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The canvas of the night stretches wide above them. Astarion watches it, entranced, ever in awe of each new starscape of Faerûn they uncover during their travels.
Tav is mesmerized in turn by the subtle play of moonlight on Astarion’s skin, in his eyes. The light snowfall grazes his hair, the flakes lingering just a bit longer than usual before melting away. Tav leans closer into the one-armed embrace, pressing his lips against Astarion's neck.
“Any new constellations you can show me?” Tav follows his lover’s gaze to a messy cluster of stars.
Astarion chuckles. “Of course, my sweet. If you remember all the ones from before.”
“All of them?” Tav frowns, doubtful. “You have a lot of faith in my memory.”
“If you can quote that bawdy poor excuse of a romance novel we stole from Gale, then surely—”
“Anyway.” Tav ignores Astarion’s smirk, pointing to where he spots a familiar, blade-like pattern, tracing it with his finger. “That one. Jassa’s Dagger?”
“Wrong.”
“Oh, well, the Sword and the Dagg—”
Astarion cuts him off with an exasperated kiss, reaching out to run his hand through Tav's hair, a pleasant shiver tingling in its wake. “Try again. No daggers there, I’m afraid.”
“Ah.” Tav skips through a couple more guesses. “Well… Esetar?”
“That isn’t even visible right now, darling.” Astarion caresses his cheek then, gentle and almost placating. “Not that I don’t find this positively adorable, but do you even listen when I tell you about them?”
“I remember most of our stargazing lessons ending in me seeing stars for a very different reason.”
Astarion groans. “And I remember how I’ve told you repeatedly that your questionable attempts at wordplay leave much to be desired.”
“This one was good,” Tav insists, “one might even say stellar—”
“Stop— ”
Astarion struggles out of the embrace only half-heartedly, and Tav doesn’t catch any trace of tension on his face, so he doesn’t break the hold. “Made you smile,” he says, with no small measure of satisfaction.
“I am not,” Astarion says, “smiling,” he tries and fails to suppress it.
“But there it is.”
Tav presses his lips to Astarion’s, feeling the grin widen. He relishes the soft, languid movement of his lover’s lips as they fall deeper into a kiss that warms Tav even more than the sphere of heat he’s keeping up around them. There’s only a hair’s breadth between them as they pull away, and Tav finds himself lost in Astarion’s eyes all over again.
“There.” Tav points to another patch in the sky, not even looking. “Mystra’s Circle.”
“Why,” Astarion gasps in mock surprise, “truly a remarkable catch! The only circular constellation out there—how did you guess?”
Tav weaves a few spheres from the heaps of snow behind Astarion, all ready to strike. They all miss, of course; Astarion leaps out of his arms to dodge them just in time, and Tav barely manages to halt the spell before the projectiles end up hitting him instead.
“Ugh.” Tav lets the spell dissipate in a burst of snowflakes. Gone is his only chance to catch Astarion off guard. “I’ll get you one of these days.”
“Darling,” Astarion laughs, “do I have to remind you of the score of our snowball fights?” He rushes back into the radius of the heating spell and into Tav's begrudging embrace, though Tav probably doesn’t look as annoyed as he’s pretending to be.
“You may win the battles,” Tav grumbles, “but you won't win the war.”
“If you ask me really nicely, I doubt I would have any choice but to concede defeat.”
“Ha! Since when are you happy to surrender?”
“I am happy with you always,” Astarion says.
And it’s those simple words that give Tav pause.
There is no hint of jest or deceit in Astarion’s eyes. Only warmth and tenderness that Tav is still getting used to seeing there, in place of the once constant fear and pain. The bright specks of light reflected in them form constellations of their own against the ruby red. So beautiful, impossible to look away from, even as Tav feels heat rushing to his cheeks and his heart rattling his chest at an alarming rate. A reaction he hasn’t quite grown out of, even after all these months by Astarion’s side.
“I—well.” Tav blinks. A nervous chuckle follows a bashful smile. “Really?”
A snowflake lands on Tav’s lips, and Astarion steals it with a kiss before it melts.
“My love.” Astarion’s gaze is so tender, his voice so fragile Tav fears that it may break. “These last six months of happy memories are a counterweight to two hundred years of misery.”
Tav’s heart skips a beat, perhaps a couple. He doesn’t know what to answer, doesn’t know how. He can’t quite believe it, still. The pain yet rings sharp from the words Astarion had said a longer while back—that not even Cazador’s death would make up for the all-consuming darkness, that never-ending pain.
But Astarion slides into his mind now, magic weaving itself in the familiar spell Tav spent months developing so they could both have this—mind-to-mind emotions and wordless connection—once their tadpoles were gone. Astarion’s feelings are clear as day there, somewhere in the in-between of Tav’s own tangled thoughts and emotions—
—it's as if there's a bright, simmering hearth in his chest, and it feels like home, you are home—
—Tav’s own face obscures his vision, one memory that mirrors thousands more like it, and when he sees that face smile, he feels—Astarion feels like it lights up everything around him, bringing to life something deep inside him that he thought long forgotten, and he feels his lips follow suit to mirror mine—
—touch is less like small bursts of electricity, like it used to be when they barely knew each other but knew enough to want one another and every touch sparked desire—
—now, the touch of my hand is grounding, your embrace feels like a warding spell, a Sanctuary that keeps at bay whatever danger and harm the world yet harbors, kissing you completes me like two split pieces of a whole finally joining—
There’s waves upon waves of joy radiating from Astarion’s thoughts, there's the shadow of his embrace that Tav can feel even as he’s lost in the connection—and all of a sudden, it’s too much to bear being parted, and so he closes the distance between them. They kiss deeply, softly, it’s all kinds of perfection Tav doesn’t ever want to let go.
Astarion’s lips are cool and yet the kiss spreads warmth all over Tav’s body. Like the familiar surge of sorcery running through his veins, only better, because Astarion’s touch is more magical than any spell Tav could ever hope to invoke. It’s all the elation of a life bound closely to his, of their life began anew. A life they get to live, against all odds, together. Their minds are still entwined, and Astarion’s coalesces into the single thought,
I love you.
And the emotion of it is strong enough, overwhelming enough to make Tav weak in the knees with how good it makes him feel, how completely it overtakes him. And Tav—
Tav is quite happy to surrender to Astarion, too.