mickume/dnd_drow · Datasets at Hugging Face

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Tav was fine. They were great, actually. A bit odd. Rough at the edges. Barely remembered their own name, had a weird expression at some points, like they were holding something down. Mysterious. Murderous? Maybe a little bit. Shadowheart wasn’t about to pry.
Okay, no, Tav wasn't fine, but at least they didn't snore.
On the third night after the crash, Shadowheart started hearing the snores coming from Lae'zel's tent.
They had just rescued the githyanki the previous day. Tav, Shadowheart, Astarion, and now Lae'zel. Tav was interested in going to the grove Lae'zel's captors had mentioned, and given their insufficient amount of rations for another day, Shadowheart couldn't agree more. They needed to eat. Of course they needed to eat. Now, what else Shadowheart needed? Of course, to sleep.
The cleric also needed that tadpole to be removed, but hey! Tav was already racking their brains looking for a solution. Everyone was helping, but for now their body still needed to be able to function. Survival, and all those things.
Thus, food and sleep. And sure, a healer.
(Although Shadowheart vaguely recalled having heard that the ceromorphosis didn't take more than a couple of days. What had been, four, five already? Maybe Lady Shar was indeed protecting her, and the rest of the group by extension.
She could have kept the githyanki out of it, though, but maybe it was a way of teaching endurance to her loyal cleric.)
It wasn't a pleasant surprise to discover that Lae'zel snored like an old dragonborn and could be heard all around camp and a little beyond.
Not that Astarion and Tav seemed to mind. The fuckers. Astarion was out some nights (weird, but Shadowheart wasn't about to question the habits of the pale elf), and when not he just entered his trance and ignored the rest of the world. Tav didn't seem to mind at all. Sleeping soundly every night. Even giggling in dreams.
(Again, the fuckers.)
Shadowheart's sleep, curse her, was lighter. Maybe it had to do with her training. She couldn’t really remember, but it seemed like a plausible explanation. It definitely made sense with what little she recalled. Always ready for a possible attack, she couldn’t be surprised while she slept.
(With all its downsides, like being annoyed by the snores from a particularly murderous githyanki.)
Or maybe it was just the tadpole fucking around in her brain and making her wake up at the slightest of sounds. Although calling Lae'zel's snores "slightest of sounds’ was definitely too kind.
But she could overcome it. She was Shadowheart, faithful cleric of Lady Shar, sent on a holy mission. Some githyanki snores wouldn't stop her from sleeping soundly at night.
The next day Gale arrived.
She had thanked Lady Shar the fleeting murderous intent she had seen in Tav's eyes when they had seen Gale's hand coming out of the portal had been left at that: an intent. Shadowheart started to reconsider her thankfulness as Gale's snores joined the already loud ones from Lae'zel.
"Ah, I broke my nose as a child. Sorry," Shadowheart carefully brought the topic to Gale the day before arriving at the grove. "Can't do much about it! I actually possessed a magical artifact that helped with that. See, Tara also complained all the time, so..."
"But you left it at Baldur's Gate, I can guess?" Shadowheart asked, tiredly. She wasn't even going to ask who the fuck was Tara. Didn't have the energy for that.
"Uh... not exactly," Gale looked nervous all of a sudden. Shadowheart's eyebrows arched. "Let's say that, in times of need..."
Shadowheart stopped listening right there. And in any case, a goblin just happened to jump on them about ten seconds later. Gale didn't bring the topic up after that, and Shadowheart couldn't be bothered to do it either.
The half-elf had tried, at least. Wasn't about to try with Lae'zel, though. They annoyed each other enough already, and that was a soft way of putting it. Though Shadowheart didn't discard reproaching it to the githyanki in the future. If the conversation invited to do just that, then why not? She was going to use all her weapons against Lae'zel.
(Loud weapons that didn't let her sleep, specifically.)
Wyll and Karlach came soon after and, as apparently half of the people on Faerun given the statistics of their current encampment, they both snored. Loudly. A lot.
"Hey, soldier... Shadowheart, was it? You look tired. Are you catching enough sleep?" Said Karlach two nights after joining their merry band.
