CHAPTER 12

I should have just taken the damn earring. Then I would not be lying by myself beneath the open sky, awakening fresh from a dream that has left me covered in sweat and my throat raw.

I need a bath.

No one in their right mind would attempt to bathe outdoors in this weather, even if they happen to come across a pond that has yet to freeze over. But I am a Warden during a Blight, and I think that gives me some license to not be in my right mind, even if the only other Warden I travel with seems to have retained his.

We are still a few days away from Redcliffe. Riordan has gone ahead of us, leaving me to deal with my new recruit. I am not kind enough a person to forgive so quickly, and I think Loghain knows this. The look we leveled at one another when he joined us at the gates of Denerim had been wary and full of mutual distrust, and we have exchanged few words since.

Alistair was right. I do not know if I can trust Loghain with my back in battle. But the word that has reached us from Redcliffe so far has not been good, and that means that I will have to find out how well I can trust him soon. It is the mistrust that makes me so inadequate at explaining the dreams to Loghain on my own, I think. Still, I have jolted myself awake more than once on our journey back to Redcliffe, only to see Loghain lying on his back, simply staring up at the sky, barely a bead of sweat on him. I may be the senior Grey Warden, but he knows far more about fear than I do. I do not have to like him, but I can respect that much about him.

Fear clouds my mind. A good cold dunk will clear it up.

We have come to rely on Shale as our watch, exhausted as we all are as we hurry back to Redcliffe, and I check to make sure her back is turned before ducking into the forest. I hear a familiar pant of breath behind me and turn, stopping Soris from following with a single look. He stays by the fire, his head raised high and his eyes locked on me, his mouth gaping open and his tongue lolling between his fangs. Finally he settles himself on his stomach, and I turn and continue on into the woods.

I do not have to orient myself much to find my way, even in the dark. We are not far from a point we passed earlier this year on our journey away from the Dalish encampment. Then, it was still spring, and Wynne was the first to spot the pond surrounded by grass and shaded by the gentle arms of leaved trees. We smelled like werewolves—or so she claimed—and we needed baths, and she would not budge until we all had our turns scrubbing ourselves clean. Alistair and I went in together, and he had laughed until he cried when we stood together in the center and he saw how the water went up to my chin when it was only up to his chest on him, and I admitted that I was standing on my tiptoes. That was the first time since we met that I truly laughed with him.

Tonight I part skeletal branches alone and step silently upon ground cold and bare of green. I look for a rock shaped like a werewolf baying at the moon—its silhouette fooled me enough the first time I saw it to engrave it into my memory—and follow its sloping back towards a grove of bare-armed trees, the tallest only half as high as the vhenedhal. Leliana had explained to me that, many years ago, the ground had ruptured here, and left a face of pure granite jutting up towards the sky that tonight balances the crescent of the waning moon on the tip of its finger. I did not know the earth could do that. I thought its shifts were limited to the dirt on its surface! Hearing that made me wonder how firm the ground really was beneath my feet. Orzammar only renewed my worry.

Below the face of rock is the pond I search for, its dark mirrored face glittering beneath the moonlight like a hidden jewel as I weave through the trees towards it. It reminds me of Morrigan, strangely enough, although I doubt she would find the comparison flattering. I glance around quickly to ensure no other living thing is already there before stepping into the open at the pond's edge.

I shed my armor and my clothes and tuck them and Starfang among a pile of rocks. Fang I keep strapped over my bare back in its sheathe, and I step into the water and slide into its depths, one cautious step after another. I am sure the water is close to freezing, but it feels no cooler than it did when I had toddled through its depths just this past spring, fascinated with the feel of water supporting me up to my neck and uncomfortably aware that I did not know how to swim. I had to get out soon enough, uneasy with the possibility of drowning and Alistair's energetic splashing not making me feel any safer.

Tonight I only go up to my waist before stopping, then crouch down so that the water rises to my shoulders. I can stand up any time I need to, if the feel of water around me becomes too confining for me to bear. I sit there on the sloping bottom of the pond and raise my knees to my chest, clasping my hands around my crossed ankles.

But I might as well be entirely underwater. The night is silent, slumbering in darkness as my friends do and as I ought to be as well, and the quiet closes around me as though the forest holds its hands cupped over my ears. There is not even a breath of wind to stir the air.

It is too quiet, and too still. Maybe I should have brought Soris with me. It has only been a week since we left Denerim, and I miss my family, and dancing with them around the vhenedhal. And I miss Alistair and his strange ability to make everything seem like it is going to be fine.

And I miss, most of all, a set of hands that always know the exact wrong moment to touch me, and a smooth, sweet voice that feels like honey on my fingers, and can make me squirm with a single word.

Maker. Wrong thing to think about. If anything at all, I came out here to get away from thoughts like that.

When I look up at the moon, its thin crescent is a grimace of a smile, as though it is telling me that I cannot even hope that things will get better from here. I laugh. I cannot help it. Looking to the sky has always brought me solace in the past, but not tonight. Tonight, it only makes me realize how alone I am right now.

