#pasiphaë elago

[lewis-winters]

4, 13, 19, and 22 for any ship involving a medic

WAAAHHH I only saw this now, I'm so sorry.

Let's do something different, with each question corresponding to a different ship! I know it says "OTP" asks but, unfortunately, the reality of being a multishipper is... well. This.

4. Doc Bryan/Nate Fick - Which one is more protective? Who needs to be ‘protected’?

Neither of them need protecting, they can definitely handle themselves on their own. We know that, they both know that. But Doc Bryan's default existence/way he interacts with people he cares very deeply for is just. Manhandling, chastising, and worrying. It's like enrichment for him, ya know? So Nate lets Tim fuss over him and lets him worry, because if he doesn't, Tim will just worry more somehow. And if Tim yells at officers for putting his Captain in trouble, well. So long as he tacks on a sir at the end of it, they'll be fine.

13. Baberoe - Who’s the bigger tease?

LMAO, Eugene. Babe tries to give it as good as he's got, but he's unfortunately too impatient and gives in to his own game easily. Eugene, however, knows what he wants and is also very patient and will make Babe wait. RIP Edward Heffron, you were a good man.

19. Pasiphaë/Halsin - How do they feel about PDA?

Ok. So. Yeah, I snuck some BG3 in here, Halsin counts as a medic! Anyway. Halsin's touchy-feely. Has always been, even before they properly got together. I have this headcanon that he has a thing for Pasiphaë’s hair—it’s the first thing he noticed about her, apart from her eyes. He obviously can’t stare at her eyes and not get caught, though, so instead he focuses all his pining energy into maybe-sometimes-accidentally-but-also-on-purpose catching the end of her long pony tail/braid hybrid in his fingers. When they get together, though, it's incessant. But it's always Halsin initiating. Pasiphaë’s a little more shy; she's a widow, it's been years since she was touched like this, but she gradually warms up to the idea.

22. Spina/Julian - What reminds each of their partner?

That stupid knit hat haunts Julian everywhere he goes. Sometimes, he'll leave Ralph for a little bit, then brush against someone wearing a knit green hat, and immediately get this urge to chase that person down, because it might be Ralph! But no, it's just some other guy wearing a knit hat. It would be pretty adorable if Julian didn't feel so embarrassed about it.

On the other hand, Ralph-- "Oh! You're from Alabama? My boyfriends from Alabama, too!"

Obligatory OTP Asks

[hellofanidea]

one more!

There is a barrell full of potions of dubious colors and varying sizes, each one suspiciously unlabelled-- Bargain Barrell Brews, the sign above it says.

"Piece of advice," Phaë says, looking at the assortment over Thistle's shoulder. "If they can't even get the sign right, it's probably not a smart gamble."

"No," Thistle agrees, even as they keep staring at one of the bottles. It's a short, fat thing filled with a liquid that shimmers silver and gold, specks of purple dancing through. "Though perhaps..."

"I'm not fixing whatever happens to you if you take that."

[hellofanidea]

prompts!!

Pasiphaë looks up, and immediately makes eye contact with Halsin.

She wishes she hadn't. His gaze is warm and concerned and unwavering in its observation of her. It makes her want to withdraw, to hide somewhere far away where he can't elbow his way into her life and make himself comfortable by her side, fill the spaces she has left around her heart.

"Something wrong?" She challenges him.

He doesn't answer with anything but a dip of his head as he looks away.

[hellofanidea]

and because I have BG3 on the brain, always

"Good morning, Thistle, sweetheart, last night was rather eventful! When were you going to tell us you're currently sharing a body with an ancient horror from the very depths of Umberlee's domain?"

Phaë's voice is sweet, maternal, but the look on her face is a decidedly frightening one of very controlled fury. Thistle immediately shrinks back in their bedroll.

"Didn't come up before," they say weakly.

"Didn't come up?" Shrieks Astarion from just behind Phaë, his hands on his hips and lips curled dramatically to bare his fangs in irritation. "Didn't-! Yes, I'm sorry, my mistake, 'are you currently possessed by anything other than the tadpole' really should have been an introductory question!"

[lewis-winters]

Hate and Hunt with Phaë? - Nathan

hate: What does your OC hate? Why? How do they act towards the object of their hatred?

by virtue of being a godless paladin-- the gods. particularly the divine intervention of said gods. however, if we're talking specifics, I think she has hatred in her heart ESPECIALLY for Loviatar and her followers, but also for Ilmater and his followers. there's a lot of trauma backing this, of course. Loviatar's followers kept her captive in their dungeon for a year and a half when she was but a young Paladin of Ilmater, just starting. she got out on her own, even after prayers upon prayers to Ilmater. When she limped back to her order, they didn't praise her resilience, but instead praised Ilmater, and made her torture into a blessing, her slaughter of the clerics into a blessing. she didn't know it then, but when she became oathbreaker years later, that was the beginning of the end for her.

hunt: Who or what is your OC hunted by? A person, a feeling, a past mistake? Is your OC able to let their guard down, or are they constantly alert?

