Prologue
In the early hours of the morning, before the sun had yet to rise, Baldur's Gate was uncharacteristically quiet and still, its residents dreaming beside one another in their collective slumber. The streets were devoid of animals, carts, even beggars as everyone had retired for the evening. The air was crisper, untainted by the pollution of production and movement. He liked taking whatever small freedom he could roaming the streets in these early hours, even if it was harder to find stray mammals to feed on.
He had just returned to the streets from the castle after delivering his latest prey to his master, and he preferred to forget the experience each night as quickly as he could. Tonight's selection had been a half wood-elf on the younger side with smooth skin, a voice like honey, and a naivety even the most chaste of clerics could not emulate. A few drinks and they were the best of friends; another drink in and their lips were joined, and just a few sweet words after that, they were taken back home and presumably dead. He pushed the thought down and locked it away with the rest of them, never to be called upon again.
Movement to his left, across the street. A medium-sized bundle of black darted up the street, intended to move further away from him, but it had already sealed its fate when it moved from its nest. In a flash, Astarion's teeth sunk into the creature, warm blood filling his mouth immediately. Cat, a young two or three years of age, judging by the vintage of the blood. He drained it dry in a blink and dropped the poor thing without a second thought, turning away from it and wiping the back of his hand on his mouth in the same motion. It was never enough, but it was always worth the risk; Cazador would flay him if he found out he'd eaten something other than dead rat again, but he would get flayed even if he had obeyed orders, so, really, what did it matter?
The black night sky was quickly turning into a dark blue as the sun began to rise. Disgust welled within him as he knew what he had to do if he wanted to see tomorrow night; it was time to go "home". Astarion deftly made his way down the street, in the opposite direction his prey had been trying to run, as he made his way back to the castle. Resentment and bitterness swelled within him as he realized his freedom, or whatever remained of it, was seeping away with the rising sun. He felt himself pondering how long he could continue with this dreadful routine, but pushed that thought away with the rest of the other unpleasant thoughts and memories he kept; he did not have the privilege to wonder how long he would suffer like this. Immortality and the eternity before him were answer enough, and an eternity with Cazador was something best not thought about, if he wanted to retain his sanity.
The temperature was rising with the sun. Astarion pulled a loose hood over his head on the off chance he needed to make a run for it and hide somewhere. As much as he enjoyed the quiet of the night, he missed the warmth of the sun. He missed the colors the city had within the day, flowers in bloom, the privilege of being able to admire someone beautiful without plotting their seduction and untimely deaths.
His mind was trailing too much, and he was letting the guilt get the better of him again. Astarion pushed it all down and reminded himself that these things were small prices to pay for surviving what he did, so many years ago, and for obtaining immortality. These hours between jobs, when he was alone and left to his own devices and could bask in the peace of the night, were enough to get him by. For now.
From behind him, the sky flashed brightly, too brightly to be the rising sun. Astarion spun on his heels, panic welling despite himself, to investigate the cause.
What in the seven hells was that?
The sky opened up as if a hole was ripped into it, and some sort of flying shell with tentacles came bursting out of it. Astarion had heard of beings on planes other than Faerûn, but had never seen such a thing before. Could this be a creature from another plane or planet? What business could such beings possibly have with Baldur's Gate?
Whatever that thing in the sky was, Astarion knew better than to stand around and find out. He turned on his heels once more and took off in the direction of the castle; if he could just get back in time, if he could just find cover, he would be safe. It was just around the bend, now, nearly in sight. He would make it, and forget this ever happened. He would.
All around him, people were coming out of their homes to investigate. The ship was noisy as it pushed through Faerûn's winds, and the noise roused them from their sleep. Astarion kept speeding away from it, weaving around people as they began to stand in the middle of the street and look up at the flying mystery. He was nearly there, now, and whatever the ship wanted with Baldur's Gate, the foolish citizens on the street could deal with on their own.
He was reaching his hand out to Cazador's gate, his fingers tingling with the anticipation of gripping the metal, when something suddenly came up behind him and brushed against his back. In an instant, his consciousness flicked out, like a candle in the wind.
