#caedesisms

[whomuses]

// Gonna do a lil like character building here and I wanna talk about how Caedes changes over the journey. Please note this will obviously involve discussion of durge stuff, blood murder vomit etc, also mentions (unintentional) weight loss so if these are things you struggle with, don't read!

When we first meet Caedes off the nautiloid, they're already not in great health. Having been tadpoled and dumped there by Orin, injured, they're still relatively strong physically. Mostly at a healthy weight; with some broken horns, scars and missing scales, the main issue is the chunk of memory that is missing. Whilst the road is hard and tiring, he actually manages to eat fairly well at first. They've always been strong but relatively lean, the nature of ... everything going on. The road means anything extra is fairly quickly stripped back, leading to the dragonborn basically being a block of muscle. But after Alfira... everything starts to really change. Caedes didn't reaelise before just how easily sleep would make him susceptible to the urge. They make no secret of the murder - not proud of it in the slightest, but he's also not going to lie. The others were warned, near the moment he met them, about the urge. Now they're scared to sleep. Still give in fairly regularly, but get less hours, stay up later, start to distance. It only gets worse as the travel goes on. When he starts getting close to Gale, Caedes lets himself come back into the circle again, but after a couple of close calls, they really shut down. By the time they reach the elfsong, Caedes very rarely joins them for meals, and sleeps incredibly little. It starts to really show it's toll just around the time they're getting to the tavern; having lost weight and gotten significantly weaker, whilst he's still tall and built, Caedes is surprisingly light.

The exhaustion, mixed in with the effects from Bhaal's rage at his perfect murder machine fighting so strongly against their nature, doesn't exactly make Caedes frail? But he's very fallible. Easier and quicker to anger. The urge bubbles much closer to the surface. And through all of this? They're trying to hide it. All of it. Always acting the strong leader, stoic and unbotherable. Even when he's struggling with aiming magic due to struggling to see, hiding away from the camp to cough up blood... only really spending any time with Gale, and even then, after they're done uh... distracting each other, Caedes would slip away to stay awake.

After the blood is removed, it takes... a few days before Caedes finally gives in and allows sleep. Even though, theoretically, the urges are gone; they still... don't trust themselves. It's Gale who forces him to come lay down, and promises to stay awake and watch over him. They wake up curled up together. No nightmares, no urge, just deep, exhausted sleep. After that Caedes is a little more sociable. Starts joining the group again.

In terms of my like overarching post game story, Caedes realises that something is 'wrong' just before they go to fight gort. And whilst he can't prove anything, that feeling doesn't go away. By the time they're in the bhaal temple he's nearly convinced but still somewhat in denial, because dragonborns and humans are not supposed to be able to breed. After the fight with Orin, though, what Withers said when he resurrects Caedes is what convinces him that he's pregnant. They truly believe that is what saved them, not his own ability. (Obviously Withers was not talking about the egg, but, y'know.) He means to tell Gale just before the fight with the brain, but when he gets pulled in for that kiss, he realises he can't say anything yet. Gale had not long ago said about not thinking he'd want to be a father; the words still linger, because Caedes isn't sure what to do. Right then and there isn't the time. They needed to make sure they lived and then... then he could say.