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Astarion was in trouble. And he knew it.
It wasn’t just the bloody flayer in his head - in all of their heads, and in her head - and he couldn’t believe that the flayer parasite was now considered to be the least of his problems. In the scale of all else he was attempting to cope with, anyhow.
No, the biggest problem now was that his carefully construed little balancing act was crumbling. Quite quickly, in fact. And it was doing something to him.
He knew what the feeling was. Guilt. He had to call it what it was - it was guilt .
It welled up in his chest every time he looked at her. Thank the gods he’d been blessed with one thing - he was still by some miracle still an excellent liar. Thus, he still held every feature of his face like one.
Astarion ran a hand through his hair in sheer agitation. He hadn’t meant for this to happen, never in a thousand years. And the worst part of it was, Thalia had no idea.
She had simply, quietly, shyly fallen for his whole act. She believed him, trusted him, and he had taken care to not disappoint enough times so that she would continue to do so.
She had no doubt also imagined there was real affection and care in how he had held her strong, lithe body in his arms. He could almost feel her against him, as she’d been the night before.
If Astarion closed his eyes, he could see hers. Those lovely hazel irises, as warm as the fingertips that roved over his profile; as warm as the soft breasts that were covered by her beautiful red hair; as warm as his lips became when he kissed her belly and bare, freckled knees. She was . . .
She was a good girl, a sweet girl. Because truly, she was good; she was simply and solidly a good person. She was capable, she was strong, she was perceptive. She was innocent. And radiant, and kind; she was gentle, warm and ruddy and she was a thousand times too good for him.
He felt sick with this internal admission, as if he’d gorged himself on tainted blood.
If it had only been sex, maybe he would’ve been able to handle it. But he doubted even that now.
If all that had passed between them had been these fleeting, carnal encounters, he might have found what he had to do far easier. But no.
It was far worse. Because Thalia had done far more for him than just lay with him.
To say nothing of the first time she had allowed him to drink from her. This, she had done with a sincerity, a strange selflessness that he hadn’t appreciated enough then. He had known fullness, a true satiation from constant hunger, for the first time in centuries. He had appreciated that. But not that she had been the one that filled him.
She had done a thousand small gestures, and said countless things, that had made him internally pause even as he continued to spout his customary flattery and pleasantries.
He could hardly begin to list them all. The pile of small game and large buck she had somehow snuck outside of his tent - caught with snares, hides intact and not a drop of their blood spilled. The blessed hunting prowess of a wood elf was evidently alive and well in her, as much as the dexterity of the Rangers she had lived with all these years. The blood of those creatures had kept him satisfied for two days.
And there was the way she had taken his side when the rest of their companions had immediately been wary of having a vampire in their midst.
“Well, I’m not going to be his personal blood-bag.”
“Damned bloodsuckers. Of course. Why not? First brainworms, now leeches.”
“If that thing does anything to me in my sleep, it’s on your head.”
“You want him around, keep him in your tent, Red.”
Really, Astarion couldn’t have cared less what any of them had to say. His skin was far too thick to mind; if anything, it had only amused him.
It did then, and it did now. No, what had made the difference was the sudden stiffness of Thalia’s frame, and the sudden sharp edge to her voice. She’d been outnumbered, and had no reason to vouch for him. She didn’t know him.
And again, while it’d amused him - admittedly, even impressed him - he now only appreciated it.
“He’s in the same quandary we all are, and has just as much a right to be here as any of us. If anything is to be on my head, then it’s on my head. No more about it, now.”
And with that same immovable resolve, she had, as their troup’s selected leader, somehow kept him in check. Well, even that was something he wasn’t willing to admit; no one was truly able to do that. No one, except for . . .
Astarion shook the thought off. He wouldn’t think of Cazador now. If it killed him, he wouldn’t.
No, Thalia had done something else. She had admonished with a simple but effective manner.
She had challenged him, she bantered, she joked, she beamed, she smiled and laughed and kissed him and teased him, and . . .
And by the gods, how he’d enjoyed it. He had. Truly, no matter what he might claim. Insanely and simply, he’d . . .
And he knew it was somehow, somehow completely different this time. She was different, she had made him different.
And yet, if his life and all he had ever known hung on it, he’d be damned if he could really even explain why. Part of him wanted to curse her naïvety, and the other part blessed it because . . .
