Chapter Text
The tieflings threw an okay party. For their situation, out in the wilderness and running around with not much more than the clothes on their backs, it was fine. Perfectly fine, okay party with middling music, paltry illusion light shows, and conversations that didn’t talk about anything dramatic. Astarion had inched away from the spotlight after too many had found it suitable to aim it directly at him. Too many bright, glowing faces wanted to shower him with gratitude for his heroism against the goblins, like they did with his battle comrades, and too many tried to flirt with him when he much preferred rewards to be in the form of coin.
The alcohol didn’t quite meet the shandy or dessert wine that he was used to at the Szarr Palace, which didn’t help matters. Those bottles at least managed to seem mild to a tongue that tasted nothing but blood.
“Your parties back home have to be better than this,” Astarion commented to one of the only companions he could tolerate that night. “A party out in the wilds should be a bit more wild, don’t you think? This is more just a merry band of drunks dancing around the campfire with a bottle in hand.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see two tieflings doing exactly that, their arms twined at the elbow.
Astarion took a swig of his wine, and he grimaced at the acrid taste. “Even the wine is bad. All I want is a little fun. Is that too much to ask?”
Fenfen smiled, almost laughing. She made no move to mingle with anyone else or leave to become an audience for the bard. Not interested in the rest, she favoured his company, and she sat criss-cross on his prized velvet cushion with the same comfort as if she was a cat enjoying the same luxury.
With the two of them here, alone, at the edge of camp, nowhere to be and the perfect excuse, he dropped a line.
“What do you say we make our own entertainment, darling?” Tilt his head, twirl a curl between his fingers, shrug. Pretend at liquid confidence. “Get a little closer, so to speak. Away from all the noise.”
Fenfen’s eyes widened, her whole being seeming to rise with a silent gasp. Hooked. “Could we?”
Raise his eyebrows for a second, as if he hadn’t expected her willingness. “As the party winds down, we’ll slip away. I’ll find you.”
—-
Astarion lost sight of Fenfen after that. He wasn't interested in searching the party for her. He knew her by scent among all the grass and plant smells of the woods outside their camp.
The night went on, and Astarion watched the tieflings and his companions fall over themselves as they imbibed more and more. Drinking led to sleep. Everything settled into murmurs. As quiet as just another whisper, Astarion stole away from the light and into the darkness.
Like a predator hunting his favourite prey, he tracked her scent to a clearing, The ground was covered in grass, he noted. That would make this more comfortable, at least.
Fenfen turned up her head as he approached, looking at him with pale eyes that scrunched with a smile. Specks of dust like fireflies bathed her in glow.
“I’ve been waiting for this. Since the moment I met you—“
“Look at what I found,” Fenfen interrupted him.
Astarion stepped closer. A small, fuzzy bat, gripped onto the gnome’s clothes with its claws. He knelt beside her, unsure how to transition this into an embrace of passion. Fenfen was a druid, and no doubt speaking plainly with the bat. It almost felt like they had a voyeur.
“This is a young one,” Fenfen explained. “Just left the safety of their mother, flying on their own and catching their own food. They’re a little scared and a little lost.”
“And what are you doing with it? I hope you’re not taking that flying rodent back to camp.”
The bat tried to climb Fenfen’s shirt, and she easily redirected it to her sleeve instead. “Giving them a moment to catch their breath. And I thought I would show you. They’re so cute, and their fur is so soft. Hand.”
Astarion offered his hand, and Fenfen took it, showing him how to pet the bat with two fingers.
“Soft, right?”
“Yes. It’s not even a full bite, though.”
Fenfen giggled.
“Is this your idea of entertainment? I had a few other ideas…”
She didn’t take the nudge.
“It’s peaceful out here. There were so many people at the party, I couldn’t even hear myself think. And all the drink makes tongues loose — if one more person calls me Lady or Ma’am, I might scream.”
Astarion paused and frowned. “Forgive me, I think I’ve been under the wrong impression. Can you explain..?”
Fenfen huffed, giving him a look. “I don’t belong to the names of man nor woman. It’s not important if our companions use the wrong words about me, which is why I haven’t said anything before. I’ve let you all come to your own ideas. Some of them are funny, anyway.”
Astarion stared at Fenfen. In his own time, since waking up on the shore in the sunlight, he had lived life to the fullest, being violently himself as much as was safe. And Fenfen — was not being themself on this journey.
“It should be important.” Astarion met Fenfen’s eyes. “Who you are is important. You should be respected.”
His voice shook with slight anger, and it took him by surprise just how genuine his conviction was. He took a deep breath and wiped his expression clear.
“Yes, well, that’s nice,” Astarion broached. “But we didn’t come out here in the dark of night to coddle scared little bats.”
“That’s right!”
