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[illithidnapped]

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[illithidnapped]

"You weren't." Well, at least insofar as speaking to him directly, that is. The voice is different, the intonation off.

So no, definitely not Byerly.

"Oh, I was just passing through. Taking in a little air before the place is crawling with drudgery."

[altusimperius]

Benedict opens his mouth as if to disagree, but closes it again-- he's learned a lot, working for Byerly, and one of the lessons has been that sometimes it's not worth arguing.

"Then I'm surprised you're doing it now," he admits pleasantly, plucking the cigarette from his mouth to tap it into an ashtray on his desk, "or are you saying you prefer nothing to drudgery?"

[illithidnapped]

“I prefer a great many things to sore palms and a pat on the back.” Exhaled as he lifts a hand to examine his own nails for the briefest of moments.

“I imagine most people do, too.”

Speaking of, this is precisely the moment he opts to stride forward, bracing his hands at the edge of the desk and leaning just forward to catch a peek of what’s being written— or should he say drawn— across parchment.

[altusimperius]

Benedict has just enough time to tilt his head confusedly-- being patted on the back is drudrgery?-- before he has to jump into action, quickly (but perhaps not quickly enough) shifting the document back over his page of drawings.

"I'm," he says as smoothly as he can while remaining fully aware of how un-smooth he is, "sorry, did-- was there something you needed?"

[illithidnapped]

"Not really, no."

Ever so casually spoken, slender fingers snaking out to snatch up the corner of that now-hidden page of drawings, tugging it free with as much success as Benedict's own reflexes allow.

"But it looks like I'm not the only one who prefers a little nothing to hard work."

[altusimperius]

Pursing his lips with a defeated sigh through his nose, Benedict reaches too late for the parchment, and tries not to look too guilty as he lowers his hand.

"I can do both," he insists primly, "the workload's light this morning. ...not that it's any of your business." He cuts his eyes periodically to the page Astarion is holding, as if checking it for anything incriminating: and he's safe, for the most part. The drawing is competent, for what it is, and there's nothing offensive hidden in the foliage.

[illithidnapped]

Shame. Would've made it better.

"It's not half-bad, you know." He finally concludes, taking a casual seat across the edge of that desk, tilting his head slightly to one side in order to better evaluate it.

"You could sell something like this for a decent coin or two, if you weren't whittling away your talent filling out forms and whatnot."

[altusimperius]

"Because casual artists are known for their sprawling wealth." An arch of his eyebrows as Benedict cants his head toward the elf, not about to fall into that line of thinking.

"I'm not whittling away anything. It's engaging enough work." He lifts a hand to beckon for the parchment, asking for it back.
"What isn't drudgery, to you?"

[illithidnapped]

"Casual? Gods no. Hence the if you weren't part of my prior statement. Do try to keep up." A throaty chuckle lives there, tongue pressed to the edge of one sharp, overlong tooth, even as he tosses the paper aside. Fetch, boy.

"Fun, naturally. A little excitement. A little grandeur— a little mayhem. Oh, indulging in a hot meal is novel enough, but you people barely serve anything lukewarm here, and I am starving, in so many more ways than one."

[altusimperius]

That tooth is alarming, and Benedict finds himself staring at it for the moment before he rises from his chair, stepping after the tossed-aside parchment to recover it. There's plenty of space left, and these things aren't cheap, so it's best to keep all his whittling to one surface.

"What sort of fun do you fancy, then?" he asks as he straightens, returning the drawing to the desk but remaining upright himself, settling his hip against the desk's edge.

[illithidnapped]

“Same as anybody else I suppose.”

My my, would you look at all that pristine paperwork left right within arm's reach. Don’t mind him, he’s just going to pluck up the rest of it out of curiosity alone. Nothing wrong with a little reading material between friends.

“You know how oh so many religions tend to have a list of all the nasty little things that you should never, ever let yourself do under any circumstances?”

A few slender fingertips lift, rubbing idly at one another before he thumbs past one page in favor of the next.

“Those.

All of them.”

[altusimperius]

Well-- no, that won't do. With a slightly pained look, Benedict reaches forward to pluck the documents right back out of Astarion's grip, assuming he's quick enough.
For obvious reasons, Benedict doesn't handle any correspondence too sensitive, but that doesn't mean what he does do should be paraded around in any public capacity; it's an ambassador's office, after all, and there are standards. One hopes.

"You're off to a good start," he says with a weak laugh, trying to maintain the confidence of a moment ago while wavering into uncertainty.

[illithidnapped]

"Why thank you." He muses, flicking his own wrist so that reaching grasp might miss its initial mark.

That he could continue to make this difficult is a given— and so one hopes that the moment Benedict's fingers finally close around held documents, there's a level of awareness that he's being permitted a victory, rather than seizing it.

"Sometimes I feel as though no one around here appreciates my hard work."

[altusimperius]

Just when it's looking like they might have a problem, Benedict is able to snatch the documents back with a subtle sigh of relief. He's fully aware of the concession, pressing them protectively to his chest even as he offers Astarion an ingratiating smile.

"They probably don't," he admits, "things can be... adversarial. It's still worth being here."

[illithidnapped]

“Trouble in paradise, you say? How awful.”

