AN: This is the sequel to "Everlasting Hope". New readers are very much welcome. You will maybe be a bit confused in the beginning but you will easily be able to follow this.
This is the ONLY chapter I will post before my vacation (I'm trying to hold on to that, with the exams hovering over me.) Seriously I can't stop writing. I thought it would take longer for me to start this, oh well. Surprise!
I would love to hear what you thought of this piece, because I don't feel that confident about my portray on Zevran.
"Now far I am from you, before my fire alone,
And read again the hours that so silently have gone,
And it seems that eighty years beneath my feet did glide,
That I am old as winter, that maybe you have died" - past shadows, agathodaimon
"Good, good. Now do the same movement again with more speed." Zevran grinned at the young boy.
He grunted and attacked the assassin with his small wooden daggers. The young boy, even called Akilles had learned some of the assassin techniques, Zevran have picked up so long ago. He was becoming quite good. They were circling each other, eyes focused. Zevran swirled with his dagger and popped behind the boy. He knocked him in the back of his head with the handle of his dagger. Akilles groaned and fell to the muddy ground. Zevran sniggered at him;
"You do know, having total focus about your environment will grant you some benefits."
"You cheated. Its not fair!" Akilles whined back at him.
"All is fair in war, and nothing is outside of it - the sooner you learn that, the better. You will say this to an enemy as well? I have a tingling feeling that neither people or darkspawn will heed that call."
"Oh, ha-ha." Akilles stood up, and siphoned the mud of with his long pale hand and shook his arms in attempt to get the remaining stains from his leather armor.
A thunder could be heard over the training compound. Zevran looked up in the sky and fell cold drop slide gracefully down his cheeks as the rain intensified.
"That's enough for today." He said, and chuckled when he saw a scowling Akilles sending him murdering glances for dirtying him down.
"Thank you for the training. And really – thank you ever so much for getting me to look my best for the wedding. What is she going to think of me now?"
Zevran let out a soft sigh and turned away to head back in his barrack.
"Tsk, tsk. Then you have to be sharp with your tongue."
"Are you coming? I know you are a friend of the king, and there are probably going to be some fine noblewoman that would love getting your devoted attention." He emphasized on the last part.
"No. Weddings do not tend to end well when I'm around." He replied coldly.
"Not even for the ladies?" The man winked.
A humorless chuckle escaped his lips;
"Not even for them."
"Your loss." He said, and with that he walked off.
Zevran remained by the fences, fixing with the already done ropes as giving him a distraction. Weddings...he shook his head, and glided slowly to his barrack. The weather was growing furiously and the rain felt like cold coins with thorns being thrown around his face. And yet, the pain of the whips of water didn't register in his brain. It never did since she left him over two years ago...He could remember everything from that day clear as the moment he was in now. The smell, the touch, the feelings – all of it was there, embedded deep in his chest, only to last as a memory. He could still sense her dying in his arms....
He hated that everyday he thought about that night. What he could have done differently...In his dreams, in his scenarios, she had lived – because he saved her. Every night that had gone by since she passed, he had saved her in numerous of ways, one more unlikely then the other. Because he was the man he had promised to be for her in those dreams. But when he woke up...everything swept back to reality harsh as a lightning. The feeling was like a hard stab with a poisonous dagger going through his every fibre, and crunching his remaining sanity. A feeling worse then the deepest of betrayal. And every morning he had to live with the admission, that he...did not save or hold on to his promise, like with Rinna. It hadn't been under the same circumstances – but the feelings were the mutual. Agonizing...He would never forgive himself for letting it happen again, for falling in love like a puppy eyed doll, for causing her so much grief. She had now slipped out from his grasp, never to be caught again. She was finally free. He had seen her smile of relief washing over her before he had closed his eyes and kissed her departing soul goodbye.
He was holding her life-less body tightly in his arms. Tears were running gracefully like glistening crystals and landed on her pale, blood freckled face. Her eyes were open and the green light within them were gone and lost, never to be lit again. His emerald dream, the eyes flashing for the desire of justice. The eyes containing a world of its own. A dream world. Now there was no life, no spirit, nothing to be found in them except of a remembrance of what used to be. He was numb. He was stunned. He was surely dreaming of this. It all had felt...as faraway reality could be. Nothing was right anymore, what was the point of everything, if all that you care about gets taken from you?