Shadowheart was close to throwing her bowl of soup at her head, but Lady Shar taught restraint to her followers. So she just took a deep breath.
And another one.
Come on, Shadowheart. Another one.
"I've been having trouble sleeping, yes," she admitted. The tiefling was too nice, and seemed to have suffered enough. She wasn't about to bring up the snores.
"You could try drinking some herbal tea before going to sleep," Wyll intervened, helpfully, as he sat just by Karlach's side on the floor.
It was amazing how the warlock and the barbarian had become attached to the hip, even though Wyll had been very set on killing Karlach not even seventy-two hours before.
"Yeah! I mean, I'm more of a booze person, but that can work," Karlach shrugged, a brilliant smile on her face.
(Who could get mad at her? Or at Wyll, poor soul, Shadowheart still couldn't get the image of him transforming into a demon out of her head.)
"I always boil a cup for myself before going to sleep, actually. Do you want me to prepare one for you too?" Wyll offered.
"I would be most grateful," Shadowheart accepted. Better than nothing, she guessed.
The infusion actually did help. A bit. Shadowheart was able to fall asleep sooner, a combination of the effects of the herbal tea, the tiredness of the day, and then the rest of the exhaustion she was carrying over from the past two weeks. At least anxiety wasn't taking hold of her anymore, since they had discovered the artifact she had stolen was protecting them from becoming mindflayers. Or so that seemed, at least.
(She didn't really like that Tav was now carrying the artifact. Not their choice, and it wasn't that Shadowheart didn't like Tav, but that little box was part of her holy mission.
...She would worry about that once the tadpole was gone, though.)
Still, Shadowheart woke up several times every night, the recently formed orchestra of snores being absolutely unbearable.
Now that there were seven of them they could even afford to take watches, and sure, that made the situation a bit better on Shadowheart's end. One less person snoring was always welcome. Except if the one keeping watch was Tav or Astarion, of course.
Not that she managed to sleep any better, no matter the case. But hey, at least there was no way Shadowheart would fall asleep while on watch.
One night, Shadowheart considered casting silence on everyone around her.
Then she remembered everyone slept more than twenty feet away from each other, and in any case she couldn’t keep casting the damn spell every ten minutes.
She tossed and turned as she kept trying to sleep.
There were several accidents at camp, if you could even call them accidents.
Firstly, Shadowheart had been about to kill Lae'zel. Oops? Lae'zel had tried to kill her first, after all. Several times in battle even, she was sure of it.
(Somehow, somehow, every time of the few when actually Lae'zel decided to use her crossbow in battle, Shadowheart was in front of the prey the githyanki had chosen.
Just, you know. Somehow.
For fucks" sake, the githyanki could pick any other goblin.)
Shadowheart couldn't say she was sorry, but it definitely hadn't helped her case against the githyanki. Tav seemed pretty disappointed in both of them.
"I can't have you trying to kill each other," they said, tiredly. "We have enough problems already. Fix whatever is going on between you two, or... I don't know, at least be cordial."
"Or maybe get a room," added Astarion, earning a couple of very sharp weapons thrown at him.
(The githyanki and the follower of Shar could apparently agree on something: killing Astarion.)
"Please don't kill anyone, we don't have more resurrection scrolls and I'm not paying Withers if it's your stupidity getting you killed," Tav groaned, bandaging the cuts a very smug Astarion had gotten as a result.
(Astarion almost getting killed didn't count as an accident, by the way. He was stupid, and he had actually deserved death. Momentarily and, in his case, again.
Damn vampire spawn.)
The second actual accident had been Tav sleepwalking (sleepwalking?) and killing Alfira. Allegedly.
"I don't remember anything, I swear," and they seemed absolutely broken, so at least Shadowheart couldn't do anything else but believe them. "I woke up and I... I was... I couldn't... My hands were covered in blood and I..."
(Their hands were still covered in blood, but Shadowheart wasn't about to point that out.)
"Come on, soldier. Let's get you cleaned," Karlach said eventually, because no one knew what to do with Tav.
They buried the corpse near the river and tried to move on as best as they could. Tav included, to some extent.
