Rune’s not so good with romantic words. He’s not so great with romantic gifts either.
Written for the ficwip 2024 ‘hey, sweetheart’ event
Since he woke on the Nautiloid, words have been difficult for Rune. Perhaps it’s the head-trauma and the parasite burrowing into his brain, or perhaps he’s always been a lumpen-tongued creature, unable to translate thought to coherent speech. So far he’s scraped by, bludgeoning his way through conversations like a back-alley boxer, bare-knuckled and brutal, but now he finds himself in need of more than a fistful of words.
Astarion gives him a headache with all the thoughts he can’t get from one side of his scarred skull to the other. Compliments and pet names and assurances flow from his—partner? bedmate? lover? friend?—companion like wine. Rune skips being drunk on it and goes straight to the hangover, unable to reciprocate. It’s infuriating. He killed a fucking orthon, why are a few affectionate words so damn difficult?
There are other ways to speak. Pictures say a thousand words, or so it goes. Items can be your voice, say what you can’t. Rune’s no painter, but he knows what Astarion enjoys.
His gut churns as he crosses the camp, his unspeakable words clasped in a clammy fist behind his back. Astarion glances up from his book, smile half-shadowed in the firelight. It makes him look Rune’s favourite kind of dangerous; a night-predator, eyes aglint and aglow.
“Need something?” he asks, setting his book aside, then blinks at the object Rune drops into his lap. “What’s this?”
“Affection,” Rune says. Astarion snorts a laugh.
“Darling, this is a knife. It still has blood on it.”
“You like knives. And blood.”
The snort becomes a full-bodied laugh, head thrown back, mouth wide enough to show red tongue, white fangs. The hollow core of Rune’s head turns in on itself, growling to cover the whimper of humiliation. Go somewhere dark, cut something open and crawl inside, this never happened, this never happened, this never happened. He starts to turn away—Astarion leaps up and catches his wrist.
“You’re right,” he says. “I do like knives. And blood.” Hesitation. “And you.”
Rune swallows. “I want to say things. To you. And I can’t.”
“Thus the knife.”
Astarion examines it for a moment, considering, then tosses it aside. It hits his discarded book and thumps off the cover—the sound reverberates in Rune’s head, but before it can crescendo to murderous levels of anguish, Astarion takes his face in both hands.
“Don’t worry so much about saying things, sweetheart.”
He pulls Rune into a kiss, and Rune grips his waist tight, holding him close. There’s a knot just left of his heart, a tangled, bloody skein of firelit eyes, the white arch of a brow, the shift of weight before the throw of a knife; of skin pale as bone and soft as silk, a sharp laugh and sharper teeth; of need and want and fear sunk in like claws.
Astarion draws back.
“I hear you,” he says. Taps Rune’s temple. “And even without these little go-betweens, you’re loud enough.” He puts his palm to Rune’s chest, over his heart. “I hear you, love.”
The knot unravels ever so slightly. Rune lays his hand over Astarion’s.
“So no knives?”
Astarion grins. “Well, I’ll never say no to a decent blade. I do so enjoy a good stabbing.”
Rune barks a laugh, and lets his vampire drag him into their tent, where they speak without words until the sun comes up.
