#5.1k

And if his lack of coin meant he sometimes availed himself of a trinket or two via five-finger discount? Well, there were worse crimes he could be committing.

(and very likely would be, before the night was over)

Last year had been the first one he’d missed in a decade. With their party smack in the middle of their Illithid Issue and arriving in Baldur’s Gate at the tail end of the season, they’d missed the last night by just two days. But this year, this year, for the very first time, he didn’t have to leave before the midnight bell to lure away some unfortunate victim for Cazador. In fact, he could stay all night if he really wanted to. And he wasn’t alone! This time he had people that he could share the night with, no lonely wandering for him!

As it turned out, of the five people (and one Tressem) in their group tonight, he’s the only one who had ever actually been to the Night Market before. Tav and Shadowheart were both still missing the majority of their pre-Nautiloid memories, Gale and Tara had never stepped foot (or paw) in the city prior to their adventure last year, and they hadn’t even known Astraea existed yet when the last one was open. This made him, by process of elimination, the resident expert on what was worth seeing and which booths had the most promising stock, a job he was taking very seriously.

“You’re really going to tell me that the magic show isn’t worth even a peek?” Gale asks from Astarion’s left, waving a flyer advertising a show called “Mirage Arcane!” at him as their group walks through the archway that opens up into The Wide.

He scoffs as he snatches the flyer from Gale’s hand, crumbles it, and tosses it to the side, ignoring Tara’s scolding meow of “Mister Ancunin! Littering!” from where she’s perched on Gale’s shoulder. “Not even a little,” he says. “Trust me, Volo’s unenthusiastic performance at the goblin camp puts their little light show to shame. Besides, you’ve already seen it, and if I recall, you weren’t terribly impressed last time.”

“When? I think I would remember having been to a show like this, and I can assure you, I’ve never visited the Night Market here before.”

“It’s the same three obnoxious idiots who spend all day in front of Sorcerous Sundries loudly casting unimpressive spells and making the square all but uninhabitable.”

“Ah,” Gale says, his face going carefully blank in the way it does when he’s thinking very judgmental thoughts about another practitioner’s magical skills but is trying to pretend that he isn’t. “In that case, I think I’ll second us giving it a pass. I’m sure there are much more interesting things we could be doing with our time tonight, and my experience last time is not one I’m keen to repeat.”

“What happened last time, Mister Dekarios?” Tara asks.

“Ah, well, um, nothing exciting,” Gale stammers, a faint blush creeping over his cheeks. “Merely a minor disagreement between myself and them. Terribly boring, really!”

Astarion snorts. “Ah, yes, your ‘minor disagreement’ that got the Flaming Fists called on us,” he says, then leans forward and catches Tara’s eye. “He nearly got arrested.”

Tara clicks her tongue, “Really, Mister Dekarios! Their lackluster wizardry notwithstanding, what on Toril did you do to warrant having the authorities summoned against you?”

“Nothing untoward!” Gale says, “I merely told them that all the noise was irritating, unnecessary, and unbecoming of the craft, and asked them to tone it down a bit.”

At Tara’s silent glare, he continues, “I also… may have… possibly… insinuated that, if they actually had any technical skill, they wouldn’t need to resort to such ridiculous distractions to draw the eye away from their poor somatics.”

“What he means to say,” Shadowheart cuts in, “is that he got in a shouting match with three street performers over spellcasting techniques. And then, when the Fists tried to break it up and threatened to arrest him for disrupting the peace when he wouldn’t back down, he told them the real crime was the ‘Absolute lack of anything resembling magical literacy in this city,’ and followed that up by calling them ‘Gortash’s boot-licking mercenary force.’ Loudly. In front of several dozen witnesses.”

“Mister Dekarios!” Tara gasps. “Well, I should hope the Blackstaff never hears of this. You’re not tenured yet, and I think we’ve dealt with enough scandal for one lifetime. And what would dear Morena think if she knew you were off acting the ruffian in the town square?”

