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mumms-the-word · 5 months ago

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In Fathoms Below - Ch. 2

Ch. 2 - The Launch

Characters: Gale, Karlach, Wyll, Lae'zel, Shadowheart, Astarion, Halsin, Minthara, Gortash + other OCs; pairing is Gale x fem!Tav Plot: The island city of Nautera disappeared over 4500 years ago, if it ever existed at all. Now not a single, legitimate record of Nautera exists, save for one. The Nauterran Account. Long thought lost, it has recently been retrieved from the depths of Candlekeep’s archives and placed into the capable hands of one Gale Dekarios. With the Nauterran Account in hand and an eclectic team of Baldurians and other allies mounting an official expedition, Gale journeys to find the ruins of Nautera…but hopes to find so much more. A/N: Gale is meeting the team and the submersible is about to launch! For those curious about where a certain pale vampire is, don't worry. He's around here somewhere. Also, have some mood music!

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Lord Enver Gortash. It wasn’t a name that Gale immediately recognized, but the man carried himself with an air of confidence and self-importance that was impossible to deny. Whoever he was to the city of Baldur’s Gate, it was someone of significance.

Gortash straightened from his subtle bow to offer Gale another charismatic smile. “I’m in charge of this little expedition, at the behest of Grand Duke Ulder Ravengard himself. It has been a lifelong dream of mine—and his—to locate the fabled Nautera. When we heard that there was an ancient record of the islands and that there might be a man capable of reading and deciphering it—well, it was practically a dream come true. We wasted no time in organizing this expedition to seek out the fabled city. Rest assured, I’ve gathered only the finest to ensure our success. Including you, naturally. You’ve come highly recommended.”

Gale struggled to keep up. Recommended by who, Elminster? And how did this man know about the Account when not even Gale had been certain it still existed until only a few short days ago? And Ravengard—that was a Baldurian name, if he recalled. One of four Grand Dukes that ruled the city. If this was a Baldurian expedition, why had Elminster arranged for him to join? Then again, perhaps he ought not to look a gift submersible in the mouth...

He set those concerns aside for now. “A pleasure to meet you, Lord Gortash.”

“Likewise.” Gortash snapped his fingers at the drow woman. “Minthara. Gather the others will you? We can have a little debrief before we launch.”

Gale didn’t miss the withering look Minthara shot at the back of Gortash’s head, but she turned and left even so. In the meantime, Gortash gestured toward the githyanki, who was watching them both with a sour expression, her arms still crossed over her chest.

“This is—”

“I am capable of introducing myself, istik,” she said, cutting her eyes briefly at Gortash before settling her gaze back on Gale. She straightened and lifted her chin. “I am Lae’zel of K’liir. No doubt I will be this expedition’s strongest fighter, should the need arise.”

“Lae’zel is here to offer her people’s expertise on Nautera,” Gortash said, appearing unruffled by her interruption. “The libraries of K’liir contained quite a few tir’su slates with accounts of the islands. I’m sure the two of you will have much to discuss as we draw closer to the city.”

“Truly?” Gale couldn’t help but be intrigued. “I confess, I’ve always wanted to learn tir’su. No doubt time in your company will prove valuable to us both.”

“Save your words, istik,” she said, settling back against the table and folding her arms again. “I offer only that which is necessary, be it in words or with blades. I do not chatter.”

“Ah…duly noted.”

Gortash chuckled. “Don’t mind her. She’s like that with everyone. Ah, here we have our healers. This is Halsin Silverbough of the Emerald Grove and Shadowheart, a cleric who has offered her services to the cause.”

“You must be the translator we’ve been waiting for,” Halsin said, nodding to him. “Well met.”

“Funny,” Shadowheart said, looking Gale up and down. “I thought you’d be more…”

“More…what?” Gale tilted his head. “Dashing? Roguish? Elegantly dressed?”

She pursed her lips. “More of a peacock, I suppose. Your reputation precedes you.” Her gaze settled briefly on his silver Mystran earring before returning to his face.

“Ah. I dare not ask which reputation you’re referring to, if that’s the case,” he said, laughing somewhat awkwardly. He could just imagine what the others had heard about him by now, especially if Elminster had arranged for him to join up.

But just as she noticed his earring, he couldn’t help but notice the symbol on the circlet she wore over her hair—a round black disk like a new moon. Any follower of Mystra would recognize that symbol. It was the mark of Shar, one of Mystra’s longest and most relentless divine enemies. The two goddesses absolutely hated each other.

Curious that there would be a Sharran cleric on board. But if she was here as a healer, perhaps she intended to do no harm. Or so he hoped. He offered her his most charming smile and a little bow.

“Rest assured, I’m more than happy to offer my services to the expedition. The discovery of Nautera is not something a man simply passes up.”

“That’s the spirit,” Gortash said, flashing him a quick grin. “Ah, and I know you’ve met Karlach.”

“Hello again, Gale,” Karlach said, giving him a little wave. He waved back.

“And this is young Wyll Ravengard, son of Grand Duke Ulder Ravengard.”

“At your service.” The young man bowed gracefully before rising and offering Gale a smile. Gale noticed that one of his eyes had been replaced with a smooth, stone eye and that there were several scars on his face and neck.

For a young son of a grand duke, Wyll didn’t look the part. This man had clearly seen trials the like most could only find in their nightmares. Still, it was curious that he was here. From what little Gale recalled of Baldurian nobility, Ulder Ravengard only had one son, and this expedition was sure to be dangerous at times.

Wyll's presence must be a hint of Ravengard’s confidence in the success of the expedition...or else there was some other, darker reason no one dared to name. Gale hoped it meant the former.

“And finally,” Gortash said, as the drow woman returned to the table, “allow me to introduce our general, Minthara of House Baenre. She has brought with her a retinue of drow scouts and soldiers that will no doubt be invaluable as we explore any Underdark passages along the way.”

“I also serve as the second-in-command for this expedition,” she said, clasping her hands behind her back. “And I suffer no disobedience of any kind. If you will not listen to Lord Gortash, you will listen to me. Is that clear?”

“As crystal,” Gale said, trying to look sincere. He glanced around the group, trying to match faces with names and names with occupations. Gortash, the lord and leader. Minthara, the general. Karlach, the bodyguard. Wyll, the young noble. Halsin, the druid healer. Shadowheart, the cleric. And Lae’zel, the githyanki soldier and tir’su expert.

