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winters-mistress · 1 month

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Raindrops and Roses

"Here, girl." Vesemir says, placing a wooden plate upon Ciri's lap. The dog in her lap shifts, hid weight a conofrting presence. Icy blue eyes snap in Vesemir's direction, and Thunder growls at him. He's a breeding stud, and one of Ciri's favourite dogs that are here in the Keep. Hunting dogs, they tell her, a soft of wolf shepheard cross, but all Ciri sees are enormous fluffy beasts who she adores. He'd been napping on her ever since she'd returned from lunch, and she had been comforted by the weight and the warmth of the fluffy black and white dog.

The girl looks up from her camp of an old mage's settee settled by the fire, piled with blankets and furs and pillows, her skin pale as she looks up at the oldest witcher.

He reminds her of Eist, warm and strong and commanding and reliable, although Eist definitely wasn't as prickly as the old witcher was. The Skelligan jarl never handed out chores or lashes or scoldings in the way Vesemir did, but her beloved grandfather never lectured Mouseack or Calanthe the way he did Geralt, Lambert and Eskel when he felt they were treating her unfairly or too harshly. It wasn't often, and the quiet talking to's during pillowtalk the Skelligan had with Calanthe never produced the same results as the venomous lectures or whip lashes that the eldest witcher gave out to his pups.

Both men are strong and wise and raggedy and trustworthy and loyal, and Cirilla's heart aches with how much she misses him. The way he would tuck her into bed and curl around her when she had a nightmare, dump blankets upon her little head or rub his knuckles against her temple, tell her stories of his homeland and sneak her cookies and tartlets after one of the nannies had sent her to bed without supper when she had snuck out to play knucklebones or throw rocks in ponds. She misses him horribly, but there is an echo of him in the old wolf that tells her that he will be just as instrumental in healing her hurting heart as much as his pups would.

Geralt is her echo of Calanthe, strong and brave and wicked with a sword. Parental and forceful, antagonistic with her when she needs it just as much as they were gentle when the times for love came. Protectors in their own rights, a strong pillar coming in quick after grief.

Eskel is her echo of Mouseack. Magical and eerie, spiritual and gentle with a gruff exterior. Mouseack's imposing height and large beard spooked off as many people as Eskel's bulk and scars, thick, large hands that are scarred and powerful are the same ones that brush her hair back and wrap bleeding cuts and kiss her hair and light up her room with beautiful images when her ghosts threaten to tear her apart.

She cannot pinpoint who Lambert stands in as just yet. Perhaps a mix of Eist and Lazlo? Eist, who would teach her all the dirty tricks of knucklebones and rook and all the drunk card games, and Lambert, who tells her each and every dirty trick he has with a blade and at the card table as he taught her gwent. Lazlo, who would keep her in line when she would run off with her group of little companions scolds her just as much as Lambert does when she edges too close to poison ivy in the woods or in the caves below Kaer Morhen when the two of them go fishing one afternoon. He is rough and gruff, but he sits outside her room whenever she's woken up from a nightmare, gives her an extra slice of bread and slips her a couple sips of Rivian cherry liqueur whenever Geralt wasn't looking as the witchers hit the bottle.

She loves them all, as gruff and snappy and imposing and scarred as they all are.

Ciri comes back to earth and looks down at the plate Vesemir places in her lap. She doesn't understand why he's feeding her at first, they've had lunch two hours ago. Thick slices of chicken with warm bread and green wild vegetables, as well as some lovely strong and hard cheese and a couple berries Eskel hadn't useful for the pies the day before.

She still thinks about that hunk of cheese and bread, slick from the freshly churned butter that melted into the thick slices. Her mouth waters at the thought.

It's honeycomb. She realises, looking down at the plate. Two large and uneven hunks of the stuff, dripping and slick with honey, and four cookies with dollops of strawberry jam in the middle. The dog snuffles, uninterested at the food, and closes his eyes again.

Her eyes widen at the treats, and she looks up at the old wolf.

"Uh-" he scratches at the back of his neck, an uncharacteristic show of nerves. "I know our tonics and herbs fucked up your-" he points at her stomach underneath the dog and the blankets, and she wishes she hadn't. She'd forgotten about the pain for a few minutes, warm from the dog, while her back was similarly heated from hot waterskin Eskel had gotten for her that morning when she'd woken up in a panic, her sheets slick with blood and horrible cramping in her abdomen.

The witchers ran in, swords at the ready, one after another, and she couldn't find the words to stop their fears, blinded by tears and shaking with the pain.

