrong but was too occupied with his Witcher and the Witch to take proper notice. The Dragon tugged at the bonds between the White and Violet, and they did not snap, but it seemed as though all parties wished they would. The Witch left, and Jaskier stayed with his Wolf.
And then he didn’t. The mountain, which had been full of plants struggling to survive in a hostile climate, and yet still surviving, became barren as he descended. He hit the plains and kept walking. Forests which had growth healthily for eons became overwrought with thorns, gardens produced shriveled harvests, and the world looked like a permanent winter wasteland, similar in colour to the not-his Witcher. He did not take notice, beyond annoyance, for winter reminded him of time spent waiting for someone who did not want him anymore.
(The one who had made him feel Life as it should be felt, believed that Life’s only blessing would be his absence. The irony was not lost on him.)
He wandered as he once had, without purpose and without joy. The colours blues and greens and yellows and reds and purples which he had once draped himself in gave way for browns. He sang at first, if asked, but no longer of the not-his Witcher, and eventually people stopped asking.
He was between towns when the World’s screaming was joined by a scream full of rage and pain and fear and triumph, a scream tinged with flame and Violet, a scream strong enough to stop him in his tracks. The World was silenced for a moment in its wake, but its cry began anew, screaming louder and tinged with sorrow.
(He knew what had happened, and despite himself, a part of him mourned her.)
He travelled onwards, ignorant of the World around him. It was many months into his aimless journey that he heard the crying of a village. The sobs of children and adults alike drew his attention, and despite himself, he could not help but investigate. They were thin, starved of food and sustenance and joy, and his heart wrenched as he looked around himself, and saw death in every field.
He sat and he talked and he told stories, he made the children laugh and the adults sigh and he tried his best to relieve their pain, but it was not enough. He rose to leave, and he was asked to play. Music still came from him easily enough, although it was not so full of Life as it had once been. He sat, and he played and he played and he played. As he played, smiles graced the faces of the village, and he felt himself smile in return, and as he did so, the grey around him shifted back to green, and growth began anew.
When he left the village, the gardens were bountiful, and laughter rang through the streets. As he walked down the main road, a few flowers bloomed in his path.
(Green returned to the World as plants grew once more.)
He made music as he travelled. Travelers on the road looked at him in shock, their frames gaunt, and they watched as Life returned to the world around him. He spread song and music and Life once more, and although he did not drape himself in his colours and his flowers were dull, the people were well fed and happy, and so he continued.
(It was a few weeks into his travelling when he heard a prayer uttered to his first name. He left, but he heard it again in the next town, and along the road, and wherever he went. As he travelled, his first name was uttered along with Dandelion.)
(Yellow returned to the World as small, weedy flowers bloomed behind him. Dandelion overtook his first name in prayers.)
He made it to Oxenfurt, and the World screamed as it had always done, still haunting and sorrowful, but with the beginnings of a warmer undertone. He saw the plight of the elves, their fear and pain and rage, and he made it his. His songs were no longer to bring Life, but were now to save it.
Sandpiper was never a name he expected. It was far from his favourite, but it meant something, and that was enough. His music signaled safety and a chance to escape, and his songs covered the sounds of running footsteps huddling in the bowels of a boat. His new songs made his heart ache, but he continued.
(Red returned to the World as he witnessed too much elven blood spilled, and donned a coat as a signal.)
He sang and he saved and he hid and he smuggled, and then he was being hugged by a Violet Witch who had made the world scream of fire and triumph with her death. A Violet Witch who was, in fact, not dead. She still screamed of Wrong, but it was dull, minimal now, and her Violet dulled too.
(When he found out she’d lost her powers, well. He understood the dulling.)
For all the Violet Witch had died in fire, it was not familiar to him. It was used to torch his fingers in search of information for the not-his Witcher, and he screamed. He felt the gardens around him begin to swell, but then there was a Violet not-quite-Witch turning the fire against its wielder. They ran and laughed and fled, and then fought and protected each other and separated.
He felt the World scream once more, rageful this time, as a Violet flurry washed over him, tainted by a power older and as Wrong as anything he’d ever felt.
The jail cell shouldn’t have held him, but his presence would only draw people to the elves, and he didn’t yet have another purpose. His music was used as a weapon, albeit a mild one this time. Annoyance was simply the best use of his time.
(The World screams began to crescendo, but they were not rageful or fearful or sorrowful. He’d have almost called them joyful, if he had any inclination to believe in joy now.)
His song was interrupted enough that his restlessness joined with his anger, and he rose to take action. A further interruption when the door opened, creaking as it swung open. He turned, reprimands already on his lips, only for them to die as he took in the sight before him.
The not-his Witcher, the White Wolf, stood in the doorway. The embrace may have been warm, may have felt right, but it was not so hot as the rage that he’d been wrangling and suffocating within himself since that day atop that accursed mountain. He did not follow, and the words that fell from his lips were so full of bite he’d have torn the not-his Witcher’s heart in half if left unchecked.
And yet, all it ever took was one sentence to quell that fire within his soul, one hand upon his shoulder to settle him and set him following once more. They journeyed far, following the trail of the Child Surprise and the Violet Witch.
(There was something wrong there. The way Geralt had reacted to Yennefer’s incantation did not bode well, and the World screamed at him of the Wrongness of it all.)
He met a Princess. She did not respond to his questions or his jokes or even his songs, but she did seem to strike an interest in his stories, and so he spoke of long past journeys and old friends, desperately trying to see any light in her eyes.
They climbed a mountain, to a keep he’d never dared venture to, despite many winters of longing. He was not welcomed, and nor were his songs, so he put himself to work wherever it was most necessary. He assisted his Violet Witch, cooked and cleaned and repaired and stayed out of the way of the not-his Witcher’s brothers, who in turn stayed away from him.
