Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Please,” the voice pleaded for all Elara cared. Standing before her, Enver Gortash’s dark eyes were focused not on the bloodied scene before them but her. 

“Do you believe me now?” Elara asked, head cocked to the side. 

Gortash took a step forward, gloved hand stroking her cheek. “Yes,” he breathed. If Elara wanted, they could bathe in the beautiful visage before her. She didn’t, though—not yet. She had other things she needed to do, boxes to check off before she indulged in her lesser urges. Turning, Elain’s dagger sailed through the air, slicing into the tender, unprotected flesh of that last, living victim.

The symphony of bloody death filled Elara’s chest like warm sunlight. Oh, the urges sang, that’s beautiful.

Another, softer part of her balked—guilt tried to claw its way up her spine where it could better sit in her throat. Once, Elara would have sobbed herself hoarse after such a scene, but now…now she didn’t care. Guilt was a useless, soft emotion.

She was the spawn of Bhaal—his favorite daughter, his only Chosen. Standing behind her was the Chosen of Bane. Like her, he was young and he was hungry, desperate to prove himself. Unlike her, he thought this alliance would result in power and tyranny when Elara knew the truth: any union between her Dread Lord father and Bane would end in ruin and death.

Liking him was immaterial, truly. And yet…

“Find me tonight,” Gortash urged, fingers wrapping around his wrist. “Do not keep me waiting.”

It was a game between them. Whatever order he issued, she was to break. Then he’d do his very best to punish her, soliciting power even when they were undressed in the dark together. 

Elara merely nodded, slipping from his grasp to half-vanish into shadow. With a few soft whispers, Elara was invisible to anyone looking, her magic blotting away her feelings. 

Magic had always been there. Before she’d known the truth of her heritage and had merely thought there was something very, very wrong with her, magic had been a friend. There was no morality to it, just the ever present feeling of rightness. No where else did Elara feel that—not even when she gave in to her murderous impulses. 

Tonight, though, Elara could be nothing but the Unholy Assassin. The Slayer. The Spawn. The prodigal daughter who informed her father on things happening before her butler Scelaritas could. Elara made her way through still congested streets, weaving in and out of crowds unaware she was among them. That was how Elara preferred it. The city would rally around itself should they ever learn a Bhaalspawn terrorized their streets.

And she’d had eighteen years worth of experience trying to control her urges. Not everyone needed to be a victim, not every night needed to result in a bloodbath. She’d already killed more than enough, all in Bhaals name, to satisfy Gortash’s desire to know once and for all what she was capable of. His unwillingness to obey his Lord would be his downfall…and she would miss him when he inevitably died.

He was the only real friend she’d had in years. Maybe ever, truly. 

Elara shook the thought from her head, pushing bloodstained, blonde hair from her face. She looked like any other moderately pretty woman roaming the streets. Not so beautiful she stopped and turned heads but not so unattractive she couldn’t charm her way through a door if she needed to. Elara glanced down at her hands, unhidden and cut from slippery blood and her excitement holding her blade—she’d sliced open her own fingers more than once. If she could have seen her face, she’d have caught the trio of slashes marred against the tan skin of her neck.

Life as a Bhaalspawn was a violent one. That encounter had nearly cost her her life—and Elara wore those scars the way fine ladies wore pearls around their necks. 

Sighing, Elara’s boots splashed into fetid water. She recognized cultists toying with a refugee on rotting docks, though she ignored all of it even when they nodded their heads in deference to her. It was as things should be, even if it still made her uneasy.

She’d been just a girl, once. An ordinary person with parents, with a life that belonged only to her. Now…Elara shook her head. She ought to be grateful there was anything greater waiting for her at all. That her murderous urge served a purpose rather than just betrayed someone deeply sick. 

The temple always felt like a welcome reprieve from the world at large and her own thoughts. There was no room for weakness among the Bhaalian horde and Elara knew better than to let them suspect she had doubts or any fears at all.

Especially when Orin was swanning around. Elara could hear her voice echoing from the high stone, mingled among the screams of ecstasy and pain. There was no point seeking Orin out—not unless she wanted a fight—and Elara had other needs, besides. Ignoring those who looked, she made her way down steep, stone steps to a throne she’d spent the last six years seated upon.

If her sister had her way, there would not be another six years. 

It was tempting to demand everyone leave the room so she could be alone, and something delicious about knowing she had a direct line to Bhaal the rest of them wished they did. Let them see her—she didn’t care. With a deep breath, Elara closed her eyes and called upon the urges in her blood.

When she opened her eyes, only bloodstained darkness remained. There, standing in a pool of red liquid, was her god father peering back at her with bright eyes.

“Elara,” he began, his voice rough and jagged. “I trust the Bannite understands our position?”
Elara rolled her neck. “I showed him who he was dealing with. Whether he respects that or not, well…”

A dark chuckle filled the silence. “And what of what he told you?”

Elara drummed her fingers on the stone throne. “He claims the Crown of Karsus exists and is being held in a vault in the hells.”

“Do you trust him?”

“No,” she admitted, daring to look her father in the eyes. “With your permission, I would travel to the ruins of Netheril and see for myself.”

There was a pause as the Lord of Murder considered this. Elara dropped her gaze into the abyss beneath her feet, ever deferential to the orders given to her. Whatever he decided, she’d do—just as she always had. 

“Go,” he finally said, steps whispering against a floor she could not see. “Determine the truth of the Bannite’s word. If he’s telling the truth, I want you to lead the raid and it will be you who crowns the brain.”

“Yes, father,” Elara promised, heart thudding in her chest.

“He cannot know we do not intend to share power. Do you understand?”

Elara nodded her head. “I do.”

