abraxaslogs | [ CLOSED ] hands like skeleton bones

[ Technically, Julie is working, but the cold and the dark have slowed business to nothing but the barest trickle of patrons, all of them regulars and already several tankards in. She's washing dishes when the suds suddenly align, begin forming letters. It's off-putting enough for her to snatch her hands out of the water, drying them on her apron as they finish assembling. His name looks like she's already dragged her hand through the bubbles, but she hasn't, and it stays that way.

She immediately begins wondering how fast she can get the drunks either on the street or upstairs in bed. Probably pretty fast. She's already untying her apron when she responds. ]

Tavern. I can be there in fifteen minutes, though.

[ Julie does not wait for a reply before she's out at the bar, prodding the two men sitting there away. She takes a bowl from someone mid-bite. ] Hey, chug it if you're gonna drink it. Closin' up now.

[ Part of him isn't expecting to hear back, not right away—they're not letters where they wait to be delivered; they just drift in and out, and he's already thinking of where the hell else he can go if she doesn't answer. He's aware Nott is, supposedly, out of Thorne's reach, but he isn't exactly subtle how he is, and his fleeing a second time from Thorne when they'd specifically come for him seems far more tenuous than being one of two dozen prisoners who simply walked through a few portals.

He shifts further into the shadows when a passing woman with a basket of bread passes by and gives him a look.

Then Julie's cursive loops through the mossy stone. He should. Explain. He knows, when she says fifteen minutes, she's thinking of the Horizon. Explaining feels like an extraordinarily monumental task at the moment, so all she gets is: ]

Not there. In Nott. What tavern? Where is it?

[ If she tells him it's on the other side of the fucking city, he may as well just lay down here for the night. ]

[ On the other hand, she becomes concerned when she doesn't hear back quickly -- she has come to think of it as the exact equivalent of texting, and everyone knows that the list of good reasons to not answer promptly is short. Sleep, work, emergency, mind games. End of list. So she's not surprised when a response begins to curl across the glass of the window while she collects various dishes that people may or may not actually be done with.

It's only once she reads it that she stops, stands in place and whispers to herself, what the fuck. The writing fades and her brow knits, her reflection staring back at her in the glass.

After that beat, she moves quickly. Grabbing a broom, she starts literally shooing the stranglers upstairs to their rooms, blows out lanterns. ] Go the hell to bed, you're drunk anyway. Do not -- ugh, there you go.

[ She grabs her coat from the stand in the corner, snuffs out the last flame besides the smoldering fireplace. ]

The Hare & Harrow, east side of town. Where are you? I can come get you.

[ He squints at the sun nearly disappearing, reorienting himself. East. He can't see the tavern she speaks of from here, but he is not, at least, all the way on the other end of it.

A few seconds pass before he answers. It's a decision between whether or not he can make it there on his own or if he wants to risk Julie coming here to retrieve him. In the end, he decides Julie coming to find him, at this point, will draw less attention than him stumbling and bleeding his way to the tavern. His head feels like crushed glass. He can't even say what's keeping him upright, except that it's just what he does. But the ground looks more and more appealing.

How long will Thorne care to look for him, if they do at all? (How long before they look to Yennefer for answers?) ]

Southeast. By the square.

[ Is there more than one square? Doesn't matter. She knows this city better than he does; that'll have to be good enough. ]

Edited 2021-11-18 04:49 (UTC)

[ The pause before he answers feels like it takes an hour. Something is wrong, something very drastic has happened, because he should be a million miles away in Cadens, but he's here and how??

She's standing outside the door, still, her hood covering her hair and a spare cloak in her other hand. Cadens is in the desert. He wouldn't have needed one out there. Words appear and fade across a puddle that she immediately splashes through, paying no attention to the hem of her skirt getting damp.

It doesn't take her long to reach him, though she is in danger of passing by him in the alley. She knows better than to look like she's looking for something or someone, but god is it hard to restrain.

