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For the past half hour, Astarion had been patiently planted outside of his tent, updating the ledger where he fastidiously notated his inventory, tracked the group’s current goals and progress, and followed everyone’s personal goings-on as far as they concerned or interested him. All the while, he would intermittently peek over the top of the page at Uk’el, kneeled in front of his own tent in silent meditation, wrapping and re-wrapping his sacred red cord around his hands and wrists. The subtlety was necessary, lest any of the others mistake his vigilance for hopeless infatuation. He was lying in wait, prepared to strike the instant an opportunity presented itself.
Over the past few days, he had noticed Uk’el making odd faces during his prayers or any time he was alone and thought no one would be looking. What worried Astarion was how similar these new expressions were to the ones the cleric had previously been failing to suppress, when the rogue’s lavished affections had begun to ring hollow for him. Granted, they had since cleared the air of that troublesome angst, and at least this time he wasn’t making the faces at Astarion. Which was an improvement if only because it left open the possibility that whatever was tormenting him now might have nothing to do with the elf whatsoever. Still, even if the cause was not his problem, a distracted healer would be. And if he was being entirely too honest, he’d also begun to grow fond of Uk’el’s dopey smile.
As soon as he saw the shadow of agony pass over the half-orc’s face, he made his move, setting down his book and quill and sauntering over as if everything was business as usual.
“We really must stop meeting like this,” he hummed to pull Uk’el’s attention from his prayers to himself. “People will start to talk.”
Uk’el opened one eye and quirked an eyebrow at the intrusion.
“Stop meeting how? You coming over to my tent? I think everyone already knows we’re-”
“I mean,” Astarion sighed, “with your scowling like you’ve got a thorn in your paw and my coming over to check on you. People might start to think I care.”
“I’m afraid that ship may have sailed.”
The cleric’s fond smile made Astarion’s heart skip a beat - or it would have, if he’d still had a pulse. As it was, the long-obsolete lump of muscle in his chest simply spasmed uselessly at the dread of having to ruin this moment by turning to serious discussion.
“So, what seems to be the matter? You look itchy, like you swallowed a ball of wool yarn.” Astarion cut to the chase, knowing that the longer he delayed, the more likely he was to talk himself out of talking.
Uk’el’s smile faltered. Although he caught himself before it collapsed entirely, Astarion had not missed the flash of pain in his eyes.
“It’s nothing. Just have a lot on my mind. And, well, in it.”
“Surely you can do better than that. Whatever’s bothering you, you’re hiding it worse than I was my, eh, condition when I got to walk around in the sunlight for the first time in two centuries.”
“That bad?” Uk’el winced. “You know, it really made me wonder how you’d been getting away with it for so long before.”
“The right lighting does the heavy lifting. Trust me.” Astarion paused. Was this really worth it? Was it really necessary to stir this pot? When the tables had been reversed, when Astarion had been the one keeping all his cards so close to his chest that he might as well have stitched them into his shirt to save himself the trouble, Uk’el’s own strategy of simply sitting back and waiting with saintly patience until Astarion worked himself up and let something boil over seemed an attractive alternative to pulling proverbial teeth.
For better or for worse, Astarion just didn’t have the same longanimity.
“I won’t pry if you tell me off, but I must say it’s rather unlike you to deflect like this. You talk about your damn feelings almost as much as Karlach.” With a small shake of his head, he admitted, “Which makes me even more worried that this is about something quite serious.”
Uk’el searched Astarion’s eyes, and for once the elf gave no resistance. But when he gave one of his trademark sighs, an unexpected fury roiled up in the elf’s chest and temporarily overcame his concern.
“Would you kindly quit that patronizing snort of yours?” he snarled, catching himself by surprise with his own vehemence, yet completely at the mercy of its riptide.
Uk’el blinked, looking just as shocked.
“It was a sigh, not a snort. And I didn’t realize it bothered you.”
“You always do it just as you’re about to put on that ‘holier-than-thou’ tone of yours that means you think you've got the right of it all.”
“Is that how it comes across? It’s not to insinuate that I think I’m right or above anyone. It’s that-” He hesitated. A pit slowly sank in Astarion’s gut as the realization hit that he wasn’t only pushing the matter he’d come to address, hadn’t only taken a hard left turn out of petty annoyance, but was also now essentially demanding that Uk’el justify his breathing patterns. He felt like an absolute ass. “It means my head’s won out over my pride and I’ve resolved to dispense with all self-preserving pretense and be fully, nakedly honest with you because working out whatever’s on the table means more to me than preserving face.”
Folding his arms, Astarion clicked his tongue. The fire in his chest receded, and his scowl smoothed into a simple frown.
“Hmph. Do you have to be so bloody reasonable about it?”
“Yes. Because this,” Uk’el gestured between them, “is important to me.”
“Fine! Then just say whatever disgracefully genuine thing you were about to say.”
Uk’el got half-way through another sigh but caught himself. When his eyes darted briefly to Astarion’s, it sent another pang of guilt through the spawn’s already over-taxed heart.
“I’ve been thinking about what you told me, of how our first night together - and our second, I suppose - were a survival tactic for you. About how the things you’ve had to do have damaged your relationship with that whole sphere.”
Of all the possible topics he could have guessed, of all the likely confessions he had prepared for, this had not been on Astarion’s short list. And he hated it. He didn’t like surprises and he certainly didn’t like the territory they were headed for. Every fibre of his being was shrieking like lightning, urging him to find the most immediate escape route possible. How he managed to resist that instinct, he couldn’t have said. The romantic in him wanted to believe that love won out over fear. The self-hateful cynic that had kept him alive this long informed him he’d merely frozen, craven that he was.
