Archive of Our Own

It was like a scar had been cut into the soil and sky between the sunny, mountainous heights of the Mountain Pass, and the darkness that loomed ahead where the Shadowcursed lands lay. Halsin had named a town within ‘Reithwin’, where memories of battle and Sharran corruption still sat raw in his heart. Like an iron toad of regret.

He spoke little in the manner of detail of the place, other than its proximity to the Moonrise Towers, though the wood elf’s eyes oft shifted into narrowed disapproval over Shadowheart’s enthusiasm regarding the subject.

“It was Shar’s will that the lands fell before her might and majesty. It can only be determined She will protect us while we carry out her commands.” She said, ignoring Halsin’s low growl as they pressed forward

Intrinsic devotion was a concept far more alien to Gale’s thought processes than, as he had recently found out, the illithid hive mind they were all fighting to forestall. It required one to be seeking and accepting his faith and the devotion to his goddess, without the need for praise or reward.

He did not know how to feel any other way. Her hand had erased all other concepts of love bar hers.  Even the memory of the few flings he had before her – like that sweet young lad he had fallen head over heels for as a gangly teen – paled in the light of her might and majesty. Thus later, as he stood while Elminster passed on her grace to halt the progressing corruption of the Orb, he felt almost elated that she even remembered his existence. The weave caressed his heart, almost with a fleeting lover’s touch before the pressure began to build.

Gale’s brow creased. “It feels a little…well – “

“Only a few moments more.” Elminster’s eyes were closed as he murmured the words of Mystra’s spell.

Should he have possibly halted the elder wizard’s hand, cessating the boon and responsibility their goddess had placed upon him to absolve himself for his unholy transgressions? Possibly, but that thought was nary within the ability for Gale to fathom at this moment. Not while he was still trying to accompass Mystra’s commands to end his life – and possibly his entire existence.

Not while her might and magic was burning through his very soul.

That night – as they made camp to rest before entering the Shadows – Gale rubbed habitually at the mark over his sternum. It was at peace and no more plagued him with its voracious hunger and pain. Though a new weakness had leadened his limbs, he lay awake. Counting through base eight arithmetic, he used the octal shapes of the patterns in the tent canvas to visualise how the square of any number – less one – would result in a number that would fit into eight most perfectly.

He squinted at a dangling makeshift wind chime – still and silent with the flaps of his tent closed – evading his sight. It had pieces of octagons within, he knew. So he cast a ‘light’ cantrip so as avail himself of the shapes that plagued his mind.

Another folly; casting any spells so soon after what Mystra had bestowed upon him. His body become weighted, like sand piles made of iron fragments were heaped upon him and the air itself grew thick and close. He could barely catch his breath for how like a newborn babe he suddenly felt. The orb throbbed within his breast, as though to remind each breath they were only allowed to be drawn so long as it tolerated them.

Humbled and reminded again of his foolishness and stupidity, Gale, forced his racing heart to calm and let the air return to him. Gradually and without more panic than was absolutely needed. Not that panic was ever needed, he chastised himself as the heaviness slowly lifted and air was returned to him. The weakness remained however, which he took as the hint needed to down a potion that would induce the slumber he could not readily chase.

After all, a good wizard needed to be well rested to be useful.

**~**~**~**

How did one truly calculate loss? Philosophy oft did wax poetic over the merits of carving a weapon from the space loss and grief left in their wake, to somehow make it into something that somehow fought off the pain. The empty space would then solidify in the weight and shape of the lost object, person or place, sitting heavy in the heart in the manner of a lump of cold iron. Of course, as time flowed, grief always seemed to lessen. But in reality, it remained the same size, weight and shape – the wrongness of it always present to remind one of what was there before, and what would never be again.

It was only the lived experiences growing more in number around it that caused the illusion of its reduction. Then here and there, the grief would surface and be felt almost as clearly as the day it planted its dark seed within.

The Shadowlands – cursed by the Lady of Loss, a constant reminder of grief – was perfectly apropos to its namesake. The oppressive nature of the unnatural was almost an afterthought to their resident holy cleric, who strode through the shadows that brushed lightly over her like a lover’s touch, while biting into their own limbs with craven, rotted jaws. Clamping down hard enough to make stumbling over air become a common enough occurrence, that even Lae’zel began calling for frequent halts.

To relight torches, she said. Or glare at their wizard for being unable to cast even a simple cantrip, so determined she was to use those excuses. But – despite his own problems concerning the weave holding the orb at bay – Gale noticed the hesitation in her normally poised demeanour, and the tremor of a hand that would escape her attention as she held a light aloft to see her way.

With their nerves shredded, aching weariness pulling at their bones and the group’s attention scattered in the mire of uncertainty, it was only a matter of time before the jaws of the shadowed blight emerged out of allegory and into reality.

They simply never saw it coming.

Astarion took the first hit when a claw of darkness and mist rent a gaping wound over his spine, his light leather armour barely able to withstand such a sudden attack and all hells broke loose as he stumbled forward with a pained cry. Wyll’s eldritch magic flew past Gale’s ear and slammed into the creature before the mage could even blink. Then the young warlock was already by the vampire’s side in the next moment, grabbing him bodily and dragging him into the more concentrated circle of light.

It happened so fast that Gale felt like he was moving in slow motion, the whirl of action from the fighters in their midst, pairing up and protecting their backs while pushing the injured to the centre to be healed by Shadowheart or Halsin a frenzy of movement that he could not follow. There was magic pulsing in the air, Karlach’s cry as she cut into creatures that had no true existence and the noise. Oh the constant noise of the never ending death rattles of the corpses turned shadow and ash.

It baffled his senses, battering them from all sides with flashes of light, the constant oppressiveness of it all. Even the smell confused him and overwhelmed conscious thought. But precious time was passing, and he was a once renowned wizard not currently protecting his own. Cantrips of light obviously could not cooperate under such cursed circumstances, but he had many other spells up his sleeves.