“I don’t know, I thought it was pretty funny,” Tav says from his other side, patting Astraea’s back in an attempt to coax a burp out of her now that she’d finished her dinner. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Gale so furious before! His face was so red when he was shouting at that Fist that I thought he was going to pop a blood vessel, and it only got better when Shadowheart cast Silence over them all mid-argument.” She laughs as she continues, “Gods, I thought they were going to start tackling each other once they realized yelling and spells were off the table. And then-” she breaks off into a fit of giggles, “and then, Gale just, he just hauled off and punched the Fist he was yelling at! Right in the face! Dropped him like a stone!”

“We didn’t even get to finish our shopping because we had to run before the Steel Watch got there,” Shadowheart says, laughing as she recalls their escape and mad dash through the city’s streets, “but you should have seen Gale’s face when he realized what he’d done.” She wipes a tear from her eye, “Lae’zel was so proud! She practically paraded him around camp after dinner that night!”

Tara says nothing, merely staring judgmentally at the side of Gale’s face while he keeps his eyes fixed ahead and does his best to avoid looking at her, her silence a response in itself.

“Yes, well,” Gale says, clearing his throat, “in my defense, our visit to the Stormshore Tabernacle that morning had left me more than a little rattled and on edge. Suffice to say, I think we can skip this particular attraction.”

“Anyway,” Astarion interjects with a clap of his hands, redirecting the conversation back to the most important topic of the evening, “as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted with that stupid flyer, we don’t need to decide, because I already know what we’re doing first. We’re going to go see the real star of the market.”

“And who would that be?” Tav asks.

“Elt’aiir the Elemental Sword-cerer,” he says, turning to face them and walking backwards, throwing his arms wide as he expounds on the best act the Night Market’s ever had, much to Tav’s amusement. “Terrible pun name aside, there’s nothing else like him! He’s a Tabaxi, and he says he’s a sorcerer, but I think he’s actually a bard, and he pulls elemental swords out of thin air to use in his acts. Juggling swords made of water, knife throwing at his assistant with knives of pure lightning that boom thunder when they hit the target, all sorts of things!” As he describes each act, he enthusiastically mimes the actions as if he were performing the tricks himself. “His closing act is sword swallowing. The last one is always a longsword made of blue fire, and I’ve been trying to figure out how he does it for the last twelve years. My current theory is that he’s figured out how to cast Arcane Gate inside his mouth.” He whips back around again to face the direction they’re walking, pounding a fist into his palm, “I just need to catch him casting it to finally prove it.”

“That’s not how-” Gale starts to say, but Tav catches his eye and cuts him off with a shake of her head, mouthing Let him have this.

She settles Astraea back in the wrap on her chest, having given up on getting a burp out of her for now, then steps up to Astarion’s side and takes his hand. “That sounds exciting, I can’t wait to see it!” She swings their clasped hands between them as they walk, “Lead on, my love.”

── ･✩*₊˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖₊*✩･ ──

They had finished watching Elt’aiir’s show nearly twenty minutes ago, and Astarion and Gale were still bickering about it as they walked through the market, with neither looking like they were going to run out of steam any time soon. It didn’t help that their respective arguments boiled down to “That’s not how Arcane Gate works!” versus “Just because you can’t do it, oh great Archwizard, doesn’t mean it can’t be done!” and the rest of the group had reached the end of their patience.

“Boys!” Tara yells from where she’s settled in Shadowheart’s arms, voice thundering from the Thaumaturgy she cast on herself. Both men startle and stop dead in their tracks, their attention snapping to the Tressem, as do several other patrons in the vicinity, though they all breathe a sigh of relief and carry on their way once they realize the shouting isn’t directed at them. “I think we all would appreciate a change of subject, don’t you?”

A mutual embarrassed fidgeting and polite mumbles of “Right, yes, of course,” are enough to soothe Tara’s irritation. They are not, however, enough to stop Shadowheart and Tav from shooting each other a look and only barely keep themselves from cracking up at the sight of these two grown men, a former-Chosen Archwizard and a deadly vampiric Assassin, accomplished adventurers and actual saviors of the world, cowed by the ire of an eight-pound winged cat.

