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The Chionthar murmurs. It beckons, it promenades, it sussurates. The gentle arc of its many mouths leave bruise-dark marks against the sand that fade away as quickly as they’re made: A palimpsest of give and take over seconds and hours and tendays and centuries, the primordial force of the vast river gentling to greet the land with a lover’s touch. There is the barest lightening on the horizon, a pale glow that splits river and sky, dawn’s gentle fingers just starting to spread across the water.
It is the first sunrise over these cursed lands in a hundred years.
Wyll greets it with his bare toes curled into the chill of the damp sand and the gentle lapping of the river swelling to meet his ankles.
He has not slept. Few have: The revelry began late, well past midnight, and has lasted long into the night and now into the creeping day. Even now, he can hear the soft plucking of a lute, Alfira’s wavering soprano, drifting over from the square. He can hear the stamp of dancing feet, the laughter of tieflings and Harpers and gnomes alike half-drunk on spirits and the sheer joy of survival. The joy does not supplant the terror; it grows in the soil of fear and blossoms, stubborn, euphoric, the sharp blade of adrenaline balanced on its edge between the two.
Moonrise Towers had been a slaughterhouse. Blood and grief dripped from every surface. Certainly no place for a celebration in the wake of the toppling of the Absolute’s seat of power. After securing the premises and indulging in a brief rest, just enough to soothe the worst of their aches and dull the blade of exhaustion, the bedraggled band of Harpers and Wyll’s own party had made the long trek back to the Last Light Inn. A handful of Harpers had been left behind with sending stones, told to check in every hour. There was nothing they could do about the vast army marching westward, aside from send a message to Jaheira’s contacts in Baldur’s Gate and make plans to set a blistering pace to the city on the morrow.
But in the interim—a breath. A night of peace. Of restoration.
Of celebration.
And it is a celebration. It should be. The tieflings had survived the newest obstacle a hostile world had built in their path. Dame Aylin and Isobel had been freed from the specter of Ketheric Thorm, tormentor and father. The Absolute’s highest-ranking generals defeated, its source of illithid tadpoles destroyed. A god’s will denied.
It is almost too much to believe. Like a tale featuring the great heroes of old.
(Most unbelievable of all: A pact, undone—but he has spent seven years with the weight of Mizora’s leash around his throat, and he feels it as keenly as ever. Six months is a lifetime. He will not trust his freedom until he no longer feels her presence at the back of his eye. He hardly dares to hope.)
Wyll is not much in the mood for celebration. He is thinking, instead, of his father, collapsed on his knees. He is thinking, instead, of a vile parasite squirming its way into his father’s eye. He is thinking, instead, of Duke Ulder Ravengard standing tall at the side of the Chosen of the Absolute.
He is thinking, instead, about failure.
Wyll raises his drinking horn and finds it empty. He blinks down at it, befuddled, then gropes beside him for the bottle of wine he’d stabbed into the sand next to the log where he’s made his perch, close enough to the murmuring Chionthar that he could rest his feet in its familiar current.
There’s not much left. He swirls it, mesmerized by the faintest pigmentation returned to it by the glow on the horizon. Then he tips the bottle back and drinks direct from its neck.
He is thinking about the fear on his father’s face.
(He is thinking about “Go.”)
He is not so lost in his thoughts, though, that he misses the careful footsteps coming around the bend in the path down to the riverbank. It takes him a moment to recognize the cadence; he isn’t used to being able to hear Astarion’s footfalls. He suspects—with a warbling of something painful in his chest—that Astarion is treading rather more heavily than usual for his own benefit.
Astarion appears like a pale shadow out of the darkness, sleek and graceful. The infant sun touches upon his silver hair, sets it aglow with a ghostly luminescence. He is beautiful.
Wyll looks away.
“Hello, darling,” Astarion says, bright and lively. “You know, I can’t help but feel a sense of familiarity about this whole situation. A party with vinegar for wine … the drunken revelry of tieflings … not to mention, a devilishly handsome young man brooding by himself on the riverbank.”
Despite himself, Wyll smiles. It’s a touch wobbly, but, gods damn him, Astarion is a charming cad. “I’m not much in the mood for a party,” he says, and Astarion huffs out a little laugh.
“Yes, my dear, I can see that.” There’s a brief pause, an almost-palpable hesitation. Then Astarion pads forward, steps silent once more, and settles himself on the log a respectable few feet away.
The distance aches.
