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nyrandrea · 7 months

Note

You have very good writing and I think you really do comfort fics well! So I was wondering if you could write a fic with Astarion where the Tav he is trying to seduce has like major self esteem issues. Like they kind laugh at his attempts to compliment them. But at first it seems like a joke until he realizes that Tav isn't joking about it and he tries to help them see they are beautiful. (this is one of my fav prompts to give people ngl)

Thank you so much! This is a lovely prompt and I hope I did it some justice! :)

Word Count - 2k

Enjoy!

xxx

As the storm clouds gathered ominously on the horizon, you and your party found yourselves on a desolate, rain-soaked road in the middle of nowhere. The relentless downpour had turned the earth into a sea of mud, and the wind howled like a vengeful spirit.

Your clothes were soaked through, and faces were etched with exhaustion and desperation. With each step, your boots sank into the muck, making the journey even more arduous. Thunder rumbled in the distance, a menacing reminder that you had to find shelter soon.

“Ugh, there’s probably some saying about rainbows after the storm and whatnot,” Astarion said, holding a rucksack over his head in a failing attempt to save his hair. “But I’d much rather not be out in the middle of one.”

“Ah, it’s not so bad, just think of it as a long overdue shower,” Gale said. “And the saying is ‘Don’t fear the storm, for the rainbow is never far behind!’”

“Oh yes, that’s the one,” the vampire drawled. “I’ll rest so much better now that you have enlightened me.”

Amid the pelting rain, you spotted a faint glimmer of light in the distance. With newfound hope, you quickened your pace and beckoned the others to follow. As you trudged closer, the light revealed itself to be a cozy inn, nestled among ancient trees that shielded it from the worst of the storm.

“Thank the Gods,” Karlach breathed. “If I got any more drenched, my engine would have snuffed out.”

“Wouldn’t that solve your problem, then?” Lae’zel snidely chimed in, only to hiss when you elbowed her.

The inn's windows emitted a warm, inviting glow, and the scent of wood smoke and hearty meals wafted through the air. Your tired body yearned for a meal and a warm bed, mindflayer tadpoles be damned.

“Have we got enough gold to stay here? I mean, for everyone to have a room?” Shadowheart asked.

“We should do,” you said, pulling out the team’s shared coin pouch. “I sold that egg we uh... found.”

“You mean the one we stole after we killed its mother?” Wyll asked, clear disdain lacing his voice.

“It’s not technically stealing if the target is dead,” Astarion cheerfully chimed in. “Besides, we rescued the other one, didn’t we? One good turn deserves another.”

Wyll grimaced. “Your idea of virtue is a damn twisted one.”

“Aw, you love me really,” the vampire teased back.

“Here we are!” you announced as you reached the inn's doorstep, you were greeted by the innkeeper, whose eyes twinkled with the knowledge that you had nowhere else to go for the night. After taking payment, he ushers you inside, where a crackling fireplace cast a comforting light over the room, he takes your belongings up to your rooms with the help of Wyll and a begrudging Astarion.

Finding a long wooden table in the corner of the room, the group sat together, their spirits lifted by the fact that they were safe from the fury of the storm outside, at least for one night. The innkeeper, his apron stained with years of hospitality, served you a hearty meal of roasted meats, fresh bread, and stew.

You listened to the rain's rhythmic drumming on the inn's thatched roof, feeling a deep sense of gratitude for having found refuge in this little hidden haven. With a deep, contended sigh, you tucked into your meal, savouring every bite.

At least, you were trying to.

“You better eat up,” Astarion teased, lacing his fingers together as he rested his chin upon them to watch you. “Because I plan on doing just that very soon.”

“Crap,” you mumbled between mouthfuls. “Are you hungry? Why didn’t you say so?”

“Oh, am I hungry,” he smirked. “Just not for blood.”

You almost choked, but you masked it well with a nervous chuckle. He wasn’t... flirting with you, was he? You had always been bad at picking up signals, not that you received them often.

‘Nah,’ you thought. He couldn’t be, not when there were so many other better-looking people, at this table alone, that he could choose from.

“Well, I know you’re not craving my charming banter.”

“Oh no, something far better.”

Now you really were at a loss.

“Do you... need to borrow my hair comb again?”

“I mean sex, darling.”

This time you couldn’t hide the choke, but you were more afraid of dying from embarrassment than anything else.

“What?”

The deafening silence that had befallen the table was broken by a low whistle from Karlach.

“The direct approach, I can respect that, mate.”

“Direct? I’ve been trying to drop hints for weeks now but perhaps a little more serenading is needed,” he looked you up and down with a knowing smile; he had hooked you, now it was time to reel you in.

“Darling,” Astarion began softly, his voice a gentle caress, “when I look into your eyes, I see galaxies of beauty and depth that defy description. It’s as if the universe itself painted them with the colours of a thousand sunsets.”

A faint blush tinged your cheeks as you lowered your eyes, unsure of where to look. Astarion reached out and gently lifted your chin, so your eyes met once more.

“And your smile,” he continued, “it’s like a radiant sunbeam on even the cloudiest day. It has the power to brighten my world in an instant.”

“Ooh, that’s a good one,” Karlach said, fanning herself. “You’re even making me blush!”

“Careful, we wouldn’t want you burning any hotter now,” Gale smiled, though it was strained. He looked almost as uncomfortable as you felt.

“Your kindness,” Astarion went on, “it knows no bounds. You have a heart that’s more expansive than the ocean, and it’s a privilege to be the one you’ve chosen to share it with.”

“Bah!” Lae’zel practically spat. “These nonsensical attempts at beguiling are a waste of time, why waste your energy talking when you can claim and dominate each other instead?”

You were hard-pressed to agree with Lae’zel on this one. Well, except maybe for that last part.

“Alright, you can stop now,” you said.

“Not until you’re convinced,” Astarion replied, a sly smirk forming on his lips. “How about this? You are a masterpiece in a world of art,” The vampire flamboyantly declared, his gaze unwavering. “Your uniqueness, your quirks, your imperfections – they all make you the incredible person I fell in love with. You’re not just enough; you’re more than I ever dreamed of.”

You roll your eyes. “Gods, you know you don’t have to keep practising the fancy fake flattery on me, right? I know it’s all like a big joke to you but enough is enough, eh?”

Astarion finally pulls back and frowns at you, not in that puppy-pout way when he didn’t get what he wanted, but in a way that he looked genuinely offended.

“You think I’m joking?”

“I... uh,” you stutter, suddenly flustered.

“My compliments aren’t fake, darling. Decorative, perhaps, but you do know I mean every word, don’t you?”

“Pfft,” you try to wave him off nonchalantly, but your quivering voice betrays you. “No, you don’t. It’s... it’s all just a bit of fun, r-right?”

“Perhaps I should be a bit blunter then,” Astarion said, leaning forward ever so slightly, his expression serious and scarlet eyes piercing into you. “You’re... beautiful.”

You swear you could feel something just break inside you in that moment.

A tentative smile, like a fragile flower pushing through the cracks of self-doubt, graced your lips, but it wilted in the harsh light of scrutiny. A tight knot formed within your throat as everyone stared at you in anticipation. What were you supposed to say? Thank you? That you were grateful for the shower of compliments from Astarion, this... gorgeous man, because you sure as hell didn’t deserve them?

“I’m a little tired,” you suddenly say, your chair scraping the floor with a shrill screech as you quickly stand up. “Excuse me.”

Leaving their concerned calls behind you, you made your way up the stairs of the tavern and into the hallway leading to the rooms. The innkeeper had allocated them, but he’d neglected to say which one was which, so you merely picked the first door you could get your hands on.

It wasn’t until you slammed the door shut and leaned your back against it that you realised that you picked the wrong bloody one.

The room was large and luxurious, the centrepiece was an ornate, four-poster bed adorned with rich, crimson drapes that seemed to dance with the flickering candlelight and crisp, white linens, neatly turned down. An old, familiar skull-faced tome laid face up, its amethyst eyes staring ominously at the ceiling.

It seemed that someone got first dibs on the rooms, and it didn’t take a genius to work out who.

‘Shit,’ you curse to yourself, scrambling for the doorknob. ‘Maybe I can get out before he-’

As soon as you open the door, Astarion is already right there, his hand raised into a fist.

“Knock-knock?” he says, giving you a tentative smile.

“S-sorry, must have gotten a little mixed-up.”

“That’s quite alright, dear,” his tone is too soft for your liking, as if he feared offending you in any way.

“Right, well,” you strain a smile and edge around him to get to the hallway. “Goodnight.”

“Wait,” he catches you by the arm. “Come back in, won’t you?”

You squint at him suspiciously.

“To talk, darling. Nothing else, not if you don’t want to.”

Gods know that you wanted to, you were just... surprised that he did.

As you re-enter the room, you notice a small, antique writing desk nestled by a leaded glass window. A vase of freshly picked wildflowers graced the wooden surface, infusing the room with their sweet fragrance.

Astarion caught your stare. “Ah, unfortunately I have run out of perfume to mask my er... musk. So, I had to improvise.”

“It’s nice,” you remark, the tight knot in your throat making it hard to speak.

“Well, I should hope so. They are your favourite after all, are they not?”

A surge of guilt jabbed through your chest, you had occasionally stopped on the road to admire the flowers; their colours, their scent was intoxicating to you. Had he been observing you even back then?

You didn’t know what to say, words were always tempered by hesitation, their resonance dulled by the fear of judgment. Each sentence was punctuated by apologies, as if you believed your very existence owed the world an explanation. Confidence always remained just beyond your reach, an oasis in the desert of your own mind.

Astarion sat on the bed and patted the empty spot next to him; you silently took the invitation.

“I would like to... apologise for earlier. Making you uncomfortable was never my intent, I...” he paused, his eyes flickering over you. “I just wasn’t sure how much clearer I could make it to you.”

“That you... like me?”

“Like you?” Astarion took your hands and squeezed them. “I adore you. Everything about you, all that you do is... nothing short of breathtaking.”

Tears welled in your eyes and spilled over your cheeks like the gentlest rain, your trembling shoulders burdened by the weight of your emotions

“I’m sorry if you don’t hear this enough but... I wish to change that. You really are, truly, beautiful.”

The tears flowed freely then, your sobs echoing in the stillness of the night. Astarion gathered you in his arms, a silent pillar of support. His hand, cool and reassuring, gently cradled your trembling one, his thumb grazing back and forth over your knuckles.

“It’s okay,” he whispered, his words a gentle caress. “Let it out, darling.”

Astarion’s presence felt like a sanctuary, a safe haven in the storm of emotions. He didn’t offer empty platitudes or rushed advice. Instead, he listened, letting you pour your bottled emotions out, allowing it to find solace in his quiet understanding.

With each tear that fell, Astarion’s touch remained steady, unwavering.

As the night wore on, you found yourself nestled into his side as you lay together on top of the covers, your head tucked into his shoulder while he stared up at the ceiling. He turns his head briefly to kiss your forehead, and in that sacred space, amid the tears and whispered sorrows, you found solace, strength, and perhaps the willingness to accept that, in your own way, you are beautiful.

xxx

Links to my other Astarion works

Everything's Fine

Restless

Request - Astarion kills everyone in his path to get to you

Request - Astarion tries to rescue you from kidnappers

#astarion x reader #bg3 astarion #astarion #astarion x tav #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 #astarion ancunin #my writing #fanfiction #request

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petricorah · 5 months

Text

Sokka was used to the cold.

He’d spent his whole life in it. He was born into frigid and bitter temperatures. He was used to breathing burning crisp air into his lungs, used to walking when he could barely feel his feet, used to sleeping surrounded by ice, and used to the coldness that struck deep into his heart while staring out over the empty tundra. He loved it. Just the feel of winter winds whipping through his hair made his spirits soar, smiling despite the pain of icy gales against his teeth.

And then.

He melted, slowly. Traveling the world had been quite the culture shock, and he had taken some time to adjust to no longer being surrounded by snow, but he grew to love the pleasant lukewarm air and the ability to wear short sleeves. But the firebender was another thing entirely.

Being close to Zuko was as uncomfortable it was so hot. The man’s very skin was a furnace that radiated heat, and somehow, it made Sokka’s own cheeks and chest burn for reasons he didn’t understand for years. But he got used to it. Despite how stubborn he was, Sokka was good at adapting. He was still from the water tribe, after all. Soon, the heat pulsing off of Zuko as they brushed shoulders or fought side by side wasn’t unnatural. It became welcome, especially…

Well. It was purely strategic to put their sleeping bags side by side, because once the campfire died down, laying by Zuko with their shoulders almost touching was the only way to stave off the brisk night air.

He wasn’t sure when it changed, when the embers of their friendship sparked into something more. They’d travelled the world together, trying to rebuild the world ravaged by the Fire Nation. Zuko refused to stay behind a desk, and Sokka refused to let him go at it alone. And slowly but surely, Sokka forgot what it was like to be cold. What it was like to not have Zuko by his side, to feel his warmth surround him like he was the center of a fire, the comforting lull of heat as he hugged him, that fiery, caring temper, and blazing hot fingers interlaced with his own.

And now, he was back in the Southern Water Tribe.

Alone.

And he has never felt so painfully…cold.

#uhmmmmmmmm no thoughts on this other than i wish i had time to do an in-scene longer fic of this but. anyway have this cringy poetry #zukka fic #myfic #lately been thinking about doing a longer atla fix. i need to get their voices down more but i feel like if i do a nano-type just write #a lot! it could be fun #notmyart

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adrift-in-thyme · 14 days

Text

I worked on the fic as promised and…it got out of hand. So instead of a snippet I’ll just give you guys the whole thing XD Thank you all for providing that extra nudge I needed to finish it!

Though there’s nothing too descriptive here, there are brief mentions of blood, injury, and captivity. So be careful and take care of yourselves <3

————————————————————-

There is another fae in their group.

Hyrule has sensed it since he joined this little band of heroes. Fairy magic is soft, gentle, easy to miss when it is not in concentrated amounts. But there is a strength to it, an unbreakable force that little else possesses.

While the dark arts are vicious, like a javelin through the heart, fairy magic is soothing and unshatterable. Dependable and comforting.

There are many different magical signatures amongst the men and boys who share his name. Some torn apart and melded back together into something stronger. Others as mighty as a gale force wind, or as swift and discerning as a rabbit, as decisive and resilient as a barricade. Still others as fierce as a soaring hawk, as vicious and protective as the wolves that prowl the forest, as crafty and quick as the mischievous foxes that sometimes play around Hyrule’s feet.

Hyrule keeps his eye on them all as they travel, discovering who they are, watching their tells, learning the ways their faces portray their emotions even when they attempt to cloak them. And he wonders who amongst them is a brother in more ways than shared spirit. Who among them flits on a pair of silken wings.

He wonders until the day Time breaks.

Their journey is a long, arduous one, treacherous and laden with pitfalls. It’s only natural that it would take its toll. Still, Time holds out impressively. Even while he studies him with the other heroes, Hyrule never sees that mask of his slip, never sees a chink in the armor he wears.

At least, not for the first three months of traveling together.

But then, one day, there is an accident. A simple slip up born of exhaustion. During a battle with a group of black-blooded beasts in Twilight’s Hyrule, Warriors doesn’t see a monster lunging for him. Not until it’s too late.

And when he crumples into a limp, bloodied heap, Time’s mask shatters.

He doesn’t manage to piece it back together for the rest of the day. Not when he carries Warriors back to camp. Not when he lays the captain down on his bed mat and helps Hyrule tend to him. Not even when Warriors comes to, groggy and sore but very much alive and very much himself.

The captain teases him about being over protective. Time’s answering smile is a hollow one that doesn’t reach his eyes.

The injury had been a severe one, Hyrule won’t deny that — perhaps, more so than any of them have endured thus far. But Time seems to take it the hardest of any of them. And Hyrule can’t help wondering if maybe, just maybe there is something more behind his behavior.

Could it be that Time has been feeling the overwhelming nature of this quest the same as the rest of them, caving beneath its weight but unwilling to show it?

So, during dinner that night when Time sets aside his untouched food and slips silently away, Hyrule trails after him.

He goes a short way into the surrounding forest, footsteps soft, ears pricked for any sound of disturbance. Then, he stops, casts a quick glance around him…and disappears.

Hyrule peeks out from the cover of a nearby bush, eyes wide as he stares at the place where the old man had stood. For a long moment, he remains motionless, thoughts whirring, trying to decipher what has just happened.

Hero of Hyrule or not, people don’t simply dissipate like the morning mist. Though, with Time’s seemingly endless collection of masks, he supposes something of the sort is possible. Still…

Hyrule frowns.

There is something else here, hovering in the damp night air. A familiar magic that now drifts lazily over to him in delicate wisps.

Hyrule straightens. His brows dip further.

He knows what Time’s magic looks like, smells like, feels like. It is difficult to ignore, after all, tangled and tortured as it is. Such power is meant to flow freely. But Time’s has been grasped in hands that are not his own, grasped and mangled, suffocated, stretched to its breaking point and further, morphed into something completely unlike what it must have been at the start.

It is nauseating to behold at times. Right now, however, right now Hyrule can’t bring himself to look away. Because threaded in between the heartbreak and pain are gentle strands of the faintest blue fae magic.

The traveler steps forward. His eyes travel over the trail Time’s power has left behind, leading all the way up into the highest branches of a nearby oak. If he squints, he can make out a tiny dot among the lush leaves, shimmering emerald.

His lips part in a silent “oh.” He dares to take another step forward, then another and another, wings issuing from his back as he goes, body shrinking until it too can soar up to the haven of foliage.

Time doesn’t startle when he lands quietly on the branch. He remains sitting where he is, legs hanging over the edge into the open air, wings wafting gracefully back and forth. Hyrule stares at them, almost taken aback by their beauty.

He should have expected it, he supposes. Every fairy’s pride is their wings, after all. But Time’s unforgiving plates of armor, his dull gray tunic and obsidian trousers, the glowing marks of crimson and navy blue adorning his face – they provide such a severe air. Strength, dedication to duty, and unyielding courage are what they convey.

His wings, however, they speak of softer things, fragile things held close and treasured.

They are long, sweeping along the height of Time’s body in flowing curves like those of a butterfly. Their translucent surface is colored a deep emerald and adorned with veins of pale pink. They remind Hyrule of the vibrancy of the forest after a long, hard storm; of the look of leaves when the emerging sun caresses their dewy surfaces.

He walks closer, almost enraptured by this sight. Perhaps, he should turn away from something so vulnerable. That is likely the polite thing to do. But he has traveled far beyond politeness now, mesmerized as he is by this discovery.

And when Time says, “Hello, Hyrule,” there is nothing in his tone to communicate that this is an invasion of his privacy. On the contrary, he sounds calm, unbothered. He pats the spot beside him and slowly, Hyrule settles down upon it. Their wings nearly touch.

“So, it’s you,” he says, awkward and awestruck.

A small smile quirks the old man’s lips. His gaze remains trained on the heroes gathered far, far below them. Their laughter and chatter float up to them in bubbles of murmured joy.

“Yes, it’s me,” he says, mildly, as though this meeting is no shock. As though he has been expecting it for a long while.

Silence settles for a moment as Hyrule scrambles for what else to say.

“How?” Is all he can come up with.

Time chuckles. Hyrule is certain the sound is lighter than usual.