I never have been brave, or strong. But I have always been good at pretending to be when I had to, and at least I do not have to be right now. And I am too tired. I drop my forehead to my knees and gather my legs closer to my chest until I can feel my heart beating against them. My shadow below me trembles with the ripples my movement creates on the mirrored surface. I watch it shiver, surrounded by a halo of silver light, the dying moon's blessing caught and trapped within the water's dark depths. My nose nearly touches the water. I could kiss my featureless reflection if I wanted to.

I laugh again. Maker, how pathetic am I?

I do not know where the words come from; they seem to spill like drops of water from my lips. "'O Maker, hear my cry,'" I murmur. "'Guide me through the blackest nights. Take me from a life of sorrow. Lift me from a world of pain...'"

There is a vague prickling at the nape of my neck. I fly to my feet and whip around, Fang drawn in my hand.

I suppose I should not have been surprised to see Zevran standing there, although it is the first time we have been alone together since the night in the alienage. He has skulked on the periphery of our group since we left Denerim, always just within sight and never closer to me than necessary. The others have noticed, of course; we may be traveling as quickly as we can, but even we have to stop to rest. And of course it was Leliana who asked, during one of our quiet moments gathered around the campfire, nodding off one after the other over a mug of Morrigan's tea. I told her what had happened before we left Denerim, or at least as much as I was comfortable revealing. She just looked at me, her blue eyes blinking like an owl's in the firelight. "I do not understand why you two are so cruel to one another," she said.

I flush suddenly, and somehow the water does not start boiling around me.

He looks at me, silent, and I am tempted to wade deeper into the pond to ensure he cannot reach me. I sheathe Fang and cross my arms over my chest instead and stare back at him, holding my ground. I should never have to be scared of him, not like I have been scared of others in the past. But he makes me feel exposed in a way as no one else has. I am far too aware of the water lapping around my bare waist as I shift my weight below the surface. I have to force myself to relax.

"Care to join me?" I ask at last, trying as best I can to keep my voice casual. "It's a little warm, but otherwise it feels fantastic."

"Hmm." He strips his glove from his hand and steps forward to dip a bare finger into the water. "Yes, very warm." He flicks the droplets from his finger and remains in a crouch, staring at me. More silence passes between us. I swear I can hear the forest breathe.

"I have not heard you pray before," he says finally. "And here I thought I had corrupted you so thoroughly."

"I don't really make a habit of it," I reply. "I don't think the Maker hears anything elves say. But my dad did try to teach me to read using the Chant. Bits of it come to me sometimes. And sometimes they fit the moment."

"Hmm. Like sex poetry, no?"

I chuckle uncertainly. It sounds more like a hiccup in my ears, and I cut it short with an awkward cough into my raised fist. "Maybe that's what I've been doing wrong all this time. How did it go again? 'The song I see in thee...'"

"'The symphony I see in thee, it whispers songs to me,'" he corrects me. "But perhaps it is not the best moment for such poetry."

We stand staring at each other in complete silence again until I look down, hoping the moonlight has hidden my flush. "Look, Zev, I...I understand if you want to go."

"Go?" he repeats, and I look up to catch the briefest flash of incredulity flicker across his face before it disappears behind his half smile. "Where would you suggest I go, in the middle of a Blight?"

"Back to Antiva?" I suggest half-heartedly.

"Returning without Taliesen now would be sure to bring half a House of Crows down upon my head," he says dryly.

"Then...I don't know. Explore Orlais. See if they need you in Starkhaven. Or maybe Alistair does. I don't...I don't know, Zev. I don't want to hold you back."

"You do not hold me back," he says, and I cannot read his face. The moonlight's silvered hand works well at obscuring more than just my own awkwardness. "I followed you tonight because I wish to speak to you about...my past."

"You've told me a lot of it already—"

"Not everything. You have been very forthright with yours, more honest with me than I deserve, while I have not been so with mine."

I shrug uncomfortably. "You don't have to explain yourself. If you're leaving, it'll be easier for both of us if you just...go."

"I am going nowhere." He sits cross-legged in the frozen grass by the pond and fixes me with a sharp look. "You have asked before about the last mission before I came to Ferelden. The truth of the matter is that it is the reason why I accepted the contract on you Wardens. I was looking for a suicide mission, some way for me to go out in a blaze of glory. And my last mission was the reason why."

"A suicide mission?" I repeat. "That's..."

"Unlike me, si." Zevran smiles briefly. "But what started it all was unlike me, as well. My last mission was...a team effort. With Taliesen."

"The charming one."

"Hmm. That you can laugh is a good sign, I suppose."

I cough into my fist. The ache in my lower back is long gone, but the stitches are still in my ear, and they are difficult to ignore. "It's how I get by."

He studies me with glittering amber eyes. Like marbles made of molten gold.