An ecclectic group if he ever saw one. He couldn’t fathom why half of them cared about finding the ruins of an ancient city. At worst they would find nothing, save perhaps stone blocks and broken pottery, and at best they’d locate ancient writings, perhaps a rare fragment of the legendary mythallar. Gale knew what he wanted out of the trip—answers about Nautera and its relationship with Netheril as well as the pride in knowing he had proven generations of Candlekeep scholars wrong—but he dared not wonder why the rest were interested.

Perhaps it was better that he did not know…for now.

“Now,” Gortash said, clasping his hands together. “There are plenty more important people to meet but you can make those introductions along the way. We had best be off. Gale, you will be sharing a bunk with Halsin and Wyll while aboard the submersible. I trust they can show you the way?” At Wyll and Halsin’s nods, he continued, “Splendid. Everyone, we will meet at the helm in exactly one hour. If you’re not inside the submersible, you’ll be left behind. And, Gale…”

Gale paused just as he was turning away to follow Wyll and Halsin down toward the submersible. He faced Gortash again, finding himself caught beneath the Baldurian lord’s dark, unreadable gaze. Gortash’s smile, however, was as charming and practiced as ever.

“Bring your little book. We’ll have need of it.”

-----

The interior of the submersible was nearly all metal. Metal sheets, metal pipes, metal grates, metal bolts. If it wasn’t metal, it was thick glass that peered out into the blue depths beyond. While not entirely unwelcoming, it was certainly different from the creature comforts Gale was used to in his Waterdhavian wizard’s tower.

The bunks, at least, looked passably comfortable, though Gale was a bit disappointed that there was no chance of a private room. Still, Wyll and Halsin seemed sensible, even friendly company.

“How does a young noble and a druid come to join an expedition like this?” he asked them as he dropped his pack onto the only available bed in the room. It was little more than a narrow padded mattress with a thin pillow and a blanket folded at one end, but it was his now.

Wyll, leaning against a ladder-like set of rungs that led to a bunk over Gale’s, gave a light shrug. “It’s a legendary city at the bottom of the sea, like a fairy story of old. What's not to enjoy? I wanted to see it for myself and my father was only too happy to negotiate a place for me...so here I am.”

Gale noticed a shift in Wyll’s voice at his last sentence, but couldn’t quite discern the meaning or emotion. Wyll’s pleasant expression and soft smile were polite, but impenetrable. If there was more to his tale than he was letting on, there was no way for Gale to know it.

“I take it you’re interested in the legends and the history of Nautera, then?” Gale asked.

“Only what I don’t already know. I’ve heard the stories, of course.” Wyll began to gesture with his hands, as if painting the scene. “A fabled city on a distant island, home to a thousand wonders of every kind. Flying ships, walking stone creatures, marvels and magic and more. Only for it to disappear over the span of a single day. One day it’s there, another island in the vast sea, and the next—” he snapped his fingers, “—gone. Not even a rock jutting up from the water to suggest it was ever there.”

He smiled and dropped his hands, shrugging. “They say the person who finds Nautera will be granted one wish, whatever their heart desires. But I’m not so sure that’s true.”

“Perhaps not, but there are always elements of truth even in the midst of a fairy story or a legend,” Gale said. “Perhaps wishes were granted there, back when it was above water.”

He turned to Halsin, who was seated on the bunk opposite, his wooden staff resting on his knees. “What of you? I’m surprised to see a druid of the forests showing an interest in an underwater city.”

Halsin smiled faintly. “It is odd, and this…submersible is unnatural to me. But I was told there was a need for a healer, and I have been many strange places in my modest life. To see the ruins of a civilization that predates my own people…such marvels are not to be ignored, I think. I am here to be of service and to satisfy my own curiosity.”

“Then our interests align. Though I hope we will not need to rely on your services too much, Master Halsin.”

“Just Halsin, please,” the old druid said, chuckling. “And I agree. Though if the need arises, I can be useful in other ways.”

Before he could explain further, there was a sharp knock just outside the bunk room. A young man in uniform leaned in through the open doorway. “Saers, you’re wanted at the helm. We’re to launch in a few minutes.”

“We’ll be right there,” Wyll responded, and the young man disappeared. Wyll took a deep breath and turned to smile at Gale and Halsin. “We’d best be off. I hear the best place to witness a submersible launch is at the front.”

He and Halsin ducked out of the room, the tall elf literally hunching to make it through the rounded, low doorframe. Gale made sure to retrieve the Nauterran Account and tuck it carefully into his satchel, alongside his spellbook and a few other supplies, before following them out of the bunk room.

The helm featured an impressive array of controls, dials, levers, and gauges, all manned by various pilots, including one surly-looking blonde dwarf at the very front. Overhead, bolted sheets of metal made up part of the sloping, dome-like ceiling before transitioning to curving panels of thick, reinforced glass between metal bars, giving them a clear view of everything immediately ahead and above them, and a fair view of the sides too. At the center of the room, a large, curving, mahogany desk and a surprisingly plush chair took up much of the space, looking elegant yet out of place, as if they had been teleported in from someone’s office back in the city. Someone had laid out several maps and navigation tools on the surface. The chair was unoccupied at the moment, but Gortash stood just to the side of it, hands clasped behind his back, watching the pilots work.

A few paces away, Karlach shifted restlessly on her feet, tapping her fingers against her thigh and turning her head this way and that, as if trying to catch all the action going around her. Minthara, Lae’zel, and Shadowheart stood nearby, with Lae’zel and Shadowheart eyeing each other darkly and Minthara ignoring both of them to stare over the head of a gnome pilot messing with specific controls.

Gortash glanced over his shoulder and noticed the three of them entering. “Ah, good. You’re here, just in time to watch the magic happen. So to speak,” he added, sending a grin Gale’s way.

Before Gale could respond, Gortash turned away and directed his next words to the blonde dwarf at the front of the room, where a big metal ship’s wheel was waiting. “Redhammer, begin the launch and take us out to the open sea.”

“Aye, saer.” The dwarf pulled one of the levers and took the wheel. “Commencing launch.”

