Chapter Text
It had to be some sort of miracle, Geralt mused as he walked into their shared room at the inn, that it took nearly two decades of knowing each other before Geralt walked in on Jaskier mid thrust for the very first time.
Even though he’d never admit it, Geralt knew that this one was on him. Usually, he was far more observant when he returned to the inn after his job was done, knew immediately that if Jaskier wasn’t singing or flirting or in the middle of a brawl, then he was likely giving a private performance to someone in their shared room and he’d make a side quest to have his dinner first.
But today was just a shitty fucking day overall, had been from the moment they stepped foot in this backwater village where he was constantly gawked at like a mutant freak that he was. Jaskier’s influence had brought about some improvements over the years, but it would take more than a few songs to fully change people’s perception of witchers. To most, he was still just as big of a monster as the creatures they hired him to kill. Even worse sometimes, because he had the nerve to wear a human face and walk among them.
Geralt had agreed to slay the beast that had swallowed one of the villager’s young sons, as well as many of their fishing boats, for a miserable amount of coin, because even Jaskier’s haggling skills weren’t of much help in this particular village and Geralt was too soft to let any more innocent kids suffer because of his own selfishness. Then, he spent the rest of his day traversing the forest and lurking in a filthy lake under the burning rays of the scorching late summer sun to slay yet another one of the nasty selkiemores that never made it easy on him to kill them.
By the time he made his way back to the village, still coming down from his potions and dragging an oversized selkiemore head with him for proof, his entire body felt like one giant bruise. He was covered in guts from head to toe, the toxic blood of the creature stinging his oversensitive skin and he stank like he crawled straight out of a sewer. All he wanted was to pick up his coin, get into a scalding hot bath to wash away the mess stubbornly sticking to his skin and pass out for the night.
He felt more for the girl he’d frightened by his callous bursting into the room than about Jaskier’s whining complaint as he pulled away from her and rushed to pull up his braies and cover himself up. Jaskier had fucked enough. Some would even say he’d fucked too much. One interruption wasn’t going to kill him. Geralt didn’t doubt that Jaskier would seek the girl out once he was done with his dramatics to finish what he’d started anyway.
But first, he’d make sure to give Geralt a piece of his mind.
Geralt undressed with the backdrop of his familiar chatter, mostly tuning him out as he dropped his now ruined clothes to the side and cast a quick igni to heat up the bath that had cooled long ago.
“What about the concept of knocking do you have a hard time grasping?” Jaskier was saying as Geralt stepped into the tub, grimacing at the stench that was emanating off of him. “I was going to ask why you didn’t use your witchery senses to know I was busy, but now I can smell why.”
Geralt groaned as he sank into the hot bath, the warmth of it bringing instant relief to his sore muscles. “I knew,” he said bluntly, though it’d be more accurate to say he didn’t even stop to think about it. “I just didn’t care.”
Jaskier let out a noise of pure outrage and Geralt dunked his head under the water to both clean up and to tune out the worst of his upcoming rant. The water distorted his words enough for Geralt to ignore them, at least for the most part. He held his breath for as long as he could as he scrubbed at his skin and his hair, but not even his enhanced witcher stamina would allow him to stay underwater forever.
When he was at the very edge of suffocating, Geralt emerged from the bath, inhaling a deep breath. The fragrant oils that Jaskier insisted on pouring into his baths despite Geralt’s continued protests had helped neutralize the worst of the sour, biting stench, and as he continued to breathe in the lavender scented steam, his headache slowly evaporated with the last of the tension in his body.
The other senses slowly trickled in from his slight meditative state; the sound of Jaskier’s voice mixed with the noisy patrons of the inn’s tavern below them, the small droplets of rapidly cooling water sliding down his face from the drenched mess of his hair, the slightest of vibrations coming from the medallion that always hung around his neck.
The last one finally made him open his eyes and he surveyed their room with a frown. At a first glance, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. There was only one bed, but there always was these days. It was a cheaper alternative, and after years spent out on the path sharing a bedroll because Jaskier always complained about being too cold, neither of them minded sharing.
Then there was Jaskier himself, hair a ruffled mess and cheeks flushed from either exertion or annoyance, though knowing him, it was probably both. He was also, Geralt couldn’t help but note with some amusement, still very visibly aroused. His braies were comically tented, and he didn’t even try to hide it as he stomped from one side of the room to the next as he vented all of his frustrations about Geralt and his lack of understanding for his supposed needs.
