Chapter Text
Prologue
It was hilarious, really. That tadpole and its non-consensual insertion into his body had ever since freed him of unwanted touch. However, that reality took a while to settle in. And it's not like he hadn't tried to fuck up this one thing going for him, too. He had tried to seduce Tav, and the following rejection had pushed more feelings to the surface than Astarion had thought possible, considering he actually really wasn't that interested to begin with. He just wanted to protect himself, make sure Tav favored him in any way, and sadly, the first thing he should be better at than most people that came to mind was sex. And acting like he was into someone he actually wasn't. It wasn't that Tav was appalling. Their good looks had actually been a problem in and of itself because the first thing that crossed Astarion's mind when he saw them was that he should bring them back to Cazador.
Even after he just crashed in a giant alien tentacle spaceship, even after he had that thing bite down behind his eye, even after feeling the sun on his skin for the first time in two centuries, he saw a conventionally attractive person and immediately thought that Cazador would surely like to bite down on them.
It wasn't easy to accept that, no matter how drastically the situation had changed, how out of reach Astarion was for Cazador and his influence, Astarion's mind was still not his own and wouldn't be for quite a while.
In all his escape fantasies he had over the decades, he had always pictured himself instantly free of him. Like he could just forget two hundred years of torture and mind control and just be himself again, even if he couldn't even remember who he was before all this.
He would have to learn who he was, and it annoyed him gravely.
He didn't want to spend his newly earned freedom on healing.
He just wanted to be done with it.
Especially if there was no guarantee that he would stay free. After all, he didn't stop being a spawn. And he never even once heard a story of a vampire spawn that escaped their master's grasp.
Anyway, it had been a week since Tav's rejection when they met the devil. The aforementioned rejection had left Astarion with shame. A part of him had reacted very insecurely over the idea that he might not be as attractive when looked upon completely sober and in broad sunlight. Not being able to see one's reflection really didn't help with self-assurance. Another part of him had gotten anxious over the fact that now he really had to trust, or rather hope that his experience as a rogue would be reason enough not to forsake him. But lastly – and this was the emotion that stuck with him most – he was relieved he didn't have to do any of it. To be fair, he might not have been so comfortable so soon with the fact that he couldn't use his body, hadn't it been for Tav's gullible nature. They seemed to be easy to manipulate, even without any seduction on his part. And for their chosen group leader (who even made that decision?!), they seemed a tad too naive. Astarion didn't like "heroes", but he couldn't deny that it was easier to sleep in a camp that heavily scrutinized the idea of stabbing people before their wake.
Astarion had seen the self-righteous rage in Tav's face when they pulled Shadowheart off a prone Lae'zel, and it was only half hilarious and actually half frightening.
Anyways, after Astarion's vampirism had been accepted (even if he wasn't allowed to take a sip from Tav) and after Tav's rejection, he started to settle in and become comfortable in the presence of the others. And with himself. And then it dawned on him that this was the first consecutive month since that awful coffin, he hadn't slept with anyone. He also hadn't been tortured or humiliated in a month. His body had been his, completely. And the romantic mood in camp had him thinking if he could ever imagine something like that for himself. He saw Karlach and Shadowheart be way too horny for their own good and only stopped by Karlach's condition so that one had to endure the long-lasting sexually repressed stares they gave each other. He saw Tav have their overly sweet (not a compliment) moments with Wyll, and Astarion had no doubt that they were talking about marriage even before sharing their first kiss. He saw Gale pout in a corner with his overly jealous eyes set on their every interaction, which was at least very funny to witness. And he saw Lae'zel staying all to herself –sometimes suggesting that she could lock one of them up in a sex dungeon, but also not really giving him the impression that she actually missed sex (or whatever the highly violent shit she called sex was).
And he wondered where on that vast spectrum he might fall as soon as he had healed from all the memories. And he found himself longing –not to any of these "lifestyles" in particular, but just to… explore. To find out what sort of relationship, if any, he would like for himself. What might excite him for more than one night, or… let's be honest, even something that would excite him for a night. And he wanted to learn what kinds of people he was really attracted to. He still had trouble discerning if he was actually attracted to somebody or if they were just objectively attractive people. Because under Cazador's rule, he had stopped making that distinction a long time ago – if he ever did, to begin with. He wasn't yet sure whether this try at self-exploration was just a good distraction for his anxious thoughts or maybe even the first step in healing.
However, the encounter with the devil left a suspicion in the back of Astarion's mind that this would have happened whether he was on this path of self-discovery or not.
At first, when he appeared, Astarion didn't even think about whether this man in front of them was attractive or not.