(The World’s screaming got louder. He ignored it.)
The not-his Witcher returned to the keep, and stuck to the side of the Princess and his Violet Witch. He does not weep, does not rage. He simply continued on as he had been. The plants in the keep did not wither, but their growth was not as fast as it had been, or should have been, but they were not dead.
Except this time, death came to them.
Voleth Meir, the Deathless Mother, the Wrong Witch, possessed the Princess. Voleth Meir entered the keep unobstructed and murdered all but a handful of the few surviving Witchers. He’d not been present when the Wrong Witch had revealed herself, but his entry to the hall did not go unnoticed.
The Wrong Witch seemed greatly offended by his presence. He was more offended by hers. She reached for him, on the outskirts of the World, in that space where they both resided. She’d opened a portal to another Plane, bringing forth foul creatures that were not wanted here, by him or the World. Her reach and her portal both tried to drag him back in. He did not move.
(The portal to another Plane screamed in harmony with his World, forming a fragment of a sound he had known in his earliest times.)
The Wrong Witch could not kill him, but he did not know how to kill her either. He tried to do what his Violet Witch had asked of him, but fumbled and fell. He did not fight, not as he could have. The not-his Wolf pleaded and begged for the Princess, for her to let go, but failed. His Violet Witch gave herself up for the Princess, and then the World screamed louder, and they were gone. He did not know where they had gone, but he knew how to get there.
The other Plane welcomed him in the same way his World welcomed him – it didn’t. The screams were different, but not unfamiliar. He found the Witch and Witcher and Princess, and the Hunt approached.
He fought now.
This other Plane did not want his plants and song and Life, but he did not give it the choice. The horses of the Hunt stumbled as roots snarled around their hooves, and gnarled branches caught onto their riders. The Hunt approached, slowed but not stopped.
The Princess got his Witch and the not-his Wolf out. The other Plane screamed with their loss, the Hunt raged as their prey escaped even while the Life around them withered without its source. He got himself out.
He landed on a table. The Witchers that had survived were gathered around the huddle forming at one end of the room. They were alive, and held each other and laughed and cried and breathed, and so he left.
He passed through death and destruction and despair as he ascended to the room he’d claimed as his own. He sat. And waited. And sung.
His song was a tune of mourning and pain and life and family and regrowth and decay and rage and triumph and hope. He sung and it spread and the plants did not grow, but they did not wither, and the Life around him remained at peace.
He did not notice for some time, but the World screamed along with him. They shared the tune together, and he felt the embrace of the World in its harmonies.
(The tune they shared echoed one he had not heard since his youth, in that first place he existed in.)
His song was interrupted by the door. His Violet Witch hovered and listened. He continued singing, but the World was done joining in, and so he too trailed off. The Wrong screamed out of her again, strong and loud, and where he’d once recoiled at its presence, he rejoiced. She approached, and sat beside him, and waited with him. And after they waited, and the World seemed to settle around them, they talked.
(Purple returned to the World, slowly and softly and gently as the dawn rising around them, as they spoke.)
His Violet Witch moved on, and he lay down. He stayed there until the sun had truly risen, and then he began to work. He cleaned shattered glass and dust and blood, and hauled monster carcasses and righted furniture and mended doors and walls.
He did not touch the bodies. They were not his to handle.
When the Witchers had finished and left the hall, they found him next to a pile of broken furniture, with another chair to be added to it. They did not comment on it, nor did they comment on the tune he hummed as he worked, they simply joined in. They worked together until dusk, and he hummed all the while. The plants around them grew faster.
He passed his time for a week, and then he found the Princess. She sat outside, under the first clear sky of many days. Her eyes shined with tears. He sat and waited with her, and she did not talk. The World still screamed around her, so he joined with it. His music grew louder, and she calmed, and joined in. She sang a different tune, one which matched the World’s and his own, but was still made up of a separate piece.
(Blue returned to the World as the clouds shifted to reveal the sky, clearing it as they sang.)
The Witchers handed his Princess and his Violet Witch supplies as they prepared to leave. He sat, and waited, and watched. He did not hum now.
A hand fell on his shoulder, and that had always been all it ever really took to cause him to lose his fight, so he followed the not-his Witcher Wolf as he moved through the keep, away from the others.
He did not know what to say or sing or do, so he stood. And he did not have to wait long.
Jaskier’s name fell from the not-his Witcher’s lips, and then those lips were on his own, and a name did not matter so much. He squeaked, and he heard the World pause in its screaming to laugh at him. He returned the embrace as best he could, pulled his Witcher as close as possible, and then some.
His Witcher pulled away and laughed, and Jaskier smiled and laughed back, and fell forward into another kiss. His Witcher cut it short and laughed again, and cupped his face, and smiled softly and sadly.
They talked. They sat and they talked and it took them past dusk and dawn and well into the sun’s next path across the sky to finish. When they had, Jaskier leaned against his White Wolf, and closed his eyes.
Jaskier awoke in a bed, warmed through to his soul. The World’s screams were happy and settled over him like a blanket. His Wolf was behind him, curled around him. His Violet Witch and Princess were piled on the bed too, and the Wrong from them all curled around the World’s screams and settled over him like a blanket.
They left together, and as they descended from this mountain, the World was awash with colours and life and flowers. Jaskier draped himself and his White Wolf and his Violet Witch and his Princess in them, and they travelled onwards, blues and greens and yellows and reds and purples following behind them as Jaskier sung the now-joyous tune that the World screamed at him.
(White had never left the World, but it was no longer tinged grey, and was as pure as the first fall of snow on a bed of grass. It became purer with every smile and kiss.)
(The World did not stop screaming. The world was not designed for them, and they were not designed for the world, but they were meant to be there nonetheless. The World screamed its song at them, and they answered it in kind.)