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Whatever Astarion might have thought, Sebille was no fool. Nor was she oblivious. She knew he snuck off at night when the rest of them were either sleeping or in a trance. She knew that red eyes were not typical for high elves. And she knew that he spent an inordinate amount of time staring at her. From any other man, she would have presumed lust. But something about Astarion's gaze gave her pause. Hungry, yes, but not quite lustful.
She didn't trust him. Not that she really trusted any of her new companions, bound as they were through the tadpoles in their heads. But Astarion especially put her on edge. At least Lae'zel was honest about her bloodthirst. Astarion kept his secrets close to his chest. Like his suspiciously vague claim of being a magistrate in the city.
She didn't exactly suspect him of secretly plotting to slit their throats in the night, but she doubted his intentions were wholly pure. And so, as Astarion volunteered for watch once more, she leaned back and pretended to fall into a trance, just waiting for him to make his move.
She'd been expecting him to sneak off again. She truly hadn't been expecting to suddenly have a shadow looming over her, blocking out the light from the campfire. Nor did she expect to open her eyes to a mouthful of needle-sharp fangs.
Astarion abruptly realized she was not in a trance, and his eyes went wide. "Shit."
It was almost comical how quickly he retreated, nearly falling over himself in his haste to get away, as though he were the one who opened his eyes to a vampire looming above him.
Sebille leapt to her feet, summoning eldritch magic to her hands. Her urges pushed her to release, to sear his flesh and watch him boil away. Or, even better, to take one of his daggers to his chest and peel his flesh away, opening up his ribcage like a treasure chest. He was beautiful in life—or unlife, as it were—so how beautiful would he be in death?
But Astarion did not attack. He did not lunge at her throat fangs-first. He simply stood there, eyes wide and almost frightened, uncharacteristically stumbling over his words. "It—I didn't—I wasn't going to hurt you!"
Sebille arched a skeptical brow. "So you normally loom over people with your fangs bared, is that it?"
"No, it's not—I just needed… well, blood." He sounded so defeated as he admitted it, like admitting to a weakness. Which, in a way, it was.
Sebille glared at him, hoping her black-as-pitch eyes unnerved him as much as they had unnerved her the first time she saw her own reflection, back on the beach. "So you were going to drain me, is that it?"
"It's not like that!" he protested. "I'm not some monster. I feed on animals. Boar, deer, kobolds! Whatever I can get. But when I'm fighting, it's… harder. I'm just too weak right now."
Sebille narrowed her eyes at him. She had noticed him seeming a bit more sluggish recently, the dark shadows under his eyes seeming darker than usual. And foolishly, she'd ignored it.
This was what she got for ignoring it.
Astarion continued, his voice turning from pleading for her to understand to wheedling. "If I just had a little blood, I could think clearer. Fight better."
Sebille wanted to refuse. She wanted to balk at the very idea of it. But… hadn't he been the only one of her companions who hadn't retreated from her in the wake of Alfira's death? However much Sebille had insisted she hadn't truly been to blame, that she had no idea what had happened, the others had looked on her as a monster. Which, in a way, she supposed she was. The shattered flashes of memory from that night still haunted her trances, making her sick to her stomach. The look of such utter terror on the sweet bard's face as she passed.
Alfira hadn't deserved that. No one did, truly, but especially not her. Not when she'd been so eager to help.
The next morning, Astarion had been the only one who didn't look horrified at the twisted, mangled corpse found in the center of a ritual circle in the middle of camp. If anything, he'd been almost complimentary, if a bit odd about it. Sebille should have been disgusted by his easy acceptance, but in the wake of the others' distance, she'd instead clung to him.
The memory disgusted her. But she couldn't very well hold Astarion responsible for her own weakness, could she?
Finally, reluctantly, she lowered her hands and allowing her magic to dissipate. Somewhere in a distant plane of reality, where the stars do not shine, her ancient, unknowable patron grumbled in mild disappointment at the lack of bloodshed. Sebille did her best to push thoughts of her patron from her mind. With the amount of violence they saw on a daily basis, it would be appeased soon enough.
Astarion had relaxed almost as soon as the glow of Sebille's magic had faded, though he made no move to approach. He did, however, glance between her eyes and her hands in confusion.
"How much do you need?" she asked.
"Er… what?" He shook his head. "Not much, I promise. Only a taste." His eyes were wide, as though he couldn't believe what was happening.
Neither could Sebille, in all honesty, and she was the one considering allowing a vampire to bite her. Many questions ran through her mind—Would the bite turn her into a vampire as well? How much was 'only a taste'? Would it hurt?—but all she could bring herself to say was, "Not a drop more than you need."
"Really?" he sounded so genuinely stunned, as though this outcome had never even occurred to him. "You mean you'll—" He cut himself off, lips curling into his usual sly smirk. "Of course. Not one drop more."
Sebille wasn't certain how much she believed that, but she beckoned him closer all the same. Away from the fire, away from their companions, just in case anyone woke up unexpectedly. Humans and half-breeds tended to be harder to rouse than full elves, but from the way Wyll had leapt out of his bedroll the previous night at the sound of an owl's hooting, she knew it wasn't impossible.
