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Summary: This is the eighth and final part to Alleyway Affairs.
The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: Explicit
WC for part 8 - 18k, total - 78k+
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, explicit sex, explicit consent, angst, in love & its a disaster, additional tags posted on ao3
The sullen face of the moon burrows itself into the bloated belly of clouds. The unruly rain pelts the ground, each drop plopping into puddles and soaking the earth with the fiercest of grief. Your father’s manor is the monster on the hill. It leers over the sea, its body and bulk extending over what felt like acres of land, nearly stumbling over the cliffside. Its gated arms encompass the secluded roadway. It’s knotted hands of moss and steel unfurl, allowing your carriage to have entered the roundabout. A sea of carriages are already here, with guests hoarding toward the front door. Their carriages, coach drivers, and footmen wade to the stable yard to wait out the ball.
Your stomach twists. In your peripheral, you watch as Devina fidgets with the mask on her lap, pulling at the ribbons. She should have done this sooner, so she hurries, tying the ribbons behind her hair, securing the mask snugly in place.
It is a full-face mask with cut open eyes and painted lips, with a collection of spikes spewing out from one side: all whites, greens, and creams. Its design is divided down the middle, one half adorned with pearls that match the ones pinned in her hair, the other half encrusted in emeralds. The features painted on; the smile of white rising high at her cheekbone contorting into an exaggerated frown of sage dipping down her chin.
The emerald reminds you of the ring you brought to Drake.
You glance away from her, gaze settling on Astarion instead.
His gloved hands are curled over his thighs.
The disguise he wears is one he deeply despises. It hadn’t been the one you’d initially picked.
Drake had sent both of your outfits a few days prior, much to your vexation. Upon his handwritten note, Drake’s words were dipped in the black ink of his intent, written with fluid flicks and precise elegance.
For the masquerade, little dove. If you wish to infiltrate the ball without issue, you must wear it.
You had trailed your fingers along the many pale feathers bursting out from either side of the corset’s shoulders and spine. Your mask was made up of two parts. It had cut out eyes that flourished outward in feathers, the golden nose short like a beak, yet beneath it was fully white, with a molded-out nose and soft, expressionless lips.
It was as though you were wearing two faces.
One of a marble statue, and then one of a dove.
Your dress was of the same color scheme, the boning of your corset pearlescent with trim lace and gold embroidery that streamed into sashaying slips of cream.
After you had gone through the pieces of your costume, you found another note with another set of clothes.
And for your lover, whose authentic self should be reflected in his attire.
D.
At first, you hadn’t known Drake’s meaning. Astarion’s outfit consists of the finest materials, from the pure gold chains that dripped from the ruby of his rose broach to the gilded embellishments of his waistcoat. Beneath it, he wore a billowy blouse, the ruffles running high up his neck, all lace trimmed. His pants were of the same marrow white as his blouse, coordinating with the withered white of his long cape. The cape drenched his body from shoulder to ankle; however, you felt sick at the sight of the red dipped hem. It was purposefully made to look bloodied and torn.
When you helped him dress, he had been dead silent. What he was feeling you already knew, without needing to ask. It crept in you just as the way his eyes followed your hands making reluctant progress of his buttons and cufflinks.
You knew he couldn’t see himself reflected in the mirror, and for once, you had felt relieved by it. Not that he wasn’t beautiful, that much was evidently true. No.
It was that when he’d finally put on the mask, he transformed into something you did not want him to see.
It was formed from bone-white ceramic, and it consumed the whole of his face. It stretched from its perked ears to the peak of its snout, the nose tipped black. Bold strokes of scarlet and gold bordering the cut-out eyes, forming them into a sneer, painted up to the middle of the ears. The upper lip pulled back over long, jagged canines; its teeth beset in a perpetual snarl.
The mask was that of a wolflike creature, keen on pursuing prey.
Your stomach had dropped; your gaze turned aside as plumes of anger engulfed your heart.
Drake wanted me to see him like this.
And only this.
A hand touches yours.
You flinch out of your thoughts, as Astarion gestures to the carriage door. The footman is already aiding Devina down the steps. You are to go next.
You pause, gesturing to Astarion’s waistcoat with a furrowed brow. He knows what you’re asking, as he pats over the inner pocket.
You had given him your sending stone as an extra precaution. You aren’t sure if Drake would ever heed your call in this situation… let alone if it came from Astarion’s voice. But for some reason, you felt better if Astarion was the one to keep hold of it.
You turn to leave the carriage, and yet, you feel Astarion’s fingers squeeze once over your palm. You look at him, but his mask can only display one emotion. Wrath. Nonetheless, you squeeze his hand back in response, a wordless reassurance for whatever is to come.
☾☼
Whispered words ensure your entry regardless of your concealed identities, and Devina beckons you through the manor’s colossal doors.
Once inside, you lose your breath.
It is a cataclysm of magnificence and madness. The high ceiling was a flood that flowed far and wide, meticulously decorated with winged divinities fluttering amongst an endless heaven of pinks, yellows, and cerulean. The designs merge into the twin winding staircases opposite one another, a purple runner pouring into the ballroom. Heavy chandeliers are twinkling from the ceiling, their droplets made of crystal, glass, and enchanting shine. It is nearly blinding.
As you make your way into the main ballroom, Astarion’s hand finds yours. You look at him, and he tilts his head.
You suppress a quivering inhale as your fingers lace together.
Even the gods would never enter here.
The room is not a room. It is more like a dream.
From the domed ceiling hang draped curtains that touch the floor, made of lavender silk organza. Lit candelabra cast mysterious figures onto the faces of masked revelers. Ornate furnishings and people saturate the room in vivid hues. Tapestries fall at either side of the windows, their folds like molted layers of a snake’s skin peeling into the wooden floor. Windows made of tinted glass are pulled taut and tall over the walls. They deluge the room in technicolor every time lightning strikes the earth.
An orchestra’s music bleeds into the ears of every guest, its array of sound as loud as the colors threaded into the fabric of the room. It is a collimation of percussion, strings, woodwind, and brass. The rumble, the droning melody, the harmonization of shrill notes and low soothing strums make your head swim in symphonies of dizziness and sway.
Astarion holds your hand tighter, as you make your way to the center of the room, yet the nausea doesn’t dissipate. The people dressed in gaudy and grotesque costumes, their masks made to provoke mouth ajar awe or a wide-eyed fright.
Each mask was of a delirious design, whether it be their downturned noses that obscured the whole of their countenance, or their elongated smiles, forlorn frowns, jubilant jeers, or their sharp chins, their beaks, snouts, scaled skin or tufts of fur. They wore overgrown roots, spikes, feathers, or decayed bouquets for head pieces.
Some wore masks that merged two to three faces into one in a gruesome tug of wrenching features. Others wore masks with horns that curled up and over their head and around their painted lips. Some wore masks that resemble jesters, relishing in their malice and mischief with three-pointed jingling hats and permanent grins.
Their masks were made of porcelain, some pig or sheep leather, some ceramic or paper mâché.
All of them not a definitive animal, yet all of them distinctly… inhuman.
For those not dancing, they sit at round tables with flutes of bubbling champagne or glasses of wine. At the center of each table is a grandiose centerpiece of bronze leaf foliage surrounded by vast varieties of cheeses, berries, and the peeled apart and nibbled skins of cooked animals. The guests not sitting choose to flock from one table to the next like squabbling seagulls, the slick of pork juice glistening around their lips and on their greedy fingertips, the seeds and stain of blackberries purpling their once pearly white teeth.
Others dance to and fro around the room in supreme giddiness, in bizarre twirls of tinsel and terrible laughter, their hyena like howls of hilarity piercing and relentless.
Devina’s fingers find your wrist. She leans into your ear.
“There are other rooms down the corridor, if you don’t find who you’re looking for here,” she leans back, then pats your hand not entangled with Astarion’s.
“We will reconvene at the end of the night. Enjoy the festivities.”
With that, she turns away, weaving between bodies and sound.
Astarion leans into you as well, his voice an octave louder than normal to combat the swells of music.
“What should we do, darling?”
You looked at him, and although the whole of his face is obscured by his mask, when you’re this close to him, you could make out the red of his irises.
You open your mouth to respond, but you are cut off by a voice. Its deep drawl is like playing an organ. Deep. Resounding. It judders the bones.
“Starting with a dance always fills me with exhilaration.”
You turn, and before you stood the body of a massive vulture.
His mask, different from all the rest, is a skull. Cleaned, yet unpainted, unadorned. It was bone. Its beak extended out, far down the cut of his chin, obscuring his mouth. His eyes followed you from behind the ebbing of bone. His cape protruded out in profound blacks, tawny browns, and sand-colored feathers. They stuck up around his neck like a high collar, and when he touched your hand, you noticed his jewelry. On the last joint of every finger, he wore talons that extended out over his fingertips in a slight curve. Not crafted from diamond or gold, no, they looked to be… carved out from bone.
He stood a head taller than most, having to peer down his beak if only to meet your gaze. He cocked his head at you, mutely mocking your silence.
You hesitate, and he chuckles behind the mask, his feathers shaking and his eyes glinting.
“No need to be coy, Lady Brentwood,” he said, his timbre dipping down with his bow.
How did he—
“And you are?” Astarion intervenes, plucking away the stranger’s hand from yours, his tone short and clipped. The stranger rises from his bow, and though you can’t see his smile, you hear it in his voice.
“My apologies, I forget myself,” he says whilst raising his chin, “I knew what you’d come as, but of course you weren’t privy to the knowledge of my attire.”
He tapped at his beak, and for some reason, you felt as though his eyes never left you, even when addressing Astarion.
“I should be more conscientious of first impressions. I’ve been told I’m either downright dreadful at them, or diabolically delightful,” he remarked, then reached for your hand once more, “I am Renald Lockwell, the host of this grand event, and the one whom invited you both.”
The garish golds of the room take hold of you in its fist. You feel it clench and twist over your ribs.
No.
“Ah!” Astarion intercedes, untwining your hands and reaching out to shake Renald’s. Renald accepts the gesture with grace. “I apologize for my prior tone. It is a pleasure to meet you. Your home is quite astounding in its extravagance.”
Renald’s eyes land on Astarion, and for that brief moment you can breathe.
Act natural.
But that second of reprieve ends all too sudden, as Renald’s gaze fixes on you once more.
You hold up your hand to shake his own. You suppress a cringe.
He waves off Astarion’s apology, “No matter. I am pleased you made it safely overseas and look forward to our meeting in the East Wing later.”
You nod, smiling tightly, then reply, “As do we.”
You pull back your hand, and Renald’s eyes sparkle with something you can’t decipher.
“Yes…” he trails off while looking at you, then glances back at Astarion, “…well. I hope you enjoy a drink and a dance in the meantime. Please feel free to mingle to your heart’s content,” he pauses, then turns his attention back to you, “I hope you’ll also take part in a dance with me sometime this evening, as well, Lady Brentwood. That is, if it is of no consequence to Lord Brentwood.”
“Of course,” you say, struggling to mollify yourself, “I’ll find you later on.”
“Lovely,” Renald replied, “I do look forward to it.”
Your eyes follow him through the crowd as he leaves. You don’t realize Astarion is speaking to you until you feel him take your chin in his hand and guide your eyes back to him.
“Are you alright?” He says, and his eyes are clouded with concern.
You don’t respond.
You can’t.
You just… met your father for the first time, and though you could only make out his eyes, he looked the same as you had always imagined.
A vulture encircling my life.
Astarion bows his head, the snout of his mask grazing your feathered hair piece.
“Love.” His fingers lace in yours. “You’re okay. I’m here. Talk to me.”
You had been looking right through him. It takes a moment for your gaze to settle, for your pulse to be soothed by his thumb rubbing circles over the silk of your gloved knuckles.
“We need to pick them off, one by one,” you say for only him to hear, finding your composure, “or else we need to go with our other plan, and well… it would be best we avoid that.”
He offers you a nod.
“We can explore the rooms together, since they currently aren’t here,” he suggests, yet you bite your lip behind your mask. If you wish to get this done before Renald comes lurking, you need to hasten the process.
“We should separate. We will save time---” you say, and his rebuttal is right on the tip of his tongue, but you don’t allow him to cut you off. “We will reconvene here in an hour,” you assure him, yet from his eyes he doesn’t look to be anywhere near warming up to your proposal, “If all else fails…” You take a breath, “…we proceed with our second plan.”
A long pause.
“Fine,” Astarion resigns, a frown found so plainly in his voice, “I don’t like it, but fine. Promise me you’ll be careful.”
A ghost of a smile perks your lips.
“You act as though you’re worried about me,” you tease, trying to make light of the situation, and yet your heart seizes when you feel him embrace you, his chin resting atop your head, his arms wrapping around your waist, below your wings.
He whispers into your hair, and it sounds both quietly anxious and… afraid.
“I love you.”
Just as he says it, he’s pulling away, his arms falling to his sides.
You mean to say it back, but someone taps your shoulder, and you spin around, eyes landing on a stranger with the mask of a serpent.
A mark.
Lord Levi Avington.
“Could I have this dance with you, my lady?” Lord Avington politely inquires whilst extending his hand out to you. You waver, then glimpse back to where Astarion was standing.
He’s gone.
Your heart drops.
From behind you Lord Avington gently yanks at your hand, and you twirl into his arms. His eyes are black, like night skies without any stars. His mask is made completely of bronze, the designed body of a serpent slithering around the cut open mouth, up the cheekbone and hissing out from between his brows. Despite the snake’s fangs and red bejeweled eyes, you find the mask to fill you with a sense of pity, as though the man beneath it was being constricted against his will.
He looked to be harmless, yet the ooze of his smile said otherwise.
“You look ravishing,” Lord Avington announces with such intolerable charm, and it wards off any mercy you may have had, “I haven’t been able to take my eyes off of you since I saw you across the room…”
You peel his hands away as graciously as you can muster.
“It’s a shame the music is so loud,” you reckon, “should we find a better place to get to know one another?”
He beams.
“Why of course, my lady,” he bows, then looks up to you through the bronze of his mask, “I know every room. I could give you a tour.”
☾
To say he isn’t pleased would be an understatement.
From the instant he felt nimble fingers curl around the bend of his arm, wrenching him away from her, he was incensed. He’d only gone along with it as when he’d turned around to see the face of the culprit, he found the face of a rabbit instead.
It was unmistakable.
The long white ears. The pink tipped nose. The mask was shaped with a bubbled upper lip, with long white whiskers, and cut open eyes. The red ringlets of the woman’s hair brought out the red of her lips, and the azure of her mischievous gaze.
Lady Ruth Reed.
He’d let himself be drawn from the ballroom floor, shown through the corridor, all the while the woman giggled back at him, her voice slippery and smooth. One of her hands skimmed over the winding wall, trailing over the drip of oil paintings, tracing the passing faces of lineages and stormy seascapes. They were headed down the West Wing.
“I’m surprised you didn’t resist,” her fingers slide over Astarion’s wrist, “you even left your date behind.”
“She’s my wife,” Astarion declares, about to yank away his arm, yet he catches himself, shaking his head and training his tone into something sultry and sly, “…regardless. Where are you taking me?”
She clicks her tongue, “I knew that already, Nicholas, and honestly, it depends on how big of an appetite you have,” she flirts.
He’d been warned their marks would be given descriptions of their costumes as well, but her overall familiarity with him was unnerving. Astarion chooses not to respond, instead becoming preoccupied memorizing the layout of the winding hallways, intent on finding a place to kill this woman in private.
However, everywhere his eyes landed, people prowled. The rooms with open doors were swamped with gossiping guests inside, whilst doors left closed were guarded by a pair of servants with masks of their own.
Hells.
This isn’t going to go as straightforward as we’d hoped.
Ruth’s hands curled into the front of Astarion’s waistcoat, tugging him to a guarded door. He tore her hands from his clothes without thought, and yet she only laughed in reply.
“I love when my men play hard to get,” she says, and proceeds to lean into him with heavy lidded eyes, and batting lashes, the scheming of her lips all too smug. She turned her attention to the door, and then her ditzy behavior transforms to stern nastiness with the snap of her fingers at the guards. “Hurry up and open the door. We don’t have all day.”
The guards, recognizing her and his description from their employer, willingly oblige. Instantaneously, Astarion is hit by a gust of pungent aromas, the smoky scent of roasted pig flesh, the rich savory depths of sauteed vegetables, the buttered breads, the spices of nutmeg and pumpkin in golden brown pies, the sweet vanillas of other baked deserts.
The wall’s white crown moldings are a stark contrast against their mustard yellow paint, culminating up and over the ceiling, a chandelier swaying over the dinner table. A blanket of food is laid out atop an elongated table, sprawling from one end of the room to the other. People are sitting all around the table, all wearing masks that allow easy access to the meal, despite one.
The man at the head of the table with a turkey leg dripping its grease down his one hand and a piece of triple layer chocolate cake in the other, has his mask pushed up over his head. It is made from burgundy-brown leather, with a wrinkled snout and protruding teeth, the head of a boar created to be as lifelike as possible.
It was as despicable of a sight as the corpulent man engorging himself on his feast.
However, the mask belonged to a mark.
Lord Bartholomew.
Lady Reed laces her arm around Astarion’s, snatching him to her side.
“Curse the gods, we have the wrong room,” she spits out.
“I didn’t think this was what you had in mind,” Astarion remarks sarcastically.
“It wasn’t,” she deadpans, yet before she can turn, Lord Batholomew catches her in his line of sight. He beckons her over with a wave of his hand, whilst taking another mouthful of meat.
Lady Reed rolls her eyes, shoulders deflating as she submits to his wordless demand.
“This will only be a moment,” she promises, and Astarion frowns, following the drag of her hold to the head of the table, standing beside the boar.
“Good to see you, Ruth,” Lord Batholomew states boisterously, pieces of meat stuck between his teeth.
“Wish I could say the same,” Lady Reed retorts whilst crossing her arms over her chest. “What did you want---”
“Oh! And this must be Nicholas, a pleasure to finally meet you my friend,” Lord Bartholomew interjects, dropping the turkey leg to his plate and sticking his hand out for a handshake. Astarion glances at the man’s greasy fingers with unveiled disgust, then quirks a brow.
“The pleasures mine,” Astarion impassively replies, not moving to shake the man’s hand.
“My apologies,” Lord Bartholomew begrudgingly says, whilst wiping his hand over the tucked napkin draped over his chest.
“Dennison,” Lady Reed hisses under her breath to the man, “What. Did you. Want?”
“Is it true you brought the new girl?” Lord Bartholomew heaves Lady Reed over by her arm, and answers into the shell of her ear, his jovial expression cast from his countenance, each word marinated in agitation. “I told you she wasn’t for sale.”
Lady Reed shakes him off, stepping back, clearly disheveled despite trying to appear otherwise. She smooths her hands over her curls, only for them to spring back into place.
“Don’t get sentimental, you know she will catch us a high price tonight,” Lady Reed argues, voice tightly quiet, glancing away, “I’ll find you another toy to play with soon enough, so don’t pester me.”
They’re… selling girls?
Here ? In what room?
Gods above. I’m going to be ill.
Lord Bartholomew doesn’t respond, choosing instead to glower at Lady Reed and take another chomp of his decimated turkey leg.
Lady Reed perks up at this, finding his silence evidence that she’d won. She smiles like champagne bubbles, winking at Lord Bartholomew before proceeding to drag Astarion away from the table, and out of the room.
“Now, now, we’ll go to where the actual buffet is,” she promises, and Astarion’s stomach drops, any scrap of appetite gone from him in an instant.
☼
Wherever Astarion has gone off to, you hope he is having more luck than you are.
The only place that could possibly have any privacy was surely the East Wing, as the double doors connected to it were heavily guarded by a line of masked servants. That only left you the West Wing, which was wide open and profuse with people, the party herding in and out of the hallway to the connected ballroom, and vice versa. There were no places to take out Lord Avington, as eyes seemed to follow you everywhere you turned. Their lurid costumes and constant blathering fusing with the loudly ornamented walls and diminishing sound of the orchestra.
Lord Avington gives you the grand tour, his dazzling white grins enchanting the women and men that pass by. Each open room he gives an arm swept flourish and the people a deliberate review, the matters of scandals a travesty against own heart. However, as he describes each person with the utmost sympathy, you find the manner he does so to be rife with condescension, as he weaves stories of people’s lives and shortcomings like it were comically tragic. Those same people would then flash him oblivious smiles, ignorant of his knack for learning and extorting secrets.
“You don’t have the reputation of a gossip, but that’s all you’ve done,” you quip, and Lord Avington gives you a sheepish grin.
“Don’t misunderstand me, I beg of you,” he relents, then swipes over his suit, “I’m not interested in gossip. I’m interested in people,” the corner of his lips quirk up, as he adds on, “I’ve been interested in you for some time, Lady Brentwood.”
How could I misunderstand how conniving you truly are?
Just how are you so blatantly praised in the public domain?
You’re nothing but a fraud.
You bite your tongue.
You don’t know the intricacies of the relationship Lady Brentwood kept with this man, nor do you want to know.
Time is ticking down, and you haven’t even found one other mark, let alone an apt place to take out this one.
If Astarion and I can’t do this, we will have no choice but to proceed with the meeting, and that only makes things escalate to a degree I’m not confident we can get out of.
Your lack of response must get under his skin, for he turns to boasting in order to sway you, his tongue riddled with numerous accomplishments he made in manners of business and influence in Baldur’s gate.
When you do enter another room, of course you aren’t alone.
There’s a flock of ladies perched on each leather sofa, facing opposite of each other, fanning their faces, and exchanging hearsay with exaggerated tones. Their painted nails and painted faces, molded masks of pouts and mouths all adorned in pale tones, like that of blushing porcelain dolls. The walls are slathered in a parakeet green. It is frankly a repulsive sight to be seen.
“Did you hear about Lady Quin? She’s expecting again,” a blonde woman asks behind her palm.
“Didn’t her last pregnancy almost kill her?” a red-lipped woman giggles in reply.
“It is a shame it did not,” another woman cooly remarks, sat squarely in the middle of the couch.
She differs from the rest, her mask formed into the face of a peacock, its azure feathers spouting from the yellow tipped beak and erupting past the crown of her head. They flutter in fern greens, violets, and indigos, dozens and dozens of feathers reaching high and wide. Her dress is as theatrical as her mask, with its train of feathers flowing to the paneled floor. Her fingers, neck, and ears are decorated in dangling drips of diamonds and sapphire.
“You are so terribly cruel, Lady Forrest,” a woman with beaded bands coursing up both her arms interjects, gasping in mock horror, then insisting with peak melodrama in her intonation, “say you don’t mean it.”
“But dear, how could I not mean it? It would be crueler for the woman to live through another child, especially when she tends to a toddler of a husband, on a mountain of debt,” Lady Forrest replies with a stoic expression, however, her lips betray the ghost of a smile.
The blond woman hides her laugher behind her cupped hands, her brows in her bangs, blurting out, “Lady Forrest! You scoundrel!”
Whilst the red-lipped woman cackles, “Not all of us can be as well off as you, Aramita.”
The woman with beaded bands sinks into the cushion with the back of her palm cast over her temple as she sighs, “Do never change, Aramita. I relish your fiendish flare.”
Their laughter soon dies on their lips, as you and Lord Avington’s presence takes root.
Lady Forrest keeps to herself in a blasé lounge while the rest of the women sit up proper, smoothing out their dresses and hair.
“Come to ruin our fun, Lord Avington?” Lady Forrest questions aloof, yet her brows minutely rise when her gaze shifts to you. “Oh. Lady Brentwood, I presume?”
You nod, and watch as she repositions herself in her seat, but doesn’t get up. She outstretches her hand to you.
“Do come and meet me,” she beckons you forward like a dog, and though you feel your fingers itching to curl into a fist, you suppress the urge.
You come to her, and she takes your hand in yours for a brief moment, a smile finding its way on her face. Her features are sharpened to cut, her mask concealing her high cheekbones, yet revealing her straight nose and thinly lined lips.
“Dears, this is my splendid acquaintance, Blaire. She’s the one transporting my product across the seas.”
It’s as though she’s presenting you like a prize, and the other women gobble you up, smothering you in flattery.
“Oh, I just love your costume!” the blonde exclaims.
“I love it too, where did you have it made?” the red-lipped woman inquires.
“It’s a shame your mask covers so much of your face, I’m sure you’re quite pretty under there,” the blonde woman interrupts.
“I can’t believe your family line dared to leave the Upper City for overseas. How does it compare to here?” the woman with beaded bands queries.
“Aramita. Let the woman breathe, will you?” Lord Avington demands, stepping in to pull you out from the gaggle of fawning ladies.
Lady Forrest rolls her eyes.
“Oh? So now we are on a first name basis, Lord Avington?” She challenges, an edge to her tone, and Lord Avington flares his nostrils, already on his way out the door. You let him lead you, knowing you must return to the ballroom soon anyways.
When you enter the hallway once more, Lord Avington is steaming, his grip on your wrist becoming too tight, while he mutters under his breath to you.
“You’re doing all the work with smuggling her shit and yet she has the gal to act all self-righteous. I don’t care what “rank” she is in. She’s the vainest woman I’ve ever had the indecency of meeting.”
You half-listen to him, gaze filtering through the throngs of guests and settling on two figures at the far end of the corridor.
Astarion.
Your heart leaps inside your chest. You yank away from Lord Avington, and when he glimpses at you in surprise, you offer a small apology.
“I’m sorry. But excuse me for a moment,” you say, leaving Lord Avington bewildered as you wade through the crowded hall alone.
Your thoughts are pelting you like that of the rain tap, tap, tapping the windows.
Is this what life would have been like raised by my father?
Elaborate balls and costumes?
Shameless debauchery held behind closed doors?
Would I have been one of them?
But what makes you any better? Haven’t you done worse than these people?
You’ve killed. You’ve done it with your own two hands.
How many of these people can say the same?
☾
He knows what is inside before the guards even open the door. He can hear it seeping through the walls, and whatever he may have come to expect dies inside him. His stomach lurches. Bile is frothing up his throat.
Lady Reed pushes past the guard to help creak open the door, and there, through the sliver of the doorway, Astarion sees.
The room is red. Vibrant, violent, red. If there are windows, they are blocked by the velvet folds of black curtains. There are beds. Several scattered across the room. There are locked doors, which lead to gods know where. There are lit candelabra illuminating bodies. Harsh incense, with its resinous scent, can hardly dilute the thick smell of sex.
A mass of naked forms, all knotted together, from the couches to the beds, to the floor, everywhere.
But what’s worse.
Despite the moaning and groaning, the obscene slap of skin and the potent rank of sweat.
Is he can tell who is enjoying themselves, and who is undoubtedly, not.
He can tell by their dead eyes. The way they lay there, devoid of expression, as if their minds have left their bodies and all they can do to survive is… endure.
He’s going to be fucking sick.
Astarion pivots on his heel, side-stepping Lady Reed. He hears her yell after him, but he ignores her. If he turns back now, he’ll murder every last one of those bastards in that room.
His mind is encased in a daze. All the extravagance of the manor. All the intricate outfits and décor, all the luxuries, all the bountiful feasts, all the indulgences of power.
If I ascended… then perhaps this is what would have come of me.
With a manor or a castle such as this. Laughing in the face of suffering. Taking part in the condemnation of the weak…
His arm shoots out as he uses the wall for leverage, his body sagging against the wall, his head hung low.
I would have lost myself to power.
Suddenly, a presence before him startles him out of his misery.
“What happened?” She whispers, her concern dousing her every word, and she’s touching the fingers of his hand, huddling close to block out the noise of others strolling by.
Astarion’s gaze meets the eyes of his love. It is as though everything else… disassembles and flutters away. He takes her hand in his, and though he knows she may scold him, he raises his mask if only to leave a lingering kiss over her gloved knuckles.
“I saw something I didn’t want to see,” he admits, and then fixes his mask back over his face. “But I’m better now that you are here, my darling.”
Astarion keeps her hand in his, and they both make their way back to the ballroom, exchanging conversation in undertones.
“Unfortunately, our original plan isn’t going to work,” Astarion murmurs to her, “too many monitoring eyes.”
“I know,” she whispers back in a sigh, “I ran into the same problem as well.”
“Then we’ll have to attend the meeting,” Astarion acknowledges, and notes how her head bows with a pang in his heart. This isn’t what she wanted.
“Do you think he recognizes you?” Astarion asks, and she shrugs.
“How could he? We’ve never met,” she responds, and then laces their fingers together, “however… I can’t shake this feeling of apprehension.”
Astarion frowns behind his mask, knowing very well what she means, yet not wanting to voice it in case it heightens her anxieties. Instead, he leads her to the ballroom.
☾☼
Another song has begun, this one more mellow and slow, like wine down one’s throat.
One of your hands is in his, the other on his shoulder. You dance together, for what may be the last time.
“I’m scared,” you confess, so quiet you wonder if you have admitted it at all, but then you feel his hand clench over your side. You inhale, and whisper, “I’m scared of being here. I’m scared of my father,” you pause, wetting your lips beneath the mask, “…and I… really don’t want to fail you. I can’t.”
Astarion stiffens. His eyes meet yours. His tone is firm.
“Knowing what it may cost you, and yet you’re more concerned with me,” he lightly scolds, then adds on, his voice lowering, “You won’t fail me. You have never failed me.”
You falter, the topic of his ascension teetering from your tongue, it being thorns around your heart. He must know what you mean to say.
Astarion gestures to the room about you.
“This could have been me. I could have had all of this.” Your eyes flicker away, a twinge of pain in your chest, but he continues, his tone sincere, “but you stopped me. You saved me from what I could have become,” he pulls you closer, “I don’t need that scroll,” he looks deeply in your eyes, and you feel you can see all of him, despite the mask, “All I need is you.”
You shake your head, denying, “I didn’t save you—"
“You did. I understand now just how much. I… I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything before,” he insists.
“You don’t have to apologize to me anymore. I love you,” you say quietly.
“I know you do. I know it like I’ve never known anything,” he answers, and then his voice lowers, “I hope you know… how much I love you, too.”
“I do,” you reply, and your eyes sparkle, “you’ve been telling me every day.”
He scoffs in an affectionate jest, “Darling, I promised you I would.”
“Oh, so that was a promise?” You tease, and you can hear the smile in his voice.
“More so a vow,” he states, and it’s like the words are made of sunlight, honeyed with adoration.
You laugh softly, your face and heart becoming warm.
“A vow,” you echo, and everything else falls away, the slush of colors and the slur of countenances, and all there is, is you and him.
He leads, the sequence of steps coming like second nature, and you huff a laugh at it, feeling the humor radiating off him in waves. Your bodies harmonize, as the music sweeps and swells, and his gaze never leaves yours.
Even if I die tonight.
Even if the hells take my soul.
It could not take my love for you.
It lives within me.
Forevermore.
As the thoughts enter your mind, they are torn away by a figure looming behind Astarion.
Our time is up.
“May I step in?” Your father intercedes, side-stepping Astarion. You glance at Astarion and give him a nod.
Without a word, Astarion releases you, though his fingers linger on your hand for a touch longer than necessary.
The song changes with the change of hands.
“I’ll be waiting,” Astarion assures you under his breath, then walks away.
“I appreciate the gesture,” Renald comments, taking position, his hand clasping yours, his other resting below your wings, “A dance is a good way to determine how well we will work together in the future.”
Is it so you will know if I can always obediently follow your lead?
If I will ever misstep?
“I agree,” you comply, and then follow his steps, his movements precise and practiced. It is far more refined than Astarion’s.
You waltz in silence, your gaze averted to any place but meeting his, his own transfixed upon you.
“I thought you were an angel when you first came through the entrance,” he states, timbre steeped in charm, and your heart shrivels inside your chest, “but instead, you’re a dove.”
You sway, following his every step, you survey the room, adamant on concentrating on Astarion. You find him leaned against a table, flocked by women and men alike, yet his attention never diverts from you.
“You worried about your husband?” Renald asks.
“No, he can handle himself,” you remark lightly, and Renald tilts his head.
A beat.
“Why a dove?” He inquires, and you stall in your movements. The toe of his shoe nudges yours, correcting your stance, and you start back again in your dancing.
“No reason,” you respond, and though you say it, a part of you ponders why Drake chose this costume for you. If it was meant to insult you or… something else.
“Why a vulture?” you ask, and you feel the pound of the music inside your skull, feel it thumping in your blood.
Renald hmms, as you both wade in and out of couples, the slur of distorted faces makes you ill.
“Vultures are commonly misunderstood…” he suddenly explains, and then he’s looking down at you as you angle your head up to meet his gaze through the masks, “they are patient, adaptable, and… despite their diet of the dead, they are not as cruel as one may think.”
Your heart is in your throat.
Was he vying for sympathy?
“You can relate?” You calmly query, the ache of angling your neck up to look at him a nuisance. You feel his fingers clench over your side, the talons a slight dig into the boning of your corset.
“Yes.”
“How so?” You gauge, observing just how severe his eyes are, like they could strangle you in vines, like they could sever your head from your spine.
“Though the people of this city lionize me, it’s inauthentic,” he remarks caviler, and then he bows his head so that his words worm their way into your ear, “they fear what they don’t understand,” he exhales through his nose, and then his tone takes on a touch of resentment, of regret, “the only person I thought could understand me… failed in that regard as well.”
You stiffen.
He pulls back, ever so slight, his shoulders lax, his head slanted as he speaks, “I hope that you can come to understand me, Lady Brentwood.”
You force yourself to keep up your pace, yet your steps are unsteady. You swallow, and say sly, “As I hope you never fail me, Lord Lockwell.”
He gives a haughty laugh and does so with his whole body, his head lulled back, his shoulders shaking, and the sound rumbles through you like an earthquake splits open the ground.
It's fortunate that your mask hides the fact that you can’t even crack a smile.
As his laughter dies down, he lulls his head to the other side, gazing at you over the blade of his beak.
“If it is not too imprudent to ask,” he murmurs, at first playful, yet then his inflection becomes stern, “if this is our first time meeting, why is it that I feel I have seen you before?”
Your blood runs cold.
You cannot comprehend what expression he must be wearing behind his mask. You can only wager it from his words.
“How could you know if you’ve seen me if I’m wearing this?” You reply simply.
Your hands have begun to sweat.
You pray your thanks to the gods that you wore gloves.
Renald doesn’t reply. He leans in too close. You stop your dance. He doesn’t drop your hand, nor does he remove his other hand at your ribs. You remain in your stance as if set in a trance. He brazenly stares at you without disgrace.
You feel as though he is watching over a carcass being picked apart, contemplating when he will swoop in to feast upon the scraps.
You swallow, glancing in the direction of Astarion again. You find he is approaching, and your heart clenches in your chest.
You look back at Renald.
The music crescendos.
Out the windows, lightning strikes the earth, and your father’s gaze glints under the streams of vibrant shades.
“It’s your eyes,” Renald declares, never looking away, “I’ve seen them somewhere before.”
A boom of thunder ricochets off the walls, and the sounds of the orchestra wail and whine, then drag, like that of nails engraving red trails in skin.
You don’t deny.
“Shall we convene for our meeting now?” Astarion announces upon his arrival to you both, and despite his mask never changing, it seems more malevolent than before.
You pull away from your father’s grasp.
Renald politely steps back, and yet, his eyes don’t leave you for what feels like an eternity.
“Yes,” he remarks, then turns to Astarion, “You both will follow me to the East Wing. The rest of our group have already been escorted there.”
You give a shallow nod, and Renald turns his back on you, making his way down the corridor, and you trail behind him. Astarion takes your hand in his, but you have lost the ability to speak. You can feel his stare on you, silently probing you for answers you cannot yet give.
At a set of double doors, masked butlers bow. Their flattened mouths and placid faces, devoid of color and expression. They were like the phantoms that crept through the manners’ walls.
The East Wing starved for light. Only a select few candelabra are lit, dripping wax onto the plum carpet, casting all of your elongated shadows along the sallow walls, and it is as if you are watching animals roam the halls.
The vulture.
The dove.
The wolf.
Your shadows slip over one another as you meander farther and farther, the ending seemingly never coming into sight. The sound of the ball fades into the background, the musing of guests becoming the whisperings of the dark.
When you come upon the room, two more butlers guard the entrance. They open the doors upon Renald’s approach, and inside you find a dining room. Thick velvet drapes adorn the lone window behind the head of the table. You can see the profound black of night lit up in far off ignites of enraged lightning strikes. The grumble of thunder quivers your bones. The room is lit by various candelabras, the smell of musky amber melting into the aroma of perfumed guests.
At the long, burnt mahogany table sat four others. Two of which you’d seen prior, the other two you had not.
Lord Bartholomew’s boar mask is pulled up over the bulb of his nose so that he may suck pork juice from his thumb, the remnants of a meal glistening upon his mouth.
Lady Reed, well suited with her rabbit ears, is using the pad of her finger to rub over her teeth, wiping clean any red lipstick that may stain her smile. She scrunches her nose beneath her mask in a show of disgust at your arrival. You don’t know why.
Lady Forrest is too preoccupied inspecting her many rings to notice, twirling, and adjusting them so that they may glitter more brightly under the flickers of candlelight.
Lord Avington grins oh so polite at you, yet it is tinged grim when he catches sight of Astarion holding your hand.
As Renald enters, his presence rattles the other members into subdued states, with their hands in their laps and eyes laid upon him. He walks to the head of the table, and gestures to you and Astarion to have a seat. Astarion settles down next to Lord Bartholomew, and as you go to take the seat across from him, Renald clears his throat.
You freeze, and he signals to the seat directly across from him, at the other end. You bow your head, abiding by sitting at the end. You peek at Astarion, a ripple of unease in your gaze, and his hand finds your knee under the table.
After you have sat, Renald nods, visibly pleased.
“Thank you all for attending tonight,” he warmly begins, signaling with his raised chin to his servants. You flinch when the doors to the room slam closed. A moment passes of complete silence, and then Renald starts up again, his voice laced in vitriol, “As you may already know, things have been contentious as of late in Baldur’s Gate. Our way of life is being threatened, and undermined. I have gathered you all here as part of our agreement to discuss proceedings on eliminating, as well as infiltrating, the Council of Four.”
The Council of Four?
No… he means to take power of Baldur’s Gate by killing off the four Dukes.
That includes Wyll’s father.
You feel Astarion’s hand squeeze over your knee. You look down at your empty plate, and inhale shakily as the other members break out into ramblings of their current discontent and overall emphatic agreement.
When you glance back up, you find your father’s gaze is on you.
I need to persuade him to leave this room with me. It’s the only way to ensure the execution of the marks will go as planned.
Your father speaks as if you are the only one in the room.
“Lady Brentwood, you’ve been fundamental in the orchestration of this plan. I think all of us can agree that after I’ve taken on a role in the Council of Four, you too shall follow.”
The other members’ heads turn to you. Though some seem disgruntled at the notion, none voice their disapproval. Instead, they nod and quietly acquiesce to it.
“Yes,” you respond, straightening your back, “I find that would be most reasonable.”
“Should we go into the logistics?” Renald asks, unsettlingly calm, staring straight at you.
“Should we not have a toast to commemorate our union, Lord Lockwell?” Astarion intervenes, raising his empty glass, surveying the room, then locking eyes with Renald, “After all, I’ve heard you’re something of a connoisseur yourself.”
“A drink would pair well with our discussion,” Lord Bartholomew loudly approves, and with his approval come the rest of the group’s.
“I could go for a glass,” Lady Reed announces.
“Well… I am rather parched,” Lady Forrest tacks on.
“… perhaps it would,” Lord Avington reluctantly agrees.
Renald is quiet if not for the impatient tap, tap, tap of his taloned finger on the table. After a moment, he nods.
“Of course,” he concedes, and then rises from the table. He calls out the request for his servants.
After several minutes of prolonged silence, the doors reopen. The same two servants enter with bottles uncorked. The pair present Lord and Lady Brentwood’s brand of wine to the guests. They fill each and every glass simultaneously, as the Lords and Ladies begin their nonsensical chatter.
Your father’s gaze continues to be fixated on you. After the servants leave, Renald begins to raise his glass, his taloned hand at the underside of his beaked mask, you take your chance.
“I was going to wait until after we had our drinks, but it is too urgent of a matter, Lord Lockwell,” you lie straight through your teeth, and the masked faces all swivel to you. “I need to speak with you,” you insist, pushing out your chair and standing tall. You try to suppress the quickening of your pulse, or the pins and needles of your nerves. “In private. Right now.”
A moment of tense silence ensues. No one moves.
Then, Renald readjusts his mask and sets his glass down. The wine swishes, nearly spilling onto the table.
Everyone startles at the action and follows suit, setting their glasses down accordingly.
“Lady Brentwood,” he states coolly, with a tilt of his head, “If it was that urgent of a manner, why not tell me earlier?”
You don’t hesitate.
“You would have wanted me to tell you surrounded by hordes of guests? I scarcely found the location appropriate,” you counter, crossing your arms over your chest and raising your chin.
Renald’s eyes narrow at you, and then he laughs, “Ah, then I presume you’re completely right,” he decides, and then gestures toward the door. “Let us not waste a second longer.”
He gets up from his chair, and before he goes to open the door, he squints back at the group. His whole demeanor seems to have shifted, as when he speaks, it is pointed, it is minacious.
“Remain here,” he declares, “You are not to leave this room for any reason,” and then he is knocking once on the door. It opens, a servant bowing as Renald stalks by. He doesn’t turn to see that you will follow. He knows you will.
You take a glimpse at Astarion before you leave. His eyes are wide.
This is what you planned for.
Yet something is brewing inside your gut, looming over your head.
You can’t go back now.
You follow your father out the door.
☼
You’re shuddering.
A thousand thoughts clustering inside your mind.
A singular feeling saturates them all.
Dread.
You don’t know where he is leading you to. You don’t know how Astarion will fare alone.
You know he can handle himself.
That isn’t the issue.
Your father has not muttered a word. He leads you down a labyrinth of hallways, then up a fleet of winding stairs, nevertheless, it is as if you are traversing into an abyss. The rich colors of the West Wing cannot reach here. The servants surely not allowed entry. The walls are drab, with peeling wallpaper and the dank musk of rot. The carpet is frayed. There are no vivacious ceiling paintings, no ornate chandeliers, or gilded ornaments. This place has all the symptoms of neglect.
There is hardly even any source of light.
For the first time since arriving, you wonder how he can live with all this empty space. The empty rooms. The empty hallways.
The hung portraits of past family members, the only source of companionship.
To think you share a bit of their blood too.
For not the first time in your life, you wonder if you have siblings. You don’t know. In the public sphere, Lord Lockwell was a widower. He never had children.
Yet if I am alive, were there more like me? Brothers and sisters left deserted.
Mothers killed off as though they were nothing?
Renald stops before double doors. He plucks a key from his pocket, then turns the lock. With a click, and a creeaaak, the room behind the door is revealed.
You don’t realize you’ve been holding your breath until he looks at you again.
I have to keep him preoccupied for as long as possible.
Renald gestures for you to enter, and you bow your head, slowly making your way into the room. It is enormous. A mahogany bed frame with golden claw feet. A tremendous armoire. A colossal fireplace with a jaw full of flames. Double doors that lead to a large balcony overlooking the sea.
Curtains pulled back so not to cover the magnificent long faces of windows. The night sky is alive with streaks of rain, with strands of light.
You create as much distance as you can between you both, crossing the room to stand beside the fire. The heat of its embrace is not enough to warm the chill running down your spine. Renald’s mask is cast in lacerations of shadow, in bends of cruel yellow.
He… or it… is horrifying.
Your eyes follow his arm to his hand at the door handle.
He turns the lock with a click. His same hand takes hold of his beak, his other hand unlacing and discarding his cloak to the side. He pulls the mask over and off his face, discarding it to the floor.
Your chest rises and falls.
And though his eyes were not like yours, though the creases of his forehead or the thick of his brows were not like yours, though the hook of his nose or the cut of his jaw were not like yours.
His mouth.
It was unfamiliar in its stretch of teeth, and—
“Lady Brentwood, there’s no need for masks here.”
It was unfamiliar in how it curled over words with a depraved sort of excitement, and yet—
Your fingers feel over the molded lips of your mask. You feel yourself begin to sink.
Yet the shape of his lips.
The way he smiled.
“Why are you hesitating?” Renald mocks, crossing his arms and leaning back against the door, and then he is leveling you with a glare.
It resembles my own.
“Unless you have something to hide.”
Do my eyes look like my mother’s?
“I don’t think it’s necessary,” you contend.
It can’t be that.
It can’t be—
“Then indulge me.”
Your hand quivers as you begin to unlace the knotted ribbons at the back of your head. Your hand covers the whole of the mask.
Then you let it fall to the floor.
“Step into the light,” he commands. For whatever reason. You do as you are told.
Maybe it’s because when he speaks, all anyone can do is obey.
Maybe it’s because you’ve been conditioned to listen your entire life.
Maybe it’s because you want him to know the face of who will take everything from him.
As he took everything from me.
You know he knows when his sneer drops. When his lips part. When his brows rise. When his nostrils flare.
“It can’t be,” he mutters in disbelief, the shadow of the fire flooding in the depths below his eyes, the golden hues sputtering and sprawling below his chin, “I knew I’ve seen those eyes before.”
He comes forward to you. This is wrong. You’ve made a dire mistake. But you can’t move. Shackled to the floor. You don’t know why you swallow down the scream rising in your throat.
You don’t know why you can’t run.
His arm outstretched, his taloned fingers skim over the corner of your eye. You flinch. It doesn’t cut. But it could.
“You look just like her,” he breathes, and then his taloned fingers are grazing down to the shape of your mouth.
“Except for this,” he murmurs, and you can see the tears building in his eyes. They glint against the light. His gaze meets yours. His hand falls from your face.
“How can you be alive?” He asks, hand sliding over his face, his features all wound tight, as strained as his voice, “I had a deal.”
Your chest constricts.
You can’t speak. His hand descends to his side. All that has haunted him has subsided. Only fury remains.
“What do you want?” He demands, standing straight, his towering figure looming over you, “Why have you come?”
You backpedal. The fire is burning up your spine. When you don’t immediately reply, his forbearance snaps.
“Did you hope I’d have a change of heart?” he snarls, “Did you hope I’d come to regret what I did?”
He moves forward, and you backpedal to the side of the fireplace, into the lulling dark. The light expands over his face, engulfing his features in scorched gold.
“Was it not enough you both have haunted me everywhere I go? Throughout my many days and my many nights? Standing in the tenebrous corners of the corridors? Or hovering at the ceiling of my room? Is it not enough I hear your laments every time the sea crashes against the rocks?” He fumed, inching closer to you, and your wings flatten against the wall. The feathers dig into your shoulder blades.
“Did you come to take your share of my empire?” He asks with utter disdain, and before you can blink, his large hand is at your throat, your head banging into the wall as he hoists you up by your neck, “Or did you come to kill me as some silly act of revenge?”
Your feet lose contact with the ground, your legs dangling. Your vision ebbs in and out. You try to pry at his fingers, the talons nipping through the lace at your neck.
“Or maybe…” he ponders, his head lulling to the side, tensing his grip, the air a hiss through your clenched teeth. You desperately strain to reach for the blade strapped to your thigh, underneath your dress.
He grounds out each word, “…that bastard Drake sent you here.”
Your eyes widen.
You forget you need to breathe.
