Chapter Text
Shadowheart smirked as she stretched and felt her back crack in several places down the length of her spine. A year ago, if someone had told her she would be taking on the compassionate maternal role of her group, she would have driven The Nightsong’s spear through their heart. As she wrung out another rag over the washbasin and plugged a cork into her water canteen, she had to admit that she found a modicum of fulfillment in caring for Calliope, no matter how tiring or exhausting it was. Whether she was just subconsciously paying Calliope back for the nights she spent rocking Shadowheart to sleep after she abandoned Shar, assuring her she was not as alone as Shar convinced her she was, or the times she serviced her weapons and cleaned her armor and braided her hair when Shadowheart was left catatonic following the deaths of her parents, she didn’t know. She admitted to herself it wouldn’t have mattered how many acts of benevolent service Calliope had done for her; this was the kind of love Calliope and that softie Karlach had been preaching about during the length of her journey with them, and for the first time, Shadowheart felt it pouring out of her as freely as rain from a summer storm. Shadowheart piled a tray with a couple apples and pastries before making yet another trek up the stairway to Calliope’s room.
Wyll had been summoned to Stormshore Tabernacle late the previous night by a messenger who found her slumped on the steps outside its doors. Without a second thought, he’d thrown off the bedcovers and slipped his feet into his boots and made his way to the tabernacle. From what Shadowheart had seen, Calliope was just waking up as they opened the doors, but Wyll simply furrowed his brows and shook his head to Shadowheart before carrying Calliope up the stairs and putting her into bed. For the rest of the night, Wyll and Shadowheart, sat in the hallway outside the door waiting for a single word, a violent outburst, a cry for help - anything that might indicate Calliope was under duress - but the rest of the night passed peacefully, and both Wyll and Shadowheart were gently awoken by the sun peeking through the curtains.
Wyll was still slouched on the floor against the wall when Shadowheart came back with the platter of food for Calliope, but he rose to his feet when he saw her and helped her set it on the small table outside the door. Shadowheart smiled her thanks and sighed slightly before resting her forehead against Wyll’s shoulder.
“Have you seen her yet?” Shadowheart asked, not yet lifting her face to meet Wyll’s. She felt exhaustion fill her from the ground up the longer she stood, and Wyll wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her into him to lighten her burden as much as he could. The relationship they’d cultivated since the events on the dock was not what Shadowheart or Wyll would have labeled as anything remotely romantic, but after spending her life pursuing loss in Shar’s name, Shadowheart had grown to crave Wyll’s unwavering devotion to her. He pulled her in tighter as he sighed and replied “No, I haven’t. I thought I heard her moving around, but I wasn’t sure if she was getting up or rolling over in the bed, and I didn’t want to disturb her.”
Both eyed the closed door for a minute, deep in thought about their next move. Finally, Shadowheart broke the silence and grimaced. “We were foolish to believe him again. So typical of Gale, isn’t it? The moment things get difficult, the second something doesn’t go according to plan, he vanishes, back to the loving embrace of his goddess,” Shadowheart sneered, visibly choking on the final word of her admonition. If there was any part of Wyll Shadowheart could admit to being jealous of, it was his blind support of his friends, regardless of what they’d done. Even after personally witnessing Astarion complete the ritual of ascension, he continued to seek out the good in him and point it out to others when it came to the light, and that trait did not go unnoticed now.
”He didn’t abandon anyone. I’m sure of it. Gale may be shortsighted in his pursuit of a goal, but he is never malicious. He wouldn’t have dreamt in his wildest imagination of bringing Calliope all the way to the tabernacle and force her to watch him disappear. Something is wrong,” Wyll replied calmly, holding Shadowheart’s hands in his own. Still, Shadowheart scowled her disapproval and rolled her eyes, which only made Wyll laugh gently and brush her hair out of her face.
“If it will help you trust me, Shadowheart, I will personally visit the tabernacle myself and demand an audience with him. Even if he is the devil and the rake you claim him to be, he is, above all else, my friend. My friend will grant me an audience, and my friend will come to his senses,” he advised, the slightest hint of a scolding in his tone. Shadowheart bit her lip, but nodded and said nothing. She desperately wanted to trust Wyll, who only knew how to do the right thing. If her heart did not fully trust him, she’d force it with her actions until it became natural. He’d never given her a reason not to trust him, and she doubted he had any type of ulterior motive to do otherwise now. As she reached for the handle on Calliope’s door, she jumped back with a start as the door heaved open from the inside, and Calliope met them in the doorway, her scarred face stoic and serious, but clean, fully dressed, hair pulled back into a braid, and quiver packed with arrows. Speechless, Wyll and Shadowheart appraised her shockingly put-together appearance with their jaws slightly parted, and Calliope lifted her eyebrows and opened her palms to them in a shrug.
”Well?” she beckoned, adjusting her leather bracers on her wrists before shifting her bow further onto her shoulder, “Are we ready to hunt down whoever’s got my wizard?”
