[ She does not tell him what she is, but the low, inhuman growl that winds itself around her words and the cold authority of her gaze are answer enough. She may detest Cazador's methods, yet, to Astarion, there is little difference in the way her will settles over him. He finds that he cannot turn away. The buzzing lights and broken machines, the chill of that small, airless room, the entire, accursed city—all of it seems to fade into the background, forgotten and unimportant. All that matters now are the woman's words and that frozen, inescapable glare.
Astarion's shoulders slump. He thinks on the poem. He thinks of great pain and of centuries before and of mechanical footsteps, going round and round and round. She thinks she is offering him hope—a way to break the cycle. But all Astarion sees is the same looping path that there's always been: obey, and be spared his master's wrath—until she changes the rules. Until she has other use of him. Until she gets bored. She offers him a different hand—perhaps it's even a more merciful one—but it's still the same old chain. ]
I won't do it again, [ Astarion says, and hates himself immediately for it. ] I... I can control myself.
[ It hadn't even been about hunger when he'd bitten the boy, not really. Oh, yes, Astarion had been hungry when he'd done it—starving, truly. But he's been starving for the past 200 years. What was one more night on top of it? No, what he'd done had been a test. The only real reason Astarion had bitten the boy was because he'd needed to prove to himself that he could.
Instead, all that's been proven to him, yet again, is that freedom only comes from power. Power that, right now, belongs solely to the entity before him. ]
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Astarion's shoulders slump. He thinks on the poem. He thinks of great pain and of centuries before and of mechanical footsteps, going round and round and round. She thinks she is offering him hope—a way to break the cycle. But all Astarion sees is the same looping path that there's always been: obey, and be spared his master's wrath—until she changes the rules. Until she has other use of him. Until she gets bored. She offers him a different hand—perhaps it's even a more merciful one—but it's still the same old chain. ]
I won't do it again, [ Astarion says, and hates himself immediately for it. ] I... I can control myself.
[ It hadn't even been about hunger when he'd bitten the boy, not really. Oh, yes, Astarion had been hungry when he'd done it—starving, truly. But he's been starving for the past 200 years. What was one more night on top of it? No, what he'd done had been a test. The only real reason Astarion had bitten the boy was because he'd needed to prove to himself that he could.
Instead, all that's been proven to him, yet again, is that freedom only comes from power. Power that, right now, belongs solely to the entity before him. ]