Larian Studios lit a hearth inside fantasy nerds’ hearts when Baldur’s Gate 3 made its debut from early entry on Aug. 23 in 2023. It had all the things a fantasy lover would need in a role-playing online game: an thrilling premise, deep character customization, an unbelievable backdrop set in Dungeons & Dragons‘ Forgotten Realms, and an enigmatic solid of characters.
Whereas everybody has their favorites, it is plain that one specific character managed to sink his fangs deep into Baldur’s Gate 3 followers: the one and solely Astarion Ancunin, carried out to perfection by award-winning actor Neil Newbon. Every companion comes with their very own fair proportion of woe, and Astarion isn’t any exception. Astarion — as soon as a Justice of the Peace in Baldur’s Gate — had his life modified ceaselessly after a ruling he made, when thugs beat him practically to demise.
As he lay dying, vampire lord Cazador Szarr stumbled on him and reworked him right into a vampire spawn. It saved his life—however at an awesome price.
Now, award-winning creator T. Kingfisher (Nettle & Bone) and Random Home Worlds are increasing on Astarion’s tragic background in a brand new e-book following the vampire spawn in a time earlier than thoughts flayers took to the skies over Baldur’s Gate.
On this unique excerpt from Baldur’s Gate 3: Astarion, we see our favourite vampire rogue make plans to rob a magical store, solely to come across a creature most foul. Learn on under or, when you’re extra of a listener, then we have got fairly the deal with for you: Neil Newbon studying the excerpt for you. Go on, darlings, it is to die for.
Learn on for the excerpt
There have been two magic retailers on the town, and Gurgan’s Magic Emporium was the opposite one. The unique wizard Gurgan had died many years in the past, and it was now run by a relative who clearly had not discovered pleasure in operating a magic store. Rumor had it that the constructing hadn’t been cleaned because the Spellplague. The store most likely contained wonders, however you possibly can by no means discover something in it, and that included the traps. And whereas retailers have been public areas the place a vampire may stroll in with out issue, and the brand new proprietor lived off-site, there was no telling what magical countermeasures had been put in place to maintain out thieves.
Properly, he’d mentioned that he was bored.
Astarion appeared up the skin of the constructing and sighed closely. It was 4 tales tall and in-built that model of structure frequent to the Decrease Metropolis of Baldur’s Gate, the place any bits of earlier buildings on the lot have been slathered with mortar and included into the construction. These bits included a squat brick guardhouse, a glassblower’s chimney, and the remnants of a cathedral to some god nobody remembered, filled with difficult bits of buttress and some damaged gargoyles. It appeared like a marriage cake made by drunken goblins.
He traced a possible route up along with his eyes, took off his socks and boots, tucked them away into the shadow of a drainpipe, and started working.
He hated spider climbing. He simply wasn’t excellent at it. Some individuals may calmly stroll the wrong way up on a ceiling as if gravity utilized to different individuals. Aurelia was good at it. So was Violet, to his chagrin. Astarion may actually solely do it on all fours, and provided that he took off his footwear. His mind saved insisting that no, down was that method, and whereas he didn’t fall off, he obtained extraordinarily queasy and tended to stumble.
He appeared round yet one more time to ensure nobody was watching, then went up the facet of the constructing, wanting much less like a spider and extra like an anemic gecko with a worry of heights.
There have been pigeons nesting underneath the eaves. They hadn’t woken up. Astarion made positive his ft have been correctly braced on a stone gargoyle, reached out, and wrung one’s neck earlier than it even woke. He sank his fangs into the plump physique, previous the layer of feathers, and there it was.
Blood ran down his throat, skinny and sizzling, stronger than whiskey, smoother than wine. It pulsed over his tongue because the pigeon’s coronary heart beat frantically, the wings nonetheless trembling because the chicken tried mindlessly to flee. Astarion gave himself over to a rush of sensation that made one of the best orgasm of his life appear banal by comparability.
When the pigeon’s coronary heart had stopped and the frenzy had lastly pale, Astarion picked a feather out of his enamel and set the small corpse down on the roof. One other? I do have work to do…
Properly, maybe yet one more.
He reached for an additional chicken, and it opened its eyes and yelled, “Get off, you bastard! What’re you doing?”
Astarion groaned. The bliss of blood-drinking was pushed out by the load of his annoyance. “Oh,” he mentioned. “It’s you.”
The chicken cocked its head to at least one facet, learning him out of 1 beady orange eye. “Do I do know you?”
“We’ve met.”
“Have we?” The chicken thought for a minute. “Sorry. Reminiscence’s not what it was. Who’re you once more?”
“I’m named Petras,” Astarion lied, “and also you’re Rooftop Henry.”
“That I’m,” the chicken mentioned, settling down out of arm’s attain. “That I’m.” He noticed the roof with a proprietary air. “You robbin’ the place?”
“That was the plan.”
Rooftop Henry nodded. “Sensible choice, sensible choice.”
Each burglar in Baldur’s Gate knew who Rooftop Henry was, though no one knew what he was. He undoubtedly wasn’t a chicken, for all that he seemed to be a quite disreputable cross between a pigeon and a seagull. There have been quite a lot of theories, from a misplaced acquainted to a wild-shaped druid who had someway gotten caught to a polymorph spell gone horribly unsuitable.
