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It’s hard to be mad at Gale.
Not due to anything the man does, really. Not on purpose, at least. If Gale simply tried to guilt him into not being mad then Astarion could handle that. He could get even madder about it, actually. But guilt gnaws at him, and he can’t even be mad properly. Mainly because the wizard infuriatingly takes everything to heart. He’ll look down with those big wet eyes of his, his entire body shrinking in on itself, and then he’ll go sit somewhere else where he thinks he won’t annoy you. And then. Then he keeps staring at you and circling, like he doesn’t know if he’s allowed to be there any more.
Gods, he’s not even sure he’s mad anymore. Or, no, he is, but even trying to glare at Gale makes the other man look so sad and pathetic that it’s not worth it.
It’s not like Gale did something horrible! He just made Astarion’s last meal a bit… crispier than preferred. He’d had the duergar up close, seconds away from being drained dry, when Gale decided that what he really needed was for someone to shoot a firebolt at him. Yes, he did yell at him about it, but only a little. Maybe five sentences. Then he stopped , because Gale looked like he was about to cry .
He was pissy about it, yes, because the fauna of the underdark was quite unappetizing, but the man is acting like he killed his favorite pet or something! Puttering around at the edges and trying to intercept all of the camp chores the party tries to make him do as if he can work his way out of having done anything.
If the wizard had made a display of it, loudly proclaiming that he’d take on Astarion’s chores, maybe he would have been more okay with it. He’s not not shallow and utilitarian. He can appreciate a good bit of groveling. But he’s not. He’s taking on the chores as quietly as possible and just… doing them. Leaving Astarion to pick up a basket of somehow already clean and folded laundry, dishes already done when he picks them up to take to the stream nearby, and, both endearingly and infuriatingly, entering his tent to find all of his belongings spotless and neatly arranged like someone had sicced a maid on them.
It’s blatant manipulation, only, Gale is actively avoiding acknowledging that he’s done it.
Any time he does talk to Astarion, he has this warbling quality to his voice, words soft almost like he can only barely bring himself to speak, and it’s infuriating. Any sharp movement or even slight raising of his voice makes the man flinch, shrinking in on himself like he’s expecting to be hit.
It would have been so much easier if Gale could have just yelled back, if they had just traded a few sharp words and then been over it, Astarion stalking off to find someone else to bite, the wizard promising to be a bit more mindful with his incinerations, no further drama necessary. Don’t get him wrong, Astarion does love his drama, but that’s not what this is. This is melodrama , and he can’t stand it.
The others are noticing as well, even as unobservant as most of them are. There is an eerie silence descending over camp without the wizards incessant talking. He doesn’t miss it. He doesn’t . It just feels empty without it. As if the air itself is shrinking away from him. Or pushing in on him. He can’t quite decide. It feels bad is what he’s trying to get at, and he’d really like for it to stop.
The man of the hour is sitting in his usual spot by the campfire, working on the stew that the others are going to have for dinner. His brow is creased in what looks like concentration, but from where Astarion is standing he can’t imagine what there is in the soup pot that could require that level of focus. Next to him Karlach and Wyll are having an attempt at an animated conversation, but they keep trailing off, glancing over at Gale as if expecting him to join in. Usually he would, no conversation safe from the opinions of their resident wizard, but now he simply shuffles closer to the stew, staring intently at the way it moves as he stirs it.
As one both Karlach and Wyll turn to stare at him, clearly asking him to fix this . And it’s not that he doesn’t want to, he just has no idea how to . People are supposed to get up in his face and scream, to rage and scream and call him names, not cower like kicked dogs waiting for their master to put them down.
With that though something clicks in his head. Gale is expecting to be punished. He has done something wrong, and now he is scrambling to do enough things right that he won’t get too hurt. It’s an uncomfortably familiar experience, years of serving a master who delighted in hurting him and his sibling leaving him more equipped than anyone else at camp to see what is happening. The image his brain conjures up of Gale under Cazador’s whip turns his stomach, something dark and cloying unfurling in his chest.
But why does Gale expect that from him? Who did that to Gale before this ?
You don’t develop those habits overnight, especially not in ways that stick around after the fact like this. He’d almost assume that there was someone at camp causing this, if it wasn’t for the fact that he would have noticed. Those sorts of relationships are loud. They take up space even when they’re not the focus, dragging along behind someone like a ball and chain, unignorable.