“I’m not sure.” He cocks his head, bangs falling aside so Hyrule can see his markings. “I have theories, of course, but I have no way to prove any of them. And those who might have been able to explain are long gone.”

His voice is good-natured enough but the words carry a weight that Hyrule can feel in his soul. He ducks his head.

“I’m sorry.”

Time shrugs. “Their fates were not your doing. There is no need for you to ache for them. Or for me.” He turns now, a smile brightening his face once more. “What about you, Hyrule? What is the nature of your transformation? Were you born with it?”

“Oh, it’s just a spell,” Hyrule replies, quickly. “Though, I’ve wondered if I was born with fae blood in me. I don’t think it would’ve worked otherwise.”

Time hums, thoughtfully. He is quiet for a moment, once more staring down at their comrades.

“I wondered why I felt the presence of one of my brethren amongst the group. But it wasn’t my place to pry. Besides, I assumed it was only a matter of time before I discovered who it was. Secrets don’t stay concealed for long in a group such as ours.” He grins. “It seems you found me first, however.”

Hyrule laughs. “It sure seems that way.”

“That isn’t why you followed me though, is it?” The old man’s gaze is sharp and discerning as he pins Hyrule with it. The traveler fights not to sink into himself beneath it.

“No.” His voice is a bit smaller than he wants it to be, embarrassment sneaking into it against his will. “It isn’t.”

Time nods and looks away again. Stance relaxed, expression guarded, he waits. Hyrule swallows, gathers his courage, and continues.

“I saw how upset you were about Wars.”

Time flinches almost imperceptibly. The walls that had gone relatively low rise again so far Hyrule is taken aback by it. Yet, he plows on anyway.

If anything, Time’s reaction validates his decision further.

“And…I saw how you tried to hide it, too. And I wanted to make sure you were okay. Because you don’t, old man, you don’t have to hide what you feel.” His gaze travels to those magnificent wings again, grander than his own, yet so similar. “Or what you are.”

“It’s dangerous,” Time murmurs. “You know that, traveler.”

Perhaps, he is talking solely about feelings and the open expression of them. But Hyrule sees a bottle anyway, brimming with desperate magic, translucent sides smeared with blood and tears, it’s top shut so tightly the air has grown thin.

“Not with us,” he says, firm despite the dizzying rush of fear the memories bring. “Not with me.”

He scoots closer. His shoulder bumps against Time’s, their wings brush. Time’s next exhale catches at the end.

To anyone else such proximity would be touching enough, a display of closeness between two brothers in arms and spirit. But Hyrule knows that to fae it means even more than that.

Wings are not only the pride of the fairy people. They are also their greatest power — and their very life. To allow someone else to touch your wings so freely is a show of trust as momentous as when Time had shown them his ocarina. Not the one embued with sacred magic and given to him by Lullaby. No, the one that is even more precious to him that even that one. The one Sariah had given him so very, very, (very, very, Hyrule adds for good measure) long ago.

The stiffness that had seeped into Time’s posture eases slightly. Hyrule feels a smile stretch across his face.

The two of them grow silent, allowing the symphony of night creatures to fill the space between them. Hyrule swings his legs, back and forth, back and forth, listening to the crickets and owls singing in time with the laughter of his brothers. Time still looks down upon them.

Watching over them, Hyrule realizes with a sudden burst of warmth.

Their leader can seem cold sometimes, distant. Little had he known the depths of his love for the heroes with whom he shared a spirit of courage.

There is much, he thinks in wonder, that he doesn’t know about the old man.

Beside him, Time sighs and exhaustion permeates it. “You all aren’t going to give up on me, are you?”

Hyrule sends him a grin. “Nope. We’re not gonna stop until we know all your secrets. All of them. And we’ll know because you’re comfortable enough with us enough to share them, because we’ve earned your trust enough to be gifted them.”

Emotion burns in Time’s eye when he turns to the traveler. His face is more vulnerable than Hyrule has ever seen it before — even when Warriors fell.

“My trust isn’t easy to earn.”

“And Hyrule isn’t easy to save.”

Time holds his gaze for a long moment. Then, he smiles. It is small, almost shy, but Hyrule knows it is a gift. The first of many, if he’s lucky.

“Well, then, I suppose you’re amply prepared for such a challenge.”

Hyrule leans in closer, pride welling within him when Time returns the gesture, and his grin grows.

Yeah. He thinks, watching with wide eyes as fairy dust floats around them. I am.

We all are.

#trin writes #linked universe #linkeduniverse #linkeduniverse fic #lu time #lu hyrule #angst #but also a hearty helping of #fluff #fairy time au #hehe that’s a tag now #I had so much fun with this #I never write time and hyrule as a duo #which is a shame cause I love their dynamic #so I loved getting a chance to do it here #also #it’s always a joy getting one of the boys to support time #he needs comfort too darn it and he’s gonna get it whether he likes it or not

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nouearth · 9 months

Text

the remedy for guilt.

clark kent x male reader.

summary: guilt, pain, and shame consumes clark as his nightmares have been haunted by the memory of lois.

wc: 2.5k. genre: angst, comfort. warnings: cavill!clark, clark has ptsd, nightmares, topic and depictions of death, mentions of blood and wounds.

request.

thunder blared and cracked to the man’s startle, and immediately, the sky unlocked with a haze, ghastly as if stolen from humanity. spirits of hard rain quickly crashed onto metal gates, barriers that ward off trespassers, and came down harder onto carved stones. it sank into the heart of earth after.

it was an orthodox setting some have found comfort in after painful months of mourning. clark wondered how incredibly cathartic mother nature’s tears would feel on his skin once it was his turn.

he flinched when a droplet does—burned—and the wind heckled.

in loving memory of lois lane, it was carved beautiful like her handwriting. she was always in a rush, chasing after the biggest scandals with a notepad in her hand, yet the scribe flowed with impressive structure, prideful in every stroke of her pen. kneeling on one leg, without a care that mud had inked uncomfortably into his pants, clark caressed the engraving of lois’ name, gently as if it was skin—her skin, and the gale laughed—louder now.

“—got you these flowers,” clark bitterly chuckled, gently waved the wrapped bundle of cream and pink rosebuds that the wind was sure to have blown away by now if it weren’t for his clench on them. “figured these colors would be a nice change of pace, so…”

the thunder approved clark’s choice of flowers.

“i’ll get going soon, but i just wanted to see you one more time before—“ the gale blew stronger, lifted clark’s bangs and almost his glasses, but they soon found refuge in his breast pouch. there was a beat of silence as the wind sang, unusual in its whistles. “before i head back to—“

there it was again.

a gentle croak that harmonized with the wind.

someone’s hurt. struck by lighting, maybe? if being drenched in the rain hadn’t strung him back to reality, the eery sound of help definitely woken clark to his senses. he was vigilant, carefully scanning his surroundings with his x-ray vision.

nothing out of the ordinary—

“help,” a voice squeaked from somewhere, barely audible, but clark managed to filter the gust out. he spun in place when a whisper attacked one ear then the next. defensively, he lifted himself off the ground and scanned the gravesite from a higher viewer. alert, yet calm.

no one.

“please, speak up!” clark roamed in the air, inspected every corner. the wind and rain fogged his endeavor, but he was determined. it grew louder now after several patrols, and relief settled because he was getting closer.

“help me,” it whispered in the fog, and the haze grew thicker, heavier. “please, help me. i can’t breathe!” it cried out now, desperate because safety was near, yet so far away. “please, where are you?!” it pleaded.

“I’m coming, stay put!” clark shouted, and he flew down, a bewildered frown etched into his face when the mist barricaded his arrival, knocking him back. “what the—“

it was like touching an invisible shield when clark curiously reached out, pressing a palm into nothing. thick air swallowed his hand and he pulled back when another cry startled. “hurry, please! i-i think I’m going to—” it choked.

“i—“ clark ascended higher now, challenged by the mystical fog. he was absolutely clueless, puzzled, but was later comforted because force was always on his side.

“i’m here!” the clock ticked in his head. thunder and lightning shook the atmosphere of earth, and the rain hit clark’s skin like bullets as he rushed down the gravesite, punching through the several layers of air. one by one, they unfurled, and clark grunted as if it could boost his strength at the very last layer. “please! help! oh god, i—”

“you’re…” it was sheer, unveiling the field of gravestones, and he could see something moving, waving, but the rain blurred his vision. “you’re…” the voice weakened.

harder now, clark punched several more times with a battle cry louder than the previous, through gritted teeth enough to break bone, and the fog cowered at the very last second, thinning in wispy strides from his force. the swing from his arm pulled him to the source with incredible force. it was out of his control now, the wind yanked, then drove him to the ground, dragging clark across the muddy field. absolute black had entered his vision, and he could only breathe. breathe in mud, rain, grass, as he was pulled everywhere but nowhere, yet somehow closer to the source of those dreadful cries.

“you’re...”

the voice croaked over him as clark was grounded, blindly face-planted into the soils until he wasn’t. his head slowly lifted by an unspeakable force, and the cry continued to creak like nails on a chalkboard, unbearably closer to his face. a cold breath bit at his skin and as if the spell was broken, clark snapped his eyes opened.

it was horrid. it took every little breath clark had in him, and he tried to shut his eyes. he couldn’t. the spell hadn’t been broken. it was a mere glamor as clark’s eyes began to stung, brimmed with tears as he was bewitched to stare into the bloody corpse of his former lover. “you were,” the more it croaked, layers of skin cracked and peeled off. clark shuddered, his eyelids unwillingly pulled to the heavens as he watched lois’ broken skin unveil bloody wounds, then flesh, then bone, as she ascended higher before him, like a deity, until his head was thrown back.

“TOO LATE.” the voice crackled like the thunder before it, and her corpse crumbled into ashes, spilling onto him like heavy rain.

a guttural inhale stirred you from your dreams, flinching, but it was the sudden movements within the bed that woke you into a fright, scrambling you in bed. equally, clark’s silhouette sat up and slumped against the headboard as he paced his breath. in and out, his pants began to slow, but it was the flicker of the lamp, unveiling reality, and then the warmth of your hand on his chest that pacified him.

“clark,” your voice made him turn and he watched you simulate a regular breathing pattern before following your guidance. “slow, just like that.” your hand rested over his beating heart, aiding its journey to its regular pace with calming strokes, while you held his distraught with assurance, locking it into a vault when you leaned in to press a kiss to his lips. a job well-done, but also a measure to bring him back.

his breath was warm against yours, and he muttered a soft apology before pulling away, but keeping your hand to his chest, appreciative but silently afraid of letting you go.

“water?” before he could answer, you offered your cup of water that’s been sitting at the bedside table, and with two quick gulps, he soothed his throat.

it was a routine at this point. not every day, but at least once a week, clark would get night terrors that would startle you awake. others would’ve found it incredibly annoying, but you could never bring yourself to that thought. after what clark had told you, it would’ve been incredibly wounding for you to.

“i’m sorry,” clark sighed and pressed a warm hand to your cheek. you shook your head against it, mustering up a tired smile before pressing a kiss into his palm. he only pulled you closer to his side as you both lay breathless in bed. “let’s go back to sleep—“

“hah, you and i both know that won’t be happening.” chuckling, you playfully pushed him away before laying his head on your lap. he does so without any complaints, and an appreciative kiss to your stomach pressed. clark was always so protective of you, it was the least you could do for him. “want to talk about it?”

“no, it’s just…” clark’s gaze drafted to the wrinkles of your shirt, then he spent the majority of the silence inhaling your scent. it assured him that you were here—still here.

your fingers threaded through his locks in soothing rhythms, but clark’s frown remained. “lois again?”

“i didn’t mean to—“ he looked up, apologetic in the weary state of his gaze.

“clark,” your palm gently applied pressure to his temple, and you couldn’t help but to kiss him once more, then his nose, then his forehead, before pulling away. “she’s not… she shouldn’t be treated as if she didn’t exist.”

“I know,” clark hummed, agreeing yet reluctantly so. the strokes to his head—your touch—crumbled the protective walls of his nightmares and dreams, and a vault, mainly consisting of his insecurities and guilt, unlocked. “i know…”

one would agree that it was weird, offensive even, to talk about your ex-partner, more so if they had passed away. it gave the message that they still clung onto them, that they still loved them, that you were brought into someone’s life solely to fill that missing puzzle in their life. you’ve admitted that you struggled with that before, your self-esteem took a dive because you compared yourself to the impact she made on clark’s life. envious, you teared over.

but you’ve accepted it now. because clark’s dreams of lois wasn’t because he needed to replace her. the more he awakened you with his night terrors, it was telling that he was haunted by guilt—consumed by it. it ate him up on the inside. where the happiness that you would fill clark was immediately swallowed by regret, because the voice told him that he didn’t deserve to be happy.

clark agreed.

“i killed her, didn’t i?” his voice animated like the soft wrinkles on your shirt.

“you know that’s not true,” you frowned, and you pressed your palm to his cheek. “clark.”

“if i had been there quicker, if i had been stronger, if i had—“

“if you had abandoned the hundreds—thousands—of people in the city?” you questioned his blame, and he once again, looked up at you. orbs wet, glistening under the shade of dim lights. a sigh left your lips, and you continued the stokes to his head. “i know you’re superman, and… and you feel like you have to do everything—like you can do everything.”

“for the most part, you can.” your voice softened as well as your touch, until it came to a halt. warmth seeped into his head as you rested upon it. “but it’s frankly impossible to save everyone, you know that. and from what you’ve told me about lois, she would’ve wanted this outcome.”

“(m/n),”

“she probably would’ve forced you to, if i’m being honest.” you chuckled, and looked down at him, into his sober orbs. “and i could never, ever, know what you are going through. to have the safety of the planet fall on your shoulders. to fight those who try to destroy our planet. to take the life of those who do. to play god.”

“but what i do know is that,” clark gazed up now, his turn to caress your cheeks while you closed your eyes to the roughness of his hand. to the warm touch that has become a memory you would yearn for on a daily basis. “it’s not your fault. you had the impossible decision to choose between thousand of lives versus the love of your life, and i’d reckon you’d feel guilt either way, clark. and i’d also reckon that…”

“hm?”

your forehead pressed to his while his hand maintained on your cheek, and you blindly kissed at whatever was in front. his nose, lips, cheeks, features that you felt and cherished with all of your heart. all of your being. “you and lois knew the lives of thousands mattered the most.”

“i wouldn’t have had to make that decision had i been stronger, though.” clark reasoned, pulling away to sit up now, because guilt ate him again, as soon as you fed him his innocence. “if i was smarter, i would’ve been ten steps ahead. i would’ve figured out that the sun could heal me, to grant me more powers, to—”

“clark,” his mutters halted when you touched him again. though his back faced you, he knew the look you were giving him as he stared blankly, achingly into the wall. reassuring strokes lined his broad back before you leaned your forehead on it. “you can’t change the past.”

“it’s not about changing the past, it’s about,” he was frustrated, apologetic, sorrowful, all in one, and clark buried his face into his palms, muttering. “it’s about you. i can’t let it happen again. what if i lose you too?”

“you’re not going to lose me, clark.”

“we don’t know that—“ he sighed, lifting his head up, and then peered back at you. his wrinkles have never forested deeper, and exhaustion seeped into the fine lines. “it would break me. i wouldn’t know how to move on with myself, how to live, how to—“

“if that day ever comes, then i’m telling you now that i want you to make the right decision.” your arms wrapped around his waist, embracing him with the utmost warmth because in the pit of your stomach, in your deepest worries, you were afraid too. he was right. you never know if something might happen. whether from another attempted destruction of the world, or a simple heart attack, life was short.

“i need to keep you safe.”

“you already do, clark. and if something were to happen to me, then i trust that you will do your best to spare me from looking at death in the eye.” but clark’s hold to your hands sobered you, the warmth and beloved roughness like a potion, broke you free of those reckless thoughts, and you melted soft kisses along his upper back in appreciation, sighing. “but until then, i don’t want you spending the rest of your life worrying about me.”

“it’s my job to.” clark mindlessly played with your fingers, thinner than his. “to worry.”

“i know,” you squeezed tighter around him. “but i fell in love with clark kent, not the man of steel.”

“but—“

“if it’s my time to go, i don’t want you looking back at how we should’ve made more memories. you don’t need any more powers than you already have, clark.” you assured him with another kiss to his shoulder, and despite his refusal, he melted, leaning back into you. “you’ve kept me safe as you already are, and you will continue doing so until my very last breath.”

“until your very last breath…” he repeated, but you can hear the bitterness in his tone. chuckling, you soothed him with another kiss, to his other shoulder now.

“and until my last breath, i promise to also protect you as you will protect me. i may not be as strong as you are, and i may not be the sun that heals you.”

“(m/n),”

“but when the time comes, i assure you that your guilt will not be anchored to me. that you will no longer suffer because of me.”

“because i trust you.”

nouearth. please do not repost, plagiarize, or translate my works. andif you like this story, please reblog and leave a like!

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likethelightfromorionabove · 2 months

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The Degenerate of Waterdeep

With Elminster's little charm relieving the fear of imminent explosion, Gale seeks out a little solace and finds more than he had bargained for.

Pairing: Gale/ Unnamed GN Tav

SPICE Rating: 4/5 Content

Warnings: Voyeurism, mastrubation, general degenerate behavior

Smut below the cut dolls, enter at your own risk

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

With the usual din of camp finally quieted, Gale tried to step lightly as he snuck to the edge of the treeline. Privacy was hard to come by and once they hit the shadowcursed lands it would likely be nearly impossible. So he did his best to quietly climb to a secluded spot where he would perhaps have a little time to himself.

Elminster’s little charm hadn’t done much in the way of raising his spirits, but it did have one small perk. The orb had always been…temperamental and the risk of tipping it too far one way or the other with any undue excitement was a risk Gale hadn’t been willing to take. In his isolation, it really wasn’t much of a bother. Between the pain of Mystra’s abandonment and his constant anxiety that the orb would overtake him, in truth Gale hadn’t thought of it much. In recent weeks, however, things had become far more…mercurial.

Meeting Tav was the furthest thing from what he had expected when he was abducted by mind flayers, but it was certainly the sweetest. It was also, perhaps unsurprisingly, the most maddening. Every slight brush of their hand when they walked beside him, every glance that lingered slightly too long, every post battle smile, red as the setting sun. Neither of them had necessarily been secretive about any affection held, but there wasn’t exactly anything that had been directly said.

He had considered approaching Tav, asking them on a late night stroll or perhaps something more bold. Were he a braver man, perhaps he would have, but for tonight, Gale had decided to simply do something for himself. As he entered the cover of the trees at the edge of camp he could feel his pulse beginning to pound, blood rushing slightly. With a low groan he palmed his already half hard cock through his trousers and sped up a touch. The sooner he was alone, the better.

To his disappointment, there was rustling in the trees ahead of him. He was nearly certain everyone had been accounted for back at camp, his ears pricking towards the sound as a spell played at his fingers. There was the soft sound of a hushed voice, followed by strained panting on the wind. It sounded like…Tav? Gale pressed forward, concern crowding out his other plans for the evening. Unfortunately, or perhaps all too fortunately, the sight he came upon wasn’t the one he was expecting.