Electricity charged through the air, betraying something unsaid by her father. Something he was holding back, information that would be helpful if he wanted her to know it. That was the thing about being the Chosen of Bhaal—he loved his little tests. It was all a game, throwing her before murderous lunatics to see how she fared. If she could survive, if she could slaughter in the way he wished for her to. 

Whatever obstacles he knew were waiting, Elara would best them just as she always had. Still, it would have been nice to have a warning, even if he wouldn’t tell her the whens and hows. She knew better than to press, well aware that the only thing he liked more than obedience was punishing her brutally. It mattered not whose blood was made in offering—and if her death was offered up to him, he’d take it greedily, without complaint.

There would always be another spawn, after all. Someone better, someone who wouldn’t disappoint Bhaal the way so many others had. Gorions Ward…Elara shook the thought from her head as the world began to clear, bringing bright candlelight to her vision. She’d heard of Gorion’s Ward, of course—who in Baldur’s Gate hadn’t? They were a hero to everyone but Bhaal, and to her that story wasn’t about personal triumph but tragedy. 

He’d forsaken his own bloodline, burning away the darkness with light. 

Elara stretched out her neck again, wondering how long she’d been sitting there. Surely not more than a few moments? It felt like she’d been there for days. Elara didn’t look at anyone— not even Orin, who stood at the top of the steps, framed by that stone cut face just behind. 

“What was that about?” she demanded, falling into step with Elara the moment she reached the top.

“Ask our Lord yourself,” Elara snapped, reminding Orin of her place. Orin thought being the granddaughter of the failure Sarevok meant something—but it was a stain on her line, on herself. Orin was too obsessed with beauty, besides, to ever be an effective Chosen, and impulsive to a fault. Elara had tried with her—she truly had. Orin was simply unteachable. 

Orin stalked off, shrieking about the unfairness of it all. One day, Elara would have to kill her. Did Orin know it, she wondered? Was she prepared for the inevitable showdown between them? Elara wasn’t. If she was honest with herself, she might have admitted that she’d let Orin live simply so there was someone to carry on if she ever managed to leave. 

A back-up plan she would come to regret, certainly. 

Elara didn’t bother spending the night in her chambers, nor did she spend another moment in the temple. It felt like a dream, descending upward into the city. She could hear the soft sounds of lovers murmuring and drunks stumbling, the sound of music from nearby taverns welcoming folks in for a meal and a drink.

She had an apartment above one of them—a space she kept simply for herself when she needed a reprieve from it all. When the lust for blood overwhelmed her and some of the light came flooding back in. Her father had been a cleric for Lathander before…before. Elara had never felt his divine presence personally and suspected the Morninglord had never had much use for her. And yet…and yet when she was drenched in blood and delighting in the death she’d wrought, she swore she felt his fingertips brush against her brow.

Maybe that was merely the memory of her pretend father. 

She felt it, though, passing by a familiar street of modest homes. Don’t look, don’t look, don’t look—

“All is ash and meat,” she whispered to herself, head turning of its own accord. Among the neat rows of homes lay an empty lot, still untouched all these years later. The grass was neatly kept, with dotting yellow and white flowers swaying in the moonlight. The home had burned to the ground, killing the family inside. Elara still had the paper from that day, noting the three inside and the corpses so badly charred that they’d been otherwise unidentifiable. 

Her heart ached at the memory, one she refused to truly examine. If she did, the guilt might consume her and who knew what she’d do, then? Elara kept walking, turning her eyes back toward the streets in front of her. If she kept walking, she’d end up in the Upper City where Gortash resided—and in his bed, which was where he wanted her.

But tonight Elara wasn’t interested in games of pretend. Turning abruptly, she made her way toward the cemetery and a familiar grave.

“You’re an asshole,” she whispered, picking the lock that would let her into the tomb. She and Gorion’s Ward were related, after all—they had the same sire. She ought to have the right to rob him of his gold whenever she felt like it.

Of course, she could have just plundered the temple, but Elara wanted to look at that carved, attractive face and offer them her middle finger. As if the once Bhaalspawn cared about her at all. It was just… “How did you do it?” she wondered once the heavy door of the tomb slammed shut behind her. 

How did someone defy a god? Why, too? Elara wandered the musty, dark space until she couldn’t stand it. Only then did she snap her fingers, willing the candles to ignite under the command of her magic. 

“I can do better than you,” she told that statue, staring upward like a defiant child. “I can succeed where you failed.”

Then why are you here, child of Bhaal? A voice whispered in her mind, caressing her thoughts.

“I don’t know,” she admitted out loud, sitting on a bench across from the statue. “I wanted you to know that I hated you.”

If you say so, she swore that voice replied, their words laced with humor. I trust you’ll follow the right path.

“Well, you shouldn’t,” she said snappishly, though Elara didn’t bother getting up. She felt peace…and warmth. Looking upward at the ceiling, Elara flashed that middle finger at the watching god. “I don’t belong to you.”

She swore she heard an answering laugh before a softly whispered, we’ll see. 

GALE:

Baldur’s Gate was as foul as any city Gale Dekarios had ever stepped in. It was certainly no Waterdeep, at any rate, with its trash strewn streets and drunks stumbling about. He’d never had any interest in seeing Baldur’s Gate, and yet…

Gale sighed, rubbing at his chest. He intended to sleep for a night and continue his journey deep into the surrounding forest where, ideally, no one would be harmed when he finally let go. It had been months of trying to keep his arcane hunger under control, but he’d only become more ravenous which meant he was more of a danger than he’d ever been.

And Mystra was silent. 

He’d hoped Sorcerer's Sundries would have something that could help him, but that had been a fools errand. There was nothing—no wizard had ever absorbed Netherese magic and therefore hadn’t thought to write down what might come of it. He had left behind a journal, hoping it might be helpful to the next mage who came after him, though for all he knew it would be published among the comedic drawings for all to laugh at. 

