Author's Note: I hope you like this chapter. The Castle I am speaking of is Winterwatch tower. I haven't written many romantic relationships before so I hope you'll leave a review and tell me how I could do better.
Today I have commited the most irresponsible act a Grey Warden could. I gave myself a day off. Ok technically it was not a day off, we spent a fair bit of the day moving across the Hinterlands.
After our group reached a good place to stop, Alistair and I announce that we were going to scout ahead. I don't think anyone but Sten believed we were going to be doing just that. Leliana laughed and told us to have fun while Morrigan rolled her eyes and went back to reading her mother's grimoire, while Wynne told us to be careful, her voice full of worry.
We couldn't find any inns or taverns, but Alistair told me about an abandoned castle he used to play in as a child. I thought it would be a good place to have a picnic. We walked together and talked about our lives and what we liked to do for fun. He told me he used to collect wooden statues of creatures and knights. I told him about Delilah and Habren. How I once tried to train them as warriors. I wanted them to be my comrades in battle like their fathers had been for mine. Delilah tried for a week before telling me she wasn't interested and Habren said the whole thing was unlady like, and would only consent if I got her a suit of jewels. I had enough Habren stories to keep the both of us occupied until we reached the ruined castle.
We ate and joked and snuggled and kissed. We laughed about everyone and everything. I felt like I was just me again. I told Alistair this and he felt something like that, though being a Grey Warden is too important to him too ever stop thinking of himself as such.
I told him about how Fergus and I used to go exploring in a similar place, an old fort from the Black Age. Alistair asked if it had something to do with the werewolves. I, elated I finally had somebody to discus interesting historical facts with got to rambling the story of how we became Teyrns, and how nobody's sure if Haleia or Mather Cousland was the first Teyrn because they were married to each other, and so both received the title. I could tell Alistair couldn't understand what I was talking about, but he listened nevertheless. I can't say the same about some of the other boys I've been with. Alistair became more animated when I started talking about the actual werewolves, comparing my knowledge to the stories he heard in his childhood.
I offered to buy him a statute of one when we got to Denerim. He agreed and thanked the maker that statutes were the only werewolves we were going to see. I lightly punched his arms and told him that after everything we've seen, Darkspawn, drakes, and even the Archdemon itself, that the one creature he thinks probably isn't still out there are werewolves?
Defensively, he said that maybe these werewolves would be different, maybe they'd have some sort of sympathetic backstory. I said I'd give him a sympathetic backstory, I don't even know if that's a double entendre or what but I thought it sounded sexy when I said it, and you know how these things go.
We didn't go all the way though. I honestly don't know why. We both wanted too. And I doubt we'll have privacy like this for a while. Something held us back. At least we both had a good time. I told Alistair I wished we could do this more often. He said we would, one day.
We told everyone about the castle, it was a good place to make camp. I go to bed alone, but for the first time in forever I believe I will have pleasant dreams.