Revelations and Reconciliation

by ArielOfAutumn

Canon divergence where Charname, Ilyrana, and Sarevok were once very close, as children, before Ilyrana was "saved" by Gorion, who ensorcels them to forget one another. This will revolve around these two characters coming to terms with the events of BG1, when they got the memories of each other back, and if they can ever forgive one another for everything.

25. Homecoming Part 2

Chapter 25: Homecoming Part 2

Ilyrana

"The hell are ye?"

The dwarf was still alive, in bad shape, covered in bruises both fresh and old, but still very much alive.

"We're-"

"Doesna matter. Yer getting me out o' this godsdamned prison so I don't care much who ye are."

Rana finished picking the lock on his cell and stepped back so Sarevok could toss a healing potion inside.

"Much obliged," the dwarf growled, chugging the entire bottle. "Tastes like orc piss if ya ask me, but I guess ye didna ask, did ye? Now, I suppose the mayor sent ye. 'Bout blasted time. I've been stuck in this shit hole for I don't know how long and me and him are goona have words, ye hear?"

"The mayor didn't-"

"Hey, you two seen them kids anywhere? Scrawny things they are. Them's the ones been getting napped right outta Tor Niedrig. Mayor sent me to find them after that shady little gnome shown up in town, spoutin' off praises to the Mad God."

"Wait, what gnome? Do you mean-"

"Aye, Tiax. That's his name. Right nutter that one. Anyway, followed him down here where he squared off with this Jorval and he got himself runt right outta the temple. Right mean bastard that human is. That gnome took Jorval's best warriors with him though, and a few o' them cultists. Prolly how you two got in. Not so much muscle defending this place now."

"What happened to-"

"Ach, I'm ready to get outta here. Don't have no more time to stand around listenin' to more o' yer yappin'. I'm goona find them kids and go home. If ye make it back before us, tell the mayor I'm comin' fer him and he owes me big time, ye hear?"

Rana watched the dwarf finish wagging a finger at Sarevok's waist in an attempt to be threatening, a somewhat baffled look on her face. Then, muttering about yappy humans and useless elves, he strode off, heading toward the main chapel, and the children.

Sarevok looked at her, a similar expression of irritated bewilderment on his face.

"You talk too much," she told him.

"Apparently," he agreed sarcastically.

The pair headed further into the temple. Rana shook her head at the thought of Tiax having come through here.

Small world.

At least he'd made it easy for them to breach this place. And he wasn't still here so she wouldn't have to listen to him talk in the third person.

Strange, though, that Jorval was able to fend him off, only to have his best fighters follow the crazed gnome instead. And what was left couldn't get a single spell off against us.

Two heavy wooden doors waited at the end of the short hallway, and Rana put away her growing unease. Stopping before them, she began lightly running her hands over the wood, feeling for any traces of magical traps. There were two, one on each door, and she disabled both before leaning in to listen for any sounds inside. All she heard were faint snores.

No one had been able to get down here to notify the High Priest of their attack. And his god seemed to care even less about helping him.

Slipping a dagger up the slit between the doors, she slid it up until it clicked against a deadbolt. She could pick the lock on the handles easy enough, but she wouldn't be able to pick this.

"All yours," she whispered to Sarevok, then backed away to give him some room.

Sliding his sword out of its sheath across his back, he took two steps back. As he adjusted his stance, he glanced back at her, and she put away her dagger in favor of her short swords. Checking to make sure the poison she'd applied to them was still evenly coated, she nodded at him.

Sarevok took two long steps forward, bringing his sword up as he went, then brought it crashing down in a brutal slash across both doors. The sound was deafening, as if the doors had been blasted off their hinges by the force behind the stroke rather than the blade itself.

They entered what appeared to be a sitting room. Moldering bookshelves lined the walls, filled with tomes that had seen better days. The furniture, though, was pristine, and of expensive quality. Another set of doors were located opposite them, and they burst open right as Rana noticed them.

Jorval stumbled into the room, obviously having jumped out of bed at the sound of the doors being blown off their hinges and crashing into his sitting room.

He had been old the last time they'd laid eyes on him, and time had not been good to him. His white hair was long and greasy, wild from sleep. He had no facial hair. His eyes were a blue so pale they almost matched his hair. He'd thrown on a frayed gray robe that was stained with all manner of things.

The High Priest saw Sarevok first, and after a split second of terrified confusion, he raised his hands and snarled out a spell. Sarevok laughed when nothing happened.

"I remember you being weak and incompetent, only able to hold sway over the most deranged and soft-headed, but I assumed you developed something over the years. How disappointing."

Rana began slipping around the edge of the room, slowly circling to position herself behind Jorval. He noticed her.

"Alianna?" He croaked.

Sarevok advanced on him, drawing the man's attention back to him, allowing Rana to continue moving. Jorval lunged towards a nearby bookshelf, tore some of the books down, and produced a wand from some small hidden spot behind the texts. A cloud of freezing air shot toward Sarevok, but he merely raised the Sword of Chaos before him. When it hit the blade, ice spread across the dark steel, enveloping it in a coat of frost, before immediately melting and sloughing to the floor.

"What do you want, Deathbringer?!"

"Your life, old man."

"Come and take it then!" Jorval screamed, raising his arm to point at Sarevok, the enchanted ring on one of his fingers glowing white before shooting forward, materializing into a ball of blame as it launched at Sarevok.

Ducking behind one of the bookshelves, Sarevok narrowly avoided the blast, and when the fireball exploded down the hall behind them, the temple shook from the impact.

While his magic was disabled, it appeared he could still use magical tools, like the wand and the ring.

Rana was almost in position now, if Sarevok could just keep him distracted a few seconds longer.

Gripping at a pendant around his neck, Jorval muttered the words that would invoke its power, then began to laugh as five copies of himself appeared around him. All six of the Jorvals turned their heads to look at Rana, their yellowed teeth fixed in an insane grin, and she froze at the unnerving sight.

"You look so much like your mother, Ilyrana. I almost thought it was her come back from the dead. She was such a beauty, and you held such promise of surpassing her in that regard, but those unsightly scars…"

Jorval frowned at the three marks on her neck from the gibberling, the only scars that weren't covered by her armor.

