Chapter Text
Lethe tried to think about when she might have had a worse day than this one. The day she looked her father in the eye and told him she was leaving to join the Rangers? Maybe. The day he and the elders confirmed she’d never wear the same emblem as them? That was up there.
No, she concluded with some bitterness. Being kidnapped by an Illithid ship, infected with a parasite through her f*cking eye, no less, and narrowly escaping with her life couldn’t truly be overshadowed by any other moment from her life thus far.
At least she had a few motley companions now. A Cleric, half-elf like her. A roguish elf who claimed to be a magistrate, and whose skill with a blade could or could not be related to that profession. A Wizard who’d gotten himself stuck in his own portal. And, she thought, most astonishing of all, a githyanki woman.
They’d been wandering for a few hours, trying to get their bearings. She stayed close to Shadowheart, who seemed uncomfortable with the gith woman’s presence, while Lae’zel walked ahead with Astarion and Gale, who regaled her with descriptions of Baldur’s Gate and Waterdeep. While Gale described Waterdeep as a near-paradise, Astarion clearly held no love for Baldur’s Gate, speaking of it as a festering cesspool of crime and corruption. Still, he concluded with a note of sadness, he’d likely have to get back there soon.
“Honestly, if I had my way, I wouldn’t go back at all. This parasite situation gives me a good excuse to mill about in, well, wherever we are.” He looked at their surroundings with narrowed eyes, as if he’d never seen trees before.
“I would not suggest we delay,” Lae’zel warned in a low voice. “The longer we wait, the more likely we are to become ghaik, and that is not a fate I would recommend, no matter how much you despise your istik home.”
“Yes,” he grumbled.
“Don’t see why you can’t be a magistrate somewhere else,” Shadowheart commented.
“It’s not always that simple,” Lethe acknowledged, prompting a quick look back from Astarion, and a curt, acknowledging nod.
The conversation devolved into arguments about where they were, what their next move should be. But Lethe was distracted. Something about the landscape was familiar to her. Something about the roads…she was sure she’d walked them before. She was sure she’d seen those mountains in the distance before. The events of the morning had completely scattered her bearings, but she was sure she knew where they were. If she could only find some landmark…
Then she saw the gate.
“I know where we are,” she said, as astonished as she was relieved. “And I think we might be able to fix our problem here.” She ran towards the gate, the others struggling to keep up, but as she did, she realized something was off. There was an odd energy about the place, and makeshift ramparts obscured what was once a familiar entryway, and kept it closed off.
“This is a Druid enclave,” Gale observed. “You’ve been here before?”
Lethe nodded, staring at the ramparts with a growing concern. Those weren’t supposed to be there. But she didn’t have time to contemplate it further, before they were overwhelmed by the sounds of shouting and running behind them. Several men, screaming to be let in through the gates, followed by a band of sniveling goblins.
In the chaos that ensued, Lethe noted the guards that appeared at the ramparts were tieflings, with no Druid aspects to be seen on them. Something lurched inside her gut, but then an arrow went whizzing by her.
Right. They were fighting. Definitely the worst day. But at least the same supposed magistrate who’d held her at knifepoint mere hours ago was now putting his blade to better use. She spotted him by a tree, tearing his dagger from a goblin he’d just felled in time to plunge it into the gut of another one who was leaping at him. Others from inside the grove rushed out and joined the fray, including a man boastfully calling himself the “Blade of Frontiers.”
Before long, the goblins were defeated, leaving dirt-mixed bloodstains all over the once-pristine entrance to the Emerald Grove. “Open the gate!” the man who’d led the party that had brought down this whole mess shouted again at the stunned tieflings on the ramparts. They complied, yelling that everyone should get in as quickly as possible.
Lethe got the sense that these attacks weren’t uncommon. But it hadn’t always been that way.
Inside, the leader was arguing with a tiefling man. She’d missed the beginning of their conversation, but she caught the name, “Halsin.” She ran over before any of her new companions could ask what was going on.
“Halsin.” She was breathless by the time she caught their attention. “Where is Halsin?”
They both looked at her with varying levels of confusion, anger, and sadness.
“He’s still First Druid of this Grove, yes?” she insisted. “I need to speak with him.”
The two men put aside whatever differences they had, just for a moment, just long enough to exchange glances.
“I’m Zevlor,” the tiefling man said gently. Too gently. “What’s your business with Halsin, may I ask?”
