[ CLOSED ] if i say your name

[gynvael]

Who: Geralt + Various
When: April
Where: Cadens; Horizon
What: Catch-all for April, post-event
Warnings: General Witcher stuff, trauma, small felines, the usual. NSFW marked.



(( starters in the comments below. find me at discontinued or at Noa#1979 to plot stuff! ))

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sylvain.

[gynvael]

[ Returning to Cadens doesn't yet mean returning home. They trundle him off for "observation." Observing what? That his limbs are intact? It isn't as though they'll atrophy overnight if someone takes their eyes off of him for a minute.

He's fine. He's healed. He's barely limping.

To top it off, he shortly finds himself with company. Don't misunderstand. He likes Sylvain all right. They shared a shit time inside a dark hole together, then spent a week surviving the frigid mountains. It doesn't matter. Sylvain is still another person in his vicinity. During a period when Geralt is short on patience.

The first six hours of Sylvain's occupancy is punctuated only by a grunt from Geralt. It's an acknowledging grunt.

When the twelfth hour strikes, Geralt has answered precisely two questions, then silently offered the redhead a piece of candy delivered by one of the nurses. He doesn't eat candy.

By the next day, he's wound up with a small winged feline in his lap. It's not unlike the one slipped past his door in Nocwich. Fluffy, tiny, and what in fuck is he meant to do with it?

Geralt holds it up in both hands with a sigh. Its legs dangle. It yawns wide at him.

He looks at Sylvain. One eyebrow arches. You want it? ]

[philancer]

[ Sylvain's not sure who Geralt pissed off or if this is just karma for something, but they end up roommates when they're first moved back to Cadens. Which is a bit of a surprise, since he half expected it to be Claude or someone, but here they are. He does his best not to annoy the other man while they're sharing space, but he's also trying to stave off extreme boredom of his own and the antsy urge to be up and around.

...That and sleep is still scarce because it's far too haunted by nightmares for him to get more than an hour or two here and there. So there's an effort not to br cranky about everything on top of everything else.

Still, watching Geralt try to deal with the feline.... whatever it is, is hilarious in its own right. At the look he gets shot, he just holds his hands up to ward off being handed the creature. ]

Oh, no. It looks like it likes you. You should keep it.

[gynvael]

[ To Sylvain's credit, Geralt tends to permanently look annoyed, whether he's actually bothered by his present company or no. He hasn't slept much, either, spending most of his time by the window or occasionally escaping into the halls to stretch his legs. ]

I've enough pets at the house. [ By which he means there is exactly one, Jaskier's. To Geralt, that is enough. Disregard that he built the thing a bed roughly two weeks in. He'd been—keeping busy. That's all.

He puts the creature aside, whereupon it promptly climbs into his lap. He puts it aside again and glances at Sylvain. They're both fed up with being trapped in a room, he expects. ]

When are they setting you free?

[philancer]

I still live at the inn, so don't look at me, I'm not sure Mags wants more bodies running around.

[ Still, he watches in amusement as Geralt tries setting it to the side, only to end up with it back on his lap again kneading its paws into his thigh. Yeah, he doesn't think Geralt's gonna be getting rid of it that easily.

At the question, though, he just flops his head back dramatically on the pillow with a huff of breath that ruffles his bangs. ]

Never, it feels like. I'm pretty sure they're just keeping me out of spite at this point. What about you? Has there been any word? [ He squints over in Geralt's direction again. ] I'm surprised you're still here, actually.

[gynvael]

[ Undoubtedly not. He's surprised she still allows them to stay at all. They aren't a quiet bunch, though he supposes they spill enough coin nightly to make it worth it. He steps into the inn only on occasion these days. Makes him wonder what it was like while half of them were missing.

He huffs. ] Few days, I imagine. They didn't believe me when I said I'd be fine.

[ He can walk out of here, but no amount of convincing them it's near impossible for his wounds to grow infected seems to work. He suspects none of them want the exceptionally high-profile death of a Summoned on their hands. Over-cautious. ]

At least we're being fed.

[philancer]

Honestly, they probably have so many of us insisting we're fine at this point, they've just stopped listening to all of us on principle.

[ Sylvain's not sure he's actually fine at all. But he's pretty sure there's nothing they can do for what he still needs to work through, and time will heal all the rest. He'd just prefer to be not fine somewhere else. ]

But the food isn't that bad, at least. Then again, it's not hard to beat questionable water, mushrooms, and roast rodent.

[gynvael]

[ That is, he gathers, a salient point. Perhaps others might've had the benefit of at least being used to sort of treatment.

Geralt is not. He does not have doctors and nurses fussing over him when he's injured. At best, he has Jaskier grousing about him being an idiot. Oftentimes, it's just Roach snorting at him from a distance. The attention is irritating.

He scoffs. Yes. There's that. Even for him, that was a bit much. He can usually hunt himself something better than a handful of fleeing rodents. At least the grouse once they fled was an improvement. ]

You didn't enjoy the mountain squirrel I cooked for you?