*bg3 spoilers ahead*
word count: 1.5k
content: canon typical violence, Astarion x gender neutral!reader
What if you could hug Astarion after he finally kills his master? (set after the option where he does not ascend)
“Why does tragedy exist? Because you are full of rage. Why are you full of rage? Because you are full of grief.”
—
“But I'm not above enjoying this.”
—
The body fell to the ground with a rather disappointing thud—muted and squelching into a heap at his feet. It was, of course, a glorious moment still; Cazador dead by his hand, the light fading from his monstrous eyes. It was just that, well, Astarion had envisioned it would all play out with much more spectacle than the altogether clumsy manner his centuries-long tormentor crumpled lifelessly to the bloodied stone.
There ought to have been more of a flourish, he thought maybe foolishly. Something befitting of the dramatic climax when his freedom was finally secured for good.
Cazador had loomed so large, seemed so above, reigning over him for centuries—controlling every aspect of his being that he might as well have been a god for all Astarion could refuse him. Ultimately, he had expected him to die like a god as well. Not like a man.
Astarion had envisioned the hall echoing with the finality of his hollow corpse hitting the floor. Like the satisfying boom of great castle gates slamming shut on that portion of his life forever. This creature who ruled him, boot on his neck for hundreds of years, vanquished at last.
Above all, he expected satisfaction. A flood of it flowing through his cold veins and bringing warmth to his long dead skin. That the elation of it might bring him back from the brink of his undeath, however impossible that may be.
And he did not get that.
Shocking.
Instead, Astarion’s knees banged painfully to rest on the ground amidst his bloody handiwork rang out in the chamber. The sound of his bones jarring in his ears.
The air felt thick and cloying, a dank weight in his lungs that constricted like a snake, leaving a growing tightness in his chest. Astarion sat for a moment—still waiting for the rush of fierce joy that never came.
Which was strange, he thought distantly. He felt very distant now, somewhere between floating and tethered horribly to the ground, the magnitude of it all crashing down was suffocating.
It would stand to reason, he had assumed, that at the end of it all—when his freedom had been secured for good—there would be a sort of immediate relief, like cool water to a burn, like the blissful ebbing of pain after a healing spell. Though apparently that did not stand to reason at all as now it seemed more as if he’d thrust the raw wound of himself straight back into the flames. There was no wave of elation as he stared from far away at his hands that still clutched the blade, as tightly as when he dealt the killing blow.
So Astarion sat — feeling something slip away from him, leech out and stain the floor like the blood of his former master. And in all the empty space left behind, something else began to grow in him. Something which he knew must have always been there lurking under the weight of his rage and waiting to be released.
The tightness in his lungs culminated in the familiar sensation of a stone stock behind his tongue. His mouth filled with coppery spit as he fought through the pain to swallow it back. His throat felt as though it had been torn to shreds, burning as his eyes began to sting and something roared in his ears.
Astarion wondered from a place outside of his body if someone was weeping—the sound of it barely audible over the pounding in his head.
It wasn’t until the strangled reverberation of a sob, wrenched from his gut and leaving him flayed open as Cazador, tore through the chamber walls again that he realized it was he who wept, who wailed shamelessly in anguish. His head fell back — fanged teeth bared in a snarl, face contorted with the ugliness of a grief long since buried in the coffin he’d broken out of years ago.
The dull constant pulse of vengeance pushing him ever onward after his escape had gone. In its place an awful throbbing ache that bloomed, growing in intensity like a knife to the skin of his back, a twist of the blade for every year he spent in Cazador’s possession.
He’d done it.
He’d slayed the beast.
He’d won his freedom.
And now he was left with all this pain that had driven him. That he’d clung to desperately so he would not give up. With no place left to put it all down.
Nothing more to do with it but feel.
Though he took some small pleasure that the creature who had planted this seed laid before him now, just as small and broken as Astarion had been.
Good, he thought — spat in his head. Another shout bubbled up in his chest, clawed its way past his fangs that scratched the plump flesh of his lower lip, scarred over years of self-inflicted bites.
His knees ached where the harsh stone bit into them, his head spun as everything blurred around him with the moisture beaded in his eyes.
Slowly, as if moving through honey, the world began to shift. The cavernous ceiling tilted down, down, down until his eyes were locked on the stone steps that led in from the hall. There was something warm and blessedly solid at his back - covering him where he was bare, enveloping him slowly into its sturdy, gentle embrace. Bringing him back to his body.
For a brief moment he thought maybe it was him that died. Maybe this was Death come to ferry him away. Wherever it was things like him went.
But he didn’t think death smelled so sweet or so familiar. The rich smoke of campfires permanently woven into soft linen and leather, the light notes of lye soap underneath the metal tang of well-worn armor.
Nor would Death have held him so kindly, cradled in a circle of strong arms.
You were knelt behind him in the bloody mess, pulling him to rest against your chest with a light hand guiding his head to your shoulder. It was a balm - your touch - a soft heat to the aching muscle of him. Behind you, Astarion could just make out the blurry outline of his companions and the soft shapes of the other spawn, drifting back down to the stone dias.
He couldn’t muster the energy to feel even a bit embarrassed by the way he turned in your grasp, the blade clattering forgotten to the floor as his nails scratched at your back, pulling you in closer, trying to crawl under your skin.
“I’ve got you,” your voice came out in a hush. It seemed to him you were saying it more to yourself, an assurance of sorts. But he took solace in the words regardless.
How long had it been since he’d craved this—the touch of another? Since that time he could no longer recall, since touch had been a comfort, since his body had been his own.
And now he longed to be fully engulfed, hidden away from the sting of the world, nestled safely between your ribs. As you muttered to him, he pressed his face to your neck which became increasingly wet with something that ran thinner and saltier than the sweet rushing of blood in your veins.
Astarion thought he might have said your name — a whisper as the flood inside him began to ebb to nothing more than a trickle. That you might have shushed him, petted his head like a dear thing. Brushed the tangled, silvery curls from his eyes and held him closer still.
“You’re safe now,” he heard through the ringing in his ears.
And Astarion—creature of the night, hungry beast, quick to bite and slow to trust—had never believed anything more in his life.
“It’s over,” he said.
And it was only partly true, but there was triumph in that still.
This, at least, was over and you were still there at the end of it all. He found the relief of that simple fact so staggering that he could do nothing to resist your gravity pulling him in.
A drifting, icy comet caught in the orbit of your celestially warm chest.
“Well done, I think you got him.”
And despite himself, Astarion laughed. More of a hoarse coughing, really, than anything else. You were chuckleing too, your shoulder bouncing under his cheek and there was the miraculous feeling of lips pressed briefly to the crown of his head.
“I should hope so,” he replied after a moment, reluctantly—though he would never admit it—allowing himself to be detangled from you and pulled to his feet.
He tried to think of some sharp-tongued quip to diffuse the tension in the air but nothing came. Your eyes were red rimmed when he met them, looking up at him with something that might have been pride.
And then the words came easily.
“Always so full of surprises, aren’t you?”
