The City of a Hundred Rooftops

Baldur's Gate was still yawning when Astarion and Tav slipped through the dawn-chilled streets. The stone held the night's cold, and the fishmongers' carts rattled over cobblestones, their wheels groaning like the city itself waking from a long dream. Tav carried a rough-woven blanket over one arm and a small leather satchel over her shoulder. Astarion walked beside her, his steps lighter than they had been in decades. He kept looking up — not at the shop signs or the gulls, but at the sky, where pale pink bled into the deep indigo of retreating night. "You're staring," Tav said, not unkindly. "I'm memorizing," he replied. "The last one was... pinker. This one is more gold. I need to know if they're all different." Tav smiled and turned left into a narrow alley. "This way. I found it three days ago." "You've been scouting rooftops?" He raised an eyebrow. "While I was brooding in the Elfsong's cellar." "Someone had to plan the next ninety-nine sunrises." She pushed open a rusted iron door that led to a spiraling staircase, the steps worn smooth by centuries of feet. At the top, a low wooden door opened onto a flat, slightly slanted roof. The city spread beneath them like a crumpled map. Chimneys breathed woodsmoke into the air. The harbor glittered, a thousand needles of light on black water. "I've never been up here," Astarion said softly. He walked to the edge, fingers brushing the parapet. "Two hundred years in this city, and I've never seen it from above." Tav spread the blanket on the tiles and sat, patting the space beside her. "You've been underground. Or in ballrooms. Neither has good views of the sky." He sat, close enough that his arm brushed hers. The contact was deliberate — a small, terrifying act of claiming. She didn't pull away. The sun crested the rooftops, spilling molten light across the city. It touched the spires of the Stormshore Tabernacle first, then slid down the walls like honey. When it reached them, Astarion flinched — a reflex born of two centuries of pain — but the warmth was gentle, golden, and it pooled in his lap like a blessing. "It doesn't hurt," he whispered. "No," Tav said. "It never has to hurt again." They sat in silence as the sunrise unfolded, slow and patient, as if the sky itself was learning how to be new. Gulls cried overhead. A bell tolled from a distant temple. Somewhere below, a child laughed. "Ninety-eight more," Astarion said eventually, his voice rough. "That's not nearly enough." Tav leaned her head on his shoulder. "Then we'll find a hundred more reasons to watch them."