The real mystery, though, was how Shadowheart hadn't heard a thing that night. Of course she had heard the snores, though Tav didn't snore. But come on, they had presumably gutted the poor bard in the middle of the camp.
Still, somehow, Shadowheart had stayed asleep as the carnage took place.
On top of that, new questions arose. Had it been the tadpole's fault? Was Tav lying? But why would they lie, exactly, and how? They had fully admitted they believed they were responsible. Where was the trick?
(Maybe there was no trick. Or maybe there was magic at play that even Tav wasn't aware of.
Worst case scenario, Tav was an amazing liar.)
The little sleep Shadowheart managed to catch on subsequently nights was filled with nightmares regarding herself and Lae'zel, and then Tav killing them both, of killing themselves, Karlach, whoever. It changed each night, actually. Sometimes it wasn't even Tav.
Lae'zel was always there, though.
The last thing Shadowheart had expected from the crèche was the faith crisis it had provoked on Lae'zel.
The githyanki was shaken to the core, and Shadowheart had expected to feel more smug about it. Shadowheart understood how important faith was to Lae'zel, as important as her own faith on Lady Shar was to her. She couldn't begin to fathom how she would react if she discovered her goddess had been lying to her.
She couldn't bring herself to be happy at Lae'zel's pain. Not really.
Shadowheart made the first watch that night, and it was clear to her Lae'zel wasn't sleeping. No sounds came from her tent, after all. Shadowheart couldn't be surprised, truly. Voss" had given them all food for thought with that prince of his.
What was rather surprising, however, was that an hour into her watch, Lae'zel herself stood up and sat by the fire, opposed to Shadowheart.
"I'll take the watch," Lae'zel said after a few seconds. Clearly she had no intention of even trying to sleep that night.
(She wouldn’t admit that, tough as she was. Shadowheart couldn't blame her.)
"You should try to rest, though," Shadowheart heard herself saying.
"I said I'm taking it, istik " Lae'zel snapped, and a second later her expression changed .
(Was that regret?)
"Well, I'm not going to sleep for now," Shadowheart huffed. "So I guess we can take the watch together."
"If that's what you want," Lae'zel rolled her eyes, then looked away.
Huh. Less willing to argue than Shadowheart expected. She really was fucked up.
"I know what you are going through—" Shadowheart started.
"No, you don't," Lae'zel bit back, interrupting her.
"—even though I haven't experienced something similar myself."
"Hta'zith ," Lae'zel deadpanned, but Shadowheart kept speaking.
"The thing is, I think you would find some solace in talking about it," to this, Lae'zel's eyebrows arched. "I assume I'm not the best example, but Tav seems to be doing better since they are open about their murderous urges."
The silence that followed creeped the fuck out of Shadowheart, but she steeled herself. The fire reflected in the githyanki’s eyes, giving them a more orange hue. She didn’t look at Shadowheart, but at an undetermined point in the ground, next to the fire. Her arms hugged herself in a protective manner. It was the most vulnerable the cleric had ever seen her.
(She wanted to... maybe... maybe she could reach out and...)
Finally, Lae'zel opened her mouth, her eyes going back to the SHarran like sharp daggers.
"If you try some counseling-shit again with me, I'll cut your tongue and feed it to the owlbear."
(There it was. Lae’zel was back, if just slightly.)
"I thought you didn’t like the owlbear."
And, as it seemed, that was it for their conversation that night.
Shadowheart didn't hear Lae'zel's snores that night, though she had expected that after their talk. She peeked out of her tent, and saw her sitting with Tav on a corner of the cave.
They were talking.
Something warm appeared on Shadowheart's chest.
One less thing to worry about.
The cleric was the first to notice that Gale had started to join Astarion on his nocturnal... whatever-they-were. Excursions, sure. That was a word that could fit whatever Astarion did.
How? Well, as exasperating as it was not having been able to sleep properly in the month and a half they had been traveling together, Shadowheart had learned to distinguish her party mates by their snores. Astarion didn't snore (because he didn't sleep), but Gale's were clearly missing some of the nights.
Coincidentally, those were the nights in which Astarion wasn't on camp.

