#i wonder how approval with wyll is going to play out :P

[blackjackkent]

Shoutout to whoever that person was who pointed out a while back that not only do we find Lae'zel caught in a comically dumb trap by a couple of tieflings, but that there are also several other broken equally dumb traps further along the road indicating that she got caught SEVERAL times and smashed her way out of all of them. Lae'zel is great.

Also I sort of have a bad feeling about what's going to happen to these two tieflings, given that Lae'zel is probably the closest thing to someone Rakha has liked since she woke up. D: But here we go!

"Zorru was right. Yellow as a toad, and twice as ugly."

Yet more representatives of another group Rakha doesn't recognize. These two have horns and ill-kept leather armor, and are talking in low voices together about the prisoner they have caged and hanging several feet off the ground.

Rakha draws a sharp breath as she recognizes the face of the captive - the only other familiar face she knows. It's Lae'zel. She has a sharp bruise over one eye and an expression of absolute fury that would do credit to the beast instinct in Rakha's head.

"The thing's dangerous," the second of the horned guards insists to her companion. "Leave it for the goblins to kill."

"And if it escapes?" says the first. "How will you--"

He breaks off, scowls warily hearing Rakha's footsteps behind him. "Oh. A guest," he says, sounding not particularly pleased.

Rakha's eyes flick around the area, taking in the situation, trying to sort out what is happening. Lae'zel is trapped. Lae'zel helped her on the ship; Lae'zel knew what to do with Rakha's aggression (most of the time at least). Lae'zel is an ally. These who trapped her, then, are enemies.

The blood pulse thumps at the back of her skull - and mixes its rhythm with a sudden stab of pain through her right... what did Gale call it? Ocular region.

Narrator: Your skull pounds in response to the prisoner's white-hot stare. Her lips don't move, yet you hear her voice.

~~Get rid of them.~~

Well. That's new. Rakha blinks several times rapidly. She has seen flashes of imagery through Lae'zel's eyes. Through Shadowheart's. Perhaps from Gale's, given time. But pure thought is another thing in entirely. It's jarring, puts her on edge, yet another voice inside her head.

But Lae'zel's voice is not like the beast that craves blood. It is controlled and sharp, decisive. Practical. An order. A purpose to the violence. Get rid of them. Yes.

Attack the tieflings.

Fire explodes from her fingers, an overwhelming burst outwards. Behind her, she hears Shadowheart curse and Gale whistle softly. She doesn't wait to see if this means they will follow her - and in truth, she's surprised when they do.

Gale is at her side within moments, his own fire spinning out of his palms, the same cry of "IGNIS" on his lips that came instinctively to hers. Behind them, Shadowheart does not attack, but when one of the horned creatures drives a deep cash in Rakha's side, she's dimly aware of some soothing magic from Shadowheart's direction, finding the injury, sealing it.

The fight lasts less than a minute. In the end, the horned fighters are dead. Rakha and her companions are not.

The beast sings in Rakha's head as the death screams echo around the small gorge. Their blood stains the grass.

Blood... blood... blood... blood... blood...

She feels that maniacal grin start to tug at her lips again, forces it away and scowls into the ground until her heartbeat starts to settle into something resembling calm. But the sated thrill remains, singing along her skin, mixing with the magical energy that lingers there.

Lae'zel scowls impatiently as Rakha's expression slowly clears, the haze of violence leaving her eyes. She seems unbothered by Rakha's reaction to the killings. "Enough gawking. Get me down."

Rakha expected no thanks, so she feels no need to demand it. "I'll have you free in a moment," she says, equally blunt.

(Gale, watching this, is intrigued to note the difference between Rakha's matter-of-fact practicality here and the wary threat she offered himself at their first meeting. "Is this what passes for an overture of friendship in the land of angry madwomen?" he asks dryly in an undertone to Shadowheart, who is carefully healing a wound in her own shoulder.

"I wouldn't know," she fires back irritably without looking up. "I haven't been home recently.")

Rakha's solution, after examining the cage carefully, is to burn the bottom of it out from under Lae'zel, which sends the githyanki crashing to the ground in an ungainly pile. She glares up at what remains of the cage before clambering to her feet and dusting herself off.

"The tadpole hasn't yet scrambled all your senses," she says coolly to Rakha, as if nothing happened. "Auspicious." She adjusts her gauntlets, resettles the enormous greatsword on her back. "But the longer we wait, the more it consumes. My people possess the cure for this infection. I must find a creche. You will join me."

As she did on the nautiloid, she speaks so decisively, with such expectation of being obeyed, that Rakha listens in silence, absorbing the instruction.

You will join me. Very well. It is a plan where she has none, save to wreak vengeance on any other illithids that cross her path. Creche, though - the word is unfamiliar.

"Careful," Shadowheart comments with an air of annoyance. "She obviously sees your kindness as weakness. Don't let her take advantage."

Rakha raises one eyebrow. Kindness? She killed the guards and broke the cage, but it was not out of kindness. This was an act of practicality, just as was Lae'zel's request for help - mixed with a touch of inescapable, insatiable bloodlust. Shadowheart, she suspects, simply does not like Lae'zel. Fair enough; she is not required to. But Rakha will make her own judgments.

"And what exactly is a creche?" she asks Lae'zel bluntly, ignoring Shadowheart's warning.

"It is many things," Lae'zel answers promptly. "A hatchery. A training grounds. A shelter. Githyanki protocol is clear - when infected with a ghaik tadpole, we must report to a ghustil for purification."

Rakha parses this carefully. A shelter. A githyanki home. Not Lae'zel's, but others of her kind. A place where they can be purified, the tadpole removed. Free of the tadpole, she can make whatever plans she needs to, find a way to silence the pounding need for blood in her head - or assuage it.

Good.

"All right," she says curtly. "We journey together. Let's find this creche."

Lae'zel straightens up and looks visibly pleased - perhaps the first such expression Rakha can remember in response to herself. "You have made an ally from Creche K'liir," the githyanki says gravely. "Few know such fortune."

(A/N: She then announced "Call me Lae'zel" but of course I'd already decided Rakha knew that. XD This whole next sequence of lines I actually don't remember at all from any other playthrough; I think because normally I already have Astarion by this point so Lae'zel goes to camp rather than introducing herself.)

"I'll trust your judgment," Shadowheart says icily, stepping up at Rakha's side and squinting at Lae'zel warily. "But I won't trust her. Not until I've gotten the measure of her."

"You've a sharp tongue, *elf*," Lae'zel snaps back. "Would that your mind proved its equal."

"Half-elf," Shadowheart corrects with a sneer. "I suppose the finer details are lost on a creature like you."

Half-elf. Rakha files this away. It implies the existence of a complete elf, and some other part of Shadowheart not yet identified. There are a lot of types of people in this world, she is learning.

She is also learning that Lae'zel and Shadowheart will have to be kept far away from each other.

Or perhaps close... perhaps close... until one of them draws on the other and the scent of death pours out of their wounds...

Lae'zel rolls her eyes and turns deliberately away from Shadowheart, focusing her eyes back on Rakha. "Come," she says crisply. "The horned ones mentioned a camp. One there - this Zorru - has seen githyanki. A creche must be near. We will ask this Zorru where he has seen my kin."

Without waiting for a response, she turns and stalks away.