“You’re not a Druid,” Lethe said, more harshly than she meant it, but she just wanted a straightforward answer to her question. She realized, then, that there weren’t just a few tieflings here that had been on the ramparts. The entire place was brimming with them, whole families by the looks of it. Enough to populate a small village. In the distance she could see the entrance to the Druid temple, but the grove itself seemed to have been taken over.
“No.” He gave a small, sad smile. “We’re refugees. From Elturell. Trying to make our way to Baldur’s Gate. Halsin granted us asylum here.”
“Where is he, then?”
“Who is Halsin?” Astarion had appeared, almost out of nowhere from behind her.
“A healer,” she said. “The best this side of Baldur’s Gate.”
“Mmhmm,” Astarion responded with pinched lips and a raised eyebrow. Lethe bristled. She didn’t love being around someone who could see through her lies so easily. Not that she made a habit of lying.
“I’m afraid Halsin is…gone,” the man from the goblin fight said.
“Gone?” Her voice cracked. “What do you mean, gone?”
“He joined our party to investigate the goblin camp, find out why they’ve suddenly become so aggressive and intent on attacking the Grove.”
“And now you’ve gone and gotten him killed,” Zevlor said, sharped teeth bared, but with a note of fear and tragedy.
“He got himself killed!” the man responded angrily.
“He’s dead?” Lethe screwed up her face to keep herself from crying.
The man sighed. “I don’t know. We were spotted. He was captured in the scuffle, insisted we run and save ourselves.”
She nodded. That was definitely the Halsin she knew.
“Doesn’t change the fact that he had no business being there in the first place, but,” the man shrugged.
“Well, I hope you’re happy,” Zevlor said. “You’ve doomed us all.”
“Gods, this is tiresome,” Astarion said.
Zevlor turned sharply to him. “Excuse me?”
“Oh, did I say that out loud?” Astarion held up a hand. “Forgive me. I only meant, as my friend implied, we’re in need of a healer, but she quite irresponsibly neglected to emphasize how urgently.” He gave Lethe a pointed look. “It’s really the only thing we need to worry about right now, don’t you think?”
“I…yes.” Lethe sighed. She hated to admit it, but he was right. Whatever personal troubles she had, it wasn’t the concern of anyone standing here, whether or not they cared.
“Well, Halsin has an apprentice, Nettie,” Zevlor said. “You can speak to her in the temple, if the Druids will allow you in. They’ve kept the security tight ever since Halsin left.”
“We can be persuasive,” Astarion assured them, clapping Lethe on the shoulder.
“Can you?” Zevlor raised an eyebrow. “Well, in that case, I may implore you—”
“No thank you!” Astarion shouted, already ushering Lethe towards the Druid temple. Shadowheart trailed behind them, and Lethe noted that Lae’zel and Gale were nowhere to be found.
“That was…audacious. Even for me,” Shadowheart mused.
Lethe pulled herself out of Astarion’s grip. “Where’s everyone else?”
“Well,” Shadowheart sighed, “Lae’zel became quite enamored with Wyll, sorry, the ‘Blade of Frontiers,’” she said the moniker in a mocking tone, “and went off to observe his…technique. Gale got pulled into a conversation with a fellow wizard, though I don’t think he’s even got an apprenticeship yet.”
“So, not that I care, but I’m just curious,” Astarion said. “This Halsin. A former lover, I assume?”
“What?” She whipped around to face him, frozen in her tracks. The breakfast she’d eaten before being captured had survived in her stomach this long, but now it threatened to come back up. “No! No…” she looked around, but their only witnesses seemed to be a silent pack of ox, and she hadn’t cast Animal Speaking yet that day. “He’s my uncle.”
“Oh.” Astarion’s face softened, more than it had when they’d met earlier that day, when he realized she’d been as much a victim of the Illithids as him. But then it screwed up again. “Well, why in the hells wouldn’t you have said that when Zevlor asked?”
“I don’t know! Last time I was here, there were no tieflings, no refugee camp, no goblins. I had no idea what we were walking into.”
“Seems sensible enough,” Shadowheart said.
“And what of the Druids?” Astarion asked. “Will they be pleased to know they’re in the presence of royalty? What would that make you, anyway? A princess? A duch*ess? Countess?”
“We don’t have royalty,” Lethe muttered, resuming her march to the temple entrance.
Astarion gave an exasperated sigh behind her. “I know. It was a joke.”
