Chapter Text
"To you are owed
Ourselves and all creation: a brief while
We linger; then we hasten, late or soon,
To one abode; here one road leads us all;
Here in the end is home; over humankind
Your kingdom keeps the longest sovereignty.”
-Orpheus to Hades, Ovid’s Metamorphoses , book 10
In the end, it’s shockingly ordinary, the manner in which Vax’ildan of Vox Machina dies.
They’re cleaning up a band of orcs that have been causing trouble outside of Vasselheim when it happens. Kashaw, Zahra and Kima have settled into Whitestone, and the main party had been on its way to the Fire Ashari when the bastions had asked for their help taking care of the orcs that had been waylaying travelers. They’d accepted, of course. How dangerous could a few orcs be?
There’s no protective booby trap or treachery demon’s wrath this time. No climactic confrontation or dramatic duel. Just a blow Vax doesn't dodge in time. His enemy strikes true, and the rogue falls. Almost too easy, really.
Across the battlefield, Vex has just let an arrow fly when a wave of dark dread sweeps over her. Cold sweat beads on her neck as she drops her attacking stance to scan the fight for her brother. Her mind whirls, recalling the last time she felt this ice creeping through her veins: outside Uriel’s palace when Vax was at the mercy of the Briarwoods. She and Vax have never had that kind of twin connection, not really, the kind where they feel each other’s pain or know when the other is in trouble. For it to be happening now…
Her eyes lock onto a single orc, and time slows to a crawl as she watches him bring a blade down onto the unmoving form of her unconscious brother.
Vex’ahlia screams.
An arrow slams into the orc’s chest, then another, and another. Blood spurts from his mouth as he falls, twitching weakly, but Vex has already forgotten him. He is nothing to her, the battle is nothing, there is nothing and no one in the world but her brother, lying motionless on his back on the cold earthen ground. Dimly she registers that the other orcs are dead, the battle is over, Vox Machina is victorious once more, but all she sees is the blood pooling under her brother’s torso. It takes her an eternity to reach him, what feels like three lifetimes, but finally, finally , she does. She lands hard on her knees next to him, arcane energy already gathering at her fingers, and plants her hands on his blood-soaked chest, pouring all her strength into the Cure Wounds casting.
Nothing happens.
Vex pulls her hands away. The magic dissipates, but Vax is still lying there. The blood is flowing slower now, but the wounds are still open. She tries again, the Cure Wounds taking the last of her spellcasting as she forces the healing magic into her brother’s body. But the light fades, and Vax doesn’t move.
“ Pike! ” The cry forces itself from her chest, and Vex spins on her knees, searching desperately for the healer. The rest of the party has gathered around them. Percy, white-faced and blood-splattered, has an arm around Keyleth, who looks like she can barely hold herself up, a hand over her mouth. Scanlan’s normally jovial countenance is grim. Grog is breathing hard, coming down from his rage, his brow furrowed as though he can’t understand why Vax isn’t just getting up already. And Pike--
Pike is standing in front of her. There are tears in her eyes. She is very, very still.
“Pike, come on!” Vex’s voice cracks, the words tearing at her throat as they’re spoken. “Do something, heal him! Bring him back!”
“I can’t.” Pike speaks softly, but each word rips through Vex like a knolling bell. “I can’t heal him. And I can’t… I don’t have the spell. Vex… he’s gone.”
A gasp, a sob. Keyleth, Vex thinks. Someone should make sure she’s alright, for when Vax wakes up. He hates when Keyleth cries. “What do you mean, gone?” she says. “He’s right here, he needs healing.” Why are they just standing there? Can’t they see what’s happened? Why won’t Pike help him?
“Vex.” Scanlan, this time, and she turns to him, a biting retort already on her tongue. It’s halted by the expression on his face. There is no twinkle in his eye, no quirk at the corner of his mouth. Vex can count on one hand the times she’s seen Scanlan take something seriously, without adding a twist of irony or humor. There is no humor in him now. “Vax is dead,” he says. “I’m sorry. Your brother’s dead.”