The last time they stood on the bank of the Chionthar, tieflings celebrating a world away, Astarion had crept close; had run a delicate hand along Wyll’s shoulders, his arms; had flirted and peered up at Wyll through damnably thick lashes, murmured compliments. And then: Listened. And then: Was kind, in his own way, obfuscated by a barbed tongue but sincere nonetheless.
It had meant everything to Wyll, to be sought out and seen and understood. (To be desired.) To feel Astarion’s cool breath against his cheek, the corner of his mouth, before those fangs pressed against his lips in a gentle kiss. He had tried to send Astarion away after just the one—but Astarion had swooped in for a second, just at the crest of his cheekbone, and murmured something absolutely filthy in his ear—something about Wyll seeking him out later that night, and the two of them finding out together if Wyll’s horns made handholds as sturdy as he thought they might.
Wyll had not sought him out. Not that night, at least. But in the morning, when Astarion pouted and sighed about missing out on the Blade’s attention, Wyll had thanked him, and kissed his hand, and asked if he would grant Wyll the honor of a proper courtship. The sight of Astarion—suave, sultry Astarion—flustering, pink high on his cheeks and the tips of his ears, had made him near-giddy.
Astarion had put up a fuss, of course. What was the point, he groused, of courtship and fairytale romances, if they had tadpoles in their heads that could turn them into tentacled thralls at any time—but he’d said yes.
And he’d kept saying yes.
He’d encouraged Wyll’s tentative hands, and kissed him with feverish delight, and touched him gently, without disgust for his warped features, and tried to give his body to Wyll over and over and over again, the very paragon of temptation, and they had danced to the rhythm of Wyll’s heartbeat beneath the serene guidance of the moon, and—
—and it was a pantomime. A reflection of Wyll’s desires. Smoke and mirrors to hide the fear and desperation at its core.
I had a nice, simple plan, Astarion had said. I needed you on my side, he had said. I want this to be real. I want us to be real, he had said.
All the while, looking small and unsure and almost wretched without the smoke and mirrors to lead Wyll astray.
He hadn’t put up a fuss when Wyll said he needed … he wasn’t sure what he needed. He wasn’t sure what he was feeling.
(He had felt like a monster.)
((He had felt—small. Betrayed. Used.))
Time, he had said. I need time.
Astarion has given it to him.
(He kept saying yes. And Wyll, at night in his tent, heart in his throat and vision blurry, had thought of every time Astarion had said yes—to a hand held, to a goodnight kiss, to swaying together beneath the stars—and tried to find the no under all the misdirection that Astarion surely had wanted to say.)
Astarion wrinkles his nose at the murmuring Chionthar and draws his feet up onto the log, away from the danger of getting his boots wet. “I suppose you’re worried about your father,” he says as he starts to tug his shoe off.
Wyll blinks. Lifts the wine bottle still in his hand—realizes it’s empty. “Yes,” he says. He feels slightly dizzy. “How can I not be? The Grand Duke is the most powerful man in Baldur’s Gate. With him under the yoke of the Absolute …” He trails off, nausea churning in his gut. “I don’t want to think what they could use him to do.”
(Does he know? Is he screaming in his own head as his body is puppeted? Is he afraid?)
Astarion peels off his second boot. Then his socks. Rolls up his leggings to bare his slender moon-pale ankles and the graceful curve of his feet. He wiggles his bare toes. They’re tinged the same purple as the tips of his ears, inert blood cool beneath the porcelain skin. The sight makes Wyll’s chest ache.
“Well, I wasn’t talking about that,” Astarion says, looking down at his feet as he trepidatiously lowers them to the damp sand. He winces slightly at the chill. “I was very specifically talking about your father, not the ‘Grand Duke of Baldur’s’—ah!” He cringes back as the Chionthar sweeps over his feet, drawing his legs back up to his chest protectively. “Gods that’s cold, how have your toes not fallen off yet?”
Wyll’s smile is lopsided. And then he realizes he is smiling, and there is a lurch of guilt in his chest, so painful his breath catches.
“I—I cannot separate my father from his role as Grand Duke,” he says, rubbing at his chest with one hand. “My worries, what I feel … it’s insignificant, in the face of what peril may await the city.”
Astarion sighs heavily and tilts his face back, closing his eyes. The growing light—pale and delicate as cornsilk—splays over his face, catching on his eyelashes and the curve of his lips. “Frankly, darling, I can’t say I care much what they use him to do to the city. There’s always some emergency or another, some hopped-up Bhaal babe slaughtering people or burgeoning cultists eager to, oh, I don’t know, create an army of undead vermin to take over the Counting House. I’ve been around 200 years and the city’s still standing.”
