Chapter Text
There once was a lonely princess, who spent her days locked away in a towering, impregnable fortress…
Astarion jolts out of his daydream, dragged back into his family’s dreary library by a light rap to his knuckles. He wishes he were deadly allergic to ink, or at least, stricken with something close. Yet whichever deity responsible for pestilence is deaf to his plea this day. His skin chafes against the parchment’s coarse grain, his nose itching from the mealy scent of ancient dust. He can practically see the plumes with each turn of a page, swirling into the pale sunbeams that slant through the tall grated windows. That feeble daylight does nothing to dampen the oppressiveness of it all: the floor-to-ceiling shelves that line every wall, filled to choking with books. They make him feel like sitting within a colourful, diseased lung, waiting for it to collapse on him. Astarion hates this place, almost as much as he resents his lessons and his tutor.
Durge might like it here. The sudden thought softens his anger a little, though nothing could lessen his loathing for the tutor’s ever judgmental, ever vigilant eyes. They track his every twitch and penstroke, straining for any sign of misbehaving intent. Astarion intends on giving him none.
At least this is better than the training grounds. Funny how these sort of flaccid, self-placating thoughts have started popping up in his mind of late, especially when some inconvenience places him in a foul mood. Astarion remembers Durge biting into a pear once, coming away not only with a big bite of fruit but also half of a worm. While he was retching over the creature’s remaining half still wriggling in the pear, Durge calmly swallowed and, grinning at him with his great, jagged teeth full of pear and probably worm, said something along the lines of “it’s just extra nutrients”. Absolutely revolting. Still, Astarion has apparently picked up something of that relentless gratitude himself. Miserable as the library is, he concedes that the training grounds would be far worse.
His family has always been more than wealthy enough to afford him private fencing lessons. He even has early memories of having enjoyed them for a time. But as Astarion outgrew his first practice rapier, Father decided his privacy was no longer worth the coin. He was then placed in group lessons instead, made to sweat and bruise among children of lesser stock. Such an environment would serve to build the character he lacked, or so Father had said. And so he had made an initial effort to adapt and assimilate. Whiny, limp-wristed brats that they were, he was gracious enough to never call his classmates as such. With his natural charms and superior dress sense, Astarion had even managed to draw a small circle of mostly patriar girls around himself. It was tolerable for a while, going to class, spending more time gossiping than fencing, giving relationship advice he knew nothing about but pretended to anyway. When one boy thought it funny to trip him, everything dove straight to hell.
He never understood why the little punk started picking on him in particular; Astarion supposed it was because he never cared to placate him like the other boys. They always flocked to him, guffawing at anything he said like a pack of powdered hyenas. Every other session had in store for Astarion something awful. Once or twice, his perfumed handkerchiefs or change of clothes would find themselves on the training grounds, stomped into the dirt. Other times, the boy would rob Astarion of his practice rapier and—leveraging his unfair height advantage—dangle it over his head while the other boys laughed. Knowing that they could not verbally provoke him without being quickly humiliated in turn, Astarion’s bully and his ilk preferred physical abuse. When Astarion’s hair was pulled for the last time, he hurled a handful of sand into the boy’s face and kneed him in the groin during paired practice. The abuse stopped then, though it sadly did not spare him from group lessons once and for all. The punk, however, never returned. While his tormentor was gone, the training grounds only grew more intolerable in other respects. Astarion’s small circle of so-called ‘friends’ evaporated, while whispers and dirty glances now trailed his every step.
“Are you done with the exercise, Young Master?” Rasps the tutor.
Astarion says nothing. He has not lifted his pen from the final punctuation he has placed. The ink blooms wider and fuzzier from the pen tip, the period turning into a tiny, jet-black head of dandelion seeds.
“Ah, so you are finished.”
He mumbles an expletive under his breath. Astarion was counting on the old man not noticing for a little while longer. There is yet another quarter of an hour until the end of his torment.
“I’m just going over my answers again.” He lies.
The tutor pulls the paper out from under his elbows anyway, lowering his glasses from where they perch on his hairless scalp down to the short, dumpy bridge of his nose. The large, round lenses turn the specks of his eyes into huge black saucers. Coupled with his dwarven stature, they make him look like a particularly distrustful owl.
“Well, this is… sufficient.” The old man says, in that sophisticated halting cadence that Astarion loathes. “You demonstrate adequate understanding. Only, you need not have taken so long to arrive at such… middling conclusions.”
“Super. May I return to my chamber now?”
“Not yet. I believe we still have enough time for another short—and hopefully more fruitful—exercise, or even a prelude to your next lesson.”
“That’s not what we agreed on for today.” Astarion protests. “You had a lesson outline. You showed it to me.”
“An outline is but a suggestion. Deviation is inevitable, even desirable, if I am to tailor the lesson to the pupil’s needs.”
“Thanks, but no thanks. I don’t need any more exercises.”
“I beg to differ.”
“Well, you also said this and that about learning and teaching being… bilateral?” Astarion is a hair’s breadth from pushing out his chair dramatically. “The process is only worthwhile if the student is as open to receiving knowledge as the teacher is willing to give. Well, I’ve had enough of this, so you would be wasting your breath.”
The tutor squints at him, the magnified circles of his eyes flattening into gargantuan sunflower seeds. His judgment once again crawls over Astarion’s skin like ants. At least it is not Father’s scrutiny he is squirming under. Those ants’ bites tend to be much more venomous.
“If only you had a modicum of patience, or the will to apply yourself.” The tutor breathes a long-suffering sigh. “You might prove… adequately capable, yet.”
