#oc luna

This is Silk finding out that this chick they've been running with (and have been starting to develop kind of a fixation on for totally unsuspect reasons) ate their ex-girlfriend's soul a few years ago. What do you do when you find out someone you loved and feared and felt held but trapped by has crossed oceans of time and passed the very gates of death itself to find you again through the body of their own murderer? What do you do to that murderer when they contain everything that's left of that person? What about if you were always taught that the very act of murder-and-consumption was the highest sacrament and greatest personal attainment there is?

You freak it.

Really, absolutely no one in this scene is having a normal one, or getting out of it unscathed. (Except maybe the nice lady in the next room, whose biggest problem right now is that she's still awake and working in the dead hours just before dawn.)

Chapter One

Luna had seen a lot in her life but the events of the last tenday had left her unsettled and she didn’t care much for the feeling. It was probably the fact that she’d experienced true terror before in her past and she wasn’t keen to relive it again so soon. She was relatively young for her kind, only 50 or so years old, as a half-drow that settled her in her final years as a young adult. Were she human she might be considered middle aged or even older by the archaic standards by which they viewed women.

I guess that was something the drow do have right, holding our older women in reverence.

She shook the thought away, she knew the cost of that reverence was absolute tyranny under Lolth. Pushing her long white hair out of her eyes she peered out from her bedroll at her strange new companions. Sleep wouldn’t come easy for her and so she silently stood and retreated from the circle of safety in which they slept each night. Their forms were still, save for Karlach who let out a snore and a grunt every so often.

A tiefling barbarian powered by infernal mechanics, an vampiric elf with tragedy in his eyes, a cursed human man with too much mystery to make him simply a harmless wizard, a fairytale prince with a dark past, an alien from a different plane whose hardened armor likely shielded more than just her body, and another half human stuck worshipping a terrible goddess for unclear reasons.

The half smile that crept across her face in the moonlight held warmth. She couldn’t help but already feel a certain attachment to them. Was it too soon to call them friends? How does one describe a group of perfect strangers who are about to risk their lives together?   They were on the eve of storming a massive goblin war encampment. Where hopefully they’d be able to retrieve a Druid who might be able to heal them of the mindflayer tadpoles they’d found themselves infected with at the start of their adventure.

Halsin, they’d called him.

The handsome older tiefling at the grove seemed certain that if anyone could set everything to rights, it would be him. Luna held no love for the Druids of the Emerald Grove for she had seen their cruelty firsthand. While her Goddess, Eilstraee called her to good, it had been all she could do not to rip out the Druid Kagha’s throat when she had discovered her holding a child under the threat of death by a venomous snake. She could have killed a little tiefling girl all over a statue.

As a Cleric, her reverence for her Goddess was absolute but she was certain that the Dark Maiden wouldn’t call on her followers to kill children for removing a statue. Luna wasn’t educated in the ways of Sylvanus but surely he wouldn’t have wanted blood spilled over his idol. With a deep huff, she cleared the memory of Kagha from her mind and gazed up at the moonlight.

Moonbathing was her favorite thing to do since she’d made it to the surface. There wasn’t a moon or a sun in Menzoberanzan — just the Narbondel and the fairie fire of various shades that lit the cavernous spaces and houses, some bioluminescent flora and fauna existed as well. Largely, there was darkness and the bleakness of the Underdark had weighed heavy on her. They’d said it was because she was a “filthy half-breed” and that was why she couldn’t abide the Underdark. But the joke had been on every person who’d pursued her as she’d fled Menzoberranzan. Every member of the party was a full drow, a whole hunting party meant to eliminate her before she could escape the Underdark. Her survival had been mere dumb luck, because as she’d finally made it to the surface they’d overtaken her to discover it was a midday on a brilliantly sunny summer morning. They’d been forced to turn back, some falling to the ground in pain and being left by the group to suffer.

Luna had continued into the sun, her eyes and skin burned against the foreign rays of the sun — but that pain had been all that stood between her and freedom.

