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War, blood, demons, and famine — all terrifying in their own right — but very much tangible. You can experience war within your body, taste the blood upon your tongue, perceive the demons, and anguish in the famine. It’s not these things that unnerve Gale the most.
Gale isn’t frightened of the things that he can make sense of.
Piercing red eyes cut through the darkness of his room — disembodied and simply watching. Bound by his own body in a state between sleep and wake, Gale cannot make sense of the gleam of lips curled over elongated canines — much too large to be that of a human. Of the dark rumble of a chuckle emanating from the darkness. Of the figure vanishing as soon as he finds his ability to move again.
Gale isn’t frightened of the things he can make sense of, no. He is frightened of the things that are void of both logic and unexplainable in the volumes of tomes that line his shelves.
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“And you’ve been taking your potions, I presume?”
Gale studies Tara, feline eyes studying him in equal measure. A tressym as your therapist wasn’t ideal, but it was all he had available, given the circumstances.
“Of course, quite religiously. It doesn’t seem to ease the occurrences."
The mage hand hovering nearby scribbles, quill in grip, diligently on the parchment. The soft sounds of ink bleeding into paper fills the otherwise quiet tower. It’s always quiet these days, until the moon finds its perch and bathes his bedroom in milky white.
Then the quiet dissipates.
“The same visions? Or have you been experiencing new ones?”
There is a brief hesitation as Gale swallows thickly. It’s easier to try and tuck away those vivid images into the back of his mind, into the depths of his subconscious. But that doesn’t work, it never does — for the subconscious mind surfaces once the waking faculties disarm themselves.
“The chained man…”
His voice cracks, the words exiting his lips and falling into the space between them. His companion tilts her head, ears perked in his direction.
“The chained man, Mr. Dekarios?”
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Clink, clink, clink.
It’s been happening for days now, the clanking of chains echoing down the barren hallways. When investigating, Gale finds nothing suspicious. The closer he gets to the sound, the further away it gets. It won’t stop.
Clink, clink, clink.
The hallway stretches on seemingly into the infinite planes of reality, the view from his opened bedroom door dizzying and frightening. Gale knows this is a dream, and yet he cannot wake. It is more terrifying when you are aware of your inability to react, inability to wake, and inability to move.
Clink, clink, clink.
His faculties find him again, and he quickly shuts his door, casting a hasty arcane lock and backing to a corner of his darkened room. The fireplace flickers and crackles, the shadows dancing across his walls and bed like demons in their own right.
Clink, clink, clink.
Those demons pale in comparison to the being just on the outside of his door, the weave faltering under whatever foul magic they’ve conjured. This was no simple adversary, this was a skilled mage, able to tamper with Gale’s very own craft.
Clink, clink, clink.
“I’m warning you, I am not to be trifled with,” Gale warns weakly.
It doesn’t stop the spell from dissipating completely, the door jiggling and the lock turning ever so slowly.
He’s fitted only in his nightshirt, not at all prepared for any sort of battle — let alone one with a seemingly advanced magic user.
The door creaks open.
Clink, clink, clink.
Gale braces, preparing a spell discreetly. Then it fizzles in his hand just as fast as the threat enters.
The figure isn’t solid, instead a flickering and transparent shape of a man — features indiscernible. A simalucrum, perhaps, or an avatar. Pulsing bright cerulean chains bind them shoulders to toes, and it thumps across the floor as they trudge into the room.
“DEKARIOS.”
The booming otherworldly voice startles Gale, and he prepares another spell. A flame hovers just at his fingertips.
“Stay back, what do you want? I’m a mage of considerable acclaim, and I am far from any diffident novice. I’ll not hesitate to-”
With a flick of their wrist, Gale’s flame extinguishes.
“Sheath your magic, chosen.”
There is not much of a choice but to simply obey. And so he does, tucking his hands to his sides.
“Why are you here?”
“Ask me who I was.”
Gale studies him, ominous and faceless, sickly greens encased in tendrils of blue. It would do no good to further defy this entity. It would only extend the dream and lend a hand to his mounting anxiety.
“Very well,” a release of breath, mostly as a brief soothing to his fraying nerves, “who are you then?”
“In life I was known by many names: The Archwizard, The Arcanist Supreme, The Child Who Would be a God, The Unmaker of the Weave.”
It was clear now.
“Karsus.”
