#he's not a tav so mouse doesn't fit | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sky-kiss · 7 months

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Okay I had a thought and you can do with it whatever you want... but Raphael speaking infernal is so underrated. Even in game when he casts spells during battle, he doesn't really verbally say anything which is a shame (but is kinda cool if certain beings are powerful enough to cast nonverbally. Either that or my game is hella bugged). When you had that moment in your latest chapter of him speaking infernal to transform that made me 😳Like the way it'd described of being this harsh language and Raphael speaking it just snapped some part of my brain and I'd imagine it'd do something for Joi/Tav too. Like would Raphael still somehow make it sound beautiful (to quote Mamzelle, "a voice that could make the foulest blasphemy seem the sweetest hymn" or it would he still sound harsh but it's still hot because it's flying out of THAT mouth?

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A/N: There’s an actor I used to adore who was German, but often spoke a lot of french. So his German would come out with that gentle French lilt. Gonna channel that.

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He comes to her in the evening, this devil she loves, and the scent of cherries, sulfur, and musk hangs about him like a shroud. Raphael prowls about her suite like some great cat, his dark head held high. In the hells, his hellfire eyes will light with their inner fire. On the prime material, he’s softer. Warm brown, a touch of honey, almost sweet enough to make her forget.

“You’re late,” she says.

He hums lowly. The natural theatricality of the noise does not rob it of its power; Tav shivers. The devil sees; he knows. He always knows. “Ah, but there is such beauty in anticipation, wouldn’t you agree? Desire honed to a knife’s point.” A turn of his right hand, long-fingered and elegant. “Before one tips over the edge.”

It’s a fine enough point in principle, but less appealing in reality. Their time is short, limited to stolen moments when their schedules align. She has a city to rebuild. He has the lower planes to conquer.

Her devil smiles, patronizing. “If you feel neglected, mouse, I have already proposed a solution. You’ve only to accept the offered hand.”

“Join you in Hell?” He nods, eyes wide and lovely. It strikes her that he has cultivated every aspect of this human skin: the smile is so wide, so open, and so nakedly suffused with guile that it wraps back around to innocence.

Raphael steps close. The scent again: cherries, sweet and delicate. Her devil, wearing sweetness and silk to hide his uglier underbelly. He brushes the fringe of her hair back from her cheek, touch lingering. “Deny me all you like, pet. It shall make the eventual fall all the sweeter.”

Anticipation. Tav shivers.

Some nights, they fuck in front of the fireplace or on the chaise. Never in the bed. It’s her stipulation. Raphael crinkles his nose at the coarse language and indelicacy of the location. She deserves better, he says. The phrase always comes with an accompanying hand gesture, as if he's framing her for a portrait. Something pretty he can lock away from the world, point at when he wants to feel superior. Admire his wealth, this wild adventurer he’s collared.

Most nights, they work. Tav shuffles through requisition orders. Raphael amends his contracts. She watches him work, more often than not, gaze flicking across the elegant script. It burns, and there’s an undeniable elegance to the infernal ruins. Tav reaches out to race a line, mouthing the words. She’s out of practice. Infernal is not a pretty language; it fits particularly poorly in her untrained tongue. Raphael rests his chin in his palm, amused by her attempt.

“Allow me.”

The devil repeats the phrase. It may as well be a different language. The words drip off his tongue, the harshness erased in favor of a lilting cadence. Tav chews the inside of her cheek, brow furrowed. “Is that…is it a regional dialect? Something distinct to Cania?”

“In all likelihood, you’ve only heard the lower dialects. The least baatezu are harsh and guttural. The higher speech has a grace to it, provided one is willing to learn. It is a melody, dark and heady as any wine.” Raphael places his hand, palm up, on the table. “Allow me.” Tav sets her hand in his. “Close your eyes, pet.”

She does.

Raphael traces lines across her palm, humming to himself. “There are four tongues, sweetling. Lower, lowest, high, highest. For the sake of your sanity, we shall avoid the dialect of the archdevils. But the language of the courts might please you.”

“And is there a reason my eyes must remain closed?”

He chuckles, thumb pressing against the veins of her wrist. There is an awful note of potential in the touch; he could break the fragile bones with half a thought. “Feeling, Tav. Like the steps of the dance, it should fill you, move you.”

She shivers as his fingers ghost up her forearm, featherlight nerve strokes. Raphael repeats the lines of infernal, his fingers drifting up on the mouth melodic stretches, dipping down when the words adopt a guttural edge. It is never grating, never clipped; some of that is exclusively him, years of experience and language marrying in a distinctive vocal pattern. Tav chews her lower lip. She’s too aware of his heat, pinpricks of warmth dancing across her skin as he plays his game.

It is beautiful and dark, and she feels the words on her skin. Raphael traces the runes. Her mind struggles to translate the higher dialect, flowing until it isn’t, succinct until double-meaning creeps into the terminology. Tav feels drunk in the darkness.

“And now,” his voice is closer, spoken against the shell of his ear. The devil gathers her into his lap. He smiles into the curve of her throat. “The student demonstrates what she’s learned. Come, pet, impress me.”

He traces the runes on her thighs. Over the skin of her belly. Between her breasts. And if she loses the thread, if her voice gives way, her devil stops. He’ll suck a bruise into her throat, press teeth until they threaten to breast skin, tease, tease, tease…

Anticipation, she thinks, that earlier word flitting across her awareness.

And her devil is ever patient.

#bg3 raphael #raphael bg3 #raphael x tav #baldur's gate 3 fanfiction #asks #my fic #raphael out here abusing the dark power of his voice #in this house we make terrible choices #im sorry there isnt more language stuff #my latin is SUPER rusty so i didn't risk it

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