doggish: not a sit of doubting (talk ⚔ it's a leap of faith)
Fenris ([personal profile] doggish) wrote in [community profile] albinomilksnake 2024-07-20 11:30 pm (UTC)

[A choice, then. A choice that wasn't a choice at all, and oh, yes, that's a familiar tale, isn't it? A slave driven to the brink with desperation, clawing at the walls and so desperate that he'd take any out offered to him— gods, is there any sadism a master won't stoop to? Us, Astarion says, ours, and Fenris wonders how many times such a ritual was performed.

(How many times would Danarius have done it if he could have? Hundreds of times, if the magic didn't dilute, for what magister wouldn't give an arm and a leg to have such control over all his slaves? No need to fret about rebellion; no need to worry about health or resentment, the vengeful mother with a knife or the heartbroken lover who decides to end it all in one spectacular bang, oh, no. Better to make sure they're all docile, and who cares if their souls are screaming?

And he hates that even now, his first comparison is Danarius, but it is what it is— and of all the scars he bears, that, at least, is a small one).

He wants to know more. To ask how long it's been since Astarion was able to converse freely, if he was ever able to at all; to wonder if those compulsion spread even to thoughts, and this is the first time his newfound companion could even think without having to fear undue influence.

But there's that last sentence— and oh, that takes priority, for he can hear the wariness threaded there, tentative and fearful both.]


Well, do not think me a saint for it.

[He doesn't look away from those hollow eyes shining across the fire, whether they return his gaze or not.]

I am no endlessly doting figure, here to accept any and all as they come. I find magic to be the source of most of the world's problems— blood magic especially— and I am not inclined to coddle what mages I find. They are dangerous creatures at the best of times— and we are not in the best of times. Nor am I often compelled to share my fire like this, not with those I find on the road. I am not cruel, but nor am I some bleeding heart ready to empty my pockets for the sake of another.

[A breath to let that sink in.]

. . . but I know more intimately than most what it is to be marked and mutilated by one's master. I know what it is to be held on a leash and kept at his side, mute and deaf and blind, resigning yourself to your existence until a seemingly miraculous escape presents itself. And I know what it is to flee into a place where you know nothing and understand even less, left only to try and make your way as best you can.

[It's more of a speech than Fenris really meant to give, but he doesn't regret it. Still: some quiet awkwardness is present in the way his fingers idly tap at the ground, self-consciousness displaced.]

So: it is less that I do not care and am blind to what you are, and more that I am too familiar with being the pawn and unwilling victim of a magister gone mad with power.

[A beat, and then, a little glibly, he adds:]

Besides: you may find you attract less stares than me when we go into Kirkwall. An elf with white hair and fangs is unusual, but not more than a warrior walking around with a fortune's worth of ore burned into his skin.

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