#purdle-writes

[purdledooturt]

WIP Wedneday

I got tagged again, and y'all... you may not know this but I basically bleed WIPs. I have nothing but WIPs. Sometimes they never become anything, and WIP Wednesdays are the only way they see the world at all. Thank you @cinnamontails-ff for freeing one of these boys from the jail.

In celebration of the announcement of the continuation of An Empirical Science, I would also like to contribute to the Holy Rolan Empire.

The door clicked closed – then, it clicked again. Locked.

“Drop the glamour, please,” Rolan all but growled, “before I do it for you.”

Tav gasped at the commanding tone, her heart seized by cold tendrils in confusion. Immediately, she did as he had asked, dropping the disguise with an exhale. “Rolan!” Her hand flew to her chest, trying to still her pounding heart. “It’s just me!”

“Tav!” Rolan gasped back, his expression going from dark and fierce and angry to something more akin to surprise and confusion and… suspicion? With one final once-over the expression melted into something more sheepish, as his shoulders relaxed with a sigh. “I’m sorry about that. You… you had triggered some alarms, so I…” He ran a hand through his hair, letting loose a few tendrils from his normally immaculately styled half-up ‘do. “It’s good to see you, though.”

“I’m so sorry,” she said, pursing her lips together as she felt her face burn red out of embarrassment. Of course they would have security measures for disguises and seemings – she didn’t even think about it. “That was wholly my fault.”

To try and soothe the awkward air, Tav went for the first gesture she could think of: a friendly hug. Oddly, Rolan accepted – in fact, he damn near melted into it. She enjoyed his warmer body temperature, momentarily reminded of the piggy-back rides Karlach used to give her when they were racing Lae’zel. She rested her chin on his shoulder. “It’s good to see you, too.”

He pulled away from the embrace, examining her once again. “My reaction was completely unwarranted. I apologise, I didn’t mean to scare you, I just thought you… were someone else. Why were you in a disguise anyway?”

She looked down at her bag of purchases and sheepishly held them up to call his attention to them. Curiously, he peered in. “Last time I came by, Lia wouldn’t let me pay, so…”

He laughed. “You silly girl,” he said fondly, shaking his head. He gestured towards a well-lit seating area by the large floor-to-ceiling window. “Why don’t you take a seat over by the window? Let me at least get you a drink, and I’ll let Cal and Lia know you’re here so they can say hello.”

Tav marvelled at the room Rolan had claimed as his office – the walls were covered in books, from floor to ceiling, but unlike Lorroakan’s old set up it was much more organised and welcoming. Rolan had his books in shelves of polished cherry wood – she found that the desk, chairs, his drinks cabinet, and the furniture at his seating area matched, giving the room an elevated, moody, professional air. It was luxurious and neat – it was just very him.

“ I’d love a juice of some kind,” she called out over her shoulder as she settled down on the plush seat of one of the armchairs. “This place is beautiful, Rolan - you’ve outdone yourself!”

“I found the difficulty of furnishing a space is greatly made easy by having lots of money,” he said in his normal, sardonic, Rolan way, though there was markedly no bite in his tone. “I do hope this juice would do.” 

She’d turned to find him walking towards her with two glasses of wine and she laughed, leaning forward in her seat to reach for one. “That counts,” she joked, as she watched him take the other armchair across from her. She took a sip of the wine – chilled and sweet. 

Before he leaned back he reached into his pocket, pulling out a pouch which he’d tossed her way. It landed on her lap with a light jingle that betrayed its contents. “Say nothing,” he said, pre-empting her protest with a raised hand, “that should be exactly what you paid, and not a gold more.”

“One of the scrolls was on sale,” she mentioned – concern about being credited more than what actually paid oddly the first thing in her mind.

The second, she found, was amazement – the idea of Rolan just… casually calculating the cost of her purchases, just from that brief glance into her bag, just to refund her? Well, she knew he was a genius, but that was as impressive as Astarion’s one-handed lockpicking trick – it was another level entirely. “Rolan, really –”

He finally settled down in the armchair, waving her concerns away. “I’ve accounted for that, don’t worry,” he said, “just to keep the books clean for Bex.”

Ooh - why did he react so poorly? Who was he expecting? 👀

I am super excited about this idea so I am definitely motivated to keep working on it - I just want to have it all planned out before I commit (sorry). I have a prologue whipped up that explains the whole premise from the get go, but there's a whole lot of middle to work with.

#rolan #rolan x tav #rolan x oc #purdle-writes #purdle writes #holy rolan empire #the brainrot continues to rot #rolan bg3 #bg3 rolan #rolan nation #rolan brainrot

[cshion2005polofish-blog]

how to make cookies

when I was a high school student, I started making cookies. For example, chocoratechip, green tea, pumpkin and so on. I tried to make a lot of kind. Then, I’ll write the recipe of snowball cookies.

In a bowl add 180 gram of flower, 20 gram of almond purdle, 50 gram of sugar, and 50 gram of egg. Mix until settled. Next, add 50 gram of melted batter and milk a little. Mix until settled again. Next, divide the dough into about 20. Bake them in oven at 180℃ for 15minutes.

[purdledooturt]

drink break

Summary: Astarion didn't often run into Tav awake when he drank from her at night - not since the first time, anyway. But he can't say he doesn't enjoy it.

Note: I'm extremely grateful to the members of Cinnamontails's discord for their part in getting this out of WIP hell - it's so cool being surrounded by other creative people and there's something about it that pushes one to keep creating, so please come and join us! They also helped me come up with our fruit-based nickname for Astarion 🤠 [AO3 Link]

Tonight, Astarion was at peace.

He often took on first watch – he would take the time alone to hunt, get a break from the chatter of his companions, and he would read uninterrupted, winding down from a full day of travel or exploration or combat. It was the benefit of being an elf – he’d seen his companions running on less-than-ideal amounts of sleep, and their performance always suffered when they were poorly rested. Meanwhile he was free to hunt, crawl back into his tent, trance for four hours and be back to his usual perky self. He liked to lord the fact over Lae’zel, who begrudgingly agreed that being able to enter into a trance was a lot handier than needing to sleep – he cherished what wins he could have over her.

He had nowhere to be tonight – he had drained a bear the night before, spotting it sniffing around towards their camp chest which had just been restocked with supplies carefully catalogued by Gale. It wasn’t much of a challenge, and probably the closest he would have to a restaurant experience as a vampire, but the bear was extremely filling, and he didn’t want to be picky. He was feeling sated enough and didn’t really need to hunt, so he took the time to catch up on his reading while he sat watch, lounged on his carefully stacked pile of plush pillows at the entryway of his tent, enjoying the sounds of the forest and the mild breeze on his skin.

He greatly valued these moments. He occasionally wondered if this was how he would have spent his nights if he were still alive (minus the outdoor aspect of it). Often, he would look up at the sky and think about his old life at that wretched castle, and it would steel his resolve to never return. He prized his freedom, however temporary, and other than the occasional intrusions from his guardian, his mind was his own. His companions (tadpole included) made for far better company than his siblings. His companions listened to him and there was a friendly camaraderie that the surlier members of the group refused to acknowledge. They never told him to be silent, never tried to sabotage him, never told him he wasn’t good for anything but lies and seduction. They valued his input, and he, in turn, begrudgingly depended on them. It was the closest thing to friendship for him (although he couldn’t tell exactly what it was the stopped it from completely crossing over).

But what he appreciated the most was the ability to manage his own hunger. Gone were the days of mind-numbing starvation. Gone were the days where he fed on rats and bugs, getting what little sustenance he could from fetid and rotten blood. He was free to hunt as he pleased, though he stuck with animals as he’d been requested to, save for the times he got to bite into the necks of the less-friendly thinking creatures they encountered.

The most delicious of all, however, remained his first. Which reminded him —

Tav, their leader, had offered herself for a drink this morning, and he was waiting until she was well within her dreams before he wandered off to top himself up. While he didn’t explicitly need to feed, he always took her up on her offer as he couldn’t miss the opportunity to have some of her blood. Hers, for some reason, cleared up his mind the best.

He decided it was a good time to do so when Halsin woke up to take over – the two elves had an arrangement where they took turns to watch while the rest of their companions got their eight hours (or as close to it as they were afforded to). It worked out for everyone, and it meant Astarion would get his me-time guilt-free. He watched as the druid wandered towards the fire with blocks of wood and his beloved set of carving tools – he was in the process of creating little wooden trinkets for some of the party, after Shadowheart had requested he made her a little trinket of what animal he thought she would be if she were a druid. She got a little wooden goldfish the next day, which she carefully hung at the entryway of her tent, dangling like a sad, friendless mobile. She was so very pleased, smiling wider than usual as she cooed over the gift, and Astarion was surprised that the idea of being a forgetful fish didn’t offend the Sharran.

Neither of the elves said anything – they were both very good at keeping silent, not wanting to interrupt their companions while they slept. Astarion pulled himself up, leaving a folded note about camp chore allocation he’d been left one day as a bookmark. Wordlessly, he headed towards Tav’s tent as Halsin began carving away – tonight’s project seemed to be Karlach’s, and it looked to be a bear that looked more like Clive than an anatomically accurate one.

Astarion pushed past the flaps of the tent, careful not to let too much of the light from the campfire through. He didn’t want to admit it to anyone, but he was a bit soft on Tav, wanting to make sure she got her rest and was inconvenienced as little as possible by his feeding on her and accepting her generosity. Normally he would find her sleeping peacefully, exhausted from the day’s travels, and he would sup just a bit generally as a dessert before he left for his bedroll feeling lighter and happier.

He blinked at the sight in front of him as he let the tent flap fall behind him, and the sliver of light that came through from the campfire shrunk into a line and then nothing. His dark vision meant he could see her clearly even without the light.

She was hunched over, in such a poor posture he had to actively bite his tongue to not comment on it. Her hair was showing signs of chaos – she always was a bit of a wriggler in her sleep, and so her hair often tangled from the back (or so he noticed – he also noticed it tangled worse when it was freshly washed, as was the case tonight). With one eye open and the other closed, she lifted a finger at him in a gesture that he took to mean as ‘hold on’, while she chugged down the contents of her waterskin.

