Chapter Text
They are battered, bloodied, brains feeling scorched by psionics—and stunned..
Mal cuts a sharp whistle; Scratch responds at once. She says, “I’ll search the area to be sure this didn’t attract any unwelcome attention.”
Karlach startles at the same time as Lae’zel, their mouths opening in protest—Karlach in confusion, Lae’zel in outrage. Gale’s raised hand cuts them off. “I’ll prepare an alarm spell in the meantime.”
Mal disappears without another word, leaving them to stand in the disarray of their camp.
Ozone and iron still burn the air with their stink, and something else—the unique tang of Planar friction, familiar to Karlach for all the times she’s stood witness as an abyssal pocket tore through infernal space. Static prickles her skin, raising fine hairs to point like antennae at the place where the Astral portal had spat them out. Wyll, standing nearest to it still, takes an uneasy step back, a glassy look flickering through his eyes before he shakes it off.
Gale does not set to preparing an alarm spell, however. He turns to Astarion instead. “Does she still have the ring of mind shielding?”
“She just put it on,” Astarion replies coolly, not bothering to conceal the building of some dark emotion.
Gale nods, relief loosening his shoulders, though his face is still locked in a scowl. He rakes a hand through his hair, leaving it uncharacteristically untidy and staring at the ground as though assembling an equation. His whole body goes still with the effort of his concentration.
“Tsk’va! She leaves now when the truth is finally before us?” Lae’zel’s voice cuts like a vicious blade. The muscles of her neck are visible bands of tension, her expression livid. “That creature is no guardian, much less a savior. It is ghaik! We have been serving a parasite’s puppet. Now is not the time for—”
“She walked away so we could speak freely, Lae’zel,” says Shadowheart, folding her arms.
“One hopes,” Gale murmurs distractedly, a note of doubt in his words.
“Would you have us weigh its danger aloud, when we can’t be sure if it’s listening?” Shadowheart asks Lae’zel, tension—from battle, from the truth—bleeding annoyance into her words.
Lae’zel bares her teeth—but says nothing.
Sounding like he’s thinking out loud, Gale says, “If the Emperor has been listening, it may perceive more than what’s spoken out loud—perhaps even beyond surface thoughts. I need to determine whether the link is passive or continuous. If proximity factors into it, then every word we utter near Mal may well reach its, ah—ear.”
“So it could be listening even now?” Wyll’s voice is edged with disgust.
“There’s no way to be certain,” Gale says, looking frustrated by the fact. “If the ring functions as intended, she’s shielded. We, however, are not.”
“What’s our move, then?” Wyll asks.
Gale flashes him a quiet look, tapping his brow. “I’m working on it.”
Jaheira gestures to them. “If we assume that it is aware of all between you, then we must follow caution when speaking around the monk. It would be wise to keep your counsel from her—most of all where suspicion lies.”
They go still, exchanging looks—searching each other’s expressions as if it might reveal some new way the tadpoles have managed to shred through their privacy.
Karlach frowns. “This is …”
Saying it’s “fucked” doesn’t even touch it.
“… We’ve all heard its voice,” says Shadowheart. “But after the crèche—after Mal faced it, or it’s illusion—it only ever seemed to speak to her. The dream woman stopped appearing to me altogether by the time—”
“Woman?” Astarion interrupts, frowning.
“The guardian, as we knew it,” Shadowheart explains impatiently.
Wyll straightens, brow creasing. “The woman?” He looks to Astarion, exchanging looks of suspicious confusion. “The dream visitor—when it came to me—was always a man. A soldier. Someone I—almost knew. I could never place the name, but the feeling was there.”
“Hold on—” Karlach steps forward, recognizing the implication with a sinking sense in her gut. “I also saw a woman. She looked—kind. Warm, even. Definitely not a man. I could just … tell.” Which is weak reasoning, arguably, and only makes the dread prickle her insides like needles of glass.
“As did I,” says Gale. “Her vision was—serene. With eyes like starlight.”
“And I,” says Shadowheart. “Without the starlight.”
“Mine was a man. Though now that I think of it—Mal spoke of a ‘she’ before. When that—thing—asked her to fetch Ketheric’s stone,” mutters Astarion, scowling. “How, in all the Hells, did we not realize we were each seeing someone different?”
“Ghaik deception,” snarls Lae’zel. “They prey upon trust. Upon weakness of the mind. Each of us saw what it thought would make us complacent. A face we’d be inclined to obey.”
“Not just obey—but confide,” Gale muses. “It tailored its image, weaving an illusion to suit each of us. Curious that it never crossed our minds to compare notes.”
“I think it must have had some influence on us,” says Shadowheart. “I remember trying once—to ask Mal about it—but it kept … slipping my mind. And then enough days had passed, and so the matter felt—unimportant.”
“Keep the flock close, but never close enough to talk,” murmurs Wyll, shaking his head. “If it had never been forced to reveal itself, we might have carried on never knowing. Convinced our guardian was our own personal champion.”
“If nothing else, the creature’s deceit tells us it’s invested,” says Gale, rubbing his temple. “But how does it maintain this connection? Through the Prism? The tadpoles? I need to understand the range of the Emperor’s reach. For that, I’ll need—a variable of sorts to measure against.”
“Archdruid,” Jaheira calls, turning her scowl on the other elf. “May we trouble you to see how far our dear monk has gone?”
“Of course.” There’s no pause between the rumble of his answer, and the ripple of his form as feathers bloom across his skin. His large body twists into the shape of a raven. Wings unfurl—and then the enormous raven gives one heavy beat before taking off soundlessly into the dark.
Karlach stares after him, miserable. “I hate this.”
Gale is moving, lifting a hand to begin tracing shapes in the air with two fingers, the afterglow of Weave-light trailing faintly behind them. “Best to assume our ‘guardian’ can still hear us, if it wishes.”
Lae’zel sneers, “Then we must destroy the shell it hides within and free Orpheus.”