Once they were a safe(ish) distance away, Sebille turned to her pallid companion. "You're the expert," she said. "How do you want to do this?"
He startled at her question, raising one hand to his head as though to comb through his curls before thinking otherwise and offering a haughty grin. "Why don't you lie down, and I'll climb on top of you, darling? Don't want you getting lightheaded and collapsing partway through."
Sebille wrinkled her nose. He was insufferable. It was just her luck that he was also unbelievably attractive. If any other man had made a comment like that to her, she would have slit open his belly without a second thought. Though whether that was the drow in her speaking, or something else, she was uncertain.
Still, she obliged, laying herself out on a patch of grass at the very edge of the fire's light. The darkness caused her no difficulty, of course, but she'd overheard Wyll and Gale complaining about not being able to see a thing. Their need for less rest at night wasn't the only reason she and Astarion were consistently chosen to keep watch.
She tensed as Astarion climbed on top of her, looming, his ruby red eyes mere inches from her own void-black pits. For just a moment, before he lowered his face to her neck, she saw a hint of… embarrassment? But that made no sense. What reason would he ever have to be embarrassed?
He nudged his nose against her left ear, and she tilted her head to the side, allowing him access to her neck. Every instinct she had screamed at her to stop this, to throw him off, to eviscerate him for ever daring to touch her in such a way. But she forced herself to relax, to sink into the grass the way one might a feather bed. Though, if she had ever slept in a feather bed before, she couldn't remember it.
Astarion took a surprisingly long time to actually bite her. She'd been expecting him to just stick his fangs in and be done, and didn't that sound like a familiar refrain? But no, he took his time, sniffing and… licking her? She tried not to shudder at the cold, wet sensation, occasionally heightened by the slightest scrape of his fangs. Then, between one breath and the next, he struck.
His fangs sunk into her flesh like tiny shards of ice, and the feeling of her blood leading her body was… indescribable. Painful, and yet… strangely pleasurable as well? Shivers broke out across her body, and it was all she could do to lay still and not do something embarrassing like pull him closer. She curled her hands into fists until her long nails dug into her palms and little crescent-shaped pools of blood started to form. The pain usually helped her to focus on the here and now, to chase away the urges. Except now, it only seemed to heighten the heady sensation.
Quickly, she grew lightheaded, though she couldn't tell if it was from the blood loss or the… whatever the other sensation overtaking her was. She didn't want to chance it, though, so she raised a hand to prod him firmly in the ribs. "Enough," she rasped, her voice worryingly weak. How much blood had he taken?
It took Astarion a moment to remember himself and what he was doing. He let out a questioning noise, then a startled yelp as he withdrew. "Of course." He scrambled back, a mirror of his earlier retreat when she'd caught him about to bite her. He didn't go quite as far this time, however, before he let out a positively sinful moan. A trail of crimson blood—her blood—dripped down his chin, and he swiftly caught it with his thumb and brought it to his mouth. "That was… amazing," he murmured, sounding dazed.
Sebille also felt fairly dazed, albeit for an entirely different reason. "Feel better?" she asked.
He took a few deep breaths, seemingly to regain his bearings, and nodded. "I do. I do! I feel strong! I feel… happy."
He sounded strangely bereft as he said the word. Sebille gazed up at him for a moment longer before she stood as well. Her head swam with the sudden movement, and she reached out to brace herself on a nearby tree. Except, the tree was a bit farther away than she'd thought, and she might have collapsed altogether, had Astarion not reached out and grabbed her.
"Careful, darling," he murmured. "I asked you to lie down for a reason, you know."
Sebille gritted her teeth, yanking her arm away and trying to ignore the way he scoffed. "All right, then we're done. I'm going back to bed."
"Good idea," he agreed. "Personally, I'm going out for a hunt. You were delectable, my dear, but I'm in need of something a bit more filling."
She supposed that made sense, if she truly had managed to stop him before he took too much blood. "Fine. Just be careful, and get back before the others wake up. Unless you want to explain what just happened to Wyll."
Astarion smirked. "You say that as if I should be frightened. Frankly, at the moment, I'd welcome the challenge."
He turned and skulked into the woods—strong, powerful, more confident than before. Partway there, however, he paused and turned to glance at her over his shoulder. "This is a gift, you know. I won't forget it."
Sebille nodded. "Good."
His expression did something odd again for a split second—something almost akin to sadness—before it was once again covered by his usual roguish smirk. And then he vanished into the woods altogether, not to be seen again until morning.
Sebille collapsed onto her bedroll, shutting her eyes and willing herself to fall into her usual trance. But try as she might, the meditation did not come to her easily. Memories of Astarion's body on top of hers, his fangs in her throat, came to her mind unbidden. She wanted desperately to shove him to the ground and have her wicked way with him. It was only fair. After all, he'd taken what he wanted from her. Now it was her turn.
She shut her eyes and, at last, found peace enough to fall into a trance.