She looked charming. Adorable in a very unruly, wild gremlin kind of way.

She popped the cork lid back on the skin, smacking the top of it with practiced precision. Keeping one eye closed, she began to lay back down on to her bedroll, her hand gesturing towards him with palms up, inviting. Tensing her core, she brushed the hair from her neck and pushed her hair up on to the pillow, making things easy for him to access. She closed her eyes.

“Are you awake?” he whispered, as he began to kneel alongside her. Was she… sleepwalking?  Was she conscious? He’d never run into her awake for feedings since they started their arrangement. She adjusted her position as she laid down, laying her entwined fingers together over her stomach like a princess in a coffin, ready to rest. It was a comical sight with the unruly bedhead looking like a nest-crown.

The eye closest to him fluttered open briefly. She muttered, “yes,” like a childish princess impatiently waiting for her true love’s kiss. He wanted to snort at the sight.

“Shall I come back another time, darling?” he asked, still keeping his voice low. He watched as she pursed her lips and let out a forceful sigh through her nose. It had been a while since he’d fed from her while she was awake, and while the first time went better than he expected he didn’t want things to be awkward given how intimate the whole experience tends to be.

“It’s fine,” she replied, muttering under her breath. She cleared her throat quietly. Her voice was a bit scratchy despite the water, and Astarion wondered if she was perhaps getting sick. Humans were always so susceptible to illness. He wondered if the ground was too cold for her despite the bedroll. Maybe the bedroll was too thin?

Ah – he really was soft on her. The others must not be allowed to know, but he tried to scan through his inventory in his mind. He may be able to spare her another blanket to tuck under her bedroll, just to stop the cold from seeping into her back. But he’d have to do it in a way that made her think she “made him” give it up.

He enjoyed teasing her – it was so easy when she was so gullible.

He began to position himself over her neck, like he often did when she was in deep sleep and lightly snoring. “Well, at least you’re not snoring this time.”

Her eyes popped open and her mouth fell slack in shock, and she smacked his chest lightly, though she tensed when she noticed that he had his arms over her like a makeshift cage. Why did everything about vampirism hinge on sensuality? “I don’t snore,” she argued. She was on the verge of pouting, staring up at him as he hovered over her. Her eyes looked so large and so round in the dark. He could stare at them forever.

“You convince yourself that, darling,” he said with a smirk, as he lowered his mouth towards her neck. He could hear her heartbeat speed up, thudding loud in the silence of the tent. Gods, teasing her was just so fun. Excitement made her blood taste a little different. He made sure to let his breath hover over her skin. “Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

She tilted her head away to give him easier access to her neck, almost reflexively. He glanced at her from his periphery, noting the full pout and frown that marred her eyebrows. Petulantly, she snorted. “Absolutely not do I snore,” she whispered furiously, relacing her fingers together over her diaphragm. She closed her eyes again, but the small pout remained. It looked like it could be dispelled with a kiss, but he wasn’t about to test his luck.

He shushed her, enjoying the way she shivered from the base of her spine from the sensation. He knew a thing or two about appealing to someone without actually touching them. Breathily, he whispered, “Now, now – let’s be professional about this, darling.”

“Yes, let’s,” she said, quickly sparring against his flirting like she always did. Gods – he loved the sparring. It kept him on his toes, and not in the fight-or-flight manner he had grown accustomed to. “I always am. I think this is a you problem.”

He sighed again, dreamy and content. His hand found its usual place against the other side of her neck to keep her still. “I do so love dessert,” he muttered – his lips brushed against her skin closely before he bit down and began to feed. She stiffened at the action – she always did, even when she was asleep, but she remained stiff. He rubbed slow circles against the skin of her jaw near her ear. He pulled away briefly, keeping his lips mostly against her, to whisper, “relax, pet.”

She melted under his touch upon instruction, and he resumed his meal. He hummed in appreciation.

He tried to take little – he was still full, after all, and he didn’t technically need to feed. He just wanted to accept the offer, selfish as he was, to help clear his mind. He gave the puncture site some kitten licks, cleaning up the remaining blood, leaving nothing wasted. “Let me wipe that up,” he said, as he pulled back and straightened back to sitting position, studying his companion who now seemed to be at the edge of sleep. Her head lolled back as if trying to follow the sound of his voice.

“M’kay,” she slurred, as she began to turn on her side. He knew she was a side sleeper – she liked to sleep with her knees tucked up towards her chest and one hand tucked under her head. She often complained about pins and needles the next day, but never did anything to change her sleeping position. He knew she drooled, too, when she was extremely tired – he usually wiped the drool off when he was cleaning her up post-feed. “Thanks.”

“Do you… want water, darling?” He asked, as he tipped out some of the healing potion they kept explicitly for clean up into a clean handkerchief. He approached her and gently held her chin as he took care in dabbing the handkerchief against her wound. He checked for drool – nada. Good.

“D’be nice,” she muttered, her words fading into silence as sleep began to take her back into its arms. “Thanks, melon.”

He frowned. “Excuse me, darling – melon?” Where did that nickname even come from?

She hummed in agreement. “You’re my melon,” she said simply as her voice gave way to a light snore. Her breathing evened out, betraying slumber.

He shook his head as he took her empty water skin, making his way out of the tent and towards the big cauldron they used for clean, potable water. Halsin watched him with mild interest as he carefully refilled the water skin, before cautiously punching the cork back in place. No words were exchanged as he strode back to Tav’s tent, sliding in to find her with her arm stuck up.

“Gimme,” she muttered, and he rolled his eyes to hand the water skin to her. She sat back upright, eyes lidded and hair still a mess. “Gods, I’m so thirsty tonight.”

“That’s because you drool.”

“I do not,” she disputed, lips wrapped around the mouth of her water skin, but he was amused to find her reach up to her cheek anyway. She grumbled, before taking a big drink – he wouldn’t be surprised if she’d emptied the damn thing again. She gulped down the liquid greedily, before she let out a light ‘ah’ as she put the lid back in place.

Astarion’s hand shot out, offering to take the item. With a confused look, she passed it to him, and he put it back on top of the crate she used as a makeshift table. He stood and prepared to leave. “Thanks, Astarion. You didn’t have to do that,” she said softly, with a dopey smile that made her eyes crease at the corners in the way he adored. It made her look so innocent.

Never one to let opportunities pass, he countered, “well, nice of you to remember my name now, my dear. You called me a melon a few minutes ago.” He didn’t address the rest of her statement. He didn’t know how to deal with gratitude – so he didn’t.

She laid back down, closing her eyes and trying to paint herself as a picture of peace. It didn’t seem like she noticed his avoidance. “I didn’t call you ‘a melon’,” she clarified, though it did nothing to demystify the topic to Astarion, “I called you ‘melon’.”

“Yes, okay, darling – but where in the hells did that comes from?”

She frowned and one eye cracked open. “I thought you knew Elvish. Isn’t that ‘friend’ in Elvish?”

Oh. She meant ‘mellon’, but she used the wrong tone, didn’t elongate the correct syllables, and got essentially nothing of it right. He pursed his lips together, unsure of whether to correct her. It would be funnier to… not. Plus, he found he wasn’t very pleased with being called ‘friend’, but he was somehow fine with being called ‘Melon’. It was… cute. And it was special because no one had ever used that pet name on him before. He could let it pass.

“Yes,” he lied, “well, you just butchered the pronunciation a tiny bit, darling, but I see what you’re going for now.”

The single open eye rolled. “That’s what I get for being friendly. Get out of here, you melon.”

He scoffed. “Well, goodnight, my sweet,” he whispered, as he turned to head out of the tent. He cast her one final glance. He could make out her beady little eyes peeking at him and the telltale crease in their corners betrayed a grin she tried to hide beneath her threadbare blanket. He could imagine the little wrinkle her nose would make when she made such a face – it was his second favourite feature of hers.

He felt the intense urge to bundle her up and take her away – she looked so vulnerable and innocent at rest, and the fact that she trusted him while she was in this state gave him conflicted feelings. A part of his mind told him she was an idiot and the perfect target – too trusting, too naïve, too stupid. Fell quickly for a pretty face and a kind word. His insidious mind whispered there must be an ulterior motive to it all – a fetish or some such she was wanting to fulfill. Surely no one was this kind? This giving? If she were in Baldur’s Gate she would have followed him to slaughter without question. And he would have led her there, and the world would have been less bright without her in it.

It made his phantom heart clench. Another voice in his mind asked – what does that make you? You fell quickly for a pretty smile and a generous heart.

Well. It seemed they were just two fools meandering around.

“Sleep well.”

She let out a sleepy chuckle, followed by an impressive yawn. “Goodnight, my melon.”

Astarion emerged from Tav’s tent to find Halsin still carving away, deep in focus. The larger elf looked up at him and his expression softened, before returned to his work with a slight smile. The vampire walked over to his tent, slid in, located the spare blanket he was going to bait Tav into taking in the morning, and laid down to prepare for his trance. He was surprised to find his cheeks hurting.

As he closed his eyes, he thought of melons and wood carvings, and the faint scent of the rosewater that always lingered in Tav’s tent.

Tonight, Astarion was at peace.

#astarion x tav #soft astarion #there's something about waking up at 3AM to chug a full water bottle that gets me feeling real gremlin #9 INT Tales #purdle-writes #astarion x f!tav #astarion x female tav #baldur's gate 3 fanfic

[purdledooturt]

WIP xDay

SO. @larvasmoon tagged me for WIP Wednesday but I lost track of the days - I'm so sorry!

Anyway, the last WIP I dug up for this turned into a full fic, so I had to find something else to post (we love suffering from success) - please enjoy this excerpt from the Dadstarion fic I'm working on in between other things ❤

Remember That I Love You

His daughter stood on a step stool in front of their mirror, making faces at her own reflection. Astarion, crouched low and armed with sewing pins, looked up to find her scrunching her nose while trying to lift her eyebrows. He clucked his tongue and shook his head. “Darling, do be careful or your face will get stuck like that.”

