Standard Disclaimer: Bioware owns all Dragon Age characters and in game content. I own the bits that are left.
Chapter 5 – Leaving the Nest
The Previous Day in Antiva
Frediano observed the young child who flitted lithely, weaving in, out, over and under obstacles without a pause. It was remarkable for one so young to be this agile. There were children his age who would not have been this surefooted on flat ground never mind the roof tops of the poorer district in Antiva City that were chock-full with obstacles like laundry, plants, rain barrels and different types of discarded furniture. The boy navigated through the maze of hurdles with expertise bordering on paranormal ability.
He had been on his way back from the slave market seeking possible recruits. The pickings were slim with most of the good ones already sold to older and more powerful Guild Masters. If he wanted to build up his cell, he had contemplated, he would have to look elsewhere. Perhaps the slums would have parents willing to sell their children to him.
It was fortuitous for him that he had come upon the spectacle that was the foreign mage trapping a young scamp. Taking in the situation, he had been curious when the boy did not cringe in fear and wondered if it was from bravado or pure foolishness. Remaining to observe the scene and listening to his conversation with the mage, Frediano realised the boy knew the consequences of his actions only too well but had not cowered and remained fearless while speaking with his captor. He was first impressed by his tenacity. Most slaves were too broken to ever make it through the Crow training. A Master was sometimes forced to purchase two dozen or more to ensure that at least one or two made it. Frediano's cell was still too young and lacked the resources to make such volumes of purchases. His excitement had escalated after seeing the practised style with which the boy caught the sovereign and kept it. Consequently, he found himself following stealthily behind the boy after he had made his escape from the debacle.
He watched silently, chuckling when the boy threw himself off the roof, dropping ten feet to the ground, rolling and folding onto himself before standing up with a flourish, bowing left and right as if to some appreciative audience. As the boy grinned to himself and ran towards a famous brothel that served the middle and lower class citizens of the city, Frediano dropped silently into a dark alley and followed.
The Moaning Marta was owned by Marta, who Frediano knew to be an enterprising woman. She picked up attractive people with no means to fend for themselves and who were not adverse to the body trade. She offered them food, board and protection for their willingness to sell their bodies. The men and women took a small cut of their earnings and could leave any time they wished to. Marta had often enthused that willing whores were the best whores. Her customers certainly agreed. She also did not allow any customers, however full their purse was, to abuse her staff if they did not enjoy it.
Frediano wondered if the boy was the son of a whore and how much it would cost to purchase him. His lips thinned as the thought that the boy's parent may be adverse to the thought of releasing him to Crow training. An evil glint ignited in his eyes as he resolved to remove any such hindrance the Crow way.
Marta tapped her foot impatiently waiting for her adoptee to return. He was late and she was worried, wondering what mischief he had been up to. She, however, would never have let him know the affection she had for him. He was way too cocky for his own good, confident of his own cunning, wit, quicksilver tongue and good looks. He was a clever boy, deeply perceptive and highly empathic. He absorbed information like a sponge and could already swear colourfully in all the seven languages found in Thedas. Sometimes she swore that he saw too much for someone so young and the cynicism in him had grown to match.
Besides this, he was such a handsome boy, almost too handsome for his own good and she worried about him living in the Moaning Marta indefinitely. There had already been offers from some of her more perverse customers to purchase his entertainment for the evening. Not for all the jewels in Antiva City would she sell anyone else's body for profit without consent. Anything done in the Moaning Marta is consensual and it would stay that way until they laid her to rest under six feet of dirt.
However, she would have to ask him soon. The other occupants were starting to question his presence without a sponsor. The other children lived on the little stipends their fathers or mothers earned here but Zevran had no one to sponsor his care and the others were starting to question this. Although she paid for his portion of board, he did not have to clean the rooms like the other children, simply because he did not have a parent who was alive to require such services of him.
Marta wondered whether he would be willing to trade his body in exchange for money or if she should find another trade in which he would excel. She sighed remembering his mother. The proud Dalish had made her promise as she laid dying after childbirth not to push him into it.
Give him a chance to make something of himself. She had moaned in her dying throes.
She closed her eyes and took in a steadying breath. Even if she did not do so for his mother, she would have for his father. Marta sighed at the thought of the woodcutter elf who provided the brothel with all its wood in the past. He was a strong yet gentle and warm man, ever ready with a smile. She had been infatuated with his good looks and so were half the ladies in the brothel. When he returned with a Dalish elf for a wife, they had all been secretly devastated but none more so than Marta.
She had wanted to hate her but could not. Their love was almost palpable to everyone who saw them and too sweet to hate. When he had fallen ill, the proud woman had fallen on her knees to beg Marta for money to seek cures for him and Marta could not refuse her. Despite their best efforts, he had wasted away and died. She had been so distraught she would have followed him to the Fade if not for the discovery of his baby, Zevran, in her.
