(no subject)

[worstsin]

Since The Iron Bull had wandered onto his camp in the woods, matters had only gotten worse.

It was as if the woods were twisting and rotting around Geralt, starting from one central location and feeding outward like a pestilence of reality itself. It affected nearly everything, but Geralt found himself more and more susceptible, more and more changed.

Soon enough, he told Nina to stop coming. That had been at about the time everything he ate had stopped satisfying. When he began looking at human flesh with needy and feral desires.

The witcher kept busy. He had to. That was the only small kindness in any of it, and even then, he felt sick and guilty at times about what he'd had to do, some of the things he'd had to put down. Geralt wasn't the only thing in the woods being twisted.

But the worst had just wrecked his camp, and nearly trampled Geralt with it. It was only luck and superior intuition which had woken him just in time.

Fleeing on wolf-swift feet, quiet as an owl, Geralt ran to the only place he thought he could turn for help. Possibly understanding.

The lights were still on at the farmhouse, though some eerie blanket of discomfort, of unnatural quiet, lay around the property. Geralt didn't know what it was, only that here, more than anywhere else, set the hairs on the back of his neck on end.

He made certain that his boots made a noise as he opened the barn door, peering inside. His eyes flashed in the dark, every glimmer of light reflecting out of them again. It was no problem to find the Bull in the dark with his yellow eyes, even if he hadn't been able to follow the smell to the man. Musky, almost draconid.

Geralt cleared his throat and called to Bull in the dark. His skin was paler than it had ever been, gone from a healthy pinkish alabaster to something closer to Regis' unnatural greyish palor. He still bore the outward manifestation of his mutations, dragged out by strange magic. Long canines, sharp black claws. The general appearance of a panther waiting to pounce.

"Hey. I need you."

Comments

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

Bull unfurled from one of the finished stalls, rising to his full height in the dark. He'd been spending time between Geralt's camp and the barn, because he didn't trust himself to sleep near anything that couldn't fight back.

He didn't trust himself to sleep much at all.

Something dropped from his hand, tossed gently onto the small pile of things he'd accumulated; it was one of Dorian's shirts. He missed the smell of him, missed how it felt to have him curled close. But he would not go home until this was settled. Not to sleep, anyway.

Geralt had been suffering differently, but suffering all the same. Bull saw it, and he knew it. The feral desires, the ebb of control. He knew those feelings.

"What do you need?"

[worstsin]

Geralt silently sucked in a very deep breath and let it out as a long and obvious sigh. He scrubbed at his eye with the butt of his palm. They always felt hot lately, even though he was getting sleep. But the nightmares made it restless, dreams of Ciri, dead. Laying beneath Caranthir. Laying beneath Eredin. Dreams of Ciri, captured. Dragged back to Tir na Lia for experimentation or slavery or worse.

"There's a fiend in the woods. This corruption, whatever it is, is affecting it. It was usually content to leave everything well enough alone and kept a wide berth, but tonight it destroyed my camp. And it wasn't aiming for the pots and pans."

It had looked grotesque too, in the moments Geralt had caught it in the dark with his cat-eyes. Fiends were usually majestic creatures, and Geralt had never liked to have to kill one. This one was off.

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

"Like a rabid bear," Bull said, understanding. He rubbed his head and moved out of the stall he'd been not-sleeping in.

"Krem!" he called, a bit louder. "You catch all that?"

He looked up toward the loft. Krem was right - it was more comfortable up there - but Bull didn't want to thrash and find himself falling a story down in his sleep.

If the fiend had destroyed Geralt's camp, then it wasn't very far from Krem's farm, and that was reason enough for Bull to want to take it down. Krem and his lovers had been working hard to make this place their own. They didn't need anything damaged by a sick animal.

[krempuff]

Krem had been listening, since he'd heard Geralt come into the barn, tucked up in the loft quietly. He didn't sleep up there any more than he slept in the house or down in the stall with Bull, really, but he'd taken to keeping his armor and weapons up there. In case.

Apparently, in case was a good thing.

He popped his head down from the loft door and sketch a vague, perfunctory salute of acknowledgement, before disappearing back up. "Smash and your maul are in the tack room, Chief. I'll be down in a minute."

[worstsin]

Geralt gave a startled glance up, surprised that Krem was in the loft, a look of nearly comedic owlishness on the witcher's usually flat face.

The Iron Bull was such a huge presence that it nearly masked another person in the barn, the overpowering scent of Bull and the sound of his huge heart beating, his huge tendons moving. Geralt had simply assumed that the scent of Cremisius Aclassi hanging in the air was stale. It was his barn, after all. He would have to remember that, about both of them.

