[ OPEN / CLOSED ] i think i found a way to kill the sun

[gynvael]

Who: Geralt + Various
When: December
Where: Cadens, Horizon
What: Some catching up now that he's home
Warnings: Discussion of trauma; nsfw marked



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

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[gynvael]

[ A curse tumbles out of him as she grinds down on top of him. He hears too much wrapped up in the sound of his name; a longing, a need. It stirs an ache in his chest he can't explain. He kisses her hard—feels his breath stolen from him as he steals some of hers in turn. Her lips are soft, as are her fingers. So much of her is soft: her hair, her scent, her smooth skin beneath his own coarse hands. (Her heart, despite it all; he knows it can be soft, fragile, behind its hardened walls because although he's rare to ever admit it, his own is the same.)

He pulls her closer, tighter. She's fucking hot around him, a heat that scorches through his veins. Makes his fingers dig into her. Their foreheads touch. His thighs press against her and he can feel her tracing his scars, the path of them where they bite into his skin. He cants upwards, shifts the angle that he knows she's seeking from how she moves. 

Eventually, his face buries in the crook of her neck. Her hair falls around him, and he tangles his fingers up in it. He's breathing heavier, a hitch when her name comes out of him: low, deep in his chest, a simple Yen that says more than anything else. His body tightens—all of him, down to his toes, and then it releases. He groans, a flush running through him as he starts to steady his breath. ]

[vixening]

[ the moment she feels herself pull the curse from him, she knows he's close. knows, just as he can hear all of that in the single noise she makes when she says his name, what he's saying when he reaches across her with calloused, rough hands. he kisses her just as hard, just as unforgiving, just as unrelenting, and it's exactly what yennefer needs. more than that, it's what she wants - from this, from him, from whatever form them is going to take - but no matter how well she might know it, she can't get enough.

his hold on her tightens, and her's on him does in return - her fingers and nails pressing into his skin. she traces the scars as best she can, wanting her hands across every inch of him she might not already know, and when their foreheads touch she opens her eyes to him. makes a conscious effort for him to see her looking at him, if he finds himself looking back at her. or- at least, that is the plan of it. that is her intention. up until he cants his hips just so, and that feeling shoots through her. electric and sharp and overwhelming, that threatens to push her over. her breathing hitches and races with it, noises she doesn't even have the awareness to know she's making, pleasure and him the only things she can hold onto.

yennefer isn't really aware of how he he curves into her so much as she just adjusts for him, his face in the crook of her neck and her body arched up to fill the space. his fingers tugging at her, most likely in her hair, his breaths hot and heavy and all over her. she holds onto him with all the ferocity she can manage, losing herself in the feeling of him, in the feeling of him losing himself. and without really planning it, without realizing so much of what she's doing, her arm crooked over his head - the one he's got his face buried into her shoulder. she pulls him closer to her, tucking her cheek and nose to his temple as she feels the tension cresting, can feel him building and building. ]

Yes- [ she whispers against his hair, their breathing and their bodies and the smell of both of them the only thing she can really sense. ] Yes, Geralt- [ and then the tension breaks, his groan matching her own as she feels it, feels him inside her.

she doesn't quite let go of him, even as their breathing starts to slow. doesn't quite peel away from where he's wrapped up in her, even if her own grip on him starts to loosen. she feels the steadying of the air between them, but even so, yennefer feels an almost stubborn need to hold onto it - nosing still at geralt's temple. ]

[gynvael]

[ Somewhere in it midst of it all, they've become tangled up in each other. Her fingers grasp his shoulders and his arms are around her in turn. He takes his time while they settle, while his veins hum with a pleasant buzz. Warmth floods his limbs. He doesn't quite want to let go of her, either. He wants to stay here in this moment where everything feels less heavy and he isn't—the only thing he's drowning in is her.

He's all right with that, he thinks. Drowning in her.

When they finally part, a little, he stays close. Touching. Because she will leave. They both need to leave in time (he has not forgotten the way she simply vanished in his room and did not return for weeks), but for now. For now, he can stay and he wants her to stay, too.

Slowly, he leans in to kiss her, something gentler than their hunger earlier. ] I missed you.

[ He says it, finally, out loud. Says what he's been telling her this entire time they've been together, in each kiss and brush of his hands. Not just her presence, but her. What they had. What was there before all the regrets and hurt. Before she shielded her heart so tightly from him. (Before he had, too, from her.)