"I'm sorry. I'll stay quiet. Go on."

Now it is Zevran who laughs quietly. "I think we have had an exchange like this before, yes? But I shall go on. And do not feel the need to stay quiet, if you must speak." He rests his chin on his raised fist, his elbow propped on one knee. "Taliesen brought another Crow on to help us. She had a certain skill set that he said would be very valuable to us for this mission in particular. I still do not know what that skill set was. I saw her and could not see anything else afterwards. She was an elf and a very experienced Crow, with at least three years more experience than I. And tough, and dark—dark hair, dark skin, lips full and red like berries. And eyes that shone like justice. Rinna was her name, and I had never seen anyone like her before."

I swallow. "She sounds beautiful."

"That is an understatement. Rinna was exquisite. She was a painting without a frame. None could hold her. Of course, we were on a mission, and so we spoke to one another on a strictly professional basis. But sometimes when we were together I would see her looking at me, and she would smile. And I would find myself very much looking forward to when the mission was over."

"But that was your last mission?" I ask. "What happened? Did you..."

"Nothing happened. She died."

A part of me is selfishly relieved. I am glad it is not something he can see. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be. Taliesen and I killed her together."

I am used to how cavalierly he speaks of violence by now, and yet this still manages to surprise me. "Why?"

"Taliesen came to me one night, just before we were to finish off our mark. He told me that Rinna had betrayed us—that the next day, when we closed in for the kill, we would be certain to fail because she had already warned our mark of what would happen, and had been paid handsomely in thanks. So we decided together that she would have to die. Betraying the Crows, you see, seemed unforgiveable." Zevran does not move a muscle, except to give me one of his half smiles. "Taliesen, as you...well, he was not very kind. I simply watched. She swore up and down the entire time that she had not betrayed us, and begged us not to kill her. Even told me she loved me. I laughed and told Taliesen to slit her throat, and spat on her as she bled out at my feet. Taliesen left. I stayed and watched the life fade from her eyes. I thought it was what she deserved. But the next day, when we went to take our mark using a different strategy, we found out the truth. Rinna...had not betrayed us, after all. I do not know who it was. But it had never been Rinna."

I sink back into the water, sitting on the bottom of the pond again, my knees tucked beneath my chin. I cannot think of anything to say. It would all be utterly inadequate.

"When we returned to our masters, we said only that she had died during the mission. And...well, I was...not very much liked by one of the guildmasters. You must understand, I was very proud of myself then, very sure that I could do no wrong, that no one could resist me. I told this to anyone who would listen. This guildmaster in particular had grown tired of my boasting. He looked right at me and told me that he knew Taliesen and I were lying. He knew what we had done. And he said that he did not care. Nobody did. The mark was dead and the contract was fulfilled. If a Crow or two was lost along the way, well—it is inconvenient to lose a fine blade, but much less so when there are many others to take its place. One day, he said, the same would happen to me. And there would always be another Crow to take my place.

"Taliesen and I were punished for killing Rinna without a guildmaster's order, of course; they may have many replacements, but it is better to not have to replace a good weapon in the first place, yes?" He directs his laugh at the ground. "But it was a slap on the wrist, in truth. Afterwards, I could not focus on even the smallest task. When I healed enough to take contracts again, I waited until the most dangerous one I could find came up." He looks up at me. "And that was the one on you and Alistair."

I say nothing again, and he keeps talking. It is like he cannot stop now—and I could not have stopped him if I wanted to. "I wanted to die. But if a...tool, a weapon is all that I was to be in my life, then I was at least going to die in the most brilliant way I could imagine one such as I leaving this world. So I hired enough mercenaries to make sure they could finish the job after I got myself killed, or so I thought. And that is how we met, you and I. Although it was Alistair who knocked me unconscious, if I recall, yes?"

"I think so," I say.

"I did not expect to wake up from that. I thought as I fell, ah, Zevran, this is it. Now you can rest. Very relieving, you know. Instead I woke up with a headache and you and your friends staring me down. And you saved me, as I have told you before." He shrugs. "That is all."

Silence closes around us again. I sit wrapped in water and staring at my knees, doing everything that I can to keep our eyes from meeting again.

I have always thought him unshakeable. And now I know that he, in many ways, is not. No more than I am, at least. This is not what keeps me silent. But something does.

"Do you have nothing to say?" he asks quietly.

"I...no. Thank you for sharing that with me."

"Is that all?"

I cannot look up at him.

"You saved me in more ways than just that one time after I tried to kill you. It is luck that I chose the contract on you first." He is silent for a few breaths before speaking again. "And still you have nothing to say?"

"I have to...I have to think a little," I say. "Maybe you should go back to camp."

"Brasca," he growls.

My head bounces up as he stands and strides past the pond's edge and straight in, not even pausing to remove his boots or any of his clothes along the way. The water licks at my legs with his entrance and I stand. I do not know what to do. He should not be in the water; it is too cold for him. My mind races and flails like a moth caught indoors, and my feet in comparison are rooted to the ground, caught between going to him and running away. "Zev, stop!" I finally choke out. "You'll catch a cold!" Andraste's blood. That is all that I can say?