Things have been so shady lately, all across Abraxas. The tension, the new people, the ghosts. Even she can feel it. And now this. It has to mean something, right? The last time she lived through this many "coincidences", everyone else didn't.

There's movement in her peripheral vision, and she turns toward it. ]

Geralt?

[ Part of him already regrets agreeing to let her find him. Impatience is not a trait he normally bears, but right now, he hates needing to wait. He'd rather be moving. He exhales and watches the streets and blinks away the increasingly dark spots in his vision.

As hard as he's attempting to lurk unnoticed, it's near impossible for him. Even in the dimming light, the torches on the streets reflect the shine of his eyes. With her hooded cloak and long skirt, he'd never have recognized Julie on sight alone. Her scent, though—that's not changed. Just overlaid with the smell of ale and soap. The moment he catches it in the air, he steps further out. His fingers wrap tightly around a wood pillar. Blood stains ragged, torn nails; more of it is dried and sticky in his hair.

The sound of his name makes him turn. He releases a breath he'd not realized he was holding. There. She's here. Except, underneath the relief, is the understanding he still needs to stay on his feet to make it back with her, however far that may be. Because there's absolutely no way Julie can carry him anywhere. Which. Fuck. All right.

A beat passes. It takes a second for him to form some sort of coherent reply. ] Could use a hand.

[ Julie might be too small to actually carry him -- and in fairness to her, he's a very large man -- but she is not weak or helpless, and she is not worried about her ability to get him back home with her. He is so unsteady, and her invisible hand braces his arm while she's still twenty feet away, taking brisk steps toward him and shaking out the cloak she brought him. When she reaches him, she gently wraps it around him, covers his hair with the hood like she does her own. She knows what it's like to be identifiable.

Once that's done, her physical hands both steady him at the elbows. She looks up at his face, taking him in, already making mental notes of what she has to do as soon as she can get him inside and at least away from the danger of collapse. Her voice is soft. ]

Christ, you're a mess. C'mon, we're not far. You just gotta keep it together a couple of blocks.

[ Glancing behind him, she takes the reins of the horse with her third hand, bears as much of his weight as she can when she takes the first steps back down the street. She's stronger than she looks, and it's not the first time in recent memory that she's taken on an injured person's load.

She's quiet getting them back, focusing on not letting him fall. ]

[ Somehow, it's only now that it strikes him the magic she'd used in the Horizon, with her hands, is one she also carries outside of it. The realization flickers in and then out; most of his attention goes into placing his feet where they won't send him flat on his fucking face. The cold doesn't bother him—if anything, it's the only thing that's let him go for this long; he'd have never made it this far through the dry heat of a desert—but the cloak keeps him from feeling so exposed, and he tugs it around himself.

He leans more of his weight on her than he means to, probably stumbles at some point, but she keeps him from hitting the ground and that's all that matters. If he's got any thoughts on what the hell happened—he doesn't. He hasn't had the chance to process it, or maybe he doesn't want to have that chance. Maybe it's for the best his focus has, for the past week, narrowed down to not. Dying. An important task.

The trek to the tavern takes both too damn long and no time at all. He's not counting the minutes or looking ahead, just walking, until she eventually stops and he catches on that they're here. He braces a hand against the doorframe. Some part of him is just waiting for permission to let himself drop, whether that's Julie shutting the door behind them or reaching a chair or perhaps a nice bit of floor where no one will trip over his body for the next few hours. ]

[ Honestly, she hardly thinks about how heavy he is, and he is heavy, because she's got so running through her mind. She has to get him in a bed and clean him up some. Make sure there's nothing actively dangerous that she can spot. See if she can get any information out of him before he passes out entirely, though that's really the least of her worries. If it has to wait until he wakes up, then so be it. But it would be nice to know that he's not severely concussed.

She pushes the door open with her hip, forces him to walk to the table nearest the stairs before she lets him sit. They're going to have to go upstairs, because she can't leave him downstairs to be found, but she needs to move the horse from the entrance and lock the door. She wobbles very slightly as she deposits him in a chair. ]

You rest for a minute while I put your horse in the stable. I will be right back, Geralt. Don't pass out. You can pass out the second I get you in bed, I swear, but not before.