“I needed a bath,” Geralt interjected, giving Jaskier a chance to catch his breath before he talked himself hoarse. His voice was already a bit rougher than usual after hours spent singing, and he wasn’t in the mood for listening to him whine about it all day tomorrow when he inevitably couldn’t meet his self imposed level of quality. “And I already had one waiting in my room.”
“Our room,” Jaskier corrected, shooting him a scowl that would be a lot more menacing if he wasn’t stopping around their room like one of Eskel’s petulant goats. “I paid for it as much as you did and I have full right to use it as I damn well please. The least you could do was knock and then politely wait outside until I was finished. But oh no! You just had to burst in here and scare the poor girl half to death, as an uncultured bastard that you are. And don’t even get me started on-“
Then he was off again, and Geralt settled into the tub with a sigh. Once Jaskier was properly wound up, there was no stopping him until he tired himself out. Suddenly, letting him finish and spending a few uncomfortable minutes waiting outside the door seemed like a far lesser evil than putting up with Jaskier’s foul mood.
Jaskier was in a foul mood, there was no doubt about that. This was hardly the first time Geralt had scared off his chosen partner for the night, be that intentionally or simply by his intimidating presence. But Jaskier had never gotten this annoyed about it, this aggressive. It was as if there was something more to this than the superficial need to get off, something that he wasn’t willing to admit.
And if Jaskier didn’t want to talk about something, then Geralt knew it had to be serious.
Feeling slightly worried now, Geralt reached for his medallion and took another deep breath, focusing on the tiny spark of magic he could still feel lingering in the room. Was it some kind of curse? He’d only left Jaskier alone for a handful of hours, but that was more than enough time for him to get himself into trouble. All Geralt had to do was look away from him for a minute, and before he knew it, Jaskier was in the middle of a brawl that he later insisted he had no hand in starting as if Geralt didn’t know damn well that he threw the first punch.
It didn’t feel like a curse, though, or anything particularly magical that would be causing Jaskier so much distress. Geralt looked him over again, took in the full state of his uncharacteristic disarray, messy, sweat dampened hair and heaving chest and the sharp scent of his -
And there it was. Just like that, everything suddenly clicked into place. The scent of Jaskier’s arousal still lingered in the air, pouring off of his body in waves, fueling Geralt’s own arousal in turn and giving away the one secret Jaskier had been keeping from the day they first met.
Jaskier was an incubus.
Not a pure blooded one, of course. Geralt had seen him naked enough times to know that there were no furry legs or hooved feet hiding underneath his frilly pants, had seen no signs of horns growing out of his head. But there was definitely enough incubus in him to always keep him looking young and healthy, his eyes an impossible shade of blue that was distinctly non-human, no matter how hard Jaskier denied he was anything but.
Geralt had known that Jaskier was something from the first time the bard approached him in that tavern in Posada, his medallion alerting him to his presence long before Jaskier ever opened his mouth. That fact only became more apparent the more time he spent around him, forever young and virile despite the rough conditions of the Path, and once he’d realized that he was a threat to no one other than himself, it was why he’d allowed Jaskier to tag along on his travels. Or, at least, stopped actively trying to leave him behind.
He’d suspected that Jaskier had some elven blood in him, was maybe part fae, but Jaskier never said anything, and Geralt never asked. Why would he? He won’t lie and say he wasn’t curious, but if Jaskier wasn’t willing to share when he told him literally everything else, it felt rude to prod at what seemed to be a sensitive topic. Mixed lineage often was. And if Jaskier abandoned the life of a noble to follow a witcher around, sleeping on the hard ground and occasionally resorting to eating rats, then his life before had to have been rough and Geralt knew enough of what that was like not to force him into reliving it just to satisfy his own curiosity.
Besides, he was still a witcher. No matter how comfortable Jaskier seemed to be around him, it was a whole different thing to be a human around one, and to be what some might consider a monster. Sure, it kind of stung a bit that Jaskier would ever think that sharing that part of himself with Geralt would put him in danger, but in the end, he couldn’t really fault him for it either. Witcher’s awful reputation was severely exaggerated, but it didn’t exactly start out of nowhere.
If Jaskier wanted to pretend that he was completely human even though he didn’t look a day over twenty even in his early forties, then Geralt had decided that he would leave it be. If Jaskier wanted to tell him, he’d do so in his own time. Until the truth became too relevant to be ignored, he’d play along and ignore this rather obvious half incubus in the room.
Because it was so fucking obvious, wasn’t it? Now that he knew for certain what Jaskier was, he felt like such an idiot for not putting it together sooner. He’d smelled it on him before, a type of magic that was specific to creatures that fed through sex, but never quite close enough to fully connect the dots that the smell was coming from Jaskier himself rather than his partner like he had today.