His grip loosens. You plummet to the floor with a thud as you scramble for breath, wheezing as he paces and yanks at his hair.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” He demands, moving back and forth across the room as he scowls at you, “He never fulfilled his side of the deal. He’s always wanted what I had. He sent you here to make a mockery of me,” and then he pauses, his hands dropping to his sides,“….But what I don’t understand…” he curls his taloned fingers into fists, the bone piercing his skin, as he directs his attention to you, “…is why you’d work for the man that had your mother killed.”
Something inside you cradles itself and dies.
No.
Drake couldn’t have been responsible. It was always someone nameless. Someone indistinct. Easy to pick off after the deed was done. No loose ends. Certainty none of Drake’s men.
Drake sympathized with you.
Think of the people he kept in his ranks.
Would they bat an eye at murdering a mother and child?
You told him your story, and he listened as if he understood, as if he knew.
But why would he keep me alive?
But it’s simple, isn’t it? He used you. He kept you alive to use you. That’s all there is to it. A pawn in his long game. It didn’t matter that he made himself out to be the only one there for you all those years. He who sheltered you. He who gave you everything you never had. It was all his way to own you. To keep you like a pet.
And now I’m here doing his bidding.
Renald must see it written all over your face. He halts. His face broadens absurdly into a splendidly sinister smile, “Oh. Of course you did not know. How cruel. He really is a sick bastard, isn’t he?” He nudges your foot with his toe. You curl further into yourself, lost in a daze.
“And to groom you into working for him? That’s fucking diabolical,” he huffs out a laugh, it’s anything but humorous, “My own flesh and blood coming to kill me? This must be a ploy or my karma coming back to bite me,” he taunts, syllables a slur of sadistic intent, consonants coarse enough to cut.
“If you’re really my daughter, you’d be smart enough to know not to make a deal with the devil, so it’s not too late to change your mind,” He crouches down in front of you. You watch him over your knees. “We could work together. You’ll have your place in the council of four alongside me. Father and daughter, as it should be… for really, what other choice do you have? You don’t really think I’ll let you leave here alive otherwise, now do you?”
Your eyes narrow. You use the wall as leverage, slowly rising. He mirrors your movement. You feel the red ring of his fingers once wrapped around your throat, throb. You blow a few stray strands of your hair from your eyelashes, pulling off your long-sleeved gloves. Your guild ring on one hand, a fake wedding ring on another. You raise the hem of your dress, unsheathing the knife at your thigh, and shakily holding it out in front of you.
He smiles, ominously amused.
He steps back; hands held in the air.
“You don’t want to fight me,” he mutters under his breath, “We could come to an agreement.”
“Stop fucking talking,” you state, standing straight, your grip tightening, your body becoming still, “Or else I’ll cut out your tongue along with your heart.”
He eases back; persistent in keeping his hands raised in mock surrender. The flames lick over his face one more, but there is no light behind those eyes.
His mouth contorts, like it’s holding a gargle of spit. He watches all the phases of your features pass like withering seasons. His hands drop to his sides. He shrugs, then smiles something vile. A shutter passes through you.
“Oh, you precious thing. I’d love to see you try.”
You hear the thump of your heart in your ears, feel the weight of your dress and the strain in your shoulders from your sewn in wings, the boning of your corset forcing you to take shallow breaths.
It doesn’t matter.
You slide your back across the wall, knife outstretched as you grip the handle of your blade tighter, memorizing the places on him you want to bury its body into and tear through like parchment.
Pure, unadulterated rage sears up your body like the devastation of a city on fire. Thoughts and reason become ash.
You push off the wall, surging toward him at a full sprint.
You’re naturally fast, moving to slash the blade across his chest, but where you are quick and calculated, he is strong, unrelenting, moving like a bear on its hind legs.
He steps back for every slash of your knife, dodging each blow. It infuriates you. You fake a pass at his waist, and as he motions to grab your wrist you delve the blade into his pectoral muscle, just missing his heart.
It doesn’t get very deep, for then he cracks his foot into your stomach, and you fling back onto the floor with a groan, the knife spewing blood from his wound as you fall. He grimaces and then raises his foot to slam it down on your chest. You roll out of the way in the nick of time, rising into a crouch, your blade in hand.
A breath, and now he’s the one rushing forward, his left jab colliding with your right arm as you block. He swings again, this time to the right, and you dip low and slash at his stomach in a sweeping motion with your knife, tearing through the fabric of his waistcoat and slicing over his abdomen. He staggers back into the armoire, and as you go in for another strike, this time surely to pierce his heart, he knocks the knife out of your hand with the back of his wrist and goes to claw you across the face with his taloned hand.
You deflect his blow with your arm, and you recoil, taking the brunt of his boned claws as they shred through skin. Your heart seizes in your chest as the blade slides across the floor. Your brief distraction costs you dearly, however, as he lands a kick to your ribs, the explosion of pain mind numbing. You teeter back, and he reins in, sweeping your legs out from underneath you. You narrowly avoid knocking your head on the floor when you tangle your legs with his, causing him to lose his balance and fall backward.
You scramble toward the glint of the knife, but then he’s on his knees fisting the hem of your dress, dragging you to him.
“Your mother always had some fight in her,” Renald taunts, his fierce grip tearing off strips of your dress as you resist his pull, “but she never knew when to quit.”
Your stomach lurches, and you flip to your back, kicking him square in the face, the crack of his nose is sickeningly satisfying to your ears. You then crawl back on your hands toward the knife near the edge of the bed frame.
He wipes at his face, the blood surging from his nose, over his lips. It gets in his teeth as he speaks.
“You never know when to quit,” he darkly declares, then lunges after you, grappling with the knife now gripped in your fist. You wheeze through your teeth, thrashing your legs up to kick him in his side, but he doesn’t relent, taking every blow to his injured abdomen with a wince. You both squabble over the knife, and you scream in frustration as he begins to peel away your fingers.
“AGHH!”
You go for a blow below the belt with your heeled boot, but he twists his body out of the way, and the both of your bodies roll across the floor, with you landing on top, sitting right over his open wound. He howls in agony, and you straddle him, then use the whole of your weight to try and drive the knife into his eye, his hands over yours straining to push you back.
The gold of the flame gleams off the bloody blade, the blood dripping over Renald’s eyelid as he flinches. You don’t hesitate. You watch as his pupil dilates as you surge the blade through his cornea.
He lets out a blood curdling scream, hands unraveling from your grip over the blade to the wing sewn into your corset’s spine, yanking you off him with enough brute force to snap the wing clean off, and fling you over to the fireplace.
You collapse next to the burning blaze as he gathers himself, removing the blade from his eye with a howl. Lightening ignites the room in a flash of white, and then he’s on you again, the knife slashing over your shoulder, cutting deep past skin and sinew, and you shriek, your body thrumming with adrenaline, exhaustion, and white-hot pain. He collects your hands in one of his over your head, pinning them so that you can feel the lick of the fire just out of reach.
He wrenches the blade out of your shoulder, and holds it to your throat, his face a bloodied collage of indigo and purple, his ruined eye leaking blood down the cut of his jaw. The white of his other eye fractured in blood vessels, and when he opens his mouth again to speak, it’s as though he had been feasting on the insides of pomegranates, his smile stained red and stretched wide.
“I asked for her death to be quick,” Renald spits out, “I’ll be sure to make yours last.”
☾
To maintain a performance like this was excruciating. To soak words in honey and let them drip from his tongue felt like arsenic burning at the back of his throat.
She knows how to handle herself. I don’t need to worry…
But I can’t help it.
The people sitting around him bicker on and on. Discontent over the favor Renald holds for Lady Brentwood. Irritation at the lack of propriety, at the inconvenience of the two leaving so abrupt. They all pivot to him.
“How does it feel to know your wife is shacking it up with another man, Nicholas?” Lady Reed inquires with a pout, leaning across the table, her cleavage on full display, “Must be hard on you, huh?”
“Have a bit of decorum, dear,” Lady Forrest retaliates whilst inspecting her nails, “It is unbecoming.”
“Oh, and you’re the poster child of decorum, Aramita,” Lady Reed counters, emphasizing each vowel of the other woman’s name, “How’s sleazing around with the Flaming Fist? They still giving you a cut of the proceeds?”
Lady Forrest raises a brow.
“That is mere business, dear. Not everyone here needs to sleep their way to the top.”
“Speak for yourself,” Lord Bartholomew interjects, then gives a big bellied laugh, whilst jabbing Astarion with his elbow, “It’s always fun dabbling in the merchandise, if you know what I mean.”
Astarion’s jaw clenches.
Damned fool.
“Those poor women probably suffocate beneath you,” Lord Avington jokes, then swats the air with his hand, “plus. Everyone knows you’d catch a better price if you didn’t depreciate the value first.”
“Don’t you agree, Nicholas?” Lord Avington tacks on, smirking in Astarion’s direction, plainly trying to make Astarion squirm, for whatever reason.
This insufferable imbecile.
I’ll take pleasure in watching you die.
Astarion swallows down the bile bubbling up his throat. If this is his chance to convince these scoundrels to die, then he will take it.
And if they don’t drink, he’ll just have to tear them apart instead.
“Of course, of course,” Astarion nods, his tone trained into that of sardonic indifference, “But honestly, why should we waste our time squabbling over such trivial matters? We should have our toast, with or without or missing guests.”
Astarion watches as Lord Avington deflates. The other two women seem less than agreeable, shrinking in their seats.
“I agree,” Lord Bartholomew announces with another haughty laugh, “I’m not the kind of man who waits on others,” he picks up his drink, his mask still pushed back over his head, and swirls the red liquid around and around, “Don’t be so coy, Ruth. It doesn’t suit you. And Aramita, didn’t you say you were parched?”
The women perk up at this. Lady Reed sticks out her tongue in childish rebuke, then picks up her glass. Lady Forrest rolls her eyes yet also reaches for her glass.
Lord Avington, the godsdamn coward, hesitates.
“He’ll be displeased,” he argues, yet evidently his opinion holds no sway over the other’s sense of pride.
Astarion opens his mouth to urge him on, yet Lord Bartholomew intercedes.
“He can pour us another glass,” he quips, and then he’s placing his glass to his lips, and draining it down in gulps.
The women, not wanting to seem spineless, follow suit. Lady Reed seems to want to compete with Lord Bartholomew, the wine dribbling down her chin as she chugs, whilst Lady Forrest, prioritizing her modesty, sips.
It isn’t long before the poison takes effect.
Lord Bartholomew, with his revolting air of proud rebellion, and his wide mouth smile is about to spout an insult to Lord Avington but finds the words won’t reach his tongue. He tries again, yet chokes on air, futilely gasping and gasping and gasping —- his grubby fingers clawing over the thick of his throat, and then his eyes are rolling to the back of his skull. He seizes, once, twice, then over and over, the power of each convulsion is enough to cause the chair to collapse with him in it backward onto the floor. His body lurches with each contortion, his mouth spewing with foam and bile.
Lady Reed blanches, then opens her mouth to scream, but nothing but a strangled wheeze leaves her lips. The poison boiling in her blood making her body twist like a corkscrew, her head slamming onto the table with a BANG smashing the ceramic plate beneath her face. Glasses topple over on the table and onto the floor at the force of it, Renald’s lone glass once full now spilt across the table, the liquid pooling around her Lady Reed’s head and dripping onto the floor.
Lady Forrest’s shriek crackles through her like the lightning strikes outside, submerging the room in brief engulfs of white. She flings herself out from her chair in supreme horror, stumbling over her two feet in a desperate attempt to flee the scene before her. Her heeled boot catches on the corner of the table, her ankle bent out of shape as she plummets face first onto the floor with a THUD. She tries to rise from the carpet, one hand fisted on the floor, the other wrapped around her throat as she gulps down lungfuls of air in vain.
Amid the chaos, Lord Avington scrambles from his seat, his own holler consumed by a howl of cantankerous thunder. Astarion rapidly rises, his chair knocked over behind him. His irises are churning molten red, his instincts keen as he pulls off the wolf mask over his head and bares the blade of his fangs.
The gods forsaken snake think he can flee, slithering around the table, giving Astarion a chase, yet it abruptly ends when Lord Avington trips over Lady Forrest’s convulsing form.
He lands with a THUMP, and he crawls on his hands and knees like a toddler toward the door. Astarion stalks over and grabs him by his ankle, nearly snapping the bone under the force of his grip. Astarion drags the man to him despite Lord Avington’s attempt to claw himself away.
Astarion tangles his hand into the man’s hair, white knuckle fisting it, forcing the man to a kneel, as Lord Avington writhes, screaming in agony at the snapping of his strands, hands grappling with Astarion’s grasp.
Astarion jerks the man’s neck to the side, exposing the flesh of his throat, the rampant pump of his pulse, and without thought, Astarion’s fangs delve into the man’s veins. Astarion clamps down so viciously he feels he could reach the marrow, and yet he drinks in the man’s screams and the thick tar of his blood.
The taste is akin to the rats he used to feed upon.
The man judders and then jolts, his cries waning into feeble, broken pleas. Astarion drinks until the man no longer has a voice to scream, until he is devoid of color. He unceremoniously drops the man to the floor, and he lands sideways over Lady Avington with a plop.
The room becomes eerily silent once more. It is truly a brutal and gory sight, yet---
It’s over.
The blood oath is complete.
She will live.
Astarion crumbles back against the table. It takes a moment to compose himself, his body thrumming with the vigor of a feed, his mind and heart reeling with hazy relief.
Astarion takes a white linen napkin and wipes his mouth and chin, then discards it.
He steps back. Surveys the room for his mask and plucks it from the floor. He goes to the double doors.
When he opens them, there are no servants waiting to attack. Perhaps they’d been summoned elsewhere. Perhaps they thought this was according to their master’s demands and didn’t want to intervene.
Perhaps they were cravens and ran off when they heard the screams.
Regardless.
Where is she?
He fixes the mask back over his face, ready to start in the direction down the hall, yet suddenly, as if it were the whisperings of the dark, he hears it.
His mouth goes dry.
Sweat builds at his neck.
His dead heart plummets in his chest.
He’s running before he even knows why.
It’s faint.
Barely discernible.
But it’s there—
Despite the muted musings of the party in the opposite direction.
He can hear her screams.
☾☼
Maybe this is how you deserved to die.
With your own blade pried out of your hands.
With your back against the floor.
Your body broken by blood, sweat, and tears.
The tip of the knife is penetrating the boning of your corset and sinking past the skin of your stomach.
You’d managed to free your wrists from his hold, but still you are caught.
Another screech squirms out past your clenched teeth, as you thrash your feet. Renald is straddling your waist, surging the blade deeper despite your vying strength to keep the knife away. Every nerve ending is shrieking, blood pumping loudly in your veins, your hands squeezing over his, trying to resist. There are tears descending your cheeks, your jaw clicking, your nails breaking the skin of his hands, your shoulder sweltering with pain.
A bead of his sweat lands on your temple.
“It’s a shame you couldn’t have stayed away,” he seethes, “Then you wouldn’t have to die like this. I really don’t like getting my hands dirty. It’s much easier having others do the work for you, you know? In that way, I admit, Drake and I are alike.”
“You’re not a father. You’re a beast,” you hiss, livid, yet so very tired, “You deserve far worse than death.”
You strain again to remove his grip, and yet it’s useless.
He won’t budge.
Your bones are aching. You’re stuck in this perpetual, godforsaken hell…
If I die, it will all be for nothing—
The knife wedges itself further into you, and you choke out another scream, the ignite of agony coursing through you, head to toe.
Astarion—
I have to live—
Just as the thought enters your mind, there’s a jiggle at the door handle. Someone is trying to lock-pick their way inside. The sound alarms Renald, and in that split second you use his loosened grasp to your advantage, letting go of his hold on the knife with one of your hands to dig your nails into his damaged eye.
Renald roars in pain, his hands falling from the knife to grab at your wrist. You tear the knife from your stomach then plunge it into his clavicle or anywhere else you can manage, over and over, as if maddened with rage, your shoulder sprouting its sizzling pain down your vertebrae. His blood is spurting down your wrist, revealing the ring of your blood oath. All of the blood oath’s tallied initials no longer glow, besides Drake’s initials at the center.
Astarion did it.
Renald catches your wrist, taking sight of the yellow bloom, but as he does, the door swings open, and though you can’t see Astarion enter, you know it’s him.
Astarion does not waste time, pouncing onto Renald’s back, his wolf mask shoved up over his white curls, his fangs barred as he sinks his teeth into Renald’s throat. His eyes are the hells unbound, and he goes into a frenzy, not merely drinking, no, he is latched onto Renald’s neck with such visceral viscous force that he’s tearing the flesh like slabs of meat, blood splurging from Renald’s throat before going in for more.
Renald grapples at Astarion, yanking him by the back of his cloak and hurling him across the room.
Astarion’s body hits the floor with a thud. Yet he leverages himself up again into a fighting stance, your father’s blood pouring from his mouth and jaw. He spits out a piece of the man’s flesh, then yields his dagger, glancing at you.
An infinite range of emotions are conveyed in that look.
Ire, panic, worry, resolve.
“Playing with parasites,” Renald reprimands while stumbling into a stand that resembles a drunken stupor, your knife stuck in his shoulder, the flesh of one side of his neck gone. He swivels his attention from Astarion, and then to you, “you are such a disappointment.”
You feel the wrath rippling through you, crackling up your shoulders into your fists. You try to rise, but crumble back onto the floor with a wince.
Everything fucking hurts.
In an out— you see visions of the past, the present.
The collision of Renald’s taloned fist into Astarion’s side. The slash of Astarion’s blade into Renald’s arm. Their all-out brawl is ferocious as they clash. You focus on crawling back toward the wall, leveraging yourself into a hunched over stand. Your vision is spinning.
You watch in terror as Renald throws Astarion across the room, Astarion crashing into the mahogany armoire, causing it to topple over. He rolls off the top of it to the floor, then gets back up, the blood at his temple streaming down his cheek.
Astarion’s gaze meets yours from across the room, his eyes flickering to the steel fire poker hanging on its hook next to the fireplace. You slide back against the wall, then unhook it from its place and wield it in your palm.
“Let’s spill some blood,” he remarks with a sardonic smile, and with it Renald is charging at him, his back completely exposed to you.
Red static sizzles up your spine, casts its sheen over your eyes. Rage engulfs your body. You dash forward at the same time, using all that is left inside you to jam the fire poker through Renald’s back and out through his chest, impaling him straight through the heart.
Renald wails, buckling to his knees. Astarion has side-stepped him, and for good measure, delves his own blade into the unmarred side of Renald’s throat, and then the man is falling onto his back on the ground with a THUD.
Your father gurgles on his blood, the fabric of his torn clothes devoured in a flood of red, blood hemorrhaging through his fingers as they grip at the twisted tip of steel protruding from his heart. You watch, as for whoever comes to find his body should know the truth about him.
His heart was nothing but a beating piece of gore.
But then, the animalistic adrenaline and the rampant rage keeping you upright leaves you, and you teeter, your legs giving out as you crumble against the end of the bed frame, head lulling to the side.
And you are… tired.
You are so tired.
Shivering.
Everywhere.
Underneath your skin.
Behind the whites of your eyes.
You are weaving in and out, slurring into the scenery of the room.
You see your father’s limp form. He, once a vulture, once a gruesome beast now… just a quiet, mouth agape, corpse.
You see Astarion, how he is splattered and drenched in so, so much blood….
“Please,” you hear him plead, the hushes and muses of consciousness making it hard to discern, “Please. Darling, —up, we need— leave.”
You feel as though you are floating to the ceiling, looking down at yourself, watching in vague anticipation. Astarion is frantically attempting to tear scraps of fabric from your dress to wrap around your wounds to stop the bleeding. He knots them in place.
“Come— to me, please., I’m going to— out of here.”
You register his tone, his inflection, the twitching of his lips. The wilting of his words. Desperate. But you are too far away— unfamiliar.
It’s happening.
Scarlet wet fingers caress the apples of your cheeks, and he tries to steady your line of sight, but you are looking right through him. His voice is sewn with feverish tremors. His brows furrowed, his lashes stuck together in clumps of unshed tears.
“—Can’t lose you. — won’t lose you. I need you. Please, —darling. My everything. You — to focus on me. Return to me.”
It’s over.
The corpse of your will— now decaying in the corner. You should be relieved, should snap out of it, but your throat swells from where hands clamped it shut, your body blistering blue in all the places cut into and broken. Your mind lingers in the places of memory not meant to be dredged up.
You must have said those words aloud, because Astarion is answering back, as stubborn as can be, and oh, how you love him…
“It is NOT over, you hear me?!”
You let him hoist you up, wondering numbly when the rain had stopped.
“We need to escape from the balcony, then get to the street,” Astarion reasons, and though it sounds simple, you know it won’t be. He takes your hand, careful of the makeshift bandage wrapped around it, and crosses the room, stepping over Renald’s body and unlocking and opening the balcony doors.
The sky is infinite. There are so many stars.
The brightest one beckons you to him, as he surveys how you’ll work your way to the ground below. Despite the height, Astarion swallows down any residual fear. He won’t let you fall. He won’t let you die.
It’s slippery. It’s dark. But he will find a way.
“I need to know you can do this,” he begs, his body quivering, his voice breaking, “tell me right now. Can you do this?”
Though you are in a haze, and everything in your body is throbbing, you nod.
He nods back at you, and you can see the tears in his eyes from the moonlight illuminating his face.
You both silently begin to scale the wall. It is an arduous process, each slip of your foot and strain of your shoulder grueling. But you force yourself through it, your muscle memory of ebbing brick and finding paths taking over. Astarion won’t stop looking back your way, paranoid.
When you reach the bottom and need to traverse around the west end of the manor to the stable yard, your pace becomes slower, and slower, like that of a crawl. You don’t recall when Astarion had picked you up in his arms. When he carried you to the carriage.
You don’t recall the threat of a coachman being eaten alive if he didn’t take both of you out of there right fucking now.
You don’t recall the broken wheel, or Astarion’s wrath, or the dead man left with his horses in the outskirts of the Upper City streets.
You don’t recall most of anything. All you know is the pavement beneath you, that you’re propped up against a wall in an alleyway. Astarion’s panting heavy as he cannot carry you any further, and there is nowhere left to go, as the morning is coming all too soon.
“Astarion, use it,” you say, and your voice wobbles with the effort it takes to speak, and you’ve broken out into a fever, “use the sending stone.”
You don’t have to ask twice, as then he is rifling through the inner pocket of his waistcoat, gripping the sending stone in his fist, and sending his internal plea.
The sun is rising.
He has to leave or else he will die.
“Astarion,” you murmur, fingers clamped down on your wound at your stomach. It is oozing through the bandages. “You need to go.”
“I can’t leave you,” he replies, erratic, hysterical, not even registering these were some of the first words you’ve said to him since you were in Renald’s room, “I can’t leave you here to die.”
“If you don’t go now, you could die,” you argue, and he shakes his head, refusing, and you hear the despair and torment wringing out from his voice.
“No! I… I won’t leave you… I can’t leave you.”
“Astarion,” you plead, “please do this for me. It’ll be alright.”
And then he is sobbing, falling apart, hands sliding over his face.
“What if he doesn’t send anyone?”
“He will,” though you aren’t entirely sure, and it hurts to lie to him, you must, “he always does.”
“I…”
The sun is slowly making its way over the horizon.
“Astarion, please listen to me,” you implore, “please go. It’ll be okay.”
You’ve never seen him so miserable. It devastates you.
“I… I love you,” he says, hesitating still, yet you insist.
“I love you. More than anything, everything. Now go.”
And then Astarion turns and runs, and you settle into the dawn, mind set adrift, accepting this will be the end.
☼
You wake up in an unfamiliar room, on an unfamiliar bed.
Your head feels like shifting sand. Your bones are heavy and your limbs stiff.
You are slow to rise into a sitting position, expecting your shoulder and stomach to ripple to life with agony, yet no pain comes. You glance down and find the stab wound in your stomach has gone, and that you are dressed in a different set of clothes.
You feel over your shoulder. Where there once was tattered flesh is stitched closed, now miraculously healed.
Regardless, the phantom ache of its memory persists.
The recollections follow. The ball. The fight. Being cut into. Astarion. The carriage—
Astarion.
You swing your legs over the edge of the bed. Your heartbeat picking up its pace, its uptick beats like that of his name, pounding repeatedly.
Astarion.
Astarion.
You asked him to leave you. Had he managed to find shelter from the sun?
He had to.
You move toward the black door, and when you open it, there is someone standing right outside.
A doorman you know all too well.
“Ms. Dove,” Ambrose remarks, clearly startled, yet then composes himself, “I’m relieved to see you’re awake.”
Relief floods your body… that and... unease.
Drake had sent someone to save you, and though you’d completed your blood oath, you’d butchered what Drake wanted as well.
“Yes… for how long was I out?” you murmur in reply.
Ambrose’s voice drops to a whisper, “A few days. Your injuries were quite dire, Ms. Dove.”
A few days?!
Panic must show on your face, as Ambrose’s expression softens into one of sympathy, yet the way he speaks remains so matter-of-factly, “Things are precarious, Ms. Dove. The murder of Lord Lockwell has caused quite a storm. Not to mention the other four…”
You give a timorous inhale. You know the kind of trouble you are in.
“I see…”
“Ahem,” Ambrose clears his throat, and then straightens, “nevertheless, you should see master Kane. He’s in his study.”
You give a curt nod.
Prolonging the inevitable would be pointless.
“Alright,” you acquiesce, and then traverse the spiral of stairs.
When you finally make it to Drake’s study, it takes a moment before you enter the room. It isn’t fear, or revulsion.
It’s everything else in between.
This man. Who came into your life with the promise of saving you from your circumstances. Who you’ve known for over a decade. Who you’ve committed countless atrocities with. Who has always been there, a voice of ridicule, a voice of reason, a voice of comfort. Who gave you a new life. Who saved you from bleeding out even if it came of no benefit to him.
Who praised you. Who made you feel seen. Who made you feel powerful. Who taught you how to fight. How to kill.
Who’d taken your mother from you. Who’d ultimately used you. Who predetermined your path as if you lacked freewill.
Who played God.
Behind the door, his voice carries.
Always smooth like whiskey. Always calm. Always like that of a lulling fire in a frigid home.
“Come inside, Dove.”
When you open the door, you find him where he usually stands. Before the fire. Back facing you. Sipping from his glass.
“You’re awake,” he says, not turning back to you.
You don’t rush in. You don’t go for blood. You are cautious. Slow. You don’t know how to act.
“You… came to my aid,” you query, uncertainty laden in your voice.
“Yes…” he answers, and it’s in the way he says it… as though he doesn’t understand it himself.
Drake sets the glass down on his desk. Your eyes follow the movement and then you spot a scroll. It isn’t like anything you’ve ever seen before.
Your heart is in your throat.
He sighs. Clasps his hands behind his back.
“You succeeded,” he remarks.
“To an extent…” you respond.
Though you could reach out and grab the scroll, you don’t. You are anchored to the ground.
“I knew the risk I took having you enter his manor,” Drake starts, staring straight into the licks of flame, “I confess I felt the deepest of satisfactions at the description of how he was found, considering…” He trails off, then half turns to you, his intonation murky, and somber, “…the harm that befell you.”
“Why did you save me?” you implore, “you could have left me to die. Kept the scroll. All your problems gone.”
“You’re not a problem,” he snaps at you, and you flinch back, stunned. It must disconcert him as well, because then he’s dragging a hand over his beard. You note how it looked unkept, not meticulously trimmed. You note the dark circles under his eyes, the way his hair stood in places where it would typically be slicked back.
He looked as if he hadn’t slept in days.
Your eyes widen, taking it all in. You’d never seen him like this before. Never.
“It would have been easier… yes,” he trails on, his gray eyes overcast skies, “but then I’d lose you.”
You falter. You don’t want to misconstrue what he says, this man made from riddles and deceit. Yet every word carries the lilt of sincerity, the pang of truth.
He looks down at his drink, his head slightly bowed, as he mutters, “Though I have a feeling that by the end of this conversation, I’ll be losing you regardless.”
When you respond, it is so quiet it is drowned out by the crackle of firewood.
“You say that like you care for me.”
He smiles that half smile that doesn’t fit his face. It’s broken.
“Yes.”
You flinch.
Your eyes prickle with tears.
“He told me you had my mother killed,” you utter, as your fingers curl into fists, your nails creating crescent moons in your palm. “That you were… supposed to kill me.”
He glances down.
His smile slowly fades.
“Yes.”
You swallow. You didn’t think he’d admit to it so… simply. Your heart is crumpling in your chest.
“Why didn’t you?”
“I may be a bastard,” he answers, “but I’m not someone who murders children.”
You scoff. Shake your head. You don’t accept this as his answer. Won’t.
“You used me,” you retort, “That is why you insisted upon keeping me alive. Why I’m here. Even now.”
He doesn’t immediately respond, instead, picking up his glass and taking a long drink. You watch, all pent up with emotion you can’t quite elucidate.
“It started off that way, yes,” he admits, and you bite your lip to keep from crying. He glances in your direction, then away. “But I… have grown fond of you. I’m not sure when, not sure how. But plans changed. You were no longer a pawn… you were like a….”
“Pet?” You interject, and he shakes his head.
“A daughter,” he corrects.
The word sickens you. You want to sink into the floor. You want to turn and run.
“Trust me, the notion confounded me as well… disturbed me even,” he clarifies, “But then I grew to like the idea. Having someone to leave everything to when I die. To continue my legacy. To create her own.”
“They’ll be looking for me,” you say, “I can’t stay in the city.”
“Many people wanted him dead, you know,” he reasons, “you won’t be the only suspect.”
“Will they look into you?” you inquire.
“My associations with Renald are nonexistent in the social realm. No one knows of it. To anyone else, we have no affiliation,” he replies.
“What of Lady Cordelian? How can you be so sure she won’t say anything?” you ask, and he smiles again. It doesn’t reach his eyes. It never does.
“I have my means of keeping her quiet.”
You exhale, briefly letting your eyes fall closed.
“You can’t be suggesting I stay here,” you say.
“No. I’m certain you’d never agree to it, even if I did suggest it. You have a vampire to return to…” He answers, conflicted, resting his hand on the desk, “…he sounded so… remarkably distraught when he sent me that message…”
“Does this mean…” you bite your cheek. “You’ll let me go?”
Drake doesn’t say anything. He takes the glass and sips from it again until it’s gone. A lull of silence passes before he mutters.
“Is it my blessing that you want?”
You glance down. There on your finger you still have it on. Your guild ring.
You slip it off. You place it atop the desk he leans against, then step back.
“I don’t need your blessing,” you murmur.
He’s quiet once more. He picks up the ring. Mulls over it. His hand drags over his beard.
He looks at you, then moves so that he stands before you. He reaches out and takes your hand, peeling open your fingers. He places the ring onto your palm.
“You stay here, and you can have everything,” Drake begins, “The money, the control, the power. If things keep going according to plan, one day you too can rule the Upper City. You can be so much more than what you were. It’s what you’ve worked hard for. What you’ve endeavored to obtain. You can be everything I always envisioned you to be.”
You don’t respond.
Pondering this.
He places his hand over yours, closing your fingers over the ring.
“Without you, we never would have come this far. The city knows our domain. Our greatest hindrance is dead. All you need to do is accept your place in this.”
You bite your cheek. You can’t succumb to his will anymore. You don’t have to. You have a choice.
“I can’t. I won’t anymore,” you reply.
His hand tightens over yours.
“Listen to me,” he orders, and then says your real name, and you meet his stare.
Drake’s baritone trembles you to the bone, how it felt as though he swam in the dark of your wounds, “You choose him, and he will leave you. He can live for eternities, little dove. He will get over the novelty of you. Don’t you see why he was desperate? It’s not because he loves you, it’s because of this,” He reaches back for the scroll on his desk, holds it up in a fist, “after you give him what he wants, he won’t stay. You know this.”
He takes a long inhale.
“This,” he gestures to the room, “This is what remains. I will be here, always, and this. What we have built. This will be here, waiting for your return.”
You tear your hand away, the ring still in your grasp.
“Drake,” you say, before taking a breath, forcing yourself to keep holding back your tears, “I thought you saved me. I thought you’d given me freedom.”
You reach for his hand, and he lets you take it in yours. You place the ring in his grasp, then curl his fingers over the ring.
“If you ever cared for me,” you susurrate, then let your hand fall away from his, “like you claim to, you’d… you’d let me go…”
It hangs in the air, like phantom shadows that listen, that pass by overhead, taking refuge beneath his eyes, bawled in his fists.
But you refuse to inherit his sins.
He exhales. He puts the ring in his pocket, then places the scroll in your hand. You take it from him with a quivering touch.
He turns from you. Walks to stand in front of the fire again.
You stay there. Not moving. Not knowing how to.
“Leave,” Drake says, quiet. “…before I change my mind.”
You nod, a lone tear dripping down your cheek. You wipe it away with the back of your knuckles. You go to the door, and before you are about to close it behind you, you pause.
“…Goodbye Drake.”
When the door is shut, and you have gone, you can’t hear him reply.
“Until we meet again, little dove…”
☾☼
You run home.
Inside of you there are fields of lush green. The swashes of sashaying sage splaying itself over hillsides. The lilies with their yellow sequin buds and white pedal trim. You inhale the fragrance of sweet solace.
Then wipe at your whimpering face with weary palms.
You’re leaping from one building to the next, the crisp night air alive in your lungs. You run faster, jump farther than you ever have in your whole life. You are chasing the merciful moon’s gaze, so heavy and full, through the mist. The scroll tied to your waist. The cold nipping at your heels.
His name is on your tongue. It’s sung in every beat of your heart. Like the mourning doves you’d spent your mornings listening to. A reminder of a new day. A new dawn.
You run until it hurts. Until you come across the only place you can imagine him waiting at. The dilapidated state of the entrance and the dark of the night, doing nothing to dissuade you from climbing up the side of the building, hand over foot.
When you enter through the second-floor window, you sprint up the stairs, your pulse so loud you can hardly make out any other sound. You scour the rooms but find nothing. No one.
Beads of sweat are forming at your brow, doubt obscuring reason, but then you turn, and there. The hatch leading to the rooftop is left open.
You bolt up the stairs.
There he is. Sat on the floor, head in his hands, too consumed with emotion to even notice you.
My love.
My orchid.
My everything.
“Astarion?” You breathe, and as soon as his name leaves your lips, he’s dropping his hands and meeting your gaze with a broken inhale.
A light breeze carries the scent of the sea, and Astarion says your name with wide eyes. It’s heavy, like it takes all his strength to say it.
He’s rising to his feet. You slowly approach each other, as if encased in a dream.
When his hands find your face, he breathes, and then his arms are encompassing you, holding you as though you are the most cherished thing that exists, and for him, it’s true.
“Oh gods,” he says, and there are tears in his voice, and he’s trembling all over, but so are you, “I went back, and you weren’t there— I had to hope they’d saved you—” he holds you tighter, fighting back tears but they descend his cheeks. You feel the tears hit the top of your head. The relief that is overflowing him is pouring into you, “—but then the days passed and I— I didn’t know if you’d—”
“It’s okay,” you say quietly, your arms wrapped around him too as you squeeze him back in reassurance, “I’m okay. I’m here now.”
You hold each other for what feels like forever. You never want it to end. You never want to know a life without him embracing you, pressing his lips to the top of your head, murmuring nonsensical ramblings of elation into your hair.
When Astarion does pull back from you, he asks, “What happened? Did Drake do anything to you?”
“No. Actually he…” you bite your lip and unravel yourself from Astarion, “…he let me leave.”
Astarion’s bites the inside of his cheek.
You untie the scroll from the loop at your waist. You hold out the scroll for Astarion to take.
“And he gave me this.”
Astarion’s eyes broaden, his brows rising into his white curls. “Is it…”
Seeing as he won’t take it from you, you put it in his hands. His fingers curl over it.
“Yes. The blood oath is complete,” you say, then a ghost of a smile lingers on your lips, “you can make your wish.”
As you say it, you can’t help but be a touch anxious about what that wish could be. He hadn’t told you outright. Even though you’d had the idea of him being able to walk beneath the sun, that didn’t mean he shared the same desire.
Nevertheless. Whatever he chose. It was his choice, and his alone.
“Astarion I…” you begin, and his gaze follows as you glance away, toward the horizon, then down at the ground. “I will have to leave the city,” you say, “because of what occurred with my father… and without the protection of Drake, it’s not safe for me to remain here anymore.”
“Alright,” he replies, taking your hand in one of his, “then where will we go?”
We.
“You don’t…” you falter and fidget, but force yourself to say it, “You don’t have to leave with me. You can do anything, and go anywhere, you choose.”
You feel the weight of his stare. He sets aside the scroll on the floor, then caresses both your cheeks in his palms, angling your head up to look at him.
“Is it so hard for you to understand that I choose you? Wherever, or whenever, or for whatever reason,” he soothes, and you let out a little sigh. A tear escapes your eye. His thumb chases it away.
“Aren’t you going to make your wish?” You question, and his brows furrow as he frowns. “Are you ready?”
“Yes,” he affirms, then reluctantly lets his hands fall from your face. He leans down and takes the scroll in his hand. He undoes the knot, then unravels it.
Its words are written in a cipher; however, the letters unscramble upon the page for any eyes that set upon it, allowing Astarion to read it out loud.
As he reads, the words disassemble from the page, and he internally makes his wish.
You watch as the scroll evaporates into golden ribbons and streams of mist. Its envelopes Astarion, blooming though his body, his skin radiant like shards of diamonds reflecting every star woven into the fabric of night.
When his feet touch the ground, his hand is cast over his chest. His eyes are closed.
“What…” you remark, breathless, reaching out to touch him. Your fingers enclose over his wrist, and there, you feel the faintest… pulse.
“Astarion,” you say awash with astonishment, and when your gaze falls upon his face, your breath catches in your lungs.
His skin is flush, the roses of his eyes now blooming in the apples of his cheeks.
His chest rises and falls.
“What did you wish for?” You ask with a shaky voice, as your hand reaches out to enclose his cheek.
It’s warm.
“To be cured,” he utters, and you jerk your hand away. Your mouth agape.
Astarion smiles weakly, hand going over his chest, as he breathes in deep.
“I can feel it beating…” he utters in twinkles of disbelief, and he can’t stop gazing at you, “I can see myself reflected in your eyes…”
Fresh tears spring to his eyes, and he swipes them away, laughing quietly.
Your hand settles over the place of his heart. You can feel it thumping under your hand.
“It worked…” you trail off, and then his hand is enclosing yours, keeping it to his chest.
The sun is rising.
But he doesn’t need to cower, nor does he need to hide.
He doesn’t need to fear.
He doesn’t need to be a slave to his thirst.
The pink rim of the sun is nestling into your skin, tangerine warmth coating your tongues. The flavor of it is intoxicating, vivid, and alive. The orange light is burning bright in your lungs, like a star rising inside you.
“I’m free,” he remarks, and the tears stream down his cheeks, and when he swoops you in his arms, twirling you around, you feel his joy like you have known his pain.
You don’t know if you’ve ever felt like this. If you’ll ever feel like this again. You think you will. You have hope you will, as with him here, every day is like soaring across the sky and sea.
“Yes,” you reply, kissing his cheek, as the honeyed sun reveals more of her sweet face, and illuminates your bodies in a peachy, yellow glow.
“We are.”
A/N: I want to thank you for reading this story. I know this is just… fanfiction. But I poured my heart and soul into this. I wanted to cover themes of choice, forgiveness, freedom, etc. I tried to even be symbolic with names, animals, colors, etc., But regardless. I hope you enjoyed following me on this journey. I’ve always wanted to write novels, and this is the closest I’ve come. Maybe one day :). It would mean a lot to me if you left a comment to tell me your thoughts, or a heart, but if not, I appreciate you regardless.
Thank you.
Until next time.
This was so fucking beautiful! I loved every moment was captivated by quite literally every damn word. Quite possibly my favorite story I’ve read!!! 🖤🖤🖤
The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: Explicit
WC for part 7 - 9k, total - 59k+
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, explicit sex, explicit consent, angst, in love & its a disaster, additional tags posted on ao3
The glow of lanterns sways in the haze of misty moonlight. The moon dew glitters upon the water, the swooshing ocean knocking against the wooden beams upholding the dock. The sea air is crisp, lingering in each inhale, sticking to the skin. The anchored ship before you, immense in size and poise, emits rickety creaks as hired hands move up and down the boarding ramp. The men transfer barrels of the couple’s delectable brand of wine from the ship onto the harbor.
As you approach, one of the many men depart from the group, his wispy white beard and thick unruly brows pinching at the sight of your arrival.
His voice, contorted by the snarl of his mouth, rumbles out, his temperament surely best suited for unwasted time.
“Ya’ got business ‘ere?” He remarks, eyeing you and Astarion like the bits of chewing tobacco at the bottom of a spittoon.
You know him.
In fact, you know every man working here under the veneer of hired help. You pull back the hood of your cloak and tilt your head thus the light of the lantern can sweep over the contours of your face.
No disguise. No borrowed skin.
Instantly, his eyes widen, and his head bows.
“Beg your pard’n, Dove,” Garlen hurriedly grovels, the grumble of his tone now trained into submission.
Your place in Drake’s world comes with its perks.
“Is the couple on board?” You inquire, pulling the hood back to its former place.
Garlen doesn’t respond, too distracted by the appearance of your unanticipated acquaintance. You watch him scrutinize the way Astarion stands behind you — like a shadow with a sadistic smirk.
“Garlen,” you try again, and he drags a hand over his beard. Whatever questions he may have, they die right then and there on his lips as he diverts his attention back to you.
Don’t ask.
“They’re both in their cab’n, putt’n away the rest of their things,” he says, and the side of his lips tick up beneath the whiskers of his beard, “we’ll keep watch, let ya’ do the dealin’, and then take care of the bodies.”
You give him your confirmation in a curt nod, and that’s all he needs before striding back to his fellow men. They converse under cupped palms.
You turn to Astarion. He tilts his head. You mutely mull over what you want to ask for a moment, then lean in close. The creaking of the dock conceals your words from others.
“Do you want to feed on them tonight?”
You lean back. He glances away.
He’s hungry.
You know this, have known this. Yet, for some reason, despite the somewhat successful escapade of your wrist in his mouth, he hadn’t asked to do it again.
He wouldn’t feed on you.
You don’t know if it’s a testament to his repentance in… hurting you, or if it’s his unwillingness to cross that line again, or if it’s a secret third thing he hadn’t yet stated.
Ever since Theo, things had been different.
He’d been different.
That morning you came home. He had embraced you, held you. It was gentle, as all the weeks to follow would be. It was tender, it was patient, it was… remorseful.
From you, from him. Condolences came in simple gestures, a graze of his knuckles over the plush of your lips, the tickle of your fingernails sliding through his strands, the pull of his arms encompassing you throughout the day, whether to kiss your hair or to… feel you close to him.
But all through out, he began to show worsening symptoms of hunger.
You hadn’t pushed, of course. A shy suggestion, a hinting when his lips found the slope of your shoulder. But each time he’d brush it off, a hmmm this, a don’t worry yourself dizzy, my darling that, or even an offhanded catching prey in the city is tedious.
He persisted in dismissing it.
Despite the fatigue of his features. The pallid apples of his cheeks.
You don’t pry. Don’t insist. Though… you can’t help but want to ensure he’s been eating enough.
“I’m not entirely sure, love,” Astarion remarks with a half grin, the moniker making your heart squeeze, “their type tends to taste bitter.”
You bite your cheek. You don’t question him. He notices, and his slight smile dips.
You turn toward the ship, sauntering forward to cross the ramp. You pass by familiar faces, and at the sight of you they scurry to the side, prompt in making space. Stares loiter on Astarion, and you shrug it off, your senses stippling into a heightened state, attuned to the sound of two voices ringing out past the locked cabin door.
“You needn’t beg,” Astarion smirks, kneeling to picklock the door.
“I needn’t say a word,” You quip lightly, crossing your arms, “you know I’m as good as you are at it.”
Click. The door unlocks. The voices inside must not notice, as they are rising in octaves, their heated discussion verging on an argument.
He stands up again, quirking a brow at you.
“Your over confidence is adorable,” he remarks, and you shake your head at him, the ghost of a smile playing on your lips.
A moment passes, and your mood shifts. Astarion can see it there, a glint behind your stare, a twinge of your mouth. You’re settling into somberness.
“You ready?” He asks, and you nod. Before you open the door, you close your eyes.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Everything else falls away. Your body becomes what it must. Your mind melts into the mist.
Inhale.
Exhale.
You open the door.
☾☼
You’ve memorized the way people of their kind move. Smug like sin, with their slender legs and slippery fingers, with their precise and polite steps that fall like long lashes over cheeks.
Blink, blink, blink—
And they’ve moved through you.
You’d been told that Blaire Brentwood was of a different breed— or rather, a different brand. She moves like the swish of red wine she specializes in, full bodied, and bold. Fluid hips, shoulders back and head held high, and a smile that snagged a bit on her dry wit. Her husband, Nicholas, was stated as having a tempestuous temper, and a heavy pour, yet he softened at the sight of his wife. It’s these plain descriptors that define your victims, that define how you must partake in the act of usurping their identities. It is these descriptors that plague you, as you delve your blade into Blaire’s slender neck, as you watch Astarion’s hand smother Nicholas’s screams.
You hold her against your body, feel her writhe as the blood gurgles into the silk of her blouse. You make it as quick as you can manage, and within an instant her limp form is crumpling onto the floor.
Her hair cascades over her face, strands stuck to the wet of her neck, to the blank of her stare. You cringe; your heart being sieved inside your chest with shame.
You take a shaky breath, counting internally to get rid of the panic gnawing at your mind. Your slurring gaze steadies on Astarion and Nicholas again, only to widen in the realization that Astarion hadn’t yet killed the man.
“What are you doing?” You utter, your throat dry. The whites of Nicholas’s eyes are consumed by red webs, as he squirms immobilized against Astarion. Yet Astarion doesn’t release him, nor does he plunge his knife or his teeth into Nicholas’s throat. Astarion’s hand, the one clamped over Nicholas’s lips, clenches and unclenches, nails digging into the pliable flesh of Nicholas’s cheeks. The carmine of Astarion’s irises are all but swallowed by the black of his pupils.
You say his name, but then his eyes close tight, his mouth opening, closing, then partially opening again.
Muffled pleas spew out against the muzzle of Astarion’s palm. But, still, minutes drag on, torturously slow, morbidly aching, the man weeping and wheezing. Astarion’s countenance is like that of cracked marble, splintering into a contortion of unravelling and restraint.
More time ticks by. It is godsdamn agony. You don’t know why he is waiting, or why he is persisting in making this last.
“Astarion,” you say, treading the ice, as you begin to tip toe near to the two. You can’t take him prolonging this man’s suffering – never mind the reason.
“Don’t get close,” Astarion warns through clenched teeth, his jaw clicking, eyes still squeezed shut, his tone like gravel, gargled out and broken, “Don’t get close to me.”
Your breath shudders in your lungs, and you freeze.
“Okay,” you acquiesce, stepping back, and Astarion’s eyes blink open to make sure that you do in fact stay the hells away.
Your face wrenches at the miserable sight of Nicholas, yet you can’t bring yourself avert your gaze.
Astarion’s hand unclamps from Nicholas’s mouth. Nicholas swallows up gulps of air in order to screech. Astarion plucks his knife from his hip, about to delve it into the man’s throat – yet his grip quivers. It quakes.
