She shifts between Astarion’s legs. There’s a question of how that hangs heavy in the air. And as badly as Gale would like to take her intimately– to wrap himself up in everything that is Morgane and spill inside her with his head buried in the crook of her shoulder and his arms tight around her back– he knows that’s a lover’s right; not his. Plus, he doubts Astarion would accept such an overstep. He had been invited through the threshold of their relationship, certainly, but not upstairs. It was more than likely the vampire would claw his throat out shortly after Ethel’s. He sits back on his haunches.

“I won’t take it personally, you know. If you’d like to… comfort yourself on him. I know this must all be a bit much.” Gale draws circles in the air at Astarion.

“And exactly what do you mean by that, Gale?” She challenges.

He sighs. Gale knows himself to be charming; he ended a couple dozen days in wizarding school with another in his bed, but with Morgane, something always tightens his tongue. Makes him swallow down poetry that would flow like water from his heart had he only known she’d have a cup to fill with it. But he’d sooner drown in his unrequited love than douse her with it. So radiant is she, a bracing ray of sunlight, a shield and brilliant sword; he forces his way through his next words like they aren’t a knife to his heart.

“I mean.” Gale pinches between his eyebrows and his stomach sinks. “You don’t have to look at me for it. We’re not lovers. You owe me no intimacy. No trivial amount of tender consolation for the… sowing. I’d rather you were in any part happy. Comforted by the kisses of your real lover” Gale forces the tiniest smile onto his face through his self admonishment.

“Gale, I think you underestimate your place in my heart. I’m not yours, but I still-“ Morgane hesitates. Her lips press together and Gale catches a change in Astarion’s gaze. Something forces the vampire’s tongue still, mercifully, as Morgane resumes speaking.

“...I still value you. And I wouldn’t be able to accept this if it wasn’t at least you doing it. Astarion can’t; the Dawnfather himself would have to usher forth the most brilliant of blessings for me to bear his child. And exposing him to that amount of sunlight might outright kill him.”

Before Gale can answer, a shiver of anxiety chills his spine. He feels the tadpole in his brain reach out without his direction. Morgane? No, she refused to use such powers. The brief flash of dread is interrupted by Astarion’s cool voice. A psychic tunnel connects his intuition to Astarions, feeding him a glimpse of the vampire’s worries:

“Morgane’s oath forbids her from lying. She doesn't accept you lightly. Some part of her genuinely chooses you. If you’re nervous, schoolboy, maybe it’s because you’re afraid of why.” Gale feels the cold needle of genuine terror that pierces Astarion’s heart, more violent than he’s ever feared a wooden stake would. Then, a skittish acceptance– almost chaste in its earnesty. Trust. Love. A love he wishes he shared with Morgane, true, but that makes his heart swell all the same at the depths of Astarion’s devotion.

Gale meets his eyes, his pale lips perfectly crooked into a sickle moon smile, his eyes hooded seductively in a way Gale has learned to be measured. But with Morgane facing Gale, Astarion’s face softens. “I wouldn’t let anyone other than you touch her. Not for a moment. Come, wizard. Share our bed for the night and let us forget about it in the morning.”

His final sentence on the matter is punctuated with an uncharacteristically kind smile that disappears like the morning mist when met by dawn. Astarion’s lilting laugh brushes away the last wisps of intimacy with dismissive ease.

“Besides, Faerun would weep; one of its greatest works of art lost, burnt to a crisp in Lanthander’s light.” Astarion chimes in, cheerful as if he hadn’t just confessed. His expression is once again an easy smile, no trace of the icy intent Gale saw a second ago. “Now, come to me my sweet. In as sorry a state as I am, I still know I’m a feast for the eyes. Sate yourself, Morgane.”

Gale has no choice but to study Astarion as Morgane, with a final look of thanks, turns her attention to him. Despite the purpling bruise covering his orbital, cheekbone, all the way down his porcelain cheek to his neck where the hag grabbed him, Gale can’t deny: Astarion was an amount of beautiful that implied divine intervention. And how well he fit next to illustrious Morgane; as if the sun and the moon danced between night and day every time they touched.

She settles between his legs on her knees and cards a hand through his silver curls, careful to avoid where they are matted with blood. She touches her forehead to his in a gesture that’s so intimate Gale blushes. As they kiss, his shaking hands find the stays of his robe– it seems as good a time as any to undress.

