Try, Please Try For Me

The Few Things Someone Should Know About Jaskier

"You can't be serious."

Jaskier's heart falls as he reads over the paper again, making sure that it wasn't just his eyes seeing things. He wishes that's what it was, that something was wrong with his sight or his mind to make him see words that aren't really there. That would be a preferred alternative to the truth.

"It's for the best, Julian. It will bring peace between our nations."

Jaskier stares at his father, mouth gaping open like a fish as he tries to find words. "You're trying to marry me off as a bonus in a peace treaty!" He cries, flailing the paper around as if it somehow proves a point.

"We are at war, Julien," his father replies. "Our people are dying. This treaty will put an end to it."

"But-- you-- a witcher!?!"

"They don't have nobility like we do. They are a warrior nation. Witchers are their most revered fighters."

His father walks over to him and snatches the paper out of his hand. Then he grabs a pen from his desk and splays the document out on the surface, signing it in a single fluid motion.

Jaskier feels as though someone's shoved his mouth full of cotton when his father offers the pen to him.

He doesn't take it.

"Why can't it be someone else? There has to be someone else."

"There is no one else." His father punctuates each word. "No human would marry a witcher, let alone be strong enough to survive it for more than a few weeks. And even if they did, a witcher's lifespan is longer by far. The union would be null and void in a manner of decades."

"Oh so you wouldn't subject a regular person to this, but when it's me it's no problem?"

His father puts a hand on his forehead, brows bunched together. "You are more...resilient than a regular person. And they requested that it be someone who is not fragile."

Not fragile. Jaskier doesn't want to even begin thinking about what that implies. "You-" he knocks the pen out of his father's hand and points an angry finger at him. "You're doing this on purpose! Aren't you?"

His father raises a hand fast as if to hit him and Jaskier flinches. But the blow never comes. Instead his father sighs and goes to pick up the pen. "This is an honor for us. You'll be doing a service to your country, and besides, it's a better match than we could hope for since none of the other noble families would want..."

He trails off before he finishes his sentence, but Jaskier knows what he was going to say.

"Say it," he spits.

"No one would want to marry their children off to a halfbreed."

Jaskier lets out a humorless laugh because of course-- of course that's what this is about. Everything always was in the end. His father treated his blood like it was a curse. Like Jaskier had personally decided to shame his family when he was the one who couldn't keep it in his pants and got a halfbreed bastard for a son as a result.

Well so much for that. His father was a complete bastard of a man and he deserved a bastard son to shame his honorable name.

"I'm not going to do it," Jaskier says, anger bubbling inside him. "I won't."

"Do not test me boy," His father warns.

There's something dangerous in his voice and Jaskier has heard it a thousand times before. He knows what will come next, but he will still try to fight it anyway, he always does. He would hate himself if he didn't. If he just bowed his head and took the easy way.