Tav was leaned against a nearby tree, face screwed into a grimace. For a brief moment Gale worried they were injured until he followed the path of their arm down to where their forearm met their wrist and disappeared beneath their waistband. His ears burned as he stumbled backwards, torn between the embarrassment of stumbling upon something he wasn’t meant to see and the enthralling rush of being so close to something he had so deeply desired.

His back hit a nearby tree with a soft thud and he froze, certain Tav would have heard his movement. By Mystra’s grace, they seemed to be too caught up in their own relief to notice. Absentmindedly, his hand wandered, settling to grasp at his cock. The flame across his face burned hotter, something between shame and desire licking at his mind. He should leave, allow Tav their privacy and seek out his own. With a soft moan, he started to turn to go when Tav suddenly voiced a clearer word.

“Gale…”

Panic seized the wizard’s heart as he locked his eyes back to Tav, an apology and excuse bubbling to his lips. However, their eyes were still screwed shut, breathing heavily. Gale sank to his knees, heart pounding in his throat, fingers fumbling with his laces. The sound of his name falling from Tav’s lips again chased any lingering shame as his hand wrapped furtively around his length with a whimper.

“Gale…please…”

He tried to suppress his groan as his hand stroked, subconsciously keeping pace with Tav. His legs were already shaking, his end closing in on him more expeditiously than he would have hoped. Yet he couldn’t stop. His name was now multiplied on Tav’s tongue, mingling with a few soft swears and pleading noises. The orb in his chest began to glow and a distant voice in his mind urged him to finish and abscond with his shame before he was discovered.

Gale didn’t know how he would face Tav the next day, but his mind was too far gone for it to truly matter. His head spun slightly as he approached the cliff, eyes fluttering closed as he soaked in the symphony of their voice. Their final cry matched pitch with his own as they tumbled over together, the crash of his pleasure knocking Gale off balance. He fell forward onto one hand as his other milked his remaining spend from his oversensitive cock, shuddering as his body thrummed for more.

The force of his release left him slumped on all fours, no longer worried about running in shame, only focused on the intensity of his senses. A low chuckle in front of him pulled him from his haze, snapping his gaze up to meet Tav’s amused one.

“That…That was quite the performance wizard.” they rasped, a hand extending towards him expectantly, “Perhaps we should see what else you can do.”

#bg3 romance #bg3 companions #bg3 fanfiction #gale of waterdeep #gale x tav #tav #baldur's gate fanfiction #gale smut

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pennyblossom-meta · 4 months

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Gale/Wyll banter

Here's a collection of Gale/Wyll banter that I found in the dialogue files. I hope this is useful as both fanfiction resources and general curiosity :)

Help: I'm fairly sure there's a line from Wyll (?) mentioning how Gale doesn't ever eat vegetables, but for the life of me I can't find it. UPDATE 30/12/2023: Found it and added it to the post, the banter happens with the MC during the tiefling party. Also added a couple more interesting tidbits of dialogue.

Warning: long post.

Act 01

Loss of powers

Wyll points out that he used to kill big monsters, and now a few goblins are a challenge. What gives? Gale remarks it must be the tadpole. Wyll: Was a time I tussled with hill giants without breaking a sweat. Wyll: Now, a mere werebear could swat me halfway to Amn. devnote: Amn = city on the Sword Coast. Pronounced "AAHM" like UK Eng "arm". Gale: Strange things are happening to us. What festers in our minds may well impel our bodies.

—

Netherese magic

Wyll recalls the hag said 'Netherese' and asks Gale what he knows. Astarion adds a thought if he is present. Wyll: Ethel mentioned Netherese magic. What in blazes does that mean? Gale: Magic from the fallen empire of Netheril. Ancient, exceedingly dangerous, and quite unrivalled. Astarion: Wonderful! I'd hate to be destroyed by any common old magic. devnote: A little sarcastic. You've been told the dangerous magic inside you is ancient and unrivalled

—

Goblin raids

Wyll: I've known goblin raiders to slaughter entire villages and strip them for loot - but I've never seen one ravaged like this. Gale: It's hard to imagine anyone who'd willingly inflict such devastation, be they zealots, marauders, invading armies... A sign of far worse to come, I fear.

—

Act 02

Mountain Pass

Gale: These cragged hillls make for weary soles. I see why most headed inland prefer the smooth sailing of the Chionthar. Wyll: More importantly, the land west of here suffers under a terrible curse. Gale: You've seen it for yourself? Wyll: I've glimpsed that doom during my travels, but never dared get close. Wyll: If we continue this way, we may get too close for comfort.

—

Scary woods

Wyll: What a dismal forest. Monsters could be lurking behind any and every tree. Gale: We'd be wise to fear the trees themselves. It feels like the forest itself longs for our destruction. devnote: serious Wyll: Frustrating, that. Wyll: Monsters, I can fight. But I can no more sever these shadows than I could the wind or the sun.

—

Approaching Moonrise

Gale: Moonrise Towers lies ahead. We're nearing the Heart of the Absolute, I'm certain of it. Wyll: Then let us push forward, heads high, weapons in hand, and turn this tower to rubble. Gale: Your confidence is encouraging but a little premature. Let's keep our eyes on the task ahead. Or eye, as the case may be.

—

Tollhouse

Gale: A tollhouse like this would only be merited in the most prosperous of settlements. This was once a thriving trade route. Wyll: Should it be any wonder? The Chionthar's waters carry merchant vessels from as far east as Berdusk. devnote: bur-DUSK Wyll: And they wouldn't have brought just trade goods, but song, dance, and custom. Riches of the mind and the spirit. Wyll: So much was lost when the darkness fell.

—

At the Mason's Guild

Gale: The masons here thought they were building something to last. How wrong they were. Wyll: Perhaps it's a blessing that none of them survived to see it fall to the shadows. Gale: No need for such a grim assumption. Halsin helped many to escape these shadows before the town was consumed. Wyll: Then some masons were more blessed still, if they could put their talents to use elsewhere. Wyll: Perhaps some of their work even graces Baldur's Gate.

—

Guildhall

Wyll: It might seem a bit ramshackle, but this place has a boastworthy bar. Gale: A bar is only as good as its cellars. Which vintages can we expect to find on their racks? devnote: Anticipating a nice drink Wyll: Here, a bottle is judged more by its ability to crack heads than the quality of its contents. Gale: Ah. If that's the main criteria then I shall reset my expectations accordingly. Water it is. devnote: Good humoured

—

House of Healing

Wyll: This was a hospital? Feels more like a prison. Gale: A common enough interpretation. Sickness has a nasty habit of making you feel trapped, if only within the confines of your own body. Gale: I once spent weeks convalescing in the Hospice of St Laupsenn (*) after a nasty bout of ruddy pox. For all their kindness, leaving that place behind felt like freedom to me. Wyll: I've always relied on the kindness of the healers and menders of the Coast. Better a cleric's healing touch than a chirurgeon's scalpel.

(Lore note*): The Hospice of St. Laupsenn is a temple of Ilmater in the North Ward of Waterdeep.

—

Moonrise General_AssaultState

Wyll: This is it, Gale - today, we annihilate the heart of the Absolute's power. The bards will sing of our victory here. Gale: Entirely unnecessary. Though if they are so inclined, I might be convinced to share a stanza or two of my own for inspiration. devnote: Feigned modesty

—

Moonrise General

Wyll: This is no aimless horde - the Absolute's forces are organised. What do you make of it, Gale? Gale: All enemies have some chink in their armour, no matter how much they like to believe themselves invulnerable. That's what we must find. devnote: Cheery/determined Wyll: And if we don't find any clear weakness? Gale: Then we hope our mutual strengths are enough to dominate them. Or, we die nobly in the attempt. devnote: Cheery/determined

—

Moonrise Prison

Gale: Not a devil in sight. How disappointing. COL_MizorasRescue_State_SavedMizora = False, TWN_Wyll_State_MizorasCaptureHappened, MOO_MizorasRescue_Event_WalkedAway = False Wyll: I doubt a few iron bars are sufficient to hold one of Zariel's. Gale: True enough. But an illithid pod? That would probably do the trick. devnote: Cogs whirring Wyll: I wager you're right. Ah, Gale - what a pleasure to see a genius' mind at work.

Wyll: Of course Mizora was Zariel's captured asset. How did I not see it coming? TWN_Wyll_State_MizorasCaptureHappened Gale: It's in a devil's nature to conceal the truth - you can't fault yourself for that. Wyll: I've been pacted for seven years on, Gale. I should be able to read between Mizora's lines by now, no matter how narrow the gap.

Gale: How long have you been pacted to Mizora, Wyll? Wyll: Seven years. Seven years of hunting the monsters of the Sword Coast - and seven years of Mizora's tight leash. Wyll: And seven years of wondering if I'd ever rid myself of her - or if I even should.

—

Act 03

At the Basilisk Gate

Gale: The history of the city itself is captured in the archives here - a fascinating resource. Wyll: I wonder what those archives will reveal about us a hundred years hence. Gale: Only the most excellent and complimentary things. With some encouragement from us, of course.

—

Morphic Pool

Gale: Whatever the outcome of what's just ahead, it will be the stuff of legends. Wyll: In that case, someone needs to survive to tell the story. Gale: My money's on you, Wyll. Wyll: I'm betting on all of us.

—

Misc banter

Gale's ticking time bombs

Wyll points out that Gale has two ticking time-bombs inside him - but he's holding together pretty well. Wyll: I admire your courage, Gale. Gale: Thank you. Any particular reason? Wyll: Between the orb and the bug, you've got more than your fair share of unwelcome passengers. Gale: What can I say? Mother always taught me to be a gracious host.

—

Wyll thinks Gale has potential

Wyll tells Gale he's got potential, and suggests he rename himself something more... heroic. Gale finds Wyll quite the tryhard. Wyll: You're an impressive fighter, Gale. You should consider a new name. Gale: I take it you have some suggestions? Wyll: 'The Wizard Wonder!' Or how about, 'The Master of the Weave'? Gale: Tempting. But I think we might already have the maximum number of theatrical titles.

—

With Laz'el and Wyll

Lae'zel notes that Gale knows a lot about mind flayers. He responds with information about his training. If there, Wyll chimes in as well. Lae'zel: You strike me cleverer than most istiki, Gale. Multiple tutors, I should guess. devnote: istiki - non-gith. IH-stick-ee Gale: Many a wise man and woman indeed. Waterdeep is the home of myriad scholars. Wyll: Ah, the City of Splendours. Spent a whole Fleetswake there with my father. What a delight.

—

Romance

The following dialogues are marked as ROM, which I assume is a flag for triggering when there's an active Romance with the MC.

Romance banter, Act 1

Gale: If your natural charm isn't quite up to scratch, Wyll, there are magical means of adding a little flourish of charisma. Wyll: A kind offer, but I think I'd rather pursue things the old fashioned way.

Gale: Have you noticed any attachments of the more, erm, romantic variety flourishing in our camp, Wyll? devnote: Fishing for info, a bit awkward. Wyll: I think I'm not the right person to be asking. Wyll: I can recognise a troll's silhouette on a far horizon, but I wouldn't know a flirtation if you whacked me alongside the head with it.

��

Romance banter, Act 2

Gale: I knew you were a graceful man, Wyll, but I hear you're quite the dancer too. Gale: I've been known to trip the light fantastic myself. Mine was a popular hand at the annual Blackstaff's Ball. Wyll: I'd have love to have witnessed it, Gale. I wager you are as elegant on the dance floor as you are on the battlefield.

Gale: I've heard that in Baldur's Gate, 'wizard' is also a term used for one who eschews their more, ahem, carnal desires. Is that true, Wyll? devnote: Fishing for info, a bit annoyed about what he's heard Wyll: Where are we going with this, Gale? Gale: Oh, nowhere. I just think it a rather cruel misnomer. Not at all reflective of the glamour wizarding life affords. devnote: A bit sulky/sensitive about it

—

Romance banter, Act 3

Wyll: I'm probably going to regret this, but Gale - if I'm to be wed, would you like to make a speech? Gale: You've asked the right wizard. My oratory skills have left many a wedding guest weeping in their seat. devnote: Honoured/very excited at the prospect of speaking at length. Oblivious as to why his previous listeners might have been left weeping… Wyll: Promise it will last less than half an hour? Gale: I can promise it will feel like less than half an hour... devnote: Trying to avoid committing to a short speech

Wyll: I used to believe the beauty of first love was unable to be surpassed. Wyll: But Gale - you are so much more tolerable now you've found your second. Gale: I'll take that comment with the sincerity and good will I assume it was intended. devnote: Not rising to it, cheerful

—

Misc quotes

Tiefling party

Gale: Wyll's a good man. He may actually be a tried-and-true storybook hero. Gale: Then again he's so full of himself it's a small miracle he hasn't resorted to self-cannibalism yet.

Wyll: You're running away from Gale's cooking. Wyll: It's delicious, don't get me wrong, but that man wouldn't eat a vegetable unless Mystra herself commanded it.

Other

Gale: So, you didn't fancy sharpening up the old moniker? I'd have thought the 'Blade of Frontiers' might be feeling a bit dull after all you've been through.

Player: Sounds heavenly. Mind if I join you? Wyll: Not at all. You hunt the deer, I'll scrounge up the ale. Prepare your belly for roast a la Ravengard! Wyll: Let's hope Gale doesn't take offence if I assume cooking duties, just the once.

#bg3 #gale dekarios #gale of waterdeep #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 spoilers #astarion ancunin #astarion #lae'zel #baldur's gate wyll #bg3 meta #wyll ravengard #bg3 wyll #bg3 gale

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doomed-era · 1 year

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Deities/Deity-like Figures of Zelda

I've noticed a common trend in the Zelda community where most deities aside from the ones mentioned in Skyward Sword are rarely brought up or discussed, and I think that's really a shame. Hyrule is implied to be very polytheistic and has a multitude of less frequently mentioned gods and godlike beings. Here's a list of all the gods I'm aware of in alphabetical order, as well as a short description. Some of this will be based on my own headcanons and opinions, but if there's anything you want to add on or that I missed please let me know!

As an additional warning—This contains major spoilers for Majora's Mask, Skyward Sword, Link's Awakening, Phantom Hourglass, and Twilight Princess. Proceed with caution!

Cyclos

A wind god who creates cyclones, featured in The Wind Waker. According to The King of Red Lions, he bears some ill will towards humans, and will mock Link if he is trapped in one of his cyclones. After defeating him, Link receives the Ballad of Gales, which allows him to control cyclones. Cyclos's brother is Zephos, another wind god.

Demise

The ruler of demons, featured primarily in Skyward Sword. He tried to attain the Triforce, but was imprisoned by Hylia under a magical seal. He is permanently destroyed in Skyward Sword's present day, but his servant Ghirahim travels into the past and revives him using Hylia's spirit. He is defeated, and his consciousness is sealed into the Master Sword.

Din

The Golden Goddess of Power, primarily featured in Ocarina of Time. She appears in Oracle of Seasons as an oracle, and in Minish Cap as an NPC. She is mentioned or referenced in The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword. Dinraal the dragon from Breath of the Wild is likely a reference to her, as well as a crest featured in Memory #1, but she is not directly referred to or featured in Breath of the Wild. Din along with the other Golden Goddesses created the world (or Hyrule, as is stated in Ocarina of Time, however we are assuming that Hyrule is referring to the entire world despite canonical countries outside of Hyrule), and left the Triforce behind.

Earth God

Mentioned in a learnable song in The Wind Waker, the Earth God's Lyric.

Farore

The Golden Goddess of Courage, featured primarily in Ocarina of Time. She appears in Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages as an oracle, and in The Minish Cap as an NPC. She is mentioned or referenced in The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword, and the dragon Farosh in Breath of the Wild is likely a reference to her. Her symbol is on a Triforce crest in Breath of the Wild Memory #1. She, along with the other Golden Goddesses, created the world and left the Triforce behind.

Fierce Deity

A god featured in Majora's Mask. He is a powerful deity that assumedly was turned into a mask. Link can wear this mask to transform into the Fierce Deity.

Four Giants

Guardian Deities of Termina. Link's journey in Majora's Mask is to find and summon the Four Giants to prevent the moon from falling.

Frog Deities

Guardian deities of the Sheikah, featured in Breath of the Wild. The Sheikah and the Yiga will bring offerings to these deities and they are frequent around Sheikah and Yiga occupied areas.

Goddess of Time

Featured in Majora's Mask. As the moon falls down on Clock Town, Tatl cries out for the Goddess of Time to save them. This prayer may have been answered, as Link relearns the Song of Time to travel three days into the past.

Goddess of Sand

Featured in Ocarina of Time. The Desert Colossus is mentioned by Sheik to be a "goddess of sand."

Hylia

Featured in Skyward Sword and Breath of the Wild. Appointed to guard the Triforce, Hylia orchestrated the events of Skyward Sword as an attempt to stop Demise. While trying to save the surface world, she sent hylians to Skyloft while staying and fighting alongside the other races in an attempt to defeat Demise. She was then killed, and reincarnated years later in the form of a mortal girl, Zelda from Skyward Sword. In Breath of the Wild, she is a deity worshipped in most settlements. It is believed that women of the royal bloodline can pray to Hylia to unlock a sealing power. The Sheikah seem to revere her highly.

Light Spirits

Featured in Twilight Princess. The light spirits Ordona, Faron, Eldin, and Lanayru guard Hyrule "at the behest of the gods," and seem to reside at springs in their respective provinces. They prevented the Interlopers, the ancestors of the Twili, from using the Triforce and sealed them into the Twilight Realm. In the final encounter with Ganondorf, Princess Zelda calls (or even prays) for aid, and they provide her with Light Arrows.

Lord Jabu-Jabu/Jabun

A fish deity worshipped by the Zora in Ocarina of Time and Oracle of Ages. He eats the Princess of the Zora, Ruto, and is infected by a parasite that is defeated by Link. Jabun, who is likely related to him (or could possibly be him) is featured in The Wind Waker.

Malanya

A god of horses featured in Breath of the Wild. He functions similarly to a Great Fairy, living inside a large flower and needing to be revived. He is able to bring horses back to life, and will scold Link for letting them die.

Nayru

The Golden Goddess of Wisdom, featured primarily in Ocarina of Time. She is alluded to or mentioned in The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword, she is an oracle in Oracle of Ages, and an NPC in the Minish Cap. The dragon Naydra is likely a reference to her, and her symbol is on a Triforce crest in Breath of the Wild Memory #1. She, along with the other Golden Goddesses, created the world and left the Triforce behind.

Oshus

Also known as the Ocean King, Oshus is featured in Phantom Hourglass. He is the guardian of a portion of the sea, and creates an realm that Link travels into.

The Seven Heroines/Eighth Heroine

Guardians revered and worshiped by the Gerudo at some point, first mentioned in Breath of the Wild. They all represent a different virtue: skill, spirit, flight, gentleness, motion, endurance, and knowledge. The Eighth Heroine is rumored to be worshipped by the inhabitants of the Gerudo Highlands.

Valoo

Guardian deity of the Rito in The Wind Waker. In order to grow wings, young Rito must climb to the top of Dragon Roost Island to obtain a scale from Valoo.

The Wind Fish

The creator of an illusory realm called Koholint Island featured in Link's Awakening.

Wind Waker Prologue Deities

Gods called upon by the people that flooded Hyrule with a magical sea. They are implied to be connected to the Triforce, however this is never confirmed.

