Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Guilt and doubt clung easily to Gale Dekarios. But he’d always been weak; he simply loved too easily to grow a spine. A few days of sharing camp with her—the cleric of Selûne, pale and bright, a star in her own right—was enough to lead him down a path of selfless devotion. He loved her more than he had ever loved anyone, or anything. Gazing upon her, kneeled in prayer with her eyes shut, pale lashes fanned over freckled skin, was enough to drive Mystra from his mind. For there was no God, no devotee, there was only her. Only Selina.

But she had never felt the same way. The Lady of Silver was her first priority, she had made that awfully clear. She had been untouchable, unbreakable. A beautiful force of radiance and light, carved from the stars themselves. She had to be. It was true that high-elves were said to be more beautiful than the average human, but Selina was more beautiful still. The silver of her eyes shone unnaturally; the white of her hair too bright for her young age; the freckles on her cheeks and shoulders mirrored real constellations. Selina was no ordinary cleric, and Gale was desperate to touch her. To please her. To sate her and care for her.

But she was untouchable, unbreakable.

Until she was broken. Utterly pulled apart and put back together.

By a vampire, of all things.

Perhaps it was fitting—that a cleric of Selûne would love a creature of the moon and stars. But Gale wanted too desperately to be loved by her that he didn’t care about any of that. He had always favoured the Dawnfather, too attached to early mornings and sunlight filtering through stained windows. He didn’t care about that anymore either. What would he do with sunspots and warmth, if it displeased his own celestial? His Selina.

Except, of course, she was not his. The reminder came as easily as his desperation for her; they walked hand in hand, pulling each other along. He loved her, and he could never have her. Two truths that were so unshiftable he might as well set them in stone. Perhaps carve them into the wood of every door in his tower in Waterdeep. 

Astarion and Selina had been inevitable, really. The whole camp had known it since before he revealed what he truly was—before Selina offered her blood to him. And that’s all it had been, at first. Or so Selina reassured Gale when he came pleading for her to see sense, to not offer her own strength to him. But it wasn’t her strength, she always replied. Any strength or skill she possessed, she owed to The Lady of Silver. Her Goddess had put Astarion—this creature of night—in her path, and it was now her duty to sate him. Clearly, she took that duty to heart. By the time the goblins were defeated, and the Grove saved, Astarion was indulging in more than her blood.

It would always be a source of shame, but Gale had watched them the night after that tiefling party. Selina had approached him, beauty itself illuminated by fire and stars. Timid, for once. Wallowing, perhaps. Gale easily assumed Astarion had propositioned her—he’d seen them just a few minutes earlier, faces close together as he seemed to whisper filth at her. It made him glad to see her doubt, even though he hated himself for the thought. It was that hatred that forced him to tell her to have fun, to leave him to his brooding and spend the night searching for pleasure. Selina nodded, unsure, but she said nothing more of it. And hours later, when the party had quieted down, she abandoned the campsite for the woods.

Gale made himself invisible. Then he followed her.

And he watched. 

He watched as Astarion drank his fill, as she sagged against him, as she moaned in pleasure. He watched as he unraveled her and claimed her. Rougher than she deserved, quicker than what she’d earned. Astarion was a machine built for sex and seduction, and so his actions appeared utterly too mechanical. Was he even enjoying himself? Was it all too rehearsed and practiced? The words he spoke into her breast and her thighs, was she the first to hear them, or the thousandth? 

It was clear that she enjoyed herself, but Gale knew she deserved better. A real lover who wanted her properly—who sought her pleasure, not his own protection. 

When Astarion had revealed that to her: that his attention had been entirely selfish, Gale had assumed she’d end it. Did she not hold herself in higher regard? Was this Goddess fearing woman really okay with being an end to means for a vampire spawn with desires of grandeur that far exceed the moral limits Selina lived within?

But she did not end it. If anything, their relationship deepened. And it deepened even more when they delved into the vampire lord’s lair and stopped his profane ritual. Selina and Astarion were in love. They’d spend eternity together among the stars, cradled by her Lady’s light and grace.

Then Astarion died.

Just like that.

The netherbrain defeated. Baldur’s Gate saved. Tadpoles gone. 

A year passed, then Astarion was killed by a rogue Gur.

Selina was beside herself.

And so Gale had invited himself to stay. To care for her. Help her. In any way he possibly could.

A scroll of Seeming weighed heavily at the bottom of his pack. He’d probably removed it and stuffed it back in six times before eventually leaving it there. It was a sick thought. A sick idea. But if he had to look like the pale elf to have his lover, then he would.

Gale Dekarios was weak, and selfish, and so in love that the ground shook beneath his feet when he stood outside her door, guilt and doubt clinging to his hand as he brought it up to knock on the thick wood.

It took her a while to open, long enough for regret to pool in his stomach. How smart was it really, to care for the woman you loved as she grieved another man? It was incredibly idiotic. He’d regret it the second he realised how much Selina still clung to the memory of Astarion.

But when the door did creak open, and a pale face appeared, eyes tearstung and lips puffy, he all but crumbled. He could never regret a single moment spent in her presence. If all he ever had of her was this, his gaze on her features, he could be satisfied. Her beauty would be enough to satisfy him for years. What was food? What was water? Sleeping, breathing? Nothing, compared to her.

“Gale?” Her voice was whisper soft.

Every single word in every single language he knew vanished. His brain was smooth, empty. The woman before him looked… weak. She was not the cleric who had brought down her might on their foes, she was just a girl. Heartbroken. Lonely.

His lips parted. His throat was drier than sand. “Selina,” he croaked. “I… I must tell you how incredibly sorry I am.”

“Oh, Gale,” she whimpered, and the door swung open fully. “Thank you. Please. Do come in.”

Following her was second nature. Gale traipsed behind her, taking little notice of the home Selina had shared with her vampire. He focused on her instead, on her lithe body staggering forth through her grief.

Shame choked him. Mere hours ago he’d dreamt of her lips around him, on him. But who was he to treat a woman so? Especially her.

They settled in front of a fireplace, lit but dying. Selina sunk into her armchair, tucking her legs to her chest, and Gale wondered if the chair he claimed had once been Astarion’s.

“I’ve been a poor friend,” said Selina quietly. “I saw your letter, but… I couldn’t make myself reply. I am sorry.”

“But Selina, I understand completely.” His hands itched to reach for her. “You’ve lost the love of your life.”

Her grey eyes flickered to him. “That we made it through all that… Killing Cazador. The brain. And then he’s killed by a lowly monster hunter,” she hissed. “Tell me, Gale, am I a terrible person for feeling shame almost as palpable as my grief? I failed him. I failed my Lady.”

“You did no such thing,” Gale hurried. “And you are no such thing. You cannot blame yourself for his death. I won’t allow it. And your lady, how sure are you really that it was she that put Astarion in your path? How can you be sure you’ve failed her? Truly, Selina, it’s not your fault.”

She buried her face in her knees and let out a sob. “I know it was her work!”

“Tell me, friend. How do you know?” He wanted to reach for her, to comfort her with more than words, but he could tell she wouldn’t be receptive. His cleric was lost in the throes of grief, and it was his job to free her.

Selina lifted her gaze again, and peered into his eyes. “You must promise to not think less of me, to not hate me for keeping it to myself until this moment.”

“I could never hate you,” he said easily, and hoped she understood just how deeply he meant that.

“When we first met… Or, before, rather… I was on a mission to find the Nightsong. Dame Aylin was always my priority. I was just setting off from Baldur’s Gate when the Illithid ship picked me up.” She ripped a stray thread from her loose robe. “Gale. Gale, I cannot believe that it was mere chance that put that very same ship down so near the path that led us straight to her. Was it mere chance that Shadowheart travelled with us to be brought from the darkness into the light? That I met a vampire, a creature of the night? No. I cannot believe that. You were all placed in my path by the grace of my Lady, but Astarion more than anyone. My Lady knew that in him, I would find the last piece of my soul.”

Gale thought his teeth might shatter from how hard his jaw was clenched. “You loved him very much.” It mattered little to him that finding the Nightsong had been her original mission. Why would he care when her devotion was one of the reasons he loved her?

“He was part of me. And now he is gone.”

“But you’re still here, Selina. Do not succumb to this darkness.”

“I don’t see the light anymore,” she confessed brokenly. “Has my Lady forsaken me, or is the world so clouded by my shattered heart that I see nothing but black?”

“It is clouded, but it will pass. Winds will shift, and light will shine on you again. Beautiful girl—“ he couldn’t stop the compliment from tumbling past his loose lips, “—trust me in this, as you trusted me with the crown all those months ago. As you trusted me with your life all those nights on the road. I know what it is to love someone. I know what it is to lose them. One morning, you will wake, and you will smile when his name crosses your mind. Smile and remember the love you shared, not in grief but in peace.”

“It cannot be that easy, Gale,” she sobbed. “It cannot!”

He rose from his chair then, and crossed the space between them to pull her into his arms. No longer could he stand watching her so lonely, so small.

Selina fell into him, hands clinging to the velvet fabric of his robe as she sobbed into his chest. “You can’t leave me too,” she heaved between her cries. “Gale, you mustn’t go anywhere.”

“I won’t,” he promised, with every intention to keep it. “As long as you need me, Selina, I will be here.”