Even now, even with her curled against him and her scent in the air, he isn't sure they can really have it all again. He isn't expecting things to be the same; he knows they can't. That's not how it works. But he lets himself hope, perhaps, that they can find a new path to walk. One that's not so divided. ]

[vixening]

[ she finds that even as they linger, the urge to pull away from him never quite appears. she's always been used to that - to rolling over to the other side of the bed, to the comfortable matching of their breaths as they've laid side by side. that's always been fine, she's always needed a little of that space to get her bearings again and to separate herself from the way her entire body sings with him, but right now? right now she can't quite convince herself it would be worth it.

yennefer knows they will need to part. knows that this time with him is limited, and that she'll be expected back. it would be the way of fate that the one time she actively wants to stay is one where remaining, really and truly remaining, is impossible.

they do finally part - but neither of them are ready to go far, and almost immediately after he is leaning in to kiss her again. she kisses him back, her lips swollen and tasting of him, as her arms untangle from around him. as her hands return to his chest - gentle presses of skin on skin, where she can feel the distant, slow beat of his heart. i missed you he says, his voice that same low growl, but somehow so different. so new. it sends something of a shudder through her as she breaks away from the kiss to look at him. to find his eyes and see - these are words they've been passing between them, one of the many that goes unsaid. she's felt it in the way he's grabbed for her, the way his arms wrap around her and hold her tight. the way everything she sees, she hears, she smells - is him. him and her.

once more, he can catch a glimpse of a smile, softer around the edges. smaller. something private and uncertain and his as she leans forward to press her forehead against his. to take a deep, slow breath. ]

I've missed you too. [ she nearly whispers - hoping that he knows, just as she's known through him, how much she's been saying it too. how much those words have been pushing at her. because while she knows as well as he does that they can never go back to where they once were, she is finding that this new version, this unexplored path, might not be nearly as bad as she had once believed.

yennefer finds herself curling into him, then. finding exactly where it is she can fit where she is as wrapped up in him as possible. and then she lets out a breath - a sigh, even - just as soft, just as content, just as gentle.

she knows she can't stay, but perhaps they can have a bit longer. just a bit. ]

[gynvael]

[ Before now, he'd have said she needn't say it. That actions mean more than words. Then he hears it, I miss you, too, and he realizes perhaps he needed it said out loud more than he thought. He'd stepped into this plane feeling too fucking fragile and that's not changed, but. Maybe he can be, with her, just for awhile. Maybe that's what he needs, too. 

There's nothing else he wants to say, so he simply doesn't. He lays with her, listens to her heart, her breaths. She is tucked around him, and he slides his fingers into the spaces between hers. Slim, soft, next to his own. He drinks in the calm as much as he can—because he understands, they both understand, that their conversation is far from over. That this is not a conclusion. It's a start. A step.

There are still other things he needs to hear. He can't avoid it, even if he wants to.

Eventually, he turns to face her. His hand trails over her arm. ] 

I know it was not your intention to endanger her. [ Ciri, he means. His capture nearly led to her discovery. And he can't afford to let that happen again. ] But whatever play you are making with the queen, if it places Ciri at risk, it can't continue. I need to know you understand that.

[ He is not accusing, but where Ciri is concerned—for him, there is no such thing as a worthwhile risk. She's too important for that. She has come to mean too much to him for that. (She still looks towards him for so many things, even with all the years and absence between them. He can't forget the pained, almost hurt, way Ciri asked what Yennefer was doing in Thorne. As though she were expecting the worst. And he knows that Ciri does not trust easily—even less easily than Geralt somehow—but even so. The reaction had been...it's left its mark.)

They've both paid a heavy price, he and Yen. He can't change that. Nothing will fix that. So he just needs to know that it will be worth the weight they carry forward from here on. ]

[vixening]

[ she realizes, for a second time that night, how much she means the words. how much she's been meaning to say them, whether or not she'd have the chance. everything in this place since she'd arrived here has felt so far from possible that she hasn't really allowed herself the chance to consider why, but the chance to actually say those words to him. to whisper them in the safety of this imaginary tent, on this bed, against him? whether or not it was possible, yennefer was not going to let the chance pass her by.

they sit like that for some time, and she is glad for it. glad for the quiet, glad for the still, glad for the simple, consistent, heavy weight of him near to her. for a few moments she just closes her eyes and listen to his own heart, to the sound of his breaths, to the stillness of the room.

it will not last. it never lasts. but this- this she wants to. and so, like most things in her life, she tries to take it. and she succeeds, if only for a few extra minutes. until they settle side by side on the bed. until he is turning to face her, until he speaks, and she feels that easy calm start to grow taut.

yennefer sits up, then, though it isn't much. having been on her stomach, she merely pulls her arms to her, sitting up on her elbows so it feels less like...like what? like she isn't taking this seriously? like this is some grave matter to discuss? ]

Whether or not you believe me, I am doing this for her. [ she looks down at her hands on the sheets, and not to where she knows geralt is turned to her. where he faces her and watches, his expression neutral. his tone even. his hand still drifts across her arm and the gooseflesh it leaves in its wake nearly had her shuddering. though it also, in many ways, grounds her to this. he does not accost her, but his tone is firm, and yennefer knows. it should surprise her, in a way - how quickly he has shifted, how easily his place of protecting ciri has fit him. the image of geralt she'd had in her mind for so long had been of him running away, avoiding children because what? what was it he'd said? that their lives weren't made for a child? and yet here they sat, here they spoke, here they directed their lives for the single purpose of one. (though ciri is hardly a child at all)