All around the room, various pilots began to flip switches, pull levers, and turn wheels, calling out responses or numbers that Gale could make no sense of and watching various screens and gauges as they worked. He felt the floor beneath him shudder as distant engines roared to life, the dull rumble and vibrations reaching them even there in the helm. The excitement in the room was palpable. Gale’s heart began to pound and his blood began to race through his veins, all in anticipation of the launch.

All at once the entire submersible gave a downward lurch, as if being dropped or let go, and a flurry of bubbles billowed up against the glass. Gale moved to a free space near one of the windows, out of the way of the pilots, watching as more curtains of bubbles bounced and twirled upward as the seacraft began to lower gently away from the docks. He felt his ears pop as they sank lower and lower and began to turn away toward the deeper blue of the ocean depths.

No turning back now.

“Watch those power gauges, boys,” Redhammer said, directing his fellow pilots. “Steady now. Increase engines one and three and bring them to thirty percent.”

The rumble from the engines louder grew until it was a sonorous thrum in the background, the vibrations beneath Gale’s boots now a constant drone. Outside the submersible, the massive metal fins on either side came to life, frightening and scattering several fish that had ventured too close. He felt the seacraft tilt and adjust before it fell into a steady, subtle rocking pattern, like that of an undulating whale, as it began to move forward. It wasn’t unlike the rocking of a ship on the sea, though perhaps more regulated.

As they moved away from the docks and out toward the open expanse of the ocean depths, they cut through fronds of thick, towering kelp, sending fish and other creatures fleeing through the waving undersea plants. It was surreal to watch the underwater world pass by them through the windows of the submersible, almost as if he were seeing merely illusion rather than reality.

“Whoa…” He turned to see that Karlach had joined him at a nearby window, staring out of it in wide-eyed wonder. Her glowing eyes were even more alight as she took in the waving plants, the fish, and the bubbles as they moved through the water. “We’re really doing this…”

Her wonder bolstered his own and he offered her a somewhat crooked smile. “Nervous?”

She glanced sidelong at him and laughed. “Too late for that now, soldier. Besides, Gortash doesn’t pay me to be nervous.”

Redhammer’s voice called out again. “All engines to forty-five percent. Take us down ten degrees down-angle and hold us steady.”

Working in tandem, the pilots pivoted the seacraft and maneuvered it downward, increasing the speed until they were moving along at a noticeable clip. The kelp forest quickly gave way to rocky reefs with sparse coral and from there to gray, silty sand that disappeared into darkness the farther they descended. The sunlight overhead grew fainter and fainter until at last they were enveloped by inky blue and cobalt, the waters ahead illuminated only by the brilliant enchanted lights that shone outward from the front of the submersible.

Beyond the reach of the seacraft’s lights, the depths below beckoned, looking like a vast, empty void of velvet black. Gale held tighter to his satchel, his eyes on the dark waters ahead. He was loathe to pray to any goddess other than Mystra—and even she hadn’t been listening to his prayers lately—but he was tempted to offer a meek prayer to Umberlee, the chaotic goddess of the seas. They were in her territory, after all...

And at the mercy of her infamously temperamental whims. The darkness of the depths was a tangible reminder of their tentative place in her domain, because, as any Waterdhavian knew, the Bitch Queen was more than capable of summoning a creature from the depths to sink a ship.

A massive submersible diving into her depths would only be that much more annoying to her, and that much more susceptible to destruction. Gale could only hope her attention was diverted elsewhere.

#bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #gale #gale dekarios #gale of waterdeep #my fic #bg3 ic #bg3 fanfic #bg3 fanfiction #in fathoms below #can you tell i want the karlach-gale friendship to shine in this fic #because i do #i love their friendship so much #also i must have listened to the atlantis soundtrack like 25 times writing this scene #i literally had the submarine song linked here playing in my head even when i was writing without music playing #Spotify

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i-was-bored-so-this-happened · 8 months ago

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Greensleeves Chapter Seven: The Horror And The Wild

Fandom: Baldur's Gate 3 Warnings: Brief description of dead animal at the very end Wordcount: 4.1k

The party adjust to their newest member and set out on their journey to the goblin camp. They're interrupted by an old business partner of Xaph's

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Gale and Xaph return to their companions without further discussion. He shares what they have learnt from the goblin prisoner, about this Absolute. A god none of them have heard of. Xaph peers at the map and plots possible routes with Wyll and Shadowheart. Two black circles are on the parchment now: the goblin camp, and where Zorru had encountered the githyanki. One is much further west than the other. The goblin camp must be their priority. The githyanki can wait a few days. The tieflings can’t.

“Your kind prove compliant, Xaph. A useful trait.” Lae’zel tells Xaph as the group collect themselves and begin to move. The tone of her voice almost makes it sound like she’s trying to compliment rather than insult.

“I warned you, didn’t I?” Shadowheart butts in, “You ought to reconsider keeping her around, before she causes real trouble.”

“Let’s not start a fight,” Wyll reasons, “Not here.” He’s right. She shouldn’t start a fight within the group, not after accepting Lae’zel and bickering with Shadowheart. Besides, to bring violence inside the grove would certainly have them tossed out by the druids, and they might take that as an opportunity to evict the refugees too.

“We’re not compliant. We’re survivors. These people are running for their lives.” Xaph informs Lae’zell, refusing to break her stride and let the githyanki goad her into an argument. That’s far too easily done with Shadowheart already.

“Cockroaches are survivors. Yet I do not congratulate them.” Lae’zel points out. Xaph’s tail twitches, but she still doesn’t stop. Astarion and Gale note the movement, and the latter mumbles,

“Steady. Remember she’s acting out of fear, like the rest of us.” He’s right too. She can’t pick a fight with every being they come across who has something against tieflings, but it’s always somehow worse being the butt of the joke in front of a group of people who aren’t.

“The teeth-ling was clear. If there are githyanki west of here, that must be our objective. Purification cannot wait.”

“We are tieflings. With an f.”

“I am unfamiliar with the - well, I shall not say culture. Custom, perhaps.” Lae’zel says, eyes rolling behind Xaph’s back. The tail twitches again, more violently this time, but Xaph’s jaw is set.

“Nor am I familiar with yours.” Is all she says.