A lot of people loved sex, but Jaskier took to it with a passion that went above just wanting it. It was as if he needed it, just like he was trying to explain to him now and Geralt had dismissed him as only being dramatic. And now that he was aware of exactly what Jaskier was, his realization was quickly followed by guilt.
Due to some bad weather as the summer slowly gave came to an end, the stretch of this particular trip had taken far longer than either of them expected. They’d spent the past few weeks traveling through tiny, judgmental villages that weren’t very fond of witchers and they spent most of that time isolated out in the woods alone, because if no inn would take Geralt, then Jaskier wasn’t staying there either.
This was the first village, as shitty as it was, where Jaskier could sing his heart out in a tavern and get paid for it rather than be pelted by stale bread and rotten eggs, the only place he could find eager company and feed.
And Geralt, inconsiderate in his own selfish frustrations, had just chased away his dinner.
No wonder Jaskier was angry. He must have been starving. And it definitely explained why he got so frustrated the longer he went without sex and company, and why he didn’t seem overly picky when it came to choosing his partners. If Geralt had bothered using his senses to assess the situation instead of simply bursting in, he would have known to wait. He could have – should have – let him finish what he started in relative peace.
“I’m sorry,” Geralt said gruffly, the surprise of his apology enough to finally shut Jaskier up. “For interrupting your dinner.”
Jaskier frowned, staring at him like he’d suddenly grown a second head. “My dinner?”
“The girl.”
“The girl?” Jaskier repeated, absentmindedly wiping his mouth and then lighting up with realization. “Oh, my dinner.” He shook his head with a laugh. “She was quite delicious, I’m not going to lie.”
Geralt fought hard not to make a face at the heavy handed implication behind Jaskier’s words. He always did whenever Jaskier spoke of his lovers. “You should go find her,” he said, even though the mere thought of Jaskier being with anyone made his stomach churn with displeasure. But he couldn’t exactly offer himself up to his friend – a creature that fed on sex that had never once in all the years they’ve spent traveling together showed a single ounce of interest in bedding him – instead, now could he? “Finish what you started.”
Jaskier frowned, looking at Geralt like he was the most fascinating riddle he was struggling to solve. “Are you feeling alright, Geralt? First, you apologized and now you’re telling me to go finish what I’ve started after you’ve made it blatantly obvious that you couldn’t care less about my need for company. Did something happen during your hunt? Have you perhaps fallen and hit your head on a particularly hard rock? Because I have to say, you don’t sound quite like yourself.”
Geralt rolled his eyes at Jaskier’s never ending rambling. Of course he couldn’t just accept his apology and go on his way. Not in the mood to further discuss the intricacies of Jaskier’s sex life that he was not, nor would ever be a part of, Geralt got straight to the point. “Jaskier, I know.”
“Know what?” Jaskier asked, looking just as puzzled as before. “Are you sure you’re feeling alright? Do I need to go find you a healer? I’ll go find you a healer.”
Before Jaskier could do just that, Geralt confidently said, “You’re an incubus.”
Jaskier simply stared at him for a moment, then he promptly burst into uncontrollable laughter. “An incubus,” he managed to get out, breathless between the fits of giggles and chuckles he couldn’t seem to stop. Geralt patiently waited for him to calm down, which Jaskier eventually did, red in the face and wiping the tears that had gathered in the corners of his eyes. “An incubus,” he repeated with another chuckle. “Thank you, Geralt. I haven’t laughed this hard in a long time and I truly needed it. When did you get a sense of humor?”
Geralt, who wasn’t nearly as amused by Jaskier’s pathetic attempts of covering up his secret, said, once again, “I know what you are, Jaskier. You don’t have to keep pretending.”
Jaskier’s increasingly frantic attempts to hide the truth from him were kind of insulting and more than a little hurtful, Geralt had to admit. Hadn’t he made it clear over all the years they’ve known each other that Geralt wasn’t in the business of killing anyone or anything just because they were different? Until the day that Jaskier killed someone with his abilities, which wasn’t very likely due to a multitude of reasons, Geralt wouldn’t harm a single hair on his head.
And even then, well. Geralt was ashamed to admit that even with a good reason, he wasn’t sure if he could find it in himself to harm Jaskier in any way, no matter how justified he’d be to do it.
“You’re actually serious,” Jaskier realized aloud when Geralt showed no signs of being anything but. “You really think that I’m an incubus.”
“I know you are,” Geralt said for the sake of clarity, for the third time in just as many minutes.
