Chapter Text
The others are altogether dissatisfied with how the morning unfolds. They shuffle around each other awkwardly in camp, keeping their conversations close and quiet, sending glances toward you and Astarion as the two of you sit together far away from the fire. He asks you, just once, about the true intention behind allowing yourself to be bitten, to be killed, but after your initial deflection he drops it, perhaps afraid of invoking your ire if he presses the issue further. He changes the subject to the matter at hand: finding the goblin camp.
A few hours of rest, with some food and water, has done you some good. Your body still feels as if it’s snapping out of rigor mortis, but overall you are less lead-infused than you were earlier. Gale suggests scouting for the war camp tomorrow, when you’re likely to feel better, but you want to get it done today. There is little time to waste before your limbs remember how swift they can be, and while your exhaustion may slow you down in a fight against goblins, you have no doubt that you will still be lethal. You need to rid yourself of this urge long before you fully recover, lest it exert itself wiping this camp of your companions.
Travenya offers to lead the hunt for you, but the others agree that bringing a druid along will only blow your cover. You all elect to split into two groups: one to investigate the inn along the Risen Road, and the other to infiltrate the war camp and rescue Halsin. Velarissa, the drow, will be your leader once you find the camp; Shadowheart, Astarion, Wyll, and yourself will follow her. Wyll had insisted on coming along with Astarion, in order to keep an eye on him, and you’d been too tired to argue.
You trudge through the forest now, and keep your eyes pinned to the dirt, foraging for signs in the mud. Your steps are heavy, and your brain pounds against the restriction that is your skull, but nevertheless you push on so that you do not give your urge time to recover.
Footprints appear to you sometime later, belonging neither to your group nor to goblins. Quicker and quicker you move now as you follow along the tracks. The same blood-rush that encompassed you as you’d hunted Astarion’s boar follows you now, pushing past your exhaustion and sharpening your mind as fast as the crack of a whip. The scent of ruin rushes down the hill you climb until you crest the top, the others panting behind you, only for you all to find the company of Aradin slaughtered in the mud of the road. They had been left to rot before the bridge that led them to their deaths.
The five of you collectively stop and stare down at the bodies, watching the flies come and go. The blood-rush pulses hard in your ears, but you try and ignore it for the sake of your companions, who have watched you steadily since your revival.
Astarion scouts a little ahead to observe what lay in wait inside the gate of a dilapidated village. Velarissa bows her head in silent prayer, while Shadowheart tries to ignore her, shooting an annoyed look from the cleric to you. Wyll paces back and forth and tries not to look upset over the death displayed before him.
You keep your eyes interlocked with Shadowheart’s, so that your mind does not delve into the cavity of the body below you. You wonder if Velarissa had prayed over you like that while you were dead last night.
To your relief, Astarion comes bounding back to you all. “Goblins ahead, of course.” He says. “We ought to find a way around.”
You find yourself waiting for Astarion to take the lead down the hill that wraps around the village, but no one moves. Velarissa’s eyes pin you down first as she looks up from her finished prayer.
“None of us are hunters, Mazeiah. You’re best fit to lead us further in these woods. On you go, dear ranger.”
A feeling settles in your stomach, as heavy as rocks sewn into your guts, one that will never erode. It tells you that you’ve left bodies in sh*t-stained roads before, just like this, many times— and you did it so easily and without remorse that you can likely do it in your sleep; while your hands are bound; with your hands.
You’re no ranger.
It’s perhaps another half-hour before you finally find the first signs of the war camp: the putrid smell of it gets to you first. It isn’t long after your nose is set burning do you find a wooden bridge. It will lead you over a chasm and to the main gate, if you follow it, but none of you do just yet. You settle yourselves in the bushes and trees along the edges of the road, near the base of a cliff, and watch the gate from afar.
“We could get Halsin now.” You suggest, watching the goblins as they shuffle around.
“There are a lot more of them than the five of us.” Wyll responds. “Perhaps we ought to gather the others first.”
“What, and march in with an army?” Astarion argues. “I’d rather we take a few people who know how to keep their mouths shut. Mazeiah and I can sneak around by ourselves, if we must.”
Hearing your name on someone’s tongue, especially his, is foreign to you. You heard it once last night, softer than you’d heard it just now; and if you had stayed dead, you would have never heard it again.