That had been almost 30 years ago but the memory still felt like a fresh wound in her mind. She forced the sounds of screaming and the curses chanted on the wind from the Clerics of Lolth. Instead, she let the moonlight kiss her skin as she offered her arms and her troubles up to the visage of her Goddess in her lunar form. Swaying lightly in the breeze as she allowed her muscles to ease and willed the stress and unease away. She scanned the reaches of her mind, her memories for something sweeter to replace them.

Images of perfect ripe berries, sunflowers, the yellowed and worn pages of her favorite book, and silver swords ringing true all flashed across her mind. Her favorite things never failed to bring a smile to her face. But something else, just a flash of something new had been in the mix: kind eyes and the warm words of the very Druid they currently sought to rescue.

The words were easy to know the source of, she had taken Halsin’s journal and his pipe from the Grove while Nettie hadn’t been looking. While she didn’t approve of stealing, she couldn’t help but want to know more about the Elf that everyone spoke so highly of on both sides of the simmering conflict. Besides, she had told herself repeatedly that she would return them to him as soon as she rescued him so it truly wasn’t stealing. Many of her nights were sleepless and reading over his notes and journal entries had been like getting to know the man a through one-sided correspondence. Luna couldn’t help but notice an obvious warmth in the tone of his words, even in something as clinical as his research notes.

The flowers were drawn so lovingly, as were the animals depicted in the quite talented sketches that accompanied many of the notes. She thought of the soft Druid that must have drawn them — probably meek and scared in the hands of their goblin captors. Her resolve strengthened.

The kind eyes took her a moment longer to connect, but after a moment a blush crept across her dusky, storm-blue skin. They were Zevlor’s eyes, of course, the kind and handsome older tiefling that had sent them in search of Halsin in the first place. Luna had always had a soft spot for people who care for those around them who are weaker. Zevlor’s dedication to his kin had been admirable.

She’d wished she hadn’t talked him out of laying out Aradin, that failed adventurer, but alas it has been the right thing to do. Violence was nessecary, yes, but only as a last resort when the time for words was passed. With the new lightness of spirit provided by her meditation came the clarity of the truth before her. It was very likely that unavoidable violence lay on the horizon for Luna. It wasn’t that she was afraid for herself, as a tempest Cleric, her ability to heal and destroy had already made her valuable for her camp-mates.

Luna recalled the stunned look on Gale of Waterdeep’s face when his thunderwave had missed during the battle at the front gate of the Druid Grove where they’d first happened upon Wyll, Zevlor, and Aradin. She had stepped up right after and with a deft hand, thunderwaved two goblins from the top of the outcropping on which they’d chosen to make their stand. The goblins had perished and her party had been able to fight its way to the small group in front of the gate to rescue them from the Worg and Bugbear which had surrounded them.

“What kind of Cleric are you exactly?”

Gale had done little to disguise the shock in his voice as he asked that question. It was colored with both amusement and surprise. Luna had smiled sweetly at the question and offered her answer. In truth she had barely avoided the wizard and her other companions. She was powerful but like the storms she wielded, her power was unruly and dangerous.

No, it wasn’t herself that she was afraid for.

Zevlor popped into her mind once more, triggered by the memory. His dusky crimson skin, the wrinkles and ridges that adorned his rugged face, and the nervous twitch of his tail as they’d spoken together in private in his cave. With a start, she shook his face loose of her mind and started back for the campfire. Sleep would be important to the success of tomorrow’s battle. She had already let Astarion feed on her, she couldn’t handle any distractions or weaknesses.

She climbed back into her thin bedroll, flat on her back to look at the stars as she let the sweet sounds of the evening carry her to sleep.

—*—*——*—*—

The battles had been trying, but they had lived to tell the tale — but only just. Sneaking in through a weak wall in the temple facade had proven a key strategy, she was grateful for Wyll and his ability to blast down the rubble. It had allowed them to bypass the leaders and goblins within as they’d made their way back to where Astarion had spotted a bear being tortured by the goblins.