Zephos

Wind god, and the brother of Cyclos in The Wind Waker. Zephos seems to reside around a small shrine near Dragon Roost Island, and the Wind's Requiem song located on his shrine will let Link learn to control the wind direction.

#majora's mask #wind waker #ocarina of time #oracle of ages #oracle of seasons #skyward sword #twilight princess #phantom hourglass #link's awakening #breath of the wild #legend of zelda #loz #longpost

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gravitycavity · 22 days

Text

Sunshine (Pomni x Ragatha) Chapter 5 - And Fresh-Fallen Rain

[Click here to read from the beginning on AO3!]

It was only a matter of time before Pomni blinked herself awake.

Wave after wave of pulsing pain, synchronized with the beat of her heart, relentlessly pounded the back of her skull. A landscape of crimson curls, wild weeds, and shimmering stars expanded, contracted, and twisted before her half-lidded eyes. The disorienting sight was more than enough to make her stomach do flips — and fail to stick the landing every single time.

But even so, it was hard to feel anything but content.

The wind was fierce and frigid, but Pomni didn’t know it. She didn’t feel the bitter cold, even as gale after freezing gale slashed her skin like the crack of a whip. All the pain in the world wouldn’t have phased her, not as long as the wind’s touch highlighted the slightly-wet spots where Ragatha’s lips had so lovingly grazed her face.

Stalks of overgrown grass wavered as a brisk squall flew across the yard; a palette of fallen leaves, which just so happened to be sleeping in its path, was cast into the sky. Red, yellow, orange, and brown — the cozy colors swished and swirled through the air, then drifted back to their resting spot below the jungle-like lawn.

It only took a moment for the breeze to return. Coming from the other direction now, it passed through Ragatha’s red yarn hair before pummeling Pomni’s face. All at once, the saccharine aroma of the ragdoll’s locks — strawberries and soil and fresh-fallen rain — introduced itself.

And it was heavenly.

Pomni’s eyelids drooped further, and a dumb, wobbly smile blossomed on her face. As her tiny arms wrapped around Ragatha’s plush, guffawing belly, she didn’t worry about how embarrassed she was to have fainted, or what Ragatha’s little kisses had meant, or why someone like her even deserved to be treated with such affection. Those pesky doubts were for future Pomni to agonize over; for now, they crumbled to pieces with each precious peak of Ragatha’s laughter.

“Oh! There she is!” Ragatha flinched as Pomni’s arms enfolded her. “I was starting to worry I up and killed you…”

“Nope! Still kicking.” Pomni chirped, “But just barely…”

Slowly, Ragatha’s giggles began to peter out, but their spirit still tickled every word she spoke. “Goodness me — aren’t you in a good mood! Your head didn’t hit the ground too hard, did it?”

Pomni waffled. She decided not to tell Ragatha about the big lump on the back of her head — the redhead would just worry herself sick, after all. “...I’m fine. Just a little bit dizzy.”

“I really am sorry.” Ragatha placed her soft hands atop Pomni’s, idly dragging her digits across the jester’s worn leather gloves. “I should have warned you before I…” she paused. “Well, y’know…”

Pomni could feel the heat rising in Ragatha’s hands. She waited patiently for her to finish, but as the silence dragged on, it became increasingly clear that she’d have to be the one to break it.

“No, it’s okay! Really! I just, um, wasn’t expecting…that. And if you think about it, it was actually my fault. I wouldn’t have fainted if I had just listened—”

“No, no! It was sweet! I don’t know. I just figured…” Ragatha said, a nervous tilt to her tone, “...since you were having so much fun getting into your character, I ought to return the favor.” Ragatha's hands were twitching now, “And…”

Somewhere nearby, a ladybug crested a wobbling blade of grass, flitted its wings, then buzzed away to who-knows-where. Another brisk gust wandered through the dilapidated yard, sending an armada of dandelion seeds sailing swiftly through the air.

“And…?” Again, Pomni was the one to shatter the silence.

“Oh, nevermind.” Ragatha forced out a laugh. Pomni swore she could hear the woman’s blush. “I think I’ve just got an overactive imagination.”

Another pause. That made three.

Pomni’s heart was beating a mile a minute. Unsure if this was even real, she slipped her hand out from beneath Ragatha’s, eager to simply trace the woman’s strong, soft frame…

… but her finger didn’t get very far before arriving at the gaping hole slashed across the ragdoll’s abdomen.

Guilt flattened Pomni’s heart like a speeding train. Holding Ragatha close, the jester sat up in a snap, examining her friend’s injuries with a level of determination that could only be described as ‘obsessive’.

Talk about a mood-killer — it was as if Pomni had never even bothered to stitch Ragatha up at all. Stuffing leaked out of the ragdoll here, there, everywhere. Nearly all of Pomni’s makeshift threads, nowhere close to well-crafted, were already failing — if they weren’t coming loose, the strings themselves were coming apart.

Pomni clenched her teeth. Her brow descended, and her lips trembled fiercely.

“Hey, hey! Don’t cry! You don’t have to worry about me.” Tenderly, Ragatha pushed herself against Pomni's little frame, “As long as you’re with me, I’ll be okay, Sweetheart.”

“I’m not sad.” A stormy look came to Pomni’s face. “I’m angry.”

“...Angry?”

“Stupid #$&%ing tree monster. Stupid #$&%ing Caine!” Pomni bared her teeth, “Stupid #$&%ing circus!”

“H-Hey, now! Take a breath, okay? Let’s not get ourselves worked up—”

“No! I’m pissed!” In a snap, Pomni leapt to her feet, firmly holding Ragatha in her arms. “I’m not gonna let you get hurt anymore,” she said, making a beeline toward the haunted mansion, “Not a single scratch, from now until we escape this horrible circus together — I promise!”

Ragatha’s eyes were sparkling, though Pomni was too focused on climbing the front porch’s creaky staircase to notice. “Pomni, Y-You don’t have to do all that…!”

“Too bad. I want to.”

“O-Oh…” Ragatha’s breath felt warm against Pomni’s chest. “I see…”

Without another word. Pomni summited the porch stairs, where a pair of double-doors patiently awaited her arrival. She eyed the doorbell, but her hands were full — so she opted for three mighty kicks at the doors’ expense instead. “Hello? Anyone home?”

Pomni and Ragatha waited for an answer. And then waited some more. Pomni’s shrill voice echoed at least a dozen times in the stiff silence.

“Hellooo!?” Pomni’s ill-fitting boot pounded the door thrice more. “We don’t have all day, you know! Open up!”

“Pomni! It’s been five seconds!” Ragatha chided, “Don’t be rude!”

“Rude? What am I doing — interrupting supper time? They’re NPCs.”

“I know that! But still. It just feels so wrong…”

A relaxed smile found its way to Pomni’s face — at this point, the jester wouldn’t have been surprised if Ragatha were hiding a pair of angel wings underneath that pretty dress of hers. “Let me guess. You’re the type of person who feels guilty about not giving equal attention to all of your stuffed animals, aren’t you?”

“I—” Ragatha sputtered, glancing off. “N-No! I’m thirty years old! What makes you think I own stuffed animals?”

Pomni raised an eyebrow.

Ragatha had been caught red-handed, and she knew it. It was incredible how quickly her face flushed completely pink. “Okay, first of all, how dare you attack me like this—”

Before Ragatha could even finish her tongue-in-cheek response, both girls simply lost it. Their uncontrolled, side-splitting laughter — one giggling, one cackling like a witch — spun together into a harmonious duet, and for a fleeting moment, both captives felt like they were home.

“Alright, alright.” Ragatha wiped at her eyes. “Enough joking around. How about I just ring the doorbell for you, Sweetheart?”

“Huh?! No way! You have to stay still or you’re going to rip yourself! Look, I’ll just set you down—”

“On the dirty porch? Are you out of your mind?” Ragatha reached for the ornate button beside the door.

“Hey! What are you doing?! I just told you—”

“Oops!” Ragatha poked the button, then quickly fell back into Pomni’s arms like a helpless princess. “Sorry, dear. Didn’t hear you!”

Pomni grumbled, and the doorbell replied with its signature chime. Windswept shutters battered cracked windows as Pomni and Ragatha stood there, waiting for something, anything, to happen.

Pomni’s patience was in short supply. She stamped her foot, and the old porch whined. “Seriously?”

“Maybe the entrance is around the back? My old apartment building was like that.” Ragatha said. “Ordering anything by mail was just the worst. It’s like — I get that the mail carriers had to stick to a tight schedule, but they would never read the signs. Oh, and trick-or-treat was a nightmare every Halloween—”

Ragatha’s riveting tale was cut short as, at last, the double-doors swung open at the sound of the magic words — trick-or-treat.

Ragatha’s mouth fell open. Pomni wrinkled her brow. Both women studied the other’s outfit in stunned silence — and suddenly, Caine’s choice of costumes didn’t seem quite so arbitrary.

“Ohhh…” They nodded in sync. “Right…”

Cautiously, Pomni poked her head through the door frame. If the scent of stale tobacco pouncing upon her senses was any indication, the surprises weren’t over yet.

“It’s…” Pomni breathed, “...an elevator…?”

“Ooh, and an old-fashioned one, too!” Ragatha tapped her fingers together, excitedly peering inside.

The interior was nothing if not visually striking. Each of its four walls, carved from cherrywood, hosted polished panels gilded with gold. Winding bands of white and black and gold and blue danced a tango across the smoke-stained carpet. An expensive-looking chair sat in the corner; an equally-elegant end table, complete with a flickering lamp, complimentary cigars, and a half-filled ashtray, sat to the left.

“Gosh, and just look at all these little aesthetic flourishes!” Ragatha gushed. “Folks back then really put effort into making every little thing look beautiful. You know what I mean?”

“Uh-huh. S-Sure…”

“Sometimes I wish that attitude would make a comeback. I don’t know. Maybe I’m just an old soul…”

Pomni blinked, regarding the elevator’s interior through empty pupils. She would have instinctively eyed the exit had she not already been standing in the middle of it.

The jester couldn’t recall something as simple as her own name — but, by some cruel twist of fate, everything else about the life she’d had stolen from her remained crystal clear in her head: including her swarming, overcrowded menagerie of obsessive anxieties.

Back home, Pomni’s teeny-tiny cubicle — something she couldn’t believe she actually missed now — was located on one the higher floors of her employer’s drab highrise. Entering the lobby, a lengthy carpet led the eye to a conveniently-placed pair of lifts. Their metal doors, constantly opening and closing as employees funneled in and out, was a sure sign that another busy day of work lay ahead.

Pomni was quite familiar with the contraptions — which was reason enough for the tie-wearing twenty-something, armed with her trusty backpack, to begin each morning with a hard left towards the musty concrete stairwell instead. By the time she’d reach her floor, the young accountant would be out-of-breath, weak in the knees, and far sweatier than any sane person would ever like to be. In her book, though, it was worth the trouble. She would do anything in her power to avoid the sensory torture that was riding in one of those cramped sardine cans.

Elevators were awful. Just awful. Women wearing far too aggressive perfume; men who had forgotten to wear any deodorant at all. Extroverted co-workers trying to make small talk; creepy strangers trying to hit on her. Idiots with no concept of personal space; morons with no respect for the fire marshall’s occupancy limit clearly posted on the wall in big, bold letters.

But being stuck inside of a tiny box with eight other people was a dream compared to the experience of riding alone — where her mind could wander, and the simmering fear of some catastrophic malfunction could consume her thoughts. What if the power went out? What if she got stuck? What if she were trapped inside and ran out of oxygen? What if the cables snapped, and the final moments of her life would be her screaming in horror as the car was sent plummeting down the shaft?

Nope. Pomni didn’t like elevators. Not one bit. Sensitive to Ragatha’s feelings, however, the young woman tried her hardest to force a smile onto her face. “Wow. C-Classy…”

For a moment, Ragatha didn’t even react. “...You’re nervous.” she tilted her head in concern, “What’s the matter, Sweetheart?”

“Nothing! Nothing’s the matter!” Pomni lied, and rather poorly, at that. “I was just…” she floundered, “...admiring the craftsmanship! Gee, don’t you wish they made stuff like this nowadays?”

“...Yeah. I just said that.”

“Right…! S-So…! Anyway…!”

Pomni closed her eyes, ducking her face behind Ragatha’s shoulders. Oh, come on! What are you waiting for? Just go! It’s just an elevator! You’ve had your whole life to be a coward — now’s the time to be brave. For her! You can do that, can’t you!?

The shaking jester steeled herself. The sole of her oversized boot departed from the sturdy wooden porch, swung forward, flirted with the elevator’s artsy carpet, pressed down…

…and the entire car shifted with an ear-splitting creak.

Pomni’s whole body seized up — she couldn’t stumble back onto the porch fast enough. Nope. Nope. Abso-#@%$ing-lutely not.

“Pomni! You are nervous!” Ragatha rubbed at her chest, “Oh, no — Ugh! I’m sorry! Are you afraid of elevators?”

Pomni squirmed in place. Her gut commanded her to keep up her defenses — to deny, deny, deny, because showing the slightest inkling of vulnerability had been punished so severely in the past. Despite all of her strongest instincts, however, the soft look of concern on Ragatha’s face hit her like a magic spell.

“Um,” Pomni’s shoulders slumped, “Maybe a teensy-tiny bit...”

“Oh, Sweetheart…” Ragatha drew closer, “Forget it, then. Why don’t we try looking for another way in?”

“N-No! It’s fine! This way is the fastest!”

“But I want you to be comfortable, too…”

“You’re worried about me?!”

Ragatha twisted her lips. “Is that bad…?”

“Yes!”

“O-Oh…”

“God, Ragatha — can’t you just be selfish for once in your freaking life!?” Pomni’s voice was sharpened to a fine tip. “I mean…look at yourself! You’re falling apart at the seams — literally!”

“Pomni! Don’t be ridiculous!”

“Watch me!” Pomni squished Ragatha against her chest before the ragdoll could even think to protest. Surging with adrenaline, she clenched her jaw, made peace with her god, and barreled forward.

The ancient elevator quaked beneath her feet; each time it stirred, her body seized, preparing itself for the whole contraption to plummet into the endless abyss below. Pomni quailed at the sound of squeaking metal, cowered at the buzz of hydraulics, and pined after the whistling wind outside the car — a beacon of safety and stable footing.

She shivered, choking on every haggard breath that just wasn’t enough — but somehow, the slight weight in her arms gave her the courage to open her eyes and face the music.

“I…” Pomni stood in the center of the elevator. She looked down at a begrudgingly-happy Ragatha, each stammered word framed by bouts of breathless laughter, “...I did it!”

Ragatha beamed, practically singing. “You did!”

“Yes, indeed!” A series of polite claps sounded from behind. “Jolly good show, darling!”

Pomni just couldn’t stop smiling. “It was, wasn’t it?” she agreed. Sticking out her chest, the young woman pulled in a deep breath, and then…

…Wait a minute! Pomni spun around on a dime. Who said that!?

A ghostly figure, surrounded by an otherworldly aura, sat with her legs crossed in the elevator’s cushioned chair. Her outfit, equally as old-fashioned as her surroundings, evoked all the stylings of a suffragette. Her wide-brimmed hat cast a spooky shadow over her face. Her ruffled shirt was tucked neatly into a long, floral-print skirt. A silk sash spanned the length of her chest, bearing a progressive slogan spelled out in a simple typeface.

An eerie smile crawled across the phantom’s ashen face. Slowly, she looked up from the book in her lap, and the lamp’s struggling flame gasped its final breath, “Going up?”

Pomni SHRIEKED.

“Pleased to make your acquaintance.” the ghost marked her place with a bookmark, closed her tome, and sharply raised her other hand, “Dining room. Fifth floor.”

With a light ‘ding’, the elevator’s sole exit slammed shut, casting the car in total darkness. The elevator rumbled as if caught in an earthquake, rusted gears whirring and whining all the way.

“Uh…” Ragatha’s face fell. She looked up at Pomni, who was taking things exactly as well as you would expect.

“WHAT?! HEY! NONONO! WHAT’S GOING ON?!”

“There’s the handrail, darling.” the ghost pointed with a wink, “You might want to make use of it sooner rather than later.”

“NONONO! LET ME OUT!” Pomni pounded her foot against the door, “WAITWAITWAITWAITWAIT—”

The ghost shrugged. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Suddenly, the elevator shot into the air at gravity-defying speeds, thrusting Pomni and Ragatha roughly into the floor — and pinning them there for the remainder of their abrupt ascent.

🎪 🎪 🎪

The haunted lift halted the same way it had started.

Painfully.

The doors slid open with an innocent chime, and the girls shivered in sync as the ghost’s ethereal high-heels passed straight through them.

“Right this way, ladies.” the phantom twirled her fingers. A magical aura surrounded Pomni and Ragatha, dragging their aching forms behind the ghost as she stepped gingerly out of the car.

A cozy dining room awaited beyond the threshold. Autumn-toned streamers stretched across the ceiling. A perimeter of potatoes, turnips, and radishes, strung up on strings and carved with grotesque faces, was proudly displayed on each wall. A large banner pinned to the wall read ‘ALLHALLOWTIDE GREETINGS’, just in case the apple-bobbing stations weren’t sufficiently on-the-nose.

A long, wooden table was situated in the exact center of the room, dominating the space. The ghostly woman sat herself at its head, and, with a flick of her finger, sat her dazed guests across from each other.

“Well, well, well!” The ghostly specter fanned her face with her weighty novel. “Do my eyes deceive me, or has another troupe of wayward rabble-rousers dared to trespass upon the esteemed estate of—”

“Oh, God!” Pomni, green in the face, scrambled to slap her hands over her mouth. “Oh, holy #$@%—” She swiped the closest open receptacle she could find — a gorgeous Edwardian vase — and held her mouth against the opening. Her whole frame crumpled forward as her body quite ungracefully emptied itself out.

“P-Pomni!” Ragatha’s fingers grazed the side of her face. “Oh my goodness — are you alright?!”

The jester groaned. Plopping the vase back onto the table, she weakly nodded, trembling hands hugging her ailing stomach. “I’ll be fine. J-Just…give me a second…” she faceplanted into the large heap of candy corn piled on her plate. “This happens more often than you’d think…”

Ragatha pouted, watching Pomni’s face sink deeper into candy corn mountain. Individual pieces slid off of the young woman’s plate and scattered across the table. “Remember your breathing, okay, Sweetheart?”

Pomni flashed a flaccid thumbs-up.

“My word! What is the meaning of this?!” The ghostly apparition clenched her fists, lips curled back in disgust. “Perhaps if your detestable generation spent less time listening to that boorish ‘jazz’ music — and I’m being generous calling it music at all — you’d have room in those cramped skulls to remember proper etiquette!”

In a flash, she tore open her book — the cover read, ‘THE LADY’S BOOK OF COMMON ETIQUETTE & ASSORTED DEMONIC SPELLS — 1860 EDITION’ in embossed, glossy lettering.

The ghost loudly cleared her throat. She pointed to the text with a manicured fingernail, “Immediately upon entering the parlor, find your hostess, and speak to her first. It is very rude to stop to chat with other guests before greeting the lady of the house.”

Ragatha blushed, shrinking in her seat like a scolded child. “Ma’am...”

