When he considered his formative years, Zevran could only recall having made one serious wish, and that was to grow up. Though now of an age to dismiss wishing as a luxury of the well-to-do and otherwise out-of-touch, echoes of the childhood mentality persisted.
And to give his younger self credit where it was due, the logic behind said wish was, in fact, perfectly sound. Children were a terribly disadvantaged bunch overall. Physical inferiority and a lack of experience placed them at the mercy of their elders, which given the great variety in the goodness of caregivers, was a frightful gamble in and of itself. Children were forever deemed too young to go where they pleased, or fight back, or be taken seriously, or make and spend their own money, however meagre an amount it might have been. But they were always old enough, weren't they, to have to obey authority. Or to be held responsible for their actions– in fact, children were usually subjected to the consequences of the actions of the adults on whom they relied. And worst of all, youth was no shield from the circumstances outside anyone's control. The grind of poverty and its various deprivations did not discriminate by age, nor did illness, or the pervasive sense of unease that came from a tumultuous home life. All of the downsides of adulthood, none of the good sides. What was poverty solved with, if not the freedom to make a living– or, failing that, to steal it? What was boredom solved with, if not the right to pursue entertainment as one saw fit? Life as a Crow recruit had been replete with torture, back-breaking unpaid work, disdain, and being forced to do any and every wretched thing that a superior demanded. What was that suffering sweetened with, if not tenure that was granted once the final test at the approach of adulthood had been passed?
At one point, a Zevran of five or six had confided his wish of accelerated ageing to one of the prostitutes– Amador, a man whose undimmable optimism had often been called 'suffocating' by his colleagues- while they were washing and drying the breakfast plates together. How puzzling it had been when Amador, after a short pause, had patted Zevran on the head with a sad little smile and told him not to wish his life away.
And now, here Zevran was, at twenty-five or twenty-six, nursing a pang of guilt for making that wish while the party trudged along the road to Wysbeche. And what nerve he had to be surprised by said guilt, when it came every time he had 'wished his life away' since that moment in the kitchen with Amador! Some people were just too foolish for their own good, and Zevran, evidently, was one of them.
Was it unreasonable, though, to wish for time to speed up when a larger, rather more pressing guilt (and Maker knew what other emotions) were radiating through his body from his chest to his toes, as they had been since waking from that nightmare? Oh, Rhodri had assured Zevran there was nothing to be concerned over, as she always did. She had been so gentle and patient. So sure of his goodness and innocence. It should have been reassuring, but it wasn't. If anything, it made it worse.
But what was he to do? He had tried– Maker, he had done his utmost to tell her then and there about Rinna. Quivering like a foal, his chest so tight and airless that Zevran was sure his heart was about to give out, if it hadn't already. But heaven help him, he couldn't, and he was forced instead to sit and stew in the shame of keeping the ugly truth from a deserving person until he could. How delicious it would have been to skip ahead to that moment in time when he finally had the backbone to tell her everything. It would, so far as he could tell, have been far better to bypass imaginings of Rhodri's disappointment and revulsion, and simply see the real thing for himself. Plunge the knife in, instead of administering a thousand cuts. But Rhodri had said, hadn't she, that she would rather Zevran left the confession until he could deliver it without folding like a Trevisan gambler in the process.
Well, no she hadn't said that. Still, whether she had put it far more kindly than that or not, the fact remained that Zevran would have to, somehow, ready himself to divulge the gruesome tale in a reasonable state.
But how?
Would practicing speaking about it help, he wondered. Mages practiced spells; Leliana practiced singing; Rhodri, on occasion, would seek Zevran's opinion on diplomatic ways to say things (which was terribly flattering in and of itself) and would then practice the phrase a few times to commit it to memory.
He attempted to run the scenario through his head, in which he sat Rhodri down and recounted every bitter detail of his misdeed, only for that diecast tightness in his chest to reappear with a vengeance; Zevran dropped that idea then and there.
Another, surprisingly merciful thought came unbidden, of approaching the topic from distance. To suddenly bare the deepest, most painful part of oneself was, when one considered it logically, far more arresting than peeling the layers back until the tiny, rotten core lay in the open.
It could work. His chest was cooperating enough to let air in and out, which was about as promising a sign as Zevran could have hoped for in the circumstances. So where to start? With Rinna?