It can’t be any of them, because out of all of them Gale spends the most time with Astarion, and no master instilling this much dread in someone would leave them to occupy their time elsewhere. Gale talks positively of his childhood, extolling the virtues of his mother and her patience with him, how she was an angel, how Tara has been his best friend for years, how she has helped him grow.
The lack of a mention almost brings him to suspect a father of this. Some unnamed and unfeatured patriarch who didn’t tolerate such a rambunctious child. Someone who tried to douse the flame of curiosity, tried to snuff out the sparkle of Gale in that young boy. A suffocating presence his whole childhood, lingering in the shadows long past his majority. A firm hand that choked out all the bite and backtalk he has grown so used to from the mage. It fits, almost, but not quite. The stories of Gale’s childhood don’t have any holes that this supposed father could fit into, there is no clean click of a puzzle piece slotting into place, only a vague suspicion, and a poorly founded one at that. From the stories of her he’s heard, Gale’s mother would not stand idly by if someone mistreated her son, her spouse or no. Whoever this was, they were outside her sphere of influence.
The answer seems so clear the moment he stumbles upon it that he nearly smacks himself for not noticing. Someone with power over Gale whose shadow lingers over everything the man does. Someone outside the influence of both his mother and his tressym. Someone who could treat him any way they wanted with no fear of repercussion, someone who Gale could, would, had to dedicate his entire life to.
Mystra.
The earring the man wears is no ball and chain, but it may as well be. In this new light, it looks more like the tags put on cattle than anything else. A symbol of ownership. An eternal reminder to the man she cast out for trying to please her, but doing it wrong. For making a mistake.
The man who is currently doing his best to make up for his mistake towards Astarion.
It’s uncomfortable, having it directed at him. Knowing that this was what Cazador saw, that his pain and fear had been just as clear, maybe even clearer. Knowing that Gale expects that same treatment from him. That, had he ever gotten the chance, he would have gladly usurped Cazador. Taken his place. Had all that fear directed at him. He would have relished in it, in the power, in finally being the one in charge. Now the thought just makes him feel ill. Gale is the closest thing to a friend he can remember having, someone who has looked at him and seen something more than his body, than his fangs. Maybe the only person currently in the world who cares about him. He can’t lose that, not now, not to this.
It’s with nausea brewing in his stomach, psychosomatic in a way that can only be this clear in a body that doesn’t perform its functions any more, that he finally approaches the other man. He doesn’t look up from the stewpot, but his entire body goes eerily still. The only sound he can hear from him is his racing heartbeat, his lungs as frozen solid as the rest of him.
“We need to talk.”
Even when he expects it, Gale’s flinch hurts something inside his chest, where his heart should be. His breathing kicks in, a reedy sound, and he nods sharply before standing. The short walk to Astarion’s tent, because he is not having this conversation in public, thank you very much, has the aura of a man to the gallows.
The inside of his tent is cramped, not set up for two people to inhabit at once, at least not while standing. It’s clean, at least, due to Gale’s earlier ministrations, something he’d almost forgotten in the whirlwind that revelation set loose in his head. He sits on his lone stool, used more as a table than for sitting, and looks at his wizard.
He’s standing just inside the tent flap, eyes locked on the ground, and he has never seen the man this tense. Not even in the middle of battle does he carry this much tension, flowing fluidly between spells like a dancer, negotiations to keep their lives has the man alive with energy, almost radiant, so far into his element that he’s almost ethereal. This stiff quiet man in front of him isn’t Gale. He’s just a shell.
“Gale? Could you look at me?” He’s making his voice as gentle as possible without falling into the cadence he’d use for a seduction. Gale would know it was fake. He always knows.
It’s a glacial slide of Gale’s eyes up to meet his, fear and resignation painting his face in equal measure. The simile of a kicked dog feels more appropriate than ever, bracing for a hit you know is coming, at some point, but that you don’t fully understand the reason behind. His tongue darts out to wet his lips, and his voice is just a croak as he speaks. “I’m sorry.”
“You’ve already apologized. You don’t need to do it again. You’re forgiven.” It’s counter to everything he knows, to everything he is , to forgive and forget, but he can think of no other way to fix this. None of the tension leaves Gale’s body though, still just a wire-taught, the resignation on his face folding away to make space for confusion.