The figure tilts his head, as if acknowledging his recognition. Chains pull across the worn floorboards of Gale’s tower as he shuffles and sits in one of the armchairs by the fire.
“Sit.”
Gale obeys, settling himself across from who he now knows is Karsus, perhaps the greatest wizard who had ever lived. He smooths out his lavender nightshirt, and leans forward in rapt attention.
“You do not believe me to be real.”
The chair beneath Gale squeaks as he sits back, observing, wrapping his mind around logic. It was his mind playing tricks, it always was.
“I do not. These visions have plagued me for some time since…” His eyes fall to his hands.
The apparition also shifts, the chair squeaking just as Gale’s did.
“Since your folly?”
Gale’s gaze jerks back up.
“It was… It was simply a matter of ambitions, of-”
The orb throbs violently beneath the skin of his chest, and he grips it with a deep grimace. But that doesn’t make sense, Mystra promised to quell it — promised to keep it tame for an exchange.
“You do not believe me to be real, what must I do to convince you, if not for your very own senses?”
“Ah!” The fingers clawing at his chest resurfaced old wounds and scars from his previous times spent fruitlessly trying to remove the embedded evidence of his overstep. “By Mystra, I beg you to cease this!”
The orb dulled back to its usual light hum.
“Mystra,” Karsus hummed. “You call for her yet she does not stop my hand. Do you believe me to be real now?”
The orb twists again, burrowing a pain deep into his bones. The memories of his year in isolation wound just as deeply, attached by the thread of vicious flashbacks with each pulse of agony.
“Gods, yes! I believe!” It quells again, and Gale wipes the sweat trickling down his brow. “Why have you come? I thought you to be… banished to the fugue plane or bound by a relic.”
“I am tethered to the mortal plane, unable to advance into any afterlife or lack thereof. I simply… exist. I am cursed to live with the evidence of my fall from divinity, with the needling of my failures pricking at me infinitely.”
“And what of…” Gale gestures to the snaking binds around his entire body, “what of these… restraints?”
Karsus lifts his arm.
Clink, clink, clink.
“These were forged in life, well before my descent into the depths of shame. I began carefully crafting each thread of magic, each hum of arcane sovereignty, each twist and turn of planar binding.”
“But why, why would you craft such a restraint for yourself?”
Karsus pulls the heavy burden forward into the firelight, the green and oranges muddling together.
Clink, clink, clink.
“I was unaware. I was only shackled once I ceased existing. I was pitched into darkness, a display of my unwavering hubris mocking me endlessly as I suffocated. When I emerged, I was unable to move my limbs, for these tendrils constricted me like a snake weakening its prey. All of it,” he lifts his arm, showing off the heavy weight of the encumbrance, “is of my own creation.”
The fire popped, the flame’s light dancing on Karsus’ face. Gale clears his throat.
“That doesn’t exactly answer my question. Why me? What does this have to do with me?”
“If that is a question you have to ask, you are both void of wisdom and common sense alike. Or perhaps you avoid common sense as you do your hearing and vision. Which is it, Gale of Waterdeep?”
The insult bristles Gale.
“Now hold on just a minute- agh!”
The pain returns to his chest.
“Your ambitions have exceeded even mine.” Karsus comes to his feet, the chains clicking loudly. “For you have begun constructing your binds even in life. You are already bound to the very thing that destroyed me. Yet you do not see it. You have evidence of your own demise in blatant evidence as the binds that have taken root in your chest, yet you labor upon it still!” His voice booms across the room, echoing loudly and reverberating against the floor.
“I.. I don’t understand! I’m sorry, please!” Gale shields himself with his hands, as if it would do anything against a much more powerful opponent.
“I’ve come to warn you, warn you not to fall into the same path I fell victim to. I have arranged for three entities to aid you, each supplying you with the needed information to avoid an eternity of shackles such as mine. Do you understand now, Dekarios?”
“Three entities?” Gale stands as well, his knees shaking. “Please, just tell me what to do. Help me!”
“Goodbye, young mage.”
Gale reaches for Karsus, but he phases right through. Panic settled itself in his chest, and he squatted, tightening his eyelids as if they would erase the dread.
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
Gale’s eyes flutter open, and he is staring at the ceiling of his study. Intricate woodwork sprouts above him in magnificent forms, he always had a penchant for the unique.
