#poor boy just wanted sex and instead did a speedrun through a three page long sad backstory lol

[ode-to-fury]

One Small Freckle

Pairing: Gale/Tav

Words: no clue

Summary: Whoo boy I woke up this morning and this lil drabble basically wrote itself and I like it so much I thought I’d post it. Self indulgent to the max which is my favourite type of fic to write. Gale has some morning after thoughts. This is based on my Tav but idk I think it’s fairly vague.

Gale lay awake, surrounded by Shadow Weave which terrfied and tempted him in equal measure, thinking.

Gods.

Gods.

He’d meant it as a farewell. He’d meant it as- as a last night, a last wonderful night with the woman he had come to love. He’d meant to show her one more facet of his beloved Weave before the inevitable happened, perhaps to give her something to explore in future. In truth, it had been a selfish, shameful thing, and he’d known it would hurt her more than anything else.

I’m in love with you, too.

He’d made his peace with the fact that his life would pay for his follies. It had all made perfect sense to him. Too much sense. He’d endangered the Weave with his ambition, and Mystra had spurned him, and now, to protect that thing which he loved the most and earn his godess’ forgiveness he simply had to destroy himself.

It had made perfect sense, in his heart, in his mind. No doubt Mystra had known it would, clever, clever thing that she was.

And what would it hurt for the world to have one less grasping wizard in it to sully its wonders? Who would miss him?

His mother, perhaps. And Tara. But the two of them would be safe from the destruction he would cause, far away in Waterdeep. And even more safe, when the threat of the Absolute was gone. They would mourn, but heal. In time.

I’m in love with you, too.

Her hands had callouses on them that scraped against his skin when her fingers danced across it. Those callouses scraped against his own, from the years working with his staff, from writing. Such mundane tasks that he yearned for now. She had one small freckle on the palm of her right hand, just below her thumb, that he could have spent hours admiring. Had she always had it? Or was it from days spent in sunlight adventuring through Faerûn, seeing all those places in the flesh he had only ever seen on paper?

Had he ever loved anything so much as he loved her hands? He remembers the first time they’d touched, trapped in that rock. Warmth eminating from her fingers, even then. If he’d known how the touch would damn him, would he have taken that hand?

Yes. In a thousand different realities. In every lifetime he could concieve of, the answer was yes.

I’m in love with you, too.

He’d attempted to match the colours of his nighttime illusion to her eyes, though he thought he’d come up woefully short. In some light, they seemed grey, like thunderclouds, or green, or blue. Then she would grin, or laugh, and starlight would burst forth from them. Days upon days he could have sat finding the perfect words for that light, for the brown specks that floated in it like leaves on the surface of a pool of starlight. He’d tried to count them, but he hadn’t had the time.

Time. Once he’d thought he’d had enough. He’d thought he would have lifetimes, like Elminster. Thousands of years to unravel the universe, it’s secrets, it’s functions. Now… now when all he wanted was to watch as the corner of her mouth quirked upward, and a dimple appeared on her cheek, now he would run out of that which he had taken for granted for so long.

I’m in love with you, too.

And then. Then he’d made the largest error of them all, and forgotten that she was not a goddess, despite his feelings on the matter, and she would not know to guard her thoughts in the astral plane, when they connected.

Pleasure had ripped through him, as Mystra had shown him, in the way he loved, but knowledge also.

He’d seen her thoughts, the hurt he was causing her, but the love also. A love large enough to match his own, at the least. He’d seen her fears, and her dreams, and her loves. Forests she’d walked through and rivers she’d crossed. Her yearning for greatness and reknown and acceptance. Glimpses of firelight and laughter, of tears and loneliness. Such loneliness it had made him gasp with the pain of it.

They’d mingled and loved like the gods do, but the clumsy fumbling of their mortality had interfered, and Gale had lost himself in the essence of her and had had no desire to find his way back to himself. Not ever.

I’m in love with you, too.