[ Her voice is low but firm, and she makes him look her in the eye before she goes back outside. She's moving too fast, startles Baron in his stable, doesn't take the tack off of Geralt's horse. She's got to talk to people -- Lloyd and Nadine, Jaskier and Ciri, maybe Sam. This feels far worse, more ominous, than it felt when she accidentally discovered new Summoned at the same time she apparently spontaneously distributed a new magical ability. It's so specific, this must mean something.

When she comes back inside, she latches the door closed behind herself, walks over toward him and puts her hands on his shoulders. She feels fucking terrible for making him move, but he has to. At least she can try to enlist the others to carry him, if she needs to. ]

We have to go upstairs, honey. I'm so sorry, but you can sleep as long as you want once we're there.

Edited (don't hate me i just keep finding typos) 2021-11-20 04:59 (UTC)

[ Those are certainly stairs waiting. Geralt chooses not to linger on the concept of climbing up a set of stairs. That's a problem for five minutes from now. In the meantime, he's got more pressing matters like keeping his eyes open. When he looks up, they at least focus on her with some steadiness. He nods. Half of him is vaguely numb; the other half just fucking hurts. He counts his breaths until he hears the door creak open again. His fingers curl reflexively around a blade he does not actually have before he relaxes a hint.

She needn't to tell him twice; he's already got his palms planted on the table. He grits his teeth and forces to his feet and does not quite swallow the noise he makes. He isn't steady, but he is up. What help she offers, he'll take it.

(Later, he will consider exactly how much of himself he's put into Julie's hands. It's not something he makes a habit. But he does trust her, here and now.)

Every step up feels like it might be last. Somehow, it's not. He blinks hard, his vision swimming. He's bleeding from somewhere (several places, probably), but he can't tell if it's started to drip on the floors or not. His fingers find purchase on the nearest piece of furniture—a dresser, a table—and he takes a moment to try not to tip over. ]

[ It is, luckily, not a particularly steep or long staircase, even if it currently feels like the longest one in existence. She braces him from the side and the back, bearing as much of his weight as she can handle, and keeping her magic hand planted between his shoulder blades. She doesn't actually know how much that will help if he passes out, but she figures that at least it should make him fall forward rather than backward. Even more fortunate is that Julie does not live at the end of the hall upstairs, but rather only two doors down; her hand leaves his back and opens the room for them. By the time she half-dumps him on the closer side of the bed, she's close to collapse herself, her back and shoulders shaking from supporting him.

Julie takes a second, closes her eyes and catches her breath, then starts moving again. She has a whole to-do list in her head now, and the more of it she can do while he's still conscious, the better.

With a soft grunt, she falls to her knees and begins to remove his boots. She's not particularly delicate -- she just doesn't want them in her bed, and also he's covered in blood, so everything has to be washed. ]

What happened?

[ Where she puts him, that's where he all but collapses. There's a second where he blinks and then she's on the floor tugging on one of his boots, and he doesn't remember seeing her move towards him. He reaches down with a wince to loosen the buckles on the other boot, if only because he's certain he'll pass out if he sits still. Hard to know how well his fingers work, though.

He should tell her he's fine, that she can just leave him here. He'll wake up eventually, put himself together one way or another. Probably. But he feels like shit and even for him, the word fine is too blatantly untrue to put out there. ]

Thorne. [ He lifts his shirt gingerly. It's not the first time he's tried to take stock of his wounds; a couple look recently cauterized—not ideal, but he had zero supplies and only his Signs to get by. Seemed the simplest option to keep from bleeding.

Fuck, he needs a nap. And were his head on straight, he'd have realized it ten minutes ago—but it takes him until now to put it all together, between the empty downstairs, that he does not recall her paying anyone, the scent in the air. This room is not just a room in a nearby tavern. It's hers. Hers and someone else's. ]

I don't need long. [ It's impossible to say if Thorne will care to come for him. He doesn't feel like risking it when it involves someone else in their own damn home. ] Just a few hours.

