"Rhod, wait. I need to tell you something I, ah… should have told you earlier."
Aha, there it was. It was inevitable, really; things couldn't follow the Warden's schedule forever. These four days of predictability and compliance had already been miraculous enough.
Zevran made sure his wry cackle was locked down before turning to look at Alistair, who now stood with all eyes on him.
The party came to a stop as Rhodri surveyed the man with a quirked brow. "If you've left it 'til now to tell us you're wanted in Redcliffe for some heinous crime, Alistair, your timing is very poor. The town bridge is right in front of us."
"Wh-? No!" Alistair shook his head hard enough to make his short, styled hair flop a little. "No, absolutely not. I… erm…" He trailed off, squirming like a sinner in the Chantry.
The Warden stepped forward and rested a hand on his arm, her expression softening. "Mmm? You seem worried. What is it? Would you like to step away with me for a moment and we can talk, just the two of us?"
Why Alistair even bothered looking the Warden in the eye was a mystery, when her own gaze was fixed squarely on his cheek. Zevran could have counted on the fingers of one hand the number of times he had seen her make eye contact with anyone. Still, though, Alistair did– and with a very contrite expression, too.
"No point in keeping it private. S'not something I can hide. Anyway, we're nearly at Redcliffe now– wait, you said that already! Argh!" He sighed exasperatedly. "Rhod. Look. Here's the thing: I know Arl Eamon because he… raised me."
Rhodri displayed most of her teeth as she gave the Templar a delighted, split-mouthed grin and drummed her hand on his arm. "Ah, bonus! We'll be visiting family, then! I look forward to meeting the Arl and paying my respects to him!" She paused. "Unless, of course, you don't get along? We can set up camp and you can wait here if you'd rather not see him."
"N-no, I like him. But he's not– well, he is family, I suppose, but there's also, uhm…" Alistair's brows were knitted enough to hold a pencil in place. "Oh, I might as well just… argh! I'm-King-Maric's-bastard-son-and-I'm-sorry-for-not-telling-you-sooner!"
Zevran could have eaten the dramatic silence up with a spoon– and would have, had the Warden's immediate shrug not spiralled it all into anticlimax first. Even Leliana's fascinated look faltered.
"Yes, I thought that might be the case," Rhodri said off-handedly, her faraway eyes missing the spectacle that was the Templar's fish-like gaping. "You and Cailan looked so alike. Anyway, though, are you telling me this because we need to approach this in a particular way?"
"... Well, no," he mumbled. "But it's big news and you should've known sooner. I've never told anyone before now, but it's not really something you're meant to hide at a time like this."
Rhodri whiffled a hand. "Nonsense. Who your relatives are is none of my business, unless they pose a threat to my own family. You could go up to Arl Eamon and exercise royal duties in front of me and it wouldn't be my concern until it affected my people."
Alistair's brows almost disappeared into his hairline. "Really? You're not bothered by this at all?"
"Ha! Why should I be? My father is a Magister's heir, and will be head of one of Tevinter's most powerful families, and I'm his heir. I never felt obliged to tell anyone. Well, I suppose the earring gives it away," Rhodri tapped the snake curled around her right ear, "but even so."
A cold, clammy chill spited the sunshine and sank into Zevran's skin as he ran his eyes over her. Unwarranted, certainly; he had already been certain she was someone of some influence from the start. Somehow, though, in the space of the last few moments, she had grown two heads taller, a cubit broader, and her face was twice as murderous.
Alistair, looking eminently more baffled than perturbed, blinked hard. "Well! I wasn't expecting this sort of jolliness, to be honest. Then I s'pose we just… go on as normal, then?"
"That's the plan, yes," Rhodri said serenely. "Unless you'd like me to start calling you 'Your Highness,' of course. Do illegitimate children have a right to rule here?"
"Doubt it." He rubbed his neck vigorously. "I certainly hope not. And definitely no 'Your Highness.'"