“We don’t know what unbinding the Prism will do to your gith prince,” says Shadowheart. “Or to us. Until we understand how any of this works, we err on caution.”
Gale lowers his hand. “Agreed.” He begins pacing a slow circle, muttering as he does, eyes on whatever thing he’d scrawled in the air, which appears to be only visible to him. “She’s gone far enough to escape the immediate range of contact, surely. Yet—we know the Prism allows us to travel some distance whilst still maintaining our bond to it. Meaning: it’s a conduit, not the origin point. The Emperor, thus, speaks through it—but via what? Not ordinary telepathy, surely. Even a simple sending spell carries its own signature, distinct from message.” He shakes his head, frustrated. “But my encounters with the creature were confined to dreams. It would have been all too easy to dismiss anything unusual as dream logic.”
“Mal’s had the most dealings with the creature,” Wyll points out.
“Except—we can’t risk speaking to her about it,” Shadowheart says. “The Emperor will be watching for any trace of doubt.”
“It’s the tadpoles,” grunts Karlach. “Has to be the tadpoles, right?”
“That’s my assumption,” says Gale. “But as an illithid, we don’t know the extent of its control or influence over our parasites. Mindflayers and these tadpoles share a biology we barely understand. The creature may command more of them, and of us, than we realize. ”
When Halsin returns, it’s on a silent swoop. He lands beside Jaheira without changing forms, cawing in the cadence of person-speech. Jaheira listens, then relays to them, “She’s at least a mile out. Judging by her pace, she’ll add another three, perhaps, four, before the hour’s end.”
Gale’s expression sharpens. “Excellent. That should suffice.”
There’s a strange pit in Karlach’s gut. When she looks between her friends, they appear more like scattered shapes to her in the half-light. The others keep talking, debating, and Karlach tries to follow—but the night’s revelations seem somehow too far removed from what should be reality.
How the hell had they been carrying around a mindflayer all this time?
Lae’zel is furious. When she offers her input, it’s clipped consonants and clenched fists. Everyone has the look of having stood too close to an explosion, and it’s only by Gale’s almost restless mutterings that they manage not to stall out waiting for their brains to catch up to events. There is still no sign of Isobel or Dame Aylin since they’d flown off with Arabella, but this is the least of Karlach’s concerns.
Sketching circles into the dirt with the tip of his staff, Gale says, “Our problem is three-fold. First, how the Emperor’s connection to our tadpoles truly works. Second, the scope of that link—its range, its triggers, its limits. And third, what form of magic might block or obscure it without disrupting the protections Orpheus affords us within the Prism.”
“All ghaik within a colony are psionically networked through an Elder Brain,” says Lae’zel tersely. “As it stands, Orpheus’ power is what shields us from that network.”
“But the psionic infrastructure still exists. The connection never disappeared. It only narrowed,” says Gale. “The Prism doesn’t sever our connection to the Elder Brain, it merely insulates it. The Emperor, however, existing within that bubble, has had no trouble reaching through it.”
“Emotion,” Shadowheart says in realization. “Extreme emotion. In the beginning, even a single surge of heightened emotion would cause our tadpoles to stir—to respond to one another.”
“Ghaik do not experience emotion—”
“But we do,” Shadowheart cuts back shortly. Her gaze finds Gale’s, who is watching her with the hungry interest of a man seeking the other half of a puzzle. “It would explain its uncanny ability to interject at moments of crisis.”
For some reason, this brightens Gale’s expression. “Fortunate for us, then, that it’s attached itself to our monk. If anyone can moderate their own emotions, it’s her.”
Out of the corner of Karlach’s eye, she notices Astarion shift. Glancing at him, she sees his jaw set like stone, rage darkening blood-red eyes.
Shadowheart crosses her arms, tone dry. “And how exactly do you intend to measure the thoughts of a creature sitting in a different Plane of existence?”
“We can’t know how much the Emperor hears—or whether it’s always listening—but we can measure the limits.” Gale takes his staff, drawing another line into the dirt, eyes narrowing. “If the Emperor listens through the tadpoles, the link is psionic more than magical. Detect magic won’t respond to psionics—”
“Ghaik hunt by thought, not arcanic auras,” says Lae’zel.
“Precisely.” Gale nods, scrubbing at his beard. “And identify might only provoke it.” He shakes his head, and resumes his pacing, pausing mid-thought to sketch into the dirt as he speaks his ideas out loud—like he’s patching together a solution out of scraps. “We’re facing three overlapping magical structures: the Netherese enchantment upon the tadpoles—rooted in necromancy and enchantment both; there is Orpheus’ shield, likely psionic by nature, or it may involve abjurative magics; and then we’ve the psionic network itself, which behaves like divination magic, allowing thought to pass between minds. Though, it also displays traits of both enchantment and illusion—"
“We’ve spent our strength defending the Emperor from those githyanki,” Wyll points out gravely. “Our options are few—and all the poorer for the fact that we can’t examine the Prism directly. Is there anything we can do?”
“We know how to push our tadpoles to interact—to share our minds,” Shadowheart offers. “Perhaps we might try detect thoughts. I don’t have it prepared, but—”
“I will cast it as a ritual,” Gale interrupts, shoulders squaring with alertness. “Excellent thinking, Shadowheart! I will cast the spell on—I will need a volunteer—”
“I might as well make myself useful,” says Wyll, stepping forward.
“The rest of us can use the tadpoles to simultaneously open a connection,” Shadowheart says, finishing her thought.
“In that vein, a sending spell may be worth testing as well,” Gale calls over his shoulder, moving to his pack to procure one of several spellbooks in his possession. “And if we can confirm that the psionic link does not intersect with the divination line established with Weave, it will be worth procuring the components for a telepathic bond.”
“Sorcerous Sundries will have everything you need. It can be our first stop once we’ve reached the city—” promises Wyll with a smirk. “—as I’m sure it will delight you to hear.”