“It seems to me your anxiety is manifesting itself at night, because you refuse to take care of yourself when you’re bouncing around on those two legs of yours!” Tara scoffs, and the quill scribbles faster. “Really, you’ve worked yourself into premature gray hairs throughout that head and that thing on your face.”
“That’s the problem,” Gale ran his fingers through his beard, the scratch a comforting feeling despite Tara’s opposition, “I don’t quite know if it was simply a manifestation…” He huffs, not looking at Tara because he already can hear the scolding before he says it. “It felt real, down to the orb-”
“Enough of that,” Tara dismissed him with a wave of her paw. “If you start believing the delusions, you’ll go mad. Let’s not establish another mad mage in Toril, I believe we’ve had quite enough of those.”
“Ah, quite right…” Another inhale and exhale through the nose.
“Of course I’m right. And what of the other? No more of the glowing red eyes and fangs now?”
“He still visits quite often.” Gale says it almost fondly. He doesn’t know why, as this entity was the most consistent in his torment.
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The new moon is usually when it is most active, though it tends to visit at sporadic moments. It’s just when the room is pitch black, the glowering eyes curiously hover ever closer. Always just out of sight, always covered in just enough darkness to conceal anything beyond pools of red and the slight gleam of teeth.
Gale charted the moon cycles endlessly, preparing himself for the nights when the entity would be the closest. His unending hunger for knowledge would not allow him to stop wondering what or who it was. Why was it following him?
His attempts at trickery or capturing the entity was always in vain. It would disappear as fast as it came, a dark chuckle left behind as remnants. Gale eventually gave up, and assumed himself forever a victim of its unwavering gaze. It became a sort of morbid comfort. Gale was alone these days — aside from his dear tressym — and the entity, no matter its simple observance, made him feel as if he had company beyond the drabbles scribbled in his endless tomes. Even if that company was malevolent.
Tonight was no different, as his mind awoke and his limbs stayed very much glued to the mattress — paralyzed. There are those eyes again, but they are so much closer.
“My, you are an interesting one,” a silky smooth voice purrs through the night. “You know how dangerous it is to not be able to speak or move, while predators prowl just outside your cozy little home, hmm?”
His heart pounds like a rabbit’s and his chest tightens with the inability to scream, fight, or do anything. Anything but watch as the chilled backside of a hand gently brushes down his cheek. Bumps erupt down his skin, and his hair stands on end.
“Oh, look at that,” The hand cups his face, and Gale responds with a small whimper. “Interesting. Very, very interesting. Imagine what I could do with you, unable to do anything but receive.”
Despite his terror, Gale keens softly, his limbs shaking with the urge to flee or lean into the touch. The unknown of which he craves more terrifies him tenfold. The hand snakes down his nightshirt, bristling the hairs and scratching with sharp nails.
“What a delightful visage you wear though. That’s all it is though, a mask of confidence when all you want is to serve, to give. Isn’t that right?”
The trembling in his limbs continues as the hand adventures ever deeper, until he feels his fingers twitching.
He shoots up in bed, grasping desperately at his night shirt. He casts a dancing light spell and directs it around the room. As usual, it’s empty. He runs a hand through his sweat-slicked hair, and takes a breath.
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Tara tilts her head, her tail flicking in concern behind her though she tries to mask it by subtly stretching her wings.
“How did you feel when the apparition touched you?”
That’s a loaded question. A number of answers pop into Gale’s mind — terror, embarrassment, disorientation, and most shamefully, arousal. He settles for the one that disturbs him the most.
“Wanted.”
Perhaps not the answer the motherly feline expected, and to be frank, not the answer Gale wanted to give. But it was laid out now.
“And I thought the nightmares involving a certain goddess were troublesome. At least we don’t have to contend with her anymore.”
His gaze falls sheepishly to his lap.
“We don’t,” Tara pauses, her head tilting in study, “right, Mr. Dekarios?”
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Sleeping was fitful, nigh impossible following the encounter with the hallucination of the former great archmage. Gale attributes it to his lack of sleep, his mind conjuring up delusions. His body trembles with the chill of the winter air, his throw doing very little to stave it off.
Then a familiar warmth fills the air. His body relaxes, and it curls around him like a protective womb.
It was the weave, pure and untainted by worldly magic or other planes of existence and their vices. Gale knows what this means.
“Mystra,” he says quietly into the night.
“Gale of Waterdeep.”