Tav was fine. They were great, actually. A bit odd. Rough at the edges. Barely remembered their own name, had a weird expression at some points, like they were holding something down. Mysterious. Murderous? Maybe a little bit. Shadowheart wasn’t about to pry.

Okay, no, Tav wasn't fine, but at least they didn't snore.

On the third night after the crash, Shadowheart started hearing the snores coming from Lae'zel's tent.

They had just rescued the githyanki the previous day. Tav, Shadowheart, Astarion, and now Lae'zel. Tav was interested in going to the grove Lae'zel's captors had mentioned, and given their insufficient amount of rations for another day, Shadowheart couldn't agree more. They needed to eat. Of course they needed to eat. Now, what else Shadowheart needed? Of course, to sleep.

The cleric also needed that tadpole to be removed, but hey! Tav was already racking their brains looking for a solution. Everyone was helping, but for now their body still needed to be able to function. Survival, and all those things.

Thus, food and sleep. And sure, a healer.

(Although Shadowheart vaguely recalled having heard that the ceromorphosis didn't take more than a couple of days. What had been, four, five already? Maybe Lady Shar was indeed protecting her, and the rest of the group by extension.

She could have kept the githyanki out of it, though, but maybe it was a way of teaching endurance to her loyal cleric.)

It wasn't a pleasant surprise to discover that Lae'zel snored like an old dragonborn and could be heard all around camp and a little beyond.

Not that Astarion and Tav seemed to mind. The fuckers. Astarion was out some nights (weird, but Shadowheart wasn't about to question the habits of the pale elf), and when not he just entered his trance and ignored the rest of the world. Tav didn't seem to mind at all. Sleeping soundly every night. Even giggling in dreams.

(Again, the fuckers.)

Shadowheart's sleep, curse her, was lighter. Maybe it had to do with her training. She couldn’t really remember, but it seemed like a plausible explanation. It definitely made sense with what little she recalled. Always ready for a possible attack, she couldn’t be surprised while she slept.

(With all its downsides, like being annoyed by the snores from a particularly murderous githyanki.)

Or maybe it was just the tadpole fucking around in her brain and making her wake up at the slightest of sounds. Although calling Lae'zel's snores "slightest of sounds’ was definitely too kind.

But she could overcome it. She was Shadowheart, faithful cleric of Lady Shar, sent on a holy mission. Some githyanki snores wouldn't stop her from sleeping soundly at night.

The next day Gale arrived.

She had thanked Lady Shar the fleeting murderous intent she had seen in Tav's eyes when they had seen Gale's hand coming out of the portal had been left at that: an intent. Shadowheart started to reconsider her thankfulness as Gale's snores joined the already loud ones from Lae'zel.

"Ah, I broke my nose as a child. Sorry," Shadowheart carefully brought the topic to Gale the day before arriving at the grove. "Can't do much about it! I actually possessed a magical artifact that helped with that. See, Tara also complained all the time, so..."

"But you left it at Baldur's Gate, I can guess?" Shadowheart asked, tiredly. She wasn't even going to ask who the fuck was Tara. Didn't have the energy for that.

"Uh... not exactly," Gale looked nervous all of a sudden. Shadowheart's eyebrows arched. "Let's say that, in times of need..."

Shadowheart stopped listening right there. And in any case, a goblin just happened to jump on them about ten seconds later. Gale didn't bring the topic up after that, and Shadowheart couldn't be bothered to do it either.

The half-elf had tried, at least. Wasn't about to try with Lae'zel, though. They annoyed each other enough already, and that was a soft way of putting it. Though Shadowheart didn't discard reproaching it to the githyanki in the future. If the conversation invited to do just that, then why not? She was going to use all her weapons against Lae'zel.

(Loud weapons that didn't let her sleep, specifically.)

Wyll and Karlach came soon after and, as apparently half of the people on Faerun given the statistics of their current encampment, they both snored. Loudly. A lot.

"Hey, soldier... Shadowheart, was it? You look tired. Are you catching enough sleep?" Said Karlach two nights after joining their merry band.