It takes all of Astarion’s willpower not to roll his eyes. It has been weeks of this.
“Whatever you say, Master. May I go now?”
“You may not. Now, open your book to the eighth chapter. To truly understand the development of the Gate’s mercantile history, we first turn to an overview of that of its neighbour—”
Sullenly, Astarions lowers his eyes to the indicated pages. Ten excruciating minutes more. His gaze skids over the letters as his mind remains stubbornly immune to comprehension, wandering elsewhere, anywhere. To his chamber’s windowsill limned with moonlight. To the freedom far, far beyond.
.
In the fortress dwelled not a single other living soul. The long, dark corridors held only fading traces of those long gone, echoing with timeless grief. There must have been other people here once, the princess mused. Her days were thus filled with the mourning of those whose faces she had never glimpsed…
Mother has at last arrived at the conclusion that to keep him under watch, she must do it herself. Or at least, make a semblance of an effort. To her credit, she has not as frequently delegated the task to the estate’s numerous but ineffective servants. That is to say, Astarion has been made to accompany her to a truly stomach-churning number of afternoon teas, soirees, and charity drives. For all it is worth, Mother’s minimal effort has indeed proven more effective at keeping him in line. It just so happens that he hates seeing her made miserable by Father more than he loves being a menace.
“…My little Henri is surely well on his way to an auspicious career in Waterdeep. Now, I will of course miss him dearly if he chooses to stay after graduation, but the gods know that city loves their scholars. There is no better place for him, in my mind.” Titters lady Vinton over the thin porcelain rim of her cup.
“Well, Hendrik might never, with you still calling him that.” Says Lady Linnacker, her lips quirked slightly in a way that only implies condescension. The huge yellow gem atop her bulbous finger joint catches the afternoon sunlight filtering into Lady Vinton’s tea arbor, carving it into a dozen jagged little shards. Astarion does his best not to squint, lest someone misconstrues his expression for a nonexistent opinion that he might be coerced into voicing. Across from him, Elina—Lady Linnacker’s daughter who shares her mother’s dark ochre curls and severe jawline despite her young age—seems to have the same idea. She does it more poorly, of course, her eyes watering in the effort.
“What’s wrong with showing a little affection for your own children?” Lady Vinton huffs.
“Showing off said affection, you mean.” Lady Linnacker sips her tea. “The boy’s not even here, Clarice. And I am inclined to think he would not relish the idea of his mother embarrassing him in his absence.”
“Embarrass…” Lady Vinton’s silk gloved hand flies to her chest. “Why, maybe you could stand to be a bit more affectionate—”
“That’s wonderful, Clarice, what your son’s accomplished in such a short time in Waterdeep.” Lady Ancunin interjects, her sweet voice a stream of cool water over the brewing tension. “I could not stand it, to be away from your child for that long with no end to the separation in sight. Yours is a rare fortitude.”
Lady Vinton’s affront deflates instantly. She leans back in her chair with a generously buttered crumpet, vindicated.
“Thank you, Priscilla. It is not always easy, truthfully, but I manage by keeping myself busy.”
“With frivolities, you mean.” Lady Linnacker keeps needling. “I reckon you would manage even better with a fraction of Hendrik’s discipline.”
“I’m sure discipline is indispensable to reaping such early success. He must have been taught well at the academy prior to leaving for Waterdeep. You recommended it, didn’t you, Lacey? What was the name again?”
Lady Linnacker launches into her alleged expertise at curating the right education for her children, completely forsaking her prior pastime of prodding at Lady Vinton. Mother does that a lot, Astarion has come to notice. He thought it was something she did only in response to Father’s anger, but it feels more than that. She seems to have a natural talent for both detecting acrimony and quickly smothering it. Her effortless beauty, her perceived fragility, her inclination to placate, all work in her favour in diffusing discourse and maintaining the status quo. A shame that the status quo invariably sucks—in Astarion’s very objective estimation—and that Mother is always so successful at steering the conversation back to the inane and toothless. He was hoping to see two patriar ladies tear into each other, preferably physically, right in front of one of their own children.
Elina is yawning so wide her jaw practically unhinges. He debates tossing a crumpled tissue wad into her open mouth, ultimately deciding against it. Not out of altruism, naturally; it would be hilarious if she choked. Living with the consequences of his past actions simply reminds him more often that actions, indeed, have consequences. Instead, he opts for flicking the tissue towards her plate. It lands between a slice of fruit cake and an eclair stabbed full of fork holes, smoothly as a croquet ball sailing between hoop legs. Elina stops yawning. She looks from the tissue to him, at first wonderingly, then with budding interest. Astarion flashes her a hint of teeth.
“…and you must never fully delegate your children’s moulding to tutors, no matter how carefully vetted.” Lady Linnacker prattles on obliviously. “Sitting in on a session or two per week wouldn’t hurt.”
“Oh, I’m not sure about that. Don’t tutors go to school for that sort of thing? They ought to know their own methods.” Lady Vinton remarks.
“Yes, our own tutors have all been quite effective. Though I suppose checking in once in a while might give the child incentive to stay well-behaved.” Says Lady Ancunin.
