The Last Light of Dawn: An Astarion and Dark Urge FanFiction

Chapter 1

A cloaked figure apprached the ramshackle hut. Their hood was up to protect against the rain that battered against it. A bulky object covered in a dark canvas was slung over their shoulder. They held it steady with one hand, adjusting their grip when it squirmed eerily. Any much further through the outskirts of Baldur's Gate, and they would be in Rivington.

It was an old building with a soaked thatch roof. One wrong move and the whole thing would fall apart. It had been abandoned long ago and left to rot. A place only good for the rats and the dead.

It was perfect.

The door was half caved in, but the figure was able to force it open with one ram of his left shoulder. He pulled the hood off his head, shaking some of the wet out of his white curls. "It will take forever to get my hair back to rights again. It is so difficult without a mirror. And I am sure you will end up being incapacitated for some time, so you will not be much help." The last sentence he directed to the bundle on his shoulder. It nearly rolled off him in response.

"Lucky we had that extra elixir of hill giant strength. I would not have had the strength to do this otherwise." Astarion clutched the bundle tighter as his vampiric eyes adjusted to the darkness. It had once been a barn, judging by the piles of old straw that covered the place and the stale smell of manure. Small shafts of rain poured from the roof. He gritted his teeth. If water could get in, so could the sun. He had quite a bit of manual labor ahead of him if he were to make this place safe before dawn. Plus a few other thankless he was not looking forward to.

The twitches from the bundle turned into a full-blown concussive rolling. A high-pitched noise came from beneath the wrapping. "Alright, alright. One more moment."

He found driest, darkest corner he could, gathered the old straw into a pile using one arm and his feet, and lay the bundle on top of the makeshift bed. "I admit, it is not the most...accomadating place to sleep. But we have slept in worse spots." His mouth crooked into a half smile as memories of their misadventures with their friends poked at his tadpoleless mind. With the greatest of care, he pulled the heavy blanket open.

Alan'na was even worse than when he first wrapped her in the blanket. The wood elf's olive skin had turned almost as pale as his own, the scar under her eye and across her left cheek she had since they first met looked almost fresh. Her entire body was covered in sweat. Blood stained a white bandage around her neck, leaking from two all-too-familiar puncture marks. Marks that he hadn't given her.

Her body writhed, twisting around itself into almost impossible shapes. Then the screaming started. A sound that pierced Astarion's dead heart and cracking it in two. "I know, my love. Gods, I know. I am so sorry."

She fixed him with a miles-away stare, one the glass saphire eye from the damned bard that took her own away, the other the most beautiful shade of violet. He did not know why he was talking to her. This part of the process was awful. If nothing else, he still remembered the pain of it as every drop of life was burned out of him. The pain was all there was. He doubted if she could even truly see him now.

"Easy, darling. I've got you." He grasped a hand that clawed at the empty air. Caressing her palm, he kissed each fingertip in a rhythmic fashion, pinkie to thumb, thumb to pinkie. The tension loosened, the writhing calming to an occasional twitch. The grimace on her face showed the spawn that her insides were still roiling.

Astarion bent over his lover's form and pressed his lips to her forehead. Her fever raged, almost enough to burn his lips off. The last bit of heat that she would ever give. He hated thinking about endings, especially when it came to her. Now it was inevitable.

The screaming started this time punctuated by cries of his name. Cries for him to help, to end a pain that he could not, no matter how much he wanted to. "I was there when the urges took you. I am here now. I promised I would be."