A reverberating little thump landing as its gutted carcass collapses over tattered parchment, scattering into dismal thwips from so much jostling before sinking into silence.
And Astarion isn't any different, when the dust settles.
(Vexing. Frustrating. He's so angry. So hurt. He can feel it under his skin, seething like blackened bile in his throat— so why won't anything come?) Standing there like a slack-jawed fool: Astarion, the beguiling— who could talk the jewels off a baron's knuckles. Astarion, charmer of men; as if the words tell me are the most indiscrutible ones ever known.
Still hunched into himself.
Still angled towards Vakares, despite everything.]
What's there to tell?
[There. That's it. Start somewhere. Spread your arms, flex your claws; posture like this isn't the end of everything you'd wanted (it's not. It's not, it's not— but he can't see that anymore, blind past the tip of his nose).]
Everything's already decided. What I say won't make a damned bit of difference now....
[Ensuing pause thick against the back of his teeth, facetious in tone, and sharp as pricking claws, but—
no subject
A reverberating little thump landing as its gutted carcass collapses over tattered parchment, scattering into dismal thwips from so much jostling before sinking into silence.
And Astarion isn't any different, when the dust settles.
(Vexing. Frustrating. He's so angry. So hurt. He can feel it under his skin, seething like blackened bile in his throat— so why won't anything come?) Standing there like a slack-jawed fool: Astarion, the beguiling— who could talk the jewels off a baron's knuckles. Astarion, charmer of men; as if the words tell me are the most indiscrutible ones ever known.
Still hunched into himself.
Still angled towards Vakares, despite everything.]
What's there to tell?
[There. That's it. Start somewhere. Spread your arms, flex your claws; posture like this isn't the end of everything you'd wanted (it's not. It's not, it's not— but he can't see that anymore, blind past the tip of his nose).]
Everything's already decided. What I say won't make a damned bit of difference now....
[Ensuing pause thick against the back of his teeth, facetious in tone, and sharp as pricking claws, but—
Maybe he wants to hear it, to be sure.]
....will it?