And Astarion felt cold. He steeled himself for the heat of what was to come, to drift back in his mind and puppet this body from afar. Smile, meet her eyes, and unfocus. Fenfen met his smile with unbridled joy.
“We’ll forage for mushrooms. I know you can’t eat them, but some of them are good for poisons and potions, and I need them for some of my spells.”
That was–
Hmm.
“Mushrooms,” Astarion repeated, more surprised– and relieved? But he needed this night. He needed Fenfen to become emotionally attached, to associate him with love and someone who loved them.
Fenfen’s smile wavered. “Did you want to hunt together instead? I don’t use my panther form often. Or talk about those spells Gale is teaching you?”
“Please, don’t bring the wizard into this.” Astarion hesitated, wanting to take them in his arms and force them into the planned intimacy, but that damn bat. That little bat was staring at him. “Is that all you want to do tonight? Look at mushrooms?”
Fenfen frowned. “You sound disappointed. I thought you wanted to be with me, away from camp, finding little joys in nature to entertain ourselves with,” they said softly.
“No, I’m sorry. You’re just— I assumed you wanted sex.” He made it clear this time. Confused, frustrated, and feeling more than a little guilty.
Fenfen stared at him, like the bat clinging to their sleeve. “Why?”
“Why would anyone want sex?”
“To have children.”
Astarion scoffed, and reminded himself, not for the first time, that Fenfen wasn’t the sharpest blade in their camp. “It was a rhetorical question. But besides conceiving offspring, most people enjoy having sex. Generally, I mean. I obviously don’t know your opinion on the subject, seeing as I’ve ended up in this situation.”
Fenfen was quiet for a long moment. Astarion looked up at the moon through the leaves, trying to eye how deep into the night it was. Maybe it wasn’t too late to approach Wyll’s tent.
“Does this mean you don’t want to pick mushrooms with me?”
“What?” Astarion snapped his neck around to stare at them.
“Do you still want to pick mushrooms with me?” Fenfen replied, as if he hadn’t heard the first time.
“Hells, why are you so difficult?” Astarion complained aloud. He didn’t care to keep his thoughts to himself. “You’re a druid who lives in a forest. Aren’t you supposed to be all about the physical and nature’s gifts or something like that?”
“What is a gift of nature but all of life and death and everything that breathes around us?”
Astarion groaned at that response, falling back on the grass. This was going to be a long night. “I don’t understand you.”
Fenfen leaned over him, expression unreadable as always, pale eyes meeting his own red.
“What do you want?” he grumbled.
“You say you don’t understand me,” Fenfen said carefully, raising an eyebrow. Their voice was flat, but bordered on sardonic. “If you’d like to change that, I would love to talk to you about mushrooms. Not many like to hear what I have to say. I’m a little fey-touched in the head, you see.”
Astarion narrowed his eyes at the gnome. They were right, even if he didn’t want to admit it, using a logic that suited Fenfen too much; if you want to know someone, spend more time with them.
“Fine.” He sat up and glared. “Mushrooms, then. However, only if I’m allowed to do something about that hair of yours. It’s an abomination.”
“A deal, then.”
His ploy had failed, but Fenfen’s perception of him hadn’t been hurt. Hard to get? Well, he could play that game. He just had to change his approach. Take Fenfen’s view to the world. Take a few steps into the fey and prepare to dance like one.
Fenfen hummed winding tunes while Astarion braided their hair.
—--
Astarion greeted sunrise with the full gratitude of someone who had been denied its rays for two centuries. He stood in its way, where the tree branches parted to form a spotlight, his arms outstretched for the sun to warm every bit of exposed skin.
Behind him, he heard Fenfen stir, leaves and grass rustling. He didn’t greet them immediately, letting them wake up at their own pace.
They asked a question that took away a bit from the warmth of the morning sun; “What are those scars on your back?”
“Not the romantic type in the morning, are you?” Astarion asked rhetorically. “It’s a gift from my master, Cazador. Some sort of poem. Carved it into my back over the course of a night. He made a lot of revisions as he went.”
“What does it say?”
“How should I know? Not like I can read it.” Astarion turned around, ready to cut conversation short and return to camp. His back prickled. “What does that tattoo on your face mean?”
A bad question in return, since Danvar had the same tattoo, and likely had been done with consent, unlike his own marked poetry–
“I don’t know.”
Astarion blinked. He stared at them, their hair now tied back in braids. Fenfen touched a hand to their face, tracing over where the letters were scrawled. Now that he searched, he found where the red edges wavered and where colour deepened; where ink and needle had pressed into unwelcoming flesh.
“I got it in the Feywild,” they explained. “I know this writing was on a page from a book. I honestly thought it would wash off, but it’s been spelled to stay.”
Hushed and serious, Astarion demanded, “Who put it there? Who did this to you?”
Fenfen only smiled and picked up the pouch they had put their mushroom finds in. “Let’s get back to camp before they come looking for us.”