It is decided through vote that Xaph is least likely to get them lost. As a ranger, she has a better grip on maps and traversing rough ground than the elf who looks like he hasn’t seen the sun in a century and the self-proclaimed wizard of Waterdeep, and Shadowheart and Lae’zel both carry the prickly presence of lone wolves who are distinctly uncomfortable in a pack. Wyll is well-suited to keeping everyone on task, which Xaph thinks will work well to curb her habit of going off the beaten trail in pursuit of interesting tracks. When Shadowheart points out the impracticality of her armour for hiking, Lae’zel makes that noise between her teeth again, tchk. In loose formation, Wyll puts himself between the cleric and the githyanki. A fight between them seems inevitable, but hopefully the Blade of Frontiers can keep it verbal for the time being. It scratches a pleasant itch in Xaph’s brain, that from above they must look like an arrow. She, Astarion and Gale form the triangle of the point and Lae’zel, Wyll and Shadowheart the shaft.

She revels in being outside again. The sun is warm, but pleasantly so, and the wind moves enough to keep cool air circulating around them and prevent overexertion. The air carries only the occasional waft from the nautiloid, and is otherwise deliciously clear. No longer drowning in the stink of burning flesh, blood, and acrid smoke, she can dissect every delicate note of the grasses around her and the flowers they hold. When they pause so Wyll can shake a stone out of his boot, Xaph takes the opportunity to retie her hair so it’s all gathered up and she can feel the breeze on the back of her neck. Even the unevenness of the ground beneath her feet is a delight. It’s been a while since she’s travelled with others, and it takes her a while to correct her speed so Gale doesn’t lag behind, so Lae’zel doesn’t snap about them going too slow, so Wyll stops fretting about them burning through energy. Eventually, they settle into a rhythm and keep to it until the sun reaches its peak and several members of the party start flagging. Even those used to roughing it are struggling, weakened by the tadpole. They should endeavour to sweat no more than necessary to retain fluids.

Now several miles away from the grove, they’ve reached a bridge. Deciding to make a brief stop before crossing it, they find a good clump of trees that cast enough of a shadow to hold them all. Xaph slides down the trunk of a tree, lets her head fall back onto the bark, and reaches out blindly for her bow to unstring it and give it a break. Food, provided by Okta, is doled out and eaten in near silence. Lae’zel stays standing. Pacing, actually, questioning if there’s any real need to stop. No one answers her, too tired. Once they’ve eaten, Wyll and Shadowheart split from the group to investigate voices they can hear not far away. Gale tells the remainder of the group his Yawning Portal story with suitable dramatics, and Xaph resists the urge to correct his grip when he mimes holding a crossbow. Lae’zel shows no such restraint, but to look at Gale her words are no more than irritating flies, and his blasé attitude makes Astarion chuckle. It’s a neat little pocket where, for a moment, Xaph thinks this group might work. At least for the next few days. As long as none of them turns. Or dies. Or kills another member of the party. Alright, it’s a little complicated.

Wyll and Shadowheart bring disturbing news back to the shelter of the trees. A man has died nearby, leaving his siblings under the impression that the Wyll and Shadowheart were True Souls, beings chosen by this new god the Absolute as vessels of her word. Their brother had died after foolishly following an owlbear mother back to her nest, and after convincing the siblings not to avenge him they had run off into the woods. A tadpole had squeezed out of the dead man’s eye not long after. With more than mild concern at the third mention of this new god now coupled with a mind flayer worm, they end their break early and continue to move.

Their redoubled efforts do not last long. They don’t even get to cross the bridge. Halfway across, Xaph skids to a stop as bright red and gold sparks swirl in a vortex in front of her. She groans audibly as the sparks convalesce into the form of a man. He looks human, even if his skin carries a reddish undertone. Middle-aged. Not particularly remarkable.

“Don’t.” Xaph warns at the sound of multiple weapons being readied. She herself hikes her bow up her shoulder and waits.

“Xa-pha-ni-a,” he stretches each syllable far longer than necessary, until they’re transparent, “Well met, muzz.” Xaph’s companions have heard her use this word on the tiefling children when she wants their attention, when she demands their respect. He knows her name, this swirl of sparks that stinks of sulphur. Astarion can taste cherries in the air, unable to overwhelm the smell of the hells. Shadowheart can feel her hair prickling at the back of her neck at the untoward curl of his lip. Gale can judge the track of his eyes from Xaph’s boots to her hair before he appraises her friends. Wyll and Lae’zel know devils when they see them. Xaph closes her eyes as she breathes in through her nose and opens them as she heaves a world-weary sigh,

“Raphael,” worse, she knows him, this must-be-infernal, and she does not show him the respect he has ordered, “What. The everloving fuck are you doing here?”

“Mind your manners, little mephit. Speaking of, what manner of place is this that I find you in? The path to redemption?” his voice rumbles ever so slightly deeper than it should, “Or the road to damnation?” he leans forwards, into Xaph, and she leans back to maintain distance, “Hard to say, for your journey is just beginning. What would suit the occasion? The words to a lullaby, perhaps?” there’s whispering behind Xaph but she doesn’t listen closely enough to make out what her companions are saying. Raphael always did like delivering his riddles in song form, “The mouse smiled brightly: it outfoxed the cat! Then,” he drags a hand through the air, “Down came the claws, and that, love, was that. They know how to write them in Cormyr, don’t they?”

Lots of lullabies and faiytales come from the Cormyr area. Wine, too. He’s been listening. Watching. The air around Xaph and Raphael shifts as something red-hot teases the bones of her spine. Gale shuffles his feet, uneasy at the mention of Cormyr, under the same suspicions as Xaph. This devil had heard their late-night conversation. Her tears.

“What’s brought you down here with all us worms, Raphael? Hardly your scene.”

“Quite right,” his eyes rove over the party again, “Too many pests, and decidedly too middle-of-nowhere for my tastes. Come.” Raphael offers Xaph his hand and, to Wyll’s dismay, she takes it. The entire group is engulfed in the same red-gold sparks that had brought the devil to them, sparks that turn to flames that flare white without burning and are snuffed out in an instant.

***

They are no longer on the bridge. They stand in a grand dining room. Dining room, because there’s a behemoth of a table in the centre, round and positively overflowing with food. Every good cooking smell in the world comes from this table. There are huge roaring fireplaces, huge black statues, huge everything. They are ants here.