He keeps wading forward. I finally manage to take a single step back before he reaches out and catches my wrist, roughly circling my waist with his free arm and pressing me against him. I flinch away, turning my head and raising my free hand to shield my face instinctively. "No," I gasp, and the look in his eyes would have sent me running if he did not hold me so tightly. I do not understand what it is I see in there. His face seems so foreign. So confused. Then I realize that I have seen that look before, in my mother's face, as she rounded a corner and saw me pinned to a scaffold's frame, hands pressing mine to the bars while more dug into my throat. Heartbreak. Anger. Shame.

My arms begin to crawl with the pressure of nonexistent hands gripping them. Fingernails rake at my upper arm and I do not realize that they are mine until his hand leaves my back and grabs the wrist on my other hand and drags it away. His hand does not release mine, but takes it along the return journey to my back and holds it there, pinned against me. Trapped again. My heart begins to panic and I cannot breathe for a moment, until he leans closer and I catch leather and musk wafting around me. It does not stop my heart from fighting in my chest, but I can breathe as long as that is all that I can smell.

"Do not run from me, Daen," he says, and his voice is sharp, biting at my ears.

I shake my head. What I am denying to him, I do not know.

"Why?" he demands. "Tell me that much and I will release you. And you need never see me again, if that is your wish."

"That...it's not. It's not." I shake my head again.

"Then what is wrong? What is it about me that frightens you? Do I remind you—"

"You...no! It's me. I'm not..."

"Not what?"

"I'm not the person you thought I was," I blurt. It is all that is on my mind. "I'm...not brave. I can't be."

"That is all?" He lets out an exasperated breath of air. "Ma feca. I spent nights wondering what you were hiding from me when we reached Denerim. After Taliesen, you finally told me and I knew that you are exactly who I know you are. But still you ran from me." He grabs the back of my neck and presses his forehead against mine. It feels hot, almost feverish. "I do not understand."

"Because I'm a coward!" I spit. "I'm afraid of humans. I'm afraid of the Archdemon. I don't want to die." And I sob between a laugh that sounds like rock grating against rock. "Especially not for...damn shemlen." Tears. At last.

I jerk back as lips touch my cheeks at the points where hot water drips down my face. He holds my face even more firmly between his hands and eats my tears as I choke them back. I try to tell him to stop, but the words sputter away, diminishing with every touch of his lips. My sobs are extinguished by sheer surprise, and he draws back and looks me in the eye.

"You know why I took the contract on you, and why I went about it the way I did. I wanted to die. But in truth, I am terrified of death. Here, I will admit it: I am a coward, too."

"Hah," I croak. "So we're both cowards?"

"That is precisely what I am saying." He tilts his head. His voice is all confidence and soothing, but the childlike nod of his, the way he looks at me, full of hesitation and curiosity, says that he is not nearly as confident as his voice sounds. "We...fit each other, no?"

I kiss him, knee deep in freezing water that I cannot feel.

I know that there is more to his story than what he has said. Crows, after all, do not love—or so he has said. But with Andraste's blessing, maybe there will be more time soon for him to tell me everything. It does not have to be right after the Blight is over, or even within the year. It could even be only before I leave for my Calling. And I will be as grateful to hear it then as I would be if I had heard it any time before, so long as it meant that he had always been there with me until then.

When we break away, I stare up at him and can only hope the moon does not hide what I am trying to tell him with every fiber of my being. "I won't be scared anymore one day, Zev," I say. "I promise."

"Ah, mi amora, you are already brave enough for the both of us. Do not doubt it." He gives me that look—the half smile and lazy lids that I have yearned to see—and pushes my hair out of my eyes. "You must be, to go into battle with this broom brush on your head."

I bury my face in his chest in reply and hug him against me as tight as I can manage. My arms and legs shake and he all but hauls me out of the pond. I cannot even explain that it is not the cold that is responsible for my trembling but something else entirely. He sits abruptly and takes me with him, and I do not let him go. I barely feel it when my knees scrape the cold dirt of the ground. There is nothing more real than him here with me; his warmth and his smell have filled the vacuum of the forest's silence that I bathed in alone before he came.

His head drops to cover mine and I hear him mumble something into my hair that I do not know or understand. It could be Antivan. I only know that my ears have never heard those words before.

"I still have the earring," he finally murmurs into my ear. I understand that. I wonder why I could not make out what he said before? I will have to ask him later. "Will you take it now?"

I have to pull my head out of his chest to reply. "Andraste's arse. I'll wear it."

Zev raises a brow. "That does not seem very safe to me. We will need a fire and a needle..."

"I'm a Warden. I really don't think this is going to be what kills me," I say dryly.

He eyes my naked body. "Yes, I see your point."