The Warden nodded cheerfully. "See, then? We're just visiting family. Ah, don't be guilty, amicus!" She patted his cheek. "No trouble, hmm? Now, we must buy the Arl a present, and then we'll go and say hello, yes? Does he have an aquarium? Perhaps we could find some lovely fish."
A snort issued from the back of the group– presumably Morrigan's doing, and Zevran could have sworn he heard a small whine escape from Leliana as well.
"... Fish? No, he hasn't got an aquarium that I know of. We tend not to give gifts like that here." Alistair shook his head casually. "We can just come as we are."
Rhodri's mouth fell open. "What? No gifts? Not even a cake? Oh, there must be someone in town I could commission to do an Orlesian croquembouche." She waved a hand. "I don't have that sort of cash on me, so they can send the bill to my father."
Laughter erupted from the redhead and the Templar, and Rhodri pursed her lips at them.
"Well, really," she said reproachfully. "That's not helpful at all. What, you want me to just show up to your adoptive father empty-handed? As though I thought so little of him I didn't bother to find something he liked? Preposterous."
"Well, for a start," Alistair replied through a grin, "I doubt a bakery in Redcliffe would be willing to send a bill all the way to Tevinter. They want coin in hand."
The Warden's eyes widened.
"And it's considered better to come without gifts if it is a family visit, even if you are not family yourself," Leliana soothed. "Otherwise it looks like bribery."
"B-bribery?" she echoed weakly, staring at Leliana in horror. When Alistair confirmed this with a nod, Rhodri tipped her head back and let out a harassed sigh.
"Come on, then, let's go. Bloody Ferelden. No gifts, my foot. How my cousins lived here, I'll never know…" She muttered a stream of Tevene, some of the content remarkably similar to Antivan obscenities, and tiredly beckoned the party to follow her into town.
Zevran could have jumped for joy. Not only was she a Northerner, she was a proud one. That was a commonality between them that made for easy rapport-building. He practically skipped his way over to the Warden's side and smiled up at her.
"I know just how you feel, my Grey Warden," he assured her sweetly. "We have the same gift-giving customs in Antiva. Not quite what we are used to, no?"
Rhodri stared ahead with a haunted expression, and she shook her head. "No, my friend, it certainly isn't. Bloody Ferelden…"
§
At first glance, Redcliffe gave quite a pleasant sort of impression- as far Fereldan places went, anyway. It wasn't a patch on Antiva City, of course, but such comparisons only yielded wistfulness and weren't worth the energy it took to indulge them.
No, the optimistic approach was in order here. Redcliffe was… charming. Rustic. At the very least, it wasn't raining, and it looked like it hadn't been raining for about three days.
The absence of rain helped the contrived optimism along rather more than Zevran expected. It was common knowledge that the ideal place was an urban environment with warm, sunny weather. Though Redcliffe was neither urban nor warm, it was dry and comfortable. Even the architecture wasn't half bad, with a number of the buildings boasting enormous, detailed fish carved into the wooden supports. Really, the locals had done the best they could with what they had, and of all the places Zevran had seen in Ferelden (far too many, by now), Redcliffe was definitively the least worst of them.
Of course, first glances were often deceiving. The evidence of that could not have made itself plainer when the party was stopped at the bridge into town by a local with a bow and quiver slung over regular clothes. He had circles under his eyes dark as bruises, and moved in jerky strides as he approached them.
"I ain't going to stop you from entering," he said to them, his voice reedy with exhaustion, "but do you know what's going on here?"
Ah, brasca, was it that time again already? Zevran looked around for the corner where the pleasant façade would be peeled back to reveal a revolting underbelly– one that in this case was no doubt crawling with darkspawn.
Zevran saw Rhodri squint at the question and Maker, could she not just get on with questioning the man? It was agonising being left wondering what flavour of evil was going to gobble him up in front of a wooden fish house.
"I… assume you're not referring to the civil war that is currently ravaging the entire nation?" she eventually asked.
The man's face fell. "So you don't know? Nobody out there's heard? What're you here for, then?"
