Brother's Keeper
"Melitele's tits!" Lambert's curse is meant for himself, for cutting his return to Kaer Morhen so close. It's meant for the weather, steady snow falling in such thick flakes that it turns the air white. And it's meant for the fact that he's stuck below the Killer and miles from shelter.
He stands and takes stock of his surroundings, as best as he can. Usually he simply rides through these woods and along the barely there path, in a hurry to get it over with, winter on his heels. Or he rides the opposite way, in a hurry to leave after a whole long winter in the keep, eager to be out in the world. One year he hadn't ridden it at all. He had stayed in the South but it hadn't felt right at all. The relief on Vesemir's face at seeing Lambert when he did ride to Kaer Morhen in the winter after that had been so nakedly strong, Lambert doesn't like to think about it.
The wind picks up and the snow turns sharp, stinging Lambert's face. There's a small path leading deeper into the trees, almost too faint to see. But someone did travel it, and not so long ago. With Lambert's luck, it's just a bandit, or some dumb logger who's long frozen to death. But he follows the trail anyway, leading his horse.
It takes him to a small hut. He can smell the smoke from a fire long before he sees the hut, with the roof low to the ground and covered in tall ferns as it is. As he gets closer, he can hear a horse chewing its feed and someone moving around in the hut. Whoever it is, they've been here for a while - what tracks Lambert can see are days old and rapidly disappearing under more snow.
"Hello?" Lambert calls out as he walks up to the hut. He has no wish to surprise its inhabitant.
The door opens and Eskel steps out. He looks like shit.
"What are you doing here?" Eskel frowns at Lambert, standing in the door of the hut as if he intends to defend it. His face is pale and damp with sweat, and he shivers at a sudden gust of wind despite wearing his amour.
"Trying not to freeze to death. You gonna let me in or what?" Something is wrong but Lambert wants to find out what it is inside.
"Stable's out back. Bring some wood from the stack while you're at it." Eskel disappears into the hut again, and Lambert hurries to follow his directions. The stable is barely big enough for both horses but they seem just as glad to be out of the cold as Lambert will be. He piles his arms high with logs from the wood hidden under the eaves of the hut. It's nice and dry but not too old. Chopped in the spring, if he's any judge.
Inside the hut it's wonderfully warm, a fire burning in the hearth. Lambert tosses another log onto the flames, just because he can, and shrugs off his jacket. There's a kettle on the boil and Eskel offers him a mug of tea. With a generous splash of rum, it warms Lambert up in no time as he stands in front of the fire. He looks around the hut: it's clearly not lived in a lot, but it's in good order and Eskel's bedroll is spread out not on the floor but on some straw in the bedframe.
Eskel sits on it, holding his own mug of tea in both hands, hunched over it. He smells off, as if he has a fever or another sickness. He looks like it, too, grey skin and a tension in his posture that speaks of aching bones and muscles.
"What's wrong with you?" Lambert frowns, not in the mood to be polite or patient about it.
"Nothing."
"Nothing my ass, you look like you're gonna keel over any moment now. And you didn't just stumble over that hut either. So tell me, what's going on?"
"It's— I'll be fine in a couple of days. No need for you to stay around once that storm's over." Eskel is obviously not fine, and he's squirming under Lambert's hard gaze. "Alright. Promise me you won't tell anyone."
"Fine, I promise. Nobody will hear anything about this from me." Lambert is in equal parts annoyed and intrigued. It's not like Eskel to have secrets. He's reliable, dependable, reasonable. Boring, one might say. Lambert has said it, more than once.
"It's the potions. Swallow. I can take it just fine, and it works, but I need to keep taking it. Not much of a problem out on the Path, there's always drowners. But up in the valley? Not so much. So I wait it out here before I go." Swirling the last of his tea in the cup, Eskel refuses to look at Lambert.
"You're addicted to Swallow? What the fuck?" Lambert gapes at Eskel.
Not such a perfect witcher after all, huh? The thought comes unbidden and with a savage satisfaction.
"Yeah. Took a couple of years to happen. Noticed one bad summer when there were no contracts. I thought I was going to die." Eskel shrugs, stretching out one arm to put his mug on the table. It clatters against the wood, Eskel's hand shakes so badly. "I'm gonna be alright. Best thing you can do is to leave me alone."
Slumped forward, Eskel sits for a moment as if he has to gather his strength before shrugging off his jacket and lying down, rolling over to show Lambert only his back. His shirt is damp with sweat.
Lambert is left sitting by the fire. He wants to ask if Eskel is sure, or if there's anything he can do. He wants to do something, if only so he can forget about his moment of glee at discovering that Eskel isn't the shining example everyone always made him out to be. But Eskel clearly doesn't want any help.