Sighing again, Gale intended to continue toward The Elfsong Tavern when something caught his eye. A flash of red in the otherwise inky dark, making its way up a wall. Gale looked, surprised to find a young woman walking along the top of a watchtower, peering down at the streets below. She raised a foot and too late, Gale realized she was going to jump. 

With a quick, whispered spell, Gale leapt from the ground, flying upward just in time to slam his body roughly against her own. A muffled scream of surprise shattered the otherwise peaceful silence as the pair hit the hard ground in a tangle of limbs.

“Don’t jump,” he said, heart pounding in his throat. “You have so much to live for.”

“Get off me!” she demanded, shoving at his chest. Gale rolled over, one hand resting above the now silent orb hidden beneath his wizard's robes. Beside him, the woman he’d seen brushed herself off as she scrambled to her feet. In the torchlight, Gale saw a wicked scar streaked over moonbright green eyes. How had she gotten that, he wondered? 

Behind her, a rather well-made staff loomed over one shoulder, marking her as some kind of user of the weave. Another wizard, he wondered? She didn’t look like a druid…perhaps a Warlock? Gale’s fingertips crackled with magic, drinking in her own connection with the Weave. 

“What is wrong with you, wizard?” she snarled, facing him down. Despite her smaller frame, she looked lethal, her face devoid of any of the warmth he might suspect. 

“You were going to jump,” Gale said as he realized she was merely another arrogant sorceress. 

“Oh, for Ao’s sake,” she muttered, running a hand through messy braided blonde hair. “I was not about to jump. Not to my death, anyway.”

Of course not. She would have used a spell to keep her from splattering to her death and still…and still Gale couldn’t get death out of his thoughts. It was stalking him even now, hovering just behind as he marched toward his own. 

“My apologies,” he replied, offering her a slight bow. “Are you injured?”

She scoffed, running her hands over the tightly made leather wrapped around her body. “I’m fine.”

“Well—no harm done then, I suppose. I’ll take my leave.”

That should have been the end of his encounter. Whoever that woman was clearly had no interest in conversation and truthfully Gale had other places he needed to be. This was merely another embarrassment he could add to a long list as he consoled himself that it would soon be forgotten. No one would remember Gale of Waterdeep. Not fondly or with distaste, either. Perhaps they’d wonder and turn him into a cautionary tale, but that would be the extent of things. And this woman would never know what happened to the bumbling stranger who’d mistaken her for a jumper. 

Gale started to turn as warm, callused fingers reached for his wrist. “Don’t move,” she whispered, pulling him into the shadows. The pair ducked behind a rack of weapons as the sorceress whispered the familiar words to an invisibility spell. Gale turned his attention toward the walkway, where a group of three prowled. Something about them was off, he decided. They were decidedly unwashed and exceptionally pale, and as they got closer they dragged the smell of death with them.

Both he and the strange woman buried their faces in the sleeve of their clothes. He couldn’t make out the words they whispered among them, nor did he recognize the symbol emblazoned on one of their cloaks. 

“C’mon,” she whispered, tugging at his sleeve. “This way.”

Gale followed behind her, making his way toward a wooden door. She all but shoved him through and he expected her to slam the door in his face, leaving him to make his way down the stairs alone.

“Go,” she ordered, the only sign of her the continued touch of her fingers. “Quickly.”

Gale did as he was told, curious as to why she hadn’t just left him there. “Who are they?”

“Disciples of Myrkul,” she replied, her feet silent as death behind him. “Couldn’t you tell by the smell?”

“I don’t make it a habit to cavort among the Death Three,” Gale replied with some indignation. He heard her snort of amusement, which begged the question, “How do you know what the Disciples of Myrkul look like?”

“Well, the insignia’s on their broaches clued me in,” she said, her amusement bright. Once they were back on the street, he waved his hand revealing them both beneath silvery moonlight. “But they always look like living corpses.” 

“Perhaps they are,” Gale suggested as he shook out his hands. 

“Sometimes,” she agreed, eyeing him with suspicion. “Better to avoid them than to end up shambling behind them as a mindless slave.”

“I’m tempted to ask how you know so much,” Gale said, wondering who, exactly, she was. 

“Oh, I’m Myrkul’s most devoted follower,” she replied, eyes bright as though she’d made the funniest joke. “And you’ll make a fine addition to my corpse collection.”

“I wouldn’t recommend it,” Gale told her, thinking of the orb in his chest. “My blood is filled with necrotic magic.”

Interest ignited against her expression. “How did that come about?”

“It's a story for another time and another person,” he informed her. “I apologize for assaulting you, but now I think I ought to be going.”

She waved him off, though none of the interest in her expression faded. “If you say so, wizard.”

“I’m Gale. Gale of Waterdeep,” he replied, unsure why it felt important to say so. She sized him up and he had the sense that if she’d wanted, she could have laid him flat on his back. Perhaps those scars were a warning rather than true injury. And maybe Gale didn’t want to know how she’d gotten them. 

The sorceress offered him a warm hand. “Elara…of Baldur’s Gate, I guess.”

The magic between them met, tangling in shades of blue and red. He swore he saw the faintest spot of violet meet where their fingers touched, though when he looked back at her, she betrayed no recognition she’d seen it at all. 

“Enjoy your time in the city,” she offered, taking her hand back and turning toward the shadows. “Try not to assault any more strangers while you’re here. There are murders stalking our streets, you know.”

A soft chuckle punctuated her words. Was she thinking of the Myrkul-ites they’d nearly strolled right into? It was tempting to chase her down and ask…and to what purpose? He was on a suicide mission now and didn’t need anything or anyone to convince him otherwise. Gale let her go, turning once again for the road that would take him to the Elfsong Tavern and by the time he arrived, she’d been purged from his worried thoughts. 