as Oathbreaker, I have been toying with idea of Myrkyul wanting her as his Chosen, ya know? during the Wailing Years, he's supposedly "dead" with his corpse rotting in the Astral Planes... but like. I love the idea that some part of him gained some power to whisper in Pasiphaë's ear during the Wailimg Years, especially since she's literally the only necromancer to have managed to take the uncontrollable power of the spellplague lands for her own gain. I imagine she would've been the in he could've gotten to being revived, but was stopped when she told him to fuck off.

during the events of BG3, though, I imagine for the whole of Act 2, when Phaë realizes who they're up against, he starts that whispering shit in her ear again and doesn't stop until the defeat of the elder brain in Act 3. she can't let her guard down around him-- of quite frankly, she won't. she's very afraid of giving in to the promise of power, especially as the foes they face grow more dangerous by the minute, and her actual children are once again put in the front lines.

[lewis-winters]

Day 13: Fear

Part of my OC-tober 2022 (that will get fucking finished in 2024 so help me god)! Well. We're indulging this time around with some Baldur's Gate 3 on my Band of Brothers/HBO War Blog. I guess. Honestly, with how many OCs I have in other fandoms, I might just start playing around with them for this prompt list, too!

tw: If you're starting to notice a pattern in my writing with parenthood, in iterations of both problematic or good, uuuuuhhhh no you fucking don't.

They’ve been sitting by the fire in the Elfsong tavern for a whole of hour, in perfect silence, before Jaheira chooses to break it. “You will not return upstairs.”

It’s not a question. Still, Pasiphaë answers it as one. “Not until they’re all in bed. I’ve no patience right now,” she tells her with a deep sigh. “For anyone or myself. I… do not like who I was today.”

Belligerent. Jumpy. Too slow to react, too impulsive in her decisions. Near unrecognizable, as compared to her original cool and collected demeanor at the beginning of their journey. She expected better of herself, and her companions definitely deserved better than the kind of mess she’s become. But they’ve been running on near fumes for the past few days, having been tossed about here and there by Mystra, Shar, Lorroakan, cultists, Orin, and Cazador, all alike. On top of that, Serafina had decided to join in on their quest, despite Pasiphaë’s explicit orders for her to get out of the city while she still could—truly, there was a time when her sweet little girl would obey her with no question, but alas! she’s inherited her other mother’s bullheaded-ness. Pun intended. Not for the first time, Pasiphaë found herself wishing that Melisandre were still around to share in her pride over their daughter’s immense bravery. The abrupt reminder of what she no longer had—after several months of not thinking about Mel even once—had been enough to throw her off her rhythm completely. The day had already started being kind of shit.

Ulder Ravengard and his unfortunate decision to mouth off about his son’s new appearance was the last straw.

“I lost my temper.” The verbal dressing down was spectacular while it was happening. Invigorating, even. Pasiphaë doesn’t remember the last time she’s felt such catharsis. After the months of non-stop action, it was good to release it all.

It was the stunned silence afterward that felt particularly… damned. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

“Bah, he deserved it,” Jaheira scoffs, waving a dismissive hand. “He is better off for listening to your wisdom.”

“Calling whatever that was ‘wisdom’ is too generous.”

“But it is what it is: a mother’s wisdom.”

Pasiphaë snaps; “I’m not Wyll’s mother,” and Jaheira tilts her head back and lets out a hearty HA! loud enough to draw the attention of other patrons.

“You are not just his mother, that is for sure,” Jaheira says, wagging an admonishing finger at her. “All of them seem to have attached themselves to you like little suckling pups to a bitch’s teats.”

“Your metaphors leave much to be desired, Jaheira.”

“You were protecting your pup, is what I mean,” Jaheira shrugs. “Even if it is from his own blood. Wyll holds you under no contempt for such a display. I may even go so far as to say that he’s grateful for it.”

“Perhaps.” Oh, but Wyll loves his father so—even when the man has done nothing but abandon him. Pasiphaë knows it isn’t right to get between father and son, not as a simple party member, and most certainly not while one still holds out hope for reconciliation. She might’ve just ruined Wyll’s chances back there, with her vindictive nature and even sharper tongue. If she had, would he ever forgive her?

As if reading her thoughts, Jaheira tsks. “We mothers, we always want what is best for our children. Nobody can fault us for that.” There’s a small smile on her face; a tiny quirk of the corner of her lip that feels conspirative. Like they’re in on a joke together.

Technically, they are. Pasiphaë smiles back. Or tries to. “Whatever you say.”

Their conversation, once again, falls to silence. Patrons come and go, and the tavern keeper’s boy comes once and twice to stoke the fires until, finally, they fizzle out into glowing embers. The night grows even quieter soon after, with the patrons quickly disappearing out the door, or into other rooms, until, finally, it is just them, and the occasional drunkard outside.

“You can go. Rest,” Pasiphaë says, aware that it is late. Tomorrow (later?), they are to confront Gortash. “We’ll need all our strength come morning.”

“You are determined to keep vigil.”

“Someone has to.”

“If I were to climb up those stairs, I would not be surprised to see some of your pups waiting for you by their fire,” Jaheira chuckles, standing up with an exaggerated groan—her knees are not what they used to be. “No doubt, they will send me back down again—or even come down themselves—if I return empty handed. Come, now.”