“I don’t think it would be very safe for Mazeiah to go running off with you again.” Wyll states as he sits crouched between you two, hanging back far enough for you all to glare at each other.
Velarissa sighs sharply. “I doubt the vampire will do any harm. It seemed like an accident in the first place. Drop it now, lest we blow our cover while inside.”
The three of you exchange equally dumbfounded glances with one another, surprised by the Selûnite’s leniency. Shadowheart is the only one who looks unamused by the drow’s comment.
“Really? A cleric of Selûne is content with a vampire running amok?” She questions with her arms crossed.
Astarion scoffs. “I don’t ‘run amok’ through camp, thank you. I’m rather well-behaved, all things considered.”
Shadowheart rolls her eyes at him, and he feigns offense. Velarissa ignores the vampire’s theatrics, and answers Shadowheart’s question. “I am not content with it. I simply believe that what was done was unintentional. If it happens again, he will die.” The drow turns to Astarion now, who tries to brush off her threat as if it’s nothing to him. “I’m sure you realize this, yes? I’m sure you’ll take greater caution from now on?”
He gives her the slyest of smiles. “Of course, darling. I don’t feel like being stabbed by any of you.”
“Well, I’m glad the word of a vampire settles it, then.” Wyll sneers at Astarion, but changes the subject despite his protest. He asks no one in particular, “How do we get in, then?”
“Velarissa,” You turn to her, “You can get us in. They’re following a drow already— they’d listen to you without question, I think.”
“You know what they say about assumption,” Shadowheart murmurs quietly near you. Your annoyance is obvious, but you hold your tongue, and refrain from chastising the person who brought you back to life not some hours ago. You watch her green eyes dart around as she observes goblins lazily patrolling the main gate. “But maybe you’re right. It looks like they’re celebrating.”
Astarion glances up at a slowly-darkening sky. “Night will cover us soon, should we need to leave in a hurry.”
You give Velarissa a simple nod when her eyes pull away from Shadowheart and fall on you. She nods back, and arises as your leader. The lot of you follow her across the bridge without any further discussion, the warm orange of the evening sun beaming against your backs. You find yourself somewhat afraid that it might be the last time you feel it.
You first approach a goblin with a toothy grin and a warg by his side. His face falls when he spots Velarissa, and he throws his drink to the ground in an attempt to look appeasing. “Commander!” He shouts. “Whatta pleasure!”
Velarissa plays her part flawlessly. She ignores the goblin entirely and walks right through the gate, with you, Astarion, Shadowheart, and Wyll in tow. There is no falter in her steps, and no hesitation in her eyes.
The goblin camp looks exactly like you had expected it to: food and drink strewn about, tattered tents and spikes stuck into the dirt, boxes torn into like animals, all of it accompanied by an overwhelming stink. The goblins run around either drunk out of their minds or playing games or both. You spot a poor juvenile owlbear being held down in a corner, corralled into a sort of makeshift maze, that you assume had been built for one of their games.
You force yourself to ignore them all, and follow Velarissa through two great oak doors that separate the ruined courtyard from the temple. You step inside to find a high ceiling with rafters, and steps leading down to an archway. The markings of the moon goddess are etched into the stone above you.
Velarissa breathes deeply at the sight of her goddess’ symbols. “A temple of Selûne. Look what they’ve done to it.”
“Fitting for the moon witch.” Shadowheart almost laughs at her. After having found a shrine to Selûne in a cave some days ago, the clerics had made it clear to one another who exactly they both worshipped. It was by coincidence that the groups had split up the way they did, otherwise the two would not have chosen to travel together again.
Velarissa’s voice is steady and low. “Save your jabs for later. We must keep up this facade, and bickering will do quite the opposite.”
“Then save your sermon for later. I need not be reminded just how much danger we’re in.”
“Quiet, elf, lest I wrench that tongue from you.” Velarissa’s voice booms all of a sudden as you pass by a guard of goblins that come patrolling up the long entryway. Velarissa stops them with a raised hand. “Where is the prisoner being kept?”
“Down the stairs and to the right, Commander. Two of us are down there interrogation’ him now.”
Without a word, Velarissa marches on. Shadowheart’s face shows pure hatred for the drow, but she says nothing, and with silence you all make your way through the ruins.