Then the blade slips from his fingers, plummets to the floor.
His palm slams back down over Nicholas’s mouth, and as if possessed, Astarion surges forward, mouth ajar, fangs glinting under the candlelight, severe and sharp. The grace of his once sly demeanor becomes the ravages of depravity, he like that of a crushing crescendo, a thousand thorn pricks, a blindingly brilliant lightning strike. He digs his fangs into Nicholas’s throat, his adam’s apple bobbing as he drinks, and he drinks, and he drinks until the man is devoid of color, sound, a soul.
As he finally unlatches from his victim’s throat, his hold concludes. Nicholas’s corpse collapses to the ground.
When Astarion opens his eyes again, they’ve regained the depth of their red. His chest rises high and falls low. He’s… almost flush with a faint whisper of pink in his cheeks, the previous sunken state of his cheeks full like pouring wine into an empty vase. He stands up straighter, and stronger. Alert. Awake.
“Why did you make him wait?” You mutter, body and mind converging into one, the drown of guilt engulfing you. Your eyes drop to the bodies on the floor. Truthfully, you don’t know if these people were bad people, if they deserved their deaths. Even if they were supposedly corrupt, even if they were regarded by some as vapid, or vile…
He lived long enough to see his wife dead at his feet.
Astarion swipes over the blood dripping down his chin. His jaw is drenched in it. He doesn’t reply. He’s staring off somewhere over your shoulder.
“Astarion.” You demand an answer, yet when his gaze meets yours, you cease to speak.
His eyes are desolate.
“I tried to fight it,” he utters, nearly delirious, both blood drunk and reeling.
His fingers are trembling as he smears the scarlet of his mouth onto the back of his sleeve.
“… I—” you begin, but don’t know what to say.
“I’m sorry,” he interrupts, gaze affixed to you. His brow furrows, his frown deepening like a severed wound. “I… really do have no control.”
It registers to you then his meaning – no control over feeding, no control over the pull of his insatiable thirst, his eternal curse dictating his body regardless of his will.
“You can’t resist that,” you scold, concern curtailing your prior anger, “Astarion, it will kill you if you don’t eat.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” He snarks back with an indignant scowl, and you flinch. As soon as you do, he glances away, not able to stand the sight of it, his fingers curling into a fist.
“Then why—” you start, but he cuts you off.
“You know what it’s like, don’t you?” He states directly to you, pained, punctuating each word with his hands, “to have your body do something against your will, despite everything else in you refusing.”
You don’t respond.
The hollow air carries your answer.
Yes.
“I know you do,” he confirms, and then sighs, the foul scent of the dead pungent and profuse, consuming the confined space of the cabin. “Even if I know I don’t want to hurt you, my body works against me. Even if I choose not to kill anymore — at least — not like this, it doesn’t matter, because that is what I am designed to do. I have no choice.” His cadence teeters on this admission, this aggravation that builds and builds but has nowhere to go besides festering inside him like a virus.
“When you get the scroll,” you murmur in response, as the tide lulls the ship back and forth, “You will have a choice.”
There is a suggestion underlying those words. He glances away.
He mutters, feeble, his features fragmented.
“If I am not the beast, then what am I?”
It saturates the air like the blood soaks the rug at your feet.
“If I am not the whore, then what am I?” You rely, and his gaze swivels back to you. He opens his mouth to retaliate, to fiercely insist against the title you’ve given yourself, yet you don’t let him.
“Astarion. Tell me,” you continue, “was I made to be what I’ve done? Were you? Don’t we get to decide?”
He opens and closes his mouth. Then weakly denies, as though thoroughly defeated, “It’s different for you, love.”
There’s a knock at the door.
Garlen.
Even though everything in you is screaming to convince him otherwise, your allotted time is over, and the discussion must end.
Astarion pulls his hood over his head, uses the slick of blood on his index finger and thumb to vanquish the flickering candlelight. You open the door.
After conversing with Garlen, the two of you leave, the carnage of the evening delt with as though it never occurred in the first place. When you get back to your safehouse, Astarion washes himself in silence, and you offer him space. Despite the violence of earlier being over, you know that the night is still young.
☾☼
Checking into the couple’s luxurious inn is all too easy. You both look the part, dressed head to toe in the finest of fabrics, furs, and the gaudiest of jewels. You both speak the part, too, with a lilt of cavalier, a hand swish of dismissal, a tongue tsk of impatience. No one even bothers asking why you’re arriving this late at night. As soon as they see your attire, or the glitters of your gold across the counter, they beckon forward, bathing you both in pleasantry and flattery, a “Welcome to Baldur’s Gate! I hear it is your first time visiting from overseas,” and a “Your wine is legendary here, it’s such an honor to have you stay with us.”
They show you to your room, to where they have already placed your luggage – transferred here by wagon — heated your bath, prepared ample refreshments, and freshly made cuisine.
To see how the other side of Baldur’s Gate lives… it leaves you without an appetite.
Astarion is unusually reticent. Typically, he would be absolutely reveling in others waiting on him hand and foot, yet tonight, it was only to his upmost annoyance. It takes one glare from him for the workers to bow their heads and promptly vacate the room.
As soon as the door shuts, he turns the lock. He doesn’t look at you, instead, he moves straight toward the armoire to undress. The multitude of layers he has on are stripped one by one until he’s shirtless and tugging off his trousers.
You avert your eyes, heat flaming in your cheeks, relieved that you hadn’t been caught mindlessly watching. You distract yourself, unlatching your luggage and rifling through it, only to step behind the partition to slip into night clothes. As you change, the sparkle atop your third finger catches your eye. There, taking the place of your guild ring, was a wedding ring. It was one you had chosen, rather than taken, as you had refused to steal the couple’s wedding bands.
It was enough you had already stolen their lives.
Your hands drag over your face.
You can’t let your mind be set adrift.
You pluck the ring from your finger and set it aside. Fortunately, the partition is tall enough to shield you from Astarion’s gaze. Even so, he would most likely be avoiding it, as he had been avoiding it ever since the incident on the ship.
Will we be going into the masquerade like this— with him unable to look me in the eye?
Subconsciously, you’ve begun to rub your thumb in circles over the place of your blood oath. Despite not being visible, you’ve memorized every detail of it. It’s that of a yellow ring, with Drake’s initials and your covenant etched inside the center. Stemming from it, there are tiny slashes pointing to each initial. Thirteen of those initials will no longer glow if beneath blood. The remaining four would. But once they are dead, and you have received the scroll, then this blood oath will wholly disappear.
Everything will come to an end. It will be complete.
But what happens then?
What happens if I die?
You shake your head and move to sit at the edge of the king-sized bed. You lie back, sinking into the plush of the mattress, gaze unseeing as it sets upon the ceiling. The events of the night play on, repeatedly.
Astarion says your name.
You lean up onto your elbows to meet his eyes.
“If you had the scroll,” he starts, fingers tangled in his boundless white curls, “What is it that you would wish for?”
You pause, taken aback by this unforeseen question. He notes this, and grins faintly in reassurance, though it doesn’t reach his eyes. He places his other hand on his hip, and in a tone treading on unease and bravado, he tacks on, “besides being with me for all eternity, that is.”
You lean back, staring up at the ceiling once more. It isn’t a line of inquiry you want to dabble in. Regardless of your doubt after the night of your reunion… you had known.
The scroll would always be meant for him.
“I’d wish for whatever it is you wanted.”
“No.” He firmly denies, and you peek back at him due to the forcefulness of it.
“I mean…” he trails off, softening, a touch disheveled at your response, as it is so open and willing to do anything for him, a concept foreign and fundamentally wrong…, yet something he has come to accept, as he feels the same for you.
“…Although I appreciate the sentiment… don’t say anything that concerns me. What is something you’d want? Soley for yourself?”
You exhale a breath you didn’t realize you were holding.
What is something I would wish for?
You then give him a weak smile, and murmur, “I’d like to see our friends again.”
His heart clenches.
“You wouldn’t need a wish scroll for that,” he states, and you shrug.
“I miss them,” you confess, and it is more than true. You think of them, too often, can feel their phantom presences in returned-to places. Pushing them away… was like pushing into the purple of a bruise.
“Okay,” he gives in, reluctant, accepting your answer despite it not being the one he expected, “I’d be remiss if I didn’t admit I… on occasion… miss them too.”
“Even Gale?” You tease, and he rolls his eyes. This time his smile crinkles his crow’s feet, and you know it to be sincere.
“Don’t push it, sweetheart.”
You laugh lightly in response, and his lips perk up even higher. You want to ask him about what occurred earlier in the night… but you’re wary of breaking whatever fragile stability has formed. Despite the fact that he appears ravishing and lush, there was exhaustion inlaid in his gaze.
It worries you.
He must read your mind, because his smile dips, and he casts his gaze aside. He doesn’t retreat, however, instead sitting at the edge of the bed. You can almost… feel him withdrawing into himself.
You move so you are sitting beside him.
“I love you,” you say, and how natural it has become to tell him the mantra of your heart. He’s still not used to it, probably never will be, but he doesn’t flinch. Instead, he looks at you as if you are the rain that comes after a decade long draught, or the sun that shines behind billowing clouds. You quench his thirst for affection; you bring warmth to the bitter cold of his skin.
“All I want is for you to be okay,” you whisper, pinkie tapping the side of his hand. “…to know I love you… that I’ve forgiven you…” you unconsciously rub at the phantom pricks of your neck. You look to him as your hand envelops his, “…To know that I trust you.”
He means to look away, shaking his head, pain rippling through his face, yet you caress his cheek, guide him back to look at you.
“You told me once that you’d become much worse than Cazador. But that wasn’t, and isn’t true, and it never will be.”
He gently pulls at your hand, and you let it drop from his face. He gazes at your intwined fingers.
“You’re not a beast,” you insist, and the word beast breaks apart on your lips, “Even if you remain a vampire, even if you feed on me every day,” he winces, but you continue, “Who you are is what you decide.”
“What if I don’t know how to be anything different?” He murmurs, glimpsing back at you, and it is bleak, it is weary. You squeeze his hand. He leans into you; forehead pressed to yours, his eyes closed. “How can you love me enough to believe that I will be?” His expression crumbles. “How can you love me when I am like this?”
“Oh, Astarion,” You susurrate, your nose tapping his, your eyes falling closed.
His presence is like falling into a flowered field, where the sunlight splays over your face, where the rolling hills and long grass roams, where the daffodils and dahlias embrace. It’s outside the city, somewhere you can’t reach, can only remember in a dream, and yet it’s also never fleeting, never far, living inside you, endlessly.
He is everything.
“Can’t you feel how deeply I adore you?”
And he can feel it, as your heartbeat is near, and it is thump, thump, thumping lazily in his ears; soothing, and ceaseless.
“How could I not love you?” You ask, and for a beat, he does not answer, yet you can feel the warmth of his breath fanning out over your lips.
“I ask myself that same question in every moment I am with you,” he confesses, and your eyes blink open to find him admiring you under his lashes. He tucks a stray stand of hair behind your ear, then caresses your cheek as his eyes dip to your lips.
“After the masquerade,” He begins as he leans in to kiss the corner of your mouth, then the apple of your cheek, “and after we get the scroll,” then beneath the corner of your eye, then to your temple, “…stay with me.”
“In the city?” you ask, half breathless, half anxious, as to stay in the city meant to stay under the omniscient eye of Drake.
“Anywhere,” he corrects, gaze heavy as he pulls back, if only to sweep his thumb over the swell of your bottom lip. If there is way to describe both yearning and ache, it would be in the quiet way he says, “…will you, my darling?”
“Yes,” you say, and it’s all he needs to hear, and your eyelashes flutter as he presses his mouth to yours.
At first it is warm, like the honeyed sun now nibbling at the closed curtains. The scent of his bergamot cologne and the flavor of his kisses are like that of blackberries that stain lips. Your fingers graze at the nape of his neck, twirling in strands of snow, and his hands are cupping your jaw. He tilts his head to deepen each kiss, to pull you closer, nearer, thus he may memorize the soft shape of your lips, full of pout and succulence, and to learn the language of your tongue, how it slips over his, how it swipes at his bottom lip, how it makes him feverish with want…
It is both greedy and soft — like that of a well-kept secret passing through tangling tongues. It is mauve and mellow like the melt of his mouth. A heat is simmering beneath the skin, stretching up your spine and sinking down between your thighs, to the curl of your toes and then sprawling to the twine of your fingers in his hair.
For every thud of your heartbeat, you exchange it for every hitch in his breath, as you both submerge yourselves into each other, mouths eclipsing, hands traversing, bodies searching for one another like lost souls search for solace in star studded skies.
And then he is everywhere, hands slipping down your sides, and wading over the hem of your chemise, then under to feel the soft skin of your upper thighs. He must burn with this heat too, as his kisses become as hungry as the low hum at the back of his throat, his fingers clenching over your hips, his teeth skimming your bottom lip and sucking it into his mouth.
You know this need. It is carnal and unable to be kept contained, it thrives on his touch, his taste, his lip bit moans and furrowed brow. It craves to be close, to have him all over you, to feel his want throb for you against your thigh… to feel him fill you up, until all the emptiness dissipates, until all you know is him, all you know is to be complete. You want to give. You want to take. You want to remain with him like this, and no, it’s not purely lust, it’s more than that. It’s always been more than that.
You’ve never felt safe like you do with Astarion. Sex used to be… a means of survival. Transactional. Empty. You were a commodity. A means to an end. And is it wrong to never want this to end? How good it feels to be wanted for you. Not what you can offer, but who you are. No one else has known you like this. You’ve been unclothed, but you’ve never been truly naked.
He looks at you like you’re a magna opus. A work of art that transcends the physical, that was made by hands that took their time with every brushstroke of adoration, with every stipple of yellow and swash of evergreen. And it’s not just your body. It’s what he sees in you.
He pulls you on top and you straddle him; one hand caught in your hair and one hand cradling your cheek. He lies back, and you move in, as he deepens each kiss, parting your lips and twining your tongue with his, and you can feel his erection, thick and aching, grinding up against the cotton of your panties. The area there is already damp, and your cheeks heat, as you don’t know if it’s from your arousal or his.
You break from his kiss to catch your breath, and yet he captures you in a kiss again, and again, as if he’s covetous for even the air that gets to fill your lungs, as if your lips against his is the only way to sate this voracious want. You pull back completely, hands at his chest and shoving him down to the bed, his head plopping on the pillow. His hair is in disarray, tickling in his lashes, and his cheeks are lightly flush. His half-hooded eyes are profoundly dark with desire, whether it be to devour, or to revere in devotion. Perhaps both are true.
You smile, sinking down onto his clothed erection, watch him groan and his eyes roll back. The pads of your fingers trail over his bare chest, playfully and faint, to the cut of his collarbones, to the slow rise and fall of his breath, to the dusky pink of his nipples that make him shiver and clench the bed sheets.
“You’re sensitive here,” you tease, thumb grazing his nipple and your other hand stroking down the lines of his abdomen. It’s like discovering a weakness. His muscles become taunt, his cock growing even harder against your sex. His response only comes in hnnghs and hmms as you lean down to press your lips to the place over his heart, then beneath his peck, to the jagged line of faded scars, to the dip of his navel, then to the ridge of his hip, and hells, you have no idea how torturously good this feels for him, do you?
You come back up, if only to lean forward for your lips to skim his ear, as you place your palms back on his chest, and roll his other nipple beneath your thumb. You coo, “Do you like this?”
He doesn’t immediately reply, fidgeting and rolling his hips up to relieve the aching of his cock against your sex. You shift upward, to tease him by not letting him know just how much you’re soaking through your panties, yet his hands find your hips, and he’s slamming you back down onto him. You gasp into the skin of his neck at the immediacy of it and at the swell of him nestled prominently against you.
“—yes,” he admits, and it’s through labored breath, “you’re making me go insane…” and the force in which he’s anchoring you down increases, to where you can feel the length and shape of him straining in the confines of his pants, can feel every twitch, every needy pulse. He tangles his hand in your hair, then pulls your head back so that you look him in the eye, and pleads, brazenly, “Please— sweetheart— my love— I need it.”
Fuck.
Your lips part and your body stills. He sounds so erotic it makes the heat pool between your thighs and the black of your pupils wide. You don’t reply soon enough, so he’s dragging at your chemise, pulling it over your head, discarding it to the side, and he’s surging forward to press his mouth to your lips, to your chin, to under your jaw, to the slope of your throat.
The crimson roses of his eyes have become the pedals of his lips, hauntingly succulent, flush… the flat of his tongue and the suck of his mouth, and you become his garden, with lilies, lavenders, and lilacs. You mew at the melt of his tongue, fingernails dragging through his strands and scraping over his scalp, making his hips jolt and him purr against your throat.
You’re nearly too delirious with desire to understand the vibration of his words into your skin.
“I… I’m trying not to be rough, love,” he confesses as if drunk, gaze unsteady as he looks at you, “but I can’t hold back—” His clenched fingers in your hair tighten, then loosen, then tighten, and you uhmmn at the delicious sensation of his unraveling restraint, “I want to bend you over and fill you up.” Your face heats, and you want to look away, as the intensity in his eyes is boiling in your blood, but you can’t, and he doesn’t let up as he continues, “I want to taste you; I want to hear you. I want to devour you. I want to feel you clenching around my cock.”
Your glazed over, half hooded eyes and rosy cheeks are intoxicating. He wants to drink the color.
His adam’s apple bobs.
“Let me…” He implores, and he leans in so his teeth skim down your ear and catch on your earlobe, and he murmurs, while rocking his hips back and forth, his erection sliding over your clothed sex and aching clit. “I’ll make you feel so good, sweetheart,” he says, and your heartbeat is absolutely racing, and he’s getting dizzy off the sound, “…please let me make love to you.”
He’s searching for something. You already know what it is. He wants your yes. Needs it. He won’t do anything without it.
You feel like your pulse is already saying it, yes, yes, yes—
You press your temple to his. Look him deep in the eyes.
“Yes, I want it,” you say, and his breath takes, and you place your lips on his, once, twice, “I want all of you.”
His eyes darken.
“I’m going to give it to you, love,” a breath, “I need all of you.”
He states it as if it’s a promise, and then he’s flipping you over so that you’re on your back, and he’s on top, the callous of his fingers skidding sinfully sweet over your exposed skin. He drags his palms over the sides of your breasts, over the dip of your waist, and then to the waistband of your panties. His tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth, and he swallows thickly, taking in how the rosy flush at your cheekbones flows down your neck and is blooming in the valley of your breasts. It is such a stark contrast to the cotton white of your panties, and you’re so beautiful, so exquisite and divine, especially in the way your arousal dampens the front of your panties, especially in the way you’re looking at him as if you could consume him whole.
The feeling is reciprocal.
He cascades his palms over the swell of your breasts, cupping them as his lips find yours once more.
“Mmmnm,” you mew at the twirl of his thumb around your perked nipple, moan brokenly as his lips descend your chin, to the underside of your jaw. He trails further until he’s enclosing his lips around your nipple, sucking it into his mouth with hollowed cheeks, while gently pinching and rolling the other between his index finger and his thumb.
Your hips careen, magma pouring into your core as you burn, the letters of his name gasped out— Ast ar ion — and he hums his approval as he sucks, swirling his tongue around and around. He unlatches from one nipple to give the other much needed attention, flicking his tongue back and forth, and your nails nip into his shoulders.
You whine, yearning for him to relieve the want between your thighs. You then clutch at his hair, pulling gentle to drag his mouth back to meet yours. The wet rings of his mouth make your nipples pebble and ache, and your fingers wedge into the waistband of his sleep pants.
He aids in your endeavor, tugging the waistband over his thighs to let his throbbing erection spring free. The strain of his erection is of the same yearning as yours. He is pitifully hard, practically leaking in precum. When your hand trails to the base, yet does not touch but falls away, he has to restrain himself from picking up your hand in his and coiling it around the base of his cock.
Gods.
He is as urgent, as desperate.
But he wants to take his time with it, has to, or else he may come undone and lose himself in you too soon. Afterall, he wants to make you feel good, but his prior feeding has left his body vigorous and vibrantly alive, all the fatigue and lightheadedness gone to the wind. He feels immense, limitless, in a way he hasn’t in weeks, like he could take you in any and every way, could fill you to the brim with him, as he is overflowing with all he has to give to you. It matters not that it’s borderline animalistic, it matters not how impure or ravenous his thoughts and desires are.
You said he isn’t a beast.
But fuck, he’s dragging your panties down and spreading your legs, and there’s a tick in his clenched jaw at how drenched you are, how your arousal slicks to the inside of your thighs, and all he wants is to stuff his face there and eat you out now.
And shit, he says it out loud, and you’re opening your thighs wider, and dammit, if he’s going to eat you out, he wants to do it with your legs over his shoulders and your ankles crossed behind his back. He gets off the bed, and before you can ask Astarion? He is dragging you by your hips to the side of the bed, then getting on his knees and propping your legs over his shoulders so that he can nuzzle his nose into your curls and spread your lower lips with his fingers to give access to his tongue.
You throw your head back, gasping on his name, and he is lapping at your cunt without a shred of hesitation or shame, dragging the flat of his tongue over the seam of your sex, sucking over your clit with hollowed cheeks. He runs the tip of his middle finger along your slit, then pushes it in, and your hands weave into his hair, your nails sliding over his scalp, and he hums against your clit at the sensation. You feel his tongue swirl over the bud of nerves, feel his fingers digging into your thigh as you cross your ankles and anchor him to you, the other hand too preoccupied with sinking his middle finger knuckle deep. He pumps it inside you at a languorous pace, and feels you buck up into his mouth. You feel him smile around your clit, the squelch of your sex and the sound of your squeal quickening his pace.
Then he’s plunging his index finger in too, curling both so that they hit that part deep inside, and you whine, your grip on his hair almost painful, but it doesn’t matter. He loves it.
He pumps his fingers into you, in and out, in and out, the pattern only interrupted by the suck of his mouth on your clit.
But right as soon as you’re nearing the edge, his fingers are popping from your cunt and replaced by the wet of his tongue, and yes— gods — this is your favorite.
And oh fuck – he can hardly breathe, tongue dipping into your sex, his thumb rolling over your clit as your thighs clench tighter around his head. He opens his eyes to look at you as he begins to fuck you with his tongue in a way he knows makes you arch your back; makes you tighten over his tongue and scream.
Your arousal is dripping down his jaw, and the way you taste is as delicious as the blood in your veins, and he can’t get enough. He drops one of his hands to palm over his cock, his hips jutting as he helplessly rocks into his hand and groans into your cunt.
It is so good.
You feel tears prick the corners of your eyes as your hands grip his hair, and then you’re propping yourself on your elbow and finding his stare. Your blood is thrumming, your senses singing, the coil of your core ready to snap, and you know it’s coming, it’s almost here, and he is going to make you cum, you’re going to fucking cum—
And you must be saying it, over and over, because he’s purring his approval into your pussy, he’s thrusting his tongue as deep and as fast as he can manage, a bead of sweat forming on his brow.
When it finally happens, you’re throwing your head back and seeing speckles in the static of your sight, feeling your heartbeat thud inside your head, the heat bursting through your body and then oozing into every honeyed sensation. Astarion is incessant as you ride out wave after wave of your climax, drinking you up like he does when he feeds, and your toes curl and you’re moaning a mangled mess of his name.
You don’t know it, but he could get off to the sound of his name on your lips, could cum at the taste of your orgasm on his tongue.
In the haze of your senses, your ankles uncross from Astarion’s back. You attempt to catch your breath, as you watch Astarion rise from his knees. You move backward onto the bed, wetting your lips as you note the sheen of your arousal glistening on his mouth and chin. You feel heat reignite in your core. Your eyes dip down to his cock. It throbs upward, slightly bent, the veins bulging and the head seeping precum down the length of his shaft. You feel your jaw go slack.
Is it bad that you find it mouthwatering how fucking needy it looks?
The bed dips as his knee hits the mattress, and he’s climbing over you. The tips of his pointy ears are tinted pink, just like the bulbous head of his cock, and your heart is thudding hard against your ribcage.
“Do you want it like this?” He mutters, and his tone is ground out through the clench of his teeth, the gravel of it scattering your skin in goosebumps. He holds himself over you, as he asks, “you want it while on your back, love?” and then he’s leaning in to nuzzle his nose against the slope of your neck, “I can fuck you in every way I know you like.”
But then, Astarion drags his teeth and tongue over the skin of your throat, and you involuntarily shiver. He really hadn’t used his teeth on your neck ever since the last time he fed from there.
If you want to. You can.
I trust you.
But you have yet to be able to say it aloud when he must catch himself, because in an instant he’s withdrawing from your neck, his chest heaving like an ocean wave crashing into the shore, his brows pinched, his lips forming an apology. You don’t let it leave his mouth, as your hand coils over the base of his cock, and he’s choking on a moan.
“Didn’t you say you wanted to bend me over and fill me up?” You tease, your head tilting and lips quirking up into a mischievous smile as you stroke his erection from base to tip. Your voice lowers to a playful purr, “Hurry up and take what is already yours, sweetheart. I’m getting very impatient.”
His cock jolts in your hand, and you watch with wicked delight as his nostrils flare. He moves quick— untangling your fingers from his cock, then dragging you and flipping you over so that you’re positioned on your hands and knees on the bed. He props your thighs open wider with one of his hands, the other hand guiding himself to the entrance of your sex. He nudges the head of his cock past your lower lips and slides it over the slick of your slit. You gasp, trembling everywhere at the marvelous sensation, your cunt aching to be full.
“Fine,” he grumbles, then glides the weeping head of his cock over your clit, repeatedly, until he’s coated in your arousal, until you’re squirming and mewing, “I’ll take what’s mine.”
And then he is pushing the head of his cock into the wet hot velvet of your sex, stretching you to fit the thick girth of him as he fills you up inch by inch. It could be torment with how slow he does it, — like he’s fucking savoring it — and you’re keening into the mattress, arms nearly giving out, as his nails dig into the flesh of your hip to keep from slamming into you all at once. His brows are furrowed, and his teeth are clenched, the snug fit of you nearly milking him then and there. It feels like forever before he’s buried to the hilt.
He lets out a groan that becomes a growl because hells, it’s like you’re molded to the shape of him. The walls of your cunt are clenching down, gripping him so tight, but you can’t help it. He is so thick inside you, throbbing and filling you up completely.
He grips your hips, holding you steady, pulls back until only the tip is still inside, and then he’s slamming back in with the force that makes your thighs tremble and your body thrum with white sizzling pleasure. You throw your face into the bedsheets to muffle a scream, and then he’s doing it again, and again, pulling back, surging forward, tip to base, tip to base…
His rhythm builds in intensity and pace, the slap of your sexes resounding in the room with each delicious thrust. You’re meeting his hips with as much as he gives, despite the ache in your arms, despite the clouding of lust in your mind making it hard to focus on anything but the ridiculously good feeling of being fucked.
His breath is ragged, his expression wrecked, what once was deliberate and deep becomes both sloppy and indulgent, both rough and relentless. He’s becoming as noisy and needy as you, spouting nonsense and curses and utter filth from his lips and gods— it doesn’t matter. You love it.
“It’s— it’s so greedy and wet for me.” he says, and one of his fingers slides up your inner thigh to feel your arousal dripping down. He brings his fingers to your clit, swirling the pad of his middle finger around it, and mutters, you’re fucking divine, and you’re everything, and I love you; I love you; I love you—
Fuck, it is those three words that cause heat to surge down to your core, make you clench around his cock and seep onto the bedsheets. He chokes on a groan, your name fracturing on his tongue, and one of his hands are lacing into your hair, the other propping you up so that you are raised on your knees. He noses up the exposed slope of your neck, his hips still thrusting hard and deep inside you as he speaks hoarsely into your ear, “I love you— so much—” and then he’s leaving open mouthed kisses along your throat, his mumbles merging into his moans, “I’ll tell you every day,” a flare of heat sears inside your core, “until you never doubt,” his teeth are scraping your skin, and gods, you’re going to cum— “and yet, even then, I’ll tell you still.”
His lips are silk; his teeth are sharp. He drops your hair, and your head lulls against his chest, your neck left wide open. You’re on the brink of climax, when the heat submerges you in dazzling bliss, when you feel his lips twitching over your heightened pulse. It’s pounding so fast he can’t even see straight, it’s thumping so hard it’s as though it beats inside his own chest, and he wants it. He wants it. He can’t, he won’t, he shouldn’t, he needs to—
Your eyes roll back.
His fangs graze your skin.
Your walls are sucking him in, squeezing down and pulsing, as your climax slams into you as hard as his thrusts. It soars through you, zipping down your spine straight to the place your sexes meet. It feels so fucking good you almost lose the ability to breathe, lips parted and body coming undone.
His thrusts continue, though uneven and shuddering, sweat beading at his temple as he feels every moment of your climax coursing through you onto him, and though you are a quaking mess in his arms, you still manage out the words through panted breaths, “…love, it’s— okay. You can… bite.”
You feel his cock twitch inside you, yet he mumbles in reply, “I— can’t hurt—” you feel his lips take the place of where his fangs were, “— you again.”
“’s okay,” you say, and your pulse is slowing, easing, and your body is melting into his, “I trust you.”
You feel his chest rise and fall, feel his hips still. You think he’ll stop all together, and for a split moment you worry you’ve said something wrong.
“Count,” he suddenly says, raw, desperate, and your eyes widen, as he slants his mouth over the place of your pulse once more, “…count for me.”
You do as asked, your cunt involuntarily clamping down onto him as his fangs pierce your flesh, and he begins to suck.
“F-five,” you try, and it’s much harder to form words then before as he’s easing himself out of your sex, then easing himself back in, leisurely and drawn out— and he’s overly cautious, sucking faintly, softly, as if he’s not drawing any blood into his mouth at all—
“Four,” you continue, and finally, he’s sucking firm, and you feel it now, the pain converging into the pleasure like a flood, saturating your senses in hazy satisfaction, and he must feel it too, as he’s groaning against your throat, his body weight collapsing into you. You sink down into the mattress, his chest to your back, his fangs still embedded deep, his cock still sliding in and out, in and out—
He hums, trying his best to remind you to keep count, despite the fact that he can barely think, the flavor of your blood sinfully sweet, almost as sweet as the wet heat of your sex— and fuck — he’s going to lose his sanity—
“T-three…” the syllables tumble from your mouth, the absolute depravity in the sound of your sexes filling the room, and you should feel ashamed of how soaked you are, how you may cum again already this soon—
“…two,” you gasp, and his thrusts become shallow, fast, and you can feel the wet of your blood oozing from his lips, as he is groaning low in his throat, barely able to keep from losing control—
Yet, you are already gone— gushing over his cock, body vibrating against his as the dizziness of your surroundings becomes the slush in your senses, and you can’t remember what number you’re on, or what even your name is— and then— you feel it, his hips snapping forward, his fangs unlatching from your throat so that he can muffle a guttural moan against your skin, his cock pulsating so deep as his seed pumps into you.
It feels hot, it feels like it’s too much, yet you want it, all of it, and he couldn’t stop even if he tried. He is clung to you, your blood and your name on his lips and his eyes are rolling to the back of his skull. It feels like he’s drowning— and yet— he doesn’t mind dying if it’s like this.
It takes a long while before it’s over, and after you feel bloodless, light-headed, empty— yet full, and it’s all you can take before your knees are giving out. He doesn’t let you fall face first into the bed sheets, instead, cradling you to him as he collapses onto his side with you.
Your eyes remain closed, your clit humming with overstimulation, your cunt aching at still being stretched full of him. It doesn’t hurt, no, it feels good, and part of you hopes he stays inside you for a few moments longer.
His nose nuzzles into your hair as he holds you, his eyes closed, his body heavy yet floating up to the ceiling. One of his hands closes over the bloody bitemark of your neck, and you can feel his breath take.
He doesn’t say anything, but you can feel him brewing in something without needing to look, so you whisper, still winded, fuzzy on your afterglow, “…you okay, love?”
He quietly asks it into your hair.
“…did I hurt you?”
The pain from his bite is far away, drowned out by the affection pouring out from you, so you reply, simply, “…no, love.”
“Can we stay like this?” he murmurs, “…just for a little longer. Then I’ll clean you up, sweetheart, and make love to you again.”
You turn to look at him. The usual sharp contours of his face are smoothed out.
He’s an open orchid.
He feels your gaze, and opens his eyes, and you reply.
“Yes,” and then the red in his eyes are like rubies, sparkling, “I’d like that.”
☾☼
The wanton wind is howling outside the carriage, as the lone lantern in the cabin sways. The horses neigh as their hooves trot over the wet cobblestone. Rain is pelting the window, and the indigo night makes the passing trees look like black blotted thumb prints.
The corset you wear is digging into your lungs. You prefer it that tight. You watch Astarion from underneath your mask. It is thanks to the woman before you that you have it. As it is thanks that most who attend this event will have theirs.
Astarion is staring back at you, adorned in his own mask, sitting next to Theo’s wife, Devina Cordelian. She’s ringing her gloved hands in her lap, her face pulled taunt and pale like the pearled pins in her hair. She’s not yet donned her own mask.
“Remember what I told you when we arrive,” she states, airy and dismissive, aloof yet you note the way her knees are digging into each other, “Their masks will be distinct like we discussed. Should not be hard to spot.”
You nod. You hadn’t done much speaking this entire ride, instead, choosing to let her chatter on and on. Though her proclivity to ramble made you apprehensive, her ability to put out a kill on her own husband, and to cooperate with Drake, made it easier to trust she wouldn’t succumb to pressure.
The ride there continues as the rain picks up. A lightning strike lacerates the earth outside, casting the inside of the carriage’s cabin in white. Devina is clenching fistfuls of her dress.
You can’t see what Astarion’s expression looks like. Don’t know what lies beneath his mask. If it is anticipation. If it is trepidation.
You don’t even know what you are feeling. Perhaps an amalgamation of the two. You wish you could return to yesterday morning, when your head was in Astarion’s lap, and he was playing with your hair. You were humming while lazily gazing up at him. He was tracing the side of your face with his fingers, while the golden hues of the sun were attempting to slew in through the curtains.
Another strike of lighting. Devina gasps, then turns to face away from the window.
You turn to look out it, and there, in the distance, is your father’s manor coming into view. It is massive, like a mountain overtaking the sky. You’ve never been near it before— yet it’s familiar the way fear is.
That bastard lived as a king while I starved.
He thinks I am dead, yet here I am. Alive.
You inhale shakily.
Will he be wearing a mask too?
Your fingers curl into fists.
Will I know who he is if I see his face?
Will his face resemble my own?
Astarion taps your foot with his.
You uncurl your fingers, and yet, the dread is tarred to your heart.
You can’t be rid of it.
Thunder rumbles through the sky and the carriage rolls to a complete stop.
Devina glances at you, and simply says, “We’re here.”
☾☼
A/N:
hello again. We've almost come to the end of the story. The next chapter will be the last. I hope it will live up to your expectations. :') I've been struggling with my confidence in writing lately, but no worries. I will finish this story. An update will come in the next few weeks. Please comment and let me know what you think, or leave a heart if you enjoyed :)
thank you for continuing to read. It's a big encouragement that's kept me going. <3
see you soon.
The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: Explicit
WC for part 6 - 8k, total - 50k+
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, explicit sex, explicit consent, angst, in love & its a disaster, additional tags posted on ao3
To anyone else, it would be confounding as to why Lord Cordelian would choose this meager brothel rather than the more meticulously maintained ones. It was not as though the man didn’t partake in the nightly pursuit of indulgence in say… Sharess’ Caress, or the Vixen’s Inn, or at his second manor over the water.
No, in fact, he has had his fair share of affairs in those places.
Perhaps, as of late, The Siren’s Call lulled to him melodies of the sea.
The brothel, situated on the outskirts of the Lower City, is perched at the edge of the harbor. The coo of collapsing seas and howling winds would at times rattle the floorboards, would hum through the walls. He had commonly spoken in idyllic tones of how soothing the waves crashing into stone sounded from out the window.
Truly… it was a run down, hovel of an establishment, with its creaking doors and frail, unkempt girls, but it was far more secluded and less frequented by the likes of those who may recognize him, and it was rather charming in the manner of its desperation to endure.
The women of the upper elite all tended to turn up their noses, to fixate on the eloquence of propriety and etiquette, to talk wearing a sheep’s skin only to reveal a wolf’s teeth. Even his own wife fell into the ring of supercilious, and although she has a use to him when the time called for it, he preferred his women not at all groomed to be personifications of prosperity. Status and wealth can embolden a woman’s will, and it grated on him, tremendously so.
The Uppercity class of women were like that of precious jewels. Pretty to look at, undoubtedly wondrous in an abundance, yet variable in nature. See, at the end of the day, a man gives a jewel value by his desire to buy it. If there is no inclination to purchase it, then it is deemed worthless. It is as enviable as the crunch of cobblestone beneath his feet.
Besides, the best diamonds are made under pressure.
That is why he rather his women have the qualities of honest humility, the willingness to acquiesce, and the need to accommodate. It also humors him when they speak in a manner that lacks the awareness for what is improper to say.
He liked his women to please, and to listen. To direction, first and foremost, but also…
Well, even he has a heart.
Nevertheless, the recent passing of his acquaintance discouraged the likes of well-known brothels. It had bolstered loneliness, that in turn gave way to the grief that accompanies loss. But the only way he knew how to grieve was by searching for liberation in the arms of fleeting lovers.
So, he made his way here, for the fourth time this week.
☾☼
The bustling pavement, with all its assorted affairs. The daytime drunkards having their early evening heaving and retching, the catatonic gazes of beggars rattling their half empty cups, the many common folk all marching into their place of routine rum and revelry.
The fusion of odors could make anybody plug their nose in repugnance. Yet… for you, there is a numbness to nostalgia. There are symptoms of learned tolerance for survival.
You peek at Astarion. He must know this himself, as he seems unperturbed. His eyes carry that aloof, glazed over quality, the same you’d noted the last time you both visited this section of the Lower City.
As soon as his gaze turns to you, you hurriedly glance away. Things have been strained since your conversation the other night. You know he had wanted dreadfully to pry, but chose not to, hoping you’d fess up eventually.
Except, that part never came.
After all, he told you he loved you.
What if you tell him, and that dwindles to dust?
Who has ever loved you? Who has ever chosen you?
Your fingernails dig into your palms as you weave through throngs of people, through winding paths and descend fleets of stairs.
The crowds disperse the farther you traverse. You walk through alleyways and twisting turns until you arrive at the abode of those who have nowhere else to call home. The fragrance of the ocean air is thick like the stick of humidity on a hot summer day. It carries with it the tune of wind chimes, their haunting laments lingering within whoever dared to listen.
The Siren’s Call is positioned on a cliff, the hill beneath it cascading into the sea. The boughs of pine trees tap, tap, tap on the salt incrusted windows with delicate knuckles, and stretch across the roof in listless indolence.
When you approach the entrance of the brothel, it seems to sway in and out of sight, the lantern glow swishing back and forth, illuminating its steps in ribbons of yellow, as the repotted lavender wafts in the air its sweet perfume.
This is it.
You feel you are standing before the closed mouth of the hells.
You rest your hand on the door handle, yet Astarion’s hand finds your other wrist.
“What’s the matter?” He asks, peeling open your palm to further prevent the puncture of your fingernails.
“Nothing can go awry tonight,” you reply, and it’s also true. You half turn to face him.
Your voice drops an octave, “We can’t have this turn out disastrous. It needs to appear natural if we don’t want to jeopardize the deal with Drake and Theo’s wife.”
“It will appear as naturally humiliating as a woman scorned could request,” Astarion guarantees sardonic, and you glance away. Your hand slips from his.
“We need her to infiltrate the masquerade ball.”
“No need to remind me,” he crosses his arms, “I swore I’d behave, didn’t I?”
“You know I didn’t mean it that way,” you deny, quieter, “I…” you try to find the words, but their fleeing from your tongue. You sigh, then try again, “Whatever he says to me… promise you won’t intervene until I signal or say to…”
“I know.”
“And it’s really not too late to change your mind,” you tack on, but Astarion shoots you a not this again look, and you wish you could swallow back up the words as they leave your mouth.
“I admit I’m not excited to stand back and watch you seduce another man into submission,” he retaliates in a deadpan tone, but then reasons as optimistically as he can, “But fortunately the manner of his kill should make up for it.”
You turn back toward the door, but before you enter, you feel the curl of his fingers over your wrist.
“You don’t need to insist upon doing everything by yourself, you know.”
You answer without turning back this time.
“I’m sorry.”
Though for what you are apologizing for, he cannot be entirely sure. As for the accusation, it seems too heavy an apology.
☾☼
Upon entering The Siren’s Call, the potent scent of booze, the musk of lung clinging cologne, and the incense of smoky vanilla intermix.
When you breathe in, an additional waft of sea salt and sex all conjoin to strangle your senses. You take in the splintering planks semi hid beneath a turquoise rug. Or rather, what used to be turquoise, as the color is notably faded, besides an ugly blotch of spilt red wine. The ends are all frayed, like they had been chewed on by the erratic hues of hungry candlelight. There is a bar tucked in the left corner of the establishment, a newer, much needed addition that is being tended to by a familiar face. Men and women huddle around it, clanging their beer mugs and slurping their brews.
Gold coins glitter across the counter, cast aside in a show of carelessness.
To your right is a handwritten sign with hourly rates. The brief list of subsequent “names” come with their availability. Most are of the seven day a week schedule. Beside it is the front desk, attended by a woman with long ringlets that match the red of her lipstick, and big, doe-like pupils that seem to narrow like a feline when they land on you.
“Welcome,” she announces with her lips fixed into a wide, routine smile, her eyes crinkling under the guise of pleasantry, “It seems you have heeded the siren’s call. How may we be of service to you, this fine evening?”
“I have business to attend to,” you remark, holding up your hand and flashing the guild ring on your third finger. Immediate recognition floods the woman’s face, her strained grin dropping and the crinkles of her eyes smoothing out.
“Dove?” she queries in a tempered tone.
“Sage,” you reply with her own alias, and though you speak with measured hesitation, the burden of affection weighs down upon each syllable of her name. She scrutinizes every aspect of your face, though the better part of it is hidden under the hood of your cloak.
But… it matters not. She knows your voice well enough.
She opens her mouth to impart upon you a more personal greeting, yet snaps her mouth shut when noting the man behind you. He’s donned in the same attire, though his face is less obscured. She can make out the prowling red of his irises as though they were ruby stars embedded in the quilt of night.
She leans into you, stare still locked onto Astarion, and speaks under her breath, “is he one of your acquaintances, or one of Drake’s?”
“He’s my partner,” you assure her, “though I’d appreciate it if you kept that part between us.”
She quirks her head and raises a single brow in response. A ghost of a grin settles upon her lips, and before she can dig for more details, you curtail her curiosity.
“Is our friend here?”
Her gaze swivels to the bar. It is as rowdy as swine squealing and rolling in mud.
“He’s having a drink as we speak,” she remarks, then sighs, “Let’s go to the backroom. We’ll have more privacy there,” she places a sign on top of the counter that displays “Be back momentarily. See Amber at the bar for information” and then slips out the other side.
“Your partner can come too,” Marcella mentions in a suggestive tone, and you roll your eyes, despite the heat the threatens to bloom in your cheeks. She beckons you both to follow her as she leads you to the office at the back of the brothel. She unlocks the room, and you all mosey in. Her musing disposition disassembles as she proceeds to unlock the safe in the corner of the room and pull a vial from its contents. She walks around the desk, and places the vial in your hands, her eyes fixed on yours.
“Here’s the plan. Theo will be accompanied upstairs to the back left room, at the end of the hall—” She starts, then frowns, as if realizing the implication of what she’d said. You shake your head, dissuading any sympathy from her.
She nods, then resumes speaking, sitting atop the desk with her legs crossed.
“You’ll give him this,” she taps the vial in your grasp, “Drake said it’s a concoction that’ll stop his heart. Theo will need to drink it all for it to work, so make sure he’s at least a bit subdued. You can use the manacles beneath the bed as a ploy to get him situated.”
Astarion hmms behind you but remains otherwise silent.
“And disposal?” You ask, yet you can already gleam the answer.
“We handle that part, though, don’t make a mess. Messes are harder to clean,” she clarifies, and you place the vial in the pouch laced through your waist belt.
“Understood.”
She then gently pulls at your wrist, urging you nearer. Perhaps she thinks Astarion a human with simple hearing, as her voice dips low, close to your ear, as to keep him out of earshot.
“I don’t know how much your friend knows, but I need to tell you… Drake was panicking when you left. Had everyone searching for you,” she murmurs, “the girls and I thought you ran away. When we all heard the news of you coming tonight… we were angry that you hadn’t finally gotten out of this.”
Your fingers clasp over hers.
“I wish it were that simple, Marcella,” you susurrate back.
“You have the means,” she reasons, “The girls and I will manage. You don’t have to…” she struggles to say the right word, “…keep investing in us.”
You pull back to look at her. Her gaunt face has filled out, and the sunken shallows beneath her eyes are now but whispers of weariness. Her fingers, once like stems of a withering flower, now squeeze back in rejuvenated ease. Your gaze befalls the room about you. Though still derelict, it gives the impression of refined, like a bruise hidden behind a swash of makeup.
At the mention of investment, you unlace a coin purse from your belt. You set it beside her on the desk.
“What’s this?” she picks it up and opens it. Her mouth is set, slightly ajar. “This is far more than he said.”
“His payment will come. This is solely from me,” you correct, and her chest rises and falls for a moment, processing.
Her demeanor sours.
“Anything from you is from him,” she retaliates, a touch harsh, but then she wilts, placing it back beside her. Her voice is hollow. Quiet.
“This isn’t necessary…” she trails off, not wanting to accept it, yet not returning it either.
“My debts here will never be fully paid,” you murmur back, your gaze falling to the floor. You note the toes of her laced boots peeking out past the bottom of her skirt. They are both scuffed and sun bleached.
She is quiet for a time. You both seem to forget Astarion’s presence. Marcella takes your hand once more and loosely holds it in hers.
“Though it was hard… my mother never regretted taking you in. None of us did,” she murmurs, and there’s a douse of sorrow in her vowels. She takes a shaky breath. “There are no debts to be paid.”
You don’t respond. Can’t. You swallow thickly. Blink it back.
“I don’t want to bury another sister… so please, flee this city,” she pleads whilst meeting your eyes, “You deserve to be happy.”
“As do you…” you oppose, but she shakes her head.
“It may not look like it, but I am. We’re doing better than we ever were before,” she asserts, and there is no indication of deceit. You’d know. She used to always tuck her hair behind her ear when lying.
You pull your hand away. There’s a forest of pine trees in your chest. They’re tap, tap, tapping at your insides, just as the lone one does outside the window.
You can’t bare to turn back toward Astarion. You know he’s been listening to each and every word. An explanation can’t be given… at least not now. You don’t even know how you’d bear to fill in the gaps.
There is a knock at the door.
“Sage…?” A woman asks, and Marcella is quick to answer.
“Yes?”
“Theo is requesting a girl… what should I say? Should I keep stalling him?”
Marcella looks to you, and then calls back through the door, “Yes. Tell him we have a new girl, then escort him to the room. She’ll be there in a moment.”
“Alright,” the woman agrees, then departs.
Marcella gestures toward the entirety of you.