Being ambushed by shades in a land of darkness and shadow felt quite unfair he felt, in the grand scheme of things. It was not like they hadn’t already courted constant death with all odds stacked against them thus far. This behaviour of the Fates was truly petty, almost priggish in what wanton mishaps and dangers constantly attacked them from all sides. Both figuratively and literally, as they were now again experiencing. Much to his annoyance and dismay. Gale planted his feet into the dirt and tried to shake off the lethargy that dogged his every step since entering these accursed lands, counting to eight as his hands remembered how to cast before his own mind had even cottoned onto the unconscious act.

Being a wizard that could conduct the currants of his own Mistress of Magic on such instant instinct was a useful necessity. He did not need precision for where to aim the art of the weave, for the missiles would regardless hit their targets.

Or they would have, had his arms not suddenly spasmed and the ground come up to meet him.

It was critical failure of his own body that so mentally sideswiped him, that he did not even get the chance to catch himself as he hit the solidly packed, dead soil. A crack, then blinding agony spreading across his face was all the evidence he had that his nose was broken, and then the true ordeal began.

Fire, racing through his body from the tips of his fingers to his toes, burning invisible scores through flesh that felt like he was being simultaneously flayed and thrashed. But he was untouched by flames, and his body remained intact. Was it? He could feel the skin between his toes within thick leather boots, which were still strapped to calf muscles actively twitching under the pressure of the growing affliction.

It was impossible, that his body remained somehow whole.

He thought.

He felt.

Another second of eternity passed, when white hot shards of ice slammed into his torso and lodged themselves within his chest, melting through the core of his very being. His strained heart heaved, near writhing within him as it fought and fought to continue beating his precious lifeblood. That same blood burned hotter than the sun, in that he imagined it felt, with such ferocity that he could not even scream through his torment. There was a wetness about his visage, clouding his vision of events still swirling around him in a violent squall of blades and death. Was it blood? He could not tell, for his arms were now useless flaccid fleshy appendages. How could one know what was blood and what were tears when they could not even use their fingers to ascertain?

The fire spread through his body, blood broiling and heart faltering with skips without burning him to cinders. It was only when it finally reached the tadpole that nested deep within the meat of his mind that Gale could finally take a long desperate breath, and screamed.

**~**~**~**

Last Light Inn was an oasis nestled deep within a mire of bleak wastelands as far as the eye could see. Naturally, or unnaturally as it truly was, the line of eyesight did not surpass more than less than a hundred footfalls before the world became enveloped in the now familiar shadows.

Gale stood at the border of the Selunite light that protected them all from the dangers that lurked without. Though Marcus had gotten the drop on them earlier, the wizard thought back on how they had all managed to fend off him and his lackeys. How one minute they were talking with Isobel about the greater protection she may be able to grant them to traverse through the mists. The next, winged ghouls broke through the roof and door, surrounding them all in seconds and cascading chaos broke out.

There had been no warning, no signal of an ambush of any kind. Once the last creature was cut down and Marcus received the final blow – his apparent treachery discovered and summarily disposed of along with his body – Gale’s fingers begin to tingle. The adrenalin had worn off far too quickly and it was only by virtue that Karlach and her beefy arms were close by that he did not break his face again. This time upon the wooden floors of their host.

As the magical exhaustion near rent his body apart once more and the healers within the room poured their own magic into his convulsing, uncontrollable body, the frantic question repeated in his mind. What had his Mystra done to him?

He had been close to Isobel during the attack, not for want of trying to protect her, but rather by sheer circumstance. Tightly packed as they were in the rooms she had commandeered for her purpose. His spells flew true, without the lethargy and heat that had plagued him since the moment they stepped within the borders of these lands.

A refreshing ease to every cast, he would have let out a most undignified ‘whoop’, had they all not been fighting for their very lives. His arm brushed against Isobel’s robes, and a missile aimed squarely for a singular ghoul suddenly split in twain, seeking out an extra target and turning them both into the ash and mist from whence they came.

The cleric had stumbled slightly into him and he hadn’t thought much of it at the time, but now hours later – standing at the wall of the dome she had erected to protect this little haven – he began to wonder.

Reaching out a hand, Gale brushed his fingers against the selectively permeable membrane shimmering in deceptive fragility. Selune’s magic was a beautiful thing indeed. Spiritual and for the faith, without denying those who would seek its aid so long as no harm came to those who wielded it. Because then that calm shimmering moonlight could become a metaphorical spear, driving itself into the hearts of enemies and cleansing the world of their taint.

He cast a simple magical armour about himself and his suspicions proved horrifically true. The moonlit shine of Selune herself – surrounding his hand that touched the wall imparting safety to himself and others – parted and dissolved. He felt, rather than saw, the mage armour grow from his body in a manner uncommon for works of the Weave.

It was still magic. The thrill of the cast coming as naturally to him as breathing was no different, except the light shimmer of the shield surrounding his body mirrored the domed wall almost perfectly.

He was promptly sick in the bracken filled stream that crossed through the border. Stomach acid, bile and whatever rations he had managed to consume merely added another drop to the polluted lands that would not notice it at all. He knelt on the ground and dug his fingers into the ochre soil. She had not halted the Orb’s veracious hunger, nor contained the power within a shield that he truly controlled.

Mystra had fed him to the Orb instead.

He could have easily suspected the Orb was now reaching out for magic of any kind to consume, without devouring him first. Of course that would have been the simplest explanation. But as the days passed and he felt his body grow weaker and frailer, he knew it was truly the other way around.

He also now realised how Marcus and his creatures had seized an opportune moment, when Gale had been in too close proximity to the very one who fed magic to the dome and thus, inherently, weakened her. With this revelation, Gale wanted no more to do with this place.

Many questioned it, but he did not dare go near Isobel again. Additionally from then on, he sped through the confines of the domed walls upon every exit and entry as though the hounds of the hells were on his heels.

Mystra had given him a time limit.

**~**~**~**

“Tara was born from grief, you know.” Gale said, ignoring Jaheira’s raised brow as he slouched heavily in the chair, spooning the watery broth that somewhat constituted as food in this place into a mouth that no longer could taste. He just knew he needed the nutrients, and so forced himself to down what he could while his body continued to fail him.

