Work Text:
Coming Untouched – Ageplay (BG3) – Kidnapping (TWST)
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Shadowheart groans, staring up at the oppressive, omnipresent dim that is all she ever sees here. For all that she loves her Lady Shar’s darkness, a bit of sunshine here and there couldn’t hurt. A warning twinge of pain flares in her hand and she winces.
“Are you injured?” Minthara asks, looking up for her book. “Let me see. A warrior distracted by pain endangers us all.”
Shadowheart yanks her hand back. “No. I’m fine.”
“Just because Tav sent you skulking back to camp with your spell slots exhausted, you would suffer pain rather than letting me lay on hands?” Minthara looks down her nose, somehow, despite the fact that she is seated and Shadowheart is pacing at the edge of camp. She sounds almost impressed.
“You’re not my mother, Minthara, there’s no need to coddle me,” Shadowheart snaps.
Astarion licks a finger, drawing an imaginary tally mark in the air. “And… point to Team Cleric.” When both women round on him with eerily similar fury, he raises his hands in a placating gesture. “I see tensions are high and my sparkling presence is unhelpful,” he says. “Come, Lae’zel, Karlach— let’s go trade in some of that armor with the Zhent at Moonrise.”
“Chk. You just want someone to carry the load.”
“Oh, I’ve done plenty of worrying about loads in my time, darling,” he trills as the two women grab piles of plate and leather and head away from camp, and Shadowheart and Minthara are alone.
Aside from the owlbear cub, but he’s conked out and snoozing like someone put a Feign Death on him. And Withers, staring into the void until someone needs him.
Minthara rises and stalks over to Shadowheart, brow furrowed. In a quick, dark flash of purple skin, she grips Shadowheart by the arm and presses her own hand against the cleric’s, pulling away with an impossibly deeper frown. “It does not heal.”
“I’d think you’d understand painful gifts from goddesses… but that’s right, Lolth’s fangs would only pierce you to bleed you dry,” Shadowheart snaps, pulling her hand away. Why on earth did Tav insist on rescuing the woman from the depths of Moonrise’s torture chamber? “As I said, you are not my mother. It’s not like a kiss from you would make it better.”
A strand of white hair, gossamer as spiderweb, drifts across Minthara’s throat as she tilts her head. “And if I were your mother, my lips would still carry poison. It is a lesson you would do well to learn, Shadowheart. You are a prize debutante, and yet you still harbor softness in that heart.” She raises an eyebrow. “It will be your downfall.”
Shadowheart lurches forward, black braid whipping behind her. “Say that again,” she challenges, but even she can hear her voice tremble; there’s no way Minthara Baenre missed it.
No.
The other woman raises her chin, evaluating her with cool red eyes, and walks a slow, deliberate circle around Shadowheart before leaning in. “Was that an order?” Her hand darts up, grabbing Shadowheart’s chin, and Shadowheart is out of spell slots and the Blood of Lathander is back at her tent and all she has is her dagger—
Minthara blocks the knife easily, but rather than retaliate, she smiles. It is a terrifying expression, and Shadowheart rather wishes she had never seen it, because its awful beauty will etch itself into her eyelids if she ever looks away.
“That’s closer to what I’d expect from my own daughter,” Minthara says. “But you are too slow on your draw, Shadowheart. Is it that difficult, to stomach the thought of killing me?”
“Hardly,” Shadowheart retorts. “But Tav would be irritated and it would make an awful mess.” She sheathes the knife and steps away.
“Hm. Weak,” Minthara says, and steps closer. “A mother should impart discipline. Tenacity. Would you give up so easily?”
She’s slightly shorter than Shadowheart, the drow tendency towards small, slight figures on display, and yet she looms over her in so many other ways. Minthara’s presence and personality shadow one corner of the camp, Halsin having moved out from a tent to sleep in bear form rather than deal with being so close to a noble daughter of the dark elves.
“Fine, Mommy,” Shadowheart spits. She doesn’t know why the word comes to mind. Lady Shar has taken everything from her, even the memory of which parent is the human; she certainly doesn’t allow Shadowheart the memory of being coddled by a tender maternal figure.
No. Viconia DeVir was worse than Minthara in so many ways, is worse, and she’s the only mother that Shadowheart has ever known.