Shadowheart was close to throwing her bowl of soup at her head, but Lady Shar taught restraint to her followers. So she just took a deep breath.

And another one.

Come on, Shadowheart. Another one.

"I've been having trouble sleeping, yes," she admitted. The tiefling was too nice, and seemed to have suffered enough. She wasn't about to bring up the snores.

"You could try drinking some herbal tea before going to sleep," Wyll intervened, helpfully, as he sat just by Karlach's side on the floor.

It was amazing how the warlock and the barbarian had become attached to the hip, even though Wyll had been very set on killing Karlach not even seventy-two hours before.

"Yeah! I mean, I'm more of a booze person, but that can work," Karlach shrugged, a brilliant smile on her face.

(Who could get mad at her? Or at Wyll, poor soul, Shadowheart still couldn't get the image of him transforming into a demon out of her head.)

"I always boil a cup for myself before going to sleep, actually. Do you want me to prepare one for you too?" Wyll offered.

"I would be most grateful," Shadowheart accepted. Better than nothing, she guessed.

The infusion actually did help. A bit. Shadowheart was able to fall asleep sooner, a combination of the effects of the herbal tea, the tiredness of the day, and then the rest of the exhaustion she was carrying over from the past two weeks. At least anxiety wasn't taking hold of her anymore, since they had discovered the artifact she had stolen was protecting them from becoming mindflayers. Or so that seemed, at least.

(She didn't really like that Tav was now carrying the artifact. Not their choice, and it wasn't that Shadowheart didn't like Tav, but that little box was part of her holy mission.

...She would worry about that once the tadpole was gone, though.)

Still, Shadowheart woke up several times every night, the recently formed orchestra of snores being absolutely unbearable.

Now that there were seven of them they could even afford to take watches, and sure, that made the situation a bit better on Shadowheart's end. One less person snoring was always welcome. Except if the one keeping watch was Tav or Astarion, of course.

Not that she managed to sleep any better, no matter the case. But hey, at least there was no way Shadowheart would fall asleep while on watch.

One night, Shadowheart considered casting silence on everyone around her.

Then she remembered everyone slept more than twenty feet away from each other, and in any case she couldn’t keep casting the damn spell every ten minutes.

She tossed and turned as she kept trying to sleep.

There were several accidents at camp, if you could even call them accidents.

Firstly, Shadowheart had been about to kill Lae'zel. Oops? Lae'zel had tried to kill her first, after all. Several times in battle even, she was sure of it.

(Somehow, somehow, every time of the few when actually Lae'zel decided to use her crossbow in battle, Shadowheart was in front of the prey the githyanki had chosen.

Just, you know. Somehow.

For fucks" sake, the githyanki could pick any other goblin.)

Shadowheart couldn't say she was sorry, but it definitely hadn't helped her case against the githyanki. Tav seemed pretty disappointed in both of them.

"I can't have you trying to kill each other," they said, tiredly. "We have enough problems already. Fix whatever is going on between you two, or... I don't know, at least be cordial."

"Or maybe get a room," added Astarion, earning a couple of very sharp weapons thrown at him.

(The githyanki and the follower of Shar could apparently agree on something: killing Astarion.)

"Please don't kill anyone, we don't have more resurrection scrolls and I'm not paying Withers if it's your stupidity getting you killed," Tav groaned, bandaging the cuts a very smug Astarion had gotten as a result.

(Astarion almost getting killed didn't count as an accident, by the way. He was stupid, and he had actually deserved death. Momentarily and, in his case, again.

Damn vampire spawn.)

The second actual accident had been Tav sleepwalking (sleepwalking?) and killing Alfira. Allegedly.

"I don't remember anything, I swear," and they seemed absolutely broken, so at least Shadowheart couldn't do anything else but believe them. "I woke up and I... I was... I couldn't... My hands were covered in blood and I..."

(Their hands were still covered in blood, but Shadowheart wasn't about to point that out.)

"Come on, soldier. Let's get you cleaned," Karlach said eventually, because no one knew what to do with Tav.

They buried the corpse near the river and tried to move on as best as they could. Tav included, to some extent.