“Well, find a clown and take some humor lessons.” She checked her clothes for wrinkles, though of course they were covered in bloodstains anyway. Two Druids stood at the entrance to the temple, ignoring a small group of tieflings making various demands and complaints. Lethe stepped forward, but Shadowheart stiffened.
“Wolves,” she murmured. She gave Lethe an embarrassed smile. “I should have known. Where there’s Druids, there’s wolves, aren’t there?”
“Sometimes,” Lethe admitted. “You don’t like wolves?”
“It’s silly. A childhood fear. I suppose everyone has them.”
Lethe expected Astarion to make some snide comment, but when she glanced at him, he was concentrating on his nails.
“Well, there’s no need you going in,” Lethe said. “I’ll just talk to Nettie, and if it’s good news, I’ll report it back to everyone straight away. Bad news too, I guess.” But she was trying to remain optimistic.
Shadowheart nodded, clear relief on her face. “There were some injured during the fight with the goblins, and I’m guessing the resources on the tiefling side are a bit lacking. I may be able to help them, and get more information about what happened to Halsin while I’m at it.”
“Perfect,” Lethe said.
Shadowheart walked off just as the Druids made notice of Lethe and Astarion. “We’re closed to outsiders,” they said, rather definitively. Lethe didn’t recognize either of them, not that she expected them to recognize her, either. She’d only been here a few times, and not for many years.
“We’re here to see Nettie,” Lethe said.
They weren’t moved by this. “Like I said. Closed.”
She took in a deep sigh. Here we f*cking go, she thought. “I’m Lethe. Lethe Silverbough.”
One of them raised an eyebrow, confused and unimpressed, but the other one’s eyes widened in recognition. “Hang on.” She pointed at Lethe. “Yeah. I remember Halsin talking about you. His niece, right?”
Lethe closed her eyes. “Yes.”
She turned to the other Druid, whispered something in his ear. He laughed, and Lethe knew exactly what he’d just been told about her. Lethe could feel Astarion’s gaze flick to her, and she wished she could use the Scroll of Invisibility stashed in her pack, so that no one could look at her, either curiously like Astarion, or judgmentally like the guards.
“Shame, that,” the male Druid said, unable to hide an amused smirk. “What’s your business here, then?”
“Nettie, like I said.” Lethe tried to keep a congenial smile plastered on her face.
The guards exchanged glances. “Wait here,” the male one said, and he left his post. The female Druid gave them a warning glance, indicating that she had no interest in making chit-chat until he returned. Not that there was anything in particular Lethe wanted to discuss with her.
Astarion, on the other hand, had no shortage of things to say. “So, I’m assuming that answers my question. Regarding whether or not they’d be pleased to see you.”
“They won’t be prostrating themselves before me, no,” Lethe said quietly. She found avoiding eye contact with anyone—Astarion, the Druids in the courtyard, and the tieflings surrounding them—was unfairly difficult.
“I find Druids to be a self-righteous lot anyway,” Astarion said with a shrug. “No offense,” he added to the guard, who pretended to ignore him. Lethe had to suppress a giggle. Privately, she agreed with him, though she still had to play the part of a diplomat.
“I had no title,” she said finally. “My father was First Druid of our clan, just like Halsin. I was just his daughter.” There’d been titles bandied about, back when the elders were excited about her and her progress. But when things changed, they stopped calling her anything. The other youths in the clan had their own names for her before she left, of course, but none that she was willing to repeat here. “Anyway, there’s a reason I wear a Ranger’s emblem, not a Druid’s.”
Astarion hummed, clearly fishing for more details, but considering she could already tell he was hiding a mountain of truths about himself, she wasn’t eager to give him more rope to wrap around her wrists. Not that she had any idea what he’d do with it.
She looked away, just as the male guard returned.
“Kagha wants to see you,” he said bluntly to Lethe and Astarion.
“Who’s Kagha?” Lethe asked, but she got only an eyeroll and impatient sigh in response, as the guards stepped aside to let them inside.
Okay. Conversation over. Got it.
They made their way through the temple courtyard, where a group of Druids stood in a circle, performing a rite over an idol of Silvanus. Her neck turned as she tried to discern what was going on, tried to decipher the words they were saying and remember what ritual it was referring to. But she was too far out of touch with her roots.
“What are they planning?” Lethe whispered, mostly to herself. “Why are the tieflings so upset?”
“Who cares?” Astarion asked.