She offers her hand.

Pasiphaë stares at it.

Something in her chest shudders with anxiety and—is it her imagination? The tadpole behind her eye, wriggling with a sordid kind of glee?

“I fear I cannot be to them what they need me to be, Jaheira.”

Jaheira frowns, confused. Still, she keeps her hand out. “And what is that?”

What, indeed? A leader? With the amount of times she’s failed them? Perish the thought. A caretaker? Barely. Her hands are not made for healing, anymore. Certainly not with the Triad’s silence and her simmering resentment over it. And what comfort she could give is quickly dwarfed by the enormity of all their suffering. What use is a lullaby, when she couldn’t even hold Karlach enough to soothe her tears? What use is her sword, when it can scarcely keep Lae’zel from the betrayal of her kin, queen, and god? Clearly, Pasiphaë couldn’t even call herself a protector—just two days ago, she’d failed to protect Astarion from his worst possible self, leaving the burden to Gale, instead; and just last tenday, Shar had taken from Shadowheart her last connection to her past, while all Pasiphaë could do was helplessly watch. Hells, she certainly couldn’t protect Wyll, who only ever looked to her for wisdom and guidance. Or even Gale, whose final decision haunts them all—Astarion, especially, who has begged her over and over again to make Gale see reason. But how could she, when all she could think about is his fate as both Faithless and Discarded? She understands too well the challenge that lays before him to possibly talk him out of his task in any way that matters. The blasted Wall remains a prominent phantom in Gale’s mind as much as hers; but while she’s resigned to her own fate, that doesn’t mean he should be, too.

Gods, but what will she tell Morena, then? Tara? Astarion? That she let their beloved boy die, simply because the folly of the gods and their selfish nature was too strong for her to fight? No. That would not do.

And yet. She hesitates.

“If I am their mother, as you say I am,” she tells Jaheira. “I am a shit mother. My Melisandre would be ashamed to see how poorly of a mother I am being.”

Jaheira knits her brows together. “Your partner?”

“Yes.” Her beloved. The mother of her children. The balm to her soul. The light in her darkness; Pasiphaë is never going to see her again. “She was always better at this than I—my children—I was never—”

“Serafina seems to adore you.”

“Now,” Pasiphaë entreats, feeling the blasted tadpole wriggle and squirm behind her stupid eyes the more distressed she becomes. “I have failed her before, terribly, and it was only time that allowed those wounds to heal. Time is not on my side, now. If I fail them—when I fail them—”

She stops. She cannot bear to think of it. But it is inevitable. “I fear that it is not a matter of if, but when I fail them, Jaheira. I am cursed to repeat my mistakes. And when I do… gods when I do…”

“You will not.”

“You are a fool to—”

“Ha!” Jaheira barks, snatching back her offered hand to reach out and shake Pasiphaë by the shoulders. Like she were a kitten being pulled back by her scruff. Gone is the amicable, conspiratorial smile, replaced thoroughly by a stern glare. “It is you who is the fool to let such thoughts paralyze you!” She lets her go, wags a finger in her face, “you have fallen out of practice in the art of seeing yourself as what you are. What you are truly capable of.”

“But I am capable of failure!”

“And you are capable of triumph!” Jaheira snaps, throwing her hands up in the air in frustration. “Why are you so determined to fail?”

Pasiphaë blinks. Blinks again. Something hot rolls down her cheeks and she scrubs at them with her hands. They come away wet.

“You said, once, that you are destined for the Wall of the Faithless. This is the truth. In many ways, you are,” Jaheira continues, kneeling on the ground so as to catch her eyes. “But you are not dead yet. Your pups are not dead yet. Pull it together; you must see this—if not for yourself, then for them.”

For them. Yes. For them. Children are only as resilient as their parents, Melisandre used to say. Whisper in her ear, when the worst of the grief had taken over as their baby girl cooled in her arms. Phaedra is gone, but Xenodius and Serafina yet live. For them, Pasiphaë had rallied. Taken up what strength she had left, and trudged forward.

Get up, she thinks Melisandre would say, now. Get up, my love. They are hurt, but they are yet living. Get up.

“I wish I had your wisdom,” Pasiphaë says, finally, after a long moment of silence. It comes out in a croak, barely a whisper, barely even words. Still, she manages a small smile. “True mother’s wisdom.”

Jaheira tsks. But slowly, she too returns a smile. “You have it. As I said: you are just… out of practice. Come, now,” again, she gets up on her creaky knees with an exaggerated groan.

And offers her hand. “Your pups might sleep better, knowing that their mother is nearby.”

This time, Pasiphaë takes it. “Their bitch of a mother?”

Jaheira laughs. Laughs and laughs, even as she pulls Pasiphaë toward the stairs and their camp. It’s loud and bawdy and definitely a great disturbance. But it does sound like music, and Pasiphaë likes hearing it. “Just so!”