“Hmph. As appalling as your conduct is, I suppose you aren’t completely hopeless. It’s worlds better, at least, than that infantile rabbitoid or that foul-mouthed modern-art abomination.” The haughty ghost shook her head. “But I digress — what business do you mortal wretches have in the decrepit domain of I, the great Margarethe MacGuffin?”

A long, drawn-out pause ensued — longer than usual. “Um…” Ragatha rapped on her chin, “…Who?”

“Who? What do you mean ‘who’?”

“Come to think of it, I’ve completely forgotten what we’re even supposed to be doing here. Pomni…?”

Groggily, Pomni lifted her head; more than a few candy corns came along, sticking stubbornly to her cheeks, chin, and forehead. “Brooch,” she sighed. A single morsel tumbled off her face, “We’re looking for the—”

“Brooch, you say?!” Margarethe flinched at the word like a trained dog hearing its name. Her sour mood shifted in an instant. “You couldn’t possibly mean…” she drew closer, “...that brooch, could you? The legendary MacGuffin family heirloom? The priceless treasure forged in the highlands beyond Hadrian’s Wall, passed down from generation to generation—”

“Uh-huh! Sounds about right!” Pomni abruptly pushed her chair out, sending an avalanche of candy treats pittering and pattering across the hardwood floor. She wasted no time racing to Ragatha’s side — and gently, so gently, hooking her arm around the dolly’s. “So where do we go? What do we do? How do we leave!?”

“I…” Margarethe balked. “Sit back down this instant, young lady!”

“Uh, hello?! Do you not see that my friend is practically in pieces, here? We don’t need your stupid theatrics — none of this is even real, anyway — just spit it out so we can go back to the tent and get her fixed!”

Margarethe’s posture was as sharp as a tack. “For shame! Never in my sixty-seven years have I witnessed such uncharismatic, uncouth, unbecoming behavior from a young bachelorette. Simply appalling — you’ll never find a husband with that attitude.”

“Aw, really? You mean it?”

“I beg your pardon?!”

“HAHAHA!” Ragatha slapped the table, “G-Golly, Ms. MacGuffin! This glassware is just to die for! Wherever did you procure such a stunning collection?”

Margarethe hesitated — but then curtsied in appreciation. “Well! I’m glad you noticed. They’re just wonderful, aren’t they?” she proudly mused, “The help says they’re made of this newfangled, petroleum-based material that’s cheaper than glass and impervious to breakage. Bakelite, I believe it’s called — the material of a thousand uses!”

Pomni flicked the nearest goblet. She whispered in Ragatha’s ear: “I think they’re plastic.”

“Indeed — we are truly blessed to be reaping the plentiful fruits of the industrial age. Now, where was I…?” Margarethe tapped her bottom lip, “Ah, yes!”

Margarethe launched herself in the air with a flamboyant pirouette. “To make a long story short, the MacGuffin clan is, sadly, no more — our treasured brooch is the only artifact that remains of our storied legacy. My life is long behind me, but alas, as the matriarch of my kin, I cannot pass on into the next life until I find a soul brave enough to carry on the great MacGuffin legacy. Someone like…you two!”

Pomni and Ragatha looked at each other. “Us? You’re sure?”

“Certainly! But a MacGuffin knows no weakness.” Margarethe continued, “In order to secure my brooch, and carry on my proud family name, you must venture through my audacious abode…and confront your greatest fear!”

“Greatest fear…?” Pomni stammered.

Margarethe flexed. “Then, and only then, can you consider yourself a true MacGuffin!”

“G-G-Greatest…” Pomni repeated, almost choking on her words, “...f-fear…?”

“Why, of course, darling! You didn’t expect this to be a walk in the park, did you? It wouldn’t be much of an adventure without a little bit of challenge!”

Pomni stared straight ahead — but her pin-sized pupils didn’t perceive a single thing.

Greatest fear.

The room shrank.

Greatest fear. Greatest fear? What in the world was that supposed to mean!? Pomni didn’t have a greatest fear — as far as she knew, the obsessive thoughts that constantly terrorized her mind did so with total parity. How was she supposed to know which one had cost her the most sleep over the years?

Car crashes, plane wrecks, train derailments, high-speed transportation in general, being bitten by a wild animal and dying of rabies, stepping on a rusty nail and dying of tetanus, contracting some other horrible disease after forgetting to wash her hands and dying from that, being stalked by weird men, being assaulted by weird men, being kidnapped and murdered by weird men, weird men in general, disappointing her friends, disappointing her parents, disappointing her boss, people in general, her boss in general, being late to work, performing poorly at work, being fired from work…

Pomni’s eyes bulged.

Work — oh, no. Work. WORK.

Pomni’s mind had already overloaded itself merely accepting the notion that she was trapped forever in this weird, obscure computer game — so overloaded, in fact, that the horrific question of how the world was proceeding without her hadn’t even occurred to her.

Until now.

How long had she been gone? One week? Two? Even more? Her blood ran cold at the realization — even if she were to escape the circus this very instant, there was no way she hadn’t already been fired, no way her cubicle wasn’t already cleaned out to make way for the next poor sap to apply to that god-forsaken office.

Oh, no. No, no, no, no. That couldn’t happen. What was she going to do? Beg for her old job back? Apply for a new one? How the hell was she supposed to do that when her degree sucked, her resume could fit on a sticky note, and all her single reference could forward a potential employer was years and years of middling performance reviews?

Even if her boss was merciful, her rat bastard of a landlord wouldn’t lend her a single shred of sympathy. Not in a million years. The clock was ticking for Pomni to locate an exit before next month’s rent was due. Should she fail, and she certainly would, she’d return home to find someone else living in her apartment. Her space. The only place in the whole entire world where she felt safe.

Her belongings would be auctioned off at best, and thrown away at worst.

And…oh, God. She was a missing person. There were probably posters all over town. Posters plastered with her face and name, front-and center. Stapled to telephone poles, printed in the paper, pinned to those little bulletin boards at the supermarket. Everywhere. Millions of eyes, looking at her face. Reading her name.

Pomni could already feel them burrowing into her back. Judging her. Pitying her. Laughing at her. The best thing they could do was look away in apathy.

Her friends and family were probably searching high and low — but their resolve would dull as the months paged over into years. Embers of hope, pining for her return, would still burn in their hearts until the very end, but it wouldn’t matter in the long run. In the back of their minds, they would know she wasn’t coming home.

The few friends she had, unwilling to carry the burden of their grief, would almost certainly make an effort to forget her. Just to ease the pain. Her voice would be forgotten as old videos and voicemails were deleted. Her face would be next. And then, one by one, each of her friends would speak her name for the final time.

Pomni whimpered, burying her face in the soft fabric of Ragatha’s arm. Her chest was tight, pressing harder, harder, harder against a hollow core. Each heaving breath sent shockwaves of pain throughout her shrinking, shivering, pitiful body.

Time. She was running out. Running out of time. She had to find a way out. A way out. A way to get home. Home. Home. Home. Time. Running out. Get out. She had to get out. Get out get out get out GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT RIGHT NOW BEFORE EVERYTHING SHE’S WORKED FOR CRUMBLES TO DUST AND SHE’S DEAD AND FORGOTTEN AND AND AND AND AND AND—

Pomni choked back a scream as a dreadfully-familiar, searing pain stabbed the tips of her fingers. Blackened flesh creeped like cancer toward her palm, each heinous step piercing her skin like a thousand poison needles.

“R-Ragatha!” Pomni gasped. Abstraction shackled her wrists as the tips of her fingers sank into the ragdoll’s downy flesh. One, three, five, ten twitching eyes sprouted beneath her gloves. “No…no, no, no! I’m going to—!” She couldn’t bear to say it. “I…I need to—”

Ragatha turned. “P-Pomni? What are you—”

“I’m sorry!” Pomni strangled the ragdoll’s wounded arm, squeezing the bulky limb hard enough to force clumps of cotton out of her own failed stitchwork.

Her eyes squeezed shut.

Her breathing slowed.

Shaky breath in, shakier breath out.

In and out.

In, and…

The grandfather clock announced the hour with a half-dozen chimes. Pomni cracked open a single eye. Like magic, her mind was calm and clear.

Her weary gaze swept over Ragatha’s shredded arms, over her shoulder, her neck, her furrowed brow, her gnashing teeth, her wincing eyes.

“P-P-Pomni! I said let go!” Ragatha’s complaints finally fell on Pomni’s ears, “That hurts!”

Flinching, Pomni released the doll’s arm, “Ah! I’m sorry! I-I—”

“What’s gotten into you?! Is everything okay!?”

“Y-Yes! Everything’s just fine! I just, uh…” Pomni slumped over, still gasping for air. “Um…” she shrank beneath the shadow of Ragatha’s stern gaze, “...just needed a hug?”

Ragatha’s stony face didn’t crack. “You’re hiding something.”

“What?! No, I’m not!”

“Don’t lie to me! What’s going on?! It looked like you were just about to—”

Margarethe hissed. “Alright, alright! That’s quite enough chatter!” She clonked Pomni’s head with her hefty book. “In case you forgot, I was in the middle of explaining—”

“HEY!” Pomni barked like a dog, rubbing the back of her head. “Who the #@$% do you think you are, you ancient &!$#% !?”

“Heel.” Margarethe’s razor teeth flashed a ravenous smile, “...If you know what’s good for you.”

Pomni growled — but wisely kept her big mouth shut. It helped that a small part of her was thankful for the excuse to drop the subject with Ragatha.

Margarethe chuckled. Referring to her book once more, she flipped to a specific page and began chanting a hex under her breath. Before either Pomni or Ragatha could ask what was happening, a pair of blindingly-bright orbs had already emerged from both of their chests. The magical objects drifted toward MacGuffin’s outstretched hand.

“Now. Let’s begin with the darling coquette. What are her nightmares made of?” Mararethe peered down at the two white spheres orbiting each other in her open palm. Studying one for a moment, she cocked her head with a sneer. “Hmph. Typical.”

Ragatha slouched, looking sullen.

“Centipedes. It’s centipedes, right?” Pomni leaned on Ragatha’s chair. She had only just walked herself back from the verge of tears, but she had made a promise to protect Ragatha, and she intended to keep it. “Don’t worry — you’ve got me by your side, remember?” She spoke through a confident facade, “I-I’ll squash ‘em for you!”

Ragatha covered her mouth like she was about to vomit. “Ugh, Please—” she shook her head, “D-Don’t make me think about their guts...”

Margarethe flicked Ragatha’s orb back into the ragdoll’s chest, leaving only Pomni’s circling her palm. She cleared her throat. “As for the untrained whelp…” she was already laughing as she lifted her long-fingered hand to her face — but the moment she gazed into the orb, her smug affect faltered.

The phantom’s cold, soulless eyes ping-ponged between Pomni and Ragatha. “Well.” Grinning, she flicked Pomni’s orb away, “Isn’t that sweet? I wouldn’t have taken you for the type, darling.”

Pomni jerked her head. “Huh? What type? What do you mean sweet?!”

Mararethe’s face simply radiated superiority. “I suppose you’ll just have to wait and see, now won’t you?” She mocked, fanning herself. “Oh, shame on me! I haven’t been this worked up since the summer of nineteen-aught-five. This is going to be fun…”

Pomni’s knees locked together as the ghost faded away. “Wait! Where are you going?! What’s my fear?! What—”

“Best of luck!” The candles flickered to the rhythm of Margarethe’s cackling laugh. “You’ll need it…!”

With minimal fanfare, the door to the next room swung open all by itself, creaking horribly on its rusted hinges.

🎪 🎪 🎪

Margarethe MacGuffin’s maniacal mansion was truly massive, and, within the last few hours, Pomni and Ragatha had been treated to a terrible tour of every last nightmarish nook and creepy cranny. Just as Caine had advertised, an assortment of ‘tricky traps’, ‘perplexing puzzles’ and ‘supernatural sentries’ had been set up for them to navigate, ranging in difficulty from ‘mind-numbingly easy’, to ‘psychologically traumatizing.’

Surprisingly, Pomni’s accounting skills had come in handy in the manor’s ‘money-counting room’. The horrifying puzzle, involving the petty minutiae of tax codes and estate settlements, was easy pickings for the seasoned number cruncher. Still, no one was perfect, and Pomni’s sole mistake — in which she’d forgotten the purpose of box 12D on form 5E-344-B — left her at the mercy of a swarm of greenbacks-turned-paper-cranes.

In the music room, Ragatha would have taken the opportunity to show off her cello skills, but Pomni, concerned that Ragatha would worsen her injuries in the process, had flatly refused. A small back-and-forth had ensued — but in the end, both parties agreed to disagree once the instruments, magically stirred to life, started to viciously attack. Poor Pomni had never sprinted so quickly in her life.

The place where Ragatha’s expertise did come in handy, however, was the stables. A pack of raging horse skeletons ran rampant, threatening to trample anyone foolish enough to stand in their way. Ragatha’s prior experience with equines, however, gave her all the tricks she needed to quickly soothe the wild herd. In retrospect, the room’s main obstacle wasn’t even calming the horses — it was reassuring a shivering Pomni after the jester had learned first-hand what a horse’s skull looked like. It wasn’t pretty.

In all of that time, not once had either of their so-called ‘greatest fears’ reared their ugly heads — or even so much as teased them. Every single task, no matter how asinine, was turned terrifying by the prospect of transforming into an unimaginable nightmare at any point in time.

The sheer anticipation was a torture all of its own — but the girls’ latest assignment, apparently designed to drive them straight to the precipice of insanity, was a close second place.

“Ohoho, don’t fret! It’s quite simple!” Margarethe had announced shortly after Pomni and Ragatha had arrived at the spacious ballroom. The phantom hadn’t even tried to hold back her laughter — she truly was having the time of her life. “The door to the next room is just a hop, skip and a jump away. All you have to do, honored guests, is locate the key.”

In a snap, Margarethe was gone, and Pomni and Ragatha had looked at each other with dread in their eyes. Nothing in MacGuffin Mansion was ever that simple.

Every part of the ballroom was sculpted with painstaking precision. The moon peered in through a series of extravagant French windows; long, velvet drapes, slightly darker in color than Ragatha’s licorice locks, spanned the length of each one. The checkered marble that spanned the floor hosted a spattering of perfectly-set tables; a crystal glass and a set of unsoiled silverware framed each empty plate.

A mountain of keys — brass, silver, and gold — sat upon each plate, sparkling in the moonlight. The drinking glasses beside them were similarly filled to the brim…with keys. Keys, keys, keys. Keys were floating in the flower vases, floating in the wine bottles, floating in the air.

Finding a key would be a cinch — finding the key, however, was a task tedious enough to make Sisyphus himself blush.

And so, there Pomni was, kneeling in front of the locked door, sunken eyes looking like they hadn’t had a wink of sleep in years. The young woman glanced down with a harsh sigh — the marble floor wasn’t exactly the softest surface, and her knees were starting to hurt. A lot.

Head drooping low, she half-heartedly held out her hand. “Next…”

Ragatha, slumped against the peeling floral wallpaper, perfectly matched Pomni’s energy. Without even bothering to look, she stuck her hand into one of the myriad piles of untested keys that surrounded the pair. A moment later, she plopped a plain-looking one into Pomni’s palm.

The jester ran her finger across the dented brass surface of what must have been the thousandth key to pass through her hands in under an hour. Her eye twitched.

This was the one. Their ticket out of this god damned ballroom. It had to be. She had no rhyme or reason to explain why — she just knew.

With a curt nod, Pomni crammed the key’s metal teeth into the lock and turned her hand clockwise. She leaned forward just a touch, listening desperately for a ‘click’ — but of course, just like the nine-hundred and ninety-nine attempts that came before, the stubborn door simply refused to accept her offering.

So Pomni stared. And smiled.

Slowly and silently, she stood, squirming grin blooming into a wide, razor-toothed smile. She turned to face the nearest pile of keys, filled her chest with a patient, hearty breath…

…and drove her foot into the metallic mound with all the force her skinny little legs could muster.

“Pomni!” Ragatha shouted. Hundreds of keys clinked and clanked as they skated across the marble floor. “Really?!”

“This is it, isn’t it?! My greatest fear?!” Pomni shouted, “Isn’t it!?”

“Pomni!”

“Trapped with no way out, taunted by an exit just out of reach, forced to perform pointess, tedious tasks until I go insane?!”

With every word that Pomni spoke, Ragatha’s furrowed brow disappeared to make room for a look of grave concern. “Hey! Are you listening to me?!”

“The same thing, over and over, never changing…” Clutching her head, Pomni let out a laugh, strained and dry, “As if I’m not already living that nightmare every single day!?”

“Pomni, stop it! You’re scaring me!” Ragatha finally raised her voice. Acting on instinct, she reached out to touch Pomni’s arm — but the doll’s fragile skin punished her with another gut-wrenching tear. Pain warped the doll’s face as she crumpled forward.

That brought Pomni’s breakdown to a screeching halt. “Ragatha!” snapping herself out of it, the jester immediately scrambled to Ragatha’s side, eyes pleading forgiveness. “I-I’m sorry! I was just… I didn’t mean to—” she clenched her fists, grunting in frustration, “Are you okay!?”

“Are you?!” Ragatha snatched Pomni’s shoulders. Her face was brutally stern. “You are freaking. Me. Out! Tell me what’s going on! Right now!”

Pomni swallowed. She tried to answer — she really, truly tried, yet no words came to her blanking mind.

Ragatha frowned. “Y-You’re doing it. You’re acting just like the others. Just like him.”

“H-Him…?”

“Tell me the truth. Back in the dining room, when you were squeezing my arm, did you...” Ragatha’s voice wavered, “Were you…?”

Pomni’s pupils were the size of pins. Buried memories — of her bedroom, of the forest, of the mansion’s dining room — swarmed like locusts through her mind. She could practically feel the blood freezing over in her veins again, feel the despair grabbing hold, feel her whole body rebelling against her, transforming against her will into a mindless, violent beast.

“...abstracting?” Pomni tore away, arms coiled tightly around herself. Her strong voice was stuffy and rigid, “I-Is that what you’re too scared to say?”

Ragatha’s eyes softened in an instant. “Oh, no. No, no, no! I didn’t mean to—” she winced, holding her arms out as far as they would go. She was this close to tearing open another wound. “Just…come here.”

“Wh…What are you doing?”

“I’m sorry,” Ragatha said, “Come on. Let me hold you...”

Pomni looked the other way, still hugging herself. She tried her best to look disgusted, to pretend to be angry, to act indifferent. “P-Put your arms down. You’ll hurt yourself…!”

“I don’t care.” Ragatha’s wavering smile held true, bending just slightly under the weight of her pain. “It hurts so much more to watch you cry, Pomni.”

“I’m not crying!” Pomni’s voice cracked, widening gaze sweeping across Ragatha’s arms. Her trembling arms weren’t helping her case. “I’m just…”

“...Just what, Sunshine?”

Sunshine. Pomni’s eyes were wet. She blinked away the unwanted sensation, shaking her head all the while — but it was no use. Ragatha really was the nicest person she’d ever met. “...R-Ragatha?”

“Yes…?”

“Why do you keep calling me that…?”

“Calling you what?”

“Sunshine…” Pomni’s lip quivered. She tried with all of her might to quell the storm, but there was little she could do now. A pair of shimmering streams traced the length of her face, and at long last, she cracked, collapsing into Ragatha’s open embrace.