Elina flicks another tissue wad towards Astarion. He scoffs when it bounces off the edge of his plate and disappears under the table. He sends more tissue her way. Once again, it rolls neatly in between her half-eaten morsels. Several changes in topic among the mothers later, Elina has managed two whole wads on Astarion’s plate, while hers has ended up holding more tissue than pastries. Down to their last tissue bits, Astarion is donning his smuggest grin, while Elina has gone from “entertained” to “on the cusp of a small tantrum”. He shouldn’t be surprised that his begrudging playmate would be so childish, even if she technically is younger than him. Unlike her, Durge would be appropriately impressed by him at this point. Unlike Durge, Astarion can never help himself. He flicks his last tissue wad at her, with his thumb this time, just because he could. It lands in Elina’s teacup with a soft ‘plonk’.
“…I personally find bougainvilleas somewhat tacky. Azaleas would be just as vibrant but far more elevated… Children? What seems to be the matter?” Lady Linnacker seems to have finally noticed her red-faced daughter.
‘Splat’, goes something soft and slimy—like a handful of river mud—against Astarion’s chest. When he looks down, the spring-green brocade of his waistcoat is smeared with cream and crumpled sponge cake. Lady Linnacker’s face bleaches white, her thin mouth agape.
“He was cheating!” Elina shrieks. The tableware rattle with each angry slam of her sticky little fists. “Not fair!”
“Elina, stop at once! What has gotten into you?”
“Oh dear...”
“Astarion, darling, what is the meaning of this?”
Time slows to a crawl, the world around him dimming away but for the stain on his clothes. Mother is trying in vain to clean him up, her napkin’s clumsy swipes removing the superficial bulk of it, but only rubbing the cream deeper into the fabric. Blood rushes up his neck. His brand new waistcoat and silk blouse, which he had been excited to wear for the first time at his next secret playdate until Mother convinced him otherwise, ruined, by some ugly brat. Calmly, Astarion pushes himself off his chair, walks to the other side of the table, tea in hand.
What would Durge do? Probably laugh about it, admirably unphased. Astarion has never managed to make that boy angry about anything, except the one time he apparently ‘nearly broke his neck’ trying to climb that tree. Durge’s warm chest under him, his undivided attention and annoyance and genuine worry. He would gladly find a second crabapple tree just to fall off it, too. Yet all he could do was be stuck here, in possibly the worst situation anyone could ever experience. Durge would laugh, then likely succeed at pacifying the crying child, being intelligent and good-natured and probably accustomed to dealing with similarly nightmarish younger siblings. He wouldn’t want Astarion to get into any more trouble, either. It’s been weeks without the end of his current punishment, of their separation, in sight. Who knows how much longer he would stay confined, should he get himself into more trouble.
He dumps the cold tea onto Elina’s head. She immediately stops crying. Time crawls to a standstill, everyone but Astarion frozen in their private moment of horror. When his cup has fully emptied, he places it, with mocking reverence, upside down upon her head, like a stupid little porcelain hat. A brief moment of calm ensues, then, pandemonium breaks loose.
.
Astarion curls up on ‘his’ side of the cabin, puffy-eyed and sullen. He managed to stop himself from reacting much at all over the entire ensuing ordeal, but settled back in the relative privacy of their carriage, his tears have come more freely. Knees held to his chest, his shoes are dragging mud across the cushioned seats, yet the gods themselves could not compel him to care. He needs Mother to know how upset he is with her by refusing to touch even the hem of her skirt.
The carriage bounds over some manner of loose debris or another, jostling its occupants. Astarion curses internally. Stupid unpaved country roads, stupid tea party he wasn’t even invited to in the first place, stupid little girl.
Mother is gazing out the window, feigning interest in any number of objects rolling by. She seems to be trying to acknowledge him—or at least, what he did—as little as possible. He ought not be surprised; it is what she does best, gravitating towards a self-determined sense of normalcy, how things are meant to be. In her world, Lady Linnacker never chewed the two of them out with the worst insults capable of utterance by patriar tongue in broad daylight, Lady Linton did not functionally ban them from her estate for the foreseeable future (which she, of course, worded as a ‘suggestion’), and her gathering with ‘friends’ was never sabotaged by vexatious children. In her perfect world, he might not even have been born.
Astarion sniffles loudly. When that fails to pull her attention, he does it again, wiping his nose into his sleeve with exaggerated flourish. His clothes were ruined, anyway. Still, this finally seems to unsettle her. But when her eyes turn to him, they remain unreadable, their blue the shade of the unfathomable deep that siphons light and gives none of it back.
“Don’t forget to bring anything soiled quickly to the washerwomen. We could get you another set tailored, true, but these might yet be salvageable. Your father prefers for us all to be… well, perhaps not ‘frugal’, but more mindful of our spending. If there is anything you want from the tailor’s, be sure to talk it over with me first.”
“No worries. I still have two wardrobes worth of clothes for dumb brats to ruin.” He mutters sourly.
“Darling, you have more than that. Your dresser is full of clothes you have not worn again since last spring. I am certain by now no one can recall you having worn them at any point.”
“Are you just going to be like this?” He finally snaps.
She stares at him, nary a wrinkle of concern on her perfect face. His anger is an impotent pebble that creases the water’s skin for but a moment, inevitably disappearing into its cold, immutable calm. Of course she is like this. Mother is capable of only two modes of existence: anxious or vacant. She is empty when she is not fearful, any outward gesture of affection towards him granted sparingly and only in privacy, when each other’s company is the only one they share. It is as though she was ashamed to appear his mother, as if he had unknowingly committed some grave trespass against her. In this respect, at least Father is more honest.
Against her unflinching indifference, Astarion folds himself back into the cabin corner in defeat. She is still regarding him silently, though the fact is as noteworthy as his soiled clothes.
“If I were good, would you have said all that?” He mutters following a protracted silence, without expecting her to hear.
“What do you mean?” She apparently does.