“Would you still love me, Papa?” she asked, and her face broke into a toothy grin as she turned to face him. Gods – with a smile that wide (missing front tooth and all) she looked very much like her mother, who was elsewhere pottering in the house.

The sudden movement made the cloth slip past his fingers. He tutted gently and without any malice, making a note to himself that, all things considered, she’d been unusually patient and still for this alteration session. She apologised, the words coming out almost as a reflex instead of a genuine apology before he turned her towards the mirror once more to continue rolling and pinning a new hem to her new skirt.

“Well?” she prodded again, careful to only turn her head towards him this time.

“My love, there is nothing you can do that will make Papa love you less,” he answered, truthfully and honestly. He loved his daughter unconditionally, and he did not think it initially possible until he had held her in his arms for the first time. “You know, you looked like a prune when you were born but I still loved you then,” he grinned at her, recalling the memory of her birth like it was only yesterday. Every detail came to mind with ease, her arrival to the world a bright flash of light in the timeline of his life. For someone who had been beaten into believing that you would only be valued for what you could give, Astarion found that he loved his wrinkly little child before she could offer him anything at all. “Mama and Papa will always love you.”

She hummed, and it was obvious the seriousness of his declaration went unnoticed. “Even if my face got stuck like… this?” She made another comical face, crossing her eyes and pouting. She looked nothing short of adorable. How could he, with all his sins, have made something so pure? He gave her nose a light tap, amused as her eyes followed the tip of his finger. The action made her break into giggles, which was a sound he wished he could bottle and hold to his heart forever.

“I suppose even then,” he sighed theatrically.

She began swaying side to side, as she put her hands out for him to hold. She was an affectionate child, and he’d found his personal bubble had grown and accounted for the shape of his daughter in it. The alterations were momentarily forgotten, as her skirt swayed side to side, half too long and half just right. “Even if… I don’t eat my vegetables?”

Cheeky thing. “Sure – but we would still give you a talking to, I think.”

“What?” she asked, and she nearly tipped herself off the step stool if not for his hands holding hers. “Papa, if you loved me you wouldn’t give me a talking to.”

Ah, yes – this deviousness could only have been his contribution to the development of their only child. “My sunshine, that’s not how it works,” he replies, “Nice try.”

The prompt came from Cinnamontails's discord (the prompt was provided by myself, and then taken by myself, like a greedy gremlin). As usual, I'm here to promote our little community - please come and join us!

I'm tagging @larvasmoon back, like a cheeky chook. I'd also like to tag @riskpig and @vyjuarts. And also, @bludazey (my love, because I have missed you), and @cinnamontails-ff (because I'm trying to coax more of that Rolan fic out of you, if it wasn't already obvious).

Fingers crossed I'll have something new soon (wink).

#purdle-writes #astarion #baldur's gate 3 fanfic #dadstarion #fic WIP #I'm a sucker for dadstarion truly #astarion fanfic #dadstarion fanfic #soft astarion

[purdledooturt]

Beginner's Lock

Summary: He didn’t really want to waste lockpicks but he needed to hold up his end of the bargain, so it couldn’t be helped — Astarion never personally made promises he couldn’t keep. Plus she could always just buy more lockpicks to replace the ones she inevitably would break, so the vampire spawn continued with his collecting of interesting looking boxes for his latest project - teaching Tav how to pick locks. Rating: T for swearing and general sassiness. Word count: A whopping 8,498. Hoo. Pairing: Astarion x F!Tav Series: 9 INT Tales

Also available on AO3 if that is more preferable 🤠 For context on Astarion's nickname, 'Melon', you may have to read the previous instalment to 9 INT Tales, Drink Break.

If one were to ask Astarion who the best teacher for lockpicking would be, he would not hesitate to offer himself as an answer (whether or not he would actually teach was an entirely separate matter). And it seemed Tav had the same idea.

Their arrangement started a few nights ago. Their intrepid leader had found herself stuck in a dark cell with a lock that was a little complex even for Astarion, and even though she wasn’t locked in for too long the experience had visibly shaken her. When they returned to camp that afternoon she’d wandered into her tent and had to be coaxed out for dinner, which worried the party slightly, given Tav was often proactive about dinner preparation (and the act of eating it).

She was obviously glum for the rest of the night, even when Astarion and Karlach jointly tried to tease her out of her little shell. She merely smiled a little smile that didn’t bring out the crease in her eyes, before she muttered a response that was, at the very most, quarter-hearted. Lae’zel, of all people, offered to take over Tav’s cleaning chores for the night, with some excuse of wanting the job done right. Tav merely responded with another smile before declaring to the rest of the party that she would like to turn in for the night – again, earlier than normal, without even spending any time chatting around the campfire.

She returned to her tent to uneasy mutterings of ‘goodnight’ and ‘sleep well’, and the party looked worriedly at one another as she disappeared through the canvas. No one felt comfortable enough to say anything – the rest of them continued with their usual routines, but they would occasionally stop to check on Tav’s tent for any movement.

A few hours later, near the end of Astarion’s watch just before Halsin woke, Tav emerged from her tent, hugging a knit robe close. She had actually managed to take him by surprise — he was so absorbed in the book he was reading that he didn’t pick up on her timid shuffling until she’d stood a meter from him, whispering, “Astarion, could you… please teach me to pick locks?”

His head shot up, and he had to remind himself that he was in safe company before he pulled his daggers out and pounced on his companion’s throat. “Darling,” he began empathetically, putting a hand over his chest. He tried his best to act nonchalant, to try and pretend that she didn’t just shoot a bolt of electricity through his heart by walking up to him. He observed her face — this seemed serious enough for him to mark his progress on his book with an abandoned recipe of Gale’s and call it quits for the night. “You… want to learn to pick locks?”

“Yes,” she said, before hesitating. “I… Please.”

He shifted to make room for her on the rug next to him. She slowly ambled over, keeping her knit robe wrapped tight around her form. He arranged some pillows behind her. He noted her slouched posture. “Well, I’m guessing this is brought on by your little… debacle this afternoon.”

Her fists closed over the material tighter, near imperceptible if not for his keen eye observing her body language with great interest – leftovers from his days of seduction. “Yes,” she said, before looking at the tents around them, lowering her voice further as she divulged, “I’ve… never mentioned this before but I’m actually afraid of dark, closed in spaces.” She let out a shuddering breath and gave him a reassuring smile that he’d rate 3 out of 10 for convincingness. She tried to make herself look smaller, and when she continued it sounded like she was trying to persuade herself. “It’s stupid, isn’t it? A bit childish of me, I know, but I… would just like to be able to get myself out of tight spots, you know?”

Astarion’s breath stilled.

How could he say no to that? The fear of dark, closed in spaces was not uncommon, nor was it childish. Most people were afraid of being buried alive in some form, and they should be – he was unfortunate enough to have had the experience to know that it was something to fear, when he spent a year locked in a tomb living what most would only consider a nightmare. And he didn’t even have the ability to die. He looked towards the fire as the memory washed over him, unbidden and unwanted but unstoppable. He could feel his mind drifting. He could feel his hands trying to claw away at the memory, as if it had a physical form he could contend with.

No — dark, enclosed spaces was not something he would wish on anyone. He supressed a shudder that tried to crawl up his spine, and he could almost feel the wood on his back and the lid on his face –

“If it’ll be too much of an inconvenience…” he could hear Tav say, though her voice sounded muffled and far away. He could feel the light touch of her hand on his arm, and it felt like a beacon he could use to return to the present to, “it’s okay, I just thought I’d try.”

“No, no,” he answered, trying to pull his mind back into his body, coaxing it to want to feel her touch, to feel the breeze that was real. Absently, he added, “I’m a marvellous teacher, darling — there will be no one better to teach you.” That part was true. He turned to look at her and patted her hand, which she then pulled away to wrap back around her robe. It seemed he was back. She looked at him with concern, but said nothing. He was grateful. “But I would like something for… compensation,” he said, somewhat suggestively, slipping into a comfortable and familiar mask.

May as well use the opportunity to push The Plan along.

Her eyebrows shot up. The whole of her face lit up, which was a pleasant twist from the night’s sullen mood. She seemed pleased and partly excited, even despite the prospect of needing to recompense him. “Of course!” she said, louder than she probably meant to as she continued in a lower tone that was no less excited, “That’s absolutely fine. I can, um,” she paused, hummed, and pursed her lips. Her eyes, dark and sparkling in the vicinity of the campfire, wandered to the side as she retreated into her thoughts in search of ideas. Was she aware that it was a tell of hers? He has been trying to figure out if there were stages to the eye rolling that revealed the progress of her thoughts. “I can… do your chores for a tenday if you want?”

“A month,” he countered, before he realised that this was not part of The Plan. Well, surely his tutelage was worth more than one measly tenday anyway?

She raised an eyebrow at him but the smile that spread across her mouth betrayed amusement. Her smiles always started crooked, favouring one side before evening out. It seemed her mood had done a complete shift from sullen to delighted. “Melon, you drive a hard bargain! Two tendays.”

“Three tendays, darling,” he teased.

“Two tendays.”

It was amusing that she didn’t call him out, given ‘a month’ and ‘three tendays’ were the same, but he chalked it up to her not noticing. He huffed at her, “that is not how bargaining works, you are horrendous at this.”

The irony was not missed on him that she had done the exact same thing – making the exact same offer for his same offer. Maybe she did get it, after all?

She muffled a laugh and nudged him with her shoulder. He let her jostle him. “What do you want me to do, offer two and a half tendays? Come on, Astarion, be serious! How about…” she breathed in through her teeth as she scanned her brain for another bargaining chip to up the ante with, her eyes now wandering from the top to the right in a smooth curve. She gasped and clapped her hands, pointing at him as an idea came to mind, “I can do your laundry for you,” she said soft and singsong, her nose scrunching up as she made that impish face that haunted his sweetest dreams. “I know you hate doing laundry.”

