Food For Thought

I struggled and struggled not to write about Dragon Age (if I start I might never stop) but some characters just need a little more adoration. Like Zevran—not my LI, in the end, but maybe better than Alistair for straight-out hilarity. Long story short, I needed to write something about him, just to get it out of my system.

OC ALERT and quick briefing: my Gray Warden is F!Amell, first name Hallen, love interest Alistair, and she is generally a good guy suffering from irritability (sometimes) and obliviousness (always.)

Disclaimer: Don't own DA:O.

"A puzzle for you, my Grey Warden: when is a seduction doomed to failure?"

The wry response came after a pause. "I suppose the answer is, when you're not doing the seducing?"

"You flatter me, my dear, though that is not precisely it." Although he sat out of view, sprawled on a half-rotten log behind her, she could almost hear him raising his eyebrows. "Indeed, all alone in the woods as we are, might you not be slightly concerned if that was the case?"

"I'm holding a weapon, Zevran."

"And I wouldn't dare question your ability to use it," he replied, though the humor in his tone suggested the opposite. "My dear, if I intended to seduce you, we would both be wearing far fewer clothes right now, and you wouldn't look half so tense."

He savored the minute clenching of her fingers as he spoke. "However, I would not dream of it unless you were willing." He hesitated, and then amended, "Well, not that I wouldn't dream of it, but no outright action until—"

"Much appreciated," she sighed, and tried not to do him the satisfaction to turning around to see his wicked grin. Only Zevran could have a smile specifically for innuendo. "So the answer—to your puzzle, I mean—couldn't be, when the seductee is already in a committed relationship?"

The elf let out a sudden, hearty laugh. "To that, my dear, I must beg to differ. Some of my most enjoyable exploits began with lovely young women in committed relationships. And lovely young men as well," he added, after a pause. "A very interesting story there, come to that…"

As Zevran's voice faded into the background, Hallen narrowed her eyes at the bow and arrow in her hands. The arrow, notched into the string, slipped abruptly sideways, and she swore under her breath. Just because it was her turn to hunt for dinner, and just because most of her best spells involved fire… Next time she was exercising leader privileges and sending Leliana instead, no matter how the bard protested about having gone last time. "I don't know, Zev," Hallen repeated, a note of exasperation slipping into her voice.

"—the mark was this delightful boy from southern Antiva, and you of course know what they are like down there—ha, and down there," he added, a crooked grin stretching across his face.

"You had a puzzle?"

"Ah!" He straightened, any stories of previously committed southern Antivans instantly a thing of the past. "I believe I did, my dear."

"And?"

"You were close," he admitted, lounging back against the log. "The correct reply was, when the seductee is already in love with someone else."

A sudden fit of spluttering overtook Hallen for a moment, enough so that she lowered the bow and whirled to face Zevran. The elf looked moderately amused and entirely unrepentant.

"I think it's a bit early for that," she protested. "Alistair and I aren't… I mean, I don't…"

"I never said I was talking about you," said Zevran calmly, and his teeth glinted as he smiled. "Alistair, a different story, but no matter. My dear, the point is that you are interfering with my course of action, as it were."

"Course of action?" She snorted. "You make it sound like a military operation."

"I'm a professional," he countered. "Another reason this complication of yours is so unexpected. Not, of course, that I do not respect the difficulty of the choice, but it would be much to both our benefits if you would make a decision."

Hallen, who had personally given up on shooting anything a long time ago, at last set down the bow and arrow to fold her arms. "You're being cryptic."

"The woods have ears, my dear. I like to think of it as delicacy."

She sighed. "Zevran, you are many, many… many things," she concluded, prompting a grin from the elf, "but delicate has never been one of them."

A lesser man would have hesitated to consider his approach then, but Zevran had already thought this next part through. He didn't know how much Hallen knew, but it was best to assume she was aware of the situation. Marginally, the humor in his face decreased. "As you wish. I am referring to Leliana and Alistair."

He waited, examining her face carefully. Hallen's blue eyes narrowed, and her lips parted slightly with a question, and he was sure that she didn't quite get it. Either Hallen was a magnificent liar, or his Gray Warden really had no idea. In all fairness, it could be either, but Zevran suspected that Hallen would never deliberately lead any of her friends on like this.

So she really must not know. Oh, this was marvelous.

"What are you talking about?" she said at last. "I don't understand; what does Leliana have to do with me and Alistair?"