“If I were better-behaved, or exceptional, or just… different, somehow. A son worth having.” Astarion holds a tremulous breath in his throat. “Would you have at least tried to defend me?”
The memory is still a fresh gash, yet his own curiosity cannot help but pick at the bloody mess. Mother was very, terribly sorry, and she knew he was, too. She was so sorry that her young son was foolish and at an age of perennial irritability, neither of which he could help. Elina did nothing wrong, she said, wiping tea and snot and tears from the brat’s face with part of her own very expensive dress. When Lady Linnacker was not yet mollified by her dozen apologies, she turned to Astarion, expecting one from him, her eyes threatening not anger but grave disappointment. Afterward, she doesn’t even acknowledge that it was Elina who had thrown the first stone, let alone try to explain to him the necessity of such humiliation.
“You are not unworthy of having.”
There is hesitance in her words, crouched in the subtly overlong spaces between them.
“What was said was simply what the situation demanded, and was not uttered with pleasure. Even if you were… any way other than that which you are, I would not have chosen a different course of action.”
It isn’t personal, Astarion could read the stale comfort in her ludicrously diplomatic language. Mother would not have defended a ‘better’ child, either, no matter how much more well-behaved or prodigious. It also means that there is absolutely nothing Astarion can do to win her favour.
“What do you do with pleasure, then?” Astarion asks, genuinely wondering. Sometimes he thinks her a benign spectre that haunts their halls. Maybe what she would like is for him to be a spectre like her, chained to life only by a warped sense of duty or penance, expecting nothing from it in turn.
“I am not… particularly unhappy. You may not appreciate it, but I have put much effort into insulating you from as much hardship as possible. There are far, far worse ways to live a life, my dear, ones that you will never have to directly experience or confront. Yet, to be worthy of our place in this safe haven, we must do our part to maintain it.”
He tries to think of other ways of living a life, quickly realising there aren’t so many he can name. Even the faces of the servants whom he sees daily come into focus only at the peripheries of his own comfort. Any life they live beyond their service is a great, vacuous void, one he has never cared enough to try illuminating. Surely, they are not so miserable as she claims? He thinks of Durge, living with his siblings and mother in that tiny house—no larger than his own family’s solar—behind a shriveled rose bush, tucked away in one of the Gate’s many nameless alleys. Of Durge working sunrise to sunset every day Astarion doesn’t see him. Durge leaving his sorcerous talents to the wayside for want of better options, because his family’s survival comes before all else. Astarion still paying him for his friendship: pittance, really, compared to what it truly means to him, to what Durge truly deserves. A splinter of uncertainty lodges itself in his heart.
Is Durge happy? But he must be. Astarion has seen him smile and laugh more than anybody he knows. So clearly, Mother is wrong, her restive mind blinding her to anything but danger and misery beyond this gilded cage she calls a safe haven. A cage whose very bars she polishes with grotesque reverence, for whose perpetuity his and her own unhappiness is apparently a fair price to pay.
“I see Lady Vinton ‘doing her part’ just fine without spurning her own child. She doesn’t seem capable of shutting up about him, in fact.” He mumbles bitterly. “You don’t have to treat me the way you do all the time to stay in anyone’s good graces. You just feel obligated to, because my very existence is offensive, somehow.”
Maybe it is his words, maybe it is how he said them. Either way, their utterance precipitates something for which Astarion is wholly unprepared. Mother’s brows crease, her mouth droops, her whole face shifting awkwardly into the unfamiliarity of genuine grief. Watching her feels like witnessing a frozen waterfall shatter thunderously into movement. When she leans into his space, the cool satin of her skirt brushing at his legs, Astarion very nearly flinches away from her touch.
Is this not what he’s always wanted, some tangible proof of her love? Mother would sometimes stroke his hair or wipe his cheek, but he cannot recall the last time she held him in earnest. Her skin is too warm to be that of a spectre, smelling of powder, and night orchid and jasmine—scents he likes to steal a spritz or two for his own cuffs sometimes. Astarion stays limp, allowing the embrace to fall over him passively, uncertain of whether he is allowed to burrow into it further. Would she find that acceptable? He simply occupies, clumsily, the space between her arms.
Mother begins to speak, and he realises he has never heard her voice this up close, his ears pressed to her chest where it originates and resonates. She sounds almost entranced, like she was uttering a prayer not meant for his ears.
“My bright, bright little star. My pride and my shame.”
Without fully understanding, Astarion lets her pain flow into him.
.
Below the princess’ sole window to the outside world laid nothing but greenery as far as the eye could see. For centuries, the fortress had stood surrounded by wilderness, permitting neither entrance nor escape. It seemed like her solitude would go on till the end of time, until the moonlit night sent a certain visitor into her dreams…
Astarion is close to naked by the time he reaches his own chamber, having left a trail of soiled clothing in his wake for the servants to pick up. Mother quickly retreated to the master bedroom the moment they stepped foot into the foyer. That brief moment of unfettered feeling seems to have taken more energy out of her than scolding him would require. Astarion is uncertain if he is glad for it. He is mostly numb and confused, almost numb enough to pay no heed to the chill of his own pitch-black, unlit chamber seeping through his underclothes. He expressly instructed the servants not to come in under any circumstances, sparing them the task of lighting the fireplace. The space is thus not only left disorganised but dreadfully cold. Regardless, it is his.
My pride and my shame...