The Warden gave him a sympathetic look. "A Blight is unfolding. People 'out there,'" she indicated the gate they had passed through, "are dying like flies because of the darkspawn. If you venture outside the village, you'll find there's not much of an audience left. As for us, we're here to see Arl Eamon."
"Arl Eamon?" the man shook his head. "Oh, dear..."
"Is something the matter with the Arl?" Alistair asked urgently.
Oh, there was always something wrong with nobility, wasn't there? They loved to gossip to each other about their maladies while maintaining a front of immortality around the great unwashed, though it must have been quite something if even the townsfolk knew...
It wasn't until the word 'monsters' reached his ears that Zevran mentally rejoined the proceedings, cursing his poorly-timed contemplations as he did.
"They come out of the castle every night and attack the village until dawn," the man croaked, watching them pleadingly. "We've no army or king to defend us, and the few of us left are waiting for death."
"Then I'll investigate the castle," Rhodri declared. "If there's an explanation for this, I imagine it'll be found there." She turned to the party. "Who will come with me?"
The man waved to get her attention. "Wait, ser. Perhaps you should speak to Bann Teagan first."
Alistair's eyebrows rose. "The Arl's brother is here?"
"He's in the Chantry. I'll take you there, if you'll follow me?"
Rhodri inclined her head. "Very well. Lead the way then, ser, if you please."
§
The rest of the day went by in a blur. The man called Bann Teagan had somehow roped them into joining the woefully underprepared villagers in beating back the tide of 'evil… things', as he had put it. The party spent long hours hurtling around the village, recruiting all and sundry into the local defence– and, more surprisingly, assisting the more vulnerable of said all and sundry as they went. The Warden didn't turn down a single request for help, to the approval of Alistair and Leliana, and the outright scorn of Morrigan and Sten. Siblings were reunited; a frantic father missing his daughter was promised extra eyes in the search. There were even donations of cash and food here and there.
It wasn't so much the act of helping that was so very novel. Zevran wasn't above doing small acts of kindness, himself, where the circumstances permitted it. Performing them in the open, though, that was rather more unusual. None of them seemed to care who could be watching, ready to exploit them and their efforts. Was this sort of serene, open goodwill normal outside of the Crows?
… If it was, did Rhodri and the others know how lucky they were that that was the case?
He silently decided to enjoy the freedom of pursuing such harmless pleasures for as long as the opportunity was there. Though exactly how long that would last was very much up for debate now that he had been signed up to fight village-decimating monsters, yet another of his ingenious, wry musings as the companions sat together in the Redcliffe Tavern, watching the sun dither a hand's breadth above the horizon.
His gaze was torn from the window as he looked around and saw the buxom, redheaded waitress standing at their table, a tray balanced expertly in the palm of one hand.
"Three pints," she handed a half-tankard each to Zevran, Morrigan, and Alistair, "and a strawberry nectar."
"Thank you, ser," Rhodri accepted her drink with an appreciative nod and took a sip.
The waitress raised an eyebrow. "'Ser?' Are you trying to get into bed with me? 'Cos I ain't that kind of girl."
Rhodri's eyes widened as she choked on her nectar.
"I- no, what-" she spluttered between coughs. Zevran smirked and took the glass out of her hand, setting it on the table before delivering a few firm pats between her shoulder blades.
"I was being polite," she gasped when she had her breath back. "I hadn't meant to offend, truly. My apologies, Madam."
That earned the table a bemused smile. Morrigan rolled her eyes and pretended to be oblivious to the scene while Alistair and Zevran looked on from behind their beverages.
"Ah, I think I've been around Lloyd too much to know politeness when I see it," the waitress admitted with a wry chuckle, jerking her head a little in the direction of the barkeeper. "If I didn't need the job so badly, I'd be away from that greasy bastard faster than you can say 'spigot.'"
The little information the woman had offered was enough to piece a backstory together, bringing with it a similar impulse to step in as Zevran had with Isabela- take her aside, teach her enough bladework to keep the worst of the trouble at bay.
