[ the bite is unintended, and sam knows it the second it slips through. it's why he doesn't react, why he doesn't so much as blink, waiting for geralt to continue. because it'd be easy to tell him that there's a difference between trying to process and being confused, but he assumes that falls into finer details that won't actually help matters, so he lets it pass.

but geralt also isn't wrong. sam hasn't really ever dealt with anything like this before. not like geralt, not like whatever these trials were meant to be, nothing. so he tries not to assume, tries to keep being patient, because that's all he can really do. his brows lift a bit when geralt says people, then fall as his descriptions continue on. the numbers alone make his stomach turn, but the way that geralt says crawled is something else. he doesn't nod, but sam's eyes do turn to the space in front of him, rather than on geralt's face.

it's not his burden to carry, and geralt's not looking for sympathy. he came to this to talk, came here to share what it is he can't stop thinking about, and sam's not the type of person to think he is just going to magically make it all go away.

the frustration is what pulls sam's eyes back over to where geralt is sitting, brow furrowed just the slightest bit. ]

What did you do before? To make your peace. [ a beat, and then- ] And don't tell me you just suffered through enough sleepless nights that it didn't bother you anymore. I can't imagine that kind of shit just stops bothering. Not really.

[ it's a nicer way of saying did you really make peace? seeing as sams not trying to pick a fight. ]