“You’ve redecorated,” Xaph notes. “New portrait,” she flicks a hand towards a towering painting that hangs on the wall above the fireplace behind where Raphael now stands. Ten-foot tall canvas, easily, the frame itself adding another two feet around the perimeter. Xaph turns her back on the devil while her companions are still trying to process what had happened. It’s an illusion, Gale can tell that much, but such a strong one of the like he hasn’t seen in…well, in a while. Wyll’s eye darts nervously along the walls, looking desperately for the windows, for assurance they aren’t actually in the hells. “Liked the old one better.” She tosses the words over her shoulder as an aside to the devil. The devil. A devil is talking to them. A devil knows the tiefling. Maybe she isn’t as soft as Shadowheart had thought.

“The House of Hope,” the showmanship is for the benefit of the party rather than Xaph, who is nonchalant, surveying the table, “Where the tired come to rest, and the famished come to feed. Lavishly,” He chews on that word for longer than necessary, making it more than it is, “Go on. Partake. Enjoy your supper.” Xaph picks up a loaf of bread. Tears it in half. Squeezes the halves into dough balls in her hands. Holds them up to her nose. Licks them. Listens to them. She tosses another loaf of bread at Astarion and he catches it without a second thought. His eyes are everywhere, there’s just so much to take in, but he has enough wherewithal to catch it.

“The food’s safe. Take what you can carry,” her words are light, but when she looks at her companions her eyes are dark and deadly serious. Her voice pushes into their skulls, Trust me. Please. Let me handle this. Astarion and Lae’zel begin to fill their packs as advised. Gale’s eyes are stuck on Xaph. He hadn’t considered that she too might have her own secrets. Wyll fidgets, entirely unable to stay still. His eye keeps going to the door, but it snaps back to Raphael as flames roar around him. A devil indeed. It’s confirmed, made official. He is showing them his true form. His skin fully red, his bone structure sharpened. Winged. Horned. A genuine product of the Hells, and one with power too.

“What’s better than a devil you don’t know?” Raphael asks the room at large.

“A devil you do.” Xaph replies.

“You’re stepping on my lines, love.”

“Maybe you need a new script.” Wyll is in utter shock. As are several other members of the party. Xaph is treating this fiend as though he’s just another human, another elf, another githyanki even. Her surety worries Gale, but it fascinates Shadowheart. “What do you want?”

“Some respect would be a suitable start. On your knees, mephit. I am not known for my patience.”

“Or for your sta-” This, apparently, is too far. Stale air rushes over the party as Raphael’s wings open. He almost seems to grow taller. It’s not clear if Xaph kneels of her own volition or if she’s forced. The stillness of her tail indicates the latter. An apology flies from her lips, then, “Don’t hurt them. Your business is with me.” Her voice has taken on a strained tone. Pained.

“That heart of yours bleeds as much as ever, then. No matter. You won’t have use of it for much longer.”

“I’ve been lower than this. Why now?” A dozen questions burn in the minds of her companions but not one of them dares to move. The extra height Raphael had gained recedes, and he steps forward so as to more effectively look down on the tiefling. Her hands are behind her back, as though bound.

“Don’t play hard to get, not when you’re in so deep over your tadpoled head. One skull, two tenants, and no solution in sight. I could fix it all,” the devil snaps his fingers and a flame leaps up between them, “like that.”

“He spits lies. The only way to cleanse-” Wyll clamps a hand over Lae’zel’s mouth before she gets them all wiped off the mortal plane. She bites him, but doesn’t say anything else once he lets her go.

“And you know I’ll never agree to your terms.” She sounds as though she’s running out of breath.

“Oh, never say never, love. But very well,” with a wave of his hand, Xaph is released. The ranger falls onto her hands, whipped out from behind her back to break her fall, and she coughs like a cat trying to bring up a hairball, “Try to cure yourselves. Shop around. Beg, borrow, steal. Exhaust every possibility until none are left. And when hope has been whittled down to the very marrow of despair, that is when you’ll come knocking on my door.” He laughs, and they can feel it rumble in the floor beneath their feet.

“I’ll rip out your tongue first.” Xaph tells him, still out of breath.

“Ah, yes. The tongue. Yet another piece of pleasurable anatomy you’ll soon have to do without. All those pretty little symptoms - sundering skin, dissolving guts - they haven’t started to manifest yet, have they? You’re a paragon of luck, muzz. But luck always runs out eventually. I’ll be there when it does.”

With a thud that rattles their knees, the party are thrown back to earth. They’re standing in the same fashion they had been in the House of Hope, still arranged around a table that isn’t there anymore. Xaph is on the ground, crumpled, still trying to clear her throat. Wyll reaches her first, on his knees in front of her and lifting her head to see her eyes.

“What in all the hells was that?” Shadowheart’s next, and her voice is sharp and accusatory, but she deliberately stands so that she’s not in the way of the light Wyll needs to look Xaph over.

“Raphael,” Xaph’s words rasp, but she sounds less congested, “Mephistopheles’ heir and a fustilarian shitfire,” the words she shouts into the dirt path devolve into Infernal.

“More importantly, darling, how in the hells do you know him?” Astarion asks, though he keeps his distance. He and Lae’zel, packs bulging with food that has proven not to be illusory, stay a few feet away from the rest of the party as Shadowheart takes Xaph’s pack and Wyll and Gale slot their shoulders under her arms to get her to her feet.

“You don’t have a deal with him, do you?” Wyll asks. The group begins to move across the bridge they’d almost forgotten was there, all of them wanting to put as much distance between themselves and Raphael as possible.

“No, gods, no,” Xaph assures him, having to stop to cough again and her face pinches in a wince, “He came to me about ten years ago, when I was as close to starving as I ever will be. He preys on the hopeless, offers them a way out in exchange for their soul. Gets quite offended if you refuse.” That can’t be it, Gale thinks, the story’s too short, but she doesn’t say anything more.

“You shouldn’t have provoked him.”

“It’s the quickest way to get him out of your hair,” Xaph tells him, “If you’re a mark, that is. Looks like I’m still a prospective client.”

“Just when I think I’ve got a grasp on our dilemma, a bloody devil turns up.” Shadowheart exclaims, throwing her hands in the air.

“Cambion.” Wyll and Xaph correct her together.