The earring is pale beneath the moonlight, but it glows all the same, and I watch it from the corner of my eye until it has gone past my periphery. I do not even mind it when I feel the sting of the earring as it pierces my left earlobe. It throbs as he takes his hand away, but I reach up and touch the smooth bit of gold and finger the little amber jewel that hangs from it between my thumb and forefinger.

"I am yours," he says.

I chuckle. "Me, too."

Then he sneezes and shatters the silence of the forest, and I laugh and grab my clothes and force him to return to camp. He sounded worse than Soris with a wet nose and all I can guess is that it means he needs to get in front of the fire. We steal past Shale's turned back when we arrive. Luck is with us in more ways—Soris is nowhere in sight, and Loghain has not moved. I sit Zev on my blankets and sneak my way to his tent to grab his entire bedroll. When I return, he has my blanket tucked over his lap and his hands held towards the fire.

"I did not realize how well you Wardens tolerate the cold until now," he says as I return. I put his blankets over his shoulders and glance across the fire to check on Loghain. The man is still asleep, his head and hands twitching occasionally. The nightmares do not seem too bad tonight.

"It's a useful skill," I murmur, sitting beside him. "How are your legs?"

"Chilled," he says, and lifts a brow. "Perhaps they could use some company?"

I stifle a laugh and take my boots off. He lifts the blanket on his lap invitingly and I slide my legs beneath. It is my turn to raise a brow.

"You know, pants can do wonders for keeping the chill away."

"The pair I wore was wet, and my tent is so far away." He nods to where a dripping shadow is propped on sticks and angled towards the fire. "Besides, you are much warmer than the thickest of woolen trousers."

"Hah. Maybe you should go back to your tent."

"I am much warmer now, I assure you. Let us sit here for a while." He seems to be entranced by the fire, and I can feel his bare legs warming against mine.

"All right. But not too long," I say.

"Will you tell me how it is you became a Grey Warden now?"

"There isn't much to tell. I just killed the son of the Arl of Denerim—the one before Arl Howe. If I hadn't been conscripted, I'd probably be dead. I got lucky."

"And there isn't much to tell?" he echoes and laughs. "Such a talent for understatement."

I echo his laugh and tell him the entire story. He only knew bits and pieces before, and interrupts from time to time to ask some questions. He even wants to know why I do not like fish. I had no idea he had even noticed that. It is the first time I have had to tell it in its entirety all at once, and it feels more like a confession than anything else. I keep silent on the full extent of what happened to Shianni—I still am not ready to speak of that, and it should not be told until Shianni is ready to tell it herself. He does not ask, but I think he knows.

"All right, your turn," I finally say.

"You already know much of what I would have to tell," he protests.

"Hmm." I decide not to push that point. "Well, how about you tell me what all of those words you call me really mean?"

"Oh? Which ones?" he says innocently.

"Got-o?"

"Gatto. It means 'little cat.'"

"You've been calling me a cat all this time?"

"It is a...an idiom, is that what it is called? For the cunning ones."

"Hah. Well, it's better than 'wise one with the diamond eyes,' or whatever it was you told Soris." I think, trying to remember all of the foreign things I have heard from his mouth. "What about eye...ai..."

"Ayana?"

"That one."

Zev chuckles. "The ayana are fairies from children's stories."

"A fairy! Even better."

"It is a very flattering term, I assure you. They are considered great luck in many parts of Antiva. And they are much like you, pale-haired and dark-eyed and delicate, and giving gifts of gold and silver to travelers in need."

"Delicate? Andraste's arse." It is my turn to laugh.

"The ayana are not nearly as deadly as you, it is true. But they are also well known to be very beautiful and pure." He grins. The firelight deepens the shadows of his smile. "To see one is considered a great blessing. It is said they appear only before those who deserve their help. I like to imagine that I deserved yours."

"Well, of course you did."

I duck my head at his words in the meantime and fight the sudden blush. Beautiful. And pure? Hah! Maker's balls. But there is one more word I want to ask about. My mind rolls its three syllables over in my head, worrying at them like Soris would at a bone. I want to be able to say them right.

He leans forward suddenly and touches his lips to the earring at the point where it dangles from my earlobe. It still stings a little, and I flinch while still trying to hang on to how I will say that one word. My thoughts scatter in the next breath. The tip of his tongue slips around the upper rim of my ear, caressing its every fold and crevasse. I shiver just as he likely expected me to and bump him in the chest with my shoulder to save some of my own dignity. "Don't do that if you don't plan on doing it all night." I manage to keep my voice steady. Maker's little miracles.

Zev smiles. "Is that a challenge I hear?"

"Hah! Shale and Loghain are right there, you know."

"Ah, yes, so they are. But we have blankets to hide us from our golem. And as for Loghain, if there is one thing that I have learned from bedding a Grey Warden, it is that your dreams keep you very occupied. And very asleep." He leans towards me as he speaks until his lips are moving on my ear, and the last words are exhaled against it.