His chest seized again; Zevran caught his hands rising in a peacekeeping gesture. Rhodri's head turned, gaze snapping onto his hands (and one of hers, since he was holding it half-aloft in his). She watched them, and him, with tender solicitude, and waited. His shoulders relaxed– had they really been up around his ears? He smiled and shook his head, and because he couldn't help himself, Zevran pressed his fingers into her hand to turn out her palm, and kissed it. She smiled with the same confidence she'd had last night, and with a nod, she lowered their hands and looked to the road again.
Zevran put his other hand down and returned to the current issue before the temptation to supply more kisses to her palm could win out.
Not Rinna's backstory, then. Perhaps that was an intermediate step.
But then, what was the beginning step? An oblique approach, he supposed, was often effective when all else failed. It might mean starting at the biography of another person altogether. Taliesen? Zevran pondered the man experimentally; his chest expanded as normal. Good, then he at least had a starting point.
He smiled to himself victoriously, sent a quick mental apology to Amador (whose discouragement, Zevran conceded, of wishing one's life away was usually right), and decided he would wait for the perfect inroad. A mention of Tevinter, perhaps, so that he could squeeze Taliesen in, or something occurring in the world around them that sparked a relevant memory of the man.
The impatience built up in him like steam– after all, hadn't it been an ingenious idea to approach this the way he was deciding to? And really, he had many, many good stories about life with Taliesen– and most, if not all of them were flooding back into the most immediately accessible parts of his mind. Some were things he had forgotten about 'til now, others cropped up from time to time and warmed him a little to recall.
But Maker help him, why were there so few Tevinter-related things around them now? The place had been invaded by nationals of that very country! According to Alistair, who was surprisingly adept at identifying the provenance of various relics given his academic background, there were little signs of Tevinter's influence most everywhere people looked.
Except for here in this bastarding forest, on the stretch to bastarding Wysbeche. And knowing Zevran's luck, Wysbeche would have absolutely nothing to do with Tevinter either. They'd probably set foot in the town limits and Alistair would point out some average-looking milestone on the border there and say it had come from the bloody Donarks. No Tevinter, never Tevinter. Wretched. Taliesen would be thrilled.
Zevran thought of him, handsome, hard-headed Taliesen, who had been resolute in speaking next to no Tevene. He had rejected his birth nation from the beginning– whether out of concern for his safety or a genuine hatred of the place, Zevran had never been able to work out, but it had always puzzled him, how he had managed to do it. An entire culture, a whole eight or nine years of an upbringing, quashed with the steeliest of intent, just like that.
The sole exception, the obvious one, people who knew him might say, was the hair-raising swear words. And didn't Taliesen make use of them! That man swore streaks of every colour, sometimes in frustration, others for no reason that Zevran could deduce, except perhaps to revisit the only part of his former country he had allowed to survive. Or, on a more prosaic level, to simply enjoy the sounds themselves. Tevene was, after all, a gorgeous language, full of hissed consonants and sharp vowels that were either as terrifying as a knife to the throat when spoken in anger, or lit the body aflame when whispered seductively.
And so it was with thoughts of Taliesen, and his penchant for obscenities in his mother tongue, that Zevran abandoned (unintentionally, he would point out) any consideration for where he was at that moment, and uttered a low, forceful "faex kaffas." Only when Rhodri made a sound halfway between a fitful cough and a snort of laughter was it apparent that he had been heard. And, judging by the longevity of the subsequent coughs and laughs, his audience of one would have something to say about it once she was able to.
On her first few attempts to speak, Rhodri dissolved into bout after bout of wheezy laughter. Eventually, though, the coughs and laughs separated themselves out, and the redness in her face reduced (Zevran liked to think that his claps between her shoulders and insistence that she drink a little water had helped in this regard).
"First of all," she said in a reedy voice, "Are you all right?"
Zevran, privately delighted that he had somehow managed to get the topic onto Taliesen, grinned.
"I am very well, my dear Warden," he purred. "I was just thinking of a friend in the Crows. Taliesen, his name was. He was a Tevinter, too, and had quite the fondness for profanity."
"Ah, I see," she nodded. "Where you learned that was going to be my next question, actually."