He slept terribly, his dreams a vision of bright, burning light and the screams of innocents. He had to bathe away the sweat adorning his body, wishing the sunlight would dissipate. The world was altogether too cheerful about his impending death march. Sure, Tara and his mother would miss him…but could the rest of the world pretend like losing his life was a great loss, too? 

At least he’d leave Baldur’s Gate behind him. Gale had the grand idea to take himself to the ruined city of Netheril where all this had begun—that bit of Netherese magic was the cause of all his pain. Why not return it to its birthplace? It was strangely poetic and perhaps a deserving resting place to someone like himself. 

He needed to take a ship back up the Sword Coast and make his way into the High Forest and then just hope he made it to the Dire Wood before the orb got the best of him. Gale felt heavy, plodding toward the docks without observing the world around him. In Waterdeep, he could ignore his surroundings, but in Baldur’s Gate criminals were apparently undeterred by large crowds or sunlight which might easily identify them.

Gale must have been an easy and obvious mark. He felt the dagger against his throat as his body was shoved between two buildings, obscuring the pair of them from the busy populace.

“Turn out your pockets,” the dirty criminal ordered, eyes darting back and forth.

“You really don’t want to do this,” Gale warned, unwilling to give up the gold he’d brought for the journey. He’d be trapped in Baldur’s Gate, unable to even return to his tower where Tara almost certainly would have found his letter. She’d tell his mother and the pair would endeavor to keep Gale within their sight indefinitely, thwarting his careful plans. 

“Turn them—”

Blood sprayed Gale in the face, hitting his tongue before he could close his mouth. The assailant's eyes bugged with fear, his own mouth gaping wordlessly. Gale peered around the man where Elara stood, grinning ear to ear as she wiped her curved, lethal looking blade against the bottom of her boot.

“You make a habit of getting into trouble, wizard?” she questioned, ignoring the would-be attacker falling to his knees as he clawed at his throat. 

“I suppose there’s no harm as long as you’re around to assist me,” Gale replied, a little shaken by how casual she was. 

“Don’t they teach you self defense in those fancy schools of yours?” she asked, stepping back into the sunlight. She was pretty, he decided—not so beautiful it stole his breath, but not so ugly he would have to have lied if she’d asked if he found her attractive. Lovely, he thought, in spite of the blood flecked against her skin like freckles and that vicious scar carved against her eye. He spied a trio of them slashed over her throat, too and once again wondered what happened to her.

It wasn’t his place to ask. 

“Not with weapons,” Gale replied, looking for the dagger she’d hidden. Despite the warmth, she wore a red and silver robe half hidden beneath a onyx cloak collapsed at her throat with a matching, gleaming red gem inlaid in a silver setting. “Where’d you learn that?”

“On the streets,” she replied flippantly, eyes cutting to the now dead body between them. “Magic can’t fix everything.”

“Only a sorcerer would think so,” Gale shot back, strangely at ease with this stranger. 

“Dare I ask where you’re going so early?” she questioned, falling into step beside him. 

“The docks—”

“Well obviously,” she replied, ducking into a seedy looking tavern. Gale followed, realizing only when they were inside she was showing him a bathing room where he could wipe up his face. Outside the wooden door, she added, “Where are you traveling to?”

“The High Forest,” he replied, keeping the finer details to himself. He could be doing a million, magical things—no need to mention the ruined city of Karse to her.

There was a pause, and then, “So am I.”

He didn’t know what made him say it. Why he offered, knowing he was going to die. Perhaps it was his fear that caused him to reach for the one bloodied hand that had been offered to him. Maybe it was something divine guiding him. All Gale knew was he didn’t have full control of his mouth when he blurted out, “We should travel together.”

There was an uneasy pause between them, causing him to add, “For safety, of course.”

She was quiet for so long that Gale assumed she’d left him there and he was merely speaking to the door. He wiped up his face, noting he looked haggard in the dirty mirror. Haggard, even. Like a man who hadn’t had a good night's sleep in months. He wore too much in his expression, his heartbreak obvious even when he wished it wasn’t. 

Gale opened the door, legs heavy, to find her still standing there. She’d pulled her thick, blonde hair into twin plaits that laid neatly against slim shoulders and her face was somehow clean despite him occupying the only bathing space he was aware of.

“I suppose it wouldn’t hurt,” she told him once he stood before her. “But once we reach the forest, we go our separate ways.”

She hadn’t asked what he was doing, and Gale decided to offer her the same courtesy. Maybe he was better off not knowing what this woman was up to, given the ease with which she cut throats. 

Still, her acceptance settled some of the ever-present anxiety weighing him down. He felt lighter, knowing he wouldn’t have to march to his death entirely alone. And who knew—maybe she’d mourn him, when he was gone. Perhaps she’d think back on him fondly.

He’d take it.

Chapter Text

Left to her own devices for one day, Elara had already picked up a stray. Gale of Waterdeep had a cat-like quality to him, if said cat was rain soaked and pathetic. She should have told him no—but she hadn’t wanted to. If he was going to the same place she was, inevitably they’d meet on the road again. She could have killed him, of course, and yet when she’d looked at him the night before, the killing urge had been quiet. That was unusual, especially as of late when the Urge seemed an ever present demand, humming in her throat as it demanded more and more. It took an impossible amount of blood and flesh to satiate it, and one day Elara knew it would consume her entirely and she would be nothing more than a killing machine.

