Chapter Text
The day after Queen Calanthe of Cintra, and her consort Eist, were ambushed and killed by a band of elves as they travelled through Erlenwald forest, several people went out searching.
Tissaia, rectoress of Aretuza, makes her way to a nondescript town named Rinde, on the southern border of Redania. There is a small shop there, with a discreet sign above the door promising cures, cantrips and sundry other magicks. On entry, she finds the place neatly kept and cared for, herbs hanging from the ceiling, glass bottles lining the walls.
She knows its owner is aware of her presence, so after some time she tires of waiting and calls out, “Yennefer, this is somewhat childish.”
A door opens at the back of the room and the woman she came looking for steps out. She seems to draw all the light towards her; she is too fine for her nondescript surroundings, dressed in silk and lace, her clothes worth more than all of her wares combined.
“I’m here, then,” she says, with that same banked anger Tissaia has always prized in her. “What do you want?”
“Cintra’s opened up,” Tissaia says, and watches her former pupil’s scowl grow wider.
“Absolutely not,” Yennefer snaps. “I’m not taking part in your games, or in any of your political intrigues. I did that in Aedirn, and what did that get me? Decades of total bullshit and then they sent an assassin after me.”
Tissaia spreads her hands. “I know your feelings about court life,” she says. “But this is a particularly nasty vipers’ nest, and the future of the Continent could depend on what happens. I don’t trust anyone else who might take the position; the fact that you’re disconnected from any alliances makes you the only safe candidate.”
“Flattery won’t help you,” is Yennefer’s response. She turns away to straighten the bottles on the shelf. “Besides, whether you trust me or no, I don’t trust you.”
“Fine then,” Tissaia sighs. “If you won’t do it for me, perhaps you’ll do it for the girl.”
Yennefer’s hands still on an emerald green philtre, the corner of her mouth twitching. She surely knows Tissaia knows all about her quest; she will recognise the bait being dangled in the most cynical way; and yet, she will take it. Tissaia is certain.
“Fine then,” Yennefer says back in a mocking repetition. “Tell me about the girl, you heartless, manipulative bitch.”
Half the continent away, Mousesack the druid, the only magic user Queen Calanthe allowed in her court, steps out of a portal into a swamp.
He brushes off the dank raindrops that fell onto his head, and wades through the mire, ears open for the sound of a battle.
It is apparently over, though; instead he hears the grunts of a man doing hard physical labour and the sickening sound of a sword parting flesh. Mousesack pushes aside hanging vines, giving up any hope of remaining either clean or dry, and finds the witcher busy hacking off the head of a great insectoid.
“I think it’s dead,” he says mildly.
Geralt looks up. Always imperturbable, his face doesn’t change at all at the sight of the druid. “Got to have the head to claim the bounty,” he says. “You’re a long way from home.”
“Calanthe and Eist were killed yesterday,” Mousesack tells him. “Murdered. Every crown in the Continent is descending on Cintra to pick at its carcass.”
“Not my problem,” the witcher says, turning away.
“Geralt, please. I know how you feel about Destiny, but you’re a good man. The girl has no one. She needs you.”
He watches the witcher turn away, and sigh, and shake his head, without any great concern about the outcome. Geralt of Rivia, stubborn ass though he is, is still a good man. He’ll do the right thing, even if he sulks over it.
And finally, outside a tavern in Toussaint, Calanthe’s Captain of the Guard straightens his tunic. They are travelling incognito, which means no sword, and he feels almost naked. Light is spilling through the windows, along with a drinking song belted out amidst raucous laughter.
“You sure this is the right place?” his second-in-command asks dubiously.
The captain is, unfortunately, certain that this is the right place. He signals to the ten or so men around him. “Let’s go get him,” he says.
Jaskier is having a pretty good night until the soldiers come in.
He clocks them immediately as soldiers, even though they wear no arms and no colours: it is in the bearing, the way they move. Their lack of any signs of allegiance is something of a worry, as it means they don’t want any fallout for whatever they’re about to do, and Jaskier can think of several nobles he’s offended recently, either from sleeping with their wives, or singing about their terrible governance.
“Thank you,” he calls, stopping his fingers mid-tune, “you’ve been a delight to play for, is that the time, I really must—” He swings his lute on his back, dips down to pick up its case, and flees through the kitchen. Hopefully he’ll be able to come back for his clothes in a week or two once the heat has died down, there are some outfits he’d be heartbroken if he never sees again, but he’s much more interested in keeping his head on his shoulders than his suits on his back.