She remembers when Triss was here and she'd gotten her cycle, when it came to light that the tonics they had her on were fucking her up good and proper. Her bones refusing to heal right, blood thinner than it should have been, the nausea and the headaches and the vivid nightmares and the aches and pains all coming to light, as well as the lumps Triss had found inside her after an examination.

They'd wear off in time, and she had thrown all the bottles of tonic and tea leaves in the fire after slapping them all silly. Verbally and physically.

She'd left for now, promising to come back at the end of spring with word of Ciri's pursuers, and warned all the witchers to never, ever, ever give any type of supplements to the girl again, otherwise she'd rip their balls off and shove them down their throats.

It's only been a month, Ciri supposed, Triss said it would take a while for the cysts to heal. She'd done all she could, made sure they wouldn't rupture, but she was no surgeon who could ease them out, and all they could do was wait for them to come out on their own.

But good gods, this is horrific.

"-the breadseed poppy's milk'll help the pain. But I thought these would make you feel better, try and make the next couple days a bit more bearable." He looks so earnest that it makes Ciri's heart heart a bit.

They hadn't meant to hurt her, hadn't realised the effects the supplements were happening. All they saw was her endurance and muscles were improving, and they all felt awful when Triss beat them all to Ciri's shaking doorframe as the girl screamed in pain.

Kaer Morhen should never hear a child scream like that again, not when it's seen so many.

They'd all apologised, seeming to be beating themselves up and be in worse shape than Cirilla herself had been. Lambert drunk himself into a stupor, Eskel had run -just like those first couple weeks when he couldn't separate the two granddaughter's of Kaer Morhen from each other- and Geralt had gone to slay one of the beasts in the caves wearing too few armour. And Vesemir had slapped them all and brought them to the girl so they could apologise and promise never to do it again.

All the pups think that suffering barters suffering, it seems.

"Thank you." She whispers, touched. These remind her of the honey cookies and strawberry tarts of her childhood, and her heart hurts with the memory and aches with the love she feels. "I-thank you."

Vesemir gruffs and pets her hair like he would the dog upon her legs.

"Eat up, girl. Need all the strength you can get right now. Then take a rest, 'll get Eskel to drop off one of those books you like whenever he and wolf get back from their hunting trip. Lamb's experimenting with some powder he found, so don't be surprised if the keep goes to shit and I have to dig the whip out again."

Ciri giggles, and Vesemir cracks a smile.

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blackberrywars · 10 months

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I just realised I wasn't following you yet? Which is honestly a crime. For your Witcher ficlets, I'd love to see some grandpa Vesemir bonding time with Ciri as a child. Just a lot of fluff, preferably modern where Vesemir gets to spend an afternoon alone with her

Hi hello sorry for the delay and thank you for this prompt!! It's very cute, and the fluff was a nice treat.

Title: Grampa's House

Rating: G Words: 1,945 Relationships: Vesemir & Ciri, Background Vesemir/Guxart, Background Yennefer/Geralt Additional Tags: Family Bonding, Fluff, Young Ciri, Grandparents & Grandchildren, The Magic of Your Grandparents' House

Summary: Vesemir struggles to figure out what to do while watching his five year-old granddaughter for the weekend because he’s an old-ass man with old-ass man hobbies, like bird-watching, whittling, gardening, and making coffee on the stove because who needs a fancy machine anyway? Turns out, she’s happy to do all those things with her grampa.

AO3 LINK

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When his idiot son drops his squealing granddaughter onto his porch, not even Yennefer can hide a sheepish grin. “Business trip,” his bony ass. He can smell a swinger’s party from here. Still, their hesitation doesn’t stop Ciri from running toward him and wrapping her skinny, freckled arms around his thighs.

“GRAMPA!!”

She hits him with the force of a gale wind, and Vesemir can’t help but run a hand through her hair. Whiter than his, but not quite so pale as Geralt’s. Before that thought overwhelms him, he takes both a deep breath and her little, inexplicably sticky hand. She proudly shows him her missing incisor as she yells hello, and she’s so much bigger now, but even still, the straps of her tiny backpack barely fit over his elbow. Her wolf plush toy has a dark stain that might just explain the state of her fingers, but he holds them anyway for the goodbye kisses and hugs. Yennefer gives him a less-stiff hug than usual, and Geralt shoots him a wry smile over her shoulder, nodding in what he probably thinks is encouragement. Vesemir just shakes his head. The pair of them slide back into the ever-beloved shitbox, Roach. Which leaves him with a five year-old granddaughter.

He’s raised several boys over the years in the Wolfe home, all of them hellions in their own special ways. Half of his grey hairs have nothing to do with his age.

That was nearly twenty years and two knee surgeries ago.

