Authors Notes and Disclaimer: These characters and some of the dialogue from this scene is the sole property of Bioware. I did not script it this is just my interpretation of the scene. This was written as a fill for a kink meme prompt
Things were getting out of hand. They both knew it. Hell, the whole camp knew it too. But as much as Morrigan tormented Alistair about philandering Warden's and the dangers their affair would bring to both their party and to all of Fereldan, the actual relationship as a whole was falling a tad short of the passionate whirlwind Elissa's mother had described true love to be.
It wasn't Alistair's fault of course. He'd been raised to view the more intimate aspects of romance as something that should be saved for marriage, even if he didn't feel quite that strongly about saving himself. She understood the sentiment, with him being her first serious relationship, she'd never had the chance to "lick a lamppost in winter" either. In fact she'd nearly died of embarrassment after she'd drunk enough of some of Oghren's Dwarven ale to have that conversation with him.
She would have never let Oghren talk her into touching the stuff in the first place if she hadn't been feeling sorry for herself about Alistair's obliviousness to all things romantic. After that she proceeded to have the most flirtatious conversation with Alistair and this time he actually caught onto the flirting and played along. It'd figure that she could only attract a guy's attention when she was as drunk as Oghren when he broke out the "special" whisky. She'd woken up the next morning with a pounding headache and a complete inability to look Alistair in the face for the next three days.
Things had gotten much better since then with their relationship, so much so that not only was there a carefully pressed rose hidden in her journal beneath her pillow, the first gift he'd ever given her, but there was also the lingering taste of their first kiss on her lips, constantly reminding her of that perfect moment. The one moment of her life where everything had felt so right. Even with the world falling down around them it was what made her decide that Alistair was who she wanted to spend the rest of her life with, no matter the cost.
Everyone had split up into teams of two at the edge of the Brecilian Forest to maximize their ground coverage in their search for the Dalish camp. Leliana had taken control of the sorting of the groups to maximize everyone's safety and had paired Elissa with Alistair with a conspiratorial wink at her and a nudge from Zevran. Despite the helpfulness from her friends, who honestly meant well, in the most vindictive of ways, the first couple of hours of their search was spent in awkward silence. All the same it was lucky that they were alone in a way, because their bashful glances and flushed faces would have made even Leliana sick.
It didn't take long for Elissa to notice the long stemmed rose that Alistair was toying with in his hands, the petals just beginning to wilt and peel back from the center bud, but it took him quite a while to bring himself to speak up about it. They'd stopped to set up their tents and sleeping rolls for the night when he finally spoke.
"Elissa, here." He started hesitantly before holding the rose out to her, "Look at this. Do you know what this is?" He asked her quietly.
A smile tugged at the edges of her lips and she had to bite her lip to keep from grinning. If she was awkward and clumsy about her affections, he was a circus bear in a tutu trying to balance atop a unicycle. "Your new weapon of choice?" She questioned with an innocent bat of her eyes and a unbelievable urge to tease him relentlessly. They'd recently moved into more flirtatious conversations after the Oghren ale incident and it had awoken the urge in her to see more of his blushes and embarrassed expressions. An urge that she was more than willing to satiate.
Ever the good sport about being teased, he was quick to roll his eyes and counter her snarky remark with one of his own. "Yes, that's right." He exclaimed humorously, "Watch as I thrash our enemies with the mighty power of floral arrangements. Feel my thorns, darkspawn!" She couldn't keep her giggle in this time and pleased with her smile he continued. "I will overpower you with my rosy scent!" By now she was finding it hard to breathe through her laughter and he was chuckling along side her. It felt incredible after the long embarrassing silence of the day to relax and just enjoy their time together.
When they finally composed themselves to continue Alistair sighed and shrugged with a gentle smile, "Or, you know, it could just be a rose? I know that's pretty dull in comparison." Elissa shook her head and smiled "Sentiment can be a pretty powerful weapon." After all, I'm falling for it, she finished the thought in her head with an accompanying blush.
"Is it that easy to see right through me?" He replied in sarcastic shock, "Eh, I guess I shouldn't be surprised." He shrugged again acceptingly before continuing with his story. "I picked it in Lothering. I remember thinking, 'How could something so beautiful exist in a place with so much despair and ugliness?'" His face twisted in pain momentarily and Elissa hesitantly placed her hand on his arm, a sympathetic twinge as she remembered the young boy from Lothering who'd told her that she reminded him of his mother who was now likely lost to the darkspawn as well. So many people that they couldn't save, innocents whose only fault was in not being able to run fast enough to escape the hoard.
