Try, Please Try For Me

Consummation

By the time Jaskier leads him down the upstairs hallway and towards his bedchamber, Geralt's heart is beating faster than it should have. A witcher's heart is four times slower than a normal man's. It's only during a hunt that he can feel his heartbeat pick up enough for it to thump loudly in his chest, when his breathing is exerted and the toxicity is coursing through his veins from the potions he took.

But Geralt feels painfully out of place walking down the lavish hallway; his eyes flickering to look at the paintings that line the walls, boots sinking in deep to the plush red carpet, his hand gripped by a man that's far too beautiful to even be looking at someone like him.

Once inside the room, Jaskier releases his hand and pours them two glasses of wine from a tray on the bedside table. Geralt eyes him as Jaskier shoves the glass towards him before tackling his own with a desperate fever.

"I think we could both use something to ease the tension," Jaskier says.

Geralt just responds with a "hmmm" and takes a long sip from the glass in his hand.

It takes much more than a single glass of wine to get a witcher even close to feeling any effect of alcohol, but the liquid helps his mouth that has already gotten far too dry and the gesture is appreciated. It...helps to know that Jaskier is just as uneasy as he is, though that's evident from the start by the underlying whiff of fear that Geralt senses every time the other man is in his presence.

Geralt can't say that he blames him. He knows what he looks like, what people think of witchers. And even though Geralt knows that people's assumptions of him are wrong, that he would never lay a hand on someone against their will, that he's not just a mindless tool for killing monsters, it still hurts that Jaskier doesn't truly want him.

It also hurts that Jaskier has emptied his wineglass in under a minute, because they both know that this...whole ordeal will be easier to get through if Jaskier is influenced by alcohol.

Again, Geralt can't blame him. But it still hurts.

"Right then, "Jaskier says, moving a hand to unbutton his doublet, "we'd best get on with it. I have no doubt they've got someone posted in the hallway, to make sure one of us doesn't try to bail."

Geralt's expression instantly goes sour and he pauses for a moment to listen. Sure enough, the faint sound of another heartbeat could be heard coming from somewhere on the other side of the wall.

A low growl rumbles in his throat.

Jaskier's breath hitches at the sound but he quickly covers it up with a light chuckle. "My family is very particular about contracts," he says with a shrug. "I know you didn't read it, but consummation had its own section, I'm afraid. Could be worse though, when my cousin got married they had to do it in front of witnesses. Be happy we got the hallway guard."

"They can't just--"

"What? Monitor our fucking? In case you haven't noticed they don't trust you, and they definitely don't trust me. Besides it's tradition." He says the word like it's poison on his tongue.

"Witchers don't have tradition. At least not things like that."

Jaskier scoffs. "Well then welcome to Lettenhove, my dear witcher. Where we'll likely have someone examine me tomorrow morning and put a fucking signature on the dotted line once they're sure I've been railed good and proper."

Geralt feels a sudden rush of anger coarse through him, and he snarls. He knew Jaskier's father was a garbage human being from the start-- just the way he talks to his son is enough to determine that. But the fact that Jaskier's family would treat him with so little dignity makes him want to break the wall down and strangle whoever was on the other side.