“You’re not considering going in there looking like that, are you?” She probes, then points to Astarion, who is arms crossed and unreadable, “And what of him? Is he going to loiter outside the door or something?”
“Of course not,” you state, composing yourself, whilst plucking potions from your belt. You hand one to Astarion, avoiding his eye, then pop open your own vial. “Do we need to reconvene afterward?”
“No, it’s safer for you to make haste after its done. Though, remember to lock the door,” she states, watching you and Astarion gulp down the different potions. You become a stranger, donned in a new face and skin. Astarion becomes invisible, blending seamlessly into the background.
You give her another nod accompanied by a weak smile whilst exiting the room. She returns it, then glances away, rubbing her arm.
As you and Astarion make your way up the stairs, the blur of passing faces seem to submerge you in a sea of cacophony. You turn down the hall, and feel your heartbeat thump, thump, thumping in your throat, and in your skull. The corroded walls seem to shrink in as if they mean to sink in their teeth. Your hand clamps over the handrail. It’s decaying wood could deteriorate beneath your palm. You can’t see Astarion, but you can sense him behind you, can feel the brewing of his discontent.
You know it will only get worse from here.
☾☼
The door closes with a drawn out creeeeak. You enter, allowing space for Astarion to creep over to the corner of the room, imperceptible. As you are locking the door with a click, Theo’s slurring voice slithers into your ear. You startle, the key plummeting to the floor. He is standing behind you, leering over your shoulder.
“They said you were new,” he remarks, the back of his knuckles sliding over the slope of your bare neck. You feel the ridges and nip of his rings. You resist the urge to flinch.
“Turn around and let me look at you.”
You do as asked, and your heart whittles itself into a stone inside your chest. Theo is the same as he’d ever been, with the contort of conniving in his nose, a wrinkle of loathsome in his handsome smile. His gaze gleams like pearls wrenched from the flat tongues of clams.
He inspects you, as thorough as one does, his knuckle grazing the side of your temple to your chin.
“I’ve never seen you before,” Theo swipes a strand of hair from your forehead, tucks it behind your ear, “Tell me your name.”
You pull back from him an inch, your fingers tremor, yet you slather your voice in a honeyed tone, strain your lips into a trained smile, “Sir, you can call me whatever you want to call me…”
You straighten, then pull him to the foot of the bed. You place your hands on his shoulders, as if to tug him forward for a kiss. Instead, you shove him onto the bed and straddle his hips.
“As long as you obey what I say,” you flirt with an added wink, despite the bile brewing in your gut.
He is staring up at you.
His smile dims, ever so slight.
“Then I’ll call you Dove.”
It is then that something in you dies.
You attempt to suppress your panic, the way your stomach lurches and your breath catches.
He takes your wrist and holds your fingers to his lips. He places wet mouth kisses on each fingertip.
“I always request I call my girls that...” he leans up, dropping your hand to forcefully cup your face, “hoping that one day I’d call upon a girl I used to know.”
You try to untangle his hands from your face.
“It makes no difference to me,” you murmur back, the lack of warmth in your tone more apparent than you had hoped. You turn your face to the side, yet he grips your chin, jerks it back to face him.
“Stay still,” he orders, and you freeze. That learned docility renders your fretful bones dormant.
He turns your face, left, right, center, scrutinizing every minute detail.
“She always wore a different face, a different body. At times, she’d even speak in another voice,” he recalls, “but what she used to say to me… how she always listened. That’s what I remember. That’s why I always return here, hoping to have her once more.”
You pull at the pry of his hands, temper your voice to be that of a frivolous, sensuous thing.
“Sir, I assure you, I’m not the one you seek,” you ease him down onto the bed once more, and he lets you, “I’m here to please you.”
You’re a machine.
“I heard this is one way you like to be pleased,” you say, easing off of him to scope for the manacles under the bed. When you find them, the chain links jingle in your palm. As you take your place to straddle him once more, he smirks.
“Seems you’ve sniffed around for input on me,” he leans in to kiss you, and you turn your head so that his lips smudge over your cheek. He teases, “You’re defiant for a beginner.”
No thoughts.
You shove him down once more, clicking one cuff over his wrist.
Mindless.
“You must have misunderstood,” he cocks his head, and the fat of his ring clinks against the steel headboard. “I like it the other way around.”
Yet everything is so loud.
“Don’t you get bored of routine, Theo?” You deflect, then weave the chain between the gaps of the headboard, then click the other cuff shut.
Theo doesn’t put up a fight. He lays beneath you, restrained.
At your mercy.
You exhale unevenly. You are about to pluck the vial from your inner pocket at your thigh when Theo speaks again.
His voice carries a foreign lilt, his features slackening, the sever of his smile jagged and stark.
His eyes twinkle.
“I know it’s you, my Dove.”
You stiffen.
Paralyzed.
Primal.
Locked behind the door.
Trapped. Surrounded.
He jerks against the manacles, then plops back against the bed, as if forgetting he is restrained. He chuckles, eyes never leaving yours.
“How I have looked for you....”
“I don’t know what you mean,” you insist, yet humiliation is bubbling up your throat, burning in your cheeks.
Why did you let Astarion come with you?
Should you signal to stop this?
Your gaze diverts to the side of the room, and upon the window’s ledge, there is a long stretch indentation from dug in nails, an indication of Astarion’s still unseen, yet infuriated, presence.
“I couldn’t recognize you by looking at you,” Theo clarifies, “but after hearing the way you say my name…”
There are pinpricks of sweat at the back of your neck.
You don’t say a word.
“I’m not as oblivious as I seem,” he tries to raise his head and kiss you, yet the manacles keep him in place, “Ha! A bit drunk, sure. But you couldn’t hide from me.”
“Theo,” you warn, but he doesn’t stop talking.
“After all those many years I sought to have you,” he rebuttals, “but he would never let me buy you! But now things have changed, haven’t they? That’s why you’re here,” he rationalizes, and you try in vain to silence him.
“Theo—”
“The offer can be yours, Dove. I’ll pay you every month. Four— no— five thousand gold. I have more than enough to give you. It’s more than you ever made by working for him, isn’t it? Or if it’s not, I’ll pay more—”
“Please—”
“You’ll stay in my nice little house across the harbor, and I’ll visit you as often as I can. You’ll get to service me on a bigger bed than this—"
“Stop—"
“And you’ll live a better life— and we both know how lonely you were, Dove. Isn’t that why you’re here?”
“Shut up,” you utter through the clench of your teeth, and you press all your weight into his chest to keep him steady.
“Just fucking shut up,” you order, and yet he squirms more. He must be realizing this isn’t going to go as he’d thought it would, as when he speaks again, desperation is saturating every part.
“Listen to me, now, Dove,” He demands, as you scramble to pull the vial from the pouch at your thigh. You don’t get to, as he interrupts your line of thought.
“Does seven years of dedication mean nothing to you?” Theo vociferates, and you take the bait.
“I never told you to keep coming back.”
“But you wanted me to,” he impatiently persists, “That’s why you always listened. You cared. We had something special—”
“You paid me to listen, Theo,” you utter, but he talks over you.
“I couldn’t talk to the other women like I could you. It was part of your charm. You didn’t judge me. You didn’t ever refuse me.”
“I did it to survive,” you refute, though it is weaker and as tired sounding as the bedframe whining beneath the mattress.
“You’re bullshitting me,” he mutters, “Maybe you were skin and bones when we first met, but that wasn’t the case the entire time. You were taken care of,” he bellies out, brows pinched together, his mouth beset in a scoff.
“You did not take care of me. You used me.”
“And yet you were so willing to be used,” he snarls back, the word willing drenched in contempt, “Don’t act above it all. You could have earned your coin in other ways.”
The room about you is swimming in and out of focus. These four walls foam at the mouth, swallowing you and then spewing you out. The clanking of his manacles on the steel. The very faint echo of moaning and bed squeaking from far down the hall. The cracks of the eroded wooden panels.
Those seasons akin to rot. Your fingers skimming the ebbing of your ribs, tracing over the concave of your inhale. How they used to look at you, gazes like feeble, frail branches, a shade of sympathy smirched over their faces. How deep down, all you wanted was to… belong.
To anything.
To anywhere.
To anyone.
You shed yourself of something deeper than garments.
“…It was all I’d ever known…” you murmur, eyes on Theo, but not looking at him. You’re looking through him.
Theo retorts back those blackened, bludgeoned words, those knuckle curled syllables.
“Your mother being a whore did not mean you had to be one.”
You don’t breathe.
He lulls his head back and gives a heavy exhale.
“Now look at what you made me do,” he lightly scolds, “I hate snapping at you like that, my Dove,” he closes his eyes, frowning deeply, before continuing, “I didn’t even mean it. You had your reasons for being here, for choosing to work for Drake. But now that you’re not,” his eyes blink back open. He smiles. “I think it imperative that you consider my offer, and everything I can offer you.”
“No.”
“No? No?” His mouth splits open and resembles gore, the scrunch of his nose like that of a snout, lips peeling back over the white of his teeth, “Do you honestly think anyone else of my status would ever propose this to you?”
He wrenches at the restraints, the red of his neck surging up his face as he reprimands, “and don’t you even dare mentioning Drake. You can give a rat a palace, but it remains a rat. Who do you think first told him about you? Why do you think he even considered recruiting you? That fuck couldn’t have his fun like the rest of us. He took you away from me—” he reels forward, the red rings of his wrists peeking at you beneath their restraints, “and now you’re finally here to— not take what I’m so willing to give?! Why Dove?! Didn’t you want to be loved?! Isn’t that what you said to me?! Don’t I mean anything to you!?”
You clutch the vial from inside your pouch, your hand quivering with fury as you do so. You snatch at his hair, yanking back his head and shifting all your weight to prevent him from fidgeting.
“You want to know what you mean to me?” You sneer, and his eyes widen in surprise.
You only remember him by touch.
Took his time, the callous rough of his palms. Dipped in tar. The ink of his intent. The stamped on scars, he made, over and over. Beneath your clothes, beneath the flesh—
He talked in droves about how it’ll help you heal. Just let him peel back the part, white knuckle your beating heart. Sink his nails into the soft skin of your thighs—
Spit. Said it’ll be quick. Then closed the blinds.
To have his throat in your hands. To make him choke, though he’d never—
Admit.
He did.
A thing.
To you.
To make him croak. Turn blue, then beg.
But like him, you wouldn’t listen. You wouldn’t stop—
“You are this room I can never truly leave,” you state, your thumb popping the cork open from the vial, “You are the better part of my day smeared against the back of your hand. You are the shackles digging into your wrists. You are the scrape of the bedframe on the floorboard, the walls always watching. You are the ringed fingers. You are the closed curtains. You are the covered mouth. You are the static silhouettes. You are the ceaseless dark. You are the reason I can’t bare to close my eyes.”
“Dove, wait— Please—!” He wheezes, and you unclench his hair, only to squeeze his mouth between your fingertips.
“You only ever wanted to own me,” you mutter, quiet, and tears are dripping down onto Theo’s chest, yet you don’t realize you’re crying. “…and you’re right. I could have refused you. I let you use me. I let you all use me.”
You pluck his nose. He writhes in his restraints. He opens his mouth to squeal, but you jam the vial into his mouth.
“But don’t ever insist you listened to me,” you chide, watching his cheeks fill, as he refuses to swallow. He’d kick his feet if there weren’t Astarion’s hands anchoring his legs to the bed.
“Don’t fight it!” you continue to taunt, and you can taste the salt of tears on your lips, “open your mouth and take it,” Theo’s forehead beads with sweat, his face is turning blue as he has no choice but to gulp down the liquid, “Isn’t that what you said to me?”
“How many other girls do you have enslaved in that home across the sea, Theo?” You watch his adam’s apple bob with each swallow, “How many other girls have you hurt like me, Theo? How many? Tell me how many?”
Theo’s heartbeat palpitates, and he begins to seize. Foam is frothing from the corner of his mouth. He convulses beneath you, yet you hold him down for as long as it takes.
Yet it only takes eight minutes until his body ceases its quaking.
When it’s over, you take the vial from his lips.
His partially opened eyes are staring blankly up at you.
You at once glance away.
You get up. You stumble into the wall.
The wall of your old room.
Someone is there to catch your weight as you crumble into the corner of the bed frame.
Astarion.
He had listened to the entirety of it.
He knows everything now.
You feel seen.
You feel nude.
Your cheeks are wet. The breath isn’t getting into your lungs. Your vision is fading in and out. Your spiraling, twisting, warped, altered.
Astarion is taking you by the shoulders. He is trying to find your eyes again. You can’t bear to be seen like this.
“Breathe,” he pulls your hand to his chest. There is no heartbeat to synchronize to, “Focus on me. Breathe.”
It is by the tense of Astarion’s fingers you know he’s upset, know by the curtness of his tone that is temporarily tempered by concern. The countdown restarts in your mind – five, four, three, two, one. five, four, three, two, one —
When the air settles back inside your lungs, and the panic partially subsides, it leaves behind only you and Astarion. He lets your hand slide from his chest. His expression crumples as he combs a hand through his hair.
“I should have never come,” he mutters, his brows pinched tight, his gaze unbound. He, a collage of emotion, all of which is distraught, “But then I’d never know what I know now.”
You gnaw on the inside of your cheek.
Everything is falling apart.
“I was going to tell you,” you insist, but he shrugs your hand away.
“No,” he declares brokenly, then breathes in deep, “no you weren’t.”
He drags a palm over his face, then passes by you to head toward the door. He bends down, picks up the key. Unlocks the door. Sets the key on the bedside table.
Then leaves.
☾☼
Both of your worlds are eclipsing. You want to follow him.
Maybe it’s for the best you don’t.
You’re careful to collect the key from the bedside table. Slow to lock the door behind you. Your potion has run dry. You pull the hood over your head. Everything else is unaffected, the downstairs festivity is as boisterous as before. Each room still occupied by every woman you ever grew up with, with every stranger that paid the appropriate price.
Astarion weaves behind stragglers that are waiting for a beer or for an empty room.
You’re going to be sick. You wipe at your wet eyes and rest your arms on the handrail and lean into it to keep you upright. You rest your temple on your arms and close your eyes.
But all you see behind your eyelids is Theo’s unblinking stare. All you see is Astarion taking in the state of the room, taking in the state of you. It was as if he knew everything. And perhaps that’s what you wanted, for him to know without having to say it out loud, for to say it out loud made it real, made it alive, and you had tried to kill off this part of your life, hadn’t you?
You lift your head. You expect him to be gone, because who in their right mind would stay? Who in their right mind would bother with the broken?
But he hadn’t left. He’s at the entrance, stalling with his hand on the handle. His attention swivels up to latch onto you. He stands there, seemingly caught between waiting and leaving.
But… you watch him go, don’t you?
No.
You accept that this is all you will ever have.
Stop.
Hope is a fickle, useless thing.
Love wasn’t made for people like you.
It’s not true.
Your friends would have never accepted you. With all their heroic endeavors, their plights of grandiosity. Even their tragedies made yours look pathetically puerile.
Don’t do this.
You can’t blame him for leaving.
I won’t let him go away.
You can’t be honest.
I’ll never hide again.
You can’t even be honest with yourself.
I won’t live like this anymore.
You descend the stairs.
A howling wind rumbles the brothel, so much so the walls tremble, and the drunkards stumble, and your visions swims, but you don’t tumble, you don’t give in.
Why aren’t you giving in?
I won’t hurt myself like this anymore.
Astarion is slipping out the door. Strangers’ hands are slipping over your shoulders, requesting your name, your hourly rate.
I am not a dove to be caged.
You shrug them off; you pry their fingers from your wrists, evade the snag of their sharp cologne or the tobacco tar of their breath or the drag of their hands at your back or the smear of their fingerprints on your clothes.
I want to be free.
Your gaze is flickering over to Marcella. And like a sister, she already knows what you mean to say. She smiles in that way someone does when they are holding back tears.
Goodbye.
You push open the door.
And for the first time in your life, you leave.
☾☼
Waves fold in, whip up, then collapse against the seawall, the tug of the moon creating a high tide. The ocean is inhaling deep, pulling back the current as far as it’ll go, before exhaling with a rushing whoosh out against the rocks. The wind chimes harmonize in low, hollow, humming tones, dancing in roaring gusts of wind and sand.
You shield your eyes, your vision adjusting to the night, the pathway illuminated only by moonlight, the lanterns not able to withstand such strong winds.
Yet there, far ahead, you spot Astarion. He is pacing back and forth, going out and then into the mouth of an alleyway, hands sliding over his face.
You hurry into the alleyway, to find his back is to you.
“Astarion!” you call out over the chimes, over the wind, over the sea.
He startles out of his pacing, then turns around, gaze latching onto you in an instant. The ocean mist is thick, coating his skin in pebbled dew. His brows are furrowed, his usual flawlessly tousled curls drooping over his forehead, clinging to his lashes.
“Don’t leave,” you plea, and the wind is whipping about in your chest.
“You’re a library of secrets,” he mutters, wrecked, and you flinch, “Even before you could never come to trust me….”
“I didn’t—"
“And I knew it. I knew it when you looked at me as if you were looking right through me. Even when I saw your scars and heard them carried in your voice. I didn’t ask and I should have. But now… now that I have been asking, it was after I hurt you in a way I can’t take back. It’s too late, and I know that, but I feel like I’m chasing you in every conversation, in every time we touch—"
“It’s not too late.” You cut him off, tears building in your eyes. You take a breath, trying to quell the pounding of your chest.
“You know that I have shared countless beds. I’ve been mangled, polluted by touch, and emptied for every portion. I cowered behind all I’d done,” he pauses, searching for the right words to say, “but your love makes me feel full. It makes me feel seen…” he takes a shaky inhale, his voice softening, “I know I’ve done wrong. But… are you not able to feel that way for me? I want to see you. I want to know you.”
“I’ll tell you everything. I won’t hide anything anymore.” The sea is crashing in your voice, “I didn’t know how to tell you before, but I know how to now,” tears prick at the corner of your eyes.
His chest is rising and falling with the waves.
“I was raised there,” you confess, and it burns, but you need him to know. To understand. “My mother worked there, met my father there. She had me thinking she’d give me the world, and in turn got herself killed over it.”
You take a breath, trying to keep going, “My father— he couldn’t risk anyone knowing his lover was a prostitute in the lower city. The brothel took me in when my mother died... and then when I came of age, I inherited my mother’s room…”
Astarion inhales and the air is like fragments. There is a sheen over his red eyes, and he shakes his head, holds his hand over his mouth.
“For how long did you… work?” he asks, and you reply.
“About ten years.”
“Ten years?”
“Yes.” Your voice is watery. You swallow. It may not seem a long time for him... but maybe… he can understand the eternity of it.
“I was able to stop five years ago, when I moved up in rank for Drake.”
His face is cluttered with sorrow.
“I wish you had told me,” he mutters, gravelly. “I wish you had confided in me before.”
You wipe at the damp of your forehead. You can feel the mist of the sea in your lungs.
“I was ashamed,” you say, and his face crumbles.
“Ashamed?” He steps toward you, and yet you find it’s getting harder and harder to hear him over the thunderous waves, over your thunderous heart, “Sweetheart, you did what you had to survive, as I did,” he repudiates, “You hardly had a choice in the matter.”
“I could have survived in other ways,” you deny, glancing away, “But I chose that life,” you look back to him. A weak smile tugs at your lips, “It felt good in the beginning… and I was good at it. I liked the feeling of being wanted, even if it was only for my sex. I craved to be close to others… for it quelled the loneliness…,” you take a breath, “but then came the vacancy. Then came their persistence. I could no longer frame it as effusive or affectionate. It became punitive. It was possessive… I felt even if I were never touched again, I would remain forever unclean.”
He says your real name. There is a lilt of understanding in his shattered voice. “You are not unclean.”
You don’t answer back. The wind resembles a sob.
He swallows. When he speaks, there’s an edge to his tone.
“Is that how you met Drake?”
“Yes,” you say, and he frowns, mouth then forming a curse, so you continue, “but it wasn’t in the way you’re thinking,” You sigh, leaning back against the wall, "At the time, I had gained a reputation, and he became interested in how a low-rate whore could entice a steady stream of clients from the Upper City nobility. It wasn’t about the sex… supposedly I... had a way of getting people to talk.”
You shrug, and he drags a hand through his hair. That same skill you had used to gain your old companions’ trust, to have them share secrets like it was natural.
You study a shingle teetering off the roof.
“Drake perfumed my mind in idyllic dreams. He gave me aspirations, gave me hope. Swore if I did as promised, he’d give me everything I ever wanted. And to a certain degree, he did,” you glance back at Astarion. He’d never stopped looking at you. “All that I had to do in exchange was solicit information and feed it back to him. I knew what I did had dire consequences… but to the extent of which he wouldn’t let on…”
You clench your fists. Then ease them open.
“It wasn’t until later I found that those who came across me ended up getting robbed, beaten, or killed…” You breathe in deep, “I wanted to stop. But then he offered me an out… an out of that room… an out of that place. And despite everything I… took it.” Your thumb feels over the ridge of your guild ring.
“Hells.” He mutters, leaning back onto the wall across from you. His head rests on it as he peers up at the night sky.
“I was no longer one of his girls. I took blood oaths, made the kills myself. As long as I could leave that room, it didn’t matter…” you trail off, gaze shifting to the ground, “I had worked my way up in Drake’s world. He… was fond of me. Swore I could inherit what he’d made. For some sick reason… I wanted his approval.”
You let out a little laugh, but it is anything but humorous.
“Even if it meant the damning of my soul,” you bite your lip, then wipe at your cheek, “At least I would no longer hunger. At least I would no longer fuck for pocket change, strip for any scrap of affection. Who I hurt, who I… killed. It didn’t matter. I had money. I had worth. I had Drake to guide me…”
“He took advantage of you.” Astarion retaliates, furious, and you lift your head to meet his eyes.
“He plucked you from where you were. He groomed you into the role,” he mutters darkly, “He’s as conniving as Cazador.”
You know it’s the truth… but for some unbearable reason you want to deny it. A part of you that has known Drake throughout the years and has seen his admittedly unconventional care denies it.
Afterall, you’d never had a father. Not really. You don’t know when you had begun to think of Drake in that manner.
Maybe you don’t want to know.
It hurts.
“I…” the words tumble from your tongue, “Without him I would have been stuck there…”
“A golden cage is still a cage,” Astarion states, “he positioned himself as your savior.”
Your heart sinks.
“He didn’t make me do the things I’ve done. It’s not the same as you and Cazador...” you want to curl into yourself and disappear, “I chose a life you were forced into.”
He says your name disapprovingly, as if wounded by the way you wound yourself.
“Don’t say that.”
“But it’s true,” you say, and for some reason saying it makes fresh tears form, then burn down your cheeks. You are quick to conceal them behind shaking hands, so tired of crying. “I understand if this changes everything. If it changes how you feel about me…”
“Nothing could ever change how I feel for you,” he denies. He pulls at your hands, your name feeble and falling from his lips, “Oh, my love,” he soothes, and your hunched over, curled into yourself, “I shouldn’t have left that room like that. I regretted it the instant I did it.”
You glance at him. Heart in your throat.
“I needed a moment to collect myself. I was… hurt that I found out that way, that you… couldn’t feel you trusted me enough to tell me prior,” he wipes a tear away with his thumb, “I’m angry at myself for providing you with so many reasons as to not trust me. I’m upset that I… sabotaged so much with my anger, and unwillingness to forgive.”
“It’s not your fault,” you refute, yet he shakes his head.
“I hurt you when I left. I said something so utterly awful to you after the fight with Cazador. I bit you. I was cruel. Even before we were together, I was deceitful. I’ve given you every reason to hate me. Yet you look at me… like how you are right now. I know I don’t deserve it, just as I knew I didn’t deserve your trust and for you to confide in me. But nevertheless… I still want it. I can’t be without you,” tears well up in his eyes, his speech becomes hoarse, “I do love you, so much so.”
You crumble into him, arms wrapping around him and pulling him tight. Where he used to be stiff, startled, now he is immediate, collecting you in his arms, lips skimming over the roof of your head.
It’s warm.
“I’ve never been close to anyone like I am with you,” you confess.
“I know the feeling,” he replies.
“I’m sorry,” you say into his chest, then pause. You feel tension in your throat. “That I didn’t tell you everything before. That you found out that way.”
“It’s alright,” Astarion replies, his words lighter than before, “Though the amount of self-control I needed to have not to murder that man was outrageous.”
You huff out a small laugh, and it rumbles against his chest.
“What?” He queries, and you can hear the grin in his voice, “Bad timing?”
“You’re ridiculous,” you admonish him with a smile, and then your expression overflows with fondness, and his breath catches in his lungs.
“Astarion,” your hand presses to his cheek. He leans into your touch. “Let’s go home.”
“My home is anywhere you are, my dear,” he replies, and leans in so that his forehead is against yours, “But we should leave before the sunrise,” he presses a kiss to your lips, and it’s soft, slow, and sweet.
“I love you,” you murmur, and he smiles, as he likes the way you say it, likes the way it feels, wants to hear it over and over again, like how the sea meets the shore, endless, and always.
“I love you,” he replies, and the ocean’s winds are now calm, as if settling with you into the serene of those words, “forevermore.”
The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: Explicit
WC for part 5 - 9.9k, total - 42.5k+
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, oral sex (both receiving), p in v, creampie, explicit consent, angst, on his knees for you in more ways than one, in love & its a disaster, additional tags posted on ao3
tw for chapter 5: graphic depiction of death, assassins killing people, etc.
The city sleeps under a yellow full-bodied moon. The lanterns wheeze in a yawning breeze, the wind combing its fingers over your figures as you leap from roof to roof. Astarion has improved in his stride, the fear of falling lessened by the thrill of flying through air, fluttering behind your fleeting form.
You are a third of the way there, the path etched out like a nightmare singed in the mind after waking. You pause to catch your breath, and Astarion takes the moment of reprieve to reorient himself with his surroundings.
“Who wants this one dead?” He queries offhandedly while swiping a speck of dirt from his trousers.
“Drake.”
He cocks a brow. You sigh.
“Lord Kallaway made a blood oath. He wanted to manage some of the brothels under Drake’s domain in exchange for political racketeering. He’d ensure financial and social contributions made in Drake’s favor,” you offer, stretching your arms up toward the sky to nullify the ache in your chest. It doesn’t ease it.
“So that’s what he wants.” Astarion gathers, hand on his hip. “Seems a bit risky to be a public figure with all those dastardly deeds he’s committed.”
“Willful ignorance is powerful if you weaponize fear,” you mutter back, gaze transfixed at the landscape before you, “Lucious didn’t fulfill the pact. Instead, he stole the majority of earnings the brothels brought in. He squandered it too, so it’s too late for bygones to be bygones.”
“I see…” Astarion steps toward you. He sweeps a thumb over the side of your face, tucking a stray hair back behind your ear. “I’m surprised he’s being tame in the order of execution.”
Your breath catches in your lungs, if only for a moment. The moonlight is coalescing in his white curls. Your brows crease, disapproval dipping the corners of your lips.
“Everything he does is with reason,” you swallow, “though if I hadn’t agreed, he’d have it done in a way that sends a more brutal message.”
“I could take the lead on this,” Astarion offers, letting his hand drop from your face. His simple touches have increased since the other night, whether that be a slide of his hand over the small of your back, the caress of your fingertips as you passed by each other, or the drag of his knuckle over the side of your cheek.
Most of the time he didn’t seem conscious of doing it. Yet in the rare times that he does realize, he always pulls back, careful of minding the distance, tempering himself. You let him do either, not sure of how to proceed in the precarious state of your relationship.
Everything seems to have remained the same, if not for these little touches, if not for the way his tone softens when calling your name, or that his gaze appears fuller, lighter, or that some early dawns he asks if you’d lie beside him, if only for the sunrise, if only before you go.
“It’s alright,” you meet his eyes, “I’ve dealt with these types before.”
☾☼
Nine
Lucious R. Kallaway
There is a seance in the way you cloak yourself in the trench of night, the way you hide in the harrowing eyes of insatiable shadow. Lord Kallaway sleeps in succulent maroon silks, all tucked in tight, yet languorous and limp, all smoothed out forehead and drooling mouth.
His room is a museum of lush indulgences, from the bejeweled upholstery to the velvet drapes, from the plush of imported carpet to the oil paintings of his likeness.
Assessing the room, you note the beams that stretch out across the high ceiling. You clench the rope in your fist. The conversation you held with Drake stokes to life in your mind like a fire.
“Dove.”
“What is it?”
“Make it look like he did it himself.”
“But—”
“If you won’t, I’ll get someone else who won’t be as gracious, and I know how much you really don’t like that. I myself admit others can be a touch too messy. Too grotesque. But it needs to be done…. You want that scroll, don’t you?”
Astarion touches your elbow. You shudder out of your thoughts, refocusing on the plan at hand. Dread is like a tide pulling back across the shore, building and building, until it will soon devour all in its path.
You can’t let it. You need to focus. You need to do this.
Your feathered step does not disturb the man out of his slumber, and with a hint of grave humorless concern, you doubt anything could wake him.
You swing the rope over the beam.
It pools over the other side.
You make a noose.
Astarion is watching your movements, watching the way your body operates as if devoid of any thought, of any feeling. Yet, even in the dark, he can sense the presence of your dread as if it were lingering over your shoulders and guiding your quaking hands.
Lord Kallaway stirs, but only to let out a broken snore. Your mind is slipping up to the ceiling, hovering there, far away enough to let this occur. Your body is an instrument of demise, it positions the chair, it approaches the snoozing man as if possessed.
Despite this… part of you needs to know. Needs to know he’s guilty… Needs to know for yourself that he hadn’t followed through with his debts.
The home he resides in is quiet. No attendants, no family, no pets. He lives alone.
No one will hear him scream.
You hold the blade in one palm, intent not to use it. When you seize his shoulder, Lord Kallaway startles awake in an instant.
“What—” he begins, delirious and drowsy boned. When his eyes catch sight of your obscured figure, he squeals and shuffles up the bed, noting the knife in your hand.
“Don’t scream,” you remark, tilting your head, “You know why I’m here, Lord Kallaway.”
He shakes his head, vehemently denying, “No, no, please—” the words are jumbled, tumbling out of his mouth, “I’ll give him what he wants, I’ll pay!”
You give a swift inhale. You know that even in his desperation, he is lying.
“Lord Kallaway,” you state, trying to subdue the man’s panic, “I can make this quick if you cooperate,” your voice darkens, “I’m one of the few who won’t resort to torture.”
“What do you want?” He contends, scrambling at the nightstand where his gold, sapphire and ruby encrusted rings lie, “I can give you more than he’s offering. I can give you all that I have—”
“You can’t,” You murmur, “Or else you would have already paid.”
“Please,” he begs, holding out the jewelry in his hands to your chest, “Please,” he lifts himself up onto his knees, slobbering with tears, shuffling over the bed to you, “You know my soul is already damned. You know what will happen to me! PLEASE! Have mercy on me!”
“I am,” you say, biting the inside of your cheek.
You step back, producing a flame in your hand. It illuminates the space about you, including the rope, including the chair, including Astarion, leaning against the wall with an unreadable expression.
Lucious eyes widen with realization.
“No!” He cradles his face in his hands, “I will suffer for eternity… oh gods… oh GODS!” He bellows into the bed, and a part of your mind that is drifting up at the ceiling reels in at the despondency of his voice.
“Lucious,” you murmur, “you made a deal with him knowing you’d never fulfill it. You had to have known the debt you’d owe.”
The man snivels into the mattress. The sight of him is like picking at a healing scab. You turn your head away, your fingers half clenching, your sight cast up to the ceiling. You feel as though you are observing yourself from overhead, the screeching and cawing thoughts in your mind unable to completely ensnare you yet clawing at you all the same.
Astarion steps forward.
“Why don’t we do him in darling? Though playing with my food is fun, I am not always in the mood for such hysterics.”
The man’s heaving sobs are half muffled by his mattress, his head buried in his blankets.
“No,” you counter, hand held up to halt his approach, “I’m not playing with him. I need him to do this.”
“I don’t think he will listen,” Astarion rebuffs, but you silence his retort with a look.
“Please,” You feel the bile burning in the back of your throat. You don’t want to do this. But you know it must be this way. You clamp your eyes shut, then reopen them, “give me time.”
You attempt to find the man’s eyes. When you latch onto his bleary gaze, he stops in his breathing.
“Do you want this to be done by force, Lucious?” You state, and his stare swivels from you, to Astarion, and then back to you. He shakes his head minutely, wiping the snot of his nose on his sleeve.
“Neither do I,” you say, while weighing the blade in your other hand, the man transfixed as you do so.
“I don’t want this to be messy. I don’t want to hurt you, Lucious,” you insist, calm and placid, the flame produced in your other hand lambent, casting yellow streams and shadowed boughs over the bend of your nose. Your voice dims like the sky before a storm, and you lean in toward the man’s face. He shrinks far back into himself.
The words are as sharp as the blade nipping the tender flesh beneath his chin, “Because I know how to hurt you. I know how to make it last. I know how to make this part the worst part. But you don’t want that, do you, Lucious?”
Lucious quivers, the syllables stuttering out from his lips, “N—no…” he gulps, then steadying himself with any last dignity he can muster, readjusts his posture.
“…No.”
“Then stand up and walk to the chair,” you order whilst pocketing your blade and beckoning him to his place of ruin.
Wordless, Lucious slides out of his silk cocoon. He is in nothing but his sleep clothes, the regality of his stature peeling away like a second skin. He won’t look at Astarion. He only looks at you. His cheeks are wet with rivers of despair. He tries to keep his chin high.
“You don’t have to do this,” his words are crumbling cities in the wake of his quaking frame, his teeth chattering as if he were freezing, “Y-you don’t have to make me do this.”
You bite your tongue, steeling yourself again the wave of guilt washing over you from his words. You open your mouth to reply, but Astarion speaks before you can.
“She hasn’t done anything to you, you ingrate,” Astarion grits out through a clenched jaw, then tsks, “You’ve done this to yourself.”
Your eyes flicker to Astarion. He doesn’t need to hear the words to know what you say.
Yet… Astarion can’t yet understand what lie ahead for the man before you both. It is a fate worse than centuries of torture…
Your attention turns back to Lucious. You take him by the hand, and he lets himself be guided toward the chair. He climbs up through his sniffles.
“You don’t have to do this.”
His hands tremble so violently he struggles to place the noose around his neck.
“I’m sorry,” you break eye contact, no longer able to bare the guilt weighing down upon you, no longer able to look this man in the eye knowing you are responsible for delivering him to his doom. The apology leaves you so sudden, so distraught, that Lucious’ eyes broaden, and his hands still at the rope around his throat.
He knows you mean it.
You hear Astarion inhale a ragged breath.
They both do.
“Lucious,” your hand befalls the man’s, your gaze unwavering, “don’t struggle, or else it will be prolonged. Close your eyes.”
I don’t have to do this.
Lucious does as instructed, sucking in his lips, tears streaming down his cheeks.
“Imagine somewhere far away,” you lull, voice like a candlelight’s glow, warm, honeyed, “Do you have a place in mind?”
I have to.
He nods, and his tremoring hands ease down to his sides.
How many lives did you save?
Does it counteract the ones you took?
Should this not one day be your mirrored fate?
“That’s good,” you soothe, “keep it in your mind… and remember to breathe...”
He gulps in one last full, swift, gasp.
He kicks the chair.
The shadows swallow up your breath.
You can’t watch, so you don’t.
However, that doesn’t mean you don’t hear it.
The bang of the chair plummeting to the ground, the stretch of the rope and the squeeze of his throat.
But… it is not at all quick.
He struggles, like you warned him against, and he gargles and oscillates, legs kicking and hands scrabbling at the rope, fingernails frantically digging into the fibers as if deciding a moment too late that he mustn’t go out this way. It is grueling, those prolonged, continuous whines and strangled wheezes. They perpetuate like the wailing of the wind outside the stained-glass windows, whistling then dispelling with a silent whimper.
You wait, eyes shut, until no sound resounds about the room but the stressed sway of the rope, swinging back and forth from the weight of his limp body.
When you blink open your eyes, it is a moment too soon.
The belly of the floor bursts beneath Lucious’ body in tendrils of a black blaze. Cinders crackle and hiss in the air, as smoke bellows out and engulfs the room. The bowels of hells are lurching up like that of a ravenous wolf. It snaps its jaws and engorges itself upon its prey, seizing the leg of Luscious’ soul. As it does, Lucious’ phantom screams. You try to cover your ears to cease the sound, try to close your eyes once more yet it commands you to listen as it howls like claps of thunder, it demands you to see as it stains the back of your eyelids in streaks of violent violet.
The scorch of Lucious’ spectra is akin to dosing flesh in corrosive acid, it is the odor of bubbling, blistering skin, and the bloated choke of ash burns in your nostrils and swells in your lungs.
You know it means to completely untether his soul from his body, and as it does, Lucious’ unbearable shrieks and unbound laments are pried from the slack of his corpse, the covenant of damnation an insatiable sadist. It goes on, until it is full, until it has captured yet another to feast upon in a place where time does not pass, where time does not end.
After, there is nothing left before you besides the dangling body of a dead man, and a perfectly intact room.
Astarion heaves in a temoring breath, and you partially come back to yourself. His hand is wilted over his heart, his eyes vast with unprecedented horror.
You nearly topple over, barely catching your weight on Lucious’ headboard. Vomit is sure to boil up from the pit of your stomach, but you stifle it by clamping down your nails so tight into your fists that they pierce the fabric of your gloves. You sink them in until they break skin. It is then you begin to count down —five, four, three, two, one, five, four, three— the pain easing you back to motion, propelling you out the window and up to the roof.
It isn’t until you have left Lucious’ abode and are far up leaping over roof tops. Under a low-lit moon, Astarion speaks.
It happens in a flurry of movement, his hand wrapped firm around your wrist, anchoring you to the spot. You spin around in a daze, finding his gaze fastened to where your blood oath mark resides, hidden underneath the sleeve of your cloak.
“Is that what will happen to you if we fail?” He chokes out, dismayed. Your mind has yet to have settled fully back inside your head. It is floating above in the sky. You nod numbly.
He shakes his head, refusing to accept this reality, sick with the knowledge he has attained. He takes your hand in his, his thumb strokes your palm yet pauses when he notes the tears in the fabric.
Your name leaves his mouth. It sounds like the mist veiling the valley peaks, it sounds like getting lost inside the woods. It sounds like despair.
“That is the price you were willing to pay for me?”
You take in the anguish of his expression. You want to deny it. But you can’t.
I was willing to do anything for you.
I still am.
Your silence is answer enough. He crumbles as a tangled breath escapes through his teeth.
“Gods,” he curses, stumbling back as if you’d struck him. He swipes over his mouth, his irises a swash of diluted crimson. He says your name once more, but this time it is feeble, teetering out, half breathed, half uttered.
“I won’t fail,” you try to assure him, and his eyes never waver from yours.
“No,” he fervently agrees, for he has no choice but to believe you, as the alternative is too horrible to consider, too unbearable to contemplate, “we won’t fail.”
☾
The night runs red down his jaw, the rush of adrenaline pulsing hot in his chest, the benevolent creature cowering in his fist. Astarion sinks his fangs into its vying veins and drinks to his heart’s content.
The blood blooms his pupils wide, consuming the whites of eyes. The flavor will have to suffice, not nearly as decadent nor delicious, not nearly as heavenly iniquitous as the taste of her.
The fox’s body becomes limp.
His becomes infinite.
However, the timeframe is shorter with these modest meals. He can feel himself wither throughout the days as they pass by, his vision static stars and his reflexes a tad sluggish, a beat slower.
Despite this, he keeps delaying the act until it’s too difficult to ignore. Now and days, there is a guilt in feeding, one that he’d conditioned himself to forget those centuries ago. This grief pulls taunt like an arrow in a bow, threatening to release, threatening to pierce him deep.
It is as deep as the way she looked at him that night, recoiling into herself, withdrawing into the places he can’t reach, can’t yet know.
He can’t forget the way her eyes fell away from his, like rose pedals trickling onto the bed and falling in his lungs, that expression prickling thorns, twining around his unbeating heart.
She was afraid.
And yes, there was a time he would have reveled in that debauchery of fright. Oh, how he used to brew in delight at the whimpers of pathetic pleas, used to dance in the phantoms that were encased in his victim’s gaze. It was as if he were a harbinger of death, and… there was power in it.
And during that time, power was God.
He could become all he had been stripped of, could embody that of a being without the need to hide, who need not beg nor weep, who need not sob or grovel into the dirt.
He had become cruel, for if he wasn’t a god, then he was the dog, snapping its jaws, without a will of its own, lurching against its leash for a master that did not preach mercy, did not know regret.
Yet now, with no master, with no collar, with no need to assert dominance to feel less weak, then what becomes of the beast?
He sets the fox down onto the pavement. His gaze befalls the stick of blood upon his hands.
Did he watch his body concave under the starve of shame?
Did he become an animal aimlessly roaming the streets to temper a ravenous thirst?
He doesn’t know.
Perhaps with the ascension…
He would have become a plump, pompous, and petulant god. All alone in his palace yet surrounded by his spawn. They, like his dogs, would howl when he commands, would bite when he decreed.
Yes. He would have it all.
But then… he would have nothing.
Would she have still taken this oath for me then? Would her soul be in jeopardy still?
The mere thought of the oath evokes recollections of Lucious’ soul, causing Astarion to hunch over. He palms at the brick wall to keep him upright.
That won’t happen to her.
And no. Of course, she wouldn’t have taken the oath… but what good does it do to fixate on what could have been? Yes… perchance she’d be safer, albeit… much farther… gone from him… and he would be…
Alone.
The possibility of eternity without her would have been a torture he’d have submitted himself to unknowingly… The price of ignorance and bliss would have come at the cost of his heart, at the expense of his soul… and even something as fickle or small as the fox lying dead at his feet… had a soul.
Oh gods… I can’t bear to know the cost she could pay… I can’t fathom that she… she wagered hers for me. And all I had done in return was punish her for trying to protect me…
Even worse than that fate, is the knowledge that selfishly… he wouldn’t have let her run far from him. No. He would have claimed her as his consort. He would have plucked her from the sky and shackled her to his side…
Would that not be the same as damning her soul?
Yet this anguish to have her with him never leaves him, despite trying to brush it aside, or firmly dismiss it, or shove it away, or run from it, or attempt to kill it— even if the hells were to drag her to its depths, I’d fall into the abyss —
Ever since he witnessed the perils of Lucious’ death, he has become paranoid at the same occurring to her. It is why, regardless of trying to maintain a safe distance prior and trying to pave the way for forgiveness, he can’t seem to keep his hands off of her, can’t seem to stop wanting to kiss her, and hold her, and protect her, even if before he was the one to perpetuate her pain —
Astarion smears the blood from his lips. He collects himself as best he can, then traverses the path back.
Several weeks have passed, and plans for the next marks have been made… even their place of residency changed. The dilapidated state of the building’s entrance remains in a state of purposeful reconstruction, but the top floor is preserved and internally pristine. It isn’t as opulent as the private sweet at the inn, with its lack of décor and stored riches, yet, she seems lighter here, less on edge.
And for that reason, he prefers it.
His movements quicken as he scales the side of the building. He stops at the second-floor window and slides in with ease, shutting it behind him.
Climbing up the stairs, he listens intently to any sound that may give away her presence.
Yet… none do.
Pushing open the door to their shared room, he finds it empty.
His heart drops.
Hells, where is she?
He calls out her name.
No response.
He bolts out the door, combing the place for any signs of life. The eerie quiet concocts a potion of foreboding, the kind that trickles his skin in beads of sweat, and he doesn’t realize he is holding his breath until he discovers the opened hatch leading to the rooftop in the hallway.
He rushes up the stairs, taking two at a time.
Up here, the view pours into his eyes, the weaving pattern of homes in the city like that of tesserae in a mosaic.
His attention diverts, and there, with a sigh of profound relief, he finds her curled up atop a bench, fast asleep.
Had she been waiting here for me?
When he reaches her, he takes a moment to memorize the way her eyelashes fall over her eyes, the way her nose crinkles as a faint draft causes her to shiver. She balls tighter into herself, arms wrapped around her waist, her knees tucked in.
There is a twinge of pain in his chest.
She looks in pain even at rest.
He kneels and gathers her in his arms. He lifts her up, her head lulling against his shoulder.
He carries her carefully down the stairs, down the hallway, and to the room. He lays her onto the bed, as gentle as possible, then turns to leave to close the hatch.
“Astarion,” she mumbles, nearly delirious in her exhaustion — really, when was the last time she slept? — and latches onto his shirt. A small smile tugs at the corner of his lips.
“Yes, my dear?” He whispers in jest and squeezes her hand.
She responds back so softly he thinks he imagines it.
“…I love you.”
His breath catches. The roses and thorns in his lungs and in his chest simultaneously bloom and clench. His brow furrows.
Why?
How?
She always has this way of undressing the soul.
His thumb sweeps over her forehead. He swallows.
“Forevermore,” he promises, even though he knows that she doesn’t hear it, her breathing settling into that of drifting across the sea, her hand limp in his.
He steps back, the rising sun stretching its limbs and sneaking in past the drapes. He tiptoes over the strand of light, then firmly tugs the drapes closed, and retreats out of the room to shut the hatch.
After he has fully rid himself of any remnants of blood, and after he is clean, he returns to the bed, and envelopes her in his arms, pulling her near.
He can hear her heartbeat as if it were his own.
One thing is beyond any doubt.
I can’t lose her.
♦
Ten
Octavia A. Dixon
Donned in her most quaint attire, a lone woman attempts to conceal herself amongst common folk, despite the drip of her pearl earrings and the slide of her jade bangle. Her sharp features are beset in a severe disposition as she twists the bangle around and around her thin wrist.
The filed nails of her other hand tap, tap, tap an incessant rhythm into the corner booth, tucked away from the crowd currently swarming the bar. Each clink of glasses, each howl of laughter, each pluck of a lute’s strings makes her dig her filed nails into the wood, until little etchings are left under their wake. She unsticks her blouse from the dampness of her skin, rolling her shoulders back with a crack.
The crumpled note shoved in her satchel is smoothed out in her mind, the ink as black as the trepidation bloated in her belly.
I have information on Drake Kane, Lady Dixon. You were right about Lord Kallaway’s suicide. It reeks of foul play— I’ve met with some girls from The Vixen’s Inn, most of them denied speaking to me. However, I secured a source. She is willing to talk about who her true employer was…. and who it is now.
If you’re interested, meet with her and I at the Elfsong Tavern.
You’ve been traversing into the Lower City often enough to know where it is located, correct?
The specific date and time are stated below.
Octavia shifts in her seat. She is here—admittedly early, despite the fact that she got lost twice in her pursuit finding the damn place— but where are they? Will they be showing? Was this too good to be true?
As the thought enters her mind, the entrance to the inn opens with a bang, and a pair come through. One with the unmistakable build and height of a man, with perusing eyes and expressive brows, the other a woman, frail and thin, curled in on herself, undeniably young yet with the body language of someone weathered and aged. They speak to one another as if dealing in secrets, the man covering his mouth and the woman leaning in to listen.
This must be them.
Octavia abruptly stands, heart thumping wild in her chest. She does not wave them over, does not need to, as they have already noticed her, are already approaching.
She settles herself in her seat as the strangers find her table. The man is quick to offer her a handshake, his lips curling upward into a suave smile. His voice shares the same upward lilt.