A goblin priestess is enacting some sort of ritual upon a group of her kind; her words are gibberish to you. Velarissa ignores them as she passes by, and so do the rest of you. You follow her until you hear a man yelling from a chamber that juts away from the main hall; Velarissa steers your group to him.
As you come upon the room, you find the man strapped to a rack as he’s tortured by two goblins, who poke at him with hot iron rods. The man suffers bruises, abrasions, and cuts that have been given little time to heal before being cut open again, leaving him prone to infection, to death.
You wonder if your hands have ever bent someone’s bones, if they’ve ever pushed an iron through someone’s cheek and into their teeth. The urge building inside you chips away at your exhaustion little by little.
“What are you doing?” Velarissa asks with a voice that makes the goblins spin around with slack jaws.
The fatter one stammers out, “W-We was just pokin’ him to make him talk!”
“Y-Yeah!” The other speaks up. “He knows where the grove is! Commander Minthara’s havin’ us torture it out of ‘im.”
You can smell the alcohol on them even from a few feet away.
“Leave.” Velarissa commands with ease, as if she’s practiced in this. The goblin pair puts down their iron rods in a nearby brazier, and briskly makes their way out of the room.
“Gods,” the man groans weakly, “Please.”
“Cut him loose,” Vel whispers quietly to you, and from under her dark parted bangs you can see her white-hot eyes burning. You take out your daggers and slice away the leathers binding the man’s wrists and ankles, not bothering to fool with the numerous locks on the mechanism. The man is lucky that you do not cut away his skin. Wyll comes to your side and helps the prisoner down from the rack onto his knees.
“Why… Why are you doing this?” His breath is shaky and parched. “You’re taking me to the other drow, aren’t you?”
“No.” Velarissa answers him quietly. “You’re not Halsin, then.”
The man shakes his head. “No… They took him farther into the ruins. I’m—I’m not sure where.”
Velarissa moves forward and drops to one knee, placing an elbow on the other. “You’re going to leave here and make your way back to the grove. Tell Zevlor that we’re here to rescue Halsin, and to await our return. If we don’t… Well, quickly now, yes? Go.”
The man breathes and shudders as if he cannot believe that he has survived his torture. “T-Thank you. Thank you.”
Wyll helps him rise, and with the last of his energy he runs off to the chasm that devours the right-half of the room, climbing desperately over cragged rock. He must have noticed the little bit of light streaming in through a deep crevice while he was stuck on the rack. You watch him slip past the rockface and disappear outside.
Astarion grabs your elbow with two fingers and directs you out of the room, following Velarissa as she quickly departs, lest the guards find you freeing prisoners. You look down at the vampire, who gives you an artfully crafted smile.
“I know you’re overcoming death-sleep, but try to keep up with us, hm? You insisted we do this today, after all.”
You admire his garnet eyes like a lapidarist who just cut them out of the rock. If you cut out his eyes, would the blood behind them be yours, too?
Velarissa leads you all past the next room over, where a robed man sits on his knees, facing the back wall. She does not slow initially, but Astarion leaves you to speed up to her. He jumps up to her ear and whispers, “We must ask someone where the druid is being kept, lest we wander aimlessly and blow our cover.”
“I know.” She says without looking at him, but she stops her march. She turns around and walks into the room where the man still sits, and calls to him with a harsh voice. “You. Where is the prisoner being kept?”
He looks over his shoulder at the drow before rising from the grimy floor. “Why, next door, of course. Though I’m sure he is in quite a gruesome state— these goblins hardly know how to torture a man. They’re too crude for my taste, Commander.”
Some kind of fire lights up in the back of your mind— you realize that yes, your hands know how to hold the tools of torture, they know how to slice and to sew, to set the bone and rend its flesh. You’ve done far more harm than this man could ever dream of doing— this worshipper of Loviatar, you assume from his whip-like caplet and the scars along his arms.
The fire in your mind sparks down your neck and sets your heavy shoulders burning. You wish to show him how to properly hurt someone. Self-flagellation is pathetic to you, you realize, for the sight of his scars sets your stomach roiling with aversion. Such feelings belong to the past, but you are not so keen to let go, apparently. You think of the urge bubbling within you, brewing in preparation for the right moment to make itself known. Perhaps the priest can beat it out of you, at least temporarily, if you will not do it yourself.
