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It should feel like victory to have made it this far. A mere walk away from getting into Baldur’s Gate. Part of you hadn’t sure if you were ever going to make it here, but now it was within your grasp. You might even have been there already, if you hadn’t insisted that you should approach the gate with fresh eyes and set up camp in Rivington for tonight.
Most of your companions had very good reasons to want to be in the city as soon as possible. Shadowheart wanted to search for her parents, Wyll wanted to rescue his father, Karlach wanted to confront Gortash, Lae’zel wanted to meet with Voss, Gale wanted to find answers in Sorcerous Sundries and Astarion wanted to confront Cazador. You’d promised to assist all of them with their missions, even if you weren’t sure why they trusted you.
Especially now that they’d seen the destructive dark urge brimming under your skin. Though, they did all seem to move past it too quickly. So very full of trust when you were just as dangerous as the monsters you all had been hunting. It had only been a couple of days since you tried to murder Astarion in his sleep, and they all sleep soundly or trance comfortably next to you again.
They were so trusting. It would be so easy to take advantage.
Granted, a lot had happened since then. Taking down Ketheric Thorm was no easy feat, nor was the battle inside of the prism that revealed that your supposed dream guardian was none other than a mindflayer. It’s just monsters everywhere you turned these days. After today, you could add Orin to that list.
A shapeshifter with the ability to imitate any of you. She could be any of your companions right now, feigning sleep and plotting her move. That should be the reason you were staying awake restlessly, but wasn’t. You were fairly confident that you could sniff out an imposter if needs must.
It was something she said that added to your sleeplessness. When you found her impersonating that Flaming Fist. In the moment, you tried not to let the words burrow under your skin but now they did. She called you her sibling.
Even though she could shapeshift, you doubted she meant that she was a fellow tiefling. No, her words spoke of something much more sinister. A deeper bond. One likely made of servitude. And you knew which of the Dead Three that she served.
Bhaal. The lord of murder.
And a killing urge had been burning in your chest ever since you woke up on that nautiloid. It’s been the only thing that you’d felt yourself tethered to. The urges compelling you to take lives and delight in the gore. It’s the most real thing about you, and it felt like it was the only thing you would find whenever you tried to look into your past.
It was what that stupid self-acclaimed butler, Sceleritas Fel, kept telling you about yourself too. As if this used to be something you did with pleasure. You were good at it. What did that say about you?
“Darling?”
The way you twisted around, weapon raised and poised to strike could just be a testament to all of the trauma and fighting you’ve had to undergo these past weeks. It would surely be enough to make anyone skittish and paranoid.
But you felt how your body moves with practiced ease, and it took all of your focus to adjust your swing to avoid contact when you spotted Astarion’s red eyes. Granted, he could probably survive a slash of your dagger, but you didn’t trust yourself not to keep going if you started spilling his blood.
“You got a death wish?” you snarled.
Your grip on the dagger was so tight that it almost hurt. Just like it would hurt to plunge it into Astarion’s heart. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would make such a beautiful mess. Blood everywhere. Oddly, he’d probably appreciate the view too.
“I did,” Astarion said and despite how you just tried to attack him, he found a spot next to you. He ducked into you tent to share your bed roll. “Before.”
The word was loaded and it made your jaw flex. You had a feeling that you still didn’t know the true extent of Astarion’s torment at Cazador’s hands but you’d got more than enough to paint a vivid picture. It made sense that he wanted to die before.
200 years was a very long time. It’s the kind of time that you couldn’t even grasp. You didn’t think you’ve been alive for that long, but even if you had, you wouldn’t know. Sometimes, it really did feel like your brain was only a few weeks old. Everything before it was black.
No, not black.
Red.
Bathed in it.
You were just as bad as the damn ox with his inner visions of carnage.
A touch on the back of your hand pulled your attention back to Astarion. His touch was so gentle that you barely felt it. You weren’t sure how he could touch you like that when you almost took his life just days ago.
When you would have made quick work of him just like you did poor Alfira. Alfira who just wanted to join the party, see the world and play her lute. The same lute that still sat in the camp chest, bloodied edge untouched.
You’d blacked out for that. No recollection at all but the blood on your hands and the sick delight twirling around in your chest was more than enough to confirm you were the culprit. It should have been the first warning. The others should have kicked you out of the camp.