Oooh. He does — he hates the scrubbing, because it makes his hands pruney and ugly afterwards. And his laundry always took forever — he seemed to always get blood on his clothes, unlike someone like Gale who had to steer clear of bodies and was more effective from a distance. He marvelled at the unfairness of it — the wizard probably didn’t have to deal with bloodstains as much as he did, and he probably had some secret laundry spell to make what little work he has to do even easier. Boo.

“Tempting,” he said, not wanting to admit she’d found a really effective bargaining chip. “Now, darling, that’s on top of the chores, isn’t it?”

She studied his face with the ghost of a grin and squinted eyes. He kept his eyes on her, not one to lose a staring contest. Her eyes flickered between his, and she must have found whatever it was she was looking for, because she nodded and shrugged, “sure, I’ll do your laundry with mine in addition to doing your chores. For two tendays.” Tav stuck her hand out towards him — it seemed she thought she’d gotten herself a favourable deal, though Astarion thought the deal was most advantageous to him. A couple of lessons for two weeks of no chores and no laundry?

“Shake on it?” She offered, before her fingers delicately curled into a loose fist, cancelling the proffered handshake, “or would you rather draft something up, Mr Magistrate?”

He scoffed, before looking around his tent behind him for a scrap of paper. He had a quill and inkpot ready nearby, but paper was harder to find. “I think I would like it in writing if you don’t mind,” he teased, as she laughed breathily, “given your less-than-stellar memory, you’ll probably stiff me of the tuition.”

“I would never!” She said, pretending to be insulted. She leaned back into the pillows as she watched him, amused as his search turned up fruitless. She seemed much more relaxed now than when the night started. “No dice?” she teased, useless as she was, lounging on his pillows with a cheeky smile on her face.

He gave her what he hoped was a withering look. “No, darling. Surprisingly my mobile office doesn’t have a dedicated place to store paper, you see.”

She pointed at his book, still sitting at his lap, forgotten. “What about the back of that?”

Astarion glanced down at the book he was reading. He was almost embarrassed to be caught completely unawares while reading a Tenebrux Morrow book, like a child sneakily reading past bedtime, but Tav didn’t seem to care. He felt his nose wrinkle at the idea of vandalising a book, even a non-scholastic one.

“Why, darling, that’s borderline sacrilegious.”

“To whom?” She asked, as she reached her hand out for it, upturned and patient. “I wasn’t aware books were under the protection of any particular god.”

“To me,” he clarified, though he handed the book over anyway. “Don’t write on the cover.”

Tav had the audacity to look scandalised and insulted for the second time that night. “Excuse me,” she made a show of daintily opening the back cover to reveal a blank endpaper. She tapped a finger against the surface, “I’m not some kind of savage idiot. I was thinking of writing it on this bit.”

“That’ll have to do,” he said, as he gave her a long-suffering sigh. It was their best option given the situation, even though he wasn’t very fond of the idea. He took the book back from her as he began thinking up what to write. “Years of study, I assume, all to draft up a sham contract.”

“I’ll have you know this contract is legally binding, and very, very serious,” she corrected, as she watched him at work, stretching across his pillows. He racked his brain for old memories – he’d dealt with contracts as a magistrate, he could at least remember that much.

He tried to keep his writing small, neat, and even to fit what we could of what was important — the parties involved, the watered-down terms and conditions. He even asked her about what they should do if someone broke their promise (‘upon breach of contract, the party that fails to fulfill their side of the agreement shall compensate the other party by setting up the other party’s tent at the next campsite’).

And to her credit, she did take it seriously, nodding solemnly as she read lines of text as he came up with them. She barely made changes or gave input, trusting the majority of the process to him. At the end of it he drew up two lines, pleased with the result of their contract which had taken up both sides of the end page and inside cover.

She let out a big yawn as she pulled her legs towards her chest. She wrapped her arms around them.

“Oh, dear – apologies for boring you,” he joked. She waved him off.

“I’m sorry, it’s not you – your pillows are so comfortable and the fire is so nice,” she muttered, as she rested her chin on her knees to watch the fire. She was fighting to stay awake – he could tell, seeing how heavy her eyes were getting. He watched a few slow blinks.

“We’ll let this dry,” he said, as he watched rub at the tip of her nose. “Now, darling, I’m just checking again that you are of sound mind, and you are not doing this under duress.”

Another yawn. With one eye shut, Tav leaned her left temple against her knees, looking at him. She hummed. She gave a thumbs up.

“I guess that will have to do,” he sighed, as he looked down at the makeshift contract and signed ‘Astarion Ancunín’. “If I were a devil you would be trapped forever, love; you really need to read what you’re signing.”

Signing his name felt foreign to him, but there was a twinge of familiarity in the action. He couldn’t remember the last time he had to sign a legal document – slaves couldn’t own things, he reminded himself, but he found his hand signed with a flourish. He watched as the ink sunk into the fibre of the paper before he passed it to her.

“You have a lovely name,” was all she said, as she took the book and the quill and signed her name without hesitation. “I trust you.”

What a stupid statement. One should always check what they are agreeing to before signing — families have betrayed each other for less, and not even love can withstand greed. Astarion was reminded of Tav’s naïveté, and he was grateful to the gods that she’d never run into a particularly exploitative fey or cambion. She returned the book to him and looked at her signature – it was simple, with no flourishes unlike his. She only signed her first name.

When another yawn made its way out of her, he ushered her away. “Go, my dear,” he said, as she got back up and rubbed her eyes. He kept the book open in his lap, not wanting the ink to smudge on his hard work. “You need all the beauty sleep you can get.”

“Of course,” she said, as she brushed dirt off her clothes, looking down at him. Her eyes glanced at his pillows, before she pouted and said, “we can’t all be so lucky like you.”

He scoffed. “I know. How unfortunate.”

“Goodnight, Melon.”

“Goodnight, Tav.”

As she walked off to her tent, he tended to the book, the inkpot, and the quill. He kept an ear out for her movements – a light tumbling, some shuffling, and then silence. Once he could make out her light snoring, he called out, “sorry, Halsin, you can come out now.”

Halsin gave Astarion a sheepish smile as he emerged from his tent, wide awake and equipped with his own book. “I’m sorry, friend, but I did not want to interrupt your courtship.”

Astarion sputtered. What? “I’m afraid you are sorely mistaken — that was nothing but a professional interaction, my friend.”

The Druid shrugged as he nodded, “Ah, of course,” he said, his deep voice tinged with amusement. “Apologies. Go, rest - I’ll take over the watch, now.”

He straightened out the rest of his things before he slid into his tent and laid on his bedroll, barely kicking his shoes off as he went. Looking up at the canvas ceiling of his humble tent, waiting for his nerves to calm down before he attempted to trance. The contract, carefully crafted at the end pages of a copy of Tenebrux Morrow, was on the bedroll next to him — the safest place he could think of.

As Astarion closed his eyes to begin his meditation he thought Tav silly for taking on such a time-consuming method of repayment — with some bitterness in the edges of his thoughts, he thought, ‘I would have just offered sex for it.’

He was soon out like a light.

The first lesson, Astarion decided, would have to be on the tools of the trade. He’d grabbed a spare lockpicking set from the group chest, opened it to check all the contents were within, and rolled it back up.

He turned to find Wyll standing behind him. “Good morning, Astarion,” he greeted as he reached for the lid of group chest. He stepped to the side to let the younger man get through. “How are you this fine day?”

“Just tickety-boo,” he replied, cheerful and without an ounce of sarcasm. He was feeling quite motivated, spending his morning since waking coming up with a lesson plan for Tav. “How did you sleep?”

“Well enough,” the warlock replied as he studied a few of the blades they stowed away. He picked one, tested its heft, and looked down the blade’s edge. “Could use a sharpen, this one. I may have to borrow Lae’zel’s grindstone. Anyway, I thought I heard you and Tav having a chat last night.”

“Yes, she did come out to ask for a favour,” he affirmed, as Wyll wrapped the bundle of spare blades back up to store. He laid the bundle down into the chest like a father would a sleeping baby into its crib, “I didn’t think we were too loud, darling - apologies if we woke you.”

Wyll waved him off with a kind smile, “No, no, my friend, it’s fine. It got too warm for me and that woke me up. I thought I heard her laughing. We were very worried about her last night, so it was like hearing music. I guess that trap shook her up real bad.”

Astarion wasn’t sure how much he could divulge. The two of them began their treks back to their destinations in camp together. “Yes, it did,” he sighed, recalling the uncharacteristic way Tav shrunk into herself as she admitted her fear of the dark. “Well, it can’t be helped.”

The Blade of Frontiers put a hand on his shoulder as he prepared to head to Lae’zel and her ever moving grindstone. His hand was warm, and his grip solid. Astarion would have fallen for Wyll were he still innocent of the pain in the world. “Well, I’m glad you could give her comfort, my friend.”

The vampire watched him leave and wave to Lae’zel who eyed his sword with hungry interest. It wasn’t a designated chore in camp, but the githyanki had taken it upon herself to maintain the camp’s weapons. She quickly reached out for the sword to study the blade, barely acknowledging the man who had brought it and just as she started talking at Wyll about it Astarion turned to look for his new student.

He found her in the company of Shadowheart — she was braiding the cleric’s hair as the two of them had a chat about hair care in the wilderness. Tav sat on a tiny stool while the other woman sat on the ground in front of her, filing her nails. As he approached, the Sharran glanced over and said, “you’ll have to wait your turn, I’m afraid.”

“Star!” Tav greeted, cheerfully and bright as the day, the complete opposite to the raven-haired girl in front of her. Maybe it was in comparison to Shadowheart’s surliness that made Tav shine brighter the sun. “Good morning!”

“Darling, you seem awfully perky,” he joked, as he stood to watch them. He had never had anyone greet him ‘good morning’ with as much gusto as Tav, and she did it consistently, even when the mornings were less than ideal. Even Karlach couldn’t keep up with the enthusiasm every day, with some mornings where she came to life slower than usual. Tav was just happy to be alive. “For someone who didn’t get much sleep.”

“Gross,” Shadowheart chimed immediately, looking up at him with her usual flat expression. Sometimes Astarion liked to imagine her large, blunt fringe was just a very, very large monobrow, given her natural levelness. “Do you mind? I’m existing here. I don’t really want to be hearing about your sex life, thank you.”