He took a deep breath and covered her hand with his own, "I probably should have left it alone, but I couldn't. The darkspawn would come and their taint would just destroy it." He paused again, as if not quite sure how to word his thoughts and feelings before simply settling on, "So I've had it ever since..."
The emotion behind his words hit her like a sack of bricks, the pain that he had felt, being unable to rescue anything more than a simple rose. Elissa had overheard him discussing his regrets with Leliana earlier but the intimacy of them being alone and him baring his feelings to her... It was as if she had suddenly swallowed a large dry lump and a familiar burning sensation set in behind her nose, as if tears were about to form. She quickly blinked them back and managed to choke out a dry, "That's a nice sentiment."
He looked at her, with his wide, honest eyes, more open than she'd ever seen them before, and began again, more quietly than ever, though his voice grew stronger with each word. "I thought that I might... give it to you actually. In a lot of ways," A scarlet blush flamed across his cheeks till even his ears were red with the rush of blood to his face and he looked down, his words lacking the usual shield of humour and light hearted playfulness as he continued, "I think the same thing when I look at you."
Elissa couldn't tell exactly what it was that her body did in response to his words because for that moment all she felt was everything and nothing, billions of minute contradictions that had her simultaneously frozen in shock and on fire with a heat she didn't quite understand. Her stomach plummeted and her heart fluttered in her throat, everything was altogether too quiet and too loud, as though the entire forest was waiting on a bated breath for her response, her entire body tingled in the same way it did before a large battle but was as still as if she were home with her bow in hand, drawn back with an arrow, caught in that moment just before the release where her heart beat seemed to stretch on into eternity. She cleared her throat and "Alistair..." She stumbled a light stutter giving voice to her shock, "I... I don't know what to say."
"I guess it's a bit silly, isn't it?" He seemed mortified, interpreting her shock and speechlessness as anger and condescension instead of the unbearable happiness that it actually was, " I just thought," He rushed on, "Here I am doing all this complaining, and Elissa, you haven't exactly been having a good time of it yourself. You've had none of the good experience of being a Grey Warden since your Joining." He looked pained for a moment, and she realized that this time, his pain was for her. She would never get the same experience that he had as a Grey Warden because even if she did survive the blight, it was more likely than not that they would spend the rest of their lives simply struggling to rebuild the order. "Not a word of thanks or congratulations." He continued, "It's all been death and fighting and tragedy."
He took her hand, still resting on his arm and opened it, grasping it tightly for one moment with a look of adoration and kindness that melted her heart before he placed the rose in her hand and carefully curled her fingers around it. Her mind vaguely registered that he'd taken the care to cut the thorns off of the stem as he went on hesitantly. "I thought maybe I could say something. Tell you what a rare and wonderful thing you are to find amidst all this darkness." She didn't realize that she was crying until Alistair's hands cupped her cheeks and his thumbs wiped the fresh tears away with a gentleness that nearly caused her to cry even harder. Instead she blinked back her tears and hiccuped away a sob before looking up into his anxious eyes and rubbing her tears away completely on the back of her free hand with a watery laugh. "I feel the same way about you Alistair."
"Oh." He looked shocked for a moment then a flush of pleasure spread across his face, "I'm, uh, I'm glad you like it. Now..." And almost instantly his shield of humor was back up, "If we could move right past this awkward, embarrassing stage, and get right to the steamy bits, I'd appreciate it." She blushed, even though she knew he was just bluffing and laughed, blinking up at him she could tell that he was pleased she had stopped crying, knowing him her tears were like a loud noise to a rabbit, something he feared but had no idea what to do about. Through her chuckles she replied, "Sounds good." An offhand grin spreading across her face, "Off with the armor, then."
He burst out laughing, "Bluff called! Damn!" The familiar tomato red blush was back, much to her pleasure, "You saw right through me!" She hid her pleased smirk behind her hands, unable to believe how innocent he could seem when he was embarrassed. The conversation quickly faded from there into a backdrop of casual teasing and friendly conversation and then gradually faded away as they ate dinner. It wasn't until much later that Alistair spoke up again, his face a strange mixture of emotions that seemed to lend themselves to some serious thought.