"Ah well, you're too old for my tastes now anyway," he finished, his voice echoing eerily as the illusions mimicked his words, each one speaking just a beat too fast or too slow.

Hissing with fury at the reminder of the priest's perverse appetites, Rana spun her swords and lunged at the closest mirror image, cutting across it's abdomen in what would have spilled the man's innards if it were the real Jorval. Instead, it merely faded, leaving five of them now, the real one and four fakes.

A blast from the wand connected with her chest, sending her flying back into a bookshelf before falling heavily to the ground, the ice making her armor burn as if it were searing hot rather than intensely cold. It was a feeling she was all too familiar with thanks to Irenicus. She screamed as she tried to tear the dragonscale off, forgetting in her pain and terror that her armor should be highly resistant to frost magic.

"Rana it's not real!" Sarevok roared, sounding far away, his voice echoing when it shouldn't in such a small room. "Illusion is his power!"

Flinging her chest armor away from her, Rana tried to rise, gasping for air despite the agony of trying to breathe through the cold seeping past the long sleeved shirt she'd worn beneath, and into her skin and then vital organs. It wasn't slowing, and it felt like her lungs would seize up, each panicked gasp making the cold more intense, more real.

"Ilyrana, darling, what ails you?"

Her mother's voice.

Looking up, she saw her. Alianna. Wearing a simple crimson gown, her long midnight black hair falling freely down her back almost to her knees, she looked like a Deva.

"M-mother?"

"Shhh daughter, I'm here. We'll defeat him together, you and I," Alianna murmured soothingly, kneeling before her to brush a strand of hair out of Rana's face.

Her touch seemed to chase away the chill, and Rana breathed deeply as warmth returned to her body.

"Rana!"

There was a screech of steel sliding across what sounded like polished stone that nearly drowned out Sarevok's voice.

"Sarevok?!"

Looking wildly around the room, Rana couldn't see him. Or Jorval and his mirror images.

"Sarevok, where are you?!"

"Fear not, child," Alianna whispered, drawing Rana's attention back to her. "He will not harm us ever again. This time, it is I who will save you. This time, you won't have to watch your mother die to that monster."

"What are you talking about? Jorval didn't kill you, Sarevok…" Her voice trailed off as she realized what her mother was saying. "Wait! Sarevok killed you to save me from you! I'm not helping you fight him!"

Rana staggered to her feet and then stumbled away from her mother, her mind trying to comprehend what was happening.

"He killed me because he could not bear to share you with another. To have you love anyone other than himself. Such violent possessiveness is a weakness of his kind. It's why I tried to keep you away from him. No pure elven daughter of mine, and of Our Lord Bhaal, will belong to a human brute."

"You tried to give me to Jorval! Knowing what he'd do to me!" Rana cried, backing away further when her mother reached for her.

"No, child. That's what Sarevok wanted you to believe, because he could not stand the thought of another male anywhere near you. I was trying to protect you, by bringing you under the personal protection of the High Priest. He was so jealous that he fought me every time I tried to get you away from him."

"Damnit, Rana, fight it! Alianna isn't real! It's Jorval! He's-"

His voice cut off in a grunt of pain, followed by the sound of something heavy hitting the floor.

"It's almost done, Ilyrana. A few more moments and it will all be over. You'll be free of him at last."

Panic seized her as she realized Sarevok was dying, somewhere close by, but she couldn't see him. Reaching out with her soul, she snatched at his half, holding onto it like an anchor, using their bond to break through the illusions.

"What are you doing?" Alianna hissed, her voice cracking, her vivid yellow eyes shifting to pale blue and back again. "Stop it, Ilyrana. Let him go. We can be together again once he's gone."

She felt his wounds, and his rage. It was his fear, though, that began to unravel the room around her. Not fear for himself. Death no longer held any surprises for him. It was his fear for her.

I will not lose you again, she whispered through the link, repeating the words he'd told her that night she nearly took her own life to spare him, and the others, from the Slayer.

Rana… none of this is real. You have to fight it!

Alianna, her beautiful face contorted in fury, lunged at her, a dagger materializing in her hand, aimed for her throat. Rana caught her wrist, the end of the blade stopping just inches short of its mark. Drawing strength from the taint, she wrenched the knife from her mother's hand, then spun the woman around, pulling her back against her chest, and drew the steel across her throat.

Her mother vanished. Along with the sitting room.

She stood in the middle of a large room with marveled pillars, a torch burning in a sconce attached to each one, and a ceiling so high it was shrouded in shadow. Sarevok knelt yards away, three smoking holes in his breastplate, and each one pouring blood.

Eyes darting to each shadow, searching for Jorval and more of his illusions, she ran to him. Falling to her knees beside him, she set her swords down to begin rummaging in her bag for a healing potion.

"That spell… that he cast… that I thought hadn't worked. It did something… allows him to read our minds… and take what he finds to create… and reinforce his illusions."

"There's only three mirror images left. Anything that pops up, we kill it," Rana said, then cursed when she couldn't find the potion.

Hysterical laughter echoed around the room, and Rana grabbed up her swords before rising, slowly turning in a circle as she searched for Jorval.

Sarevok painfully pushed to his feet, his breathing labored from his injuries.

"I can't find a potion, don't you have some in your bag?" She asked him without turning to look at him, afraid to take her eyes off of their surroundings.

"Yeah, give me a minute."

A movement around one of the pillars had her tensing, preparing for another assault. Her Infravision was useless, the number and the power of the illusions interfering with its effectiveness.

The sound of a foot sliding across the floor had her turning, flipping one of her short swords in the air as she moved. Catching the end of the blade, she threw the sword, end over end, as she completed the turn. It sank into Jorval's chest as he was coming up behind them.

Watching him drop to his knees, clutching the hilt of her sword, his eyes wide with disbelief, was a sight she was sure would stay with her forever.

"Got you," she whispered, triumph burning in her eyes as she went to stand before him.

"Careful, little one. It could be one of the illusions."

"No, it didn't disappear," she replied over her shoulder, watching the priest gasp and cough up blood. "I got him."

Sarevok's arm wrapped around her stomach from behind, and he kissed the top of her head when he gently pulled her back against him.

