[ What should be amusing (but very much isn't) is how dedicated Iorveth is to trying to send him out on his own when Astarion has never once reacted positively to it. He'd already thought he'd shown a lot of growth by suggesting that Iorveth could stay with his stupid elves while he got his fix of cosmopolitanism. For a few weeks. Maybe a month. Not a year! His century-and-change might have flown by for Iorveth, but every moment of Astarion's past two centuries has felt like a godsdamned lifetime.

He visibly bristles, withdrawing his hand from its place on Iorveth's. ]

I see the world just fine through my own eyes.

[ He hardly needs a sabbatical from Iorveth to do that! His head cocks in thought, then, before he scoots away an inch. ]

Or do you think of me as some lost puppy blindly following around its— master?