Once the pregnancy was stable, she had agreed to Marta's suggestion to stay and ply her trade to repay her debts. She did not force her into it, had even provided her with the means to return to her clan. However, the woman was too proud to accept it and wanted to work off her debts and still have something to provide for her growing child's future.
Marta had provided her with the best of the customers, gentle souls who only sought to talk to a listening ear or who wished to release some tension with massage and oils. She did not disabuse the other occupants of her status as a whore for fear of being accused of favouritism. However, when she had started showing, it was all she could do to keep the others from muttering at her still working. They had thought her a brute for forcing a pregnant woman to work the body trade. If only they knew, but they would never know as Marta would not allow any word in her defence. It did not farce Marta to be known as a hard-nosed bitch. If anything, it made her job easier when dealing with difficult customers or impetuous staff.
Where is he? The boy can't afford to miss another meal no matter what the other occupants were saying about him.
The other occupants had started muttering around him, snide remarks about him being a layabout or a skiver. Many were not quelled by Marta's stern glares and had continued picking on him in her absence. She was not omnipresent and if she was to give him a chance at a better life, she had to think of something fast.
Zevran skidded to a stop in front of Marta with an impish smile. Out of nowhere, he produced a sovereign and Marta's heart sank. Turning red with anger, she moved to box his ears for the thievery but he dodged her easily. His grin vanished in the face of her anger and he leaped two steps backwards, holding up his hands in surrender.
"Marta, I did not steal this. I swear! A foreign lady gave this to me." Zevran placated.
"Oh? I suppose she had plenty of sovereigns to spare to give one to you." Marta retorted sarcastically.
"From the weight of her money bag, it would seem so." Zevran uttered disarmingly. "But of course I wasn't anywhere near it to know that." He hastily added when he realised his slip.
Marta rolled her eyes at him. "Right… Get in there and have your dinner you little scamp. Keep that sovereign where no one can see it."
"I was hoping you would take it as your cut." Zevran remarked, gaze lowering to the ground. "I know the others are giving you trouble about me not bringing in even a bit to the communal funds."
Marta sighed. He was much too young to worry about things like these. She needed to get him away from this life as quickly as possible. "I will take this and return your fifty percent cut then." Palming the sovereign and biting it out of habit. It was real and Ferelden if she was not mistaken. "This should tide you over for two weeks. Don't go stealing again. I don't want to have to answer for your lack of hands to your parents in the Fade when I eventually get there."
Zevran hugged her. "You are too young for that and I'll never get caught."
Marta stiffened, scoffed, checked to make sure no one was looking and hugged him back briefly before shoving him away to walk into the brothel. "So… You going to tell me the truth of how you got this?"
"Is it so hard to believe that a lady found me so handsome that she was willing to give this to me?" Zevran teased.
Blood froze in Marta's veins. She span around so quickly, it was amazing she kept her balance. Inspecting Zevran with a professional eye before running her hands up and down his body, she questioned urgently. "Did she touch you in any inappropriate way?"
"Well, she did have me in quite a bind. She caught me with a tree root and it held quite firmly onto my leg." Zevran replied seriously, sensing the panic Marta was in.
"A mage then? What did you do that she would retaliate in such a way in board daylight with so many people in the market place?" Marta's hands paused and withdrew when she realised he was unharmed.
"I… Err… I stole her money bag." He stuttered quickly and dashed under her skirts, through the open door into the brothel.
"ZEVRAN!" Marta's shriek shook the rafters of the brothel but the little rascal had already escaped through the back door with a loaf of bread. Shaking her head and chuckling affectionately to herself, Marta vowed to find something else for him to be. She would not allow the child to become a thief or his mother would rise from her grave to haunt her.
"Pardon me." A cultured voice stated behind her where just moments before she could have sworn there was no one. Startled, Marta turned around to find a well-dressed man standing behind her. His stance was that a rogue though he hid it well behind fine clothes.
Marta feigned a smile and nudged him mock playfully. "Ser, we are not open yet. Give the ladies or gentlemen some time to freshen up for the day, no?"
"I'm here about the boy." The man gritted out, firmly brushing himself off where she had touched him.
Marta's eyes narrowed to slits and she icily declared. "He is too young for you, Ser. If your tastes run that way, I have a few better, more experienced boys who would be able to service you better."
"He is just the right age for me and I would like to take him off your hands. No doubt you would be glad to be rid of him? I will offer you a sovereign for him." Frediano took out the sovereign and offered it to Marta.
Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Zevran crouched on the second floor balcony listening in to their conversation. She clamped down on the urge to smack the pervert in front of her and queried frostily. "And what do you want from him?"
