A past DAWC challenge I have accepted: to write a story about a random piece of inventory. This story- and original character- captured my mind right away... and the latter isn't letting me go as easily, so we'll see how it plays out. As always, enjoy!
The Denerim marketplace was bustling with activity under the warm Fereldan sun. Children running about happily, various smells nearly overpowering the rotting garbage and wet dog smells that found a permanent residence in the soil itself, and Zevran found himself basking in the warm glow of it all. As well I should, he thought to himself. He was somewhat of a free man, in the company of his fierce and just as lovely Warden, along with the rest of the oddball party that she had gathered through her travels.
They were back in Denerim by personal request from Arl Eamon to Kit, his Warden. It naturally came at a time for a need for supplies, so she had decided to have the group camp near the large city for a little while, see what can be done. Alistair, Leliana, and Wynne were doing a fantastic job with handling what the Chantry had to offer, collecting a bit of coin from the old scrolls found in the temple ruins. Morrigan had disappeared a little while ago with a ten bundles of deep mushrooms and five scrolls he didn't have a chance to investigate. Sten and Wolf, Kit's mabari, were guarding their camp from intruders, bandits, and whatever foe came their way. That left Zev to replenish supplies and replace armor and/or weapons where needed. A master of bargaining he was not, but he had picked up a few tricks throughout the years, fine-tuning them with what he saw of Leliana's skills.
But recently, he noticed that there wasn't much of a need for bargaining, as the collective amount of money gained was increasing in bounds. First seventy-five silver, then two soveriegns, then more. A peek inside Bodahn's cart showed nothing special to him. It still could make an elf wonder...
He had just finished purchasing a pair of silverite daggers when Kit raced up to his side, cuts in her... not her inscribed set, but a plain leather set of armor that didn't quite fit her marvelous body, forehead, and arms, and a black eye starting to form. "Zev, it's time to go," she stated without prelude, speaking through a scarf covering the lower half of her face.
"Already, my dear Warden? No taking in the sunshine, smelling the gloriously horrid smells of the land?" He looked at her and noted she was looking around at the bustling crowd, as if searching for something... and carrying a separate, yet small, cloth bundle under the cover of the cloak she was wearing as well. "My my," he all but purred at her. "And here I thought your intentions in this city were above thievery-"
Kit interrupted by shushing him. The crinkling in the corners of her eyes told him she was smiling all the while. "We can continue this outside of the city, because we need to go," she insisted.
"What exactly have you acquired?" he asked, evading yet another direct order to leave. Whatever she had must hold some importance, otherwise she wouldn't be in such a rush... either that, or she got caught in the process. Since blending into the shadows was his specialty, it was a known fact that acting calm and not rushing around was a better way to discourage pursuers.
"You need to trust me when I say-"
"Hey, there she is!" shouted a guard from across the square, pointing in Kit's direction.
"Zev?" she asked, raising a brow.
"We need to go," he replied, gathering his purchases.
He followed her as she raced across the other half of the square, towards the houses that were stacked closely together. Kit even had the audacity to laugh as she heard the shouts of the city guards pursuing them, becoming muffled as she ducked them into an alley between houses. They snaked around, jumping over barrels of items, just barely brushing past smatterings of people-
And down to a newly set stone wall where there used to be an archway. "Son of a tied down..." Kit softly swore, striking it with an open palm. "This way," she quickly added, running off to the right. As they ran by an alley, a few guards that had split from the rest noticed the two running figures, and picked up the closer pursuit. Just when Zev was almost sure they would be caught, and was readying himself to throw a fire bomb behind them, they passed under a folding wooden slat being supported by a metal rod. Kit knocked the rod aside, the duo just barely escaping the collapsing pile of large wooden logs... effectively blocking the guards and buying them that much more time.
She ducked into a considerably darkened alley and quickly stopped, flattening herself against a wall as she looked back and forth. Zev was short enough to crouch down in between a pair of barrels. "I do hope you have a plan, dear Warden," he whispered to her.