"It's over then," he whispered into her hair.

"Yes. It is."

"NOOOOOO!"

Rana went still. That sudden scream, filled with agony, and denial, had come from far across the room. And it was from Sarevok.

"What-"

The arm around her tightened, a low chuckle coming from the man behind her.

"Still so easy to fool, godchild," Irenicus murmured, his lips brushing the tip of her ear.

Rana reversed the remaining sword in her hand and shoved it into the mage's belly. Tearing away from him, she took up her other sword that lay on the ground, now that the mirror image of Jorval on his knees had disappeared. Spinning around, her chest heaving as fear and revulsion sent her spiralling close to madness, she watched the illusion of her torturer laugh before fading away.

Sarevok's broken voice reached through the panic, as he repeated her name over and over again. The raw pain in each iteration had her moving almost before she'd decided to.

She had just taken out two more of the mirror images. Which left one more.

Heading towards the sound, she prayed she'd see Jorval, or her mother again. Fuck, even another Irenicus. Anything but Sarevok, if it wasn't the real him. She couldn't take that again. Couldn't take not trusting her eyes.

Coming around one of the pillars, she saw him on his knees, a woman gathered in his arms. As she drew closer, she realized it was her. There was a gaping hole in her belly, and the Sword of Chaos lay bloody beside him.

He thinks he killed me…

"Sarevok, wait, that's not-"

His head snapped up at the sound of her voice, his eyes glowing almost white.

"I'll kill you," he hissed at her, gently lowering the dead Rana to the floor. "I'll spend the rest of my immortal life making you beg me to end you. And I'll deny you. Until I've carved her name into every inch of your skin a hundred times over."

Oh, fuck.

"Sarevok, listen to me, it's another illusion. Just… wait a second. Watch, it'll disappear."

There was a flicker of hope, of yearning, that she was telling the truth. That she was real. They both looked down at the fake Rana, and she tried to steady herself after everything she'd seen. It was all too much. And seeing herself dead, even knowing it wasn't real, was extremely disconcerting.

This would haunt her.

Haunt them both.

"See!" She exclaimed, when the body briefly began to glow.

But her relief was short lived.

A sick, helpless feeling had her taking a step away, her eyes filling with tears, when the body didn't disappear. When it instead turned into golden ash.

"Nooo," she moaned. "Sarevok, please, it's not real! Jorval's making you think that's the real me! I know what it looks like, but that's not me! Please, my aegisess-"

He surged to his feet, bringing the Sword of Chaos up with him, and advanced on her.

Ah, gods, no... Please, don't do this to me. I can't... I can't hurt him. I can't kill him!

"Sarevok…" she whispered through the tears, backing away from him. "Please… don't do this."

With an agonized roar he covered the last few yards between them, bringing his sword, the sword she'd returned to him around this time last night, down on her. She danced out of range, gripping her weapons hard enough that her hands went numb, but unable to raise them against him.

"Fucking fight me, you coward!" He shouted when she avoided another strike. "Drop the illusion and fight me!"

When he rushed her, she had no choice but to cross her swords and parry the ensuing slash, gritting her teeth when the blow nearly jarred her swords from her hands. She couldn't win against him. The taint would help even the odds, but it would only prolong the inevitable. She couldn't, wouldn't, strike against him.

This is it then. It ends where it began.

Backstepping, parrying, narrowly ducking an overhead swing, she did all she could just to stay alive. At one point, when darting behind a pillar to catch her breath, she caught sight of Jorval, leaning against another pillar opposite her. His arms were folded across his chest, and he watched the fight with obvious sadistic glee.

"Sarevok, look! It's Jorval! Just there! LOOK, DAMN YOU!"

But he didn't look. Didn't hear a word she said as he kept coming at her, wearing her down with his greater strength. With his fierce desire to end who he thought was responsible for Rana's death.

Bringing up her swords a half second too slow, not having time to brace for her parry, Sarevok knocked her off her feet, sending her sliding across the floor, one of her swords spinning over the polished surface of the marble beneath her and well out of her reach.

Desperately trying to get to her feet, knowing it was already over, she scrambled away from him, pleading with him to stop.

His free hand shot out and wrapped around her throat, cutting off her words. Effortlessly, he lifted her and slammed her back against a column, holding her off her feet, as he drew his sword back. Clawing futilely at his gauntleted hand, she played the last card she held.

In one last act of desperation, she shoved an image into his mind with their soul. She hoped it worked, as there seemed to be a fog around his half. She didn't know, exactly, what she showed him. What he saw. But whatever it was made him pause. For just a second. Enough time for her to commit his face to memory, one last time, before she closed her eyes, and waited for the killing blow.

It didn't come.

The hand at her throat released her, and she fell heavily to the ground, her ankles screaming in pain as she somehow managed to keep from dropping to her knees. Leaning back against the pillar, she gasped for air.

Sarevok's fist connected with the column. Right beside her head, crumbling a portion of it, chips of marble falling down over her shoulder. She went still, staring up at him as the glow of his eyes faded to almost nothing.

"Damn you," he whispered, his sword clanging loudly as it hit the floor, and he placed his other hand on the opposite side of her head. "I know you're not real… but I still can't do it."

Hanging his head, and leaning over her, he shut his eyes, as if preparing to die. Slowly, her heart aching so much she thought it would stop working altogether, she reached for him. His entire body quaked when her fingers brushed his cheek, but he didn't move.

"Sarevok…"

Sliding closer to him, she buried her face into the crook of his neck, clutching at his armor, needing him to feel that she was real. The sound of the lethal tips of his gauntlets goring into the column made her shiver, but she didn't draw away.

"I can't see her like that again. I don't know what's real. But I can't watch her turn to ash another time," he murmured, sounding broken and defeated. "You win, Jorval. Finish it."

Sobbing, she pulled away from him, needing to make him understand. Taking his face in her hands, she placed a kiss on his lips, trying to reach him through their soul, through the haze of nothing that was all she could feel on his end.

It's me. Please, Sarevok, you have to believe me. I'm alive. It's me. Please, help me fight for us.

His arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her against him, as he returned the kiss, a pained sound rumbling from his chest.

