Had he been anyone else, he might have tripped over them, but Crow instinct stopped him before he could blunder into the little obstacles. Zevran chuckled to himself as he inspected the pathway ahead, littered with bits of discarded items - a pair of shoes, socks, a shawl, and more than a few damaged hairpins. And there - at the end of the trail, beside the water - was the culprit Karia.
He almost called out to her - was ready to tease her about the scattered clothes - but his voice caught in his throat. Something was different. He couldn't begin to imagine what, but it was something. Wind gusted off the lake, making her hair dance across her bare shoulders and for a moment he was enraptured. He held his breath, too afraid to take his eyes away from her, as though at any moment she'd disappear like a puff of breath on a cold day.
She looked… ethereal, sitting there, basking in the moon's reflection off the lake - a stark contrast to the fierce warrior that had almost single-handedly rallied the Mage Tower and saved Redcliffe from an army of undead. She was a walking contradiction of both strength and fragility, of warrior and woman. Like the two sides of a coin, doomed for one to never meet the other. There would always be the Warden that the world saw at the fore, with the woman and her own thoughts and desires eclipsed by the needs of everyone else.
What a lonely existence… he thought.
Another breeze blew past, and she shivered. He was moving towards her before his mind had even decided that he needed to, her discarded shawl in hand. As he neared, he schooled his features into his typical, easy smile.
"Oh, miss? I think you dropped something," he chortled as he settled beside her on the docks, draping the shawl over her shoulders. His fingers grazed her bare skin, impossibly soft, and it was all he could do to keep the interaction a chaste one.
Karia cast him a quick grin, "I guess I did. Thanks."
Her words were thicker, slower than normal, and for the first time he noticed the crimson flush on her cheeks. Gently, he reached up to smooth the hair that the wind had ruffled back from her face, letting his fingers trail slowly down her cheek. She was warm, and soft, and…
Zevran cleared his throat, letting his hand fall to his side, and pointedly ignored the question in her gaze. Instead, he smiled at her and gently nudged her shoulder as he teased, "Such a fierce little Warden - tell me, how many glasses of wine did it take for you to discard these things?" He motioned at her bare feet and then tugged gently at her shawl, "And this?"
"It was one glass, and the room was stuffy." She brushed his hand away, the movement awkward and less precise than he was accustomed to seeing from her. But there was a smile on her face, and he couldn't resist baiting her more.
"And if you had two glasses of wine?"
At that, the tips of her ears turned as red as her cheeks, but the alcohol had made her bold, and she quipped, "Maybe one day I'll show you."
She'd always been an expert at deflecting his advances - sometimes gently, sometimes sternly, but always ambiguously. She'd never told him "no," but she'd never quite accepted his flirtations, either. It had been a fun game, a stimulating one, that kept him guessing and had allowed a way for the two of them to better know each other.
They were comfortable around each other, both acknowledging that there was an unspoken barrier between them - this chasm of differences they could never cross. She was a hero. After today, there could be no doubt about it. She lived her life to help others, intentionally or not. She was a good person. And he…
Well. He was an assassin. He would always be an assassin. Their worlds collided - she gave; he took. Whatever it was between them, whatever it was he imagined they had was already doomed. And yet, he just couldn't help himself. He'd been taught to take pleasures where he could find them. Life for an assassin was fleeting, nothing was permanent, and love was a fairytale. But when he was with Karia, all that training, all those years of death and betrayal, all those hard learned lessons were mere whispers in the wind.
Resisting her was like running across an acre of quicksand. And here he was, lost again in the emerald depths of her eyes, wondering if maybe, just maybe, there was a chance for them. For something. Anything.
"Ah. You shouldn't tease me with 'maybes,'" he murmured, smirking and hoping she wouldn't detect the plea behind the teasing. "You'll only make me more… what did you call me… incorrigible.
Karia merely shrugged, her gaze shifting back to the water. When she spoke next, her voice was quiet, "Maybe I'm not teasing." Then she grinned, the expression seeming both chagrined and a little helpless, "Or maybe I just fancy impossible things." Their eyes met once more, and she tilted her head a little as she asked, "What about you? What do you fancy?"
Zevran felt the walls of his facade crumbling beneath her gaze, and it was all he could do to remember to breathe. She was so different from the women he'd known in Antiva. No deceptions, no ulterior motives. She had that kind of guileless power about her - that fathomless naïveté that could draw in even the most hardened of men. It was a kind of magic no sorcerer could ever wield, and he found himself floundering to keep from drowning in captivation.
"I fancy many things," he replied. "I fancy things that are beautiful and things that are strong. I fancy things that are dangerous and exciting…" Once he'd begun, he found he couldn't stop. Gingerly, he closed the distance between them, moving until their shoulders touched and he could feel her warm breath on his cheek. Their faces were inches apart, and he could see the reflection of himself in her eyes.
He paused, but she didn't pull away. His hand sought hers, and he traced his thumb across the ridges of her knuckles, across the small scars, and across the callouses. He wasn't sure that he could have let go even if she'd asked him to. Not this time. And when he spoke again, his voice was low and rough, his question a barely contained supplication for a truth he feared to know.
"Would you be offended if I said I fancied you?"
She didn't speak. Or perhaps she couldn't find the words. They were so close - so close. He wondered briefly if she could hear how his heart hammered in his chest, or if her heart was doing the same. Impossible, screamed his mind, his instincts, even as his heart dared to hope, to want.
Slowly, tentatively, Zevran lifted his free hand to her cheek, cupping it gently in his palm; and his breath hitched as she leaned into his touch. He shivered at the look in her eyes, the vulnerability that wrestled with his desires to both protect her and claim her, the traces of doubt that mirrored his own, and the longing that they'd both so adamantly ignored. Everything he feared and craved, warm and alive in his hands.
And then he kissed her, his hand slipping from her cheek to tangle in her silken hair and pull her even closer. He was overwhelmed - immersed in the feel of her, the taste of her and the lingering sweetness of the wine. She melted into him, and suddenly it wasn't enough. When her lips parted, he deepened the kiss, capturing her gasp of surprise with a flick of his tongue. Nothing he'd ever known could have compared to this kind of intoxication. She was perfect. And he knew, after this, there would be no going back. Not anymore. Not for him.
The kiss ended all too soon, and the distance between them when they parted was poignant. Leaving his hand threaded in her hair, Zevran leaned forward and touched his forehead to hers, needing to feel her closeness yet afraid of what he might find in her eyes. It had been a long time since he'd felt this way, waiting in anxious anticipation for some sort of sign - hope for some confirmation that what he felt was reciprocated, that it wasn't all in his head.
Karia remained silent, as though sensing his hesitation somehow, but still she didn't pull away. With one hand still grasped in his own, she lifted the other and clutched at the fabric of his vest, content for the moment with the silence between them. She tilted her face upwards till their noses touched, and he couldn't help but smile at the honest display of affection. Tension, like a wire, snapped, and he let out a soft, relieved chuckle as he brushed the tip of his nose across hers.
They stayed like that for a while longer, neither one willing to break the spell. Tomorrow would be another day of adventure and responsibility, but tonight… tonight was theirs. Tonight, if only for a moment, this moment, Zevran cast all thoughts of uncertainty aside and let himself fancy the impossible, too.