I shiver and still manage to keep my voice playfully calm, somehow. "You don't say? Grab some charcoal. Let's draw a mustache on him."

"Alistair has been a very bad influence on you, I am afraid." His hand covers mine.

"Are you serious?" I ask, and the sky disappears beneath his covers in response as he presses me to the ground with his entire body, his lips tracing down the lines of my neck and circling to a rest at its base. It is warmer than a dragon's den beneath the blankets—so warm that I barely feel the heat of his hands as they undo the laces on my pants and slip inside, his fingers tickling at my stomach until I squirm. When I return the favor, adding a gentle touch to the base of his spine along the intertwined path of the tattoos I know flow there, he arches his back and purrs in my ear. He seems so much like a giant cat that I almost laugh and have to bite my lip to stay quiet.

"Tonight you shall strive much more than usual to be quiet, I am afraid." He nuzzles my ear again. "Amora."

Maker's breath, that word. I feel like I have not heard it in years. I melt into him.

We lie on our sides chest to chest because it is all we have space for, and keep the blankets held down around us over each other's shoulders. Cold air still slips in even if I can barely feel the chill. It is more for modesty and Zev's benefit than it is for mine, but I find myself wondering if it is a losing battle to keep the blankets over us. It is at least a losing battle to remain utterly silent. I would bet Fang that he deliberately slips his shoulder away at one point to let a single sound through before I manage to stifle myself. He purports to have lost his balance and I give him my most sardonic look, even though I know he cannot see it. I can only hope that the layers of blanket around us muffled my unmistakable moan.

The dreams of the Archdemon are vague and touch me through a fog that night. I suppose my mind is too occupied by someone else to pay it much attention.

I wake wholly tangled in Zev's limbs. I could have stayed happily unconscious for much longer, and only rouse because he has decided to use his tongue to do something that feels uncomfortably arousing with the stitches in my ear. I cannot decide if I should elbow him or return the favor, but I can do neither in any case; he has my arms pinned down and his legs wound about mine, and the only thing I can move is my head.

He covers my mouth quickly with his as soon as my eyes open, forestalling my groggy complaint. "I do not mind, but you may wish to clothe yourself before the others wake," he murmurs.

I groan into his lips and let my eyes drift shut again. The covers are still over our heads, and I am loathe to leave his embrace. "Five more minutes."

"Hmm. I would oblige, except I heard Oghren walk past us on his way to relieve himself in the woods."

I wiggle free of Zev's arms and legs and sit up, glancing furtively around the campsite. Oghren is an early riser, but if he is awake then the others will soon follow. There is no one in sight, however, save for Loghain still asleep on his back on the opposite side of the fire. Even Shale and Soris are not standing at their customary posts—perhaps they have followed Oghren? Maker, that must be awkward. Then again, he is probably too groggy with sleep to care. That might mean that he did not notice the too-large lump Zev and I created beneath our blankets when he passed us by.

I spot my smallclothes and pants lying in a tangled mess within reach and snatch them up quickly, standing up to slip them on. When I glance back down after doing up my laces, Zev is smiling up at me with his head cushioned on his hand. I know he is practically bare under the blanket like I was, although I notice he has somehow managed to keep his socks on, of all things.

I raise my brow. "Enjoying the view?"

"Si." He grins and sits up, gathering the blankets around his hips. He pauses and paws through its folds before tossing a rumpled piece of cloth up to me. "Your shirt, my dear Warden."

I catch the bundle and tuck it under my arm. It is far too cold for him to be bare, even if he does not mind showing off. I toss his dry pants back to him, and root around a stump to find the discarded ball of one of the black sleeveless vests he prefers to wear beneath his armor. He rises as he catches it, confirming his nudity, and leisurely dons his clothing. I stand before him, my shirt gathered at my elbows before me, and watch him begin to button his vest.

He notices me watching him and seems to forget about doing up his vest, although I would bet my last sovereign that he did that on purpose. "Si, amora," he says, dropping his hands, and the corners of his lips tug upwards in a barely concealed smile as I shiver. I knew he said it to watch my reaction!

"Do you believe in the Maker?" I ask quickly.

"Andraste seems a most bewitching lady, but as to the Maker, no. Although I may have seen him last night," he replies, waggling his brows at me.

"Hah!" I scoff and shrug my shirt over my shoulders. Extra hands help me pull my shirt down my head, and I emerge to find him standing directly in front of me, a half smile on his lips and his fingers lingering at my hips. I return the favor by doing up the buttons he has left undone. This is probably what he was angling for to begin with, but I am not above feeding his ego from time to time. Although Maker knows I did enough of it last night.

I fight a blush as the ghostly memory of his lips on mine causes my back to tingle. My fingers stumble clumsily over their fellows, and I force them to relax. I am twelve years old again, my age chaotic once more in the wake of the shivering mess he leaves me in. I cannot wait for my birthday next year. Twenty-two is twenty-two no matter which way you put it.