It was a fair question, but if she didn’t have this tadpole squirming in her head, she would care, even if this wasn’t Halsin’s enclave. As it was, she still did. But she’d be no good to anyone as a Mind Flayer, she reasoned. Maybe in just a few minutes, that wouldn’t be a problem anymore, and she could go and find out what happened to her uncle. She knew he was capable of taking care of himself, but that didn’t help the pit of anxiety in her stomach.
All hopes of a speedy solution were dashed, though, the second they entered the inner sanctum. As they made their way down the stone stairs, she heard a child crying, adult voices speaking in harsh, hushed tones.
The scene that they were met with when they reached the bottom was so much worse than she could have imagined.
A young tiefling girl was pressed against a stone slab, a fanged snake circling around her as if acting as makeshift shackles. The girl looked too horrified to speak or let out any noise louder than a gasp or soft cry.
Two Druids stood beside her, an elven woman and a human man. The man was hunched over towards the woman, his eyes shining. “Please, Kagha,” he implored her. Kagha looked at the girl with such disgust that Lethe could only hope she’d committed some kind of egregious war crime. “We got the idol back. What good will this do now?”
“This abomination has stolen from us. Put us all at risk.” Kagha’s voice was as sharp as Astarion’s knife. “What would you have me do, exactly, Rath?”
“Halsin wouldn’t—”
“Halsin isn’t here!” Kagha snapped. She crossed her arms. “Is he?”
She spun around to face Lethe, who realized all too late that the question was meant for her.
“Did you hear, Rath?” Kagha said with a sneer. “We’re in the presence of royalty.”
“Knew it,” Astarion whispered to Lethe, who elbowed him lightly in the gut, trying to keep her expression neutral as she met Kagha’s cold, horrible eyes. Royalty, right. She sure felt like royalty, with her frizzled braids nearly coming out, her skin tanned from a life of living outdoors, and her clothes caked in dirt and blood.
“What do you think, my lady?” Kagha curtsied sarcastically, and Lethe swallowed back bile. “What would your esteemed uncle do? I’ve already heard he got himself kidnapped, maybe killed, by the goblins. Word travels fast here, after all. Maybe that was part of his strategy? I can’t imagine, but,” she laughed, “who am I to question him?”
Lethe didn’t answer, but Kagha didn’t seem to expect her to. Instead, she tapped her finger to her chin, as if a sudden thought had come to her. “Oh, I know exactly who I am! I’m the one Halsin left in charge. So, I don’t actually need anyone to tell me what I should do. Tell me, Lethe Silverbough, what’s the role of a First Druid?”
“To keep the clan safe,” Lethe said stiffly.
“What’s that?” Kagha put a hand to her ear. “I didn’t hear you. Speak up.”
Everyone’s eyes were on her, even the child’s. Kagha was right. Halsin wasn’t here. And Lethe had no hope of ever being in his or Kagha’s position. But she knew exactly what Halsin would say, what he would do.
“You already got the idol back, didn’t you? Your rite is continuing. Halsin would say that keeping the child captive any longer is unnecessary if you can simply let her go. It disrupts nature’s balance.” Lethe channeled every ounce of energy she had to make herself sound strong and authoritative. “He would say it doesn’t keep the Grove safe.”
“Exactly,” Rath said with some relief.
Kagha’s eyes darkened, and for a moment, Lethe feared that despite saying the right thing, she’d still said the wrong thing, and had doomed the girl. But then Kagha frowned, clicked her tongue, summoning the snake to her. “My goodwill ends here, girl. Be glad you have this idealist to look after you.” She said “idealist” with no question that it was meant to be an insult, and Lethe felt the sting right between her eyes when Kagha glared at her. The girl scampered off, and when her footsteps had died away, Kagha said, “If anything happens to this Grove now, it will be on your head.”
“By the child?” Lethe couldn’t suppress a laugh.
“The child will go to her parents. She will tell them how she was freed. She will tell them of your mercy. They will implore you, implore us. They will keep trying to interrupt the ritual. They will think they can continue to take advantage of our hospitality, get away with anything. And you will not just have doomed us, but all of them as well.”
Lethe’s throat was tight. “I wouldn’t have said a word if you hadn’t asked me what I thought. I’m not here to interfere; my presence is a coincidence and bad timing. I’m just here to see Nettie, like the guard should have told you. And then, to find Halsin, which I’m sure you’d understand.”
“See Nettie, then,” Kagha said dismissively. “Her chambers are in the back. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” She offered nothing further, but disappeared in the opposite direction, into what Lethe’s knew had once been Halsin’s chambers.
“Well, that was awful,” Astarion said with a sigh. “Oh, great.”