There’s an almost triumphant look in Gale’s eyes when he returns, arms laden with journals, pouches, and books. His response to Wyll is more of a waggle of brows, before his focus snaps back to the problem at hand.
Shadowheart, already fishing through her pack, pulls out a battered little paperback which produces a bemused and faintly mortified expression in Wyll. “Use this. Page—” She flips it open, skimming pages as she joins Wyll’s side. “—forty-two. Not a particularly compromising passage. Just repeat the first line in your head until we say stop.” She glances to Gale, explaining, “It’ll help us gauge an emotional response without the risk of delving unnecessarily into his thoughts.”
“Thank you, Shadowheart,” Wyll says, flashing her a grateful smile.
Lae’zel snorts. “And now we waste our time with children’s romance while the ghaik watches.”
“Would you prefer we sit around doing nothing?” Shadowheart counters.
Astarion gives a derisive snort, shaking his head, arms crossed.
Shadowheart ignores him. “Assuming that when the Emperor connects to our minds the experience feels similar to when we connect to each other’s—then the rest of us will press Wyll’s tadpole—just enough, as before. Not so far it becomes a struggle for control, only enough to share what he sees.”
Finishing his drawing of a neat circle and runes in the dirt around Wyll, Gale steps in front of the warlock, tucking his staff under his arm as he brings both hands to hover between them. “Shall we?”
Wyll shoots him an almost nervous smile, bringing up the book to his face. “At the ready.”
Karlach frowns uncertainly. “So, we’re just …?”
Shadowheart moves to her side, nodding. “We’re going to let our tadpoles connect with his. Observe whatever is relayed to us passively.”
Karlach snorts. “And all that time working not to get in each other’s heads.”
“Foolish experiment,” Lae’zel mutters, but she steps up beside them.
“Astarion?” Karlach asks when she sees the vampire still hanging back.
With a scowl, he rolls his eyes and shifts the barest step closer.
Gale murmurs an incantation, faint blue light coiling from his fingers. After a few minutes, he declares, “Begin.”
Wyll straightens, inhaling deep. Karlach can see his look of concentration as his gaze is fixed to the book, eyes darting back and forth over the same line.
Gale nods absently, murmuring, “Clear. I hear you. Continue.”
Feeling the nudge of an elbow at her arm, Karlach glances down to see Shadowheart nodding. With a dejected sigh, Karlach looks back to Wyll, focusing her concentration both inward and outward through the tadpole—feeling a response of pressure as easily as if the thing were a natural part of her body.
The world dulls for a moment. Her ears fill with sound that is just noise—like the roar of a wildfire. She can feel—everyone. Everyone, but Mal. Feels Gale’s determination; Shadowheart’s worry. More importantly, she feels Wyll’s composure, his quickened pulse, the faint sting of … embarrassment?
Then something spikes through her chest—crackling fury and contempt and something that feels like betrayal. It’s wicked and vicious, striking at her like a lash. It resonates with a second flare—more anger. The swell of emotion slams like thunderous waves through each of them, the tadpoles answering a collective pulse that leaves Karlach staggering back with a gasp.
“Stop! Stop—!” Gale’s voice is strained. “Enough. Astarion—Lae’zel—you both need to—”
“—benched,” Karlach croaks. “You’re both benched until you cool the fuck down. Holy shit. Fuck, man.”
Astarion offers no objection, looking only too glad to abandon the attempt. Lae’zel hisses something in her language but crosses her arms and stays put.
“Again,” Gale sighs, already turning back. “Without the orchestra of rage, please.”
The second attempt is significantly smoother, though Karlach can still feel her heart thudding with the residual stain of those volatile emotions. When Gale confirms he’s able to clearly follow Wyll’s surface thoughts, Karlach focuses with the tadpole again.
Frowning, eyes shut, she mutters, “I don’t—I mean I still don’t really hear anything. Just feels—nervous. Excited? Like the way you do before a fight.”
“Blame the other two,” Wyll replies glibly.
“Focus,” says Gale. “You’re trailing into auxiliary thought—”
Something changes. The black behind her eyes flickers, like blinking rapidly whilst speeding on horseback. There are images there—memories—but Karlach has a hard time pinning them down; like they’re something background, something not quite fixed to the fore of Wyll’s mind.
“The battle,” Shadowheart says—and as she does, the flickering slows almost to a crawl. Abruptly, Karlach realizes she’s seeing glimpses of the ambush that had woken them; the gith swarming their camp; the flash of a slender blade and the bloom of fire bolt striking its mark. “The githyanki, the fire—Gale shouting. Then you and Mal. Pulling him toward the portal—”
Karlach exhales. “Same.”
“Good. That’s good enough,” says Gale.
Karlach opens her eyes, relieved to be done with the intrusion into her friend’s mind.
“Well?” asks Gale, looking to Shadowheart as he releases the spell with a weary flick of his hand.
“Nothing direct,” Shadowheart confirms. “Emotions, passing thought as images—all sensory flashes. And it wasn’t an instant reading. My perception grew sharper the more I found myself focusing on what I was being shown. Nothing of his literal mind, however. Only impressions.”
Gale nods, pensive. While Karlach rubs at her temples, filled with an icky sensation, Wyll takes a breath, then asks, “Shall we try for a more … invasive approach, then?”
Gale looks at him in surprise. “You’re certain?”
Wyll shrugs, offering a meager smile. “I don’t see we’ve much choice. It’s the only way to understand how deeply the Emperor can reach into our minds.”
“Mate.” Karlach grimaces. “I dunno if I can …”
“It’s alright, Karlach,” Shadowheart says gently. “I’m sure between Gale and I, we’ll manage just fine.”
Wyll’s lips form a moue of surprise. He feigns a look of concern. “Oh my. I’m to have a Sharran poking about in my head, am I? Perhaps I should reconsider.”
