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“Can’t sleep, my dear?”
Gale barely startles at his beloved’s smooth tenor, rough from trance. Cool breath ghosts the shell of his ear like the night breeze with nary a sign that the man had even left their bed. Old habits die hard— it rings particularly true with Astarion, whose steps are still silent as a dormouse even in his own home.
“It’s a beautiful night,” Gale murmurs in lieu of an answer— or perhaps it is his answer. He isn’t entirely sure himself. What roused him from sleep and drew him to the balcony is long gone from his mind, replaced only with air perfumed by the sea and the inky sky before him. He glances at Astarion from the corner of his eye, catching the odd sort of look in the other man’s gaze as he regards Gale with his head cocked to one side. Ruby eyes flick to the dark horizon, the sparse midnight lights of Waterdeep reflected in them, twinkling like the stars Gale had been admiring.
“I’ve seen my fair share of nights,” Astarion begins, fingers brushing the small of Gale’s back as he passes him by and settles by the bannister. He folds his arms elegantly upon the rail, head tilted to the sky. Gale’s gaze joins him in the heavens. “There was a time I might have argued that no night is beautiful— not in comparison to the clear splendor of daylight. Daylight I was not allowed to enjoy. Daylight I coveted.” Clawed fingertips tap an absent rhythm that Gale can feel beneath his own hands. He taps back idly, pulling his gaze from the wavering atmosphere of a distant star. Astarion’s profile is just as agreeable to the eyes. The night breeze tousles his curls softly— not enough to rustle them from their perfect set, but just enough to remind one that even the immortal and unchanging can be touched by nature.
“But, tonight… I find myself agreeing with you. And not because I’m at all biased, mind you.” Astarion’s gaze meets his, his full lips turning up into a little smirk. It pulls at Gale’s heart and sends butterflies through his belly just as it did when they’d first begun to flirt with the idea of flirting. Gale can’t help but smile back, fond and just this side of playful.
“Oh, really? Not biased in the slightest?” Gale tilts his head to one side, his loose graying waves tickling his cheek.
“Oh, my dear, I am biased. But the night is still beautiful regardless of my feelings toward a certain mage.”
“What makes it so?” Gale asks, biting back his amusement in favor of his curiosity. Astarion seems to ponder this for a moment, his eyes roving over the rooftops of the city.
“Well, for one, Waterdeep smells considerably better,” Astarion remarks, drawing a snort from Gale. Astarion grins as he continues, “It’s true! The Gate had a smell. Especially at night. And there was always this awful smog.”
“Smog? From what, exactly?”
“A wonderful question indeed. I’m not sure I know, and that’s the worst part.”
Gale shudders. Dubious smog of unknown origin… No wonder he yearned so terribly for the sweet ocean air of his home during his time in the city.
Astarion’s eyes seem distant as Gale turns his focus back, a furrow forming between his brows as he delves into his memory. “I rarely thought to look up. My view of the stars was almost always obscured, or I was otherwise occupied.” He pauses, glancing quickly at Gale before his eyes dart away again. He looks almost sheepish as he continues, “And… I suppose I was rather jealous of them. They sat in the sky and stared at me, all the while unbothered and untouched. Untouchable.”
Fog ripples like a second sea above the yawning expanse of the ocean. Distantly, the call and response of two passing ships echoes through the night like melancholy birdsong.
“The same stars still hang in the sky,” Gale muses, his hand inching close to Astarion’s upon the rail. An invitation. After a moment, Astarion’s little finger twitches before linking loosely with Gale’s. “But they gaze upon a very different Astarion. I think, if I were a star, I’d be quite delighted by how it all turned out. To see you here, in a new city upon the balcony of a handsome wizard.” Gale smiles crookedly, laughing softly as Astarion scoffs and bumps him with his shoulder. “To see your gaze turned up in appreciation rather than envy.” He feels Astarion’s gaze on him as he looks back up at the sky. “I don’t need to be a star to feel that way. But I would, were I to be a star.”
Astarion simply stares at him for a moment, utterly quiet, one brow raised and lips parted. Then, very softly, he begins to titter, shaking his head. “What a way with words. I think we may be lucky you aren’t a star. You’d have no one to talk to, way up there by your lonesome. I’m rather content with you babbling by my side, I think. You should be thankful I provide a listening ear. Another reason Waterdeep is preferable to the Gate.”
Gale gives Astarion’s little finger a squeeze. In response, Astarion flips Gale’s hand palm-up and laces their fingers together upon the bannister.
“My love,” Gale murmurs softly, watching Astarion perk up. His pointed ears are alert, eyes round and earnest in that soft way reserved only for him. It almost makes Gale hesitate to say what he means next, but he forges on nonetheless.
“That sounds like bias to me.”
Astarion blinks, his brow furrowing in puzzlement, and then, when Gale presumes the pieces click together in his mind, he lets out a great guffaw not unlike the honk of a goose, as if it were suddenly punched from his chest. “Oh, shut up, would you?” He cackles, not unkindly, “Yes, you make me like this stupid city and all the stupid people in it.” He punctuates each word with a jab of his sharp finger into the meat of Gale’s arm. Gale’s shoulders shake with laughter as Astarion rolls his eyes with enough force that it is a small wonder they don’t roll straight out of his skull and onto the balcony. “It’s not funny!” Astarion insists, giggling high and unguarded.