Tara settles herself more firmly in Shadowheart’s hold, “Now that that’s settled, I wonder if we might find our way to a bit of something to eat? All this mediating does make one quite famished.” She tilts her head to look up at the cleric holding her, “Unless I’m mistaken, I believe that you and I share a fondness for seafood, Miss Hallowleaf?”

Shadowheart nods, looking at the nearby stalls, “We do, though I’m not sure there will be much fish for sale at night.” She wrinkles her nose, “Or how fresh it will be if there is any.”

“Most of the food is going to be either rare ingredients, delicacies, or imports,” Astarion says. “But there’s a vendor around here somewhere who makes dishes from exotic fish. Underdark Pyrimo, Singing Fish from Akanamere, Amnian Dunchow, that sort of thing. He keeps the fish in magical cooling barrels so they stay fresh.” His mouth turns up in a lopsided smile, “I tried to make off with one once a few years ago, thought I could bleed the fish dry then make some good coin selling them and the barrel to one of the taverns.”

“Bold,” Shadowheart says, one eyebrow raised, “did it actually work?”

“Oh not at all, they’re much heavier than they look, I didn’t even manage to move the thing away from the stack. It turns out ‘easy as shooting fish in a barrel’ doesn’t apply to stealing actual barrels of fish.”

“Speaking of barrels,” Tav interrupts, “Harkon and Elsie have a stall here, and I just remembered I have an order I was supposed to pick up from them earlier today.” She hands Astraea to her father and begins undoing the baby wrap from around her chest, then starts wrapping it around him once she finishes. “You guys go on ahead, and I’ll find you once I’m done, okay?”

Astarion holds Astraea out at arm’s length, making faces that have her smiling and kicking her feet in delight while Tav works on wrapping the long strip of fabric around his chest and over his shoulders. “Why don’t we just come with you?” he offers, “I’m sure no one will mind a detour. And besides, I don’t know that any of us should be wandering alone this late.”

“No, it’s okay. You know how Harkon is, it’ll be five minutes of paying for the order and another twenty-five of conversation. An hour if Astraea’s there for him to fuss over. There’s no sense in everyone being held up for me.” She tucks the end of the fabric in and Astarion settles Astraea into the wrap’s secured folds. “And besides,” Tav says, kissing Astarion’s cheek and flashing a toothy grin, “we both know that I’m the most dangerous thing lurking in the dark tonight.”

He looks down into his daughter’s big blue eyes, taking her little hands in his as he coos, “Do you hear that, little dove? Your mother is abandoning us to run off on adventures of her own. I suppose I must raise you alone now, just the two of us devastatingly beautiful creatures against the world.” Tav’s laugh rings like a bell at his faux dramatics, and she blows a kiss as she backs away, before she turns and disappears into the crowd as she heads off in the direction of Harkon’s stall.

 “Well, my sweet, chin up,” he says to Astraea, “we shall weather this storm with the same poise and grace that we always do.” Astarion mimes wiping a tear from his eye, “Now, I’m sure there’s nothing palatable for you or I in this barren wasteland, but we must be strong and lead these fragile mortals to their dinner regardless.”

Shadowheart rolls her eyes, but she and the others follow him as he leads them through the market. “Keep that up and one day she’ll be an even bigger drama queen than you are.”

He weaves his way through the crowd, but at her comment he places a hand on his chest and gives a dramatic gasp. “Perish the thought!” he says, turning his nose up, “My throne is eternal.”

── ･✩*₊˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖₊*✩･ ──

Once dinner is acquired and consumed, they spend the next half hour wandering the market, making occasional purchases of trinkets as they browse the various stalls. At some point, Gale and Shadowheart had decided to make a game of trying every snack they came across that they didn’t recognize, followed by a review for those in their group who couldn’t partake. So far, the leading dish was the Phoenix Wings, fried chicken wings covered in a very spicy sauce made of Maztican peppers, which they’d both enjoyed immensely despite it leaving them red-faced and sweating. The worst dish, by far, was a tie for the bottom between a stew called Bhaerulb, which neither of them realized before taking the first bite was composed mostly of onions and mealworms, and something called “Gelatinous Cube Gelatin,” which was served as four jelly-like, translucent, electric-green cubes skewered on a stick, each quivering threateningly as the stick was handed over by the cook.