“Good evening, Miss Octavia,” he says, and at the siren song of his tone her hand finds his, as if it has a mind of its own.
She swallows thickly, her eyes unable to leave his roguish yet undeniably handsome face.
“Oh, yes, the pleasure is mine,” Octavia replies, then drops her hand, which had been enfolded in his for a moment longer than necessary, “Do take a seat. I am assuming this is…?”
Octavia gestures toward the young woman, whose round eyes and pretty face were assuredly her selling feature. The young woman’s gentle eyes flick to the man’s like that of a docile deer, easily frightened.
He pats the young woman’s hand, then turns his attention back to Octavia.
“Yes. This is her. Regrettably, I doubt in this current environment Phoebe will be doing much talking. Perhaps we can rent a room to further discuss in private?”
Octavia fiddles with her bangle. The prospect of moving somewhere away from the public would no doubt be a bad idea for her safety. However, she had come all this way. She needs this information if she wants the publication’s full attention. Bribery did not work. They bound themselves to journalistic integrity, and if this could ensure her evidence from a reliable source… they would have no choice but to listen.
The Uppercity is depending on her.
The man touches her wrist, and she jolts out of her thoughts.
“If you’re concerned with your safety, I could always wait outside the door,” he offers with dip in his brow, “though I may be able to offer my own intel in addition to hers.
This perks up Octavia’s ears. She sits up straight in her seat, then gives the man a short shake of the head, “Oh… well in that case, I would fancy to hear it, plus, I trust this will not take too much time. Shall I pay for the room?”
“No need at all, darling,” the man calmly halts her hand, “I’ll pay. Give me a moment.”
Octavia watches him depart, then refocuses on the timid woman before her.
Octavia leans in across the table and whispers, “Is this okay with you?”
Phoebe nods in response, a frail creature of few words. Sympathy plumes up inside Octavia’s chest. The life this unfortunate thing must have endured. It is quite pitiful, really, if she dawdles on it too long.
The man returns with a rusted room key. Octavia half wishes she wore gloves when receiving it from his hands.
“Let us head up the stairs. You can follow me,” he beckons, and Octavia stands, spine straightening and shoulders held back.
With all her mustered-up courage and routine grace, Octavia trails after him, hand finding the stairwell. Phoebe lingers close behind.
The man, whose name she had recalled as Astra from the letter, holds open the door for her with a poised smile. She nods at him, then enters the room, hastening to unlatch her satchel and fumble for her parchment, ink pot, and quill.
The door shuts behind her, with a click of the lock.
She sets the materials down on a desk at the end of the room.
“I was told you have information on Lord Kallaway; would you mind telling me how familiar you are with him?” Phoebe requests with her back turned, dipping the quill into her ink pot, and writing out the date and name of her interviewees.
A roar of laughter erupts from downstairs, followed by the thrum of a lute, and a pounding of a drum. A rhythmic beat of feet meeting the floor and people singing bursts through the walls of the room. Octavia flinches with irritation. She neatly spells out her question on the parchment paper, despite every thump causing her quill to pierce the paper and bleed ink between the letters.
“Very familiar,” Phoebe replies, yet Octavia finds her voice to not quite fit the petite woman. She had mused it to sound as skittish and tentative as the woman looked. Instead, it seemed… austere. Fierce.
Octavia peeks over her shoulder at the young woman. Astra has his arms crossed, back leaning against the door. He directly meets her eyes, and for some reason, Octavia blushes, and averts her gaze back to her parchment.
“Is it true he was operating some of the brothels in the Lower City?” Octavia asks, her back turned once more as she dips her quill into the ink, saturating the fine tip.
She writes the same question in her paper.
“Don’t you work with the press?” Phoebe retorts, and with the suddenness of it, Octavia’s hand jolts, “why resort to speaking to me if you already know everything?”
“Da—Phoebe, no need to be so severe,” Astra interjects, but Octavia sets her quill down and turns to face them both.
“It’s okay, I know you are coming from a place of fear,” Octavia assures, “I understand coming here is dangerous. And I appreciate it,” she takes a step closer to the other woman, feels a clench of condolence in her gut, “I do not currently work with the press. Consider me a private investigator.”
“You mean, you have no connections?” Phoebe inquires.
An elated escalation of mirth booms from downstairs. A twanging of a lute, a wailing of a refrain.
“None concretely made. They will not listen without an eyewitness account, and well, you are that,” Octavia guarantees.
“Do they know you’re here?”
The crowd below is joining in, rejoicing in knowing the lyrics to the tune, their voices rising and rising in octave.
“No, I came of my own accord.”
“Does anyone know?”
Someone hollers with delight. A glass shatters.
“No, and I swear, your confidentiality is of utmost importance—”
“You’ve made a dire mistake, Octavia,” Phoebe remarks, and before Octavia can register it, the pain eclipses her body like the crescendo of a song.
The evening imparts upon her the consequence of good intentions, and she becomes like that of the inkblot in her parchment.
☾
Astarion often finds her here on the rooftop terrace of their temporary residence, gazing forlorn up at the stars. These evenings where waiting is the only strategy to have before the next mark tend to leave her restless. There, she resides, sat atop the balcony ledge, much to his distress, and takes a swig from a bottle, then sets it down beside her.
The bottle of wine is a quarter of the way empty. Her vigilance is of the same account, jerking out of a frigid thought as he settles down beside her. He does so gingerly, eyeing the bottom view as if it were an ocean of sharks, and she hmms in mild amusement.
Her smile is warm like the fluid that ran down her throat. It, albeit always a bit cautious, is all the more infectious. He repays it in full.
“I still can’t believe you went with the name Phoebe,” she jests, quirking a brow at him.
The wind swishes through her hair like a glissando. Her voice has the same effect. He rubs his chin in mock deliberation, “In my defense, it does sound like such a demure, defenseless name.”
She tilts her head, musing, “Have you known plenty of Phoebes then?”
He contemplates, whilst setting the bottle to the floor behind them, so that he may sit closer to her, “Not a single one.”
She laughs, and it is a rare, enchanting melody.
“I guess it was better than being conspicuous,” she prods him with her finger in his ribs, “Like Astra.”
He smirks, whilst grasping at her finger.
“I thought that to be very clever. What if I had forgotten my false name? I had to choose something like my own, you see. I’m not as adept at remembering names as you are,” he replies, tapping her head with his finger, and she brushes it away with a roll of her eyes.
“You’re indeed very clever, you just can’t trust your tongue,” she remarks, her gaze glittering with amusement.
“Oh, you’re very right my dear, I can’t trust my tongue,” he leans in, stare dipping to the plush of her lips and admits, “…unless it’s in your mouth.”
Her breath hitches. Her gaze skimming from his mouth to his stare, but then she leans away, a moment too soon. Her smile is faint, fleeting. She rubs her eyes.
“You haven’t been sleeping,” Astarion notes, a twinge of yearning still flickering like a flame in his chest.
She counters, while diverting her attention to the scenery before them, “You haven’t been eating.”
He frowns in response, mirroring her posture.
“You didn’t feed on Octavia,” she mentions, “and that was a couple weeks ago.”
“I wasn’t hungry at the time,” he assures, but when it comes to her, his usual gifting of telling lies unravels as soon as it leaves his mouth.
She gives him that really now? look that he’s grown far too accustomed to.
“You looked like you could consume her… and you didn’t. Any time you leave to feed… you return shortly after. You’ve become clumsy… you’ve been acting slow…” she trails off, and he huffs.
“I’m offended at the very notion of that. My reflexes are second to none,” he pledges, yet she doesn’t acquiesce.
“You seem paler, which I didn’t even think was possible.”
He leans into her space with a mischievous smile, “It’s flattering that you pay such close attention to me, my dear.”
“Astarion,” she reproaches, and he shifts back. His hands are all animated as he speaks, as if he’d forgotten he is three stories above the ground.
“Now, now, don’t Astarion me. Must everything have a reason? Must you always pick up on everything?” He complains, and she instantly interposes.
“So, you admit there is something wrong—”
Astarion’s voice overlaps hers, “Have I mentioned how ravishing you look right now? It’s quite something—”
“Is this because of me?”
His grin dissipates. He turns away from her seemingly omniscient stare.
“No,” he reiterates.
“No?”
Another breeze slips its fingers over their forms. Astarion clenches onto the ledge, his hand bumping hers. He won’t say another word. It’s dangerous when she gets him talking – it’s near impossible to evade her.
“Astarion,” she says, and his name from her lips is akin to pouring himself into mornings that never come, “Whatever the reason, it hurts me to see you like this.”
He swallows, then sighs—but it is cut short when she rests her arm on his lap, her wrist upward, her palm open.
“It doesn’t have to be from my neck,” she murmurs, “we can try like this, can’t we?”
His brows rise, and he’s about to take her arm and place it aside, but then he catches her eyes. Her gaze is fretful, imploring like the very pull of his instinct to drink.
Must you look at me that way?
It makes me want to do anything for you.
But the burden of guilt swarms inside his gut.
He intakes a drag of air through his nostrils. He places his hand on hers.
“I won’t,” he states.
“If it’s from my wrist, I’m sure it’ll be okay,” she reassures, but he contends.
“It’s the same.”
“I won’t react like I did before.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I really do think I’ll be alright—”
Her name tumbles from his lips, defeated, immediate, followed by “I can’t.”
She recoils. He bites the inside of his cheek.
“I can’t hurt you again. I don’t want to make you cry again,” Astarion elucidates, “You were afraid of me… and I… don’t want you to fear me. I want you to feel safe with me, like how I feel when I’m with —” He exhales, his tone a touch more tender, “with you.”
“You do make me feel safe,” she replies, intwining their fingers, “I wasn’t ready then. But I am ready to try like this now…, but only if you want to. I won’t ever force you to do something you don’t want.”
His head lulls back as he stares at the sky. If his heart still knew how to beat – it would be pounding against his chest.
“You have no idea how much I want it,” his adam’s apple bobs, “how much I yearn for you,” his attention slips to her, and how darling she is perched there beside him, how lovely, how enrapturing, “to taste you is to taste my demise and my salvation.”
She inches closer, too close. Her words are but a whisper.
“I’ll count, like you told me to. Then you stop.”
His chest clenches. This ocean of desire has become a typhoon.
She untangles their fingers. She raises her wrist to his lips.
“What if I can’t stop?” He responds, his cadence thick.
“You will,” she nods, biting her lip. He wets his own.
His breathing becomes ragged.
How he wants to devour her.
“Five,” she commences, slow, and he moves as leisurely, sinking his fangs into her wrist, listening to her gasp. He begins to suck, and she momentarily forgets to count, until he mmms into her skin as a reminder.
He drinks, and the flavor is akin to the dawn’s embrace.
Warm and full, the trees rustling, the crickets chirping, the spring water glistening, the wind whistling, and the morning mist pebbling on his skin –
“Four.”
It tastes like the embodiment of her — free, flittering across a cerulean and yellow sky, and suddenly he’s not afraid of heights, suddenly he is up above swishing through swashes of clouds, dipping through rays of gold –
“Three.”
Another pull of her blood into his mouth, and every endorphin sings, every vein coursing with electricity, every bone feels heavy, yet his chest is featherlight –
“Two…”
When had she become melded to his side? When had he clamped down on her wrist and gripped her thigh?
“O-one…”
And with each drink he can feel it rolling down his body like ripples of waves, can hear her heartbeat thump in his skull, can taste the heat building between her thighs, his hand clenching and unclenching over her thigh, then sliding nearer to the place that calls out for him so sweetly, the lust luscious and the burning boiling hot –
He wants all of her, wants to drink from her, wants to touch her, wants to imprint himself upon her, wants to know all her surreptitious senses and make them sing with desire for him, wants to –
Her hand clutches his atop her upper thigh, and he wrenches his fangs from her wrist. His chest is heaving, his body a cord begging to be strummed.
His eyes latch onto hers. He opens his mouth to apologize – but she extinguishes it with her own.
The smear of her blood is on her lips, yet she doesn’t flinch, doesn’t stop, and he hums at the back of his throat, the taste and feel of her mouth on his divine, so much so it sizzles up his spine and he forgets control, forgoes restraint –
She nips his lip with her teeth, and he gasps. Her tongue finds his, twining and writing poetry with her kiss. His hands are caressing her cheek and the underside her jaw, tasting her deeper, and her hands are grasping at the front of his shirt, then sliding over the bulge at the front of his trousers.
“Hah,” he pants, hips nearly bucking up to meet her all too teasing touch. She pulls back from his lips if only a hair breadth away.
“Can I touch you?” she whispers, and he nearly whimpers in reply, his brow furrowing, simultaneously intoxicated on blood, lust, and a third thing he always struggles to articulate…
“Here?” he replies, his kiss stippling down her chin, suckling at her neck, yet she doesn’t cringe in fear, doesn’t wince.
He can hear the smile in her words as she promises, “I won’t let you fall.”
At the mention of falling, his eyes blink open in realization, and one hand lurches out to grip the side of the ledge. She laughs.
“Hells,” he mutters, his staggering panic at the sight of the distant drop to his right competing with the strain in his pants. The lingering savor of her blood still blooms on his tongue like the moon in the black sky.
Heights can never deter her, however, as she leans in once more, until he’s lying flat atop the mercifully wide ledge. She has him straddled beneath her thighs.
“Are you afraid?” she questions, crawling over him, her eyes twinkling like the stars overhead.
“Yes,” Astarion admits, yet makes no move to get up.
“Do you want to stop?” Her expression shifts into one of concern, and she motions to get up, yet his hands grip at either side of her hips, preventing her from leaving.
“No,” he retorts, his voice strangled in his throat, yet evidently certain.
She eases back down onto him, and he wheezes through his clenched teeth, the press of her clothed sex onto his crotch making his head lull back and his eyes squeeze shut.
She grinds down against him, rocking back and forth, her palms falling over his chest. The friction is not enough yet altogether too much—
Her repeating hmms of lip-bit suppressed moans sear down to where he needs her most.
“Please,” he utters, his fingers digging into her hips, despite himself, “It’s torture.”
She pries away his fingers and he reluctantly lets her, then sits up. The loss of her makes him feel feral.
But then, her fingers are in the waistband of his pants and his undergarments, and she’s tugging at them —
He lifts his hips to aid her, and she succeeds in yanking them to his mid-thigh, his cock springing free. The cold press of concrete on his backside makes him hiss, the whish of cool air making him shiver. Her hand, wet with her saliva, wraps around the base of his cock, and the warmth that was so suddenly stolen from him is encased in the soft of her palm.
“Ahgh,” he groans, hips surging forward, her name teetering from his tongue.
She leans down to murmur into the shell of his ear, “You’re safe with me,” her rhythm remains melodic, deliberate, “Just focus on my fingers,” he twitches in her hand, “on my voice…”
Her hand pumps up and down, up and down, and he listens to her labored breath, all eager at making a mess of him…
He pants, feeling as though his eyes will roll to the back of his head at the sensation, her hand snug and soft, so good…
His hand enfolds hers, and urges her on faster, more, faster, to wrap her fingers tighter, harder, just like that, yes—! as he moans unabashedly loud into the night, his hips careening higher, and higher. It is building and building, like fangs sinking into skin, like the night turning to the morning sunrise—
Yet then, her hand abruptly stops.
“No—” he startles, the loss of her touch surely a new form of suffering, “Please,” he begs, as his hips raise in futility, “D-Darling— please— don’t stop—"
But it is not her hand that encompasses him, it is her mouth —
“Ah!” Astarion gasps, his body set aflame, the warm wet of her mouth and the swirl of her tongue over the head of his cock nearly enough to make him weep. Her fingers curl around his hips as she presses her lips to the underside of the tip, and each and every peppered kiss is maddeningly diaphanous. He arches his back, his breath shuttering and his chest fluttering at the affection of her gesture.
He means to catch sight of it, so he rises onto his elbows, but then she is gripping over his hips, endeavoring to hold him steady as she meets his eye and begins to bob her head up and down his shaft.
Her name seems to shatter past the clench of his teeth as she takes as much of him in her throat as she can manage, and it’s enough to swing his head back and see celestial cities behind his eyelids.
She hallows her cheeks, sucking firm, and Astarion’s moans rumble through his chest and out past his parted lips, his hand diving into her hair, gathering it in his loose fist to keep it from cascading over her face.
And he does try, desperately, not to force her head down, but it’s so fucking hard, it feels so good, it feels like he’s delving into velvet, like he’s drinking her blood until he’s pitiably drunk –
He feels her moans humming over the base of his cock, and she’s so exquisite, so perfect, and by the gods she’s taking him so deep like such a good fucking girl, until there’s tears in the corner of her eyes and running down her cheeks, and he said he didn’t want to make her cry, but he can’t stop —
And then it’s there, flooding through him like rapids in a river, drowning him in a senseless sort of pleasure, akin to the sweet release of dying, where everything is cast in a vast garden of white, the kind of death he’ll only ever experience with her —
“I’m going to—” he pleads in warning, but his hand is still weaved in her hair, still clutching the strands, “you’re going to make me—!”
Little does he know, this was always her favorite part, even better when he watches, so her pace doesn’t let up, it only quickens, and her moans persist in vibrating over his shaft, and she’s peering up at him with those half hooded eyes, and it’s all he can take before he’s climaxing, his hips jolting forward and his cock pulsating as she drinks every last drop.
When it’s over, his hand descends like a leaf from her hair to his side, his body vibrant with the vivid gold of an afterglow. He chases his breath while admiring her drag her thumb over the drips on her chin to her tongue.
He lays fully back then, a hand over his eyes as he smiles with pearly whites and pointy fangs.
“Hells,” a bubble of laughter forms in his throat at the absurdity of receiving oral sex atop a gods damn balcony ledge, “two centuries old and yet you manage to be my first for many experiences.”
She gives a soft laugh, still catching her breath. His chuckles, however, become a swift inhale as she delicately cleans him with her fingers, then helps yank up his undergarments and pants. He looks at her through the slivers of his fingers.
“Is that your way of saying you find me special?” she jokes with a sleepy smile, all sanguine and sweet. Astarion pulls her down to lie on his chest and kisses the top of her head.
“Is that your way of wanting me to tell you you’re special?” He replies, easing into night’s yawning breeze and the way her hair tickles his nose.
“Mmmm,” she responds, her arm enclosing over his waist, “Maybe.”
He chuckles, and then they sink into the silk of the night’s solace.
A long lull of silence ensues, and he thinks he could remain here forever, if not for the sun’s return.
Perhaps an hour or so has passed, and he ponders if she’s fallen asleep, and how best to carry her downstairs to the bed, when she whispers.
“Astarion.”
There’s something there in her voice that lacks any of its prior humor.
“Yes, my dear?” he coos, his eyes having fallen closed, his fingernails combing through her hair, his body in harmony despite the height of where it lies.
“…I love you.”
He becomes very still beneath her.
When he doesn’t immediately respond, she continues, in that same careful, sincere tone.
“Despite everything that came before, and everything that will come.”
He answers quietly. “You say that like you’re saying goodbye.”
“Maybe I won’t get to,” she half rises, and finds his gaze, “so I need you to know.”
“Nothing is going to happen to you,” he firmly contends, yet she shakes her head.
“Nothing is certain,” she sighs, whilst gazing at the horizon. She then looks back at him and takes his hand in hers. She places it over her heart, and its beating is like that of freshly fallen snow, like newly blossomed pedals in spring, “except for how I feel for you.”
Tears prick his eyes. He rises and she shifts to sit on his lap. His hands caress her face.
“You already know, don’t you?” He whispers, gentle, and searches for it in her eyes, “how deeply in love I am with you.”
Her eyes shine with unshed tears.
Her lips quiver.
“I never want us to be apart again, so please,” he kisses her wet lashes, and then tucks her head beneath his chin, his arms wrapping around her, “don’t speak as though we will be.”
☾☼
Your right hand is on his shoulder, his left resting on your shoulder blade. Your other hand is clasped in his.
“Feet together, then right, then close, feet together–” you instruct as your bodies dance across the bedroom floor.
“Darling, I hardly need guidance on how to do a simple waltz,” Astarion sardonically comments, though he undermines it by misstepping again, nearly stomping on your toe. Your nose scrunches, and you quirk a brow.
“You’re obviously very much out of practice,” you dotingly mock, then inhale once more, “feet together, then left, then close—”
He missteps again, then offers you a coy, wolfish grin.
“Maybe if we had music, it would be easier to keep rhythm,” he remarks, a stray curl falling over his forehead. You sigh whilst swiping it back into place.
“The masquerade ball is in a month or so. We must look the part,” you argue, and he rolls his eyes and leans in.
“I don’t recall in all my life a time where enacting a murder meant including a dance,” Astarion quips with a scowl, and you close the distance by purposefully bumping the tip of your nose with his.
His attempt at suppressing a smile fails terribly so.
“If we are assuming the identities of our next marks, then we have to know how to dance if asked,” you reason, and he sulks in response.
“I’m only agreeing to this because of how devastatingly gorgeous I’ll look in that suit you got me,” he gloats, then pouts, as if mildly irked that you are no longer paying attention to him now that he is finally following your lead, “…and of course, I’ll want to see how utterly captivating you will look as well.”
You don’t respond, still too focused on watching his feet. His hand tilts your chin back up so that you must meet his eyes.
“Is it customary to look at your feet during a waltz as well?” He teases, with a rise of his brow.
Your eyes narrow at him, yet the corners of your lips perk up, a betrayal of the annoyance you’ve been combatting the entirety of this lesson.
He would throw a fit if I called this a lesson.
“Astarion,” you scold, “I know you know the steps… or would it better if I count the beats?”
The mere mention of counting makes him hmmph, and you swear, if he could blush, he would be doing so.
“Don’t mention counting unless you want a repeat of the other night,” he cautions with the kind of smile that crinkles his crow’s-feet and makes the scarlet of his irises glint with mischievous intent.
A heat plumes up your neck and settles in the apples of your cheeks.
“I’m being serious!” You exclaim, and he huffs out a haughty laugh.
“As am I,” he retaliates, then leans in to kiss you. You turn your head so that his lips press to your cheek.
“Astarion…” you warn, but then his lips are trailing down your jaw, and his arms are encompassing you close, the waltz be damned.
“Don’t we have to pretend to be married too?” he hums against your skin, parting his lips and sucking at the underside of your jaw, “should we consummate our marriage as preparation?”
You open your mouth to reply, but then his lips are trailing to the pulse point beneath your ear.
You feebly search for the words you wanted to say… before you lose the chance to…
“Our next mark…” you mumble out, your breath catching with every kiss and suckle on your neck, subconsciously noting how even now, he never uses his teeth there anymore, “…I-I think I—”
“Yes,” he mews, his knee wedging between your thighs, “tell me what it is you think…”
You inhale, and let your eyes fall closed.
“I think I should go alone…”
A beat.
His knee falls as he pulls away from your neck and holds you by your arms. There is sliver between his brows, a disapproving dip in his mouth. He awaits your explanation, without a reprieve of his own reply.
“It’s…” you try to say, yet the words are tethered to your tongue. You’ve been struggling to tell him for the past week, yet now, when the time has come that you have no other choice but to be vulnerable… but to tell him about this…
You can’t.
To confess the past would be to resurrect the dead. You used to go about your life like you didn’t exist, a phantom lover passing through others in fleeting reassurances. If he knows, will his gaze still turn toward you? Will he still playfully rest his chin on your shoulder while pulling you close?
Will he return to you?
That humiliation was like bile; yet you kept yourself purging.
Why did you keep yourself urgent for others who used you?
Why did you let yourself be belittled?
He’s not like them.
They only wanted your sex. Only wanted the flesh. Only wanted the part of you and gave up the whole and what happens if he knows that---
They’ve all… had their share.
How can you let yourself be seen when you know what you are?
How can you hope for a garden when you are the weeds?
He says your name. You’d gotten lost in the chasm of your thoughts.
Astarion’s white brows are knit together; his head slanted.
“It’s nothing…” you shake your head, stepping away from him, “I thought you’d enjoy a night of rest, but… it’s better you go,” you give him a half shrug.
“It doesn’t seem like nothing,” he states, stern yet patient, “what are you not saying?”
“Nothing,” you offer him a faint smile, and something inside you dies a bit at the cowardice of it, “it’s nothing.”
☾☼
A/N:
Confession time... the montage of kills ended up being too long. I have written currently 16k+ in counting, and that's way too long to post in one chapter. So, that to say, expect the second "part" very soon from now.
We are nearing a very big reveal, and then we will be entering the final arc of the story. Please let me know if the change of POV was okay, or if you prefer strictly reading from the reader's point of view.
Thank you so much for leaving a heart and commenting. I try to reply to every comment. It means so much to me, and keeps me going <3 (that, and my undying passion for Astarion lol).
The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: Explicit
WC for part 4 - 7.7k, total - 31k+
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, oral sex (female receiving), p in v, creampie, explicit consent, angst, on his knees for you in more ways than one, in love & its a disaster, additional tags posted on ao3
read on ao3
or keep reading below <3
hope it's okay I tagged you again :) @babypeapoddd and @joyful-enchantress
☼
Traversing the Uppercity is like tracing the crevices of your palm. You tread its cobblestone walkways like skimming over callous. The maintained gardens like the nails you must keep trimmed. The domineering domains of the privileged patriars are like clenched fists white with rage, the fortresses impenetrable and fierce.
The sun revels in the city’s grandeur. You follow the dips and valleys as if they are ingrained within you. The pristine manors, the elaborate merchant stalls, the flowered fields that flow from one another like converging seas. The perfumed air of lavender and honeysuckle. There is a serene quiet of the Uppercity. It soothes with its calm lulling breeze, with its demure femininity, with its docile decorum. The marble and limestone statues cast long stretching shadows as you pass underneath, their chiseled gazes demanding reverence, utmost grace. It is a wonder the gods are not responsible for their creation.
You find your way to his residence, trailing down an extensive, spiraling path, shaded by a canopy of trees. Looming gates tuck away a prodigious manor that could rival the elite. When you get to the entrance, a pack of patrollers take one glance at you and wordlessly open the gates with bowed heads and averted gazes.
You walk up the staircase to the front door. It is oak paneled, with iron reinforcements that restrain the intricacy of bronze and copper trimming beneath. It opens without you needing to knock.
You nod at the door man your greeting, and he bows his head politely in response. He then closes the door behind you with a heavy thud, gesturing to the grand staircase.
“He’s in his library, Ms. Dove.”
“I figured,” you murmur, the false name dredging up feelings you rather remain buried. You sigh.
“Thank you, Ambrose.”
He bows again, before glancing at you once more with foreboding clouding his eyes.
You turn away, leisurely ascending the stairs, the pads of your feet echoing about the home, unsettling the stillness of the residence.
Drake Kane.
His initials are stenciled into the blood oath at your wrist, as they have been, countless times over the past decade of your life.
You take in the oil paintings of ethereal landscapes, the gilded furniture. The various tapestries draped over the walls are weaved depictions of dancing deities and singing devils making a mockery of faith.
He whose soul eclipsed with yours for the pursuit of this.
All of this.
When you reach the top of the staircase, you pause for a moment. The hallway to his study looks as though it could go on for an eternity before you.
You gnaw at the inside of your cheek.
The rich red of the floor runner rivals that of Astarion’s irises.
Gods.
The way he looked.
Your fingers clench over the banister. You can’t think of this morning now. Can’t fixate on the uncertainty of his eyes or the crinkle in his brow. Can’t recall the way he caressed you, held you, spoke to you with honeyed words.
The guilt of leaving him in a hurry blisters your insides, festers in the fact that you’ll have to return after this and answer questions you yourself are not ready to answer, not willing to admit.
Did he mean everything he said to me?
Will he regret what he said if I tell him everything?
Will he still want me if he knows what I’ve done?
Could he come to fully forgive me?
If I get that scroll, if I…
You try to free yourself from the thoughts like wolves hounding your mind, however, when you reach Drake’s door, they are encircling, ruthless.
As you enter, the air in your lungs contract. The thick velvet curtains are all pulled closed, evoking the presence of night in the room. Books line the walls from floor to ceiling, organized meticulously by series and author, yet many litter the floor in disarray.
You nearly trip over one when your eyes fall upon him.
A tightness forms in your throat, making it difficult to swallow. The man, although hunched over, still towers high, leaning against the side of his disastrous desk. One gloved hand teeters his glass of liquor, the other idly stroking the scruff of his precisely trimmed beard. The glow of the fireplace spills over the deep crevices of his crows-feet and pass over his wrinkled mouth, his face a contortion of twisting tendrils, of yellows and shadows. He doesn’t turn his attention to you, instead choosing to admire the snapping jaws of flames as they devour the wood with crackling contempt.
When Drake speaks, it is as smooth as the brandy he is drinking.
“My sources say you’ve been very successful as of late,” he swishes the alcohol in his glass, “Efficient. Quick.”
He diverts his attention to you.
He smiles.
You know he is unhappy.
“I’m impressed… Even after all the hogwash in the city and your day in the sun, you still know how to make dealings in the dark,” he commends you, and there, beneath the brewing ire is a lilt of sincerity.
You inwardly cringe.
There was a time when you would bloom with satisfaction at his praise.
Now, you can only wither.
“Get to the point,” you provoke, the façade of his suavity useless when it came to you.
His gray eyes freeze over. His smile unhinges. His expression hardens, all pinched tight, his voice lowering to scold you.
“Did you really expect you could hide something like this from me?” He reprimands, then finishes off his liquor with an unflinching gulp. He sets his drink on the desk with a bang. He pops the bottle of brandy open and refills the glass.
“I thought you knew better,” he mutters.
You give a shaky inhale, attempting to maintain your composure. It was always a thing of instinct to lie. But there’s no lying to Drake.
“I’m not hiding anything; he isn’t any of your concern.”
He smiles that half smile that doesn’t fit his face. Behind your back, you rub absentmindedly over your wrist.
“You know,” he starts, “When you first came back here, I was relieved,” He admits, takes a sip from his glass, and then gestures aimlessly, “You running off before the approaching apocalypse really put things in perspective.”
He rests back against his desk, facing you head on, “I mean… I always knew how invaluable you were to me. How necessary you are in keeping things afloat,” he waves his hand, “No one is as clever, as competent, or as cooperative,” he points to you, “you don’t trust in this line of business, but you and I have developed a special bond through the many years…” he scrubs over his beard, voice trailing off.
A special bond.
The remark makes you splinter like the firewood.
“And well, after everything you’ve done, after all we’ve accomplished, I couldn’t fathom you’d leave. Somehow… I had hoped dearly you’d come back in through my door, and you did.” He smiles, but it falters as he swishes his drink. His tone darkens.
“Though, I was hoping it wasn’t for someone else’s sake.”
“I’m not doing this for him,” you retort, “and even if I was,” your shoulders straighten, your chin tilting up in defiance, “I don’t see why it matters.”
He laughs unhumorous. You bristle.
His head tilts to the side.
“You came crawling back from saving the world to beg for a bounty you had once profusely refused,” he mocks, and a swash of embarrassment slathers you in red.
He levies you with a tempestuous scowl. There’s an accusation inlaid in his eyes.
“Who do you think you’re trying to fool?”
You glance away.
“And of course it matters,” he contends with another condescending laugh, “you’re acquainted with a thing whose core design is to eat you.”
You sputter, “He doesn’t want to—”
He cuts you off, “We deal in deceit every day. It’s useless to deny it,” he shackles his gaze onto you, “not to mention, I have eyes everywhere,” he gestures about you.
You open your mouth to retort, but the words die on your tongue when he adds on, “But please, tell me you don’t let the thing feed on you.”
“I don’t--” you blink, flushing. He notices. He shakes his head. His eyes dip to your throat, fortunately concealed by your high neck top. It doesn’t matter. You feel like he can still see it, the markings Astarion left hours prior, can still see the puncture wounds of fangs from your alleyway affair.
“If you’re not careful,” he delves a knife with his words, “it will bleed you dry, little dove.”
“Stop.”
You squeeze your fists tighter. Your stomach drops. Astarion’s confession ripples through you.
“Despite my vitriol, my deceit, my pettiness, my shame, and my… almost killing you.”
But he didn’t.
And he wouldn’t now.
He… couldn’t…
Something shifts. Drake knows he’s hit a nerve.
He knows how to twist the knife.
“Look at yourself,” he motions to you from head to toe, intonation slick with disdain, “To think— you’re doing this for a leech?”
“What,” you bite back, “are you upset I’m not doing this for you?”
He laughs.
From the top drawer of his desk, he takes out a blade. He pulls up one of his sleeves, then yanks the bottom of his glove upward to expose his wrist. He holds the handle of the blade out to you with waning expectation.
“Glide the blade across my arm, Dove. You’ll find the mirrored symbol of our blood oath on my skin, as it is on yours.”
You don’t touch the knife.
He flips it over in one hand and does as he said. Slides it horizontally over the flesh, lets the skin pebble with blood. The blood drips down his forearm and over his wrist. Just as proclaimed, a twin inscription is revealed in a dull glow.
“You are doing this for me,” he contests, “though I admit, this complicates things a bit.”
You step back.
The room is hot.
The metallic scent of blood sickens you.
A familiar sense of hopelessness floods you.
“Don’t,” you warn, “don’t touch him.”
Drake shrugs with a sneer, tossing the blade onto the desk, and swiping the blood away with gloved fingers.
“Give me a reason not to,” he remarks cavalier, “seems to me this can jeopardize our oath, and I don’t like taking on unforeseen risks.”
“Drake,” your voice breaks, “please.”
“Don’t look at me like that,” he quarrels, pinching his brow, “makes me think of when I first met you.”
“You already have my soul at your disposal,” you insist, “it doesn’t matter who I’m doing this for, it will be done. He won’t complicate that.”
Drake becomes eerily quiet for a moment too long. He picks up his glass of brandy, eyeing the licking of flames.
“Then what?” He queries.
Your blood goes cold.
“What do you mean?”
He turns to you.
“What comes after its done?” He drinks. “You planning on running away again?”
You inhale.
“No.”
He beams.
“Good.”
And then he is swooping forward to you like that of a panther on prey.
“But remember this,” he plucks up your hand, his gloved fingers still damp from his blood. He squeezes, purposefully, right over the palm, “Remember who it was who gave you everything you have. Remember who gave you the clothes on your back, the food that you eat, the bed that you sleep in,” he pauses, eyes narrowing, “Who got you a way out of that room. Who made sure that you were no longer only skin and bones, selling yourself off to whoever would bother purchasing,” you teeter backward, wrenching your palm from his, heart lurching at his words.
“When this contract is over, and I’ve gotten what I want, you’re still indebted to me. You made your choices,” he sneers, “and I don’t care about the vampire, as long as he doesn’t interfere with that.”
You try to steady yourself, but you can’t. You’re trembling.
Your silence is not an appropriate confirmation.
“Understand?” He asks, though it comes with the connotation of being a demand.
“Yes,” you answer, diffidently.
He ponders over you with a scrupulous expression, then sighs. You hold your breath as he passes beside you. He opens a cabinet at the wall behind you, pulling out a matching glass, then walks back over to set it on top of his desk, right next to his. He fills it, then holds it to you. You mean to refuse it, but instead, you reluctantly take it.
The corners of his mouth perk up at this, and he takes a sip, watching as you do the same.
“Besides…. I don’t want,” his voice teeters, watching you drink with smug acknowledgement, “you to end up like your mother.”
He downs the last of his brandy, inspecting the now empty glass.
You recoil as if struck, visions of your mother flittering behind your eyes.
It is hard to remember the blur of her face, as she was so young. Much younger than you are now. You don’t even remember the sound of her voice.
He would bring her up.
An outrage so profound bubbles up your stomach like bile. Drake’s insinuation scalds you.
“He’s nothing like my father. He’s not a monster,” you argue through gritted teeth, but Drake doesn’t acquiesce.
“Bit of irony behind those words, isn’t there?” he states.
Vampire.
Monster.
“He wouldn’t…” the words falter, and you set the drink on his desk, not taking another drop, “he wouldn’t hurt me.”
His eyes flick to yours.
“I’m sure she thought the same,” he suggests, then stalks off behind his desk, rifling through drawers.
“For the ones yet to come,” he tosses you a scroll, “to aid in your endeavor.”
You unbound the scroll, and skim over the names, locations, dates. All listed meticulously.
You pause at Theo Cordelian’s name.
A sliver of dread sneaks up your spine. You subconsciously grip the parchment too tight.
As if reading your mind, Drake notes, “Our friend Theo still visits your old place of work,” you glance up at him, easing your grip, “his lovely wife finally caught on.”
He gives a rueful smile.
“The girls know he is a dead man. They will assist you in making the kill.”
Like they have a choice. They work for you.
“Ask for Sage when you decide to visit,” he shrugs, “you remember her, don’t you?”
Her name’s Marcella. And yes, I know her.
You don’t say this, instead choosing to change the subject.
“What of the remaining four?”
“You never miss anything, do you…” Drake combs a hand over his beard, “I’m still working on that. It is essential we get you an alias, an invite… the whole thing.”
“An invite?” You ask, perplexed.
“Yes. For a big, ostentatious, masquerade ball. Isn’t that thrilling? I have to give it to these people, they may be predictable, but that doesn’t mean they don’t know how to have fun.”
You’re already shaking your head no.
“You can’t be serious.”
“I am always serious,” he waves his hand at you, “it’s not like you can’t handle it. You managed to save the world. Four people in one night is nothing,” he assures with ease.
“Who’s hosting it?”
Abruptly, he draws back. His face becomes blank.
“Who is it?” you reiterate.
“Renald’s the only person who would hold a ball in his own honor,” Drake states simply. You huff out a laugh.
“You’re fucking kidding me.”
“He’s not a mark,” he reasons.
“He’s my father,” you retort.
“Not in any of the ways that matter,” He challenges, the line between his brow and the dip of his frown deepening, if only for a moment, before smoothing out.
“You can avoid him the whole night. As long as you make sure the people we need to have killed are killed, then there is no issue.”
Your nostrils flare.
“I should have known you’d pull something like this,” your voice raises an octave, “you knew I would never have agreed if I’d known.”
No.
You can’t.
You’ve tempted death enough times to know better.
“You know I can’t,” you refuse, despite knowing it is too late, that you have no choice, “I can’t get near him. If he even considers the possibility I’m there, all hell breaks loose.”
“If he knew for sure you were still alive, hell would already be upon us,” Drake soothes, all calm and collected, “But he doesn’t. So, no reason to worry. All you need to do is do what you do best. Avoid suspicion.”
“That’s not a guarantee,” you protest, “I— I can’t—.”
His words strike you down like a sword.
“How much do you care for this vampire?”
You stop.
You look at him in disbelief.
“What?”
“How much,” he repeats, slow, methodical, “do you care?”
You know what he is getting at.
You cast your eyes aside, and mutter, “You’re a son of a bitch, you know that?”
He blinks, unperturbed.
“I guess that answers my question,” he nods, “Good. I knew I could depend on you to get things done.”
“When will you give me the rest of the intel?”
“A few months or so.”
“When’s the event?”
“A few months or so,” he remarks. You bite the inside of your cheek.
All this will go to hells. He is either being willfully ignorant or he is desperate.
“I’m leaving,” you murmur, turning to the door.
But then he says your name. Your real name.
You don’t look back, you only pause.
“Please be careful,” he says with an inflection that whispers of curtailed concern. It is not unkind. It is… soft.
But then, it is gravel.
“And don’t be naïve. Keep that thing in line, or I’ll do it myself.”
You cast him a look over your shoulder.
“Oh and,” he tacks on, pointing at his third finger, “did you bring it?”
You have to hold your tongue.
You untie the coin purse at your waist. You extract the severed finger, still swaddled in cloth, from inside. You toss it on his desk.
He unwraps it with care, peeling back the blood-stuck layers of cloth. He plucks off Cedric Lao’s ring. Slipping off one of his gloves, he cleans the ring until the green of the emerald is stark against the pale of his skin.
He slides it on over his ring finger, then casually casts the severed finger into the fire.
He examines the ring with a small smile.
“Thank you, Dove.”
You don’t respond. Instead, you turn on your heel and leave out the door, away from Drake, and away from this.
☼
It isn’t until you are halfway to the inn, and halfway to Astarion, that you stop. You’ve returned to the sound of the Lower City, where the people horde together, not victims of propriety, but rather buoyant, musical spirits, weaving their way of life into their rampant conversation, into their howling laughter, their jocular pettiness and pride.
It isn’t until you have scaled the wall of one of the overarching buildings, that you realize you are… lost.
Not in a manner of direction. You know the way back.
But you don’t know what comes after that. Where to go then.
Drake was right. You shouldn’t be naïve.
There was never a reality where you get to leave this city.
Even if Astarion receives what he hopes for from the wish scroll. Even if he may decide he has forgiven you.
If you must continue down this path… you couldn’t ask him to stay. Shouldn’t.
You open your palms. There, healed over countless times beneath the ravages of nail bites, was the phantom of a cut. Precisely made, over and over with every oath; it haunts the flesh.
You can still feel the glide of the blade. That piercing pain; sudden and fierce, then dull and throbbing. It signified the clasping of hands, it meant the covenant of your soul tethered upon pursuit, or damned by potential failure.
You think of this morning, staring absentmindedly at the ceiling, fingers combing through white curls. The way Astarion’s arm was wrapped around you, the way his cheek pressed to your heart, the way his lashes lay closed. All the sharp angles and rigid lines were smooth like a still pond. That place. That haven of him, unlike anywhere or anyone else.
It was tender, and peaceful, and…
He was safe.
You tilt your head up, peering over at the horizon as it basks in the glory of a brazen sun, the light bursting out from behind clustering clouds.
You think of the scars he received, and and the ones you gave yourself.
He will be free.
Regardless of the cost.
Your fingers curl in.
Not enough to hurt.
Enough to remind you.
Even if I am dragged to the hells.
☾☼
Losing track off time is not your standard forte. However, as the sun anoints the city streets in an outpouring of waning gold, you know you’re late. You slither down slanted roof tiles with ease, and spring across the gap to land on the inn’s balcony ledge, clutching onto the guardrail. You heave yourself over with an exhale. You knock against the balcony window, and although the inside of your shared abode is kept obscured by thick drapes, when leaning in close enough, you can hear a barrage of movement from inside.
A click, then a shuffling of footsteps away.
You make sure to be careful upon entering, eyeing the corner of your room where Astarion is sulking with his arms crossed, peering down at you over his elevated chin.
You hardly get the chance to breathe before he’s spouting off.
“I thought you’d only be a few hours.”
“I know,” you state, attempting to disguise the sheepishness of your voice as you lock the window, then conceal the sun behind the drapes once more, “I’m sorry. It went longer than I initially expected.”
You half expect him to tap his foot in response. He allows your excuse with an exception.
“Well. Don’t be so reticent darling, tell me what the man said,” he demands, stalking forward. When you swivel on your heel to face him, he halts in place.
“He gave me this,” you remark while collecting the bunched up scroll from the pouch attached to your waist belt. You hold it out for him, and he takes it, wasting no time in reviewing the list of assorted names, locations, times…
“It’ll make tracking them down easier and faster,” you tack on, and he hmms in response.
“How thoughtful,” he responds dryly, but then the notch of his brow builds as he skims over it once more.
While he combs over the details, you leave his side to change into new clothes.
Visiting Drake always made you feel smothered. Peeling off each piece of clothing helps alleviate that residual feeling, like a film clung to your skin that won’t wash off…
“There’s only five here.”
You nod with a sigh, before realizing he can’t see you behind the partition. You step out, smoothing your hands over the airy cotton of your blouse.
“Yes. The last four are a bit… complicated. But that won’t be of any concern to you. I’ll be taking care of it,” you assure, and for some trivial reason you think he might agree.
Perhaps it’s purely due to the exhaustion, as the look on his face clearly declares otherwise, all unimpressed and quirked brow.
“Oh?” He tilts his chin at you, one hand waving outward, exuding a vigor you’re far too drained to combat, “please do explain the rationale behind that choice.”
“It’ll be too much of a risk,” you insist, but he scoffs in response.
“Darling, as if our prior propinquity hasn’t been anything but precarious.”
You shift your weight from one foot to the other and raise your brow.
“Drake wants me to take them all out in one evening at Lord Lockwell’s annual masquerade ball.”
He blinks, processing your words.
“Ah.”
You give a curt nod, then drag a hand over your face at the omission. He shakes his head, placing a hand on his hip.
“And what ever made you think I’d agree to you going alone?” He inquires, bewildered.
You peek at him behind splayed fingers.
“Because…” your fingers slide off your face.
You say it as though it is common sense, and perhaps to you, it is, “If anything goes awry, you won’t be collateral damage.”
“Typically, it’s me whose more of an optimist,” he quips, sardonic, but then his tone loses any ounce of humor. “There’s something you’re not telling me. What makes this such a risk considering everything else we’ve faced?”
You shrink backward.
How do you say something like this?
“It’s… Lord Lockwell. If he discovers I’m there… well. It would be disastrous,” you explain.
He edges toward you, crossing his arms over his chest once more, the scroll scrunched in his grip.
“Isn’t that a given when you take on assassination work? Nobody tends to think fondly of murderers in their manors.”
“It’s not that,” you prevaricate, before deciding it is no use. You pass by him to sit on the edge of the bed. You cradle your head in your hands, the dread of this impending confession cratering your shoulders.
You stare at the ground.
“Having his illegitimate child show up to his politically pandering ball may ruffle his feathers. That’s all.”
Astarion is dead silent.
You bite the tip of your thumb. Shit.
When he finally speaks, he is incredulous.
“You’re… you’re Lord Lockwell’s daughter?”
You glance up at him. His eyes are akin to red hibiscus unfolding in the sunlight, all bright and big.
He rakes a hand through his hair, and draws in a breath, mauling over his response. However, all that makes it out past his lips is a, “You?”
“Yes,” you respond a touch dismissive.
“Oh no, no, no,” he wags his finger at you, and you roll your eyes, “This is not something you flippantly divulge,” he gestures wildly, “Why did you never mention this?”
“It never felt like the appropriate time to mention,” You halfheartedly rebuttal, and he scowls at you, shaking his head.
“Oh, don’t give me that.”
He tosses aside the scroll and then plops down next to you. He sighs with his head swung back.
“Disregarding the fact that you decidedly didn’t tell me this like so much else,” he complains, then locks eyes with you.
“It’s time to start talking. What else am I not privy to? Do you have any other colossal revelations I should know of?”
“I—” you start.
I can’t do this. I can’t do this. I can’t---
But you need to.
“What else do you want to know?” You give in, shifting back onto one of your elbows.
“Well for one,” he leans in a bit, for added affect, “who is this cryptic employer? Where did you go this morning? Oh, and how in the world did someone as morally virtuous as you get into the business of blood oaths? And—” he halts briefly, his shoulders hunching as he pinches the bridge of his nose. “And... well…” he trails off, “the whole flock of our weirdo companions bestowed upon you their entire life stories, and yet it was never the time to say this? Did you ever even trust me—or rather— us?” He amends, striving to remain indifferent, yet evidently failing.
“His name is Drake Kane. I’ve known him for quite some time. He resides in the Uppercity,” you answer, looking anywhere but him, “I’ve been doing this for the better part of a decade, before the mind flayer invasion.” You pick at the skin around your nails as you continue, “As for why… well. Let’s just say I was desperate for money.” Your gaze falls over the room around you.