Jaskier blinked at him, thoroughly taken aback by Geralt’s newfound revelation, though Geralt had to admit that he’d put up a very convincing act. If Geralt didn’t know better, he might actually believe that Jaskier wasn’t aware of what he was himself. But Geralt did know better because surely no one could be this clueless, and he really wasn’t in the mood for being fooled into believing otherwise.
“Wait,” Jaskier said, squinting at Geralt, clearly deep in thought and still struggling to catch up with the course of their current conversation. “Is that why you never let me touch your super special silver sword?”
“That, and because I don’t trust you with sharp objects.”
After the incident with the apple, the pear and the, well, every single food item that Geralt had ever trusted Jaskier to cut, Jaskier had been banned from using anything sharper than a blunt butter knife. And while the silver likely wouldn’t hurt Jaskier much aside from some mild irritation, Geralt did not want to know which one of his body parts he would end up amputating first if Geralt allowed him access to a giant and an incredibly sharp sword.
It said a lot that Jaskier didn’t put up a protest about Geralt’s remark about sharp objects, though that was probably only because he was too busy coming up with examples to trump Geralt’s argument that he was, in fact, not human at all.
Jaskier gestured down to his legs that were nearly on full display as he was still only wearing his braies. “I mean, I know I’m pretty hairy, but do you see any hooves? Or horns, for that matter?”
“You might not have any horns, but you are incredibly thick headed,” Geralt said, ignoring Jaskier’s scowling. They both knew he was a stubborn bastard so there was no point denying it. And since Jaskier refused to see reason, Geralt decided to point out some of the most obvious signs of his true self that Jaskier had failed to hide over the years. “You never get tired,” he pointed out. “No matter how long we’re out on the Path, you rarely have trouble keeping up with me. You’ve also never gotten sick since I’ve known you, and I’ve watched you eat countless poisonous berries and weeds that would kill any regular human. ”
“Maybe I just have good genes,” Jaskier argued, arms crossed defensively over his chest.
Geralt snorted before he could stop himself. “I’ve seen both your parents, Jaskier. And your siblings. It’s definitely not the genes.”
Aside from Jaskier, good looks did not run in the Pankratz family. While Jaskier’s mother had some striking features and Geralt could see the hints of their shared bloodline, he saw absolutely no similarities between Jaskier and his father, unlike his poor, unfortunate sisters. Jaskier’s beauty had come with his incubus side, because it was the only thing that made sense considering his food source.
The lack of any resemblance Jaskier had to his father was obvious to Geralt within moments of meeting the man, and he wondered if he knew. He couldn’t not, surely. And if he did know, was that the reason why he resented, and maybe even downright hated, Jaskier so much?
Jaskier barked out a surprised laugh. “If I didn’t hate them all as much as I do, I’d be tempted to be offended on their behalf. But as it is, I’ll allow it.” Then, he grinned. “Wait, does that mean you think I’m good looking?” When Geralt faltered to respond straight away, his grin only grew, as did his incredibly tempting scent, happiness mixed with his ever present arousal. “You do, don’t you? You think I’m handsome, beautiful, downright stunning-“
“I think,” Geralt said pointedly, for once grateful for his mutations since they prevented the blush that would have no doubt erupted all over his face if it could have, “that if an incubus isn’t attractive, if he fails to catch anyone’s interests, he goes hungry. And a hungry incubus is a dead one.”
“You’re really not joking,” Jaskier finally realized far too late into their conversation, giving Geralt an incredulous look. “I know I get around a lot, but you can’t seriously believe that I’m an actual sex demon.”
“You’re only part incubus,” Geralt amended. “They often appear completely human, which is probably why you didn’t take notice of it sooner.”
How that was even possible, Geralt still couldn’t quite comprehend, but it was Jaskier. He did and said things that baffled Geralt on a near daily basis. Thinking of it now, Jaskier not knowing that he wasn’t human wasn’t surprising at all.
Jaskier scoffed. “I think I’d know if I weren’t human.”
“Would you?” Geralt said, his doubt clear in his voice.
“I would,” Jaskier vehemently insisted.
“Hmm.”
“Don’t you hmm me!” Jaskier snapped, gesturing wildly with his arms, reminding Geralt of a stubborn baby bird trying to take flight for the first time. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you today to make you act so fucking unreasonable, but I certainly don’t have to stay here and take all of your baseless slander.”
Slander, Geralt mouthed to himself, feeling more than a little incredulous himself. Right. And he was the one who was supposedly being unreasonable here. Watching Jaskier stomp around and pick up his hastily discarded clothes prevented him from arguing his point further – like the fact that he was a witcher who recognized most creatures on sight – because it would only serve to enrage Jaskier further and get them absolutely nowhere.