He turned his gaze to Rhodri, whose face would tell him how his chances looked for indulging that little urge, and her knitted brows were all the answer he needed.
"Is the tavern owner giving you trouble, Madam?" she asked seriously, and perhaps a little too loudly, as one of the militiamen at the table close by glanced over at them.
The waitress' eyes widened and she shot a glimpse over her shoulder, sighing with relief to see that Lloyd was engrossed in the task of counting the money he had fleeced from them and the militiamen who were drinking nearby.
She looked back at them, her mouth a thin line now.
"Keep it down, would you," she hissed. "Didn't I just say I can't afford to lose this job? He gropes me and pays me next to nothing, yes, but if I get the boot here, then I end up somewhere much worse. I ain't got any other options!"
Rhodri gave a half-shrug and went to get up. "I'd best have a word with him then, teach him some basic manners-"
The waitress hastily stepped in front of her, shaking her head. "No, no, don't. That'll just make things worse." She smiled pleadingly. "It's sweet of you, but I'll be fine."
"He'll be fighting with us tonight," Rhodri answered, "and I don't tolerate that sort of filthy behaviour. In fact, I'd better go and tell him he'll be fighting, since we haven't spoken with him yet…"
The waitress laughed. "Lloyd? Fighting? Ooh, you've got the wrong bloke there. He'll lock himself away in his cellar like he's done the last few nights, and– hey! Where are you going?"
Zevran gave a low chuckle. "Somehow, I do not think that will be the case this evening," he said to her as Rhodri, who was already halfway to the bar, had a groaning Alistair in hot pursuit. Morrigan rolled her eyes and slid over to the opposite chair, turning her back to the unfolding spectacle as the Warden and the barkeep exchanged words at a volume that grew by the syllable- on Lloyd's part, at least.
"There's no need for that kind of talk," he objected, wiping his brow with the bar rag. "That's murder!"
"It isn't murder to say that your source of income will dry up if you don't join the collective effort to keep them and your village alive tonight," she replied with a shrug.
"It is if you're sending me into the fray when I can't even hold a sword," he protested. Alistair clucked his tongue, folded his arms, and shook his head at the man reprovingly.
"Then I suggest you make your way down by the Chantry to practice with the other beginners," Rhodri pointed at the door. "And if I hear of any indecent behaviour from you, I'll see to it personally that you face disciplinary action. Off you go."
Zevran stifled a snort as he watched the barkeep throw his hands up and stomp toward the front door, barking over his shoulder, "it better be as I left it when I get back…!"
Lloyd turned to the waitress and pointed at her.
"Bella, you'll run the joint while I'm gone, and don't you dare undercharge." With that, he tramped out, slamming the door behind him as he went.
In what appeared to be a rare moment of unison, Alistair and Morrigan rolled their eyes, passing each other as Alistair returned to the table and Morrigan ("I cannot suffer a moment more of these inane dramas") departed the tavern.
Bella walked into the centre of the room and declared that drinks were free for the rest of the day, to the uproarious delight of the patrons. A line formed as people drained their tankards and made their way to the bar, and no-one made a single noise of impatience as Bella quietly conversed with Rhodri for a few minutes before taking her place behind the spigots.
When the Warden rejoined the table, Alistair got to his feet.
"I want a word with Bann Teagan before things get exciting," he said to her, making sure to shoot Zevran the requisite glare as he did. "I'll meet you outside the Chantry, all right?"
With a wave, he was out, and Rhodri and Zevran were left alone at the table– with no shields on them, no less!
Progress!
"Well, that was exciting," Zevran murmured to her through a chuckle.
Rhodri shook her head. "I wouldn't care to repeat it. Poor Bella. I'll pay her a visit tomorrow, I think." She cursed under her breath before her eyes suddenly widened. "Zevran!"
He quirked a brow at her. "Hmm? You already had my attention, my Grey Warden."