--

Pasiphaë Elago is my Tav. She's a moon-elf, and a Paladin of Ilmater/the Triad turned Godless Paladin-- it's a long story. She's named Pasiphaë because her late wife, Melisandre, was a druid whose wild shape was a bull. I think I'm funny. Before the events of BG3, she was an adventurer in her own right, and is technically retired and is literally broaching 500 by the time she's kidnapped by the Ilithids. That being said, because she's so old and had just lost her wife a few years prior, she doesn't romance the BG3 characters but accidentally adopts them all during their whole tadpole ordeal. Oh make no mistake, Astarion, Shadowheart, Karlach, and Lae'zel tried to hit that, but she shut that down so fast-- "Some of you are as old as my eldest grandchild. It's awkward." Team Mom! Total GILF!! And also!! suffering. Help her, she thought she was done having to parent like this after watching 2 of her 3 children (the last died during the Spellplague) grow up, move out, and make families of their own. She's supposed to be RETIRED, damnit. She's trying so hard. She just wants a NAP.

Speaking of Greek Myths, isn't it funny that Astarion shares a name with the Minotaur? I swear, I didn't think of that before naming Pasiphaë. I did, however, think of it when naming Ariadne Ancunin, my other BG3 OC, who happens to also be Astarion's biological sister. The name's important. Ariadne gave Theseus the power to kill her Minotaur brother, after all. But that's for another day entirely.

None of this makes sense to any of you. That's fine. It's for ME.

[lewis-winters]

was cleaning out my folders and found this one alignment chart from @cloudofbutterflies and I was compelled by brainrot to plot my OCs along the axis. here they are:

some of my girls are missing, but please know that those that are, are still very much covered in blood, they just are, unfortunately, not pathetic. more sinister.

[lewis-winters]

Day 16: Victory

Part of my OC-tober 2022 (that will get fucking finished in 2024 so help me god)! Another Baldur's Gate 3 one, folks!

This was just an excuse to write a Tadfools puppy pile and also a little dropped hint to whatever is going on between Halsin/my Tav. Again, some Bloodweave in there. Because I care them. And Shadowheart being clingy, because I like that, too. Team As Family, of course.

Also! A tiny depiction of a stray headcanon of mine: being a particularly stubborn and petty godless Paladin means breaking the habit of using gods’ names in vain so, Pasiphaë often incites the ‘Great fuck’ or ‘Holy shit’ when truly exasperated or in a situation that might have had her previously calling for Ilmater. She does this out of spite. I love her.

tw: allusions to Astarion’s whole backstory; they’re all traumatized and pretending so hard that they aren’t

As soon as the sun sets, they go and set Cazador’s Palace ablaze.

Between Gale’s fireball, Shadowheart’s conjured elemental, a gallon of gasoline Astarion had filched from an abandoned food stall, and their overall enthusiasm, they make quick work of the old place in little under two hours. With the amount of destruction that has been wrought upon the city already, nobody bats an eye at the raging flames, nor at the four lunatics that started it. The only ones who do are their Harper allies, who find them sitting together on the Lower City Wall a relatively safe distance away, surveying their handiwork from under some curtains they’d stolen from the ballroom and are now using as blankets to keep warm.

“We were wondering where you were,” Jaheira sighs, making herself comfortable on the ground with them as the rest of her team scouts ahead, checking to make sure the damage doesn’t spread anywhere else. “When we saw the brain fall, our first thought was to search for you in the Chionthar’s waters. Were you here the whole time?”

Nobody answers for a long moment. Nobody moves. They simply watch the flames, its blaze and its warmth enough to evoke the sun.

Finally, Pasiphaë blinks, slowly, like she’s just been awoken from a dream. “We hid by the docks until the sun set,” she tells Jaheira, flatly. “Slept some.”

What a sorry sight they must have been: huddled together behind some barrels and crates like a litter of abandoned kittens, licking their wounds and attempting to crawl into each other’s skin—the very antithesis to the image of victory.

They couldn’t help it, though; the overwhelming silence in their minds where six other presences had been was disconcerting, to say the least. After nearly a year of sharing their tadpole telepathic link, suddenly being unable to feel each other, mentally, incited a desire in all of them to feel each other tangibly, instead. Even Astarion, who in different circumstances would have turned his nose up at the mere idea of cuddling, did not protest when Shadowheart so much as crawled into his lap, and simply turned his face into the crook of Gale’s neck while Pasiphaë circled her arms around all of them best she could. It was difficult, too, to simply dismiss the absent pieces of their seven-way connection. Pasiphaë had wondered, aloud, if Wyll and Karlach also felt the loss. Or if Lae’zel missed it, now, with as much intensity as she had despised it, then. Nobody had wanted to follow that trail of thought.

It ached too much.

Instead, they’d made plans. Serious ones at first, with the Crown of Karsus still in pieces in the Chionthar and majority of the city reduced to rubble and ruin. But the more they talked of it, the more they went in circles. Those plans were for a future a bit farther from reach. Complicated. They wanted—needed something simple.

Shadowheart had been the one to suggest burning Cazador’s Palace to the ground; arson sounded much more invigorating than drinking themselves into a stupor at the nearest tavern. Once they’d unanimously agreed, they’d quickly fallen asleep, tucked tightly against each other. Waiting out the sun.

