[Something in him buckles to hear it. Under the weight of everything said. Unsaid. The silence and the empty bandwidth in between. The stillness that takes root in all his fingers too fixed and heavy for him to overcome, and so there, for a time, lit by the glow of his own palm and the pale sheen of those tattoos no more than a few feet away from where he sits, Astarion does what he always does when faced with the insurmountable: he concedes to it. Lets it rule him. Have him.

Only this time, it feels right.]

Gradual. [ Proves a surprising level confession, casting him as something rife with capable indiffernce; he'd seen Cazador enact it once or twice as punishment. Never enough to kill his own unruly pets, but enough to make them think he might just on a whim, should they insist on clawing at the last thin walls of his charnel house patience.]

Worse comes to worst I was planning on crawling back inside my bedroll and rejecting crawling out until the sun sets— but I couldn't do that without alerting you. And I....didn't want to actually run off.

[What a waste that would've been. Or would be, he supposes, considering it's not too late.]