Even if you now knew it would have turned you into a mindflayer without the prism’s protection. Though, it had flown to you before, and the Emperor seemed rather attached to you. So maybe you’d have killed all of the others if you’d wandered off and it had decided to follow you.
“Maybe you should kill me,” you found yourself saying to Astarion and withdrawing the hand under his touch.
You didn’t deserve gentleness. Not when you might have laid waste to whole cites, bathed in the blood of children and done it all with a sick grin on your face. It felt like something you would have done.
Well, not you now, but you then. And you were not sure if there is all that much of a difference. Fighting was becoming more difficult with each passing day.
“Way too late for that,” Astarion said, drawing his hand back to himself. “If you wanted to die at my hand, then you should have let me drain you that first night.”
Right. Back then, he could have killed you. You had presented yourself to him and let him sink his teeth into your neck. Part of it felt wrong, like you shouldn’t be handing him such an obvious chance to hurt you.
But he’d stopped when you’d asked. And every time since that, he’d just taken enough to recover his strength, not even disturbing you in your sleep.
“Can’t turn back time,” you muttered.
If you could, you’d go further back. Figure out what had happened to you. You had more pieces now, and you knew you’d landed in a pod in the mindflayer colony and been experimented on. A sneaking suspicion told you that maybe Orin had been involved in landing you in there with the way she acted around you.
But if you had truly been her sibling and delighted in killing like your urges told you, wouldn’t you have been on the same side? Why would she have turned on you?
Astarion let out a soft huff. “I would not want to,” he said and reached for you again. This time, it wasn’t just fingers gracing the back of your hand. No, he grabbed your hand and pulled it into his lap. Held on tight enough that you couldn’t just slip it away easily.
You could get it free. His fingers probably broke rather delicately. Snap, snap, snap.
No. You liked his hands. You didn’t want them destroyed. You pinched your eyes together and willed the thoughts away. It was something you were getting better at, at the very least. You were starting to have practice.
But it had been something different when it came to the full slaughter. You hadn’t been able to anticipate what happened with Alfira. You had just barely managed to warn Astarion that he was about to be next.
And when you’d come to all tired up and angry, it had felt like you were in some sort of primate, feral state. But it had still felt like you. Just unleashed. Like it was always going to be brimming underneath the surface. It had been caught just in time, but you might not be as lucky next time.
“I’m going to hurt you,” you said to Astarion and felt how it cracked something open in your heart.
You’d told Sceleritas Fel that you hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to Astarion about how you cared for him yet. It was the truth, but it was probably better if he didn’t know the true extent of it.
You were so selfish for even getting involved with him when your past was blank but stained. When you had to worry about tadpoles in your brains and the elder brain being controlled by lunatics. Two now, instead of three but still. There should be no time for romance or attachment at all.
It didn’t seem to matter, because you couldn’t deny that you cared deeply for Astarion. In fact, you cared for every single one of your companions and all of them were in danger because you couldn’t control this part of you.
“I’ve got thick skin. You know, you’ve seen my scars,” Astarion said, voice almost dancing over the words, even as he pulled forth his own trauma for you. “Is this why you haven’t been sleeping?”
You snapped your head sideways to face him. “What?”
He was right of course, but you’d mostly been sneaky with you lack of sleep. You still let keeping watch rotate and you lied down in your tent, pretending to sleep. It was taking its toll, but it wasn’t anything that a few healing potions couldn’t fix. It was a good thing that you were far more precise with your arrows than your spells. Those hadn’t been recharged in a while.
“Halsin noticed,” Astarion said, just a touch too casual. “You’ve got to remember that I’m not the only elf in the camp anymore. Him and Jaheira aren’t as willing to look the other way.”
“Concerned?” you asked, propping a knee up in front of you, leaning on it and tilting your head to the side. You tried to pull your hand back over to yourself, but Astarion kept hold of it. Not hard, just enough that it couldn’t slip away from him without you putting more force behind it.
You didn’t.
“Always, that big hunk of an elf. He has quite the soft spot for you. Going on about how he had high expectations and you exceeded even those,” Astarion said, and he was too tense about it.
Jealous maybe?
He hadn’t seemed to care back in the groove when several of the other companions started to veer for your attention. He hadn’t brought it up until that dance with Wyll where he’d asked you to choose between them. You’d chosen Astarion without blinking.