“He claims he can help. How true can that be?” Shadowheart asks, addressing Xaph specifically.

“Honestly, I don’t know.”

“He flaunts his paltry wings as if he wants to impress us,” Lae’zel sneers, “You saw the red dragons slaying his infernal kin above Hell’s fires, did you not?” These questions are for the group at large, though they turn out to be rhetorical, “Next to a dragon, a devil’s a gnat. When I am kith’rak, I will take my Queen Vlaakith his head as a trophy.”

“Kith’rak?” Gale repeats, his pronunciation very close to Lae’zel’s.

“Githyanki knights. The riders that chased the nautiloid. They are the commissars and enforcers of my Queen Vlaakith’s will.”

“Forget the kith’rak,” Astarion cuts in, his pronunciation not as clear as Gale’s, “There’s a devil after us. Cambion!” he corrects himself before Xaph and Wyll can, “This just gets better and better. Shop around he said. He seems sure we won’t find anything.”

“That’s his angle, to grind hope down to bone meal.” Xaph tells him.

“Maybe, but all that take your time, I’ll wait nonsense. He’s playing with us. He reminds me of someone I used to know. Someone that liked to play with people. Creatures like them don’t play games unless they know they can win.”

“We’re not his playthings, Astarion,” Wyll says, “We won’t be.”

“Besides, he can’t have a cure. Only the zaith’isk can remove the tadpole.” Lae’zel reminds them. She and Astarion descend into debate. Xaph turns her head to look at Gale, who’s hardly said anything. This close to him, still propped up by him and Wyll, she can see spidery lines of black that crawl out from the neck of his robes up to his eye. Curious.

“Rather flattering, to be invited to dine with a devil.” He says quietly when he sees Xaph is waiting for him to speak.

“For you, maybe. He’s got no patience for me anymore.”

“What did he do?”

“Nothing I can’t handle. He knows how far he can push.” She doesn’t want to go into it, how hands of hot air had pushed her to the floor and held her wrists, her tail. How motes of fire had burned beneath her skin. She’ll be left with the feeling of bugs creeping over her body for hours, until Raphael forgets or lets her go. Shadowheart presses a cooling, healing hand between her shoulder blades and she regains some strength in her legs, “But for the rest of you? That was roses and champagne.”

“He wants something from us. Badly…” Gale gets lost in his own thoughts and Xaph has to laugh at him.

“He wants our souls, Gale.” Wyll says.

“Let me play advocatus diaboli,” he borrows Wyll’s own phrase from the day before, “If there’s one quality all the denizens of the hells share, it’s ambition. A quality they share with many humans, come to think of it. He wants Xaph’s soul, yes, but why drag the rest of us tiddlers in with the catch of the day? Fact one,” he starts to count with the fingers of his free hand, “There’s something very strange and very powerful about our tadpoles. Fact two, a cambion offers to take it away. The infernal aren’t known to aid mortals out of simple kindness,” Wyll hums in agreement, encouraging Gale, “Whatever Raphael wants, we must be the key to getting it. Along with our tadpoles…”

***

They know they’re making proper progress when Shadowheart recognises a specific tree. A short detour brings them back to the place where she, Astarion, Gale and Xaph had made camp that first night. There’s a good few hours of light left, but Xaph is still wincing at odd intervals and they’re still weak from their time aboard the nautiloid, so Lae’zel’s protests are largely ignored when they decide to camp here again. Gale manages to talk her down, reminding her that no warrior can be at their best without rest, and that seems to calm her somewhat. The party, though larger than before, is as subdued as they had been that first night. The combination of hard travel and Raphael has tired them. Xaph fillets fish Lae’zel and Shadowheart had engaged in competition to spear from the nearby stream, and Gale peels potatoes Okta had given them. A look passes between the ranger and the wizard and they know they will not be able to have their discussion tonight. They have more than enough food to use foraging as an excuse between the tiefling’s donations and Raphael’s buffet. Astarion had suggested that the devil’s food might be poisoned, but Xaph had quickly quelled these concerns by shoving handfuls of the stuff in her mouth.

“Xaph?” Wyll’s voice rings out between the rocks. He’d gone exploring, and has apparently found something of interest. Xaph cleans the smell of fish off her hands and moves towards the sound of his voice, tailed by Astarion.

Wyll has found a boar. Full grown, stone dead. Xaph squats and runs a hand over the bristles of its stomach.

“The pig’s dead, my friends. Staring at it won’t bring it back.” Astarion tells them.

“I can’t figure out how it died,” Wyll says, ignoring Astarion and crouching beside Xaph, “He’s fairly young. Strong.”

“Must be five or six years old,” Xaph slides a hand under one of its front legs, “Not warm, but he’s still a little stiff. Can’t have been killed more than a day or so ago.”

“Can you eat it? Because otherwise, I don’t understand what the problem is.” Astarion says flippantly. Xaph reaches for the boar’s snout to see the length of its tusks, and that’s when she notices the puncture wounds. Small holes punched into the beast’s neck, less than a finger’s length apart. It’s the only wound on the boar’s body, as far as she can see. She twists to Astarion and holds out a hand,

“Knife?” he obliges, passing her a dagger, but he does ask,

“Shouldn’t you lug it back to camp before you start hacking away?”

“I want to see something.” Xaph tells him. She sets the point of the dagger in one of the puncture wounds and cuts.

“And? Is it dead enough for you?”

“It’s been completely drained of blood.” Xaph states, and this effectively shuts Astarion up. Wyll probes the incision Xaph has made, investigating further. He looks at her, the question in his eye forming on his lips in a whisper,

“A vampire?” he asks. Xaph nods. “So close to where you’d slept? Are we safe here?”

“We’ll be fine with the night watch, but we should keep a specific eye out.”

“So you can kill it, I suppose.” Astarion muses. Xaph stands and turns to him, and he recognises the look in her eye. Determined.

“No.”

“No?”

“They must be starving, to drain a boar of this size and still not be strong enough to dispose of it,” she glances at Wyll to confirm he feels the same and finds no resistance from him, so she locks eyes with Astarion again. His red eyes glow in the night, as her green ones do. They’re beginning to take on that nocturnal sheen as the sun sets. He’s watching her. Waiting. “And hunger makes beasts of us all.”