⭐️

It was hard to count how many days went by. Selina’s schedule was irregular and grief-laden. She cried, and she prayed, and very little else. Most of the time, Gale found her curled up in one of the armchairs by the fire he kept dutifully.

He cooked for her, he prompted her to rest and forced her to eat. He knelt beside her when she prayed and held her close when she cried so hard her body shook with it. There was nothing in it for him, if anything he was only making things harder. It only took Selina a day before she began resenting him for his care, but he knew her feelings would change. One day, she’d be grateful that he brought her through the worst of her heartbreak.

But for a long, long while, it was hard. Neither of them slept much—Selina wracked by tears, and Gale desperate to catch each and every one of them. They didn’t eat much either, despite his attempts to feed her. Grief was an appetite killer, he supposed, 

So he watched, unable to do anything, as she withered away before his very eyes. Muscles shrunk and then disappeared. Pale hair greyed and came loose.

Selina had once been a great warrior, a devoted cleric of Selûne. That woman died with Astarion.

A young girl remained, weak and afraid and dependent. 

Gale was steadfast at her side—always. Selina might not be the woman she was when they met, but she was still Selina. He still loved her, even though his never fading feelings choked him with guilt almost every day. It felt entirely too wrong to love the shell that Selina had become, yet he did. He’d love her in any shape or form, at any age, in any circumstance. If her resentment lingered when her grief waned, he’d happily be her punching bag. If she hated him for caring for her, if she wanted to hurt him, he’d let her. There was not much more to it.

If Selina ever felt the desire to kill him, he’d first find immortality, only to give her the satisfaction of being able to do it over and over again.

It seemed, eventually, she caught on.

Beneath a night sky, they laid on their backs in the now overgrown garden. Selina had been plagued by nightmares again, and Gale had followed her outside easily. The stars made her safe, he knew, but they could not protect her against would-be attackers. That’s why he was there.

They were silent, both content to study the constellations above, until Selina spoke with a confidence he hadn’t heard since the netherbrain.

“Gale, are you in love with me?” She said it so airily, so easily. How long had she suspected? 

“I don’t know whether it’s best to answer in truth, or to spin a lie,” he answered her honestly, emboldened by Selûne’s light. “Or perhaps that is answer enough in itself.”

“I suppose it is.”

“Forgive me.”

“How long?”

Gale sighed at the stars. “At the risk of sounding like a poor imitation of a poet, since the moment you pulled me from the blackest of depths—in more ways than one.” It was all easier to say, knowing she couldn’t see him.

“You never said.”

“I don’t see what good it would have done. Astarion had you wrapped around his finger before I could muster the courage to be honest with you, for fear you’d cast me out.”

“Perhaps everything could have been different,” she said. “Perhaps if I never fell for his expert tricks, he’d still be alive.”

Gale’s heart clenched. His love laid bare, ready to be picked apart, yet it was still only Astarion she could think of. “Selina,” he said. “You must stop thinking like that. He is dead, and dwelling on the past to rethink every choice will not bring him back.”

“You’d like that,” she said, though not unkindly. “If he never came back.”

“He won’t. So don’t think of doing anything silly. Astarion is dead, and he must remain dead.”

The silence after that was unbearable. It hummed, electric, as though the air itself braced for something awful. Selina’s fingers twitched where they rested on the grass, so close to his that the distance seemed almost deliberate. Gale forced himself still. The ache in his chest felt ancient, so much worse than the orb ever had been.

“Do you ever miss her?” she asked suddenly.

He blinked. “Mystra?”

Selina hummed. “You speak of her sometimes, when you forget yourself. I wondered if… it hurts.”

Gale exhaled slowly. “It does. Though not in the way you think. It is not her I miss, but the idea of being chosen. Loved, perhaps, in a way that transcended me.”

“Then you know what I feel,” she said. Her eyes met his, silver-bright and wet. “Selûne is still there, I know she is, but I cannot feel her light anymore. It’s like… it’s like she’s looking at me through glass. And Astarion…”

Without thinking, he reached for her hand. His fingers brushed hers, a whisper of contact, and she didn’t move away. Encouraged, he turned his palm up so their hands rested together, cold and trembling.

“You are still loved,” he said. “You must believe that.”

Selina swallowed hard. “By you.”

Gale opened his mouth, but no words came. She watched him, searching his face, and something flickered there—a flash of pity, or understanding, or maybe it was warmth. Her thumb traced the edge of his palm before she seemed to realize what she was doing.

“Gale…” she murmured, and her voice cracked around his name.

He sat up, unable to stand the distance any longer. The world had gone terribly quiet except for the faint chirring of insects, the whisper of the wind through the long grass. She followed his movement, rising too, her night-robes pale and silvered by moonlight.

“If there is even a spark of light left in you,” he said, “let me keep it safe until you find it again.”

“Don’t,” she whispered.

“I mean no harm. I would never—”

“I know,” she said, and it sounded like sorrow. “That’s what makes it worse.”

Her hand slipped from his. The loss of warmth felt physical—something torn from him. She stepped back, one pace, then another. The moonlight caught the tears streaking down her cheeks, making them shine.

“I can’t,” she said. “Not this. Not you. Not right now.”

“Selina—”

“No.” Her voice was soft but firm, the kind of tone that left no room for argument. “Please don’t follow me. Not this time.”

And she turned, skirts whispering against the grass, and walked toward the house. The door creaked open, spilling a thin strip of light across the garden before closing again.

Gale stood alone beneath the stars, the scent of night-blooming flowers thick in his throat. The warmth of her hand still lingered on his skin. He lifted it, studying the faint tremor there as though it might contain some secret meaning.

For a long time he simply stood, listening to the silence she left behind. Then, very quietly, he whispered her name—once, only once—and the night swallowed it whole.

⭐️

Another few days passed—then she found the scroll of Seeming he’d wallowed over.

She blew through the house like a storm, wind and thunder and holy rage. Her footsteps echoed down the hall, the sound of each one a warning. Gale looked up from the patch of weeds he was fighting in the overgrown garden, and the sight of her—hair wild, eyes alight with divine fury—froze him in place.

He didn’t need to ask what she held. The parchment in her fist might as well have been his own heart, clenched and crumpled.

“Selina—” he began, but her name barely left his mouth before she was upon him.

The wisp of a woman came down on him with the strength of a tempest. Her fists rained against his chest and shoulders, sharp, relentless, each strike driven by disbelief as much as fury.

“How dare you!” she screamed. Her fingers found his hair, yanking, tearing until strands came loose between them. “You’d take his shape? You’d be him?” Her voice cracked like thunder, and she struck him again. “You’d hurt me so?!”

He stumbled under the onslaught but made no move to defend himself. He only raised his hands half-heartedly, not to stop her, but to steady her as she struck. He submitted to her fury and, in some twisted way, welcomed it.

Each blow felt like proof of his existence—proof that she still saw him, still felt something.

Pain was a kind of grace. He remembered her in the temple, suddenly, being struck by the Loviatar worshipper. Perhaps the Maiden of Pain and her followers had a point.

His robes tore easily under her grasp, the fine velvet splitting down the front as threads snapped and frayed. Rain had begun to fall—a fine, cold drizzle that caught in her hair and turned it silver again. The sight of her, incandescent in anger, nearly brought him to his knees.

“Selina,” he rasped, “please.”

She didn’t stop until she was spent. Then, when the divine storm had finally exhausted itself, she broke. Her hands went limp, and with a sound halfway between a sob and a gasp, she collapsed into the mud before him.

Gale stood there, trembling, his scalp burning where she’d pulled at it, his chest stinging where her nails had raked. His robes hung in ribbons. For a moment, he thought he might fall beside her—let the earth swallow them both.

“You shouldn’t have come here,” she said finally, her voice hoarse, broken. “What did you think would happen? With that spell?” She lifted her head just enough for her eyes to find him. “Did you think I’d ask you into my bed, if you looked like him?”

Gale swallowed hard, the taste of iron thick on his tongue. “I only wanted to bring you comfort.” His voice was barely more than a whisper. “I only wanted to see you smile.”

Selina laughed—a short, hollow sound that hurt more than any blow she’d landed on him. “And why would seeing him, knowing he’s dead, ever make me smile?”

He had no answer. Only silence and the steady patter of rain between them.

“Of course that sounds…” he managed at last, forcing a breathless laugh of his own. “Awfully logical when you say it.”

Selina turned her face away, streaked with mud and tears, and Gale lowered himself beside her, but not close enough to touch. He knew better now. The space between them felt infinite.

When she finally spoke again, her voice was soft, almost kind. “You must leave, Gale.”

He flinched as if struck anew. “Selina—”

“Please.” Her tone left no room for argument. “Before you ruin what little good there still is between us. I do not want to hate you, Gale.”

He wanted to tell her that it was too late, that ruin had always been his craft, that love was only ever another name for it—but he said nothing. He only bowed his head.

When he finally rose, his knees ached, his clothes hung heavy with rain, and the scroll of Seeming lay half-buried in the mud between them—ink running, edges softening.

He left it there.

⭐️

Gale froze for days.

The fever took him like punishment, curling him in sweat-soaked sheets while the house creaked around him. The smell of rain and candle smoke hung thick in the air. He dreamed of moonlight and blood, of Selina’s hands striking and then soothing him, the two acts forever twined. When he woke, he found her by his bedside, face pale and eyes hollow, as though carved from stone.