“Not that prisoner.” Velarissa tells the priest. “I mean the druid.”
“Oh, he is farther into the temple, near Commander Minthara, I believe. I have yet to pay him a visit myself.”
“I doubt you could stick anything deep enough in his bear-hide to make him talk, let alone squeal.” The words fly from your mouth without restraint, without thought, but you can hardly stop yourself. “Little can be done with such toys.”
The priest seems more amused than irritated. “Ha! Your tastes must turn to the exotic, if you would think my tools of worship to be mere toys.”
“Not exotic. Just practiced.” All of this admittance, and for what? For the slim hope that a beating might subdue your urge, when death could not? Whatever curse takes hold in your mind finds you pathetic. You can feel it searing into the back of your head, angry that it can hardly make you move in your current state. You let yourself smile at its frustration— at your frustration. The priest smiles in return, and you feel that shame is far from you now.
“Are you interested in experiencing my worship first-hand?”
“Self-flagellation is beneath me.”
“Then allow me to indulge you.”
You can see from the corner of your eye that Astarion is grinning from pointy ear to pointy ear, unabashedly showing his fangs, clearly amused by the exchange.
“Oh, I have to see this.” He declares with a hiss. “Don’t you dare say no.”
Shadowheart flares her nostrils at you with a frown. “I revived you just hours ago, and here you are wanting to get the life beat out of you. As entertaining as it would be, it would also be foolish of you.”
They think your submission to the priest’s flail is for pleasure, rather than penance. To wear yourself down to embers, to quell the fire burning up your insides— it is all to keep them safe.
But you do not tell them this. You play along with their assumptions, and let your smile widen. You ignore disapproving looks from Wyll and Velarissa as you strip yourself of your leather chest piece and undershirt. Shadowheart’s glare eventually relents with a roll of her eyes.
“Just don’t wear him out too much, priest. We may have use for him yet.”
“Please, dear lady, call me Abdirak. I promise, I will take no more from him than what Loviatar asks.”
The priest is delighted with you. He sighs as he takes in the sight of your bare back, malachite in the torchlight. “You are a canvas,” He breathes. “A painting in blood awaits our Lady Loviatar. Place your hands on the wall, dear one. Let our lady hear your cries!”
You will not let them hear a thing. This penance is for yourself. It is a struggle against your worst desires, a battle to keep them at bay. The blood you give to the vampire, to the priest, will never be equal to the blood you’ve spilled in the past— but you hope that it will outweigh what you’ll spill in the days to come.
The cut of a barbed whip opens up your back, and leaves traces of rubies dripping slowly from you. You make no sound, as you’ve promised yourself, for the hit had been purposefully light, a test of tolerance. The priest laughs.
“Don’t be shy, dear one. Let Loviatar hear you!”
You do not endure such things for gods. You loosen your shoulders, and another hit lands, cutting deeper this time. You can feel the blood pool in your wounds and cascade down your back now, warm and quick. Still no sound escapes your throat. You hold it back without much effort, the pain finding a familiar place to settle inside of you; a pain you’ve inflicted on others a thousand times over.
“Louder, tiefling! If I cannot hear you, then neither can my goddess!”
The whip had been put away. A mace thuds into your back now, ripping open skin that lets your precious blood fall to the floor, falling between the stones, filling the grout with red. Your nerves are on fire now, not just from the pain, but from the urge— it flares in retaliation to your maiming, coursing through you like a rush of flame, brighter than ever. Your nails scrape the stone you bare your palms against in an attempt to keep it at bay beneath your skin, but it bubbles and surges and threatens to spill from you.
You catch the soft drip, drip of your blood bounce against the floor— blood that has hardly ever been spilled. The sound of it now frightens you, snapping you back to the fear that first spawned when Astarion drank from you. This is a mistake.
You barely hear the vampire speak up over the heartbeat pounding in your ears. “I didn’t realize how much blood our friend had in him.”
“Honestly, isn’t this enough?” Wyll pleads.
“There is more to be seen,” Abdirak pants not from fatigue, but from anticipation, “and much more to be heard.”
The mace lands again, hard, and rakes across your upper shoulder all the way down to your spine; your tail flicks sharply in reflex. Misery sears itself across your flesh and into your very bone, leaving your wounds tender, fresh, and drenched in red. You bite your tongue so deeply to keep yourself from wailing that you taste it, and feel it drip over your lip.
