This story grew out of a friendly collaboration with Ravenia here. I let one of her main character's have a cameo in my strory "Queen of Thorns," while she let my main character in that story have a Cameo in her stories "Theshold" and "Crossing Over". I was intrigued by the setting she had written for Michael Cousland. He is a very different person here, still carefree and unmarked by the horrors and the decisions of a Grey Warden, while Anora does not hold the power she does as queen.
In chapter 15 and forward Michael's brother, Fergus Cousland, joins the story as part of the collaboration between Ravenia and me. While both "Rebel and the Queen" and "For the Love of Leah" are stand alone stories, both run concurrently and tell the tale from the PoV of the two Cousland brothers and their women. I wholeheartedly recommend that you read Ravenia's story too, so you can enjoy the story from both sides.
I am much indebted to Ravenia for helping me develope the characters in this story and to Cadsuane for story developement and proof reading.
This is also an erotic story and some of the characters are written a bit tongue in cheek, so be warned. It is rated (M) mature for very explicit sexual content. If this isn't your cup of tea, please look elsewhere.
Chapter 1. Different Circumstances
Teyrna Anora paced in her room irritably. She wanted to scream in frustration, but that would only cause a scene with guards running in to her bed chamber. It had already happened twice before and she disliked looking like a fool. So instead she tried to calm herself by sitting down on a small chair and waved Erlina over to massage her temples.
She had been so close. Despite her father's mad scheming, she'd gathered enough support from the nobles to win her bid for the crown at the Landsmeet. She would finally be the queen she knew she had always been meant to be. No longer dependant on her foolish husband and her father. Everything had been set in motion the way she had planned.
Everything except for one stupid elven girl. Who could ever have guessed that the little brat, Neria, would turn out to be such a speaker, or that Maric's whining bastard, Alistair, would actually discover a spine at the most inopportune moment? She'd been so sure she had everything in her hand, only to see it slip through her fingers as the Landsmeet voted to make Alistair King of Ferelden.
She still couldn't quite grasp how it had happened. She'd been furious—a fury born out of denial, as if her rage alone could unmake that dreadful reality. It had taken her a long week to cool down enough to come to terms with things.
Alistair had surprised her by visiting her in her prison cell and offering her one last chance to regain her freedom and retain the Teyrnir of Gwaren—if she only relented and swore fealty to him. Her immediate reaction had been to spit on his offer, but a week in prison had woken her up to the reality that, however galling it would be to swear fealty to Alistair, the other option was far worse.
The words had tasted like ashes in her mouth when she took the oath in the throne room before the throne that should have been hers. Humiliated, she'd been forced to smile and thank the king for his generosity as she received her teyrnir in return.
Gwaren had been her home, but after living in the royal palace in Denerim, it felt small and provincial. She didn't really miss the finery or the splendor of Denerim. It was the politics and intrigue she missed. The excitement of playing a game she knew she could play better than anyone else. Everything in Gwaren seemed petty compared to Denerim.
It might have even been boring to rule Gwaren if it hadn't been for a band of rebels known as the Black Griffons. She had first heard of these rebels during the civil war. They'd been one of many such groups fighting against her father. The nucleus of the band had apparently been comprised of survivors from the royal army in Ostagar, led by a knight from Highever.
The Black Griffons had been too few to pose any real threat to Gwaren, but their continued raids had disrupted supplies and prevented Loghain from receiving much needed reinforcements for the war in the Bannorn. Now the civil war was over, but the rebels had apparently turned into simple outlaws, and continued their raids.
Anora had tried to organize her forces to root out these outlaws, but so far without success. The army of Gwaren, although professional and capable, had been decimated by the war and the Blight. Few of the best commanders were still alive. She'd also grudgingly been forced to accept that her skills as leader and Queen had not extended into military matters. What looked simple and elegant on a map would always be confounded by realities.
Anora heaved a sigh and dismissed Erlina. She looked out of the window into the night. Below her were a sea of lights from the city, and beyond that the blackness of the forest. Then she went to bed and tried to find relief in sleep from her frustration.
In the dark forest outside Gwaren, Michael Cousland waited, trying to concentrate and remain calm. His plan depended on surprise and he had to wait until almost all of Gwaren was asleep if he was to succeed. That meant he had to wait for hours until the time was right, something that always made him restless.
Michael had always been everything his elder brother Fergus wasn't. Where Fergus had been dependable and careful, Michael was mischievous and reckless. It had always been Michael who got them into trouble as kids and Fergus who got them out of it. Despite their differences, Michael had always loved his brother. The one thing they had always shared was an intense sense of loyalty.
Michael had cursed and begged his parents to be allowed to join his father and brother when the call had came from the King to fight against the darkspawn, but they had been adamant. Michael knew he could have talked his father into letting him go, but his mother was impossible to budge. Then, he had thought it unfair. Fergus was the dependable one. It should have been he who remained at Highever to rule in their father's place while Michael went to war.
Part of him suspected that it was his recklessness that made Eleanor forbid him to go to war. He had always been her favorite and she feared that he would get himself killed in the war. That was a dark irony of course, as he had defied his parents' will and gone to war anyway, and now he was the sole survivor of his family because of it.
He had sneaked away from Highever, the day before his father was to lead the army to join the King at Ostagar. When he arrived, Fergus had been away on a scouting mission and he'd found himself as acting captain of the forces from Highever, at least until his father arrived with the rearguard. His father, however, had never arrived, and while Michael wondered why, he was too thrilled by the fact that he would lead the knights of Highever in battle to be concerned.