Shadowheart snorts, rolling her eyes with a small, appreciative smile. “Former Sharran. Don’t worry. I’ll be gentle.”
“This is all well and good.” Jaheira crosses her arms, drawing their attention to where she’d been observing them in silence. “But what if it is listening now?”
“Then it already knows of our suspicions,” says Gale. “But that should hardly be a revelation. I expect it’s been aware of every doubt we’ve entertained since the beginning.”
Karlach can’t help glancing in the direction where Mal had vanished near an hour ago.
Gale begins pacing again, robes flaring around his boots, murmuring, “We’ll continue to test the connection against detect thoughts. Should that prove successful—”
“And what about Mal?” Karlach asks, frowning. “We just gunna leave her out there?”
Some of Gale’s excitement dims. He frowns, exchanging a look with Shadowheart, who says in a subdued sort of way, “Mal won’t return until we send word to determine it’s safe. She’s given us this time to think while the Emperor presumably gives us time to ‘process’. We may not have such an opportunity again without arousing its suspicions.”
“And what then?” Karlach demands.
“Private sanctum—assuming we can scrounge up the components,” says Gale. “If we can isolate the Weave in a small radius, I can compare psionic pressure with and without proximity. Once Mal’s back in range, we will test it. Discreetly.” He looks up, eyes catching the moonlight. “If the Emperor doesn’t react—doesn’t notice—then we proceed with further examination.”
Karlach frowns, grounding herself on the sound of his voice. “And if it does?”
“Then we know we are compromised,” Shadowheart answers before Gale can. Karlach meets her gaze—sees something bristle behind moss-green eyes. “Either way, we’ll have learned something useful.”
҉ ҉ ҉
As if resensitized by its recent usage, the worm throbs with a flash of pain and heat. Karlach’s eyes snap open. She reaches for her weapon—but the only threat before her are the raised voices that cut through the gray silence of the early morning.
“—so your solution to being spied on,” Astarion is snarling, “is to start spying on her?”
Gale’s voice is sharp with impatience. “If you’d listened for half a sentence, you’d know the arcane eye isn’t surveillance. It’s reconnaissance. Temporary, invisible, and entirely necessary.”
“Surveillance or reconnaissance. What’s the damned difference?”
Karlach rubs her eyes, realizing she must have dozed off during the last round of ‘tests’. Her ass is sore from being sat on the ground, and one side of her neck is pinched from her awkward slump against a tree. Moreover, her head still aches from the tadpole exercises, even if she’d not been directly involved. Just the proximity of it—the pushing, the resisting; Wyll’s recitation of The Noble Duke’s Vow—had been enough to drain her more than the fight against the githyanki.
Her eyes flick to the book. It lies facedown by the fire, its pages crumpled from overuse.
Sitting up, she groans, “What’s going on now?”
Shadowheart glances back from where she’s crouched beside Gale’s dirt scribblings. “Gale wants to try monitoring the Prism through an arcane eye once Mal’s back. Astarion thinks it’s—” She makes a face, intoning, “… ‘treachery’.”
“It is treachery!” Astarion snaps. “We’ve monsters burrowed in our skulls, and another one in that damned box—now he wants to add his own little peeping spell to the mix!”
Gale straightens, exasperated. “It’s not peeping. It’s information. If the eye can observe the Prism without alerting the creature—or Mal—then we’ll gain valuable insight into its perceptive range. And if the Emperor takes notice, all the better. We’ll have proof it’s watching.”
Shadowheart stands, wiping dirt from her hands as she does. She says, calm but firm, “You know she would want us taking these precautions.”
Astarion sneers at her bitterly. “Then perhaps I’d prefer to be kept in the dark as well. Spare me the pleasure of lying to her face.”
Wyll looks between them, hollow-eyed from the long hours after such a rude awakening. “He’s not entirely wrong. None of this sits right.”
“Of course not,” Gale replies, allowing his shoulders to slump, betraying his fatigue. “But if private sanctum works, then once we reach the city, we need only find somewhere secure to cast it again and tell her everything. Until then, ignorance keeps her safe—and us along with her.”
Astarion’s eyes burn with violence in the pale dawnlight, fangs flashing as he snarls, “And where, exactly, in that cursed city do you expect to find a ‘secure place’? We’ll be hunted by the Chosen, Sharrans, Cazador, and gods knows who else. You’ll be lucky to cast a cantrip before someone tries to butcher us on the street.”
Jaheira rises from her seat by the cold ashes of the fire, unruffled by the straining tempers. “Enough. Whether the wizard’s plan is genius or folly, Mal has been gone too long. Someone must fetch her.”
Halsin stands, rubbing at his shoulder as he stretches the stiffness from his neck. Astarion’s huff has the druid pausing.
“I’ll go,” Astarion mutters. He stalks off without another word.
Locking her arms in a stretch above her head, Karlach bites back a yawn, grumbling, “Strong start. It’s gunna be a good day, I can tell.”
No one has the energy to indulge her with a response.
҉ ҉ ҉
They sleep well into the morning and pass the latter half of the day in exhausted intervals of silence, slogging through mist and surrounded by the ominous backdrop of thunder, which promised yet more delays. Every muscle in Karlach’s body aches; somehow, she feels more exhausted by the poor sleep than their battle against the gith. And probably some of that is to do with the tadpoles, but she doesn’t want to linger on thoughts that might compromise her mood.
If it’s true that the Emperor is sensitive to their emotions, she’d rather not prove herself the weaker link.
They listen to Lae’zel tell the story of Orpheus, and by highsun, Wyll takes the lead, guiding them to the shell of an old Flaming Fist lookout. The keep is half-collapsed and open to the valley, but it’s shelter enough. Everyone busies themselves with preparing the area for camp, working without talk beyond the necessities: who takes first watch, who should scout the ridge, what they’ll do when they finally reach the city. Every plan carries the weight of expecting something newly terrible to disrupt their course.