She’d long wanted to go to Candlekeep outside the city where she’d heard whispers of tomes that held the truth of Bhaals spawn. Their tragically short lives, for one, were of great interest to her. She was twenty seven, already older than most—though not all. The relic Saravok still existed, pathetic as he was. She’d faced the Murder Tribunal with her sister Orin and succeeded where Orin had failed with a great twisting in her gut while she sliced her way through the city and killed an innocent chained up in Saravoks keep. 

It had been after, when Orin screamed off, furious that she’d been bested by an outsider, that Sarevok had told her about the Second Sundering and how the spawn had come to be. Seated beside the hulking giant, he’d explained that when Ao had cast the gods out of the Outer Planes, Bhaal had known he would not survive long. Death meant the end for a god, and given his own questionable status in the first place, he wasn’t likely to be reborn the way Mystra had been. Ao wasn’t going to step in and reappoint someone. That was why they’d been cast out in the first place. Too many gods meddling, or that's what she’d been told. Sarevok was just as uneducated as she was, and more willing to believe the divine word of Bhaal than Elara had ever been.

Bhaal’s realization he wouldn’t survive was marked with Elara imagined must have been a terrifying time for a large swath of mortal women. He’d spread his seed around, likely just taking whatever he wanted without regard to the women attached to the wombs. The result had been a plague of spawn he could draw upon, much like other gods utilized their Chosen, thus bringing him back when he did, inevitably die. Sarevok was the result of that time, as was Orin and likely others Elara wasn’t aware of.

But not her. She’d been crafted of Bhaal’s blood and whatever other materials of creation were used to make demi-gods. Not that she was lucky enough to be one, of course. All she had was his will and his blood—everything else was simply chance. She was as mortal as the next person, with a mind and will of her own. She could have resisted him—and she’d tried on more than one occasion, always to disastrous results. Rebelling a little after completing the Murder Tribunal, Elara had met a bard and taken up with him. They’d fallen in love and she’d felt the call of the Lathander again. She’d intended to marry that man in one of the Morninglords temples.

She’d killed him the night before her wedding. A gift, Scelaritas had called it. She’d gone out of her mind, unable to even warn him of what was coming, had whispered she loved him before plunging her blade into his body so many times that in the aftermath, he wasn’t recognizable. His beautiful face, his golden hair, his lovely throat…all of it ruined. She’d never tried to resist after that. 

But now, no one was here to supervise her. She’d ordered Scelaritas  to remain at home, Gorash was unaware she was checking up on him, and Bhaal wouldn’t have any interest in her comings and goings until she sacrificed another in his name. There were other things he looked to, petty dramas with the gods, likely his other children wreaking havoc, and blessing those who acted viciously and without cause. 

Standing on the deck of the ship, Elara felt free. She wasn’t, of course. The dagger hidden beneath her cloak was a reminder of what she truly was and the horrors she intended to unleash just as soon as her plan came into focus. 

Destroy the world. Ruin it. Lay waste to it all, until not a soul was left standing. 

If she did everything right, she’d succeed where every other spawn before her had failed. She’d be revered, would be the favorite of Bhaal himself. Immortalized in blood until the end of time. That was what Elara wanted and not even the wizard accompanying her could pull her from her mission. 

She was curious about him, though. What did he need in the forest? And what were the odds that this stranger who came crashing into her while she was stalking after Kethric’s little spies was going the exact same direction as her?

The gods were meddlesome and this had Lathander written all over it. 

I’ll kill him even if he’s your favorite, she thought silently toward the heavens. I’ve done it before. 

Only silence replied. Did she feel good about that response? No, she decided, given that the favorite of Lathander had been the man she believed was her father…and he’d died pleading with her to reach for the light. He’d died with words of forgiveness on his lips. Elara shook her head, chasing away the memory. She didn’t want to relive it. 

“I never tire of the sea,” Gale told her from beside her, braced against the smooth, wooden railing. Baldur’s Gate was fading in the distance. She’d forgotten about him for a moment, her thoughts back on home and her life. Elara glanced over at him, unused to having someone who wanted to speak to her. Everyone in her life either loathed her or was at least a little afraid of her that it kept them careful with their words. 

“I’ve never left,” she told him, unsure why. “This is my first time leaving home.”

“Hopefully it won’t be the last,” Gale replied, his optimism strangely infectious. There was no point in telling him it absolutely would be. Once she had the Crown of Karsus planted firmly on a baby elder brain, there would be no leaving Baldur’s Gate ever. She’d be chained to the city if her father had his way, ensuring the brain remained docile under her watchful gaze.

But that wasn’t the sort of thing you shared with a stranger. Summoning a smile she hoped made her look sunny and not deranged, Elara nodded her head. “Hopefully.”
She’d once hoped to travel. She’d had a lot of hopes, once, if she was honest about it. Now her dreams were bloodsoaked and brutal, all the softness of her former life discarded like a child’s blanket. Those weren’t the hopes of adults, or that was what she told herself, anyway.

Still, Elara remained where she was, watching the horizon until all that was left was the sea. It was only then she decided to track down Gale, who’d retreated below deck to the room he’d paid for.

The room she’d be crashing in for the next two days—Elara was quick to pull a few gold coins from the purse tied to her belt and shove them into his hands. “So I don’t owe you.”
Gale pocketed the coins without bothering to count them before sitting on the edge of the bottom bunk. Truthfully, Elara would have preferred it—closer access to intruders and escape, should she need it. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Gale to use a little magic, it was just that she assumed she was better at killing, and faster at noticing trouble. 

After all, she’d spotted that thief a mile away…and Gale hadn’t realized he was being tracked by two criminals until she’d baptized him with blood. It was tempting to ask him what was going on and Elara didn’t think she cared enough to delve into the complex emotions of the wizard before her. 

He looked like the sort that cried.

“So…tell me about Waterdeep,” she said. She was curious about the city, spoken with such reverence. 