His now entirely unoccupied hand rises— fingers fanned— to press themselves across his cheek in a show of feigned shock.

And then he smiles, all sharp edges.

“But then I suppose that’s the nature of warfare, isn’t it? Everyone wanting to do things their own way, everyone getting their passionate hearts worked up into a fervor, knowing any moment could be their last.”

A sigh lives here. Wistfully pleasant.

“Hardly any wonder they're all so high strung.”

[altusimperius]

"I... suppose."

It sounds right, and Bene's not about to wax poetic about the matter, seeing as he's personally one of the topics on which Riftwatch's leadership tends toward the conflicted.

"In case you're thinking of agitating," he adds, with a quirk of his eyebrow, "I don't recommend it."

[illithidnapped]

“That sounds like the advice of a man that’s been burned before.”

Long lashes flutter for a moment, not innocent, only grazing along the concept of sympathy— before shadowing the red of his eyes, lips twisting faintly by the barest degrees.

“Or...watched someone burn, maybe.”

[altusimperius]

"Maybe."

The resulting smile is coy, evasive, but the whole situation is still-- and perhaps always will be-- too raw to properly joke about, as far as Benedict is concerned. It can be funny when he's no longer in danger of paying the ultimate price for fucking it up, which is to say, probably never.

But he's still his mother's son, and Byerly's attaché, and he's not too oblivious to model the behavior of those cleverer than himself.

"A fascinating subject, which is ultimately none of your business."

[illithidnapped]

Evasiveness, and kittenish at that. If ever a predatory glint existed in his eyes— and it certainly does, mind— it’d make itself as present now as it did back home over the faintest scent of blood in the air.

He does so love a good game.

“Is that how you speak to all your allies, I wonder?”

He’s measuring him now, this wisp of a man before him: the weight of his stance, the set of his smile, how closed his posture— even where his eyeline rests. Footholds no doubt exist somewhere.

[altusimperius]

It's strange to Benedict how that glint in Astarion's eyes brings to mind his mother in one of her moods, a notion that grips his heart and leaves him momentarily pinioned with uncertainty, a butterfly stuck to a board.

He's spent so much time digging so deep, looking for a way out of this particular deep-seated paralysis; he's in Diplomacy, he should be able to handle situations like these. If he were Byerly, he'd have already deflected, turned it back on Astarion.
But he's not.

"...only the especially nosy ones," he replies, with far less confidence than he wants.

[illithidnapped]

He sees it, right there in constricted pupils. In stiffness, something that proves Benedict’s on the back foot. Hardly a middling parry. No real bite.

How precious.

“And with flattery, too, I see.” Said as he rises, all smooth movement, for the sake of prowling nearer to his quarry instead— testing the waters of proximity, and how they might tip the scales, so to speak.

[altusimperius]

Though tempted to take a step back, Benedict holds his ground, instead becoming all too aware of how heat rises into his face (and possibly elsewhere) at the invasion.
He's not inexperienced in these matters, per se, but handling them while sober and attempting(?) to fend them off is an entirely different beast from drowsing stoned and drunk in a pile of other handsy youths. He's blushing, he knows it, and the moment isn't unwelcome so much as unprecedented. He's at work.

"--well," is all he manages to say, finding his gaze lingering on the delicate structure of Astarion's face, the intriguing little points of his canine teeth, the pale strangeness of him.

[illithidnapped]

Honestly, if he had an ounce of decency in him, he would feel ashamed for playing such an unfair game— but it’s so early, and he's so bored— and he’s keeping his own claws sheathed, at the very least. For the sake of one very, very rabbiting little mouse.

"Well what, sweetheart?"

He isn’t purring, but his voice has gone low and throaty all the same, cutting a near line to it when he reaches out with delicately poised fingertips to just barely nudge the underside of Benedict’s chin. The pads of his fingers a touch cooler than they ought to be.

"I know I've got the ears for sharp hearing, but you don't seem to be saying much of anything anymore."

[altusimperius]

Benedict's mind races through all the potential responses and finds nothing even bordering sensible; the little graze of fingertips against his chin has him uncomfortably aware of his own heartbeat, the warmth of the blood flowing to his cheeks, ears, and below.

It's been a while. And this man is no Colin, almost his polar opposite, but in their shared lucidity that makes him all the more intriguing.
Vibrating with tension, one hand moves to lightly grip Astarion's arm at the elbow, making as though to pull him closer.
Where's the person who was so charming at parties, Bene thinks, and who is this idiot fumbling about like an adolescent?

[illithidnapped]

The whisper he offers is given so near to Benedict’s cheek that spent breath likely pools against it, the faintest scent of leather oil and lilac clinging to the air:

“If I was your enemy, dear heart, you’d be dead by now. You do realize that, don’t you?”

At that grip on his arm, the laugh he offers is as secretive as anything else in this moment, flashing the full edges of his fangs as his nose crinkles. The fingertips at Benedict’s jaw flick, gingerly knocking away all that focused attention with an almost playfully chaste affection.

“And everything in this office would be mine to rifle through as I liked.”

There’s a wink as he withdraws, letting his arm drag against Benedict’s grip.

“...drawings included.”