The real mystery, though, was how Shadowheart hadn't heard a thing that night. Of course she had heard the snores, though Tav didn't snore. But come on, they had presumably gutted the poor bard in the middle of the camp.

Still, somehow, Shadowheart had stayed asleep as the carnage took place.

On top of that, new questions arose. Had it been the tadpole's fault? Was Tav lying? But why would they lie, exactly, and how? They had fully admitted they believed they were responsible. Where was the trick?

(Maybe there was no trick. Or maybe there was magic at play that even Tav wasn't aware of.

Worst case scenario, Tav was an amazing liar.)

The little sleep Shadowheart managed to catch on subsequently nights was filled with nightmares regarding herself and Lae'zel, and then Tav killing them both, of killing themselves, Karlach, whoever. It changed each night, actually. Sometimes it wasn't even Tav.

Lae'zel was always there, though.

The last thing Shadowheart had expected from the crèche was the faith crisis it had provoked on Lae'zel.

The githyanki was shaken to the core, and Shadowheart had expected to feel more smug about it. Shadowheart understood how important faith was to Lae'zel, as important as her own faith on Lady Shar was to her. She couldn't begin to fathom how she would react if she discovered her goddess had been lying to her.

She couldn't bring herself to be happy at Lae'zel's pain. Not really.

Shadowheart made the first watch that night, and it was clear to her Lae'zel wasn't sleeping. No sounds came from her tent, after all. Shadowheart couldn't be surprised, truly. Voss" had given them all food for thought with that prince of his.

What was rather surprising, however, was that an hour into her watch, Lae'zel herself stood up and sat by the fire, opposed to Shadowheart.

"I'll take the watch," Lae'zel said after a few seconds. Clearly she had no intention of even trying to sleep that night.

(She wouldn’t admit that, tough as she was. Shadowheart couldn't blame her.)

"You should try to rest, though," Shadowheart heard herself saying.

"I said I'm taking it, istik " Lae'zel snapped, and a second later her expression changed .

(Was that regret?)

"Well, I'm not going to sleep for now," Shadowheart huffed. "So I guess we can take the watch together."

"If that's what you want," Lae'zel rolled her eyes, then looked away.

Huh. Less willing to argue than Shadowheart expected. She really was fucked up.

"I know what you are going through—" Shadowheart started.

"No, you don't," Lae'zel bit back, interrupting her.

"—even though I haven't experienced something similar myself."

"Hta'zith ," Lae'zel deadpanned, but Shadowheart kept speaking.

"The thing is, I think you would find some solace in talking about it," to this, Lae'zel's eyebrows arched. "I assume I'm not the best example, but Tav seems to be doing better since they are open about their murderous urges."

The silence that followed creeped the fuck out of Shadowheart, but she steeled herself. The fire reflected in the githyanki’s eyes, giving them a more orange hue. She didn’t look at Shadowheart, but at an undetermined point in the ground, next to the fire. Her arms hugged herself in a protective manner. It was the most vulnerable the cleric had ever seen her.

(She wanted to... maybe... maybe she could reach out and...)

Finally, Lae'zel opened her mouth, her eyes going back to the SHarran like sharp daggers.

"If you try some counseling-shit again with me, I'll cut your tongue and feed it to the owlbear."

(There it was. Lae’zel was back, if just slightly.)

"I thought you didn’t like the owlbear."

And, as it seemed, that was it for their conversation that night.

Shadowheart didn't hear Lae'zel's snores that night, though she had expected that after their talk. She peeked out of her tent, and saw her sitting with Tav on a corner of the cave.

They were talking.

Something warm appeared on Shadowheart's chest.

One less thing to worry about.

The cleric was the first to notice that Gale had started to join Astarion on his nocturnal... whatever-they-were. Excursions, sure. That was a word that could fit whatever Astarion did.

How? Well, as exasperating as it was not having been able to sleep properly in the month and a half they had been traveling together, Shadowheart had learned to distinguish her party mates by their snores. Astarion didn't snore (because he didn't sleep), but Gale's were clearly missing some of the nights.

Coincidentally, those were the nights in which Astarion wasn't on camp.