********
Gale just barely managed to pull himself up onto the barstool at the Blushing Mermaid and with an exasperated sigh, he lifted a finger to the bartender, whose eyebrows shot halfway up his forehead at the sight of the battered and broken sack of bones slumped over his bar. ”A whiskey, if you don’t mind,” Gale sputtered. “Neat.”
”Buddy, what the hell happened to you? Need me to call a Fist in here for ya? I just saw one - “ the bartender replied hurriedly, using all his might to pull the cork out of a dusty bottle from the top shelf. Gale exhaled a small laugh and shrugged before dropping a couple coins on the bar and finishing his drink in one grateful slug. “No, I think they’re best left patrolling the streets and protecting the innocents,” he said somewhat sarcastically, very aware of how the bartender’s gaze remained fixed on his face while he refilled his cup.
”Say… I know you from somewhere, don’t I? Sure, I do! Gods, you’re- you’re one of them -“ he started to say, pointing a quivering finger at Gale as if he’d not once been reprimanded by any parental figure for being rude. His voice trailed off, though, as Gale confirmed his suspicions with a knowing shrug. He winced quite visibly, though, when the searing pain in his ribs reminded him how fragile he suddenly was. Rather than show anything remotely resembling sympathy, the bartender leaned forward on the bar and continued to stare at Gale, unwavering and unflinching, and continued by saying, “And say.. that means you… Ain’t you that god of - “
“FORMER god, yes,” Gale interrupted pointedly, choking on his second serving of Waterdeep Whiskey. The moment he clumsily slammed the empty cup on the counter, both men whirled around to face a sudden creak of the saltwater-weakened hinges on the front door. Gale cast a glance over his shoulder, and returned to his drink, but his mind caught up with his vision a moment later and his throat closed around a panicked gasp. He felt himself falter on his stool and observed how tightly his knuckles closed around the edge of the bar counter, but he was barely conscious of the involuntary movements his body made as he registered the person, or rather the goddess, who stood in a convincingly corporeal form in the doorway.
Shrouded in a silvery-lavender robe befitting a woman of her station, Mystra strode across the floor to her target, eyes fixed on Gale’s without a hint of curiosity about the room she managed to suck the air out of without even trying. Gale swallowed a dry gulp as she greeted him curtly, her fingers stationary at her side. It had been decades since he’d last seen her in her human form, and she looked exactly the same as she had when she visited him at the altar he’d built out of copper coins, silver jewelry, and creek stones in his mother’s garden. Without the added benefit of the astral realm’s mystical glow, Mystra looked too close to perfection to pin as a mortal; her alabaster skin was pulled taut over knife-edge cheekbones, her grey eyes all-seeing but devoid of emotion, and her each strand of her cascading walnut-hued hair remained eerily stationary, no matter how she moved. Out of deference to her status as an immortal goddess only, Gale awkwardly rose from his seat and concealed his discomfort as best as he could.
”Mystra,” he began, the goddess’ name a bitter venom on his tongue, “I cannot say I expected to see you here, but the last few tendays have been an education, to say the least, so I also cannot say I’m surprised.”
Mystra lifted her chin and appraised Gale in his obvious state of duress, but did not mention it. “You are again in need of my assistance and encouragement, Gale of Waterdeep,” she replied, her voice somehow echoing against the driftwood walls of the bar despite its low timbre and volume.
Gale slowly turned his head to face the bartender, curious about his reaction to his patron, but was startled to see him perfectly frozen in time, his face uncannily calm and chest unburdened with the need for breath. Even the whiskey he had just been pouring from the decanter into a glass hung in the air, each drop suspended in the whisper of a moment above the empty vessel. A mouse, once happily gnawing on a morsel of bread on the floor behind the bartender, was frozen in a leap as the old black tomcat was caught in a pause, its arm outstretched and claws unfurled. The only other patron in the building at the time, a middle aged woman with tousled gray curls, lingered unnaturally over the swallow of drink that hung in her throat. A parlor trick for Mystra to use to impress naive schoolboys, yes, but today it was a tool to buy as much time as Mystra needed to sway Gale to her favor, Gale decided. He turned back to Mystra and did his best to cover his suspicion by lowering his head and lifting his eyes to watch her through his hair, but he recalled how, despite his wishes, Mystra still knew him better than anyone on this plane. Nearly anyone, anyway.
Mystra continued her stride across the floor, her feet never quite making full contact with the ground, until she stood an arm’s length away from Gale. Gingerly, and with what could almost be perceived as genuine warmth, she brushed the back of her fingertips against the swollen bruise on his cheek, and he exhaled his relief and bit his lips as she withdrew from him.
“In all the time I spent focusing on your endeavors, Gale, I neglected to observe the behaviors of those with whom you stooped to acquaint yourself. An inconvenient folly, on my part; a veritable death sentence on yours, especially in your mortal state. Tell me, Gale; is this the first time Astarion Ancunín has caused you harm?”