"What's 'fax k'farse' mean?" Alistair asked curiously, a wicked gleam in his eye. "Pretty sure I heard Avernus say something like that… I have a feeling it's going to be rude. It's even got the word 'arse' in it."
"Oh, it is revolting," Zevran beamed. "Taliesen told me it meant, 'shit on compressed shit.'"
The Templar snickered. "'Shit on compressed shit.' I'll have to remember that. Fax k'farse. Fax k'farse. Fffffffax k'farssssse."
Rhodri let out a sad little croak, advising Zevran in barely audible Tevene, "'Oh, he's murdering the pronunciation.'"
"You should have heard how upset Taliesen was if I mispronounced his curses on purpose." Zevran grinned at her. "Oh, I would get ten extra profanities for my trouble, then."
"Hmm?" Her eyes narrowed as she asked slowly, dangerously: "He would speak rudely to you?"
Zevran wanted to laugh. Playfully, not bitterly. After all, life with Taliesen had been fine enough. He could be a brute when frightened, to be sure, and with the number of times Zevran's incorrigible softheartedness had put them at risk, he supposed Taliesen's temper ought to have been many orders of magnitude worse than it was.
And yet, his antics had put Rinna at the same risk, and she had never raised a hand to him.
Not that she had needed to; that woman had the drop on everyone she met, him and Taliesen in particular. Their weaknesses and desires might as well have been printed on their foreheads, so apt was she to manipulate them to make anyone do most anything. She could turn around Taliesen's fits of jealousy, replete as they were with broken furniture and shouts that rattled the windows, with a simple, perfectly-worded threat of departure. From the apartment, from the relationship, from the triad. From the insecurity of a weak man who cared neither for the Crows or his colleagues. Twenty seconds of speaking, and Taliesen would be falling over himself to sweep up the broken plates, fit the chair back together with shaking hands, stumble out of their stifling little apartment to buy her favourite fish (he always forgot to bring anything for Zevran) and cook it.
And Zevran, well. She kept him in line well enough, didn't she? Knew just what to say to make him want to stick his neck out for her, steal her this or that for her, help her with an alibi when she had angered someone higher-up. Rinna rarely returned the favour, especially when it came to the difficulties obvious elves faced and human-like half elves did not. In those moments, fear would grip her, and she would run, leaving Zevran high and dry. Yet somehow, Rinna always had the right words to spall away his indignation afterward. The right touches, the right promises, the perfect blend of gratitude, apology, and flattery that coaxed him into forgiveness, and Maker help him, he fell for it every time.
But it wasn't just that, was it? Because surely if his risky behaviours had frightened her, she would have whipped out the same threats she used on Taliesen, knowing full well Zevran would have snapped-to and hardened himself up. Probably.
Still, though, Rinna didn't ever pull him up on it. If anything, she didn't seem to mind, and Zevran's stomach dropped as it occurred to him that she might have even preferred him that way.
Well, when it came to that, why wouldn't she? Outward displays of softness, even when risky, made for a perfect indicator of how receptive the person was to flattery and cajoling, a fact Zevran himself had often used to his own advantage when seducing marks. Which meant Zevran must have known, on some level, that he was consistently baring his neck to Rinna. That, on its own, was a horrifying thought, and when it started to blend with flashes of Taliesen's dagger opening her forcibly bared neck, Zevran shelved it immediately.
He glanced at Rhodri, and the last of the urge to laugh died away. It was a terrible thing to consider that she openly appreciated displays of softness. From Zevran, yes, but from everyone else in the party, too. She encouraged them, insisted on them often enough, displayed them herself without a hint of shame. He'd never had a hand raised to him, or even had it threatened. No artful attempts to change his moods. Not so much as a vague show of anger.
But then again, Zevran supposed, he had never given her enough of a fright to warrant any of it, or any other reaction intense fear might have provoked in her. Not that he would try it and see, but even so. It paid to remember where one stood with another person, to keep a close eye on how far their goodwill had been pushed.
Not that any of that helped here and now. This had all meant to be an inroad into speaking about Taliesen, and now that Zevran had squandered valuable time pondering him and Rinna and relationship dynamics as a whole, the resulting silence (and heaviness of the unanswered question) had caused Rhodri's gaze to sharpen as she scanned him intently.