“It is a little funny,” Gale manages, head ducked as he gathers himself.
“You and your smart mouth. I should do something about that.” And then Gale’s breath catches in his throat as Astarion steps close, laughter dying in his chest. He often finds himself anticipating the radiating warmth of another body whenever his beloved draws near, that animal part of his brain unnerved when it never comes. Though there is no danger— not to him— that primal protective instinct that tells man from other still hisses run.
Gale loves it.
“You should do something about that,” Gale agrees sagely. His voice has dropped slow and rough, and he watches the way Astarion responds to it. Nostrils flaring, eyes sharpening, ears pricked. Predator. Gale will be hunted and devoured. Astarion’s gaze is hungry, ravenous, as if Gale doesn’t keep his belly full with a deal he has with the butcher— don’t ask, don’t tell. As if he sups not of Gale’s blood, freely and eagerly offered, untainted by parasitic magic.
Soft lips meet his as if they mean to mold into his very being, and he is drawn up onto the balls of his feet to chase Astarion’s mouth as his is taken. Teeth at his lip, a tongue against his own— and then a knee nudges its way between his thighs, parting his loose satin night robe. Astarion presses him to the cold stone of his tower, cornering him.
“Here?” he gasps, not so much incredulous as pleasantly surprised.
Astarion captures his lips again, the top of his thigh pressing insistently between Gale’s legs where he throbs. There is naught but the thin fabric of purple briefs between Astarion’s bare thigh and Gale’s cunt. His moan is swallowed by the other man as his hips twitch of their own accord, rubbing himself against his husband like a desperate animal. His robe slips down his shoulders, the cool night air kissing his skin and making him shiver.
“Yes,” Astarion hisses, breathless. His eyes seem to glow in the dim, wild. “Let your beloved city watch. Let them see what their archmage becomes in my arms.”
“They have seen,” Gale gasps, “They know you have saved me.” He feels Astarion grip him tighter, lips grazing his bearded cheek, mouth at his jaw. “You have made this tower a home again. You have— ah— breathed life into me once more—“
Astarion gasps, fangs grazing Gale’s tender skin. A threat. A promise. The other man jerks against him, hips canting forward, and then he pulls away just enough to look between their bodies.
“Naughty thing,” Astarion breathes. An otherworldly hand is tucked beneath the waistband of his briefs, bulging the fabric with shimmering skin. Gale thinks of dipping his fingers into Astarion’s wet heat, dragging that slickness through his folds and up to his cock, circling it. The mage hand does so, making Astarion’s knees buckle. “Ah— no,” he huffs, and Gale stops, the mage hand dissolving into the very air around them. Astarion meets his gaze, knowing, warm. “If I am to have you, I would have you.” Slender fingers wrap around his wrist, bringing it to his flat stomach. Gale’s fingers look thick and dark against him. Astarion slides his hand down, down. It takes the place of its magical counterpart, nestled against cool skin and a surprisingly warm core. Wet, just as Gale is. Astarion sighs, content, and rolls his hips once, twice, seemingly trying out this new fit. It satisfies, for he leans into Gale once more, nearly looming over him, enveloping him.
“Please,” Gale pleads, for nothing and no one, for he has what he needs.
“You have me, my sweet,” Astarion pants, rocking, pressing, taking, “what do you need?”
“Please,” he repeats almost nonsensically. If he were to put into words what he needs, he knows Astarion would endeavor to please him. But what he needs is to crawl into Astarion’s very bones and make a home there.
“I know,” Astarion whispers, as if he’d read Gale’s thoughts before even Gale had time to process them and their implications. “Take what you need. Let them know how I please you…”
Gale clutches at Astarion with his free hand, the other working a stuttering rhythm against his beloved, fingers slick and clumsy. His own hips rut against the offered thigh, the fabric of his briefs clinging to his dampness, dragging over Astarion’s smooth skin and leaving it damp, too. The friction against his cock is delicious, just this side of too much, almost not enough. Perfect. His panting is ragged as he tips forward to press his face into Astarion’s neck, gasping as he grinds down hard, chasing the coiling tightness in his belly. His hips shift, the pleasure overriding the twinge he feels in his knee from a decades old injury. He’s tipping, teetering— He feels Astarion’s hole flutter against his fingers and he sees white.
He must have cried out. Distantly, he’s aware of the whistling wings of pigeons vacating the roof of his tower, their roost disturbed. Against him, Astarion sags and trembles, lips against the crown of Gale’s head, mumbling words Gale cannot hear. He feels a kiss pressed into his hair, then another. His robe has pooled onto the floor beneath them, forgotten. When Gale gently removes his hand from Astarion’s briefs, it shimmers in the moonlight with release.
“Well,” Gale begins, voice quiet and rough, “I suppose we’ll need a change of clothes.”
Astarion snorts, pulling away to meet Gale’s gaze. His eyes are dark, fond, crinkled at the corners with amusement. “Or perhaps we’ll wear none at all. You’re coming back to bed, aren’t you?”
Gale’s eyes drift to the night sky once more. The shimmering stars almost seem to wink at them. Delighted.
“Perhaps we should invest in a telescope…”