Like Starlight and Wine (A Baldur's Gate 3 Astarion x Tav Fanfic)

4. The Pale Elf

The first sensation I feel as I stir, is the warmth of the sun on my skin. Sand and grit feel like a million tiny shards of glass beneath my aching back. Confusion clouds my mind as my lashes slowly flutter open, and for a moment, I wonder where I am, and how I got here.

It doesn't take long for the memories of the previous events on the nautiloid to flood into my mind, filling my brain with a quick, overwhelming succession of images, playing out the entire incident in my minds eye. The Mind Flayer parasite. The githyanki. The half-elf and her suspicious object. The battle. The crash. And then... the magic that saved my life.

I collect myself, stand to my feet, slowly, carefully, my body aching and throbbing. And I look around to get my bearings and figure out where the hells I am now. 

I am on a beach. And I am surrounded by burning debris... what was once the flying nautiloid is now just a crash site littering the landscape. And what about me? I half-expected my memories to return once I was free of the mind flayer ship, but my past is still an aching void. And this parasite... If I don't find a way to remove the tadpole burrowed in my brain soon, my future will be as blank as my past.

My head whispers vengeance: I cannot wait to slice my way forth, seeking whatever wrought this tragedy upon me.

I don't even know where to begin. But standing around on the beach, waiting for this parasite to turn me into... into one of those things... was not going to be productive. So I move forward. Putting one weary leg in front of the other, I push my way through the loose sand until I come across the first dead body on the scene. The mangled corpse of a dead fisherman laying in a pool of his own blood glistens up at me like a beacon. It whispers to my blood.

I bend over the body, drinking in the pungent corpse. Since I awoke on the ship, my  mind has been cold and empty. But something stirs, with my hands close to this body. I know nothing of why. But I find a half-smile flittering across my face.

No, Tav! I curse at myself, pushing the smile away. This is vile.

With a shake of my head, I can hear my own blood throbbing in my ears. There is something unknown and unspeakable, deep within my heart.

I leave the body alone, stumbling away from it in the slippery, white sand, and amble along the beach, just where the salty blue waters lap at the edge of the shore. What kind of monster am I? And what does the face of such a monster look like? I ponder, and I realize that I don't even know what I look like. I have no memory of that either. And though I am afraid to find out, my curiosity is stronger. As I reluctantly bend over the edge of the water, I silently wonder what kind of monstrosity I will see in my reflection.

My breath catches in my throat, but the only face looking back up at me is that of a regular woman. A human woman with chestnut-brown hair, a tan complexion and amber eyes- as mundane as they come. The only thing that stands out at all is a gnarly burn scar that warps and disfigures half of this face. Ugly. Not new. Not a scar collected on this little nautaloid adventure but something much older. Something from my life before. Something that is now swallowed by the dark void of my missing past. I don't know why, but the thought of it fills my stomach with roiling dread.

Well, half my face may be melted, but I'm no monstrosity. At least not visually. Now that that's out of the way, it's time to press ahead. I need to figure out how to get rid of this mind flayer tadpole in my head, and quick. If that githyanki woman aboard the ship was correct, it won't be long now before I'm a mind flayer myself. I need to find a cure. A powerful healer. But first, I need to get away from this crash site and find civilization.

As I pick my way along, I find random crates and barrels littered along the ravaged beach. And I find myself rummaging through them, looking for supplies, scraps of food, anything to keep me going, all while avoiding the dead bodies that litter the beach, so that my evil blood will not be stirred by them. I don't know what kind of monster I used to be, but I am not one now...