The grandiosity of it all flickers to that of your old abode. The derelict doorway, the crackled skin of wood panels with their teething nails. The sharp corners of a locked room, lit by a candle’s flickering, feeble glow. The bed beneath you is not layers of silken blankets, but rather of tattered sheets only made sweet by sweat and the scent of shared skin. The ragged black drapes like clumped lashes, closing with each patron who entered.
You look back at him, suddenly tired, “Like I said before. I was trying to be someone different when we got the parasite’s powers. I wanted to do right by the world. I wanted to be worthy of belonging… to someone. To somewhere…,” your hands fold over your lap, “I never told you, or anyone else, before because—” you stall, the necessity to keep it from him strangled in your throat, “I was ashamed and—,” you glance down and away, “before being abducted by the mind flayers… I was…”
Waist deep in waves, enveloped by the night breeze.
Breathing in the riptide.
Salt in your lungs, the sea collapsing overhead.
“I wasn’t ready to confront it. If anything, I was still running away from my choices. It wasn’t because I didn’t trust you,” you try to assure him, yet there is an undercurrent of something else there you’re not disclosing. He knows it. You know he knows it. But with what you do share seems almost enough for him.
“And what about now?” His hand falls over yours, and you look at him quizzically.
“Do you still trust me?” He questions offhandedly, yet you know he means it sincerely.
Yes.
But the word doesn’t depart your tongue. No. Drake’s words fester up in your mind.
“…don’t be naïve.”
You say nothing in response.
His expression softens a bit, yet his brow furrows, the hurt evident by your lack of response as it tugs at the corners of his lips. He takes one of your hands in his. His thumb strokes over the scars of your palm, and you involuntarily shiver.
“How long have you been doing this?” He murmurs, gentle.
Your mouth goes dry, and your cheeks color. You close your fingers over his thumb.
“I don’t remember,” you profess, a bit dazed. It’s only somewhat true.
His chest rises and falls. You want to reach out and tuck the defiant curl tickling his forehead behind his pointed ear.
But you don’t.
The words that you spewed at Drake resonate in your head.
He wouldn’t hurt me.
“Astarion,” you say, and his gaze swivels from your palm up to your eyes. You don’t say another word, and he cocks his head. You inhale, then brush the few strands of hair falling from your disheveled bun away from your neck, revealing the skin of your throat.
“I…” Your lungs are knotted together, yet you try in vain to get it out.
“I do,” you insist, though subdued, “I do still trust you.”
And as you say it, you know… deep down. It is only somewhat true.
But you want it wholly to be.
You need it to be.
Astarion’s eyes widen in recognition, and he shakes his head a little.
“I… that’s not necessary,” he jolts up, stepping away from you.
“I think it is,” you murmur back, picking at your cuticles.
“Are you wanting to test me?” He queries, becoming defensive. Your frown deepens; you shrink back.
“No,” you assert, then deflate, “I’m not trying to test you.”
“I won’t do it again,” he speaks over you, and it is pained, “I couldn’t.”
“Astarion.” You try to regain his attention, but he’s swiping a hand over his face, wrecked.
“I’m trying to show you that I trust you—” you persist, but he isn’t listening, his voice overlapping yours.
“You shouldn’t,” he remarks, “You shouldn’t l—” Your stomach drops, and you cut him off, “I shouldn’t?”
At the immediacy of your voice, he stops. His attention diverts back to you.
“I didn’t mean—”
“What did you mean then?” Your fears are like plucked feathers, and your voice wavers, “are you… do you… still want to—”
Hurt me.
“Of course not,” he retaliates, as if reading your mind, “If this morning was not a clear enough indication, I don’t know what will be.” He snaps, and the cage around your chest constricts.
“Then…” you trail off, and clueless as to what to say, you look down at your palms. Self-conscious that he knows of your habit, you press them face down on top of your thighs. You feel the pressure of his stare as he contemplates you.
Maybe it is a test.
Maybe I need to prove to myself that I can still trust you.
Maybe I’m afraid of being naïve.
Maybe I’m afraid that Drake will be right.
Again… always…
Maybe I don’t want to end up… even more like my mother.
“I’m sorry,” you apologize, and he bristles.
“There’s nothing you should be apologizing for,” he rebuttals, frustrated, “I’m the one that…”
He doesn’t need to say it. It hangs in the air.
There is a lull of silence.
You rest your elbow on your knee, mentally tracing the designs of the area rug.
“I’ll do it,” he says so quiet you have to strain to hear him, “I’ll do it if that’s what it takes… for things to go back to…”
You finish the sentence for him.
How they once were.
However, you’re not sure if there is a way to truly return to the way it was before. Though you ache with this ubiquitous hope, it seems as though there will always be a pull of his resentment scrabbling at his shoulders, and a swift tug of trepidation yanking you by the wrist.
You glance up at him again. He meets your eyes. Perhaps the same thoughts are preying upon his mind.
Regardless.
You want to try.
He must as well, as he cautiously approaches. He sits back down next to you and slips the stray strands from your neck. His fingers splay, reposeful over the skin. His lashes fall over low lidded eyes, and there is a question there, a searching for silent reassurance. A faint etch of worry settles in the lines around his mouth.
You tilt your neck to the side. It is a yes. Your heart thumps fiercely inside your chest.
You don’t realize you’ve begun to clench your fists until his fingers are prying them loose, his thumb sweeping and soothing the skin there.
“You’re trembling,” he susurrates into the shell of your ear, and there’s a lilt of suffering in it.
You try to ease your breathing, to pacify your pulse, but it is of no use.
“I can hear your heartbeat,” he presses his lips over the pulse point, and you try to suppress a flinch, and if he were not a creature of the night, he fears you’d be able to hear his heartbeat too.
“I can feel it beneath my lips,” he gives the skin a closed mouth kiss, then an opened mouth one.
“I can feel it beneath my tongue,” he sucks the space bellow your ear, as delicate as can be, not enough to mark, yet you squirm a bit, feeling your breathing become more labored, your pulse heightening. You blush, trying to be more aware of remaining still.
You can’t help the heat flooding down to your core at having him touch you like this— it’s so familiar, so instinctual. Memories of him flutter through your mind, his teeth deep in you all those times before, drinking until the blood was dribbling down his jaw, until you were as weightless as a bird in the sky.
Nevertheless, anxiety nips at your nerves.
You feel the tips of his fangs barely graze the skin. You inhale deep, and he cradles your jaw with his other hand.
You feel him whisper into the skin.
“I won’t hurt you,” he promises, but there’s something in the way he says it, as if he’s trying to convince himself as well, “I’m not a monster.”
You want to say that you know, but it’s too late, as the words become incoherent jumbles from your lips as he sinks in his fangs.
He begins to suck, scarcely enough to taste.
You half gasp, the initial sting easing into the flood of diluted pain, of saturated pleasure. You feel him exhaling over the skin, and then his fangs are delving deeper as he sucks more firm.
For a fleeting moment, you worry you may faint from culmination of fear mingled with desire, of anticipation convolving with apprehension.
His hand fully closes around yours. His thumb rubs lulling circles there, seeking to reign you in, striving to calm you down.
All those times he had done this before like narrow, straight paths and rounding corners, and now, they are merging into a maze of maddening affection.
It feels good. It feels wrong. It feels like you may float from your body and rise to the ceiling if not for him anchoring you down.
A whimper stumbles from your lips, and yet you know you’re not the only one affected, as Astarion hums against your throat, a tangled groan of urgency and restraint.
Little do you know how much he resists. How delectable you taste, how he aches for more, this carnal hunger like that of a starved animal, like that of a beast. It is primal, and all encompassing, all compelling yet— you are close, so close. You are safe. You never take. You are the dawn he yearns to experience again, even if it burns, even if it means his very demise, he endeavors to have you still—
Another pull of blood from your veins, and you begin to feel hazy, like you are drifting off. A languish of your bones, your body melding into his hold, thoughts fuzzy, fleeting, and yet— that is when it descends upon you.
It is a downpour, sudden, and all too cold.
The scramble of your feet through the closing jaw of the city. Buildings bloated behind you, then prowling before you, then compressing into you from all sides.
Focus ebbing in an out. The potion of healing not enough to fully quell the wound still throbbing at your neck. The lantern lights glow simultaneously dilating and constricting, then stretching out, then swishing you in its mouth.
Finding your way into your inn, beads of sweat slick over your forehead and creeping over your skin as you feebly crawl into bed.
Curling into yourself, temple to your knees, knees snug to your chest.
Shuddering with sobs that go on for hours on end.
Part of you grieving over the fact that he hadn’t completely bled you dry.
After all, …
It is what you deserved.
“Stop,” you beg, pushing him away from you with a quaking gasp, the tears building in your eyes threatening to spill. He retracts from you in an instant, immediately noting the wet streak down your cheek. Although he is absolutely flushed, his eyes burning bright scarlet, the red awash with riveting feeling, his expression morphs to one of panic, of concern.
“I—” he attempts, wiping the back of his hand over the blood of his mouth, “I’m sorry— hells — I didn’t mean to make you cry,” he anguishes, then moves in to swipe at your tears, but you wince in response. He backpedals; his porcelain features shattering.
“I’m sorry,” you shield your face with your hands, hot tears descending your cheeks. It is like you are being swallowed up whole, the feelings of embarrassment, of denial. You don’t understand yourself. You don’t know why your body reacted this way. This shouldn’t be so hard—
He wouldn’t hurt me.
He wouldn’t hurt me.
But the ugly reminder of that night doesn’t go away. It is like a mirrored image reflected on every wall of the room.
“If you’re not careful…. it will bleed you dry, little dove.”
“I’m sorry,” you curl into yourself, feeling miserable, feeling worthless.
It’s what I deserved.
It’s what I deserved.
It’s what I---
But Astarion is there, pulling you into his arms, attempting to mollify. His voice is watery, and it’s too hard to focus on what he says, too hard to listen, too hard to hear over the drown of your own thoughts.
“Please stop apologizing,” he pleads, kisses the top of your hair, rocks you in his arms, “I promise my darling— that night I swear I wouldn’t have—”
But then he stops. You can feel the drops of his own tears hit your temple.
“I don’t know,” he admits in broken syllables, “but what happened before will never happen again. I— I need you… I can’t lose you… I was so afraid that I had… the memory of you wilted in my arms… I can’t—” He chokes on the word, and then takes a breath, steadying himself.
Your breathing slows, and yet you can’t bear to unravel from him, can’t take looking him in the eye like this. You want him to finish, but you can’t say it out loud. It strains against the confine of your teeth, yet you force it out.
“How could you have changed your mind…” you say, and his arms tense around you, “when you despised me that much.”
Is it only for the scroll?
He pulls back but you refuse to meet his eyes, covering your face with your hands. You feel like a coward.
You feel his eyes heavy upon you. It’s as though he’s truly seeing you for what you are… for the first time.
This battered, featherless, little thing… how pitiful compared to that shining hero of the city…
What a fraud you are.
“I was angry with you,” he starts, all earnest and steady, “I loathed you for what I perceived as betrayal… I thought you choose to abandon me when I needed you most. I know now that it was me who didn’t give you a choice.”
You lower your hands from your face, only to examine the floor beneath your feet.
“I wanted to hurt you. I wanted to make you feel as much pain as I had,” the drag of air into his lungs is all wound tight, but he continues, “When I saw you at that tavern, all that resentment and blame I kept came pouring out. I felt possessed by anger at you… and at myself… my dead heart practically lurched out of my chest at the sight of you.”
His voice softens even more so. He wants to reach out and hold you, but he doesn’t.
“And then I… had you again. You were saying my name, professing that you…” you glance back up at him, and you watch his adam’s apple bob as he swallows thickly.
“That you love me, and I… I was overwhelmed. I was angry because… it meant everything to me. So, I tried to prove that it didn’t. I wanted to hurt you, I wanted to keep you, I wanted…” he trails off, then partially regains his composure.
“When I realized what I’d done… when I saw you cradled in my arms, barely able to stand… I was so afraid that I…” the syllables wade in the tears of his voice, “I was terrified to find that I had let myself go too far. I lashed out afterwards because I couldn’t come to terms with what I had done, what I am.”
And then he is getting on his knees before you, taking your hands in his, his eyes imploring to meet yours.
“It used to annoy me how despite everything, you always tried to see the good in everyone. The good in me. No matter how diminutive or selfishly intended, you believed in me. You cared for me. Not for what I could offer you, which at the time really wasn’t more than sex… and then I couldn’t even offer you that… No. You cared for me because of who I was. And although I can still find myself steeping in the pure and utter shit of the last two centuries, even though I do still grieve over the ascension…” He gives your palms a squeeze, and your gaze locks onto his.
“I need you to know that what I did that night I will regret for the rest of my eternity.”
It is as though you had forgotten how to breathe before.
The room is silent for a long time.
“I don’t know what to say…” you murmur.
“You don’t need to say anything,” he hastily replies.
Your gaze drops to his hands holding yours. How refined and lovely they seem, despite it all. They feel like satin over your callous, over the ridges of your scars.
Another lull of quiet.
“Do you want me to go?” He asks, and it is aching.
You shake your head.
“No,” you glance up at him, “I think… we both need time to heal…” you mumble and weakly tangle your fingers together with his.
“But I don’t think I can do this alone.”
“You’re not alone,” he refutes, bringing the back of your hand to his lips. He kisses it.
“I’m not going to leave again.”
You want to believe him. Part of you already does.
You don’t know how long you both remained there, settling into the evening, adrift in a river of recompense.
When you think back on this later, the memory is a domicile for the inviolable.
It is the calm before the storm.
☾☼
please let me know if this was okay <3 thank you for reading.
The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: Explicit
WC for part 3 - 9k, total - 24k+
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, oral sex (female receiving), p in v, creampie, explicit consent, angst, on his knees for you in more ways than one, in love & its a disaster, additional tags posted on ao3
TW for part 3 only: very, very brief mentions of past SA.
read on ao3
or keep reading below <3
and here you go @babypeapoddd and @joyful-enchantress
The murky moon melts into thick somber clouds that convolve and collide amid the sky, the whoosh of waves crashing into the shoreline. The storm from earlier in the evening wandered over the horizon of the sea, its lacerations of livid lightning staining the night in streaks of lurid white.
A cold, misting rain causes the strands of your hair to stick to your forehead. You wipe the back of your hand over your wet lashes, taking in the saturated city enveloped in a moist static. The streets are empty, yet the Blushing Mermaid wears a veil of hazy gold, bursting with cacophonies of sound. The raucous hoots of laughter and slurred speech echoing from below are a revelry only known and shared by those attempting to escape a downpour.
Astarion is beside you, contemplating the view.
It’s one thing that you crossed a line, that you had managed to weave yourself into the fabric of him. Again. It’s another thing that the dull ache at the inscription of your wrist and the phantom divots of teeth marks on your neck have begun to burn. This tenderness coils like a thorned rose around your beating heart. It is needles and thread all bound together, like kindling for a wildfire, like roots in soil you cannot pull out.
You can’t stop thinking about his needy breaths, his curls intwined in your fingers, his eyes gazing up at you between your thighs. You can’t stop thinking of the nights so long ago, when you would gently tug at him to lay atop your chest so that you may run your fingers through his hair. How his pointy ear pressed to your pulse, and he’d listen to it sweetly croon a melody he himself had forgotten, but never wanted to forget again--
You can’t stop thinking about how you wanted to say it, over and over.
When he had bickered with you, countless times, the disdain in his voice combatting with the sparkle of delight in his eyes.
When you had noticed him safeguarding the trinkets you brought him, every now and then.
When he had begun to touch you for whatever plausible reason, whether that to drag you by the wrist toward the direction he wanted your party to go, or to slide his palm over the small of your back when passing by or reaching across to sweep a stray strand from your eyes, claiming “Clip it back or something darling. Who do you expect to fight with hair in your face?”
When he would scold you for getting too hurt, in a way that made it sound as though it wasn’t actually bothering him.
“…and you just had to be the hero. What if Shadowheart couldn’t have healed you? What then, hm? I’m only saying this because it’s in my best interest you remain in one piece-- Oh, don’t give me that look— Why are you smiling--!”
When he positively glared at the back of Gale’s head when he insisted upon teaching you magic, then proceeded to act aloof when caught in your line of sight.
When he’d huff out a laugh at the absurdity of your group’s terrible luck.
When he poured himself out to you, divulging the sorrows of a creature you swore to him you’d both kill.
When he first asked you to hold him at night.
When he all but purred the first time you ran your fingernails through his hair and then when he had acted terribly offended when you stopped.
When the cadence of his voice had begun to soften when speaking to you.
“Darling.”
“My sweet.”
“My dear.”
“Sweetheart.”
When he had confessed, “I want us to be something real.”
When you had reached out and held him after Moonrise Towers. Had felt his startled wince melt as he reluctantly welcomed your embrace, his arms enveloping you. The serene in his sigh, the way he squeezed your hand in both of his.
When he had found you, that early dawn before everyone awoke. When you were perched on a roof of a nearby building beside your camp, at the edge of the harbor, your knees to your chest, your palms numb from the dig of your nails. You could hear the birds sing a familiar song; gentle, sweet, devastating. When he came, he had noticed the dampness of your cheeks.
“Did our Karlach’s incessant snoring scare you off, too?”
You grinned tiredly at him, the way you so commonly did ever since arriving at Baldur’s Gate. He never pried about it but… you wished he would.
You lifted your head from your knees as he came to sit next to you.
“No, though I’m sure we can still hear it from here if we try.”
“That we can,” he agreed, gesturing to his sharp ear.
A lull of silence followed. You heard him shift a bit, run his hand through his hair.
“You’ve been sneaking away more often lately…” he trailed off, the common routine of your morning departures too worrisome to ignore. The others had mentioned he had been asking about you, in that offhanded, yet all the more insistent, manner. You told them what they told him: the impending battle was the burden you were grappling with. Nothing more. However, where they believed you, he hadn’t. He couldn’t escape the feeling it had to do with something else. He had hoped it didn’t have anything to do with him.
“I come here to listen,” you reveal, eyes turning back toward the sky, “I used to listen to the birds every morning when I was younger,” you continue, unsteady, “I still adore listening to them sing, adore admiring them flock over the horizon, all lovely and free. I’m drawn to them. I don’t know why,” you paused, then turned to him with a timid smile, “They give me this yearning nothing else does.”
And he had murmured back, as if without thought.
“You remind me of them, too.”
“How poetic,” you had laughed, all shimmering and light, your heartbeat plush. You had poked him in the ribs, thinking it a common place tease, “Is that your way of saying I’m chittering and flighty?”
“Well but of course my dear—” he attempted to elaborate with a scrunch of his nose, a glimmer of mirth in his gaze. You had gasped in mock horror and slapped him playfully on the arm.
“Astarion—"
He had caught your hand. Pulled you close. Looked at you with a countenance you’d never seen anyone wear before.
He looked to you like you were something precious.
His thumb had soothed over the scars at the inside of your palm. He held your palm to his lips and pressed a tender kiss over it.
When he had leaned forward to kiss you, it was like the mourning doves’ new refrain.
You knew it was too soon. But the words were always there, just as the wind rustles through the trees, just as the grass ripples in rivers of evergreen, just as the birds soar across the sky.
Then and now. All these places that keep you tethered to him too fulgurous to subdue.
I love you.
I love you.
I love you.
But you hadn’t said it then.
You had said it in the alleyway— and…
You got what you deserved in response.
He had been honest with you. Not from the beginning but… later. Yet you…
Your fingers clench in, feeling over the nail indent scars.
You didn’t know how.
And now it was too late. Whatever occurred earlier was certainly a byproduct of tension, an eclipse of sense. Just as it was in the alleyway. All those memories were the dust of a time gone by.
He doesn’t love you.
He will never love you.
“Must we wait in the rain?” Astarion whines; and you untangle from your knotted thoughts. It’s the first time he’s spoken since you both left Cedric Lao’s manor. You had traversed all this way in a damp silence; from the manor to your inn for supplies, and now to here. It wasn’t like him to be so quiet, but perhaps you both didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t even cursed earlier when he got his boots slicked with mud, or when he had all but slid off roof tiles. You had grabbed his hand, held it firmly to keep him from falling, and he had regarded you with a look akin to rumbling thunder.
All the words he wouldn’t say were inlaid in that expression.
You didn’t know how to interpret them.
“He may be inside already, but we need a plan,” you answer. You glance at him, “have any ideas?”
“Oh well—,” he starts with one hand on his hip, the other pointed at you, “…well we find him,” a pause with much internal deliberation, and then he’s speaking with his hands and a few octaves louder to make up for the shhhh of soft rain, “and then….” Another pause, for effect, “…we kill him. Seems cut and dry to me.”
You don’t know what other response you were expecting. You succeed in stifling a laugh. “And that is why you never came up with the plans,” you lightly mock.
He scoffs, “Well Miss I Make Up the Rules and Have Wonderful Plans, what do you suggest?”
You turn your attention away from him, and once again survey the tavern. Beneath the hulk of the ship fastened at the entrance waits a covered carriage with two docile horses. When you squint, you make out the coachman with his head hung low, slack against the seat, presumably asleep.
“There’s not a chance Cedric Lao would walk back in the rain, nor would anyone in the lower city purchase a carriage like that. That must be for him,” you gesture to the carriage, and Astarion’s shrugs in halfhearted agreement.
“I’ll have to make sure of course… but regardless, I’ll need to lure him out, alone. Ideally, we strike when in his carriage, away from the tavern. Worst case scenario, I lead him to an alleyway or out of view of the coachman…” You rattle off, mind preoccupied with potential scenarios. It was always easier to become fixated on logistics. It aided in ignoring the convolving of guilt in your gut.
“And what will I be doing? Twiddling my thumbs?” he protests.
“You can shadow me inside. If he’s there, and if I can manage to persuade him out with me, I’ll signal to you to leave beforehand. I’m thinking you can lie in wait in the carriage, and we will attack when it starts moving.” You feel for the pouch strapped to your waist. You pluck out an invisibility potion, and hand it to him.
“Well, aren’t you confident,” he says, then holds it up to you and states the obvious, “this only lasts an hour.”
You nod. He continues to brood, as if not convinced.
“Like I said, I’ll signal to you. It won’t take long to convince him to leave,” you guarantee, then subconsciously reach forward, your fingers skimming his sharp ear. He shivers at the sudden touch. “When we’re outside, you’ll hear us and know when to take it.”
“Hmmph,” he grumbles at your teasing, then concedes, “fine, fine. You’re the expert.”
Your smile weakens. You know what he means but it’s not the way you take it.
Yeah.
An expert.
He notices it, but swallows down questioning it.
“Try to remain a little way away,” you mention.
You know you can’t go in there in your natural state, so you prepare to don a new identity.
A new face.
A new body.
After the spell is cast, you feel minutely more distant. Reserved. Detached.
You turn to him once more.
“Remember, we don’t know each other.”
☾☼
Inside the tavern is a labyrinth of life, with its boisterous drunkards, rhythmic merriment of music, and gregarious guests engaging in drinking games and delusive gossip. You had entered first, Astarion waiting outside for a brief while to ensure no one mistakes you both coming in together.
You peruse the people about you, their common clothing, their callous hands carrying around jugs of beer or necks of wineglasses. You wade through bodies,scanning the lower-level room for any hint at your mark’s description.
Human. Black hair with rivulets of gray. Smug eyes like faded lilac. Tall. Thin build. A calm cadence of conceit.
A thick emerald ring with a silver band, always worn on his middle finger.
You start with the people perusing the eclectic paintings of deer silhouettes and portraits of pirates from ancient seas. No one there fits the description.
Then you turn to the guests stumbling into standing candelabras bound to be knocked over onto rugs riddled in blotches. No.
Finally, the patrons waiting under the suspended mermaid caught in a seine. The voices about you carry no such intonation of the ruling class. You are about to make your way upstairs when you hear it.
“You should know already what I’m having Bosun,” a man states from the second to last seat at the end of the bar, his back to you.
The bartender, Bosun, responds with a tinge of concealed irritation, “well, your type of drink typically depends on if you win or if you lose.”
The man in turn chuckles, his laugh collapsing in on itself like cashmere waves. Despite every seat being taken at the bar, you slide like silk in between him and another patron.
“I’ll have whatever he’s having,” you say while leaning your body against the counter. Your stare is that of velvet when you meet the man’s lavender eyes. With the lilt of your simper, all sanguine sunset tinged lips, his mouth goes dry.
“Seems you have a refined taste,” the man offers, and you shrug, scanning him up and down and biting your lip.
“That I do,” you declare without diffidence.
His smile widens and his gaze twinkles with the implication. The stranger at the seat beside you catches on, takes his drink, and leaves. You take the seat without question. With an elbow on the counter, you face your body toward the man.
When the bartender leaves your drinks, the man raises his glass to clink yours.
On his middle finger is an emerald ring. Silver band.
Cedric Lao.
He’s wearing the reason he’ll be killed.
You skim your index finger over the rim of your glass, causing ripples of shivers down his spine. You admire him over the succulent crimson of your wine, swooshing and swishing in your hand.
You weigh your chin on your knuckles, leaning into the man with an evening sparkle in your disposition, a suggestive tickle skittering in your laugh.
“I’ve seen you here before, but I’ve always been too shy to ask your name.”
“Really? I haven’t seen you before. If I had, I would never forget a face like yours.”
You giggle, your hand covering your face as if to hide a blush.
“Aren’t you a charmer,” you reply.
He laughs. Tilts in close, mouth next to your ear, confirming what you already know.
“My name is Cedric.”
Too easy.
He leans back, tapping his glass with his finger. His other hand adorned in chunky rings glisten in the candlelight. You try to ignore it, as the sight evokes memories you rather kill than the man before you.
You respond to him with a false, sensual name, the kind with syllables that slip off the tongue with ease.
“As beautiful as you,” he flirts with a wink.
Ugh.
You open your mouth, yet you catch a whiff of white in your peripheral. At the other end of the bar counter, Astarion is leaning back against the wall.
He is blatantly watching you both.
Hells.
He’s making it too obvious.
You mask your discontent by taking a sip from your glass. You tilt your head to the left side of the room, but he doesn’t budge. You pray he can read your mind.
At least buy a drink.
His nostrils flare in a hefty exhale.
Fine.
He seems to say back before motioning towards the bartender. You then hear him requesting the dryest, reddest wine possible.
You glimpse back at Cedric, who is as clueless as any noble. You bend into him, lips almost brushing his ear. “I hope this doesn’t come off too strong, but did you come here alone tonight?”
You pull back and dazzle with pearly whites, and a bitten lip; a performance meant to appeal to any simple-minded man. Despite being a few customers down the counter, you sense Astarion stiffen.
“I did,” Cedric coos, absolutely devouring your flattery, enough to the point that the other patrons of the tavern seem mildly disenchanted out of their drunken hazes. Each time he takes a sip from his glass, his attention is beckoned back to you, as if tethered by the adulation of your tongue.
When you take another sip, you purposely let a drip of wine descend your chin.
“Will you be leaving alone too?” You susurrate, dragging a lone knuckle over the lingering drip of wine at your chin. You bring the knuckle to your lips and clean it with your tongue. Cedric nearly chokes on air.
You smile. Honeyed. Polite.
“If you must know,” he confesses, “I’m thinking of leaving with quite the temptress, if she’ll have me.”
Perfect.
You laugh in flittering delight.
“Perhaps she will…” You slide your hand over the counter, careful to rub your thumb over the sliver of his wrist. “I mean, you happen to be her type,” you pause, lingering, “but she’s a little worried she’s not yours.”
Cedric meets your eyes, and presses his body closer, until his lips are a hover over your ear, “she is anyone’s type, I assure you…”
You can’t help but peek down the bar. Astarion is scrutinizing you both with a half sneer, his fingers slowly clenching around the neck of his wine glass.
You say it with your eyes.
You’re staring too much.
His brows rise, his nose scrunching as he beckons toward the door with a slant of his head.
Then hurry it up.
Cedric’s hand squeezes your upper thigh. You cringe yet play it off like a jolt of excitement. You note Astarion raking a hand through his hair, his eyes rolling so hard you worry they may fall back into his skull.
Cedric flirts again, “Would you like to finish your drink before I take you home?”
“What about the rain?” You say, just to make sure.
“I have transportation.”
Of course you do.
Your attention flicks to Astarion, then to the exit.
Go.
And that he does, stalking off through the crowd as melodramatic as can be.
After another stretch of flattery and casual touch, you raise your glass to your lips, and drink down the last sip of your wine.
The time has come.
He laughs, soft, content.
The light ensnared on his emerald ring pesters your sight. Its array of greens like foliage frothing up your throat.
“I’ll pay,” you offer, about to reach into your coin purse. He stops your hand.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he opposes, reaching into his coin purse and spilling an excess of gold coins onto the counter. It is far more than needed to purchase your drinks.
“I won big tonight,” he gloats.
You have to suppress a scowl.
“That you did,” you acknowledge, and with that, you head toward the exit together.
☾☼
You make your way out into the night. The rush of frigid air hushes the tavern heat still humming over you, the chirping of crickets coalescing in a somber chorus. A fog of foreboding settles in your bones and smears the scenery before you in a gray film as Cedric leads you down the stairs, your hand enclosed in his. There is a familiar rub of numerous rings.
They could imprint in your palm ugly indents if he held any longer, or any tighter.
It takes but a few moments to descend the stairs to the carriage, but for you, it is an eternity.
The smooth of unblemished hands.
The harsh of thick jewel incrusted rings.
A grip slithering around your wrist.
Licked lips snug to your ear.
Susurrations like a serpent’s hiss, requests like a parasites’ squirm.
It bleeds black from his mouth.
“I shouldn’t be here. A man of my rank… I bet it makes you feel special, doesn’t it? The dove of the Lower City. I should purchase you a more lovely cage…”
Cedric says your name. You recoil from the past just as sudden. He doesn’t notice.
Of course he doesn’t.
“Wait for me in the carriage,” he motions, all suave and poised, “seems as though my coachman decided to sleep on the job.”
The latter hints at his irritation. You nod and wave him off so that he may attend to the matter.
Upon entering the carriage, you find two plush brown leather seats opposite one another, windows tucked behind cascading pleated drapes. Atop a short table is an oil lamp still illuminating the space in grazes of pale yellow. You close the door behind you, still able to make out the muffled aggravation of Cedric and the sputtering repentance of his coachman.
The only inkling of Astarion’s presence is when he tap, tap, taps a phantom nail against the chimney of the oil lamp. You whisper in response.
“Remember to wait until I signal.”
He offers no verbal agreement, much to your dismay. He seemed all too contempt inside the tavern.
Maybe he’s thirsty—
The thought conjures recollections of earlier in the night. You shake your head when abruptly the door to the carriage swings open.
Cedric steps foot inside, and the coachman closes the door behind him. The noble turns and latches the door shut, then proceeds to unceremoniously plop down beside you.
The side of his thigh bumps against yours. He sets his hand atop your knee, all but consuming your space.
“Finally, we’re alone…” he announces. You force a smile that doesn’t reach your eyes.
“Have you ever visited the Upper City?” he inquires.
You are about to reply when a sharp whap of the coachman’s whip sets the carriage into motion. You jerk forward only to be barred to your seat by Cedric’s arm. The horses let out startled neighs, hooves trotting over the still slick streets.
You regain your composure, but Cedric does not immediately remove his arm. Instead, he caresses your cheek, the cool silver band of his ring making you shudder.
Unbeknownst to you, Astarion’s glower is boiling over at Cedric’s touch.
The table in front of you emits a sharp tap, like that of Astarion’s nail.
Cedric’s attention diverts toward the sound, yet you place your palm over his, directing him to focus solely on you.
Wait, you internally plea.
Not yet.
“I’ve never been to the Upper City,” you lie, gaze lilting from his, to the oleander of his lips.
Tap.
“Is that where you intend to take me?” you ask meaning to stall him, but he’s encircling like a vulture, crowding you against the carriage wall.
Cedric collects your hair in his hand and gathers it to one shoulder. You know what he intends to do before he does it.
“Hmmm…” he hums, moving nearer, closer.
Tap.
You stifle a flinch each time Astarion wordlessly demands a signal.
We’re not far enough away yet.
Cedric is too distracted to notice, his mouth pressing to your throat. You give a shaky inhale in response, your fingernails digging into the flesh of your palm.
You glance at the space Astarion resides.
Only a little longer.
“I intend to take you to my bed,” Cedric revels, each kiss growing more greedy, sloppy, and wet. “I intend to make you mine,” his other hand slides up your thigh, “I intend to make you scream—”
BANG.
The oil lamp topples over as Cedric’s lips are wrenched from your neck, his hair caught in the clench of Astarion’s white knuckled fist, the strands snapping as Cedric squeals.
“AH—!”
Astarion’s other hand clamps over Cedric’s mouth, smothering his startled scream.
Astarion bares his fangs, anchoring his gaze onto you. His irises are a wrathful wash of radiant red.
Your breath shutters.
Without delay, he delves his teeth into Cedric’s throat.
“URgghhm…” Cedric gurgles in anguish, legs kicking and fingers prying at Astarion’s unrelenting grip. You spring to action, seizing Cedric’s wrists and holding him still. Astarion’s adam’s apple bobs with each swallow.
Cedric’s flush face dwindles in color.
The coachman’s voice bellows out over the trot of hooves and howling wind, “Everything alright back there, My Lord?”
Cedric groans into Astarion’s palm, and you answer for him.
“Do give your Lord privacy while he plays.”
The coachman knows better than to ask any additional questions. He whips the horses once more.
It must only take several minutes. In your restraint, Cedric’s squirming limbs grow limp. His pulse point slows to a stop.
He’s dead.
Astarion unlatches from Cedric’s throat, blood oozing down his chin. He carelessly casts aside Cedric’s head, the man’s lifeless form plopping into the leather seat. He wipes his mouth with a scrunched nose.
“Tastes worse than the wine,” he scowls with the utmost disgust.
You can’t help but be a little irked with him. The carriage can’t be too far from the Blushing Mermaid. If anything had gone awry…
You sigh. On the other hand, you admittedly felt relieved not to endure the noble’s touch for even a second longer than needed. Once you were at the inn, you’ll have to scrub those places clean…
You take the blade strapped to Astarion’s leather waist belt, and carve into Cedric’s neck, ensuring the pierce of fangs indiscernible. You don’t speak.
You pick up Cedric’s wilted hand, the one with the lone emerald ring. You place his hand on the table in front of you, and right at the knuckle, you begin to cut to the bone.
“Not that I find any qualm in it, but what in the hells are you doing?” Astarion asks in a bewildered whisper.
“Following the client’s request,” you reply simply. Clack. The blade slices through. You tear a thick strip of fabric from Cedric’s shirt, and swaddle the severed finger, still wearing the ring. You then place it in your coin purse.
“What of the body?” Astarion asks.
“We leave it,” you state. You get up and stand by the carriage door.
“As per the client’s request?” Astarion mirrors your movement.
“Yes,” you affirm, your hand at the latch.
As soon as you unlatch it, you both jump out, and scurry off into the night.
☾☼
When you both arrive through the balcony window at your inn, the coming day is a stretch of diluted orange, a yawn of dissolving indigos. You yank the drapes closed to prevent the carnage of sun from entering, then teeter back, your chest heaving, your legs all but buckling beneath you. You had dashed frantic from rooftop to rooftop, like that of scurrying felines, all the way here. The exhilaration had been a pounding in your temples, an airy flutter in your chest, yet now all that remains is the ache.
You feel over the places that Cedric Lao’s phantom touch persisted in lurking with a lulling palm, pressing over the whisper of wet at the side of your neck, over the drag from your knee to the clench of your thigh…
All that remains is the mess.
A dishevel of white catches your eye as Astarion stalks off to the corner of the room. There, he fills a basin with water and uses a damp rag to dab at the dried blood on his lips and chin, then dunks the rag into the water. He hastily swipes at the underside of his jaw whilst you light a standing candelabra, the sprawling shadows lurking over the slight hunch of Astarion’s shoulders.
You pass to the armoire for a change of clothes. Inside, you pull out an array of varying casual attire and sleepwear. Padding over to him, you note the rigidity of his jaw; the way he wrings out the water with fists.
You want to ask, but you’re exhausted. You rather him brew in his contemptuous blizzard of thought for now, unbothered.
“I bought these for you,” you mention, setting the clothes beside him on the counter, “you can leave your old clothes in the basket. I’ll take care of them tomorrow.”
“It is tomorrow,” he snarks, not even acknowledging the clothes.
“Well, I’ll take care of them today,” you amend, preventing yourself from taking a tone. Crossing to the other corner of the room, you fill the bathtub with hot water and sprinkle in perfumed soaking salts. You pull at the overhead canopy’s curtains, concealing the bath behind them.
“Would you like to wash off first?” You offer, and he dismisses you with a wave of his hand.
“Go ahead,” he remarks, his back still turned to you.
You internally sigh. Walking behind the partition you undress with only a moment’s hesitation. When you finally step into the bath after pulling the curtains closed, you hiss at the heat. Sinking down until you are submerged up to your neck, you start by rinsing your hair, followed by scrubbing at every inch of your body.
Although you are clean by anyone’s account, you remain in the bathwater, yearning for a mere few more minutes of reprieve.
Cedric Lao.
Number eight.
Typically, at a time like this, you’d be inconsolable. But tonight’s murder is but a numbness, like that of your skin becoming acquainted with scolding heat. Perhaps it’s because he was like so many others that came before.
Regarded you with a serpentine stare.
Squeezed, prodded, and pried.
The ribbon of water swirls and slips over your callous fingers. Your brow furrows.
Always with rings.
Gods.
You wanted that man to die.
You tuck your knees to your bare chest and wrap your arms around them. Your cheek resting on your knee, you placate yourself by following Astarion’s silhouette through the curtains. He paces like the push and pull of a tide.
Astarion clears his throat. His silhouette halts.
“Are you alright?” He asks casually enough.
“Are you?” You query back, your lungs contracting as if inside a tightening fist. You gather the length of your hair, wringing it out, then comb through it with your fingernails.
A pause.
“Why wouldn’t I be?” he mutters with blithe disregard.
Just by his tone you know he isn’t.
“I’ll be out soon,” you reassure, then decide to stop idling, and the water splashes as you rise. You take the towel beside the tub, then fold it snug around your body.
Another pause. A full exhale.
“It was torture,” he admits.
You freeze. Your heart stills in your throat.
“What?”
“Come out here,” he demands.
You push open the curtains and step out of the tub. Your hair drips onto the floor, the cool air stippling your exposed arms and legs in goosebumps.
His chest rises and falls at the sight of you, as if startled, and then entranced.
You stand there, unsure.
He’s fully wiped away the blood from his neck and his mouth. Changed his clothes.
He’s regarding you like he intends to say something. Like he’s desperate to tear the weeds from his throat and let them tumble from his mouth. But he can’t say it. He’s not comfortable with verbalizing it, he’s not good with this. It is as though he feels he is the one fixed to the floor before you, unclothed and quiet.
You want him to try. To tell you. To yell at you, to elucidate rather than evade. Anything is better than this climbing ivy of contention consuming you whole.
Anything is better than the shadow of what used to be.
And he can take anything and everything from you if he wanted. Just like in the alleyway. He could ruin you. Smudge the color behind your eyes, make it so anyone who comes across you will only know you from the mess he left.
But if he gets too close, the words won’t come. Only the shared language you speak with your hands, your hips, your skin. You can’t do it. You can’t keep hoping he’ll stay when this is all over. You can’t keep hoping he will feel the love you have for him with every touch.
“Come here,” he says again. You don’t move.
“I can’t.” you admit. He unsettles a bit at it.
“Why?”
“You know why.”
He drags a hand over his face, defeated. A sound between a scoff and a laugh stumble from his lips.
The thing he says next makes the fabric of you fray apart.
“Don’t you love me?” He taunts in a dithering tone, wrought with emotion.
You feel tears spring to your eyes. You furiously blink it back. You know what he’s doing. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t fucking hurt.
“Don’t do this,” you chastise.
“Whatever am I doing—” He repudiates.
You clench the towel tighter around you, glowering.
“Don’t say things that you know will hurt me just because you’re upset,” You warn, briskly moving behind the partition.
“I’m not—” he sputters.
“Yes. Yes, you are,” you assert, “it’s what you do.”
You snatch up your change of clothes from the floor, kicking aside the towel and yanking the chemise over your head. All you can think.
I hope you die screaming.
I hope you die screaming.
I hope you die screaming.
It burns behind your eyes. He boils over.
“It’s what I do?” He jeers.
Fuck.
“What about what you do?” He disputes, and you try to cut him off to no avail. You can hear the pad of his feet. You step out from the partition, arms crossed. He’s pacing once more.
“Astarion—”
“You tell me nothing of yourself. You betray me, after making me care for you. You make promises you don’t keep,” his hand is a tangle in his hair, his other hand gesturing here and there, “you have me all over you, on my knees for you, and then you have me—”
Your cheeks burn with the implication.
“You didn’t have to do that— I wasn’t—"
“--watch you shamelessly flirt with that absolute imbecile right in front of me,” he inhales, then continues, “then you have me watch as he lays his filthy hands on you—”
“Do you think I planned for what occurred in Cedric’s house?” You erupt, and his attention diverts.
“Do you think I wanted his—or anyone else’s hands on me besides yours?” You retaliate, stepping into his space, jabbing your finger into his chest, “and yes. I didn’t tell you about myself. But really Astarion, did you ever even ask?”
He opens his mouth to retort, but you don’t let him.
“I swore to you that I’d help you kill Cazador, not that I’d help you become him!” You admonish, gesturing to him wildly, “and I’m sorry that isn’t what you wanted. Do you think this,” you indicate to you both with your hand, “is what I wanted?”
He’s seething. His irises red, riven with resentment. You don’t stop.
“I am trying to make it up to you! Can’t you see? Everything I do, or have done, has always been for you!”
You nearly lose your breath. You feel lightheaded, the tears welling in your eyes, in your words.
His eyes become cold.
“Make it up to me?” He mocks, “how can you ever make it up to me? You have no clue what it all meant to me. You have no minuscule of comprehension of what I endured, what I could have become.”
He steps toward you, takes your hand in his.
“I feel their hands smear over my skin, I feel their phantom palms prying me a part,” he starts, “fingers closing over my throat,” he utters hovering your hand over his neck, “indigo teeth indents and violent violets,” he takes a breath, trying to reel himself in, but he can’t. He is unraveling.
He molds your hand into a fist. Holds it over a heart that has forgotten what it means to beat.
“A cacophony of their lascivious moans a coffin laden in my chest.” He clenches his fingers over yours, then lets your hand drop. With every sentence, with every syllable, you see him fall apart. “Two centuries of solicitation, two centuries of polluting touches, of perusing eyes, of submerging myself in submission, of surrendering myself to sounding subservient, to staying still, to obedience, obedience, obedience. Of TAKE, TAKE, TAKE!”
His dolorous tone nearly breaks, the chance to rid himself of this agony unbearable, the necessity to bear his pain insurmountable.
You can’t breathe. You want to close the distance, to comfort him, to soothe him, but you can’t.
He has fistfuls of his hair in his hands as he resumes, “every dark room is a remembrance of him! My muffled screams they… they say they sound like moaning,” his fists are balled over his eyes, “my body a machine droning on, and on, and on, and who saved me then? Who saved me?”
Tears are spilling down your cheeks... you hurriedly try to wipe them away, but they keep coming. He looks at you once more, and it is broken.
“Why should I have sacrificed my ascension!? Why should I have saved those spawn? Why when no one saved me,” he fervently maintains, and then it hangs in the air.
You both are silent for a long time. He casts his gaze aside.
You want to say something. Anything. But you don’t know how. You don’t know how to make this better. You want to take it all from him. Bare it for him if it meant he could live free. You wish it was that easy. You wish it wasn’t so hard.
I can’t do this alone.
Don’t leave again.
I need you, even if it’s wrong.
He says your name.
When you meet his eyes, his expression crumbles. His voice is hoarse. He gestures to you weakly.
“And then there’s you,” he states, and you flinch, not ready for what may come.
But his tenor softens, his tone shifts.
“You who took the time to know me,” he concedes, “despite my vitriol, my deceit, my pettiness, my shame, and my….” he falters, the confession too much to bare, his face wrenched tight and brows scrunched together, “almost killing you.” He chokes on the word. You recoil at the confirmation, wounded.
That night.
He meant to…
Tears cascade over his cheeks, the agony clawing up his throat.
“Despite everything,” he accepts, “You who wanted to save me. Who still does, for whatever reason,” he steps into your space, and you step back, breath dense in your lungs, and it hurts. He tries again, and this time you allow him near you, let him caress your cheeks, tilt your head up to meet his pained gaze.
“I can’t decide whether I could spend eternity hating you or wanting you…” he admits, and your body quakes., it is teetering. His thumb swipes under your wet lashes, holding you steady, looking to you with firm resolve.
“I want all of you,” he begins, “I want your taste. Your mouth,” his eyes dip to your lips, his thumb grazing your bottom lip, gentle, “your words, so soft and warm it feels as though it melts on my skin. I want the hush of a breaking morning yearning for your touch, to entwine like the curls you used to comb your fingers through,” his fingers slide through the still damp strands clung to your neck, “I want to hold you into many days and many nights, I want to hear your laughter-- evenings where the world is silent and all I can hear is you.”
You make a strangled whimper in your throat, while he insists, “I want your sighs, your ramblings, the way you play coy -- I want to listen, I want to know— all of what you don’t say, I want the moans you hide behind your fists,” he takes one of your hands in his, squeezes it, “I want my name on your lips, and mine alone. I want you in my space.”
He presses your palm over your heart, his hand covering yours, “I want your heartbeat against my ear, a faint, lazy calm, like sea foam passing over sand,” he can feel your pulse thump, over, and over, and always, “I want all of you— and I can't take it. From the moment I saw you in that tavern—From the moment I left. I can’t think of what we had before, or else I lose my restraint.”
The world around you seems to be blown away, like the pappus of a dandelion. You don’t know who initiates first, whether it him with the sashay of carmine roses in his eyes, or you, with your vibrant pulse, casting the room, and him, in gold.
When you collide, the colors merge, the gold blooms and the red hues, his lips are lush and full on yours, his hand tilting up your chin so that he may taste more of you. Each kiss spirals into desperation, into the esurient pursuit of each other’s tongues, your hands at his waist, his body melding into your space.
You wish to know what he hungers for, and he wishes to know the intangible, the taste of your secrets; metallic and sweet. His lips trail from your lips to your jaw, they are a hum against the hollow of your throat, a suck below your ear. Molten heat careens your spine, then pools in your core. You squeeze your bare thighs together, and his breath catches when your fingers become a tangle in his hair, nails grazing the back of his scalp.
You tremble, catching his mouth with yours once more, and then his hands are a slide over the swell of your breast, the curve of your waist, the flesh of your thigh. He trails his hand up and under your chemise, bunching the fabric at your upper thigh, feeling your skin under his palm. He groans into your kiss as he wraps your leg around his waist, so that he can press his hips into you.
You’re wearing nothing under your chemise. The silk of his sleep pants, stretched taunt and tight by his arousal, bumps against your sex.