Kit's eyes fixed onto the ground in between them. She bit her lip in thought, which was then released as her eyes widened and met Zev's gaze. "I do now. This way," she quickly replied, starting off to her right once more. With a slight push off the wall for extra speed, he followed.
Instead of ducking in between alleys, they raced down towards the market square. "We're doubling back," Zev called up to her in warning.
"Exactly! Hurry!" she shouted back.
Not having a choice of saying 'no' in the moment, he ran with her to an apartment just out of the open light of the market, where up against the wall was a ladder. Without hesitation, she began to climb. Zev hurried up after her, pausing as she stopped at a certain point near the top to look down at him. "Watch," was her only instruction, before she turned herself around, braced her positioning, and leapt forwards to grab onto a decorative set of stones surrounding a window, making a rough sill. She pulled up her feet to rest in between the lower half, and keeping a grip on the upper part- with a cleverly hidden crevice, etched with time and careful precision- half turned to watch Zev's progress.
He would have to go a couple of rungs higher than the one she used to achieve the same effect, but was he glad when he did make it. Heights weren't his forte, so time was of the essence for him. "What now?" he quietly asked.
"You'll have to use me as a ladder of sorts to grab onto the ledge," Kit replied, nodding towards the overhanging part of a roof. "Since I can reach it myself just fine..."
"I believe this is the part where you tell me not to look down, correct?"
Smirking, she stated, "For good reason, of course. I want you to climb up, not be distracted by my 'deadly sex goddess' nature."
Zev chuckled under his breath. "As my lovely Warden wishes." As instructed, he set a foot on her upper leg, bent to support itself against the window, and set the other on her arm. With a quick count, she pushed him up enough to reach the ledge, and kept her arm within reach until he swung himself up to safety. The roof was at a slight incline, but it was easy for him to keep his balance on it. Cautiously, he peered back over to watch Kit's ascent, which he was sure would be as graceful as her ease around a dagger.
While keeping a grip on the hidden crevice, she braced her feet against the bottom of the window, and pulled up with her arms while planting her left foot on the glass. Her right landed on the top of the outcropping decorative part of the window's frame as she let go of her safety crevice. Pushing off with her feet, she stretched her arms out towards the ledge, and found herself gripping it with a much more secure hold than she had the last time she did this maneuver. Looking up at Zev with a wonderfully surprised look, she remarked, "I guess fighting darkspawn has more benefits than I thought..."
"Over here!" another guard called out as he spotted a cloaked woman hanging from the ledge. Kit didn't need to look down to see if her ears were deceiving her; that would just take time anyways. She swung her legs to gain momentum, then hoisted herself onto the roof, and started running with Zev again. As they crossed a pair of ply boards stretched between one roof to the next, a chanced glance to her left caught guards joining them on the rooftops.
"Andraste's flaming knickers!" she cursed, urging herself and Zev to go faster. The end of the stretch of shorter buildings was drastically coming up, with no rope or windows to jump to safety with.
"Are you sure this is the plan?" Zev found himself asking as the 'dead end' realization hit him.
"Do you trust me?" Kit shot back, now pulling him along as he started to slow.
Looking behind to see the guards not close, but easily in pursuit, and ahead once more to the blank wall of a towering building ahead of him, he replied, "Not right now, no."
Laughing, she crowed, "Then it's a good day to die, my dear assassin. Now jump!"
"I wonder where they are," Leliana thought aloud. Back at the designated meeting place, about fifty paces from the city gates, the bard relaxed against a tree, Alistair next to her, sharpening his sword, and Wynne on the other side, recounting the number of potions and poultices she carried. It was a good day for the three of them, making the streets of Denerim safer overall. However, the journal she had found on the poor dead man they had found hinted to something worse going on behind closed doors. It was something that she felt needed Kit's immediate attention.
"Maybe caught up in the marketplace," Wynne supplied. "I'm sure they're just fine," she added, hoping to ease Leliana's worries.
