I've seen somewhere an HC that Astarion lied to Tav about the extent of Cazador's abuse and that in reality Cazador was a caring and affectionate master.
Can we not do that?
Can we not woobify a villain just like we woobify Astarion?
I think there can be a middle ground between victim blaming Astarion and seeing him as this defenseless little flower who could never hurt a fly.
Cazador is an abuser. Period. Even if he tortured his spawns once in centuries, that is still abuse.
Even if he forced them to sleep with strangers once, that is still rape and it's still abuse.
Even if he entered their minds to control their bodies or thoughts once, it's still abuse.
Even if he gave them rats once, that's still abuse.
And we are quite sure he didn't do any of those things only once in several decades or centuries, as the game shows us.
Even if one doesn't want to believe Astarion (and it's weird because he has zero motivations to lie as the outcome of his life would still be the same: be free from slavery), there are plenty of other testimonies in the game that do that for him.
The servant speaking of the "horrible things" Cazador will do to him once he gets back, the fact that if you handle him back to Cazador he gets skinned alive and turned into a zombie, the siblings who hunt him who are completely subjugated to Cazador's mind control, the kennels and the rough torture instruments scattered around, the simple fact that this man carved personally an infernal mark on the back of his spawns for them to be "consumed", as that is for his own admission their ultimate purpose. He forced his spawns to fetch children as prey for mere revenge reasons and killed the daughter of one his spawns and left the corpse to rot in an abandoned bedchamber. He has a diary in which he records his "special obsession" and punishments he reserved for Astarion. He imprisoned 7000 people and left them to starve in a cage for centuries.
Now, if we want to HC that Cazador still has humanity left in him, and that he doesn't always have gorish violent outbursts we might indeed do that. Two hundred years is a very long time and probably even a Vampire Lord gets tired of the same sadistic routine.
There is no doubt that in his own mind Cazador is doing the right thing and is convinced he was spoiling his spawn, because he probably had it worse during his spawn times. He was impaled for eleven years, he had one of his friends killed under his eyes, and he was probably the only spawn of Vellioth, meaning he was the only one his master could obsess over and torment relentlessly. But his idea of "kindness" is his own perception of himself. It's his own point of view which is completely narcissistic and does nothing to take in consideration the torments of his spawn, even for a while.
We might also think that sometimes he understood pain and suffering and used to comfort his spawns via affectionate gestures but that would hardly be any retribution for torments he himself has inflicted. If anything it would indicate a personality disorder in which sadism and guilt mingle together to create this unpredictable ambivalent monster who acts sweet and caring one day and might skin you alive the next.
Cazador is not good, Cazador is not caring. He is a turbulent, complex, disturbed man with his own demons and painful past, we might feel sad for him, feel compassion for him and appreciate his character without forgetting that overall he's still a sadistic vampire lord who genuinely takes pleasure in others people's pain and treats his slaves as objects to satisfy his whims.
Astarion might be a liar and a manipulator but he lies to bring Tav on his side, seduce them and obtain protection because he's scared his vampirism might get him killed. And overall because that's what he's been taught to do in order to fetch dinner. That's in itself already proof of abuse and trauma response behaviour. But it's obvious when he's lying and when he's not, the game makes it super clear he's only playing with Tav about sleeping together, and Tav is equally amused at his attempts (you get the opportunity to tell him he's silly and a liar).
When he speaks about Cazador, there is no hyperbole in his words. He stops at describing some very specific episodes and vague suggestions, but he never gets overboard in trying to spur compassion or horror in Tav about his past abuse. He casually speaks about his scars when Tav sees them for the first time, and his demeanour is falsely lighthearted, like he's forcing himself to talk about them only because Tav asked. ("Now let's go, if I can't see them you certainly can't"). As a matter of fact, he's reclutant to speak about his past and we can only get him to open up if we choose the romance path and get to deepen our bond with him.
Astarion is selfish and arrogant, he comes from a noble background so it was certainly tough for him to accept and adapt to some things. He's an instigator and a yapper so no doubt he did what he could to annoy Cazador and get on his bad side from time to time. We can even HC he knew the Szarrs and always wanted eternal life without considering the cost, but in my opinion this shouldn't invalidate what Cazador did and how it impacted him. Trauma is also subjective and different for everyone, if for Astarion 200 years of enslavement have been a lot, another would be scarred for life at the mere thought of hunting a victim or at mere touch of a rusty knife on skin.
I think that simplifying this gothic horror which is Baldur's Gate 3's vampiric lore does a disservice to the player and we should take it for what it is: an horrifying story of power, corruption and control, maybe even envy, obsession and sexual attraction but please don't throw in feelings like "care", "gentleness" or "love" because those aren't present if not in the shape of another form of control and psychological manipulation and its still a completely toxic and abusive relationship.