"Don't know if you've ever run into a fiend. It's like a cross between a deer, a tiger and a nightmare, but worse. Bring something big to hit it with. They're slow, but they have a third eye that can hypnotize you. Luckily, it only works on one target at a time. Which is why I came here to pick up you assholes."

Assholes was said with a deep level of fondness and respect.

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

Bull wished he could capture the look on Geralt's face when the witcher realized Krem was up in the loft, and had been there this whole time. It wasn't often he saw Geralt surprised. Worth it.

"We've run into demon-corrupted bears. And, one time, demon trees filled with possessed squirrels."

Never mind the actual demons when they manifested bodily. He wondered what Geralt would think if he saw a Pride demon, or one of the Nightmares. Bull hoped he never actually got a chance, but with the way shit had been going, he kept thinking a Fade rift was going to open up here in Darrow.

Bull chuckled when he heard assholes. Sounded like the way the Chargers talked to each other, and that made his sleep-deprived self feel better. He shuffled into the tack room to grab his dragon-claw maul and Smash, and he came back with one over each shoulder.

[krempuff]

Krem did, in fact, only take a few moments to suit up. He listened to Geralt and Bull speak down below, and when he came down, it was in armor.

It didn't fit like it used to, which was a blessing and a curse. There was nowhere in Darrow to be refit for armor. If they kept this up, he was going to have to try and figure something out.

As well as the maul, he had his sword strapped to his hip. Couldn't be too well heeled for something like this. Especially if they were going up against something that verged closer to the demonic. He took Smash from Bull, and arranged the maul carefully in a sling across his back, made especially for carrying it distances.

"We're not talking about the squirrels, Chief. Don't wish that evil on us right now."

[worstsin]

Geralt watched Krem stretching in his armor quietly, eyes curious, thoughtful. He had no idea how old the man was, both because Krem had a fairly lineless, clear, inscrutable sort of face, and because Geralt had gotten to the point where it was difficult to tell a human's age. They were young, or they were old.

He suspected he might be on the younger side though, now. Maybe he'd still been growing into his armor. Because he pulled at it now like it was tight around the shoulders, in serious need of adjusting.

That was bad. That sort of thing killed men. Killed witchers. But there was no helping it tonight.

"Give me that armor later. I'll adjust it for you. I have a repair kit in my things back at camp. Provided it wasn't also destroyed."

He shook his head and waved them after him, out of the barn.

"Not a fan of Squirrels, either."

There was irony in his soft voice.

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

Bull also noticed Krem's fussing and before he could say anything, Geralt did. He grunted his approval as Krem took Smash from him. "If it was destroyed, I've got gear for that in my trunk. Either way, we're adjusting that so it fits you."

He'd been taking care of the Chargers for years. He'd been one of the oldest and most experienced members in the group, and it fell on him to make sure his boys were well-outfitted, that they had what they needed to do their jobs. It was why he made sure Krem had a good set of stays not long after he joined the Bleeders. Something he could fight in.

Bull followed Geralt and Krem out of the barn, not bothering with armor. He didn't have his with him, and besides, he was Qunari.

"And I'm just saying," he said of the squirrels, "we've dealt with some weird shit before. Whatever this is, it isn't going to throw us off."

[krempuff]

Krem grumbled a little bit at both of them suddenly fussing. The armor fit well enough for the moment. But he would hand it over, certainly. More than likely to Bull, simply because he'd worked it out for him a time or two before, more than for any other reason.

Until now, there'd been little reason to worry about growing too broad for his armor. He wasn't using it. He'd patched it up, from his arrival, and that was that. Now, though, he might need to have it reworked. If it could be done at all, in Darrow, they would figure it out.

"I'll manage it tonight, at least," he said. "As long as no damnable rodents come at me. Are we going, or not?"

[worstsin]

"We're going," Geralt said. He stepped outside of the barn doors and lifted his nose into the air, scenting it. He was lucky that the wind was moving toward them, out of the forest, and not the other way. He could actually get a sense that way of where the thing was.

It would make tracking much easier, especially if the thing didn't come for them as he hoped it might to save energy and time.

The witcher set out, long legs eating the countryside up beneath him. He kept a steady pace, a bit slower than usual. Krem was human. But Geralt made certain not to seem like he was being burdened. Largely because he wasn't.

He might be more used to working with another witcher, but he needed the other two to make this successful, without too great a risk to himself.

After a time, he spoke up again. His low voice carried well on the night air, even though it was soft-spoken.