It was very likely, this was their Druid but they had no way of knowing for sure.

Only Wyll and Karlach had supported her in her decision to free the bear without knowing fully. But her companions had followed her into battle nonetheless. The large brown cave bear had in fact, been the Druid Halsin and he’d noted her potential madness at freeing a bear with no questions asked.

The moment Luna had laid eyes on him out of wildshape form, something had caught in her chest. Something she’d never felt before. She’d seen many handsome men and women in her time, surely this wasn’t just about Halsin being easy on the eyes. He was an altogether unexpected thing, the soft and meek Druid she had been anticipating was instead an unusually large elf, built more like an orc than any elf she’d ever laid eyes upon. It was another thought for her to bury in her mind for another time. There was additional bloodshed ahead of them and it didn’t look like it was something they would return alive from.

When Halsin had offered to go with them to finish off the goblin leadership and the hundreds of goblins within the ruined temple of Selune, Luna had eagerly agreed. She found the presence of a large cave bear padding softly behind her, oddly soothing despite the way he seemed to unsettle everyone else in her party.

The full drow that had awaited them in an antechamber, Minthara had chilled Luna to the bone. There had been such hate in her eyes and it had forced bitter memories to the forefront of her mind. Like savage childhood beatings from Lolth’s favored that looked just like the cruel drow woman, who they’d come upon plotting the mass murder of the Druid grove with the eagerness of someone picking what to eat for dinner. Killing her had been easier than she would have liked to admit. 

Halsin and Karlach had lead the charge in, with Luna, Astarion, and Wyll on their heels. But Minthara’s focus had lasered in on Luna.

“Oh, whelps like you are quite rare for a reason, half-breed”

The Paladin’s words had settled on her like ice that threatened to paralyze her and she had felt the familiar panic rise in her chest one more. She was never going back, she’d sooner die. Minthara could tell she had hit a nerve and continued her line of verbal attacks, coupled with brutal physical blows to Karlach.

“Usually, someone would do you the kindness of putting an abomination like you out of your misery as a babe, how uncared for you were that they couldn’t have spared you the shame.”

When it happened, her heart had been beating so hard that it pounded in her ears like some artificer’s creation. Her blood ran cold and the rage she felt within had let loose to a blissful emptiness that overwhelmed Luna like the tide pulling her out. What had come next was a surprise to everyone but her, oh she knew what would happen and it had been too late to stop it.

Luna’s power had exploded it out in a violent storm surge of thunder and lightning, like a typhoon contained within a dropped flask — it engulfed everything around it. Wyll and Astarion were lucky enough to be standing far enough back to simply be knocked to the ground and hit with bits of debris from the blast. Minthara, Halsin, and Karlach couldn’t say the same.

The sound of Minthara’s scream growing quieter before fading away completely as she had plummeted to her death in the cavern below them was all Luna could hear as her eyes had tried to refocus from the blast. Tears had already brimmed in her eyes, if Karlach and Halsin had been standing in the wrong place — not even her healing magic could bring them back from that fall.

“Luna! For gods sake, help!” Came Wyll’s voice on the ledge of the pit. His arm had been latched to the unconscious form of Halsin, dangling in the cavern. He had been knocked out of wildshape and was elven again. Astarion was clinging to Wyll’s ankles and pulled back with all of his might to try to stop the warlock from sliding off the edge after the Druid.

She’d bit back the forming tears and dove down to the ledge and spread herself out flat, grabbing Halsin’s other arm. Still, the three of them weren’t enough to haul the Druid back to safety and she could feel them slipping after him.

“We need to let go damnit!” Astarion had hissed as he continued to hold Wyll’s legs.

Luna knew he had meant it to save their lives, but still she had held fast and pulled in an attempt to accomplish the impossible. She was unwilling to let Halsin die alone because of her foolish lack of control. She had been so ready to accept her death, she had just needed to get the other two to let go.