The others were due back sometime that evening and he continuously asked for the time, pressuring harpers and the Flaming Fist alike until one of the tiefling refugees near threw a pocket watch at him just so he would “stop asking, for Beshaba’s sake!”

He wiped his mouth over the back of his sleeve and sighed wistfully.

“I had a rabbit, you see. My first pet that papa allowed me to keep, so long as I cleaned her cage and remembered to feed her. No cats or dogs allowed within the walls of his house of course.” It was a painful memory of a childhood defined by rules, schedules and isolation, soured by strictness that had dissolved his parent’s marriage shortly after Elminster came to call.

“I was diligent in my duties and she never wanted for anything. I even let her out, supervised of course, to roam our garden. And would catch her up before she nibbled on mother’s prized rose bushes. Her coat was dusted in colour, speckled brown and orange, like the mottled finish of a polished piece of cornelian gemstone. The sunlight caught her fur just so, and she would shimmer.”

“You talk about this rabbit with more affection than even your companions, if that were possible. Even more than your cat, Gale.” Jaheira ripped her teeth into a piece of jerky and chewed thoughtfully. “Are you going to tell me about the time you also got a pet bird with pink feathers, or a fish that grants wishes?”

Gale quashed the almost instantaneous instinct to correct her on what Tara actually was and coughed instead, turning said cough into a chuckle. “No. Not at all. But this is where it gets interesting. See, summoned animals nominally do not have their own permanence. You call upon them for a time, and then dismiss them to a pocket realm. They do not normally possess sentience either.”

He trailed off as he thought for a moment, then continued quickly. Maybe talking about animals – even summoned ones – not really being alive to a druid was not the greatest idea.

“So eventually, as animals are wont to do, little Petal passed away. I was devastated of course and would not come out of my room for days. Eating and sleeping there and only coming out to visit the privy before disappearing into that space once more. Father gave up trying to force me to return to my studies and mother simply cared for me as best she could. That room became the castle walls that would protect me from more heartache.

“But as young boys do, they can get lonely.” Gale smiled and stared at the table, lost in memory. “One especially stormy night, when the waves of Waterdeep harbour could be felt streets away, I got scared. The crashes shuddered through the stonework with such ferocity that I naturally was petrified, despite being perfectly safe and dry. I began calling for Petal, wanting to hold her soft fur, to have someone to hold who was not my parents or a teacher. I did not have many friends you see.”

“I cannot imagine why.” Jaheira drawled and drank deep from her cup.

Gale ignored her. “Elminster came to our home shortly after this very incident because of how strong this wild desire to just have someone, something to love turned into something he had not seen for many decades by that point. And my ten year old self begged to maybe, just maybe give them the ability to love me back as a friend. A proper companion. No obligations or caveats. I just wanted my rabbit back.”

“And then your cat suddenly popped into the air like a mystical wild thing, solving all the world’s problems in one fine furry fwoop yes?” The harper was possibly on her third, or maybe fourth cup of wine by now. Though she had a constitution Gale could not possibly match, he sipped from his single first glass and shook his head.

“Tressym. I must remind you, she’s a tressym and she would take it very unkindly if people kept referring to her as a mere house cat behind her back.”

“I never did call her a house cat now, did I?” The older women peered over the lip of her cup at him, pinning him with her eyes that he had noticed before sometimes shifted into a somewhat predatory gaze. And not the fun kind. She blinked slowly and Gale could have sworn the pupils had constricted into feline slits, before normal humanoid grey eyes continued studying him quietly.

Druids.

He coughed again and continued with the story. Wondering when his companions would return to save him from the rather intimidating woman that he felt was mainly now babysitting him due to his increasingly useless state.

The pocket watch on the table ticked well past the midnight hour by the time the group returned. They said they had found out what was possibly keeping Ketheric from being able to be killed and would be scouting for it the next morning.

Gale stared at the table, then squared his shoulders before facing the others.

“I am coming too.” He pushed himself to stand before them and waited till the shouts of opposition, of concern and of derision – surprisingly more from Astarion than Lae’zel – died down enough for him to be heard above their din.

“If we are to fight the Absolute, I must be present. Just in case my condition is timed to deteriorate at the heart, like Mystra commanded it. If you try to keep me within these walls another day,” he shrugged at their protests. “I will simply walk out by myself and may the shadows have me.”

His words caused silence to drop faster than a baby Tara had upon being summoned eight feet in the air, before her wings were properly formed.

“Well then, darling.” Astarion near sneered the affectation and Gale stared at him in confusion, watching as the vampire slowly unbuckled his bracers with methodical snark. His entire body language vibrated with it. “I guess if our wizard wants to court death sooner than later, we best find him a front row seat and then run like hells.”

He pulled the bracer off with an aggressive flourish and slammed it on the table, the other one following soon after.

“I don’t know about you all, but I’d like to get some shuteye before watching someone be blown back to their precious goddess. Don’t you?”

The silence was oppressive and laden with confusion and concern as they watched the normally self-assured elf stalk to the door, slam it open and exit without another word.

**~**~**~**

The Sharran Temple.

It had felt like an age since the Nautiloid, a century since the Grove, a lifetime since they had last seen the sun and an undetermined series of time skips and jumps since Gale had come to terms with his death. Time, as it stood and was speeding towards an end point he just could not bear to see, was not on their side.

Shadowheart had allowed herself to be pulled away from the group to discuss options as the others rested in the wide corridor leading into the distance. The fight with the undead Justiciars had already near wiped them all out, yet they had barely even got through the front door and still had no real idea what they were even looking for.

Finding Balthazar was a primary task. What happened during or after that however was anybody’s guess.

Gale steadfastly ignored the cool gaze of the vampire boring holes into the space directly between his shoulder blades. Keeping eyes on Shadowheart’s zealotry in practice was far more palatable than whatever was making their companion more waspish than usual.

“I do not know how much longer I have.” Gale said, cutting straight to the point. He noticed she did not argue or try to placate him. If Shadowheart could be described as anything, ‘pragmatic’ would be on top of the list.

“What are you thinking, Gale?” She said, staring so intently back into his soul.