“I’m sorry,” Pasiphaë tells Jaheira. “We worried you, didn’t we?”

“No more than you usually do,” Jaheira says, waving a dismissive hand. To Astarion, she asks; “do you intend to see this blaze all the way through to its ashes?”

“Not if you promise something better, darling,” Astarion shrugs. He’s managed to slot himself sideways upon Gale’s lap, arms wrapped around his wizard’s neck, legs slung over thighs. Nuzzling into him, he recalls; “what was it? A night of hedonistic debauchery?”

Gale has his eyes closed, weary. “Hm. I think you have to count me out this time, ‘Star.”

“The short length of your sentences are starting to concern me, Gale,” Shadowheart says, from her spot against Pasiphaë, her arm intertwined with hers. Her head on her shoulder. “So long as this hedonistic debauchery involves a bed—”

Astarion snorts, an undignified sound. “How straight forward of you, Shadowheart.”

“Is the Elfsong still standing?” Pasiphaë asks Jaheira, ignoring the new wave of bickering that’s begun.

“Tall and proud, with barely a scratch,” Jaheira tells her. “I must warn you, though. A difficult conversation awaits you there.”

The bickering ceases and three pairs of curious ears perk up. Pasiphaë struggles not to roll her eyes. “For tomorrow,” she says, to both Jaheira and audience, before stretching her legs out with a groan. “For now: home. And rest.”

They get up with some struggle, sore and tired, pins and needles rushing through their stiff limbs as they pick their way through the smoking city toward camp. They cling to each other still, even when it makes walking through narrow alley ways tough. But it doesn’t slow them down at all. The moon has barely made it up into the sky before the Elfsong finally looms before them, a welcome sight.

Halsin is waiting for them at the entrance, whole, largely unharmed, and pacing. He hasn’t clocked them yet.

“You don’t have to engage him,” Gale reassures her with a whisper. “Halsin has always been a reasonable man; if we were to tell him that you wish to be left alone tonight, he would no doubt honor that request.”

“You don’t have to get between us,” Pasiphaë tells him. “But I appreciate it.”

Luckily, it doesn’t come to that—before she can even so much as make eye contact with the druid, the door of the Elfsong opens, and her children spill out.

“Mama,” Serafina gasps in Elvish, as she and her brother practically throw themselves at Pasiphaë. They’re not quite as small as they used to be, but Pasiphaë still catches them well enough and only stumbles a bit. “Phaë, oh thank the goddess, we thought you—I thought—”

“Oh, my baby,” Pasiphaë coos, holding her close as she begins to cry. “It’s alright. I’m alright. We’re alright.”

Everybody graciously gives them privacy—though from the corner of her eye she sees Halsin hesitate, just a moment, before Jaheira pulls him inside the building—leaving them to relocate to one of the tables still intact out front, waiting out the worst of the water works as Serafina blubbers and hiccups her way through words. By the time she’s calmed down, the world about them has quieted into a near hush, sans perhaps some lucky crickets. It’s still quite early into the evening, but even for a city as robust and bustling as Baldur’s Gate, being invaded by an army of cultists and mind-flayers would significantly damper the night life. On the bright side, there’s less vampire spawn and Bhaal followers in it, now. “This city is not so bad,” Pasiphaë snorts. “Now that we cleaned it up, some, I mean.”

“I’m sick of it,” Serafina sniffles, shaking her head. “I think. I think it’s about time I moved.”

Xenodius chuckles. “I was just jesting about that, you know?”

“No. I know you were. But I’m not so stubborn now as to dismiss the wisdom behind the jest. Besides,” Serafina smiles. “Phaë’s wizard has sold me on the idea of Waterdeep.”

“Well. It’s not Neverwinter.” But at least it isn’t the fucking Gate, goes unsaid.

“I want you to come with me, Phaë.”

Pasiphaë blinks. Then blinks some more. “You—”

“Please don’t say you want me to have a life of my own. I have that. I’d still like for you to be in it.”

“I… wasn’t going to say that,” Pasiphaë lies, grasping for other arguments she might have. “It’s just… Waterdeep is so awfully far, linnon dithen, and the house—who will take care of the house?”

“I will!” Xenodius protests. “I’ve inherited your propensity for bringing home strays, you know. Elias and I will need more space, soon.” He reaches out and takes Pasiphaë’s hand. “That house is too big for you, Phaë.”

He does have a point. But Pasiphaë isn’t going to give them both the satisfaction of being right without working for it, just a bit. “Have you two been talking about me behind my back?”

“Of course.”

Pasiphaë rolls her eyes. “Such brats.”

“We were just worried about you,” Serafina says, so, so patient. Since when has she become so patient? All at once, Pasiphaë’s throat tightens with emotion, and she has to blink rapidly to keep it all at bay. “That house… it has a lot of happy memories. But there are many bad ones, too. I lost Phaedra and Mel in that house. I thought I lost you in that house—” Pasiphaë winces. “—There’s been more bad than good that’s happened there, recently. I don’t like the idea of you wallowing in that for the rest of your life. Perhaps it’s time for some where new?”