“Oh, dear…” Ragatha wrapped Pomni up as tight as she could, squeezing the little jester like she would never, ever let go. Even she was trembling now. “Do you like that name?”

Pomni nodded.

She felt a lot of feelings. But most of all, she felt loved. So very, very loved.

🎪 🎪 🎪

The ballroom had nary a clock to announce the hour, and the eternal night gleaming through the windows wasn’t much help in telling the time, either. Pomni had no idea how long she’d been venting — just talking, talking, talking through the tears, explaining everything that had happened over the past few days.

“...and it’s happened three times now.” Pomni spoke softly, at last lifting her head from Ragatha’s chest. However much time had passed, it was enough for her eyes, shocked by the sudden influx of light, to immediately recoil.

She rubbed her eyes, easing them back into the light. “...it just happens. Like a nightmare. My mind starts racing — thinking the same obsessive thoughts, over and over, until the thoughts take control. And I…” Pomni winced, shaking her head. “...w-won’t say anything else.”

Ragatha hummed. She listened quietly, finger tracing winding lines around Pomni’s back.

“...But every time, I’ve managed to stop it.” Pomni said. She cringed a little at her own words. “Well, I guess that’s obvious...”

“Obvious or not…” Ragatha’s voice was calm and clear, “I’m glad.”

“Glad…?”

“Glad you’re still here.”

“O-Oh!” Pomni perked right up. Almost hypnotized, she stared into those beautiful, mismatched eyes. “Um, th-thanks. Me too...”

Ragatha giggled. “Sorry to interrupt.” she said adoringly, lightly stroking Pomni’s backside. “You were saying?”

Pomni felt light, absentmindedly curling a lock of red yarn hair around her finger. Never before had she felt so heard, felt what it was like to have someone hanging onto her every word. It felt good.

“I don't know, Ragatha. When I start to abstract, it’s not easy to bring myself back from the brink, but…” she breathed, “...it’s kind of like what you were saying before.”

“Oh?”

“I try to think of a silver lining. Something that makes me feel safe. Something…”

Ragatha’s thumb shooed away the final, thin teardrop drying on Pomni’s cheek. The ragdoll’s hand felt just like a cloud — softer than anything the jester had ever felt before. “Something…” Ragatha mused, finishing the jester’s thought, “...that makes life worth living?”

“Yeah…” Pomni welcomed a cautious smile, “Something like that.”

“Ah-ha!”

Pomni flinched. “H-Huh?!”

“There she is!” Ragatha snatched the jester’s cheesing cheek and gave it a little wiggle. “There’s my funny girl!”

Pomni tried her hardest to squirm out of Ragatha’s embrace — but the redhead had her decisively pinned. “Ow! S-Stop it!” she protested — but her sunny laughter only encouraged further torment, “That hurts, you jerk!”

At last, Ragatha relented. “Sorry, Sunshine. Couldn’t resist.”

Pomni’s first instinct was to do the same thing back — to even the score, so Ragatha could see how it felt — but the woman’s words left her melting, all the way down to her soul.

Sunshine.

She was putty in the ragdoll’s hands. What in the world was happening? What was this fluttery feeling? Why did her face feel hot enough to burn her fingerprints clean off?

“R-Right! In any case!” Pomni pushed herself off, lest she faint a second time. She could hardly believe how quickly her heart was thumping .“Th-thanks for listening and everything, but…” she glanced around in a panic, “...We should probably get back to it, huh?”

Ragatha didn’t react right away. “...You’re sure?” She surveyed the endless piles of keys that surrounded them — many of which were now scattered about the floor thanks to Pomni’s most recent tantrum.

“Of course I’m sure! Wh-Why wouldn’t I be?

“Well, it’s awfully sudden. I don’t mind talking a bit more if you need to! Really — I’d watch paint dry as long as you were next to me. Um! Not to say that listening to you is boring…!”

“It’s fine!” Pomni giggled. “Honest.”

“You’re feeling better?”

Pomni nodded.

“You’re sure?” Ragatha squinted.

“Yes! I’m sure! We can’t keep stopping like this, Ragatha. We’ve got to get you back to Caine, remember?”

“I…suppose we can get moving again, if that’s what you want.” Ragatha sighed. She glanced sadly at her freshly-vacant arms. “Just do me a favor, won’t you?”

“Yeah?”

“If we get stuck, try to keep your lid on — for me?”

“Y-Yeah. Sorry about that…” Pomni turned, scratching her head. The very moment she caught a glimpse of the piled-up keys, however, her face scrunched up. “This just — this sucks! How did the other members figure this out?!”

“Pomni.” Ragatha groaned. “Breathe.”

“Right. My bad…”

Despite herself, Ragatha still managed to look amused. “Think of it this way, Sweetheart. If the rest of those goofballs can figure this out, then so can we. We just need to put our heads together — think outside of the box.”

“Outside of the box…” Pomni stepped across the checkered floor, scratching her chin. “Like…maybe what we’re looking for isn’t a literal key?”

She scanned the ballroom through her pouting gaze. A series of large chandeliers, far grander than the tacky setpiece in her own bedroom, supervised the spacious room from above. On the northern wall was a small stage, complete with chairs, instruments, and music stands for performing musicians. A piano, paired with a small chest, sat at the far end.

The jester’s mood soured, and not just because of her recent run-in with haunted musical instruments. Keys, keys, keys — what did any of this stuff have to do with keys!? Ragatha desperately needed help, but here she was, stuck in the world’s most contrived escape room. Ugh! Did people in the real world really do this kind of thing for fun? This stupid puzzle—

Suddenly, Pomni perked up. She eyed the piano.

Piano. Keys.

Piano! Keys! Of course!

“Ragatha!” Pomni raced to where the other woman was sitting, frantically waving her arms in the air. “Hey, hey!”

“Hm? Did you figure something out?”

Pomni nodded, smiling broadly. She scooped the ragdoll into her arms, hopped atop the stage, and set her down in one of the chairs arranged neatly across it. All told, she only knocked over three music stands, two metronomes, and one priceless clarinet in the process.

Pomni turned Ragatha’s chair so that it faced the piano. “Watch this!” she chirped, dashing across the stage. Her fingers pressed down on the piano’s lowest white note, and then the lowest black; the hammered strings within the instrument sang a long, colorful scale as Pomni dragged her digits across all eighty-eight keys.

Hands clasped in hope, she spun around to check the door — but her face fell when, despite her genius plan, the door remained firmly in place.

“What? But—” Pomni’s fingers pecked a low Do, a high Re, and the middlemost Mi. “They’re keys! Pianos have keys!” She laid her hands flat on the ivory, and the piano unleashed a dissonant, un-musical scream. “Are you kidding me? How is that not the solution?!”

“No, you’re right!” Ragatha clapped her hands together, “Good thinking, Pomni! You’re definitely onto something!”

“I…am?” Pomni blushed, “But I already pressed every single key — every one! And that stupid plank of wood still won’t open!”

“Maybe it’s not about pressing one specific key.” Ragatha scratched her chin, “Maybe it’s a special combination. Notes can have letter names — A, B, C, et cetera — so perhaps they want us to spell a certain word?”

“Ooh! A keyword! That’s good!” Pomni snapped her fingers. She didn’t hesitate to start sniffing out clues for such a solution — and it didn’t take long for the old chest beside the piano to catch her eye.

Her heart skipped a beat when she saw the lock — but, thankfully, it was only for show. Breathing a sigh of relief, Pomni opened the lid. The antique chest was filled to the brim with a series of long, frayed, dust-coated cardboard boxes.

Curiosity piqued, Pomni opened one and cautiously unfurled the bulky scroll stored inside. A series of small, perfectly-cut holes stretched across the yellowed paper. Some existed in isolation, while others were grouped together into long lines — as if a leaf-munching insect had eaten its way through the fragile material.

Pomni’s tonge prodded the inside of her cheek. “Ragatha? You said you played the…” her gaze flicked aside, “...violin, right?”

“Violoncello.” Ragatha deadpanned. “Why?”

“Well, I was just wondering — since you’re a musician, do you have any clue what these weird rolls of paper are for? They seem related to the piano somehow, but…”

“I’m so glad you asked!” Ragatha gasped, clasping her hands together. “Those funky bundles of paper are called piano rolls!”

The redhead had responded to Pomni’s question in plain English, but the baffled look on the jester’s face suggested otherwise.

Ragatha clarified. “Back in the day, these were used to play piano tunes without the need for a human performer. Each one plays a different song when loaded into a player piano.”

“Player piano…?”

“Oh, right. Sorry! That’s a special type of piano that plays itself. I’m not quite sure how it works either. But back to the topic at hand — see those little holes cut into the paper? Each one represents one music note. As the roll slowly unfurls, a sensor reads them and tells the machine which keys to strike.”

“Ohh…” Pomni ran her fingers across the parade of perforations that spanned the scroll. Slowly, she nodded. “...So it’s like a music box?”

“Now you’re getting it!” Ragatha beamed. The look on her face as she watched the concept click in Pomni’s head was a painting of pure joy; was it any wonder that she had worked as a teacher prior to her captivity?

Pomni sighed. She planted an elbow on the old chest and cradled her cheek against her palm. “Your students must have loved you...”

“Well, I did receive my fair share of apples.” Ragatha shrugged. “Never had to pack a lunch.”

“Wait, seriously…? That’s a real thing?”

“No. Not really.”

A silly smile teased its way onto Pomni’s lips. Heart stumbling, she turned away, fingers unconsciously fiddling with the old chest’s loosened lock. “S-So, um, is there anything else you can tell me…?”

“Nah — telling is overrated. In my classroom, I always liked to take a hands-on approach.” Ragatha said. She admired the antique instrument seated on the far end of the stage. “There’s a player piano right there. Why don’t you give it a whirl? It’s been a while since I’ve listened to music.”

“S-Sure thing! I’ll find a good one!” Pomni said, eager to please. Just about tearing the lid off of the antique chest, she rifled through its tightly-packed contents with purpose, scrutinizing the faded titles printed on each box. She didn’t recognize a single song, much less any of their long-dead composers, so it was anyone's guess as to what the music would actually sound like. She may as well have just swiped a roll at random — and, as a matter of fact, that’s exactly what she did.

Pomni set the bulky scroll inside the automatic piano after a bit of clumsy fumbling — and more than a little help from Ragatha. With the flip of a switch, the paper started spinning, and the premier notes of a lofty, leisurely tune stirred to life beneath the ballroom’s vaulted ceiling.

Pomni’s fingers drew circles on the mechanical piano’s smooth, wood grain exterior. For a moment, she forgot where she was, utterly fascinated by the simple elegance of the century-old contraption.

It was funny. The long-forgotten piece it played, humbly subtitled ‘a ragtime two-step’, had set her up to expect something more peppy and up-tempo. As the piano roll steadily unfurled, however, the melodic constellations impressed upon the paper sang a far different tune.

It was the type of jaunty music one would expect to accompany a silent film, just…polished. Refined. All of the musical tropes of the era were present — the driving bassline, the active, syncopated melody — but the piece’s dignified pace and finely-crafted harmonies would have sounded out of place in a rowdy, turn-of-the-century saloon.

Here in the ballroom, though, it was right at home — at least, that’s what the haunted furniture seemed to think.

Looking impressed, Pomni tapped her foot, wholly oblivious to the perplexing scene unfolding behind her. “Not bad...” She grinned, turning to face Ragatha, “To tell you the truth, I actually kind of ohmygodwhat’sgoingon—”

Pomni stumbled backwards, then forwards, then backwards again into Ragatha’s chair. The ballroom’s inanimate denizens — the one-hundred-odd tables and chairs scattered across its marble floor — moved all on their own, dancing in time with the mellow melody. A backing band of squeaking wood and clinking keys added a percussive flair to the player piano’s charming, just-slightly-detuned sound.

Ragatha, for her part, was busy cracking up at Pomni’s complete and utter bewilderment. With a quick breath, she managed to compose herself. “Well, when in Rome…” The ghost of a giggle still lingered in her tone as she offered up her hand, “Shall we?”

Pomni let out a mousy squeak. “Huh?” She flinched, head feeling light, dots flitting across her vision, “But—”

“Come on. Don’t make me beg.” Ragatha batted her eyes, “It’s unladylike.”

Pomni blushed. Without a word, she swallowed, shuddering like a frightened animal as she reached for Ragatha’s hand.

Her fingers curled snugly around the ragdoll’s, plush and doughy. Both women’s palms — one big, one small — fit together perfectly.

Pomni slid her other arm behind Ragatha’s back, powerless to stop the nervous little whimpers sneaking out of her as she lifted up the lightweight woman. For a moment, their faces were close enough to feel each other’s warmth — and it took every ounce of restraint Pomni had to resist asking: ‘Can I please kiss you?’.

With a brief, peppy fanfare, the music transitioned to a new section; the enchanted furniture, as if controlled by a single mind, adapted its routine in perfect sync.

“I, um…” Pomni’s knees trembled. This stupid furniture was making her look bad. “I don’t really know how to dance…” She winced at the thought, and then at the sight of Ragatha’s grave injuries, “And even if I did, how are we supposed to—”

“Shh.” Ragatha’s thumb glided across the back of Pomni’s hand. “Just…hold me.”

Pomni exhaled.

Holding her dolly close, the jester closed her eyes, synchronizing her trembling breaths with every other downbeat. Her foot matched the two-step’s gentle pulse, and before she knew it, her whole body was swaying to the rhythm.

Ragatha nestled her head against Pomni’s chest; a blissful sigh escaped her shuddering smile. The tension in her body dissipated note-by-note, phrase-by-phrase, as her darling rocked her back and forth, here and there, to and fro.

Back and forth they went. Pomni held her plain little ragdolly as tight as she could, finger tracing zig-zags across the curves of her fleece-soft figure. She adored the sound of her peaceful breathing, the way her hands cradled each other as she lay in her arms, all of her happy little fidgets as her body responded to the music.

Here and there they swayed. Pomni’s desperate eyes wandered to Ragatha’s lips, plush and glossy. Her heart was glowing, but just beyond, a profound emptiness, like nothing she had ever felt before, opened up within her. It begged to be filled, and pained her to resist.

Swing, swing. To and fro. Ragatha was weightless in her arms. The whole wide world, and everything in it, was wonderful. Just wonderful.

“Ragatha…?”

“Hm.” It took Ragatha a moment to respond. She jostled herself as if she’d just been woken from a deep, restful slumber. “What is it, Sunshine?” She said, keeping her eyes closed.

Pomni swallowed a shuddering breath. “Do you remember the day before yesterday? When we were trying to film the new intro?”

“That was quite a day.” Ragatha cracked a smile. She nestled herself closer, basking in the rhythm of each gentle sway. “I didn’t know you could scream so loud. Zooble, either.”

“Yeah…” Pomni tittered. “When you were showing me the way to my room, I remember feeling so exhausted, so frustrated. I didn’t understand why all of this was happening to me. What I did wrong to end up trapped here. I was taking it out on everyone, including you. But…”

“But…?”

“But you were still kind to me.”

Ragatha giggled. “Oh, come on. Don’t give me too much credit. You might hate to hear this, but you’re awfully cute when you get all worked up. If I’m being honest, the hardest part was not eating you up.”

“Cute...” Pomni felt butterflies. Her rocking slowed down, falling out of sync with the beat of the music. “That’s what you said about my hat hair. Remember?”

“I do! And I stand by it.”

The social contract of conversation required Pomni to respond with a laugh, or a ‘that’s funny’, or even a small, near-imperceptible exhale of breath — but instead, she simply stood there, thinking, utterly silent. And when she did get around to opening her mouth at last, her voice took on a noticeably different tone.

“R-Ragatha…?”

“Yes?” Ragatha’s mouth curled slightly — and not in the good direction. “Is everything alright? You sound like you have a frog in your throat.”

“Do you—” Pomni swallowed, “D-Do you remember what we talked about before? About…” she took in a shaky breath, “...something to live for…?”

Ragatha’s eyes flashed open with a jolt. The doll palmed the wet spot on her cheek, and flinched again when another droplet pelted her face. “P-Pomni! Are you��” she stammered, “Why are you crying?!”

“Because…!” Pomni’s face crinkled up, “B-Because, if you hadn’t said that…” she gulped down a long, shaky breath, “...if you had listened to me that day, if you had just left alone like I said…”

“Pomni…?”

The young woman’s tear-studded chin curled inward, coming to rest against her heaving chest. “... If it wasn’t for you, Ragatha, I don’t know if I would still be here…”

The old piano roll reached its end with no pomp or circumstance; the haunted furniture took a final bow, shuffling back to their places as the two-steps’s final chord faded away.

A century of stillness stretched between the jester and the ragdoll.

Ragatha pressed her hand to her lips. Pomni couldn’t blame her for her silence. What could Ragatha possibly say? Pomni didn’t know, and, given Ragatha’s flat, stunned gaze, it seemed the ragdoll was equally lost.

“R-Ragatha…? I don’t know how else to say this…” Pomni’s whole body felt twice as heavy. Her body was a paradox, sweltering beneath overwhelming heat and flinching away from wisps of unbearable cold. “I think I, u-um—”

Enough was enough. At long last, the two hearts spoke as one, crackling voices intertwined in an impromptu duet.

“I’m sorry, but…!” the jester squeaked.

“That’s it!” the ragdoll gasped, “I can’t take this anymore — I’m just going to say it!”

Together, they forced out the exact same words: “Can I please just kiss you?!”

…And time slowed to a crawl.

Each woman was the other’s reflection, looking back from the other side of the proverbial water. Ragatha stared, at a loss for words, gawking mouth twisting into a little half-smile. Pomni stared back, eyes aglow, wearing the world’s dumbest grin without a care in the world.

Smiles became snorts, snorts turned into giggles, and giggles bloomed into fits of gut-busting laughter. Pomni’s tears flowed still, but their wet, winding trails framed a face brightened by hope. “Did that just happen?!”

Ragatha giggled, pawing at her face. If she felt any pain — and she certainly did — it didn’t show. “Well?” she remarked at last, “I’m waiting.”

“Um…!” Pomni frantically nodded. “Right! O-Of course!” A bead of sweat traveled down her brow as relief gave way to worry.

She hadn’t the slightest idea of what she was doing.

Pomni’s stance bent backward at a curious angle. Ignoring the added strain on her back, she swallowed, tilted her face closer to Ragatha’s, and then…locked up. For what felt like an eternity, she just stood there, knees chattering, staring into Ragatha’s eyes with a vacant, absolutely petrified expression.

“...Uh, Pomni?” Ragatha blinked. The moment was ruined. It was horribly, terribly, soul-crushingly awkward. “What are you doing?”

“K-Kissing you! Obviously!” Pomni shifted around, forcing a shuddering smile. “I’m just, um, y-you see—”

“Is this how you usually do it?”

“Um, no. Not really…!” a beet-red Pomni shook her head, “To tell you the truth, I’ve never really, um…” her voice shriveled further with every word, “...I’ve haven’t exactly done this before…”

“Pomni!”

“Wh-What?! Is that bad?!”

“Goodness gracious. What am I going to do with you?” Ragatha playfully rolled her eyes. “Well, you already lifted me up. That’s a…start? I suppose? Look, just tilt your head for me.”