The voice is amiable, delicate and commanding in equal measure. It always has been. How he used to pray upon the altar to the melody that was his goddess. The devastation of hearing that voice call his name in the same tone and manner was jarring — as if they had no history beyond accessing the weave.
“Why have you come?”
He knows why she has come, but he still feigns innocence. It fools no one, least of all Mystra.
“You’re close to your goal, I’ve noticed. I hope you’ve planned for the appropriate action once it is completed.”
Gale doesn’t answer. He instead stares into her eyes, knowing he has never been able to pull the wool over her eyes, and there was no use in trying now.
Thankfully, she doesn’t press the matter. She offers her hand, which he inspects with trepidation.
“What is it?”
She cocks her head in a beckoning gesture. Hesitantly, he accepts.
A whirlwind of arcane sweeps them up in brilliant hues of lavender and indigo, and the momentary warmth dissipates and is replaced with snow chilled air. His shoes crunch against thick piles of snow, and he shields his eyes from the glow of the sun off the white blanketed landscape. Once his eyes adjust, he feels an overwhelming sense of nostalgia.
“Do you know where you are?”
“How could I forget?” The sounds of innocent laughter filled the air, games played by children in the snow — blissfully unaware of the perils of the world. “Mountainside, quiet away from the ruckus of lower city life but lively enough to keep you on your toes. When things were simpler.” He approaches a fence, leaning over it to watch a heated snowball fight between a group of noble children. “To return to a time when your only worry was snow trickling into your wool socks and wetting your toes.”
“But where is the young boy you used to know so well?” Mystra took his hand. “Shall we find him?”
Then they were in a library — but not just any library — a Waterdhavian library. It was a fantastical place, and a safe haven for him for so many years. Hunched over a tome much too advanced for his age was a young boy with scraggly brown hair, enraptured in the text before him.
“Is this the boy who was worried about snow in his socks?”
Gale huffed a laugh.
“I learned at a young age that literature was often company enough.”
“But you didn’t truly feel that way, did you?”
The truth was Gale found it hard to connect with children his age. They were unpredictable and didn’t share the same love for magic that he did. The only thing that occupied his waking thoughts was magic, and studying as much as he could. He had devoured tomes any chance he could get. The lingering desire for connection still haunted him even at that early of an age.
“No, I didn’t,” he admits, before following it up with a fond hum, “that’s where Tara flew gracefully into my life.”
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“As much as you know I care for you, you really should find companionship of your own species.”
Tara’s scolds were predictable — routine —- and that brought him a lot of comfort.
“If only it were so simple.”
And feasible. His only companions now consisted of his mother and the being that visited him in the nights.
He would never say it to Tara, but he hopes he never stops visiting.
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Limbs like boulders and eyes blown wide, Gale stares into red eyes no more than a breath away. A smile creeps across its concealed face, teeth illuminated by the moonlight. He can’t breath for the momentary loss of air from the sheer horror that races through his veins.
But something else strikes him — there is more than the weight of his own encumbrance. The warmth of a body is pressing against him, firmly straddling his hips. Hands are tracing their way up his sides, nails scraping faintly enough to prickle his skin and stir warmth between his thighs.
The being doesn’t speak this time, simply touching, tracing up his neck and into his hair. They watch — as if calculating and savoring his reactions like a cat batting its prey.
Then there are lips and, oh gods, they feel real. They are on his neck, soft and perfect and foreign. How long had it been since he felt this?
Too long.
Too long perhaps that he feels his arms begin to move and yet he stays still, not wanting to break this spell of desperately desired intimacy he had been craving.
The embarrassing twitch of his cock from such little affections have his hips bucking in search of friction.
And friction he finds.
Hips grind back down against his, and this feels real too. It should disturb him — should make him feel violated. But all he feels is another firm erection against his, only divided by his night shirt and a pair of cloth pants.
The urge to touch, hold, caress is overwhelming.
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
“Hello? Mr. Dekarios? The living would like to see you return.”
He blinked back the rush of endorphins from his vivid daydream. Lack of proper rest made daydreams and nightdreams bleed into one another. It was hard to discern between fiction and reality.
“Where was I?”
“You were talking about your dream involving Mystra.”
“Ah, right. Apologies.”
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
Mystra was as elegant and flawless as ever, stepping across the snow as if they were the clouds of the heavens themselves. Gale follows, albeit far more clumsily, until they happen upon the familiar tower that housed him for much of his youth.