Gale cannot leave Morgane to the humiliation of nakedness alone, like a body to be rutted whilst he keeps his own shame covered. So, though he loathes the thought of showing them his underbelly– softened from years of arcane study and a well-stocked wine cellar– it seems the honourable thing to do. He shrugs out his robes and underclothes as the lovers enjoy each other. His arousal has flagged, he’s half hard between his own thick dark curls, but a glance at the broad expanse of Morgane’s back as she shifts onto her hands and knees for him brings it back quite fully.

It occurs to Gale that he has never taken someone quite like this before. In the rare times his lovemaking with Mystra ventured into the more corporeal, she would have him on his back. As for his romps at Blackstaff Academy…well, when they progressed beyond desperate hands under the covers, he had found himself in Morgane’s position more often than not.

As he rests a tentative hand on her lower back, guiding her towards him and silently asking her to arch her back, Gale hears her break the kiss.

“I’m not here,” he murmurs, marveling at the way his fingers splay so perfectly between the dimples on her back. “Kiss him, Morgane. Let him whisk you away with his whispers about making love to his sunlight under the stars. Please.”

He can see the hesitation in the pinch of her shoulders, but she does as he asks. Wet smacks echo through the facsimile of a tent Gale conjured as he lines himself up with her entrance. What he’d do to be in Astarion’s position right now. He nearly chuckles aloud at the idea. Chained to the wall, kissing Morgane, preferable to having his arms free and about to slide inside her? A funny thought, if it weren’t so real a feeling.

His cockhead brushes against Morgane’s slick folds and he hears her let out a shuddering whimper against Astarion’s lips. It must be his imagination, but it was almost more a moan than aghast like he expected.

“Dawnfather smile upon us, bless us with the bounty of spring coming to first flush.” Morgane prays as Gale pushes in. She feels divine. It breaks his heart.

Gale pitches forward, stuttering and timid at first. The animal part of his brain is sated by her wet heat. He begins an apology, but Morgane shakes her head and looks over her shoulder at him, finally. Her gaze soft and wet with tears dewing at the corners of her eyes. His regret sits like a rock lodged in his throat.

“Would it help to close your eyes? Maybe pretend Mystra -?”

“Don’t.” Gale snaps at her, loud enough it echoes and reminds them all of the cave walls beyond his illusion. He claps a hand over his mouth with a gasp. “I-I didn’t- No, Morgane please-”

Astarion’s eyes flare with a flash of crimson fury at his tone. “Gale.” He warns.

“Morgane, I assure you from the bottom of my heart, no part of me would be regaled by her in this moment.” Between the thrumming pleasure shooting up from his loins to his brain, it’s hard to find words that aren’t immediately suspect. “Just… worry about Astarion. I’ll try to make this quick; and if not quick, good.”

He expects the weight of his ex paramour’s unceasing disappointment to leave when Morgane turns around. Instead it’s replaced with that familiar jealousy. He exhales, and wills his hips to move again, regaled by the soft noises she breathes into Astarion’s neck with every thrust. He starts gently. It’s a balancing act that’s falling apart, trying to make himself small, forgettable, nothing, when each thrust makes him feel so alive. Each throb of her walls around his burning cock drags him out of his well of self loathing and back into his body. He can’t help the grunts that sneak from between his tightly pressed lips. Sweat drips down his brow.

But he can’t come like this. Even with the tent surrounding them, even if he closes his eyes and just listens to Morgane’s soft panting and the wet thrust of his cock, the guilt of what he’s doing swallows up any real licks of heat in his belly.

He doesn’t even register that he’s let out a grunting, desperate sob until he feels their eyes on him.

“Apologies, I– though I am but an instrument in this particular copulation, I venture to be a silent one for you,” he manages, pulling halfway out of Morgane as he feels his arousal start to flag once more. “I shall endeavor to lay back and think of Waterdeep. It’s only…”

I can’t. Not when I have wanted this so ardently for so long, and this is the only way I will ever have you, he thinks but can’t quite voice. I can’t, I can’t–

To his surprise, Morgan reaches back and pulls him back in with a hand on his hip. He gasps at feeling her heat around him anew. And when she tightens around him he can’t help but let out a whimper.

“Ah- Morgane?” Gale’s voice comes out higher than he expected.

“Keep going Gale. It feels good.” She whispers, giving him a reassuring look that’s tinged with the soft edges of pleasure. It’s so quiet and earnest, and the truth of it blooms in Gale’s chest. Questions race through his mind. Are you sure? Is it me? She must see the way his eyes dart around, for she breaks him from his spinning thoughts with a gentle word.