[ She sets his boots to the side (she won't even leave them on the rug) and rises to help with his shirt; she would really rather he not lift his arms very far at the moment. She's nearly positive he has at least a rib fracture, and if it's worse, she would really prefer he not pop a lung in her bedroom.

But she is honestly very concerned about him. Which is probably why she sounds so dry when she scoffs and tosses his shirt on top of his boots. ] Are you fuckin' crazy? You'll be lucky to be on your feet by next week, Geralt. Look at you.

[ Rubbing at her temple, she grabs a bowl from the sideboard -- the same bowl, actually, that she'd filled with water to help Susan -- and disappears into the bathroom for just a moment. When she comes back, she has a white cloth in one hand and the bowl of water in the other, which she sets on the bedside table. She dampens the cloth and begins gently wiping blood off his face. ]

Right, so Thorne, but why did you cross the border in the first place?

[ It comes off, with effort and a sharp pain that lights up the left half of his body. Last time she took off his shirt was far more pleasant. He only looks at her like he's got an argument for that except he's not exactly functioning well enough to present it. Which is perhaps several points docked in his favour in and of itself.

He relents without much convincing required. She's right. He knows that. He doesn't need a week, but he does need at least a night or so. It's just. More than he expects out of someone, a fact that's got nothing to do with Julie and everything to do with him. He can count on one hand the number of people he can show up at their door who will grant him aid without question. And for each of those people, it takes him a long time to quietly accept.

His answer comes with a delay that's not his usual silence, but a clear effort to bring his focus back to her. ] I didn't. They looked for me. Outside Cadens.

[ He isn't hard to find if someone's seeking him: he stands out, there's no changing that. Maybe he should've expected to be a target sooner or later. (Maybe Yennefer should've fucking warned him what the hell she was doing with the Queen over in Thorne.) ]

[ He looks at her like he wants to fight, and there is nothing in her eyes but a dare to even try, so she's pleased when he gives up without another word. Lightly turning his face toward her, she cleans his other cheek too, then reaches over to rinse the cloth, wringing out a trickle of dark, dirty water before she starts cleaning the wounds she can find. ]

But why you? You didn't do anything that the rest of us didn't do too, and they only wanted you?

[ She looks up from her hand to his eyes, corners of her mouth turned down. She can feel his walls up, which ordinarily would not bother her, but she feels like it's unfair to not even give her blueprint as to what's happening. ] Did you do something to make them come after you?

No. [ He grips the edge of the bed. He's not exactly trying to avoid answering; it's that he hasn't stopped to absorb it, never mind thought of how he's to explain.

He doesn't care about what they did to him. Or he does, because it's not been the most fun he's ever had, but it's nothing new. It's who they did it with. The longer he sits with this knowledge, the more raw he feels, and he wants nothing of it. But he owes Julie something, more, for dragging his shit to her doorstep in the first place. ]

They believed someone in their court was protecting me. [ It's not what they said, but what else? Yennefer's presence was not a coincidence. No one should have any reason to suspect he knows a damn thing. He's been in Cadens for barely a season; he's never even set foot in the prime minister's office. ] Perhaps they've been convinced otherwise now.

[ An unfiltered bitterness edges that statement, one he hadn't meant to let through. He can't summon the effort to want to take it back. He's not angry with Yennefer, except he is, but he isn't. He draws a breath between his teeth and sinks into the burning sting where the cloth brushes his skin. It's distracting, familiar. He tries not to keel over while Julie's helping him, which he manages, but he keeps losing track of where she is and what she's doing. If she's got anything to say, she's likely to have to repeat it more than once. ]

[ This is enough to satisfy her; she only didn't want to feel entirely in the dark. Nodding, she lets it go, and she's truly trying to avoid hurting him, but in this state, that's not really possible. Instead, she settles for quick and efficient, because she's going to have to get Nadine to look at some of these anyway, but none of them seem severe enough on their own to require immediate attention. It's not like last time, where she could see Susan's organs through the hole in her skin. Cleanliness matters more at the moment.