“You don’t want me here,” he croaked, voice rough and splintered.

“Nor do I wish to see you perish on the road,” she told him simply.

There was no kindness in her tone, only command. Yet she stayed.

She changed the towels, fetched water, brewed bitter teas that tasted like iron and herbs. The second he was well enough to travel, she would send him away. But for now, the walls of the little house contained them both.

Their roles reversed.

Now it was she who cooked and forced him to eat.

She wiped his brow with steady hands and read to him when his eyes burned too much to focus. He watched her lips move through the fever haze and thought, deliriously, that perhaps she had forgiven him after all.

And somehow, the hero of Baldur’s Gate returned.

Remarkably fast.

Her skin regained its glow, her movements their grace. When she smiled—just once, at a cat who’d decided to nap in the empty flower box outside the window—it nearly undid him in his already feverish state. She prayed again, kneeling at his side, her hand clasped around his as she whispered for forgiveness and guidance.

Her rapid recovery made Gale wonder if divine hands stirred around them—or if his mind, desperate for meaning, had exaggerated her decline all along. The spark of life had returned to her; perhaps that was miracle enough. She did not laugh, but she did not cry. 

He told himself it was duty that kept her tending him. That she was a cleric, and care was her sacrament. But when she wrung the cloth above his forehead, when her fingers brushed his skin, he imagined tenderness. He imagined love. It was all too easy to create meaning for the unintelligible whispers she spoke while ladling soup between his dry lips.

On the eighth day, he woke to sunlight through dirty glass. His head felt clear, his lungs loose. Selina dozed in an armchair beside him, her hand still clasping his, but she stirred as soon as he blinked awake.

“You talk in your sleep,” she mumbled through a yawn.

There was no stopping the laugh that escaped him. “I am sorry,” he said, smiling faintly. “I hope I didn’t reveal anything too humiliating.”

“Nothing I didn’t already know,” she murmured.

And there it was—the faintest ghost of a smile. Barely discernible, but he saw it, because he’d memorised every flicker of her expression. It lived at the corner of her mouth, fragile and fleeting, but it was real. And it was for him, because of him.

“Well, that’s good, I suppose.” He sat up with a groan. “Don’t worry, I’ll be out of your hair today. I do feel much better, thanks to your impeccable care.”

“You don’t have to go,” she said quickly. The words came out like an instinct, startled even her. She withdrew her hand and folded it in her lap. “I don’t want you to go.”

“Selina,” he sighed, already bracing himself. “I must. You said it yourself—”

“I don’t know how to be alone, Gale,” she cut in. Her voice trembled, small and raw. “Please. You cannot leave me.”

Her eyes met his, and he saw desperation—something wild and childlike twisting through the remnants of her composure. “I’ve never spent as much time alone as I did between… between his death and your arrival. I know now that I hate it, and that I couldn’t bear it again.”

“But had more than a tenday passed between word of it reaching me and me showing up here?” he asked softly. “You were grieving—it’s understandable—”

“No, you don’t understand.”

Her interruption cut cleanly through the air. He stilled. He wanted to say he didn’t need to understand, that she could tell him nothing and he’d still stay—but the look on her face stopped him.

“Still,” he managed, “you expressly told me to leave. I don’t want you to feel obligated now simply because I was ill. I’m perfectly well, I assure you.”

She fell back into her chair with a deep sigh, rubbing her palms together as if trying to wash the words away. “I don’t think I ever told you, but technically, I’m the youngest of seven siblings. Seven girls, at that. My parents were Selûnites too. I was an accident, really, and they had it hard enough as it was with my sister. So as thanks for their years of devotion, the local enclave offered to take me in… A burden lifted from their shoulders. I went from having six sisters to have more siblings than I could count on my tiny little fingers—I was only three, you see.” Idly, she toyed with a loose thread on the tunic she wore—and Gale realised that it was, in fact, his. Or it had been. He hadn’t seen it since leaving Last Light Inn for the last time. “I was raised at the temple, and I never knew of this phenomenon called privacy. Years passed, you know how it goes. I was raised to be faithful, and I was. I devoted my entire life to Selûne, and as a final test… She sent me after the Nightsong.” She smiled faintly, almost wistfully. Something warm stirred, treacherous, in his chest.

He realized then how little he truly knew of her. How she’d carried all this quietly, while the rest of them spilled their pasts like open books. Selina had only ever given them faith and light. Never herself.

“I was terrified,” she continued. “Traveling alone through Faerûn, searching for something not even my goddess could find. Then came the nautiloid, and I met all of you. I didn’t have to travel alone after all. As our camp grew, I felt more and more at home… And after it was all over, I was sick with relief that Astarion wanted to come stay with me. I could put off loneliness a little longer.”

Gale’s throat ached. “But you loved him, did you not?”

“Of course I did,” she whispered. “So much. He was my soul. My heart. But do you know the first thought I had when they told me?”

He didn’t answer.

Selina hesitated, then said quietly, “Before my heart broke for the loss of him, I was crushed that I’d have to be alone.”

The admission hollowed the air between them. For a long while, neither spoke. The sunlight shifted, cutting across her hair like molten silver. Gale reached out before he could stop himself and covered her hand with his own.

“My… my dearest Selina…” he murmured. “You’ll never be alone again. Unless you want to.”

Her eyes flicked up to meet his, unreadable. Then, softly:

“I know.”

But whether it was comfort—acknowledgment of his feelings for her, or their mutual need for each other—or resignation, he couldn’t tell.

Gale woke again, hours later, to the sound of quiet movement downstairs: the scrape of a chair, the gentle clink of porcelain. For a moment, he thought he might have dreamt her confession. Maybe he had dreamt all of it. Astarion’s death, moving in to stay with Selina. Was it his mother, wreaking havoc in his kitchen, sick of caring for her so-very-fragile son?

But then he heard her humming. Faint, tuneless, fragile. A hymn.

He sat up slowly. His fever was gone, his body weak but light, as if emptied of all but one thought: she had let him stay.

He dressed carefully, body still stiff and bruised from illness and the beating he’d earned, and descended the stairs. The kitchen was warmer than he expected. Selina stood at the counter, hair loose down her back, stirring something in a small pot. Steam curled up toward the window, haloing her in silver light.

“Good morning,” he said softly.

She didn’t look at him, but her voice was even. “You should still be resting.”

“I’ve done little else for days.” He smiled faintly. “Besides, I thought I might make myself useful. You’ve done enough.”

“You say that as if I had a choice.”

He hesitated, unsure if she meant it as cruelty or truth. Then, gently, “And yet you chose not to send me away.”

Her hand stilled on the spoon. “Don’t make me regret that.”

“I wouldn’t dare,” he said, and took a seat at the table in the middle of the room.

She poured the thin soup into two bowls, sliding one across the table toward him before taking her own seat. It wasn’t much, but it smelled of thyme and something sweet beneath it—honey, perhaps. She sat opposite him, and for the first time since he’d arrived, she looked at him without accusation.

They ate in silence. The only sounds were the spring wind and the occasional crack of the fire. He wanted to tell her that it felt like a miracle, this simple morning: the act of being alive, of sharing warmth. But the words might break the spell, might ruin the very fragile state of peace they lived in.

After a while, Selina said, “I don’t know what to do with you, though.”

Gale looked up. “You needn’t do anything.”

“That’s exactly the problem. You’ll sit here, smiling at me, and I’ll forget that you’re a man, a friend, and not some penance sent by the gods.”

“If I’m penance,” he said, “then I’m well suited to it. I’ve much to atone for.”

Her lips curved, almost a smirk. “Don’t sound so proud of that.”

“I’m not proud,” he said, ignoring the warmth that stirred in his gut at the sight of her snide look. “Only grateful to be near you again.”

She sighed, pushing her bowl away. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”

“Then tell me what I should say.”

Selina leaned back, arms folded. “You could start by telling me what it is you truly want. Why did you come here? The others sent messages, they offered to come, too. But you didn’t even offer, you just told me you’d be coming.”

He studied her face—the faint lines of exhaustion, the stillness that came not from peace but from discipline. “I want to be what you need,” he told her. “Nothing more.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one I have.”

She stood abruptly and went to the window, arms crossed, watching the rain begin to fall again. It had been a wet spring, almost like the sky cried for Astarion, too—as if it felt the grief of the woman living beneath it. “You’ll lose yourself like this, Gale. One day you’ll look for the man you were, and he’ll be gone. Gale, Mystra’s chosen, the wizard of Waterdeep, hero of Baldur’s Gate.”

“Then I’ll be rid of him at last,” he said easily.

Selina turned, exasperation flashing across her face. “You speak like a poet and live like a martyr. It’s unbearable.”

“Then why let me stay?”

She hesitated. “Because the house feels too quiet when you’re gone. But your pity… It’s bearable enough. I don’t think I could stand Wyll’s or Shadowheart’s. They’re my friends, of course they are. But you—” She looked at him then, intent but terrified at once. “You were always more than a friend. Not like Astarion, obviously. But I felt like you understood me, and I understood you.” The confession hung between them, fragile as glass. Gale didn’t move, afraid that even breath might shatter it. After a moment, she looked away. “Don’t read too much into that.”

“I won’t,” he said. But they both knew he already had.