“Sera—”

“Or you can go with Halsin, if that’s what you want!”

Pasiphaë feels like her heart’s been tossed into the air. “What.”

“I mean. I thought—” Serafina fidgets, her turn now to grasp for something to say. “You know I don’t mind, right? You aren’t… I don’t think you’re replacing Mel at all! Odi doesn’t, either.”

Xenodius nods, enthusiastically. “I think he’s nice, Mama.”

Oh, great fuck, deliver her. “I am not ready to have this conversation with you.”

“Why not?”

“Because Halsin and I are most definitely not like that.” She doesn’t try and specify what that means, afraid to lose the plausible deniability in lacking a proper label.

Despite her efforts, though, the siblings seem to understand it perfectly. Exchanging glances that are a bit too knowing for her comfort, they look to her, frowning. “Oh?” Sera says, an eyebrow raised. “I… Are you sure?”

Pasiphaë flounders for an answer. She can’t find one, so she just doesn’t answer at all.

They stay for a few more moments, before Pasiphaë’s growling stomach and growing anxiety prompts them to go inside. Everybody else is waiting around the fire pit for them, idly chatting between themselves. Shadowheart has the Owlbear sprawled across her lap while Astarion has Scratch in his. Tara has found Gale as well, kneading biscuits into his lap while meowing and mrrp-ing what Pasiphaë suspects to be admonishments and endearments.

Through all this, Halsin is cradling a slumbering Yenna, the child the only thing keeping him from getting up and… well. Pasiphaë isn’t sure what he wants to do. From the look on his face, she thinks he might want to kiss her. Or maybe tell her that he never wants to see her again. It would take more than a cursory look for Pasiphaë to determine which it really is, but she’s not ready to take more than a glance. Especially with everybody else discretely staring and wondering too loud without saying a word.

Pasiphaë looks at Jaheira, and sure enough, the druid is looking at her already, an eyebrow raised in question. Pasiphaë shakes her head. Jaheira rolls her eyes.

Dinner is a subdued affair. Nobody really wants to talk all that much. Or eat much, either. But Odi’s paternal instincts kick in, and he forces them to stomach a few bites, even when the tavern’s stew is a bit too bland for their tastes. Serafina gives up some of her own blood for Astarion’s meal, and Pasiphaë hugs her daughter extra tight to thank her for her generosity.

“It’s nothing,” Sera tells her, and Astarion, too. She smiles at him, and for a moment looks like she wants to say more, but thinks better of it. “You’re… uh. You’re welcome.” Astarion appears grateful for her intuition.

Sleep comes quick. They’re less huddled together about it, with Gale and Astarion retiring together to their own cot while Pasiphaë acquires both her children and Shadowheart in hers. Pasiphaë wants to grumble something about being made into an elf-sized teddy bear by two fully grown elves far too old to be sleeping in their mother’s bed, but decides to keep it to herself. Shadowheart is still grieving the loss of her parents after all, it’s no use accidentally prodding that wound for the sake of faux-surliness. If she could help curb that by holding her the way she did her own children after a particularly nasty nightmare, then Pasiphaë resolutely doesn’t mind being slowly crushed to death. They push together three cots to fit all of them together with Pasiphaë in the middle—and if it so happens to be within sight of Gale and Astarion’s cot and Halsin’s place by the fire, well. Nobody says anything.

They let exhaustion take them as soon as their heads hit the pillows.

--

Linnon dithen means ‘little singer’ in Tolkein's Sindarin. Forgotten Realms doesn’t actually have any official Elvish conlang (aside from the few official words in that one dictionary), so I substituted it with Sindarin instead.

Serafina also switches between calling her mother(s) Mama and their nicknames, while Odi prefers to just call them Mama. Pasiphaë and Melisandre had really tumultuous relationships with their own parents/guardians and I imagine weren’t so precious about parental monikers as a result. Odi prefers calling them Mama, though. I think that's just the kind of person he is. To their other children (Sera and Phaedra), they were Mama in times of heightened emotion while any other time they were Phaë and Mel.

[lewis-winters]

Day 15: Reality

Part of my OC-tober 2022 (that will get fucking finished in 2024 so help me god)! Yes! Another Baldur’s Gate fic ft. my Tav, Pasiphaë Elago on the HBO War Blog! I have too many feelings about this stupid game, the characters in it, and the little guy I made to go with them! Implied Bloodweave and Shadowheart/Nocturne. Because I care Them.

tw: Astarion’s whole backstory; some symptoms of derealization disorder—Pasiphaë has experience with this derealization and conducts some grounding techniques that are specific to Astarion’s preferences, to help him come back to himself; it sounds bleak, but it’s a really gentle sort of fic; mentions of Gale and Shadowheart’s own PTSD, though only fleeting

Pasiphaë comes home to a tressym in her foyer and a vampire on her couch.

“One of those times, yes?” Pasiphaë asks of Miss Tara, who only mrrps in affirmative. She gives the doting feline a scritch behind her ears in lieu of thanks. “Will you tell Gale that I have him, then? I’m sure he’ll worry.”

