Chapter Text
The story goes like this.
The young girl is confronted one day by her mother, who tells her the Grand Duke is hosting a ball for his son's birthday. In a flurry of frills and last-minute finishing
lessons, the girl's mother pushes her daughter along a carefully planned path, one that is not only proven to yield results, but has been proven to yield results by example of that very mother's own life. Marrying into wealth is a meticulous craft, and this mother will not have her daughter fizzle out their family line from lack of ambition. No, that wouldn't do at all.
And so, after months of painstaking effort and a gods- forsaken deluge of fittings, the young girl is readied for the ball, with a singular objective planted before her: win the heart of the Duke's son.
No matter that they were barely teenagers, both of them. That particular hurdle could be seen to later. Opportunities like this were rare enough that they just couldn't wait.
And so, as the story goes, the Duke's son is entranced by the young girl, and the court is set ablaze by talk of this mystery courtier, and how quickly young Ravenguard was taken to proposal, and the rest, well. The rest is history, of course.
Except, that story didn't happen, or not entirely, at least. The young girl was indeed confronted, and her mother did indeed have plans for her, and there was even a ball and a deluge of dress fittings. What changed the story was the fact that the young girl had plans of her own; or rather, someone eIse had other plans which the young girl was rather more keen on.
You see, Aella was chosen to bear The Light.
To say that Wyll Ravenguard was ill prepared for such an event as his own birthday was an understantement of mass proportions. You might sooner say that a bug is ill prepared for a morning bird's hunt, or a fish is ill prepared for the end of the river's mouth which will very soon open to a waterfall.
Yes, the idea of parading in front of the whole Baldurian court was terrifying, but that wasn't even the half of it. He had a sneeking suspicion that his father had some motive behind it all. For the life of him, Wyll couldn't figure out what, exactly, but that didnt stop him from guessing. Maybe he was finally going to let him join the Flaming Fists. Wouldn't that be something he'd dreamed of for quite a while now. But that was the more hopeful part of him, and more often not, that part usually ended up burning him. He tried to remind himself that it was no use guessing, and that soon, at the ball, he'd find out. Even if it was the last kind of thing he wanted to attend.
But, as heir to the rank of Archduke and only son of the great name Ravenguard, he had little choice in the matter. He had to attend fittings, and pose for paintings, and take dancing lessons-- those gods-forsaken dancing lessons.
He'd much rather be practicing the art of the blade, which he'd practically begged his father to be allowed of him. He was still too young, his father had said, which was absurd, because Wyll had it on good authority that Ulder had practically been born with a weapon in hand, but of course the point fell on deaf ears. Wyll finally got his way when he made the rather more pressing point that if people at the next Big Court Event found out that the Archduke's son was a helpless whelp, Ravenguard's reputation might be done for. Perhaps he played up the court's mockery a little, but the effect it had was satisfactory. That evening, Ulder gave Wyll his first blade-- a rapier with a shining hilt and a wicked edge.
There was nothing Wyll enjoyed more-- the wind on his face, the singing of steel clashing, and the feeling that he was finally in a field in which he felt he belonged. There was something practically magical about fighting; like you held the world and all its wealth of life within your hands and practiced steps. There was purpose to it.
Not for now, though, as Wyll dredged through step after step in the preparations for the ball. He didn't even know why they were doing this, why his father insisted such elborate measures when he'd been perfectly content to let it be every other year of Wyll's birthday. People, court people at least, were insufferable, and to spend a whole day with them at a ball, he knew, would be excruciating.
"--And remember!" Said Aella's mother, her voice crying out from the other room, "I won't hear any complaints about the dress. It was expensive!"
"Yes, mother," said Aella, aggrieved, though she pulled at her bodice in annoyance. The cursed fabric must have been lined with sandpaper or something...
Aella caught a glimpse of herself, freshly powdered and prepped, in the standing mirror. Late afternoon light filtered in from the window, casting the pale blue gown aglow. For all the trouble her mother had caused her these past few weeks, at least she'd thought to reward Aella with a dress in her favorite color.
... And that was where the merits ended. The sleeves were snug, the skirts were layered to the point of near immobilization, and upon all that, she'd had to put on a corset. At only fourteen, and body genetically persuaded toward the flat side of things, she hadn't had to bother before. Recently, though, her mother had taken a thorough look over her wardrobe and decided that now of all times was the moment to really crack down on the notion of Aella's impending womanhood. Corsets in general weren't quite as terrible as she'd initially suspected--at least her fears of not being able to breathe were assuaged-- but she was still getting used to the feeling.
And now she was going to present herself at court. At a ball. In a corset.
When had her life so suddenly become eventful? She longed for the days when she could while away the time in the gardens, sneaking out at night to bask in the moonlight. They had the most beautiful bullywug trumpets which practically glowed at night...
"Aella?" Her mother popped her head round the doorframe.
"Hm?"
"I said: make sure you don't sit too much. You'll flatten the crenolin."
"Oh. Oh---okay."
Her mother tilted her head, drifting fully into the room. Her eyes studied her daughter head-to-toe. They looked near nothing alike, aside from perhaps bone structure and a similar nose. While her mother, a human hailing from Waterdeep, had darkened hair and a beautiful but fairly ordinary complexion, Aella was, most decidedly from the moment of her birth, not human.
It was a rare thing that a tiefling be born to non-tiefling parents, much less a human and a half-elf. But when Aella was born, there was no mistaking it. Her skin a pale, almost greyish blue, her hair white as snow, and the tell-tale horns and...well, tail, gave her away as something other.
Of course people talked. The way Aella understood it, the event had nearly caused an unmendable rift between her parents. But, as they had eventually came to learn, Aella was indeed their own daughter-- her appearance the product of an ancient bloodline in one or both sides of the family involving a devil pact. The details were fuzzy, but Aella guessed whatever it was, it must be something taboo enough to make neither of her parents want to talk to her about it, ever.
Not that she'd dared bring it up that often. Oriana and Kalan Delanoth, bearers of their proud house as well as a wealth of secrets that extended well beyond even familial bounds, were as quiet as the dead on the subject.
Aella's mother had this way of looking at her-- like she was still trying to believe it after all these years.
"Dear me..." Oriana rested a hand upon her cheek. Her voice was distant. "You look the picture of a beautiful young woman. What wonderful children you shall have one day. Hm."
Before they could continue their conversation, before Aella could ask what made her mother think of future children of all things, a distant horn blew in the distance, down from the street.
"The carriage is here," Aella's mother said, ushering her out the door. "Mind we don't run late."
The carriage ride was silent, mostly, aside from Oriana's preening of her young daughter. She must have straightened the tiefling's silver hair and told her to sit up a hundred times before the castle came into view.
As far as castles go, the Gate was not modest, or so Aella had heard. Its owner was no High King, but that didnt mean it had nothing to boast of.
Stone and polished marble, grand iron portcullises and stained glass windows... these and more made up the heart of Baldur's Gate.
They stopped. They exited the carriage. They mounted the steps and filed inside.
And though it was the last thing Aella wanted to do, she steeled herself for the party of a lifetime.