#rae's writing #greensleeves #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #baldur's gate 3 fanfiction #bg3 fic #rae's ocs #xaph [tav]#lae'zel #wyll ravengard #gale of waterdeep #gale dekarios #shadowheart #astarion #raphael #bg3 raphael

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y-rhywbeth2 · 1 year ago

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I think it would've been funny if instead of being a dragonborn by default, the Dark Urge was literally an actual white dragon.

For shenanigans.

[Disclaimer that this idea is ridiculous and I don't care.]

The bhaalspawn plot twist is largely obvious to players of BG1+2 and those who've already completed the game. Who'd see the twist that you've forgotten that you're dragon in disguise coming? If you play another origin they'd make a good excuse to add a brainstealer dragon boss battle. Alternatively, if you take the ceremorphosis ending, you play as one.

Plus white dragons instinctually lean towards being brutal, vengeful little bastards in a manner Bhaal would probably approve of and due to their slow development would be very easy to corrupt from a young age… but my motivation is still mostly for shenanigans.

Living most of their life in a city, I imagine they're used to being in humanoid form. They had a sibling rivalry with Abazigail, as the only other dragon they know ("White dragons are weaker and inferior to Blues." - "I'm sorry, I'm too stupid to remember something, can you remind me? Of the two of us, who's a dead failure who disappointed Father?").

They got shanked by Orin in humanoid form and just woke up with brain trauma and assumed they were whatever humanoid they appear to be. Sure they have some ancestral draconic memory and speak draconic, but that's just a sign of having a dragon ancestor. It's not that weird! It might also seem strange when they start growling at the Githyanki dragon steeds, but going by some dialogue Durge growls at people anyway so it won't even stand out that much. At least the "human flesh smells tasty" thing makes sense now?

Lacking any memories of past enemies to plot against, dragon Durge simply adds their new friends' enemies to their list of grudges.

Those of us who play by looting everything in sight and refusing to share it with the party members have a valid reason; dragon hoard. Yes I do need to break my back carrying all of the money, enchanted weapons and six thousand books I'll never read; no, we're not selling any of it, fuck off.

We get to act 3 and the party gets the Bhaalspawn reveal possibly followed up by "also I'm a dragon." ("what the Actual Fuck.") Gale has already formed a hypothesis about Durge's true species, but we should also get to play Sharks Are Smooth over it. You get the standard -30 disapproval from Gale, but if Astarion is there he'll also want to play and you get 30 approval from him and Gale's disapproval doubles to -60.

Lae'zel as our resident horse dragon girl would rather travel with a red, but perhaps a mere white dragon will do for a steed in the meantime. It's training for her future, you understand.

I want to pick up Mizora with teeth and shake her like a dog with a chewtoy when she invades my camp to torment Wyll and refuses to leave. Maybe throw her around like an orca with a seal…

Romanced Wyll, Shadowheart or Gale introducing them to their parent/s (+Tara, in Gale's case) would be fun to watch.

Duke Ravenguard has hopefully learnt his lesson about not jumping to conclusions and hearing Wyll out and showing some tolerance for what appears to be an evil alliance, but a chromatic dragon sired by the god of murder who's also a reformed serial killer might be putting some tension on that... Maybe leave some details out.

The Hallowleaves are remembering the tolerance their Selûnite faith espouses and that they too are a loving couple involving one person who is technically a monster but I feel like Arnell is still on some level internally going; whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck.

I think Ms Dekarios will be mostly unphased. She's a wizard herself and Gale's been bringing weird shit into her life since he was born. Her son came home with a dragon for a fiancé/e. Sure. Must be Tuesday.

#baldurs gate 3 #bg3 #the dark urge #durge #long post

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betabites · 7 years ago

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Dragons of Tiamat, a good-parts campaign

A while back, I posted my thoughts on a ‘good parts’ campaign. I’ve actually started one, so I thought I’d share some of what I’ve done for that game.

The Pitch: ‘Y’all are a clutch of dragon wyrmlings that were raised together by a cult of Tiamat. Lately, your biggest, reddest sibling has been kidnapped! The rest of you are out to rescue her, and maybe have a little fun in the process.’

Because of the amount of content, I’ll be including links to individual pages with the dragon chassises, templates, deeds and the opposition. I love hyperlinks.

Overview - Dragon chassis - Templates - Deeds - Opposition - The Prison

The Introduction:

I started out by recapping the campaign concept, and that what we were doing now was outside the standard meta-narrative. I may have made Inception jokes. Basically, we were going to choose pseudo-classes for the characters, and then, by them selecting cards, determine a few specifics of ‘last session.’

I gave each player a character sheet, a dragon mini, a breath weapon template, and a name card to fill out. The characters were:

Delachiiwaer, the black dragon,

Zhazhefflix, the blue dragon,

Bhelachatemyx, the green dragon,

Minnenfrixxicks, the purple dragon, and

Fahrezintbrentuz, the white dragon.

And they were trying to rescue Halyxxialtix, the red dragon.

You can see the need for name cards. I recommended that folks make a shortened version. This was mainly for usability, but also let the players make an immediate stake on their characters. Delachiiwaer didn’t get used, since I had a last minute cancellation, which kind of emphasizes why standard campaigns don’t work for us. The wyrmling names we used were:

Flix, the blue wyrmling (played by @lawlessdragon),

Bhela, the green wyrmling (played by @saffrontherogue),

Minnen, the purple wyrmling (played by @sherlock913) , and

Rezzy, the white wyrmling (played by @kaminaduck ).

And Hax, the red wyrmling. She preferred Xialt, but the PCs felt otherwise.

Because of the cancellation, I had more Template and Deed cards than I needed. I dealt each player an extra Deed card, and the remainder from both went face-up on the table, where anyone could use them.

From there, I dealt out the Template cards - two to each player, and two face-up on the table. Each player could select one, either from their hand, or the table.

(Flix chose Faerie Dragonkin, Bhela chose Bookwyrm, Minnen chose Suspiciously Shiny, and Rezzy chose Ate Your Nestmates).

After that was Deed cards - six to each player, and one on the table. Players discarded one to the table, and then chose two, from their hand or the table.