"Please, my aegisess, I need you. Please…" her voice trailed off as he took her mouth again, all but crushing her against his chest, and it still wasn't close enough. Would never be close enough.

"Please…"

*

Moments earlier…

Sarevok

Rieltar Anchev stepped out of the shadows, that small, cruel smile on his lips. Sarevok froze at the sight of him.

"Look at you, son, still so sentimental, even after all the times I tried to beat it out of you."

"I'm not your son!" Sarevok snarled, raising his sword. "Gods, I'm going to enjoy killing you a second time. Once just wasn't enough. I don't even care that you're not real."

The man tsked disapprovingly.

"Even at the expense of your sister? Even now, she's been fooled to believe the two of you have won. Thinks it's you who's holding her."

That thought made him seethe, even if it was likely a lie. Still, just to be safe…

He reached for her half of their soul, felt her relief at his touch, and that she was coming to him.

"You always were a poor liar, father," he sneered.

"Was I? Hmm I can't recall ever lying to you. I remember calling you entitled, ungrateful, disloyal. All of which was true. Just like your mother. That whore couldn't just appreciate what I gave to her-"

"Don't you dare speak of her!"

He lunged, bringing his sword down in a devastating arch that would have cut diagonally through the illusion. It vanished just before he connected, only to reappear a ways away, hidden in shadow.

"Come now, Sarevok, we both know your mother deserved what I did to her. At least, I think she did. In all honesty, I can't seem to remember what it was. Ah well, it was likely something damning, I'm sure. Still, it felt good to watch the light leave her eyes. But then, you'd know all about that pleasure wouldn't you, bhaalspawn?"

His sword whistled through the air, parting shadows, but no flesh or illusion.

"Face me, coward!"

Sweeping his gaze across the room, he searched for where the bastard would pop up again. Rana brushed his soul, alerting him that she neared, and he turned to the direction he felt her coming from. Once more, the shadows stirred, and his father's voice emanated from them, gloating over garrotting his step mother. He didn't hesitate, just lashed out with all his strength, wanting to watch that piece of shit die once more.

His eyes widened in horror as a sudden gust of air stirred the nearest torch, the light flaring bright enough to see Rana just before him. With the Sword of Chaos impaled in her stomach.

Gods, no…

"NOOOOOO!"

Pulling the sword out, and dropping it to the ground, he caught her as she fell against him, sinking to his knees with her in his arms.

"No… Rana, I… I didn't know it was you. I thought… Rieltar… ah, gods, Rana, hold on!"

Quickly he searched in his bag with one hand for a healing potion, his heart hammering harder and faster as he felt her cough and rasp out his name.

"Hold on, baby…"

A shudder ran through her body, and she went limp against him.

"Rana?"

He drew back enough to look at her face. Her eyes were distant. Unseeing. The amber lusterless without the woman inside to give them life.

A pain, unlike anything he'd ever felt, burned into his chest as he felt her half of their soul begin to slip away, intangible, disconnected from the whole. He closed his eyes and touched his forehead to hers, clutching her close, as if to try and hold her to her body.

"Don't leave me, Rana… not now. Not after I…"

It was too late.

She was gone.

The pain doubled… then tripled… piercing and searing and tearing, it felt like he was being eaten alive, from the inside out. It would kill him. He was sure of it. And right now, he welcomed that fact.

"Sarevok, wait, that's not-"

That pain flared even brighter at the sound of her voice, and he jerked his head up to see her standing a few yards away, her eyes red with unshed tears.

"I'll kill you," he hissed at Jorval's illusion, gently lowering Rana's body to the floor. "I'll spend the rest of my immortal life making you beg me to end you. And I'll deny you. Until I've carved her name into every inch of your skin a hundred times over."

"Sarevok, listen to me, it's another illusion. Just… wait a second. Watch, it'll disappear."

He didn't want to hope. Didn't want to feel, even for a second, that he was wrong, only to be fooled. It would be like watching her die a second time. He couldn't stop himself from looking down at her, though. For some reason, looking at the living, breathing, lifelike illusion was more painful than looking at the dead woman lying before him. Hope was far deadlier than anything else in this room.

When her body began to glow, so did the hope.

Disappear. Be an illusion. Let that Rana, that living Rana be the real one. Please…

Rana's body turned into ash.

As did his sanity.

The next several moments were disjointed, as if he kept blacking out, and then watching parts of it from somewhere outside of himself. He didn't feel real. He didn't feel much of anything. Just that pain that had become this dull ache. Each throb of it seemed to disconnect him a little bit more.

A memory suddenly bubbled up in his mind. A not so distant one. It was when he and Rana were standing together, watching the boy ready himself to square off against two powerful bhaalspawn, if that's what it would take to protect the girl he loved. That sight had moved him, but that wasn't what the memory was focused on. It was the look in Rana's eyes as she gazed up at him. It was, he realized, perhaps the first time she'd ever looked at him with all of her shields down. Without hiding anything she was feeling.

The memory of what he saw in those fathomless depths made him weak. He released his hold on the illusion's throat, only just now realizing he'd been about to choke the false life from it.

He couldn't do it. He'd killed her once, he couldn't do it again. Even a fake. The fact that it was a fake, that those tears weren't real, but had the same effect as if they were, made him lash out, putting his fist through the column, relishing the shockwave of pain it sent up his arm.

He'd let it kill him. Let Jorval win. He didn't care. Nothing mattered now. He was sure this agony would kill him anyway if the priest didn't.

The illusion touched him, and the warmth of its hand pained him even further. When it buried its face in his neck, and he felt the tears against his skin, he thought about just pretending it was really her.

It pulled away, and he somehow felt even more hollow than before. But then he felt its lips against his own, and they felt so much like hers that he caved. He'd let himself savor this dream as long as it lasted.

It's me. Please, Sarevok, you have to believe me. I'm alive. It's me. Please, help me fight for us.

Her voice rang out inside his head, pleading.

He groaned, and pulled her to him. The smell of her, orchids and blood, made his body respond as if it were really her.

"Please, my aegisess, I need you. Please…"

The taste of her drove him mad. And when she parted her lips, and he felt her tongue slip against his own, and heard that little moan she always gave when they kissed, something inside him shifted. The pain was still there, but it had changed.