“The beginnings of my pursuit into the arcana.” Being here filled him with pride, memories both good and bad resurfacing. “I believe my mischievous little unfortunate encounter with a slaath is what catapulted me into your graces.”
“I had been watching you for some time. You were full of power and potential, had you only been content with the privileges I had given you.” She gestures to the young man bounding out of the large mahogany doors, spritely and so full of life. “You could have remained like this.”
Gale watches the young boy — himself — joyous and laughing, casting cantrips in a flashy manner to impress a group of onlookers. The boy's shirt was unbuttoned, chest unafflicted with the perils of wanting too much. He touches his own chest where the orb still hums, no longer hungry for magic, but still just as much of an ominous presence.
The snow piles shift into pillows of the sky. He was back in Elysium — Mystra radiant with the morning light. Then he sees himself — a bit older but none the wiser. Perhaps he still wasn’t.
This scene he recognizes all too well. With nothing short of absolute devotion, Gale leaves his mortal shell behind and floats into the cosmos with her. He cannot bear to watch. He turns his head, a fist of pain deep in his chest.
“Watch.”
Ignoring Mystra’s demands was not something you could do lightly. And so he did. He watches their coupling amongst the stars, the bliss on his own face.
The scene changes again, and he is reaching for an unstable fragment, radiating with the remnants of Karsus’ folly.
“No!” Gale calls to himself.
Of course he does not hear. He never seems to listen to anything but the blinding intoxication of his own hubris.
Then that stubborn man is falling, until he is alone in his tower, having lost everything.
“Please take me home.”
The plea is barely over a whisper, and Mystra does not respond, but grants his request.
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“And did anything else happen that night?”
“No.”
The lie comes easy. Tara probably knows it to be so.
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Things are moving so much quicker now. Fingers snake down and pull Gale’s nightshirt up in haste, and wrap around his length. He was still in paralysis, but his cock was assuredly not. He whimpers as the hand pulls and twists, twisting gently around his base and thumbing over his slit with each pass.
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“You mentioned that the chained man was sending three entities. Did two others visit?”
“Wha-” Gale shakes his head, and slides a hand over his face. “Yes”
He’d rather not think about them.
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
Astarion is swirling his glass of wine, offering a smirk that has imprinted itself in Gale’s heart.
“Gale, what do you say you come to the underdark with me? We could run the spawn colony like a morbid little pack of children. We’d be terrible fathers. And by we I mean you, because the actual children would be your problem.”
“I’d follow you into the depths, my love.”
Scarlet eyes roll dramatically, but a wry smile plays at the vampire’s lips anyway.
“Don’t make me cough up this swill they pass for alcohol.”
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Tara quirks an ear.
“Was this a dream?”
Gale exhales, rubbing his face.
“No, I mean… I don’t think so. That was a memory.”
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Cool lips trail down his chest, his nightgown discarded somewhere unceremoniously. The flat of a perfectly soft and moist tongue slides across his nipple.
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“Mr. Dekarios?”
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The stars are beautiful, even under this canopy of shadows. They reflect in the eyes of his lover tenfold.
“I’m in love with you.”
The words came easily.
“I never thought I’d say this but…” Astarion hesitates, a tender vulnerability that Gale was seldom privy to gracing his face. “I’m in love with you too. I think. But…” He takes Gale’s hand, cupping it between both of his. “I don’t know how any of this works. But I’m willing to try, if you’ll forgive the inevitable mistakes I’ll make.”
“I’m not exactly a man with a flawless record myself.”
It was painfully true. But if this was a mistake, he would gladly make it over again to feel those lips against his.
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
A pinch at the inside of Gale’s thighs makes him groan to the canopy over his bed. Then the wet, slightly cool tongue was making its way up his shaft.
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“Blowing yourself up is a terrible idea, Gale.” Astarion eyes him with feigned nonchalance, but Gale could see something different in his eyes. “Quite messy, and I can think of other methods of blowing that’s just as messy and less, err… covered in viscera.”
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Lips slide over his head, and slide down to his root. The cupped tongue slides skillfully around and around, sending his head spinning just as quickly.
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“You made me realize I have more to live for.”
Astarion huffed a laugh. “Of course I did. It’s me, did you expect any less?”