“But I’ve- I haven’t fixed it?”
“And you don’t need to. It was not a deliberate act of sabotage, it was an accident .” He pulls at the empty space in his chest, hoping for something of what he’s genuinely feeling to show on his face, something to show Gale that he’s serious. Not for the first time he wishes that the wizard was more easily fooled by his mask, by the act he puts on, if only so he could make him believe him now.
“I still did it. Me not thinking ahead is not a reason to forgive me, it would rather be another point against me.” The almost inhuman stillness is bleeding out of him, bit by bit, and both his hands latch onto the hem of his shirt, worrying at the soft fabric. “I know I haven’t made up for it yet.” His entire being is so heavily laced with shame that Astarion is surprised he can’t taste it in the air.
Even so, Gale’s words take a moment to process, the thought of the other man arguing against himself so foreign that it wasn’t even in the picture. Why it would occur to him to do so. Was this a game Mystra had played with him? Playing at forgiveness only to take it away? Forcing the wizard to hold fast to his perceived slight, to beg for the opportunity to make up for it? “You don’t have to.”
They look at each other in silence for a few seconds, neither of them speaking, neither of them breathing, before Gale drops his head, hands flattening down the sides of his legs. The air whistles painfully in his throat when he finally draws breath. “What can I do to make it right?” His voice is desperate now, as if the prospect of not fixing this is the worst thing imaginable, as if he’d do anything to make it better.
Had Astarion had this interaction earlier, a few days ago, an hour ago even, he would have used that desperation. Gale would be on his back, fangs in his neck, a meal for a meal. He would walk out feeling satisfied, accomplished even, and Gale would leave knowing that his fear was justified. Looking at him now, even the thought makes his stomach turn. He refuses to be like Cazador, to use people like that. To use Gale like that. Like she did.
He’s on his feet before he can think it through, hands coming up to grasp Gale’s face, only hesitating for a moment at the other man’s flinch. The beard is coarse beneath his palms, the skin cold and clammy, and it barely takes more than a nudge to tip Gale’s head up, to force back eye contact. “You do not owe me anything. My forgiveness is not conditional. All these things that you have done for me have not been necessary. They will never be necessary. You are forgiven. ”
The hitch in Gale’s breath in response sounds painful, something sharp catching in his throat as his eyes dart across Astarion’s face. It feels like an age that they stand there, Gale searching him for any falsehood, any lie, and Astarion pulling up all the raw and painful things that have made their home between his lungs. Whatever Gale is looking for, he must find it, because his entire body shudders in relief, tension bleeding out of him as if liquid from a burst waterskin, leaving him limp and empty in its wake.
One of Gale’s hands comes up to cup Astarion’s, the other clutching at the front of his shirt, and this time when Gale’s head tips forwards it’s with a sob. Just like everything Gale has done since their fight, his crying is unnervingly quiet. His breath hitches just slightly with each breath, but after the first one there are no more sobs, no sniffling, only painful sounding breathing and tears. “I’m sorry,” he chokes out between almost-sobs, “You shouldn’t have to deal with this.”
The hand not underneath Gale’s slips around the back of his neck, pulling his head down onto his shoulder. “You would do the same for me.”
Gale huffs out a laugh against his shoulder, the hand in his shirt tightening. “Thank you, though I can’t imagine you would ever require this.”
It’s with a sigh that he speaks, letting his fingers trail up into the hair at the nape of Gale’s neck. “It’s closer than you’d believe.” He doesn’t elaborate, and Gale doesn’t ask, only sinking further into him, steadying himself against the vampire’s chest.
They stay like that as Gale’s breathing calms, hitched breaths slowly evening out, Astarion’s fingertips rubbing circles into his neck. Neither of them pull away until much later, when a yawn cracks Gale’s jaw and his blinks slow down with exhaustion. Then, Gale gently extricates himself, a soft smile on his lips despite his still red rimmed eyes, and bids him a good night. He echoes the sentiment back to him, watching him leave the tent with none of the tension he had had when entering, and as the tent flap closes behind him it almost feels like some of Gale’s body heat is still lodged in his chest, sitting pretty between his lungs, pulsing with something that he has no desire to examine closer at the moment.
Doing it this way might have lost him the power he had over Gale, but for the life of him he can’t regret it.