Geralt had learned long ago that when Jaskier started acting all huffy and decided that he was right, there really was no changing his mind. No matter how fucking unreasonable he was being, pushing him would only make him more defensive and cling to his wrong beliefs that much stronger, and considering how far up in denial he currently was, Geralt didn’t want to risk making it worse.
Once dressed, Jaskier made an attempt to tame his wild mess of hair and headed for the door. “Now if you’ll excuse me,” he said, trying to sound perfectly composed and casual and miserably failing at both, “I’m going to go find-“ He paused, eyes narrowed in thought as he tried to recall the girl’s name, and failed.
“Find who?” Geralt couldn’t help but ask when the silence stretched.
“-that lovely, wonderful, delicious lady,” Jaskier continued as if he hadn’t paused at all, completely ignoring Geralt's interruption. “And I’m going to apologize to her for your brutish behavior.”
Geralt watched him as he collected his doublet and his pants from the floor and quickly got dressed, putting far more effort into fixing his appearance for a simple apology. “Only to apologize?” he asked, goading him a little further as he fought to bite back a smirk that threatened to emerge. He never could resist winding up Jaskier when the opportunity presented itself, not when he was so beautiful in his passion, even if that passion came in the form of his annoyance with Geralt.
Jaskier shot him a glare, red bitten lips pursed in that adorably annoyed way that always made Geralt want to kiss him stupid. “No person has ever left my bed unsatisfied, and I certainly won’t let that change today.”
With that, he left the room, slamming the door shut and Geralt only shook his head as he listened to him march down the stairs like a bratty child trying to prove a point.
He looked down and found that his cock had perked up sometime during this whole ordeal, no doubt due to Jaskier’s tempting scent that had little to do with him being an incubus and all to do with him just being his usual, ridiculous self. Though the way the sharp scent of his arousal still permeated the room certainly helped rile him up even more than he usually would be.
He debated himself for a moment, because jerking off to Jaskier’s scent was surely inappropriate on so many levels. Only a moment later, Geralt sighed and gave into his depraved desire, just like he always did. It might have been wrong, but Geralt never could help himself when it came to Jaskier.
Closing his eyes, Geralt leaned back into his bath with his cock in hand and inhaled, long and deep, luxuriating in Jaskier’s scent before it evaporated all too quickly out of the room. If this was the closest he’d ever get to actually having him, he might as well enjoy it while he could.
*
By the time Jaskier stumbled out of the inn late the next morning, he looked like a completely different person. A healthy, non human one, to be more precise. The dark circles underneath his eyes were long gone, the tension that had been weighing heavily enough on his shoulders to make him hunch into himself had vanished and his posture was as regal as it always was.
He was practically glowing under the late morning sun, grin just as bright as he bid his lover for the evening goodbye where she was leaning heavily against the window of her own room, looking utterly exhausted. A price she seemed more than happy to have paid for a night with Jaskier if her mournful sigh at his departure was to be believed.
Jaskier spared one very smug grin for Geralt as he strolled past him towards the direction of the Path, Geralt sighing to himself as he guided Roach to follow after him at a leisurely pace. It was far later than Geralt had planned on leaving, and usually, he’d be more than a little annoyed about Jaskier’s detours throwing off his plans. But now that he knew why those were necessary, he couldn’t find it in himself to mind it much. Not when he saw exactly how much Jaskier needed it.
Jaskier, knowing how much it annoyed Geralt to be late to anything, kept glancing in his direction, expecting to be called out on his behavior. He’d likely dragged it out on purpose for petty revenge, knowing him, but Geralt refused to let himself be baited into another pointless argument and remained silent, letting Jaskier sing praises to the girl he’d fed from the night before, swallowing both his jealousy and his typical snarky comments.
He must have been saying nothing a bit too loudly for Jaskier’s liking, however, because it didn’t take him long to drop his carefree act.
“Are you really not going to say anything?” Jaskier demanded, coming to stand in front of Roach to block Geralt’s path. Geralt, because he was nice like that, halted Roach before she made her way over him instead. Unlike Geralt, she didn’t take kindly to obstacles in her way, even if they were in the form of their favorite bard. “We both know how much you hate starting your travel so late in the day.”
Geralt shrugged. “You seemed like you needed the extra time to get your fill.”
If anything, Geralt’s easy understanding only pissed Jaskier off further. “Seriously, Geralt? How long are you going to keep this stupid joke going? Because it’s really not funny.”