He was too preoccupied with the question of why a well-dressed middle-aged stranger would wait for them on a random bridge in the middle of nowhere – just to wax poetry in their ears? Now that he thought about it, maybe Astarion also hadn't considered his looks because Cazador always wanted them young (often concerningly so), so Astarion had it programmed into him to skip over everyone who seemed to be out of their twenties (or the equivalent to their race) with his eyes.
But when the man introduced himself as Raphael and snapped his fingers, they suddenly stood in a great dining hall dipped in red and golden light. And, while Astarion was still confused and glad that Tav did all the talking, just nervously clutching onto the handle of his dagger, Raphael transformed in front of them. They all stood in shock and silence for a moment, all too surprised to speak, but Astarion could feel that his reaction was vastly different from those of his companions. Because Astarion knew his wasn't normal.
When Raphael's dark silhouette grew larger, two massive wings spanning out and blocking even more light from the fireplace behind him, Astarion took a step back. The few sparks of flame still danced around him after the transformation. Astarion's pupils dilated. The strong scent of orange zest, cherrywood, palmarosa, and a hint of dark chocolate that Raphael suddenly emitted tingled on his tongue. And those glowing, gold-orange eyes that pierced them through the darkness made Astarion's knees weak. His mind flooded with possessive thoughts when he wasn't given more attention than his companions.
When Astarion's eyes found his horns, he imagined what it might feel like to hold on to them, to feel those ridges in the palm of his hand. The thought overwhelmed him, embarrassed him, even mortified him so much in their intensity that Astarion was sure that even with the entirely different nature of his shock, he might have looked just as horrified as every other person in the room.
Astarion couldn't remember ever feeling this overwhelmingly attracted to anyone.
All of a sudden, Raphael's voice sent a warm feeling down his body, even if Astarion was certain that nothing in his tone had changed.
Astarion was only half listening to the conversation. He tried not to stare and looked around instead, but that didn't help either. He suddenly became acutely aware of the fact that the devil seemed to have a similar taste not only in fashion but also in decor. Astarion became increasingly jealous of the house they were standing in, and even in trying to concentrate on that, his eyes caught a portrait of him. Now he was staring at him again. Suddenly, he noticed that one of Raphael's sentences was starting to build up to some sort of crescendo. Astarion's attention snapped back to the real Raphael.
Their eyes met.
"…when you'll come knocking on my door."
And with that, they reappeared on the bridge. Raphael was gone, and while a few of his companions also let out a breath that they had held on to for too long, Astarion was certainly the only one who would have loved to hold on to that breath a little longer. The road afterward felt colder than before.
Astarion was quiet for the rest of the day. His thoughts were still racing, and he was desperately trying to sort them. He was especially trying to figure out whether or not his reaction to Raphael was healthy. On the one hand, a part of him had feared that, after everything that Cazador had put him through, he would never have the capability to desire another person ever again. On the other hand… his own reaction had certainly overwhelmed him, and he didn’t think that he was ready for this type of… affection, yet. Even in the privacy of his own thoughts. Because his own thoughts were working against him: first wandering to a fantasy where Astarion would rid Raphael of his fine clothing, but then slap him with a wave of discomfort over thinking of another person naked. Himself naked.
He wanted to fuck Raphael but not be a part of it. If that made sense. No, nothing of this made sense. Astarion groaned and got a nasty look from Wyll. Maybe because they were actually listening to a deep gnome at the moment, telling them about his disturbing life as a slave in the Underdark. Oh well… Astarion went back into his thoughts.
Did he maybe just discover a fetish he had? For… monsters? Or maybe whatever was between monster and man. He certainly didn’t find any of their mindflayer encounters exciting, but then again, he only had this reaction after the devil showed his true self. And he did like those wings, his horns, the heat and power radiating from his very being… or maybe he just really liked power. That was also something none of his usual conquests had.
And just as he became increasingly horny, his stupid, traumatized mind came crashing down on him yet again. He felt disgusted for drooling over someone like that. He would hate to be looked at in this way. Even if he suspected that healthy people wouldn’t have such an intense apprehension about it, he also suspected that a devil might not even care at all. But that wasn’t the point, was it? Maybe it was. Urgh, this was so needlessly confusing. And his thoughts didn’t stop annoying him with it. What, for example, if even this attraction to an… otherworldly being stemmed from his time under Cazador? He remembered that he and his siblings had sometimes bragged about extraordinary conquests, and even if he didn’t remember feeling aroused by any of these tales or experiences, it had always been a rare feeling of excitement to at least know he could tell the others something at the end of the night that could bolster his ego, even if just for the unhealthy competition.
No, maybe he was glad that he could still feel any form of desire, but at the moment, he also really could do without it.
That night, Tav wandered around the camp asking everyone what they thought of the encounter with the devil. Astarion did try to blend in with the other opinions as best as he could. It seemed Tav didn’t notice that there was an awful lot Astarion wasn’t saying. Then again, they rarely did.