“And?” he snapped. Squeezing his eyes shut with a grimace of effort, Astarion bit back the anger still threatening to burn everything before him to the ground. He didn’t just need this anymore; he wanted this. So with all the terrifyingly vulnerable honesty he could muster, he pleaded in a whisper, “Please, don’t make me regret the one time I forced myself to be as honest with you as you can’t help but be with me.”
Uk’el grimaced in kind. Astarion couldn’t help but wonder what internal battle the cleric must be fighting himself.
“It makes me sick to my stomach, thinking that I might have hurt you, made you feel trapped or used or-” He grunted, as though choking on the words. “I can’t know how it must feel, but you’ve been clear it isn’t pleasant. And even though I couldn’t have known and I don’t blame anyone for it happening, it makes me ill thinking what I might have inflicted on you, even unknowingly.
“I didn’t want to tell you when it began eating away at me because I didn’t want to imply it was your fault or your responsibility in any way, didn’t want to make you relive it or-” Uk’el shook his head. “But I couldn’t speak to anyone else about it either without having to give context. And of course, I would never betray your trust like that. So I bottled it up, even knowing what that would do. There was nothing else to do with it.” His shoulders slumped and he scrubbed at his face with both palms. His voice was a ragged croak as he muttered, “I’m sorry.”
Suddenly, Astarion was acutely aware of the sensation of standing on a precipice, as if they were both straddling the edge of a cliff. If Uk’el shed a single tear, Astarion knew he wouldn’t be able to stop himself tumbling over after him. Reluctantly, the spawn reached out and took each of Uk’el’s hands in his, pushing himself to bridge the gap between them - ready or not - wanting it for himself in that moment more than anything.
“No. If I have nothing to apologize for, then neither do you. What happened is passed. We can’t change it anymore. Not that that's much comfort…” This wasn’t what he wanted to say. “You said yourself that it isn’t your fault. And I agree: it’s nobody’s ‘fault’.
“You were so infuriatingly sweet about it all too: I thought I was flirting as unsubtly as mortally possible, yet you - in your innocence - made the fool of me, forcing me to spell it out for all at the party to hear.”
“I didn’t want to presume! You were gorgeous, entirely out of my league. And tipsy. Not to mention: hated my guts. It just didn’t seem possible that you were saying what I thought you were saying.”
“I maintain that ‘hate’ is a strong word for it. Regardless, you can’t blame yourself for what it became. Not when I literally, explicitly asked you for sex.”
“That’s just it,” Uk’el squeezed his hands needily. The pressure was surprisingly nice. “I don’t blame myself. Like I said, I don’t blame either of us. Yet still, I feel sick.”
Suddenly, the same flame Astarion had tamped down only moments ago roared back to life in his chest and erupted in a sudden outburst.
“Well what am I supposed to do about that!?”
Uk’el blinked in surprise and confusion, and the pit that had been growing in Astarion’s stomach dropped hard. As he tried to keep his head above water, a pattern suddenly clicked into place in his mind. He was scared. He was scared to address what all of this might mean for them, what it could do to the thin cocoon of trust they had begun to build around their farce of a relationship in the hopes of it metamorphosing into something real. He felt powerless, and seeing Uk’el feeling the same meant he had no safety net to fall back on if everything fell out beneath him.
He squeezed Uk’el’s hands gently in return to tether himself, praying that he wouldn’t pull away.
“I’m sorry. I just-”
“It’s okay.”
“I don’t know what to do either.” In that instant, Astarion didn’t know what was worse: that he’d just said that out loud or the realization that it was true.
Slowly, gently, Uk’el pulled Astarion into an embrace, enveloping him completely in his muscular arms. Pressing his face against the other man’s chest, the elf blocked out the rest of the world, retreating into the comfort of their connection. Every time they embraced, Astarion was caught off-guard by just how warm Uk’el was. It shouldn’t have surprised him considering his undead nature, yet he somehow managed to forget each time. And so each time again was like discovering that warmth anew. Feeling Uk’el’s fingers brush across his hair over and over soothingly, Astarion was at least able to stop worrying about what this issue might do to them as a couple. It seemed the cleric meant to keep his promise to remain by his side through it all.
“It doesn’t just tuck away nicely into a neat, little box, does it?” Astarion asked, only turning his face away from Uk’el’s chest enough to be heard. “Even though you know you aren’t the one to blame.”
“Yeah. It sticks there, squirming like a second parasite, gorging itself on another part of me. Is that what it’s like for you?”
“Sometimes. Not always. It’s…messy.”
“Mm.” They were both silent for a long while, the chirping of crickets pouring in to fill the dead air they had so carelessly left vacant. Until Uk’el muttered, “But we won’t let it kill us. Same as the ones in our skulls. No telling how long it’ll take with an enemy so less tangible. But we’ll find a way through. We always do.”
Uk’el kissed the top of Astarion’s head, and the spawn felt whatever was left of his dead, shrivelled heart melt. He tried to share in that optimism, to paint over the sense of doom plastered to the very walls of his soul with that proffered brush, but the notion effortlessly slipped through his fingers. There was simply too much they didn’t know, couldn’t know, too much yet looming before them that they couldn’t possibly control to allow any sense of true contentment to settle in. Despite his best efforts not to leave himself alone with his demons again, it seemed despair had found a way in. As it always did.
Knowing that if he lingered in that space alone for too long, he might lose all nerve again, Astarion forced himself back to the present, slamming the door behind him.
“With any luck, Magpie. At least, we can hope.”