D&D's Way of the Sun Soul subclass isn't available in BG3, so we're going to pretend Tav functions like a Way of the Four Elements Monk with some features from the Way of the Open Hand, dealing Radiant damage with every hit. I'm taking a lot of liberties with combat mechanics, either way.

Tav's monastery taught their students Deflect Missiles as a part of the core curriculum, which meant that three common archers versus a Sun Soul Monk was a very short story indeed. A few glistening Water Whips brought the trio out of the dark branches and down in a heap at Tav's feet, their bodies bristling with their own arrows. One that was still conscious made an attempt to speak, and was silenced by Tav's luminous boot-heel. Then Their fists made quick work of the attackers' skulls and spines. The entire episode lasted perhaps sixty seconds from start to finish.

Astarion's delighted smile at this display of unarmed prowess faded when Tav turned to him and fell on Their knees, running quick hands over his head and chest.

"Where are you hurt?" They asked breathlessly, face tight with concern. The Radiant damage that They dealt with every strike faded back into Their skin. "Was it an arrow? A throwing knife?"

He sat up halfway and grasped Their long fingers in his own. "I'm not injured, darling. You made sure nothing touched me." He kissed the backs of Their hands, only regretting a tiny bit that there was no blood to be licked off by an adoring fan like himself. Tav rarely used slashing weapons, and preferred rib-shattering body-blows to punching someone in the face.

Tav blinked at him in that slow, sarcastic way that he couldn't get enough of. "You mean you were lounging here on the ground while I did all the hard work?" The last few sparks of power – Lathander's gift to the Sun Souls – ran down Their neck and arms before winking out.

"Well, yes, love. I was already down here. Someone was nice enough to give me a protective spell with a little kick to it."

Now he sat up all the way, holding tightly to Their wrists. "Although … why did you choose a spell that protects one from being frightened by the undead? Why not an armor spell?"

Tav licked Their lips in a gesture of nervousness. "I've always got Protection from Evil and Good ready to go." They shrugged since They couldn't gesture with Their hands. "Lathander being our patron god and all."

A cold little knot formed in his stomach. It was the truth, but not the whole truth. "You were expecting vampires. Spawn, rather."

Tav nodded, rotating Their wrists in his grip to grasp his forearms. "I worry that the Rat Bastard," They explained, using Their preferred nickname for Cazador, "will send some of his minions after you. And I wanted to make it a little less scary for you when it happens."

"Tav …" he said gently, "I wouldn't have frozen up if spawn had attacked us. I've told you before: living in fear for two centuries teaches you how to keep going, even when you're afraid."

"I remember." They freed one of Their hands and placed it on the side of his face, more like a shield than a caress. "But I wish you'd never had to learn how." Their eyes were guileless, and kind, and brimming with the delicious fiction that he was safe, as long as he was in Their presence.

There it was again: that warm ache, stirring in his chest like a badger cozied up in its burrow. That feeling had made him realize his nice, simple plan to seduce Tav had fallen apart. It had morphed into Tav featuring in his nightly meditations, seated next to him in a stone cottage by the sea, each engrossed in their own reading or mending while dappled sunlight played across the floor…

That same feeling had made him write the list he kept hidden between the pages of the necromancy book, in descending order of threat to his relationship with Tav.

Gale

Karlach

Halsin

Wyll

Jaheira

Shadowheart

Lae'zel

Minsc

Boo

Scratch

Hootsy Featherington the Third

Withers

Volo

On good days, he told himself it wasn't a kill list.

Threat Number One came over the crest of the hill leading back to their camp, and was quickly overtaken by Threat Number Two, who was in much better shape. Threats Three through Eight followed at varying speeds behind, all of them alight with spells and enchanted weapons.

Astarion stood hastily. He knew from experience that the others were likely to tread on him as they milled around their favorite monk, clucking and murmuring like mother hens.