Arabella announces, quiet and matter-of-fact, that she thinks she’ll find her own way before they reach the city. She explains she plans to set out by next dawn, and so Wyll and Mal help her pack rations and supplies.
Karlach tries searching through her own things to find what more she can add—a coil of rope, some flint, an extra dagger—but she knows she’s failed to keep the disappointment from her face when Shadowheart comments, “She’ll be safer on her own than trailing us.”
Karlach grimaces, unable to refute the truth of it. “Yeah. I know.”
Shadowheart passes her a handful of healing draughts and a stack of bandages, and when their fingers graze against each other, Karlach meets her gaze. Shadowheart says, soft, “The city will be a gauntlet all its own. We can’t protect her and fight what’s coming.”
Karlach sighs, the bundle held between them. She nods, eyes darting past the cleric where Arabella is being fitted with a scarf by Wyll. “I know. Doesn’t stop me worrying, though.”
Mal approaches with an armful of dried rations folded into cloth—and Karlach withdraws her hands without remembering to accept the bundle from Shadowheart.
Distractedly, Mal sets the rations with the other pile on the table. Shadowheart does the same, though her eyes remain on Karlach’s face.
“That should hold her for a while,” Mal says, reaching to inspect the potions Shadowheart had brought. “I’m glad we can spare these.”
“They’re not much good to us at this point,” Shadowheart replies with only a beat of hesitation, finally pulling away to move around the table to Mal’s side. “Although, we can’t afford to offer much more.”
Karlach watches the exchange, feeling all thoughts of what to say squeeze behind the warning of: Caution! Squidy listening!
Her silence seems enough to earn her a curious look from Mal, and when Karlach still can’t find something harmless to say, Mal pats the table and gives a parting, “This should be good enough, Karlach. Thank you.”
When she’s gone, joining Wyll and Arabella, Karlach exhales unhappily, muttering, “… Sorry for being weird.”
Shadowheart chuckles quietly. “You’re not being weird, Karlach.”
Karlach disagrees with a frown. “This sucks. It feels like …”
It feels like she’s lying.
She doesn’t expect Shadowheart to reply. Much less to ask, “… Would you like to talk about it? Later. After dinner, maybe?”
Even though Karlach knows it’s not the invitation she wishes it were, her stomach leaps at the suggestion.
She sighs. “Yeah. I’ll be there.”
҉ ҉ ҉
By nightfall, the skies take on an almost foreboding black. Gale gathers the components he needs during dinner—a wad of cotton, powdered peridot in place of chrysolite, a thin sheet of lead, and a piece of opaque glass. Mal takes the upper tower to set up her tent, as far as possible without leaving sight of them. She doesn’t explain and no one questions her, and Karlach feels a little better seeing that, even in secrecy, they still have a means of communicating.
When Gale presses the ring of mind shielding and a folded note into Karlach’s hand, she hides them in a bundle of bedrolls and furs before climbing the ladder up to the tower to deliver them.
Astarion is with Mal, dour at the sight of her, and seems to need a moment to wrangle his temper before he points out, “I don’t see tent supplies.”
Karlach shrugs, beginning her descent as she calls, “I guess you’ll have to come get them, won’t ya, fangs!”
He joins her only a moment later, scowling when Gale approaches in a hurry, patting a pouch-shaped lump on his chest with a too eager smile, and a light-hearted, “Onward.”
“Don’t look so excited,” Karlach berates him, smacking his shoulder as they head out.
The others are gathered just beyond the gate, outside the watchtower’s sightline.
As Gale traces in the dirt, Wyll and Shadowheart move in sync to set the materials on different points of the sigil.
When the last is placed and the final rune is drawn, Gale begins murmuring the spell’s incantation under his breath, hands moving in precise gestures. His voice is too soft to catch, but each syllable seems to hang in the air—then melt away. It’s a strange sensation. Like gravity settling. Every minute ticks by with sleepy urgency.
At last, the final sigil flares—then fades to nothing. The components and any sign of disturbance in the dirt vanishes.
Thunder rumbles overhead, but Karlach can’t tell if it’s the threat of a storm or something else that leaves the air feeling heavier.
Gale hums to himself in approval, lowering his arms. “There. Private sanctum should hold for the next twenty-four hours. No divinations, no scrying, no ethereal eavesdropping. For all intents and purposes, this area is invisible to outside eyes.”
“But the scrying sensor will work?” Shadowheart asks, passing Gale one of his other spellbooks.
“I’ve left a window, of sorts,” Gale says, flipping through pages to find the next spell. “This sanctum is sealed against intrusion, but not projection. It will allow arcane eye to pass outward, and for nothing to peer inward.”
“You can do that?” asks Wyll admiringly.
“But of course,” says Gale, glancing up with a self-satisfied smile. “Now—let’s see what our monk is up to, shall we?”
Next to her, Astarion stiffens immediately.
Karlach lays a steadying hand on his arm before he can work himself up again. “It’s alright, fangs,” she murmurs. “Just for now.”
Gale’s second spell takes a fraction of the time to cast this round. Only a shimmer of light gives any indication of the invisible conjuration as Gale sends it out past his warding spell.
“Ah! She’s already found the note. Excellent.” A moment later, he murmurs, “… She’s burned it. Cleanly done. Removed the ring.”
“That’s us, then,” says Shadowheart quietly. “If we’re—”
Without a word, Astarion turns on his heel and stalks back towards the keep.
Karlach exhales, anxiety and guilt burning a hole through her gut.
Shadowheart presses on, ignoring the vampire. “If we’re right about the tadpoles, this should give us a baseline. Wyll—as before. Try to hold a single thought. I’ll cast the spell. Karlach, Lae’zel—you’ll both probe with the tadpoles.”
Karlach casts a glance towards Gale, sees him still looking forward with intensity, eyes fixed on an unseen image. On Mal, she knows, face crumpling into another grimace.