(Flix chose Robbed a Potioneer and Extracted Tribute from a Druid. Bhela chose Recovered a Grimoire from a Ruined Tower and Sacrificed a Treasure to Tiamat. Minnen chose Saved Some Bandits... for Later and Indulged in a Manicure. Rezzy chose Smitten (by a Paladin) and Captured a Pixie. For those of you keeping track, they managed to take every single Deed that gave them combat-capable allies.)

Once everyone had their complete character, I ‘recapped’ last session. The PCs,between acts of banditry, counter-banditry and treasure-huntery, had fought and interrogated a member of the Smith-Cult. The Smith-Cult had captured Hax, the PCs surmising that dragonfire was an important component in magical item creation. So, they had traveled to the Big City (Garfellan), where they needed to find the headquarters of the Smith-Cult and get Hax back.

The Session:

I’m going to err on the side of brevity here, because it ran a lot like an ordinary session of a campaign. Folks settled into their characters, arrived at a new city, got a feel for the place, mingled and looked for information, did some scouting, got some exposition, came up with a plan, executed their plan, had a big fight, and got some twists dropped on them.

I dropped plot threads and hooks left and right, some of which the PCs jumped on, others which they were interested in, but left fallow in interest of time. This particular miracle of PC-focus was achieved by me briefly stepping out of the metanarration to say, ‘Cool, I’m glad you’re interested in this. I’ll add it to your quest log, and it’ll come up in a later episode.’ Actually treating to your PCs like adults is amazing, folks.

So, in brief:

PCs arrive in town, drop their kit at a fancy inn, act snooty enough to get a line of credit, and sign up for the ‘rich and powerful people’ newsletter. Garfellan is a city in the throes of an Industrial Revolution. There are airships, lightning trains, mass production. They get a schedule of upcoming events, and go ‘we’ll take one of everything.’

DM Note: I was prepared for them to either act high class or low class. High class just meant they had to do a lot less legwork and administer fewer beatings, and eat a lot more hors d'oeuvres. The poor dears.

There’s a bit of information gathering, hampered by the fact that no one actually has Gather Information. Whoops. I rule they can use other social skills to do so, at a -4. They fill in some details about Garfellan.

The first big event is a lightshow at the local mage tower, The Stellarium (I said ‘The Star-Studded Tower’ in session. But Stellarium is much better, so I’m going to use that). They mingle, snack, and get brainless aristos’ impressions of what the mages are actually doing, of which the lightshow is only a side effect.

They sneak off in the middle, because they’d spotted something unusual. One of the effects of the ritual was to push back the smog and smoke of the city, to provide the tower with clear lines of sight to the stars. All well and good, but one building had kept putting up smoke unimpeded. The PCs figured that whatever was producing the smoke was at least as bamfy as the mage ritual. Like, say, dragonfire.

There are some hijinx as they cross most of town to the source. The PCs get out of them by a combination of stealth and panache. They do spot a burglary taking place at the First Magical Bank of Garfellan, but a peek after the thieves shows them getting pasted by the defending stone golem.

The source of the smoke is a octogonal building with few windows and lots of chimneys. It’s built like a fortress, and it resembles an amulet they’d taken off the Smith-Cultist they’d interrogated out in the country.

They return to the party, and have a run-in with the young Queen Egalatine and her regent, Alfonso Tybaltine. They consider killing the regent (who, naturally, wants to marry the Queen, and become king. He’s a mere thirty years older.), but settle for putting it on the to-do list.

The PCs try to push into the tower, and find out what exactly the mages did with their fancy ritual. They manage to get the unfortunate on door duty talking, one Ballestaria. She says that her fellow astronomers have come to a realization. They can’t change Fate, since that’s written in the stars. But they can change their perspective, and thus their Fates will be different. The ritual essentially installed a giant lense between the world and the stars, bending the light of the stars into a more favorable configuration.

The next day, the PCs devise a scheme, after confirming that the building they investigated was the smith-cult headquarters. They will play the part of the idle rich, and present a business deal to the Smith-Cult. They’ll start a fashion for massively overpriced wrought iron jewelry, accessories, etc, the Cult will have an exclusive contract, the conditions in Garfellan will ruin the pieces with rust almost immediately, and they’ll make millions. It’s just stupid enough to work. Especially since they’ve been hanging out with aristos for the last couple of days, so they know how dumb all this can get.

In any event, their scheme gets them in the door as guests, and quickly, an audience with the Master-Smith. When discussing the particulars, the PCs mention using dragonfire forging as a selling point offered by one of the Cult’s competitors. With some reluctance, the Master-Smith informs the PCs that the Cult can match that. And, eventually, is persuaded to let the PCs see the source of the dragonfire.

As the Master-Smith is escorting the PCs down to the holding cell, he’s called away on urgent business outside. The PCs are led to the dungeon by a lesser smith and escorts. The PCs confirm that Hax is in the dungeon, and launch a surprise attack.

They fight. Flix uses his shifting step ability to transport Hax out of the cell and into the midst of the enemy. The enemy regret this. Many breath weapons are flung. Minnen’s bandits, against all odds, survive.

At last, Hax and the PCs leave the dungeon, but decide to stop at the Cult vault on the way out. There, the find the doors already broken open, the guards slain, and three individuals in strange, baroque armor, lifting a silvery sword from the wall. The blade springs to life in their hands, shifting and flowing like quicksilver.

The githyanki charge Hax to remember the pact between their peoples, and join them. She does so. The sword-seeker extends an offer of alliance to the PCs, saying that the world is under the sway of the illithids, and that it needs to be cleansed. The PCs, after due consideration (and looting everything they can carry from the vault), agree, and follow the githyanki out.

Outside, the sky is split by an astral rift above the Stellarium, and astral dreadnaughts hang in the sky, bombarding the city below. The Incursion has begun, and the Prime Material will fall to the Githyanki.

The Wrap-Up:

I make a note of everything the players say they want to see in the following episode. I ask them whether they’d like to keep the same Templates, whether they want to add a different one, or advance the one they have. I find out that the players had been sitting on some of the activated Deeds because they thought they were for the whole campaign, not just for this episode. I agree to carry over most of those effects to the next episode.

We disperse, and I scheme for the next episode. Which includes writing this, as a way to collect my thoughts.

#rpgs #D&D #dragons #Dragons of Tiamat #Dungeons & Dragons

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