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
The muscles of a throat constrict around his head, and he is so close it’s nearly unbearable now. He chances a look down at his visitor — into those red piercing eyes.
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“What do you mean you’re sorry? Where are you going?!”
Gale hesitates, but doesn’t turn around. He knows he can’t.
“Go to the underdark where you’ll be safe. I promise I’ll return with something that will keep you safe forever.”
“Bloody hells Gale, stop with this nonsense this instant!”
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
He recognizes those eyes.
But he keens, the heat coiling into his gut as he spills into that eager mouth.
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“Forget the crown, you stubborn man!”
The voice is fading. It hurts, but Gale knows this is what he must do.
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
“Astarion.”
“Once again you’ve allowed yourself to fall victim to the unknown of what you could have, instead of appreciating what you already had. Here. In the present.”
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-”
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
Once again Gale’s eyes flutter open, and he is staring at the carefully carved ceiling. But he is alone. No ghosts, no Tara, no Astarion. His cheeks are raw from tears, and he swallows down the next sob to present itself at the flickering memories.
The fireplace flickers and illuminates a cloaked individual who stands quietly.
“Gods, has the universe not decided I’ve had enough yet?”
No response.
“What is it you’re here for? I have no one, and nothing. If this isn’t evidence that I need to forge the crown, I don’t know what is. If not just for my own sanity. I cannot live like this.”
No response.
Gale sits up, irritated and irate.
“Answer me!”
It points to the door, the cloak concealing its identity completely.
Deciding that there was really no other option, Gale wearily gets up from his bed and shuffles to the door. He opens it, and sees what looks like a temple on the other side. The cloaked figure waits just outside its stony entrance.
The structure is dilapidated, and he nearly stumbles over rubble as he passes by the cloaked individual into the darkened interior of the temple. A dancing light falls over the area, and he realizes it’s a tabernacle.
“Why are we here?”
A cloaked arm gestures to someone crouched in the far corner in front of a statue — he can’t make out who it is from where he’s standing. Easing forward, the footsteps muddled into the soft sobs of a woman.
“My precious boy,” the weary voice comes.
“Mum?”
His knees protest as he falls to the concrete beside her, and attempts to comfort his grieving mother.
“Please, come back to me.”
“I’m here! I haven’t gone anywhere.” He turns to the cloaked figure. “What’s happening? Why can’t she hear me?”
They gesture to the statue just in front of them.
The dancing lights hover near at Gale’s command, and his heart drops to his stomach. It was… him. He was a god.
“I succeeded.”
It was a statement, not a celebration. He succeeded, but at what cost?
The planes shift, and he is suddenly surrounded by glowing mushrooms. It is evident of the underdark, dreary and darkened with nothing but the biolumescent biological life to illuminate it. There are spawns here, vampiric. Hundreds, thousands.
Then he sees Astarion, barking orders, directing tasks, and scolding a group of spawns for ruining the aesthetic with their dreadfully downtrodden faces. He looks successful, like he has a purpose.
He never needed Gale. He never needed anyone. Astarion would prevail. And Gale realizes something as the masked figure unmasks himself, and the silvery shimmer of godly skin reflects back at him like a mirror.
That he wants to see Astarion be successful. Astarion didn’t need saving, he needed someone to trust.
And Gale broke it.
He looks to the copy of himself, shimmering with the embodiment of ambition.
“I don’t wish to see anymore.”
─── ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅ ───
“Gale, I quite liked it when I had the bed to myself. You’re an insufferably noisy sleeper.”
The cyan and scarlet neon glow dances across Astarion’s face in the most wonderful of fantasies. He chases the lights with his fingertips, tracing cheekbones and the lobe of a pointed ear.
“Forgive me for intruding upon your kingly throne, oh wrangler of spawn.”
“I guess I can forgive you for now, if you take the spawn children this time. If I have to read another storybook about cuddly owlbears and pixies, I’ll throw myself into the sunlight midday.”
Gale can’t help the huff of laughter that escapes him at his lover’s shenanigans.
“May the gods bless us, everyone.”
“And on that note, I’m leaving. The gods can kiss my pale white arse.” Astarion emphasises that by standing and purposefully flaunting his bare rear at Gale, a smirk over his shoulder.
The crown of Karsus lies in Mystra’s domain, and he lies in Astarion’s bed, somewhere deep, deep below ground. If given the choice again, he’d give up eternity in the light for one moment in the dark.