Tara meows in begrudging acquiescence, slightly annoyed at being told what to do with only an implication of a please in the request. Still, she shakes her wings and stretches very big, before trotting out the door, bushy tail held high.

“You’re both so lucky to have Miss Tara looking out for you,” Pasiphaë says, amused. “Looking out for all of us, I mean. I have a feeling she thinks we’re all her kittens, now, though Gale remains to be her favorite. Yesterday, I caught her grooming Shadowheart’s fringe while she slept just on the spot across from you. It was very cute.”

No reply—that’s alright. She’d begun talking less for the conversation, really, and more for just the noise. Astarion knows this. He’s become rather familiar with the tactics that she’d found useful back in her youth, when reality slipped her grasp as often as it does for him, now. Noise is a good start, and narration is even better. A good reminder of where they are and what the day had looked like.

“The garden is coming in nicely. Shadowheart has a bit of a green thumb, who knew?” she continues, puttering about her home, shedding this and that as she prepares for a nice night in. Silently, two crimson eyes stare out at her from the shadows beneath the cozy, weighted blanket Pasiphaë had been contemplating laundering, but never came around to it. It’s a particularly sought after item by all the guests of her home, after all. Just the other week, Gale was under there, too, deliriously exhausted by his magic returning after so long without. Yesterday, Shadowheart and Nocturne had shared it for an afternoon nap. Last month, when Lae’zel had jez'rathki’d with Xan in tow, the little gith baby had found the wool to be fascinatingly soft, babbling and drooling as his chubby hands kneaded at its folds. Hells, she’s pretty sure Jaheira had used it, too, when she had taken a detour into Waterdeep during one of her Harper missions, to see how they were holding up.

It must smell of everyone, now.

He may never admit it, but Pasiphaë knows Astarion finds that particularly comforting.

“We have too many zucchinis, of course. It’s a devil plant, that one,” she says, finally shedding her boots. “Too much yield. I’m going to have to give away a few baskets full—would Morena like them, do you think? Oh, what am I saying? of course she will; I’ll make sure she gets the nicest ones. I’m going to make some cheesy zucchini bread with the first harvest, though. Gale said he’ll interplanar deliver it to Karlach and Wyll tomorrow, alongside other supplies. Do you want to help me make it?”

No reply, again. But there is a shuffle, like someone preparing to stand.

Pasiphaë doesn’t bother to see if her follows her to the kitchen. He will. The kitchen is always a reliable delight for all the senses, and being in there, working with your hands, is a sure-fire way to, at the very least, focus on the present. It’s another technique of hers that Astarion’s found effective, perhaps because it reminds him of watching Gale cook. The Dekarios Tower kitchen has become a sort of sanctum for them all, after a few weary breakfasts were had around its round table, post rather eventful nights out, all in the name of sating a bored vampire’s curiosity. It became habit, then; if they’re in the mood to disturb their wizard, it was his kitchen they’d hung around. Scratch has a permanent dog flap in there, too, despite Gale’s protests. He’s a scrap stealing pup, but their wizard has always had a soft heart.

Pasiphaë’s own kitchen might not be as big or as lively, but it was just as well-loved. She hosts them one by one in it, sometimes, when they’re all feeling like shit. Which is often, though she doesn’t mind as much as she pretends to. It’s all like clockwork, see? She’s been adventuring enough to know that saving the world is only half the battle; it’s what happens after that the real struggle begins.

For Gale, it was the difficulty of coming back to a home so unchanged when you’ve been so irrevocably altered.

For Shadowheart and Astarion, it was the making of a home after escaping an entire existence of previous torment.

For Pasiphaë, it was the quaintness, the domesticity after constant doom. Always looking over her shoulder, wondering if it will fall apart any time soon with the next crisis.

Often times, peace feels like a dream.

It’s no surprise to her that Astarion feels like he is constantly trapped in one.

But it’s no alarming matter. Pasiphaë knows this, too. He may be falling back on old habits, retreating back into that space in his head he’d lived in for all those years of torment, but the world about him has changed drastically. He’s not there, any more. He needn’t fear starvation or abuse any longer. There are blankets, now, that smell of his most trusted people. And kitchens, filled with friends who will stay up all night just to keep him company. He'll come back to them on his own time, at his own pace. And they will be waiting.

Pasiphaë puts Astarion on washing duty. The cold water of the tap and the rough soil he must scrub away from the harvest are good sensations to ground him even further. Some of it splashes unto the blanket he’d dutifully dragged in here with him, but Pasiphaë doesn’t call him out on it. Instead, she lets her mouth run, allowing her stream of consciousness to fill the air between them.

It goes on for a while—Pasiphaë knows, when given the chance, she’s just as bad as Gale—but she does run out of things to say, once the dough is resting on the counter. They’re sitting at her table, now, a breakfast nook by an open bay window, when Astarion blinks. And blinks again. Hard, like he’s trying to see how many colors he can summon behind his eyelids.

“Tell me something real,” he requests of her, then. Quiet.

You are safe, Pasiphaë wants to say. You are loved.

She doesn’t.

Instead, she settles on something concrete and simple. “It’s going to rain soon. Do you smell the ozone in the air? The way the earth seems to call to the sky?”