“I am thinking,” he paused and quickly dared a glance over his shoulder before turning back to her. “I’m thinking you lead us to the Nightsong, then leave me behind to destroy it. Look at this place,” he said, waving an arm out at the endless miles of darkness beyond the buttressed walls that lined the broken pathways. “Out there somewhere is the means to take down Ketheric once and for all. I’m not going to make it to Moonrise at this rate, and frankly letting the orb finally take me out down here is a far better course of action than risking all those above.”

“You’re talking about blowing up a holy temple of Shar. Committing sacrilege of the highest course and potentially damning my own people.” Shadowheart narrowed her eyes and if the situation were not so dire, he may have chuckled to lighten the atmosphere.

Instead he rubbed at the skin around the orb out of habit. It no longer hurt, not in reality. Phantom memories of pain gnawed at his senses when he was especially stressed, but all he truly felt was tired. So damned tired. Shadowheart’s face softened at his unconscious tics and she hesitated a moment, a thought crossing her mind before taking both his twitching cold hands within her warm grasp.

He sighed at the offer of comfort as she then drew his hands to her chest. A completely chaste gesture. As though she were leading him in prayer of some kind, with her head lowered and soft whispers from pious lips. Gale tried to listen to her words, even if he did not follow her faith. This was important to his friend and he would do anything to ensure her comfort, while his own would always come sec…

Gale froze as an odd, foreign sensation began creeping up his arms. Originating from Shadowheart’s own grasp. It felt both familiar, yet not at all. Pins and needles crawled under the skin, following the veins leading up to his elbows. He tried to pull away but her uncannily strong grip kept him in place, her lips still murmuring what was now more than a prayer. It was a spell.

“Shadowheart. What in the bloody hells are you doing?” He hissed, tugging hard to release himself from her grasp. He started to panic as the sensation climbed into his shoulders and almost seemed to caress them. If not for the fact that he had a pretty damned good idea what she was doing, the feeling could have been considered mildly pleasant. But the last time a cleric’s holy power flowed around him, into him, feeding the chalice of his own magic drained dry by the Orb, Marcus had nearly killed her.

“My job,” she whispered the only words he could clearly hear before there was a flash of light and a cacophonic boom that blasted the space between them. Both he and the cleric were thrown apart and he skidded across the ground, flat on his back and quite disorientated. It was no surprise how the sudden explosion of magic had roused their companions into battle ready stance, all wondering who was the most hurt and what they should be attacking.

Shadowheart pushed herself up onto her elbows, hair frizzled and slightly smoking with a crooked smile of smugness gracing her face. Halsin assisted her to her feet, while a cautious Astarion slid towards Gale. Tense and careful, like a cat afraid to touch the volatile bomb that could explode any moment.

To be absolutely fair, there was no reason to assume otherwise.

“What the fuck was that!?” Karlach’s voice pitched high while Gale gratefully received Astarion’s hand to hoist himself up, though the elf was skittish and looked ready to bolt.

“That,” Shadowheart patted out the small cinders still smoking on her person, while Gale was looking and feeling remarkably healthy for a dying man that just got blown up by a Sharran “…was real magic.”

**~**~**~**

‘He had to find it. The thing, that thing they needed. There was too much noise, too many people. Why wouldn’t they just leave him alone with his thoughts, oh gods it hur…!’

Gale pulled his hand back from the desiccated corpse and gave it a shake, dark flaking vestiges of Shar’s influences flicking off into the aether as the magic wound itself through the joints of his fingers and slowly crept beneath his skin. It was an unsettling experience to recall the last memories of the dead like this, no matter what he could get from them. It reminded him of the balls of essence that were left from every shade killed out in the cursed lands, where a memory resided and the fear of the before times were held in stasis for all eternity.

Shadowheart had explained, in details that were contextually a medical impossibility for sure, that Shar’s presence had loaned him the ability to – in turn – gain loan of the remnants of the power of others. But only from the dead of course. It was typical that Shar coveted her followers, even the ones that had failed her, and would not permit Mystra’s devotee a boon without some sort of caveat.

Gale knew this was only short term and time would soon again catch up with him, but the grace of time was all he needed. His own magic was feeding the Orb, but no more was it pulling at his own living essence to replace and Shadowheart had eagerly assisted in helping him tell which of the many dead bodies the cavernous ruin would help or hinder.

By merit of their ragged remnants of clothing perhaps? He did not pry too deeply into the matter, not when there were more important things to concern himself. Nor did he ask why only now this form of magic was available to him. He suspected it had something to do with the thinned barriers between the Shadows and mortal plains. The curse covered these lands freely and was a workmanship of Shar herself after all, and casting cantrips (and that one time he had to misty step to avoid falling into a chasm) so far had only felt slightly different to the manipulation of pure Weave.

It also did not hurt, which was a perfectly acceptable change of pace. Magic kept him useful and alive. These people depending on him not to blow them to pieces before their time were the closest he had to real life friends that were not Tara. Gale pushed aside the lid of another crypt with the ease of telekinesis and reached within to avail himself of another Sharran’s lingering power that was of no more use to their empty husk.

-

Gale blinked, then shook his head.

“I’m sorry. What did you say, Astarion?”

“I saaaaid that it’s your turn for first watch. But if you’d just like to stare at my arse all night, that’s fine too.”

Gale tried not to choke on the bowl of warm soup he had been sipping. The timing was very poor and he glared, while trying not to indeed let his eyes linger on his companion’s rear as he sauntered off.

-

He blinked again and the words of the book blurred before him. The firelight was just enough to read by, albeit not without constraints to his vision every time it popped or flared.

Was he just talking to someone? No, that wasn’t right. Everyone was now deeply asleep, or least halfway through their trancing by now. He was alone and it was first watch. According to the pocketwatch, there was still two hours to go before he was relieved.

Glare flexed his hands, remembering how often he had touched the dead with them. At least, he thought he remembered. Pursing his lips he went back to focusing on his book, cold uneaten soup by his feet and an odd echo growing in the back of his mind.

**~**~**~**

“Where are you going?”

