[ When Geralt finally glances back at Sam, it's with a scrutinizing look. Sam might be trying to figure him out, but he's not the only one who's doing so. Geralt's learned enough to understand that much can be read between the lines of what another man chooses to ask. Like why this. Why this talk of choices made and lost. Of changing destinies. He doesn't know all the details about Sam but—
He does know Sam hasn't exactly led a safe and simple life, either. He wonders how much of that has been the man's choosing in return. How many have been choices he regrets? How many paths has he been down that he couldn't leave? Geralt can't stop thinking of that house. Out of all the spaces he visited, it lingers the most. Not only because of what was forged there, either. It's that it makes him realize that, where his own life has been plagued by loss, it feels like Sam is at a stage where he has so damn much he can still yet lose. And Geralt, he remembers that. He remembers being in that same place, once. What happens when it slips away, piece by piece. A shadow of something flickers across his face as he watches Sam. He blinks it away.
What about now. What about it? He wishes, almost, that Sam were someone he could brush aside. They've gone past that point, though. ]
I don't want a different life. [ He doesn't dream of being someone else. He is what he is. The world is not full of easy lives to desire, besides. One does not need to be a Witcher to be cast aside and die alone in the mud. That's a fate that befalls too many to count. ] I want the one I have to be left alone in peace.
[ Maybe some part of him is afraid to want more. Because he knows, deep down, what he dreamed up of in the Horizon. He knows Sam was there to see it. But it's not real. It isn't. Even if he'd managed to save the princess, there would've been no idyllic winter cabin, with a cozy house by the water to visit and a cheerful bard to bring her gifts. There would only be a fortress of Witchers, an army burning through the northern lands, and a girl with nothing left of her home or family. ]
no subject
He does know Sam hasn't exactly led a safe and simple life, either. He wonders how much of that has been the man's choosing in return. How many have been choices he regrets? How many paths has he been down that he couldn't leave? Geralt can't stop thinking of that house. Out of all the spaces he visited, it lingers the most. Not only because of what was forged there, either. It's that it makes him realize that, where his own life has been plagued by loss, it feels like Sam is at a stage where he has so damn much he can still yet lose. And Geralt, he remembers that. He remembers being in that same place, once. What happens when it slips away, piece by piece. A shadow of something flickers across his face as he watches Sam. He blinks it away.
What about now. What about it? He wishes, almost, that Sam were someone he could brush aside. They've gone past that point, though. ]
I don't want a different life. [ He doesn't dream of being someone else. He is what he is. The world is not full of easy lives to desire, besides. One does not need to be a Witcher to be cast aside and die alone in the mud. That's a fate that befalls too many to count. ] I want the one I have to be left alone in peace.
[ Maybe some part of him is afraid to want more. Because he knows, deep down, what he dreamed up of in the Horizon. He knows Sam was there to see it. But it's not real. It isn't. Even if he'd managed to save the princess, there would've been no idyllic winter cabin, with a cozy house by the water to visit and a cheerful bard to bring her gifts. There would only be a fortress of Witchers, an army burning through the northern lands, and a girl with nothing left of her home or family. ]