You gasp against his mouth, your senses engulfed in his redolent incense, all bergamot and rosemary, and his grasp, all trembling and insatiable. Whilst his hands fumble with untying the knot at his waist, you go on your tiptoes to suck lilac buds to the slope of his neck, then catch his earlobe in your teeth. He makes a strangled noise in his throat, finally getting the knot undone, and tugs down his pants, his cock springing free. He hunches down closer to you, allowing you to kiss and suck over the sensitive sharp of his ear. His fingers wrap around the base of his cock, sliding it between your thighs and beneath the slick of your lower lips. Your moan vibrates into the shell of his ear.
“Hells—”he grits out through his teeth, and nonsensical syllables slip from his tongue, enthralled by your mouth, your tongue, the milky sheen of your sex coating him with your pleading arousal. Gods, with your everything,
“Ahgm…”
“Say it again,” you susurrate into his ear, and he shivers, his one hand anchoring your thigh clenching and unclenching.
“I want all of you,” he repeats whilst pressing his forehead to yours and gazing into your eyes, sliding himself back and forth against your sex.
“Then take me to bed,” you say, and he listens, his other hand lifting your other thigh so that you may cross your ankles behind him. He carries you over to the bed and lays you down atop the blankets. After, he crawls over you. His heavy-lidded stare is like that of the night finding refuge in your room, in your touch, him like cascades of moon dew, like that of stardust you can only surrender yourself to. He helps you pull your chemise up and over your head, and you help him do the same for his shirt.
His lips eclipse with yours once more, and you feel him squeeze and fondle your breasts, his fingers rolling the buds of your perked nipples between them.
“Oh!” You coo as his kisses trail over the bend of your jaw, over the slope of your shoulder, pausing only briefly to suckle and scrape his teeth at your collar bone. Upon your flesh he leaves blooming love bites, and then he dips his head down to your breast, enclosing your nipple into his needy mouth. He flicks it in his mouth, then swirls his tongue in all-encompassing circles. He gives your other nipple a gentle squeeze between his fingers, pinching and twirling it with his thumb.
“Ahh—st…arion,” you whine, your back arching into him, and your hands fisting his hair. You pant and squirm when he changes breasts and hollows his cheeks, sucking your nipple firm into his mouth. You feel the tilt of smile against your breast, the way his breath becomes labored, the weight of his sex, pulsing and all too hot, pressed against your thigh.
Astarion’s mouth unlatches from your nipple with a pop. He sits up only to descend your body. Before you can even process it, he picks you up from your lower half, hoisting your legs over his shoulders so that his head is nestled between your thighs.
“Wait—” you beg, the position all too exposed, but it’s too late, as his tongue drags, flat and wet, up the seam of your sex. He begins to twirl his tongue around your clit, then encloses his mouth around it with a hum of urgency. Your body lurches, the sensation like being swallowed into a celestial sky, all static and stars, all shivers and light. He has to readjust his grip to hold you steady, as he languishes his tongue between your folds, lapping at your bundle of nerves, then plunges his deft tongue into your sex. Streams of heat pour down from your temple to your core, and you feel the reverberation of his groans into your cunt, all rasping and gravel, all encouraging and pleased.
When your climax approaches, like a coil about to snap, your thighs clench around his head and his nails dig into the flesh of your backside. His tongue doesn’t stop, all too eager to feel you convulse and writhe, to have you dripping down his jaw.
“Mmnn, I—I’m going— to— “You plea, the feeling too intense, and he growls low in his throat his praise.
And then it does come, and you unravel like the tethers of yesterday by a ravenous sun. He laps it up, even when the devastating waves of pleasure become lulling ripples, even when you are gasping and grasping at the sheets, tears slipping down your cheeks.
“Astarion,” you whimper when he settles your tremoring legs down on either side of him.
“Yes, my darling?” He answers in a heavy, sultry voice, one hand enclosing over your hip, his thumb tracing aimless designs. He wipes at the wet of his mouth and chin with a languid smile, his low lidded eyes nearly hidden by white lashes.
It makes you ache with want for him.
You want to make him feel good; in all the ways you can. You want to hear him say your name, to intwine like you once did.
Deciding you most certainly will, you lean up onto one elbow and reach to wrap your fingers around the length of his cock. His breath hitches, sudden and sharp, hips jolting forward into your clutch.
“Ah—"
You slide your fingers to the head of his cock, and then down his shaft, his arousal slick to your palm. You bite your lip, his brow furrowing and his eyes squeezing shut, as you pump his cock up and down. It makes you feel insatiable, makes your thighs clench and rub together. You pump your hand at a leisurely, torturous pace, and he jerks into your grasp, your name falling from his lips between fragmented moans.
You watch his nostrils flare with each exhale, the way he urgently thrusts into your hand making you increase your pace, until he is quivering, until he is nearing the edge.
“Not… not yet. I want—” Astarion pants, “to be-- inside you first...”
Your hand stills, a flourish of pink flooding your cheeks, and as soon as you pull your hand away, he is on you.
You can’t help the thrumming of your heartbeat as he spreads your thighs and readjusts himself at your entrance, one hand on your hip. He slides the head of his cock over your lower lips and nudges it against your clit, causing you to gasp. Gods. You can even feel him twitch.
Astarion leans down, gaze latching onto yours.
When he kisses you, it is simultaneous with him pressing himself inside the velvet of your sex. He sinks into you from the head, all the way down to the base, filling you completely to the hilt.
“Hells,” he grunts against your lips, and you gasp as you feel yourself adjust to the girth of him, the size and feel almost too overwhelmingly good, your toes curling, your spine bending. He slides himself all the way out, and then slams back in.
You cry out, and he does it again, and again, and again, meeting your hips, thrust after thrust. He starts at a gradual, drawn-out rate, each thump of your heart a slap of your sexes. You grapple onto his shoulders, as it resounds in the room, the wet noises and crescendo of crooning voices like that of collapsing seas.
“I miss this,” he states as he thrusts his cock deep, hitting that part of you that makes your vision haze in speckles of white, makes your body quake and your blood thrum, “You feel—” he pants, “so fucking good--”
Your nails drag down his shoulder blades, as he insists, “tell me you miss this,” he pleads, “tell me.”
You don’t think you can even speak as he keeps striking that same spot, over and over, but you try.
“Yes,” you whine, your hips careening to meet his.
“Always,” you profess, and he throbs inside you, your name shuddering from his lips in approval.
Fully immersed, like he may drown in all you are, it is as though he yearns to commit to memory the melody of your body, the mews spilling from your mouth, the way the syllables of his name become broken by desire.
All these places sacred in his mind, all the places he wants to learn by heart.
His kisses are imprinted all over you, at your cheek, to the underside of your jaw, to the slope of your neck, to the space just below your ear. Every time he says your name, all breathless, all desperate, it builds and builds in your core, the impending eclipse of your climax soon to come.
It’s like a harmonization of your bodies, of your souls, his lips, a lush rush of fever, lulling you into the forevermore. The sweat building at his brow, the vein pulsing at his clenched jaw, the relentless rhythm of his hips now a sloppy, juddering tempo.
You know he’s close too, and you want it.
“Please,” you beg, and it’s too much.
“Don’t stop--” and he doesn’t.
He can’t.
“Astarion—I’m—”
Your eyes roll back as your sex clenches down on him as you orgasm, your nails creating crescent moons at his shoulders. His mouth melds to your neck, and you feel his teeth and the sharpness of his fangs. He doesn’t bite, doesn’t trust himself to, instead, he smothers the series of shuttering moans rumbling from his lips as he reaches his limit. Its disastrous, the way you cling to him, riding it out, feeling him throb and pulsate, spilling his seed inside you.
After, he collapses on top of you. You don’t mind the weight. You trace your fingernails, aimless, over his back, as you both attempt to catch your breaths.
After a long moment spent in solace, he props himself upright, getting up from the bed. Your heart drops, if only for a second, before he’s returning to help clean the mess between your thighs with a damp hand towel.
“Thank you,” you murmur as he puts the towel into the clothes basket.
“Of course, sweetheart,” he replies, while his back is turned. You make room for him on the bed, and he takes his place, laying beside you. He faces you.
The shade of him is soft.
It’s there. On your tongue. Trapped behind your teeth. You need him to know. Even if he already does.
I love you.
You can’t get the words out, so you wish to make him feel it.
You pull him to you, until he’s hovering over you once more. Your thumb slides over his bottom lip. You take in every feature, every detail of his expression. Red eyes of the eternal, hair of frostbite. The crease of his brow, the slight crowfeet, the faint indent of smile lines, the soft cupid’s bow.
It’s a shame he can never see himself.
It’s a shame he can never truly know how you see him.
Like a vase of orchids. A drink of moonlight. A haloed silhouette.
And when you dream… It is never not of him.
“You’re beautiful,” you murmur, and then his expression shifts, at first like that of pain, and then of something full, of something vulnerable.
He leans in to press a kiss to your temple, then over your lashes, to the bridge of your nose, to the corner of your mouth.
He says your name like a faint slip of silk sliding through fingertips.
“You’re everything,” he replies, then settles on top of you, ear pressed to your pulse. He holds you close.
You lay there for a time, until sleep overtakes you.
☾☼
It is hours after, in the midst of a dreamless sleep. Astarion’s head weighed on your chest, your fingers still caught in his hair. His downcast white lashes, the smooth between his brows and the plush of his lips, all serene.
You hear his voice enter your mind through his sending stone. That reverberant baritone, that long drawl of heavy syllables, like sinking teeth.
Decent work with Lao, little Dove. It’s time you come to see me again. Make sure to leave the leech at home.
Your stomach drops, your pulse stills.
No.
You untangle your hand from Astarion’s hair, and shift to get out of bed. He grumbles at your movement, arm outstretched around your waist tightening, resisting.
“Astarion,” you plead.
“Hmm?” He mumbles, a crease forming between his brows.
“I need to get up. I… have to go,” you tug at his arm to release you, and he does, although reluctant. You leave the bed, your mind consumed.
…leave the leech at home.
You put on your clothes, lace up your boots. All the while Astarion follows your restless barrage of movement from the bed.
“Where are you going?” He sits up fully, the bed sheets tumbling to his waist.
“The man I work for requested I meet him.” You sheath a blade into the holder at your thigh, then collect your hair into an unruly bun, avoiding his stare. You don’t want him to know the creature of anxiety crawling up your spine and clawing over your lungs.
“And you have to leave now?” Astarion disapproves, motioning to get out of bed, but you hold up your hand to him.
“You should get your rest,” you grab your coin purse, suppressing a cringe at the shape of Cedric’s severed finger still inside, “I should be gone only a few hours.”
He ignores your request, leaving the bed. You avert your gaze at his naked form, a flush of heat blooming in your cheeks and in your chest.
“I don’t know where you’re going. I don’t even know this man’s name,” he chides whilst yanking up his pants, “You’re not great at concealing your distress, you know.”
“You needn’t worry—” you deny, and then he’s approaching you. You hold your breath.
“Why do you try so hard to keep things from me?” His gaze dips to your hands, and you know what he implies.
You shrink back, refuting, “It’s not that. I’ll tell you all you want to know, but now isn’t the time,” his frown deepens, “I can’t keep him waiting.”
He throws up his hands in an exaggerated sigh.
“Fine.”
“We’ll talk about everything when I return,” you promise.
“Everything?” He doubts; arms crossed.
The visions of dawn descend upon your mind in swashes of sensation, in words said and unsaid, like you’re being pulled under the current in all of what you’ve done. His prior admission akin to a choral, rising in octaves, brushing over you like strokes of acrylic. For a moment then, you thought you’d profess you’re love once more, not just through touch, but with words.
However, there is something you can’t ignore. Can’t deny.
The last time you told him you loved him… he had meant to kill you.
You glance away.
Time is waning.
If I end up failing in getting this scroll, doesn’t that mean the end of this too?
“Yes,” you concede, with that faraway look in your eyes he’d grown accustomed to, “everything.”
The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: E
Word Count: 15k
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ REVIEW THE TAGS! established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, blood drinking, exhibitionism, p in v, creampie, explicit consent, angst, additional tags posted on ao3
read on ao3
or keep reading below <3
Six dead. There are six deaths in the past month.
The apples of your cheeks are a wash of watercolor white. The thin scrape of your knuckles hatched in red fissures, curled around the end of a blade. Your pupils narrow in a stencil of black, the shroud of shadows seducing you in, clawing at your bones, imploring you to see,
Compelling you to know.
Your mark is dragging her delicate fingers along the brick walls, legs tangling and feet scrambling over one another in a collage of reckless abandonment. Her name— oh, what does it matter her name? It was something akin to rubies or roses or relics of a time gone by.
She had made her way here to meet her lover. Thinking herself stood up, she became fretfully distraught and furthermore indisposed. Her mirage of expression was soaked in the revelry of liquor. The whiskey stench stuck to her clothes like sweat.
The sight is a slur of pathetic— in a way that makes your skin crawl, and your throat tighten closed. She is a mirror for all you have felt in the past month— and now, in a bout of poetic irony, you will put her out of her misery.
A misery you orchestrated. Yet— you have a choice—
You’re thrust from the shadows satiny palms and come upon her.
A whisking of wind whirls crumbled leaves from the sidewalk to the grey water of the gutter. Your knife, intent with precision, sinks into the carotid artery of her neck.
Her body jerks like a scurrying rat, lurching against the wall. The movement takes you by surprise, as you unsheathe the blade from her throat with a flick of your wrist.
You did not mean to meet her eyes.
Even though you wear a façade of a face, the spell of disguise lingering upon your features, it is as though she knows you. Mouth ajar, eyes brimming with tears. She doesn’t even scream. Instead, she does something far worse.
“D-aniela—”
Oh—
Oh.
You jolt back. She’s delirious. In a bleeding out, drunken stupor. She sees her lover in you.
You are struck ill. Her head lulls back on the brick, body cascading to the floor.
Her hand finds your ankle. She tenses her fingers around it, and gurgles out once more, “Don’t— leave me Da—.”
They never die in this manner. Normally it is quick, painless, quiet. You crouch down in front of her. Your voice is but a whisper, barely audible over a howl of wind.
“Sleep, my love.”
The woman’s eyelids droop, her limbs pooling into the ground, ceasing their quaking. Her fingers on your ankle are like wilting flower stems, uncurling and falling away.
The sight is grim. The gash in her neck oozes in a thick river of vermillion, spreading into the fabric of her blouse like an ink drop in parchment. The dry pavement will surely be quenched soon. It is quiet once more yet, the vile inside you is a cacophony of violence. You want to scream, yank your hair and sob into yourself yet—
You don’t.
Your hand worms into the pouch tied to your waistband. Inside, you take out a sending stone. You hold it in your palm and speak using your mind.
Twilight, near the ocean, in alley two. Clean up, dispose. No witnesses.
A murmur in your mind, voice like bourbon, smooth and slow.
Sent to you, little Dove. Go fly away now.
You nose scrunches, the moniker enough to make bile bubble up your throat while you place the stone back in your pouch. The heel of your palm massages into your temple as you attempt to steady yourself. Your flesh is taunt and hot, breath coming out in puffs of condensation in the frigid night. Your vision is a greying haze. You feel it coming and you know you can’t let it overtake.
You had thought the panic would subside after the last mark. Seems your subconscious cannot contend with this way of life anymore.
It’ll have to.
A prick of perception trickles up your spine. Someone is watching.
Someone who isn’t involved.
In a flash, you swivel on your heel, blade in hand, cool steel to the stranger's throat as you crowd them into the opposing wall.
Your eyes widen.
This is no stranger.
Astarion, with his stark sharp gaze, with moonlight lilting in the mellow of his downward mouth, wafting in the waves of his white strands. He’s an orchid in bloom.
He swallows, adam’s apple bopping, causing the knife to nicked his pale flesh red.
“We have to stop meeting like this, my dear,” he says with a sly, lopsided smile, his left fang poking out past his lip.
You at once retract your blade, the cut on his neck a dribble of black blood. You sicken at the sight of it, for it is merely a sliver yet…you want to seal it closed, want it healed as impulsively as you caused it.
Your fingers of your left-hand clench. You step back from him.
“You shouldn’t be here,” you say, gravely annoyed, trying to quell your rampant heartbeat, your quickened breath.
Astarion dazzles with pearly whites, a stretch of lips that mean to rile.
“That makes two of us, but alas… here we are,” he replies in jest, yet his tone shifts, as he tilts his head considering you.
You ignore him, as you look anywhere else but him or the gory reminder laying waste behind you. You recall the face you wear. The body you’ve borrowed from the spell.
“How did you know it was me?” you ask, deflecting. The panic should pass, but instead it amplifies. He may not care about the body behind you, but you care. Shame is swallowing you whole— that, and resentment. You don’t need him to see you even lower than he’s already seen you.
“Different face and body, but same voice. Not hard to track you down when you are within earshot of me,” he explains while cupping his pointy ear; intonation heightened as if the answer were so obvious he could not believe you needed to ask. His hand drops, as does his voice.
“Though I’d very much appreciate it if you would stop avoiding me at all costs.”
“And I’d appreciate you choosing someone else to stalk,” you taunt while rolling your eyes, sidestepping him, and pulling your hood over your head. Your oversized cloak envelops you.
“Someone will collect the body soon. Be on your way,” you grumble. Turning your back on him, you make your way to the balcony ladder. It’s a bit of a jump, yet you grip the bottom step, heaving your weight up and beginning to climb. Astarion whisper shouts after you, apparently irked.
“Don’t shoo me away like an alley cat.”
As you climb to the first balcony and take a moment to pause, you note Astarion heeding the chance to follow. He grips the ladder, then hand over hand climbs after you.
Goddamn it.
You crouch down, peering at him.
You mutter with a scowl, “Why? You going to scratch me?”
He reaches the top step, and you backpedal to allow him space. He leverages himself into a stand, hands on either guard rail at your sides. He leans into you with a leer. He murmurs, syrupy sweet, his gaze unwavering from yours.
“Would you rather I bite?”
Before you can reply, you hear a familiar signal. A set of keys jangle in the distance.
You spin on your heel, hastening up the next ladder, until you reach the third level balcony. From here, you scour the wall for ebbed out brick to place your hands and feet. It’s a thing of instinct now, how you path the way in your mind to the rooftop. You start to ascend, only to hear the soft pads of Astarion’s footfalls using your trail as a guide. He does not falter or stumble, grappling into the wall with expertise that makes you tsk.
When you reach the top, you lay flat on the slightly slanted tiles, and motion for him to lie beside you. Thankfully, he does, though much too close. His shoulder presses yours, the coolness of his touch emanating through the wool of your cloak. You resist the impulse to shiver.
You rifle through your pouch, then hand him an invisibility potion.
“Drink. Now,” you mumble.
His coos into the shell of your ear, “always dictating what I do.”
You snap your head at him and level him with a volatile glare. Footsteps from below peddle their way near the ally. Your palm clamps over his mouth.
Astarion pries your fingers from his lips, then drinks the potion quick, a small drip descending the cut of his jaw before the potion takes its effect. You wrench your gaze from him, plucking a spare invisibility potion from your pouch, and gulp it down.
You lie completely back and still. Astarion does the same. You listen as hooded figures below take the body accordingly; however, the inexorable pound of your pulse makes it hard to hear. Astarion tilts his head to the side, the fluff of his feather-like hair a tickle at the top of your head.
You’re just grateful he’s finally being quiet.
It doesn’t take long, yet it feels like an eternity when the faint sounds of the alley settle into silence, and the sins of tonight soon become the cinders of tomorrow.
You let out a sigh. You should head to your room at the inn, but you are overcome with exhaustion. Let alone the predicament of letting Astarion know where you’re currently residing.
You know he wants the wish scroll. Why else would he have been tracking you for the past month? For a Rouge, he was offensively conspicuous.
You cannot see him, but you hear him rising to sit up.
“How many does this make it, now?”
You consider ignoring him but know it would exacerbate the situation further. It’s easier to think in numbers rather than names anyway.
“Seven.”
He lets out an exhale. You think he may complain about the pace of progress. After all, he never understood the concept of planning. However, he doesn’t badger. He stays quiet for a short while.
“I want in,” he says quite simply.
Your eyes widen.
“What?” you reply, dumbfounded.
“I want a part of this… little contract endeavor. You’ve been doing it on my behalf, and I should be part of the process. It is only what makes sense, of course.”
Something inside you stirs. You fume, your nails delving into your palms. You squeeze down whilst biting your inner cheek. You refuse to turn your attention to the… empty space of him., instead locking your gaze onto the caliginous sky. The milky moon wades in clouds. No stars bejewel the fabric of night.
“What makes you think I’m still doing it for you?” you inquire. It is not a deterrent. It is something you have often considered, ever since that night he fed upon you. Emptied you of all you had in all the ways he knew how.
There is an ache blooming in your chest. It is so familiar now; you do not even know what it means to live without it.
A burn behind your eyelids forces you to shut them. Gods. It was easier when you were evading him.
“Are you not doing it for me anymore?”
The consternation cracking in his tone makes you open your eyes once more.
You wish you could see him. You wish you’d know if this was another ploy to trick you, to guilt you. If this was genuine.
You sigh, quiet. Your wrist that marks your blood oath marks your intent to gain his forgiveness, throbs.
Before you can reply, he speaks.
“I’ll help you. I can drain them, make it a..,” he pauses, searching for the words, “easier kill. We can work together, and this process will be over sooner. You can return to your life of heroism,” he rambles on, “you hardly have the stomach for this. I saw it on your face. The anguish. The remorse.”
You know what he’s doing. Yet. Was he wrong? You don’t have the stomach for it— at least not anymore, at least… you hope you don’t.
You lean up from the tiles. Your words wane with an impassive implication. “Drain them. Like you nearly did to me?”
“That was—” he sputters out, and you deepen your nails into your palms.
“The answer is no,” you assert.
To be around him is to be waist-deep in a ceaseless sea. You can’t afford to slip beneath the waters, let him fill your lungs, sink you far below. You’re already struggling to keep your head above the tide in this conversation—
“I need to drink,” he contends, another bout of suasion sure to pour over you, “you have victims. Unless you rather I resort to innocents, that is.”
“Some of them are innocent.”
“And I’m sure that is quite hard for you to admit,” he sardonically maintains.
“Astarion.”
“See! I know it bothers you, so I could alleviate the manner by—”
“Fine. You won’t stop until I agree, so fine. You can drink from them,” you pause, ruminating in a reply, and you know he is sure to be beaming with a sharp smile right now, “but you will have to prove your restraint in your tendency to pester me on every decision like before. If this is going to work, we need to be able to trust each other,” you confess.
It’s a thicket in your throat. How can this even work? Surely, perhaps, you won’t need trust. He’s only here to get something from you, and it’s more vital than that. He doesn’t care about you, anyways. He made sure to prove that didn’t he—
Astarion says your name. It’s not often he ever did.
You unclamp your nails from your palms. The divots broke the skin.
You turn to him and see that the invisibility potion has run dry. Astarion is contemplating you, with a disheveled gaze and a slanted mouth.
He can see you now. Not the temporary face or body of a spell, as it has worn off, just as your invisibility spell has. No. He sees all of you.
You place your hands palm side down on your thighs.
A current passes through his countenance, a tidal wave of scrunched brow, tensed jaw, flared nostrils. The wrinkle of his brow deepens, and his hand rests to the side of his leg, near to your thigh. His fingers splay a bit, only to retract again.
His voice is quiet, thick with emotion.
“I… that night I…”
You swallow. There is a lilt of unease in his tone. You know it to be the same tone he takes when struggling to be candid. You turn to look out past the rooftops. You shake your head.
You can’t bear to know if he did or didn’t mean to do it. You provoked him into it— anyways. If it had happened, him drinking you dry, would it be anyone else’s fault but yours?
All of this is your fault.
You move your hands into the deep pockets of your cloak.
“It’s inconsequential,” you insist, voice a touch too tender to be taken as aloof. You continue, “If we do this together, you must listen to me. You must be careful and follow my lead.”
“I’m used to following your lead,” he says, not unkind.
You rise to a crouch.
“Then follow my lead right now,” you state with a feigned smile. Your gaze flickers to the edge of the roof, then back to him.
He gradually rises; brows furrowed together. Disapproval douses his speech.
“Tell me you aren’t considering what I think you’re considering.”
“If you really want to do this with me, you’ll have to get over your fear of heights.”
You inhale, prepping to run. There is a butterfly of exhilaration fluttering in your blood.
Before you can break into a sprint, he seizes your wrist.
“If you’re trying to be petty, then I prefer you polite.”
You lean into his space, and his adam’s apple bobs.
“When have you ever preferred anyone to be polite?”
The corners of his lips perk up. His eyes flicker to your mouth.
You lean in, a chance away from grazing your lips with his. His eyes become hooded beneath his lashes.
You murmur.
“Don’t fall.”
He registers what you have said a moment too late, as his eyes abruptly open, and his tongue nearly commences an onslaught of complaints.
You ignore him, breaking into a run, leaping from the edge of the building, and swiftly landing onto the neighboring roof. The air whooshing through your clothes and your hair, evokes a euphoric sense of impunity. You don’t turn back to see if he follows.
A clumsy landing omits a loud curse.
“Gods above.”
He’s made the jump behind you. When you turn back to him, he’s on his knees, with a palm over his unbeating heart. You stifle a snort behind your hand.
“Oh yes, very funny. Laugh away.”
“I am not laughing,” you insist, despite the smile adorning your features. “Gain enough momentum and remember to bend your knees when you land, old man.”
“Old!” he gasps, utterly offended, and you do laugh this time, before gearing to sprint and leap once more to the next roof.
He says your name again, astounded.
This pattern of trial and error continues as you traverse from rooftop to rooftop, peaking behind your shoulder to make sure Astarion doesn’t indeed fall. Roof running was always your favorite part of your past life. But right now, it is … made a touch sweeter… knowing a grumbling Astarion is following you.
On the last leap before you can return to the sidewalks, you glance back a bit quicker than you had before, and you swear.
You might have even caught a smile on his face while he leapt.
A flicker of warmth burns within you.
Like a secret, you keep it for yourself, choosing to be polite, instead of teasing him for it as he lands near to you.
His grievances bellow out once more. You roll your eyes, take his hand, and guide him down a balcony.
The warmth is permeating to your fingertips. You hope he cannot tell.
☾☼
The sun slumbers, yet you hasten your step. Astarion quickens behind you.
The inn you have been residing in comes into view. You glance sideways at Astarion. His fingers rest over his lips, too preoccupied taking in the look of the place to notice you staring. His gaze swivels to you, and you glance away, feeling for the inner pocket of your cloak. There inside the lining you find a silver band. You slip it onto your ring finger with a stifled sigh.
The city lanterns sway with the wheeze of a cool breeze.
“Let me do the talking,” you state as you move up the entrance stairs. The door swivels open with a whine. If he means to protest, you pay him no mind. You step in. At the counter, a young human woman—Amelia was her name— regards you graciously.
“Welcome! It’s a bit late, but I can help you here—.”
“I need another room,” you interject, resting your arm on the counter, the silver ring adorning your finger glinting in the candlelight. Her eyes immediately dart to it.
She swallows in recognition.
You worry not about her seeing your real face. She’s seen you wear too many a face to state which one is truly yours.
“Oh… but you see…, we are fully booked.”
Great.
The last thing you need is to share a room with Astarion.
Your thoughts must have surfaced on your face. Amelia relents.
“But! You’re in a suite. There’s a partition I can put up for you to ensure your privacy, and to… to best accommodate your…” her attention shifts to behind you, and her porcelain grin cracks, “your…”
“Accomplice,” Astarion states in a deliciously devious declaration.
“Acquaintance,” you retort over him.
You could pity the awkward look on Amelia’s face. You try to lift her crestfallen expression.
“That would work.”
She beams at this and gives a polite bow. She flips over a handmade sign at the front desk that states “away” and nearly trips over herself heading up the stairs.
You can feel Astarion’s stare.
“You can ask when we’re in our room,” you warn.
“Leave it to you to keep me in suspense.”
He leans close to you, a susurration at your ear. “Seems we’ll be sharing a room. Though the divider doesn’t seem entirely necessary.”
You conceal a tremor.
Your eyes flick to him. He smiles wide, all white and toothy, enough to show his fangs. Your heart flutters in your chest, much to your disapproval.
“And wake up with you luring over me? I’d rather take the peace of mind.”
His smile dips into a pout.
“That was one time.”
“One too many.”
“I seem to recall a time you very much enjoyed it.”
You flush.
“I enjoy you watching your tongue, let alone your fangs,” you counter, yet the damage is already done. He’s noticed the color in your cheeks, and now he’s simpering.
As you are about to deny the shade of cerise adorning your features, Amelia’s descending steps cease any response. With a reciprocal look, you and Astarion follow her to your room.
☾☼
As soon as the door closes behind you, Astarion is devouring the details of your luxurious abode. With its lavish velvet upholstery décor, and the balcony lattice windows peeking from behind puddled drapes, it is no doubt that crime pays. He sets forth scrutinizing your trinkets, jewelry, and closet with all the decorum of a cat swiping books from a shelf. The king-sized feather mattress, with its copious blankets, means to summon you, yet across from it, the fireplace awaits being awoken. Dividing the room is the promised partition. Its intricate wood carven spirals and swirls almost make up for the fact that it barely takes up a quarter length of the room.
So much for privacy.
You internally sigh. You will need to change locations eventually, so maybe one night won’t kill you.
You cross the room and within a few moments the enkindled fireplace crackles with a yawn. The flames are vivacious, and you steep in their heat. Your fingers move to undo the knot of your thick ponytail.
You hear a bottle uncorked. You glance over your shoulder; fingers caught in tangles.
Astarion has found the treasure trove of wine bottles in the cabinet above your desk. Tilting it to you in a wordless offering, you shrug. He sloshes the liquid before unceremoniously taking a gulp, his face scrunching as he groans with a trite repugnance.
“Gods, it’s foul.”
He then plops down upon the bed, languishing on top of it with the bottle in hand. You undo the button of your cloak, letting it tumble from your shoulders and into your arms. You fold it neatly, placing it in your armoire. Tension travels up your neck, and you absentmindedly rub at the ache while taking a seat on a lounge chair opposite the balcony window.
“So…”
He sways the bottle, all cavalier.
“How’d a guild ring manage its way on your finger?”
He tilts his head, then the bottle, as if signaling you. You know his ploy, yet you take the wine. You swallow down a dry, bitter, red.
“Circumstances.”
“That’s a touch vague, darling.”
“The details would bore you.”
“Then bore me to your hearts content. Gods know I’ll need something to mull over while immured in this room all the ‘morrow,” Astarion insists, glimpsing between the curtains to find the sliver of a sallow moon, hung low in the trench of night.
“How much do you know about blood oaths?” you say, while swirling the wine in the bottle.
“I’ve heard rumors here and there. Cazador’s cronies made hints at it, but the process was much too precarious for him to take part.”
“Being a vampire, I’m sure anything blood related would be,” you jest, before taking another chug, chasing an indifference that only comes from inebriation. Astarion sits up and meets your eyes.
“Tell me,” he says, “from what I know, you slice open your palm, do a handshake with some uppity, make a little promise and then you’re bound to keep it?”
“Along those lines, yes.”
“What happens if it’s broken?”
Your fingers clench over the bottle, and your eyes dash away from him. You set the wine down on the floor beside you and focus intently on unlacing your boots. You swallow down your hesitation.
“I don’t break promises.”
He looks to you unconvinced.
You know what he’s thinking. The promise he thought you made about his ascension.
“I don’t break oaths. I wouldn’t be here if I’d broken one,” you amend and take off your boots with a sigh of relief.
“Hmm…” Astarion hums listlessly, “so certain death if you fail…” he ascertains.
“It’s not like the Guildhall,” you offer as explanation, “we aren’t widely known to the Lower City. It’s an Upper City operation, and things are a bit more dire.”
“Another blood cult?” he proposes, dropping his legs over the edge of the bed and resting his chin on his knuckle.
“Less religious. More political.”
“And our young friend Wyll doesn’t know?”
“No one knows unless they are in it. Or… in what was Cazador’s case, potential affiliates.”
He gets up. Paces the room. You drink until the wine is gone. That purring haze of intoxication is settling in. He stops before you, hand on his hip. The crease in his brow, the crinkle in his nose, and the tautness in his tone make you sink deeper into the lounge chair.
“And not once, during our treacherous escapade against the mind flayer invasion and potential end of the world scenario, did you mention this to me.”
You answer a touch sheepish.
“If it makes you feel better, I didn’t mention it to anyone.”
“No, that doesn’t make me—” he rattles on, before suddenly pausing. He raises a brow, frown deepening.
“Not even Gale?”
Your brows furrow, and you smile aghast. You tuck a stand of hair behind your ear and shake your head.
“Why in the world would I have told Gale?”
He dismisses the response with a wave of his hand and a sulk.
“Just a thought.”
Astarion with arms crossed leans on the bedframe. The weariness of your bones and light buzz swim inside your chest. A brief quiet sets in.
He barks out a laugh, then contemplates you.
“So, all the things I told you...about my assorted past, and yet… I really don’t know much about you,” he suggests, half humorous, half miserable. His shift in tone is a riptide.
“You do know me,” you refute, stern and swift.
In all the ways that mattered.
To remember was to ache.
You used to fear he could feel all you kept from him in every touch. The callous rough of time. It was tar, stamped on scars made over and over, hidden beneath your clothes. The white knuckling of your beating heart. The room you never left, even after all the molding months, the unyielding years. It stays. You had thought before that it was enough for him to know the good. The worthy. The clean.
But to confess it all felt futile after that night in the alley, when you limped into bed, when you did not recover for a week. Truthfully, you haven’t fully recovered since.
How could you let him see any more of you? Yes. You had betrayed his trust. Yet, he had broken your heart...
Feeling yourself overflow, about to pour out, your head drops. You hold it in your hands, reminiscences pitting themselves into you like prickles of thorns in palms.
“Who I was before wasn’t worth knowing,” you confess.
“Dabbling in a little upper city crime is hardly the most shameful act—” he mocks and then stops short at your appearance. It is distraught. Distant. He knows he’s pushed too far, yet he itches to persist, to rouse the quiet parts of you.
“You’re right,” you say sweeping the bottle from the floor, and standing up.
Approaching him, you meet his eyes, then hand him back the bottle.
“It’s not.”
He doesn’t quarrel.
You proceed to the curtains, drawing them completely closed. Mutely you gather blankets from the armoire and toss them out on the lounge chair. It’s not ideal, yet you had already decided from the moment you entered the room that Astarion would have the bed. In the armoire, you collect a change of clothes. It is a simple white linen chemise. However, you pause before going behind the partition.
For some reason, getting undressed like this— even behind a divider wall, feels risqué. You wonder if it is merely the liquor that implores you to ask.
“Do you mind if I…” you trail off, and his wayward attention snaps back to you.
He quips with a sneer, holding the empty bottle in his hand, “Don’t be so modest. It’s not as though I haven’t seen everything before.”
You raise a brow, bristling.
“Fine,” you bite back. Choosing not to stand behind the partition, you begin to undo the latch of your waist belt pouch. You drag it off and set it in the armoire, the fuzz of your senses riddling you with the need for retaliation.
Maybe this is a bad idea.
After a second of delay, you start plucking at the laces of your under-bust corset.
He sets the bottle at his feet and combs a hand through his locks. His voice carries a lilt of strained triviality, and discreet curiosity.
“Who’s our next mark?”
Before you respond, you loosen the knot at the back of your corset with a few tugs, the laces unraveling. His stare unfurls a fever in your blood.
“Cedric Lao. I’ve been tracking him for a few weeks, though I have a feeling his movement doesn’t match his polished routine,” you reply, while unhooking each clasp, one by one, at the front of your corset. You notice his chest rise and fall, as if lulled under the same impulse.
You slide the corset over your stomach and hips, and it falls to the floor with a dull thud. Grasping the bottom of your blouse, you tug it over your head in one fluid swipe to reveal your brassier. You inhale. Your fingers wedge into the waistband of your pants, and you pause.
Like a tempo dripping in indigo, the rhythm of your heartbeat builds. You glance at him. His hand splayed over his plush lips, holding his chin, as he surveys you with low lidded eyes and heavy lashes.
“Dabbling in debauchery then,” he suggests, subdued, yet attempting in vain at appearing aloof.
The syllables are molasses stuck to your teeth. You swallow, then speak.
“It’s more like backroom betting...” you say while pushing at your waistband, slow, sliding it over your hips, “I’ve pinned down a potential location, but the time frame is uncertain.”
The blaze of the fireplace encompasses the room in swells of enticing fervor. His gaze dips and follows your fingers as you glide your waistband further down the expanse of your thighs.
“I plan to go tomorrow evening to comb for clues at his home,” you finish concurrently as the firewood splinters, cracks, and pops. Your pants pool at your ankles.
Astarion bites the tip of his index finger, traversing every single inch of your exposed skin. You wonder when it was the last time he fed. He is watching you as though he craves to devour you all over again.
You pluck your left bra strap and slink it down the slope of your shoulder. You do the same with the other side.
He licks his lips, his mouth suddenly dry.
“A bit of breaking and entering, then?” he queries.
The hint of a smile tugs at the corners of your lips, all coy and mischievous.
“Will you be interested in coming?” you ask, then undo the back of your brassier. Before it can fall off, you press it to your breasts, choosing then to sidestep behind the partition. Out of his line of sight you hold your brassier in one hand for his view, then let it plummet to the ground.
“Hmmm…” he hums, and when you discard your panties in the same manner, he nearly chokes. An amused grin finds its way onto his rapt countenance.
He manages an answer with some effort.
“Of course, darling.”
When you step out from behind the partition, you’re adorned in only your chemise. You pick up your clothing articles, putting them away. You are a tad indolent in putting out the candles in the room, eyeing him with each blow. After, you sit on your lounge chair, chin resting on your knees and arms hugging your legs. The fireplace coats the room in a cadence of yellows and shadows swimming over your form. You tilt your head at him.
“Do you think you can really handle it?” you state with a feigned concern, “We won’t want to get caught.”
He huffs out a short laugh, and then gives you a feline smile, all fangs, and pearly teeth.
“We won’t be.”
☾☼
The sinking sun slips its fleeting fingers over serpentine streets. You wade in its waning glow, nimble body fluttering from one rooftop to the next. Before you reach the inn, you settle into a familiar space atop slanted tiles, overlooking the vast blanket of city. The coast of serene salt and collapsing waves whoosh at a far away distance, sparkling in ribbons of sanguine pink and tangerine. Remnants of the recent past speckle your mind in color, and with it comes an ache that mourns the mornings.
You used to hold him most nights.
With your arms wrapped snugly around his chest, your cheek pressed to the raised skin of his scar on his back, your body melded to his.
He had confessed, quiet, sincere.
“I prefer this way, you know,” he murmured, “I can feel your heartbeat against me. It feels as if it is both yours and mine.”
You had placed gentle kisses over the coarse ridges and bends of his scar, once, then twice, then over and over, until he shuttered, until he trembled with the awe of your affection.
Your pulse was a garden of flowers in bloom.
“It is both yours and mine,” you whispered.
The memory tangles with the reality of now.
If he only knew what you were willing to do, and what you had already done, to see him bask in daylight once more.
But would it be enough?
Would he at least forgive you before he left again?
You drag a palm down your face, then rub your wrist, scanning west of the sea. Far off, copious somber clouds are billowing toward the city.
Eight. This will soon be your eighth kill.
Gods.
Even if he forgives you, will you ever be able to forgive yourself?
☾☼
A whimpering wind weakens your grip on the balcony’s limestone ledge. The impending storm sure to overtake the whole of the city, wails out in aguish. The rain has not come yet, but it will. You heave yourself over, and glance downward at Astarion. Wordlessly, you reach for his hand. He grips your forearm as you leverage him up with a silent wheeze. Sneaking over to the ornate windows, you peak in.
Inside is a sanctum shrouded in the darkness of unuse. Even if the servants are home, they were not permitted in these private quarters.
Your eyes flick to him, and he understands. His hand slides across the small of your back as he passes you. You suppress a shiver as he makes swift work of the lock.
You creep inside with Astarion following close behind. You both survey the sanctum, only to find obscene opulence. On the left are floor to ceiling oak bookshelves brimming with collections of novels and ornaments. On the right, framed oil paintings of the master of the house cover the wall. There are two doors, one perhaps leading to the hallway, and the other you aren’t too sure. In the center of the room is a desk smothered in parchments, feathered pens, a wax seal, and a lone candle stick. A velvet chair sits behind it.
The home is reticent. You light the candle, and it awakens saturations of maroons and gold leaf detail in the furniture.
“A manor in the upper city, and yet we camped out in the dirt for weeks. I don’t think I can forgive you,” Astarion states in a hushed tone, taking interest in the engravings of the wood shelves, tracing his nimble fingers over the ebb and flow of design.
A hint of playfulness creeps into your whisper, “It’s not as if I could house everyone here, you know.”
“You could have housed me, at the very least.”
“Mmm. A missed opportunity, then,” you say while inspecting the documents atop the desk. You make sure to memorize the order or things before touching them, so that you may put it back accordingly, however, there is nothing of note.
“If I knew we could have been living in the lap of luxury, I would have insisted upon trespassing much sooner,” he responds back.
You try the drawers and find that one of them will not budge. There is a keyhole.
A distant creak stills your hand. Your eyes dart to Astarion opening one of the doors to reveal a closet of long tunics and cloaks. He skims over the silk, admiring the embroidery and embellishments of exquisite stones, lace, and gold trim.
He holds up a sleeve to his arm and glances at you.
“You once spoke of my beauty like poetry. Does this make me seem more enchanting?”
“Astarion…” you warn, but he tsks.
“No. You’re right.”
He pulls out one of the cloaks with a flourish and holds it to himself. “This one is more befitting of me. Brings out the crimson of my eyes.”
“It’s a bit gaudy. So yes, quite suitable for you,” you tease, skating your fingers along the underside of the desk. He scoffs in reply, turning his back on you to rifle through the clothes once more.
Your finger bumps into the unmistakable edge of a key. You extract it, and with a pleased smile, unlock the drawer. Inside are open letters sent by the initials TC. You rake over the parchment and find it. A location and a time.
20, Mirtul at the Blushing Mermaid. Midnight.
Shit.
That’s tonight.
Before you close the drawer, an unsent letter catches your eye. The handwriting is different, and ends with the initials CL.
Yes, we can still meet at Sharess’ Caress at the end of Mirtul. Though Theo, perhaps you should be less conspicuous about your frequent visitations---
Your stomach drops at the brothel’s mention.
Theo.
Theo Cordelian, your subsequent mark.
But you know more than just his name.
Dammit.
You had hoped--
The muffled tap of footsteps echo from outside the room, coming up the stairway. Your eyes widen and meet Astarion’s. Mutely, you place the letters back inside the drawer, lock it, and then put the key beneath the desk once more. Right as you hastily blow out the candle, Astarion yanks at your arm, tucking you into the closet with him and shutting the door with a soft thud.
You find yourself wedged to the wall, Astarion flush to your body. His warm breath gusts over the slope of your neck. You try to be silent as footfalls stop before the sanctum, and the familiar click of a key unlocks the door.
Fuck.
You listen to the movement outside the closet and the stranger steps inside. They light a candle and hum to themselves a whimsical tune.
The flick of book pages turning, one by one, sets a pace for your pulse.
You try to move ever so slight to peer through the crack of the doorway, yet Astarion’s hands clamp down on your hips, hindering your movement with a shaky exhale. You can feel every part of him pressed into you, his lips a feather’s length from brushing over your throat, his chest to your back, his lower half…
Fuck.
You close your eyes tightly, biting your lip.
You can feel all of him like this.
Your breath hitches, your heartbeat an accelerating thump, thump, thump, in your ears. The darkness of your surroundings makes the sensations all the more insurmountable, and impossible to ignore. You attempt to shift, only a susurrus away, yet his lips skim your skin, and the swell of his crotch bumps against your backside.
“Ah,” a barely audible noise leaves your mouth, and immediately Astarion’s hand clasps over your lips.
The flick of pages pauses, if only for a moment, and then continues.
Whoever this person is, they have no intention of leaving any time soon.
Astarion’s fingers clench and unclench over your hip.
You hear him swallow.
Then, his lips are at your throat once more. You flush, color flooding your cheeks, as you know he can feel the pounding of your pulse, the inaudible whimper against his palm. An amalgamation of desire and trepidation stipples up your spine. A salacious shame burns between your thighs, and though you try to alleviate the heat by rubbing them together, it is simply not enough…
It feels as though an eternity has passed, when a rumbling of thunder tumbles through the room, followed by a sudden shaa of rain pelting the windows.
Astarion nudges into you again, and there you feel it— the undeniable arousal straining against his trousers, the full weight and thick shape of him pressed firmly to you. His uneven breath fans out over your neck once more, and he curses into your skin, the sound a tremulous hum.
“…Shit.”
Yet he does not move, his left hand still clamped down on your hip. His labored breath shares with you secrets you keep yourself, and so, despite yourself, you rest your palm over his knuckles and give it a reassuring squeeze.
Astarion needs not to ask.
He knows.
He rocks against you, his mouth flat to your throat, molding his silent moans to the silk of your skin. Patters of rain dampen the sounds of your shared sin, crackles of thunder rippling through the room. Astarion’s hand finds its way into the front of your pants, wedging beneath your waistband and slipping into your panties, melding his fingers over the curls of your mound. His middle finger dips between your folds, the slick of your cunt causing him to shudder. It shamelessly drips down his fingers.
He rubs torturously slow circles over your clit, then slides the pad of his ring finger along the seam of your sex. His tongue glides over your pulse, lips sucking wisteria blossoms into your flesh, his palm over your mouth concealing your mews and sighs. You feel the sharp tips of his fangs, the mouthing of your name as he sinks his finger into you. He pumps it into you with an agonizingly succulent rhythm of in, out, in, out…
Gods.
You know you should stop… yet it is akin to a monsoon, the sleek stark strike of lightening in your core, the roaring thunder that reverberates in your bones, the scent of petrichor and the taste of fresh rain--
Astarion stills his fingers.
You inhale, quivering all over. You realize the light of the candle has been put out.
The stranger starts to move about the room.
You squeeze your eyes shut.
Footsteps halt near the front of the closet.
Neither of you breathe.
Yet, the person stalks off toward the other door, opening it and closing it with a thud. The click of the lock punctuates the air. You listen as they retreat down the stairs.
The only sounds left are those of the rain and your heart.
We can… go.
You mean to say it aloud, but no such utterance leaves you. Astarion’s lips hover over your ear.
“I’m thirsty,” he states in a rasp wrought with hunger, “will you let me taste you?”
You freeze.
He cannot mean…
There is no way he would try to…
Yet as the thoughts swarm your mind, Astarion opens the closet door and steps out in front of you. A flash of lightening floods the dark room, and it is then that you realize the true meaning behind is words.
His scarlet irises are thin ringlets encircling the vast bloom of his pupils. His lips are pedals slightly plush and swollen. There are no inklings of humor or mischief upon his countenance.
Your mind goes blank.
You watch as he kneels before you.
Thunder booms in the distance.
It’s not enough to nod.
You have to say it aloud.
“Yes,” you accede, and then his eager hands are at your hips, sliding down your pants and your panties in one swipe. He drags them to your ankles, yanking them over one of your boots. He cannot bear to waste time doing the same for the other leg, so instead he grasps your legs and spreads your thighs. His lips pepper open mouthed kisses up the inside of your thigh as your hand finds leverage in the coils of his white curls. He drags the pad of his tongue up until his mouth is snuggly placed over your sex.