Gale stopped, staring at the middle distance before turning to Shadowheart. Her upper body propped up against the wall and her legs stretched out in front, she looked terrible. They had tried to bind the wound on her leg as best they could, but it was clear she would not survive if they could not find help. There just was too much blood. He had never seen her so hurt before, it was almost anathema for a healer to be bereft of said ability to heal.

“We should never have split up the party,” he said. “I will find Halsin somehow, then will come back for you.”

She scowled, then hissed as motion pulled on her injuries. However many there were, he could only assist with the ones he could see as per her own instructions.

“We are deep within the trials. They could be anywhere.”

“Exactly. And as much as you think you are immortal within the realm of your goddess, you bleed like the rest of us.” He motioned to her leg and sighed. “You should not have tried to do it all on your own.”

“Shar will protect me. I will succeed where others have failed.” She tilted her chin up in defiance, though the familiar prideful look was foiled by just how much her mirrored self had almost killed her.

“Shadowheart,” Gale sighed and gripped the wood of his staff a little tighter. “You and the others are the only friends, the only family I have ever had the pleasure of knowing. I treasure you too much to allow your life to be held in the sole hands of your goddess, no matter your faith and belief.”

The irony of the statement was not lost on him and he ignored the sudden look of confusion that graced her features.

“Gale, what…”

“I shall return post haste, with more potions and hopefully our fluffy druid. Just, please. Stay alive.”

Steeling his shoulders, Gale walked out and left her behind. A pulling at his heart, tugging pain almost made him turn around, just to see her face again. Just to make sure she would not vanish if she was removed from sight.

The empty corridors, lined with dark torches spread before him and Gale began to walk. He had never felt so alone.

**~**~**~**

The room was unguarded as before, with fresher spatters of blood from their failed attempt at completing the trial creating an almost Fibonacci motif in the swirling patterns upon the stone laid floor.

Zero, one, then one again, followed by two, then three – Gale counted the steps the swirls covered before ending at a larger puddle. The sequence that was the logic of the spiral ended unceremoniously at eight. How interesting, if rather pretentious with obvious planted and intended portentousness. Shar truly was a trickster goddess to create such a mathematical pattern of Shadowheart’s blood out of some sort of spite, despite her nihilistic intent to create nothing of everything.

What truly caught his eye, however, was the glint of metal reflected by torches that sprang to life as he approached the figure by the stairs leading to the Umbral gem. So close, yet unsurprising how he was consistently thwarted.

Astarion stood before him, blocking the stairs and garbed in fresh chain and leathers procured from the quartermaster back at Last Light. Though likely either pilfered or obtained at great discount after copious haggling. It was strange, Gale noted, how on guard the elf now looked while in his presence. They were alone, and it was not that long ago they were sharing books by the campfire and reaching some form of friendly accord? Astarion had even propositioned him many a time, despite Gale consistently warding him off with worries surrounding the volatility of the Orb.

Maybe there could have been more in that time. Maybe they had shared some titbits of gossip and nuance about their companions. There was a dim memory of a live mouse being smuggled into Wyll’s bedroll as a prank. The mouse had somehow ended up on Halsin’s shoulder for the remainder of their journey along the Risen Road, before being let go into the brush well before they found the crèche. Wyll had said something concerning about that incident, something very specific, he could not recall. There was a pot involved, and Gale’s shoes.

Gale himself had been the oft unwitting (yet sometimes main craftsman of varied plots) accomplice to the harmless pranks the elven vampire plagued their camp with, claiming to avail himself of boredom and monotony. He had consistently tried to educate the restless scoundrel that the battles and consistent interactions with all manner of hag, plant, mushroom and gnome were enough of a distraction to last them to the end of their days.

It was later in their travels that Astarion finally snapped. During a regular session of chiding, he wheeled about and hissed that Gale was just a child in his vampiric eyes, and that eternity had a lot of space to fill long after the mage was dead and buried. Sobered by this chilling revelation, he had stepped back and let Astarion stow a satchel of crushed Valerian Root in Lae’zel’s pack while she was away on a short scout.

Events of their travels had changed things between them. Some for the good, some for something bordering on strange and negative. There was no easily definable moment that Gale could pinpoint as when they had started to drift. Perhaps it had always be thus, and it had taken for the veil to be lifted from his eyes to see the truth in all things.

He could no longer ascertain where the disconnect between what was, and what existed now had begun. But somewhere in their travels, Astarion had become a stranger to him.

“Whatever that bitch is whispering in your mind, the wizard I know would rather blow himself than be controlled. Snap out of it, Gale!” Astarion held his short sword and dagger in white-knuckled grips, stance poised for battle.

The pointy ends were aimed at Gale, and no mirrored creature had yet appeared. Whatever this trial had once been, it had been either conceded defeat to the spilled blood of a Sharran and her tenacity to the end – or the trial itself had been replaced by something new.

There had only been dried blood to mark the former presence of the bowl one would normally need to bleed in to start said trial. Now all there was were the spirals, and Astarion.

“Why are you here?” A simple question, Gale thought. One that should be easy for the man before him to answer.

Astarion visibly flinched, though he still stood his ground.

“For you, you idiot.” He snapped, narrowing his eyes. “Halsin came to tell us Shadowheart had failed one of the tests, and that she was going to live at least. But you had already fucked off after telling him. Leaving her to bleed out to hells knows where. She said you were rambling nonsense before you left here, have been driving us crazy for the past two days looking for you and what the hell is that?” Astarion waved a blade at Gale’s right side and the mage glanced at his own hand.

The spear rested comfortably within his grip, the sharpened point wavering well above his head and the base settled lightly on the floor. Not that he needed to carry the weapon as though it were a staff, but he had forgotten where he had misplaced his old one.

Two days? When was that?

“Hmm. I thought you knew what a spear is, Astarion.”

“I know what a bloody spear is!” the elf spat, fangs flashing with a low growl. “The question wasn’t what it was. It is about what you are doing with Sharran bounty? Since when was stabbing a bitch more comfortable than just throwing a ball of fire into their face?”

