[ It comes out sharper than he intends. He gets it. Jaskier wants to be hopeful. Wants to reassure him. But that's not what Geralt wants. That's not how he works. He can't cling to an unknowable thread. It doesn't fucking make him feel better.
Jaskier is wrong: it means everything. Because whether he recalled her or not, she came from some part of him that knew. That has known, for weeks now, that she can't have survived all this time. Not that close to Sodden. Not in those woods, so near to Nilfgaard's scorching path of war. And the truth was, he'd largely accepted this long before the Horizon. It's not the fact that he knows she's gone. It's that he remembers now a time when she was not. A time when she was his, a time when he'd protected her.
A time when he could believe, genuinely, he hadn't failed her. ]
She has not survived alone for over two months with an army on her trail. [ The words sit heavy between them. It's the first time he's said it out loud to Jaskier. He doesn't look up, flipping through more pages. ] And we have more immediate concerns in this world.
no subject
[ It comes out sharper than he intends. He gets it. Jaskier wants to be hopeful. Wants to reassure him. But that's not what Geralt wants. That's not how he works. He can't cling to an unknowable thread. It doesn't fucking make him feel better.
Jaskier is wrong: it means everything. Because whether he recalled her or not, she came from some part of him that knew. That has known, for weeks now, that she can't have survived all this time. Not that close to Sodden. Not in those woods, so near to Nilfgaard's scorching path of war. And the truth was, he'd largely accepted this long before the Horizon. It's not the fact that he knows she's gone. It's that he remembers now a time when she was not. A time when she was his, a time when he'd protected her.
A time when he could believe, genuinely, he hadn't failed her. ]
She has not survived alone for over two months with an army on her trail. [ The words sit heavy between them. It's the first time he's said it out loud to Jaskier. He doesn't look up, flipping through more pages. ] And we have more immediate concerns in this world.