Zevran half-smiled. "I believe Alistair asked the same thing a few days ago."

The firelight played appealingly across both Hallen and Leliana's faces, bronzing usually pale cheeks to a flickering gold. The two women sat close together on the log, shoulders angled in and almost touching, grins stretched by bouts of spontaneous laughter. Their nonstop chatter blurred into a low murmur from a distance, but from the other side of the fire, Zevran was admiring the view more than the dialogue anyway. If all looking and no touching was the new lifestyle under Hallen's command, he intended to make good use of it.

A familiar clank and creak of metal made him raise his head, turning to see Alistair on the log beside him. For a moment Zevran wondered if the templar was waxing protective, but that would have been much too forward for Alistair, who was still convinced that nobody knew why Hallen was sleeping in his tent. Instead the man turned towards Zevran, with a question the elf would never have expected.

"Zevran, you're sort of gay, right?"

It was not meant rudely, and the elf allowed himself a smirk. "This I have to hear," he declared, savoring the flush that migrated up Alistair's neck and across his face.

"I'm absolutely not—I mean, that wasn't—Zevran," he managed, collecting himself, "I have a question. Not about me. Or you."

"How terribly disappointing." Zevran's eyes, which spoke of entire worlds that Alistair had never seen, glittered in the firelight. "But you've still piqued my curiosity. Do ask."

"Okay." Alistair paused, seeming uncertain now as to how to proceed. "Well, ah… are you good at telling if other people are, um…?"

"Pshh. Alistair, I was raised by whores. Leliana goes either way," he began to list, counting off on his fingers. "Wynne like men. Oghren is straight as they come—dwarven warriors, you know. Sten may be asexual, and as for Morrigan… straight, but I sincerely doubt that interests you."

Alistair swallowed. "I… um, just the first. And also, er…"

Zevran's eyebrows drew together. "I think you know better than anyone about our Gray Warden."

"See, that's the thing." Alistair grimaced, glancing across the fire. "Or, rather, that's the thing."

Zevran followed his gaze to the two giggling women, and suddenly understood. "Just listen," said Alistair emphatically, but it was hardly necessary. Hallen and Leliana were bent close to each other, smiling; Hallen's cheeks were flushed from laughing, her bright eyes intent on Leliana's.

"You have such pretty hair, though," the bard was saying, gently taking hold of a dark lock of Hallen's. "You must do something with it, it's beautiful."

Hallen grinned. "I'd tell you magic, but you know I'm only good at burning things," she shrugged, a response all three listeners knew was utterly true. "I suppose I wear it up a lot, so I don't think about it too much."

"You should let it down more often," Leliana murmured, still toying with the strand of hair. "You look gorgeous like this."

"I wish I had hair your color, though," Hallen said earnestly. "Brown's just so Ferelden. Yours is so much more exotic, just like your voice, and your fighting, and… Maker, I've just never met someone in the Tower like you."

Leliana beamed. "You're sweet, but I've never met anyone quite like you either." Her shoulder nudged cautiously into Hallen's and then pressed firmly against it. "And I don't think you really know what you're saying. I'm not really that foreign. Same scars from all that fighting, even if I do it a different way."

"Don't be stupid," Hallen disagreed. "Scars don't take away from the beauty, they add to it. It's a measure of strength. I'd choose the braver person any day, scars and all."

Leliana went pink, and a few yards away, an openmouthed Oghren nearly dropped his bottle of ale. Alistair, whose most impressive scar was an arrow wound in his shoulder, followed by a cut on his knee from age ten, looked miserable. "See?" he demanded.

It would have been difficult not to. "There are whores in Antiva that charge for less," Zevran admitted, with a snort of laughter.

"Then what in the Maker's name is going on between them?" Alistair's face was wrenched with confusion. "I… I mean, I know there's nothing to show that they're not friends, but Leliana is not being friendly!" The last three words were hissed through his teeth.

Zevran pursed his lips. "Are you that concerned?" Three-way, urged a tiny voice in the back of his mind, but he pushed it down, certain that it wouldn't be a very helpful answer.

"Am I concerned?" Alistair echoed incredulously. "Scholars could write dissertations on the amount of subtext here, Zevran."

This time, Zevran turned a thoughtful gaze towards the two, with scrutiny the Crows had taught him. Leliana's side of the conversation was certainly layered with meaning, but Hallen's comments seemed too harmless, her smile too ingenuous. And yet Alistair had a point: who on earth could carry on this type of innuendo without knowing?