“The city’s still standing because heroes rose from the common ranks to defend Baldur’s Gate against every catastrophe that has befallen it,” Wyll says, frowning at Astarion. “We cannot assume that someone else will act. The Blade cannot assume—”
“Gods, don’t you ever get an evening off from hero-ing?” Astarion groans. He lowers his feet again, hissing through his teeth as the cold water greets his ankles, and continues, “The Blade won’t dull if you sheathe him away for the night.”
Wyll opens his mouth. Closes it.
“Besides,” Astarion continues. He’s studying his feet. “As … noble as the Blade is — devilishly handsome frontiersman he is — I’m … well. I find myself rather concerned for Wyll, and I’d much rather speak with him, if he’s amenable.”
Wyll looks to the slowly-brightening horizon, feeling very small in the face of its vast expanse. Astarion is oddly quiet beside him. Oddly patient. The Chionthar rises to kiss his ankles.
“I’m tired,” Wyll whispers, finally. “We were so close. But I was too late, again. Too late to stop the Absolute from kidnapping him, too late to stop him from being infected.” He swallows, feels his pulse shiver in his throat. “I’ve failed him. I keep failing him. What kind of hero cannot even save his own father?”
Astarion sighs. “Is killing a god’s chosen not enough for you?” he asks, voice dry. “Honestly, I find that much more impressive than saving one man from having a worm shoved in his eye.”
“That’s different,” Wyll insists. “That’s—it is a hero’s duty, to stand against tyranny in all its forms—” (and here, Astarion scoffs, disgusted, but the words keep bubbling forth) “—but it is a son’s duty to serve his father, and I—I have never been a worthy son—and I’m so—what if he dies, and I never get to explain? Never get to apologize?”
“You must be joking,” Astarion says. His voice is flat. Wyll looks at him finally, at the disbelieving arch of his eyebrows and the unpleasant twist to his mouth. He’s slightly blurry. Wyll blinks to clear his vision.
Whatever Astarion sees on his face in return is enough for his expression to soften. “You don’t owe that man a godsdamned thing,” he says, and it’s almost gentle. “Not an explanation. Not an apology.” He sniffs, haughty. “If anything, I’d like to hear him try to explain himself—”
“He did what he had to to protect the city,” Wyll says, rote. Automatic. Words that he’s carved into himself as sure as he’s whittled himself into the shape of a blade. He has clung to those words for seven years.
“Yes, yes, I’m sure one seventeen year old warlock is a dire threat to Baldur’s Gate,” Astarion drawls. “Such a heroic man, casting his son out without even asking for an explanation …”
“I couldn’t,” Wyll says, “I couldn’t explain, my words were bound—”
“And that didn’t seem suspicious to him? Honestly, Wyll, you act as though the man is infallible, but frankly if you’ve got a boy in front of you who is clearly under some sort of geas, would your first impression be to banish him, or to summon a cleric?”
“He did what he had to,” Wyll says again. His mouth feels numb.
“He did a tremendously stupid thing that says rather dire things about his intellect, if you ask me,” Astarion sniffs.
“He is my father,” Wyll splutters, scandalized.
“He’s done nothing to earn your loyalty,” Astarion says, and his voice now is sharp, brittle. “Don’t get on your knees and beg him for breadcrumbs. You deserve better.”
Wyll’s stomach turns over.
(Astarion, shoulders rounded protectively, arms clasped around himself. A low tremor in his voice as he says, A part of me feels sick when I think about getting on my back for breadcrumbs again.)
“That—that’s not—it’s not the same,” Wyll says, tongue thick and ungainly. “I’m not … ”
Astarion just looks at him, eyes bruise-tired but sharp. “Oh, little hero,” he murmurs, “it’s exactly the same. How much of yourself have you carved away to be what other people want of you?”
(Mizora’s claws tearing through his eye, curving along his face in a cruel facsimile of a lover’s touch, as he tries not to scream—)
“Everything I’ve given has been for the good of the people,” Wyll says as steadily as he can manage when he can feel his pulse, trapped and fluttering in his throat. “I regret none of it.”
Astarion studies him, brow furrowed, for long moments. “You really believe that,” he murmurs. “Gods.” He shakes his head. “This is going to kill you someday, you know. Pact or no pact. You can’t just—give pieces of yourself away, for nothing! For a pat on the head and vinegar for wine! You are so much better than that, Wyll!”