His consciousness began to return to him in blurred vision as his eyelids fluttered open. He was now somewhere else, somewhere foreign to him in every respect, somewhere absolutely dreadful. He was in a pod of some kind, with a glass wall holding him in place. Astarion immediately began gliding his hands around the glass of the pod, where it met its construction, in an attempt to find a lose point he could crack open. Almost as quickly as he had laid hands on the pod's walls, he pulled them back with disgust. They felt wet, warm, and as though they were pulsating. Almost as though they were alive. Hurriedly, Astarion began tapping his pant and vest pockets for any of his knives or lockpicks, deciding to use them instead of his bare hands on the pod's walls.
They were gone. Everything he had been carrying before he woke back up was simply gone; all he had left was the clothes he still wore. Cursing, Astarion punched at the glass. He was not going to get this pod-goop under his nails, that was for sure. The rest of the chamber outside of the pod looked to be built of the same disgusting, fleshy material, and arched towards the ceiling in a circular shape. Was he on the thing he saw flying in the sky?
He could think on it no longer, as an honest-to-gods mindflayer approached his pod, something grey and wriggling in its clenched claws. The glass to his pods opened effortlessly, but Astarion found himself bound in place, as if Cazador were compelling him once more.
Astarion fought against the magical restraint, tried to turn his head, scrunch up his face, move his limbs in protect. Nothing worked. His skin crawled with repressed memories; it was just like when Cazador would command him to do something, his body forcing him to comply with the act. Suddenly, he was there in Cazador's palace again, performing a sickening act on one of his master's playthings as he was ordered to, retreating to the safe space he made within his own mind while his body was not his own…
Astarion blinked and his actual surroundings came back in view. The mindflayer guided the wriggling thing to his eye, his godsdamned eye, where it crawled in with a sickening crunch. Astarion felt himself crying out with the pain of the experience, but was unable to hear himself over the sound of the grub making itself at home within his brain. The headache that ensued was crippling, and all he could do was breathe through the pain while he stared down his captor. Why was this happening to him? And more importantly, what was happening to him?
Astarion had less than a moment to cope with his newfound fate before another loud crash reverberated from another part of the ship, its force throwing his captor to the side of the chamber. The pod containing him closed tightly shut once more, and Astarion regained control of himself. He panted heavily again, his bodily autonomy bringing him some small comfort amidst this horror he was now experiencing. He felt the vessel lurching with a sickening speed and instinctively knew it was on its course to hit something in a matter of minutes.
Someone ran by, far off in the distance, too far to hear him. It looked like a group of people, not mindflayers. Two different breeds of elves and a githyanki, by the looks of it. He was too far away for them to hear his shouts for help, though Astarion tried all he could, bruising his fists on the glass and straining his throat from screaming. Would he die here after all? Immortality be damned, if he was still on this vessel when it fell out of the sky, surely he would meet his end. As determined as he was to keep living, it felt like Astarion's fate was sealed along with him in that disgusting pod.
Minutes later, the vessel hit land – or something else incredibly hard and durable – and Astarion hit the glass of the pod so hard it shattered, sending him flying out of it. The walls of the vessel tore away with the impact, revealing a landscape Astarion had not seen before. He had no idea where the vessel had taken him.
His body's temporary flight came to a stop with a hard thud against his head, a rock lying on the shoreline of this strange land greeting him before everything went black again.
Astarion woke with a jolt and he immediately realized he was warm, laying on his back and blinking up at the midday sun.
The sun!
Astarion quickly rolled under some cover from the destroyed vessel and searched himself for burns. How long had he been in the sun before he woke? He patted his arms, his face, his legs, but found no smoke or other signs of damage to indicate the sun had begun to wreak its havoc on him. From the safety of his cover, he stared indirectly up at the sun, incredulous. Had he just gotten lucky and woken up from pure instinct before he had a chance to burn? Something deep within him told him something much more marvelous was happening, and cautiously, curiously, he stuck just a single finger out of his canopy and into the direct sunlight.