He doesn’t understand and is unsure if he wishes to. Astarion has done plenty to cause her (and Father) much shame, that much is true, but exactly when in his perpetually shameful existence has he done anything to warrant her pride? Or does it even matter… Does it even have anything to do with his actions? Why can no one say how they wish for him to be ‘different’? Why would they not simply tell him how to exist without being so intolerably himself?
Groping his way through the darkness, Astarion nearly stumbles over his own clutter. As his eyes adjust, he vaguely recognises the tripping hazard’s shape to be that of his old rabbit stuffie—his former favourite toy—strewn across the floor with its similarly weathered siblings: other assorted animal stuffies (owlbears, cats, foxes, a large bronze dragon, few with both their button eyes remaining), figures of knights in painted armour carved from softwood, and piles and piles of dolls (cotton, linen, porcelain, fully dressed in extravagant lace and dyed cloth, to half-dressed, to fully nude). HIs old storybooks—well perused but not well kept, their pages perilously loose and their spines frayed—litter every other unoccupied surface. He really had no need for these old comforts until recently. Astarion harbours no expectations of them managing to entertain him at his ripe old age of twelve-going-on-thirteen, but their company is still preferable to the yawning emptiness of his chamber, richly furnished as it appears.
Making his way to wear his night robe hangs, Astarion nearly falls again, slipping on spilled sheets of parchment that have somehow shuffled off his desk. It is frankly unjust how much more writing he is forced to do by his tutor after having written plenty on his own, how his damned chamber refuses to reorder itself in his absence. Astarion yanks his robe off the back of his chair, pulling it over his now bare shoulders. Its lush, velvety hug abates the cold somewhat, but is nothing compared to a living embrace. Even the incomprehensible, grief-stricken kind that wrapped around him but hours ago.
In lieu of warmth, Astarion walks to his window, seeking the moonlight. Through the veils of low-hanging clouds and curtains, it softly alights his chamber in thin, silvery tresses. Being kept busy all these days often means returning here on the dregs of daylight. Without a lit fireplace, the moon has become his primary light source, far preferred to the claustrophobic, harsh orange glow of candles. The moonlight perches outside his window, patient but beckoning. His heart in his throat, Astarion parts the curtains, letting the moon flood in with all its brilliant yet unobtrusive luminance. His gaze drops to the windowsill, pulled by the inexorable weight of his own anticipation. It is still there, wedged under the panes, exactly where he left it: a folded parchment piece, the half of it poking out into the garden beyond rumpled and curling at the corners. His heart sinks.
Durge doesn’t always visit; Astarion knows this. It would have been a greater disappointment had he actually managed, only to be met with Astarion’s absence. Astarion considers the alternative prospect: Durge waiting by his window for hours on hours—because he is able and incidentally the type of idiot to do so—getting himself soaked by the cold autumnal showers that haunted Astarion’s own trip to and from Lady Vinton’s, falling ill because of it. Astarion frowns; it is indeed preferable that Durge had not come by at all.
But even knowing this, knowing full well that it is only by happenstance that they ever managed to convene once at Astarion’s windowsill, his stubborn heart refuses to curb its yearning.
“Promise me you’ll come back. Promise me, okay?”
“I promise.”
Astarion unlatches the window, pushes it open just a hair to free his rumpled note. Even that small crack sends a ribbon of chilled air into his chamber, prickling his skin with gooseflesh. He unfolds the parchment, half-hoping for the message therein to be intact. The ink on the rain-weathered half of the note has, of course, been mostly washed off or otherwise a smudged, illegible mess.
…boring… So I thought exchanging letters would make it suck less…eaten today yet? I hope you’re not lettin… half the food from your plate again. Don’t dragonborn need to eat a lot, especially when you’re growing? I’ve been… could be worse, I guess… You would’ve kicked all their asses, I bet…
Only the inconsequential needling and quibbling of a pathetic, needy child. Astarion crumples up the note and tosses in his unlit fireplace. Instead of heading for bed, he drops carelessly into his chair with a throw blanket, wrapping it tightly around himself and pulling it up to his chin. His bed is not in view of the window, but his desk is. Perhaps even all the way across the garden, over the balding hedges and wrought iron fence, a pair of fiery red eyes would be able to tell that he is here, even if there is next to no chance of their master visiting this late.
Closing his eyes, Astarion tries to make himself rest. The world behind his eyelids is an ashen cavern, brimming with echoes.
“…adequately capable, yet…”
“…wouldn’t have expected Lord Ancunin’s child to be so… ornery…”
“…Priscilla, you and your disgraceful little terror…”
“…My pride and my shame…”
“…You’re everything...”
He slowly falls asleep amidst his inner tumult, one damp cheek plastered against the parchment-strewn tabletop.
.
Astarion is awakened by apprehensive knocks. Irritation rises within him before his waking mind fully does. Being scarcely in the mood to be seen, let alone appear presentable lately, he has expressly demanded that breakfast and warm water be left by his door without disturbance. Astarion yanks the throw blanket tighter around himself and squeezes his eyes shut. It hardly matters that he is too agitated to fall back asleep, or that the sun has crested the apex of their great oak’s canopy.
“Young Master? It is—”
He lets out a noise that Father would call ‘uncouth’ and would cause Mother to reach for her smelling salts, a wretched hybrid of a growl and a scream. Not the best signal, were he to convincingly feign unconsciousness, though perhaps displeased-sounding enough to send the message that he wishes to be left alone.
“Young Master, Lord Ancunin is home with company. He wishes for you to join him and the guests for breakfast.”
