Chapter 3

Zevran didn't normally pace, but tonight he was. The thread bare rug under his feet was thinner by the minute. Lyna should have been back. If something had happened to her…

He didn't finish the thought, he couldn't finish the thought. Lyna could take care of herself. She was more than capable. But that didn't stop him from worrying about her. It didn't help that the news he bore was dire. He didn't want to tell her about her clan. About the Keeper of her clan being dead, but he would.

"If she ever returns." He muttered turning once again. Rain pattered on the window of the room beating out a rhythm with no particular pattern. It was always raining in Ferelden. He was used to rain now, but this was a colder rain than that of Ferelden's rains. A chill set in the air. Sending a cascading shiver down his spine. The small hearth in their room lent little to no heat.

He sighed, running a hand through his blonde hair. What he wouldn't give to wrap his arms around Lyna's naked form to stave off the cold. An impish smile danced on his lips as he thought about kissing her and running his hands over her. Her touch was fire in itself setting him a light. His breath hitched and he growled frustrated.

"Dammit, Lyna." He swore.

He was ready to run into the freezing rain to look for her. He had spent three nights away from her. Three nights he had stayed with her Dalish clan waiting for those bastard Crows to find someone to track him down. Their cowardliness driving them to use other means to kill him. He was just glad that the Champion of Kirkwall had been such an understanding individual. It had helped that three of her four companions had vouched for him as a companion of the Hero of Ferelden.

He smiled as he remembered Isabela's tempting offer. Sex with Isabela was exciting and unpredictable. One never quite knew what they were getting with Isabela, figuratively and literally. She was a pirate and he had been an assassin hired to kill her husband. It had been fun, but that's all it had been. She hadn't stirred something in him. Oh certainly, she had lit a fire in loins that had drove him crazy with desire, but that was it. Pure simple lust. He knew this now and he suspected that Isabela knew it too. They were too alike in their mindsets to have been anything more. They would have ran away from each other at the first sight of something more. That's simply what they did. It was how people like them survived. No, he didn't regret not taking Isabela up on her offer. It would have been a mere fling a moment of desire and pleasure that would have quickly passed. While it would have been glorious in the moment afterward he would never be able to look Lyna in the eye again. She might have forgiven him. She was that type of person, but he wasn't certain he could break that trust to her. He had made a promise, a vow to her. He would try his damnest to keep it. Even if it meant pacing a small miserable cold room by himself.

The door creaked. Zevran spun-daggers out and poised before he could stop himself. Lyna stood in front of the closed door watching him. Her bright blue eyes twinkled with merriment as she stared at him. She didn't flinch or move waiting for him to relax first. He sighed and lowered his weapons placing them back into their sheaths.

"Lyna, sweet, you should be more careful."

She smiled at him the skin around her eyes crinkling slightly. "You haven't been on edge like this in a while." She eyed up as she unclasped her sopping wet cloak. She hung it on the hook on the back of the door. "I'm guessing you were successful."

Zevran nodded moving across the room to her. "I was. And you?"

She sighed as he wrapped his arms around her waist pulling her close. He shivered again as her damp clothes seeped into his. "Talking. I hate the talking and the politics. Alistair is good at it though. Never at a loss for words that one."

Zevran chuckled pressing a soft kiss to the top of her head. "This is true in most cases, though I do remember rendering him speechless a few times."

Lyna laughed lifted her head his shoulder, "Yes, but you always asked him about inappropriate and strange things. You and Oghren both. It's like you had a bet going as to which one of you could turn him a brighter shade of red first."

Zevran raised an eyebrow as he looked at her. "In fact there was one such bet, once upon a time."

"Really? How come I never knew this?"

"Because we didn't think it would be fair with Alistair having his little crush on you."

Lyna shrugged and stepped back from him. He immediately missed the heat they had been sharing. "Who won?" She asked moving toward the fire place. She unhooked her bow and swung her quiver from her shoulders.

"Surprisingly it was Wynne."

She laughed as she sat in a rickety wooden chair and unstrung her bow. "Not terribly surprising."

"See that's what I thought too. It's always the ripened women that get you."

"Years of practice of saying the right thing at the right time."

"Precisely."

Zevran watched her lithe form as she stretched her arms above her head. She was like watching a cat. A large lithe hunting cat. Powerful, sleek and always ready. A comfortable silence enveloped them. Zevran sat on the edge of their rented bed observing Lyna as she took off her boots. She stretched her stocking feet toward the fire warming them. Her eyes were nearly glowing in the reflection of the firelight. Her hair a silvery blonde was braided in a single braid she had pulled over her should and was twirling unconsciously around one of her fingers. The silver tattoos etched on her face glittered in swirling dips and drives along the soft contours of her forehead, cheeks and jawline. His fingers twitched as his lips ached to trace every graceful arch.

He had to tell her. He had to tell her soon.

"Lyna?"

She turned her head toward him. A smile splayed upon her full lips. "Yes, Zev?"

He couldn't meet her eyes. They were to hopeful and happy. He didn't want to crush that light. It's been years since she's been around her clan, maybe it won't be that bad. Who was he kidding these people were her family and friends. The clan wasn't dead, but they might as well be. The Keeper had been like a mother or grandmother to her, so he had been told. So she had spoken so often of her to him.