“Oh wouldn’t you like to know.” Gale smiled slightly at the little temper tantrum the vampire was throwing. It felt warmly familiar, though not in a way that matched the direction this particular conversation was meandering. He enjoyed the little sliver of comfort it brought him – nonetheless – and took a step forward.

Astarion mirrored his movements and blocked his way entirely. Gale frowned, the warm feeling dissipating into a simmering annoyance.

“Now let’s not dally about this,” he said, adjusting his grip on the spear. “We need the gem to open the door to the Nightsong, yes? The mirrored creatures are gone and the gem is upstairs. Do we really have to do this now? What of Last Light? Do you think they will wait much longer, while we discuss the merits of morality and methods to reach our end goal? There is little time for a quarrel between you and I, now let me pass or at least allow us both to alight these forsaken stairs by Gods’ sake.”

“Mystra’s sake.” Astarion’s face was stone, quietness with a storm behind those eyes of garnet and blood.

Gale stopped and blinked at him. “I beg your pardon?”

Astarion tilted his head ever so slightly. “Mystra’s sake. Or ‘For the love of Mystra’. Or Mystra’ryl. Or how about the Weave, Gale? Do you remember the Weave?”

“I – what are you getting at, Astarion?” Gale felt the annoyance grow into a proper boil. “You’re confusing the issue.”

“You can’t even say her name anymore, can you?” It sounded like a question, but was phrased as a statement and Astarion’s grip on his weapons shifted slightly. “Not Mystra, can’t even use your own magic. I wonder what else she took from you, Gale. What’s next, huh?” She going to take me next?”

Astarion tipped his head back and began hollering.

“You heard me, you bitch! I bet you took his bloody cat too!”

The echoes of Astarion’s inane yelling of complete nonsense rebounded off the walls, cascading into nothing as the silence once again fell over them both, and the truth was revealed.

Astarion stared at Gale with a look of incredulous, unhinged fury. Though tinged with facets of other unwieldy emotions that could not find a comfortable place to sit, the anger was the clearest and easiest to parse through the fog of his mind.

“I think you need to get out of my way, Astarion.” Gale’s voice had dropped a timbre and sparks crackled between his fingers.

The vampire had become an obstacle in their mission. He was compromised, which now made everything so much easier.

Astarion breathed hard, then nodded and held his blades at the ready. A flicker behind those eyes before they hardened. “I don’t want to hurt you, Gale.”

If only it were that simple.

-

Gale blinked, and the world shifted.

He was at the top of the stairs. Flickering light caused shadows to dance across his vision of white hair, red eyes wide in shock and a complexion so pale it felt as though carved from marble. Gale reached up and let his hand hover over the other man’s cheek, then touched so lightly it was almost whisper soft.

He was cold already. Stunningly so. How was he so cold – like death incarnate – yet so…beautiful.

Removing his hand left a streak of red garishly clashing against the complexion of stone. Matching red eyes, glimmering like blood blinked slowly and looked down, a motion Gale followed to see the point of a sharp weapon of some kind poking through a torn gap in chainmail. He stepped back and white hair with bloodied eyes was left staggering alone, standing with long legs braced. He was not moving, he could not move.

Blood dripped sluggishly from the wound. This did not seem right.

Blood should pour. It should be enough to make more spirals that looped around to create the base for magic to happen, with numbers and intrinsic devotion of the one the blood had spilled for. To let blood pour without the need for reciprocation.

“What…”

Soft voice. Gale watched him drop to his knees. The spear caused loss of balance, with weight pulling down at his back and he fell to his side. Weapons clattered to the ground. The blood still only dripped.

“Gale.”

Yes, that was his name. Why was his face wet? Gale reached up, feeling the moisture on his cheeks, soaking into his beard and settling in place. Looking at the liquid that rested on his fingers, he was surprised it was not blood. All wet things were currently blood, so why was he crying?

White hair, stone cold face, skin as pale as death. Ruby eyes stared up at Gale with confused sadness. The blood dripped to the stone floor and it had seemed like there was not enough. But accordingly to the specifics of this new trial – it was.

A spiral formed in the stone, curving wet and red in a pattern that seemed random, those was obvious in intent of design. No, he was mistaken. Not a spiral, a loop. The blood was pooling in delicately carved crevices beneath the body pierced by his spear. It had come from behind somehow. Was there another person present? No, he remembered something. A spell?

Gale stared and thought back to the fight he must have had. Where he had – yes that was it – he had used the powers granted to him by the deaths of others and by Shar’s allowance. The spear had flown through the air, guided by will and thought and was not seen in time by…

The name was gone.

The blood followed the carvings slowly, as it seemed to be pushed into place by the energy of sacrifice. The trial had needed sacrifice and the loop turned in on itself, forming a figure eight before there was a flash of dark light and a small pulsing stone sat at the cross section of the loops.

Gale leaned down and picked it up. So unassuming, the Umbral gem pulsed once more before going still in his palm. The trial was done and blood had been spilled. But the man at his feet was not yet dead.

Was this the sacrifice?

He had retrieved the gem, but there was still one thing missing. And it was to be for Shadowheart.

“Please, no…” the elf whispered as Gale waved his hand.

He tried to ignore the scream as the spear was ripped from the brutalised body, pulling back and flying through the air back into his own hand. Now there was blood on both sides. Still dripping impossibly slow. It made no sense.

Gale, the wizard. Renown as yet unearned, but forthwith to be granted. The one that would save them all with the powers and abilities granted to him by this place, held the gem tightly. He was assured of his victory as turned and walked down the stairs, leaving the bleeding beautiful creature behind.

“Don’t.” Came the hoarse whisper. “Please don’t leave. Don’t…leave me. Not alone. Gale…”

He ignored it. The trial had tried to trick him into feeling something for this stranger, but they were to be defeated to appease Shar. The trial had been completed and Gale left to find his companions.

There was work to be done.

**~**~**~**

How did one truly calculate loss?

Gale stared silently at the Aasimar. The pale, beautiful women of stature and might, now released from bondage and interminable torment. Her armour glistened, a century long ordeal vanishing with a cry of elation as Selune bestowed her glory upon her. Glowing wings of devoted thanks spread behind her and Dame Aalin, in turn, bestowed thanks upon them for her release.