"We must talk strategy for tonight," she said urgently, tapping a finger on the table.
"... Strategy, you say?"
"Yes. You're trained as an assassin, are you not? How do they fare on the battlefield? Surely you're used to carrying out things a little more… clandestinely, yes?"
Zevran nodded, chewing his lip thoughtfully. "This is true. We specialise in striking from stealth. I can fight against others in head-to-head combat, though a large army may make things… particularly exciting, shall we say."
Rhodri frowned. Her eyes went on him and scanned his face so intently that a part of him wondered if the answer was written somewhere there. "We must find a way to keep you safe out there."
Keep him safe? Did she know who she was talking to? Oh, this was painful, and the sooner the conversation and ocular scrutiny were over, the better. He slipped on a smile and manufactured a chuckle to distract her. "I do not think you will find the answer on my right cheek, Rhodri, however beautiful it might be."
Her eyes stopped right in his own line of vision, and as it happened, uninterrupted eye contact was even worse than face-searching. Why had he not considered that before encouraging her to look elsewhere?
After what felt like an eternity but could not have been more than a second, the contact broke and she looked away.
"Sorry," she said solemnly. "I was thinking hard and not focusing on where my eyes were. Would you tell me a little more about being an assassin so we can plan something out for you?"
Relief. At last, an easy topic, even if the reason behind it was…
No. Just answer the question.
His humming laugh came much more readily to him this time. "With pleasure, my Warden. Well, let me see. We assassins tend to have very limited opportunity to carry out our task, which means that much depends on the first attack." He shrugged and added as an aside, "and it keeps the dying process from dragging out. A good clean death, as it were."
They had spoken of clean deaths before, and he knew Rhodri's stance on the matter. Even so, it was gratifying to see her give an approving nod.
"Debilitating foes with poison," he added, "or crippling their limbs makes follow-up attacks much easier. Done well, if the first stab does not end things, the second or third will."
"You would have to know anatomy very well to make good judgements on where to strike and applying knowledge of poisons," Rhodri said as she traced a finger around the rim of her glass. Her voice dropped a little, and he wasn't sure if she was still talking to him as she muttered, "Dexterity, of course, excellent strength, but in short bursts… eye for distance, awareness of surroundings… mmm…" She trailed off, chewing on her lip.
Zevran said nothing. There was little to add to the list of his skills she was producing in front of him now– at least where warfare was concerned.
"I'd put you with Alistair for that, since he can clear quite a path, and it would be well for him to have someone at his back." Rhodri sighed. "But he needs more time to warm up to you. For now, your proximity will startle him, and that could lead to disaster."
He snorted and conceded her point with a nod. "It would be less than ideal."
"If there were better spots around here to hide and we weren't playing a numbers game, it would be less of an issue," she continued thoughtfully.
Zevran glanced out the window, looking down over the entire village. There were a handful of bridges and large mounds that would do in a pinch, though if he were overwhelmed…
"Oh, I could try to make do, I think," he said offhandedly. "If I fail, I suppose I only fail once."
He chuckled as Rhodri's eyes widened. "Ah, do not take it badly, my Warden! One does not do what I do and fear death so very greatly. You know this!"
Her brows knitted, and the remnants of his mirth died away.
"I don't want you to die, Zevran," she said soberly, "and I don't want you at greater risk of death than is absolutely necessary."
Now that was a combination: a face that looked like the wearer wanted to strangle him, saying words expressing the exact opposite sentiment. It would have been hugely funny were it any less unsettling.
"I would like you to stay very close to me this evening, then," she nodded at her own decision. "Ideally behind me. I'll be on the frontlines much of the time, I imagine, but my shields will keep us both quite safe."
Sending a mage into the fray seemed akin to entering a cat in a horse race, but the Warden looked nothing but sure of herself. He nodded quickly.
"You won't regret having Zevran at your back, my Warden," he purred. "Count on it."
Rhodri beamed and gave him one of those barely-there nudges. "Of course I won't," she said warmly. "I'm happy to have you with me."
