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Astryx and Minthara walk hand in hand across the grassy field, a githyanki child ahead of them, joyfully sprinting barefoot. “La’ria, watch your step. Should you step on a bee, your mothers would have my head.” Astryx chuckles, her breath catching in her throat as La’ria turns back at her, her face pale in the sunlight.
“Sister, why don’t you just die?”
She sees the cold face speak, the lips her own, but her heart pounds with apprehension at the intruder in her mind. The words were indeed hers, but they were manipulated, coerced.
“Why does she have to look so much like me? I’m nothing anyone should emulate,” Astryx states, struck by La’ria’s uncanny resemblance to herself. She’s not her daughter, but her niece. Her sister had longed resented her for the atrocities she had committed to her as children, her Bhaalspawn mind had been merciless to Arilda. Still, she has allowed her sister to take her daughter for a day at the park, spurred largely by La’ria’s fondness for her aunt.
“She should be proud to look like you, my love, such a strong child she is,”
Minthara notes, her hand squeezing Astryx’s firmly. She knows the moments to comfort her wife, having grown used to the lapses in cognition, how the past constantly threatens to take over the Gith’s guilt-ridden mind. Today is different; it is meant to be different. For they are here for a picnic, just the two of them, with their cherished niece.
“Aunties, you move too slow!” La’ria moans, having already placed a small blue blanket on a flat piece of the rolling green grass. Her small pale hands hold a pimento cheese sandwich, her favorite.
The sun is bright, but the breeze in the air keeps the three women cool as they enjoy their peace. Other couples can be seen in the distance, but they don’t intrude, nor do they do anything to destroy the tranquility.
“I hate you, I think I always will.”
Astryx’s mind rarely offers a reprieve, as she thinks about the very words Arilda told her before they left. A reminder that she will never be forgiven, that she can never be enough. Still, she has trusted Astryx the one thing that matters most to her in the world… surely somewhere, deep inside Arilda’s heart... surely…
“It does no good to dwell. Eat your sandwich, love.” Minthara is there, as she always is, ready to be the hand on Astryx’s shoulder, the constant source of unconditional love.
As the day moves on and the sun travels across the sky, La’ria has found some other children to play with, leaving her aunts to their blue blanket, and to each other.
“You’re not yourself, at all. What happened?” Minthara probes, sensing her wife’s sadness, deep and lasting self loathing.
“She... she said she still hates me… I know I deserve no better, but… just for once I wish we could be sisters, like… like back then.”
Her mind goes inward, towards the remnants of a time before her skin was pale, when she was happy, two githyanki children snuggling together at night, their mother kissing their foreheads.
“You two will be the future, after we are all gone, my babies, Arilda and Astryx.” Their mother had even meant it then, before she changed as well.
“Mother…”
She thinks further: Arilda was gone, as was the creche, all dead or burning by Astryx’s hands. She stares daggers at her mother.
“You can’t help it baby, I know you never could. I’m sorry I let them make you… make you into this my Astryx, starchild.”
Those were mother’s last words, before Astryx slit her throat. She held her, like a precious thing, her hands had no clue what to do, how to stop it. She held her mother as her tear ducts bleed.
“Love, come back, stop torturing yourself.”
Minthara may as well have reached into the memory, her strong arms pulling Astryx back, pulling her away from mother.
“You can never change what has been done, neither can I. We were monsters once and maybe still are, but what matters is the now, not the past.”
Minthara always knows what to say, the best way to ease Astryx’s mind.
“I truly don’t deserve you, any of them. I could spend a lifetime trying to wipe my hands clean, and yet they would still be stained red. That… that girl, my niece, she needs better, much better than me.”
Minthara shakes her head.
“Yet it is you that she wishes to be with. If you close the door every time kindness comes to you, then how can you ever find your peace? The girl sees you as I do, as a kind woman, someone who cares deeply about those she loves.”
Minthara rests her head on Astryx’s chest as the two lay down on the blanket, staring at the blue sky ahead, not a cloud in the sky.
“She loves you. It is allowed, you know.”
Astryx can’t help but chuckle.
“That’s my girl. Your sister will come around, you know. Just give her time.” Astryx feels her heartbeat increase, her anxiety risen by the mention of her sister, Minthara’s grip on her hand tightens, she has noticed this as well.
“I love you,” Astryx speaks. It's all she can say, even as tears drip down her face again–not from sorrow, but an overwhelming sense of happiness. Minthara is right, as always: Astryx has no control over the past, but she has a lifetime to still live. A life with Minthara, La’ria, Arilda, and all her friends.
She thinks back to all her adventures since her mind became her own once again, from a reunion with Arilda, a starlit night where she and Minthara first made love, a day of frivolity and ice cream with her favorite bard, Freya.
“I guess... I guess it isn’t such a bad life, is it?” Minthara doesn’t reply. Instead, she answers with a tender kiss on the lips, a meeting of kindred spirits.
She gently holds Astryx’s hand as she kisses her, her breaths ragged and forced, like someone who had needed air for so long and only felt relief when tasting her partner’s breath. She starts to kiss more forcefully, more plainly. She means to convey that Astryx was hers, body and soul.
Minthara’s passion reminds Astryx of that night long ago, when they kissed inside a little hideaway, as the wretched goblins celebrated their conquest. Astryx had cared little for their plight; she considered goblins to be loathsome creatures. She had never expected Minthara though. `When she first saw into her red eyes, she knew that she would sell the world just to lose herself inside them.
Minthara had first claimed her body that night, as they engaged in a passionate display of dominance under the moonlight, their bodies intertwined almost as much as the blood stained both their hands.