“Take Wyll!”

She’d shouted back at Astarion, hoping he’d choose to save the two of them as opposed to dying. The look of shock on his face had been new.

“No one is letting go, solider” Had come a groggy voice over their heads as Karlach had reached over the edge and grabbed Halsin by the back of his tunic. She had clearly been knocked unconscious by the blast and was bleeding from a large gash on her head. Her arrival was like a hero of old, auspiciously timed when all hope seemed to be lost. Tav wondered if Karlach had become used to having to save the day constantly as a result of her hard decade in Avernus.

Her fingers had still clung to the massive Druid’s arm, his skin slick from the battle but her grip felt more secure. Karlach had begun to slowly pull Halsin back up as the three of them scrambled to help. Incredibly, with her help it had been easy to move him.

Luna scrambled to her feet to make room for the massive Druid’s form and she’d encouraged Karlach to lay down as well.

“Please Karlach, i’m so sorry this is all my fault, let me heal you”

The guilt that threatened to paralyze her had risen like a tide from within. It’s all my fault. She had willed a steady breath into her lungs as Karlach settled before her. The moon controls the tides. She had repeated it to herself over and over. Before long her heart had begun to beat steadier and she had allowed herself to relax after a few moments.

Looking Karlach over had revealed some painful looking, but easily healed superficial wounds. Luna had quickly rummaged through her pouch to find the bottles she kept wrapped in grimy scraps of fabric so they didn’t break.

“Got a bottle of the strong stuff while you’re in there, solider?”

Karlach’s jokes had seemed quick but the wince she had made revealed that the humor was a simple front. Finally she had located the bottles she was looking for, glowing red and freshly brewed by her that morning. She’d always loved herbalism and luckily there were a lot of herbs and other reagents found on the road.

“Drink this, I promise you’ll feel good as new, friend.”

“Bottoms up, mate”

She’d then been able to turn her attention to the Druid, she had found him being tended to by the less capable hands of Wyll and Astarion. The latter being the real culprit. Wyll had removed his jacket and forced Astarion out of his to create a pillow under Halsin’s head. Halsin had appeared awake but only barely, his eyes looking up at the cavern ceiling above him without focus.

His eyes had seemed to try to find hers as soon as she had entered his field of vision when she leaned down to look him over.

“By… Sylvanus” He had murmured “My lady”

She’d found blood pooled on the ground under his head and more running slowly from one of his ears. It was then she bad been positive, her stomach sunk slightly at the truth, the bleeding in combination with the difficulty focusing had meant massive head trauma. Fatal, if unhealed.

“Shhhhh, it’s just a bump on the head, you’re going to be okay”

Wyll had glanced down at the blood pooled on the ground and then back to her, bristling at her obvious lie to the Druid. Sure, it had been much more than a bump on the head — But Luna planned to make good on her promise. There had been no need to panic the large elf. She liked Wyll, he was brave and had the makings of the kind of hero she’d always heard about in tales that had inspired her. But he was also young.

She had shot Wyll a firm look before turning her attention back to the Druid. Luna had then gently eased his head down flat on to the ground and removed the makeshift pillow from under him. She’d tossed them over toward Astarion who had immediately taken issue with the state of his jacket. He’d held the bloodstained garment aloft with a look of disdain.

“Would you look at the state of —“

 Luna had fixed Astarion with one of her harder looks and his sentence had trailed off. While Luna never liked to issue threats of violence unless absolutely necessary — she also wasn’t above letting someone know they were toying with the line, with a single glance. Growing up the way she had and being alone for so long, that look had been a life saving mechanism.

She’d turned her attention to her charge once more and had found him even more dazed than he had been only moments before, a smile had spread across his broad face as his eyes tried hard to focus on her. Something had stirred like a tickle in her chest at the sweet look on the dazed man’s face. What was wrong with her? He was dying for goddesses sake and she’d allowed a momentary distraction.

