It's not a choice, and isn't an argument to be debated— it's not even a request, no matter that the end result is obviously only so much in Astarion's own power to control. But rational thought means acknowledging that there's a chance it might play out for the worst despite the best of their efforts....and he can't. He just can't. (He's too bloody old, too tired, too weary of loss and too rife with scar tissue that never wanes in all its aches, though he never knows which is worse: the hideous marks he's been left with, or all the thousands more that'll never even show.)
But he knows there are other things on the table right now.
Related and distracting, and difficult to swallow. His red eyes flicking upwards somewhere across the line, unseen. Fixing on that glassy set of frosted lines drawn into the marrow of their coffin lid.]
It wouldn't be unthinkable....
[His voice sounds settled now. Even. Life for the average soul in Toril behind city walls is— largely— peaceful. Calm. Say what you will about roaming monsters and unthinkable terrors, but despite endless stories of heroism or horror there aren't whole portions of the civilized world being plunged into chaos at any given moment. No, it's the little dreads that accumulate when one least expects it: the odd shadow wandering at your back, the wolfish show of teeth after a not-so-distant catcall, the cold brush of clawed fingers at your neck. The microcosm rather than a macrocosmic nightmare.
So yes, those monsters have a high likelihood of returning— but not specifically for him. They'd have no way to track him, after all. Not with the tadpole already having vanished from his skull.
(....or at least he hopes not.)]
They were a threat once before, there's no reason to think I might not trip over one again if fate decides to be unkind.
[A beat.]
Still, I roamed these streets unbothered for two hundred years. My ancestors for centuries before that. If I had to choose my worries, believe me, that'd be on the lower rung. Somewhere between serving the wrong wine for dinner, and having Corypheus turn up on our bakery doorstep.
no subject
It's not a choice, and isn't an argument to be debated— it's not even a request, no matter that the end result is obviously only so much in Astarion's own power to control. But rational thought means acknowledging that there's a chance it might play out for the worst despite the best of their efforts....and he can't. He just can't. (He's too bloody old, too tired, too weary of loss and too rife with scar tissue that never wanes in all its aches, though he never knows which is worse: the hideous marks he's been left with, or all the thousands more that'll never even show.)
But he knows there are other things on the table right now.
Related and distracting, and difficult to swallow. His red eyes flicking upwards somewhere across the line, unseen. Fixing on that glassy set of frosted lines drawn into the marrow of their coffin lid.]
It wouldn't be unthinkable....
[His voice sounds settled now. Even. Life for the average soul in Toril behind city walls is— largely— peaceful. Calm. Say what you will about roaming monsters and unthinkable terrors, but despite endless stories of heroism or horror there aren't whole portions of the civilized world being plunged into chaos at any given moment. No, it's the little dreads that accumulate when one least expects it: the odd shadow wandering at your back, the wolfish show of teeth after a not-so-distant catcall, the cold brush of clawed fingers at your neck. The microcosm rather than a macrocosmic nightmare.
So yes, those monsters have a high likelihood of returning— but not specifically for him. They'd have no way to track him, after all. Not with the tadpole already having vanished from his skull.
(....or at least he hopes not.)]
They were a threat once before, there's no reason to think I might not trip over one again if fate decides to be unkind.
[A beat.]
Still, I roamed these streets unbothered for two hundred years. My ancestors for centuries before that. If I had to choose my worries, believe me, that'd be on the lower rung. Somewhere between serving the wrong wine for dinner, and having Corypheus turn up on our bakery doorstep.
[These things don't just happen, is the point.]