Tav gasped, and accidentally tugged at a section of braid too hard, sending Shadowheart jolting back with outstretched arms. Astarion found it comical. “Sorry,” she said, as she rubbed at the cleric’s scalp to soothe it, “sorry, it’s not that.”

“Oh?” Shadowheart now switched targets — the little turd always went for the easier ones, never the type to work someone down like him, “Well, care to explain what it was, then?”

“I couldn’t sleep last night so I had a chat with Astarion,” she explained simply, as she continued braiding. She was getting to the end of Shadowheart’s long locks and began to gesture for the chain to be wrapped around it and woven between sections. “It’s nothing, really. I just asked him to show me how to pick locks, so if we ever end up in jail, we can at least have more than one person who can get us out. Is that comfortable?”

Shadowheart gave her head a tentative wobble and a bob, as she was wont to do when she was feeling particularly impassioned, and she nodded, clanging lightly as she did so.

“Yes; it’s perfect, thank you.” The cleric then frowned, staring ahead again at Tav’s instruction. The crown was slid up the braid and secured to the top of her head. The Sharran made slight adjustments for comfort. She hummed, before turning to Astarion as she continued to prod at the hairpiece. “Wouldn’t it be better to teach someone like Lae’zel? Since you two are always together anyway.”

“That’s not true,” Tav argued, as Astarion said, “I don’t just take on any student, darling.”

Shadowheart shot Astarion a look, before she turned to Tav, her eyebrows climbing beneath her large fringe. The “holy woman” was probably the biggest gossip at camp, ahead of Astarion – it seemed, unlike some other religions, Shar had no rules against gossiping. Or perhaps it was their elven heritage that made them so? Plied with wine, no one’s secrets were safe from revelation by her — and she looked like she just spotted one. She got up smoothly and offered a hand out to Tav, who got up from the stool with a groan about her knees.

“Oh, this is a weird mating ritual then,” she opined simply, laughing at her friend’s expression. “Well, don’t let me get in the way of it,” she said, as she waved them away, heading towards the rest of the party looking very much like a cat that just got the canary in a compromising position with another bird, “I’m going to go check on breakfast.”

Tav brushed off the dust from her lap, placing Shadowheart’s prized hairbrush on the table outside. “Why wouldn’t she believe me?”

“It was a slightly suggestive conversation, darling,” he said, as he reminded her, “I told her you didn’t get much sleep, you told her I was showing you how to pick locks.”

She gasped, her hands flying to her mouth. “Oh!” She blushed as she looked at anything but him. He didn’t think it was even that scandalous, but apparently she did. “Oh dear, I guess that does sound a bit suggestive. Sorry about that, I hope it didn’t make you uncomfortable.”

“No, love, I’m fine.”

“Well,” she let out a grateful sigh, turning back to him now with only the suggestion of a blush remaining, “how can I help you today?”

He raised the lockpicking set to show her, giving it a slight shake for emphasis. “I thought you may want your first lesson, my dear. We’ll be looking at the tools of the trade,” he gestured towards his tent, “would you rather yours, or mine?”

She turned deep red again. “Huh?”

“We wouldn’t want to be doing this in Shadowheart’s tent, now, would we, darling?” He purred, as he enjoyed how flustered she was getting.

She shook her head clear. “Hah,” she laughed weakly, “maybe I’m not as awake as I thought, huh. Anyway, sure — your tent has the nice pillows, and I haven’t made my bedroll, so we’ll go to yours.”

“Good choice.”

The first lesson was brief, but it went well. He gave her a run-down of all the tools in the kit, their primary uses, and he pointed out the essential, most versatile picks. She asked questions here and there, but for the most part she was the most attentive little student, looking intent and determined to learn. He could almost see the gears in her head working overtime, make out the smoke coming out of her ears. He left her to familiarise herself with the lockpick set as he got up at Gale’s invitation to go collect firewood for the night. She gave him a thumbs up as she pointed at each pick and said its name out loud.

It was when he got halfway into the forest that he realised he had just given her a free lesson by doing his own chores.

Astarion sighed as he began to collect kindling. No sense in going back now.

The next lesson was mostly an addendum to the previous — two days after he’d left her to get cozy with the arsenal of tools, he’d tested her on their names and which of them would be most useful if she could only stuff three down a corset at a party. He was surprised to find that she remembered most of the pick names, and her selection was also quite good. He wasn’t the educator type, but he was proud of how well his little student was doing. He told her just as much and she just glowed at the praise.

“You really think so?” Tav asked, as he buttered her up by saying she may have a knack for thievery after all, “I’m surprised I haven’t made you want to bash your head against a wall!”

“Oh, darling — it’s not that serious,” he said, as they put the picks away to finish up for the night. He rolled the kit up and handed it over to her. She tucked it under her armpit. “You’re a very attentive student.”

“Thanks, Star,” she said with a soft smile, wringing her hands together. There was a furrow on her brow. “My old teachers used to tell me I was a special kind of dim.”

“Oh, my sweet, maybe it was just that they weren’t good teachers at all,” he said, “I didn’t find you any dimmer than most, but maybe you were like me and just hated the more boring topics.”

“Of course! My mum always said my strengths must lie in other things outside of books.”

Astarion didn’t know if he should be sad for her or if he should laugh. He decided on neither – At least she hadn’t realised that her mum’s aspiration was insulting towards her.

Not that he had a wealth of experience to refer to, but Astarion really did think she wasn’t that bad of a student. She did have confidence issues, where she would doubt herself and glance over at him before she gave her answers, most of which were correct. With that tidbit revealed, he could tell he needed to add the extra step of rebuilding her interest in learning and her confidence in her own abilities.

“Well, at least I’m teaching you something practical,” he offered, trying to reassure her. “Those old books couldn’t get you out of a maze unless you stacked them up to stand on them, and in a pinch the best use for them would be kindling.”

Gale would have a conniption if he heard them.

As Tav stood to leave, thanking him for the night’s lesson once more, he placed a hand on her shoulder to stop her. She gave him a surprised look, eyes wide with some concern. “What’s up, Melon?”

He handed her his laundry, folded neatly in a wicker basket. It was odd – knowing he didn’t have to do his own laundry, he threw himself into battles with little regard for the blood. He didn’t even cuss when he slipped on a puddle of guts. He gave her a grin, showing a hint of fang. “Don’t forget these, darling.”

The next lesson involved practice. Astarion was a more hands-on teacher, after all. He’d placed a medium-sized chest in front of Tav, once dinner was finished and once she’d finished washing up. He gave the top of the chest a confident pat. “Your first chest,” he said, as he gave the wood a slight caress. She looked at the box in a mix of anticipation and nerves.

“Darling,” he called softly, as she bit her bottom lip worryingly, lowering herself to reach the lock. “You learn this best with practice. Remember that. Not out of a book.”

She looked up at him from where she knelt in front of the chest, her eyes large and slightly quivering. Had he said the wrong thing?

Her face melted into a smile. “Practice,” she nodded, before she took in a deep breath with her eyes closed. She let the breath out slowly – a calming exercise she liked to do before she took aim at most targets, moments before their deaths. Despite her excitable demeanour she was very good at changing course. “Alright! Let’s get cracking.”

Despite his initial promise, a book was involved — but only to explain the internal mechanisms of a lock. Kneeling next to her, he pointed at the diagrams of springs and barrels and explained how they all connected — how keys worked, how locks worked, and how one can beat a lock without the requisite key. How each pick would interact with locks. Patiently, he answered her questions and explained the motions required and the tactile sensations she would need to feel out for. Once she had a working understanding of the goal at hand, he declared her ready to try.

He positioned her in front of him, and with his arms wrapped around her from behind, he took her hands in his and guided her through her first lockpicking experience. With the tension wrench in place, he let her pick her tool of choice. Hesitantly, she selected a hook pick. She turned to him for approval, still placed in front of him.

She was entirely too close. The scent of her hair and the blood running through her veins filled his senses. He reminded himself to try and feed tonight. It was a little distracting, but he pushed through – he had a job to do.

“Which one is that, darling?”

“The hook pick…?” she asked, rather than answered. She tilted her head in question.

“Yes, and?” He tried to coax her towards the answer with his eyes, and she tried to read his face before she replied.

“It’s… the best one we can use for most chests?”

“Are you asking me, or telling me?”

“I’m… telling you,” she said, as she straightened up. She hummed, and took a deep breath in.

“Then try again, darling, and convince me this time.”

“This is a hook pick, and this works best for most chests,” she said, more confidently, as she kept her eyes trained to the side.

He smiled, “Correct,” he said, as she grinned with pride and turned ahead again. He gestured towards the tension wrench, and she took hold of it, before she leaned forward to insert the hook into the keyhole. Her backside rubbed against his crotch.

He ignored it.

“Okay,” he started, lowering his voice as he guided her hand. “This is very delicate, so it’s best to pay as much attention as possible. Can you do that, my sweet?”

“Yes,” she said, her confident voice carried over from the previous question. She was staring at the lock as if it were a snake about to strike – he swore she was even holding her breath. He rubbed his thumb over her clenched fists, reminding her to relax. He felt her ease in his arms, and softly she added, “Yep.”

“Okay. Now, slowly so we don’t snap the pick,” he inserted the tool into the keyhole, finding the first tumbler and hooking it up with the hook end of the pick. “It can be a tight squeeze and you have to get your angles right, so just keep it steady.” He gave it a light flick, slowly pushing it up in search of the threshold he knew wouldn’t be far. “Can you feel that?” He asked, whispering close to her ear for fear that she would miss the telltale click of a barrel locking in place.

He did, and he wasn’t even directly holding the pick. Tav gasped, whispering back urgently, “yes.”

“Good girl,” he crooned, “now, on to the next one, slowly. You don’t have to get them all right the first pass through, you can come back to them to test them out.”