Guxart had told him in the morning that he’d do just fine, but that was just before the bastard had blown him a kiss from the driveway and sped off, off to his own weekend away. It was right about then that he realized he has no idea what little girls like to do. Ciri has only been with his son for two years, and they’d got along well, but he’s never watched her for more than a few hours. She’d been littler then. What can he offer her, now that he is old and his own boys are grown, most of their favorite toys destroyed, given away, or lost? When he was younger, this might have been easier. He had more energy then, enough to chase and tumble after a tot without fearing his worse knee would give out.

Cleaning her up is probably a good place to start.

That decided, Vesemir finds an old stepstool and guides her onto it, making sure she washes her hands. He takes some dish soap to Mr. Wolf, who is much fluffier, but just about as gray and scruffy as himself. All the while, Ciri tells him about her life.

“At recess, we play Lions and Ant-lopes! I run really fast! I like taking my shoes off, but Mama gets mad when that happens.”

“Oh? And why is that, lass?”

“It gets my socks dirty. An’ stinky. And —kitty!”

She points to the edge of his windowsill, just behind where the dish soap had been, to a tiny wooden cat figurine. The chubby little creature had been yesterday’s work, hidden in its little nook where his partner would never find it, because the bastard hates washing plates more than anything else. Vesemir chuckles.

“Hm? Oh, yes, for Guxart. It needs some work, but it’s almost done now.”

“You made that?” she asks, eyes wide as dinner plates, “How?”

“Well, if you’re interested…… I suppose I can show you.”

“YES!” she balks a bit, smiling sheepishly, “…please?”

Vesemir spends the next two hours answering that please. He gives Ciri a full tour of the garage-turned-woodworking-shed. Explains to her the difference between his chisels —paring, mortise, tang, that fancy one Eskel bought him that he still doesn’t know the name of— and almost starts in on the mallets before he stops, with no small amount of trepidation. The poor lass must be bored to tears. He braves a look down at her face and finds wide blue eyes and pursed lips. One of his larger chisels is polished enough to show her reflection, shining with curiosity. As deftly as he can, he pulls the little cat out of his pocket, holding it out to her.

“As for this little beast… are you listening?” Vesemir tweaks a pale curl, just to hear her giggle (and to distract from the chisels because she probably shouldn’t touch those until she’s at least eight or so), “What he needs is to be sanded down and polished so he’s shiny.”

“Howdja do that?”

“Sandpaper. The grains smooth out the rough bits. Here. Feel it.”

He fans out his collection, arranged from 40 to 180 grit, and lets her pet each one. He doesn’t worry for her soft skin even though she winces at the roughness because she quickly reaches for the next one. She picks out the 120 grit sandpaper —a bit too fine for this, but he allows it— and lets him show her how to gently smooth out the figurine. Her fingers are still small and clumsy, but she dutifully keeps to the direction of the grain, and the cat feels even softer than her little hands once they’re through. She paints it with a sponge brush and his own polish, a mixture of olive oil and lemon juice, gasping as the red bubinga wood reveals all its colorful stripes. Again, it receives pride of place on the windowsill.

“So…” Ciri asks, somehow even more excited than before, “whad’we do now?”

She’d liked his workshop, dusty and turpentine-smelling though it is.

“Hmm. Why don’t we go outside? I have some birdhouses I made there.”

— — — — —

Ciri squeals over the birdhouses, especially the dark purple one that “looks like Mama!” but the real noise comes when the painted bunting couple —unusually late in the season, spirits bless them— pops out of it. The little husband’s rainbow coat is vibrant as always, and while Vesemir scolds Ciri for trying to chase him, he can’t blame her for wanting to pet his colorful feathers. She agrees, thankfully, apologizing to the ruffled pair. Vesemir settles into the rocking chair he made, and once she finishes cooing at the green little wife, Ciri leaves Guxart’s alone in favor of his lap, and they sit to watch the birds until his hips start creaking.

His garden provokes similar wonder. Vesemir points out each plant and all the weeds that had sprung up in between the rows, which she happily plucks. Ciri categorizes his herbs by smell and taste, ranks sage as her favorite, and eats a little bit of dirt as a control group. He nods approvingly, because little immune systems need help, and then offers some dandelion roots instead, since they still have dirt on them and are more nutritionally useful. Maybe tomorrow they can take a walk and he’ll teach her how to forage properly. It’s good knowledge, especially for a tot. If her stomach is anything like the bottomless pit that was Lambert’s, she should know what will be delicious and what could make her sick, spirits forbid.