“It’s not meant to be funny,” Geralt said easily. “It’s just stating the obvious.”
“Fine!” Jaskier exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air to show the grandness of his frustration. It said a lot about how often he did this that Roach didn’t even flinch. “Since you insist on clinging to your ridiculous delusions, I guess I’ll just have to prove you wrong.”
Geralt lifted an eyebrow, both intrigued and slightly concerned. “And how do you plan on doing that?”
“It’s pretty simple, actually,” Jaskier said, looking far too pleased with himself considering that his next words were, “I’ll just stop having sex!”
“No,” Geralt immediately said, because he could see now where Jaskier was going with this and he didn’t like it one bit. “Absolutely not. That’s-“
“-a brilliant idea, I know,” Jaskier cut him off. “I won’t abstain forever, obviously. Just long enough for you to realize that I’m the exact same very human person with or without it and that I don’t require any special feeding to stay alive. Then maybe you’ll finally drop these senseless accusations for good and let me fuck whoever I want in peace.”
Geralt was so not on board with any part of this plan, because he could already imagine about a hundred different ways in which it could backfire. “And what if I’m right? You’re going to starve yourself until the point of death just to prove a point?”
Jaskier waved off his concern, clearly not even considering that as a possibility. “But you’re not right, so there’s nothing to worry about. That’s the whole point of this experiment,” Jaskier told him, shaking his head at Geralt as if disappointed by his lack of comprehension of this insane fucking plan of his. “I’ll go through a brief bout of abstinence, prove you wrong, you’ll grovel for my forgiveness for accusing me of being a sex demon and we’ll both move on with our lives. Easy as that.”
“Jaskier…” Geralt trailed off, not even sure where to start untangling this mess he suddenly found himself in. If he knew that Jaskier would react this poorly – this stupidly – to the revelation of his own lineage, he’d have just kept his mouth shut and spared them both the misery.
“How many times have you lectured me about keeping my sausages from entering the wrong royal pantries, huh?” Jaskier asked, lips stretched into one of his familiar teasing grins as he started walking backwards along the dirt road. “Well, now you’ll finally get your wish. My sausage will be safely put away for the foreseeable future. And when I prove that I’m perfectly human, you’ll owe me dinner and as many drinks as my perfectly human heart desires.”
“Only that?” For Jaskier, that seemed rather humble.
“And-” he continued, making Geralt bite back a fond smile as he watched Jaskier trip over a rock and nearly fall face down into the dirt. “And,” he repeated as he righted himself and straightened out his doublet, “I want it in writing that I’m the greatest bard you’ve ever had or would ever have the pleasure of listening. And a fully genuine and preferably public admission that I’m your best friend and closest confidant on this entire Continent. And also-“
And so they went on their way, Jaskier making a lengthy list of demands that Geralt would have to fulfill as punishment for his very distressing ‘baseless slander’ once Jaskier proved him wrong, while Geralt hummed and grunted his opinions on said demands in response. It seemed more polite than telling him where exactly he could shove them instead.
Geralt was highly skeptical of this whole ordeal, but he wasn’t overly worried. He knew Jaskier better than most, despite his best attempts to tune out the bard’s presence in his life. There was no way Jaskier would be able to stick with his plan for long. He’d fold the next time a pretty someone batted their eyelashes at him and fall straight into their bed, proving himself wrong in the process.
Yes, Geralt thought as he followed after Jaskier, feeling more than a little amused knowing that he’d already won this pointless competition of theirs that he never signed up for or agreed to. Everything was going to be just fine.
*
Everything was absolutely not fine.
At first, it was kind of funny, watching Jaskier try to contain himself around pretty people who desperately wanted his attention, calling him out on his leering and flirting and pretending not to hear him furiously masturbate every night to no avail. An incubus could not feed on its own desire, after all. No matter how strong or how downright desperate it was.
But the joke quickly grew old when he returned from his hunt to find Jaskier steeping a very toxic plant to make himself a deadly cup of tea and just about managed to knock it out of his hand in time to stop him from killing himself on the spot.
He’d been trying to teach Jaskier how to tell apart the safe plants from the dangerous ones for years now, but considering that no matter what Jaskier put into his mouth – which he did often and with reckless abandon – it never hurt him in any way due to his non human side, the lessons never stuck.