Astarion drags himself out of his chair (all while cursing the crick in his neck) towards the chamber’s sole standing mirror. His own miserable reflection regards him with swollen eyes, a large pink blotch marking the cheek that was slept on. His hair is untamed beyond even his own wild imaginations, his curls sticking out at wild angles, frizzy from humidity as they fall over his forehead and haphazardly frame his face. He looks the part of a proper, gods-damned monster, Astarion muses with bittersweet mirth. With even greater effort, he heads toward the vanity to begin the ordeal of making himself presentable. As Astarion combs his curls back into order, he tries not to feel much of anything at all.
.
The visitor—a handsome young man of noble bearing—would visit her dream every night as she drifted to slumber. It was in his company that the princess found bliss for the first time in her endless, wizened days. With a flick of his hand, he was capable of turning the blank canvas of the princess’ dreams into great landscapes. From him she learnt of other places, then of feelings other than grief and apathy, of people and worlds beyond her fortress’ drab, cold walls. He had an answer for her every inquiry, except that of his own origin. For a time, she did not care. He could just be the stuff of dreams, woven entirely of her own loneliness, and his presence would be welcomed all the same. Because for a time, she naively believed the gift of his company—just as her prior solitude—would last forever…
It just has to be the accursed Bormuls, of all people, to have joined his parents for breakfast this day. The senior Bormul has come to their table predictably boisterous and overdressed, his gold-trimmed suit making him look like a gigantic, swollen thumb wrapped in gold leaf. His son’s dress sense is not much more refined, salvaged only by its sole virtue of being comparably less offensive.
Morlan Bormul seems to excel at that: embodying the inoffensive, taking up as little space and attention as possible when not called upon, despite his formidable stature. Small as people often remark of him, even Astarion feels the taller one between them as they sit side-by-side. Highly unusual, as guests tend to occupy one side of the long, rosewood table of their dining room while Astarion and his mother sit on the other, and Father—the master of the house—at its closest end. Astarion and Morlan have one side of the table all to themselves this morning, while Mother and Mr. Ulis are seated at the other. Astarion sits closer to Father to—he supposes—better receive warning kicks to the shin should he start behaving out of line, as he is wont to do.
Though lucky for him, Father’s attention gravitates towards Mother at present, his hard eyes seemingly fixed upon every lift of her fork. Were he in a nosier mood, Astarion might even expect him to be glaring past the fork at Mr. Bormul’s prawn-pink face. Mother does a stellar job of appearing unaware. She looks… normal, effortlessly beautiful as always, and Astarion is almost disappointed at her impeccable composure. Mr. Bormul’s tiresome attempts at impressing her are met with perfectly courteous smiles, not a single one reaching her eyes. It almost makes Astarion feel foolish for having let himself be affected by that moment in the carriage so deeply, like he had wasted energy grieving a loss that was never his to mourn.
“…would you like one of these?”
Just as Astarion’s mind begins its incorporeal escape, Morlan decides then to drag it back into the prison of his body. Spitefully, he pretends not to hear.
“Astarion?” The young Bormul clears his throat.
By force of pure, foolish habit, Astarion emits what could be interpreted as an acknowledging hum. This, predictably, only encourages the attempt at undeserved communication.
“I asked you a question: Would you like a boiled egg?” Morlan smiles at him pleasantly, his spine a perfect straight line. “I notice you have not been eating much. Are you well?”
“I am well.” Astarion lifts the corners of his lips just as pleasantly. It is also then that he realises, with considerable irritation, how the glass bowl containing boiled eggs is exactly an arm’s length from either of their seats. He could damn well get one himself, should he so choose. “I will have one when I feel like having one.”
“Let me peel one for you.” Morlan insists, as though Astarion’s words had dispersed into thin air the moment they left his lips. He then reaches for an egg and begins trying (emphasis on ‘trying’) to peel it.
Morlan has grown considerably more vexatious around him lately. Astarion, on the contrary, finds his company increasingly objectionable. On a superficial level, Morlan is inoffensive, that much is true. He isn’t even ugly; some of Mother’s imbecilic, tittering friends might even call him ‘handsome’ without their usual noxious sarcasm, if solely for the symmetry of his features, which naturally tend toward the severe if he does not make an effort to smile. He is also gifted with the ability to identify the exact words that any adult would wish to hear, which makes him even more annoying in Astarion’s eyes. Morlan is inoffensive in the way grass stains a forest-green doublet, barely perceptible, but an undeniable nuisance once perceived. Indeed, the boy has a way of blending into their surroundings until Astarion is coerced into his proximity, at which point he unfailingly becomes intolerable.
Glutton for attention that he is, Astarion surprisingly does not relish this sort of fawning. Ever since Morlan pressed that unsolicited kiss to his hand in his family’s parlour, Astarion has been highly distrustful of any felicity he exhibits: the insincere praises, the hand kisses, the lending of an elbow and tacit expectation that Astarion would obediently take it. As Morlan grows more comfortable around him for no good reason, there is an undercurrent of disrespect that threads through their exchanges. Astarion has spent enough of his life being talked down to to know, after all. Morlan is older, true, and with his family’s wealth, has apparently been granted the privilege of condescension. Despite acting entitled to his attention, Morlan seems to care little for whatever Astarion has to say or thinks.
“Here you go.”
Astarion’s gaze drops to his plate, where Morlan’s offering now rolls unceremoniously. His egg cup is right there, sitting between them, yet Morlan is either too daft or careless to use it.