By the end of the afternoon, his knees are dirty and sore, and he desperately needs a coffee. Sunshine and sweat have tired Ciri out, but she’ll be up again before long, which he’d need more than a little artificial energy to survive. Quickly, he herds Ciri back inside and into the bath with as little contamination as possible. Once his sleeves are soaked to the armpits, he sets her into a chair with two pillows stacked atop it and heads over to his wood stove. The greca is an old, battered thing now, but it still makes his brew as sweet and strong as it did the day Guxart brought it home. As soon as it’s full, he pours himself a mug and turns back to the table.

“Do you want some?”

Ciri wrinkles her nose, “Coffee tastes icky.”

“That is why your abuelo uses lots of milk and sugar.”

He adds both into her sippy cup to fix what Guxart calls a tetero and puts a suspirito on the plate beside it. Then gives her another three because he’s a grandfather, and it’s his job. They eat in mostly-silence, aside from the gummy sound of her chewing the cookies through her first missing tooth, and the clink of his own mug on the table. Ciri finishes her cup with an exaggerated ah! and he can’t help but smile.

“You liked it, lass?”

“Mmhm! I din’t even taste the coffee.”

Which is usually exactly what Vesemir says to Guxart when he’s making fun of him, but it’s hard to argue with this kind of sincerity. Especially not when she tips her mostly empty cup back again, trying to get the last few drops between the gap in her teeth.

“Grampa, can we watch a movie now? Do yours have color in them?”

His knees cheer for joy even as his eyebrows quirk of their own will, which might just prove her point, along with the fact that he barely had any movies at all. Thank the spirits Geralt had given him a DVD along with her overnight bag. He remembers the fat, seal-like creature on the cover.

“Yes, we can watch a movie. How do you feel about Neighbor Toto?”

“Grampa!!” Ciri bursts out laughing, knocking over her sippy cup, “Nooooo, it’s My Neighbor Totoro!”

“My Neighbor Tot-ro, then.”

“Noooooooo! To-to-ro!”

He smiles and takes their dishes to the sink, letting her pester him until he finally says it right. She nods imperiously, and he can’t help but ruffle her white-blonde hair. She’s more or less a quiet presence beside him as he cleans the greca, right until he pulls out his jar of popcorn kernels. Apparently, those are supposed to come in a brown paper bag, and they get cooked in a microwave. Vesemir owns neither.

“Well, lass. This way is more fun —watch, now.”

For once, he’s glad for the new glass lids Guxart bought, since they let Ciri ooh and ahh and the popcorn exploding with butter (and a little bit of brown sugar). It’s easy enough work to herd her onto his admittedly-ancient couch. Less so when he has to remember how to play movies.

“Spirits, how does this damn thing work again?” he grumbles, unsuccessfully starting to put the brick through the slot, and then pivots back to Ciri, with her wide blue eyes and perked up ears, “Don’t repeat that.”

“Why not? Papa says bad words all the time.”

“Yes, well I tried my best with him. You’ll have to be better.”

“Aw damn.”

He barely restrains a laugh, settling for a cough as he retrieves the ever-so-slightly burnt popcorn. The movie is made slightly grainy by the TV he hasn’t changed in twenty years, but it plays nonetheless, and he can understand Ciri’s defense of it. She’s utterly enraptured, practically bouncing in her seat before she settles in beside him. He wonders if he could carve a Totoro before Ciri has to leave. By the time he hears Ciri go quiet beside him, he’s fully planned out the size and polish he’s going to use, but should he paint it? It’s never been his strength, but he should try, at least. A gentle snore interrupts his thoughts, and the weight against his side grows heavier. Ciri is fast asleep against his arm, drooling ever so slightly from the gap in her teeth. He’ll have to wake her for dinner and clean the (yet again) sticky child, but he can let her sleep until the credits roll. He yawns.

She can help him paint the Totoro on her next visit.

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Well that was some tooth-rotting fluff, and I enjoyed every second of it. I tried my best to keep the story in line with Vesemir's gruff disposition, but softened for the modern era and prompt. Ciri gets to be baby, and an utterly curious delight.

greca: a stovetop mokapot, popular throughout Latin America abuelo: grandfather tetero: baby bottle/Venezuelan term for coffee made with lots of milk and sugar, usually given to children or used to mock people who drink coffee this way suspirito: a small, bite-sized meringue cookie

Taglist: @karolincki, @hellinglasses, @girls-and-honey, @halehathnofury, @the-butch-of-blaviken, @keirametzbrassknuckles, @t4tlambert, @alllthequeenshorses, @round--robin, @on-a-lucky-tide (if anyone wants to be added/removed, pm me and I'll have it done no problem)

#berry's fics #the witcher #the witcher fanfiction #vesemir #ciri #guxart x vesemir

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