They’d both managed to choke down that single bite of the stew, and Gale had muscled through finishing half of his cubes before giving up, but Shadowheart took a single nibble of the gelatin and promptly spit it right back out. After that, a short break and a glass of wine to cleanse the palate was called for immediately.

Now, recovered from that experience, they had come to a very busy stall serving something Astarion had never seen before: Iced Cream. It was a strange little dessert, and it had caught his eye immediately thanks to the crowd of eager patrons attracted by the allure of a cold treat on such a warm night. It looked somewhat like yogurt, but it was chilled, leaving the consistency rather paste-like from what he could see. The purveyor was scooping it into spheres, serving it on top of hollow cones made of some sort of crisp cookie and in paper cups with cookie spoons.

There were at least two dozen flavors to choose from, mostly composed of the cream mixed with local summer fruits, but there were a few odder flavors, as well as vanilla and chocolate. Gale and Shadowheart each went for one of the fruit flavors, while Tara braved one of the more… exotic options (who puts lobster of all things in frozen sweet cream??). After some deliberation, Astarion selected a paper cup of the strawberry-flavored one for Tav, which Gale kindly cast a preservation spell on to keep it from melting.

Then, at the very end of the row, amongst the few too-weird-to-be-serious flavors that had been relegated to the corner (mealworms again? Who was this even for??), he spies one labeled “Vampire’s Delight.” Pointing it out to the vendor, he’s informed that that one is flavored with pig’s blood, spices, and brandy, and upon trying a sample, Astarion is in fact delighted to find that it actually does taste quite good, so he quickly procures a cup of his own. Snacks in hand, the group moves to sit at a nearby picnic table to finish them before they melt.

Rising to throw away his emptied cup once he’d finished, Astarion looks down at Astraea in her wrap and realizes that she’s the only one who hadn’t gotten a treat. Not wanting her to feel left out, he goes back and looks over the flavors again, reasoning that, since cream was made of milk, then a small scoop for a creature who lived entirely on milk wouldn’t go amiss. After a moment, he selects the chocolate, since it was one of the few flavors that didn’t have any chunky ingredients. Plus, he’s pretty sure chocolate is at least partially made of milk, anyway.

Returning to the table and his seat next to Shadowheart, he removes Astraea from the wrap and places her on his lap facing toward the cup, holding her steady with a hand on her chest. With his other hand, he reaches to scoop a spoonful of the iced cream.

“Should she eat that?” Shadowheart asks, giving a dubious look to the bowl, “I don’t think babies are supposed to have chocolate.”

He flaps his spoon-laden hand dismissively, “It’s fine, it’s just a few spoonfuls, it’s not like I’m giving her an entire bucket of the stuff. Worst case, she develops a taste for expensive desserts that I’ll have to pay for.”

Shadowheart doesn’t look convinced, though. “I thought she wasn’t old enough for solids yet?”

“It’s not a solid,” Astarion says, tipping the spoon to show the smooth texture of the food, “I made sure to pick one that didn’t have any lumps in it, I’m not a complete idiot.”

“It might not have any lumps she’d need to chew, but it is frozen, so it is still very much a solid, Astarion,” Gale says from across the table.

“Sure, but once it’s in your mouth it melts into a liquid. And, since this is iced cream, that liquid is basically milk.” He moves to bring the spoon toward Astraea’s mouth, “Really, the only difference between this and what she normally has is that it’s cold.” Tilting his head in thought, he corrects himself, “Well, that and, as far as I’m aware, Tav’s doesn’t come in chocolate.”

Tara pauses in her grooming and wrinkles her nose, “Mister Ancunin, don’t be crass.”