Abdirak reels back his swinging arm and groans with a near-crazed smile. You glare at him from over your shoulder, and decide that you’re done. You remove your hands from the wall and turn to face the others.
“Dear one,” Abdirak pants, “You’ve performed so beautifully for Lady Loviatar. How graceful your pain was.”
The wounds across your back and shoulders ache as you move to don your shirt again. You leave your armor on the ground, its weight too heavy to burden yourself with.
“Loviatar herself has found your penance inspiring. Allow me to grant you her bl—”
You grab the priest’s wrist before he can summon the sign to bless you. You will not let him heal you to the point your urge finds its footing once again. You find it slowly subsiding now, lying in wait.
“You do not wish for her blessing, after all your penance?”
“I do not endure such penance for the gods.”
The gods have not once answered your sleepless nights, and you feel as though this week is not the first you have begged for an escape from your compulsions. If death could not rid you of them, then what gods would be willing to try?
Abdirak’s eyes glaze with admiration, and he does not fight the hold you have on him. “A bold choice, dear one. Please, I must say, on a personal note: thank you. That was divine.”
All the restraint you’ve shown during your penance has been too hastily spent, for now nothing bars you from leaning down and pinching Abdirak’s bottom lip with your teeth, quick and hard enough to draw out his blessed blood. What little you can sense through the mind-numbing both your desire and your urge envelop you in is just— just— enough to pull you away from the priest. Had your companions not been there to judge you, you might have overtaken him entirely.
You notice that Abdirak is hard against you; you let go of his wrist and take a step back, and your urge goes quietly with you.
He is nearly breathless. He swallows a lump in his throat before he speaks softly. “If— If after your business you find yourself wanting, dear one, may Loviatar lead you to me.”
You say nothing to the priest as you look him over once, and then push past your companions, refusing to meet their eyes. You hear them fall in behind you, but eventually you slow down so that Velarissa can lead again.
Astarion is the first to finally say something. “That’s going to bruise, I’m afraid.”
You refrain from a short laugh, but you think he hears it in your voice anyway. “I would imagine so.”
“Would you have joined up with him, Astarion, if you knew he was into such things?” Shadowheart asks the vampire, even though she’s eyeing you.
“I mean, I had my hopes.” He answers, and you know his gaze is pinned to the shades of wine that seep through the back of your shirt.
The ever-solemn drow turns over her shoulder and speaks with a venom in her voice. “You’re a fool for wasting so much of your blood, and our time— Halsin’s time. You just awoke from the dead this very morning, and here you are, hoping to die in a fight against such pathetic creatures.”
You stop in your tracks, the truth of Velarissa’s words thudding into you like the priest’s mace. She is right— you bleed yourself now with the buried hope that if the vampire cannot grant you true death, perhaps the horde will.
How pathetic, to want to die to these vermin. Moreso, to be read so easily by your companions. They know not with what you contend— they know not what watches them every night, waiting for a chance to awaken. If you are to die, then at least they will live, and do so without the shadow that haunts you.
If you had been unwilling to come back, you wouldn’t be alive right now. Even the Sharran had been willing to give you a second chance; why can’t you do the same for yourself?
You pick up the pace again when you feel Shadowheart’s hand press gently into the unmarred portion of your back.
Velarissa eventually stops another guard along the way, and demands to know where exactly the druid is being kept. The goblins tell her to go past Commander Minthara’s chambers, over a crumbling, ladder-saddled wall, and then descend a flight of stairs to the warg pens. Walking past the drow commander will only result in a fight, the five of you agree. It’s by luck that Astarion spots two goblins walking along a wooden outcropping that winds itself around a giant gap in the floor, likely leading to the warg pens. You all follow them.
The two goblins eventually notice your group approaching, and they back out of the way with a quick bow. Velarissa leads you through a small, dim chamber, past a wooden door, and into a larger room that smells worse than the camp as a whole, somehow. Down the stairs and to the left, the wargs are kept locked in iron cells. To the right, a giant grizzly roars at two goblin children who carelessly lob stones at it.
You all stand and wait at the top of the stairs as Velarissa turns over her shoulder to speak. “Once we’re down there, kill them all. Don’t let them out the door.”
