Writing Prompt! (No pressure) -

Tav and Gale move into his tower after the fight, Tav is a druid who feels out of place - Gale makes the tower feel more like home for them.

Gale had noticed how distant Tav had become over the recent weeks. What should have been a honeymoon period of days nestled in the comfort of warm cotton sheets, bodies entwined in ecstasy were instead being met with moments of hands being tentatively pulled away, of distant gazes from the balcony over the extending seas.

Waterdeep, the city of splendours, was the wizard’s home. He loved the bustling streets, the worn cobbles that shone with the fresh autumn rains, the lines of shop windows he could peruse on quieter days. There had been so many aspects of the area he’d wanted to show Tav, and yet all had been met with the same indifference as the tower. He’d cook the druid’s favourite meals, rub scented oils into the muscular shoulders, tense from adventuring, from conversations avoided and yet Tav still seemed to pull further away, and Gale was losing hope.

He’d, of course, tried communicating with Tav about the problem, his stoic friend, providing little in the ways of feedback as to what the matter was, and so despite the inner turmoil he was feeling, he let his friend leave. Days the druid would be gone from home, coming back dirt covered and bruised, choosing to sleep on the hard wooden floor rather than under the soft blankets Gale had provided. He conjured stars on the balcony, read sonnets of his love, wooed Tav, and in those moments they were together again, only to part as the stars faded, night becoming day. His moon Tav, vanishing with the light of the morning dawn. He knew he needed to trust his love, needed to respect their boundaries, that in the end they were two different people who had their own ways of living, and yet he felt lonely, desperately alone in the confines of his beloved tower.

The rains poured from the slate tiles above the balcony; the thunder rumbling in the distance from the flashes of lightning. Gale had longed to spend days like this; wrapped in the embrace of Tav, a book shared between them and the safety of one another’s hold, acting as a protective shield from the storm. But there was no Tav, no embrace. There were only the icy winds whipping the pages of the tome with little regard for his wanting hands. It was at this moment he went against his unwritten code and cast the scrying spell, peering at the druid without their knowledge.

---

Tav sat in the forest clearing, his hands absentmindedly stroking the head of a white wolf that dozed next to him. The rains had not reached this part of the lands yet, but even if they did, the druid knew they would only bring new life out into the woods. Rabbits and birds would become the frogs and earthworms. The gentle breeze in the trees would become the pitter-patter of raindrops on the leaves. Prickling blades of grass would turn to soft moss under his boots and each step would be another of a freedom he felt he was losing.

He loved Gale, that much he was sure of, but Waterdeep, the cracked stones of the packed roads, the soulless windows he’d seen his own reflection in. That he did not love. Gale’s tower, which had been spoken of fondly in the past, was more of a stone prison, its large open windows taunting him with the world he wished to be a part of. The bed was too soft, the meals too exquisite; the sonnets he’d once loved now brought him guilt. He wanted to be honest with Gale, to tell him everything, and yet he instead pushed away the only person who’d ever grown close to him. Tav knew the wizard had been away from home for so long, had nearly lost everything at the orders of Mystra, and so this was the sacrifice to be made. Nature would have to come second, Waterdeep first. Freedom lost.  

He felt the sensation of being watched, lifting his head and glancing around the clearing. The wolf tensed next to him, and he heard the distant rumble of thunder that came with the storm. His eyes were sharp, years of hunting in difficult conditions giving him the advantages he needed to spot both prey and predator and with them he saw the scrying sensor hovering by the treeline. He didn’t need to approach it; he knew immediately who was watching him from the comfort of their sky bound throne. It was Gale, his love, his warden.

---

It was some time later before Gale heard the oak door of the tower creek open and Tav enter, a heavy thud against the wall as the leather boots hit it with force. As the druid had spotted the sensor, Gale had been quick to dispel it, his heart pounding in his chest, guilt clutching his throat tightly. He’d been overbearing in his search for answers, in his attempts to save the marriage that may have been doomed before it had even began. He listened for the footsteps, sipping his tea in a hope it would steady the rising nerves.

Tav entered the room, his jaw tight, his hands clenching and unclenching, as if trying to relieve the tension. The once warm eyes that Gale had longingly gazed into were now cold and glinting with the fires of a rage not seen since Baldur’s Gate. “You were spying on me.”

Gale swallowed deeply, his mind racing, trying to find the right words to diffuse the situation. He wanted to apologise, but he also wanted to unleash his own simmering anger at being ignored, at being pushed aside and abandoned. Just as Mystra had done… “I’m sorry, my love. You must understand, though, that I was merely concerned about you, what with the storm.”