With an awkward little laugh that he hoped would defuse things, Zevran waved a hand and offered a simple, if vague truth: "Crows are not known for being kind, my dear Warden, even to each other."
Rhodri gave a contemptuous snort. "If I meet him, I will have words with him. More, if it's needed. There will be no disrespect toward you."
Zevran's entire abdomen jittered, and it was hard to say if it was some sort of mortifying swoon reaction, or panic at the chance to speak of Taliesen going awry so early into the picture. Probably the latter, and the former didn't exist, or had never happened. Or something.
"Ah, but!" He squeezed the hand that was holding his, and kissed Rhodri's fingers. "Let me tell you a little about him. He is quite a lovely fellow, if the truth is known. Very funny, too."
Rhodri's face didn't soften. "You do not deserve to be spoken to in that way, dulcis," she insisted. "I know many Tevinters believe in being harsh, but even so, it's unacceptable, sic?"
She was getting the bit between her teeth now; a more dramatic intervention was needed if he was to get the topic back on track.
… Drama?
Oh, Zevran, you genius.
With an inward smile, Zevran pouted his lips and fixed Rhodri with his largest, most dewy Antivan eyes.
"I like to think of our stories together, though," he said softly, sweetly, ignoring the stab of guilty satisfaction as Rhodri's stony expression finally started to ebb (are you any better than Rinna when you do that?). "We have many happy memories together, you see? And he saved my life many, many times over the years."
Ooh, but it was working it was working look at that begrudging little nod she is giving you Zevran you brilliant, evil man–
"Hm," Rhodri grunted. "So he should."
Zevran, finally, permitted his smile to shine through, and he gave Rhodri's hand another squeeze. "Just so. Before you came along, he was the one protecting me." A larger, rather more stifling pang of guilt lanced through him as he added, almost unwillingly and with complete honesty, "Though of course, nobody does that as well as you do. Whoever could?"
Rhodri's chest swelled at that. She took his other hand in hers, stopping in front of everyone ("Eh–? What's the holdup?" said Alistair as he screeched to a halt) and bending down until she was eye level with Zevran. Her gaze held his unrelentingly, her voice low and certain as she declared, "You are safer with Callistus than with anyone else in the world, dulcis. As everyone in this party is. Believe it."
Don't die. Are you dying? You could be, actually. You could just keel over right here, right now. You'd better hope someone is willing to carry your carcass around until they can sneak back to Antiva to bury you. Lucky it's winter; how you'd stink if it was mid-summer!
Zevran spoke over the stalled breath in his throat (and over the background of Leliana, Stella, and Alistair twittering away approvingly. And Morrigan groaning), "Oh, I do-o-o." He cleared his throat, and led Rhodri back into a walk. "Let me tell you a story about Taliesen anyway, hmm? I would enjoy it."
She nodded again, with only a little stiffness now. "Please, dulcis, go ahead. I am listening."
"Ooh, you are my favourite captive audience, my darling!" He chuckled and pressed a quick kiss to her fingertips, noting the small smile turning up the corners of her mouth. "Now, how to start this…? Ah! From the beginning, of course.
"Taliesen was bought the same year as me." Zevran paused and rubbed his chin thoughtfully, "Well, to say he was bought is not quite right. No, he was found, stranded on a rock off the coast of Llomerryn– the Tevinter ship he was on got wrecked, you see, and so one of House Arainai's passing caravels took him before the tide could get any higher, and brought him back to Antiva City."
"Wow," Alistair breathed. "Lucky they were there, I guess. How old was he?"
Zevran shook his head. "I have no idea. Older than me, I think, because he started getting a beard quite early."
"Wh–?" the Templar frowned, "How would that tell you he's older than you? Elves don't grow beards!"
"Details, details," Zevran whiffled a hand dismissively. "Anyway, Taliesen did not speak a word of Antivan when they dropped him in the little room with me and the other thirteen recruits of that year. Ooh, you should have heard the trouble they gave him for his accent, once he had learned a few words in Antivan! How he hated it."