It had been easy.
All of the other companions had their beauty, charms and even dark demons, but Astarion was the only one who seemed to get you. He accepted you, even when you weren’t always put together right. He’d proved that even more when he’d comforted you after you’d tried to kill him.
You wondered if this was a wound for him and Halsin was a tool that you could press into it. Drive a wedge between you and Astarion. If you broke up, then he might no longer be the one you cared for the most. He could be safe from your sharp claws wanting to dig in and draw blood.
Though, if you did that, maybe it would just be someone else next time. Your care for Astarion was extraordinary but you truly cared for everyone in camp. Even the kid you’d allowed to stay here on a whim. Yena. A damn bleeding heart you were, even if it was not the kind of blood that you desired to spill.
It was the second time you’d brought a child into camp. Arabella had made it away okay but it was not sure that Yena would. Perhaps that was why Astarion had wanted to turn her away.
He would never admit it, but you were discovering a soft side to him. Just like now, with how he was holding your hand, thumb gently stroking over the back of it. A little quiet moment for just the two of you. You’d been spiralling and he’d come to find you. Sit with you, so the night didn’t seem so daunting.
You should be driving Astarion away but your heart couldn’t take prying into his insecurities. It felt too cruel. You might be bloodthirsty and have urges but you didn’t want to be cruel.
At least not the you who didn’t remember what you’d been like before.
“Do you think I’m a worshipper of Bhaal?” you asked him, gnawing on your lip.
“Because of what that maniac shapeshifter said?” Astarion asked.
“Orin,” you corrected, even though you knew he must know her name. He liked to play aloof and like he wasn’t paying attention but he always did.
“No,” Astarion said.
“What? it’s the most sensible explanation,” you argued.
“Well, remember what you asked, love. You asked if you’re a worshipper. Present tense. You’re not.”
“Semantics.”
“No, I do not think so. You don’t know your past but you do know what you’ve been acting like in these weeks.”
He was trying to be sweet but maybe he had fallen for whatever charade you’d been putting on. Yes, you’d tried to be honest with your companions about what was going on with you, but you knew they couldn’t truly grasp the extent of it. Just how brutal it got inside of your head.
“Just because I don’t remember doesn’t mean that it’s not true. And I doubt you just leave Bhaal behind. Look how complicated it got with Shar for Shadowheart,” you pointed out.
“And look how she’s now. New hairdo and everything!” Astarion said with a high-pitch giggle.
He was clearly trying to lighten the mood, but you wouldn’t let him. This was too dangerous.
“She was a Selûnite first,” you reminded him. “Taken against her will when she was just a child. Brainwashed into worship.”
Astarion clicked his tongue and gave your hand a squeeze.
“And who’s to say that you weren’t?”
You didn’t mean to laugh but it jumped out of you. You almost admired his optimism and faith in you. You didn’t think that he’d be the kind to look on the brighter side of things, yet here he was. Maybe he really was changing.
“Because I like it,” you admitted in a tiny voice. “I revel in it. I crave it. The urge is all-consuming sometimes. And it’s…”
Your throat felt tight. Not like you were about to cry but like you were about to scream. Scream out all of the frustration and fear sitting so tightly in your chest.
“Tell me,” he requested so gently.
How could you deny him?
“It’s not this thing,” you said recalling his words from that night. They had burned into your brain so much and you’d clung to them like they were a lifeline, even if it felt like it was made of twine.
This thing won’t have you.
It won’t win.
But it would. Because as much as you wanted to trust it and believe him, it didn’t feel like a thing. Something external. It would have been so much easier if you could cheat yourself into believing that. This was something done to you. A thing making you do horrible thing. A forced worship. A butler guiding your murderous hand. Any of the options was better than what felt like the truth if you dared look close enough.
That it was just you. Not a thing in you, but part of you. Intricately woven into your very fabric in a way that it could never be separated. It would win because the only way to kill it would be to kill yourself.
“It’s me,” you whispered.
Astarion let go of you hand and you thought that maybe he was finally recoiling in fear and disgust when he understood that all the death and destruction lived in your bones. But then he came close again. Much closer than before. Kneeling. Right in front of you and reaching up to gently cradle your face.
A thumb swiped across your cheek.
