Chapter Text
Roche was having a good day until his phone rang.
Reading the caller’s name, he sighed and briefly considered not picking it up. What’s the worst thing that could happen? What could be worse than what’s already been done?
But they were friends, once, well, he was one of the closest things to a friend one can have during a fucking civil war, so he probably should pick it up and see what he wants, for the old times sake. Putting the book he was reading down, he put the phone to his ear.
“Geralt,” he said.
“Roche.” The Witcher sounded more cheerful than he ever expected him to – but hey, the man has a reason to be cheerful now. A wife, a daughter and...whatever the fuck Jaskier was to him. And turns out that refusing having to choose between the lesser evil and actually having some moral compass means that once the war’s over, people won’t hate you so much.
“What do you want, Geralt?” Maybe he should be friendlier. He wouldn’t like it for Geralt to leave him, too.
“Ah, just checking up on you, you know. Making sure you weren’t eaten by any monsters.”
Bullshit, Geralt was – or used to be – as much of a hermit as he was now. He definitely wasn’t just checking in.
“Sure you are.” Roche hoped it was nothing political. He had enough politics to last him for at least three lifetimes. Maybe even four.
He heard Geralt let out a deep sigh. Here it comes. “I’ve met Saskia a few days back,” he said.
Saskia. The name made him bristle. He never liked her, not during the war and not after and what was stranger, his animosity towards the woman had nothing to do with politics or which sides they were on. He simply found her annoying. He waited for Geralt to continue, but the man stayed silent for a while and Roche knew he wouldn’t like what’s gonna come.
“Well?” he prompted.
“Well, you know their marriage didn’t last long.”
Roche snorted. “And I can’t blame either of them.”
“The point is, Saskia is worried about Iorveth.”
“She should have been worried before she married him and then dumped him again.” He got up and walked to the window. The sky was blue and snow was thawing – but spring was still far away and, if the trend from the previous years would continue, frosts were going to show their ugly heads a few more times, unfortunately for the flora and fauna confused by the sudden warm spell. “What’s he doing now, anyway? The last time I heard anything about him, he was threatening to throw Molotov’s into some factories.”
“Well, that’s the thing. Saskia thinks… he might not be doing well.”
“When has he been doing well?” Maybe he should try and plant something this year. At least some tomatoes, just around the house, to ease his grocery bills a little.
“She was wondering whether you could check on him.”
“Why the fuck should I check on him? Does she expect me to like drop everything I am doing and fuck off to whichever corner of the Continent his majesty has decided to grace with his presence?”
“Your corner.”
“I am sorry?” He must have misheard. Because surely Geralt didn’t just say what he just said.
“Your corner, Roche. He got a cabin somewhere you live. Well, probably not really close close, but still closer than me or Saskia. So, if I send you the address, would you be so nice as to check on him? Just to make sure he hadn’t burnt the place down or something.”
“Do I look like a nanny to you?” Roche asked in a biting tone, but the moment those words were out, the hypocrisy of it hit him. Doesn’t he owe it to Iorveth? After all, during the war, he was responsible for some suffering. Some of them even Iorveth’s.
Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it, don’t -
“I suppose I can,” he growled in the end, willing the visions of a frail body laying in a hospital bed out of his mind’s eye. “Make sure he’s not starting some insurgence just because he bloody can.”
“Thank you, Roche, I’ll send you the address right away.” Geralt sounded oddly relieved and Roche wondered just what kind of worries has Saskia shared with him. He knew they got married, Iorveth and Saskia, just after the war – they were one of the many happy couples celebrating the peace, ready to throw the past behind them and finally live – only to be met with the harsh reality. Just because the war is over doesn’t mean it’s gone.
He said goodbye to Geralt who promised to visit (Roche would rather he didn’t) and then he sent the address and Roche has spent good ten minutes staring at it.
So that is where the squirrel has fucked off to. Too close for comfort. The knowledge that a de facto war criminal is living in your near vicinity does not work for one’s peace of mind at all. But then again, Iorveth would probably feel the same were he in his position. He did, after all, dedicate the better part of the war to tracking the Scoia’tael commandos down. And handing the captured insurgents over to whoever was above him in the chain of command.
Don’t think about that!
The address was mocking him. He wrote it down on a piece of paper, because he was a part of an intelligence agency during the war, and knew better than to rely on electronics too much. Sometimes, when he lay awoke at night, he wondered whether they still keeping an eye on him – and then he always laughed for even asking himself such a question. Of course they were.
According to the address Geralt gave him, Iorveth lived around an hour drive from Roche’s own hermitage.
An hour there and an hour back, that is two hours, plus whatever time he’d have to spent poking around Iorveth – that is, if the damned squirrel’s there. He wouldn’t put it past Iorveth to spent the better part if the day holed up somewhere deep in the forest, playing a recorder in a tree.
And it was getting late and it would be dark soon, anyway – not to mention the heaps of chores he has to do! Like wash the dishes, load the washing machine, vacuum the whole house, change his bed sheets and… and whatever other chores people usually do. Even former secret service members. Because the war is over now and the worst monsters were put on a trial and him and Iorveth were just lesser monsters, misguided and caught up in all the hatred, that’s what’s been said, he read it somewhere in the news, so they were let go and now he has to wash the dishes every day, because getting a dishwasher when you live alone seemed a bit too excessive.
So, yeah, he’ll check up on the squirrel tomorrow, he’ll get there early in the morning to get it over with, and then he’ll call Geralt to let him know that no, Iorveth is not setting fire to things anymore, nor is he threatening anyone with molotovs and Saskia can continue doing whatever she’s doing, feeling no guilt over tossing Iorveth aside when it turned out that the war was not done with him.
Not that Roche wold know anything about that.