But the childish human affectation still finds purchase in the vast empty blackness of Shadowheart’s memory. It still falls off her tongue as she stares down at Minthara.
Who narrows her eyes further and raises her chin and says low and stern and implacable: “on your knees, girl.”
Shadowheart drops, and though she tells herself that it’s because she’ll swipe at Minthara’s tendons with the knife, she knows that it will be put to no such use. It clatters to the ground next to her as her fingers weaken.
“Better,” Minthara says, stalking around her like a shadow. She plucks the knife off the ground and throws it without looking; it lodges, quivering, in the scarred, twisted remnants of what might have once been a willow.
Shadowheart is too busy watching it tremble like her own hands to notice Minthara’s until there’s a strong set of fingers bracketing her throat, trachea tucked into the curve between Minthara’s thumb and forefinger like it was sculpted to fit. “What—”
“Hush.” The fingers stretch, exploring, tracing along Shadowheart's pounding pulse. “If I want your speech I will ask for it.”
“I thought mothers were supposed to indulge their children,” Shadowheart mutters, feeling her petulance vibrate against Minthara’s hand.
“Weaker races and their childrearing practices are no concern of mine. Mother does not capture the role in any meaningful way. Valsharess.” The drowic word caresses Shadowheart’s ear in a way Minthara never would. “Say it.”
“Val— valsharess,” Shadowheart tries, throat dry and unable to mimic the sibilant purr.
“Hmph. Unacceptable. Matron, then.”
This one is easier; Minthara’s hands soften and stroke across Shadowheart’s face. It’s a silken touch before a slap, to be sure, but Shadowheart finds that she can’t quite bring herself to shy away from oncoming pain, so long as she gets to give a little in return.
She’ll wait for her moment, as Lady Shar has taught her. Mother Superior showed her that her pain could fuel her cruelty, Shadowheart knows, because although she cannot remember much of her training she can remember learning to interrogate and backstab and betray.
She’s as close to a drow daughter as Minthara could ask for in a half-elf.
Minthara’s hand does not blaze across her cheek; instead, the older woman leans close and slides a hand into Shadowheart’s low-cut camp shirt, beneath her undergarments, and strong weapon-calluses fingers close tight around a nipple. Shadowheart breathes out through her nose, channeling the empty void of the Shadowfell.
Minthara hums approvingly. “You show fortitude. Perhaps you are not wholly a lost cause.”
Shadowheart stays quiet as Minthara increases pressure, the lancing pain turning sweet in her veins in a way she glimpsed on Tav’s face all those days ago as their leader submitted to the Loviatar priest’s ministrations. Another breath out makes her that much more aware of the swelling pleasure between her legs, rising to replace the air she releases through her nose with each meditative breath. Without realizing it, her eyes drift closed.
“You wanted a matron’s attention. Do not squander it,” Minthara orders, voice austere as she removes her hands—no! Shadowheart wants to shout. “Are you going to be my girl in this, or my plaything? The punishment for looking away from Mistress is much less entertaining for you than the one I will inflict as Matron, child, so choose wisely.”
Shadowheart’s next breath is shaky, eyes opening to see Minthara with her arms crossed and a terrible anticipation in her eye. If she is to be a child, let her be a child here, where she can be small and vulnerable before an aristocratic drow and not feel like a disappointment.
“Your girl,” she whispers, and watches as Minthara’s lips curve: a thin, wicked slash of white teeth against dark skin. “Matron.”
A nod, as if this outcome were expected. “Marring your skin with a slave’s correction would be a waste. It is good for you to know your worth.” Minthara— Matron— tilts her head, looking down at Shadowheart. Evaluating. “You would have been a fine consort, a pretty surface pet with these green eyes like the finest fungi.”
(Mushroom comparisons don’t strike her as romantic, but Minthara’s voice is nearly soft by the end of the sentence, so it lands as a compliment of the highest order.)
“Matron’s correction shall not injure you unduly,” Minthara says. She looks around the camp and frowns, not finding whatever she’s looking for. “Come. Back to my tent.”
Shadowheart follows like a child, and apparently that comparison is apt tonight. Minthara reclines on her bedroll and beckons Shadowheart forward. “Have you ever lain with a woman, Shadowheart, or are you unspoiled by anything but male disappointment?” she asks, unfastening the strapped top and setting it aside before working on the laces to her trousers.
