. x .

"Alistair."

"Aen!"

"You've an idle moment, yes? There is a most pressing matter which we must discuss."

"Er. I'm cleaning."

Aen joins Alistair on the campside log, tucking his robes neatly about his legs. "No, you are buffing. An hour ago you were cleaning that shield, and humming a tune. The tune is over, the animal fat is being applied, and the resident gossips have retired to bed."

"All right. So, er, discuss. Discuss what?"

Aen smiles, to soften the blow of the words: "Your Templarate past. Your Grey Warden future."

"Oh," Alistair shrugs, "That." After a moment's silence, he brightens. "Nothing to worry about; I've no grudge with mages. Never had, never will have. You know the chantry life wasn't for me - I've said as much."

"Yes, Chantry life..." Aen's cool side-glare skips up and down Alistair's frame doubtfully.

"This conversation feels awfully familiar." Alistair is leaning away, the small vigorous circles of the rag slowing against the surface of his shield. "So let's skip to the point, hey?"

"I simply wanted to know if, if you knew -" Aen toes the dirt in front of them.

"No. I doubt it is that you want to know anything, especially not whether I know -"

"If you knew that you're not, you know, actually in the Chantry - "

"You just came over here to make fun of me. Again."

Aen scoffs, "I'm asking an honest question! Do you or do you not know that you no longer have to fear the Reverend Mother? That her ear-splitting creeches and swift hand of righteous cheek-slappery are all in the past?"

"What is this really about?" The buffing has picked up pace again, a little sloppier for the laughter coloring Alistair's movements. "You're after something. I can tell." The rag is brandished at the air between them, "You and your wordsy traps."

"She's miles and miles away, Alistair. She can't hurt you anymore." The reassurance would have almost been sincere, were it not for the grin that curled up Aen's face as he leaned in close to whisper against Alistair's neck (being not quite tall enough to reach his ear), "You are safe, now."

"By. The. Maker." Alistair drops the shield entirely, its hollow metallic ring punctuating his exasperation. "Aen. Are you - are you honestly coming on to me? Is this - is this how you do it, you annoy your lovers into submission?"

"These wild assumptions of yours are ever so flattering." Aen props an elbow on Alistair's shoulder, though it is a bit of a reach. "I was merely informing my very good friend of his personal freedom, now that he is out from under the daunting mantle of occupational purity."

"I... look, well that's. That's fine, then. I suppose? But, no, don't - stop looking at me like that."

"Like what?"

"Don't you 'like what' me. Ge'roff already."

Aen leans his chin on his forearm, breath tickling at Alistair's jaw. "So give me a shove, if you must."

Alistair picks up his shield, drops it with a clang that makes them both wince and glance around. "Look, I'm only waiting for the right girl."

"The darkspawn aren't going to wait for the 'right girl' to fall into your lap before they get around to killing you."

Alistair's shoulders slump, though Aen is not yet dislodged. "I know. I always figured I'd just happen upon her in one of these farms we're always passing. Sun in her hair, wearing one of those cute little milking maid smocks. A dozen watchful brothers making idle threats about heart-breaking. Of course I wouldn't, but it'd be nice to know that she had them to keep her safe."

"Sakes, Alistair," Aen drawls, "I could find a cow. Milk it right here if you need me to."

"Dammit you, I'm serious! I should like to share my bed with someone special."

"What. I'm special."

A scoff. "Oh sure, you're sp-" a swallow, a glance to the diminished fire.

Aen's eyebrows lift, the cool triumph of his grin pressed to Alistair's shoulder in a kiss muffled by the wool of his tunic. Aen pats the spot. "You'll figure it out, one way or another. I'm not about to drop myself into your lap, either."

Alistair's voice is a bit dry. "Thank the Maker for small miracles."

Aen removes his arm from Alistair's shoulder, as if at a sudden hurt. "Tsk. That nearly wounds my feelings."

"All one of them?"

"Indeed, you break my heart."

"Leaving you with half a walnut."

Aen's beaming grin is stifled, and he is shaking against Alistair's shoulder with silent laughter before collecting himself. "In all honesty," He wipes the corner of an eye with his sleeve, clearing his throat. "I would make a terrible milkmaid. Elven androgyny can only go so far, and I've none of that to begin with."

"You're already in a dress." Alistair reaches forward to tweak at a skinny knee and Aen nearly topples backwards with surprise.

"These are robes and you know the blighted difference!" The reprimand drops to a harsh murmur, lest they wake the camp. There is difficulty in scolding through a grin, though, and Aen is a little bit drunk on the fact that Alistair has not yet shoved him away.

"I just... breasts, Aen. Seriously and honestly, honestly and seriously, how can you not want a pair of beautiful, firm, full... breasts? And thighs, and, Maker, a woman's hindquarters are - are..." Alistair's hands are shaping the picture before them, curving in the air and going tense to illustrate the sheer want before being thrown forward in a shrug. "How could you not?"