Unfortunately, the soldiers are smarter than the average, and as he runs pell mell out of the rear of the tavern, he rushes headlong into a second group of them. There are hands on his arms, tugging him along; strong enough that there’s no point in resisting, though he does twist a little, hissing, “mind the lute!”
They drag him round to the front of the building where there’s a carriage waiting. He gets pushed into it, squashed either side by hulking men, with more sitting opposite him and several clambering on the roof. It is, he thinks, slightly overkill.
“Gentlemen,” he tries, “if you wanted a private performance, you only had to ask.”
The man opposite him is likely in charge, a little older than the rest, with the air of one used to being obeyed. He’s looking at Jaskier with a withering contempt that feels strangely familiar. “How far to the portal?” he calls out.
“Just outside town,” the driver calls back. “Mile or so.”
“My dear sir,” Jaskier says, then can’t think of anything to add. Portal? What has he done that’s so terrible it warrants magical travel? Does whoever is after him want to see their revenge meted out in person? Most of the people he’s angered aren’t nearly this subtle, or likely to spend money hiring a mage. He was expecting a quick roughing up in the alley, maybe a fractured rib or two, not what… whatever this is.
He lapses into silence, mind going over likely lists of suspects and coming up blank. It’s bad, that much he knows; how bad, he’ll have to wait and see.
The portal washes over them; his stomach lurches; and the carriage pulls to a sudden stop. The commander flings open the carriage door and beckons at Jaskier, who follows slowly, poised to run.
“Oh, fuck,” he says when he sees where they’ve emerged. “You’ve got to be fucking joking.”
“My lord—” one of the soldiers says.
“No, really, what the fuck? Who put you up to this? I know the queen wouldn’t have ordered it—”
“My lord!” the commander says. “Queen Calanthe is dead. Eist, too. Your country has great need of you, now.”
Jaskier, who once upon a time was Prince Julian of Cintra, looks around the great courtyard of the castle, heart thumping in his chest. Nothing’s changed, from the looks of it, and he doesn’t know whether that’s good or bad. Mostly he feels the same strong urge to run he did thirteen years ago, when he took advantage of the chaos at his sister’s wedding to escape into the night.
“Well,” he mutters to himself. “Welcome home, I guess.” Then a thought strikes him. “Ciri,” he says. “Where is she? Take me to her.”
“There are matters of state,” the commander says, “weighty questions, that must be answered urgently—”
Jaskier’s a bard, has spent over a decade living very happily as a bard, but his mother was the Lioness of Cintra, and she trained him well. He glares at the commander with the full force of all his arrogant ancestors. “Take me,” he says, “to see my niece.”
And with an unhappy twist of his lips, the commander shows him the way.
Ciri is alone in her rooms, it seems, a distraught lady-in-waiting hovering outside. “She told me to leave her be,” she tells Jaskier; she clearly doesn’t recognise him, is just sharing her worry with anyone who comes by. “She hasn’t even cried yet…”
Jaskier pats her soothingly on the arm, then opens the door and goes in. He’s still got his lute slung over his shoulder, he realises. His clothes smell of stale beer and the Toussaint air. His mother is dead, apparently, though he never truly thought she could be killed. None of it feels very real.
The girl is real though. She’s sitting curled up next to a window, looking down at the courtyard. Her shoulders are shaking, so her maid was wrong about the crying, she just hasn’t been doing it where anyone could see. Calanthe obviously trained her well too. Jaskier clears his throat, she turns to look at him, and it’s like seeing a ghost: her hair, her eyes, the proud angry expression on her face. If he’d met her anywhere in the world, he’d recognise Pavetta’s daughter.
“Hello, your highness,” he says, and attempts a bow: his lute bangs into his back, and he jumps. Well. He never was much for the etiquette lessons. “Um. How are you, uh, holding up?”
Ciri stares at him, which is fair enough. He never really knows how to talk to children, even children as composed as this one.
“Yeah, I guess not great,” he says. He sits cross-legged on the floor, laying his lute down beside him. “I’m sorry about Calanthe.”
“Who are you?” she asks. “You look familiar, but I know we haven’t met.”