Vex stares at him. Looks back at her brother. The blood has stopped flowing from his wounds now. Trinket, who has been quiet so far, sensing her distress, begins nosing gently at Vax’s shoulder, whuffing softly when he gets no response.
Dead.
Her first thought, stupidly, is that Scanlan is lying. He lies all the time, his sense of humor is terrible, this is one of his idiotic jokes and in a moment Vax will leap up and she’ll hit him for worrying her and it’ll be like a thousand shitty pranks he’s pulled before. But she can hear, as though from an enormous distance, the sounds of sobs behind her. Keyleth and Pike both are crying now, and she realizes Scanlan would never do something that would make Pike cry. And Vax still isn’t moving. Vax, who refused to let her out of his sight since the dragons came, who’s always been at her side, and she knows, knows like she knows her own name, that he would never do something this cruel for a laugh.
Dead.
The world goes quiet. Vex stays there for an unknowable amount of time, feeling the blood begin to soak into her clothes where she kneels next to Vax’s broken body. That’ll take forever to clean , she thinks absently. She reaches out, when did her hands start shaking, and brushes a piece of hair back from Vax’s face. Dully, the idea comes to her that she should do something. There are things you’re supposed to do, when someone… But she doesn’t know what to do. By the time they got to Byroden and found out what happened to their mother, her body was long buried. They visited her grave before they moved on from the village. Vax left flowers for her.
What is she supposed to do?
Movement. She hopes for one wild moment-- but no. Vax’s shoulders are moving because Grog has knelt next to him and is beginning to pick him up, and Vex is suddenly, blindingly furious.
“ Don’t touch him! ” Vex shoves Grog away, actually knocking him back. Other voices are shouting now, several of them at her, but all she can see is Grog raising hands coated in Vax’s blood. How dare he, how dare any of them, Vax is her brother, hers and no one else’s. They don’t get to touch him, they don’t get to move him. This grief is hers, this pain is hers, she kneels bent over his body with the weight of it. There are hands on her now, trying to pull her away, and she thrashs in their grip. “No! Don’t touch him, don’t you fucking touch him!” She screams, and screams, and screams, until a voice pierces through the agony.
“Vex!” That’s Percy. One of his arms is around her waist, pulling her back from the body. His other hand is twined with hers. “Vex, listen to me, we can still save him!”
Vex snaps around to look at him. Percy meets her gaze, wild-eyed. There are tear tracks trailing out from underneath his glasses, but he doesn’t seem to have noticed them. She’s smearing blood all over his coat. She stares. “Save him?”
Percy grips her hand tighter. “It’s too late to revive him, and we don’t have the spell for it, but. If we get him to a temple, we can get the help of other clerics. They can bring him back like they did for Pike, but we have to hurry.” Vex looks back to Grog, still kneeling across from her. He is still, more still than she had thought he could be, and he’s made no move towards the body. As though he’s waiting for permission.
Slowly, Vex nods. Grog swallows hard, then, almost comically gentle, scoops Vax into his arms. Vax looks so small in comparison, and Vex chokes on the bitter thought that it should have been Grog taking the blow. It’s Grog’s job to take blows so the others don’t have to, it should have been him on the end of that blade. She can see in Grog’s face that he’s thinking it, too.
“We take him to the Platinum Sanctuary.” That’s Keyleth, and although tears are still streaming down her face, her voice is iron. “They’re the center of divine energy in Vasselheim.” She’s staring at Vax’s body, and Vex can see her right hand clenching and unclenching. The hand she used to burn the brand from Vax’s shoulder. “They’ll know what to do.”
Vex looks at each of her friends in turn. She can see in their faces the same consuming thought, clung to like a drowning man to driftwood: this will work. This has to work. There is no other possible option.
Vex breathes deep. “Let’s go,” she says. “We don’t have much time.”