yennefer sighs, as if to tell geralt to wait. that she's not quite done. to not interrupt just yet. ] You've heard of what happened to the other prisoner by now? Relena? [ yennefer hasn't turned to him yet, her eyes still down to her palms, her fingers, her nails, where her forearms lay against the sheets. ] That had been the Queen- separate from Ambrose and separate from her King. It was not a larger play by Thorne, but her; an experiment done by her word, and her mage, Grigory. [ there is a tension that shudders over her at the mention of him - if only because, for a moment, it brings them both back to that throne room. to geralt being split open. she pushes through. ] And she has taken a personal interest in us Summoned, and the abilities we posses. And she is one of the few people in Thorne with the resources and power to do something to satiate that curiosity. Which will lead her enemies. She comes from a military background, so of course what better way to find subjects of her experiments than members of the same states her country has tensions with already?

[ like the free cities.

and yes, there is more to what she is saying and she's sure geralt understands that - the way that politics work, the way these royals shift and change. it's a game, sure, but it's much more than that. advantages and disadvantages, some things gained and some things lost. she could start listing off the various reasons why situating herself within the queen's interest would work, what it would provide them all, what it could open up. she could go into how much the queen reminds her of the stories she'd heard of calanthe, she could speak of how ambrose is nothing if the queen ever chose to make it so.

but that's not what geralt is asking, so yennefer doesn't bother. ]

But if she has a Summoned at her fingertips who can refocus her attention elsewhere, or- [ this is not her, she realizes. this thought process, this sort of strategy. part of her wonders if geralt will even believe her. but it is the truth, the thoughts that have been swirling around in her head since she first reached out for the audience. what keeps her up at night, going over the steps in her head. ] -who is willing to satiate that curiosity for her, she'd have no reason to go searching for that power elsewhere.

[ and then she is done, falling quiet for a single moment before she does finally turn her eyes to him. and despite whatever her worries might be, whatever concerns she might have of if he believes her or not, the look he'll get from her is one of a yennefer who has made up her mind. ]

[gynvael]

[ Whether or not you believe me. It's not his intention to doubt her. It isn't. He wants nothing more than to trust her, to believe her, and he does. He just. Something lingers. Maybe it's simply too soon, this conversation. Maybe that's all it is. He's come here, to her, seen her for the first time since—all of that. And she might have healed his physical wounds, he can use the Horizon to heal them and ignore them but what has seeped and ripped into his mind remains. The rawness has not left him. It's just that he can...start to think about it now. Let himself feel it.

He lets her talk. His attention is fixed on her, taking in her words. They are not reassuring. He knows. He knows that the queen is acting of her own accord, he knows Relena was done in secret. He knows the queen is keeping her ploys quiet to avoid scrutiny from her people. He knows but it isn't the point. Because he wants the queen's attention on Yennefer no more than he wants it on Ciri. He did not agree for Yen to stay in Thorne so she can throw herself to the wolves instead. That is not—

His eyes close briefly before they open again. He does not want to part from her with a wall between them. Ciri trusts her. With her magic, her deepest secret. And more than that, he needs her. Yennefer. (He needs to believe she's among of the few he can turn to. He had turned to her. Back there, bleeding out on the ground. He knows she'd done what she had to. He wouldn't have wanted anything less.)

Her heart is steady. He can hear it. ]

I believe you. [ He sighs. Everything feels so fucked. Despite her gesture of healing earlier, some of the ache returns to him. ] Just be careful. You're important to me, too.

[vixening]

[ yennefer has not needed other's belief in her to push her way forward before. it's why she frames it the way she does - whether you believe me or not. because it hadn't mattered if she was believed. hadn't mattered if she was called insane, or impossible, or any combination of the two. she had done everything she had wanted, everything she had thought she could do, and there was very little that stood in her way.

geralt's belief in her, though. for some reason that matters. for some reason, it's worth building back up the foundation of those walls, collecting the materials just in case. she says whether or not, but still some part of her holds her breath, just to make sure. just in case. just...

i believe you. and yennefer lets out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding. i believe you and any tension she'd been drawing in on herself is released. she turns, as if some part of her doesn't believe he's said it, to see geralt still there. on his side, facing her, wrapped up in her sheets. just be careful he adds. you're important to me too. yennefer feels herself pause at that, at the easy way the words filter through the air. at the way he just...says them. she knows her pendant is still there, knows that it is tucked behind his own. knows he's still wearing it even now. that this isn't the first time he's said it. and yet even still - that part of her she gave to him, that secret she'd offered up, turned back to face her...

yennefer moves, then. finders herself sliding across the bed. to turn towards him, to fit herself up against his chest and to tangle her ankles up with his and to press her forehead to the same place where his heart is. where she can hear the slow, slow, slow beating of his heart. she closes her eyes, once she's close enough. once she feels like she can feel him all around her. ]

I know. [ she says gently, quietly, barely a whisper. she knows he can hear it, so she doesn't bother speaking up. ] And I will. [ there is a moment, barely even a second, that passes. and the she is pressing a kiss to his chest - unspoken, but hopefully he hears it. thank you. ]