Herein is a collection of short stories involving the same Warden as "Chains" and "Nations and Ages". I'll be adding to this slowly, as thoughts strike me.
These first two chapters go together, and are part of a failed attempt to complete a song meme.
Everyone wanted something. He just had to figure out what it was.
"Would you be offended if I said I fancied you?"
Confusion he expected, but the not quite derisive snort, the furrowing of the Warden's brow in agitation... For a moment, Zevran feared he'd made a misstep, a miscalculation.
"You don't have to do this," the Warden told him. "You're not a piece of meat, here."
"I'll take that as a yes, then," Zevran said, trying to recover gracefully. The Warden just stared at him for a moment, incredulity and agitation in his expression, and something else Zevran couldn't quite pin down in those intense green eyes. And then he walked away.
But he kept coming back, kept listening to Zevran's stories with a neutral expression, any judgments passing unsaid. And when Zevran asked about his place in the future, because he was growing quite desperate, frightened about gaining better purchase in the Warden's good graces, the Warden sighed, rubbed one hand over his face, exasperated. Recovered from the gesture, he looked down, somewhere between them, then smirked, before meeting Zevran's eyes.
"After I ravish you in celebration?"
A week later he found himself intimately entangled with the Warden, nothing more than warm breath and soft cries between them, no need for these cumbersome words. And it was unexpected, somewhat, a confusing and pleasant surprise. Others competed for his affection, Morrigan and Leliana shooting each other silent glares when the Warden wasn't looking, and Zevran had given up on that angle until that unexpected response, that cheeky answer to a very serious question.
That night he saw beyond the confidence, beyond the mask that was the Warden. Cadryn was frightened, out of his element, barely an adult and uncertain. But no one wanted to hear that. It would undermine his leadership in their group, would only dismay their allies. All these things Zevran saw in the nervous and eager trembling of a virgin, in Cadryn's obvious need to seem competent. And he was observant, attentive, learned quickly. More confusing than Cadryn's sudden interest in him physically was that the man placed himself in so vulnerable a position. Zevran had, after all, tried to kill him, and while Zevran hoped he'd proven his loyalty since, that didn't account for how much of the man behind the Warden's mask he revealed in those impassioned hours.
Zevran expected no more than this one night between them, but he longed for it. It gave him some purchase, some ground to stand on with the others, and he needed more. In another week the Warden made a regular habit of this, ending every night tangled in his arms, and as he grew more confident they became nearer to equals in this.
And on a night while they wandered out of the Brecilian Forest, Cadryn snatched up his wrist as Leliana prepared for the first watch, heedless of who saw them, and led him to the tent. As usual, Cadryn was gently dominant, something Zevran had come to expect from all humans, but things quickly spiraled out of Zevran's control that night, and just how far he realized when Cadryn's head dipped low, lips running down his length-
That night Cadryn, devious creature and quick study, made him feel wanted, worshiped, in more than a physical sense, because the human responded to physical cues with all haste, and asked nothing in return. By the time he was well and truly spent (at least twice over) and they lay in the darkness of the tent, Zevran on his back and staring up at the other man in confusion, Cadryn on one side, head propped in the crook of his arm, other arm draped across Zevran's midsection, Zevran was convinced this was some subtler form of control.
But Cadryn anticipated that line of thought. "I need nothing from you in return. Your pleasure is enough."
That night meant something, was supposed to be a message, but Zevran had yet to unravel it. And he expected at the core of this mystery he would find out what the Warden wanted from him.
The relevant lyrics are from Garbage's "A Stroke of Luck":
You say that you'll be there to catch me
Or will you only try to trap me
These are the rules I make
Our chains were meant to break
You'll never change me
...
Stroke of luck or a gift from God?
Hand of fate or devil's claws?
From below or saints above?
You come to me now