He needed her closer. Needed to feel her skin against his. Needed as much as he could get before the killing blow was struck and he was no more.

Pulling her closer still, he grieved that it still wasn't close enough. Would never be close enough.

"Please…" he whispered against her lips. "Please be real…"

*

Ilyrana

That fuzzy gray bank of mist that clouded their connection began to fade. At first, she'd thought it was Jorval's misleading magic. Now, she wasn't so sure.

That he'd tampered somehow with their soul link, she was certain. It made sense that the soul could be fooled along with physical perceptions, and that of the mind and heart. What was puzzling, though, was how distant Sarevok felt to her, despite how close they were. Like he was dying. Like he was bleeding out but she could see no wounds.

"And you sneer at me for my tastes," Jorval cackled from somewhere among the columns. "At least I don't carry on incestuous relations."

Sarevok pulled away from her, searching for the priest, before he looked down at her, his expression so torn, the longing so palpable, that it made the tears start up again.

"Rana…? Is this the real you?"

"Yes," she whispered. "He created five mirror images. The first I destroyed right after they manifested. The second was my mother. The third was one of him, and I thought it was the real one. The fourth started out as you, before turning into… Irenicus. The fifth was me."

She could tell he wanted to believe her, but he couldn't trust this completely. If they walked away from this battle, with Jorval dead, this fight would stay with them for many years to come. And she didn't think Sarevok would be the same. She just hoped she was wrong.

A roar of sound had them both turning, taking up their weapons as they did. A fireball hurtled toward them, and they dove to the ground to avoid it. It slammed into the pillar they'd just been standing in front of, and between the explosion and Sarevok's fist, the column crumbled and began to collapse.

Sarevok dragged her to her feet and shoved her forward, both of them narrowly avoiding being crushed by the debris.

Another massive fireball formed from the shadows and whistled toward them. This time, they were able to note where it came from before moving out of the way.

When Rana shot back to her feet, she tore over the ground toward the shadows.

"Rana, wait!"

No, no more waiting. She didn't know if he could summon more illusions. Items like his necklace could usually only work once per day, but that spell he'd cast to see into their minds meant he was well versed in this kind of manipulation. Assuming, that is, that the fake Sarevok had been speaking the truth.

She felt the drawing of power just a second before the fireball formed from the black a few yards away, and she was able to call out a warning to Sarevok while she ducked behind a pillar.

As she waited for the projectile to pass, she wondered if this very room was real. If it was just another illusion, or if the sitting room had been the actual fake. This led her to guess how Jorval had survived the Harper raid all those years ago. He hadn't been an exceptionally powerful man, or charismatic, and his lip service to whatever god he pretended to serve could be seen through even when she was a child. Now, she finally began to understand how he'd managed to obtain this kind of position. How he'd survived over the years. How he could have run off Tiax, who, while insane, was deceptively powerful in his own right. She hadn't worked with the gnome, but just meeting him had left a strong impression on her.

"Have you ever wondered how your mother came to lose her mind, my Ilyrana?" Jorval's voice rang out from not too far away. "She wanted so much to believe that Bhaal favored her above all the other women. And, perhaps he did! We'll never know, will we? She knew, though. Maybe. Off and on. She was most fun, and easy, to twist."

Rana froze, his words sinking into her heart.

That bastard… that FUCKING BASTARD!

Silently, she ghosted from shadow to shadow, slowly making her way toward him.

"Ah, my poor, sweet Alianna," Gorion's voice rang out, nearly making her stumble. "Don't listen to him, my child. Bhaal raped your mother. That's what drove her mad."

"No, Bhaal loved me," Alianna cried. "Loved us both, daughter!"

"Methinks they're both wrong," Jorval laughed. "She tried so many times to earn his favor, by attempting to bring you before me. In the end, there was little left of her. Her mind shattered beneath the weight of all the pretty little illusions I spun for her."

He was leaning against a column, holding the pendant in the palm of one hand and stroking it with the long fingers of his other. Suddenly he froze, then slowly raised his eyes to her, delight flashing in those pale orbs.

"Sorry, child, but you're in my kingdom. You cannot sneak up on me here. In my domain, I am god!"

His form bled into the shadows, only to be replaced by Gorion.

After all these years, and everything he'd wrought against them, seeing his face sent a pang of longing through her. That childlike need for the comfort of a parent, the approval, the pride. She'd thought she'd killed that part of her.

"My child, forgive me. I knew not what I did," Gorion whispered mournfully.

This isn't real. He's dead. Strike him down, he's already dead. Just another illusion. Just more lies.

"When I came upon you during the raid… I saw only what Jorval wanted me to see. What I wanted to see. For so long, I told myself that Bhaal must have raped your mother. That she never would have allowed herself to be seduced by the Lord of Murder. I could not bear the thought of her willingly giving herself to him. Willingly taking his seed into her."

Rana couldn't move. She could hear her heart pounding in her ears. She held her breath, though she didn't realize it. Sarevok stepped up beside her, sword drawn, and he looked just as torn as she did. If it was really him. She didn't know anything anymore.

"I saw her trying to save you from the boy. Even as young as he was, he looked just as evil as his father. He killed her before I could reach the two of you. Seeing her die… I could not see the reality of what was actually happening. I couldn't see that he was trying to protect you from her. Because if that were true, it meant I was wrong about Alianna. It meant our love had been false."

"He's lying…" Sarevok whispered, but she could hear the doubt laced in his voice.

"Years later, I could never forgive myself for what I did to you, Sarevok. When I saw you in Candlekeep, reading Alaundo's Prophecy, I got a glimpse of your eyes before you turned away, but it was enough. I knew it was you. And I knew it was only a matter of time before you saw Ilyrana. And that you'd come for her."

Rana closed her eyes, letting the tears that didn't seem to cease anymore slide down her cheeks.

That day she barrelled into him… when she was running from Winthrop with the stolen muffins. That was the day Gorion was speaking of.