He’d noticed Rath approaching before she did. The druid seemed to be having a hard time not throwing his arms around Lethe in a grateful embrace. “Thank you,” he said. “I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t come along.”
“The girl would have died, I imagine,” Astarion said.
“Yes.” Rath’s smile faltered. “Things haven’t been the same, since Halsin left. Even before then, his mind had seemed preoccupied with so many things. I hope once you get what you need from Nettie, you can find him. Before it’s too late.”
“Too late for what?” Lethe frowned. “Rath, what is this ritual you’re performing?”
Rath took in a deep breath. “The Rite of Thorns.”
“Alright, I’ll bite,” Astarion interjected. “What’s—”
No time to answer. The Rite of godsdamned Thorns? How f*cking dare she, that—
Lethe marched over to Halsin—no, Kagha’s chambers, ignoring Astarion’s protests that she was going the wrong way. She tried to take calming breaths as a little voice that sounded like Halsin reminded her that no good would come of anger, that wrath would not get her what she wanted. A cool head will always—
“The Rite of Thorns? Really?” Her voice in Kagha’s face came out as a shriek. “That’ll cut the whole Grove off from the outside world.”
Kagha looked bored at the outburst, if anything. “I’m aware of how it works, thank you. I thought you needed to speak to Nettie.”
“We do!” Astarion declared from the chamber door.
Calming thoughts. Calming thoughts. A nice breeze on a warm day. Ocean waves crashing against the coast. Gods, oh, what else, what else? Those couldn’t be the only two calming things she could think of.
“As you said yourself, the First Druid’s role is to keep the Grove safe,” Kagha said, taking the upper hand as if she’d been born with the right to it. “The goblin threat was high enough to make Halsin abandon us, so I am left with no choice.”
“Halsin was trying to fix it,” Lethe said, teeth clenched. “Let me find him. Give me a chance to track him down, and help him with his mission.” She almost added, Complete it for him if he’s dead, but that thought was too much to bear right now, risked too much that she’d cry in front of Kagha. “Can you at least give me that?” No, Kagha didn’t owe her sh*t. “Can you give him that?”
“My patience is wearing thin, girl. As is the safety of this Grove.” Kagha paced around the chamber with an air of authority, running her hands along the shelves, over a trunk that Lethe recognized as Halsin’s. Over everything in the chamber.
“You’re so eager to make it all yours,” Lethe said.
She thought she might not have said it aloud, but Kagha glared at her. “You're in luck. The child's interference has set us back. It will take at least day and a half to complete the ritual now. Seeing as how you’re determined to go after your uncle anyway, if you're able to bring about his safe return, as well as the goblins' defeat before the ritual is completed," she shrugged, "then there won't be any further need to complete it. But that is at much grace as I can give."
Lethe nodded and turned, met by Astarion’s disbelieving gaze. “Are you joking?” he asked. “Actually joking?"
She sighed. “Come on.”
“I didn’t sign up to mount a rescue attempt against a camp of goblins.”
“No,” she agreed as they went further into the sanctum. It was empty of anyone else; the rest of the Druids were no doubt occupied with preparing the ritual. “You didn’t. Which is why once our business with Nettie is settled, you can go on your way, and never think of this again.”
“Well,” he straightened the hem of his doublet, “good.”
They found Nettie’s chambers. She was a dwarven woman, tending to an injured bird. She whispered affirmations to it, conjuring magic over its broken body. “Be with you in a moment,” she said, without turning to look at either of them.
“With us in a moment?” Astarion scoffed. “Over a bird?”
“Shh!” Lethe fought the urge to pinch him.
A moment later, the bird rustled its feathers, seemingly healed, though not perfectly.
Nettie turned to them. “Lethe Silverbough.” She smiled. “Pleasure to finally meet you. I am sorry that you came while your uncle is absent, though. I’m afraid I’ve been waylaid in here all day. Any news of him?”
“He was lost on the mission to the goblin camp,” Lethe said, a little resentful that she had to be the one to break the news.
Nettie’s hand fluttered to her chest. “Oak Father preserve us. I pray he still lives.” She furrowed her brow. “Were you here in search of him? Did you know about his mission?”
“No, it was…some kind of coincidence.” Had she still been ingrained into her family’s teachings, she might have attributed the luck to Silvanus, but then again, she hardly felt lucky on this particular day. “I find myself in need of a healer.” She indicated to Astarion. “We both do.”