Wind rattled the balcony door, the heavy rains now battering the tower; though Gale questioned which would be the worse storm to withstand, the one outside, or the building tempest within the walls.

“The storm?! Don’t give me that bullshit.” Tav threw off his leather overshirt, raindrops still travelling down the contours of his firm arms, and marched into the bathroom, his voice raised and intimidating. “As if it wasn’t enough to keep me holed up here. Now I must be monitored in the wilderness as well?”

Gale leaned forward, putting down the teacup and registering the complaints his companion spoke. He didn’t understand what was being accused of him. He could accept the fault for the spell, but anything else was lost to him. “I apologise for the spell. It was a failing on my part, but holed up? Is that truly how you feel here? With me?”  

Drying his hair, the druid left the bathroom, his shoulders no longer showing the glistening remnants of a previous life outside the walls. The few moments alone had given his temper time to calm, his blood flowing slower, his mind realising that this was the time to confess all if he was to reclaim any balance in this relationship. “I…” He took a seat on the floor at the foot of the bed, his weathered hands flat on the cool floorboards beneath him, the darkwood frame of the bed, a support for his arching back. “The city, the tower… it’s not my home.”

Lowering his head, Gale sighed. He’d suspected as much but hadn’t wanted to admit the truth, unwilling to give up his own home after so long away. He wanted to speak, wanted to find out what it was Tav needed, but he dreaded the answer that would come: that it was over between them, alone again.

The druid’s voice was quiet as he spoke, a softness that Gale had heard very little of during their adventure together. Tough was the persona that Tav had used so often, driving forward with determination until eventually returning to saying very little when resting in tranquil glades. “Gale… I want to be with you. I never doubt that. But here, in Waterdeep. I don’t think I can do it. Aside from you, there is nothing for me here. There is no nature, no life aside from that of the people that push and shove in the streets below. There’s no peace like that I find in the forests.”

The wizard nodded, a relief that at least he was not the primary issue in this scenario. He searched for solutions, thinking of past conversations with Halsin on the matter of nature versus humanity and the balance that needed to be found for them to truly exist together. “I could…” He hesitated, pondering the mechanics required for such a feat. Would it be enough to keep Tav with him? Would he be enough?

Tav looked over with curiosity in his eyes. He’d be open to try any solution at this point. All he wished was for them both to be happy, as they had been on their travels, as they had been during their night together under the stars at Moonrise, bodies flowing together on crisp conjured grass.

“It would take time and resources, but I could come up with something that would work for you. Would you be willing to let me attempt this feat for you?”

The druid nodded, his shoulders relaxing, and he gave a heavy sigh. “Ai armiel telere maenen hir.”

Gale heard the familiar words and smiled softly. He stood, approached his love, and knelt in front of him. His knees screamed at the position not felt in so many nights, but he cared not. He brought his hand to the chiselled jaw in front of him, his thumb running lightly over the bristles of unshaven hair. “And you mine, my sweet galanodel.”

---

Over the following months, the tower changed dramatically. Wildflowers bloomed on the balcony railings, blues and purples; their petals scattered on the sea breeze. On more than one occasion, Gale found his bookmark replaced with a leaf from a mighty oak or the feather of an unseen bird. Wild wines now wrapped around the bedposts, their forest green leaves casting dancing shadows under the candlelight. The smell of water lilies permeated through the musty tomes, and the sound of trickling water could be heard as the sounds of the city quietened with the descent of the warm sun.  

These were not the only changes that had been made. Gale’s desk had been moved, the large stone wall behind now left blank. Mystra’s statue had been placed in a shaded corner, no longer an unspoken altar, but a memory of a time long since passed. He would glance at the wall often during his studies, knowing what lay just beyond it. As evening would fall, the bright light would erupt into the room, the ever-present portal of his creation creating the balance needed.

Tav would often step from it with small gifts bundled into his arms. Sometimes it would be a selection of ingredients, Gale’s cooking now involving an additional element of research which he relished in. Flowers and herbs of various types as we well as interesting stones and crystals gathered were found too, which Tav knew the wizard would find interesting to read about.

The most treasured discovery, though, was that of a large branch which had been collected, and working together, the married pair had created a small piece of artwork. As the springtime sun had shone in from the balcony, the harbours waves licking upon the shore; they’d hung it from the rafters with an auburn ribbon, the knotted wood wrapped in dried orchids and the torn remnants of purple robes.

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"Ai armiel telere maenen hir." - You hold my heart forever.

"galanodel" - moon whisper