It is something about this innocuous thing—an egg so badly peeled it is pockmarked all over, bits of shell and membrane riddling its ragged surface—that scorches off the last of his patience. It chafes at a patch of nerves that is just too raw. Astarion’s mind briefly flees to better memories: stale pastry, his legs swinging merrily off the pier; piles of boiled mud crab shells, the sweet flesh fed to him bite by bite; hard cheese and nothing else, and the scent of late-blooming gardenias. Heat rises to Astarion’s eyes, spreading to the rest of his face. Morlan can have his little performances, but this feels like a trespass, an intimacy he has done nothing to earn and will never deserve.
“What is this?”
“What do you mean?”
Morlan blinks stupidly, blindsided by the suddenness of his contempt. Astarion’s rage is cold enough to freeze a river in its rapids. He sweetly smiles.
“Are you confused, darling? My plate might be empty, but I might like to put food on it later. If you put this on that big platter over there, the servants will take it away.” He gestures toward said platter, which is piled high with fruit peel, pits, and shells.
“I… But it is for you.” Morlan seems to be getting the hint that he is being insulted, but just barely.
“Oh, is it?” Astarion brings a dainty hand to his lips. “I’m very sorry. You see, I am allergic to… nail marks. Just, deathly allergic. If you toss that outside, I’m sure one of Father’s hunting hounds will get it. They probably won’t mind the mangling.”
For three whole seconds, Astarion watches gleefuly as colour rises to Morlan’s face. But as slowly as humiliation dawns on him, his anger overtakes it shockingly quickly. The next second, Astarion feels the change in their dynamic like an invisible seismic shift, the false warmth in Morlan’s eyes replaced by his own contempt returned to him tenfold. The mask has cracked, and Astarion is left momentarily breathless by the intensity of what it reveals. He is suddenly, acutely aware of their physical disparity, of his own smallness and powerlessness. Morlan’s finger twitches, and Astarion nearly cowers. When the other boy takes hold of his hand, there is a threat behind that touch, too. The possibility that Morlan might crush his fingers flashes across Astarion’s mind. For a single, blood-curdling moment, his pulse quickens to a rabbit’s heartbeat, his dignity scrabbling for purchase against the compulsion to pull away.
Morlan shifts again. Astarion’s eyes squeeze shut, his whole body bracing. Something soft and bumpy is pressed into his hand. The mangled egg greets him from the centre of his palm when he reopens his eyes. Still holding the back of his hand, Morlan’s long fingers cup his, making them fold over it. Another blink, and the molten disdain on his face is wholly gone. Astarion’s pulse beats faster in his neck.
“You really should eat something, my dear.” Morlan’s expression has arranged itself perfectly back into smooth, impenetrable grace. “You seem pale, lately. Even more so than your lovely alabaster complexion. Eat, and be in a more agreeable mood.”
The revulsion from chancing a glance at Mr. Bormul earlier returns to Astarion with a sudden, startling vengeance. He feels on the cusp of purging the single bite of toast he’s managed to take. The back of his chair crashes against the carpeted floor. Immediately, all faces turn his way.
“Pardon me.”
He rushes out of the dining hall, headed for his own chamber.
One day, the visitor was very late to one of the princess’ dreams. On other days, he would fail to come at all. In his absence, she was left to occupy the cavernous void of her own unconsciousness…
Bursting into his chamber, Astarion slams the door shut and scrambles to his window-facing chair, He throws his weight into it, curling up self-protectively within it. Then, he waits. For his heartbeat to calm and warmth to return to his extremities; for the moon to rise again, though it is yet midday and the accursed sun still hangs high. Neither happens before his door clicks open again, preceded by no warning. Astarion’s hand dives into his sewing basket. But standing at the door is only Father, even more glum and severe than he’s ever seen him. Astarion sets down his fabric shears. He might have preferred an intruder to Lord Ancunin himself.
Father’s steely gaze sweeps across his chamber, disgust wrinkling his nose as though he could smell the disorder within. He could have; no servant has been permitted into his room to clean lately, after all. Astarion pulls the throw blanket up to hide his sneer. Every small discomfort he could cause Father is a morsel of victory.
“Nice try, with the craft scissors. But you would be dead already had it really been an intruder. I see that even your survival instinct is wanting.” Father’s voice is cold and stately, as usual.
“They are shears.” Astarion affects Durge’s pedantic tone. “And I am twelve.”
Lord Ancunin grunts, stepping into the chamber proper and pulling the door shut behind him. His polished boot snags on an owlbear stuffie upon his very first step. He kicks away the toy with irritation. Astarion winces.
“Other family’s children—even those younger than you—neither fill their own chamber with refuse, nor do they so happily dwell in it like rats.”
“You can tell? Have you inspected all of their chambers yourself?”
“Insolent little…” Father kneads his temple. “Do you take such pleasure in inflicting your onerous self upon others?”
“Guess I take after you, in that regard.”
Something about the look with which Lord Ancunin now levels him feels unprecedented: a rare, frigid contempt that even his prolific history of troublemaking has not invoked before. For an instant, Astarion’s breath is trapped in his throat. The next moment, Father’s gaze falls away, down down where his foot is abusing another stuffie. The fear that has just grazed Astarion is quickly replaced by indignation.
“I’m not going back down there, if that’s why you’re here.”
Thank the gods his voice did not tremble, yet he has meant to say more. He wants Father to stop trampling all over his space and disusing his old friends. His angry words crowd behind his teeth, none managing utterance.
“You would, had you any dignity. The young Bormul deserves an apology, at least, for the egregious manner with which you have treated him.”
“You don’t remember his name either, do you?” Astarion says, half-disbelieving. All that overwrought performance, and Morlan doesn’t even make an impression with his own future father-in-law. “And I don’t owe that cur a thing. Did you not see how he laid his hand on me? You can force us into matrimony, but you cannot make me favour him. Not even by pretense.”