Gale winced. “We won’t be staying.”

“No? Not even for a night?” she questioned. Elara wanted to see the famed Crown of the North and compare it to her own beloved Baldur’s Gate. 

“Trust me. The sooner we are out of Waterdeep, the better off we’ll collectively be. There is no reason to stay for the evening other than sightseeing—”

“Right, and I have never seen Waterdeep,” she interrupted, for all it mattered. Gale continued on, ignoring her entirely.

“Given how long it takes to reach The High Forest on foot, it makes no sense to tarry.”
“But it would be fun,” Elara added, holding his gaze. Gold flecks illuminated the warm brown, projecting warmth that otherwise shouldn’t exist. How strange to know so much about a person simply by looking in their eyes. 

“I shudder to think what you define as fun,” he replied.

“You know me so well already. We’re becoming firm friends, I can feel it.” Elara flashed him a smile without worrying how it looked. He was nothing and no one, and maybe that was why she didn’t have any urge to end his life. After all, it would have been so easy to simply shove him over the edge of the ship and pretend it had been an accident. She’d be able to watch him drown. The thought usually filled her with such pleasure, but right then it filled her with nothing at all.

Gale glanced over again, unconcerned with her expression, and Elara almos t asked what had happened to him. Why was he really in Baldur’s Gate and what did he want in the forest? She knew, without asking, that they were both going to the same place and right then, as the ship rocked gently back and forth, she wondered too if this was the secret Bhaal had kept from her.

Did she need to kill this man? She nearly pulled into her connection to her father to ask him, but she knew the answer—kill him, anyway. 

“There is…nothing left for me in Waterdeep,” Gale finally told her, his voice heavy with unspoken regret. “Better to not linger, if only for my sake.”

She’d told them they weren’t going all the way together. Elara still meant it. And yet… “On the way back, then. You’ll show me all the best places to eat.”

Gale didn’t meet her eyes as he said, “It’s a deal.”

Elara knew a liar when she saw one. 

He convinced her down toward their shared room, taking the bottom bunk before she could quickly claim it. She’d have to be careful not to wake him when she slipped out in the night. Eyeing the small cabin as she inhaled the stuffy air, she found a porthole just big enough to shove a body through if she put her shoulder into it…and broke or dislodged a few bones to make it fit. Everything else was wobbly and splintered, save for the uncomfortable, metal bunks. Down the hall was a communal bathroom that already smelled like piss and sweat, complete with swinging stalls that didn’t lock—likely on purpose. 

She left Gale with his book in their room, warning him that their lock didn’t work. He pointed to his plain looking staff wordlessly, silently indicating he could handle an interloper. She would like to see it—he was a wizard and technically, she a sorcerer. Elara knew very few spells and those she did, she did not wield with any talent. She was more likely to blow herself up than an enemy. She was better with her daggers, and preferred them

No one paid her any mind, likely thanks to the cloak draped around her shoulders. A little gift from her father when she’d first knelt before him and sworn unwavering loyalty—it hid her entirely from the outside world.

It was a cowardly way to kill, of course, but sometimes the needs outweighed the musts. More often, Elara used it to better help her spy. Hours spent outside Gortash’s home had helped solidify the alliance he’d proposed between them. Not that he ever needed to know it was her ability to sit still, even in the face of unspeakable boredom, that had united the pair of them rather than his famed charm.

Elara recognized a charlatan when she saw one.

Elara climbed upward with little regard for her own personal safety. It was a flaw she couldn’t quite shake, borne of the feeling that she was invincible. If she was honest with herself, Elara would have been forced to face the knowledge that Bhaal, loving as he could be, would have no qualms with her death, should it happen.

He’d merely abandon her in the Fuege Plane, destined to wander for eternity. He would only welcome her into his bloody kingdom if she succeeded. It wasn’t worth thinking about because Elara didn’t intend to fail. What was left for her if she did? She had no family, no skills…just rumbling magic that occasionally exploded out of her, and the urge to kill. And because she believed she simply could not fail her father, it was nothing to begin walking the sail rigging, arms flung out to help keep balance. One strong breeze might have sent her tumbling into the ocean.

She welcomed it. Maybe then she’d feel something other than exhilaration. It was incredible to be up so high, to see in every direction for miles. There was no end to the sea and if she’d flipped the world upside down she swore it would have looked the same. With one arm wrapped around a pillar, Elara carefully lowered herself, legs dangling, head resting against the wood.

She forgot herself for just a moment as she gazed out into the world. If she’d wanted, she could have pretended she was in a snow globe just waiting for the violent gods to come and shake, disrupting her easy, unhurried peace. 

Life returned all the same in the form of her skin burning from the overhead sun. Cursing softly, Elara made her way back down to find Gale reading on the bottom bunk, a candle lit on a rickety bedside table. 

“Fall asleep in the sun?” he questioned, one dark brow raised. 

She couldn’t resist scowling, though she knew she shouldn’t. He was still a stranger  and strangers required charm in order to be useful. If she let him see too much of the roiling mess just beneath the veneer, he’d likely try and pitch her overboard.

And the thought of his lifeless corpse bothered her, for some reason. 

“Something like that,” she mumbled, pushing strands of her hair off her forehead. “Hungry?”

Gale perked up at the mention of food. “Starving,” he replied with his confident, cheerful gusto. There were two parts to this man—his public face and whatever inner turmoil lay just beneath his skin. Every once and a while she got a peek of the later, though for the most part she was seeing the former. 

Elara quickly learned that the hells had been replicated on Toril, namely in the form of group dining. The smell of sweat and body odor was so overwhelming it nearly made her gag when Gale pushed open the swinging wood doors. He, too, turned his head with watering eyes, though he made no other outward show of trying to adjust. 