⭐️

Days folded into one another, seamless and pale. The house grew quieter, though not empty. Late spring brought a storm that kept them inside for days, but it faded as storms do. 

They fell into rhythm without meaning to. Selina prayed at dawn—and twilight—and Gale learned to wait until she finished before speaking. He would prepare tea while she knelt at the window, head bowed, lips moving in faint prayers. Sometimes, when she rose, her eyes were rimmed red, but he pretended not to notice.

She began letting him help again—small things, at first. Carrying buckets from the well. Fetching firewood. Reading aloud from the tomes she kept by the fire when her voice grew tired. It was, in every sense, domestic life. Quiet.

And yet it wasn’t peace.

There were moments when she laughed—a small sound, unsteady, as if it surprised her. The first time it happened, Gale nearly dropped the kettle. She had laughed because the cat had stolen bread from the counter. To him, it sounded like divinity reborn. It was more magical than the weave, more beautiful than the home of the gods.

He’d do anything to hear it again.

But then came the silences. The long, strange pauses where she seemed to realize what they were doing—how close they had become—and the air would thicken with something unspoken. She’d retreat behind her walls, and he’d let her, because he’d learned that pressing only drove her farther away.

Still, every evening she’d let him stay by her side when she prayed. Sometimes their hands touched. Once, she didn’t move them apart.

He began to dream again. Not of Mystra, nor of power—but of the small things he’d once dismissed. A warm hearth. Shared laughter. Her voice in the next room. He found himself humming when he worked, or reaching for two cups instead of one.

It felt, dangerously, like living. A life with her was more than he could have ever wished for, even if it was only the two of them orbiting the same space and deciding what should be cooked for dinner, and whose job it was to cook it.

One evening, as they sat by the fire, Selina was mending one of his torn sleeves—it had caught on a thorn in the garden, which still wasn’t fully cleared of weeds. The light from the hearth gilded her hair, and the sight of her—calm, intent, mortal—made his throat ache.

“You don’t have to do that,” he said quietly, perhaps for the fifth time.

“I know.” She didn’t look up, but said, perhaps for the fourth time, “but I’m already doing it.”

Her tone was soft, but something in it broke him. He reached forward without thinking, catching her wrist. She froze, needle poised in midair.

“I could spend my whole life like this,” he said. “In your orbit. It would be enough.”

Her eyes flicked to his—tired, bright, frightened. “Don’t say that.”

“Why not?”

“Because you mean it.”

He smiled, sad and small. “I always do.”

Selina pulled her hand away and set the mending aside. For a long moment, neither spoke. Then, quietly:

“You make me forget,” she said. “When you talk like that. You make me forget that this isn’t real. I forget why it is you’re here at all.”

“It feels real to me,” he said.

“That’s what scares me.”

She rose, turning toward the dark window. Outside, rain began again—soft, steady, endless.

“Goodnight, Gale,” she said, clutching the robe and her threads to her chest.

He watched her go, his heart swelling and breaking in the same breath.

“Goodnight, Selina,” he whispered back.

He stayed by the fire long after she’d gone, staring into the dying embers until the room was dark and the only light left was the faint glow from the moon.

⭐️

It was late when the scream came. A sharp, stifled sound—too humanoid to be anything else. Gale woke instantly, heart hammering, sweat cooling against his skin. The house was dark but alive with echoes: a choked sob, a rustle of sheets, the faint creak of floorboards in the room next door.

He was already on his feet before he thought to stop himself.  “Selina?”

No answer. Just the sound of her breathing—shallow, uneven, near panic, audible through the wall. He padded into the hallway, every step heavier than the last, until he reached her door. It was half-open, a sliver of silver light spilling through from the window inside.

She sat upright in bed, tangled in blankets, white hair damp with sweat. The moonlight painted her pale as a ghost.

“Selina,” he said again, softly this time. “It’s only me.”

Her eyes darted toward him, wide and wet. “He was here,” she whispered. “He was standing right there, by the window.”

Gale hesitated. “Astarion?”

She pressed her hands over her mouth, nodding once, violently. Her shoulders shook. “He called my name.”

He crossed the threshold without asking and knelt beside her bed. “It was a dream.”

“No,” she said, voice breaking. “It was him. I could feel him.”

He wanted to tell her that ghosts had no power here, that dreams were only memories clawing for attention—but the words felt useless. Instead, he reached for her hand. She didn’t pull away.

For a long time they sat like that, her trembling quieting under his touch, her breathing slow to even. The silence between them was heavy, but it felt shared.

“Do you dream of her?” she asked suddenly, voice small.

“Not anymore,” he said truthfully. “Only you.”

Her hand tightened around his. Then, in a voice barely more than a breath: “I can’t stand being alone tonight.”

Before he could answer, she shifted, lifting the blanket in silent invitation. He froze. The air seemed to leave the room entirely.

“Please,” she said. “Just… stay. Until I fall asleep.”

He nodded, slowly, and sat on the edge of the bed before lying down beside her. The mattress dipped under his weight, close enough that their shoulders brushed. She turned toward him, still trembling, and tucked her face into his chest.

He felt her tears through the thin fabric of his nightshirt, hot and erratic. He didn’t move—didn’t dare. His arm found its way around her almost of its own accord, steadying her, holding her there.

“It was so real,” she murmured against him. “He smiled at me, but it wasn’t the way he used to. It was cold.”

“He’s gone. Remember him as he was, don’t conjure ghosts to taint his memory,” Gale whispered.

She nodded, though her breath hitched. Her fingers caught the fabric of his shirt, clutching it tight. Slowly, her breathing began to even out again.

When he was certain she was asleep, he let out a soundless sigh and stared at the ceiling. Moonlight carved lines of pale silver across her hair, her face. She looked peaceful now, fragile in a way she never allowed herself to be when awake.

He wanted to press his lips to her forehead. To whisper that he would stay, always. But he didn’t.

He only held her. And as the night deepened, he realized he was trembling too.

Because this—this warmth, this closeness—felt more dangerous than any spell he had ever cast. They were tethering on the edge of something more, he could feel it. How evil would he be to seize the moment? Would it count as manipulation, as coercion? She still grieved for her lover, that much was painfully clear. But equally obvious was that Gale had a spot in her heart, too. How much effort would it be to make that spot bigger? 

The next morning, they didn’t speak of it. Selina was gone when Gale woke, and the tense line of her shoulders told him she’d prefer if the moment slid by. He indulged her, as he always would.

But things did change. The world did shift, if only a little.

She was careful with him now in a way she hadn’t been since before her fury or his illness. When she spoke, her voice softened at the edges. When she passed him a cup or a book, her fingers brushed his, fleeting and unthinking. He caught every touch like a flame ravaged dry grass.

Sometimes he’d find her looking at him and then quickly looking away. The first time it happened, he pretended not to notice. The second time, he smiled, and she left the room without a word.

The days came gentler than before. They walked together through the garden, where the first shoots of summer had begun to push through the soil. She showed him where the moonflowers would bloom in only a few weeks, where she’d buried the roots herself. He listened, content to hear her voice. Content that she found the world interesting again.

At night, she prayed longer, her words quiet but strained. When he knelt beside her, she didn’t take his hand—but she didn’t move away either. He could feel the warmth of her, could hear the tremor in her breath.

The dream came again for her one evening; he could tell by the way she gasped in her sleep, her face turned toward the wall they shared. He didn’t go to her this time. He lay awake, staring at the ceiling, until she slipped through the doorway in silence and lay down beside him of her own accord. She didn’t speak. Neither did he. Their breathing fell into rhythm.

She was gone the next morning too, but his pillow carried her scent. He barely had room in his heart to feel shame when he buried his face in the fabric, clinging to the proof that she’d sought him out for comfort.

After that, it became habit. Sometimes she came to him; sometimes he to her. They didn’t always share words, only warmth. It was comfort, nothing more—at least that was what she told herself.

But once, when she woke before dawn and found his hand resting against her cheek, she didn’t move it away. She only lay there, watching him sleep, her heart thudding painfully in her chest.

She thought of Astarion—the sharp smile, the cold hands, the hunger that had once frightened her and then thrilled her. She thought of the ache of losing him, and how she had prayed to forget it. And now here was Gale, gentle and human and full of a steadiness she hadn’t realized she craved.

How cruel, she thought, that love could take so many shapes. How cruel, that she could feel it again so soon.

She rose quietly, careful not to wake him, and stood by the window. The moon hung low over the horizon, pale and full. She pressed her forehead to the glass and whispered a prayer—not for forgiveness this time, but for clarity.

Behind her, Gale stirred and murmured her name in his sleep.

⭐️

The afternoon light was fading by the time Gale returned. He’d meant to be gone only an hour. Bread, fruit, a few candles, a decent bottle of wine—simple things. But the market had been busy, alive with sound and colour, and he’d been caught by a cause he couldn’t ignore: a healer tending to a fever-struck child with nothing but rags for dressings. Gale had stayed, conjuring clean water, cooling salves, light enough to see by. But the walk home through dusk was long, and he was much, much later than he’d told her he’d be.

He pushed open the door. “Selina?”

No answer. Only the steady drip of water from the eaves, and the faint hiss of the dying hearth. His chest tightened. He set the basket down and moved through the hall, past the prayer room, past the kitchen.

He found her in the corner of the sitting room—knees drawn to her chest, face buried in her arms. Her hair clung to her cheeks, her shoulders shaking with each ragged breath.