Before Zevran's stomach could finish plummeting, Rhodri was already jerking a thumb in the direction of the door.
"We should leave and get some practice in before sundown. I doubt my spells will hit you if you stay right behind me, but I'll be moving and you'll need to get used to shadowing me."
In the corner of Zevran's periphery, Bella had disappeared into the stockroom, and a tingling premonition declared the arrival of his opportunity to do a good little deed of his own. And, he had to admit, the opportunity for a moment's respite from the Warden's nerve-plucking remarks.
"Of course. But first, please excuse me for a moment, my Warden."
With a nod, Rhodri turned her gaze to the window, and amid the noise and studious consumption of alcohol, Zevran went unseen as he slipped away to the stockroom where Bella was rummaging in a large chest. His hand went under his shirt to unbuckle an unremarkable steel knife strapped around his belly, and he held it by the sheath as he knocked gently on the door jamb.
"Pardon me," he announced calmly.
Bella glanced over her shoulder and promptly turned back to her task.
"Gents' is the second door after this one," she jerked her head to her right, tsking under her breath. "I could've sworn that bloody wrench was in this one…"
"Ah, thank you, but no, I did not come to enquire about the latrines."
She paused and turned around again, appraising him warily this time. "What did you come here for, then?"
"Nothing to be concerned about, I assure you. I was sitting at the table with the Grey Warden and overheard something about your… ah… predicament here under the barkeep's employ."
Bella looked unimpressed with this opener. "If you've come looking to staff a whorehouse, I ain't interested."
Zevran chuckled. "Ah, no. No, I do not run any such enterprise. But I have had friends in similar situations as yours." He stepped forward and held the knife out to her, keeping the blade pointing toward him as he did. "They always benefited from having a little extra, ah… protection, shall we say."
Her eyes darted from the blade to him; he could almost hear the cogs turning in her head as she sized them both up. Such caution was warranted, of course; why would she trust a foreign stranger? He stayed still and kept his free hand where she could see it.
After a few more moments, Bella reached out a hand and unsheathed the blade.
"You should take the rest as well," he prompted her gently. "In a dress, I suggest strapping it to the upper leg for quick access." He drew a thumb around the top of his thigh demonstratively. "If they face you head-on, aim for the face, throat, or the space below where the ribs join, and if you can get behind them, here where the head meets the neck will end things quickly." He jostled the belt a little as a reminder for her to take it; she did. "But if you can run, do. Knives are always a last resort, no?"
Bella kept her eye on the point of the blade. "What d'you want in return, then? I ain't got any money to give you." She looked up slowly. "Unless you wanted a more physical thank you?"
"There is no need for that. Just keep the knife a secret. It is no longer a concealed blade if you show it to anyone, no? Word gets out very fast, even among trusted ones."
She placed the knife in the scabbard and nodded. "I… thank you," she said softly. "I'm sorry for being suspicious. We don't get many elves in here, but you're certainly a lot nicer than that Berwick creep."
Zevran pursed his lips thoughtfully, reflexively dismissing the first part of the woman's remark. "Ah, yes, the one we recruited earlier."
Bella chuckled. "We ought to keep you and your friends around. The tavern's a much better place to be when it's not overrun with oddballs and pigs. Almost pleasant."
He snorted. "Just so. I should leave, but first, you might consider concealing that blade before anyone catches you with it. I will keep watch while you do." Without another word, he turned his back to her and stood in the doorway.
"I think the knife's hidden now," she announced from behind him. He looked over his shoulder and nodded.
"I am sure I don't know which knife you mean," he answered through a smile that he allowed to stay while he left and made for the Warden's table.
Rhodri did her startled little head-rattle as Zevran drew up beside her, and pulled her gaze away from the window. She smiled at him. "Shall we go?"
"Always ready, my Grey Warden."
In a silence that bordered on comfortable, Rhodri drained the last of her drink and they stepped out into the afternoon.