A week passed, and they hadn’t crossed the devil's path again. There was no sign of him and nobody brought him up. It helped. Raphael became little more than a subject in Astarion’s head. He preferred it that way. It made it easier to get comfortable with the idea of being interested in someone again, and as the days passed, he could finally accept that everything about this was normal. It just took some time getting used to normal feelings again after his mind had been clouded with apathy for so long. And maybe, when they would see Raphael again (because he seemed to imply that that was an inevitability), Astarion’s reaction might feel more normal this time.
Shortly after that week, Astarion discussed his scarred back with Tav. Or rather, Tav didn’t find the composure in themselves to stay out of Astarion’s business. Well, it had helped nonetheless: Tav, being a tiefling and all, was able to point out that the poem on his back was, in fact, not a poem at all, but infernal runes. Astarion wasn’t even surprised. Cazador really couldn’t stop doing evil diabolical shit, could he now?
And when Astarion let the idea slip that maybe then Raphael could help, Tav didn’t seem to be appalled by the idea. This surprised Astarion, considering Tav had Wyll always crying in one of their ears that devils were the scum of the earth and not to be trusted, but Tav seemed to consider Astarion's situation, too. Because he really, really needed some answers.
The next time they saw Raphael, Astarion was more confident than before. A mixture of all the time he had to process his feelings, the buffer of Raphael’s human disguise, and the fact that the task at hand would decide his fate forevermore helped him keep a cool head. He even managed a conversation after Raphael considered him, seemingly already fully aware of the questions he had before they left his lips.
Was he spying on them? Astarion didn’t know how to feel about that.
Astarion tried not to think too much about it and simply confirmed that he did have to ask him about something. And then Raphael made a joke about Astarion drinking his blood, calling him a ‘little vampling’ while he did it. It brought Astarion’s blood to a boil for all the wrong reasons. At least Astarion’s reaction was easily dismissible as outrage when he demanded he’d be taken seriously, or at least he hoped so.
And so, Astarion told him about the scars. And while he did, he remembered why using people's attraction to oneself had always worked so well under Cazador. He knew he shouldn’t, had no reason to, but he felt safe around Raphael. Safer than he should, sharing dark memories with a hellspawn.
But Astarion enjoyed the attention and the sound of his voice. He even felt rather lucky that Raphael couldn’t keep a sentence simple because all of the unnecessarily added words gave him more time to take in his vision, his smell… no, this didn’t feel like something Astarion would get over soon.
And then Raphael said that he was motivated to help him and that they would see him soon. Before Astarion could get another word in, he was gone again. The sparks of hellfire slowly drifted to the floor.
Astarion knew that Raphael would want something in return. He knew enough about devils to know that. He probably just disappeared because he needed time to think of something, Astarion was sure of it. Then again… maybe he didn’t need to think about anything, maybe he just wanted Astarion to get more desperate first. He couldn’t say it didn’t work just a little, because, while they were fighting off hordes of creatures in the shadow-cursed lands, his thoughts always came back to that one vital question: What would they have to do?
Raphael gave them the answer two days later when they arrived at the entrance to a crypt. He again waxed poetry in their ears that Astarion could at least appreciate for the sound of his voice, considering the words were clearly laced with warnings of imminent doom. It was rather embarrassing, really, that he had to hear Raphael threaten them outright to remember why it would be a horrible idea to act on any of his feelings. No, he really shouldn’t.
Even if it would be no easy task, because, when Raphael told them he’d grown quite fond of them in his way and let his eye linger on Astarion for just a second, it took some restraint not to let his eyes clearly wander while Raphael could notice. And Astarion wondered, if they would talk more often with the devil, how many more close calls like this would pile up on his conscience.
But after that, everything went back to business.
Raphael told them about a fiend that was roaming down there, whose death he’d consider payment enough to give Astarion the answers he needed.
“A fairer deal than I expected,” Astarion confessed. Killing things was easy for them, even if Raphael couldn’t stop going on about how oh-so difficult this particular fight would be. Astarion had been more than prepared to let the illusion of the handsome devil, that surely would never have them do unspeakable things for the paltriest bit of information, die.
“You wound me, spawn. I always deal fairly.”
Astarion couldn’t help but roll his eyes. Raphael was more than capable of calling him by his name, but considering that Astarion had also just called him ‘devil’ rather than ‘Raphael’ (more often so in his head), he supposed it wasn’t unprompted. And he also quite liked the confirmation that teasing Raphael might be quite the easy task – Astarion seemed to have already done so without even trying.
“And we’ll close this particular deal soon enough – vanquish the beast and all will be revealed.”
And again, Raphael vanished in firey red smoke.