"Why the sudden philosophy, amora? Has Leliana gotten to you?"

I chuckle. "I might never have been inside a Chantry until I left Denerim, but I've always been Andrastian."

"Never inside a Chantry? But there is one in Denerim, yes? It was not far from the alienage, as I recall."

"Well, theoretically elves could go inside. We just had to sit in a different area and we weren't allowed to speak to any of the Sisters or ask for their blessings. One of the Sisters came to us on rest days, so honestly most of us didn't see a point of going to the Chantry. I'd peek in from time to time, but it usually ended with me getting chased off."

"And you are still Andrastian?" The corner of his mouth quirks upward.

"Hmm...old habits die hard, I suppose. My dad is pretty devout. He used the Chant to teach us how to read. But what about you?"

Zev laughs dismissively. "Not I. I still am not even sure what to think of the Ashes. But why so curious?"

I watch my fingers climb the centerline of his torso, moving to the next buttonhole. "Sister Hildegard always told us that we all will pass through the Fade when we die. Those who believe in the Maker go to His side through the Fade. But the ones who don't stay in the Fade, without the Maker. In Oblivion, she said, for eternity."

He raises a languid eyebrow. "Is this an attempt at a conversion? Please, spare me. I have been a very bad boy."

"Hah! I'd have an easier time converting a nug. Even if Sister Zevran would be interesting to see..."

"If this is a fantasy of yours, we could indulge it a little..."

"...It'd be utterly terrifying."

"Ah, so cruel."

"Never said I wasn't interested. Maybe someday, when we have the time. And a private room." I fiddle with a button, noting that it needs mending, and taking the moment to let my reply sink in before continuing. I do not need to raise my eyes to know that he is smiling at me, but I do so anyway, simply to enjoy his expression. Even I cannot fight back my own smile. "It's just—I was wondering what it would be like, to be by the Maker's side without you. Forever. I'd rather have you than the Maker for eternity, is all."

"Ah, well. If it makes you feel any better, I would welcome you by my side in Oblivion with open arms." He grins. "I must say, the idea of lingering for an eternity in a place named 'oblivion' does not quite tempt me. I prefer to believe that what comes after death is only what we ourselves wish it to be. Our bodies hold us in this world, but without our bodies, what we may perceive—ah, it has no limits except what our own minds shall imagine, yes?"

I cock my head and consider his words. "That sounds kind of nice."

"Mm, I thought it did too! Well, but it did not occur to me how much the Fade is a twisted version of that whim of mine until I found myself trapped in the bloody thing. I think perhaps having a body that can feel gives the mind a very useful frame to work in, maybe makes it less susceptible to demons. In any case, I assure you, in my afterlife my mind shall be thinking of nothing but you."

"Hmm. Along with a few others, I bet." The top three buttons I leave undone, so that the bare skin of his chest creates a striking frame for his face. He prefers them that way. So vain, my Antivan. I should ask Wynne to knit him a scarf. I smooth the line of the rest of the buttons down along his abdomen to straighten my handiwork.

Zev, meanwhile, gives me a mock look of dismay. "Never! And if they are there, it is only because I wish to share their charms with you!"

"Hah!" I promptly fasten the topmost button on his vest. He gags and pretends to choke until I undo it, and catches my elbows with his hands before they can drop away, drawing me towards him. I let him. It is what I was angling for, after all.

"Just so you know," I say, lacing my fingers at the small of his back, "I'd stay in Oblivion for you."

Oh, Maker. That sounds like something straight out of one of Soris's love poems. I start to duck my face into his chest to cover my embarrassment, but he slips a hand beneath my chin and does not let me hide. His thumbnail playfully taps the bit of gold dangling from my earlobe before it continues its descent along the side of my jaw, and I hear the soft ring of the contact in my ear. "I appreciate the thought, amora. But all of this talk of the afterlife is so depressing! Let us turn our attention to the things before us in the now-life, hmm? You are always in too much a hurry to get to the end." His face dips towards mine. "And you should not say such things simply for my benefit. It is a little difficult to un-believe the things you have always believed in, yes?"

"Not when there's a reason to," I reply, and let him lift my chin.

I do not know who does the kissing this time, but I do not need to know. Nor do I want to.

Maker's breath, I love him. I glimpsed more of him last night than I have in the past year we have been together, and that taste only makes me want to see more. My chest aches. I love him.

When will I be brave enough to say it to his face?

A tent flap rustles open and I break away from him quickly. Wynne simply raises a slender brow. "Well, it's nice to know that you two have finally made up," she says dryly. I cough and busy myself with reviving the fire for breakfast. The camp comes to life soon afterwards, and Zev hovers so close to me that I am sure everyone else knows, too, if the earring has not already given it away. My hair has grown out, but it is still not long enough to cover my earlobes.