Without meeting her eyes, Astarion answers; “Yes. I smelled it on the way here.”

“I love that smell. I love the rain. It makes music with water. You’ll hear it soon.” Gently, she reaches out and touches the back of his hand. An invitation. “I’m happy to spend this rainy night with you.”

Carefully, slowly, Astarion turns his hand over until he is holding hers as tightly as he can.

Me, too, goes unsaid, as they wait for the rain to come.

--

I’ve come to realize that I do have to do a descriptive piece for Pasiphaë, now, since I have no idea how to use the photo mods to show her to you guys. So... I’m putting that in the to write list. I have made a mood board for her, though! I’ll post it with the piece.

[lewis-winters]

'To Those Gods I Will Speak Bluntly' - Nathan

....... oh this is gonna be a Pasiphaë thing for sure. I would use this title for a fic that chronicles her journey as a Paladin? From Knight of Ilmater, to a Doubting Paladin, to Oathbreaker, and finally to Godless Paladin? Each portion being an 'accord' with her gods, with each either being for them or against them?

The rest under the cut because it is SO self-indulgent:

I'm kinda up in the air with how Pasiphaë deals with Gale's whole crisis, tbh. On one hand, she says she won't play with his life. When she urged him to live instead of follow Mystra's will (and blow up), she meant it! But a part of her doesn't want to give Mystra the satisfaction of having the Crown of Karsus AND curing Gale and putting him in her debt again. and I think this fic would be like... how Pasiphaë tries to find a loophole for that.

She goes unhinged and steals the Crown of Karsus as the brain is falling into the Chionthar and then tries to bargain with the gods with it while threatening to blow Gale up whilst they're in the outer planes. True Godless Paladin shit.

[lewis-winters]

was thinking about hubris and the different ways they differ in characters I love... then tried to see what kinds of hubris my OCs have... and after a deep dive into all of them I have written down the ones that give me the most brain damage:

amabeal - Though the narrative rewards her hubris, it's still fucking hubris. Nothing says 'I'm better than the gods' than literally eating them as revenge for their hand in the murder of her archangel brother, before turning around and actively plotting to murder her father, the Ultimate God. Or facing Death Incarnate and proudly admitting that she'd been masquerading as him for years and playing with the lives and deaths of mortals for her own personal amusement. She later on meets the entity between worlds, the eldritch horror of eldritch horrors, and greets It like an old friend before challenging It to a game of Uno to keep It from drawing her into eternal sleep. She doesn't win, but that doesn't stop her from trying to gaslight It into thinking she did, anyway. Because she is insane and doesn't know when to quit.

isabel makiling - The Christian God preaches freedom while His children bring about chains. The Christian God enslaved her people, and cast them aside when they needed Him most. The Christian God eradicated the Old Religions through fire and peddled false promises in their stead. Now, war has come to her land and to her people and with a gun made out of a gas pipe and a knife used to cut down weeds, she will fight tooth and nail for what the Christian God will not. There is no force in the world, divine or otherwise, stronger than her anger, fiercer than the monster she carries around in her chest. She is better than this false Christian God; He, His children, and those who follow in their stead, will know her rage.

shoshana - Nobody else will fight for her place in the world and her people but her. Nobody else has the strength to do what needs to be done. Nobody else knows how to survive quite like she does. Those under her care will learn to be like her, but not in the way she'd had to. She'll break those that need to be broken, if it'll make them strong enough. She'll make weapons out of the weakest children, if it'll give them a fighting chance. Those under her care deserve her best, and if her best comes with a side of harsh reality, then that's to be expected. Better coming from her, who doles cruelty out in controlled bits and pieces, in amounts that are almost mercy in their deficiency, than the world that unleashes it all at once. She is in control. She is always in control. Anybody who says otherwise is wrong.

natalie morse - Her brand of hubris is small compared to everyone else, but it's still there. A walking well of contradictory extremes-- literally, if queer religious trauma was a person. She believes, wholeheartedly, that whatever god is out there is punishing her specifically, because she was and is wrong on all fundamental levels and therefore must be deserving of said punishment. She will also fist fight said god for the people she loves, because when you're already damned, losing the people who dare to love you, despite your obvious wrong-ness, scares you. But god certainly doesn't.

pasiphaë elago - Literally her whole thing is hubris. She has the boundless confidence of a Paladin, with zero mitigation from the humility that comes with devout worship. A Paladin's divine power comes from the belief that their world view is the world view; but as a godless Paladin, the tenants of her faith don't come from a holy book; they came from her very soul. She created them herself, from the ashes of her suffering, and she believes in them enough that she draws divine power from it. If Gale Dekarios' hubris makes him believe that he is equal to the gods, Pasiphaë's hubris makes her believe that her disappointment in the gods and their actions are enough to make the heavens tremble. She doesn't want their forgiveness, she believes they should beg for hers. The only thing stopping her from going absolutely apeshit is that she is inherently a kind person and actually hates seeing people suffer. But that's it. She is hanging on by a fucking thread-- actually. No. The THREAD is hanging on to HER.