It felt wet.
Tears.
You were crying. No, what? You weren’t even sure you could do that. You hadn’t so far since you’d woken up. You had been ready to chalk it up to the fact that you were mindless and traumatised, or maybe just incapable of it. Like you could either be a murderous lunatic or a cry-baby but not both.
Clearly, you had been wrong.
You hoped it wasn’t the only thing you were wrong about. But you shouldn’t cling to that hope. You should be protecting Astarion and create distance between the two of you. So, you wouldn’t have the urge to drive a stake through his heart again. You weren’t sure what you’d do if you went to sleep and woke up with his blood on your hands.
Maybe it would make you snap into your old self. Bloodthirst ruling above all when you’d taken the life of the person you cared for the most.
Astarion’s eyes were so expressive and he looked like he wanted to say words of comfort but he was holding back. You appreciate that. You didn’t want platitudes right now, because you felt just vicious enough to twist them and spit them back in his face.
But you let him hold your face and look at you, even if it hurt to be seen like this.
“You know what I thought when I first saw you?” you asked, closing your eyes so you wouldn’t have to look at him as you shared this confession.
“What a handsome elf,” he said, a wry twist to his words.
You huffed out the tiniest laugh.
“Not too far off,” you said and swallowed. Licked your lips, exhaled. “What a perfect pretty corpse he’d make.”
You were echoing a thought that had resurfaced that night you’d felt driven to kill him. A fantasy that you couldn’t shake from your brain. You didn’t feel like you wanted him dead. In fact, you wanted to protect him but your thoughts told you a different thing.
Astarion didn’t let go of your face, but he let out a soft hum. Considering. You didn’t dare open your eyes to see the expression on his face.
“Stay here,” he said, gently letting go of you, “and keep your eyes closed.”
You had been proclaimed the leader by every single companion, even if you had never fought for the position. You didn’t have to listen to anyone. They had to listen to you. But still, you sat with your eyes closed and waited just like Astarion had asked.
The night air was crisp and almost comforting. Tomorrow, you’d reach Baldur’s Gate and you could find an inn. You’d leave your camping days behind you. You had a feeling that you’d miss it.
Astarion came back and it felt as if he was making more noise than he needed as to not startle you again. He could move deadly silent if he wanted, as he’d proved against your enemies many times. They never knew what hit them when he came out from the shadows.
“Hands,” Astarion asked and you weren’t sure what he was asking for but you lifted both your hands, palms up.
He took hold of them and he pressed a handle of a weapon into your waiting hands. Not one of your own, they all had handles smoothened from use. No, this texture was rough, like uncut wood.
Astarion hadn’t said that you could open your eyes but they snapped open all the same, and you opened them just in time to see him kneeling in front of you again. Only this time, there was a stake between you and your hands on the handle of it, while he guided the sharp tip to the centre of his chest.
When you realised, you tried to thrash away and toss it aside. It would kill him if you drove that through and you weren’t in control of your impulses. What in the hells was he thinking? He had said he didn’t want to die anymore but then he handed you the very thing that could kill him.
“Astarion,” you said, in warning, when he grabbed your elbow with one hand and curled your hands back around the stake firmly with his other.
“This is what you should have done when you found out that I was a vampire spawn,” he said, and you’d never quite heard his voice sound so quiet. His usual melodic tones stripped away, it seemed to bare and vulnerable. “It is what most people would have done if they’d woken up to a vampire trying to feed on them.”
You couldn’t exactly disagree with that, but honestly the thought hadn’t crossed your mind. A part of you had been almost thankful, because it meant someone else in camp was hiding a dark secret. That you weren’t the only one driven by your urges.
You’d uncovered more of your companions’ secrets now, but Astarion had been the first. A glimmer of hope that you weren’t quite so alone. Of course, you hadn’t killed him. You understood what it was like having bloodthirst driving you.
“I didn’t want to kill you,” you said, and the words sounded strange in your mouth. You meant them but it still felt unnatural.
Astarion’s expression softened into a smile and he looked like he knew something that you didn’t. But instead of flaunting that, he was trying to make a point. You weren’t sure that you liked where this was going but you were still bound and breathless to watch. Poised with a weapon to end him with just one good thrust.
“And a stake to the heart is what would have happened the morning after too, if you hadn’t stuck your neck out for me figuratively as well as literally. Our companions would have killed me.”