“It’s the nose,” Jaskier says. “It gets passed down whether you want it or not. It’s in all the family portraits.” He grimaces – here is this kid grieving, and he’s talking nonsense as usual. “Sorry. I didn’t expect ever to meet you, I was in Beauclair an hour ago, I’m not dealing with this very well. Let’s start over. My name’s Jaskier. Julian, formally. Pavetta was my sister, which I guess makes me your uncle.”
She looks deeply suspicious. “I’ve never heard of you.”
“Calanthe didn’t like me very much,” he admits. “Which was fair enough, I didn’t like her very much either. Your mother, though, I loved her. She was a year older than me, and I used to follow her around everywhere. She wrote to me after you were born, she wanted me to know about you. I’m sure she’d have told you about me, if—” His throat closes up, remembering how the news had reached him, already months old, in some shitty town in Lyria. He’s never been able to work out exactly where he was when Pavetta died. He still feels like he should have known, somehow.
“If she’d lived,” Ciri finishes for him, coldly. Oh, this girl is Calanthe’s, through and through.
“Yes,” he agrees. “Listen. I’ve not been in Cintra since your mother got married, I’m pretty sure I’ve been disinherited, I’m not here to bring you any trouble. But if I can help, I’d like to.”
“Can you make all those people go away?” Ciri asks, nodding at the courtyard. Jaskier goes over to the window, looks down to see a multitude of horses and carriages, the beautiful, unnatural figures of mages, officious looking heralds and nobles. Of course. Ciri’s young, still. Everyone who’s anyone will be trying to get their claws in Cintra, any way they can.
“Well,” he says, and swallows. There were lots of reasons he left, but one of the bigger ones was the fucking politics Ciri’s going to have to wade through. “I can probably make up some quite rude songs about them.”
She’s startled into a laugh, which turns into a sob, and suddenly she’s leaning into him, crying like her world has ended. Which, in a way, it has. He puts his arms around her. “Hey,” he says, “it’s all right, I’m here.” For all the good it’ll do you, he thinks, I’m here.
Once Ciri’s crying fit ceases, she’s almost asleep; he doubts she’s had much rest since the queen died. He lays her down on her bed, and tiptoes out of the room.
Baron Aelfred is hovering outside. Jaskier never cared for the chief minister, and he’s not sure Calanthe did either. She never had much time for affairs of state that didn’t directly relate to warfare, and the taxes necessary to pay for warfare. But Aelfred must be competent at his job, Calanthe never had much time for fools either.
“Prince Julian,” the baron says and bows. Jaskier winces.
“Been a while since anyone called me that.” He shakes his head. “All right, I need a summary of the political shitstorm, five minutes, go.”
Aelfred blinks. “You’re wanted in the privy chamber,” he says. “I’ll explain on the way.” They start walking. “Right,” Aelfred says. “The queen was killed by Elven rebels, so the army is currently plotting reprisals, but they’ll be needed for bigger matters. Calanthe had more enemies than friends; Skellige will stand with us, but I’m not sure who else.”
“Why do we need people to stand with us?” Jaskier asks. Us. He hasn’t been us for his entire adult life.
“Nilfgaard has been making feints at the border for years,” Aelfred says. “They’ve always been subtle, there’s no proof, but it’s certain only fear of Calanthe was holding them back. Vergen and Brugge would both like a marriage alliance with the princess; Redania and Temeria and the other big kingdoms just want Cintra to hold the line against Nilfgaard. The mages want their old influence in the court. But Nilfgaard’s the one to watch. Thank goodness you’re here, sire.”
“I don’t understand what good I can do,” Jaskier says, gesturing down at his silks and ribbons as if to prove his uselessness.
“Why, take the throne, of course.”
Jaskier stops dead. The baron strides three paces, then stops too. He’s a large man, all furs and gold chains; he turns with a clank, slowly, like a ship at sea.
“That’s treason,” Jaskier says. “The queen—”
“—is dead.”
“No, she isn’t. Her name is Cirilla. Pavetta was Calanthe’s heir; now Ciri is. If I’m anything, I’m second in line. And I wouldn’t be surprised if my mother hadn’t officially struck me from the succession, anyway.”
“Cirilla’s a child.” Aelfred’s face is confused, contemptuous. “And a girl.”
“Calanthe was fifteen when he fought her first battle. Ciri’s, what, twelve? She’ll catch up.”
“Sire—”
“No,” Jaskier says, sharply. “I’m not a prince. I’m barely a noble. And I’m not standing in Ciri’s way. I’ll do what I can to support her, but I’m not taking her throne.”