Fuck it. There's a fire and a small pot, so Lambert sets some water to boil and digs in his saddle bags to find the last of his supplies. A shrivelled onion, some dried mushroom and peas and a turnip that's starting to sprout all make their way into the water. He settles down to wait, watching the flames and listening to the wind howl outside. Behind him, Eskel moves restlessly, tossing and turning. Lambert lets it all fade away to find the calm of meditation.
It's harder than usual. Lambert is used to lashing out at everyone no matter what and he rarely has regrets about it, even with his brothers. But shame at the words he didn't even say sits hot in his stomach.
He's just about ready to give up on meditation when Eskel gets up, stumbling to the door. Lambert follows him and finds Eskel on his knees in the snow, throwing up tea and bile. He's shivering so hard that he almost falls over, so Lambert grabs him and steadies him until Eskel's stomach has nothing left in it. Even with Lambert's help, Eskel can barely stand.
Supporting most of Eskel's weight, Lambert gets them back into the house and Eskel back into bed. He helps him sip some water, just enough to rinse his mouth before Eskel pushed the cup away. It's a feeble attempt, his muscles quivering with the strain, and Lambert has never seen Eskel like this. He's never seen any witcher like this. Not once they are through the Grasses. They should be immune to poison and sickness, damnit. If Eskel were hurt - mauled by a fiend or bitten by drowners - that would have been easy. Brew some potions, stitch up what's left of the wounds. But this, Lambert doesn't know how to handle.
While he's still standing there wondering what to do, Eskel burrows deeper under his blanket. It does nothing to stop the shivers, so Lambert grabs his own blanket and drapes it over Eskel. He stokes the fire, even though it's already comfortably warm in the small hut.
Eskel's teeth chatter loud enough for him to hear. And he hear the small noises Eskel makes, soft whimpers with every exhale. They are muffled, as if Eskel is trying to hold them back with his hand over his mouth, but Lambert hears them anyway.
He wishes he had just braved the storm and ridden on to Kaer Morhen. Eskel doesn't want him here, he's made that clear with every word and gesture, and Lambert can do nothing for him anyway.
The smell of the stew chases his concerns away, at least for a while. He hasn't had hot food for days, too eager to make it to the valley to bother much with making camp. Eskel doesn't react beyond a grunt to Lambert's question if he wants some and doesn't surface from the blanket. Lambert eats, and it tastes less good than he thought it would, not with worry curled in his stomach.
With nothing left to do, he spreads out his bedroll next to the fire and tries to go to sleep.
He wakes in the middle of the night, with the wind screaming through the trees and shaking the hut, rattling the door and the shutters as if looking for a way in. It takes him a few befuddled moments of groping around, his heart racing in his chest, to remember where he is. In the dim light of the coals, Lambert sees Eskel staggering around the hut. He looks even worse than before, sweat running down his face, his eyes wide and wild.
When Lambert steps into his way, Eskel shoves him aside. It's not a hard shove, more as if Eskel has somewhere to be and Lambert is simply in the way. Lambert tries again. He's spooked by Eskel's stumbling gait and the distressed noises he makes. It reminds Lambert of a dog he's seen once, run over by a cart and dying but running in circles, snarling at everyone who came near.
Eskel doesn't snarl but he signs Aard. It throws Lambert halfway across the hut. He rolls and gets up, ready to defend himself. But Eskel just stands there, swaying on his feet. His knees buckle and he collapses like a puppet with cut strings, folding up into a heap on the floor.
He doesn't move even when Lambert turns him over, his body gone limp. Cursing at Eskel's weight and his stubbornness and the storm, Lambert drags him back to the bed. He thinks for a moment about tying Eskel down but doesn't do it. That would only end with more trouble once Eskel wakes up again, if he's still that out of it. Lambert has no desire to have Eskel set the hut on fire or bring it down on top of him. He's seen what Eskel's Signs can do.
There's no more sleep for him that night. Eskel remains barely conscious, sometimes lying still, sometimes writhing on the bed, kicking and clawing at the bedding. At least he doesn't get up. Lambert gives him some water when he's calm and talks to him when he's not, meaningless words that Eskel may or may not hear.
He remembers his mother talking to him like this, late at night when his father was passed out drunk and sure not to hear. It never took away the pain, and he barely remembers what she actually said, but the sound of her voice is clear in his memory. It was the best she could do then, and it's the best he can do now.
Eskel fades in and out of consciousness. When dawn comes, he's only just fallen asleep. Lambert cracks open the door, pushing against the drift of snow and looks at the first sunlight glittering on the frozen tops of the trees. It's a clear day. He could make it to Kaer Morhen now. But he cannot bring himself to leave Eskel, even knowing that Eskel has gone through this before and has come out fine.
So he goes and gets more wood from behind the hut, carefully coaxing the embers back into an actual fire. He busies himself with repairing his armour, chopping more wood to replace what they've used up, taking short walks so he doesn't go stir crazy, meditating and making sure Eskel hasn't died on him.