This would be a prime time to act on The Plan — while she had her backside against his crotch and her scent all over him, with his body and hands over hers and his low voice in her ear. The position was so undeniably intimate and very inappropriate, but Astarion was surprised to find he didn’t feel sexual about it at all. Tav was focused, her attention 100 per cent on the lock she was determined to defeat, and he was focused on keeping her calm and level-headed so as to avoid frustration from overwhelming her. He didn’t want to act on The Plan. He wanted her to learn.

She was deep in focus when Shadowheart passed by. “Oh, dear — foreplay just out in the open?” She joked, as she walked past with her nightly goblet of wine, headed to her tent. Thankfully she was unable to cut through Tav’s concentration. “If this is how you do your lockpicking lessons then maybe I shouldn’t sign up.”

Astarion flipped her off, letting Tav’s hand go momentarily. The cleric let out an uncharacteristic cackle.

He felt the final tumbler click in place, and immediately Tav froze and held her breath. He could feel her buzzing with excitement – he had to stop her before she broke the pick and undid their hard work. “Okay,” he said, “we’re near the end of it but don’t get too excited just yet, darling. Keep your hand very steady. It’s time to turn it but slowly, like you would a very fragile key. You don’t want to break your pick now,” he guided her again, and with her breath still held she unlocked her first chest via thievery.

Before she could even open the chest she dropped the pick and the wrench and turned to Astarion, who was forced to pull back to avoid being whipped by her hair. “Did you see that, Star? I did it!” She was abuzz with a frantic energy, and she looked like she was vibrating from excitement and sheer glee. She squealed, spinning to her knees to face him, taking his hands in hers and doing an awkward little dance with them. “I did it!”

From across the camp, with her attention piqued, Karlach yelled out, “Woo! Good job, Soldier!”

“Well done, darling,” he said, as he beamed with pride. Her excitement was infectious, but she’d yet to see the best part. He gestured towards the chest with an impish expression, “why don’t you check and see your reward?”

Excitedly, she threw the lid open and peered in, only to give an exaggerated groan.

A pile of laundry awaited within.

Astarion had surprised her with another box again, a few days later. With Tav doing his chores he had time to do as he pleased and he had time to prepare materials for her. He found that he actually enjoyed trying to come up with little challenges for her, excited to see her proud grin. Plus, her reaction to her previous ‘reward’ tickled him, so he hoped to do it again.

With her doing his chores some nights were write offs, and he would let her tend to her needs instead of practicing. Some nights he would get so bored he would sneakily take on one of his own chores without telling her. Tonight, however, their nights off aligned. And with a new contraption he was excited to test, he sought her out, determined to dump the remainder of the knowledge she would need for her basic lockpicking skills tonight.

“Hello, darling,” he greeted, watching her as she brushed her fingers through her damp hair, wringing out the excess water with a quick squeeze. “Ready to practice some thievery?”

“Absolutely,” she smiled, rising to her feet and throwing her still damp hair into a haphazard bun that tipped over one side. She ducked into her tent and emerged with a wicker basket, with his clothes clean and folded. “I’ve got your laundry here, too.”

“You shouldn’t put your hair up while it’s still wet, darling,” he chastised her, as he led her across the camp to a new chest placed squarely at the centre of his outside rug. She placed his laundry down by the entryway of his tent and he took it inside.

“I know,” she said, exasperated, “but I just need it off my back. And I didn’t want to get your front wet.”

“Why would I get wet?” he asked, upset about the thought.

“If you sit behind me?” Tav gave him a confused look, “Aren’t you going to, this time?”

“Well, I thought it best for you to practice on your own,” he shrugged, “but if you’d like a cuddle…”

She laughed, waving his flirtations away. “No, no,” she smiled at the box, taking the lock in hand and examining it, like she’d observed him doing out in the field. She’d been more observant of his lockpicking recently, and when time permitted, he would tell her about the types of locks they ran into. He wasn’t sure what information exactly she was gleaning from it this time, but he said nothing. He poured himself a goblet of wine but offered her none. “I think I can do this one myself.”

“I think so too,” he said, as he sat on top of the chest to watch her. He crossed one leg over the other, leaning on the chest with one arm. “You’ll find it’s similar to the first one,” he let out his signature giggle, “I would know, I picked them both.”

She made relatively quick work of the first box — obviously not at his speed, but he didn’t even have time to get comfortable, so it was impressive nonetheless given she didn’t really have much experience with it. Such was his burden to bear as a fantastic teacher, he supposed. She undid the lock while eyeing him suspiciously.

“Darling, I haven’t put a cursed skeleton in there, if that’s what you’re afraid of,” he joked, and she frowned at him while she leaned her weight into the box.

She gave the lid a hefty push, keeping her eyes on him as she did so. “No, but I swear if you’ve put your laundry in here again —”

She stopped midway through her threat when she finally spotted the contents of the box. Not his laundry, no. He was a better entertainer than that – he wouldn’t repeat a good joke so soon after, that was a Gale thing to do. She blinked, comically, and her mouth hung open in shock, and Astarion found that her reaction made the extra work worth it for him — he’d been lamenting how much work he was expending on preparing engaging materials for her, but this the memory of her dumbfounded face was reward enough.

She pulled out another box. Locked. She looked up at him.

“Well?” He asked, gesturing to the sizeable box in her hand. He put the lid of the large chest back down. He instructed her to use it as a makeshift table, while he took up one half of it as a seat. “Off you go, then, darling. Do mind your pick this time.”

It was the first time she’d run into this type of lock, but he’d told her about it before. With the only guidance provided being which pick would be best, he let her test it out, reminding her that the mechanics of it all remained the same. “Patience, my sweet,” he said. So slowly and surely, she worked on the lock, her face in grave concentration. Occasionally when he saw her frown deepen to a level beyond mere focus, he would chime in to remind her that she was more than capable of besting it, given she was a natural with the first lock. It worked to keep the frustration at bay.

A few minutes of silence later, she let out a gasp as she turned the lock open. She kept the lid shut, looking up at him again. “Is it going to be another box?” She asked excitedly, with a grin on her lips. She lifted the lid slightly, but not enough to see in just yet.

“Only one way to find out,” he answered, and she squealed with delight to find a smaller box within. Ah, he did have her sense of humour pinned down after all. He hasn’t lost his touch at reading people. “A new type of lock on that one, too.” Using his toe, he pointed at a new pick. “Try that one, love. And change your tension wrench.”

Placing the new box on top of the second box (which sat next to Astarion on top of the large chest), Tav began to work on the new lock, hardly giving Astarion a glance for any reassurance. She was too excited to doubt herself – this had turned into a game for her, as he’d intended. He was happy to see her confidence grow — he said less as well, finding that she would mutter the reminders to herself.

You know the basics, Tav; you can do it.

Gale approached them, tilting his head questioningly at the stack of boxes. His task of inventorying their potions temporarily abandoned, losing to his curiosity. “What are you doing?”

“Lockpicking, my wordy wizardly friend,” Astarion answered, as he kept his gaze on Tav’s fingers gently coaxing the tumblers to give way.  Gale let out a light laugh.

“Yes, I can see that much,” he said, “but I suppose what I meant to ask was if you just have a series of nesting boxes in there.”

“Well, I wouldn’t spoil your surprises,” Astarion said, as he poured himself another goblet of wine, his good mood astonishingly not ruined by the wizard’s intrusion, “so best you don’t spoil mine, hm?”

The wizard bowed in apology but stayed in the vicinity, watching Tav at work. When she finally got the lock undone, she nearly ripped the box open to reveal the next one. Gale let out a laugh, and he returned to his inventory work but occasionally kept an eye out.

“Where did you find these?” She asked, as she took out the smaller box and placed it on top of the box she had just defeated. She was building up quite a stack. “Astarion, this is so silly.”

He was surprised she didn’t recognise some of the boxes he’d collected recently – he even used them for field demonstrations, but he supposed he couldn’t expect much from her memory. “Less talk, more picking, please darling,” he said, taking a sip of his wine. There was a lingering smile on his face. This was entertaining to him too.

By the time she’d gotten the boxes stacked to her height she’d gathered an audience. Astarion heard Wyll and Karlach making bets on the total number of boxes she would have by the end, and Lae’zel merely scoffed at the display, but said nothing discouraging of Tav’s attempts. Tav had told her teacher recently that the githyanki had praised her, in her roundabout way, for wanting to learn a skill more useful than their ‘wizard and his reading’. He found that statement most amusing.

Shadowheart sidled up to Astarion with a goblet of her own.

“Well, would you look at that,” she hummed, one arm across her chest, the other upright and holding her goblet by her face, “looks like you’re not a bad teacher after all, Astarion.” She tilted her goblet towards him.

“I will have you know I am excellent,” he said, as he tapped his goblet against hers in a toast.

“She’s learned very quickly,” she praised, as she picked up the bottle Astarion was drinking, examining the label. She hummed, mildly disdainfully, which Astarion ignored — no one can be a snob when the choices were vinegar or vinaigrette. She put it back down and took a conscious sip of her wine.

Another box emerged from the ever-birthing box. Another series of whoops erupted in the air. Even Halsin had now joined in, keeping Scratch and the Owlbear entertained when they got excited over the cheering. “She has,” he affirmed, proudly. “She could use some practice to speed up and I’ve kept a few skills to my chest – I wouldn’t want to not be needed anymore, of course.”

“Heavens forbid,” the cleric said, before moving over to stand alongside Wyll and Karlach, who let her in on their wager.

After two more boxes she was at the last one — he’d saved an intricate blue box for the final one, the smallest he could find, swiped from an abandoned house somewhere. This one, she had never seen before – he made sure to hide it as a surprise. By this point Karlach had lost her bet, and Shadowheart was about to lose hers, which Astarion took some glee in. Tav’s confidence was brimming now, and she moved with greater surety than before, speeding up slightly despite the myriad of new locks she’d been presented with. He marvelled at the change in her. Maybe she was a natural at this after all.

The final lock was picked away and with bated breath she opened it to pull out a pendant. The group, barring Shadowheart, cheered as she turned to present them her hard won reward, and she gave them mock bows as they applauded her. Karlach gave her a quick pat on the back (before she could singe), as did Wyll. Gale resumed his inventorying and Lae’zel went back to oiling her weapons. When the dust settled, only Tav and Astarion remained.