“Some men aren’t a disappointment. At least not in bed,” Shadowheart says.
“How would you remember?” Minthara asks, but it’s clear she doesn’t expect an answer because she’s already continuing: “it is no matter. I shall test your skills and impart new ones if I must. Come, child; attend to me with your tongue.” The spread of her legs is a trap, but Shadowheart cannot help but draw close to the smooth, dusky stretch of skin, cannot keep her eyes away from the folds of Minthara’s center blooming before her.
She’s kneeling before she knows it, crawling close and reaching a hand to rub along Minthara’s calf. The paladin isn’t soaking, not yet, but the smallest shine in the bioluminescent mushroom’s light tells her that it’s probably not far off. Leaning in, she breathes along with Minthara as she bends and trails her lips along the deep lavender of her outer labia.
“Acceptable. Continue, girl.”
Acceptable. Hmph. She lets her lips part, sweeping wet and soft across Minthara’s mound before tentatively poking out her tongue and licking at the swelling clit.
She doesn’t die, so at least Minthara hasn’t found a way to poison her fluids. (Unless she’s built up a resistance to it? Because suddenly, Shadowheart feels slow and sleepy like she’s had a bit of drow poison dripped under her tongue.) She pushes through it and licks again, putting her mind to the wholehearted task of pleasing Minthara as she no doubt expects.
A daughter of the Baenre wouldn’t stand for anything less than perfection in her pleasure partners.
“You are still shy, little girl,” Minthara says, and there are hands on the back of her head, dragging her close. “Matron doesn’t want your pitiful flicks of tongue. I want you desperate to please me, even as you plot and scheme to take my place.”
Shadowheart nearly chokes, trying to pull back because surely she’s just swallowed her tongue, but Minthara—Matron— grinds herself harder against her face and she can’t get away. Surely, though, Matron cannot be too angry if Shadowheart gives in and follows her own desires as well?
Because that’s the difference between Matron and Mother, she thinks, fastening her lips around Matron’s clit and swirling her tongue across the knot of nerves, feeling Matron’s sigh of approval land upon her shoulders like a set of encouraging hands. Matron wants her to succeed, wants her to chase her ambitions. Enjoys seeing Shadowheart claim her power.
And so Shadowheart licks partly out of desire to please Matron Minthara and partly to imagine that her fingers against her clit are Minthara’s own tongue. Next time, she’ll do the proper drow-daughter thing, the proper Sharran thing, and pull her Matron from her throne, even if that throne is a luxuriant recline against fine spider-silk pillowcases and a bedroll more comfortable than anything Shadowheart could possibly imagine between her knees.
But for now she revels in cataloguing Matron’s reactions: the twitch of finely-hewn muscle when she caresses just beneath the clit hood with the very tip of her tongue, the glistening wetness that now surely coats her cheeks and chin, the aristocratic arch of her neck and spine as she comes.
Shadowheart shudders into her own orgasm almost immediately, fingers fast between her own thighs. “Matron!”
“Good girl,” Matron purrs, and the low resonance of it spills across the tadpoles in a wash of Minthara’s lingering pleasure. “But greedy, child, taking your pleasure before you’ve been given permission. Next time, remember: little girls wait.”
“Make me beg to orgasm and I’ll slit the vein in your thigh,” Shadowheart snipes, sitting back and swiping at her face.
Minthara laughs, low and throaty. “You will not. You crave Matron’s approval too much.” She leans in, grabbing Shadowheart’s throat for a long moment, heartbeat thundering against her strong fingers and her direct gaze blazing in the dim mushroom light, and then she lets go, pushing Shadowheart back just enough to stretch luxuriantly and stand. “I will not be a replacement for your Mother Superior, Shadowheart, but I will be Matron if you require further guidance.”
“Fine. Mommy,” Shadowheart says, and it’s a pathetic dig but it’s the best she can manage as she gains her feet and makes to return to her own tent.
“If I I must build my house with iblith and half-faeries, at least I have you to mold in a proper daughter’s image,” Minthara murmurs, and Shadowheart tries not to think about what it means that she feels more Minthara’s little girl than Mother’s.