"I… am not sure," he admitted, after a pause. "Alistair, if you are really so worried, shouldn't you talk to her? I imagine that is what one does in a relationship."

"But what if I'm wrong?" the templar blurted, still staring at Hallen. "I can't tell if Hallen gets it or not, Zevran, and what am I supposed to do if she hasn't noticed? Tell her to break Leliana's heart?"

"Might break Oghren's, too," Zevran muttered.

"I can't bring it up," Alistair acknowledged miserably, "but I can't not ask. For all I know they're carrying on in front of me and I'm being entirely stupid… but otherwise they're friends, and I'll seem jealous, and I don't want to push her away—"

Zevran glanced from one side of the fire to the other, and abruptly noticed the larger issue. Truth be told, he was rather sick of this whole looking-not-touching policy, but options here were painfully limited already. His two best shots were most likely the bard across the fire and the templar to his right—Alistair was certainly inexperienced enough to be swayed, no?—and both were unobtainable. Principled people who thought they were in love with someone else were impossible to seduce.

He was going to speak to Hallen about this, and soon.

Zevran relayed the conversation in brief, keeping his personal motives carefully to himself. As he spoke, Hallen's eyes grew wider and wider. "Wait," she kept saying, and then, "Maker," and then, "But Alistair doesn't really…" or, "Leliana isn't actually…?"

Zevran's eyes narrowed. "When even Alistair notices, it needs to be rather blatant. Did you really have no idea?"

"No!" Hallen cried desperately. "There's nothing romantic there. We're friends—just like you and me."

The skepticism did not vanish completely from his face. "Not the best example, when I know you still ache for more from me."

He beamed at her, and she rolled her eyes. "I'm not gay," she said fiercely. "I just thought she and I were friends. I can't believe… so when I gave her those flowers… or when she asked if I wanted to visit her tent—Maker's breath…" She stared at Zevran, clearly bracing herself. "Zev, how bad was it?"

His answering smirk was nefarious. "Oghren certainly enjoyed it," he offered, even though he'd intended not to mention that. It was worth it to see Hallen go, if possible, even redder than she already had been.

"Zevran!" she burst out, swiping at the elf, but he ducked away, cackling. "This isn't funny!"

"On the contrary, it's extremely funny," he chuckled, shaking his head. "To you, no, and probably not to Leliana, but to everyone else?"

She grimaced. "I need to go talk to Alistair. And Leliana. Holy Andraste, what am I going to tell Leliana?"

"'I'm not gay' often does the trick, I hear." He grinned. "You're going to crush her, I expect."

"You sound oddly cheerful."

"Well, she will be looking for comfort," he admitted happily. "Perhaps in the arms of another, yes? I happen to specialize in that."

"You're impossible," Hallen muttered, without any real force behind it. "Maker knows she's sensible enough to stay far away from you, anyway."

"Can't blame me for trying."

"Yeah, well." She stood wearily, her eyes fixed with distaste on the discarded bow and arrows. "Alistair's off-limits, okay?"

"Whatever you say, my dear." He sat up straighter as she slung the arrows back over her shoulder. "You're not actually going to shoot something, are you? Just warn in advance so I can find cover."

"Nobody ever trained me to shoot," she sulked, picking up the bow. "It's not my fault I can't hunt like…"

He knew what she had been about to say, but the devious smile that slid across her face was a very pleasant surprise. "Like Leliana," Hallen finished slowly. "Zev, does she really like me as much as you say?"

"Wrapped around your little finger," he supplied, frowning. "Why?"

Hallen hefted the bow, eyes gleaming. "So… if I asked her to hunt for me? Really, really nicely?"

He laughed out loud, as surprised as he was impressed. "You wicked, wicked woman," he chuckled, a fully merited compliment, and Hallen's grin widened.

"I mean, I'm going to clear this whole misunderstanding up," she added. "Just… tomorrow, maybe?"

Tomorrow, as it turned out, Alistair was deeply relieved, Leliana was gracious but painfully embarrassed, everyone else besides the Mabari thought this was priceless, and Zevran's plan of attack was underway.

When Alistair has better gaydar than you, you know there's kind of a problem. Just tell me I'm not the only one who accidentally romanced Leliana by being nice to her... please?

Reviews for a first DA:O fic are always appreciated!