“Selina,” he said softly, dropping to his knees before her. “What’s happened?”

She looked up, and the sight struck him like a spell misfired—her eyes wild, wet, rimmed red. “You weren’t here.”

“I told you I’d be back before sundown.”

“It is sundown,” she snapped, voice cracking. “You were gone so long—” Her breath hitched; the rest dissolved into a sob. “I thought— I thought maybe you wouldn’t come back. Maybe you too—”

Gale’s stomach twisted. He reached for her, but she flinched, so he let his hands fall to his lap. “Something kept me,” he said gently. “A child needed help. I didn’t think—”

“You never think,” she whispered. “You disappear, and everything—” Another sob stole her words.

He couldn’t bear it. He took her hands, careful and deliberate. “I’m here,” he murmured. “I’m here, Selina. Nothing could keep me from returning to you.”

Her fingers abandoned his hands and buried themselves in the fabric of his robe, clutching it almost hard enough to rip it. She drew in a trembling breath, and he felt the shudder of it run through both of them.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she said. “I shouldn’t— I can’t need you like this.”

He smiled, but it felt like breaking. “If needing someone is wrong, then I fear I’m the bigger villain here.”

She gave a sound—half laugh, half cry—and lifted her head. The distance between them vanished. He could feel her breath against his lips, smell the faint trace of salt and lavender on her skin.

“Selina,” he whispered.

Her eyes searched his—pleading, terrified, wanting. She swayed toward him, only a fraction, but it was enough to make his pulse roar in his ears. For one suspended moment the world held its breath.

And then she froze. Her eyes flickered, the light in them turning inward, away.

“I can’t,” she breathed.

He didn’t move. “You don’t have to.”

She drew back slowly, letting go of him, the air between them sharp with what almost transpired. “You should have told me you’d be late,” she said, voice steady again but thin around the edges. “That’s all.”

Gale bowed his head. “You’re right. I should have.”

She stood and crossed to the window, arms wrapped around herself. “Next time, just—leave a note.”

“I will.”

The silence that followed hurt more than her outburst.

When she finally turned back to him, the storm in her face had faded to exhaustion. “Thank you for helping the child,” she said quietly. “You do love to help people, I suppose.”

“Only the ones worth saving,” he said before he could stop himself.

Her gaze softened—a warning, a promise, he couldn’t tell which. “Then I suppose you’re trapped here a while longer.”

He managed a faint smile. “Happily.”

Selina shook her head, but a small, reluctant curve touched her mouth before she left the room.

Gale stayed where he was, still kneeling on the floor, her warmth lingering in the air like the echo of a spell. He told himself he was content with almost. But his heart, treacherous thing, kept replaying that heartbeat in which she might have kissed him—and how close it had felt to redemption. 

On the surface, nothing changed in the wake of it. They shared meals. They walked the garden path. They said little and said it kindly. But beneath it, everything throbbed with the ache of that almost.

She didn’t mention the night he’d found her crying. Neither did he. But her eyes found him more often now, lingering when she thought he wasn’t looking. When she spoke his name, something fragile stirred in her voice, uncertain and trembling.

And Gale—ever the scholar of subtle signs—caught every one of them. He noticed when she stood a little too close while pouring water into his cup. When she let her fingers rest an instant longer on his sleeve before pulling away. When she hummed under her breath, the same half-melody she had started humming to herself at night when she couldn’t sleep.

It was maddening. Because she knew what she was doing, or she didn’t—and which was worse, he couldn’t decide.

Sometimes she’d laugh softly at something he said, and his heart would catch like a bird in a snare. Other times she’d go still, her smile fading, as if remembering who she was supposed to mourn. It had been months since Astarion’s death, and in some moments she seemed to have processed it—in others, it was as if she’d just heard the news. It was a rhythm he couldn’t escape: reach, retreat. Touch, withdraw. 

Once, as they walked back from the well, their hands brushed. Just brushed. She didn’t flinch, but she didn’t look at him either. They both kept walking, pretending nothing had happened, even as the silence grew hot and heavy around them.

That night, Gale sat awake long after she’d gone to bed. He listened to the house settling, to the faint sighs of the wind through the shutters. He told himself it was enough—her nearness, her voice, her care. That he could endure this purgatory of proximity for as long as she let him stay.

But endurance had never been his strength. He’d been born to crave, to love too much, to reach too far. And now, she was all he reached for, even in restraint.

Through thin walls he heard her breath, steady and calm. It soothed him, to know she was resting. She wouldn’t come to his bed that night, he could tell by her breathing. So he settled—pulled the blanket to his chin and let his eyes shut.

Barely five minutes had passed before fabric rustled.

Gale was suddenly wide awake, ears perked and listening for her footsteps. But they never came. There was only the rustling, but Selina had never stirred much in her sleep, not even when her nightmares found her. 

Then it came, low and muffled by more than the wall. 

A moan. 

Not of pain, but of pleasure. 

Heat soared through him quicker than through Avernus. On the other side of the wall, Selina was touching herself. 

Chapter Text

Gale clutched at his chest as if to stop the orb in his chest from erupting. Except it wasn’t there anymore, and the erratic beating of his heart fed on the sounds coming through the wall, not by magic. Though hearing her moan from pleasure was magic. 

He remembered the tiefling party like it was yesterday. Hidden in the bushes, invisible, watching them. Listening to them. Astarion’s filthy words were too quiet to be heard, but there was no restraint on her volume. She’d been loud, unabashed, and completely overcome by ecstasy. Gale had been hard, straining against his pants, aching with both shame and excitement.

And he was hard once again, in a matter of moments, just from the little he could hear. But he didn’t touch himself. He told himself he wouldn’t, but knew it was a hard challenge to set. Especially when another faint sound reached him.

“Please.” Her palm hit the wall as she gasped—louder than she should have, probably, if she meant to keep her activity secret.

It was all it took for him to crumble. A weak, weak man, he was. The blanket was shoved away, and his underwear shoved to his knees. His cock hard and weeping in his hand the second he touched it. Gale had no real pail on how long he’d been staying with Selina, but he hadn’t touched himself once since arriving. The urge hadn’t really been there—not even after their almost-kiss.

He winced when he squeezed himself gently, immediately overwhelmed by the onslaught of sensation—all increased tenfold by the knowledge that on the other side of the wall, Selina was in a similar situation. It was all too easy to imagine her—pale cheeks flushed with heat, eyes fluttering shut and rolled back at the same time. Her hands, so lithe and capable, roughened by wielding but gentle when stroking through her own drenched folds. 

“Forgive me,” he heard her say through a whine. “Forgive me.”

With a palm clasped securely over his mouth, he collected the wetness at his tip to spread over his length. That alone was almost enough to bring him to the brink. But his hand was too big, too tan. He wanted her. Her hand, her warmth. Her straddling him, sinking down on him.

Warm. Warm. Warm. 

Her sounds increased, both in pitch and volume as her ministrations brought her closer to her own peak. Gale pressed his ear to the wall and drank it in as he moved his hand up and down the length of his cock at a rapid pace.

He wouldn’t last long, and he wanted to come when she did.

Her palm hit the wall again, and released a startled moan—loud enough to have woken him if he’d been asleep. He thanked every God he hadn’t been. A moment later, he followed her over the edge, moaning into his own hand. 

On the other side, things were suddenly very quiet. Had she heard him? Shame curled in his gut, but it wasn’t enough to halt the ecstasy coursing through his veins .It didn’t matter if she’d heard him. If she kicked him out in the morning, well… He’d achieved much.

⭐️

To his surprise, however, she brought it up when he came downstairs the next morning.

Selina was at the hearth, crouched before it, adding a log to the flames. The light caught her hair, turning it white-gold. She sat back on her heels, hands folded in her lap. She looked tired—not in body, but in soul. “I touched myself last night,” she said, staring grimly at the wall.

Gale, who’d sank down in the armchair he’d claimed as his, nearly choked on his own spit. “Oh.”

She sighed—not with regret, exactly, but for once Gale couldn’t give a name to the expression she wore. “When I went to bed… I was… I had thoughts. And they stirred something in me. And then I just… had the need. To do it.”

“Right.”

“And it felt so good, and so awful at once.” She looked at him. “I feel like I’ve betrayed him.”

Gale’s eyebrows drew together, and he shook his head only to delay his response and give him a chance to gather his thoughts. He cleared his throat. “I doubt he’d see it that way. If he came home from wherever and found you… touching yourself… Would he be upset?”

“No.”

“So?”

“It— It wasn’t him I thought of.”

“Oh.” Traitorous joy clawed its way through his brain. It was quite wrong, of course. He didn’t even know if it was him she’d imagined instead. Perhaps it was the man from the village who delivered firewood, or the florist over the hill. Or… Or was it Gale? The thought nearly drove him mad.

“So you see, I’ve betrayed him.”

He’s dead, Gale wanted to say. Selina couldn’t possibly betray Astarion, because he’d been dead for months.

She stood, but didn’t leave. Instead she claimed her own chair, pulling her legs to her chest.

“Gale,” she said quietly, “do you ever feel as though the gods are… gone?”

He struggled to find a single word, his brain running wild on assumptions and hope. “Gone?”