Tables were shoved together with chairs so close it was impossible not to touch strangers, and to add insult to injury, the food was awful. What had she expected, she wondered? Not this—not crying babies and drunken men all jammed so close together it felt like an assault on her ears.

Gale led her toward two empty chairs, his sea legs far better accustomed to walking with food in his hands. Elara sloshed stew on the front of her clothes twice before she sat, leaving her in a mood. 

“It could be worse,” Gale told her before digging in. Elara merely sighed.

“I could be better,” she replied, biting back a sigh.

A lot of things could be.

GALE:

Gale woke to the sounds of metal scraping against wood. Eyes adjusting to the dark, it took him a moment to realize Elara was hovering over a corpse, hands on her hips.

“What is this?” he demanded, voice thick with sleep. She turned, hair unbound and falling in loose curls down her back. Catching in the silvery moonlight, she looked like the personification of sunlight—or she would have, had her face not been splattered with blood. 

“You could sleep through the hells itself,” she commented in that cheerful way of hers. 

“What have you done?” Gale tried again, though it was clear what she’d done—she’d killed yet another person. 

Elara shrugged, clearly unbothered. “They tried to break in. Who knows what they wanted.”

“If only we could ask,” he bit back, though he supposed he saw her reasoning. They were unaccompanied and alone and perhaps a little flashier than most of the other individuals on the ship with them. If Gale was feeling charitable, he imagined someone had come looking for gold.

And if he wasn’t charitable, he imagined they’d come looking for other things. Elara stood in the dark, illuminated by a small beam of moonlight pouring through the now open porthole. She might have seemed helpless in her nightdress and bare feet, were it not for that curved, lethal dagger dripping blood at her side.

“Will you help me?” she asked him, leaning again over the lifeless body.

“You want to dump them?” he questioned, running a hand through his own tangled hair. 

“Well, I had thought about getting their breakfast order, but—”

“Okay, alright,” he interrupted impatiently. “I only meant if you thought we ought to inform the captain—”

“Who cares?” she asked, brow furrowed with what looked like annoyance. “If we get rid of them now, we can be back asleep in ten minutes.”

“I don’t think I’ll be able to,” Gale muttered, wondering just what he’d gotten himself into. This had never been his plan and now it seemed he’d agreed to travel with a blood soaked killer. 

Elara, misunderstanding his apprehension, turned those green eyes of hers toward the door. “We could lock it, I suppose.”

Gale said nothing to that, lifting the body with her. Elara exhaled but otherwise betrayed none of the exhaustion Gale felt trying to maneuver the lifeless corpse through the small window. She peered out once the legs vanished, listening for the tell-tale splash. Only then did she turn back to the bloodied floors, which Gale wiped away with a wave of his hands.

“How many people have you killed?” he asked her bluntly.

Elara laughed, climbing back up the ladder to the top bunk. “That’s hardly a polite question.”

“Do you even know?” he guessed, sitting on the edge of his own bed. “Twenty, you think?”

“More, I’m sure,” she said blithely.

“Doesn’t it bother you?”

There was a pause as she considered this. “No.”

There would be no elaboration on the subject which disappointed Gale. He had a million questions for her racing through his mind, none of which he decided to voice. It was clear they had grown up wildly different and he suspected some part of her life had seen her fending for herself. Given what he’d witnessed in Baldur’s Gate…perhaps her choice had been getting comfortable with killing, or dying herself.

His mind returned to those scars on her face and neck, lending evidence to his theory. He supposed he imagined someone like her to be less cheerful and open to strangers. “You’re not going to kill me, are you?” he questioned, just to make sure.

Another pretty sounding laugh. “No, Gale. Not unless you give me a reason.”

“Perhaps you find me annoying,” he half joked, wondering if she, like so many others, agreed with that assessment of him.

“That is a compelling reason,” she replied, shifting on the mattress above him.

Ah. There it was. Gale forced himself to lay back, ignoring that there had been a dead body a mere ten feet from him not a minute earlier. 

“I don’t think you’re annoying,” she said into the dark once Gale had reoriented himself beneath his blankets. 

“Well. I appreciate that,” Gale replied, suddenly embarrassed. He shouldn’t have said anything at all. Gale couldn’t help but think of a conversation he’d overheard by a few colleagues, complaining about how delusional and annoying he was. Back then it had been easy to shrug it off as jealous—after all, he was Mystra’s Chosen, and they were not.

How quickly that had all changed. Now he was left thinking about the loss of it all and wondered if they hadn’t been right about him. Elara’s words did little to bolster him. After all, he didn’t care about her opinion, one way or the other. She was no one at all, an urchin who was admittedly useful to have around. 

This woman, uncivilized as she was, had treated him with kindness in her way. It would have been all too easy to write him off, to let him die in that alley and move on with her life and she hadn’t. He found himself strangely grateful for her company, all the same. And though he’d woken to her killing someone and shoving their body through a port window, Gale slept rather soundly once he fell back asleep. He woke to Elara already up and dressed, her hair neatly plaited down her back. He’d watched her kill and yet as she turned those wide eyes on him, he thought she was rather harmless.

Gale stretched as she secured a belt around her waist, revealing a wicked looking dagger just beneath her robe. Why? She had a staff, had magic—was that not enough? Elara caught him looking and flashed him a deceptively disarming smile. One he was certain she’d used as a distraction before. Everything about her was just a little too practiced.

“Breakfast?” she questioned. 

“You go,” Gale said with a wave of his hand. “I’ll meet you later.”

Throwing him one last glance, Elara merely nodded, grabbed her staff, and made her way out of the rocking cabin toward fresh air and sunlight. Waiting until he was certain she was gone, Gale immediately pulled her bag from where she’d stored it, delighted to find it was a bag of holding, just like his.