It takes days of Eskel barely aware of his surroundings, lingering in a state between sleep and waking. There are more episodes where he won't stay in bed, pacing around the hut in a manic restlessness, and Lambert stays out of his way. Eventually Eskel either returns to bed or simply falls over.
When he wakes up one morning and asks Lambert for some water, and then for a cup of broth from the stew, Lambert is more relieved than he cares to show. Eskel is annoying and boring and so damn content with his lot in life that Lambert sometimes wants to punch him. Still, Lambert cannot imagine a winter at Kaer Morhen without him. It's stupid to get attached. Lambert has learned that long before he even was a full witcher. But he can't help it.
"Thank you for staying. You didn't have to." It's the third morning after Eskel has woken, and he's strong enough for them to make the way into the valley. He's busy packing his things, and he gives Lambert a smile that's shy and sweet, there and gone before Lambert knows how to react.
"Yeah, well. Couldn't leave you like this." The smile on Lambert's face appears entirely unbidden and he replaces it with a scowl. "Just don't count on me to hold your hand next year."
"Wouldn't dream of it." They return to their usual bickering, trading insults and stories all the way to Kaer Morhen. Nobody thinks twice about them arriving together, and the routine of wintering at the keep sweeps them up.
Eskel doesn't mention what happened, and neither does Lambert. For a while, Eskel seems to avoid Lambert, but that is a hard thing to do all cooped up in one castle, especially once it really starts snowing. But once it's clear that Lambert didn't breathe a word to anyone about Eskel's problem, things return to normal. They're not exactly friends, but they get on well enough and maybe even a bit better after this.
Lambert keeps busy with his still, brewing alcohol and potions in equal measure. As the winter goes on, the balance starts to shift towards potions. Lambert brews and distills, adding this ingredient and discarding that. Making potions is as much science as it is art. It's a fucking pretentious thing to say, but it's true. And Lambert is very good at both sides of it. He can look at a recipe, or smell a potion, and he will simply know what to add to make it do what he wants. Or at least he will have a good idea of what to try.
During his training, it was just about the only thing his teachers praised about him, some of them. Others gave him a thrashing for not following the recipes they were being taught, no matter how much more effective Lambert's potions were. It didn't help that he couldn't really explain why he did what he did, only that it felt right.
Now, with a few more years of experience and note taking under his belt, he can explain it. But nobody cares very much, although some of the others do take note of the fact that Lambert's bombs and potions are more powerful and more potent that theirs. Still, none of them give a second thought to his almost obsessive brewing and tinkering. Lambert suits that just fine.
As winter ever so slowly makes way for spring, the witchers get restless in their keep. The snow hasn't even melted on the pass when the first of them set out. Lambert isn't quite in such a hurry but he feels the pull as well. So does Eskel, and Lambert finds him sitting in a corner, dubbing his boots.
"Here. It tastes like shit, but what else is new. No drowner brains though, and if I'm right, it'll solve your problem." Lambert puts a couple of vials on the table, together with a scroll where he noted down the recipe. "Rotfiend spinal fluid does the trick."
Eskel stares at him, one boot dangling from his hand. "What? How would you even figure that out?" He rallies, putting the boot down to pick up the scroll. "I don't know what to say. Thank you, you didn't have to—"
"—spend the whole winter drinking potions that did nothing except give me a headache or the shits? Yeah. Well. I did it anyway, and this one is it. Drowner brains are the problem, at least together with the other stuff, I'm pretty sure. That was the easy part - you already knew it was Swallow, so it was just elimination. Trying to find something else that works, that was hard." Lambert is proud of his work. He's damn sure that none of the other witchers could have done it. Definitely not this fast.
There's that smile again, sweet and almost shy and gone like a rabbit seeing the hawk's shadow. For some stupid reason it makes the whole winter of experiments worth it, and Lambert finds himself smiling back.
"Listen, want to meet up for Beltane in Vizima? I want to know if it works. And if it doesn't, we can figure something out." Lambert really doesn't want a repeat of the days in the hut, even though he now knows that Eskel won't die on him.
"Yeah. There's an inn in Old Vizima where they're fine with witchers, the Greedy Goose. Good ale, too." Eskel pockets the scroll and carefully stores the vials in his bag. They change the subject, to Lambert's relief, gossiping a little about the worst inns they have stayed at and the best ones before it's Eskel's turn to help with dinner and Lambert goes to pack the rest of his things.
He leaves in the morning, sneaking out at dawn as is his habit, when the sun barely paints the peaks of the mountains pink. The keep is quiet, everyone else either already gone or still asleep. It avoids awkward goodbyes and stupid promises. Although he's already made one of those, and it doesn't feel all that stupid. He finds himself looking forward to Beltane, and to Eskel's company.