He counted, slowly, one, two, three, four, five, six. Usually, he began to burn within six seconds of being in direct sunlight. He winced in preparation for a stinging sensation that never came. Astarion waited another six seconds before adding another finger into the sunlight.
One, two, three, four, five, six.
Still nothing.
He pulled his hand back and looked at both palms, then the backs of his hands, curiously looking for an answer. Was that thing in his head, that tadpole, to credit for this discovery? Had it cured him of his vampirism?
Almost in response, the usual hunger greeted him, greedy for the next meal. Based on the position of the sun in the sky, it had been at least seven or eight hours since he had been scooped up from Baldur's Gate; the last meal he had would not hold him over for much longer. He knew he could sustain himself for three, maybe four nights more at the most before the hunger started breaking into his control.
Well, then, off we go. Astarion stood, brushed his pants off, and this time slid both hands into the sunlight and counted to twenty. No reaction. Feeling more confident now, he took his first step into the sun and looked up at the bright sky.
It was warm on his skin, inviting and welcoming him truly home, and it never started to burn. A tear welled up in bliss and Astarion found himself with his arms outstretched, as if hugging a long lost friend.
"You fight well," a distant woman's voice emerged from the vessel's wreckage, snapping Astarion back to reality. He pulled his arms back and darted back into the canopy he had claimed, peering out for the source of the sound. The voice became clearer as the familiar triad of two elves and a githyanki came into view. "Perhaps our survival isn't such a distant prospect." The woman's voice belonged to one of the elves, decidedly a half-elf from Astarion's measure, with a long braid of black hair down her back. From a glance, Astarion could tell the half-elf kept her secrets close to her chest, and guessed that she was a cleric based on the mace and shield she carried. He could tell that she certainly could carry her own in a fight and was not one to be easily seduced or charmed; she had a certain air of dry bluntness that Astarion could feel dripping from her.
The githyanki of the group, however, was another matter. In an instant, Astarion saw that she was fierce, not one to be trifled with, and certainly not someone to be seduced. She would make a valuable ally, but she would have to be convinced to be such an asset for anyone else. Or made to think she made the decision on her own, at least.
The other elf of the group was male, and Astarion knew from their shared ancestry that this one was a full high-elf. He also appeared to be a cleric from his weaponry. He was tan, with dark blue eyes and a short crop of dark blue hair, styled to a point on one side. He had several facial piercings and a tattoo on the left side of his face that looked like magic was flowing out of his eye, or through it, also in a dark blue. This one was clearly the leader of the group, and to Astarion's delight, had the potential to be manipulated or seduced. He was certainly a pure-good kind of cleric, radiating holiness and naivety the other half-elf cleric could not dream of matching. Astarion knew that if this person thought he was being of service, he would jump in without a moment's hesitation.
A perfect way to make an introduction to an unwitting group of three.
As the group approached his cover, Astarion noticed a boar running into the brushes between himself and the group. He ran into the open sun once more and started calling out to them for help.
They took the bait immediately. The male cleric ran up first, and Astarion was careful not to let his mouth perk up into a satisfied smirk. The githyanki and half-elf did not intervene in their conversation, even when Astarion wrestled the male elf to the ground and held a knife to his throat. What a delightfully submissive group this was already turning out to be.
The tussled for a moment before Astarion let him up. The conversation went south when the other male elf shared the details of their connected fate; they would become mindflayers if they did not remove the tadpoles in their heads. Astarion laughed, insanity nearly creeping back before he cut it off once more. The other elf introduced himself as Faustus and invited Astarion to join the group on their quest to figure out more about their fate. He learned the half-elf was Shadowheart and the githyanki was Lae'zel. He needed only a moment to consider before he agreed and joined the group. It was the best prospect he had at the moment.
As easily as the vessel from the sky had scooped him up and infected him with a tadpole, he had become free to step into the sun, no longer felt Cazador's influence, and found a capable group of people who were willing to work together with him. Things were finally beginning to look up, after two hundred years of pure shit, and whatever other quirks the tadpole would afford him, he was determined to find out with time.
He just had to play it cool, keep his hunger controlled, and not blow his secret, lest they drive stakes into his heart. Easy, right?