“Oh! Sure!” Pomni did — with gusto. “Is this good?”

“No! Not that much!”

Pomni let out a soft little whine. “O-Okay! Sorry!”

“There. That’s better.” Ragatha’s yearning gaze closed the distance, “Next, close your eyes...”

“Like this?”

“Well, yes — there’s only one way to do it.”

“Oh! Right…”

“God, you’re cute...” Ragatha filled her chest with a long, savoring breath, “...Now hurry up and kiss me.”

Pomni’s pounding heart was due to give out any second now. This couldn’t be real. Was this really happening? What had she gotten herself into!?

Slowly but surely, she moved her lips closer, closer, closer, until she could feel the warmth of Ragatha’s hushed breaths on her face. Her stomach twisted into a tighter knot with every burst of humid heat — but she’d come too far to quit now.

Carefully, very carefully, she—

“Ugh! Fine, then — I’ll do it!” Huffing just like a princess, Ragatha seized Pomni’s tunic, pulled her in, and pressed her lips against hers. She shuddered, squealing with joy as their souls linked at last.

Pomni’s eyes were wide, her belly flat, her face a bluish hue as every last gasp of air was suddenly forced out of her chest. Sharply, she breathed in again, and a familiar scent stirred her heart like a siren song:

Strawberries and soil and fresh-fallen rain.

[First Chapter] [ Next Chapter (Coming soon!) ]

#pomni x ragatha #ragatha x pomni #ragapom #buttonblossom #jesterdoll #pomnitha #the amazing digital circus #tadc fanfiction #tadc sunshine #pomni #lesbian #tdac pomni #tadc fic

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amandacanwrite · 2 months

Text

The Violet Thread of Fate ||

Reluctant Mentor Gale x Unskilled Wizard F!Tav

Length || About 4,000 Words

POV || Dual Narration, Third Person

Warnings || Descriptions of viscera, age gap (about ten years, both adults)

Summary || After waking up on the craggy shoreline of the sword coast, Elinna and Gale reunite with a new common ground.

A/n || I am feeling sort of on the fence about Gale's eagerness in his attraction to Elinna, but I also feel like it's still at least somewhat in character for him--after all in any playthrough you can wind up being blindsided by his feelings for you since he is usually so subtle about his affections. I also just think it's so fun to get the internal narration of Gale's attraction. He always seems so put together, polite and proper. I just love to see a man precariously balancing his carnal desires with his conscience and desire to be a good man. I hope you like it, I know things feel a little slow right now, but I'm planning on taking some creative liberties in the next couple parts. Please also lemme know what you think if you read it! I am absolutely tinkerbell and need the dopamine to live

Chapter Two: A Nightmare, An Awakening

Read Part One Here • Join Tag List Here

A Nightmare

Elinna thought she had died; thought the disintegration of her bodily form was the end of her short, unremarkable life. Much to her surprise, though when her vision once again returned to her she realized she had merely been spirited away somehow.

It took a few moments for her eyes to properly focus. When they finally did, she almost wished that the contact with the tentacle had killed her. It would have been far preferable to where she had wound up.

She found herself locked in a great chitinous pod, looking through smeared membranous glass at what she could only suppose was the nautiloid she had tried to escape from.

Yes…death would have been a far preferable fate to becoming a mindless thrall on a mindflayer ship. As she squinted through the clear panel in front of her and saw what appeared to be a brain walking on four spindly limbs, she realized that her fate could be even worse than regular enthrallment.

The minutes she spent entrapped in the pod felt like hours. A miserable limbo of wondering what would be coming next for her. What if she was already marked for turning into an intellect devourer? What if the enthrallment had already been put in place and she could simply be ordered to do something whenever a mindflayer so wished it?

She couldn’t just stay here. She had to move.

She tried, in vain, to wrench her arms free of the fleshy brindings within the pod. The sinuous tendrils only tightened more and more, leaving her fingertips throbbing and tingling from the blood flow being cut off. She tried to move her feet next and her boots sloshed in some sort of viscera at the base of the pod. She did her best not to vomit as the viscera eked some ichorous fluid into the fibers of her clothing and through the porous leather of her soft-soled shoes.

The last thing she needed in addition to all of this was to be covered in the contents of her own stomach–empty as it was.

The shock of panic cinched tight around her ribcage, making it hard to breathe. And as she struggled to get her lungs to fill, she also struggled to think.

“Calm down, Elinna,” she told herself. “Think about what you’ve read. Think about what you know.”

What did she know about Illithids? They were hivemind organisms. They required high-moisture, high-humidity environments to protect the mucosal membranes of their skin. They primarily fed on the brains of their prey and used psionic energy not only to fight but to control their biomechanical machinery.

She craned her head forward to look for some sort of control panel–something that could get her out of this cocoon of horror.

As she did, a valve-like door opened on the far side of the room, revealing a dizzying network of corridors. And…and one of them. A mind flayer.

Elinna went dizzy as her heart thumped in her temples. She watched in horror and sickly anticipation as it levitated toward something in the center of the room; a cistern of sorts from what she could see. It waved a four-fingered hand and the vessel opened, revealing a golden, glowing brine pool that may have been beautiful if Elinna didn’t know precisely what it was.

The mindflayer coaxed one of those disgusting tadpoles out of the amber liquid and levitated over to Elinna’s pod. She recoiled away from it as the pod opened, turning her face away from the creature and squeezing her eyes shut. She knew exactly how mindflayers reproduced, and she was not interested in getting a first hand experience with ceremorphosis.

She didn’t have much of a choice, though. Even without the parasite, the illithid was able to compel her to stillness.

It was an atrocious violation of her agency; surreal and nightmarish in the worst ways. Her mind was fully intact as the creature made her muscles release the tension they held and coerced her eyes to open. Her body was still and calm, but her heart was racing like a trapped rabbit’s. She watched uselessly as the tiny creature floated closer to her. She cried to cry out as it latched onto the orb of her eye and started to wriggle and squirm until it could find purchase beneath her eyelid.

She was silent. Infuriatingly, horribly silent as the creature continued to burrow its way into her skull.

Her pulse hammered in her ears as she screamed inside her own body, begging herself to fight, to tear her own eye out rather than let the process of ceremorphosis take place.

But her body was still as the tiny parasite worked its way into her eye socket and back into her brain.

Elinna lost consciousness as she felt the unsettling pressure of her brain matter being displaced to accommodate her unwelcome guest.

When she awoke next, she didn’t immediately know where she was. She only knew that it was loud and it was cold. The sound of air ripping past her pointed ears is what brought her back into full consciousness, and though her eyes were open, she wasn’t actually seeing at first.

There was a vast expanse of stars above her, the smell of salty air, the lingering cling of something far more acrid–like the smell of burnt sulfur woven into her clothes.

She tried to parse what was going on, it felt like she was sinking into the ocean–but if that were the case, shouldn’t she not be able to breathe?

Then she saw the burning wreckage of the Nautiloid and everything came back to her.

The travel to Waterdeep, the encounter with Mr. Dekarios, the parasite and…

And she was falling through the sky!

“Not again!” she cried as she stared at the ground rising to meet her with startling velocity. “No, no, no! I will not–This is not how I die!”

It didn’t go very well the last time, but it wasn’t as if she had any other ideas of what to do. She scoped out the approaching shoreline, selecting one spot and earmarking it. After choosing a point on a craggy cliffside, she shut her eyes and tried to gulp in a breath before it was whipped out of her mouth.

“Inveniam Viam!” she shouted.

That strange, surreal feeling of not moving, yet being in a different place came again, only this time it was followed very quickly by the feeling smashing into the ground beneath her, square onto her back. It wasn’t a far drop, perhaps only a few feet, but it was enough to hurt her. She blinked up at the sky above her, the glow of the stars somewhat dampened by the flaming wreckage of the nautiloid as it loudly crashed into the earth just a few moments after her.

She ached as she stood and looked out over the cliffside she’d misty stepped to, seeing the vast expanse of an unfamiliar coast crawling with intellect devourers and the blazing with fires choking out great plumes of black smoke. She dropped to her knees, feeling utterly defeated.

She had no idea where she was. She had no money. No food. Not even a change of clothes with her. She didn’t even know where she was–and she knew she was more than a little directionally challenged.

Her keepers at The Scribes Nest had told her not to leave; had warned her that there were dangers in the world. That she couldn’t hope to survive on the knowledge she’d amassed from books alone. That the lives of wizards often ended in folly.

She knew this, of course. She’d read extensively about every wizard she could find and more than half of them were done in by their own curiosity.

But the ones who hadn’t been rendered themselves undone…they were amazing. Elminster and Blackstaff. Lorroikan and Sammaster. Karsus and Dekarios.

Wait….

Gale Dekarios–he’d been touched by the tentacles, too!

And if she hadn’t died, then that meant he probably hadn’t either. If she could find him, if she could just appeal to him for one favor…maybe he could help her get back to Waterdeep. Maybe she would have an opportunity to prove to him that she could be a good apprentice; that she was worth the trouble of taking on as a student. Maybe he would know how to get rid of the tadpole squirming in her brain.

But none of that would happen if she just sat there on her knees and despaired.

She would need to get back up and put one bloody boot in front of the other.

She would have to be brave and she would have to trust that Mystra would guide her to what came next.

An Awakening

Hells…it just had to be a pocket dimension that saved him, didn’t it?

They were tricky little things–a slice of wild magic that functioned like an oubliette; a place to put things to be forgotten, or to be summoned at a different point in time. He’d used a few in his time, but never for more than storage during travel or to hide the occasional failed potion. He’d thought once that he might use one when it was clear that the orb would no longer be sated by the magic artifacts he consumed; discussed the idea with Tara before she requested not to speak of it until necessary.

“I don’t like think of that eventuality, Mr. Dekarios,” Tara had said to him. “I know I tend to be pragmatic…but it makes me far too sad.”

“Focus,” he scolded himself as he looked around the darkened pocket. He needed to find an opening–or at least find a way to make one, failing that.

It was a mistake that he’d even ended up in one in the first place. A mistake that stemmed from the first mistake when he’d tried to help that girl.

If he’d had any sense, he would have let her run and gone straight to help his mother and make sure Tara would be okay. He could only hope that they were still safely nestled at his childhood home in Waterdeep. At least he’d not seen either of them during his wanderings about the ship.

But then the spelljammer had lurched and started falling out of the sky, and he’d grabbed onto the strongest strand of weave he could find and followed it here. The unfortunate side of that, of course, was that the strength of that thread is precisely what made this particular pocket realm exceedingly hard to get out of. And the parasite so rudely deposited into his brain was not doing wonders for his ability to concentrate.

He held his hands up and closed his eyes, attempting to feel out the strands of weave in this darkened place. Wherever he’d been transported to, it felt very far away from Mystra indeed. Like whatever reality he’d blipped into was one almost entirely devoid of magic at all.

He focused a bit harder, the tadpole in his head wriggling with the effort. He continued to focus, trying not to think too hard about the unnerving sensation. Finally, with some challenge, he managed to pool some magic together. It felt similar to trying to collect enough morning dew on a leaf to drink.

There came a crackle, then a tear. Not nearly large enough to fit himself entirely through, but enough that he could get an arm out.

Perhaps with at least one hand in Faerun, he could channel whatever remaining weave he needed to fully escape this dark corner of nothing.

A sheen of perspiration shone on his brow as he felt around outside of the oubliette. He could feel the familiar moisture of coastal air and it sent a wave of relief through him. He wasn’t far from Waterdeep at all, then. Or at least he’d hoped as much.

Perhaps he could just appear on the main road and hurry straight to his mother to make sure that she and Tara were alright.

He was trying to grasp onto the weave when he suddenly felt the soft, almost tentative brush of fingertips on the palm of his hand.

A person! Perfect! There was no better way to anchor a teleportation spell than to another living soul. It would be a little complex to explain that, though, and he was sure a mysterious arm poking out of wherever he could reach was more than a little unnerving so he settled for simplicity instead.

“Hello?!” He called through the tear in the fabric of space and time. “Is anyone there? A hand? Please?”

He felt the hand withdraw for a moment, then it returned with what he assumed was the person’s other hand. One closed tightly around his fingers, the other grasped a bit higher, accompanied by the sensation of fingertips curling into the fabric of his sleeve. Small, gentle hands. Not small enough to be a child–but perhaps a woman.

He closed his eyes once more and took a deep breath, allowing himself to feel the energy of the stranger on the other side of the opening. He tapped into it, smelling the faint, sweetly lactic scent of peaches; tasting on the tip of his tongue the light flavor of…honeyscotch candy. If Mystra’s energy was violet in color…this energy was the color of the sky during sunrise…a gradient of lilac, rose and cerulean.

Pretty… he thought to himself before slamming the heel of his hand to his brow.

Focus you touch-starved buffoon.

“Whatever you’re doing is working wonders!” he said encouragingly. “I think if you just give me a good pull, I should come right out!”

The stranger pulled and he joined that effort by pushing himself through from the other side with what remained of that pooled bit of magic he’d gathered together.

Finally, he flew out of the pocket realm like a cork from a bottle, regrettably landing right on top of the poor woman who had helped him.

He was quick to shift his weight so he didn’t put the entirety of his considerable heft on the poor thing. Yet, his creaky knees slowed him down when it came to properly getting up. Then again…he couldn’t deny a certain reluctance to rise. He hated to admit it, and if anyone ever asked him he would deny it to the grave…but it was pleasant to feel the soft curves of a woman against him. A year was such a long time to be without it, and to feel warmth beneath him again…

It was a lascivious thought not becoming of a gentleman, he remembered, but one that occurred almost automatically much to his chagrin.

“Hells,” he said. “Forgive me miss. I’m usually much better at this–and usually not so long sedentary that my limbs can’t keep up with my manners. Allow me to–”

He lifted himself up onto his elbows and finally laid eyes on his savior.

It was the girl from before. What was the name? Elinna Inklynn.

She stared up at him with wide eyes and a face flushed with exertion. How hard had she needed to work to pull him out of that portal? Seeing her so close now, he picked up on some of the qualities he’d missed in the dim light of the Waterdhavian evening.

A constellation of mauve-tinged freckles dusted across her flushed nose and cheeks. In the daylight, her skin was almost pale pink. The soft swell of her lips sat slightly parted with a look of surprise. And her eyes…my those eyes were something to behold. Verdant as a sprig of mint and flecked with gold as if she had a vein of ore curling through the irises of her eyes.

“A-allow me to help you up,” he finally stammered. “You’re not hurt are you?”

“Not by you,” she said somewhat breathlessly.

He grunted slightly as he got back onto his feet, now allowing himself to think of the way her soft curves shifted beneath him. He reached a hand down and helped her back up to her feet as well, dusting off her theadbare apron and her slightly puffed sleeves. She was still flushed–perhaps dehydration or fever…or…

“You haven’t happened to have been on the receiving end of a rather unwelcome insertion in the ocular region, have you?” he asked.

The flush could be a sign of the beginning stages of ceremorphosis.

“I couldn’t have phrased it more repellently myself,” Elinna replied.

“No use sugarcoating it, is there?” he asked with a smirk. “I don’t suppose you know what these little passengers will cause if left to their own devices?”

“Ceremorphosis,” she answered without missing a beat. “At least–if we don’t get it handled in a few days…”

Well, color him surprised.

It wasn’t very often that ceremorphosis was talked about among the common man–it was even hard to find books detailing the finer details of the process. The girl may have been a poor magician, but she was clearly learned.

“Suffice to say, it is a process that should be avoided,” he said.

“Agreed,” she said.

It occurred to him that she was behaving…a bit stiff; almost aloof. The young woman he’d encountered in front of his tower had a bit more fire to her than this one did. Then again, they’d just gone through quite the harrowing experience. Both of them were covered in mysterious viscera, they’d been taken hostage on a mindflayer ship and well–the poor girl did just have a strange older man on top of her.

The girl bit down on her lower lip and he found his eyes unconscionably glued to her mouth. She released her lower lip and he watched as the pale pink color returned to it, wondering idly what it would feel like to–

“Are we just—are we just going to pretend that I didn’t beg you to take me on as an apprentice and that you quite sumerilly told me to bugger off?” she asked. “Are we just going to be compatriots now?”

He blinked down at her, his mind catching up with her words.

Good gods, he really was behaving like a lech. He didn’t know where this was coming from. Perhaps it was an undocumented symptom of ceremorphosis–this…uncommon desire he was feeling.

Or maybe he was just, well, desperate.

“Well, I take umbrage with that analysis. I don’t believe I told you to bugger off…At least not verbatim. I do try to not be a miserable ass,” Gale said a bit sheepishly. “But I hasten to point out that we do have a shared problem now–some common ground we didn’t have before. It seems wasteful to part ways at a juncture such as this, don’t you think?”

He looked around in the early morning daylight and frowned realizing that he didn’t recognize anything. “I certainly don’t know the area after all, and judging by the history you disclosed with me, you likely don’t either.”

“Well…no, I don’t. Aside from Waterdeep I’ve not been anywhere other than the Moonshae Islands.” she said.

“And you seem to not have a very strong sense of location judging by our time in the alleyways,” he pointed out.

“That’s true…so then… does that mean you’ll do it?” she asked. “You’ll take me on as your student?”

He grimmaced.

“No,” he said with not a moment’s hesitation. “Not a student–an ally. An equal. It’s best that we tackle this issue together, don’t you think? It makes no sense to travel separately when our searching will likely lead us to the same places. And besides that…”

Besides that, if he started to change into a mindflayer, he wanted to be sure he had someone nearby who could…put him out of his misery and get his body somewhere safe before it leveled a city.

“But I could be more helpful if you teach me,” she pleaded. “I’d just be a liability without your help.”

“I have seen your magic,” Gale said with a bit of a teasing gaze. “And I don’t know if there is much I can do for someone who casts Misty Step with their eyes closed. It seems you’d be more of a liability with the magic than without.”

She blinked up at him like he’d grown a second head.

“Oh, please,” he said. “You must know that it’s a spell that requires a clear line of sight.”

She shrank a bit. “I…didn’t know. No,” she said.

“How could you not know such a thing? You must have read a scroll to learn the incantation,” he said.

“I mean this with the utmost respect, but when is the last time you’ve read a scroll, Mr. Dekarios?”

He inhaled, lifting an index finger. Then he closed his mouth and looked off to the side.

When was the last time? It must have been ages.

“Well,” she said without waiting for his answer. “Most spell scrolls assume a certain basis of classical training, or at minimum an innate understanding of how to channel the weave.”

“I see,” he said. “I’m to assume you’re not a sorceress then?”

“Not to my knowledge,” she said with a sigh.

He clenched his jaw as he looked down at the younger woman. Gods, she really did need a teacher. Maybe he could at least talk to her about theory–or give her a few simple exercises for manipulating the–

No. No.

He had more than enough on his plate without adding a poorly self-taught mage to it.

“Elinna,” he said. “Tell you what. I have a deal to offer–a concession if your like. If we make it through this and…make it out of wherever we are and back to Waterdeep, I promise I will introduce you to some colleagues that will help you get your start as a novice wizard. How does that sound? Fair?”

To his great surprise, she still looked disappointed by that answer. The girl really was an ambitious thing–coming right to his tower to seek his tutelage and no one else's? The poor girl had no idea what she was trying to sign herself up for; a depressed, anti-social, explosive wizard. A depressed, anti-social, explosive and impatient wizard. As far as teachers went, he was not the best candidate for the job.

