Chapter 11: The Sorceress's Bargain
The canvas of Yennefer’s tent felt thin as parchment against Jaskier’s ear. The campfire crackled ten paces away, but it was the silence from within that was deafening, followed by the low, honeyed poison of Yennefer’s voice.
“A night,” she was saying. “For the Ouroboros Mirror. You know its value. It could show you anything you desire to see.”
Geralt’s response was a low rumble, unamused. “I already have everything I need in my bed, Yen. And he’s waiting out there.”
A beat of icy silence. Jaskier’s breath hitched, his heart a frantic drum against his ribs.
“The bard? Geralt, don’t pretend with me.” Yennefer’s laugh was a brittle thing. “A passing diversion. A warm hole for your frustration after a hunt. I’m offering you power.”
Then, Geralt’s voice again, closer now, as if he’d turned toward the entrance, toward where Jaskier lurked. It wasn’t the voice he used for contracts or for monsters. It was softer, darker, stripped raw. “You think it’s a pretense? I’m addicted to him.”
Jaskier’s knees almost buckled. He pressed a hand to his mouth.
“Addicted?” Yennefer scoffed, but the certainty had left her.
“If I fuck him in the morning,” Geralt said, the words blunt and devastating in their clarity, “by noon I’m already hard again, thinking about how he’ll feel around me next time. How he sounds. How he tastes. When it comes to Jaskier, I am insatiable.”
Inside, something glass shattered. A perfume bottle, perhaps. Lilac and gooseberries turned sharp in the air.
“Get out,” Yennefer hissed, her voice trembling with a fury that was entirely new.
The tent flap was thrown aside. Geralt emerged, his silhouette backlit by the enchanted glow from within. His golden eyes found Jaskier immediately in the shadows, wide-eyed and frozen. Without a word, Geralt closed the distance, his large hand wrapping around Jaskier’s upper arm. His grip was firm, unquestionable.
He didn’t lead him to their bedroll by the fire. He marched them both into the deep pine woods beyond the camp’s edge, where the moonlight fractured through the branches and the smell of damp earth and resin swallowed the last traces of Yennefer’s scent.
“You heard,” Geralt stated, pushing Jaskier back against the broad, rough trunk of an ancient oak.
“I— yes, I—,” Jaskier stammered, the witcher’s body caging him in. The bark bit through his doublet.
“And?”
“And… ‘insatiable’ is a rather strong word, Geralt. Poetic, even. I might use it in a— mmph!”
Geralt crushed his mouth against Jaskier’s, swallowing the babble. This kiss wasn’t like the one in the inn, driven by confused passion. This was a claim. Geralt’s tongue plunged deep, a relentless invasion that tasted of resolve and something frighteningly close to love. Jaskier whimpered, his hands flying up to claw at Geralt’s leather-clad shoulders. He was already achingly hard.
Geralt broke the kiss, his breath hot on Jaskier’s wet lips. “You are not a diversion.”
“I didn’t say I was—”
“You thought it.” Geralt’s hands went to the laces of Jaskier’s trousers, yanking them open with a sharp tug that threatened to snap the cord. “I felt you thinking it. That you were just a convenient substitute. A consolation prize.”
Cold air hit Jaskier’s heated flesh, followed by the searing press of Geralt’s palm. He cried out, his head thudding back against the tree. “Fuck, Geralt!”
“That’s the idea.” Geralt spat into his own hand, the sound obscenely loud in the quiet forest. He didn’t wait, didn’t prepare him with anything but that slick saliva. He notched the thick, weeping head of his cock against Jaskier’s entrance and pushed.
It burned. A glorious, brutal stretch that stole the air from Jaskier’s lungs. He was tight, unprepared, and Geralt was huge. He sobbed, fingers digging into the witcher’s back.
“You,” Geralt growled, sinking deeper, an inexorable, devastating inch at a time, “are the only thing I crave.” He sheathed himself fully, hips flush against Jaskier’s ass, and held there, buried to the hilt. Jaskier felt impossibly full, split open on the solid heat of him. “This,” Geralt rasped, pulling back and slamming home again, making Jaskier scream, “is what I think about when I’m killing monsters. This tight, fucking perfect heat.”
He set a ruthless pace, each drive a punctuation to his words. The oak shuddered with their impact.
“You— ah!— you said ‘addicted’,” Jaskier gasped, the friction igniting every nerve.
“I am.” Geralt’s mouth was on his throat, teeth scraping the pounding artery. “I’m addicted to the way you claw at me when you come. To the filthy, pretty sounds you make.” He pistoned harder, faster. “To knowing this is mine. That you are mine.”
The possession in his words, the raw truth of them, unspooled Jaskier faster than the physical force. His climax ripped through him, violent and unexpected, streaking white between their pressed bellies. He clenched violently around Geralt, milking him, his scream muffled against the witcher’s shoulder.
Geralt swore, a low, choked curse, and followed him over. He pulsed deep inside, his own release hot and endless, branding Jaskier from within. He collapsed against him, his weight pressing Jaskier firmly into the unyielding tree, his breath a harsh gust in the bard’s ear.
For long minutes, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing and the distant call of an owl. Slowly, Geralt softened and slipped from Jaskier’s body, a slow, wet slide that made him shiver. Geralt’s hands, now surprisingly gentle, tugged Jaskier’s trousers back up and fastened them with careful fingers.
He didn’t move away. He rested his forehead against Jaskier’s, his eyes closed. “I’m not good with words.”
Jaskier laughed, a weak, shaky sound. “You just used several exceedingly good ones. ‘Insatiable’ will be starring in my dreams, and possibly my next ballad.”
“Hmm.” Geralt finally opened his eyes. The fierce hunger had banked, replaced by something quieter, more vulnerable. “Yennefer is gone.”
Jaskier looked past him, toward the camp. The shimmering tent was dark. “I imagine that confession wasn’t part of her planned exchange.”
“No.” Geralt pushed off the tree, offering a hand to steady Jaskier, whose legs felt like broth. “It needed saying. To her. To you.” He kept hold of Jaskier’s hand as they walked slowly back toward their cold fire. “You’re not a substitute, Jaskier. You’re the craving.”
Under the vast, indifferent stars, with the smell of sex and pine on their skin, Jaskier laced his fingers tightly with Geralt’s. For once, he had no clever reply. Just the warm, steady weight of a hand in his, and the profound, silent understanding that everything had changed.