Chapter Text
The sky is blue.
The sky is blue, and this is the first time Karlach notices.
It stretches above her vast and endless, just as always, but there is something different about it today. It should not be possible—she knows it is not possible—and yet today it seems bigger than ever before, open and bright with some indescribable quality so beautiful and free that it steals the breath from her lungs. Wispy clouds drift through its wide expanse, slow and lazy, as though they have all the time in the world.
Perhaps they do.
Perhaps they do, and what a pity it is that she doesn't.
"Karlach, no—"
Astarion's voice shakes, raw and wretched in a way she's never heard before. His hands are on her, gripping her arms, her shoulders, her face, anything to hold her together. She can hardly feel his tepid touch against her burning skin, but she doesn't miss the way he's trembling as if he's the one falling apart.
She wishes she could reassure him, tease him, tell him it's all going to be okay. But it's not.
She stares instead up at the sky, her breath hitching in her throat. From one edge of her vision to the other, it shifts from the pale glow of afternoon into something deeper and richer, the most masterful painting she's ever laid eyes on.
How had she never seen this before? It's so beautiful, so breathtakingly wonderful and good.
Given a minute more, two, she would have time to contemplate the pure utter cruelty that it is given to her only in this moment, right as she is about to die. But she does not have an extra minute or two, and if she started to rail against the unfairness of the world she would need far more time than that.
Avernus had been choking smoke and acrid fire, the blood of devils and cries of the damned. Baldur's Gate all grit and gloom, streets choked with filth and gazes sharp with suspicion. Both of these worlds away from the big blue sky now hanging high above her—and yet even that she will take over the fate that lies immediately before her.
She wants to dance, to drink, to run until her lungs ache. She wants to feel the wind against her skin, to laugh so loudly it shakes the ground, to hold life close and never let go. To fight, to love, to live—not a weapon, not an instrument of someone else's will, but as Karlach, the girl who escaped Hell and found love and joy waiting for her on the other side.
Found him—found someone real, someone beyond her wildest imagination. Astarion, who fought for her, who stood by her, who loved her in his own way, complicated and true. And whom she is still learning to love in return.
She could live a thousand lifetimes and still it would not be long enough to give him all the love he deserved, to love him in all the ways that he should be loved.
His hands are cradling her face now, desperate, his eyes wild with panic. "Stay with me," he pleads. "Just—stay with me, darling, we'll—we'll find a way—"
She smiles, or tries to. She wants to believe him. She, too, wishes they had more time.
The pain is unbearable now. Her heart is breaking—no, it is burning. The infernal engine inside her flares, a dying star. Her veins are rivers of lava, her body shuddering as the heat devours her from the inside out.
Metal shrieks and splits, tearing itself apart, but none of it hurts more than this: leaving him.
Astarion, who fought so hard to be where he is. Astarion, who still hardly believes he's worthy of love, even as he holds her now, pleading, begging with every fiber of his being for her to stay.
She lifts a trembling hand, presses it to his cheek. His eyes are brimming with tears. And she hates this—hates that she is making him cry. He hates it when he cries.
Gods, gods take her, she can barely breathe.
"Astarion," she whispers. Rasps. Smoke and embers. "Look up. Look up."
He doesn't. He's too focused on her, whispering frantic, futile denials. He's distraught even as he's pressing kisses to her forehead, her temples, her cheeks, and before her eyes she sees blisters rise on his beautiful lips.
"Please," she breathes.
Astarion's throat bobs. Slowly, hesitantly, he lifts his head.
"Goodbye, then," she says briskly, coolly, hoisting her axe higher as she sets off. It's a bright sunny day, and overhead the sky is big and blue.
She's got a job to do. She's got a lich to take care of, and that's hardly anything worth fretting about.
There isn't anything at all worth being anxious about, in fact.
It's just ten days. No time at all.
It's strange, then, that the walk to the edge of their front yard—where Gale waits patiently for her—feels interminable, her feet strangely heavy. It's as if the very ground is conspiring to keep her here.
She focuses instead on the crisp morning air, breathes it in, deep and refreshing, as though it might somehow burn away the tightness in her chest. Focuses on the sun catching on the frost that clings to the grass, focuses on the familiar weight of her axe slung across her back. The road ahead is clear. Simple. A job to do, a lich to kill. There, and then back. Nothing she hasn't done before.
She doesn't let herself look over her shoulder. It's all fine. He'll be fine. She will return safely, and he will be right here.
So it's forward she moves, returning Gale's smile, watching as he lifts his hands to raise arcane light between his fingers. Sigils take to life at her feet, flaring bright against the frosted blades of grass. The air hums, charged with magic, sharp in her nose.
Wait, she thinks, a sudden desperate spike of feeling. The word claws its way up her throat, and she tries to say it, tries to—
But there isn't time. The spell is already unraveling, space warping around her, and there is only time enough to turn back, look up—just for a second, just to see—
The house stands quiet, small against the vast sprawl of sky. The door is closed. Astarion isn't there anymore.
She expected that. Of course, he wouldn't linger. He has better things to do with his time.
The sky yawns, endless and blue—too blue.
Something seizes and twists inside Karlach's chest and she can't breathe. She knows this house inside and out: the uneven floorboards that creak under his careful steps, the bed that's never quite big enough for the way she sprawls in sleep. But right now it is small, so small, against the boundless blue. This hue that stretches too far, too wide, too vast for comprehension—too big for the way her heart slams against her ribs.
The sigils flare. The magic takes hold. The house vanishes.
Only blue remains.
She is not sad that this is the last thing she will see as she dies. It's oddly soothing—if anything could soften the pain of being literally ripped apart from the inside, perhaps it is this.
Her mind jumps to the memory of Bex and Danis, just the other week, clad in matching robes of blue as they renewed their vows. Hands clasped tight, gazes locked in adoring devotion. The rug in their home: a soft light blue that made the whole place feel warm and wonderful.
The color of comfort. The color of love.
Maybe she will ask to be buried in it.
The thought is so absurd that it makes her laugh—the sound escaping her as a gasping strangled noise, hardly a cough. Her body convulses with a fresh wave of heat that erupts from her core. What is she thinking? There will be nothing left to bury.
"Karlach." Astarion's voice shakes. "Stay with me." Begging—cracking, breaking. "Please—just hold on—please, no."
She wants to. Gods, she wants to. Tears sizzle on her cheeks, and she doesn't know if they are hers or his.
His hand reaches for hers, pale fingers catching the light. His grip tightens around her wrist, as though that alone will be enough to hold her together.
And his veins are blue.
Thin lines running like rivers, branching delicately out just beneath the surface of his pale skin. Nothing could be more different from the fire searing through her own.
"Look," she rasps, lips curving. "You. Beautiful."
"No, no, don't—don't do that. Don't say goodbye." His breath hitches. "Don't leave me."
But she can only cry out as another wave of agony lances through her, her body arching with the sheer force of it, and Astarion makes a shattered sound.
She wants to tell him she loves him. That she's sorry. That she is grateful—for every laugh, every kiss, every stolen moment of their life together, from the grandest gesture to the smallest touch. How it has been everything, and yet she wishes it could be more.
"Blue," is the only word that leaves her lips.