“There’ll be chaos,” the baron said. “Invasion, war, anarchy.”
Jaskier swallows. He is so very, very far from qualified for any of this. “Well then,” he says cheerily, “let’s see what we can do to stop that happening, hmmm?”
In the privy chamber, Calanthe’s former council are gathered around a polished oval table. They all wear the same expression: that of men who were smart enough to know this day might come but incapable of imagining they’d live to see it. They look like they are waiting for someone to give them orders, even though they know the orders have to come from them, now. When Jaskier comes in, they turn to him hopefully, and then away, resigned. They’re smart enough to understand he’s not their saviour either.
“What are all the mages and representatives actually doing here?” Jaskier asks, leaning against the wall by the door, once they’ve told him their names and he’s forgotten them. The only spare seat is the one where Calanthe would sit, and Jaskier can’t even think about that. “Do they have… demands and such?”
“Currently we’re just making sure they have somewhere to sleep and enough to eat,” Aelfred says gloomily. “Usually when we have dignitaries visit we have months to prepare. And there are so many of them.”
Jaskier decides housekeeping is not where he’s going to focus his mind. “But what do they want?”
“They say they’ve come for the funeral,” says Calanthe’s spymaster, a thin, deceptively vacant looking man. “We have till then before anyone makes an overt move. But while they wait, they’ll make alliances, try and figure out how the power vacuum will be filled and if they can be the ones to fill it. That could be by force – any one of them would invade if they thought there was a chance of success – or the more traditional marriage. Offers will be made for the princess. Complicating matters, of course, is that none of them want the others to triumph, and most of all none of them want Nilfgaard to invade, so it’s really a question of who shows their hand first. Once someone moves, we might be able to make an alliance with the others.”
“That sounds defeatist,” says a new voice. Two women and a man walk in, as if they have every right to go wherever they please, an arrogance nobles and mages have in common. The man is older, portly, with a friendly demeanor that Jaskier knows is a trap: there’s something about him that makes him want to hide in a corner. One woman is older, chestnut haired, with a haughty yet amused expression; the other, the one who spoke, has black hair and shocking violet eyes and looks how Jaskier feels: utterly done with everyone and everything.
“Aretuza and Ban Ard have no place here,” Aelfred says, almost hissing.
“The queen once said she would see mages in Cintra over her dead body,” the older woman says. “Here we are.”
“We can help,” the man says, smiling. “We don’t want the Continent to slide into chaos any more than you do.”
“And you?” Jaskier asks the younger woman, who’s eyeing the older mages – and everyone else in the room – with a kind of bored contempt.
“Tissaia and Stregobor are the king makers,” she says. “I like chaos. I’m here because Tissaia appealed to my sentimental side.”
There’s an uneasy pause at what, clearly, must be a joke – but one delivered flatly and straight faced. And then it extends. No one’s in charge, Jaskier realises. He opens his mouth, not because he wants to be in charge, but because he can’t bear the silence.
Then the door opens again and Mousesack and a witcher walk in, straight past where Jaskier’s leaning, and stand in the centre of the room, facing the table. Jaskier edges round the room so he can see them properly.
The witcher is fully armoured, and looks like he washed in a hurry: there’s a spatter of something dark high up on his forehead and his hair is more grey than it should be. He’s still surprisingly attractive. Jaskier’s never met a witcher before, but all the stories make them sound hideous rather than tall and broad and excessively muscled.
The witcher’s golden eyes widen as he looks around the room. “Yennefer?” he asks. His voice is low, muted, but a faint note of shock is evident all the same.
“How lovely to see you, Geralt,” the violet-eyed mage says, in a tone that makes clear it’s anything but. “What are you doing here?”
“I—” the witcher says, and then pulls himself up straight. Geralt, Jaskier thinks to himself, why does that sound familiar – and then he remembers. Blaviken, a massacre, decades back now...
“Thirteen years ago,” the witcher says, stiffly, like he’s practised it, “I saved the life of Princess Cirilla’s father, the cursed knight Duny of Erlenwald. He offered me any reward I cared to name, and I asked for the Law of Surprise, that which he possessed but did not know.” He sighs. “What he did not know is that he was to be a father. Cirilla is bound to me by Destiny. She is my Child of Surprise.”
Jaskier feels his mouth drop open. Fucking hell, Calanthe kept that one quiet.