He did not feel right.

A hole had been carved somewhere deep within, but it had not been filled by their accomplishments. Nothing he had done since entering the temple had resolved the ache that never once lifted from his soul, but instead grew deeper and more entrenched. He distantly watched the pale, formerly fragmented creature take flight and lifted a hand to his face.

It was wet again.

Tears were forever falling now. Since passing the spear to Shadowheart and helping lead her to her destiny, there was a never ending flow of salt water melting from a shard of ice somewhere deep within. The others had questioned him, but deflection was always a talent of his and he ensured they would not stray from the path that would lead them to their goals. A name was mentioned. He could not recall, thus it could not have been important.

He had helped Shadowheart reach this point in thanks for what she had done for him to allow him to cast magic freely once more. How he had ever managed before then was a mystery. She was his guide in the darkness and the spear was entrusted to her.

Yet she had discarded that that stained, dark metal weapon the moment her apparent doubts had become manifest, and he mourned it.

The tip had been stained with dark red that could not be cleaned from the metal. He did not know if it had always been as such, even upon its initial retrieval. But losing the sight of it make his gut clench with unfamiliar tension, like he was missing something. Like he was losing something.

Aaylin, no, Dame Aylin – titles were earned and important after all. He hoped to earn his own one day, a coveted desire he could not recall ever not feeling – turned to face the rest of the group. Shadowheart was still and silent, face unreadable and Karlach stood strong by her side, ready to hold her in case she fell. For once, Lae’zel was holding her tongue to quip negative snarky comments on the cleric’s state of mind. Maybe they were now bound by something, since both had defied their respective gods.

The cold emptiness within grew as the thought came to mind. His abilities stemmed directly from her influence and connections with Shar. What would happen to her, to him? The Aasimar seemed to sense this and spoke words that struck like a slap, hurting and pulling grief from the depths. She spoke a truth that he would soon understand, even if he could not grasp anything of it now.

“You have all lost so much of yourself to reach this point. To get here, to free me, to be the strength behind your cleric’s decisions that all led to this moment. I must alight now and declare vengeance upon Ketheric, may he feel my blade against his throat within the day. But…” she paused and her ice coloured eyes stared not at him, but rather into him. Searching him.

Gale met her steely gaze, despite feeling the increasing urge to run, to hide. He did not want to hear her truths anymore. He wanted the empty space within to stop growing. It was swallowing his heart.

“I can see what you have lost, little wizard.” Her voice low and gravelly, hitting him like boulders with every word. “The Shadow Curse hath taken much from your sense of self, your future uncertain as the waves crashing upon far off shores. But know this, that once thou has left this abode of the Sharran trickster, the world shall become much clearer. May you have the strength to withstand the opening of eyes and revelation of heart.”

The others were staring at him too now and Gale steadfastly focussed on ignoring them. Instead he merely nodded, then watched as she took flight and her light struck through the semblance of sky, a comet against the black and shadows of Shar’s realm.

It was not until they had all returned to the surface and stepped beyond the doors of the temple that the pain within his breast, the familiar burning sensation of gnawing hunger returned. It was not sudden, rather a growing discomfort as the group gathered themselves and awaited Shadowheart’s hopeful release from Shar’s ‘embrace’. She had not followed when they stepped through the portal and it had closed behind them.

Gale hoped the goddess would spare her.

He almost prayed for it.

By the time the cleric was released to them through a new portal, emerging shaken and distraught, the hunger was embedding itself into his heart and he rubbed at the source on his chest. A quick look in a hand mirror – that he had no recollection ever stowing in his pack – had shown how the Orb was glowing ever so slightly more than before. Since before he was siphoning magic off of the dead to feed it instead of allowing it to feed off of him, it seemed like a natural response to ‘going back to normal’. Though “normal” appeared to be subjective.

Shadowheart looked broken. She did not want to talk about her experience, nor answer Gale’s question about what would happen next. This should have concerned him more for her sake, but he was a little desperate to know if he was going to have to run off and blow himself up now over later. Time limits to what could occur were definitely ramping in importance.

There was an unspoken agreement, it seemed, for no one to speak of whatever had occurred within the Sharren walls. There should have been elation over releasing the Nightsong, but a pall remained. Overbearing and still.

They were still standing by the entrance without any real plan of their next move. The pressure in his chest was becoming a mite uncomfortable, so he moved to be the first to at least try to shuffle things forward.

“I suggest, by the virtue that we have little time to spare now that Ketheric’s immortality is no longer the blockade to our proceedings to take out the Absolute, that we shuffle off quickly and submit a plan to the harpers?”

How did one manage grief?

Shadowheart stared at him, blankly and bereft of hope.

“Shar told me,” she began, taking a shuddering breath, “to thank you.”

Now this was interesting.

“For what?” Gale asked. Likely mirroring the questioning gazes of their companions.

Karlach continued to hold Shadowheart around her shoulders. A comforting gesture. Somehow his own shoulders were missing that same caring touch…he could not recall ever being held like that. Halsin, Lae’zel and Wyll were silent and stalwart as ever and none of them offered a hug or sympathetic pat on his back.

That everyone had left a good deal of space between them and Gale was not lost on him, so Shadowheart stepping forward and closing the distance was considerably welcomed. He would have accepted an embrace from her if offered.

“Oh, Gale. I am so sorry.” Said the cleric as she choked on suppressed tears, before reaching out and placing her hand upon his chest.

He wanted to welcome the touch. So bereft of contact and missing any kind of companionship, the hole in his soul reaching out for love and care. The magic of contact was normally welcomed by the starved man, as a thirst after being lost in the desert of ages. This was not that kind of touch, however, and the cavernous emptiness within did not relish the sudden sensation of being flooded and drowned.

The first moment he had learned of magic being something more than a natural skill a mortal usually possesses had been when he was a young child, sparkled motes of light keeping him company at night. They had always bothered his father.

Oh the memory hurt as the holes containing the man’s face began filling back up, slotting into place at birthdays and festivals. Even the bad times when arguing with his mother.

