[ CLOSED ] the feeling never dies in your eyes

[gynvael]

Who: Geralt + Various
When: September
Where: Cadens; Horizon; Libertas
What: thisisfine.jpg
Warnings: Blanket for Witcher canon, destruction/war imagery and related topics, etc., references to child death, NSFW marked



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

Comments

[princessvegas]

[ She did not tell Stephen who it happened to. Made a point of not even indicating a gender for the victim. And when she showed him what it had looked like, she'd created a generic body to apply the wounds to. The truth was that she hadn't wanted to talk about it, had struggled with her own feeling that speaking of it at all would be a betrayal. But Stephen needed to know what he was up against, and Julie is the only had ever seen the wounds at their worst -- even Nadine only ever saw them after Julie had cleaned them out, wrapped them overnight.

It had worked, to make Stephen take the threat seriously. He's a doctor, knew the severity of what he was looking at when she showed him. Understood how deeply it had affected her just to be the one caught in the aftermath. At least it served the purpose she wanted.

Her trust in Geralt is not changed. She doesn't hold it against him to need time, to make these decisions. She only wishes he had been more open about some of the details; that it was not only one of their own but someone from his home world, someone who is still here. No matter what anyone feels or trusts, that is a threat, an active one that still, apparently, sits on the court.

Active and growing, as Istredd had been particularly emphatic about going to school with her. Julie grew up in a place where everyone knew everyone, and had since childhood. Old bonds are much stronger than new ones.

For a long time, she is lost in thought, diving into the depths of her own manipulative tendencies to better understand what might have happened to put all these pieces into place. Where they might go next. For a Summoned to come into this world and claw themselves up onto Thorne's court, win the queen's favor enough to necessitate testing, that takes ambition. Julie knows ambition. Knows that personality. She was that person, for so long, and might have been that person here had they not thrown her in the dungeon. It gives her insight. This kind of chess is one of the few things she truly excels at.

But he speaks and she looks over at him. There's something genuinely heartbroken in her eyes at the thought, not of Geralt in Nott, but of them not being in Nott now. She's never been tight-lipped about her desire to go back, live there, despite knowing the danger. Her smile is soft, a bit regretful. ]

I'm glad too. They don't deserve what happened. They don't care about any of this political bullshit, it ain't their war. They're just stuck in the middle.

[gynvael]

[ The irony is, even Geralt never saw the worst of it. He felt it, and it fucking hurt, but beyond that? He doesn't truly know how the scar appears. It's never crossed his mind to go out of his way to examine it. He's only glimpsed it now and again in mirrors angled just right.

He looks back. Mm. He knows. He feels better with her close by, but he can't blame her for missing Nott. In the little time he spent there, it'd suited him better: the climate, the people, the lakeside. If not for Ciri and Jaskier, he may have remained there. ]

So it often goes. [ Village and towns—razed for being in the way. ] You'd have liked Oxenfurt. Not too different. Bit larger.

[ He curls his fingers around the reins. A few minutes tick by. His mind has not entirely left the topic of Yennefer. He is not often one to explain—but he doesn't want Julie to feel as though he would forsake her, or even himself, solely because he has history with someone. No matter how complicated that history. If it comes down to it—he knows what he'll do. ]

I haven't got any easy answers about Yennefer. But I have made hard choices before, and I will again. Let me handle her.

[ He had not understood then. He does now. And he's never hesitated where it counts. If there's one thing he knows about himself, it's that. ]

[princessvegas]

[ Though she tries not to think about it, the truth is that Julie's mind is a veritable library of things no one else will ever see or know. The story of New Vegas, the lives of everyone she ever knew, her own entire history. The scar on his back doesn't bother her simply by virtue of being something that other people can see. It's memory of before it was a scar that haunts her if she lets it.

In her ideal Abraxas, they're all together in Nott, though she knows that for some of them, Cadens probably suits better. But Julie hates the desert (at least Vegas had air conditioning), hates the government, is wary of the people there. The sole upsides are the fashion and the access to Aquila, the only other place she thinks she might care to live in, but at the end of the day, she came to Cadens because who she was with mattered much more to her than anything else. She wanted to be with him, with Ciri and Jaskier and Sam, and if she had to live in Cadens to do it, then that was what she'd do.

Her smile grows a little. She chuckles. ] Sounds perfect. Nott is a little on the small side for my tastes. Bigger'n where I'm from, smaller than where I always wanted to be.

[ Biting the inside of her cheek, she tilts her head to the side, pushes a strand of hair out of her face. It's not a question of his choices or her trust in them. She knows herself well enough to know that it's something much more selfish and venomous. This Yennefer was a party to hurting someone important to Julie, and that's enough to drive white hot hatred for a very long time.

She's never been one to let things go easily. ]

You can handle her. I trust you. But she's got friends now, if it comes down to it again. You don't have to handle 'em all on your own.

wrapping!

[gynvael]

[ What he misses most is going where he pleases. An illusion of sorts exists in Cadens, but it isn't the same. Still, there's a kind of home now instead. Perhaps that isn't such a terrible exchange.

He hums. Vegas is where Julie wound up, but he's never asked where it is she had hoped to go before the world fell apart and a demon drew her forth. Doesn't ask now, either. One way or another, it's too late for lost dreams. Always has been. He finds himself thinking instead, more and more, of where they may be in the months, years, coming. Still in Cadens? Pushed elsewhere by the tides of war?

Difficult to say.

He watches her for a moment, before he answers softly. ] I know.

[ Yeah. He does. She's long become someone he can rely on. If he needs her, he knows she'll be there. ]

[princessvegas]

[ She has been expecting to move again since shortly after the peace summit. She doesn't know when or where or what will be the final straw, but she doesn't feel like Cadens will remain safe for any of the Summoned for much longer. She doesn't think anywhere in this world will be, except maybe right around the Singularity itself. And that's a different kind of dangerous. ]

Okay. [ Her voice is equally soft, and it's all she says. She doesn't often fight his inclinations to do things on his own. If that's what he wants, then that's his prerogative. But it can't hurt to occasionally remind him that he doesn't have to do everything that way.

The sun gradually gets lower as they return to the city gates. ]