"It didn't sound like them being pirate raiders run by a Lich Queen was enough to worry you."

"I missed the lich thing, actually."

Maybe he will get Gale to eat the stupid artifact. 

"That's the Vlaakith Lae'zel is always going on about." 

In his experience, liches spend most of their time underground not doing anything. Even Ustalav had way fewer active liches than advertised. Being a sapient undead seems to make you want to spend eternity, like, napping and masturbating.

Probably Vlaakith is actually doing things??? Or maybe not, maybe they're just all worshipping some guy. 

"Uh. Let me think about it. Probably I'm still going to fight you though. It seems like the githyanki probably have a lot of githyanki artifacts and an additional artifact won't change things much, whereas this artifact has to be important to Shar's cult's plans because they want it so much."

"Well, I'm glad you informed me that you probably want to kill me."

"If you're going to try to kill me first, I'd appreciate it if you'd do it in some way that doesn't risk the other party members."

"Even if you were actively sprouting tentacles from your head, there's no way I could kill you that wouldn't implicate me. You don't have to worry about me trying."

"I mean, we could duel...?"

"If it's all the same to you, I would prefer to only duel Lae'zel."

"Right. So. Let's head back."

Heading back! While seriously wondering if not stabbing him now was the correct decision.

And now after all these shenanigans he gets to fuck off to a corner with Astarion, his least stressful party member.

"Hello again. I take it our cleric isn't likely to explode?"

"No cleric explosions."

"Well, that's good to hear. Tonight has been exciting enough already."

"It has been so exciting that you need a snack."

"Mmm, I'm simply going to waste away if I don't,  my heart simply couldn't take it."

Cayden bares his neck.

The tent provides enough cover that unless someone actively looks in, they're not going to notice.

He can actually savour the flavour this time. Cayden tastes divine.

It's probably the insane amount of power.

Well, whatever Cayden is doing to to taste this good, he should keep doing it forever, thank you.

Cayden will not do it forever. In fact, he's nudging Astarion's mouth away after depressingly little time. 

Rude, but also, fair. 

Cayden demands snuggles as payment. 

Oh, that's more than fair payment, as long as Cayden doesn't mind that he's kind of cold.