Tav slipped an arm around his waist, and Astarion answered Karlach and Gale's blatantly disappointed gazes by pressing himself to the monk's side. Halsin laid a huge hand on Tav's shoulder, but immediately removed it under Astarion's cold stare.

"We're fine," Tav insisted. "Just a couple of amateurs, looking for some quick gold."

Wyll stood up from where he'd been looting the bodies, holding his hands out and away from himself like they were covered in a terrible substance.

"There's … things … in this one's bag," he said unhelpfully.

" 'Things'? You'll have to be more specific, Wyll," Gale chided.

Lae'zel pushed the warlock aside and searched the leather knapsack. "He is correct. There are small medical tools, healing potions, scrolls, and a number of items typically used in brothels. How utterly bizarre."

Astarion automatically took a step back, bumping into Tav. The monk's arms wrapped around him and Astarion's hands came up to cover Theirs.

"On their way to a sex party and stopped off for a bit of robbery and murder?" Karlach snorted, crossing her muscular arms. "Baldur's Gate, man. What a cesspool."

Lae'zel lifted out two of the items. "Do Baldurians typically bring a Scroll of Hold Person and a tooth extractor to their orgies?"

No one had an answer for that. They were not the kind to indulge in that level of depravity, and Astarion wasn't going to enlighten them about all the times he'd been "loaned" to such wretched dens as a present from Cazador.

Shadowheart herself, whose newly-white Selunite hair belied the atrocities she had witnessed – and committed – in Shar's name, motioned for the others to retreat.

"Let's see what they have to say for themselves." Her eyes glowed acid-green, the necromantic symbols scribing themselves in mid-air over the corpse that had owned the bag.

Speak with Dead lifted the limp body up to waist-high for the first of its five questions.

"Why are there torture tools in your bag?" Shadowheart asked bluntly.

Astarion retreated another step when the body took a rattling breath to reply. Tav angled Themselves between him and the dead man, still holding on. Astarion's hands clutched at Their forearms.

"The client said to break the monk." The corpse hadn't been dead long enough to dry out, so its voice had the squelch of blood from Tav crushing its voicebox with the edge of Their hand. "Said to make the pale elf watch. And to make it hurt."

"Who is the client?"

"A nobleman in Baldur's Gate. Hired us through a go-between."

"What are the healing potions for?"

"To make him live longer."

There were two questions left, but the entire party was silent. The implication was clear: the thugs were hired to kidnap Astarion and torture Tav, healing Them from the point of death only to be violated again and again. Karlach, Wyll and Halsin moved immediately to surround Tav, whose grip tightened on Astarion.

His own centuries of torture had been horrific, especially comparing it with the taste of freedom he'd enjoyed these precious weeks. But to think of everything he'd endured happening all over, this time to Tav…

Elves didn't sleep, but fainting was not out of the question. And it was rapidly becoming a possibility as he hunched over, supported only by Tav's arms as the memories tried to bludgeon him into unconsciousness. Dalyria-Tav, wailing under the cannibal's knife. Leon-Tav, kneeling on a bed of hot coals so that his master wouldn't touch his baby girl. Astarion-Tav, scooping his own entrails back into his body with palsied hands as the blood-smeared nobleman thanked Cazador for "a lovely evening".

One of the party finally noticed him. "All right there, Fangs?" Karlach questioned.

"S-summit," was all Astarion could manage to ask.

Tav understood. "Jaheira," They called to the harper, who stepped forward to support Astarion. Gesturing the others back, Tav brought a glowing fist to Their chest. Chunks of rock and pieces of bark whirled around Them, joining the purifying light as a hollow sphere expanded to huge size over the corpses.

When Tav punched the ground at Their feet, Gong of the Summit dropped forcefully onto the attackers and their vile tools, crushing everything into a gooey paste less than an inch high.

Tav followed it up with Embrace of the Inferno, burning the goo clumps into ash.

Astarion mutely nodded his thanks.

After a long and artificial silence, Lae'zel said, "I shall very much enjoy killing this 'Cazador'."