an awful noise filled the air;

[iustise]

Who: Geralt & Lord John Grey
When: Early October
Where: Free Cities; The Badlands
What: Lord John moves to Free Cities; things do not originally go as planned
Warnings: None atm, will update as needed



It is not the first time Lord John finds himself with no idea of where in the world he might be, but the desert is decidedly a new twist. As he swallows back the wave of nausea that seems to accompany every portal he has taken, John shoulders his pack of meagre belongings he has managed to bring with him and squints at the scenery around him. He had done his best to scurry quickly out of the city to Nott, where he met with Yennefer and the mage who had sought him passage out of there. But time waits for no man, and already the sun is beating hot and heavy overhead. Perhaps he should have thought to bring more than the one waterskin he has with him...

It takes a bit of stumbling around, but John manages to find shelter, of a sort. Some sort of rocky overhang that at least provides a bit of shade from the sun. Wrestling off his jacket, John does his best to fold it up and stuff it into his pack, quickly coming to the conclusion that he's going to have to rethink his entire wardrobe, if the temperature in the city is anything close to this. Shooting Geralt a quick message that he's made it safely, John sits and waits and does his best not to think too hard about the whirlwind of events that have made up the past day. Or about the desert around him, for that matter, and what might lie beyond the rocky outcroppings, where he cannot see.

Having no better way he can think of to spend his time, John starts to sing to himself. Silently. He certainly knows better than to make any sound aloud. And when that gets old, he begins to amuse himself with imagining Free Cities itself, and Geralt's house. He can't say he's ever been described much about it, although that does not surprise him much either. Geralt is not one for frivolous details, and John had not thought to ask. He supposes he's going to find out now, one way or another. That is supposing that Geralt brings him back there, but -- he would, wouldn't he? And not just drop him off at an inn to find his own way.

Unease settles in his gut despite his best efforts otherwise. A noise sounds from a few feet away, a shifting of the sand and rocks, but when John turns to look there is nothing there. 

"Geralt?" John calls out uncertainly, but gets no reply, and the unease grows.

A few more moments -- minutes? -- pass by, and the sound comes again, much closer this time. John turns in his seat to look toward the noise and comes face-to-face with the strangest appendage he has ever seen sticking up out of the sand, blinking its multi-eyed gaze at him.

"Jesus Christ--!!" he exclaims, and barely manages to scramble out of the claw-eye-hand's reach as it takes a swipe at him.

Comments

[iustise]

The finally does leave John questioning slightly, it is true, but the fact that he does have one is the good part. John imagines that Geralt would have left himself until last anyway, assuming he had constructed the furniture for the others first and they hadn't just gone out and purchased it for themselves. Knowing Geralt from what he does in the hundreds of years that never were, he has the feeling that Geralt probably did build many of the things in their home for himself.

(Speaking of, John shifts for a moment, pressing a hand to his chest, reassuring himself that the little acorn that Geralt had carved for him is still safe and sound in his jacket pocket. After rolling around in the sand to escape that creature, he could never be too certain.)

John lets out the huff of a laugh at the continued grumbling. Jaskier... He remembers the other man's affinity for plants, during their time as gods. He also remembers the way his magic had crumbled, corrupting as he had fought so hard to maintain it, during that last conversation of theirs. The thought that any such ability has returned to Jaskier fills John with a fondness for the bard. He will be grateful to see him again too, even despite the...

"Pets?" John asks, raising an eyebrow even despite the fact that Geralt cannot see him. "You do seem to have a talent for collecting strays." John himself now among that number, it would seem.

[gynvael]

Plants and birdsong have been Jaskier's domain since he arrived in this place. It's an odd thing to see his friend with magic powerful enough to rival a studied druid—Jaskier was never capable of wielding Chaos on the Continent—but the truth is, he thinks it suits Jaskier. And it does mean he worries less when Jaskier is out and about on his own.

Not that he worried much to begin with. Jaskier is a man who can more than take care of himself—primarily by ascending beyond the fear of being called a coward that gets most other men killed. If the bard must hide behind someone bigger than him, he will do so without shame.

It's a good way to stay alive. Bravery is a fool's downfall.

"Hardly." Geralt shifts the horse towards the south. He'll introduce John to the animals soon. Two horses and a chocobo, as well. "We're all strays of our world."

They find each other, is the more accurate way of putting it. Few of them had much of a home even back on their spheres. He supposes John is a bit different at first glance, but the more Geralt comes to know the man, the more he senses John has not felt at home as often as he would like.

[iustise]

John contemplates that thought for a long moment, as he lets the swaying movement of the horse beneath him and the warmth of Geralt's back lull him into a sense of peace and calm at last. After all the danger he had been in, these past few days, these past few months, finding himself here at Geralt's side he finally feels as though he can breathe at last.

It is odd to realize how implicitly he trusts the other man. How, unspoken, he knows that now he is here, he knows that he is safe. John is a grown man and he is quite used to being on his own and seeing to his own protection, and yet. Having Geralt at his back is a comfort he cannot put into words. Perhaps because he was never quite so alone as he found himself in Thorne. Made all the more apparent with the knowledge of those he did care for, spread across the other territories of the land.

It is true, John supposes. They are all strays here, in one way or another. Lost, or abandoned, far, far from home.

"I had a little dog, once," John says, apropos of nothing, in that way a person does when they grow tired and their minds begin to wander. "Roscoe. A gift from a friend." The only creature John supposes he could ever claim to have called a 'pet'. John smiles fondly, thinking back on the first appearance of the tiny, long-nosed black puppy and its stumpy little legs and quick, pink little tongue. "I do not suppose you have made the acquaintance of Gustav?"