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

34. The Dark Urge

I open my eyes with a lurch, and I am not in my bed.

I stand above a body, which is in a state of gore nearly beyond recognition. The body of that brave girl, who earnestly swore to devote her life to my cause now lies sprawled and lifeless on the soft ground just a couple of feet off from my bedroll. The bard, Alfira... I can hardly recognize her torn and mutilated body... her stomach ripped open, glistening innards and thick blood spilling downward in streams, mixing and coagulating in the dirt below.

In stunned confusion, I force the hinges of my aching slack-jaw shut, working the muscles of my face as I try to work out just what in the hells is going on. Is there an attacker in our camp?! Orienting myself, I whirl around, looking to the rest of my companions, not knowing if I'll find them in a similar state of gore, but to my relief they are all sleeping soundly as though blissfully unaware of this gruesome murder scene before me.

Next, I peer down at myself. At my hands... the clothing on my body. Blood covers me, and its warmth feels like the embrace of an old friend. I recall nothing of how I ended up here, outside of my bedroll, standing above the bard's mangled corpse, but my head pounds and aches.

In a panic, I slam my eyes shut and try hard to remember something. Anything. A single moment comes to me. The flash of abject terror in her eyes. Blood spilling from her lips. No time for last words. The image excites me... fills me with horror. My eyes fly open, unable to process it. Below me, the corpse of Alfira is covered in dozens and dozens of wounds. It looks as though the killer did not stop savaging it, even when she was long gone. And my dominant arm aches... It aches from stabbing. Over and over.

Somehow... This murder was my doing. No, it was the darkness within me. What is this curse in my heart that compels me to kill in my sleep? Something wicked must have woken me. The contemptible pervert within must have lavished slash after slash upon the girl. I've always been aware of its presence residing within me, ever since the day I woke up in the nautiloid... and even before then. But where, oh where could this monster from within have come from? How did it come to live inside of me? If only I knew myself better...

But I don't have much time for reflection. The break of dawn is not far off. Right now I need to act. I may only have a few moments before the others awaken, and begin to cast blame for the hot sin before me. Yet somehow, the idea of hiding the body - of hiding what I've done... It doesn't sit well with me. I don't wish to lie to my companions, but at the same time I don't want them to think of me as a cold-blooded murder either (even though that's apparently exactly what I am). What will they do when they catch my blood-stained self standing over the bard's destroyed corpse? At best, they'll make me leave camp, cast out to search for a cure on my own. But I can't let that happen... I can't do this on my own. I still need them. Yet when they see what I've done, surely... surely they'll punish me. Abandon me. Or probably worse, if I'm being honest...

I don't know what to do, or how to handle this situation that The Dark Urge has put me in. But with the first slivers of sunlight cresting over the ridge of the distant mountains, I realize that I don't have long to figure things out. My head swims, and my skin burns with guilt where the bard's blood marks it. It's hot... it sears my flesh. Suddenly I'm overwhelmed with the need to get it off!

Quickly I scramble away from camp to the nearest body of water to wash the blood away. With heavy, jagged breaths, I stoop over the small, bubbling brook in the woods, pressing a nearby sponge gourd to my skin and begin to scrub. I scrub, and scrub at myself with the coarse sponge until my hands are cold and raw. Even when Alfira's blood is no longer there, I can still feel it burning my flesh, staining me with guilt. If I wasn't wholly certain of the fact before, I am now - I am a murderer.