"Scoia'tael. It means Squirrels, in the Elder Speech. They were a guerilla militia of non-humans, Elves mostly, and some Dwarves.

They were determined to kill as many humans as possible. Claimed it was time to reclaim their land. You realize you were in Squirrel territory, you were gonna have a bad day. You didn't realize, you were gonna have a worse one."

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

"Sounds familiar," Bull rumbled. He thought of Abelas and the Temple of Mythal in the Arbor Wilds. He thought of the tomb of the Emerald Knights in the Emerald Graves. Walking into any of those places had seemed like the start of a bad day, but he'd followed the Inquisitor in.

"Some of the Dalish elves live that way, especially in some of the mountain passes," Bull said at last. "I can't blame them, knowing the history between them and humans. We avoided them. Or, if we had to use a pass they might be guarding, we kept me and Dalish out front."

Seeing a massive Qunari walking with other elves at least gave pause.

[krempuff]

It wasn't the only thing that it reminded Krem of, but he had never actually been deployed to Seheron, and so he didn't bring up the Fog Warriors. Bull didn't, and so he didn't think it was his place. And they had not, to his understanding, targeted any one group in particular. Qunari and Tevinter were both fair game, in their wheel house. It was any colonizer at all.

"The Dwarves at least wanted basically nothing to do with anyone else," Krem said with a shrug. "If they were surface dwelling, they were integrated. If they were sub-dwelling, they probably hadn't seen a human or an elf before the last ten years, unless they traded with Tevinter. But the elves..."

Krem nodded a little. There were a lot of legitimate reasons for them to be as angry as they were. He had never begrudged Skinner or Dalish their anger, even when it got misdirected at him because he was the nearest one around.

The closer they got to the forest, the more unnerving it got. Krem murmured a quiet prayer to the Maker, and to his mother's spirits, and to anything else that might be listening, even Andraste. Even Hild's Christian Jesus, if he might be listening. They might need it.

[worstsin]

"Fortunately, they left me alone. They didn't consider witchers to be humans, not quite. We were vatt'ghern, not dh'oine. A different race from either, although elves can be made witchers, too."

Geralt was, somehow, comforted that non-integrated elves were arrogant wherever they came from. They were a proud people. It was irritating, but it also deserved a certain kind of distant respect.

The mention of dwarves living underground though, that was a bit weirder. Maybe they'd done that millennia ago, before the arrival of elves and men, but in Geralt's time they'd lived in their above-ground cities in Mahakam like anyone else, and plied their trades in every blacksmith and bank on the continent.

Once they entered the forest, Geralt felt the hush that fell over the group, especially from Krem. The man was whispering prayers under his breath. That was good. Geralt didn't believe in gods, but he always remembered Nenneke's words.

If your lack of faith made any difference, it would be the first proof I've ever heard of that a lack of faith had any power at all.

Let him pray for all of them.

From somewhere in the wood came a deep, disturbing, booming noise. It reverberated in Geralt's bones and made his hackles rise. It was followed by strange, wooden knocking, which echoed in the dark trees. He followed it, and the smell of fiend dung, as well as he could.

The trees blocked most of the breeze. The trees were eerily still.

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

"Ataash varin kata," Bull said, low and deep while Krem whispered his prayers. There were no gods under the Qun, only service and direction. Krem had heard the words many times before.

He could smell the fiend, because it didn't smell like anything else he'd encountered in the woods here. The noise it made shivered through his bones and Bull stood straighter, his good eye focused and gleaming in the moonlight.

Something in him roiled, eager for violence; eager to hurt and be hurt. In the stillness of the forest, the fiend's movement and noise seemed loud, projected.

"Best approach?" he asked low. Geralt had experience, and Bull would defer to it.

[krempuff]

The hair on Krem's arms and the back of his neck stood on end. It felt--the noise itself, the reverberations in the bottoms of his boots and in his lungs suddenly, in his ear drums--like the way a fear demon did, and Krem disliked that immensely. He thought of Adamant Fortress, the echoing groans of the Nightmares there as they tore it apartment and raided the last of the caches. Everything felt too much, and not enough at all. He was intensely aware of his own skin.

He unsheathed the sword for now, leaving Smash slung across his back. It felt more practical, while they were still making their way through the forest.

[worstsin]

Geralt let his eyes slide shut for a moment, breathing in the crisp forest air. It smelled like the moldering forest floor litter, and like coming snow. He listened to weapons unsheathing, concentrated on slowing his own heartbeat into time with his steps.

"From behind. It's mostly immune to magic, including fire, but they can be disoriented by bright lights and loud noises. So if I shout 'down,' get down and cover your eyes. It's got sharp teeth, sharper claws out front, and a pair of horns wider than a king's mantelpiece, but it's slow and bad at protecting its flanks."