How many lives had been taken for their love? Astryx thinks of this quite often, and while she was no longer a blood crazed demon, at her father’s beck and call. She realizes she doesn't care how many lives were lost, as long as she has Minthara, and Minthara has her.
“I… I love you.” She pulls away from Minthara, taking a gasp of much needed air.
Minthara smirks, her lips stained ruby red from her partner’s lipstick. “Of course you do.” She chuckles and continues her assault.
They spend more precious moments lost in each other, but soon the two women are no longer intertwined, their eyes turning upwards as they examine the clouds. “I’ve said I love you... twice now today, and yet you haven’t replied. `Why is that?” Astryx asks.
“Really, do my actions not speak to my emotions, or does the poison on your lips not provide sufficient evidence of my everlasting devotion?”
Astryx tastes the sweet death on her lips; it is a small amount, not enough to kill. She smirks, knowing she has done the same to Minthara. “Someday perhaps we’ll put too much, and then what?” She smirks, pondering such a peaceful death.
“Then we shall reach eternity together, as we should. Whether it be fire and damnation or not, I shall remain yours, eternally. I love you, too.” Minthara smiles, holding the hand of her beloved wife.
“If you could redo all of this, my pet, all your hardships with your family and that tainted bloodline. Meeting me and becoming whatever this is. Would you?”
Minthara poses a question that is very uncharacteristic of her naturally confident persona. Astryx struggles at first to answer, a life where she could have lived without those urges, without becoming a monster. It is enticing, truly, the Gith can’t deny it. She also can’t deny that Minthara means everything to her, and while her heart and mind may be scarred, this is the timeline that she finds someone to cover those scars, and to ease the burden of life.
“No, I would do it a hundred times more, if you are at the end of it all,” Astryx answers poetically, but sweetness and subtlety were gone from her partner’s mind. Her lips hunger for Astryx, to taste her mouth, to feel their hearts beating as one.
They lay in that moment, lost in each other and their love, until a small voice disturbs their tranquility.
“Ew, get a room.”
La’ria smiles as she stands over them. Her knees were scabby and her shorts covered in all manner of dirt and mud, but she was happy.
“The sun's getting low, aunties, moms will be missing me.”
La’ria smiles and takes her spot in between the two women, they clean up and prepare for the walk back to La’ria’s home.
“You know, child, you are quite impudent sometimes.” Minthara chuckles, her eyes look different when she stares at her niece, almost maternal. Astryx notices it too.
“I have to be im-pew-dent when I spend all day playing, just to find my aunties playing nightcrawlers together.”
Astryx swallows hard even as Minthara laughs. “Nightcrawlers? Is that what they have taught you about making love? I shall teach you child. The way of the birds and the beholders.”
Astryx tunes them out as she sees Arilda in her mind’s eye, young and un-scarred, sitting on the bed in their dorm in the creche. She smiles at her sister, her eyes eager for mischief. “Let’s play Nightcrawlers again, Asty, I bet I win this time!” The older sister laughs, only minutes older, yet she has taken on the more protective role in the pair.
They play, rolling together like creatures of the night, laughing and giggling. Astryx felt pain every time they had played back then, pain in her heart. She wanted to hurt something, to kill it.
“We’re here, aunties!”
The three arrive back at the small house that Arilda, Lae’zel and La’ria call home. They step inside, and Astryx sees Arilda’s face, scarred, scared. Arilda cringes every time she sees Astryx, and rightfully so. Astryx remembers how Arilda’s neck felt in her hands the last time they played, how she longed to break it. Now she feels only to hug and hold her, but she has to earn that.
“Ari－Arilda, can I talk to you, please?”
Arilda stares at her sister, reluctantly allowing her inside. They walk to the bedroom, locking the door. Arilda stands, allowing Astryx to sit on the bed, and say what is on her mind, a mind that feels more clear than it has in years.
“I’ve tried apologies, and gifts, I’ve tried explaining in letters, but you still look at me like a monster, like I’m going to hurt you. You hate me, and I accept that. Somedays…most days, I hate me too, but I’m still your sister.”
Astryx stands up and reaches out to Arilda, pulling her into an awkward hug.
“I don’t care if you hate me the rest of your life, I still love you, my baby sister, and I’ll always be there for you.”
Arilda sinks into her arms, her body convulsing as she attempts to hold back tears. Years of building up walls to protect herself crumble away and they stand again, as they once were and would always be, sisters.
“Do you want to stay for dinner?” Arilda forces the words out of her lips, a look of genuine hope on her face.
“That sounds lovely, I’d love to... I’d love to stay for dinner,” Astryx answers, her face scrunching up as well. She struggles to handle negative emotions, and has been taught to hold back tears, a sign of weakness.
She didn’t hold back now. She’d rather be weak, rather be vulnerable, if it meant she could feel such joy as today brings.
“I’m sorry for saying that I hated you…I can’t forget my past, or what you and I both did, but it shouldn’t mean I can’t see you for who you are today... big sis.”
The pair hug, walking back in as Minthara gives an anatomy lesson in the kitchen.
“Why is the drow explaining these things to my child!?”
Lae’zel enters the house once more, and her wrath is felt in a fiery tirade, lambasting the pair for every scrape on La’ria, every bit of dirt on her carefully prepared clothes, but it soon fades, as the small Gith looks up at her stern mother.
“I had a great time with my aunties. Why can’t we all be together more often?”
“I think that's a good idea, baby, what do you say… sister?” Arilda looks at Astryx, that same smile from years ago on her face.
“Anytime Ari, anytime.”