AN: I found a few old miscellaneous prompt fills and random ficlets deep in my tumblr while looking for something else recently, so I'm preserving them here!

Characters/Pairing: F!Cousland/Alistair
Rating: K
Word Count: 1200
Prompt: #20: (kiss meme, dealer's choice on type of kiss) !FWarden and Alistair, from uatu-watches.
Original Notes: (Originally posted August 2, 2013.) "Okay, so I'm totally cheating here; this is a section of an old, old Alistair/Cousland fic I wrote back in September of 2010, but since the fic itself is never going to see the light of day and my teeth have three thousand dollars worth of pain seeping out of the lidocaine and I don't think I could write Alistair right now if my life depended on it, I'm totally nicking this. Forgive me? :(

Anyway, here is #7, romantic kiss, featuring Alistair and my rather serious Lin Cousland. She's kind-hearted, but bitter to the bottom of her soul about her parents' deaths, and private enough about her feelings she never quite lent herself to much fiction. Oh well. I did what I could, and sometimes she turned out all right."

They move him that night into the royal apartments.

He doesn't have much. He's been traveling light, after all, and even before this he'd been a Grey Warden—not an order known for material possessions–and when the servants look around in consternation after putting away his few things, he awkwardly dismisses them. He is more comfortable when they are gone, but not by much; everything in the room is gilded gold, from the bedposts to the coverlet's threading to the windowsills to the inkpots on the desk. Inkpots! What the devil does he need a gold inkpot for, unless it can be thrown at the first darkspawn to burst in through the door? He picks it up, testing its weight. Not bad, really, he decides—at least, there are enough jewels encrusted on the thing that it might crack a genlock's skull if he put enough force behind it.

His door closes with a soft click.

He looks up as he tosses the inkpot aside, half-expecting to see a servant with a gilded candle or something equally useless—but instead, it is her, her hands between her back and the door where she leans on it, looking down at her scuffed leather boots that do not bear a trace of gilt on them. She has divested herself of her armor and her swords at some point after the Landsmeet, settling instead for a plain blue tunic with the Cousland crest at her heart and brown trousers—and in that moment, with her short hair in disarray where she has run her hand through it and her cheeks just touched with embarrassment, he has never seen her look more beautiful.

"Hi," she says. He doesn't bother asking how she got past the guards in his anterooms. He's seen her silver tongue firsthand; she's persuaded men on the verge of flight to stand and fight with them while covered in blood and filth—when she is at her best, he knows his guards don't stand even the slightest chance.

"Hello," he replies, just as quiet, and when she doesn't move he steps forward until they are toe-to-toe. He wants to lighten the mood, somehow, but he isn't sure where to begin. "What, sneaking into your fiancé's room in the dead of night already? It's hardly politic." He means it to be lighthearted, but when she winces and looks away from him, he knows immediately that it is the wrong thing to say. "I'm sorry—" he starts, but breaks off when she puts a hand on his chest to stop him.

Her eyes are level with his nose; that seems to be the only thing she is willing to look at. "The apologies are mine. I am sorry for this afternoon," she says, and she shakes her head when he tries to interrupt. "I should have never made decisions like that without asking you privately first."

Of all the things to be worried about— "Which decisions do you mean? The kingship? Or the engagement?" He leans forward until his forehead rests against hers. "Because I was already expecting one, and—I can't say I mind the other much."

"Is that so," she breathes against his cheek, and then she swallows, and when she speaks again he hears the familiar traces of confidence returning to her voice. "Because I thought I'd come give you one last chance to slip free, if you liked."

He is almost pinning her to the door, now, his hands flat against it on either side of her head, his lips hovering a breath above hers. "Who says I want to be free?" he asks, his voice low.

Her eyes are half-lidded and darkening as her fingers wander their way down his chest to his stomach and then to his hips, dallying at the embroidered edge of his shirt, but when she speaks, her tone is serious. "I would not ask you to give up your freedom if I was not willing to give you mine in its place."

He draws back, astonished, but her body follows his like it is on a line, and she presses her forehead into the place where his neck meets his shoulder. "I love you, Alistair," she murmurs, and the words vibrate against his chest. "If I have to become Queen to marry the man I love—well, there are worse sacrifices to make, aren't there?"

Cupping her face in his hands, he pulls her back to where he can see her clearly. Her cheeks are flushed, but she is absolutely serious, and without another thought he crashes his lips against hers. She lets out a muffled protest, but her hands are already slipping under his shirt and the muscles of his stomach jump as she draws her fingers across them. "Not fair," he groans, and in retaliation drops his mouth to the hollow of her throat, pressing his lips against the race of her heartbeat. Her breath catches and he chuffs a laugh against her neck, and then she is pushing him away just enough to rid him of his shirt. The embroidery scratches against his face as she tugs it over his head, but he doesn't care, because she is pulling him down and kissing him again, drawing on something so deep in him that he loses himself for moment in it, and it takes all the shreds of self-control he can muster to pull her away from the door and towards his bed.

The back of his legs hit the edge of the bed and he half-falls onto it, pulling her down atop him. He props himself up on one elbow; the other hand goes to her waist, pulling her as close as he can get her—not that she isn't helping, both arms wrapped around his neck as she leans over him. "Not fair," he mutters again, his lips against her shoulder.

She groans, her fingernails running against his scalp in a way that keeps him from thinking straight. "What's not?"

"That—ah. That you're still wearing a shirt. It's—not even."

Her laughter brushes against his bare chest as she sits back—slowly—to give him access. He plays with the hem of the tunic for just a moment, and then he slips his hands under it to press his palms flat against her sides. Catching the edge of the fabric between his thumbs and forefingers, he draws it up, dragging his fingertips up her sides as slowly and maddeningly as he dares, reveling in the shivers that spread across her skin at his touch.

"Now that," she says, flushed, "is not fair." She rolls her hips forward, her eyes laughing at him, and just as he wraps his arm around her back he feels her pause against him, and then, in an entirely different voice, she says, "Alistair, what is this?"

He hasn't the faintest idea what she's talking about, occupied as he is with other things, and then she draws back, and in her hand she holds a gilded inkpot that gleams in the candlelight.

He plucks it from her fingers. "This, my love," he says, "is our last line of defense against the darkspawn. Do be careful with it."

She stares at him for a moment, and then she throws her head back and laughs without restraint, and when he pulls her down, laughing because she is, the inkpot slips gently to the floor, entirely forgotten.