"How is she?" Alistiar had asked when he came back panting with half of his group. Blood was seen over his attire, but no one cared. The child was not with him, and they could only assume where she was. No one had answered and Zevran hadn't accepted what happened and he was still nuzzled deep in her cold neck. He could hear Alistair walking over to him and stopped behind him. He hadn't said anything and he fell to his knees in the corner of the room and screamed out his own shared agony. Morrigan had been standing with Aerin far back and watched the scenery play. Her eyebrows furrowed and her lips tightened.
She still smelled like her, the rosy scent was still crested in her tarnished skin. He was inhaling her fragrance as much he could, he would never forget the scent that was always radiating from her. His eyes were deep in the dark depth of nothingness. No expression. Sceneries played through his mind where she would wake up, find her child and live happily ever after – not based on the facts lying in his arms as an evidence of that will never happen. It now struck him when he pulled an inch away and looked at her empty eyes, how dirty she was. He started to wipe of the blood that had dried on her face. She deserved to be natural self; Beautiful, the goddess, his goddess of despair, pain and love. The pain of the black hole that will forever haunt him until his last day.
The smile on her lips were still there, branded into her forever young skin. The smile of release, the smile of joy, the smile of comfort – the smile he had never given her reason to feel when she was alive. He had only given her sorrow and pushed her away from him. How much would he have to pay for, before he would let the regret consume him? Another crystalized tear fell down his cheek.
"Zevran?" He could hear Alistair rasp voice talk to him after minutes that slowly passed by like a clock of aeon, the never ending rivalry put aside, but nothing made sense in his mind. She was the link to his sanity, without her, what was there for him to live for? He would never hear her speak to him again, never hear her laugh, never feel her once warm radiating touch consume his core, never again feel her supple kisses and the taste of honey embracing him.
"The child is what's important now, Zevran. There is something..." She had been trying to say, but the last part was hoarse, her throat clogging with blood, she had been cut off and didn't have the strength to continue. Everything about her had been withering, and the crimson red river ran down from her abdomen had been flowing like the wildest sea. His hand could not stop it. His fingers had been one with the stream, adding a bit of pressure before following the same motion.
And with the touch of Alistair's hand on his shoulder, he snapped back to reality.
"Let go." his voice murmured and it was filled with detachment. When the assassin hadn't responded, Alistair's hand squeezed his shoulder to pull him away. He was not ready for that yet, and moved his body so Alistair's grip would let go of his flesh.
Zevran shifted uncomfortably and sensed the all familiar cold goosebumps crawling up the back of his spine. He grunted and barged his door open, slamming it shut and went to his small bed, in the far corner of the room. Since she died he hadn't been able just yet to lead another woman to the bed. It was always her echoing in his mind, and the guilt eclipsed his mortal desires. Despite his many chances, how hard he tried, he could never become the one he was before. He had to be fully detached – able to disregard or shut of his love pathetic emotions, and he was not able to do that. With Rinnas death, that had been the way of releasing the whirlwind of emotions raging within him, believing that every woman he touched was her. But now, he could not go down the same path. Rinna was the woman he murdered, the guilt echoing deeply within his core. Diana had been the woman he let slip away. The two women that had been able to locate his black spot for a heart through the maze he had put up.
Time had been elapsing so fast, and Zevran had been in the middle of numb of reality. While he could remember holding her body so tight to him, he could have sworn she would go through him, everything that passed beyond that had was a hurricane. He heard from Alistair that the darskspawn had retreated, back in the deep roads, and not a single attack had been spotted since the child had been born. And somewhere down there was Diana's girl of two years. He hadn't stopped thinking about that either. And even though they had been scanning the parts of the deep roads that they could go through without getting lost or stumble into an ambush, they found nothing. But he would hold on to this promise of finding her. He owed her that.
Her funeral had laid the entire capital in silence. Everyone in the city had been in shock of hearing the news of her death and the baby was gone. The day that was supposed to give Ferelden great joy instead turned out to be the most bitter day since the news of a Blight was upon them. Cries could be heard over the city, from the people she had been aiding in their time of need. It all had been to sudden and unreal.