Sighing, she lets the cloth sit in the bowl once she's done, where it practically streams blood and dirt on its own, then stands and swipes some of her hair behind her ear. She begins looking in one of the bureaus, pawing through several drawers before she finds a roll of bandage cloth. ]

How'd you get out? [ She says it lightly, as if it's in a totally different conversation, comes back and begins dressing the wounds. God, she'd kill for some Neosporin. ] Thought that place was inescapable.

[ Efficient is fine; preferable. He doesn't complain, just does what he can to help her along. His body's been struggling on and off to heal, and it shows in the haphazard knitting of his skin and broken scabbing from wounds that have reopened and closed several times. Where he's sealed the worst of it shut with a heated flame, it's red and angry, but it holds. The rest—he doesn't know. It'd been enough that he could ride and walk. He'll count himself lucky. He isn't saying that with any irony, either.

When she leaves him, he leans back. His eyes fall shut but they open again when he realizes she's speaking to him. He furrows his brows, taking a moment to process her question. ]

A mage. [ Youthful-looking. Had she given a name? If she had, it's either currently knocked out of his head or he'd not been in any shape to remember it in the first place. ] Set me on that horse.

[ He'll need to find a way back to Cadens, but he's not ready to sort that out right now. He hasn't even thought of contacting Jaskier. His time frame has narrowed to making it through from hour to hour. But he's peering at Julie with a concern that's not for himself but her. ]

I don't know if they'll look for me here.

[ So one of the mages had helped him. That's interesting information, even if she doesn't really have anything to do with it. She's never been someone with interest in politics, but she knows that some of the other Summoned certainly are. Ones who would be happy to know that someone in the castle isn't willing to tolerate this kind of bullshit.

She finishes wrapping one of his arms, tries to figure out what to tackle next, then looks up and meets his gaze. She tilts her head, and it's like she's trying to figure him out. ]

Let 'em come, then. I ain't scared of Thorne, Geralt. [ She drops her eyes back down and begins to loop the cloth around his torso. He's gonna look like a goddamn mummy when she's done. ] Nothin' they can do to me that's worse than what I already been through. Anyway, I'll get Nadine to look at some of these in the morning. She's learnin' healing magic. But I think you'll make it through the night okay, you just gotta rest.

[ No. She wouldn't be. He'd have expected no other response from her. What he wants to tell her is that he is. He's lived through a lot he shouldn't have, will probably live through more until he doesn't, and it seems destined to be those who cross his path who fall first. And if he's ever been afraid of anything, it's that. He'd never wanted it. Here, with people he gives too much of a shit about.

He looks away when she does. Simpler, wasn't it? When he was just dragging his body through the mountains? There are thoughts, memories, beginning to surface now, jagged shards stained red, and he's not ready to face any of them.

She gets no argument about any of it, not even her insistence that Nadine will look him over. Maybe that says more than anything else about exactly how exhausted he is. But he does offer a quiet, ] Thank you. For... [ He hesitates. ] All this.

[ She can't help but smile, shaking her head a little as she ties off his ribs. She's picked up on his nature, the intense, closed-off facade. It's not the most unfamiliar thing in the world to her -- emotionally constipated men are a dime a dozen, really. Let her guess, huge immature blow-ups when he's frustrated or angry? Yeah. No man is ever truly as special as he thinks.

It doesn't mean she doesn't think it's funny. She thinks it's very funny, for it to be so hard to accept the idea of... friendship? What kind of fucked up world would make him think that you can't count on people who have, without permission usually, planted themselves in your life? She would hope that if she stumbled onto his front door, bleeding, he wouldn't just tell her to fuck off. Christ. ]

What's there to thank me for? Basic human decency? You needed help, I can help. Where I'm from, you help your friends. That's all. [ She looks back up at his face and pats his upper arm. ] You gonna be able to sleep? I got somethin' if you want it all to just go away until the morning.