For a long, pure moment no one speaks and then everyone speaks, a chorus of protests and denials and fury, some aimed at Mousesack, some at the witcher, who stands stoic and unmoved. He has the look of someone whose whole life involves dirty jobs no one else wants, and this is just another one. Jaskier feels vaguely irritated on Ciri’s behalf. Still, he can hardly blame Geralt for ignoring the ties of Destiny; Jaskier’s spent the last thirteen years ignoring the ties of family just as stubbornly.
The arguing would probably have continued were it not for the whirl of a portal opening up in the corner of the room. The three mages turn to face it, hands raised, before another woman comes through. The new arrival stares at the room with a disdain that makes it clear what she thinks of the chaos in front of her. “My master the Emperor of Nilfgaard would speak with the Council of Cintra.”
“Why not!” Aelfred exclaims, almost hysterical. “The more the merrier!”
The woman beckons and a man follows her through the portal. He’s not tall, but he makes up for that in sheer force of personality, a kind of cold authority that seems like it would burn whoever it touched. He has dark, dark eyes and hair pushed back from his forehead.
Someone gasps. Someone else says, “you!”
The emperor looks around him, clearly dismisses the witcher, Mousesack, Jaskier, most of the council, and speaks instead to the two older mages. “I am Emhyr var Emreis,” he says, “Emperor of Nilfgaard. But when the Usurper reigned, I was called Duny, Urcheon of Erlenwald. Pavetta was my wife. Cirilla is my daughter. I have reclaimed my throne, and now I have come to reclaim my child.”
Jaskier’s ears are ringing, adrenaline rising in his throat, sick and hot. He feels like he’s been punched.
Again, there is silence, a long moment of in-drawn breath.
And then the younger mage – Yennefer – bursts out laughing.
Everyone turns to look at her, as her peals of laughter ring out, abandoned and wild and free. “I’m sorry,” she says, hiccuping as she tries to suppress her giggles. “It’s just – it’s exactly like a bad play.”
This morning, Jaskier thinks with a growing sense of hysteria, he woke up in a tavern, looking forward to idling away a day before playing a few songs in the evening, wetting his whistle and hopefully dipping his wick. Now he is faced with witchers, emperors and mages, all of whom have a claim on the niece he met for the first time for fifteen minutes an hour ago. He wonders whether anyone would even notice if he ran away. After all, that’s what he did the last time Geralt of Rivia and Duny of Erlenwald were in the same room. By all accounts the castle was nearly destroyed back then. Jaskier doesn’t hold out much hope for a better outcome this time.
“We’re all tired,” Tissaia says, smoothly, glaring at both Yennefer and the emperor. “Let’s take advantage of the kind hospitality of the Cintran court and sleep. We can discuss everything further in the morning.”
The emperor bows to her. “As you wish, my lady,” he says. “You may send word to me any time.” He turns to go back through the portal, followed by his mage, who’s smirking at Yennefer for some reason.
“Shall we?” Tissaia says, and no one seems to know how to disobey her. Mousesack moves to intercept Aelfred, speaking urgently to him; the rest of the Council file out after them; and Tissaia, Stregobor and Yennefer leave together. Jaskier can’t help but notice that Yennefer is very determinedly not looking at Geralt.
Then it’s just him and the witcher, who’s standing in the middle of the room still, almost lost, like he doesn’t know what to do next.
“Well!” Jaskier says, brightly, because he has some sympathy with the man for being dragged into this mess; he clearly doesn’t want to be here either. “That was quite a series of revelations, wasn’t it?”
The witcher casts a contemptuous eye over him. “Who are you,” he asks, “the court jester?”
He doesn’t even wait for a reply, storming out in a sudden furious movement.
“Yes,” Jaskier tells the empty room, sighing. “That’s exactly right.”
It’s got late. He used to have rooms, but no doubt his mother had them ripped apart and remodeled after he left. He has no energy left to try and find a steward. In the end he does what he always used to do when he was in disgrace: heads to the kitchen to find a snack and a pallet to lie on in front of the fire. Hopefully no one will recognise him. And he’s slept in worst places.
His way back takes him past Cirilla’s chambers, now augmented by two armed guards in front of the door. Someone’s thinking straight, then. He doesn’t slow down – doesn’t want the soldiers to get antsy – but as he walks he thinks, sleep as long as you can, kid. The shit’s going to rain down come morning…