Thora closed the door to the suite behind her and sighed, leaning heavily back against it. She was so tired, and felt so nauseated. Something about dwarven food just wasn't sitting well with her. She hadn't had an appetite since she'd arrived in Orzammar. And the meeting with Harrowmont had been draining. They'd cleaned out the carta for him, they should have been ready to go to the Assembly. (Of course, his first response to the news had been to regret that she'd had to kill all the carta soldiers. Made her wonder if he'd had some use for them.)
Instead, they'd have to prove the Ancestors' favor for him once again, performing another task none of the Assembly was man enough for. Excuse after excuse after excuse, she thought. Why couldn't the nug-humping Assembly ever just get down to business and make a sodding decision? She wished for a darkspawn to smash. Well, there'd be plenty of that coming up, she thought. At least there was some bright side to this whole mess.
"What's the trouble, my dear?" Wynne asked, looking up from her book. It appeared to be a volume on the Orzammarian legal code.
"Wynne, how can you read that drivel and still be … alive?" Thora asked, frowning. There was nothing more boring than the legal code.
"Well, technically, I'm not," Wynne said, with a small secretive smile. Thora walked closer, and caught sight of the book hidden inside the book.
"Oh, Wynne," she said. "The Elbrins of Hazen Thaig? That is some trash, right there." She grinned at her friend.
"People who pry into what other people are reading can't be surprised by what they find," Wynne said primly, but her cheeks were red. "Anyway, I believe you're ducking my question."
"Truthfully, I am." Thora sighed again.
"I take it we're not rushing off to the Assembly to crown the new king."
"Hardly. Instead, we're rushing off into the Deep Roads to find the last living Paragon and try to get her support." Thora slowly began knocking her forehead against the stone wall. "I swear, if I didn't need someone to authorize the dwarven troops to fight the Archdemon, I would just leave and let the whole place crumble in on itself."
"We knew it wasn't going to be easy." Wynne's gaze rested sympathetically on the younger woman. She was clearly exhausted and … not quite herself. Was it more than just being back in Orzammar? the mage wondered.
"We should have guessed there would be hoop after hoop," Thora agreed. "But I had hoped for better, I admit." She looked around. "Where is everyone?"
"Leliana is having a nap, I believe. Alistair … well, I think he's in your room, but I haven't heard a peep out of him for a while. Which is odd."
"It is, isn't it? I think I'll just go check on him."
"Have fun, dear," Wynne called, turning her attention back to her trashy novel. Thora shook her head. You just never knew, did you?
Alistair had found the only human-sized chair in the suite. He was sprawled out in it, one leg hooked over the arm, deeply engrossed in a book. It was a surprisingly hot look. Once Thora had caught her breath, she asked, "Are you Wynne today?"
"A person could do worse," he remarked absently, turning a page.
"Whatcha reading?" She crossed the room to the chair. Alistair lifted his arms and she climbed in underneath to curl up in his lap. Tucking her head into his shoulder, she read a few lines. "The history of Paragon Aeducan?"
"I thought I'd see where you came from. I can see why he was a Paragon."
"You know those histories are commissioned by the Houses, right? It's not unheard of for a historian to be put to death for publishing something bad about a Paragon—at least if the House is in power at the time."
"So how much of this is accurate?"
"That one's not too bad, I think. I hear my grandfather—he's the one who commissioned the history—was a pretty reasonable fellow." He turned another page. Thora found it interesting to watch him as he read. He'd told her how much he enjoyed the education he'd received as a Templar trainee, but as he focused on the book she was vividly reminded of the sharp brain that lay behind the wisecracks and insecurities.
A wave of weariness washed over her. She'd like to lie down and sleep for a year, she thought, leaning back against Alistair's arm with a sigh and closing her eyes.
Alistair closed the book, looking at her with some concern. After a moment, he nodded in comprehension. "More hoops, then?"
She grunted, not bothering to open her eyes.
"Let me guess. We're going down to the Deep Roads to take back the dwarven kingdoms, uh, quadruple-handed, and if at that point any of us are still alive, he'll consider giving us some troops?"