“Alright,” she finally said. “Let’s see if we can go find a healer together…or maybe some other survivors…of a bath.”

“Oh, to find a bath,” Gale agreed. “Ah, but–before you think you’re journeying with most ill mannered a man–”

Gale gave the young woman a slight bow. “Thank you for pulling me out of that stone.”

When he stood up to his full height again, the young woman was smiling at him, her pretty viridian eyes crinkling at the edges. She tucked a pale copper strand of hair behind one of her delicately pointed ears and looked a bit sheepishly down the craggy shore.

“Ah–it’s almost a dead end over here–I think there might be more ground to cover if we cross through the wreckage…but I didn’t want to do that on my own,” she said.

“A wise choice, I think,” Gale said. “No telling what you would have run into. Not to imply that you can’t hold your own, of course–”

“No, you’re right,” she said, looking away from him a little timidly. “I’ll feel better with you there–it’s nice to have a friend.”

He huffed a soft breath and found himself smiling at how willing she was to call him her friend. Even after all the ways he had been a bit of an oaf to her, he felt in her he had found a bit of a kindred spirit. Someone else who sought camaraderie in perhaps…unworthy places.

She looked up at him and bit the swell of her lower lip again. “Shall we go then?” she asked him.

He gestured to the road ahead. “After you,” he said with a magnanimous smile. “Consider me your ever faithful guard dog, ready at the first sign of trouble.”

She snorted a little laugh and shook her head.

And as he followed after her, for the first time in the last year, he hoped the pang in his chest was because of the orb.

Taglist || @auroraesmeraldarose @thoughts-of-bear @cherifrog @puckprimrose @drabblesandimagines

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senualothbrok · 4 months

Text

Prayer

Summary: The God of Ambition has returned to Elysium, and you did not follow him. You grieve for Gale, and you struggle to move on with your life.

Featuring Tara the Tressym and Morena Dekarios.

Word count: 3.8k

Non-18+. Gale x Tav. God!Gale. Heavy angst. Grief/mourning.

AO3 link

You let yourself into his tower. Morena had given you the keys, after your first few visits. She had welcomed you like the family you had always yearned for. The family that he had been to you, before he left.

You had moved to Waterdeep after the reunion party. You had not known what else to do. For six months, you had stayed in Baldur’s Gate, helping rebuild the city after the threat of the Netherbrain had passed. You were waiting for him to return. For a sign from him, from anyone, that he still lived.

But he did not. And after you had seen Him, and He had returned to Elysium without you, you had no idea what to do. Where to go. Your parents and brother had died of consumption when you were a child. Your companions had scattered. The man you loved, who you had given yourself to, was no more. Tara and Morena were all that was left of him. So when they asked you to stay in Waterdeep, you accepted. There was no other choice.

Dust swirls in the dimness of the hallway as you walk, your bags swaying around you as you call out.

“Tara?”

You meander into the library. After all this time, it still winds you – how much it smells of him. You blink away the memories that come to you. His hair brushing against your face. The musky warmth of his skin. The softness of his embrace. You set your package on the table, anchoring yourself.

Tara lifts her head lazily from the plush armchair which is the centre of her universe.

“Good morning, Tav,” she yawns, her wings fluttering.

“I’ve brought you a present.”

She patters over to you, heavy-lidded and languid. “You are a dear.”

With a flourish of claws she tears open the wrapped pigeon that you have offered her. Her razor teeth glint in a grin.

“You are so kind to me.”

You dip your head with a smile.

Tara takes her breakfast with you on the balcony. Mrs Dekarios is seeing her sister, she tells you, and will likely not be back until the evening. Your eyes roam over the bustling docks, the stillness of the sea. You cannot help but remember the first night, when he had brought your spirits here, while your bodies remained far away. The moment when you had become one. Another life. Gone forever.

You wonder if He is watching. You are almost certain He is not.

Tara licks at her paw with satisfied laps. You are grateful that you can sit in silence with her. That no words are needed to express the tumult of your memories. The cracks that open and re-open in your heart. You take a sip of your tea.

“You don't have to keep coming, dear. I'm perfectly capable of finding myself sustenance. And watching over Morena, if that’s your concern. Not that we don't appreciate your visits and marvellous company."

“I know.” You set your cup down. “But it's nice to see you all the same."

Tara regards you, her bright eyes wide. She misses nothing.

"Don't take this the wrong way, dear.” She stares, appraising you from head to toe. “But when was the last time you had a change of clothes, or went to the hairdresser's? You are looking slightly..."

You tilt your head.

"Dishevelled. Not at your best.”

It is something you already know, but you do not care. You have little energy for these things now. Your energy is consumed with getting through the motions of your days. That is effort enough.

"It's not a look I'm unfamiliar with.” Tara grimaces. “And I wouldn't wish for you to embark on the same trajectory…"

You shift, waving a hand. It is too much, to speak of him. Of the man he was. Even indirectly.

"I'm fine, Tara. I don't know what you're worrying about."

She frowns. She draws herself up, commanding your attention with her gaze.

"It has been two years, my dear. You are allowed to move on with your life. To move on from Waterdeep." Her voice softens. "From Gale."

You stand. Your cup and saucer rattle on the table. You hold them down, so nothing spills over. So nothing breaks.

"My apologies, Tara,” you hear yourself say. “But I must go. I need to pick some medicines up on the way back, to drop off at the hospice. And it's getting late."

Tara narrows her eyes. Her wings twitch.

"You are stubborn to a fault.” She sighs loudly, then slumps. “But I suppose, that's part of why he loved you.”

You look down, so she cannot see your face tremble.

“Take care of yourself, my dear."

You give her cheek a gentle scratch before you turn away.

"Until next time, my friend."

--------------

You walk along the sea front, as you do every evening. You rent a husk of a room within the hospice that you can never call home. You spend as little time there as you can.

The orange sky is bruised with purple streaks of encroaching night. He had conjured the smell of the sea so truly and vividly, a lifetime ago. He had wished, then, that he could have stood here with you. He had missed this view with an anguish that you felt in your bones. He had wanted nothing more than to take you home. But he is not here anymore, and you are alone.

Sometimes, you pray. You were never religious, even before you awoke on the nautiloid. You have seen so many travesties committed in the name of the gods, to people you love and care for. And from you, the gods have only ever taken away. They ignored your childish prayers for your parents’ healing, your cries as you watched them waste away. You could never praise or worship any god, after all that.

And now, you have seen this god that wears the likeness of the man you love, who speaks with his voice, but not with his heart.

And yet. Sometimes you still pray to Him.

You have never been ambitious. Your parents’ death taught you early on that everything could be ripped away from you without warning. You took nothing for granted – not the clothes on your back, the food in your belly, the people you held in your heart. It was enough for you to cling to them tightly, while you had them. No lofty ambition could tear you away from cherishing the things you held dear.

Now, you do not desire anything. You do not hope for anything. You are empty and numb, as though all hope and life in you died the moment you realised he was gone. Now, you try and fill your time by being useful. By serving. You work at the hospice, mending wounds, cooking and cleaning, giving comfort to the dying. You feel you are dying too, and this is all you can give.

You know he would have approved of these acts of kindness. Of these efforts to remedy what the gods do not, including the god who wears his face. Part of you does it for him, even though you will never again see his smiling eyes that radiate with the pride of love.

You do not pray to Him for ambitions. To Him, you know your prayers will be futile. Meaningless. You know He will not hear them. Within His domain, He will not deem them worthy.

But the tears come as they will. The sorrow is like the darkness he had shown you long ago, when he clasped your hand against his chest and you felt the orb eating away at everything within him that was good and pure and true. You do not think time will ever staunch its hunger. You break apart in secret, consumed by the shadows of all you have loved and lost. You are powerless to fight it.

“Come back to me.”

You pray it, more fervently than anything you have ever wished for. You weep and whisper the prayer again and again. It is a rending inside you that you think will never heal. You would trade your life for it, what little remains of it, if it could restore him as the man he was. The man whose eyes twinkled in passion at the most trivial morsel of knowledge, as though he could never get enough of this world. The righteous anger that reached out from his heart to defend those around him. The earnestness of his hands, the sincerity of his questions. The kindness in him which burned bright, even when despair threatened to snuff it out. The spark of humour that lingered, even in his irritation.

You thought you had shown him how much you loved him, but it was not enough. You had failed to convince him that you loved him not for his magic, not for a grand destiny he could seize among the stars. In loving him fully and without conditions, you had thought that you should stand with him in loving his dreams. His ambitions, even though they were so far from your own.

But you failed to show him that you loved him, just as he was. That he was all you ever wanted, and more than you ever dreamed.

The god that claims his name does not answer your prayers. And you know He will not. The man who would have listened has gone forever.

But you still pray, hoping that he has not.

--------------

People whispered about it in the hospice, when you first arrived in Waterdeep. You could not help but overhear them. ‘The hero who saved Baldur’s Gate,’ they gossiped. ‘The lover of the god of ambition. The foolish woman who turned down the offer to become a god.’

You tried to ignore their disbelief, to avoid their derision. But some of them cornered you. They demanded to know why. Why did you refuse His offer, when you could have had eternity? Why did you not become His Chosen? How could you turn down such glory? Such power?

You could not answer their questions. Nor could you make them understand. You could not show them how it felt to see Him after six months of silence, fearing he was dead, paralysed by not knowing. How it was to watch Him descend on you - an immortal stranger, draped in an imitation of the man who was the other half of your soul. A poor likeness, a travesty of memory. A garish monument to his hubris, to the darkest parts of him which he had battled against and lost. All his tenderness swallowed up by arrogance, the fire of his warmth extinguished by the indifference of silver.

When you refused his offer, you could barely see Him through the mist of your tears. You did not wish to become a god. You always knew what godhood would cost. Knowing the death of your greatest love confirmed it.

But there was something that remained in the steel of His voice and eyes. The faintest shadow of what you dared to hope was love. It made you ask, even when you knew what His answer would be.

“Is there no way we could still be together?”

Your voice sounded so frail, so desperate. The man you loved would never judge you for your vulnerability, nor shy away from it. He would have embraced it, drawing ever closer to you. But under His eyes of silver ice, you felt nervous. Exposed.

“I'm sorry, but no. I know what comes of love between the gods and mortals. I would never expose you to such risk.”

Even in this calculation, there was a semblance of tenderness. He would not make you his Chosen. In that decision, there was respect for the man that once was. The suffering that he endured. His wisdom, his kindness. And that tore you apart.

When He kissed you for the last time, a shock ripped through you that scarred your soul. It was dark as the mark of the orb that he carried and could never shed. His blazing face twisted for a moment in an approximation of pain.

“You may not wish to enter the heavens, but you do a fine job conjuring them here.”

They sounded like words that he would have said. Embers of his poetry. Ashes of his love.

He ascended in a haze of lightning, and was gone forever.

--------------

No one understands it. For how can you grieve for a man who died by becoming a god? It is folly, they think, to mourn an ascension to greatness, much less refuse to embrace it.

So you do not speak of him. You try not to think of him. But much as you try, you cannot forget. You cannot forget how it felt to see and love him so entirely, and to be seen and loved by him in return. To have everything in the boundlessness of his embrace, and be left with nothing on its withdrawal. You cannot let go of half of your soul, and the traces of his love that might remain.

Perhaps this is why you are drawn back to Tara and Morena again and again. An invisible cord joins you in your loss, stronger and more enduring than what is spoken or unspoken. You mourn together, yet you remain alone.

The next time you let yourself into his tower, you can hear them bickering. You make your way towards their voices.

“Frankly,” Tara drawls. “I don’t think those drawings are for our eyes, Mrs Dekarios.”

Morena chortles. “Indeed, Tara. I confess, I didn’t expect-”

As you enter the library, she spins to face you. Grey curls spill from the messy bun at the nape of her neck. You glance around in confusion at the boxes and crates that now clutter the room.

“Why, hello, Tav,” she exclaims, hobbling over to you through the chaos. “You’re just the person we need. Do you recognise this?”

She thrusts a worn leaf of parchment under your nose. It is peppered with elaborate diagrams, lined with arrows, arrayed with his neat cursive.

“No,” you say immediately, busying yourself with the flowers you have brought.

You do actually recognise it. There was an evening when he had decided to show you, in great detail, a technique he had memorised from ‘The Art of the Night’. One which you had both enjoyed at length in his tent, more than a few times.

Even that memory hurts beyond bearing.

Tara flutters onto the chair next to you, nodding at you in greeting.

“I think we should move on, Mrs Dekarios. To preserve our dignity, at the very least.”

Morena smiles wryly. “You’re quite right, Tara. I won’t push at a closed door, Tav, don’t worry.” She peers at the parchment again before burying it under a pile of books. “Still, it’s fascinating the things that you can learn, even when you’re as old and senile as I am.”

She squeezes you lightly on the arm, and you reciprocate.

Tara ushers you towards her armchair. You lower yourself into it, while Tara nestles herself into your lap. It took you months to earn this position of honour. You scratch the side of Tara’s ear as she starts kneading with her paws.

“You missed a great kerfuffle, my dear,” Morena remarks.

“Is that the source of this…?” You gesture around you.

“It is indeed. We were honoured with a visit from His Chosen.” She spits the word out like it is a curse. “That insufferable upstart from Thay. That loathsome boy has come to me three times, and it’s three times too many.”

Tara hisses.

“I couldn’t have said it better myself, Tara,” Morena mutters.

You do not point out the twist of the knife - that He never comes himself. Not to Morena or Tara. Not to you. The idea of Him having a Chosen, after your final conversation, is devastating enough.

You are almost afraid to ask. “What did he want?”

Morena’s scowl tightens the wrinkles on her thin face. “Apparently, there was a range of ‘personal effects’ that Gale neglected to pass onto us when he ascended. Now, two years later, His Chosen says his god is remedying this oversight, with apologies.”

“The man did not look apologetic,” Tara seethes.

“No, he did not.” Morena flicks a piece of lint off her sleeve with unbridled fury. “He looked offended to have been tasked with something so beneath him. When I asked him why it took him so long, he had the gall to tell me that the gods have more important matters to concern themselves with, and that time passes differently in Elysium. ”

You flinch. He had said the same to you, when you asked why He had been silent for six months. The man you loved was not capable of such casual callousness.

You need not to remember. You reach for the nearest box and pull out a book of recipes from Amn. You imagine him standing in the kitchen, tracing his slender fingers across its pages, his eyes intense and narrowed in focus, brown as fresh earth.

“My son was hopeless about many things. He was forever cluttering this place with a mess of trinkets and potions. Well, he did before his…affliction.”

“That certainly helped with the clutter,” Tara observes.

“That it did.” Morena sniffs. “But he was always meticulous about his books, his shelves. His correspondence. His affairs. He would never have left these things in this…state.”

She throws her hands around her in disgust.

“This Chosen. This god.” Her jaw clenches. “He makes a mockery of everything my dear boy stood for.”

She looks out the window, her chest heaving. Tara and I wait. We all have such moments, when his absence is suffocating, and it takes time to find our breaths.

“Well. I shan't bore you with the same ramblings that you’ve heard so many times before.” She laughs bitterly. “A god’s shit is a mother’s treasure, I suppose.”

You lay a hand on hers. She pats it briskly. She clears her throat.

“Speaking of treasure.”

She scuttles away. From a nearby shelf she retrieves a small envelope, creased and stained with brown marks. She holds it out to you.

“This is marked for you. There were a few others, crossed out and scrambled up. I take it that this was the letter he would have given you, but decided not to.”

Your breath catches. You try to hide the shaking of your hand as you take the letter from her. You stare at his cursive, more jagged than usual, bearing your name. Again and again, you run your eyes over it, over the places which his lithe fingers would have touched. The letter is unopened. None of you know what it contains.

“Go on,” Tara urges. “Open it.”

“Or do you want some privacy, dear?” Morena’s hazel eyes quiver.

You shake your head. You are not sure if you are ready. But then again, you are not sure you will ever be. And you are desperate, frantic, to cling to whatever trace of him that remains.

You open it and start to read.

--------------

The tears come and come, and they do not stop. The pain surges out of you like an endless flood, and the agony is so sharp that you think you will die. You curl into yourself, keening, wailing. And still, the grief gnaws at you like a bottomless hole which you do not think you will ever escape.

But Tara shelters you with her wings. Morena holds you in her arms, sobbing silently as you weep. And when it is finally, mercifully over, you clasp his letter to your chest. You close your eyes, soaking up the smell of him that lingers all around you, in every page and book, in every rug and armchair that bore witness to the miracle of him. You reverberate with the warm tenor of his voice, speaking his last words to you from the blue-green skies of another life, a light which washes over all the shadows within you.

You open your eyes, and you begin anew.

--------------

You are standing on the docks, clasping a bag in each hand. Morena and Tara had insisted on helping you pack for the journey back to Baldur’s Gate, but there had been little for you to gather. You had sold most of your possessions, except for your daggers, your surgical implements, a couple of books. A change of clothing. The carved duck from Halsin. A teddy bear from Karlach.

You have nothing left of him except his letter. You had not thought to gather mementos when you were with him. You had given yourselves to each other so completely, you had thought you would have time enough to build a life together.

Now you must rebuild your life alone.

“Gale.”

You let yourself speak his name now. It is not a prayer, but you hope he hears you, though he is no more.

In the distance, the faintest lightning bolt dances across the yellowing sky. It is gone in the blink of an eye. You are not sure if you have imagined it.

Then the air in front of you flashes and flickers. You step back, squinting as blurred streaks of violet and brown and grey form a misty image before you. A shadow in his shape. His soft face in a hazy whirl, his chest bare and unmarked beneath a familiar and well-worn robe. You are gasping, choking. You reach towards him, grasping for his hands. But they slip through your fingers like star dust.

“I love you.” You are smiling and crying all at once. “I’ll always love you.”

It is an illusion. A vision. A figment of your imagination. It does not matter, either way.

“Goodbye, my love,” you whisper.

His smile blazes, bright as the northern lights. He dissolves into you as he fades away. Through the space he leaves behind, you gaze at his tower for the last time.

Your heart is broken and bleeding, but it still beats. You are alive.

You turn and board the ship to Baldur’s Gate.

--------------

My love,

Firstly – please forgive me the scrawled nature of this note. My handwriting is no match for the Netherbrain’s tremors. Or perhaps my hands shake of their own accord. At this juncture, it is difficult to tell.

Do not misunderstand me – I am not afraid to die. But I am afraid of what I might leave behind me. That my sacrifice might hurt you so that your life becomes an echo of my own, your chest corrupted by heartache as mine once was by the orb.

I hope and pray this is not the case – that in the time since I left you, you have lived a life full of beauty, happiness, and wonder. That is what I will picture when the time comes. Only you. You were all I ever needed.

You are calling to me – I have truly run out of time. But you will not – that I promise. When this is over, your life begins anew. Treasure it, as I treasured you. That is all I ask.

Yours forever,

Gale

--------------

The sequel/counterpart to this fic is Absolution.

Liked this fic? You can find more of my work here.

#baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #gale dekarios #gale of waterdeep #bg3 fanfiction #baldurs gate 3 fanfiction #gale fanfic #gale fic #gale x tav #gale romance #god gale

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