Gods that one hurt even more. How had he forgotten his mother? Why was there now a memory of not knowing she had ever even existed? Gale fell to his knees and dug his fingers into the dirt, feeling the almost foreign moisture and beginning stirrings of life struggling to seek out the light. It smelled differently too. He needed to hold something, someone, hold to care for – Tara.

The third piece of the puzzle making up for the cavernous emptiness that had been growing within was placed. He recalled the smell of her, the texture of her fur between his fingers. Her name, given the moment she dropped into existence as he grieved for Petal.

That new – yet old – memory hurt a little less, though the discomfort over forgetting her still ached. His memory was so ironclad, considered a genius by some. There was a reason he was Chosen.

Two memories of existence hit him at once and he fell backwards in shock. Before his eyes the dual faces of Elminster and Mystra danced and intertwined in geometric interlocking shapes, squaring out and triplicating until the universe only consisted of them. There was no memory of one without acknowledging the other and to remember magic was to remember her, and to know her was to recall Elminster. And to know both forced him to know how little time he truly had left, that the panic in his friends’ eyes of his impending death was not an overreaction.

“By the Oakfather. Shadowheart, what did you do?” Strong arms around his shoulders, finally. With a warm gruff breath by his ear and holding him while he writhed under the onslaught of returned memories, Gale felt he might be able to tolerate this. Might be able to survive.

Then the last memory forced a cry from his mouth.

“My Goddess wanted payment for the loan of lifeforce to him.” Her voice was small yet clear. A face began forming in the mire of his turbulent mind and he rebelled against it, keening with eyes squeezed shut. “She is the Lady of Loss.”

The face swirled, chaos of colours. White, then red. Ruby and diamond. He was shaking as the horror of the truth unfolded, slowly and reluctantly. He did not want to know.

“The memory loss was a side-effect, you said.” Wyll sounded like he knew. Maybe they all did. “But she was taking a lot more than just some key memories of his childhood for those powers.”

“Yes. And no.”

“What do you mean? Halsin he’s scratching at his face! Lae’zel, can you…yeh.”

Strong sinew and tendons wrapped in power and strength encircled his wrists and pulled them down, possibly saving him from harm he guessed. Gale just did not want to see that face. He did not want to know that the dream was not a dream, and that he had actually…oh Mystra. No.

“No no no…” Gale began to babble as Astarion’s face solidified. A smirk thrown over his shoulder while sauntering off. Sneaking Karlach’s teddybear back into her tent after repairing it without her noticing, then threatening Gale with ‘much pain’ if he ever ratted him out. That morning in the smoking shadow of the Nautiloid with a pale face calling for help, a dagger to his throat and that sudden trust, at least not to be wanting to kill each other. That moment they knew they all needed each other, if only just to survive.

“Do you know what hurts more, that is a greater loss than merely forgetting someone you cared about, Wyll?” Shadowheart said, still quiet, still clear. “It’s remembering that you lost them anyway.”

Astarion’s confused and terrified eyes stared up at Gale as he turned from them.

“That you no longer have any future with them of any kind.”

He ignored those pleases from broken and bloodied lips, forgot the screams to “Come back! Please, Gale! No please…!” that petered out as he reached the exit of the trial.

“And that you were the cause.”

An image hovered in his mind, taunting him with banality. It was just stonework with a bit of writing. There were words that Gale had forgotten were important, newly etched into the arch leading into what was once the Self Same Trial.

~ Sacrifice ~

“Oh gods…what have I done?” Gale whimpered and clutched at Halsin’s arms as his mind became whole, but his heart shattered into pieces irreparable. He opened eyes that were glazed and sore from being so squeezed shut for so long, and blinked up at the others.

Shadowheart was still being held by a stunned and saddened Karlach. Wyll looked lost and confused. Halsin was still holding him and Lae’zel had only just released his arms, though had not left his side.

“I killed him. Didn’t I?” Gale finally said, taking a shuddering breath.

There was silence in response, which was answer enough. He didn’t need an answer. He had known all along, but had forgotten by virtue of casting his lot in with yet another God. Somewhere deep below, Astarion’s cold body was now left as a warning to all those who might follow. What warning that was slowly formed with excruciating clarity in his mind, as though placed there by force to give full context. To make the sacrifice understood. To make it real.

He had used powers of Shar. All, he though, to prolong his own life that was given a limit by Mystra, in the hope he could be useful to the cause. Bit by bit he had been wiped away, so as to become the perfect weapon honed from grief of a loss he was not even aware had occurred. He had done the deed without even knowing why, and had gained the Umbral gem that had ultimately released a daughter of Selune.

The future was uncertain.

The Shadowcurse was slowly lifting, and the hold it had had over his magic was flitting away. He almost felt normal again, if the wound deep withing in his chest could be attested for. He knew now the orb had always been stable since Elminster’s visits, but the Shadows had gotten their claws into him soon after. It was never Mystra who had twisted his devotion into desperation, not with the curl of the curse playing with his soul. A comet of light streaked above and he watched Selune too receive what she wanted.

A trio of Goddesses, playing with mortal lives.

And all it took was the removal of eight key memories to be sucked into their twisted game, and the death of a friend, companion and…maybe more. That maybe, forever to be unknown. Always eight. The number of magic, immortality and eternity. How pathetic he had not seen it coming.

It was done. Ketheric still needed to be dealt with, and the Absolute needed to die.

Gale allowed himself to be helped up by both druid and gith and took a deep breath through his nose, pondering the smell of wet earthy petrichor. Maybe this place could live again. And all it took was the death of someone he cared about.

Intrinsic devotion had once been a foreign concept to Gale; whereby removing the need for reward from the equation of giving and doing tasks was incomprehensible to him. How interesting that three beings of opposing and immutable power, had somehow made it so much clearer by making him not want a bar of their existence ever again.

“Well then,” he said, lifting his chin and turned towards where the light streaked, cutting through the curse and all it touched. The sight filled him with a cold purpose. He did not blame the Aasimar, she was as much a victim as he. The world needed saving, and they all had a job to do. “I dare say someone will be ready for us. We better not leave them waiting.”

**~**~**~**