"Forgive me," Gorion whispered, his image blurring momentarily. "I didn't think I could ever right that wrong. Until you ambushed us while we fled Candlekeep. My death may have helped begin unravelling your memories. I do not know. But dying may have helped begin atoning for what I'd done. What Jorval had fooled me into doing. For what I fooled myself into seeing."

The shadows around them darkened, and Gorion vanished. The light of the torches snuffed out, one by one, until nothing but black remained. Nothing but Jorval's insane laughter.

Rana reached for Sarevok, with her hand and her soul, and he grabbed onto her with both, his grip like steel.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Jorval whispered all around them. "The dark. Anything can be shaped from it. Anything can be hidden in it. I wish I could have known of your coming, bhaalspawn. I could have prepared so much more to show you. You both so appreciate my gifts, more than the others did. Your need to believe what you're seeing makes it impossible for you to see through what isn't there. To see the lies woven into the foundation of the truths. I almost wish you didn't have to die. I could play with the two of you forever. That is, if one of you isn't already dead… how would you even know?"

Rana tried to block him out, tried to listen for movement, or a stirring in the air as he passed close by them. If she couldn't ignore him, she'd go mad. Joining her mother in the shards of her broken mind.

"Does she feel real, son of Bhaal? The harder you believe, the more solid she becomes, so what does it even matter if that's not really her? I would let you stay here with her. Ask me, and I'll let you. Ask me, and I'll tell you if she's really dead. If that's really her blood on your hands. Ask me…"

"I'm real, Sarevok. His mirror images are gone, but we've given him too much power, he can make us see anything he wants now. You have to believe it's really me. Or we're both going to die here."

Sarevok said nothing, just clung to her tighter, his gauntlets piercing through her sleeve, through the skin of her arm, and she found the pain helped her focus.

"Are you sure, Ilyrana? Do you feel real? Have you ever felt real? What is real? How do you know you're not bleeding out on the floor? Gasping for breath as you die from the wound Sarevok gave you. How do you know I'm not showing you a kindness by letting you believe you're still fighting till the very end?"

I'm real. I would know if I were dying… wouldn't I? Of course I would. I'm real. I'M REAL. I'M REAL I'M REAL I'M REAL I'M REAL!

A shape in the shadows began to materialize, and she was suddenly thrown to the ground by Sarevok. As she scrambled to rise, she could do nothing in time to stop what happened, could do nothing but watch in horror as Sarevok cut down Imoen.

"NOOO! Oh, gods, Immy!"

Sarevok caught her before she could reach her sister, who had collapsed to the ground, one long, deep slash across her chest. The confusion and pain in the girl's eyes made her sick.

"It's not her! Rana, you have to stop believing so fiercely! You're never going to shake this if you don't!"

Imoen wasn't disappearing. She lay there. Alone in the dark. Gasping and trying to form words around the blood in her mouth.

Sarevok held her to him, pleading with her to trust him. That it was Jorval dying, not Imoen. How could it be Imoen? She was back home.

She followed us. Like she did when Gorion and I left Candlekeep. She was going to try and help…

"Rana, if I have to trust that I didn't kill you, then you have to trust that I didn't kill Imoen. Please. Believe me, for just a second. That's all it takes."

How could she believe him? Believe anything?

"Trust me, Rana,"Sarevok whispered, shaking her a little.

She closed her eyes, blocking out the image of her sister as she took her last dying breaths. She had nothing left to lose. If any of this was real, she would go insane. If it wasn't, though…

"Trust…"

Rana opened her eyes, and sagged against him as she saw Jorval's lifeless blue eyes staring up at them from a puddle of blood on the floor.

They were back in the sitting room. The marbled columns and vaulted ceiling had vanished. Bookshelves lay scattered and broken, with their contents strewn across the floor. The coffee table and chairs were smashed and upended.

Rana gazed around the room, feeling numb, not even trying to accept if this was real.

"Do you see?" Sarevok asked her, and the uncertainty in his voice pulled her away from the darkness inside her mind. "All of it was an illusion. Nothing that we saw was real. We've been in this room the whole time. Neither one of us are dead, or even really injured. Tell me you see what I see."

He was trying to convince himself as well as her.

"I see the sitting room. And Jorval is dead. You killed him when he tried to appear as Imoen."

"Yes," he murmured, ripping off his gauntlets before gently sliding his hand across her lower back.

She leaned into him, feeling the bite of the ridges on his armor against her chest. She didn't care about the discomfort. Welcomed it in fact. Because it felt real.

"Let's go home," Sarevok whispered.

Home…

The word was nice, but the reality of returning, of what awaited them there, only compounded her exhaustion and grief. Still, it was better than remaining here. If he'd said, "Let's open a portal to Hell and go there," she would have gone along without a complaint. She would take Hell over this place.

Wordlessly, they left Jorval and his sanctuary of madness. Normally, she would have rummaged through his things, taking anything of interest or value, but she couldn't stand the thought of staying a second longer. Of touching anything he had touched. Of carrying with her anything that would remind her of what happened here. Even her dragonscale armor was difficult to throw in her bag, as it reminded her of her mother.

The children and the dwarf were gone. On their way to Tor Niedrig. And the presence of horses grazing near their own meant they'd turned the animals out of their stable, and took a few with them.

It was still dark outside, some time in the middle of the night. Or perhaps it was the following night. They didn't know. They didn't care.

They didn't push the horses as they left the walls behind, left the temple and its ghosts, just let them walk at an easy gait, both absorbed in their own thoughts.

If none of it was real, that meant what Gorion had said was a lie.

She wanted to believe it was the truth. That Jorval had been responsible for Gorion's actions. So she could let go of yet more hate. But accepting that as truth meant that she'd allow the rest of what happened in that room to linger on inside her mind. And she wanted to purge all of it from her memories.

She'd never know if that had been the truth or not. It would have angered her if she had any energy left for that emotion.

Sarevok reached over and took up her reigns, turning both their horses toward the forest. The sight of those trees, dark shapes outlined against the stars, made something in her chest tighten. She looked at him, trying to read his face in the dark. He didn't look at her, just kept his eyes forward as the forest neared.

She didn't know if she was ready for this after what happened. Or if visiting this place was exactly what she needed, what they both needed, to heal from it.

"Let's go home."