He lay awake in the darkness of his tent. She had fallen asleep after, which he understood. The darkness, the fear of the past days, the battles at Moonrise to rescue their allies, and now this. Now he had added to those burdens.

He’d been walking toward a precipice. Toward the abyss of nothing. Away from the pain of his heartbreak. Away from the physical pain of the orb and his arcane hunger. He’d stared into that darkness that had been beckoning since the day the orb had stolen his powers, his goddess, his life. Mystra had given him a chance to find solace in that darkness. To redeem himself in it, and save the Weave as he did. It was right. It had to be right, or she would not have commanded it, no matter her anger toward him.

I’m in love with you, too.

Away from the darkness there was pain. Strife, death, and pain. But there was life. There was Karlach, with her easy smiles and childlike hope and vulgar humour. There was Astarion, with his snide remarks and his hunger for power that matched Gale’s in a way he did not quite like, but who was by his side when he needed it. There was Shadowheart, who was closed off and sullen but who healed his scrapes and bruises with a wink and always shared her wine. There was Wyll, with his bravery and goodness and who would help Gale think of a word to rhyme with “pool” if he asked. Lae’zel, who could barely hide her smile when he asked her about her home amongst the stars and who was stronger than the rest of them combined. Weave save him, it gave him strength too.

And there was Tav.

I’m in love with you, too.

Before Elminster’s appearance he hadn’t thought about Mystra in days. The realisation had terrified and elated him in equal measure. If she had asked this of him two months ago, before the tadpole, he would not have hesitated, not for a moment.

Tav’s lips had brushed over the mark of the orb on his chest, kissing that which he had been cast out and condemned for. Her lips were soft, despite their time exposed to the elements. He wanted to ask her how she managed it. He wanted to ask her so many things that he did not have time for now.

I’m in love with you, too.

And in the darkness of his tent, surrounded by the Shadow Weave which tempted and terrified him in equal measure he finally realised that something in his heart and mind had changed.

He did not want to die.

The thought terrified him worse than anything else he’d experienced in the past weeks, and there had been some truly bloodcurdling sights.

Somewhere along their journey, perhaps next to the fire when Wyll was telling stories, or fighting with Tav at his back, knowing what she would do even before she did it, or walking along sharing thoughts with Astarion and Lae’zel, somewhere along their journey he had started living again.

Despite the orb, despite the tadpole, despite their dire, almost inevitable odds of catastrophic failure, he had started living again.

And gods, was he enjoying it.

I’m in love with you, too.

The night before he had bonded with her in a way he had not bonded with anyone in his life, not even Mystra, for she had always kept herself apart from him. Tav had had no such boundaries, and he had kept none from her.

Perhaps they would all die before this was over even without him detonating the orb. Perhaps they would transform into illithids and lose their souls. Perhaps this Absolute would crush them without so much as a second thought.

Or perhaps they would triumph, slim as their chances might be.

I’m in love with you, too.

But he would face it at her side. If they found this Heart of the Absolute and they decided it was best he go forth with his plan, then gladly he would. But until then, if she asked him to live he would live. If she asked him to defy Mystra, he would. If there was even the smallest chance that he would one day have the time to write poetry about that small freckle beneath her thumb, he would defy Ao himself to have it. He didn’t want to die. He wanted to live. He wanted to live with her, with their friends beside them.

And in the darkness of his tent, surrounded by the Shadow Weave which tempted and terrified him in equal measure, he grinned, and decided he would attempt to get some sleep before what would surely be a grueling day. Perhaps his last. Perhaps.

But certainty was ever an elusive creature when it came to adventures such as theirs. Hadn’t he been telling Tav so ever since Elminster had appeared?

He closed his eyes.

I’m in love with you, too.

#poor boy just wanted sex and instead did a speedrun through a three page long sad backstory lol #bg3 #gale of waterdeep #gale/tav #gale dekarios #gale x tav #gale fic #gale of waterdeep fic #wildweave #my writing