Inside he found the usual camping equipment, a smutty book that’s title made him blush furiously—and Gale didn’t consider himself particularly prudish but the drawing… wow. Shoving it aside, he found a pouch of gold coins, some rations, soap, a change of clothes, rope and other tools…but nothing else. Nothing damning, no documentation that said she was a wanted criminal nor letters that detailed what, exactly, she was doing. 

Gale tried to put it all back the way she had it before deciding she was unlikely to notice he’d been in there at all. She didn’t seem particularly organized just judging on what he’d seen so far. Gale put her from his mind, though there was something else bothering him.

He found her that afternoon leaning against a railing, cheeks pink from the sun.

“You need a hat,” he said by way of greeting. She turned to look at him and he wondered if she’d keep looking at him like that if she knew what lurked in his chest. If she knew what a monster he was. 

“Did you try to bathe?” she guessed, noticing his damp hair. 

His cheeks flushed without meaning to. “Ah. I did.”

“Someone walked in on you, didn’t they?” she guessed, a slow smile spreading over her features. 

“How could you possibly know?”

“Happened to me last night,” she informed him, turning her wistful gaze back to the sea. “None of those little doors lock.”

“You could lock them—”

“So could you,” she reminded the wizard, much to his annoyance. Gale was piecing it together, something nagging at the back of his mind.

“Is that why we had the interloper?”

Her expression shifted, the ease vanishing as she looked back out into the distance. “Who knows?”

Gale bet Elara did know, though. He wasn’t that stupid. What were the odds someone walked in on her, made their way to her bedroom where she just so happened to be waiting. And why, he wondered absently. It didn’t matter, he decided—their time together was drawing shorter by the hour.

Though, part of Gale would miss this strange, slightly off-putting woman. She left him on the deck, descending below to do whatever it was she did to keep herself occupied. Gale let his mind wander back to the task at hand. He was going to die—a clock ticked the hour loudly in his mind. Eyes tracing the waves crashing against the wood of the ship, he wondered what it would feel like. 

Would dying hurt?

Would he recognize his final moments? Or would he merely slip away, unconscious as the worst took over? He didn’t want to suffer, though he knew he deserved to. There would be suffering in the afterlife, besides. Mystra wasn’t coming for him—she’d leave him to wander the Fugue Plane for all of eternity. She wasn’t going to intercede on his behalf ever again.

He was on borrowed time. 

Gale was drowning in anxiety by the time he meandered back to the cabin he shared with Elara. She was propped in bed, shoes strewn about the small space. Green eyes tracked him as he lined them neatly beside the rickety table neither had used. He ought to write Tara another letter, though he didn’t.

Elara rolled to her stomach, book abandoned as Gale sat in a chair. “Are you looking forward to Waterdeep?” she asked after a moment. There was a genuine curiosity to her expression, and when he looked back, Gale had the distinct impression that this woman did not interact with a lot of people.

He didn’t know why he thought that. Only that she watched him a little too closely, as if studying his mannerisms while trying to guess his thoughts. A lock of blonde hair slid over her slim shoulder, wavy in the salty air. 

Gale only shrugged. “Why not? You’ve never been.”

A wistful smile tugged at those lips. “The world is big. I think one day I’d like to see it.”

“What’s stopping you now?”

A shadow slid across her gaze and though it was banished quickly, Gale still caught it. “My…family…depends on me.”

A half-truth if he’d ever heard it, though given the lies he had told and would continue to tell, he supposed he couldn’t begrudge her a few secrets. “You must love them very much.”

A dry laugh escaped her, catching him by surprise.

“Not love, then? Duty?”

“Duty is better,” she agreed, that smile flipping. 

“Do you want to talk about them?”

She was shaking her head no before he even finished his sentence. “I wouldn’t know what to say.”

“The truth?” he suggested. 

Elara’s smile didn’t meet her eyes. “There’s little to say, truthfully. Do you have a family?”

“My mother,” he said, trying to banish the grief that welled up at the mention of his mother. She wouldn’t understand. A better man would have told her the truth before leaving rather than forcing Tara to do it. She would mourn him.

“Just your mom?”

Gale’s heart ached. “My father is gone. I suppose there is my Tressym, but I ah…it’s mainly just me.”

Elara digested this. “Do you love her?”

“Who? My tressym?”

“Your mother, Gale.”

“Of course I love my mother. Don’t you?”

“My mother is dead,” Elara said flatly, all emotion leaving her voice. Whatever warmth she’d possessed seemed to have evaporated and when their eyes met, Gale was unsettled by what he saw looking back at him. She was empty, eyes dead and lifeless. “If you could even call her that.”

He swallowed. “She was unkind?”

Elara blinked again, eyes glassy. “She adopted me. Her and her husband.”

He wanted to pry, but he also wanted her to come back to the present moment. It seemed Elara had slipped into some memory better forgotten, lost to a past Gale wasn’t sure he wanted to know about. He waited a moment before he said, “I’m sorry…for your loss, I mean.”

That seemed to do the trick. Elara’s eyes snapped to him, wide with surprise as her lips formed a perfect circle. Perhaps, he reasoned, they had treated her badly—perhaps she was left caring for a family that had never truly accepted her.

Had never treated her with kindness. 

Or perhaps he was projecting, looking for another wounded soul. 

“It’s fine,” she said, offering him a smile that seemed perfectly polite. “Want to get dinner with me?”

“I’m starting to think I should accompany you everywhere, if only to keep the bodies from stacking up.”

Her smile was real, then, her amusement genuine. Gale thought she had a rather pretty laugh. Elara swung herself off the top bunk, landline neatly on the swaying ground. “Trouble has a way of finding me one way or the other.”

“I believe that.”

And he did.