Usually, Jaskier ingesting toxic plants wouldn’t be a problem. But as the weeks went by, Geralt noticed that Jaskier was starting to struggle in keeping up with him and Roach. He was slower, tired more easily and was quieter than he'd ever been before, which was alarming on its own. But the worst fact was that he healed a lot slower, too, and in turn became a lot more sensitive to, well, everything. All of Jaskier’s bruises and scratches and aches lingered for longer than they ever had before and Geralt’s worry for his safety increased by the day.
He should have known that Jaskier, a stubborn bastard that he was, would deny himself sustenance if only to prove a fucking point. A useless one at that, because now that Geralt knew what to look for, it was glaringly obvious that he’d always had some incubus blood inside him.
Jaskier somehow always knew who to approach for sex, for one, like he could sense their arousal, feel their primal interest. And he rarely got rejected, too, no matter which stupid line he came up with on the spot to try and win the person over. Geralt had always written it off as Jaskier being charming and pretty enough to get away with his bullshit, but apparently, some magical enhancement of their interest was involved as well. Because while his stupid compliments and lines would charm Geralt, he was also extremely biased in his fondness for Jaskier and it wouldn’t really take much to win him over.
From his extensive knowledge of all creatures he’d encountered on the Continent, Geralt knew that being only part incubus meant that not feeding won’t necessarily kill Jaskier, which was somewhat of a relief. But without that side of himself sated, he became what he’d been insisting he was all along. Jaskier was now, for what was probably the first time in his life since he’d reached sexual maturity, completely and utterly human.
And Geralt fucking hated it with a passion. Because even though Jaskier was now a lot more fragile, it didn’t mean that he was in any way less reckless.
It was bad enough when he insisted on tagging along to Geralt’s hunts or picked fights with the locals when he couldn’t take much serious damage. But now? Every hunt presented mortal danger. Every time he wandered a little too close to observe the action meant that he could die, be that from a strong blow to the chest that would crush his ribcage and destroy his vital organs, to a single tiny nick of a claw laced in venom that would kill him within minutes.
And it wasn’t just the life of a witcher that was dangerous. It was the mundane, everyday things that now took on a whole new layer of danger that turned out to be the biggest problem.
Geralt wasn’t kidding when he said that the Path was no place for a human. Long, hot days, even longer cold nights and the constant walking combined with the lack of food and other resources and often bad weather conditions were torture for most humans.
While Jaskier used to trot along Geralt’s side for most of the day without much legitimate complaint, now he needed regular breaks for food and water and rest, all of which were often scarce. Not even Geralt’s body heat could keep him quite warm enough in his inadequate clothes as the fall slowly gave way to winter, and the cold and the exhaustion had Jaskier down with a fever twice in the past month alone.
Constantly having to keep one eye on Jaskier was starting to take its toll on Geralt, too. Every sniffle and sneeze and cough had him on immediate high alert, because what if his simple cold turned into something more serious? Soon, leaving him alone became nearly impossible because what if he got into a brawl and a fist to the face had him crumpling to the ground hard enough to crack his head open and he bled out long before Geralt could find him a competent enough healer?
It was safe to say that Geralt had never been this stressed out in his godsdamned life. Caring about someone could be exhausting, and if Geralt’s hair wasn’t already white, it would have been after all of the stress that Jaskier had put him under lately.
Now, as he caught Jaskier eyeing the nearby bush that was bursting with bright red berries that were deceptively pretty and sweet for something so dangerous – just like Jaskier himself – that Geralt had repeatedly told him could kill him, he was pretty sure that he’d just hit his breaking point.
“Put. Them. Down,” Geralt ordered slowly but sternly, as if he were talking to one very disobedient child. Jaskier, proving that he wasn’t far off from that description, narrowed his eyes at Geralt’s tone and snatched a fistful of berries from the bush, moving his hand behind his back as if trying to keep them safe from Geralt’s wrath.
“No,” he said with all the stubbornness he could muster in his exhausted, worn down state. Which, for Jaskier, was still more than enough to give Geralt a headache.
“Jaskier,” Geralt growled, nostrils flaring when it sparked another burst of the tantalizing scent of Jaskier’s arousal.
While he always smelled enticing before, Jaskier’s scent had been growing thicker and stronger each day, a desperate attempt of his body to attract any willing prey in the area to get its much needed sustenance. A prey that it wasn’t likely to find this far deep into the woods, aside from Geralt, whose self control was hanging on a thin fucking thread after inhaling so much of his pure, undiluted pheromones straight from the source.
While witchers were much more resistant to allures of monsters and most types of magic, at the end of the day, they were still part human. And no matter how often Geralt fisted his own cock under the cover of darkness as Jaskier fell into an uneasy sleep beside him, no matter how many other, actually available, people he fucked, it did nothing to lessen his steadily growing desire for Jaskier and his increasingly irresistible scent.
