[ For what it's worth, he appreciates the avoidance of any real sentiment, if only because he wouldn't know what to do with it beyond pretend that sympathy isn't necessary. (The opposite is true, of course — he wants to be reached out to — but that's something he's yet to really admit to himself, given the relatively short period he's had to be free of Cazador's immediate influence.) Heckling is easier to deal with, to respond to, because he knows how to ford that particular stream, has grown so comfortable with it — and the act of flirtation — that anything else feels unsettlingly alien. Some people experience arrested development and others get turned into vampire spawn when they're thirty-nine ... same thing.
It's not particularly fun to talk about, either — nothing dampens a conversation like discussing being beaten to death and subsequently diving head-first into two centuries of enslavement.
So: ]
Blankets, or the company of a hot-blooded young thing like you — not the worst options I've ever been presented with.
[ Hot-blooded being slightly more pointed in this context, even if he doesn't mean it as such. ]
I wouldn't have taken you for a romantic.
[ In the same way that most wouldn't assume as much about Astarion, really, despite the fact that he is ultimately susceptible to such things. ]
I suppose I've a little ground to recover if I'm to be anything close to a dashing prince.
no subject
It's not particularly fun to talk about, either — nothing dampens a conversation like discussing being beaten to death and subsequently diving head-first into two centuries of enslavement.
So: ]
Blankets, or the company of a hot-blooded young thing like you — not the worst options I've ever been presented with.
[ Hot-blooded being slightly more pointed in this context, even if he doesn't mean it as such. ]
I wouldn't have taken you for a romantic.
[ In the same way that most wouldn't assume as much about Astarion, really, despite the fact that he is ultimately susceptible to such things. ]
I suppose I've a little ground to recover if I'm to be anything close to a dashing prince.