Gale puzzled over Mystra’s statement. All the time she spent focusing on my endeavors? Apart from the time I was sequestered in my tower alone? Apart from the time she cut me off from her embrace when she knew I had no one else? Apart from the time she cut me off from accessing the Weave and forced me to wander Toril in isolation? Of course Mystra would be oblivious to Astarion’s “typical” behavior. She had made herself entirely inaccessible to Gale when he needed her most, and now she’d arrived to compare notes on her new pet project. He considered his response thoughtfully before finally lifting his face to meet hers.
”Physically? Yes. I’ve never suffered more than a firm handshake from Astarion. His ascension, however - his blind pursuit of power at the expense of those closest to him - that is the wound that cuts closest to the quick,” he replied calmly, struggling to smother the memories of his friend under the weight of his words. Mystra raised an eyebrow.
”Gale, are you so fragile you’d allow a mortal slight to tip you off balance and shatter your core? A treatment as ill, if not as petty, as this would cease to be a factor in Elysium, but I fear I insult you by stating the obvious. Surely you recall how small the affairs of mortals can be from the daïs from which you once ruled.”
Of course he remembered. Of all the experiences worth recalling, Gale’s short tenure as the god of ambition was entirely unforgettable. He recalled how he and Mystra once watched bemused as a farmer sat up all night with his only goat and watched in vain as it took its last breath, and he squinted his eyes shut as he recalled the day he waved off a prayer from a sixteen-year-old boy who was forced to watch a gnoll tear the flesh from his mother’s bones because Mystra did not believe the prayer to be sincere enough. Petty, Gale repeated to himself; how petty those mortal concerns.
“Why concern yourself with me, then?” Gale asked, co*cking his head to the side and finally finding a spark of confidence hot enough to fully look Mystra in the eye. “When you have a plane heaped full with young mages eager to glean your favor, why bother assuming a human form to meet me in a dingy tavern and offer me your help when I stopped seeking it long ago? Surely, this is not out of benevolence, and your compassionate streak is arguably lacking in substance… No… you’ve more to gain from this encounter than I do,” Gale cautiously chided, making a note in his mind to congratulate himself much, much later. Mystra’s eyes contracted into a sneering squint and she clenched her jaw, a laughably human reaction to Gale’s retort, but she did not acknowledge it. Instead, she let out a huff and licked her lips.
”Ao finds himself displeased with my choices. Astarion’s behavior is not that befitting a Chosen of Mystra, and as I am a goddess, I cannot be troubled enough to interfere directly with the choices made in the mortal realm. I find myself requiring your talents, Gale - namely, the talents you chose to sacrifice to me when you abandoned your post - and with those talents, you must bring Astarion to his knees once and for all.
Gale, I am not unaware that you and your excitable companions already endeavor to cause Astarion’s downfall. Such a task is a noble one, especially…” Mystra paused for the briefest of moments, “…if you believe Calliope’s life is at stake. I caution you to remember, though, that Astarion’s current power rivals that of the Elder Brain that very nearly erased each of you from existence. Chasing this fool’s errand of yours without your once-expert control of the Weave is a death sentence, to put it mildly, and as much as I yearn to see your breathless body rotting into the soil stained by your blood, you are no good to me as a corpse, and I could do better than to have the remaining heroes of Baldur’s Gate set against me.”
Without waiting for a reply, Mystra lifted one immaterial hand and filled the spaces between herself and Gale’s chest, and he was immediately filled with a surge of powerful warmth that flowed from the cavity left by the Netherese Orb into each nerve and artery under his skin. A flash of ivory and amethyst light splashed across the bar, and each individual hair on Gale’s skin, from the backs of his fingers to the whisper-light follicles inside his nostrils, sprang to life with a jolt of electric fire. Cautiously, Gale lifted his palms to his eyes and flexed his fingers around a very tangible manifestation of magical force. A light spray of sky blue sparks emitted from his fingertips, and with great trepidation, he cleared his throat and looked up at Mystra. Her face remained unchanged, but the tension between them was markedly weighty.
”Mystra, I…” he began. Mystra shook her head and held her hand up to him again, silencing him in an instant.
”It is not a favor I grant you, and it is not permanent. It is a vestige of the wizard you once were. Do this for me, and I shall allow you to get to know the man I always knew you’d someday become.”
Gale smirked and raised an eyebrow. “In all his petty mortal glory?”
Mystra sighed and lowered her chin, then called forth a swirling cloud of blue and violet light with a practiced wave of her hand. “Yes, Gale,” she replied. “In all his imperfect, mundane, adroitly mediocre, petty mortal glory.”
In a flash, the swirling cloud swallowed Mystra, and the action in the tavern picked up where it had all left off. Gale inhaled deeply, reveling in the familiar magical glow that heated his core and cushioned his footsteps. After dropping a few more coins on the counter for the bartender, who absentmindedly turned his attention to the scraggly cat on the floor behind him, Gale exited the tavern and marched into the street, wholly grateful for another chance at a long life filled with love and humanity.