He scoffs. “Is it crass, dear Tara, to appreciate that the mother of my child, in addition to her infinite other wonderful qualities, is also managing to be a one-woman meal train for this voracious little monster?” He smiles at Astraea and gives her a playful wiggle with the hand holding her up, “Honestly, I don’t know how Tav keeps up with this little beastie’s demands. I swear, she spends half of her waking hours eating, and gods help us all if her meal is delayed in the slightest, because her patience is nonexistent and her wrath knows no bounds.”

“So what I’m hearing is that she takes after you,” Shadowheart says with a smirk.

His very intelligent and mature rebuttal of sticking his tongue out at her earns him the same in response.

Turning his attention back to his daughter, he moves the spoon back toward Astraea’s mouth, and she furrows her brow in confusion as she attempts to smack a chubby little hand at it. When she doesn’t open her mouth, he smears a bit of the chocolate onto her lips instead, causing a little pink tongue to flick out and capture the strange substance. Upon tasting the iced cream, Astraea’s eyebrows shoot up and her eyes go wider than he’s ever seen them, locking on to the spoon still hovering in front of her like a fox that’s sighted a hare, her little body wiggling in excitement as she uses what little coordination she has to reach for it.

“See?” he says smugly, moving the spoon back to Astraea’s mouth and letting her have the rest of the bite, “She likes it!” Once she releases the spoon, he coos to her, “Is that good, darling? Would you like another bite?” and her excited kicking is all the answer he needs. He dips the spoon in the cup and brings it to her mouth again, “Here we are, open up,” and continues like that until the bowl is empty and Astraea’s face is more chocolate than baby.

Once he gets Astraea cleaned up and back in her wrap, they continue on their walk through the market, browsing stalls and picking up things here and there. They stop for a few minutes to watch a bard dancing while playing her violin, the notes floating up from her instrument as glittering multi-hued bubbles that float out to the audience, popping with a burst of sparkles. Astraea is entranced, her little ears twitching with excitement as she watches the bubbles float past her. She makes a noise of curiosity as one of the bubbles floats close to her hands, but it pops right in front of her, startling her and causing her to let out a little hiccup.

A second hiccup jolts through her, and she looks confused at this turn of events.

A third, and she turns her face up to look at her father.

A few more, and her bottom lip starts a telltale quiver as her eyes go wide and wet.

They decide it’s best they find a quieter area posthaste.

As they make their way toward the park at the edge of the market, Astraea’s fussing gains in both intensity and volume, her initial grumbly complaints progressing to grizzling whines between the hiccups that continue to plague her. Astarion can tell she’s ready for bed by the way she’s rubbing her face into his shirt, one little hand resting on his chest while the other makes its way to her mouth. The hiccups prevent her from nodding off like she usually would, though, her teary eyes starting to drift closed only to pop open again with each one.

He does his best to soothe her, but the pats he’s giving to her back do nothing, and she kicks her feet crankily as the hiccups continue to disturb her. He’s just turning to ask the others if they’d be okay with finding Tav and heading home a little early tonight, when they’re all taken by surprise as something explodes nearby, the booming noise causing Astraea to finally start crying in earnest.

Expecting an attack, one hand shoots up to cover Astraea’s back as the other pulls his dagger from its sheath on his belt. He quickly looks around him and catches sight of Gale, Tara, and Shadowheart, each having dropped into their own combat stance, their eyes and hands glowing with readied spells.

Before he can do anything else, another explosion shakes the sky, the thunderous noise filling the air, followed by a series of smaller popping sounds and two more echoing booms, and he feels the heat of impending battle settle on his skin. Trying to lay eyes on his foe, he looks up, and there he sees it.

Sprays of red and gold, blue and silver, purples and pinks and greens and yellows filling the sky above them.

“Fireworks,” he breathes out, eyes closing for a moment in relief.

He feels his shoulders drop and the tension leave his spine as he realizes there’s no enemy, just a too-loud light show, and out of the corner of his eye he sees his friends doing the same, Tara slowly lowering her hackles as Gale shakes remnants of the Weave from his hands and Shadowheart dismisses her Spirit Guardians.

