"...No. Cazador wanted us to. He played favourites, pitted us against one
another - he even kept better quarters for those who played his games best.
He couldn't bear the idea that we might take comfort from each other's
company. But when I was able to get away...I don't know. I just pitied
them."
"It makes me feel rather special, imagining such powerful entities squabbling over what's left of my immortal soul," Astarion says, in grim humour. "But I agree. Fuck the lot of them."
Jacob isn't a gentle and tenderhearted person. Not even under his gruff exterior. But he softens here, too exhausted to be truly angry, but too aware of the misdeeds to be truly complacent.
He pulls himself up ad Astarion talks, grabbing his water bottle and taking a long drink.
"Could there have been a worse fucking pick for you?"
"...John has less of a spine than I credited him with," Astarion says,
after a few moments' thought. "How valuable that knowledge is, I'm not
sure. What about you, inmate?"
"You tell me," he sighs. "Did it mean anything to say what I did? I've been challenging fuckers like him my whole life. Not always for as good of a cause, though."
Astarion twitches a smile, then rolls onto his side to look at Jacob.
"...it was stupid, and reckless, and utterly futile. It accomplished less than nothing. And I wouldn't have thought less of you if you'd just walked away."
The kiss is entirely unexpected, but there's a knot that seems to unclench in his chest. Everything had been futile in his goddamn life, so to have one thing go right, mean something to someone, makes the whole thing almost worth it.
"I'm sure that when I gave it to you, it was with the condition that I'd never seen it in my life," he says, lightly teasing. He rests a hand on Jacob's waist. "So I would say you lost your dagger. Commiserations, darling."
He closes his eyes, the rhythmic movement soothing.
"The vampire hunters?"
He snorts. "Christmas is when people celebrate the birth of the son of a god who was also a god himself. They put a lot of pagan shit in it, like a tree, but do gift giving."
Apparently, following God wasn't enough to dissuade him from manipulating a string of young women into murdering their predecessors. But he can imagine not every deity in every pantheon would disapprove.
"Following someone you can see and talk to seems the better choice."
Jacob's not entirely sure that was the Voice. He's fairly certain that was his brother's own crazy fucking schemes, but the Voice only said that he would need to unite the brothers. It didn't say a damn thing about not bringing in some random sister/wife substitutes.
"And he's right. He's right, even if he is fucking crazy. The Collapse will happen, sooner rather than later. It's better to be prepared for it since we can't just fight it."
"I - I don't know. It's not a choice I thought I'd have to make," he admits, pulling the blankets over the both of them to ward off the chill in his bones.
"I don't know anything but that world. Maybe I'm too old to know any others."
"Maybe you ought to start shopping around," Astarion suggests. "Everyone here has their own home worlds, and I'm sure some of them aren't in existential peril."
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"...No. Cazador wanted us to. He played favourites, pitted us against one another - he even kept better quarters for those who played his games best. He couldn't bear the idea that we might take comfort from each other's company. But when I was able to get away...I don't know. I just pitied them."
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"Don't reas the note," he tells him, one hand on his arm. "You got nothing to prove to him. Or any of the others."
Which is rich coming from him, but he's trying.
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"I know."
Astarion laughs bitterly.
"He'd only be telling me that it's somehow my fault that the Admiral poached me, instead of permitting the death my master designed for his children."
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Jacob winces. "Well fuck him. And fuck the Admiral, too. He doesn't know half the shit that goes on in his own ship, but wants to play god."
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"It makes me feel rather special, imagining such powerful entities squabbling over what's left of my immortal soul," Astarion says, in grim humour. "But I agree. Fuck the lot of them."
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He pulls himself up ad Astarion talks, grabbing his water bottle and taking a long drink.
"Could there have been a worse fucking pick for you?"
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"Absolutely not," Astarion says, through a bitter laugh. "I don't remember my real family. They would have just been visiting strangers."
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"...John has less of a spine than I credited him with," Astarion says, after a few moments' thought. "How valuable that knowledge is, I'm not sure. What about you, inmate?"
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"You tell me," he sighs. "Did it mean anything to say what I did? I've been challenging fuckers like him my whole life. Not always for as good of a cause, though."
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Astarion twitches a smile, then rolls onto his side to look at Jacob.
"...it was stupid, and reckless, and utterly futile. It accomplished less than nothing. And I wouldn't have thought less of you if you'd just walked away."
He leans in to kiss him fleetingly.
"But I...I still like that you didn't."
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He slings an arm around Astarion's middle.
"I uh - lost your dagger, though."
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"I'm sure that when I gave it to you, it was with the condition that I'd never seen it in my life," he says, lightly teasing. He rests a hand on Jacob's waist. "So I would say you lost your dagger. Commiserations, darling."
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He breathes in with a shiver, his muscles aching. "According to the pirate, I have my choice of wardens who will freely hand 'em out."
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Astarion smiles, thumb drawing slow circles through Jacob's shirt.
"You do. The Belmonts both gave me weapons for Christmas, and I didn't even ask. I don't even know what Christmas is, really."
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"The vampire hunters?"
He snorts. "Christmas is when people celebrate the birth of the son of a god who was also a god himself. They put a lot of pagan shit in it, like a tree, but do gift giving."
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"The vampire hunters," he agrees, in a wry tone which communicates his keen awareness of the irony. "Are those gods you follow?"
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Which seems like a close enough correlation.
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Apparently, following God wasn't enough to dissuade him from manipulating a string of young women into murdering their predecessors. But he can imagine not every deity in every pantheon would disapprove.
"Following someone you can see and talk to seems the better choice."
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"And he's right. He's right, even if he is fucking crazy. The Collapse will happen, sooner rather than later. It's better to be prepared for it since we can't just fight it."
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"Do you intend to go back to that...inevitability, when you're done here?"
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"I don't know anything but that world. Maybe I'm too old to know any others."
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"Maybe you ought to start shopping around," Astarion suggests. "Everyone here has their own home worlds, and I'm sure some of them aren't in existential peril."
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"What about you, huh?"
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