Page 53 of Astarion

Jingle, jingle, jingle…

Stomp.

Perhaps I am dead, Astarion thought, and in Hell.

Clank.

Astarion stayed behind him, both to cover his lack of shadow and to use the man as a shield when the enemy inevitably heard them.

Den Suriel reached the halfway point of the hallway and suddenly broke into a run.

Clank-clink-jingle-jingle-stomp-stomp-stomp!

The paladin hit the half-open door like a charging bull. The hinges did indeed squeal, but this was nothing compared to the slam as the door hit the wall. The skeleton guards spun around so quickly that one’s arm bones got caught on the other’s broken ribs.

Astarion, standing in the middle of the hallway without weapons, cover, or a plan, lifted a hand and said, “So sorry to be a bother, but I’m afraid the maid hasn’t turned my cell yet. Do be a dear and send her along?”

The skeletons took a step forward together. One had a sword, and the other had a truncheon. Neither seemed to have a sense of humor.

“What in the Nine Hells is going on down there?” called the jailor. The scrape of a chair indicated that the mummy was getting up.

“Nothing!” Astarion called. It probably wouldn’t work, but you never knew unless you tried.

The mummy appeared in the doorway, slablike features pulling into a frown. It lifted its strangely cut fingers and uttered something arcane.

Something green and glowing appeared in front of Astarion, just as den Suriel erupted into the hall.

“For Lathander!” he roared in a voice like thunder, smashing his shield into the skeleton guards. “For Ilmater! For the Badger!”

“For fuck’s sake…” Astarion might have said more, but the green glowing thing resolved into a sword hanging in midair, which promptly tried to decapitate him.

The skeletons went down in a pile of bones. Astarion hit the ground, rolled, saw the sword stabbing down at him, and kept rolling. Briefly, upside down, he watched the paladin jam his shield into the mummy’s face and force it back through the doorway.

While Astarion had no real desire to be in the same room as an enraged mummy and the sort of person who would shout “For the Badger!” with such enthusiasm, it seemed like a better prospect than being hacked apart by a spectral weapon. He dove through the door and fetched up under the table.

Den Suriel drove his sword through the mummy. The mummy looked down at the blade protruding from its chest and broke into that unsettling cold-water laugh. Then it punched den Suriel in the head.

“Things going well, I see,” Astarion said as the paladin hit the floor in front of him. Den Suriel got his shield up just in time as the mummy rained blows onto it.

“If only I had my holy symbol!”

“If only I had a dozen flasks of alchemist’s fire. While we’re wishing, I would also like untold riches, sexual inexhaustibility, and perhaps a pony.”

“See, I wouldn’t want that,” den Suriel said, kicking the mummy in the knee. Corpse wax splattered under his boot, and the monster roared.

“Oh?” Astarion was briefly distracted by the spectral weapon, which had finally located him. He grabbed the jailor’s chair and yanked it in front of him. The sword chopped futilely at its wooden back.

“I’d just give the riches to the temple, I’m too tall for a pony, and…” He managed to grab the hilt of the sword protruding from the mummy’s chest and yank it free, taking a large chunk of the mummy with it. The backhanded slash took the monster’s head off and sent it bouncing across the floor. More wax splattered with every bounce. Den Suriel reached down and offered Astarion a hand up. “I’m already sexually inexhaustible.”

That caught Astarion by surprise. Gods above and below, he is flirting with me. “I see the gods don’t mind bragging,” he said, a trifle breathlessly.

The aasimar grinned at him. “What can I say? They require us to speak the truth.”

Damnation, the man really was attractive. Astarion had used sex as a weapon for so long that actually being attracted to someone was both delightful and mildly annoying. Like having a favorite outfit and seeing someone else wearing it. And making it look good, too.

The last time he’d been genuinely attracted to someone had been…gods, who had it been? Oh yes, that lovely little assassin from Phlan. Body of an acrobat and morals of a rutting barracuda. Was that before or after that charming blacksmith I climbed like a tree? No, had to be after. The one before the blacksmith was that diplomatic functionary from Cormyr. He’d actually convinced Cazador that kidnapping the woman would cause a political crisis and had handed over information about a number of upcoming trade deals instead. The blacksmith hadn’t been so lucky. The assassin he’d actually had to put down himself. Some people’s ideas of proper postcoital activity were exceedingly uncivilized.

Then there had been Sebastian, that first decade after he’d been turned, and that…