“Thank you, Melon,” she said sweetly, as she admired the pendant, the weight of it resting on her hand. It was on the smaller side, with a ruby inlaid in a simple prong setting. The chain was also quite delicate – it would have been a lovely gift for whoever had owned it, sadly now probably gone. “This is the nicest thing anyone has ever given me. Truly, you have been so wonderful. Could you…?”

He motioned her over and she turned her back to him, her hair now spilled out of the bun at Shadowheart’s insistence to allow it to dry. Carefully, he took the ends of the necklace and locked the clasps together as she held her hair out of the way. She looked down at the pendant sitting between her collarbones, holding it between her thumb and forefinger.

“If only my teachers were as patient as you,” she said, as she turned to take his hands in hers. “Maybe I would have turned out differently.”

He looked down at their joined hands. “Darling,” he said, sincerely, tongue loosened by the wine, “you are perfect, exactly as you are.”

She looked like she was about to cry. Not wanting to deal with emotions heavier than what he was already faced with (and not wanting to have to examine more emotions than he was now pondering) Astarion quickly added, “I’m sure you would have learned better if your teachers were attractive too.”

He was too late to stop the first tear from falling, but at least the rest were held back by her laughter.

“Oh, dear,” he said, as she gleefully turned to him with pride, besting another chest (which he had disarmed before he called her over — it was a little harder to teach trap disarming and he needed to keep some skills to himself), “I may have to pick another class with the way you’re going, my darling.”

“Oh, Melon,” she grinned, as she blew at the ends of her tools before making a show of putting them away in her lock picking kit, “we could always use a backup pick lock.”

Astarion must have made a face before he could school his emotions — Tav laughed as she rose from her kneeling position, her hands automatically reaching out for his arms like she normally did when she was trying to playfully placate Shadowheart or Karlach. He intercepted her hands with his, pushing them away exaggeratedly. “I’m kidding! It’s just beginner’s luck.”

“Luck?” He asked, as he leaned back with a hand to his mouth, looking at her with a raised eyebrow and a catty expression. He purred, “Darling, if you think you just got lucky then maybe we should consider… extending those lessons.”

She shoved him lightly. He let her. “No! I don’t want to do your chores anymore.”

“Oh, my sweet, we can renegotiate the terms,” he said, as he slung an arm over her shoulder to lead her away from the chest she’d yet to empty. He’ll do that later. “You know, I’ve been really enjoying not doing my own laundry…”

#purdle-writes #baldur's gate 3 fanfic #astarion fanfic #astarion x oc #astarion x tav #astarion x female tav #astarion fluff #look my tav is not the smartest but she means well #bg3 fanfiction #astarion x f!tav

[purdledooturt]

songs to break your back to (respectfully)

Ignore the title - this is my first attempt at writing smut and I'm just snowballing ideas at the moment for a multi-chapter fic I want to write. There is a bit of context missing to this, but take it as PWP for the time being.

I did write this with old Heisy in mind, but realistically you can probably sub in anyone else - it's not like I go into detail describing him, but he does get mentioned by name every once in a while.

Uh. This is written in second person POV (self-indulgent). There is daddy-kink (which is abandoned midway), and a breeding-kink (which the reader questions themself about). Please practice safe sex, I'm begging you - condoms do prevent more than just pregnancies.

I wrote the entirety of this on my phone, because apparently the Notes app just gets them creative juices flowing. Apologies for any spelling or grammatical errors - I tried really hard to keep my tenses straight. Trying to copy and paste from Word to tumblr is a pain - sorry for any formatting mishaps as well.

I hope this is as hot as the stories that inspired it.

❤

You never quite understood ‘backbreaking’ until you met Karl Heisenberg.

Not until you found yourself laying prone on the bed that you swear is the epicentre of a magnitude 7 earthquake, with his delicious weight on your thighs, pounding into you like there was no tomorrow. You can’t match his pace, no matter how hard you tried. You are nothing but a doll made to be used. He has such a firm grip on your hips you swear you’ll be bruised for weeks, and his breath comes out in pants that made you wetter with every sound. At one point he gathered your hair like reins and force you to arch your back, but his ministrations have made your arms weak and unable to hold you up for long. Mercifully, he let you go, but you committed the action to your memory, to ask him to try again later, in a different position.

You can do nothing but lay there as he fucked noises out of you — your knuckles have cramped closed gripping on the sheets like a lifeline but he refused to let up. You’ve tried to hold your head up but could barely manage, as every thrust knocked you back down again.

Simply put, he was a man starved, and you were all too happy to provide.

He leans down on you, slowing to a roll. He grabs at your hair at the nape of your neck and twists your head sideways as he gives the corner of your mouth a breathy lick, and you moan at the intimacy of it. You try to catch his tongue with yours. “You like that?” He asks, tucking his lips close to your ear in a growl, “your cunt just gave me a little squeeze.”

You try to nod, but he keeps your head still, continuing with his slowed assault of your poor, bruised cunt. What he now lacked in speed he made up for with raw force. “Yes,” you gasp out when he hummed.

“Yes, what?”

“Yes, daddy.”

He moans, leaning his head against the back of your right shoulder blade as he gave you a particularly hard thrust to punctuate the erotic sentence he was writing. “Good girl,” you hear him mutter, as he pulls back upright. You feel him spread your ass cheeks to get a better look at where you’re joined. He massages the flesh as he does so, “look how well you take me.”

You look at him over your shoulder, throwing your hair out of the way. All the other guys you’d been with always loved this angle and Karl was not immune. He slows to a halt, raising an eyebrow at you. You muster up your best innocent smile, batting your lashes at him. “Thank you, daddy,” you say, and he rolls his eyes at you with a shake of his head. He gives your ass a slap. The move didn’t have the effect you wanted but you didn’t mind — you love that he called you out on the cheesiness of it. You laugh.

He gasps, pulling out of you roughly. He is crouched over your legs, breathing heavy and giving you an amused and lopsided smile. “Geez, buttercup — warn a guy, won’t you?”

You roll over quickly — surely he hasn’t…? “What’s wrong?”

“Fucking vice grip,” he mutters as he crawls back over you, retaking his position between your legs. You can feel a slight burn in your thighs as you spread your legs wider than you’re used to in order to accommodate him, but the burn only adds to the excitement of it all. You watch him hook one of your legs up with his, in a move that got your brain short circuiting. “When you giggled.”

“Sorry?”

He takes his cock in hand, giving it slow strokes. “Don’t be,” he says, as he holds the base and slaps the head against your clit. You jump at the motion, and he chuckles. God — the sound of his chuckle, in the situation, is somehow hotter than the grunts and pants and dirty talking. You’ve never had so much fun during sex before, often feeling more like there was a role you were meant to play and you were gunning for best performance. “Was good.”

He rubs the head of his cock up and down against your dripping, slick slit, teasing you with a knowing grin that looked a little sharper than what you’re used to. Occasionally the head catches on your entrance and threatens to slip, but he coaxes it out to continue the slow teasing. He’s using your wetness to lubricate himself. You whine and try to wiggle to catch him but he is far too good at anticipating your moves. 

Finally, when he’s had enough, he keeps his eyes on you as he slides back in, slowly and tantalisingly. You moan as you are filled again, and your walls are stretched around his thick cock. As he bottoms out in you with a low groan, your eyes flutter close and your head tilts back. Your legs jerk — your knees dig as best as they could to his sides, and your ankles try to find each other behind him. Your left hand finds his thigh, nails digging in to the bulk of his muscle, not to push him but to anchor yourself before you float away. “So big,” you gasp out, as your lower back lifts off the bed, and he takes the opportunity to slide his arm underneath to support you, providing you with a lovely, lovely angle. With his other arm, he supports himself, leaning over you.

Given his height, he is bent over you, caging you. The idea excites you, and makes you feel oddly safe. Protected. You’ll unpack what this means later. He presses his forehead against yours. “Only the best for my baby girl.”

Your eyes flutter back open and you giggle once again, and he groans at the action but stays in you. Your right hand finds his cheek, and you cup it with a gentle smile as you give him an Eskimo kiss. You take the moment to catch his lips in a quick, cheeky kiss, which he smiles into, returning the gesture with his own light kiss back. It was a quick, tender moment, like the eye of a storm passing over and enveloping you in a peaceful silence. Slowly, he rolls his hips and the dance begins again, but this time you are more familiar with the steps as you push back. For such a well built man, Karl is so fluid, and you were enamoured with the way he moves, looking down between your bodies and watching him undulate.

Your hands travel to the base of his ribcage, sliding over his wide chest, scratching upwards before you wrap your arms around his neck. Your breaths mingle as you keep your foreheads connected, staring deep into each other’s eyes. His pupils are blown wide, and your eyes flicker between his steely greys. It hardly registers in your head that he is asking you if you’re liking it, and your mind is blank as you agree, your voice disembodied and far away: Yes. Yes. Keep going, please. Harder, please, please, please —

He’s slowly building up to his brutal pace again, and like a roller coaster your core tightens in anticipation of the heights you’re about to be taken to. He slams into you, over and over, until the room is filled with the obscene noises of your slick union and the sound of skin slapping against skin, mingled with your panting and the punctuated gasps he thrusts out of you. He breaks eye contact when he nudges your head to the side to start whispering praises in your ear — oh, how tight you are. How well you take him. How your cunt was made for his cock, and how he was going to absolutely ruin you. You feel the familiar ache in your lower belly — you’re close. So, so close. And you can’t get enough of him, grasping at what you can with clawing hands and desperate legs. Like a mantra you plead, fervently praying to the shrine you built in your mind for this man you met while on this whirlwind holiday.

The angle at which he holds you has you seeing stars soon enough — he continually hits a spot that makes you spasm, and he grins proudly. “That good?” He asks, as you come down from the soundless scream from your climax. He hardly slowed to accomodate you and let you ride out your release.

"Oh, yeah,” you reply mindlessly, voice hoarse, and as revenge for his cockiness you let out a breathless giggle, followed by a kegel.