"Zevran, what's wrong?" She was on her feet and standing in front of him in an instant. "You weren't hurt were you? Creators! I knew it. I told Oghren I should gone with you."

"No," He shook his head, grasping her hands in his. "I'm fine."

"Then what is plaguing you?"

He stared at her hands. He had never had to do this. He had never delivered news like this to someone her cared about. Someone who meant more to him than his own life. "Lyna," he whispered, rubbing his thumbs across her hands. "Your Keeper is dead."

"What?" She removed one of her hands from his and placed it gently under his chin. She lifted his face so that he could look her directly in the eye. "What did you say?"

He couldn't look away. He forced himself to continue looking into her eyes and face. "The Keeper of your clan is dead."

"How?" Her voice wasn't sharp, but it was ice. She was going to that place she to when she couldn't think her actions where she forced herself not to act. It was one of the reason he had trained her in the arts of being an assassin. She could reach inside and pull out a cold aloofness that rivaled even his. That detachment sometimes frightened him. He worried she would lose herself in it one day. That one day it would just be easier for her to stay lost. He knew the temptation of such a place. Before Lyna, it had been a welcome relief to the life he had lived.

He squeezed her hands and stood up putting her face a hairsbreadth away from his. "I shall tell you everything, my sweet warden, but promise me you will do nothing rash."

She didn't move. Instead she stood in front of him waiting patiently. He squeezed her hands again. "Lyna," He warned lowering his forehead to hers. "Do not do anything rash."

She blinked. "Zevran, I'm waiting to hear what you have to say."

"And I am waiting for you to give me a promise to not be stupid about this."

She started to pull her hands away, but he tightened his grip on them. "I can't and you know it."

She was in commander mode. Zevran loved and hated this side of her. It was a side that had grown on her since becoming Commander of the Grey. He hadn't been present when it had started to emerge, but he had grown use to it. It was a part of her now- this dark unfeeling vortex of practicality and certainty. He told her then. He told everything that had passed in the last seventy-two hours. Afterward, she stood stunned. He still gripped her hands in his.

"Lyna," Zevran released her hands, slipping his arms around her waist. He drew her to him. At first she remained stiff and unyielding; it wasn't until he placed his lips gently and tenderly on hers that she thawed. She kissed him back just as sweetly. He kissed her longer than was probably necessary, but that was beauty of only being with one person, she didn't mind. In fact she enjoyed it as much as him. The causal flirtation, the long passionate stolen kisses, the sweet explorative love making, the open kindness and truthfulness of their feelings and thoughts- he had never truly been loved like this in his life before her. He knew how lucky he was to have this.

So many people in all of Thedas would never possibly feel this. In the Crows he had been a commodity, he was a tool bought and sold to the highest bidder. Once his usefulness was over he would be tossed aside like trash left to rot in some gutter somewhere. No one would have mourned him. No one would have shed a tear for him. People might have pitied him. Or at least their eyes would have watered at the stench of his decaying flesh, but that would have been the only tears he caused. He had known it all those years ago when he first came to Ferelden. But all of that had changed the moment he had opened his eyes and saw her staring down at him with her bright blue eyes and silver tattoos. He had thought a spirit had found him. And in a way the spirit of mercy had. He hadn't known then what would happen how just being around her was exciting and unexpected. How her laugh brightened his days and nights. How he would go out of his way to tease her, to talk to her, to make her smile. When had it become more than lust and desire for a beautiful Dalish? He didn't know.

He hadn't even been aware that he could feel such things. He never had experienced them before. Love, kindness, mercy, compassion, these were foreign words to him. These words were her.

"Zevran?" Her warm breath tickled his lips and sent a shiver of desire sweeping through him.

"Yes, amora?" He snaked a hand up her back and pulled the tie binding her hair. The leather strap slipped easily off.

"I mean to go speak with Merrill. She's in the city. I know she is." She swallowed leaning back to look him in his eyes. "I need to hear it from her."

"What will you do once you learn what you wish to know?" He began to unbraid her hair letting the silkiness of it flow over his fingertips.

Lyna was silence for a moment as she thought. He didn't mind her silence. He knew what he would've done. That was easy, but Lyna hadn't been raised to kill like he had. If he was in Lyna's position he knew that someone would die. But then if he were in Lyna's position he would not have those same instincts.

"I don't know." She whispered as she rested her head on his shoulder. He continued to run his fingers through her hair. She sighed and closed her eyes. "I have been gone for so long from my clan. It's like going home again after a long journey. I feel like I need a long hot bath and a good night's sleep in my own bed."

He could understand that. He had felt that way about going back to Antivia after following her for a year. But Antivia was his childhood home. He missed it like his favorite pair of old boots, once they had become too worn to wear anymore. It was comfortable and familiar, but filled with holes and gave him blisters.

"Come, amora, you can worry about more in the morning. Let us have that hot bath and bed." He suggested letting his fingers caress the tip of her sharply pointed ear. "Of course, in case you were wondering I do have more planned than just sweet kisses." He smiled charmingly at her. "I have missed you these past few days." He turned his face to press a feather light kiss upon the very same ear.

She shivered and a giggle escaped her lips. "Ah, Zev," she purred. "I've missed you too." "Then why are we still standing here?"

"Because you haven't rang the maids to draw a bath yet?"

Zevran laughed.