He is languid.
His tongue swirls over your clit and your arousal leaks down the cut of his jaw. You feel him groan deep in his throat, the vibrations drenching you in molten pleasure. You whine, teeth secured onto your knuckle, your other hand caught in his locks, urging and pleading him closer, nearer, and oh--
He sinks his tongue into the velvet of your sex, plunges it in and out, in and out, like a tide meeting the shore, relentless, endless— and you weep with the overwhelming sensation, as it is too fucking good, and almost too fucking much---
He hums your name like a prayer, his fingers taking the place of his tongue, his tongue finding its way to your clit again.
You know it is coming, can feel the hot haze of fizzles scattering under your skin, speckling your eyes in starry heavens. You glimpse downward at him just as a strike of lightning illuminates the room.
There, you find his eyes are already on you.
Watching. Wanting. Devouring.
And yet, for some foolish, impulsive reason, you want to tell him that you love him.
It is then that your orgasm ripples through you, dazzling, made of both light and sound. He clasps your thighs and doesn’t stop lapping at your cunt until your knees buckle, until you fear you might collapse from the raptures of your high.
When it is over, he wipes his hand over his wet mouth and chin, only to clean his fingers with his tongue.
You rest your weight on one arm, flushing behind your palm.
Fuck.
As he stands you fumble with pulling up your panties and pants, your eyes anywhere but his, but then you see the tension of his trousers, and gods.
You want to make him feel good too.
So bad.
He must read your mind. His hand touches yours.
“We don’t want to be caught,” he reminds you in a tone attempting mischief yet spoken with a lilt of bewilderment, as if he cannot believe what occurred between you either. He swallows.
“And we have Cedric Lao to kill,” he continues, his timbre a touch more composed.
“Yes,” you numbly respond, chest heaving, heart syncopating in your chest, “I know where he’ll be, and when.”
“Then let us be off,” he says, then takes your hand in his, and leads you to where you first entered.
Gods.
The eighth mark tonight.
Nine more after.
Yet you can only wonder if you will be the one surviving this.
Summary: The last you heard from Astarion, he told you to "die screaming." Months later, you find each other again. Only this time, deep in the city, in an alley under nightfall. Perhaps, he will bleed you dry. Or perhaps, he has other plans for you.
Rating: E
Word Count: 7.2k
Pairing: Astarion x you (fem!reader)
cw: 18+ REVIEW THE TAGS! established relationship pre breakup, post ending for BG3, blood drinking, exhibitionism, p in v, creampie, explicit consent, angst, additional tags posted on ao3
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It is in the end— after the blood had been shed, the world nearly ended. When you are once more alone, companions returning to their new obligations or new plights, when you are left with kind consolation and heavy goodbyes.
The city sleeps, yet often you do not. Residing at differing inns from night to night, you attempt to lead a life nameless once more. A lack of sleep, a predilection for forgetting. Perhaps that is also what led you here, entering a tavern prevalent in profound impropriety and bottomless drink.
The ale is a warm rush of current down your throat, a haze settling inside your mind. The scintillating fireplace of licking flames cast rhythms of shadow across unfamiliar faces.
You’re here on business… or rather, pursuing a whisper of opportunity. It isn’t unnatural to be stood up in this line of inquiry. Not many mages boast of wish spells, and even fewer know how to get their hands on one.
You had managed to not resort to needing Gale this long… so. Other avenues became necessary.
At least that is what you keep telling yourself as you keenly monitor the door.
One door close, and you pick lock it open, but your years in this line of work were hells bent on survival. Not miracles.
Yet, your miracles are not here. At least, one of them doesn’t show. The other you hope won’t.
You groan, cradling your head with your hands, then kneading balled fists against your eyes. The man eyeing you from across the bar coughs to conceal his sudden disinterest. Who can blame him? You’re pathetic.
“The deal is still on the table. You play your part just like you used to, and I help. The hero act wasn’t going to last, you know. Coming here is a testament to the matter.”
You grip the handle of your mug, your drink swishing to and fro. It all but topples over onto the front of your undershirt as you raise it to your lips. You take deep gulps, liquid dribbling down your chin. You smear it away.
You cannot get drunk quickly enough.
However, as the hour plays on, you begin to curse your tolerance of drink, as well as everything else gone wrong in the past months.
Fuck.
Gods, surely there is no use to this anymore—
A honeyed voice pollutes your buzz. It is a suave soliloquy, with syllables like rose petals. It wafts in the air, laughter silk soft with an undercut of severity. It prickles up your posture, and you are shrouded in thorns.
Fuck.
As sly as you may, you cast a glance over your shoulder, and there he is.
Without the tadpole's defiance of the sun, Astarion was thrust into the night once more, cavalierly caviling at the young man draped under his arm. The man is of noble build, with embroidered robes adorned in maroon and amethyst gems. The noble’s cheeks are a flush delight fueled by the splendor of Astarion’s charm.
The sight is the sea collapsing into you, wave after wave. Breath sealed in sinking lungs. You will drown if you don’t look away.
There are two awful realities to unfold before you.
One, how dismayingly odd the noble is for someone of Astarion’s taste. Just met his prime, early twenties, broad shoulders, and bright-eyed. These types were the kind Astarion would toy with until they bristled and cried. Not the kind he’d be involved with.
You swiftly shift to stare into your half-empty glass. A shiver stills your sigh.
Unless of course, the context of taste meant something entirely different.
Then it was most certainly his type.
You take a swig.
Second.
Astarion is philandering.
With your intended mark.
You shouldn’t look again. But you must be sure. On first inspection, the noble fits the bill all right; medium height, thin build, pale eyes, hair, and skin. The description checks out, everything but the—
A cacophony of swooning laughter manages to reach your side of the tavern.
“He laughs like a hyena.”
You turn, slow as if that will help conceal your gaze. It doesn’t.
Crimson eyes meet yours, and dread pollutes your surroundings, your thoughts, and your breath. Your stomach drops, the skin of your arms pebbling as a chill slinks its lips down your spine.
This is not how you planned the night to go.
There it is again, the clutch of your gut, the crater burrowing itself into the trenches of you.
You had not died— screaming, as he had last proclaimed. The reminder of those words, dripping in contempt, brazen in believed betrayal. They had marred your thoughts and sought to spoil the solace of your soul. The severance of your last encounter had sunk its teeth into you, chewed sinew, and spit out the scraps.
Astarion.
He whom you had given everything— anything— for. Gone. Never to be seen again.
But he is here— and you… you realize you really shouldn’t be.
You can’t be.
The mark can wait. There will be other nights.
Within a fluid movement, you set your mug aside, reach into your pouch, and spill gold coins across the counter. You make haste from the bar to the entrance. You slide behind shoulders and wade through strangers cackling and clinking cups unaware.
Even so, you feel him watching you.
The tavern bell chimes. You cringe with the acknowledgment it calls forth to you. The breath in your lungs constricts, the agony in the urgency to flee from his line of sight too much to endure.
Why is he here? Shouldn’t he be in the Underdark?
Did recognition pass across his countenance? He could have seen you but not see you.
This is the only comfort you can indulge in as you quicken your pace, the city lamp yellow hues sluicing and splaying across the street.
A bell chimes and footfalls patter behind you. You don’t even need to look. The thought is nauseating. How well-versed you are in the sound of his steps.
“I hope you die screaming.”
It resounds in your mind just as he calls your name. It sounds foreign. It sounds like a memory. Like a dream, you never wake from.
You have half a mind to keep walking, roaming further into the city and into the surrounding, comforting dark.
He could want to make his past proclamation true.
Perhaps you’d let him if only to be rid of this ache.
This burden you bury beneath your smiles and behind your eyes, the loss of him you carry in your voice.
How it is known by all who know you.
“I didn’t think I would find you alone, in my time of the night. Where are your companions, darling?” His tone tinged in disdain; his darling laced with ridicule. There is a slow decline in breath. It staggers still in your lungs, like tangled strands caught in dragging dingers. Is it dread? Is it grief? Perhaps it is a touch of mourning.
You know now what you knew the last you spoke— you are the bearer for all that did not come to fruition. You are the reason he won’t say our companions. Our friends.
And though you loathe yourself for losing him, though you blame yourself for all the things you previously thought you were sheltering him from. You cannot endure this in silence any longer. Not when the chance to confront him is here.
Who are you to run away? You have spent your whole life running.
This isn’t imprisonment. This isn’t a life sentence.
Yet… isn’t it?
You can’t go on like this. You haven’t been.
You whip around, and Astarion stumbles into you. As you collide— his scarlet eyes widen, and a flash of recollection startling your pulse. The effect of being this close isn’t lost on you. You can see, even under the dim lanterns glow the crease of his brow, the wrinkle in his nose, the dip of his cupid’s bow. But just as sudden, he steels himself, stepping back and straightening, a glint in his glare, wrath warping his mouth and brandished on his tongue.
You muster the will to speak before he can.
“They were your companions as much as they were mine,” you bite back, though the spite of it makes you hesitate. Whatever you feel doesn’t matter.
“But…” you sigh, then start again, “that matters not…” you offer.
Your companions who watched you wither away the moment he left. Companions who offered you condolences yet spoke in passing of how things may have been different— for Astarion’s fate. It was blameless yet… how could they have not blamed you? And maybe that is why when it was over, you pushed them all away.
That is why you offered goodbyes in place of being a part of the next journey.
Karlach’s hand on your back, Shadowheart’s curt smile, La’zel’s tense jaw, Gale’s exasperation, Wyll’s sorry nod.
You’d never known family—let alone friends. So why grieve yourself over it?
Even if you gave all you could, even though you had killed yourself to keep the world.
It means nothing now.
All you can do is make him see sense. All you can do is convince him to listen, to hear you. You just didn’t think it would happen this soon when you are unready. When you are still angry— at yourself, at him, at everything.
“What matters is that I am sorry,” you plead, and Astarion teeters on his heel, bombarded by your insistence. But you can’t stop. Even if he thinks you are pathetic—distasteful or blunt.
Your hurt is too deep. You remember the vitriol in your supposed lover’s voice. You remember scrubbing your skin raw after the battle with Cazador. You remember numbly thinking if that was all you always were to him. A plot for protection. A ploy for power.
Hadn’t he said as much?
“I’m sorry how things ended. Now if that is all you wanted, let us be on our way,” you bitterly retort. You mean to turn your back on him, on all of this.
But just as sudden, the verses of carved intent burn at the inside of your wrist.
Dammit.
A contract is a contract.
Even if you walk away. Your past self has condemned you.
Abruptly, his cold, nimble fingers curl around your forearm. His filed nails nip into your skin— though the pain doesn’t end there. His touch burns through you fields of forlorn faith of anything different than the vile sure to leave his tongue.
He is incredulous.
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry? That’s all you have to say to me? Are you sorry to be reminded of how you refused to help me despite stating you would? How you ruin any chance of me ascending, of being more than my captor? You’re sorry?!” He bellows out, the way he does when things are far too outrageous to constrain within a reasonable decibel.
The words stick like tar and taste of arsenic. He must have rehearsed a version of these lines before, as he always made sure to hone his skill of slights. They puncture the air with each consonant, every vowel, as he draws you in closer.
His presence encircles you, a predator playing with its prey. He could end you here and now, drain you of all you are.
As if he hadn’t already.
You yank your arm away and vociferate back.
“I ruined your chance at becoming Cazador. You couldn’t see it. You wouldn’t. The spawn aside, you would have been damned. I love—” a near concession you barely manage to conceal, “I loved you,” you finish.
Dammit! You love him. His mean proclivity. His budding vulnerability. His gentle rebuffs. The sly quips, the grandiose turn of phrase, the sharp smiles, the soft uncertainty of palms alleviating parts of you that were left derelict. When the others slept, you’d glide your fingers through his strands of hair, humming quiet, close, gentle. You never knew if he truly saw you in the same way— as if you were precious as if you were his new comprehension of eternity.
It is why you’d been willing to risk your reputation to pay repentance. To earn some semblance of forgiveness.
Even if you had to become what you once were…
He wouldn’t have to.
And that is enough. Yet—
Yet, you blink and blink it back.
You can’t cry- not like this. Not now.
“I was trying to…” it almost tumbles from your tongue. Save you. That is what you mean to say. But it feels wrong to say it— it felt wrong even then, even if that is what you meant to do, even if it was done with intent rife with compassion, with desperation to help him. You know, deep down, he will despise you further if you admit it. You hadn’t wanted to fix him, but in that moment, you knew love would never heal him. Nor power. Not vengeance.
It was through choice— a choice you seemingly made for him.
So, you halt yourself. Shake your head, and turn away.
“Love?!” He sputters at your confession in disbelief. You hadn’t told him that before. It was never the right moment, or perhaps you feared rejection. Even if you had said it countless times, like the mantra pounding in your heart, would he have ever believed you?
He grips your wrist this time, preventing you from even daring to leave.
“I needed you. And you went back on your promise.” He says indignant. “I should kill you for what you took from me.” He gestures towards the blade sheathed at his hip and for an instant you… you wouldn’t mind if he did.
You’ve been beaten, bloodied, beguiled, spurned. What is left of you after the fight for the city? Victories wrought with death, a closure that did not fulfill. All of it was done with a broken heart.
Deep within, you cave.
How did we become this?
Your features crumble, brows pinching together and tears beginning to burn, threatening to descend your cheeks. You’d never let him see you cry. He’d heard you before… held you as you shook beside him. But never would you show your face. It was too much. For anyone.
Except… the night he left. In front of the others— you wept.
You cannot retreat into the night, for he knows the dark better than you. You had thought he’d known you better.
In the thralls of morality, you finally had the chance to do right by the world. So, you tried. Always.
It’s why he disliked you once. It’s why he cared for you later. It’s why he detests you now.
“Then go ahead Astarion, kill me if you must. But I… I love you with all of me. I promised I’d help you defeat Cazador. I never said I’d aid you in ascending. And you know— you had known I wouldn’t.”
It is a dagger through your heart, the tears have come, yet you cannot hide.
You’d said it.
Love. Not loved. Not the past tense, but the current, the now, the always, the evermore.
For a moment you think he didn’t hear you, didn’t believe you, or thought it a lie. With his proficiency in deceit, shouldn’t he recognize the absence of it?
Astarion’s resolve begins to crack. His lips twitched downward, his jaw tense. The watery remorse seeping into your voice makes him shutter, makes him step back. He clenches his fists, his eyes shutting tight. It’s as though he’s fighting— against what you say— against what has become of you both.
He opens his eyes, on the verge of tears.
“You had no right to refuse me,” he jabs his finger toward your chest, his words are crumpled, falling apart, “you said you would do what I needed.”
“I thought I was doing what you needed,” you insist, hands puncturing your wavering intonation, “That I— I couldn’t do what you wanted. And for that— I am sorry… I am sorry.”
You begin to cradle yourself, backing up, treading away from this… demise of you.
You mutter while meeting his eyes again.
“I know what you want now. I promise you will never see me again.”
Just as the others.
As soon as it leaves your lips, his hands are on your arm, at your wrist. He drags you down the dim alleyway between the tavern and the inn. He seizes you against the opposing wall, your body caged by his, your spine straightening to the cool press of brick.
He is all-consuming, a tidal wave. The moonlight combs through the waves of his hair and coruscates in the gleam of crimson irises. You inhale the aroma of his skin, and it riddles you speechless, the notes of rosemary, the undercurrent of bergamot and cinnamon intoxicating.
Anchoring you to the spot, Astarion is seething.
“No,” he pauses, squeezes his eyes closed, and shakes his head in contention before clenching your wrists tighter, pale red ringlets sure to form. “You don’t get to cry… you betrayed me. Maybe I didn’t become Cazador, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t become much worse.” A mirthless smile snags at the corner of his lips. He scrunches his nose, as if in disgust.
“Don’t look at me like I’m the one who did that to you. Don’t tell me you love me now.”
You steel yourself. You know the game he is playing all too well. You can’t let him see the wound he’s prying wide open, even if your heart is plummeting to the abyss inside your chest, even if your stomach churns.
You step into his space, causing him to flinch, his sneer slipping from his smug face. You murmur quiet, kind.
“You were afraid. I know. But power would not have quilled your fear. No one would hurt you more than you would have hurt yourself. You would have become everything you despise, and I couldn’t watch it happen.”
His grip has lessened. He looks at you with timid uncertainty.
Your voice hardens.
“You can hate me for it. You can kill me for it. But I never wanted to hurt you.”
What you say lingers in the air for a long moment. He regards you with an inscrutable expression.
But it shifts. It morphs. It becomes impenetrable, unknowable. Astarion does what he does best. He withdraws within himself. He counters with defiance.
“The path to the hells is paved with good intentions, my dear.”
You gasp as he releases your wrist, then bring his deft fingers to glide over the underside of your jaw. You shiver, ensnared by the sensation of his sharp nails, his thumb pressing against the seam of your lips, parting them ever so slightly. He drags his thumb over the plush of your bottom lip, and the breath strangled in your lungs releases in a broken sigh, his touch igniting a memory, only known by your skin.
He surveys you with a raised brow, with prowling eyes. His eyes peruse your body as his other hand descends your forearm, nails tracing an aimless motif. Fingers flow from there to the bend of your waist, featherlight over the fabric of your blouse. He curls his palm snugly on your side, thumb positioned beneath the underside of your breast. He can feel your inhale beneath his splaying fingertips. You exhale shakily slow, clinging to the façade of indifference. He tilts his head with a tsk of disapproval, then gently grips your chin.
He flattens his palm over part of your cheek and jaw, slanting your head. He brushes your hair aside, unveiling your neck, then skims his lips over the shell of your ear. He is so close, so familiar. The sanctuary of this nostalgia overcomes you. His cashmere voice is a susurration for surrender.
“Say you’ll let me,” he coos, and the sweet redolence of his presence pervades your senses. Yet, you must try to resist, even when his fingers at your side wade up and down, soothing, and — tempting. When his lips press beneath your ear, then over your pulse, warmth cascades down inside your core, and your knees buckle. You feel the heat bloom between your thighs, your sanity yielding from this all-encompassing yearning.
He drags his fangs over the nape of your neck yet does not bite. Instead, he hallows his cheeks and begins to suck, a violet blossom blooming into your skin beneath his mouth.
You tremble against him, another gasp fumbling from your lips.
“Oh.”
You feel him smile as he hums against the hollow of your throat in approval. Your hips jolt toward his, and you inhale brokenly as his arousal presses to your stomach. It is straining against the fabric of his trousers, firm and full.
Your lust threatens to unravel all sense. Your mind is in the mist.
Latching onto your heavy gaze with his own, he repeats himself.
“Say you’ll let me.”
He says it with resolute intonation, yet an inkling of doubt tinges the end of his sentence. It is not a command, though not a question either. Perchance, he is not sure for which he implies. If he is struggling with who he has created himself to be, or if he is still the Astarion you knew.
Never treading too far, too close, without reassurance. Yet, here, and now, he treads the line of persistence in proving to you the error of your ways. The error in endeavoring to see him, to know him for all the beautiful, the soft, and the gentle. For forgetting who he was made to be. For thinking ascension would be the thing that would break him when he, himself, is too far gone.
You ache with the love you have for him.
“Show me the kind of man you’ve become,” you reply, calm, “Why ask for permission?”
He hesitates for a moment, doe-eyed and dazed.
Then, he decides.
He tilts his head, looking at your lips.
“I wasn’t.” Astarion states, with a cadence of wavering insistence, and with it, you sink lower into the surrounding night.
Your body tensing, your pulse quickening.
His fingers leave your side and weave into the strands of your hair. He pulls your head into a slant once again, causing the nape of your neck to become completely and utterly exposed. The markings of his kisses are scattered along the skin, like that of his own design.
The moonlight swims in his half-hooded gaze, glints off his fangs, and fills you to the brim with trepidation.
There is a sudden, stark stillness in your body.
He mutters, insouciant, “I’ll bleed you dry.”
His breath is a warm flush on your skin, and then his fangs delve deep.
“Ahh!” you hiss, sagging into the adjacent wall. His lips enclose, as he begins to suck a stream of your blood into his voracious mouth. He is harsh in his thirst, his Adam’s apple bobbing with every thick swallow of your blood he takes, the tug of your hair eliciting a dull pain.
Despite this— a sinful sense of pleasure saturates the pain, as it always does when he feeds. Your pulse, heightened, like an orchid in full bloom, beating a deafening rhythm. It is reverberating in your ears, in your temples. Your fear once formidable now fleeting, flowing away with each draw of your blood to his lips.
The euphoria of feeding envelops you in a lukewarm embrace, milky mind a mirage. His grip eases on your hair, and he steadies your jaw with caressing fingers, the rush of your blood now a slow, steady pull from your veins. The effect of drinking entrances him, and you feel the hum of his moan, the lulling of his languorous lips.
It is as though you are being anointed, touched by phantom palms in all the places you yearn— the heat building beneath your skin like a fever that will burn you alive. Your voice, a lilt of his name, shivery and silver. He hmmms against your neck, and your fingers find their way into his curls, trailing your nails through his strands and over his scalp.
He groans, deep in his throat. It is just like the way he used to, those many months ago.
It is like your head is floating, the fever a flavor you sought to forget— but there is no forgetting, not when it is etched into the marrow, into your soul. You want him. So much, you are distraught with want, the heat coalescing at your core, seeping down your inner thighs.
He unlatches his mouth, just to mutter, voice drenched in desire, “I can taste it. You’re so eager for me.”
“I— I don’t—” you whimper in response, biting your lip. But as you try to deny—
Astarion holsters your wilting body up and shifts his knee, pushing it between your thighs. The friction is not nearly enough, yet all too much. You try to resist, yet all sense has vanished. You succumb to him, rolling your hips against his knee, aching for relief. Astarion’s breath catches in his lungs, and though your eyes have fallen shut, you don’t know if it’s to solely focus on the chase of a teetering high or to escape the city’s midnight mussitations. Maybe it is to memorize the motion of hips, the silk of his sigh, the bend of his fingers clenching and unclenching on your waist. It’s building and building, a relentless sea in the mellow meringue of his dipping vowels, the thrumming of this heat enough to drown in.
His knee drops, and despite yourself, you let out a faint whine. You think it is on purpose, a cruel way to deter your relief, yet he grips your hips and pulls you flush against him.
He feels so good, heavy, and thick, snug against where you need him most.
He grinds into you with every sashaying sigh, his head drooping into the crook of your neck. His dulcet exhales tremor through you, showering your head from toe. Your toes curl inside your boots, and your hands clench in fistfuls of his hair.
You don’t know how far this will go— especially here, only concealed by nightfall.
If it remained like this, insatiable, yet… safe. Not crossing the line…
Just as the thought nips at you, Astarion is wedging down the sides of your trousers inch by inch, your mound of curls peeking out from your underwear. He means to feel you, to know the wetness between your thighs. You clench them together, suddenly shy, sheepish at him having evidence of how eager you truly are, how completely he’s undone you with only this continual grazing of his hips, a brush of his lips to the shell of your ear.
You part your thighs, just barely enough for him to flatten his palm and curl his knuckles around your cunt, fingers a touch away from delving between your folds. Yet— he doesn’t. He hovers his fingers there. He is waiting for something yet can’t quite admit.
You know.
You nod, ever so slightly, and give in, letting him set the pace, letting him ascertain what he needs from you.
“Please,” you say, trying to withstand shifting into his touch.
His chest rises and falls. His ring finger slides over the seam of your lower lips, thumb a featherlight swirl around your clit. He teases his middle finger between your folds, sinking slowly until he is knuckle-deep. Your hands leave his hair and find purchase on his shoulders. Your head sways and you bite your bottom lip, stifling a moan.
“Mmmn—“
“You like this?” He says, not unkind. He gently pumps his finger in and out, in and out. A leisurely tempo of sweet torture.
“Yes.”
He lifts his head to look at you, crimson irises a thin ring, his pupils blown wide.
“You want more, don’t you darling,” he encourages you in a sly teasing tone, with a lilt of consideration.
“Yes—“
His ring finger pushes in, and you adjust to the width of them both. Your heartbeat is like a crescendo, as his fingers glide, soaked in your arousal. Again, and again, they pump into you, increasing in pressure, in pace. His thumb twirls over your clit, lazy circles compared to his fingers.
Your nose scrunches, your nails dig into his shoulders. He coos into your ear, praises of you sound so insatiable, such a good girl.
It’s coming, you know it when your hips begin to jut forward sporadically, the coil tightening in your core about to snap. Sizzles of stars pepper behind your eyelids, and stream down your spine.
But can you be quiet enough? What if someone hears you? Sees you?
The inkling of worry must show on your face.
“Just focus on my fingers,” he soothes, “on my voice.”
His thumb massages over your clit, and you gasp out a fragmented version of Ah—starion.
“Let me make you cum, sweetheart,” he susurrates, “you’re so beautiful like this. Clenching on my fingers, whimpering my name.”
His reassurances are relentless, and you tip over the edge of oblivion, rashly muffling your moans into his shoulder, into the fabric of his shirt. Waves of white wash over you, pulse thrumming in your chest.
It is pooling in your core, soaking his fingers, and dripping down his wrist.
You hear him give a shaky breath, wrought with longing and saccharine anguish by your release.
“I want you… I… I can’t— I need you,” he admits on impulse, his fingers sliding out from you, drenched. You tremble at the loss of them, nearly delirious in your post-high. His words make your core clench, make you feverish once more.
Does he mean to take you? Right here? Right now?
A concoction of concern looms over you, and you lift your head from his shoulder. You glance at him, then dart your gaze from one side of the alley, a dead-end brick wall, to the other side. The street before you is devoid of life, no Flaming Fist patrollers, no drunkards huddled in dusk. The lanterns give a dim glow, swaying in the cool breeze. Nevertheless, the light cannot reach you here. Though, surely someone will leave the tavern once the hour’s shade dissipates, to flee home from a brawl, or to sluggishly crawl into bed.
You look to him once more, and again it is as though he reads your mind.
“I know,” he sounds pained, head drooping. By the tension of his trousers, the shut of his eyes, perhaps he is.
“I won’t… we don’t have to,” he quietly assures, and it is so unlike the bravado of before. It is delicate.
You see him, the Astarion you had once been devoted to. Ready to fight for, to die for. And although it may lead to disaster, to the unraveling of your very being, you have never been surer.
This evidently wasn’t only about lust. If it had been, he’d have left you by now for your mark in the tavern. He wouldn’t have followed; he wouldn’t have touched. To be this close had always been a rarity done out of a need to be cared for, adored, to be cherished. Though he may never love you, though he may be planning to hurt you in a way worse than death, you… if only for tonight…
Your palm caresses his cheek, and you meet his eyes.
“I want you,” you murmur, “I’ll be quiet.”
A breath and his eyelashes fall over his eyes as they watch your lips. He leans in close.
“Let me hear you,” he states, then his lips are on yours. The seal of his lips eases the weight of hesitation from your skin, his honeyed mouth in harmony against yours. His tongue slides over the seam and you part your lips, tangling your tongue with his. His needy palms are at your waist, gripping and pulling you nearer as he angles his head, deepening the kiss. You nip at his bottom lip, and he groans in his throat.
You briefly come up for air, panting with the metallic aftertaste of your blood lingering on your tongue. A chill hits your exposed skin as he anchors his fingers at your pants once more, tugging them down until they fall to your knees. You step out of them, a flourish of fear amalgamating with shameful escalating arousal. He pulls you in for another kiss, as his fingers begin to fumble with his waistband. You aid in his endeavor, dragging his pants down until his cock can spring free.
You taste his steadying inhale. He breaks the kiss, then hooks one of your legs over his arm, pushing your back further into the wall, deeper into the cocooning shadow.
You are vibrating with anticipation, dripping onto the floor. He presses the head of his cock to you, and you quiver. He nuzzles it over your folds, then glides it back and forth, until it’s slick, until it’s ready.
You look at him, and the array of emotions passing over his countenance is like deciphering a blur of seasons changing. Your chest is heaving. You are fully bare, fully vulnerable, in more ways than one.
You need him so fucking bad, your hips push forward instinctively, the head of his cock nearly dipping inside you. He responds in a low, guttural grunt, hiking your leg a bit higher, bumping the tip of his cock against your sex once more.
“Say it again,” he murmurs, half delirious, half desperate, rolling his hips into you.
His brows are furrowed, white lashes cast over closed eyes. The damask rose of his flushed cheeks, the pink tips of his pointed ears, pale skin incandescent under the moonlight.
He feels so good, so heavy, and thick sliding over your sex.
He looks so beautiful, the corner of his lips smudged with your blood, the scarlet trail disappearing down his jaw.
But it matters not— his body, his beauty. It is all of him, in every way. The meadows of his mind, the lilies of his laugh. The valleys of his voice, the lavenders of his language. The willows of his worries, the serene of sunrise in his smiles—
Your heart could burst outside your chest. Your vision is a stretch of liquid silhouette.
“I love you,” you say, as if it is as natural as breathing, as simple as the sun rising at dawn.
He reacts in a tremulous exhale, nostrils a flare and the arm anchoring your leg falling a little.
A flush of embarrassment flames in your cheeks.
He probably didn’t mean for you to say that again.
An apology is on the tip of your tongue when he repositions himself at your entrance and sinks in.
Inch by inch.
“Ah—!” You gasp, yet his palm is quick to soften the sound as he encloses it over your mouth. You whine into his hand; your eyes rolling back as he sheathes himself inside your wet, hot heat. You squirm slightly to adjust to the girth of him. He doesn’t stop pressing forward until you are full to the brim.
Astarion pulls out almost completely, before slamming back inside. His hand falls a bit from your lips, and as if by instinct you part your lips, sucking his index and middle finger into your mouth. You peek at him with low-lidded eyes, and he curses the gods beneath his breath.
You hum around his fingers as he sets a sinful rhythm of a gradual outward pull, a heavy plunge in. The slapping of skin echoes softly in the alleyway, and it is downright disgraceful, yet you become lost in its soliloquy. He is undoing the tethers of your mind, diluting all sense.
There is no doubt he feels it too, his agonizingly slow pace increasing in intensity, his quiet pants becoming drawn-out moans.
“Gods, you feel so fucking good,” he mutters, pumping himself in and out, over, and over. You think you may go insane. His fingers pop from your mouth, and he takes hold of your chin.
“Look at me,” he instructs, and you comply, though it makes you blush, makes you boil hot in your blood.
“Say it again,” Astarion commands, and you clench around him in astonishment, in a flare of pleasure. You whimper unintelligibly, glancing away, embarrassment steeping in your face as a surge of wetness coats his cock.
He nearly loses control.
“Say it,” he growls out as he slams deep into you again. His hand clasps your jaw, fingers a curve over part of your neck, urging you to look at him once more.
“I love you,” you confess. You feel tears beginning to prick your eyes, as an impending orgasm sears within you something fierce. Your cunt tightens over his cock, you feel him throb.
“Again.” He orders through clenched teeth, thrusts now sloppy, uneven.
“I love… I—” You try to speak, yet the words are a jumble from your mouth. It’s coming, oh fuck… it’s…
“I love you,” you profess, just as your orgasm consumes you in licks of flame, in rivers of euphoric relief, just as—
Fangs. Fangs delve deep into your neck, the shivery silk of your orgasmic high becoming static fuzz, as Astarion begins to drink your blood like he’d gone centuries without it.
You try to speak, but you are left speechless, as with each draw of your blood, you feel his cock pulse inside of you, his body shuttering, his groans vibrating into the hallow of your throat.
Astarion sucks hard, his hips slamming into yours as he reaches his climax. His cock spasms as he releases his seed inside you, droplets of his cum dripping to your feet. The rush of your blood being drained renders you weightless.
He is devouring you, mouthful, after mouthful.
“Astarion—” you plead, fingers clenching in his hair, tugging at his head. He won’t budge, won’t stop.
“Please,” you beg, tears beginning to cascade down your cheeks.
It is as though he can’t listen, as if set in a trance. Your heartbeat starts to slow, your sight fading.
Your grip loosens on his hair. You don’t pull— instead, you graze your fingernails over his scalp, like an ocean wave meeting the shore, trying to remind him, trying to—
BANG.
A door swings open, the sound emitting from the tavern. Astarion jolts, fangs yanking out of your flesh, blood spilling down his chin. His cock slips from you, and you sigh at the loss of him. Your consciousness ebbs in and out. You slump against the wall, almost unable to stand as he drops your leg to the floor.
You feel his frenzied hands at your ankles, yanking up your trousers. You numbly watch his flustered movements as he pries up his own pants.
Foreign voices ring out, an argument of sorts. You aren’t sure.
You aren’t sure of anything.
Astarion is mouthing words at you. His hair in disarray. His eyes glistening in the moonlight. He attempts to keep you standing, while scouring the floor for something.
“Please,” he suddenly sounds so frantic, so afraid. You feel something bump against your lips.
“Please drink. Darling, please,” he implores.
He tips the bottle and something familiar hits your tongue. You begin to gulp it down, the bottle trembling in his hold as you do.
A cool nourishment floods your body, and your senses and your surroundings return to you once more.
A potion of healing.
You drink until the bottle is empty. Though you feel rejuvenated, it is not enough to wholly quell the effects of blood loss. The skirmish down the street seizes your bones in realization, a welcome distraction from what just occurred.
You cannot get caught like this.
You hand the bottle back to Astarion wordlessly, avoiding his eyes. You double-check your body and find at least you are fully clothed. The sticky mess between your thighs and in the crook of your neck, however, brings anything but relief.
“We need to go.” You mutter emotionless, attempting to brush past him.
Could you still scale the wall in this state? It’s a miracle you’re even breathing right now.
Astarion grabs your wrist and says your name.
“You can’t,” he states, and again, he knows your thoughts. It does anything but endear you.
He continues, “Not like this. We need to wait for them to leave.”
“Why?” You bite back in a whisper. “So you can finish me off?”
He recoils with the stab of your words.
Good.
You yank your hand away.
It would have been one thing if he’d just had his meal, but instead, he made sure he had all of you.
You don’t know if it’s him you’re more upset with, or yourself. A sob claws at your throat. You turn away from him, approaching the wall. You begin to scope out a path for your hands and feet.
“It’s your fault.” He declares, and you stiffen, unmoving. You peer back at him.
“Yes. All my fault,” you move towards him, finger jabbing into his chest.
You take your wrist, and without forethought, smear it over the blood still wet at your neck.
You extend it out for him to see. A contract, made in blood, visible only in blood, illuminates in a yellow scrawl of initials on your skin.
“And I have done everything to make up for it.”
His eyes widen in shock. He grips your wrists, inspecting the golden glow of letters.
“Why—”
“A wish scroll,” you don’t let him finish, “I complete the contract, and I get a wish scroll. It could… it could cure you… or at least allow you to live in the sun.”
He drops your wrist, shaking his head in disbelief.
“How many?”
“Seventeen.”
He lets out a breath.
“Only seventeen?”
“Of noble birth,” you state, “though still far better than seven thousand.”
He pinches the bridge of his nose in frustration.
A voice rings out from down the street. Someone is calling the nightly patrollers.
You tense and then turn away once more.
“You’ll need me alive if you want that scroll. So, let’s part from here. I’m sure I can find you once I get it.”
“This isn’t you,” he argues, “the hero of the grove, the savior of Baldur’s gate, of the world. You can’t tell me your feelings for me are enough to inspire this.”
“Astarion.” You slide a palm down your face. This conversation is going nowhere, and you’re running out of time.
“There are things about me I never spoke of. That our friends could never know. I wanted to be something different, and I was. But this is more to me than that. You are more to me than that.”
He is silent. Your voice softens. You’re about to cry.
“I’ll see you when it’s over.”
Before he can respond, a CLANG clatters from the street. A rustle of feet, and voices rising. Someone is being arrested.
You don’t waste time to find out. You begin to scale the wall, ignoring the throb of your neck, and the exhaustion of your limbs. You force yourself to climb until you’ve reached the top.
You don’t look back at him. You slide over the other side, then hit the ground running.
You hear him call after you, yet you don’t stop. You won’t.
You run as far as you can, bitterly knowing that when morning comes, at least then you’ll be safe from him.
One that can't keep his hands off of you once he's finally got you all to himself.
How he curls his pointer fingers into the waistband of your trousers and yanks until you're flush against him. Grabs a cheeky handful of your ass when you lean in for a kiss, cups your face with his free hand just to feel as it grows hotter, guides you until your mouths are slotting together in that languid push and pull that never fails to have goosebumps rising along the skin of your arms.
It's absolutely perfect. The warmth of you. The little sounds you keep making into his mouth when he swirls his tongue around yours just so. The steady rise and fall of your chest against his own, unmoving one. He's so spellbound that he's forgotten to breathe again. A moan gets trapped in his throat–comes out like an eerie creak when you tangle your fingers in his hair to drag him impossibly closer. He finally hiccups in a breath when you give a teasing nip at his bottom lip. Full on groans this time.
It never gets old, he thinks, being with you. It's rather funny.
Astarion's been as close to you as one can feasibly get, more times than he can count at this point.
Body to body. Flesh to flesh. He's been tangled up in you–has buried parts of himself so deep inside so many different ways that he often forgets where he ends and you begin. He's kissed you until his lips have gone numb from it. Held his ear close to your panting mouth to hear the sounds you make for him and only him. Committed every whine, and groan, and whimper to memory as if he'll be deaf by morning.
He's sank his fangs into the soft skin at your neck, wrists, chest, thighs–mapped out every major artery until he could find them with his eyes closed if he had to. He's swallowed down your lifeblood in greedy mouthfuls until your warmth overtook that ever-present ache in his bones. Your life becoming his own. Every time he feels his skin flush with heat, he thinks of you and the gift you continuously choose to give him.
You make him feel more alive than he's felt in over two hundred years.
But, he's an awful, greedy man. You give, and give, and give again, and he can't help but want more. Need more.
So Astarion pulls you close again, kisses you over and over, presses his bare skin to yours and basks in your warmth, and explores every curve and dip and imperfection in your perfect skin with his mouth, and tongue, and teeth. He counts the number of times he can make you say his name and how many different ways you can say it. He trusts you with everything, just as you have trusted him. He lets himself get lost in you in ways he'd never thought he'd have.
And when it's over, he lies close to you. Presses a pointed ear to the spot on your ribs where your heart beats the loudest and listens as it slows. You're tangled up in one another– parts of him buried so deep inside that neither of you are sure where he ends and you begin. You fall asleep rather quick, lulled by the lazy trail of his fingers along your goosebumped skin, wherever he can reach.
It never gets old, you think, being with him. It's rather funny.
astarion slams into her, hard, just as something massive and sharp glints through the air. her sword falls with a clang, and her back hit the cave floor with a crack, the wind knocked clean out of her. her brain is trying to keep up, but it happens too fast.
the sound… the wet sickening sound of metal tearing through flesh. then a loud roar, followed by gurgling, and then the heavy drop of a body, hard enough to shake the ground.
her heart is hammering loudly in her ears, feeling like it's about to leap out of her chest. she scrambled for her sword before climbing to her feet, prepared for the worst, but the sight before her was an unexpected one
the orc is on the cave floor, throat torn wide open, blood seeping from the gash and pooling slowly beneath it. it had been sprayed in thick dark ribbons across the stone. Its war axe laying inches from where she was previously standing, its blade buried halfway into a stalagtite instead of her skull.
astarion is standing over the lifeless body.
he’s breathing hard. his chest rises and falls in sharp, shallow bursts.
and he’s drenched in blood.
its everywhere — splattered across his cheek, his forehead, dripping down his jaw in dark streaks. it's in his silver hair, on his throat, streaking down in vivid lines, something hot twists low in her stomach.
he looks like a predator.
he just killed for her, didn't hesitate. just threw himself between her and that axe. and now he's standing there, drenched in gore.
the dagger that finished the job is dripping blood onto the stone floor, drip, drip, drip, the only sound echoing in the cavern.
then, he turns his gaze to her, his breathing more controlled. with a graceful flick, he shakes the blood from his blade - it scatters in a fine arc - and steps over the orc's body.
he walks towards her.
her breath catches.
"are you alright?" he asked, his voice low and rough-edged, his eyes scanning her for any sign of injury.
she nods slowly, because what else is she supposed to do? he's standing in front of her, painted in violence and breathing hard from saving her life.
he looks like something out of a nightmare.
…or a dream.
maybe its the adrenaline. maybe its the fact he just saved her life, but she cant stop staring at the way the blood glistens along his throat, can't stop tracing every drop that clings to his face. contrast of the red against his marble-pale skin is devastating
blood should make someone look monstrous.
but astarion?
he looks divine. like some fallen angel baptized in violence, wrathful and unholy.
and maybe it was morbid, admiring him like that, all blood-soaked and heaving. but instead, she's never been more attracted to anything in her life.
his head tilts slightly, and she only then realizes she's been staring. his lips curve into that familiar, wicked smirk, blood still staining the corner of his mouth.
"well," he purrs, voice dropping to a dangerous whisper, "if i'd known you'd look at me like that afterwards, i would have killed something for you much sooner."
Negotiate
Astarion is used to giving… in exchange for something. Blood, pleasure, favors - everyone wants something. So when you do something kind with no strings attached, he’s suspicious. Then he’s confused. Then he’s undone. Because no one ever offers him company without a price….until now.
Blush
You only wanted a pear. Astarion, of course, made it about you blushing.
Cloak
You only meant to survive your night watch, not end up draped in Astarion’s cloak and scent.
Tent
Your first night sharing a tent with Astarion should have been simple: crawl inside, close the flap against the hungry gloom of the Shadow-Cursed Lands, try to sleep. But nothing involving Astarion is ever simple.
Blades
Sparring with Wyll was supposed to be about improving your swordsmanship and not about getting flustered by his smooth charm and warm smiles.
Headcanons Scenario
How They Flirt With You {Male Companions & Female Companions}
Traditional
Jugular {Astarion x OC}
He was supposed to ask. He was supposed to resist. But desire doesn’t play by rules.
Summary: He was supposed to ask. He was supposed to resist. But desire doesn't play by rules.
There was a moment - just a moment - when he could have resisted.
The scent of her blood clung to the air like the memory of something forbidden. It pulsed, warm and golden, beneath her skin as if daring him to touch it. She stood too close, too trusting, neck bared in a tilt of laughter, unaware of the monster that lurked beneath his smile.
Astarion’s hand hovered near her shoulder, fingers twitching. He shouldn’t. Not tonight. Not after everything.
But hunger was a demanding thing. Not just the thirst - that he knew too well. No, it was her. The soft beat of her pulse, the unguarded way she looked at him. As if he were worth something. As if he were someone.
And maybe that’s why he didn’t go for her wrist, didn’t ask like he sometimes did now. No, he leaned in slow, almost reverent, and pressed his mouth just below her ear.
She froze.
He whispered her name. Not as a warning but a confession.
Her breath hitched, a tremor against his lips.
And then he bit.
Not harshly. Not cruel. But with an aching gentleness that hurt more than any violence ever could. His fangs pierced the skin of her jugular like a lover’s kiss dressed in crimson. Her hands clutched at him not to push him away, but to hold on.
He drank as if starving, not for blood, but for the illusion that he could be close to something pure. Something real.
When he pulled back, her blood was a smear across his lips. Her eyes - wide, unblinking - held no fear.
Just sorrow.
“You weren’t supposed to,” she whispered.
“I know.” His voice cracked, a quiet, ugly thing. “But I wanted to remember what it felt like… to be wanted.”
he's quieter around camp now. less of those sharp-tongued quips that usually flow so easily. he catches himself staring at her when she's not looking, then quickly glances away like he's been caught doing something wrong.
his feeding has become reverent instead of ravenous. he hesitates now, asks if she’s sure, presses a soft kiss to the pulse before he bites.
he seeks her approval in ways that have nothing to do with seduction. when he makes decisions, his eyes find hers first. her good opinion has become as essential as blood.
and now during fights, he’s reckless with his own safety now, throwing himself between her and harm without thinking. “i can handle myself, you know,” she’d say, crossing her arms.
“i know darling…” he trails off, staring at his hands. he doesn't understand why he did it either. the thought of that blade finding her skin had sent him into a panic he couldn't name.
she doesn't know why, of course. he barely knows himself. but he has a hunch, and it terrifies him.
he doesn't know when it started—somewhere between her asking "did you rest well?" and the way she bandages his wounds tenderly—but now when she looks at him, really looks at him, his dead heart does this stupid fluttering thing.
when she brushes against him, her warmth doesn't just touch his skin. it goes deeper. settles in places he'd forgotten existed, places that ache with want that has nothing to do with feeding or fucking or getting what he needs to survive.
maybe it's because she cares. actually cares, not the fake concern people use when they want something. she shows it in the small things: "you seem tired today." "i saved you some of the good wine." "the stars are beautiful tonight, aren't they?"
to someone who hasn't experienced genuine affection in two hundred years, these little moments feel like everything.
the nights when her tent flap opens for him now, everything is different. he moves differently. less performance, less of that practiced charm he's perfected over decades. he's gentler with her, almost hesitant. his hands linger on her face before he kisses her, and she looks at him like he's something precious instead of dangerous.
he takes his time now. when he peels away her clothes, he does it slow, reverent. each kiss tastes like honey and guilt because he knows—fuck, he knows—that he started this as a lie.
the pleasure is overwhelming now. more intense than anything he's felt in centuries because it's real. when she arches beneath him, when she whispers his name like a prayer, it threatens to break him completely. he's louder now, lets himself feel everything instead of just doing what was necessary to play the part.
but with every touch, every breath, the guilt eats at him. this isn't the calculated seduction he'd planned. this isn't using her for protection. this is something else entirely, something that feels too much like love and too much like betrayal.
she trusts him. opens herself to him completely, and he built this on a lie.
after, when they're tangled together, he holds her tighter than he should. she fits against him perfectly, her head on his chest where his heart should be beating if he were still alive. if he were still worthy of this.
"what's wrong?" she asks, voice soft. her fingers trace patterns on his skin, and there's concern in her voice. she’s noticing.
"nothing," he lies. his fingers find her hair, thread through it like the motion might calm the storm in his chest.
"you're different tonight. quieter."
different. if she only knew. if she only knew the man she's falling for was built on deception. that every tender moment between them started as manipulation.
"i'm just thinking," he says.
she doesn't push, she never does. just settles deeper against him, breathing slowing as sleep pulls her under.
he stays awake long after she's asleep, studying her face in the candlelight. the way her lashes cast shadows on her cheeks. her lips, slightly parted. the complete vulnerability written in every line of her body.
she trusts him enough to sleep in his arms, and the weight of it is crushing. how naïve. she doesn't know he'd originally planned to use her. doesn't know every sweet word in those early days had been calculated, how it was all for his benefit.
but somewhere along the way, the performance became real.
two centuries of survival instincts stand off with something newer, invasive almost. something that makes his chest ache. something that whispers maybe he could be worthy of the love he sees in her eyes.
the realization hits him like dawn breaking as he lay with her, now noticing he stayed all night. feeling the rhythm of her breathing as she slept in his arms, how warm she was against his cool skin. how she trusts him.
he loves her.
the thought should terrify him. instead, it settles into his bones like coming home. he loves her. not just her body, not just what she can do for him, but her. her kindness. her strength that never comes at the cost of gentleness. her trust that she gives freely, even to broken things like him.
he loves her, and he's completely fucked.
I remember all of them. @sunflowersoldat - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