Nettie nodded. “Well, as I’m sure you know, Halsin’s skills are unmatched, but I’m happy to do what I can. What seems to be the issue?”
Lethe faltered, suddenly aware of all the implications that came with their condition, but there wasn’t much way around it if they wanted help. “We’ve been infected. With Illithid parasites.”
Nettie spoke another prayer under her breath. “Come with me. I have some supplies in my back room.”
Lethe exchanged a look with Astarion, who shrugged, but kept his eyes on the back of Nettie’s head as she led the way. A stone door opened as Nettie put her hand to the circlet on her forehead.
As if the gods were determined to show them every horror imaginable that day, the scene they walked in on was hardly reassuring, and it was punctuated by the sound of the door closing behind them. A drow lay on a table, dead and surrounded by blood.
“This one came to me this morning. Same problem as you.” Nettie’s voice was solemn, full of regret and anguish.
“Dear gods. What happened to him?” Lethe asked.
He started transforming.” Nettie turned her attention to a shelf lined with different objects.
“But how did he die?” Astarion asked, slow and careful. He didn’t wait for an answer though, and Lethe had the horrific sense that he already knew what it was. “Does anyone else know that he’s dead?”
“No. With everything else going on, no need to cause a panic until we know more.” Nettie sighed. “If only Halsin was here. He’d have your tadpole out like that.” She snapped her fingers. “Still, we have options.”
“What kind of options?” Lethe asked.
Nettie didn’t answer, just turned around, a branch in her hands. “Hold out your arm, please,” she said to Lethe.
Lethe blinked, hoping she was mistaken as to the type of branch it was, but she wasn’t. “No.”
Nettie’s eyes were wide, imploring. “Please. It will be quick.”
“This is your option?” Lethe choked back a miserable laugh. “A poison branch?”
“Oh, hell.” Astarion sounded more disappointed than surprised, though certainly incensed.
“Transformation could occur at any moment. It doesn’t matter when you were infected, how you’re feeling right now. Believe me, I want nothing more than to remove your tadpole safely. I would even crush the creature myself if you didn’t want to claim that right. But we’re out of time. These infections have become dangerously common, and my first duty has to be to the health and safety of the entire Grove.”
The parasite seemed to squirm in Lethe’s head, and she couldn’t help but find a certain amount of wisdom in Nettie’s words. She certainly didn’t want to put anyone at risk. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d made a sacrifice for the greater good, just the largest one she’d made by far.
“You’re not actually considering this madness, are you?”
Astarion’s words cut through her so sharply that she inhaled as if she’d been awakened from a horrible dream.
“Like it or not,” Nettie said to Astarion, “it’s far from madness.”
“I’m not doing it,” Lethe said, her resolve steeled. “I’m not just going to roll over and die. You said we have options. Halsin is an option. Kagha’s already said she’ll give me time to find him. Let me do that.”
Nettie’s arm shook and she grimaced. “Fine.” Perhaps she was relieved that she didn’t have to go through with it. Lethe certainly hoped so. She set the branch back down and picked up a small bottle. “Take this with you, though. It’s a wyvern toxin. At the first hint of any transformation—unusual headaches, a feeling of squirming in your gut, anything like that—you must promise me that you’ll take it.” She dropped the bottle into Lethe’s hand.
Lethe was speechless, but Astarion rushed to her side. “Absolutely,” he said, entirely unconvincingly, Lethe thought. “At the first sign of any transformation, we’ll be glad to down the whole bottle between us.”
“One sip each will do,” Nettie said, eyes narrowed.
“Even better!” Astarion flashed a dazzling smile, and not for the first time that day did Lethe note to herself how f*cking sharp his teeth were.
“I need you to swear it. Both of you.”
Astarion and Nettie both looked at Lethe expectantly, and it felt like every word from her mouth was a solid, living thing, like beetles eager to get to work on the decomposing body in the corner. “I…swear.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” It didn’t seem to matter to Nettie that Lethe felt coerced to say it, but she was, albeit very politely, asking Lethe to kill herself. How could she sound happy about it?
But yes, she told herself. Becoming a Mind Flayer was definitely not a viable option. So, if there was such a thing as the ability for an infected person to know if they were transforming, if she happened upon any of those signs, then sure, she’d drink the poison.
“Shall we be going?” Astarion asked.
“I know this wasn’t the solution you wanted,” Nettie said. The door to the room remained shut. “And you may yet find a better one. But thank you all the same, for your integrity. I would expect nothing less from a Silverbough. I would expect nothing less than to do what’s right, for the good of everyone.”