“The people of Faerûn deserve a hero who will give anything, everything, to protect them.”
“And what about you?” Astarion asks. A note of pleading slips into his voice. “Don’t you deserve better than to let people use you until you’ve been worn away to nothing?”
“It’s not like that—”
Astarion scoffs. His upper lip is curled into a sneer that reveals the blades of his teeth.
“It is an honor to serve Faerûn’s people,” Wyll says, more quietly now. “Being the Blade … it has given me more than it’s ever taken away.”
Astarion glares out towards the horizon, but he doesn’t respond. Perhaps sick of Wyll’s bull-headed, fool-hearted fairy tale nonsense, as he’s phrased it before. There’s something almost endearing about the tense twist of his lips, almost a pout but for the sliver of fangs still visible beneath a half-hearted sneer.
They sit in silence. The slowly rising sun spills light outwards in peach hues that seem to soften the world.
Eventually, Astarion heaves a sigh. “Look.” Astarion crosses his legs; uncrosses them. “I—I may be new to this whole ‘caring about people’ thing, but … I know I don’t want to see you hurt. I find myself … frustrated when you just let people use you.” He picks at the nails of one hand. “It bothers me, I suppose. And I—worry about it. About you.”
“Astarion,” Wyll murmurs. He doesn’t know what to say, what to do with his hands. The tone of Astarion’s voice—soft, halting, achingly earnest—spears him between his ribs, as sure as a thrust sword might seek his heart. He tries to think if anyone has ever spoken so angrily on his behalf. It is odd, to enjoy it, knowing that Astarion is wrong, but …
Is it so bad? To take pleasure in being defended? Even if said defender is a spiteful vampire reproachful of the very concept of helping people?
The guilt squirms beneath his breast bone, but more quietly than before.
Astarion looks at him out of the corner of his eye. One fang worries at his lower lip. “I—hm.” He clears his throat. “I’m—I also wanted to talk about … what I said. Last tenday. About us.”
The baffling, tender warmth of Astarion’s protective though poisoned words seems to chill.
“Alright,” Wyll says slowly, cautiously.
Astarion squirms under the weight of his attention. “I meant what I said,” he starts quietly. “You—you’re incredible. You deserve something real. And you—deserve an apology.”
Wyll’s heart lurches.
“I didn’t say it, before,” Astarion continues. He has clasped his hands in his lap and is twisting them together. “But I am sorry. I’m sorry for using you. For seeing you as a means to an end, instead of a person. So. I’m sorry. Really, truly sorry.”
“You owe me no apologies,” Wyll says. “What you did … I understand why you did it. You were scared, you—”
“I’m always scared,” Astarion scoffs. “But that doesn’t exactly change what I did, does it? I tried to manipulate you into falling for me so you would be my shield and my weapon. And it would have worked—it did work—if I hadn’t … well.”
(All you had to do was fall for it, and all I had to do was not fall for you.)
“No harm was done,” Wyll says, but his throat is tight.
“Gods, you’re infuriating,” Astarion mutters. “Could you please just let me be sorry I hurt you? Unless you can honestly say I didn’t.”
(A month of tender courtship scrutinized. Every held hand, every embrace, every kiss examined—Did he want to say no? How could I have not realized he didn’t want it?)
((The clawing pain as he realized that he had not been sought out due to understanding or affection or desire. That the sheer relief of that first night on the banks of the Chionthar, and every night thereafter, was a lie.))
Astarion smiles, very small and very bitter. “That’s what I thought,” he says in a voice of forced levity.
But I don’t blame you, Wyll wants to say. But I understand. Didn’t I hurt you, too? How many times did you say yes when you wanted to say no?
“Did you mean it?” is what Wyll finally manages to say.
“Mean what? ‘I’m sorry’?”
“What you said that night. That you wanted us to be real.”
Astarion’s face softens. Under the pure gold of the sun’s kiss, he looks almost otherworldly.
“More than anything,” Astarion says, very quietly. “I wish I’d realized it sooner.”
“Oh,” Wyll says.
His cheeks feel very warm. The sun is rising in earnest now, its heavy belly only just scraping the horizon as it ascends.
Astarion’s hands are still folded on his lap.
Feeling oddly as though he is floating, Wyll reaches out and gently touches Astarion’s wrist. The look Astarion gives him in return is almost difficult to look at, it is so nakedly relieved. There is something in the soft creases at the corners of his eyes and the delicate, pleased curve of his mouth that makes Wyll think of happily ever afters.