"Have you heard of the Antivan Crows?" Frediano countered, realising that the woman had misunderstood his intentions, not that he did not have such inclinations but perhaps now was not the time to reveal this. He twiddled a sovereign over his fingers. "I would like to train him as one."
Marta's heart soared. This must be the Maker's grace. A chance for the boy to be one of the infamous Antivan Crows! They were a law to themselves in Antiva and feared elsewhere in Thedas, often travelling to other places in Thedas to accomplish their contracts. Assassination was surely a better profession than prostitution or petty thievery. She heard the Crows educated their children in everything. The arts, languages, literature, everything Marta would not be able to offer Zevran who surely would excel in this given his roguish tendencies.
"Ten sovereigns." It would not do to appear too eager, the man may think there was something wrong with the boy and she wanted to get rid of him.
"What? Do you wish to bankrupt me? Two sovereigns are all I can offer!" Frediano fished out another sovereign and offered it to her. He mentally tabulated his expenses and knew he could afford little more.
Marta raised her eyebrows in mock outrage. "Do you think I raised the child to give him away? Seven sovereigns."
Frediano spluttered. "I could buy seven slaves for that price! Three and that is my last offer." Perhaps if he cut some corners here and there, he may be able to afford this ridiculous price. Otherwise, he would just have to come back to remove the boy from her forcefully.
Marta smiled exultantly, not having expected more than two sovereigns in the first place. "Ah… But none of them are the same quality as my Zevran, no? Five sovereigns and afternoons off for him to visit me."
"Emotional entanglements will only hinder his training." Frediano protested. He would have to condition the boy to leave this woman behind.
"It is a sad, sad day with one does not have anyone to return to after a hard day's of work. So do we have a deal?" Marta asked, smiling as she watched the man squirm.
"Three sovereigns and one day off each week. I cannot guarantee that he would visit with you." Frediano gritted out.
"Deal! I'll have the boy ready for you tomorrow." Marta held out her hand for the sovereigns.
"Why tomorrow?" Frediano complained as he fished out another sovereign for the brothel owner. It was easier to comply then have to return to remove the boy with violence.
"I am taking his day off first, of course." Marta chuckled triumphantly before slamming the door in his face.
Zevran angrily threw his meagre belongings onto a large scarf. He would leave! He would not allow himself to be sold. And for what? Three sovereigns? He just made one sovereign this morning. Of course, that had been out of the goodness of the foreign mage. Or was it pity? He did not know the difference and did not care to find out. He simply would not be sold like some chattel. Unbidden tears flowed down his cheeks, furiously swiping them away, he tied up the scarf into a little bundle, heaved it behind his shoulder and prepared to exit through the window.
"Zevran… Where do you think you are going?" Marta's plaintive voice stopped him in his tracks. The woman whom he had regarded as a mother for all his life had just callously sold him for three sovereigns. What did she have to sound so sad about! Mopping his face with his palm, he schooled his features into a tight, blank mask before turning to face her.
"I'm leaving. I am not your property to be sold. Mother left you money to take care of me. I am not a… your… slave to sell!" His voice rose at the end despite his efforts to appear uncaring.
Marta took one look at his reddened eyes, sighed, closed and locked the door behind her. "Where would you go? What would you become?" She moved forward to envelope the boy in a hug. This child who had been like a son to her since his mother's death. He resisted, stubbornly remaining stiff but did not withdraw from her. "My little darling, I promised your mother that I would give you a chance to be the best that you can be. Staying here you would have to become a whore, my guard or a street rat eventually. Now you get the chance to be one of the infamous Antivan Crows, educated in all the fine arts, languages, literature and skills of an assassin. Able to take contracts that would allow you to travel all over Thedas. This is an opportunity you will never get elsewhere."
Zevran's arms slowly curled around her. "You are not selling me because you don't want me?" He asked in a small, trembling voice.
"Don't you know that you have become my heart? How could I live without you? But this would be the best life for you outside of these walls. I would have fulfilled my promise to your mother and the others would think me a cold hearted bitch to sell you away and be more willing to listen to me, no?" She smiled disparagingly, pulled back and kissed the top of his head. "Come, none of these tears. Let us go get you a proper backpack and clothes from your cut of the money you gave me. I want to send you off in style."
Nodding, Zevran looked up adoringly at Marta, hugged her close and admitted. "You have always been a mother to me. I'm sorry I doubted you."
Marta's heart tightened at the little boy's confession and prayed to the Maker he would survive the rumoured tortures she had not allowed herself to dwell on.
Author's Notes
I would like to thank all the silent readers of this story. A special shout out to Nocterayne for adding my story to your favourites and for pwny5153 and FeZeTh13 for your encouraging reviews. I hope you will continue to join me on this story with Neria and Zevran. They will tell me where they want the story to go.
I would also appreciate any other reviews (either good or bad would not matter but please be constructive). Thanks in advance.