"Every woman has tits and an arse, Alistair. I thought you wanted someone special."

"No, yes, of course I do. Just asking you, is all. I mean, why me?"

A weight settles in the air that had not been yet borne on their previous jabs and crass suppositions. Aen's appraisal is gentler this time around, pulling apart Alistair's military posture, his carefully trimmed hair, the minor cuts and bruises on his jaw and knuckles, the ropey swell of muscle under the loose sleeves of his drab tunic and the heavy folds of his leather breeches. Rather than answer his question, though: "Would you deny a woman if she were thin and flat?"

"Well." Alistair blinks, then narrows his eyes in thought. Finally, he shakes his head, "Of course not, if we got along and she - "

"Then why would you deny me?" It's a small voice that asks, as if it weren't Aen asking at all, but only a very small part of him that never got the chance to grow very loud.

"I never said I - hey now, that's dif - and - oh, sod it, I asked you first."

"'Why you'?"

"Yes. It's not as if you're left wanting for options."

"That was damn near a compliment. Bravo."

"Don't avoid the question."

Aen scratches under the high collar of his robes, fidgeting carefully between the vulnerability of a truth and the flattery of a lie. "Is it that you wish me to sing your praises, or to list my faults?"

"What, is it... is it really that complicated?" There is a hint of a smile behind Alistair's words, a bored inflection of tone, a carefully suppressed grin. "You know I can't turn down the offer of praise. I mean I know I'm dashing and witty, but it's nice to hear it from other people."

The heat starts in Aen's belly, curling down his thighs and up his chest, warming his limbs and neck and ears before finally flooding his face. The words are dragged out, an unusual loss of eloquence. "To start, you are kind, but not weak." Stilting, and Aen finds himself leaning away, looking away, maintaining composure. "You are confident enough to admit when you are incapable, and that is a very, very good, er, thing. You head into battle with a clear head and always, always this is done so fearlessly that others are instantly inspired to follow."

"You have an infatuation with my skills as a warrior?"

"By the nine fucking hells, Alistair, what do you want me to say? That you appeal to my exclusive sexual appetites? Or, that when we are apart I am left with a wanting like a gaping wound in the core of me?"

A discomfited silence. "Go back to the warrior skills, I liked that part."

Aen glares, jaw set. There is a scuff of boots in fireside dirt, a flash of thin arms clad in dyed linen, a small tackle. Alistair is pinned more by his own shock than by the narrow mage straddling his waist, and holds both hands up in supplication, trying not to laugh because yes, wow, that is a very serious glare. "I thought you weren't going to drop yourself in my lap?"

Aen leans down until their noses are nearly touching. "Would you now hear of my faults?"

Alistair balks. "Eh. Sure." He clears his throat. "Sure, yes. The reasons, that, whyyoulikeme. Those."

"I am not kind. I would never admit to weakness. I could never imagine going into battle without you at my side. You are," Aen sidles down to press groin to groin, bracing his palms against the flat of Alistair's stomach to lift and descend, a roll of the hips, "everything that I am not, every strength, physical and - "

Alistair has stuttered to a sit, grasping Aen's waist to lift him away, muttering, "Woah, hey, ah, woah. Heh. Wow, that's... Wow, okay."

Aen pushes down through the resistance, demanding when Alistair would have been gentle, bullying when Alistair would have been patient, making an example of his claim.

"Uhn, oh okay, I'll just - " Alistair bites his protest in half, the breath rushing out of him in a heave of chest and shoulder as Aen grinds -

There is a brief scramble to get arms and hands out of the way, and Alistair is now pulling Aen back down against him as much as he is pushing him up, body answering questions that neither could have put into words (the answer being an enthusiastic 'yes'). It is not until Aen has felt Alistair's cock swell and pulse against his own through the press of their clothing that he risks a kiss - a kiss is, after all, much more important than what goes on below the belt (which could be susceptible to certain prejudices of infrequent use).

The kiss peaks in darkness, a clash of faces pressed tightly shut against a backlash that would never come. Aen involves his tongue and a noise leaks out of Alistair that sends a fire lancing from his belly to his cock. It is once Alistair's jaw has relaxed and his hand has come up to cup the back of Aen's head that Aen stops, pulling himself away, testing the new boundaries.

Alistair pulls him back by the neck, interrupting the escape, face dark with passion.

Aen grins, holding a finger up between them.

As a sky after a storm, Alistair's expression clears. He blinks. He blushes. He winces, shifting in the dirt.

"Alistair."

Alistair has to swallow twice, but manages to croak, "Aen?"

"Will you be my lover?"

"Mnh." Alistair flops back to the ground, arms splayed, casting his gaze heavenward. "Oh, all right, fine."

. x .