Lethe was halfway turned around, but now she stopped. Astarion took one look at her and sighed. “Oh, hells.”
She only half-heard him. “Can I ask you a question, Nettie?”
Nettie nodded. “Of course.”
“What do you think of the Rite of Thorns that Kagha’s orchestrating?”
“It’s not what I would have done,” Nettie admitted. “Nor, certainly, is it what Halsin would have done. But she’s doing what she thinks is best for the sake of the Grove. It’s not my place to question it, just to respect it. I’m sure you understand.”
“Right.” Lethe bit her lip. Gritted her teeth. Turned the poison bottle over and over in her hand. “I just find it a bit ironic that you’re being complicit to a ritual that will leave dozens of people to die.” She looked at Nettie, met her hard eyes. “Just to save your own skins. It takes a lot of nerve, then, to tell me that I have to sacrifice myself for the greater good.” She took in a breath through her nose. “Is this the glorious Emerald Grove now? Is this how things work here? That you fold at the first sign of trouble and demand everyone else face death head-on so that you can remain safe?”
She had to give Nettie credit. She was smart enough to realize that this was a refusal to take the poison, that the word she’d given moments before was now null and void.
The dwarf woman’s face contorted with anger and regret. “To hells with it.” She spun around towards the shelf, and Lethe’s hand went to the sword at her hilt. But Nettie gasped, and Lethe realized an instant after her that it was because the poison branch was gone.
And Lethe also realized that Astarion wasn’t standing beside her anymore. He’d moved quickly. She and Nettie had been so focused on their rage that they hadn’t even noticed. “No!” she shouted, but it was too late. Astarion had already scratched Nettie’s arm with the exposed end of the branch, leaving behind a brown-red trail of blood and bark. He stepped back, a look of dark triumph on his face, maybe the ghost of a smile, though Lethe could barely stand to look at him. But nor did she want to watch as Nettie gasped her last breaths, stumbling to the ground as the poison took hold.
“There has to be an antidote,” Lethe said, which might have been the most useless thing she’d ever said in her life. She looked around the room, not even sure what she should be looking for. Nothing on Nettie’s little table looked like an antidote. But she lurched forward towards the shelves. “We can’t kill her. We can’t.”
“She’s already gone,” Astarion said. When Lethe kept searching, his voice hardened. “Lethe, stop.”
She spun around to him, teeth gritted, aware that she might spit at him, she was so angry. “Why did you do that?”
He was baffled by the question, and after a couple of breaths, she was too. “It’s my fault,” she said. “It’s my fault you had to kill her.”
Astarion’s pointed face softened. He actually sighed. “Why in the hells couldn’t you just lie to her?”
That was too loaded a question for someone she’d only known for a few hours. “I don’t know.”
“Well,” he scowled at the body, “best try to figure out a way to get us out of here while I clean this up.”
“What’s the point? You know what they’ll do when they find us? What Kagha’s f*cking snake will do?”
“Kagha’s snake isn’t going to do anything, trust me,” Astarion said. “Nettie said the drow only died this morning, and no one knows about it. As far as anyone will be concerned, she brought us in here, assured us the drow was very dead, and…she was wrong.” He shoved the drow’s body onto the ground, and dragged it towards Nettie with clear strain. “He attacked her…gods…” he grunted, “and then dropped down dead. We saw the whole thing, were quite powerless to help. But that explanation is only needed if anyone saw us come in here, because by my count, no one did. So if they ask if we even saw her, the answer is going to be a very firm no. She never opened the door to let us in, so we left.” He placed the branch gingerly near the drow’s right hand.
“What if they cast Speak with Dead on either of them?” Lethe asked.
“Gods, do you enjoy complicating things?” Astarion looked at her as if he’d never met a more baffling person in his life. “Isn’t that a Cleric’s spell?”
“They might have a scroll, or—”
“If they even think to do something like that, we’ll be long gone. I don’t know about you, but if this uncle of yours is our best bet for a fast cure, I plan to be out of here faster than a jackrabbit running from…from a gnoll.”
Lethe felt numb, completely unlike herself in the shock of everything that had just happened. She slapped herself lightly across the face to try to pull herself together, prompting a raised eyebrow from Astarion. “It should have been me.”
“Dead?” Astarion chuckled. “So now you’re prostrating yourself?”