“This better work,” Karlach mutters, joining Wyll and Lae’zel to begin another excruciating round of tadpole-fuckery.
҉ ҉ ҉
Rivington is a chaos of tents, battered buildings, and frightened faces. The few Fist on patrol do so in twos, trying—and failing—to appear in control. The air tastes of sweat and soot and animal shit, and Karlach’s mind floods with images of the Blood War and the countless battles they’ve faced since—until she realizes the noise she hears is the sound of a city—bustling, not being sacked. She has to force herself to take a steadying breath to find her equilibrium.
Eventually, with effort, the bizarre tension in her fades enough that she can almost feel a sense of excitement to be here. To be home.
Of course, it’s not quite like home, because this is a place that had moved on without her. A place now flooded with those fleeing the Absolute’s army. A place inundated with desperate, hopeless people.
The streets are crowded with refugees in ruined lines pressing in every direction. Carriages and carts and animals clutter the narrow, uneven roads. Beyond the line of roofs, the great monument of the city itself: Wyrm’s Rock.
Almost as if announcing their presence to the city—and their enemies—something rumbles beneath their feet, deep and ominous.
“Was that an earthquake?” Wyll balks, looking around them, incredulous.
He catches her eye and Karlach frowns, tension reclaiming the line of her shoulders.
Baldur’s Gate doesn’t get earthquakes.
“Whatever it is,” mutters Shadowheart. “It doesn’t bode well for the city.”
They split up—one group to investigate the situation at Wyrm’s Crossing, another to roam the neighborhood and take stock of things. Karlach ends up with Mal, Shadowheart, and Astarion—with Halsin in rat-form, nestled beneath the cover of Mal’s hood and hair.
They thread through the crush of people like a blunt instrument, Karlach first, using her bulk to carve space for them to follow. Even still, they’re pulled along with the flow of people, Karlach reaching behind her blindly to secure a hand on Shadowheart’s arm—just the person closest to her—to keep from stumbling as the uneven dirt path slopes down towards a large building.
Up ahead, a Flaming Fist’s banner flaps lazily on its high post. Beneath it, a sign reads: Attention! Donations desperately needed for refugees. Every copper helps! A line of refugees snakes away from a small donation table where a man in the scarlet tabard of the Fist counts coins.
“They’re taking donations,” Karlach points out unnecessarily. “Now we’re finally in the city, I’m sure we can put all that coin to proper use. May as well give what we got.”
There’s a groan from Astarion, but when she glances over her shoulder, she sees at least two pale-haired elves still huddled close behind her.
Without pausing for thought, Karlach pushes forward, greets the haggard-looking peacekeeper with a smile, and starts pulling out whatever rations she knows they can spare.
It’s after Karlach has offered up a good share of their rations, and Shadowheart has dropped a pouch of coins into the collection box, that Karlach realizes she’s one elf short of a bunch.
“Oi. Where’s Mal?”
“She probably saw something,” Astarion mutters tersely. “Let’s keep moving, shall we? All these wretches—” His nose crinkles in disgust; he inches closer to Karlach to use her as a shield, shooting a dirty look at the crowd as if the city itself offended him.
“Yeah. Alright. Let’s go.” Hooking both arms around their shoulders, she pulls them forward and keeps her eyes scanning the nameless faces of the crowd as she leads the other two like children through what feels like a sea of bodies. “She could’ve warned us, though.”
The three of them drift off to one side of the road, and Karlach exhales with the relief of being outside the thick of foot traffic—can’t shake the weird buzzing in her belly that keeps twitching her muscles, like she’s expecting trouble. Her engine whirrs, warm and loud in her chest—the way it does before she throws herself into battle. It’s uncomfortable and unsettling.
(Maybe she’s not good with crowds anymore?)
They find a spot to stand around the barn’s flank near a line of shabby tents—patched canvas sagging under the weight of last night’s rain, with refugees huddled close to their fires, or shaking out the sodden material of their clothes.
Stretching her shoulders and breathing deep, she says, “We’ll wait here for her, then.”
Astarion shrugs and Shadowheart turns to her, catching her eyes.
“Should we—”
Then a voice calls: “Karlach!”
Startled, all three of them twist around, scanning the crowd. Karlach’s sense of alarm has her fingers twitching—but then she spots a small figure waving from one of the tents—
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Karlach laughs, breaking away from the elves to rush toward the young boy—takes in the red skin, bright eyes, and close-shorn hair and grins. Nearby, another kid jogs to join them, wide-eyed. “Umi? Ide? You guys made it!”
Her heart swells with joy to see the young faces from the grove. Safe. Unharmed.
The reunion is short-lived.
҉ ҉ ҉
They regroup just to split up again.
Karlach’s having a hard time catching her breath, so while the others head off to scout or ferret out spies or whatever, she offers to do a sweep of the refugee camp in an effort to gather information on the status of the Absolute’s army. Halsin joins her, which is new, but she quickly realizes it might be a mistake when the druid reveals himself to be just as wound up as she.
Her mind replays the encounter with Orin—and then the one with the Sharran who’d popped up not long after, looking spooked as he informed them that Shadowheart’s cloister could be found in a place called the House of Grief.
Trying to navigate town without accidentally bumping shoulders with people, however, has her thoughts springing back to the Bhaalist.
The guard had seemed so normal—even when he’d been spouting shit about “killing every last one of them” and “guts on the floor”, Karlach had only thought him deranged, not … not …
Not whatever horror Orin is.
Somewhere in the distance, something snaps—and it’s got her thinking about the way the guard’s bones had snapped, and how his skin had rippled, and the wet, sick sound of his head twisting; she remembers the thwop, thwop of flesh sloughing to the ground; her mind flashes with Umi and Ide's terrified faces; their screams and Karlach’s shout for them all to flee; remembers the slender white body that had slipped free of the carcass like a cloak.
