a rich ponce with far too many names.

The longer he's here, held by the water and a beautiful archer, the less anything seems to matter. Every breath in is humid perfume, the room softened by intimate lighting and steam and his own bad eyesight; Vex'ahlia's voice has a warm, inviting quality to it, and her hands are sure. When she stops touching one patch of scalp, he could swear he still feels her fingertips there, some echo of her lingering on his skin. He wonders, stupidly, just how obvious the remnants of her touch will be to her compatriots. But mostly, he doesn't think much at all, just drinks in the nearness of another body and reacts when appropriate.

In other words, he is very, very tired, not to mention a little inebriated. Tomorrow, this will all look differently, no doubt, but he's struggling to plan past the next fifteen seconds. Why bother? Why not, at least for a time, allow himself to exist in this no-man's-land between dreaming and wakefulness? For once he doesn't feel the near-overwhelming dread and determination that mark his every waking moment (and more than a few of his dreams, too).

"I'm not about to disagree," he says, making no effort to mind his tongue, "after you broke me out of prison. You do seem to know what you're doing."

Even when it's utterly absurd. A moment later, curious: "And - the bear?"