Because he knew what was behind it. What it fed in her, and what he saw as the result.
She was kind, but oh, she was so lonely. And that was her downfall. But, anyone who had lived as she had would be. Lonely, and wanting to be known. Known, held, looked for, and . . .
Astarion closed his eyes. He couldn’t dare speak the word. Not out loud, not in his thoughts. He had once to her, already. In jest, of course. And it had been a lie. At the time. But it terrified him now. It terrified him in a way that . . .
Asatrion inhaled deeply, working his jaw around fangs that he needed to file.
Thalia wasn’t too far away from his tent. She was close by, tending to one of the camp’s three fires. He could just catch her low hums, the tune of a waulking song, over the crackle of wood and kindling. Mingled with the smell of fresh burning wood, of the coals and dry grass was her scent on the night breeze - wild chamomile, and thyme.
She was already such an anomaly but, she was also a Ranger that actually took the time and effort to perfume her hair. He had suspected as much, but had found this out for sure on their first of many trysts. She had admitted to it, almost bashfully, that she did so every night before sleep.
“Well, I see no reason why I shouldn’t, Astarion. Especially not when I know now that you actually like it.”
“I assure you darling, I don’t just like it …”
A laugh bubbled in his throat before he choked on what felt like a sudden, smothered sob. He breathed in again, determined to stave off what he couldn’t allow. Not now. Not ever. Not ever.
Astarion gazed through the parted fabric of the tent flaps at her, seeing for now just her back. The firelight danced over the waves of hair that hung over her shoulders and spine, and she appeared to almost be an extension of the flame.
Bright, warm, alive. Beautiful.
Astarion exhaled, slow and even. What would she say? When he came to her, when he did what had to be done, told her what he knew would rend her heart . . .
He cursed his existence, the previous two hundred centuries and every day that had come before. She didn’t deserve this. Not from him, not from anyone. Half-elfin or no, however long she had lived, she still seemed practically a child in the scale of time and experience he had. But she was strong.
She would survive. She would find a way to. Her proficiency would serve her well, though; it already had for so many years. She was . . .
Astarion felt a horrible, sickening dread taking root deep in his gut. Thalia deserved more than this. She deserved better than this. She . . .
He was getting foolish and fantastical, but he could so clearly imagine it. She truly had the cadence and visage of a woman that should’ve already had a loving husband of a decade, and a brood of children trailing after her for however many years she chose to bear them.
She exercised every aspect of the intimacy he’d known as if she could readily see such a life for herself, as if she wanted that - as if she had it already, against all logic and reason.
She had never said so, though. Not to him, anyhow. Actually, she had said almost less of her history to him than he had of his own. And even if that was what she had, and had left, she would never leave all of that behind, for good, for him.
Did she really want such? Or was she somehow more like himself than Astarion had originally thought? Just remarkably good at pretending? Even so. That, that kind of safety and simplistic bliss was something he could never give to her.
Perhaps, all this was just . . .
Perhaps he was just being absurd. But one thing was not absurd, and that was what he had to resolve. As best as he knew how. Whatever happened, whatever she did or said, he didn’t know how he would react . . .
Astarion’s fist clenched at the tent flap and parted it. He focused on just putting one foot in front of the other, until he was less than a stone’s throw from Thalia.
He stopped, watching, then remembering it was almost impossible to sneak up on her. Thalia’s bare hands appeared, starkly contrasting in the dimness as she brushed the dirt from them. Her voice reached him almost immediately. “Can’t sleep, lover?”
She said it quietly, but the smile on her lips fell when she saw him. She got to her feet quickly, eyes full of concern. “Astarion? What is it?”
He looked down at her. At the one who, for whatever life he had left, already held it in both hands. He would let her have it, he realized. He wanted her to have it. Whatever the rest of his life was like, whatever was left or whatever it looked like, he wanted her to take it; he wanted her to break it, heal it, ruin it, hold it and keep it . . .
And find some way, somehow, to love it. Whatever she chose to do, he wanted it.
She deserves something real, he thought with a resolve so intense that it gave him the inward push he needed. I want to be the one who gives her that.
Astarion met her eye. “Do you have a moment? I-I think we need to talk.”