“As in… absent. Silent,” she said. “I pray and I pray, and all I feel is air. I keep expecting her to answer, to comfort me, but…” She trailed off. “It’s as if Selûne’s turned her face away. As if I’ve disappointed her beyond repair.”

He leaned forward. “You could never—”

“Don’t say that,” she interrupted softly, not unkindly. “You don’t know what I’ve done.”

He hesitated, studying her. “Then tell me.”

She shook her head. “It’s not a story worth telling.”

“Selina,” he said, voice low. “How many times must you confess something before you realise you could tell me anything, and it would not change how I feel about you?”

Something in her eyes flickered—fear, shame, maybe even hope. She stared into the fire as she spoke.

“When Astarion died,” she said, “I prayed for him to be returned to me. Not in words—not aloud—but I wished it with all I was. I offered Selûne anything. My faith, my service, my life. Just to have him back.” Her throat tightened; she looked away. “And when nothing happened, I cursed her. I cursed the moon for being cold. I told her I’d rather follow him into darkness than live in her light alone.”

The words broke something in her. She pressed her hand to her mouth, eyes shining in the firelight.

Gale moved before he thought, kneeling beside her. “That doesn’t make you faithless,” he said softly. “It makes you human. Well— You know. Humanoid.” She had a way of ridding his speech of the frivolous.

She gave a broken laugh. “And what use does a goddess have for something as humanoid as grief?”

“More than you think. You forget that I knew a goddess quite well.” His hand hovered near hers—not touching, not daring, but close enough that she could take hold of him if she wanted. “Selina, if Selûne’s gone quiet, it’s not because she’s angry. Perhaps she trusts you to keep walking without her voice in your ear.”

Her gaze lifted to his, trembling, searching. “You make it sound so simple.”

“It isn’t,” he said. “But I know what it’s like to feel abandoned by divinity. To stand in silence where there should have been love.”

Her lips parted. “Mystra was… different. You—”

He nodded once. “It was different,” he agreed. “But she hasn’t abandoned me yet, and my mistakes far exceed yours, whatever they are.”

Selina reached out then—a small, tentative gesture—and let her fingers brush his. “How did you get over her? How does one get over a goddess?” she asked.

Gale held her gaze, and the truth came easily. “I found someone new, someone better, to love.”

For a long moment, the room was only firelight and breath. Her hand stayed in his. He didn’t pull away.

“You shouldn’t say things like that,” she whispered.

“I know.”

“Then why do you?”

“Because they’re true. Because I’ve been close to death too many times to keep things to myself. Because I need you to know you’re cherished, Selina. Loved. If not by your goddess, then by me. By our friends.”

She exhaled, eyes flicking down to where their hands met—his large and steady, hers trembling and pale. Slowly, she withdrew, folding her hands in her lap once more.

“I don’t know what to do with you,” she murmured.

“So you said. Let me stay until you do,” he said.

She looked up, and for the first time, she didn’t look away. “You’ll regret it.”

He smiled faintly. “That would be a first.”

The fire popped, sending sparks briefly into the air. She startled, and he nearly laughed—the smallest, gentlest sound, enough to make her lips twitch in answer.

Gale retreated to his own chair again, content in improving her mood, if only slightly. There was a rather large tome on the table beside him, and he’d meant to start it that morning; it seemed as good a time as any. But he’d barely cracked the first page before Selina spoke again.

“Aren’t you going to ask?”

“Hm?” He looked up at her, hands spread across the wide page to steady it.

“Who I thought about last night. You won’t ask?”

He wanted to, obviously. “It’s private.”

“I told you. I don’t know about the phenomena of privacy.”

“Still…”

“Wouldn’t you be glad, if I said it was you?”

Gale forgot how to breathe. The question hung in the air, electrifying the room. He couldn’t tell if she was teasing him or confessing, and the uncertainty was agony. He set the book aside carefully, as though any sudden movement might break whatever fragile thing had just taken shape.

“Would I be glad?” he echoed, buying time, trying to tether his thoughts before they scattered like sparks. “Selina, do you even need to ask?”

Her gaze didn’t waver. “Clearly I do.”

He swallowed hard. “Then yes,” he said at last. “Yes, I would be glad.”

A quiet settled over them—not peace, but tension stretched so thin it might have snapped if either of them so much as breathed too deeply. The fire crackled. On the stove, he realised something was boiling.

Selina’s eyes softened, but there was no triumph in them. Only confusion. Weariness. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she whispered, sinking back into herself. “I still love him, but when you speak to me, when you—” She cut herself off, shaking her head. “It’s like I’m being pulled in two directions. And I hate myself for it.”

“Don’t,” he said immediately. “Don’t hate yourself for feeling. The heart doesn’t obey the same logic as the gods. The heart doesn’t obey logic at all.”

“You say that as if you know.”

“I do.” His voice broke on the admission. “Too well.”

He leaned forward, not far enough to touch her but close enough that the warmth of the fire seemed to mingle between them. “You don’t have to choose now,” he said softly. “Not between him and me, not between grief and… whatever this is. Let it be confusion for as long as it must. I can bear that.”

She looked at him—really looked—as if seeing him for the first time. The flicker of the flames turned her silver eyes to liquid mercury. “You shouldn’t be so kind to me,” she said. “It’ll only make things harder when I send you away.”

He smiled faintly, a little broken. “Your struggle delights me, though I loathe to admit it.”

Selina’s breath caught; her eyes glistened. For a heartbeat, he thought she might reach for him again, bridge the last inch between them—but she didn’t. Instead, she pushed to her feet, wrapping her shawl tightly around her shoulders.

“I need some air,” she said, already moving toward the door. “Stay here. Keep an eye on lunch.”

He rose halfway from his chair, hands braced on the arms. “Selina—”

“Please.” She didn’t look back. The door closed quietly behind her.

Gale stood in the silence she left behind, the echoes of her voice still ringing in his ears. He wanted to follow—to make sure she was warm, safe, breathing—but he stayed. He obeyed; he could be obedient. He could be good. For her, he could be anything.

He sank back into the chair, staring at the dying fire. The room smelled of smoke and lavender and something indefinably her. He pressed a trembling hand to his chest, to the place where his orb once pulsed, and found that the ache there was very much alive. He almost missed it for a second. At least it had been something to occupy his thoughts and distract him from himself. They said absence makes the heart grow fonder, though Gale had never expected he’d feel sorry to be rid of the ticking bomb within him.

He sat in the armchair long after she’d gone, staring at the door she’d disappeared through. The morning light had begun to climb the walls, slow and golden, tracing the uneven plaster in soft bands. Dust floated in the air, suspended and unmoving, and for a strange, fragile moment Gale felt as though time itself had stopped. Not just in that moment, but for every moment that had transpired since he arrived. The seasons and weather changing was all he had to go on to calculate the passing of time, but still he could only live by an approximation. Months had passed—that’s all he knew. But what else mattered?

The house was quiet, save for the soft settling of the fire and the faint tap of tall plants knocking on the windows, swayed by gentle spring breezes. He could still feel her everywhere. The echo of her voice, the faint warmth where she’d stood, the ghost of her touch at his wrist. 

“Get a hold of yourself,” he muttered, forcing a laugh that didn’t sound like one. It was madness. All of it. He shouldn’t have come. A weak, sick, guilty man he was, and now he was on the path of utter, complete ruination. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and buried his face in his hands. Breathe, he told himself. Just breathe. But her words wouldn’t leave him. Wouldn’t you be glad, if I said it was you? What a funny way to die.

He let his mind wander—again—to the thought of following her outside. Saying something sensible. Something kind. Something that would pull them both back to the safer distance where they belonged. 

He’d just reached for his cloak when the door flew open.

Selina stood in the doorway, framed by the golden morning light. Her chest rose and fell too quickly, her expression caught between fury and despair.

He froze where he stood. “Selina—”

She didn’t let him finish. In three strides she was across the room, and before he could think, her hands were in his hair, her mouth against his. It wasn’t measured, or gentle. She kissed him like she was trying to suffocate him. Her breath hitched, his heart lurched, and the world narrowed to the heat of her closeness and the taste of lavender and thyme.

He didn’t think. He didn’t move, except to hold onto her upper arms, unsure if it was to steady her or himself. He simply let himself feel it—this impossible thing he had wanted for so long—until she tore herself away, breathing hard.

They stared at each other. Her eyes were wide, terrified, glistening with something that wasn’t quite tears. He released her immediately, hands hovering in the air, trembling .

“Selina,” he said, hoarse. She remained on his lips, so sweet and intoxicating, but the look on her face was enough to quench the need for more. “What—”

“No,” she cut in sharply. “Don’t. I can’t— I shouldn’t have—” She stumbled back, pressing her fingers to her lips. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she whispered. “I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore.”

“Nothing’s wrong with you,” he managed, though the words came out barely above a breath.

Her gaze darted toward him, then away. “Forget it,” she said. “Pretend it didn’t happen.”

Gale stood very still, too afraid to move and break the moment. His pulse thundered in his ears. It was absurd to think a single moment could undo everything—the boundaries, the promises, the care he had so carefully constructed around her grief—but he knew, with a dreadful, crystalline certainty, that it had.