“Karlach?”
Halsin’s hand on her arm draws her attention. Karlach blinks—and realizes she’d come to a stop in the middle of the road.
She grimaces a smile, shrugging. “Fucking shapeshifters.”
He sighs, nodding, and gives her arm a squeeze. What else is there to say?
They move through the rows of tents in uneasy silence. Uneasy, mostly, because neither of them can bear to look at all the need that surrounds them, with so little to offer, and the burning knowledge of all the ways things might turn for the worse.
Rivington’s outskirts are a patchwork of filthy canvas and weary faces, smoke from cookfire hanging thick as smog. Between them, their height makes them easy beacons for the desperate; every few paces someone stops them to ask for water, medicine—even some clearly just looking for a word of comfort. Neither of them are very good at saying no, so they shoulder what weight they can—literally—hauling crates, righting carriages, helping an old man shift his tent away from a mudslide.
She tries to keep half an ear open for talk of the Absolute’s army, but the stories blur together—rumors traded like bad coin. Some say the cult’s already inside the city—but Karlach knows it is. Others claim the host still camps by the river, but nobody really knows. Mostly, they talk about lost kin, stolen food, concern for their children and ill. The kind of trouble you can’t really fix with an axe.
Halsin moves among them like a man trying to atone for something. Where he sees rations have run thin, he conjures goodberries by the handful and presses them into small, filthy palms. When an argument breaks out over a cooking pot, his voice alone settles it. Karlach drops what coin she has into the hands that need it most and tries not to think of it as pity.
Mattis, another survivor of the atrocities that struck the refugees in the cursed lands, offers her a discount for the goods he’d acquired in his scavenging of Moonrise. Karlach’s pretty sure the discount is on the extreme side, but Mattis has his pride, so she makes a point to let him know what a great favor he's doing her.
The necklace is quite the prize. With guilt still weighing heavy in her heart, Karlach decides it’ll be a gift best reserved for Mal.
҉ ҉ ҉
By the time they’d looped back toward the center of town, the sun had dipped low, and it was easy to spot Shadowheart, Lae’zel, and Astarion as they approached. They were greeted with tired faces, a little blood where there hadn’t been before, and the look of people who desperately needed an end to an excruciatingly long couple of days. Shadowheart filled them in briskly: how she, Jaheira, Mal, and Astarion had followed a trail of blood under the bridge until it spilled them into the temple itself, just in time to cross paths with the rest of the group.
Wyll, she’s informed, had stayed behind with the others to continue an investigation that might link the deaths to a priest, butchered bodies, and the doppelgangers they’d discovered beneath the temple.
Waspishly, Astarion had then announced—without asking first—that Halsin would be accompanying him to scout Wyrm’s Rock, as the evening was yet burdened with more to do—meetings with Voss and the Harpers not something to be put off.
Simple plans. Seemed straightforward.
They weren’t.
The meeting with the Harpers is another ambush. It’s more doppelgangers and the dreadful realization that the Harper aid they’d hoped to find would not be got in the city. By the end of it, the ground had been slicked with blood and viscera, and Karlach had felt herself nearly shaking with rage and disgust. Jaheira had wiped her blades and determined a drink—or several—to be in order, and led them to Sharess’ Caress to regroup with the rest.
Over ale and exhaustion, they trade information: more on the victims being targeted by the Bhaalists, and how they mean to make it look like the cult’s work. Astarion and Halsin had come bearing somehow more terrible news: Gortash is set to be named Archduke. Meaning he’d be holed up in Wyrm’s Rock—practically spitting distance from them. It was all she could do to contain her fury—could picture the bastard, smug in his assumption that he was untouchable.
Astarion then relays that Counselor Florrick had been arrested by Duke Ravengard, so any thoughts of infiltrating the fortress as the siege engine Zariel had built her to be die quickly. She knows, even if she hates it, that Gortash wouldn’t hesitate to use either one of them as a meat shield between himself and the justice of her axe.
Karlach tries anyhow: “We need to kill the fucker anyway. Why don’t we just bust in and take him out?”
Annoyingly sensible, Mal says, “We’re not an army,”
After many more drinks and the beginnings of half-developed plans, they retreat below, to the tunnels beneath the Open Hand Temple. Though the place still reeked of death, it was a covered and defensible position—and easy enough to tidy once they’d scrubbed away the blood and gore.
҉ ҉ ҉
While Gale prepares a proper dinner, the rest of the group drifts into routines.
Karlach wanders to the edge of the underground passage, staring at the dark smear of the river pushing through the massive supports of the bridge, to the craggy shape of the islet that braced the keep sheltering the man who’d ruined her life.
Gortash is so close, and the thought of him breathing free air while good people are dying twists something sharp and agonizing in her chest.
“Have you thought about it?” Wyll’s voice echoes behind her, his boots crunching on gravel with his approach.
She smiles without looking back. “What? Flinging myself into the river to swim across? Yeah. Maybe.”
He comes up beside her, knocking his shoulder with hers. “Have you thought about going back?” he clarifies. “To Avernus.”
Karlach turns to him, startled. “What?”
He shifts, moving so he can lean back against the opposite side of the tunnel. Still calm, he says, “I mean it. If that’s what it takes to keep you alive—isn’t it worth trying?”
A jolt of alarm rocks through her, almost hard enough to crack her engine.
Going back?
To Avernus?
She shakes her head, turning to face him entirely. “Wyll—what? Mate, you can’t expect me to—”
“I’d go with you,” he says, smiling then. “I’d become the Blade of Avernus. I would. If that’s what you need. At least until Dammon—or Gale, maybe—find a way to help you.”
The shock of his words feels like a punch. Her eyes burn. “… You’re serious.”
He dips his head. “Of course I am. I’d do more if I could.”
Karlach brings her hands to pinch the bridge of her nose, squeezing her eyes against the fall of tears.
Of course he would.