Catching sight of it moving through the distance, Geralt froze behind a tree. It had poor vision, they were safe at this distance.

"Fiends have a third eye in the middle of their forehead, I mentioned before. It can hypnotize you. You get caught out front and hypnotized, all you're gonna see is a red eye in darkness. You focus on that eye and when it starts to move closer, you get the hell out of the way. Just worry about saving your own skin; evade. Let the other two worry about everything else for the time being."

The fiend lurked in the distance. It was a huge bulk, twelve feet tall, with a span of antlers even wider, like a massive elk. It was black-furred, shaggy around the neck like a lion's mane, but the flanks had jagged pale cream bars. It was a creature made to hide among the trees, despite its size.

It rooted at the base of a large pine in front of it with its horns, seemingly in some great pain. Geralt had seen the strange, oozing tumors around its mouth and neck when it attacked his camp before.

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

Bull listened closely, kept his eye on the fiend as soon as it came into view. It was big, but not the biggest thing he'd ever gotten into a fight with. The eye was the part to watch out for. Bull had been hypnotized, in a sense, exactly once and he wasn't interested in reliving that experience.

He slid his maul off his shoulder, held it ready, focusing for a moment on the lighter stripes on the fiend's flanks. Good thing to aim for. He looked at Krem and looked at the fiend's flanks again, hoping Krem would notice the same thing. Safest place to hit, easiest to spot.

It acted like a sick animal and Bull felt kind of sorry for it, wondered if they'd even be here if it was't corrupted. But they were here, and they couldn't just let it go around tearing things apart. Nor was it kind to let it live and suffer.

"Alright," he said quietly. "Let's make it quick."

The last thing he wanted was to draw this particular fight out. He moved away from their group, flanking the fiend to the other side. For a man of his size, Bull could be quick, and he could be quiet. That striped flank was his aim with the first heavy swing of his maul: immobilize it, then kill it.

[krempuff]

With eyes on the fiend, Krem was even more unnerved. It was a huge thing, in the way that going after dragons was going after a huge thing. It was a good thing there was the three of them, but Krem suddenly wished there was more. They could have used it.

Bull split off, and Krem went the opposite way, keeping an eye on the way that the fiend rooted about at the trees. Noises felt muted. More muted than they ought to have, even in the thickness of the forest. Something stank of rot, different than the usual molder of the forest floor, and Krem wasn't sure if it was the fiend, or something else.

[worstsin]

The fiend gave a deep bellow when the maul hit its flank, sending it staggering to the side. Its antlers caught on the branches of a young pine, shattering the trunk with a loud crack.

It stunned the creature for a half a second -- the witcher as well. Geralt paused to shake his head and rid himself of the ringing.

It turned its great horns on the Bull, ready to make a charge for him. Geralt made a grab for the silver sword on his back, grateful for gloved fingers. He wasn't certain he could handle the blade, under the circumstances, without pain. Silver for monsters. The thought was stomach-churningly ironic.

He leaped for it, turning a fast pirouette, thin sword a razor.

The smell of death pressed in on him.

[shok_ebasit_hissra]

The loud crack of splitting wood snapped through his head but didn't distract Bull for long. Irrationally, he wanted to put his head down and meet the damn thing's charge straight on.

He saw Geralt move, saw Krem, smelled blood.

Bull went low. He couldn't take those antlers, but the fiend's chest was broad and open, if he could just get to it. In his urge for blood, he forgot the fiend had claws, forget it was capable of swiping at him. Bull roared frustration when claws caught his side, but he spun to get out of their grip, didn't go down.

He stepped back, eye on the fiend as he reached to feel how bad the injury was. Not too deep, but it was going to hurt the next time he went to swing the maul. The fiend was turning on Geralt and Bull tried to find Krem, tried to make sure he wasn't in the thing's line of sight.

"Watch it, Geralt," he barked, though the witcher would have a hard time missing the large creature's movement. Maybe it was slow, maybe it telegraphed its movements, but it was strong. "Krem. Krem."

[krempuff]

It was a curious thing. Krem could hear Bull, as if from a distance. He was aware of the forest in that same sort of way, a great distance between himself and the reality of the situation. He could see the red eye, seered into him, staring, a flash of dark and everything else very, very far away.

Dodge, something in him said, the warning from Geralt, the instinct. Dodge. Move. You have to move.

He does the best that he can, almost an afterthought of a motion, a shuffle of things when he can manage to convince his body and mind to work in sync enough to do that for him at least.