She’d touched himself to the thought of him. She kissed him. Perhaps she was just as weak and guilty as he was. Perhaps he’d been wrong to put her on such a pedestal. Not that she didn’t belong on one, but in his reverence, in his desperate need for her, he seemed to have forgotten that she was just a girl, really. She was young, especially by eleven standards, and she had accomplished too much for the time she’d been alive. More importantly, she’d lost her first love. How confusing it must be, to want someone else then. To feel alive after thinking you lost your soul.

“No,” Gale said, without really thinking. “I can’t.”

“You must,” she rasped—though she did not run. She remained, hovering too close. 

“You thought of me.”

Her steely gaze met his. “Of course I did.”

“You kissed me.”

Pale features twisted with uncertainty. “I want you. But I cannot have you, you must see that.” She lifted her hands, reached for him… But caught herself at the very last moment and clutched her own robes instead. “I will not do that to him.”

“Astarion would want you to be happy!” Gale pleaded. “If you want me, and I want you… Will you truly keep this happiness from yourself?”

Selina made a noise akin to a growl. “Yes, Gale Dekarios. Yes, I bloody well will.”

“Why?” He was desperate, barely a second away from getting on his knees to plead her for just another kiss, just one more moment of her lips on his.

“Because it’s all a lie!” she cried. “From the beginning, it was all a lie! I only slept with Astarion after we saved the grove because you told me to! I did it to make you jealous!”

The confession brought him down. He fell to his knees, too weak to remain standing beneath the weight of her words. When Selina remained standing, he unabashedly twisted his hands into her robes before he buried his face at her hip. Above him, she let out a sob as her hand came to rest on the crown of his head. 

“I wanted you to see him flirt with me, I wanted you to know he asked me for sex,” she said quietly, and every word tore a chunk out of Gale’s soul. “I went to you, and I wanted you to tell me to stay. To be with you. But you told me to go.”

“You loved him,” Gale said through heavy breaths. “I cannot believe you didn’t love him.”

“I loved him,” she agreed. “I loved him with my heart and my soul. Eventually. But for so long… too long… I wanted you more.”

Her fingers twisted through his strands, and he couldn’t help the moan that fell from his lips. He was too sensitive, nerves frayed and surfacing. It was almost too much, everything that had transpired that morning. Hells, he hadn’t even had breakfast yet.

“I thought maybe… succumbing to my pleasure… my need for you would bring my goddess back, but it hasn’t.”

“You haven’t succumbed,” Gale said, searching for her eyes. “I can— Please. Let me. I’ll help. Please, Selina. Let me help.”

She stared down at him, gaze heated and pained all at once. “You love to help, don’t you?”

“I do,” he nodded desperately, every moment tugging at his hair, sending sparks of pleasure to the pit of his stomach. “I’ll do anything you want.”

For a while—it could have been ten seconds or ten hours, the concept of time was entirely beyond him—she said nothing, did nothing.

Then she sighed. Released him. Stepped back. “But I can’t, Gale. There can’t be anything between us. If I love you, what’ll happen to me when I lose you?”

“You won’t. Ever.”

“I’m an elf, you’re a human. I’m probably older than you in years.”

“Please.” Gale couldn’t do anything but beg—for her to touch him again, for her to accept him, for her to do anything besides leave.

“No.”

And with that she was gone—disappearing back into the garden—leaving Gale kneeling on the floor, hands wafting through the air she just occupied, stealing the essence of her being. 

⭐️

He should have expected her frigidity—her need to pretend everything was normal—but it still hurt. When she returned, hours later, red cheeked and avoidant, it was like nothing had happened.

Gale was in his armchair still, face in his hands as he tried to collect himself—to feel normal again. An impossible task.

“I told you to watch lunch,” Selina said, brushing past him swiftly. “The soup is all but ruined now.”

He stared at her like she’d grown a second head, his own pounding from hunger and anxiety. “I forgot.”

She sighed, staring into the pot gone cold on the stove. “We’ll just have bread then, I guess.”

“Selina…” he tried, knowing it was futile.

“Will you get the bread, Gale? And cut it up, please?”

But she knew how to play him expertly. Such an innocent, unimportant request, yet he devoted himself to it like the fate of the world was at stake. Her simple words got him out of the chair and into the pantry, where he spent a long while picking out the most perfect loaf for their late lunch. He’d disappointed her, after all. He’d failed to watch the soup, he had to make it up to her.

Without saying a word, he cut the bread into even slices. It was a nice sourdough, airy and light. He’d made it himself, and he’d added carrots to the dough—because Selina liked carrots. 

She watched him, still standing by the stove, not saying anything either.

“Do you want something on the bread? Or some tea?” Gale asked her, only to break the suffocating silence that stretched between them.

“No, thank you.”

So stilted. It would have killed Gale if he didn’t know the reason. He hoped, prayed, that knowing about the conflict in her heart would be enough to keep him going if the awkwardness lasted. It was worse than her rage. Rage was at least an emotion. But her silence… her act… was infinitely worse.

“Okay.”

They ate in silence, gazes avoidant.

When Selina finished, she stood, and left the room. Gale remained, as he always did. And thought. Maybe he even prayed, eyes closed and hands clasped loosely in his lap. 

Please, he asked Selûne. Do not forsake her. Help me make her happy. Show her that she can be happy. She found your daughter. She saved the world from The Grand Design. Has she not earned your unwavering support? Has she not earned endless happiness? 

There was no immediate answer, but Gale wasn’t really sure how praying actually worked. His relationship with Mystra had been… different. He’d worshipped at her altar uniquely, compared to her other devotees. Would Selûne even hear his prayer when he wasn’t a follower? Somehow, he knew she would. The Lady of Silver’s presence was strong in the cottage, even when Selina wasn’t there.

It was several hours before the cleric returned home, and Gale wondered absently where she spent all her time away. He was in the middle of cooking dinner when she waltzed in. She said nothing, only stared at him—at his forearms, perhaps, revealed as he’d rolled up his sleeves to spare them unnecessary washings—then bolted up the stairs where she remained until dinner.

They ate in silence. Cleaned and washed in silence. Read by the fire in silence. They didn’t even exchange pleasantries before disappearing into their separate rooms.

She didn’t come to him, and he certainly didn’t go to her.

And so it went on for a few days—constant, awful trepidation. They circled each other like they’d break if they got too close. Words were few and curt, but not unkind. It wasn’t enough, though, and Gale felt like he was well and truly dying.

Her lips were constantly on his mind. The taste. The sensation. Gods. He wanted to kiss her again. He wanted to kiss her until his lips bled and he couldn’t breathe anymore. The orb, the idea of divine godhood, paled in comparison to his desperate need to kiss her just one more time.

For the first time, he considered leaving at his own behest. Else he’d probably die, and he couldn’t do that to her. But then she started giving him little orders again. It wasn’t anything new, really. On the road, she’d always been the one who called the shots, but on the road, Gale had been too busy worrying about upcoming death and unrequited love to really understand what her orders actually did to him. 

Now, when she asked him to clean the kitchen or make lunch or sweep the floors, there was an edge to it. He supposed she meant it as punishment, in a way. Perhaps she wanted to see how far she could push it before he snapped—how many chores could she force upon him before he caught on. Before he told her to stop. Only, of course, he’d never ask her to stop. If she asked, he’d get on all fours and let her use him as a footrest.

Every request, every order, sent heat curling in the pit of his stomach, no matter how inconsequential.

A week after the kiss, she found him in the garden—kneeling in the dirt, fighting his everlasting battle with the weeds. Her sudden appearance startled him, but the laugh it pulled from her made his blood rush far more than sudden fear. He peered up at her, blushing in shame, fingers clenching around stems.

“Selina.”

“Gale. I am sorry,” she said, though she didn’t sound apologetic at all. It was the happiest she’d sounded since he arrived. “You do look quite wild, you know.”

He frowned. “Wild?”

“When was the last time you shaved, for example?” she asked. “And out here, crouched in the mud… How dirty you are.”

She was patronising him—he had no idea why, but that now familiar heat stirred in his gut again.

Gale reached a muddied hand up to touch his face and was almost surprised to find that his beard was much, much longer than he’d remembered. There were no mirrors in Selina’s home. When was the last time he’d shaved?

“I didn’t realise,” he admitted.

“Obviously,” she hummed. “Go do it now.”

“I’m busy.” He looked around at the garden bed as if to say see? 

Selina crossed her arms. “I said, go shave.”

He blinked at her. It was more direct than any order she’d given him. Unlike can you please pour me some tea? this one couldn’t be interpreted as a friendly request. She was demanding something from him.

And he was ever eager to please. To give her everything he could.

He rose, wiped his hand on his already dirty robes and looked at her again. “I need a mirror.”

“There’s one in my room,” she said, silver eyes wandering his body. Gale worried for a second that she’d linger at his hips—that she’d somehow notice his half hard cock through heavy fabric. “Come.”

Without another word, she turned. Gale followed her obediently, almost stumbling over vines in his daze. The world felt fuzzy, almost—soft at the edges. It was probably the blood rushing from his brain to his cock, as he grew a little harder seemingly with every step he took. 

Floorboards creaked worryingly beneath their feet, the hearth was on its last embers, the pot on the stove was smoking far too much, but all of it was so incredibly unimportant. The house could have burnt down, for all he cared. He was happy enough to be allowed in Selina’s presence again. Happy enough to exchange words that weren’t heavy with the unspoken.

