"No! I will talk to you no more. Not on this subject." Zevran objected loudly to Alistair.
"Zevran, I know what you're going through-" Alistair started to say.
"No, that is where you are wrong. I care not for what happened, she made her choice." Zevran interrupted. "Leave me now." Zevran finished, pointing the man to the door
"Very well"
Alistair moved towards the door. After a couple of steps, he stopped and turned to Zevran then said "If you truly are not affected by what happened, why then are you so keen to escape speaking of her?"
Zevran remained silent, he turned away from Alistair, his black hair blowing with the movement, and looked into the fire that blazed in the grate.
Without another word, Alistair left.
Zevran threw his glass into the blaze and watched the fire change colors as the wine evaporated with a dispassionate eye. Greens and blues and purples flashed by, but all he could see was her.
Her red hair that hung in silken strands around her eyes and coming to settle around her shoulders, her dark amber eyes that seemed to glow alight with some hidden humor, also her intricate tattoo, inked into her skin in black, the color complimented her bronze-hued skin.
He had once believed to "Take your pleasures where you can, for they do not come often, if at all." but she had changed his mind on that without even trying. He had not believed in love and certainly did not believe in its power until he'd fallen for her. He'd never before imagined himself settling down and marrying but after he met her, he'd started to dream of it more and more often.
He remembered then how they had fought the night before they were to raid Denerim and free it of the Arch Demon. He had meant to tell her his feelings but she had stopped him before he could say that he loved her. He could remember word for word what she had said: "I had a dream as a child that I would one day wear the white dress but that is now nothing more than a withered husk, an empty house where the spark of hope once lived. I learned years ago that love is true for everyone but me. For me it is a fairy tale, something whispered in a cold night to comfort myself in the dark." and she had died still believing that.
"She was our sister and our daughter before she was your hero, her loss lessens us all" The words that Keeper Marethari had spoken at her funeral sounded in his thoughts, she had been his lover before she had been their hero and her loss had destroyed him.
He remembered what it was like, to be on that rooftop. The flagstones were warm from the dragons fire and the darkspawn kept coming. The acrid smell of the smoke in his nostrils and the taste of it in the air as the city burned down around them. He was covered in blood from darkspawn, elves, men and dwarves. The last line of defense made up of the three peoples of Fereldan before the Blight spread throughout all of Thedas.
She stood at the front of the line, her sword in her skilled hands flashed in the light of the many fires and the last rays of the setting sun. Stabs and parries, cuts and dodges as she danced through her battle. Every time the Arch Demon snaked its scaly head down, she met it with a flurry of blows that brought a roar of pain and the dragon pulled its head from her range. When the beast took to the air, she would pull her bow from her back and pelt it with arrows until it landed again, unable to retain flight for any great amount of time because of the many tears already in its wings.
The Arch Demon fell to the ground, finally beaten. She had been blown away in the gust of air from the beast. She cast one last look back to Zevran. Then without another thought, sunk her blade into the dragons skull. He had been forced to watch helplessly as her body convulsed violently while her soul and the Arch demons taint battled against each other. The shockwave was strong, she fell away as Zevran was knocked from his feet. He stood from the ground and he knew before he had moved anywhere near her, her eyes no longer glistened and she was just too still. He knew that she was gone.
As he moved closer he seemed to move slower. After an eternity he was next to her body, his grief over came him causing his knees to buckle as he looked upon her face. Tears came unbidden to his eyes, he felt them rolling down his cheeks. A sob escaped from under the lump in his throat. His hand supported her head and his other wrapped around her body. He touched his forehead to hers, in that instant he felt himself crumble completely.
He was pulled back to the present when a log fell in the grate causing the fire to release a wave of sparks up the chimney. He sighed, wiping a tear off his cheek and reached into his pocket, pulling out a small item. He opened his hand and the ring that rested within it glittered in the firelight.
Once again Keeper Marethari's words echoed in his thoughts, "She was our sister and our daughter before she was your hero, her loss lessens us all" She had been his love before she was their hero and her loss had annihilated him.