“Dance with me?” Astarion says, almost shy.
Wyll cannot control his smile in response. He stands, feet sloshing through the water, and sketches a bow. “It would be my pleasure, good saer.”
“Such a proper gentleman,” Astarion teases, but he gets to his feet with a little giggle that makes Wyll’s cheeks ache from the force of his smile. Wyll leads them a few steps away from the log, onto drier sand. Astarion’s hand is cold, but Wyll’s is colder when he lets go.
Alfira is still playing her lute. It’s a slower tune, now, peaceful, bright, in perfect duet with the sun as it settles gladly into morning.
Astarion sets a hand on Wyll’s waist. His shoulder. Wyll mirrors him, and at the opening of the next measure, he steps in. Astarion steps back to match, and Wyll begins to guide him through a simple peasant dance he doesn’t remember the origins of. It is a dance he has seen plenty of couples sway to in the tired aftermath of victory, content merely to be close.
He leads their dance to the shoreline, where the Chionthar playfully nips at their heels, and then back to dry sand. Slow rotations as they circle together and then apart, arms outstretched so their fingers just barely brush at the apex of the turn. In again, and Astarion slots himself so very neatly up against Wyll’s chest it nearly takes his breath away. Wyll falters, misses a step; moves back in to make a place for himself in the circle of Astarion’s arms.
They sway for a moment there, caught in orbit close enough for their breath to mingle. Astarion’s eyes are so vivid in the pale morning light.
“Wyll,” Astarion says, very quietly, and Wyll can feel the shape of his own name caress his mouth.
“May I?” Wyll breathes, and Astarion’s eyes crinkle into a smile that rivals the sun for its brightness. In lieu of responding, Astarion brushes his lips against the corner of his mouth. A soft, chilly touch that makes Wyll’s breath catch in his throat. He tilts his head, and their mouths catch. The curve of a lip, the point of a fang. A quiet sigh that passes from one mouth to the other. The cheeky flick of a tongue along his bottom lip, begging for a taste.
Wyll eases back after a minute or an hour or a year. His mouth is slick and tingling. There is a very faint blush high on Astarion’s face. Wyll has never seen him look so unguarded.
Just because he can, Wyll kisses the tip of Astarion’s nose. Astarion huffs a laugh and kisses his chin in turn, then tucks himself in close, chest to chest, head cradled at the crook of neck and shoulder.
Astarion’s nose is cold against Wyll’s neck. His hands are light where they’re placed on his back—like he’s not quite sure what to do with them. Wyll wishes he could rest his head on Aatarion’s shoulder in turn, turn his face into Astarion’s neck and press a kiss to that silent place where a heartbeat should be—but these damned horns …
Instead, he lets himself wrap his arms tighter around Aatarion. One arm around his waist; the other, holding him about the shoulders. Secure, but not hard. He realizes, with a quivering sort of horror, that he can feel what he now recognizes are scars beneath the thin fabric of Astarion’s shirt. Had he truly not realized, before Raphael stripped Astarion bare to make a spectacle of his pain? He tries to think back. He had felt the unevenness, surely, at some point. Or—had he perhaps simply never held Astarion like this when Astarion wasn’t doing his best to distract him with feverish kisses and clever hands?
He sweeps his palm in a slow arc along Astarion’s spine. The scars are knotted and thick even with the fabric in the way.
There’s a soft little sigh. The barest breath, a minute tensing, and then Astarion seems to go boneless. He melts against Wyll, cheek rubbing against Wyll’s shoulder as he settles more heavily into Wyll’s embrace.
His is a weight that makes Wyll’s chest ache to bear. His own cheek settles against Astarion’s temple. The strain of his neck, still not fully accustomed to the weight of his horns, eases. The sun’s warmth drapes over them.
For a long moment, he marvels at how they fit together.
“I don’t know what comes next,” Astarion says, quiet, the words catching in the hollow of Wyll’s throat. “I can’t promise you that your father will be safe. But I can promise that, whatever the future holds for you, you won’t face it alone.”
Wyll’s throat is very tight. He looks westward, along the river, where somewhere far in the distance his father and Baldur’s Gate await him. Astarion shifts against him, pulls away just enough so he can follow Wyll’s gaze. One of his hands slips from Wyll’s back—finds Wyll’s hand and squeezes it, instead. Together, they look westward, towards an uncertain future, illuminated by the new dawn.