When Oghren and Soris return, he has a wild goose under his arm, already plucked bare and its head dragging limply on the ground behind him. I set a pot of water to boil for him and eye the bird appreciatively. It is a little thin, but it still has enough meat on it to make a decent breakfast.

"Goose in the winter, dwarf?" Loghain asks, a hint of grudging respect in his voice.

"Don' mention it. Some hunter forgot about 'is snare," Oghren grunts. "The mutt put it out o' its misery. All I had ter do was pluck it."

He sits and slides a sizeable blade through the goose's neck, neatly decapitating it in one stroke. Soris snatches the neck out of his hand before he can toss it to the side, and he sits back flapping his hand in the air and glaring after my mabari's retreating back. Soris is back again for the innards after the bird has been scalded and Oghren has split it through its stomach. This time he waits for Oghren to toss him his prizes one by one, and catches them out of the air, his giant jaws snapping shut with a noisy crack and slobber occasionally flying to spatter his surroundings. Leliana sighs at that and moves back, rubbing at her cheek with the back of her hand. I stay where I am—I am used to mabari drool—and watch Oghren split the goose's carcass open through the back, widening the gap with both hands through the cut and pulling the exposed bones out with a few firm tugs. He then proceeds to shred the goose meat into smaller pieces while he waits for a frying pan to heat. Thank the Maker he is not using his battleaxe to do it—he takes good care of his weapons, but there are a few dark stains along the edges that were probably left by a genlock's neck.

It is a remarkably leisurely breakfast for us, considering that we still do not know what to expect when we finally reach Redcliffe in a few days' time. But I think it is something we all need, and do not push for us to move faster, although Loghain sends me a few impatient glances.

When the shredded bird has finished cooking, we gather with plates in hand about the fire. Zevran sits beside me and slides a helping of goose onto his, humming a lilting tune under his breath. Leliana's ears prick up and she glances at him, her face beaming.

"Is that an Antivan song?" she asks. "It sounds lovely! What is it about?"

"Ah, it is a very tragic love ballad, about two young Crows in different Houses who fall in love. Er...star-crossed, as it were. Not so lovely as you may believe, as it involves the total destruction of both of their Houses. Speaking as a former Crow, I must say Antivan minstrels have quite the imagination! But the love scenes, they are magnificent and an inspiration to us all! Shall I translate a few verses for you?"

"Oh...no, that is quite all right," Leliana demurs.

"Is the painted elf making an allusion to itself and the Warden with its choice of tune?" Shale asks. The golem stands closer to us than usual, watching us as we eat. Shale is a hard one to get to know, and all I have really learned about it is that it hates birds. I suppose the golem must derive some pleasure from watching us destroy anything bird-like, although it has been averse to the idea of eating birds in the past.

"Why do you say that, my stony friend?" Zevran inquires curiously.

"The painted elf and the Warden would do well to remember that I do not need to sleep," Shale says dryly, and I gag on my stringy mouthful of goose while a slow smile spreads across Zevran's face. "Blankets alone do not hide everything. It was a nice try, though."

Leliana laughs. "I heard it, too. Very steamy." I cough and pound my chest and she laughs again. "We have all heard things here and there before, Daen. I know you try to be quiet, but sometimes things slip through."

"Right," I say, shooting a dirty look at Zev. He resumes humming, but casts a sly glance back at me.

"Maker's balls, what is wrong with you, Antivan?" Loghain demands. "The both of you. I was practically right next to you. Right next to you, Maker preserve us. You don't have even a shred of decency, do you?"

"And hide a mere fraction of my gloriousness from the world? I would sooner fall upon my sword," Zevran intones with mocking indignation.

"Oh. I thought that was what Daen was doing last night," Leliana says innocently. And now I am sure that I am as pink as her old Chantry robes, and I wish desperately that I had a set to hide under right now.

"Suddenly I am grateful my old bones allow me to sleep like a log," Wynne sighs. "Thank the Maker I heard nothing."

"And this is why I make my camp so far away," Morrigan mutters. "'Tis helpful...usually."

Leliana looks at me and laughs, her mirth spilling from her mouth with a silvered ease, and soon we are all laughing with her, although Loghain looks like he has swallowed a bone, and all Sten does is smile with his eyes while Morrigan uses hers to stare expressively at the sky. Leliana's voice is infectious and magical, and her laugh is the absolute only one I can think of that can immediately set my mind at ease and want to laugh along with her, too.

When I face my Calling, this will be one of the memories that will keep me alive on the Deep Roads. I will fight for them. And for my family. And, most of all, for the man who sits next to me and looks at me with eyes that promise me that he will never stop looking at the world through a face full of quiet amusement, because that is who he is, even behind the masks he wears for everyone else.

The darkspawn will never know what hit them.

Note: Aaaand an even longer chapter. Oops.

Daen cites from Transfigurations 12 in the Chant, with some skips.

Let's just say I'll try my best to update either Beak or Clouds on Sundays from now on, but if it doesn't happen, it's because I'm too busy.

Until next time.

-K