He hadn't been referring to the house, the Rookery, in Tor Niedrig. He was talking about this forest. Their tree. Their refuge.

Insects and other nocturnal sounds quieted as they passed among the trees. Only to start up again a moment later. They navigated through the low hanging branches and upraised roots by the moonlight that made it through the leaves overhead. And, eventually, the emerald glow of Foxfire mushrooms growing on the trunks and stumps and branches. Dotting the forest like fallen viridian stars.

Their tree loomed ahead, dwarfing the ones around it, standing just as tall as she recalled it being.

"It's smaller than I remember," Sarevok murmured.

Despite everything, she found herself laughing, the sound hushing the forest again.

"Well, you did a lot more growing than I did."

He snorted, the corners of his mouth trying to turn up despite his best efforts to keep them at their regular frown.

Dismounting near a small stream that now ran near the edge of the enclosed glade, he unsaddled and unbridled the horses, letting them graze where they would, confident the night and trees would keep them close.

As he began making a fire and unrolling the bed rolls, she stripped off the rest of her armor and knelt beside the stream, trying to scrub the blood and grime from her skin, hissing at the frigid water. When she was as clean as she could get without fully bathing, it was far too chilly for that, she rose and began walking around their tree.

Trailing her fingers across the rugged bark, and finding some of the indentions they'd made in the wood with sharpened rocks, she smiled sadly at the memories.

The caps of the glowing green mushrooms felt velvety beneath her fingertips.

Climbing up one of the low branches, she returned to the spot she'd once slept at, the first time she came to this place. She found more carvings, having forgotten they'd even made these, and the fact that they still remained, after so many years, gave her her first sense of peace in a very long time.

They'd come full circle. Returning to this sacred place against all odds. Against everything the gods could throw at them. That knowledge gave her strength.

Dropping to the ground, she searched for one particular spot between where some of the lower limbs branched off from the trunk. As she circled, using her hands to help her see in the dark, she felt Sarevok's eyes following her from where he knelt by the stream. He'd been marking her movements, never letting her out of his sight, and she understood why. Understood that he was afraid she'd disappear. Still just another illusion all along.

After two rotations around the base, she finally found what she was looking for. Her fingers dipped into the crevice, and when she felt the incredibly worn material of the almost disintegrated blanket tucked inside the hole between the limbs, she leaned against the tree, too overwhelmed to move.

Time had nearly covered the blanket, wrapped around the bag of supplies they'd hidden in this nook in the tree, the wood growing around it until it was almost sealed inside. A few more years, and it would become a part of the tree. The sap preserving it for centuries. Perhaps as long as they would live.

"Is it still there?" Sarevok asked from behind her. "After all this time?"

She nodded, unable to speak around the lump in her throat. After a time, her forehead pressed against the tree as she steadied herself, she spoke.

"Do you think we would have made it?"

"You mean if we hadn't been separated?"

"Yes."

He didn't answer right away. Not until he'd reached out to touch the blanket, to reassure himself it was actually there. Then, he gently turned her around to face him. He'd removed his armor and cleaned up in the stream. She suspected he'd spent extra time ensuring no traces of her blood remained on him, even if it had never actually been there.

"No, little one. I don't think we would have made it."

His answer stung for some reason. Maybe she'd assumed it would be the opposite. His arrogance giving him the certainty that they could have survived, even as young and vulnerable as they were. Before she could speak again, he continued.

"I think, perhaps, it's better this way. What happened. Gorion tearing us apart."

"How can you say that?" She demanded, unable to hide the pain in her voice. "Erasing our memories was the driving force behind everything that happened between us! Even if that illusion had been right, you and I went through hell because of it! You literally went to Hell! That would never have happened if we'd been able to stay together!"

He looked down at her, his expression unreadable. He watched his hand brush away her damp hair from her face, tucking some of it behind a pointed ear.

"Rana, one of us was still going to have to die. Because of the prophecy. Would it not have been worse if we'd stayed together, somehow escaping this place? If we'd grown up together, the bond between us strengthening naturally, rather than by force, as happened with our soul? If, when the time came that we realized what this temple was, and the purpose for our being here, we learned that we were bred to kill one another? Could you have struck me down and lived through the loss? Do you think I could have murdered you and then not immediately followed you into the Abyss, or to whatever other end? No… it's best Gorion did what he did. For whatever reasons he actually did it. It's best that I died, sparing you Hell. If I could have known we would end up back here, together, alive, I would have suffered my damnation gladly."

She hadn't realized she'd been crying while he spoke, until he brushed her tears away. She was surprised there were any left, after all she'd shed this night.

When he took a breath to say something else, she rose up on her toes and kissed him. She felt his surprise, and it was brief. With an anguished groan he pulled her against him, tangling a hand in her hair as he tilted her head back to deepen the kiss. She clung to him, her nails biting into the back of his neck when she wrapped her arms around him, that desperation to be closer returning tenfold.

She needed him. Now.

And always.

The bark of their tree bit into her back as she was lifted and pressed against it. Her legs wrapped around his waist, the memory of that night they'd sparred, the night he'd defeated her, in more ways than one, making her dizzy with want. Her long sleeved shirt was tossed to the ground, and her head fell back as his lips descended from hers, brushing down her neck, then her clavicle. Her bra joined her shirt among the leaves.

She didn't realize they were moving, that he carried her to their bedrolls, lost in the sensation of his mouth covering one of her breasts, teasing the nipple with his tongue. He laid her back against the blankets, following her down, settling his weight above her, and her hunger began burning out of her control.

They kissed as if they faced the gallows in the morning. As if they knew there were already forces at work, conspiring to interrupt them, to take her from him once again.

They kissed until they shared breaths, each ragged inhalation indistinguishable from the other's. Until all that mattered in their shared world were the constant reassurances that they were both alive. That this was all real.

Her palms slid up his sides, dragging his shirt up at the same time. Reaching back with one hand, he grasped the material and ripped it over his head before taking her mouth again.

His hands roamed over the silken paleness of her skin while her own explored the dark scarred expanse of his. Each hitched breath, each moan of desire, each new scar their fingers discovered urging them past the point of no return. Until the hand on her side stopped in its exploration, lingering over the jagged scar that curved around her waist. Until her own came to rest on the scar across his torso.