“It’s just the fireworks show.” He turns to them and lets out a small, embarrassed laugh at their collective overactive battle-readiness. “I forgot all about it, I didn’t get to stay this late most years,” he explains, swaying and bouncing a still-crying Astraea. “I don’t know why they’re launching them from the other side of the park though, usually they do it from the harbor. You’d think-”

His explanation is cut off when, upon resuming patting his daughter’s back, there is a wet, squelching sound.

Very quickly, he realizes three things:

The “heat of battle” he’d felt a moment ago hadn’t dissipated in the wake of his discovering there were no enemies to slay.

His entire front and the area underneath the palm he has on Astraea’s back are both, distressingly, very wet.

There is a godsawful smell emanating up from the crying little bundle strapped to his chest.

He freezes in place, ears pinned back, taking in the wide-eyed surprise on all three of his companions’ faces as they’re all hit with the odious scent now wafting through the air. He closes his eyes and lets out a long breath, before looking down to survey the damage.

To say he’s a mess would be an understatement. It’s like Astraea’s somehow opened a portal to a sewer dimension in her diaper. It’s up her back, somehow all the way to her hair, and it’s completely covered his front, his shirt and the wrap saturated with what should be far too much waste for someone so small to make. It is, truly, everywhere, having soaked through all the layers of fabric between them. He shivers involuntary in revulsion and has to stop himself from retching when he feels a drop fall down to splatter on his boot.

That causes Tara to make a face, flapping her wings once as she says, “I’ll just go and check in on Miss Tavrya, shall I?” and takes off into the night.

Astarion turns to his friends. Gale has schooled his face into a careful mask of emotionless neutrality, though he doesn’t quite manage to suppress a gag, while Shadowheart has covered her mouth and nose with her hands in an attempt to keep the smell out, though he can also see her shoulders vibrating in what he knows is laughter at his expense.

He points at her threateningly. “Not. A word.”

Her control slips for a moment, and she lets out a snort of laughter, though she at least tries to cover it with a cough.

“Will you please just get over here and help me?” he growls, pointing at his Bag of Holding on the ground by the bench. “There are supplies for her in there, as well as a towel and one of my spare shirts if you’d be so kind as to toss those to me.” He looks down at the mess he’s covered in. “Or maybe just the towel to start.”

Shadowheart goes for the bag, picking it up and reaching an arm in as she starts pulling things out and handing them to Gale. The wind shifts direction to blow from behind Astarion, and she wrinkles her nose, her eyes watering a bit. “Gods, that’s really bad,” she says, finally finding the towel and pulling it out of the bag, “how in the gods’ names can someone so cute make something so foul?”

He looks down at the little poo-monster still strapped to his chest, no longer crying, though she looks ready to start up again at any moment. “Your guess is as good as mine,” he says, “though I’m beginning to suspect some sort of infernally-powered bowels.” Astraea shifts in his arms, and the smell hits him full force again, “Ugh, I don’t think I’ve smelled this awful since we ran into that crazy sorcerer and his Grease Elementals while searching through the Undercity for Bhaal’s temple.”

“Well, look on the bright side,” Gale says as Shadowheart holds the towel out to Astarion, “at least her hiccups are gone now.”

As if summoned, Astraea hiccups once more and lets out a wet-sounding burp.

And as he reaches for the towel, he feels his front become absolutely soaked with something warm and slimy and, disgustingly, still chocolate scented.

Ah.

So not just wet-sounding, then.

Holding one last spark of hope that he’s wrong, he feels that spark die as he looks down to see that Astraea’s covered them both in what appears to be every drop of the iced cream and then some. It’s all down both her front and his, all over the wrap, and thanks to the open collar and lace-up front, she’d even managed to get it up his neck and inside his shirt.

Shadowheart stands, frozen, looking back and forth between him and the towel in her hand.

Then, Astarion’s ears twitch as he catches the sound of familiar footsteps approaching, and he sighs in resignation, his head dropping in defeat.

The footsteps come to an abrupt stop a few feet away. He hears Tav’s hand slap over her mouth and nose as her muffled voice rings out from behind him.

“Gods above! Why do you guys smell like chocolate and ass?!”