He'd moved around the campfire so that he was sitting next to Elissa in front of her tent, his eyes meeting hers without hesitation. "So all this time we've spent together..." He began thoughtfully, "You know: the tragedy, the brushes with death, the constant battles with the whole Blight looming over us..." He stopped to chuckle appreciatively at the sheer weight of what the past few months had put them through. "Will you miss it once it's over?"
Elissa bit her lip, her eyes downcast as she considered his words, when she saw the head of the rose, poking from the pages of her journal in her lap her jaw set in a stubborn line. She wouldn't leave him after this, not like this."There will always be more battles to fight somewhere." She said firmly, not wanting to believe that their troop could fall apart so easily just because the Blight was over. Alistair frowned and it was clear that he didn't hold the same steadfast faith as he replied desolately, "But that doesn't mean we would necessarily be fighting them together." She frowned and opened her mouth to counter him but he placed his fingers over her lips and continued, "I know it... might sound strange, considering we haven't known each other for very long, but I've come to... care for you. A great deal."
Elissa's heart stopped, but he showed no signs of hesitation and she was left in shock and a numb warmth as he went on. "I think maybe it's because we've gone through so much together, I don't know. Or maybe I'm imagining it. Maybe I'm fooling myself." He paused and his fingers fell from her lips, "Am I? Fooling myself?" He asked her anxiously, "Or do you think you might ever... feel the same way about me?"
Her heart racing faster than she ever thought possible, the words were out before she could stop them, "I don't know." She was shocked by the truth behind them, she was falling for him, but did she love him? Was this just because they were the last two Grey Wardens in Fereldan? Or was it just the weight of the Blight and the constant fear of death that was forcing them into each others arms for comfort? How could she tell? "It's..." She paused, not wanting to hurt him and simply said, "It's too soon to say."
Seeing the hesitation in her eyes seemed to harden something in Alistair and his hand cupped her cheek, "Well, is it..." He leaned forward, his eyes closing and his head tilting, "Too soon for this?" Unable to stop herself, or think of what the consequences were for once in her life, she simply gripped the cloth undershirt that he wore under his armor and met his lips halfway. All at once her world exploded. It was everything she had ever read in books. From the shock of his warm skin against hers to the rough scratching of his perpetual stubble against her chin.
His rough lips parted against her own and she took the opportunity to deepen the kiss, her arms sliding up around his neck and pulling him closer. He embraced her willingly and in that moment if there was one ultimatum of which she was certain it was that she never wanted it to end. That kiss. Their moment alone in the forest, when everything seemed perfect and right. This relationship, hesitant, uncertain and sprung from the strangest of sources, was something she didn't want to surrender. Unfortunately, like all moments, it had to end, and as Alistair drew back with a cheesy grin and a hesitant, "Wow... Uh, so... Too soon?" He looked hopeful but worried that he had moved to soon, and they blushed simultaneously as they realized what had just happened.
But Elissa grinned impishly through her chagrin and replied, "I don't know... I need more testing to be sure."
He blinked in shock but his lip twitched in sheepish amusement. "Well, uh, I'll have to arrange that, then, won't I?" His arms encircled her waist and drew her closer until her head was resting comfortably against his chest. He gazed down at her appreciatively as she hid her face in the fold of his undershirt, "Maker's breath but you're beautiful." She snorted and thumped his chest with her hand and he chuckled. "I am a lucky man." They spent the rest of the evening in comfortable silence before returning to their tents for the night.
The next night they rendezvoused with the others, a distinct glow about them that had Leliana and Zevran snickering in pleasure, despite the truth being so much less than they hoped. Nearly two months had passed with scarce but a few snatched kisses and chaste touches to reassure Elissa that that night had not been just a dream. In fact the progress she had made was so abysmal that Morrigan was taking bets on how much longer the relationship would last, much to Alistair's ire.
She didn't want to force him to move forward, because she knew they both had reason for reservation, especially after she learned the truth of his birth, something that had been hard for her to understand. Now not only were they Grey Wardens they were also the last of the Couslands and Theirins respectively. It considerably complicated their relationship, even if they both felt even more strongly about the other, there was no denying that after the Blight they would both have responsibilities, and who knew where fate would take them.
All the same, she could take the stalemate no longer. Somebody had to cave, and it couldn't be her. If she came on to strongly she could ruin everything. Instead, she'd take a more passively aggressive stance about the matter and lure him into it. And hopefully, something could finally move.