They paused, and he drew back to look at her, both of them touching the scars they'd given one another. With deliberate slowness and intention, she ran her hand up his chest then around the back of his neck, tugging him back down to claim his mouth with her own.

"Rana…"

She gasped when he ground his hips against hers, at the friction caused by the hard length of him pressing against the juncture of her thighs. With a growl, he knelt up and began tugging her boots, then her leggings, and everything else in between off of her and throwing them to the side. When she was finally bare to him, he froze, staring down at her, his eyes burning with soft golden light.

"Defeated… yet again, by you," he whispered.

Reaching for him, sliding her hands over the muscles of his torso, and feeling them clench beneath her touch, she pulled him down to her.

"I need you… now," she whimpered, unable to wait any longer.

His hands tightened painfully around her hips at her plea. A wordless cry of disappointment escaped her throat, though, when he moved from between her legs to lay on his side next to her. That cry tapered off into a moan when she felt his calloused fingers trail down her stomach, circle her navel once, twice, before descending lower.

Rising up on an elbow, he leaned down to press his lips back to her own, his tongue twining with hers as he sank a finger inside of her core. Her cry of pleasure nearly drowned out his groan of anguish.

"Gods," he growled into her ear. "Rana, I'm going to hurt you, you're too tight."

She would have laughed if she could remember how to.

"I don't care," she finally panted.

When her hips began to arch up to his hand, her cries growing louder as she neared her peak, he stopped moving, and she keened.

His chuckle at her plight made her dig her nails into his forearm, urging him to finish what he'd started.

"Please, Sarevok… need to feel you inside me…"

His teeth sank into her shoulder, muffling his defeated groan, as he began tearing at his breeches with shaky hands. Before he could move atop her, she reached for him, wrapping her hand around his shaft, and suddenly understood his concern for her welfare. As deliriously aroused as she was, though, she was confident she could manage just fine.

"Slow," he bit out, placing his hand over hers to control her strokes. "Or this will be over before it's even started."

Smirking at being able to turn the tables, however briefly he allowed it, she nipped at his neck while her hand squeezed around him. Relishing the taste of his skin, and the quickening of his pulse beneath her teeth.

"Rana, I'll be gentle for as long as I can," he murmured hoarsely.

We'll see about that… she thought to herself.

If she wanted gentle, she wouldn't be here with him. With this man in particular.

Rolling her beneath him, he rose up and took himself in hand, gripping her thigh in the other, holding her open to him. His eyes met hers when she felt him brush against her entrance. She held his gaze as her hips undulated up to him, hissing in a breath as she felt her wet heat glide against his erection.

With a beastial snarl, he pushed into her, his hands sliding up to pin her hips into the blankets, holding her still to receive him. It took three agonizingly slow thrusts, each deeper than the last, before he was buried as deep inside of her as he could go.

Sinking down onto one elbow, his other hand firmly wrapped around her hip, he looked at her. His breathing was labored from the effort of holding himself still, allowing her body to become accustomed to his.

"Are you all right?" He asked her, his voice strained with the need to take her as he so needed to.

She nodded, not trusting her voice. There was pain, as he'd predicted. It had been so long, and his size would take some getting used to, but the discomfort didn't bother her. Quite the opposite in fact. She just didn't want him to think he had to handle her as if she were made of glass.

"Rana…"

She leaned up to capture his lips with hers, certain that if she stared into the intensity burning in his eyes any longer, she would be undone completely. Irrevocably altered by his palpable need for her.

The kiss was languid, a sharp contrast to the raw sensual desperation burning between them, the amount of control it took to hold back, to prolong this moment, as well as prepare them both for what would come next.

When she could take no more of his stillness, of feeling him throbbing inside of her with none of that delicious friction, she rolled her hips, urging him to take her, a small whine of frustration escaping her lips.

That was all it took.

With an almost audible sound, his control snapped.

Drawing his hips back, he drug her against him as he plunged into her, and she broke the kiss when her head fell back, eyes sliding shut at the force of him driving into her as he set a bruising rhythm.

Her nails scored his back, drawing blood as she tore into the scars there. His teeth marked her breasts, her throat, and his fingers dug a little deeper into her hips with each thrust.

Heat pooled in her abdomen, burning hotter when he whispered her name, his deep voice tinged with awe as he took her closer to the edge.

She tried to match his pace, moving her body with his, but he kept her pinned beneath him, limiting her movements, trying to last as long as he was able.

"Oh, gods…" she moaned, back arching, nails raking for purchase, as her climax danced just out of reach.

The rhythm changed as he slowed, sinking even deeper inside of her with each stroke, and putting more pressure against her most sensitive spot. The effect was immediate, and she wasn't prepared for it.

Sinking her teeth into his chest, she screamed, helpless to do anything more than writhe beneath him as her muscles clenched around him, her body shuddering through a powerful release.

"Rana…"

He groaned her name as he joined her, somehow thrusting even deeper as he came, and she whimpered at the feel of him pulsing inside of her.

They lay like this for several moments, their heaving breaths the only sound in the now silent forest. His weight should have been uncomfortable, but she felt like he was keeping her grounded, holding her to him so she couldn't float away or otherwise disappear.

"Are you all right?" He eventually asked again, drawing back just enough to look down at her, his hand brushing her hair away from her face.

"Yeah. You?"

Her question seemed to amuse him, until he began to pull away, and the scratches along his back and the bite wound on his chest reopened, making him wince.

"I'll live," he hissed, dropping onto his side beside her before wrapping an arm over her and pulling her back against his chest.

"You better," she mumbled, tucking the blanket around her when he pulled it over them, her exhaustion returning with a vengeance. "You're no good to me dead… OW!"

She kicked back at him when he nipped her shoulder in response to her teasing.

"Go to sleep, little one. You're going to need your rest," he rumbled groggily, sliding an arm beneath her head and tightening his other around her waist.

"Sounds like a threat."

"Oh, it is," he replied.

Neither would remember whatever clever retort she was sure she made, as they both fell into a deep sleep, lulled by the familiar sounds of their forest as the insects took up their songs again, beneath their tree.