He fought bravely at the doomed battle of Ostagar and observed firsthand how Teyrn Loghain betrayed the King and his army to their deaths. He had managed to rally a few dozen of his soldiers to fight themselves away from the terrible slaughter.
He had sworn he would take vengeance upon the traitorous Loghain, and in so doing, brought the remnants of his troops back to Highever. There he had received his next shock. Highever had fallen and men belonging to Arl Howe of Amaranthine had tried to kill them. From local peasants he learned that both of his parents had been slaughtered the night after he had left. Arl Howe claimed it had been the work of bandits, but Howe's men had been in control of the castle the day after and now controlled the whole of Highever, threatening anyone who resisted with death.
Michael had been forced to weigh his options. He wanted to avenge his family and punish the traitor Loghain, but was forced to admit that with a handful of soldiers under his command, he couldn't possibly hope to manage either of these goals. Gwaren was a land of great forests, however, and was subsequently dependant on a winding passage through the Brecilian forest for communication with the rest of the country. That should be the ideal place for a small but determined band of soldiers to strike at the enemy, and then use the nearby forest to conceal themselves.
Through persuasion and the force of his personality, he'd brought his little band through the Brecilian Passage and into Gwaren, and began his raids. For an entire year he had kept up his campaign against Teyrn Loghain. He lost many of his men, but had been able to replace them with a ragtag group of outlaws, refugees and malcontent soldiers.
It had been a hard time. He'd lived in the forest without any of the comforts he had grown accustomed to at home. He wasn't sure how much he'd actually been able to achieve, but at least he'd done something. If the alternative had been hiding and doing nothing, he would much rather have preferred the life of an outlaw, as long as he had a chance for action.
The previous week, one of his men who had entered Gwaren while disguised in order to collect rumors of possible targets, had returned with the startling news that Loghain's daughter, Queen Anora, had returned to Gwaren. No one knew exactly why yet, but Michael had suddenly seen the chance to do something decisive in the war against Loghain. If he could kidnap the Queen, and possibly hand her over to Loghain's enemies, it would be spectacular success.
His lieutenant, Ser Gavren, had tried to talk him out of it, calling him reckless and mad, but Michael refused to change his mind. Nothing could deter him from his purpose. In the end, Gavren had let him outline his plan and grudgingly conceded that it actually might work.
So now Michael and his men waited restlessly in the forest outside Gwaren for the city's inhabitants to go to sleep.
Finally, the lights in Gwaren went out one by one until just a few lamp posts were lit in the town. Michael signaled his men to follow him as they began to slowly, silently make their way out of the forest.
It had been a hot summer and the moat around the town was almost dry. When they had safely advanced within a few yards of the moat, hiding behind an empty outhouse, Michael carefully watched the sky. The moon lit the ground with its pale light, but the many clouds in the night sky soon obscured it, hiding it from view. Michael quickly led his men into the moat and started slowly creeping along it.
After about twenty yards, he reached his destination—a small opening in the city wall for sewage, covered by iron bars. Michael had scouted this location previously and was well aware the bars were rusty and would easily come off, allowing an agile man to slip through. Now he carefully bent and twisted two iron bars off and prepared to crawl in. He tied his swords to rope and then affixed other end of the rope to his waist before entering.
The sewer was smaller partially blocked by debris. For a moment, he was afraid that he'd be stuck in the passage and the whole plan would come apart, but then he managed to crawl through. He pulled the rope with his swords after him and armed himself once again.
Michael was now directly beneath the city wall. He didn't think all his men would be able to come through the hole without being discovered, and he didn't want to risk a bottleneck if they had to escape in a hurry, so his next target would be the guards on top of the wall.
He found a nearby tower in the wall with an entrance that must have stairs leading up to the wall itself. He carefully crept closer and peered inside. The tower was empty, except for some barrels and boxes of provisions and a ladder up to the next level. As soon as he was satisfied that the tower was empty, he entered and started to climb up the ladder as carefully as he could.
The ladder creaked noisily, despite his attempts to remain silent. For a moment he froze, but then he continued up quickly. His only chance if he was heard was to take whoever was up there by surprise. As his head peered up through the hole to the second level, he saw two guards sitting against the wall, sleeping, one of them having just opened a bleary eye to look at him.
"What the…?" the guard began, trying to shake himself awake.
That was as far as he would get. Michael leapt up from the ladder and drew his sword. The guard that had awoken first tried to fumble for his weapon, but Michael didn't give him a chance. He thrust his sword into the guard's neck, and the man fell with a gurgling sound as his life pumped out of the gash and splattered on the wall. In one fluid motion, Michael was already slashing the other guard, who mercifully died before even understanding what was happening.
Michael waited silently for a while, listening for sounds that would signal that he had been discovered. When he had heard nothing, he untied the rope he had previously tied his weapons with, from his waist. The rope was much longer than needed to just bring his swords through the sewage gate. Now he slipped out onto the wall and unrolled the rope's full length over the edge, gripping the end tightly, and lodging his feet against the wall.
One by one, his men climbed up the rope to him, until the whole group was up and inside the tower. Michael told two of the men to disguise themselves in the dead guards' uniforms before the bodies were dumped into the moat. He left the two disguised guards as well as two more men in the tower. He then set off with Ser Gavren and the other two men down the ladder once again.
Now that they were inside the town, their next objective was to find a way into the manor. He had a good idea where the private quarters of the Teyrn were, and led his men, carefully hiding amongst the shadows of the houses, towards the manor.