NOT MY ASTARION BRAIN ROT CONTINUING CUS LIKE i just got the scene where he literally says he misses seeing his face and that like he wishes he knew what he looked like and i??? WANTED SO BADLY FOR IT TO BE AN OPTION TO DRAW HIM
LIKE IMAGINE STARING AT HIM ACROSS THE BONFIRE, watching the way the light dances across his pale skin. youve been through hard times and one of the things you've learned to get through it was to draw
at first, you loathed the fact that you had to paint rich people for mere couple pieces of gold when you knew your art was worth more than that. you loathed even more that they'd upturn their posh noses at you and scoff when, truly, they knew what a treasure your art was.
now, seeing astarion, the way his white hair seemed to almost form a halo around his head, reflecting the moonbeams that graced his body, watching as he crossed his legs and meditated; you knew that you didn't regret a single second of the trials and tribulations that led you to this point.
you could finally put this agonizing skill to use. you could draw him.
and so you scrounged up some paper, an ink well, a quill; all things you'd pocketed during your adventures with the rather willful vampire.
you sat there, nib of the quill scratching against the parchment.
your art was nothing compared to the paintings you'd done before; these were mere lines and ink blots. you wished you could truly show him how beautiful he was through water color or pastels. instead, trapped in a land you barely knew, all you could do for him was this.
he had his eyes closed, of course, so you drew them from memory. strikingly red, like rubies, like blood. you didn't forget his crow's feet; you loved the way they wrinkled when he laughed. you shaped his lips, soft but rough from years of bite and chew, and formed it into his infamous mischievous grin.
his hair always seemed unruly but, drawing it now, it felt like drawing gorgeous chaos; there was an order to it, the way the bangs fell across his forehead, the way the sides feathered in front of his ears and curled behind them.
when you stopped, you realised you'd drawn him over and over, across several pieces of parchment.
the way he frowned and his fangs would glance across his lips. the way he'd look confused and his eyebrows would furrow. the way he'd look longingly at the stars, mind distant and eyes almost empty, like he'd made so many wishes that were never granted by the cosmos.
you never liked tooting your own horn but you felt like you truly captured him.
so, you took your pieces of paper, all drawings of him, dozens of them, small and sketchy; you took it all and you sat beside him and spread them out in front of you.
it took him a second to realise you were there. he'd been letting his guard down recently, especially when you were on watch duty, and it took you laying your head across his shoulder for his eyes to flutter open.
he opened his mouth, like there had almost been a retort slipping off his tongue, but the sight of your drawings stopped him.
he let out a ragged breath, eyes flickering across all of them. his clawed hands hovered in the air, trembling, as if taking a hold of the drawings would make them crumble under his touch.
and perhaps, in his head, he really believed they would.
'darling,' he'd call you, his voice wet with unshed tears 'what's all of this?'
of course he'd still joke. it was how he coped with things. he joked to hide how he truly felt and, of course, you were always there to understand.
'it's you,' you answered a matter-of-factly, as if you hadn't just turned this vampires world upside down 'its you the way i see you.'
and that's what makes him crack. because maybe, since you were the one that drew all of it, you hadn't noticed. but he noticed.
he noticed all the love and devotion you spilled across the page. every single detail, every single stroke, it was all from love.
and as someone who had never been on the receiving end of it, astarion cracked and he hid his face into your neck and he cried.
they were soft sobs, almost unnoticeable. but he cried nonetheless.
he cried for his past that he'd lost under his sadistic master, he cried for his difficult present that seemed impossible to escape, and he cried for this hopeful future you seemed to lay out in front of him.
he cried because he didn't realise that he had this much hope left inside of him. because he didn't know what else to do in the face of your devotion.
you just sat there, humming and rubbing his back, ignoring the way his arm wrapped around your waist, claws digging into your skin as if you'd disappear in front of him if he didn't hold on to you as tightly as possible.
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