“That adroit tongue of yours was very effective. I can think of a few paladins I trained with who’d test their oaths to try your mouth.” She continues, voice dropping from that breathy earnestness to something downright seductive.

The praise lights him up like a sunbeam into a prism. Heat boils up in him from his neck to his cheeks to his ears, and it’s all the encouragement he needs to grip her hips and redouble his efforts. Fire lit anew in his heart and loins. He was trying so hard to forget himself in shame and admonishment that he forgot to consider he could forget himself in her. How she feels. Smells. Tastes. He stifles his moans as she meets each thrust, beckoning him towards release, but it’s much easier to consider climax with her praise in his ear.

He keeps his eyes down watching his cock disappear inside her in awe. He doesn’t see the look she must share with Astarion but when she speaks again, he can imagine it– the twinkle he’s seen in both their eyes, the telepathy they seem to share as lovers.

“He’s being so good, Astarion. Tell him.”

Morgane throws it out like bait. Gods, had it been so obvious her praise had his orb flickering with hopes of more?

And Astarion, like a bloodhound, picks up the trail with a mischievous glint in his ruby eyes. Gale can’t help but groan and grip her hips, dropping his head in hot, flushed embarrassment as he fucks her with renewed vigour.

“Oh, yes. And, look. It seems he’s working awfully hard now that he knows he’s been such a good little pup.” Astarion tilts his head to look around Morgane just in time to catch Gale’s hand whip up to cover his mouth. It fails to stifle the audible moan that rips from his throat when Astarion calls him pup. A wicked idea seems to stroll into Astarion’s head as he leans into Morgane’s ear.

Gale recognizes Astarion’s Elvish for “And he’s actually quite handsome when he’s quiet.” He stills with shock, jaw slack, but tries to conceal his reaction. He’s been meaning to hide his understanding of the Elvish tongue from Astarion to keep his poker cards close, so to speak. But it’s hard when it’s directed at him, and harder when Morgane clenches around him tight when the words leave his lips. He puts his head down and focuses back, tries not to think too hard about how quiet he wants to be all of a sudden. But Astarion’s lilting teases in his mother tongue find weak spots in his mental armour.

“It that it, little wizard? Shall I tell you how well you’re treating my darling lover? How her little mouth drops open every time you roll against her? You’re being such a good boy for us. You know, we might have to keep you.” Gale moans loud against his hand and feels his heart race doubletime. The thrumming fluttering in his chest alights along his neck; indigo light casting arcane shadows against Morgane’s back. Every thrust is delicious, every nerve in his body suddenly alight. He forgets where he is and feels his brain swim with pleasure as Astarion continues his teasing.

“Keep going. She likes it when you pull all the way out before thrusting back in. It makes her eyes roll back.”

Gale can’t conceal the way he immediately takes Astarion’s instruction. The wanton moan that leaves her lips when he does exactly so nearly brings him to finish. But Morgane’s pleasure is at the apex of his priorities. And as hard as it is to have a cogent thought, the devotion and worship he wishes to lavish unto her radiant form doesn’t exactly require much deliberation. His heart thrills at the idea of coaxing more moans out of her, of hearing Astarion acknowledge his prowess. To be acknowledged as a suitable mate; a lover to equal their well traveled elven seductor. Maybe in some hilariously forgiving future, he’d be welcomed into their shared home to help them start a family.

The door in that dark corridor in his heart cracks open; its lock weakened by heady pleasure. Gale loses himself in the fantasy of Morgane spread out underneath him, legs hooked around the backs of his thighs, or even better, his shoulders. Back bowing up against the bed, her fists gripped in the sheets as her third orgasm grips her (he’d always offered his lovers more than one.) Sowing his seed in her womb, as deep as his cock would let him put it, a satisfied smile on her face when she dips her fingers into herself and collects the dregs of him. Tastes them-

“Don’t stop. Gods, Gale, just like that. I should have known you’d be a– a quick study–” ” Morgane moans. He comes out of his daydream. It’s not often reality is nearly as good. Well, as good as it can be, given the circumstances. “I don’t know what you’re telling him, but he likes it as much as I do.”

“Oh, I can tell. You both look positively ravished.” Astarion’s red eyes bore into him and Gale swears he sees lust under that teasing squint. “In fact, shall we reward the little prodigy for treating you so well? Good boys deserve treats, and judging by the sounds you’ve been making, he’s been more than good.”

“I- yes. He’s doing amazing.” Morgane manages between gasps. “Gale, tell us what you need.”