Father looks at Astarion like he were something small, below even pity, as approaches him with heavy, muted footsteps. Lord Ancunin’s gaze eventually hangs over his head, like a sword suspended midair by a single strand of horsehair. Astarion shifts deeper under his throw blanket, his stomach a bag full of cold, writhing worms.
“Recall, boy, with whatever little cognitive faculty you possess, how I have never demanded anything of you. Now you will grant me the favour of keeping quiet and listening for once in your life. You think yourself master of your own fate? You reach pitifully for any scrap of minor discord you can sow, thinking they would change your circumstances in any material way. Perish the thought.”
”The only thing that would, is power. Power as in wealth, prodigious capability, or both. You live lavishly yet nothing here belongs to you. Having neglected your own self-cultivation, you have no competences to speak of, let alone any that would constitute a trade. What hope do you have for change, if you are indeed so miserably unhappy?”
Power. The word lingers in Astarion’s mind even as the rest of Father’s preaching fades into white noise.
“To my displeasure, I cannot threaten your misbehaviour with confinement forever. The Bormuls have graciously offered to host us for a couple tendays on their orchard estate. Mr. Bormul hopes to see your health and humour improved by the change of scenery. I would hardly consider self-inflicted woe ‘ill health’, but the visit might indeed portend some good. At the very least, it would give you more time to… acclimate yourself to your betrothed. We depart in three days.”
The tangible threat snaps him to attention. Astarion nearly spills out of his chair, sitting up so abruptly.
“Wait… What do you mean ‘depart’? You cannot just…! Three days? You just decided on your own to haul me off like baggage as you see fit?”
Father turns back halfway out the chamber to lift a thick, judgmental eyebrow at him.
“Do not even start. Three days is plenty of notice. Though you and your mother seem to share the notion that packing for a trip means bringing along all the contents of your dressers.”
“But—”
“Pack light, if you could even learn to.” Father’s hand is on the doorknob, though he doesn’t miss the opportunity to throw one last disdainful glance at him. “Or let the maids do it. The gods know this chamber also needs proper cleaning.”
Before Astarion can mount further protestation, the door is slammed in his face. He slumps back in his chair, his chest hollow. Slowly, resentment rises within him in a searing, whipping lash of flame. How can Father be so heartless, so oblivious, so fecklessly cruel? Astarion cannot afford to simply disappear for ‘a couple tendays’. Even Father cannot… must not do this to him.
His mind overflows with the possibility of Durge’s disappointment, how his face might look upon finding nothing but another rain-soaked letter by the window. Astarion’s fruitless written apologies smeared into illegibility, then running into nothing like his own private tears. Durge’s formidable patience wearing thin, his busy life returning to its natural course as he one day decides not to come again. Durge forgetting him.
In her lonely dreams, the princess tried to weave landscapes herself at first, drawing from memory what the visitor had shown her. But as his visits grew scarcer and scarcer, even those she would gradually forget. Her landscapes turned uncanny, unrecognisable, ever fearful. Whatever was beautiful in her dreams was disappearing with him, and neither of them knew why. Soon, even sleep failed to be a place of solace. Once her sadness and desperation became too much to bear, she at last decided to…
To what? For the life of him he cannot recall how the story proceeds, let alone its ending. Astarion has scoured through all the storybooks of his childhoods since the beginning of his confinement, yet none of them appears to hold this tale. It must have been one told to him by a maid or nurse, or some other faceless hired help, and he has likely forgotten the bulk of it because its ending was not a happy one. The princess might have been rescued by her dream visitor, who turned out to be corporeal. She might have decided to escape the fortress herself to look for answers. She might have just thrown herself off a parapet to spare herself the heartbreak. Or she could have simply withered away in her solitude, forgotten and unmourned.
Astarion throws his window open so hard he briefly fears a pane might shatter. The chilly autumnal wind rushes in. Astarion shivers mightily, pulling the throw blanket tighter around himself as he drags his chair as close as possible to the open air. It will get even colder as the sun sets, but for now, the cold feels good. The staleness of his chamber dissipates with decent circulation in days, taking some of the persistent fog clouding his mind with it. He resettles in the chair with a mixture of renewed determination and desperation. Like this, there is no conceivable way that they would miss each other, should Durge pay his next visit. Astarion has full, unobstructed view of the garden below, just as Durge should see him clearly, no matter his vantage point. Once again, he waits for the moonrise. Perhaps a book or some embroidery might make the time pass more quickly, but as is with food, Astarion lacks the appetite for much else but waiting.
Durge will come, he must. They have to at least share a proper farewell before the cruel currents of Astarion’s life drag him to the next unfriendly shore. So he waits. And waits. Ashen day fades into argent night. The moon climbs high on the cloud-marbelled sky, shining kindly, powerlessly, a single luminous white scale adorning the heavens.
Astarion drifts in and out of sleep, soon losing track of reality and the mirror-world of his own dreamscape. The sun rises, and goes. Time melts away in a heady blur. At some point, his dream places him in his bed, away from the window, which displeases him greatly. His incorporeal limbs feel feeble as a fawn’s, sapped of all strength. Yet, he wills them into dragging him out of bed, returning the chair to its proper place and pushing the closed window open again. The moon pours back in, surely glad of their reunion. Astarion floats gently on a cloud of heat down into its silvered cradle. As the dream enfolds him once more, the phantom touch of claws lingers in his curls, tender as the moonlight.