“Finally,” Astarion breathes. The vampire fingers the hilt of his dagger with a grin, and you almost find yourself doing the same.
The goblin children scream with delight in infuriating the bear further as you approach them, pestering him into a fury. He throws himself against the cell door and rattles the bars with his might, and they shake with the threat of unhinging. The goblin overseeing the children stands in salute to Velarissa, who says nothing, but instead nods directly at you.
It is with no hesitation that you grab one of the children by its hair and press your blade across its throat. As the other child shrieks and goes to run up the stairs, the blood-call rings clear in your head. You sling out your bow and bring an arrow to its string, ignoring how your wounds scream at your movements. You fire one quick shot at the child, and watch as blood pools beneath its little body.
Astarion grabs the goblin overseer and takes his own daggers to her back; she fights pitifully against him. You don’t flinch as Halsin’s iron bars come crashing down just behind you, his deafening roar not nearly as loud as the beating of blood in your ears.
The grizzly sets upon one of the loosed wargs and snaps his teeth into its neck, drawing a veil of red that sprays across the floor, across your boots. You lose yourself gazing at it as it reflects torchlight and battle alike.
Another warg comes barreling out from its cell— Velarissa punctures its side with a shining, steel glaive, and Shadowheart brings down her morningstar into its head. Astarion fires an arrow at a goblin across the room, and it goes down with a thud. You shoot another one without realizing it, and soon, all of your enemies are dead, and all of your weapons are no longer made of steel, but of carrion.
You can hardly look away, and find yourself wanting.
Halsin is just as bear-like even as a man. The giant wood-elf volunteers to fight alongside you all as you confront Minthara and the other leaders of the horde. You all agree that it is best for Halsin to wait in the next room over, poised at the ladder, to await the fight to come.
Velarissa approaches Commander Minthara now, who is relieved to find another drow among them all. “The Absolute blesses me today,” She says with a strong, notable voice. “You were sent to assist me in finding the grove, yes?”
“I know precisely where it is.” Velarissa tells her.
Minthara’s eyes widen. “Show me, true soul.”
Vel blocks her mind from the drow, whose eyebrows furrow in annoyance, with scrutiny. She demands, “Why deny me?”
“I know, and you may not. We were sent to protect the grove— from you.”
Halsin drops then onto two feet from the ladder-wall and near instantly transforms into his grizzlyself. He charges across the crevice bridge as Velarissa and the rest of you draw your weapons on Minthara and her nearby minions. Velarissa forces her glaive against the commander’s greatsword with a sharp clang, and together the two set to fighting.
You draw your bow again, and with Astarion the two of you fire arrows at the goblins spilling in from the room’s main entrance. Shadowheart’s dark spells go flying overhead and obliterate a goblin across the bridge, as Halsin slings another into the chasm with naught but his teeth. Wyll’s rapier finds its mark in the bellies of his enemies as he strangles them with hell-summoned tentacles. Your shoulders sear with heat, but you do not stop firing arrow after arrow.
Minthara’s sword chimes right next to your ear as you turn and shove your shortblade into her greatsword. The drow commander fights both you and Velarissa at once, spinning and deflecting your combined power until Vel’s glaive manages to cut Minthara in the leg, sending her onto one knee. Velarissa wheels around and hits the commander in the head with the butt of her polearm, knocking her into the stone table nearby, leaving her unconscious as she falls to the floor.
Velarissa spins around and goes after a goblin intending to alert the horde with a wardrum, but she manages to cut him down before he can reach it. You watch the end of the slaughter, and stand over the drow commander’s body, watching her lay slumped against the floor.
The room goes quickly still. Your enemies have all gone down nearly at once, and now those left alive are catching their breath. Halsin transforms back to himself, and groans before asking, “Is she dead?”
You bend down over Minthara’s body and place two fingers on the vein in her neck. She is warm, and her heart still beats. You can slit her throat, as your hands itch to do, as Halsin would command, but something tugs at you. Perhaps it’s the wisp of kindness that so often escapes your notice; perhaps it’s the subtle realization that if you do not abstain from the path your past has set you on, then you never will have the chance again. To indulge the urge is to give up your freedom; you know this in your bones.
You lean in close to her ear and whisper, “Sleep, drow. Today, I will grant rest to all who are wicked but myself.”