“It’s you” he’d murmured

“Shhhhh”

“Eilstraee, I saw you in a painting…” Halsin’s voice had trailed off.

Luna had fought back the blush she’d felt at such an obvious but flattering mistake. He was concussed and needed healing, he didn’t know what he was talking about. She’d hushed him gently again and closed her eyes. She had looked to the night sky within her and the beautiful pendant of the moon hanging on its canvas. A deep breath had centered her within her power as she summoned the strongest healing spell she had been capable of in that moment.

In hindsight it had probably wasteful to expend the most powerful healing spell she had on hand before they’d dealt with Dror Ragzlin. Still, it had worked out for the best, the hobgoblin had been no match for a full strength cave bear blessed with the might of her goddess. Of course he’d been helped by a freshly healed and mended Karlach, Wyll, Astarion, and herself.

They’d agreed there would have to be a discussion on what exactly happened when Minthara had pushed her too far. She’d begged for their patience and to respect her privacy. It was the same respect given to all of them. They had agreed with varying levels of ease — some outright vowing to pry it out of her. There was a lot she should have probably said to her new companions but she couldn’t begin to understand how to start. For now she was content in respecting their secrets and begging them to let her have hers.

They were grateful to reach camp and the rest of their traveling companions that night. Gale had prepared a stew of foraged roots and some fish he’d magicked out of the Chinothar. It bubbled on a smaller fire the wizard maintained just for his nightly prepared meals. Always ready for whenever his companions were ready to eat as he lounged in a chair nearby, reading a heavy tome.

Strangely, even now as they began their post-battle and evening rituals, her mind drifted back to sweet moment when Halsin had awoken freshly healed. She’d been holding one of his hands as the spell took hold. As he had come back to full consciousness, his thumb had begun to stroke her hand tenderly. Luna had tried not to think much of the action until the Druid had sheepishly cleared his throat and pulled his hand away from her grasp with an awkward chuckle.

But now, standing outside her tent, gathering her supplies for a bath her mind drifted back to the gentle touch of his large hand in hers. Why did she feel so strange after healing a man she’d just met? Sure, the elf was attractive but she was sure it wasn’t that. She’d taken people to bed before and none had caused such an unusual reaction. Logic clearly pointed to a romantic affliction. However drow were not known for being romantic and in that regard Luna was more drow than human.

Maybe I should just bed the giant elf and get him out of my system.

Her goddess embodied love of all types but romantic love had always seemed beyond her understanding. Eilstraee had been patient always in their meditations, but deep down she worried her goddess believed such a thing beyond her. Not that it matters and I’m missing much, she thought.   She enjoyed carnal relations and had never met anyone to change that to anything deeper. She shook these questions and frustrations from her mind as started off toward the river, sundries in hand.

By the roaring fire, several of her companions had already gathered around warm bowls of food, fresh from their baths. Tomorrow they were due back at the Grove, Halsin having already headed there right after the fall of Dror Ragzlin to set the escalating conflict to rights. She continued past her companions with a quiet smile, polite but quick enough to not invite company.

As she scrubbed the grime and blood of the day away her mind drifted to Minthara again. She’d been a Baenre. After so long free of that nightmare and yet the conflicts and horrors of her people had found her already. A Baenre. Minthara’s family had essentially ruled Menzoberranzan since not long after its founding. Of course Lolth’s will was the final word, but the Matron Mother of House Banere had only the Spider Queen herself above her in station.

Her heart began to race. Even a Half Drow like herself, kept out of sight as a servant and whipping post, knew about House Baenre. All Minthara had probably ever known was violence and at the end, she’d died a violent death. In her chest, her heart heaved at that thought. Her eyes brimmed with tears, she refused to allow to fall, she wouldn’t cry for that monster.

Am I any better than they are after this?

 As she lingered in the water the tears had fallen anyway, carving little rivers of their own in the blood and muck on her cheeks — the evidence of her guilt. She scrubbed harder at her face in the broken reflection on the surface of the water.