There was a standing mirror in the center of the room, one that certainly hadn’t been there on any of his previous visits. Next to it, a small table with a wash basin, shaving cream and a sharp knife. 

“Let’s get you looking like yourself again,” Selina said, voice unexpectedly soft. She guided him, hands on his arms, to stand in front of the looking glass. Peering out from behind him, she sighed. “Professor Gale Dekarios. Wizard of Waterdeep. Saviour of Baldur’s Gate. Mystra’s Chosen. Mystra’s former lover. Not that you look like it.”

Selina’s words were cruel, but true. Looking at himself for the first time in months, Gale was shocked to see not the strong, handsome man who’d left Waterdeep and Blackstaff Academy behind to aid a friend, but a haggard husk with sunken eyes and an unruly beard that almost reached his chest. His hair had grown too, and it hung lifeless over his shoulders.

He’d been so lost in her that he’d completely forgotten about himself. 

“You stink too, you know,” she continued. 

“I do?” he asked absentmindedly, too occupied staring at the stranger in the mirror. “Yeah. Probably.”

“Shave. Then you can bathe.” She handed him the cream and the knife, then perched herself on the edge of her bed. How he missed her bed. Her warmth. “I’ll stay here, if you don’t mind?”

“Okay,” he said, fingers clenching around the cold metal in his hand. 

There was nothing inherently sexual or erotic about shaving, especially not when it was such a blatant necessity. Her eyes on him, however, were charged. The heat churned in his gut, making his cock twitch in his trousers. He felt dizzy with his own arousal, the knife unsteady in his hand. 

He looked at her, pleading silently.

“You want my help?” she asked, a small smile on her lips. Somehow, she was surprised. 

“Yes, please,” he sighed. “I— My hands aren’t… steady enough.”

Selina pushed herself off the bed and took the knife from him before she cast a simple spell to move a stool into position. “Sit,” she said, and when he did, she continued while lathering his face gently with the shaving cream. “I suppose your hands are tired. Pulling at the weeds all day. Baking my bread. Tending my fires. Sweeping my floors.” Her voice was gentle, genuine. 

But the shaving cream was cold—a welcome reprieve on his heated skin. “Yes,” he replied, careful to not move his face too much. “But I’m happy to do it.”

Their eyes met for just a second. “I know you are,” she said. “I’m not blind.”

“And I’m not trying to hide.”

She sighed to the tune of the knife scratching against his cheeks. “Can you understand? Why I… Why am I as I am?”

“You’re grieving,” he mumbled.

“I’m broken,” she corrected.”Far beyond repair. Yet you don’t care.”

“Not at all.”  He hadn’t meant to say it… quite so reverently. What he really should have said that she wasn’t broken, certainly not beyond repair. But Selina didn’t seem receptive to such suggestions.

Her cool gaze flickered to his lap for barely a second, and Gale realised immediately what she must have seen there. He was rock hard, chafing against the inside of his trousers, and while seated, his robes offered little coverage.

But her eyes met his, and it seemed like she wouldn’t comment on it. 

The scritch, scritch, scritch of the razor was all the noise in the room. She stared at his face intently as she removed months of growth. The rough hair fell limply on his lap, a sticky mix of shaving cream and unkempt curls.

Then, just as she moved from his left side to his right, she hummed and said, “touch yourself, Gale.”

He jolted, and was glad the knife wasn’t against his face. “What?”

“Touch yourself,” she repeated. “Unless you’d rather not? I can go. Let you finish this on your own.”

Did she mean finish the shaving or… 

Gale swallowed. “Really?”

“Must I ask again?”

He shook his head. No. No, of course not. He’d always do what she asked of him.

Slowly, he moved a trembling hand to cup himself through all those layers of fabric; it was plenty enough to bring a moan from his lips; small and drenched in humiliation.

Selina hummed gently. “Remember the knife,” she murmured just as she pressed the blade to his face again. It was cold still, enough to make him wince—enough to send a rush of vile pleasure down his spine. “With Astarion,” she said, and Gale sensed he was in for a tale. “I never really got things my way. He always wanted to decide everything. Understandable, given his past. And I was more than happy to indulge him. Really, I just wanted him to be happy.”

“Yes,” Gale said breathlessly, massaging his erection through his clothes. The friction was addictive, but nowhere near enough. He wouldn’t take it further, though. He wouldn’t remove his clothes until she told him to. And if she didn’t… He was sure her words—whatever they were—could bring him to completion on their own.

“But I suppose I always envied him a little,” she continued, voice low, hands still carefully working on his beard. The hand not holding the razor grabbed his jaw—to hold him still, presumably, yet it only served as another source of humiliating elation. “In my dreams, it was always I who made the decisions. He was the one on his knees, begging me.” The knife dipped into the wash basin, and she sighed. “Show it to me. Show me your cock so that I may compare.”

Gale stood, but only long enough to unlace his leather pants and shove them down his legs. His robes slipped off next. Even naked, he felt as though he’d burn up, standing before her so revealed. He trembled—all of him—beneath her silver gaze. When seated again, he palmed his cock once more, moaning quietly at the sensation of skin on skin.

But Selina batted his hand away so she could see his cock for herself. 

“You’re larger than I thought you’d be,” she said airily. “Larger than him maybe. Thicker, too.”

“T—Thank you,” he keened. “Can I touch myself again?”

She smiled—wide and genuine—and she was so beautifully radiant. She looked like she had on the road, pulse racing, skin shiny with sweat after a battle. Gale wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. He couldn’t even remember if the orb had intrigued him, called to him, more than she did in that moment.

“Yes, Gale Dekarios. You can touch yourself again.”

He wrapped his hand around himself properly, using the wetness at his tip to slick the way. He’d always been so easily aroused, but with her it was another matter entirely. With her gaze on him, he felt seconds away from orgasm, and he’d only just touched himself.

“Thank you,” he said breathlessly. “Thank you, Selina.”

The knife returned at his cheek, and the scritch scritch scritch resumed. Gale pumped his cock to the beat of it, uneven and curt. His teeth dug into his lips to contain his own noises and spare him more humiliation—not that he wouldn’t enjoy it.

“Mystra… Did she order you around?” asked Selina. Her voice was so calm, her hands so steady. The only sign that any of it was affecting her at all were her eyes—they were wild, dark stone more than bright silver.

“One does not— not order a goddess around,” Gale replied, words punctuated with an errant moan. His free hand curled around the edge of his seat as he worked himself closer to pure bliss. “But n—not like this. She… It was… equal.”

“I doubt that,” she murmured. She dipped the knife in the water again and then left it there. “You love to make people happy. You love to help. Mystra must have known how to properly take care of someone like you?”

Someone like you. Selina’s words made him sound like a thing, something helpless. It pulled another moan from his throat, and his cock pulsed in his hand as he staggered nearer the edge. He squeezed himself, the hard length drenched in precum.

“I— I took care of her. It— Not much… for me,” he stuttered. His eyes squeezed shut and he tucked his chin to his chest. 

Only then did he realise that she was done, that he was no longer beared if. In fact, he was clean shaven. He hadn’t been clean shaven in years. He lifted his gaze to hers and stared at her—expectant.

“Pretty,” she mumbled, fingers turning to steel on his jaw, keeping him in place. “No, not really. You’re far too rough to be pretty. Astarion was pretty. You’re…” she tilted her head, studying him. “You’re handsome. A real man, hm? Those broad shoulders and that hairy chest, that voice… Yet, this is where you’re happiest, isn’t it?”

“I’m happiest where you tell me to be happiest,” he told her earnestly. “I’m happiest with you.”

She smiled again. “Come for me, Gale Dekarios.”

He did. It was fast and sudden and all encompassing, and Gale almost fell off the stool from the force of it. He cried out as pleasure ripped through him, sending ropes of pearly white across his chest. Her hold on his face gentled, and she sighed contently as he trembled through his orgasm.

“Selina,” he pleaded, letting go of himself. “Selina.”

“Gale,” she replied. “Know you’ve made it all so much harder. I don’t know how long I can restrain myself now that I know the face you make when you come.” Her hand carded through his hair—kind, loving. He melted into it, leaning into her hold as lethargy took a hold of him. “My helpful, kind wizard.”

He grabbed onto her wrist and whimpered. “Selina.”

Selina only hushed him gently and hoisted him onto unsteady legs with a surprising strength. “Let’s wash you, alright? You did so well. So good for me.”

Two steps in the direction of the door, he collapsed onto his knees. She staggered as he fell, but remained steady. She was always steady. His own precious deity, his own goddess. Mystra, the weave, Selûne all paled in Selina’s radiant light. He clung to the fabric of her clothes, his mind somewhere far away. The Crown of Karsus—he’d never deserved it. Him, a God? What a pathetic being he’d make. He should have given it to Selina instead. 

But the thought made him pause, made him ease his grip on her and cleared his mind.

He was Gale of Waterdeep, he was a professor at Blackstaff Academy. He was Mystra’s chosen. Once, he’d been a man of great ambition. Sure, it had only led to impending doom—in the form of an orb and appetite for magic that could have killed everyone near him, Selina included—but ambition nonetheless. 

How was it that that same man was happy on his knees, happy to serve a woman who didn’t—or couldn’t? Wouldn’t?—love him.

It didn’t matter. 

He would have plenty of time to find that man again. 

First, he had to save Selina from herself. From the grief that still licked at her wounds.