"Not far off. We're going down to the Deep Roads to go find Branka, the only living Paragon—who is a cranky pain in the ass, I may add, and in the unlikely event she's still alive is even more unlikely to give a nug's left leg about who ends up on the throne. But we're supposed to somehow manage to get her to weigh in on Harrowmont's side." When he didn't say anything, she added, "What you said might well be easier."
He tossed the book over the arm of the chair and onto the floor. In one easy motion, he got up, lifting her with him, and carried her over to the bed. "You seem so tired," he said. "I've never seen you like this before." As she stretched out on her stomach, he put his big hands on her shoulders and started working on the knots there. "Is it just … Orzammar?"
"Partly." She sighed as his hands found a particularly sore spot and worked the tensions there. "I haven't been sleeping well, either."
"I know. Something about being here makes the nightmares a lot more vivid," he said. Neither of them had gotten much sleep since their arrival.
"Too close to the darkspawn," she murmured. "I bet the Deep Roads will be worse yet."
He made a small sound of agreement.
"I'm just so tired, and I want to get out of here," Thora sighed.
"Strange," he murmured, working his way down her shoulder blades. "You're the one who's actually from here, and you're the one having the hardest time being off the surface."
She moaned as his thumbs pressed into her back. "Uh-huh." Alistair shifted to his side, trying to find a comfortable position to keep rubbing her back without falling off the bed. It was a fairly obvious comment on their relationship, she thought bitterly, that a chair that fit him made her feel like a small child, and a bed that fit her made him seem like a giant. "What is it you see in me?" she asked suddenly.
His hands stopped for a moment, working on a muscle near her spine, then continued. "What brought that on?" he asked.
"It's just … I'm a dwarf. Despite my preference for the surface, Orzammar is really all I know. You're a human—the surface is your world. Don't you— Wouldn't you be more … comfortable with someone from your world?"
He knelt down next to the bed, looking at her face. "What would ever make you think that?"
"I just—All these complications, and the furniture doesn't fit, and I don't fit, and … I just don't know!" she said.
Alistair stroked the side of her face softly. "You're exhausted."
"That doesn't mean I'm wrong." The words were muffled in the pillows.
"Look at me," he said. His voice was firm, demanding her attention. Thora sat up, looking at his beloved face, which was completely serious for once. Alistair took her hands. "You are my world," he said. "Where you came from doesn't matter, except that it's part of you. If you were from … Orlais, it would be the same. To me, you come straight from the Maker, made especially for me."
Thora's eyes smarted with tears, then suddenly she grinned. "That would be a lot sweeter if I actually believed in the Maker."
He grinned back, relieved that he seemed to have gotten her out of that defeated mood. "Way to step on my beautiful moment, there."
"Sorry." She put her arms around his neck, hugging him.
He held her for a few moments. But he'd seen the shadows back in her eyes, so he couldn't quite let it go. "So is that it, then? Sleep and politics and the unlikely pairing of an Andrastean ex-Templar with a dwarven warrior princess?" He felt her tense again, and she broke the embrace to look at him.
"Alistair," she said.
"Uh-oh."
"Alistair, I think we have to talk about the Landsmeet—"
"NO!"
She jumped at his tone. His eyes were blazing with a different kind of fire than the one she was used to seeing. "But—"
"I said no," he said more quietly. "We've been over everything we need to go over. 'Duty or death', remember? Pretty much says it all. But since neither duty nor death has come to pass, we're not going to worry about it until one of them does."
"But don't you—"
"No, I don't. And neither do you." He closed his eyes, running a hand over his face. "Look," he said. "If I have to—you know—then that means the end of us. I get that. And I get that you think I have to. But I don't think I have to. I don't even think I should, and I won't until it's absolutely necessary. And I don't see any reason to make ourselves miserable now just in case we have to be then."
"Fair enough," she said. "If that's the way you want it."
He studied her for a moment, then his eyes darkened with the familiar fire. "No," he murmured. He pushed her back onto the bed and settled his big body on top of her small one, feeling her arch against him. "This is the way I want it." His mouth closed on hers, and suddenly she felt much better.