"My favoritest mage has a point," Alistair added. "We've all seen Kit get herself out of the strangest of situations with..." He broke off as the wind blew over them, which soon had him holding a gauntlet covered hand to his nose. "Maker's breath, what is that smell?"
"It's me," Kit replied, having drawn close enough to hear Alistair's question. "Or us, rather..."
Leliana stood to find Kit and Zev walking side by side down the path, a wide smile on Kit's face as Zev appeared to be only slightly amused. Both of them had their hair plastered to their heads and were dripping water from their armor, but aside from Kit's slight injuries, they didn't look any worse for the wear. Still... "Alistair's right, I'm afraid. That is an awful smell."
"You can blame our dear Warden for that," Zev stated matter-of-factly. "You, however," he continued, now directing his words towards Kit, "could have told me I was standing over a false platform."
Stopping, she turned to face Zev, holding her arms out in a helpless shrug. "Now where's the fun in that? And as I recall, you weren't standing-"
"Where were you?" Wynne interrupted, adopting you're-in-trouble tone that Kit knew too well.
"Getting this," she easily replied, producing a bag tied to her belt and showing it to the group before casually tossing it to Alistair. "What do you make of it?"
After examining the bag and finding nothing special, he opened it and peered inside... before pinning Kit with an arch stare. "If this is another one of your jokes about-"
"It's not, trust me," Kit interrupted, starting to laugh.
Pulling out a golden, almost unassuming in nature by lack of frills and gems, crown, he asked, "Are you sure?"
Laughing harder, Kit managed to say, "Read the inscription."
If there was anything Alistair was sure of, it was that he'd never understand women. Shaking his head, he did as he asked. "'May you rule the lands with the mighty resolution of the Maker, and the kind justice of Andraste'... what is so special about this?"
"Keep reading," Kit insisted, her smile growing even wider, if that was at all possible.
After turning the crown around and reading further, he dropped it as if it suddenly burned his hands. "Maker's breath," Alistair breathed, his eyes wide.
Leliana winced as it was dropped. "Such a pretty looking thing," she couldn't help but protest.
"It's fine with me, you can drop it as many times as you want to," Kit reassured. "In fact, I prefer it."
"That... that..." Alistair repeated.
"Oh yes, that," Kit couldn't help but boast.
"'Ruler of Fereldan... Loghain Mac Tir'?" Leliana cried, having finished reading the description.
"Any louder, and our dear Warden's hard work will be for nothing," Zev couldn't help but admonish with a smirk.
Kit and Zev watched as Wynne read the inscription for herself, before pinning Kit with a hard look. "You could have been killed for such a thing," she scolded both Kit and Zev.
"Ah yes, such a terrifying ordeal makes me wish to rest my head upon your bosom, for I feel I'm about to cry," Zev retorted with a roguish smile.
"... I'm going to walk away now," Wynne cooly replied before doing so.
The rest of the group stood in silence. "Loghain's crown," Alistair finally said, breaking the long pause.
"Loghain's crown," Leliana echoed, a mischievous smile starting to spread.
"Teryn Loghain Mac Tir... the bastard's... bloody crown," Kit finished. "And now that that's over, I believe we have a bit of business to finish up in Orzammar... after I get a bath. I do smell really bad."
As both Kit and Zev started ahead, the former collecting her prize to stash it back in the cloth sack along the way, Alistair interrupted. "But we're finished with Orzammar... aren't we?"
Leliana's eyes widened as what was said sank in. "What are you implying, Kit?"
"That Zev and I must smell much worse than my poor dog right about now," she smugly called back.
Beside her, the elven male chuckled. "That is quite the devious plan you have," he stated, guessing correctly what her intentions were. What were plain silverite daggers without some gold inlay after all? It could give their opponents something nice and shiny to stare at whilst being killed, he mused.
Sharing a sly look and a wink, she repeated, "Do you trust me?"
"Always, il mio amante."
AN: Not bad for my first one shot in a while... tell me what you think! :D