“They wouldn’t have,” you argued because you knew the good hearts of your companions.
Even back then, when everything had been new and confusing and you were just figuring each other out. They wouldn’t have killed him, would they? You didn’t want to think them capable of killing Astarion, but all of you had blood on your hands by now.
Sure, it was mostly blood of cultists hellbent on causing war and destruction or monsters trying to take your lives, but it was still lives lost. And with each fight, you fed into that urge to kill just a bit more. It wasn’t enough to fully satisfy it clearly, but it was a slight release all the same.
But you didn’t want to drive this stake through Astarion. You wanted to let go of it and pull him into your arms. Hold him instead. Close enough that some of your hellish warmth could seep into his cold skin.
“You are dangerous,” Astarion said, looking into your eyes with purpose. “But so am I. So is everyone in this camp. Trained killers the lot of us. Complicated pasts. You’re not special.”
His voice tilted up, gaining a humorous lilt and it made you laugh. It sounded kind of choked up and wet. His red eyes had never looked as soft as they did while gazing into yours.
“You are,” you whispered, almost inaudible but he’d hear it. “Special.”
“You can try to kill me anytime,” Astarion said. “I don’t think you’ll go through with it.”
What a novel and lovely idea. As if your love for him could keep him safe when it was exactly the thing condemning him to your murderous attentions.
Your love for him.
It was love, wasn’t it? You didn’t have anything to compare to, but it felt like that, even out here in the wilderness, tadpoled brains and an ever-present ticking clock. However unlikely, it felt real.
“You don’t know what I’m capable of,” you told him and hoped that he could see the sincerity in your eyes. Make him understand the threat he was standing opposite.
“You don’t either,” he said, lip twisting up to a smirk and you guessed that he had a point with that.
He moved the hand from your elbow and instead laid both of his hands on top of yours. He let himself press just a bit more into the stake, enough that it was catching on his sleepshirt. A flimsy fabric. It would do nothing to stop the stake from driving through it. Smooth like butter. It would sail right home, poison his heart and stop it a second time.
Stop it for good.
“You’re playing a dangerous game.”
“And yet, I’ve never felt so alive,” he said and leaned just a tiny bit closer. “You are not your past, even if you don’t remember it. So, the urges are a part of you. Big deal. You still get a choice who you want to be right now. Just like I do. Let’s keep making choices together. This is what freedom is about, isn’t it?”
It felt like a stake was driven through your heart, knocking all of the air from your lungs with one fell swoop. He was paraphrasing something you’d said to him. That he’d be responsible for his own choices now that he was out from under Cazador’s thumb.
For good and for bad.
He was right. It wasn’t so different from you. You were still the one making the choices. You were allowed to cast the die on your present and your future, just not your past.
The nagging grating voice in the back of your head still told you that you could drive the stake in and kill Astarion but you shut it right up, like you had done dozens of times already. You just had to keep resisting that part of yourself. You could do that.
“Let go,” you told Astarion and he pulled his hands from yours.
He looked at you, chest open and inviting for malice, but you tossed the stake aside and instead grabbed hold of his face. You cradled it like he’d cradled yours, holding it like he was the most precious thing in all of Faerûn. He might just be.
“It’s not going to be easy,” you said, leaning your face closer to his.
You wanted to spill every warning you could think of but you knew that he already knew a lot of it. He’d seen you in action, tied up and snarling like a feral beast. You at your most dangerous and at your most vulnerable. And he’d taken care of you.
He’d chosen to take care of you when he had every right to kill you.
You had to choose to take care of him, even if your urges screamed to kill him.
“Kiss me.”
Astarion’s smile turned soft and he reached behind your back until he could pull you right up against him into his lap. His hands stayed behind your back, holding onto you gently, as your tail whipped back and forth in anticipation.
“You’ve got this, and I’ve got you,” he whispered as he leaned in to press your lips together.
Those were other words echoed from that night when you almost made the worst mistake of your life. You hadn’t really heard him then. Too hung up on how he didn’t understand that the urges controlled you so deeply, so intricately, but now you were finally ready to hear him.
“And I’ve got you,” you whispered back, as you broke the kiss just for a moment.
When you kissed him again, you felt how his lips tilted up into a smile.