This man who’d bargained his soul once already—still fucking willing to risk it again for someone else.
She wants to tell him that it’s not that simple. That the thought alone makes her stomach snarl itself into bramble and thorns. That she can still feel the scorch of that place clinging to her bones. She’s not even sure it’s fear that repels her from the idea of that place. It would be easier to step into the river and inhale deep into her lungs until the weight of the water sunk her body to the floor.
Her throat works soundlessly—thinks of iron chains and rivers of blood and the smell of rust and cooking flesh. The thought of going back there is enough to leave her feeling cold with nausea.
“… You’re a good friend, Wyll,” she says, voice creaky and weak. “But—I’m not going back there.” She sniffs, lowering her hand to look at him. “Not for anything.”
He holds her gaze for a long moment—then nods. Lifting a shoulder in a half shrug, he says, “Think about it, at least. For me?”
All she can do is nod mutely.
Satisfied, he pushes off from the wall to head back inside, leaving Karlach alone with the river’s steady whisper.
҉ ҉ ҉
“You shouldn’t be out here alone,” says Shadowheart—which is how she announces herself, because the only other sounds echoing down the tunnel are that of the others chattering and the clatter of pots being cleaned.
Karlach glances at her, smiling faintly. “Not alone now, am I?”
Shadowheart huffs something that’s almost a laugh, pausing a few steps short of where Wyll had stood—still a careful distance from where Karlach is sat on the uncomfortable ground.
“It’s dangerous,” Shadowheart says. “No one should be alone. Not while there are shapeshifters abound.”
Karlach sighs. “Yeah, yeah. I get it. I know. Sorry. Just—needed … dunno. Some air, I guess.”
She’s tired, anyway, if she’s being honest with herself. Ever since they’d woken to those gith and the holler of the Emperor echoing in their heads, beckoning them to enter the Prism, it feels like they’ve barely had a chance to stop to rest. At least back in the cursed lands—between the Shadowfell, Shar, Moonrise, and Ketheric—they’d had adrenaline to push them forward, and the very real threat of death biting at their heels. Now, the danger is something … abstract, almost. Something Karlach can’t hit. Something they have to endure until the pressure of it all finally pops.
Only—Karlach’s never been good at waiting games.
Glancing over at Shadowheart, she sees that the woman is still standing almost stubbornly at a distance. Or, maybe a respectful distance. Respectful of Karlach’s want for distance. Or—the distance Karlach had wedged between them these past days while her heart and mind tore each other apart.
A crisp breeze pushes beneath the bridge, catching the opening of the tunnel in a gust that sends their hair snapping in its direction. The thudding of waves against stone and rock and the shore are a barrier of sound, pushing back the noise of their campmates—of the world.
Prickles of doubt nag at her, nudging the anxiety that’s persisted in her gut back into wakefulness.
But the moon’s light has found a way to cut through the obstruction of the bridge and the cliff, a single band of silvery light catching the cleric where she stands in the otherwise dark of the tunnel—illuminating her face and eyes and hair like something ephemeral. Something ethereal.
Karlach holds out her arm. “A hand?”
Shadowheart blinks at her. Then at the offered hand. Surprise and confusion more than hesitation extends the seconds between them.
With a bemused smile, Shadowheart approaches—slow and careful, like a wary animal. Karlach doesn’t miss the flicker of hesitation before Shadowheart takes her hand; unbothered, Karlach automatically adjusts so they’re clasping forearms, and uses the strength of her own legs than the assist to get herself to her feet.
“Getting old,” Karlach explains with what she knows is an impish smile.
Shadowheart blinks up at her again—and they’re standing close.
Close enough Shadowheart has to tip her chin up to face her.
Close enough that the chilled puff of their breaths in the autumn air mingle between them.
Karlach watches the cleric’s eyes dart across her expression, searching. Then, as if finally remembering herself, Shadowheart takes a half-step back, narrowing her eyes almost playfully.
“Right,” Shadowheart says, not bothering to sound convinced.
Karlach’s smile widens. She arches a brow. “Right.”
The tunnel is wide enough that Karlach could step around the other woman easily.
Karlach doesn’t move. And Shadowheart doesn’t step out of the way.
Shadowheart’s hands hang awkwardly at her sides, fingers flexing in an almost nervous-like gesture, though her face does a fair job of not betraying more than a pinch of something that looks more like worry. Dark lashes fan across pale cheeks—cheeks colored with the warm flush of the cook fire, or a hot meal, or … something else.
Karlach smirks. “Something on your mind?”
A thousand different thoughts crowd her head—things she wished Shadowheart had said; things she wishes she had said.
Karlach still isn’t expecting:
“… I’m sorry.”
The words are barely more than a breath.
All of Karlach’s bravado escapes her. Her own voice feels locked in her throat. Emotion buzzes in her belly, thrilling and alive with possibility.
Shadowheart swallows, squinting like she has to force herself to hold Karlach’s eyes. “Karlach, I’m sorry. I hurt you—and I’m sorry.”
The world compresses to a moment.
To this moment.
Stupidly, Karlach can only nod. And swallow. “Yeah. Um.” Her throat feels raw. “Well—I’m sorry. Too.”
Sorry for what exactly?
She’s not sure.
She just feels it.
Feels the ache of guilt for things she wishes she’d done different.
And she’s tired. It’s been vicious day after day. And it might be true that she’s never stopped moving since Avernus—but now, everything is too fast. Everything feels like not enough time and too much to do and days that carry on like years and seasons that turn like seconds.
They stand that way for so long, Karlach almost feels herself begin swaying—like she’d lost any sense of balance and was now subject to the ebb and flow of the river and winds.
Shadowheart draws a breath, starting again, “I wanted to explain—”
But—fuck it.
Every minute is precious. Every breath is borrowed life.
And Karlach still loves Shadowheart.
(It’s instinct).
She reaches forward, takes her waist—finds her anchor—and kisses her.