A lesser man would have folded long ago, but Geralt, just as stubborn as Jaskier, had clawed his way towards sanity whenever the temptation to offer himself up to Jaskier grew too strong to resist. But now, with the open collar of Jaskier’s doublet that showed off the slender line of his neck, his flushed cheeks and the carnal desperation shining clear in his eyes like a fever that was burning him up from the inside, he didn’t know how much more of this he could take before he finally snapped.
“You’re being ridiculous,” Jaskier said, taking a step away from Geralt to keep those blasted berries safe before Geralt could knock them out of his hand and get him as far away from them as he could. “I’ve had these same exact berries many times before and I was perfectly fine!”
“That was before.” Geralt took a slow step towards Jaskier, approaching him like he would a scared, timid horse while Jaskier carefully followed his every move. “Now, with your immunity compromised, they could kill you. Do you want to shit yourself to death? Because that will happen if you eat them.”
Disturbed by the mental image of such a horrific death, Jaskier opened up his fist and glanced down at the berries to inspect them a bit closer. He had his moments of idiocy and insanity sometimes, but he was far from stupid. He wouldn’t intentionally poison himself just to prove a point. Or, at least, Geralt hoped he wasn’t.
But as Jaskier’s brows furrowed with determination upon examining the berries, Geralt decided that he wouldn’t leave that to chance. He lunged forward and grabbed Jaskier’s wrist, carefully twisting it to the side to tip the berries out of his hand, with little success. Jaskier, having somehow anticipated the attack, closed his fist into an iron grip and refused to let them go, even as they squished and the red juice dripped down his forearm like blood.
Instead of putting up a fight like Geralt expected him to, Jaskier instead went very, very still, staring hard at the spot where Geralt’s hand was clasped around his wrist. It was the first direct skin to skin contact they’ve had in a while because Geralt was pretty sure that Jaskier needed it to use his abilities and he’d made an intentional effort to avoid touching him to curb his own temptation.
With the way Jaskier’s scent flared around them, his sharp inhale when Geralt’s own body responded in turn, he was right. He never should have touched Jaskier, because just like Geralt had feared, the call of Jaskier’s body from this proximity was impossible to resist.
Before he knew it, he was leaning in and pressing their lips together in a kiss that Jaskier returned instantly with such ferocity he nearly knocked them both down to the ground. If Geralt were any less sturdy, he’d have sent them sprawling into the dirt, but as it was, he only wrapped his hands firmly around the writhing bard in his arms and held him close as Jaskier tried his best to devour Geralt down to his very soul.
Geralt could feel the exchange of energy between them as Jaskier started to feed off of his arousal, his medallion vibrating in warning against his chest. If it were anyone other than Jaskier, he would have heeded the warning and quickly either removed himself from the situation or neutralized the threat. But it was Jaskier, and while the sensation of someone drawing from his energy was slightly unnerving in its unfamiliarity, it didn’t feel dangerous.
Geralt didn’t feel out of sorts or like he was losing his mind, becoming yet another mindless victim of a starving incubus like all the stories claimed would happen. Sure, he probably wasn’t in the state to be making the most rational of decisions, but he’d attribute that more to the influence of his cock rather than Jaskier’s incubus abilities. Jaskier heightened his arousal without even consciously realizing it, but he didn’t force anything that wasn’t already there, and while incredibly horny, Geralt was still very much in full control of his faculties.
Whether that was because Jaskier wasn’t a full incubus or because Geralt was a witcher, or a combination of both, Geralt didn’t feel threatened at all. If anything, he was experiencing an incredible rush, because kissing Jaskier was something he’d wanted pretty much from the day they first met, when he found himself wanting to kiss the bard just to make him shut the fuck up already. And really, that was all the reassurance that Geralt needed to keep Jaskier in his arms, even though it might not have been the most sensible idea at the moment.
It was Jaskier who found the strength to pull away first, ending the kiss and the spell that had settled over them. He stared at Geralt, eyes wide with both wonder and horror before he suddenly came to his senses and wrenched his arm away from Geralt’s slack grip, stumbling over his own feet and landing hard on the ground, Geralt too stunned himself to catch him in time.
“Ow,” Jaskier said after a long moment of silence, far too calm considering that his foot was facing the wrong direction, the cuff of his pants covered in a red liquid that definitely didn’t come from the berries. He blinked at it a few times, then tilted his head up to face Geralt and said, far too calmly, “I think I just broke my foot.”
And then he promptly passed out.