Astarion’s private favourite was that Henry had been a smuggler who had acquired a load of magical gadgets, been cornered by the Watch, and, in a determined try to cover the proof, had tried to swallow a wand of surprise.
No matter his origin, Rooftop Henry fell someplace between an especially intelligent parrot and an especially dim particular person. His reminiscence for many issues wasn’t good, although he knew right down to the minute when the native inns put their trash out. On evening, he was keen to behave as sentry in return for a chew to eat. He was, actually, a member in good standing of the Thieves’ Guild, although it was rumored that the treasurer coated his dues herself after he had tried to pay in regurgitated herring.
“Breaking in, are we?” the chicken requested, gazing over Astarion’s shoulder.
“That was additionally the plan.” Astarion labored his method round to the opposite facet of the gargoyle and leaned down to look at the closest window. The latch was absurdly simple, which meant that there have been nearly definitely alarm spells in place. He unrolled the mushy leather-based strip that held his instruments—lockpicks, assorted devices, and a diamond ring so gaudy that he would by no means dream of carrying it however which served admirably for slicing glass. Yet one more factor that Cazador didn’t learn about. The Guild maintained a number of protected homes across the metropolis with lockers the place one may hold instruments, a change of clothes, and even loot that had gotten too sizzling to deal with. Astarion saved his gear in certainly one of them and made positive that his personal dues have been paid up repeatedly. Loss of life was nothing in comparison with what the Guild would do in the event that they discovered you working independently.
“Hey. Hey, mister.”
Astarion chosen a skinny steel implement with a hook on the tip, which he’d stolen from a healer who specialised in tooth extraction. It was additionally excellent for catching hidden wires.
“Hey, you. Mister vampire.”
Astarion sighed. He thought of denying it, however the drained corpse of the pigeon was actually six inches to Henry’s left. Happily, the chances of Henry remembering this dialog in an hour have been minimal. “Sure?”
“You don’t need that window, mister.”
“Don’t I?”
“Nah.” Rooftop Henry started preening underneath one wing and appeared to get distracted. Astarion had reached out with the hook and was mere inches from the window body when the chicken remembered what he was saying. “There’s spells on that one.”
“There are spells on all of them, I think about.”
It was unimaginable for a chicken to smirk with out lips, however Henry tried. “You’d assume that, wouldn’t you?”
Astarion leaned again and gave the chicken his full consideration. “I assume meaning there’s a window that isn’t spelled?”
“May be, is likely to be. I occur to know there’s one constructed at simply the unsuitable angle by that chimney over there.” He gestured with a wing. “There’s an owl sleeps there through the day.”
“An owl.” Astarion folded his arms. “So is that this owl a wizard? Has he dispelled the alarms on a window?”
“Don’t be daft.” The chicken spat on the shingles. Astarion had by no means seen a chicken spit contemptuously earlier than and determined that he didn’t must see it once more. “It’s an everyday owl. Eats mice and rats. Then it does what owls do…” He appeared expectantly at Astarion.
“Makes extra owls?”
“No, you addlebrained bloodsucker!” Henry bounced up and down on clawed purple ft, clearly irate. “Don’t you recognize nothin’ ’bout birds? It pukes up owl pellets. All of the bits and bones and hair that it don’t need cluttering up its guts.”
“How unpleasantly organic.”
“Yeah, effectively. Ashes to ashes, shit to shit.” He spat once more. “Level is, the pellets hit the window each time, which units off the alarms, so after about two tendays, the apprentice who units all of the spells stopped doing that one.”
Astarion sat up, all of the sudden very . “Have they, now?”
“Yep. May even present you the window.” Henry cocked his head to at least one facet, purely birdlike. “’Course, I’d count on a consideration in return, belike.”
Astarion smiled, retaining his lips over his enamel. “Naturally. Could I give you a useless pigeon?”
“After you’ve had your mouth on it? Shove off. I could also be a chicken, however not less than I’m not a bloodsucker.”
“That’s actually not how vampirism works.”
“Says the vampire.”
Astarion rubbed his temples. He didn’t even know if birds may turn out to be vampire spawn. It had by no means actually come up. I suppose I may ask Cazador, however… no, I don’t need to have to elucidate any of this.
“High-quality,” he mentioned. “What do you need?”
Rooftop Henry informed him.
“You’re severe?”
“Critical because the pox, mate.”
As offers went, it was one of many best Astarion had ever made. “Very effectively. Assuming this window is helpful to me, I’ll get it for you.”
“Shake on it?”
“How, precisely?”
Rooftop Henry stood on one leg and prolonged the opposite. Hoping that nobody on the roofs of Baldur’s Gate occurred to be wanting of their course, Astarion fastidiously shook the little purple claw.
“Proper,” Henry mentioned. “C’mon, then. And go simple on the shingles, except you desire a fast journey to the bottom.
Baldur’s Gate 3: Astarion by T. Kingfisher, printed by Random Home Worlds, can be launched on Sep. 29.