[ It sounds so simple, how she says it. Maybe it is. He huffs, making a vague effort to rearrange himself so he won't pass out only to wake up with a crick in half his body.

Of course she's got something. (Is there anything she hasn't got something for?) There's a second where he almost considers her offer. Tempting, not because everything hurts or because he thinks he can't sleep—if anything he's halfway gone as it is—but because there's...a lot. On his mind. Things he once long buried and should never have been unearthed, except they were. And if he sleeps, he's not entirely certain some of it won't break free.

Still. He never likes being put out unless he has to.

In the end, he shakes his head, eyes already closing. ] This is fine.

[ Her offer really traced back to that bitterness before, that sour edge that she didn't want keeping him up when he so desperately needed to sleep. But it's his choice, and her only answer to his huff is a small noise of amusement. She stands and pulls the blanket back over him -- even with a lit fireplace, the nights are cold in Nott -- then gathers his shirt to soak it in cold water, see if she can get at least some of the blood out.

She's gone from the room before he wakes the next morning, and doesn't come back until Nadine has finished and left as well. When she does return, it's with towels in one hand and a plate in the other. From what Julie can tell, the people of Abraxas don't have coffee and don't eat real breakfast, but by God, she can and will still put eggs on toast. She ate enough porridge in the dungeon to last her the rest of her life. The food is left next to him on the table, and she disappears into the bathroom, where she calls out. ]

Good mornin', sugar. No rush to leave, but you have got to take a bath, there is still dried blood all over you. A coon dog could peg you for a dead body right now.

[ One of the few saving graces of this world is that they have figured out indoor plumbing, and the roar of the large wooden tub filling with hot water soon drowns her out until she comes back through the door. She's examining his still-damp shirt, which she drapes over a stand in front of the fireplace. ] You feelin' any better?

[ It's a new thing, to have someone in and out of the room. Geralt's been left to his own devices for so long, he can't recall the last time he had someone bring him a meal. Maybe Jaskier, a few times. He's mostly accepted he's just. Apparently being looked after by a few people, only one of whom he's only spoken to more than once or twice. And yet, they're here all the same.

He's not so out of it that his appetite's dwindled. The plate's in his lap by the time Julie returns, half of it already vanished. A brief pause before he answers. ]

Mm. Nadine worked her magic. [ So to speak. His head's still fuzzy, splintered, but he can move better than last night. That's all he's after. That's really all he can afford to focus on right now, because it feels like if he addresses anything other than the cuts and bruises and fractures, he will unravel. He sets the plate aside. He does need a damn bath and he wants to test how he is on his feet, on his own.

It takes bracing on the headboard, but he gets up. The ground does not spin and he's steady enough, even if his side flares hot. At least he can always rely on his body stubbornly stitching itself back together. He glances at Julie, carefully stepping through the room. ] Could use something nicer than a freezing river.

Edited 2021-11-24 14:45 (UTC)

Right? She's pretty good for only havin' a couple weeks under her belt. She knew a lot before she started, too. Said she had to learn it to save this kid, back home.

[ The fussing will take a while to end. There is something highly unnerving about seeing someone so much more physically powerful than yourself be so hurt, and the only things Julie knows how to do with that feeling are either walk away or fix it. She's not about to walk away from her own bedroom, so fix it she must.

She does try to hide it, but there is concern in the way she watches him get to his feet, her hands half-outstretched as if to catch him from where she stands; she only lets them relax when he doesn't stumble or sway. Last night had just been... a lot. A lot is the best way to describe it. But he stays stable and she is content to just follow him, turn off the tap so that he doesn't have to bother bending over.

There's a soft snort of laughter, humor in her voice, when she moves over to the mirror, leans close and begins picking at her own reflection. She used to spend literal hours staring into her phone camera, and now she feels like she has to make a special trip just to make sure her face is clean. ] To think I was gonna ask if you wanted to skinny-dip in the lake. It's only barely freezin' out there. Ice on top is still thin enough to crack in the sun.

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