“Little bitch,” he swears, but there is no venom at all. He sounds so amused, so enamoured. Like he was having so much fun, too.

You poke your tongue out at him, scrunching your nose in the process. You were feeling carefree and playful in his presence. The arm that was supporting your back slides out from under you, and he uses his hand to grasp your face roughly, his thumb on your cheek and the rest of his hand wrapped across your neck and around your jaw, locking you in place. He takes the opportunity to lick your from your chin to your lips. You stick your tongue out again, less playful now and more desperate. He sucks on your tongue to punish you. He pulls away but you remain connected with a thin trail of saliva. His hips never slow. Oh God — everything he does is hot.

He’s made you cum at least four times since the night started and as much as you enjoy the treatment you were hitting your limit. You notice his pace stutter — he was close, and chasing the high he’s put you on four times tonight. He starts roughly pawing and kneading at your tit. You cover his hand with one of you own, squeezing along. Your other hand takes care of what he couldn’t. You try to encourage him.

“Karl—“

“Where do you want me?” He asks, sounding breathless and strained, and in a moment of sheer stupidity and fuckdrunk horniness, you gawk at him.

“Inside. Oh, god — inside.”

He groans, his head buried now in the crook of your neck. The hand that was massaging you is now on the bed, and he has now enveloped you. His lips are at your collarbone, leaving ghost kisses with his breath. He alternates between biting what he can reach and muttering “oh, baby” and “please” over and over.

“Fuck,” he pushes himself up slightly and catches your ear again, licking the shell of it. He growls, the timbre of his voice sending a shock down your spine all the way to your tailbone. “You horny little bitch. I’m going to fucking fill you until you’re dripping. I’m going to fucking breed you.”

You moan. ‘Do I have a breeding kink?’, you wonder. Who fucking knows. Who fucking cares? Your mind is blank, and you damn the consequences, begging senselessly.

He moans and stills to a jittery stop after a final hard push, and you can feel the heat of his release inside you. He pauses, his breathing intense. “Fuck. Holy fuck.”

"Holy shit,” was your reply, and he is catching his breath as he pulls out of you. You shift to lean on your elbows, keeping him in your sight as he gets up. He stands at the foot of the bed, taking deep breaths to fill his lungs not unlike an athlete who has just finished their event, and you do the same, involuntarily trying to match his breathing. You watch as he steps away, disappearing into the ensuite. You can feel his spend start dripping towards your ass, and without the added weight of him on your pelvis you take stock of the state of your body more clearly, and you swear you’ve broken something, somehow. As his figure reappears, you declare, “I’m going to keep you.”

He laughs as he approaches with a small towel. He begins to wipe your thighs with the damp cloth with a gentleness that was the stark opposite of the assault he’d mounted against your body previously. God — he helps with clean up too? Heaven help you. “Are you?” He croons.

“Are you kidding?” You ask, as you sit upright with weak, shaky arms and take the towel from him with a smile and a bright ‘thank you’, taking over the wiping. You watch as he wanders over to the kitchenette, still fully nude, now to grab two glasses of water. You could marry him for this alone. “Where have you been all my fucking life?”

He gulps down his drink. “Romania.”

“Ha. Ha. Very funny.”

“That good, huh?” He asks, with a wolfish grin, as he passes you a glass of water and he sits at the bed again with his back to you.  He leans with his elbows on his knees.

You shuffle towards him on your knees, making the bed springs complain. He tilts his head towards you. With your free hand, you brush his hair behind one ear, parting the curtain which hid his face from view. You place your chin on his shoulder and beam. “That good. I think you’ve pulverised my pelvis but give me a few hours and I can go again.”

He throws his head back in a rakish laugh, and you find yourself wishing you could bottle the sound. He’s rearranged your insides, surely — you’ve never felt so many butterflies in your stomach before. You wrap your left arm around his waist, sliding over to the edge of the bed to sit to his right. You spill a bit of water as you move.

“God, I could use a smoke right now.”

“I have never once smoked in my life,” you reveal, unsure of why you couldn’t seem to stop your mouth from running, “but I could also use a smoke right now, too.”

He wraps his arm around your shoulders, and the two of you are oddly tender and soft in the afterglow. You knew of happy drunks — you didn’t realise something similar could apply to this. You were feeling… cuddly. Your cheeks hurt from beaming. “Have I reset your programming? You’re doing wonders to my damn ego, buttercup.”

You take a sip of the water and let silence fall over you. Suddenly the weight of exhaustion bears down on your shoulders, heavy and cloying. You yawn.

“Go wash up,” he says, giving you a slight shove with the arm still wrapped around you. “Don’t want you getting an infection.”

Romantic — not. But very caring. Karl Heisenberg was ticking the boxes swiftly and convincingly, getting closer and closer to your idea of perfection. A voice in your head chastises you for the irrationality of your thoughts, chastises you for hearing wedding bells after three fun-filled days and one passionate night together. Sure, it was out of character, but then again you’d never had anyone fuck your brains out like he just did. “Yes, yes,” you bat his concerns away with a wave of your hand. You try to stand but find your legs stiff and uncooperative. You’re like a newborn foal.

“You sure you only need a few hours to recover?”

You flip him off as you hobble to the ensuite, and he lets out another laugh, flopping on to the bed as he does so. You turn your attention back to your own care, and wash up as you normally do.

You hobble towards your suitcase to look for new underwear. You’ll forgo the sleep shirt tonight, wanting to feel your partner’s skin.

You look up to find him watching you, pillows propped up behind him as he leaned against the headboard. There is something missing in the picture — a cigar. He strikes you as a cigar person. “You need help?”

“No; thank you though,” you say, as you pull your underwear on. You wander back to the bed and take the free spot, sliding into the covers.

“Do you need me to get you anything for the, uh…” he’s at a loss for words for once. Your eyebrows rise as you try to decode what he’s trying to say. “Well, I’m not really keen on little Karls running around, despite what I said.”

“All good,” you say, as you reach to the inside of your left forearm, feeling around for the familiar stick that is your birth control implant. You pinch the ends of it to make it stick out, and he observes it closer. “Birth control.”

“Well, I’ll be damned.”

You pull the covers up to your chin. You turn to lay on your side to watch him. He brushes your hair back.

“How long is a few hours?” He teases. You slap his hand away, and with an exaggerated huff you turn away from him, and the pettiness of it all makes him laugh. It makes you laugh too, unable to maintain the facade. “Goodnight, doll.”

“Goodnight. Don’t disappear on me or I’ll hunt you down.”

You fall asleep to the sound of his laughter.

#pwp #karl heisenberg x reader #it's about time i tag this filth #it should be hidden enough now uwu #purdle-writes #karl heisenberg

[purdledooturt]

The darling @riskpig tagged me for WIP Wednesday/Thursday so here I am! 🙈 I have this scene/idea I wrote on my notes app in October that’s looking for a home in a fic, but I thought it was hilarious so I’m putting it out anyway (it’s pretty raw and unedited but it made me happy when I wrote it so I hope y’all enjoy anyway)

🩷

She looked at him as they rested under the cover of the sparse tree, near the mindflayer pod that Astarion had emerged from. Tav hunched over with her head tucked towards her knees, wishing the dizziness away. Her new companion must regret joining her now.

Looking up at him, she noted his eyes. Red, deep and inviting like rubies inlaid in a cave.

Pale skin. Red eyes. This could only mean —

She stood to her feet in a flash and blinked at him as she wobbled in place, still unsteady. He looked at her in surprise, raising an eyebrow her direction, before looking behind him to see if she’d spotted anything. He found nothing.

“Yes?” He asked, as he watched her shuffle around her belongings.

She dug through her bag, the tiny thing that it was at her hip, and unfurled a wizard’s hat she had scrounged up from a barrel just down the beach. Odd spot to hide it, but it’s since been rehomed, so what did it matter?

She shook the hat open, trying to flatten the creases with her hands against her thighs. Her new companion said nothing as she pulled at the brim. She gave it a tentative sniff — inoffensive, which was a bonus — and nodded to herself in approval.

She handed it to him.

“For you,” she said, “to protect you from the sun.”

He froze, his lips pursed and eyebrows knitted in a frown. “What?”

“You’ll burn out here,” she fussed, as she waved the hat towards him with a nod of her head. “Go on, put this on.”

He gave her an odd, unreadable look. Was she being too forward? He’d made no motion to take the hat — instead, he crossed his arms across his chest. He scoffed. “Whatever do you mean, darling?” He asked, in a tense drawl.

“You’re an albino, aren’t you?” She asked, pulling the hat back to her chest as the longer she held it out she found the larger the feeling of dejection grew. She had only meant to help, but in the back of her head she could hear her mother telling her to remember people’s boundaries. “I’m sorry, I don’t have a nicer hat,” she looked down at the scavenged hat, before looking back up at him as he now stared at her wide eyed, lips pursed in an attempt to hold in laughter.

He let out a little snicker. The corners of his eyes creased as he turned away, before turning back to her with an amused look.

Oh. She wasn’t being pushy — this must mean she was being dim.

“Oh, well, don’t worry about it then if you don’t want to,” she said lamely, as she rolled the hat back up to size to fit her little pack. Tav could feel her face burning — maybe she should wear the hat instead if the heat was affecting her this much.

“Thank you, darling,” he said, with mirth in his voice and obvious glee in his eyes, “but I will be fine.”

She nodded, mutely, as she straightened out invisible creases from her tunic. “Okay,” she stared ahead, into the wreckage of the nautiloid ship that now seemed much smaller than it was when she was inside it. “Let’s… let’s go.”

She sighed, shaking her head. Jokingly, she said, “well, as you can tell, the tadpole probably won’t have much to eat up here,” she tapped at her temple.

Her companion released a peal of laughter from behind her.

This was going to be a long trip.

—

I will tag @gwen-writes and @cinnamontails-ff for this upcoming Wednesday 🥹 and I am tagging u back @riskpig because I always love seeing your art 🩷

#purdle-writes #this is my int 8 tav #she means well