The sky was in a sea of moving dark clouds, and the rain had been falling gently upon her tomb. He hadn't been able to touch her ever-so-white skin. She looked so peaceful, in her golden dress. The glow that once emanated from her was gone. Rose petals slid with grace from the sky before landing softly upon her divinity. Her smile was still there. The candle she had been...He had said his final goodbyes to her. His eyes dry like the dessert. No more tears could be found in his amber eyes. No more emotion. He was a ghost, a soul-less vessel roaming through this world with one promise of finding her child. He died with her that night.
Zevran massaged his throbbing temples, and listened to the storm raging outside the barrack. He had wanted to leave Denerim, to leave Ferelden and go back to Antiva. He didn't care about the assassins that would be waiting for him, it was now another dull bodies left at the mercy by his dagger. He would kill, kill and kill with basic instinct of survival, but he would welcome the embrace of death if it could take away the aching rotting within his heart. He was the living dead.
Alistair had visited him the night that Zevran had wanted to depart. The rivals had talked, and everything that had come to past had been forgotten. They talked about the child. Alistair found out that the archdemon had been residing within the baby girl. He had not taken the news lightly. Morrigan had still been in the city, only being next to the shaded statue of grey that would the day they are finished building it, represent two lost souls. Diana and the kings daughter. She had explained surprisingly fast how she had stayed in the city all the time, how she prevented the Orlesians to see the demon. She also explained that the templar had gotten her pregnant which ticked Alistair off since he found out that Diana had been correct about that night, especially about the part that Morrigan had removed it. Morrigan left Zevran two things - the earring and an orb. When they would go back to the deep roads for real, she would be there, she had said. She never stayed in Denerim permanently, but had been there five times in the two years that had gone by. Zevran also knew she would be at the wedding tonight - just to annoy Alistair.
The king had to marry under the pressure from the nobles and Eamon and the pressure of conceiving yet another heir to the throne. He recalled that Alistair hated the very idea. He was not over Diana, and the idea of having another woman in his bed was to much. But in the last half year, he had reluctantly agreed only because an opportunity had showed itself. The Empress of Orlais had a proposal of marrying of her daughter to Alistair. It would strengthen the unity between the two countries. Eamon had agreed, and Alistair's opinion being discarded, it had been decided. The Empress daughter Zena had just arrived two weeks before the wedding would take place and tonight the two of them were marrying in the palace.
The Orlesians had come to Denerim one month after the funeral with soldiers, mages and four Grey Wardens. A new Commander had been assigned and since Zevran was staying and needed their help to even have a chance of finding Aurelia, he asked to join as a recruiter. To train the people that wanted to join the Wardens. They had accepted him after a quick battle between him and the Commander where he easily outdone her, to her great embarrassment. It was a woman by the name Cecile leading the Wardens. With no Wardens left in Ferelden, since Alistair is the king, they had immediately started to recruit new members. To their satisfaction - many had wanted to join. Many said it was thanks to Diana that they had survived and wanted to pay their respect by being part of the Wardens. Fairy tales about the wardens had not gone unforgotten - the dark part about them had been. So now he was living outside Denerim with the new recruits and the Wardens in the compound that Alistair had built for them. Akilles is one of the new recruits. Zevran got reminded of himself in him. The thirst for proving yourself of being worth to be part of something. Difference being that Zevran never had a choice. Not that he had minded the assassin life, back then. Because so many had wanted to join, tests were made to see who were the fittest. Zevran had watched all of them. No one took his breath away - then again, what could? The more surprising part was seeing Oghren wanting to join the order. He was the first of the recruits to drink the cup, and he lived through it. It had cheered everyone up, and give more confidence about their coming survival.
All these thoughts made his head feel groggy and he paced through his room, and leaned over the table he had in his room. The only thing consisting on it was maps over the deep roads. He had tried to calculate where they had been and where they had gone with small success. Nothing new was to be marked on them and it was bugging him. Cecile had been watching the maps with him on occasions and had agreed that it as important to locate the child. He frowned over the maps and with one arm he swept them all off the table in frustration.
Maybe the wedding wouldn't be such a bad idea after all.
AN: So did you like the start of this?