He breathes deeply again, then takes a few more breaths for good measure until he's something resembling calm again. "You are forgiven," he says, in a much softer voice. "You do not need to like us, you do not need to want to be with us, you may be planning to only stay with us temporarily, but please, in the future, at minimum give the rest of the party time to object or to reposition and prepare in case we do in fact need to intervene. Does that work for you?"

“Right. Okay. Yes. … Though I had moved so as not to give away your position, and, time was of the essence, and I don’t think we all agree on our priorities. If someone is dying and I could prevent it I will step in to save them regardless of how that could put me in danger. Though, for the record, putting my staff down didn’t really do much.”

"It may not have been that bad from a tactical perspective," he concedes. "And I hope that that 'regardless' in that sentence was for rhetorical effect because if you will try to save someone in fact without considering the trade-off—well, you are free to do so but this is something you party also has an interest in knowing."

“Rhetorical effect, yes. I don’t want to throw my life away either, I have things to do. Just.” She gives a vague wave. “He was dying and I had a chance to maybe save him. Without putting you all directly at risk, because I did. Think about that.” Pause. “Also for the record I could probably talk an owlbear out of eating me but I assume that phrasing was also for rhetorical effect.”

"It was. And it's fine if you want to be all Good and save people, I would just have liked about ten seconds more to position properly in case I needed to stab a bitch."

(Shadowheart approves.)

“Fair. I’ll, you know. Look at the rest of you and gauge how stupid you all think I’ll be to go running off to help strangers. I’m not used to this whole… adventuring party business. It’s usually just me in the woods, doing things.”

"Speaking of it being just you, in the woods..." He reaches into his Bag of Holding to grab the package Ivetrielle had grabbed for Kagha from the swamp, opens it, and shows her the stick inside it as well as a note she wrote. "What is this?"

Ivetrielle looks both amused and irritated. “Well, I know you’re not used to being out in the wilderness, but I should hope you don’t need me to tell you. It’s a stick, Astarion. A yew branch, to be specific.”

He grabs the note and unfolds it one-handed to show it to Ivetrielle, glaring. It reads:

Has anyone ever told you it's not nice to go through other people's things?

She smiles placidly, looking as innocent as one possibly can when one has ruthlessly drawn their party member into a trap.

(Lae'zel approves.)

(Shadowheart approves.)

He folds his arms and says, "Well?"

(And fuck both of you too.)

Innocent blinking. “Well, what? You’re the one who went through my pack without permission, when if you were curious about something you just could have asked. Like a reasonable person.”

"I," he sniffles, "gave you the information about your aunt for free. The least I expected is that you would share your findings!"

“Well, I wasn’t privy to that deal you decided I was a part of, now was I. And instead of asking, you went through my pack to see for yourself. This is what my circle would call a learning exercise.”

Shadowheart looks away and covers her lips to hide her laughter.

"Well. Well!" He huffs.

"Ivy, beautiful, I'm terribly curious about what you found in the swamp and what you did with it. Won't you share it with me?"

“’Ivy’,” repeats Ivetrielle, archly. “Bit overly familiar, but I’ll accept this as progress. Well, it was an enchanted ring. I couldn’t quite make sense of what it was meant to do. I could just tell that it was made with,” she waves vaguely, “extremely nasty fey magic. Likely made by the local hag, as a favor to the Cloakwood Circle. And so I took it to Rath, who’s about the most sensible senior druid in my circle, along with the note.”

"And what did the note say?"

“Descriptions of the common wild forms of the shadow druids that would be joining her. To assist in the change of power. It’s likely they’ve already infiltrated the grove. It’s why I didn’t want us to linger or make a particular fuss about it.”

"...that's. Bad."

"So when we return to the Grove it might be a battlefield, or the smoking remains of one."