“No. Thinking on your feet like that. You had to make up for my stupidity. I’m usually the one to solve problems like this. Well, not like this, but you know what I mean.”
“It was pretty stupid,” he acknowledged. He cleared his throat as he stood up. “But anyway, you can get the next one. Show off your on-the-fly cunning, so to speak.” He smiled. “Impress me again.”
“When did I impress you in the first place?” she asked, crossing her arms.
“As reckless as your little speech was, there was something…charming about it. Liberating. Calling someone out on their hypocrisy like that,” he shrugged, “I won’t say I wasn’t annoyed with the timing and consequences, but I also won’t say I’m sorry the woman’s dead. I mean, to expect us to off ourselves at the first sign of trouble? Completely delusional. Horrible healer. We did Faerun a favor, quite frankly.”
She was surprised he wasn’t screaming at her with a beet-red face, declaring that he regretted ever joining up on her, warning her that the others would be hearing about this once they were free from this chamber. That, or assure her that it was fine, she did nothing wrong, he was sure she tried her best. Her whole life, reactions she’d received to every mistake had been one of the two. Yes, he wasn’t happy. She wouldn’t be either, in his position. But he was being remarkably calm.
Which meant he either really believed he needed her, was actually impressed by her, or, most improbably, both.
“The circlet around her head,” Lethe said as the fog finally lifted from her mind. “That’s what she used to open the door.”
Astarion beamed with approval. “But, I assume if it’s found on our person, it would look a bit suspicious.”
“Well, like you said,” she couldn’t hide a certain bitterness, “we’ll be long gone by the time they figure anything out.”
“Ahh, yes. I think you and I just might get along after all.” He swiped the circlet off Nettie’s head. “Would you care to do the honors?”
She took it, and as they both grasped an end of the circlet, she felt compelled to ask, “What does it take, to get along with you? Abandoning refugees to their fate, I take it?”
He narrowed his eyes, but his smile remained. “Let me make something clear. I have no interest in being considered a good person, but nor am I a cold, unfeeling monster. I joined up with you because I assumed that, like me, you understood the urgency of our situation. I get that you can take the ranger out of…wherever you live, but you can’t take…”
“I don’t really live anywhere.”
“You can’t take…the instinct to help every damn limping orphan you see out of the ranger. Is that right?”
“Sure.”
“Sure.” He nodded. “But I will say this. If you had told Nettie you’d drink the poison, and if I had believed you,” he gripped the circlet just a bit tighter, “I would have grabbed this thing myself, and left you here to rot with her and the drow. Only some kind of detached shade wouldn’t understand the plight of the tieflings. I heard about what happened to Elturell; it’s certainly a damned shame. But only a deranged idiot would think that derailing our path to a cure by helping them is going to serve anyone, would think that sacrificing themselves is always the right thing to do, full stop. Does that sound fair?”
Fair. It was a laughable word. She’d spent her whole life trying to live by what was fair, what was right. And here he was presenting a definition that felt so warped, so far out of the realm of anything she’d ever considered before.
But as she stared into his eyes, his, gods, wow, red eyes, very red, she couldn’t find a way to argue with his logic. Something about it felt sickening, but while she didn’t love it, she didn’t hate it either. She forced the words to mull about in her mind, replayed them over and over, accepted them a little more each time.
“It sounds fair,” she said. “It’s fair.” Maybe by tomorrow they’d have a cure anyway, and she’d never have to worry about betraying his good graces again.
“Fantastic.” He let the circlet go. “Let’s get out of here, shall we?”
“Right.” She secured the circlet to her head and opened the door.
“Well,” he said, “what’s next then, fearless leader?”
“I’m no leader,” Lethe mumbled as she closed the library door. “I’m just the first one who figured out where we were.” She paused. “I think you just don’t want the job.”
He laughed. Loud. “Leadership has been given to many with far fewer qualifications,” he said with a little flourish of his hands. He stopped walking, and they found themselves in the same spot where the little tiefling girl had been kept, but at least Rath and Kagha were nowhere to be seen. He closed the distance between them, and her heartbeat sped. Weren’t they supposed to be leaving? “We can trust each other, can’t we?”
Could they? She had no idea. The better question was, did they have a choice?
Maybe they didn’t need each other, but if it hadn’t been for Astarion, she might be dead right now, or worse, holding a bottle of poison that she felt compelled to drink.
“We can trust each other,” she said, slipping the circlet into her pouch.
“Excellent,” he said with a grin. He walked to the stairs, and once she was out of his sight, she shivered.