You search for any twitch of her face to confirm that she has heard you, but she remains perfectly unmoving.
You rise, and tell the bear druid that the goblin commander is dead. Satisfied, the group moves on to the rest of the temple, slaughtering goblins and hobgoblins and other vile beings alike. The clerics send down both light and shadow to obliterate and strangle their foes; the bear rips his fangs into the throats of anything that moves, and sinks his claws into their belly flesh; the warlock’s magic holds goblins in place as he rams his blade through their hearts; and the vampire uses twin daggers to slash at the ankles of some and the necks of others, bringing them to their knees either way.
But you, you do not fight. You kill. It is not so much an act of survival or necessity like the others might deem their own actions. It is a joy to you, whether you want it to be or not. You try not to consider this fight to be an indulgence— rather, you are restraining the urge with petty combat. It seethes and writhes within you, knowing it can kill those who fight alongside you as easily as it can this pathetic horde.
You fly through crowds of goblins and fell each one swiftly, with a flash of your shortsword in the torchlight and a sick gleam in your eyes. No smile graces your face, but those who catch a glimpse of you see that this is no chore, but rather a game, one that you have only ever won.
You take hold of a goblin by its face, the fire that has surged through you since your revival now kindling at your fingertips. The goblin’s skin melts away, slowly at first— and then your power comes to full realization, and sets him boiling with white-hot flame. Embers smolder in your hand as you take it away in surprise, but even this revelation does not pull your body away from the slaughter.
You have magic, and it is just as deadly as your blades. You fight from then on with both steel and flame, delighting shamelessly in their combined fury. The fight makes it way outside, bringing death to an ogre and its minions, to goblins and their kin. The stench of burning flesh sears your nostrils and riles your nerves. You cannot imagine yourself slowing down, but then things seem to come to a halt as the last creature burns in your grasp.
You swing upright, and catch your breath with an open mouth, your tiefling fangs bared to the nearly-gone sun, its golden fire not unlike your own. The taste of copper lines your tongue, and the stench of war fills your lungs. Your mind reels from the fight, numbed with leftover adrenaline. You can do nothing but breathe it away through your tightened throat. You are remorseful yet thrilled to find that your limbs are no longer lead.
The others finish their killings a few seconds after you, and you watch now as they fall back in exhaustion, weapons limp by their sides, their stances slack. They glance around the camp and silently count heads, but when their eyes land one-by-one onto you, they stick there.
You look down at yourself, and realize how drenched in blood you are. Its warmth runs along your face and neck, into your mouth, across your chest, down your legs. You look at the shortblade still clenched in your hand, and drop it as you catch your blazing eyes in its reflection, letting it fall into the blood-washed dirt.
They must find you appalling.
You find your feet marching forward, and do not care that they stomp through the open ribcages of a few goblins along the way. The others stare you down as you walk straight through the war camp, and you meet none of their eyes. You gaze ahead at the desecration laid before you and stumble through it almost in awe.
You hear a faint call from Shadowheart far behind you, but the flame smoldering in your mind keeps you from responding— yet you stop.
“Where are you going?” She asks. You hear her take a few steps forward, but then halt. You glance over your shoulder at her, but then a flash of violet pulls your attention away. The tiefling girl runs from pillar to pillar within the temple grounds, calling for you to run. You know she is an illusion cast by your sickening urge, but you follow her command anyway, and break out into a furious sprint. You keep your eyes locked on her so that you do not glance at Astarion on the way out— his red stare would stop you.
“Wait!” You hear the bear-druid call, but even his deep voice cannot command you like the bard’s singing does.
You chase her across the bridge that led you here, across the road and into the woods. You don’t know how long you pursue her as her hair whips through tree branches and leads you through a forest-maze. Your chest is afire and your legs splinter like fallen trees, but you don’t stop until you’re well ahead of the others, and even from there you keep running until your feet finally give out from underneath you.
You fall to one side of a giant tree trunk, your head narrowly missing the stump. You find yourself on your back, the canopy above you spinning relentlessly, your shoulders and their various wounds screaming in protest. Your breath eludes you for an eternity, and your mind is lost at sea.
You must be an abomination, to be capable of such a stupor— to stand beneath a ruby waterfall, and forget to breathe.