He suppressed a snort as displeasure, ranging from Alistair and Leliana denouncing, in chorus, the mockery of Taliesen's accent as 'a bit rude,' and then proceeding to pretend as though they hadn't, to a call from Stella that Taliesen, regardless of age, size, and state of outnumberment, would have done well to 'give those little bastards the old one-two'. And of course, there was Rhodri, who quietly harrumphed and muttered to herself in barely audible Tevene that, aside from the hideous Vyrantian dialect, a Tevinter accent was an auditory delight.
'Yours in particular,' Zevran crooned to her in his best Tevene. Rhodri, beaming, bounced on her toes; with a grin of his own, he squeezed her hand and looked over his shoulder at Stella.
"Funnily enough, dear lady," he chuckled, "Taliesen did just that. He was not a small boy, and– well, he never spoke of his life in Tevinter, but I always suspected that he and his family were labourers of some sort. Taliesen was terrifically strong, even then, and capable! I remember one day, he was so tired of the laughing that he picked one of the ringleaders up like a bundle of sticks," Zevran lifted his hands (and the one of Rhodri's he was holding) and made a overhead tossing motion, "and threw him at the others."
Stella whistled. "Good man! That would've knocked 'em down like pins!"
"Oh, it did," Zevran smiled. "And for as long as the breath was knocked out of them, they were silent. So, not very long."
Alistair let out a disappointed noise. "Is there a happy ending to this story?"
Zevran snorted with, admittedly, more contempt than he had intended. "There is rarely a happy ending to a Crow story, my good friend," he said, and as he felt Rhodri's fingers stroke tender lines on the back of his hand, unconsciously tight muscles in his neck loosened. He sighed, "Though I am sure Taliesen would call it a happy ending."
"Yeah?" Stella prompted loudly from behind. "Did the building burn down and everyone inside died?"
"You are closer than you know," he replied with a smirk that took effort to keep in place. "Though it was nothing so quick. No, I suppose there are two happy endings, then." He held up a thumb, "The first is that Taliesen learned Antivan. Very quickly, too. We struck up a lovely little deal, Taliesen and I. He would sit me down to practice Antivan with him in the afternoons, and if anyone ever gave me trouble, he would hold them by the hair and kick their teeth in."
"Zevran."
"Mm?" He looked up from the knife he was sharpening to find the new boy watching him intently.
He sat on the floor beside Zevran and said, quite plainly, "I want Antiva name."
Zevran frowned. "Antiva name?"
"Yes."
"... You want to be called Antiva?" Zevran shook his head, and reminded himself to speak slowly, "That is the name of a country. Country. Antiva, Tevinter, are country names. Not for people."
The boy groaned impatiently– he was already getting quite the reputation for hot-headedness– and shook his head. "No! I want…" he chewed his lip, "... Ah! I sayed it wrong. I want Antivan name. Yes?"
His face darkened as Zevran hummed uncertainly; uneasy, Zevran, keeping a good grip on his knife, held up his hands in a peacekeeping gesture.
"I understand," he said quickly. "But your name is an Antivan name."
"No!" the boy growled and pointed at the door to their stifling little room shared with, as of this morning, thirteen other recruits. "Always, they says– they say, 'Tal-yessen, Tal-yessen, from Tevineter, go to home you fucking Tevineter!' Laughing to me! The masters laughing to me too!" He swiped a hand through the air, "It's not Antivan! I want Antivan name, Zevran!"
"You are saying it the Tevinter way," Zevran replied calmly. "They say Tal-yessen there. But we say 'Taliesen' here. That is the Antivan way."
"... Taleesen?"
"Taliesen," he enunciated clearly, and repeated it as the boy turned his ear to him. "Taliesen. Say it like that."
"Taliesen?"
Zevran smiled and gave an encouraging nod. "That's right. Taliesen. That can be your Antivan name."
"Yes!" Taliesen knocked a proud fist to his chest. "Taliesen. Now I am Antivan boy! No Tevinter! When they tell me to going home, now I say 'I am home!'" He grinned at Zevran, "And then I… what is…?" Taliesen swung his leg upward demonstratively.
"Ah, it is kicking. Kick-ing. You will kick."
"Yes! I kick– I will kick them a lot. No more teeth. Hah!" He grinned and nodded, "I am Taliesen! It's good!"
"That's it, feller!" Stella clapped approvingly. "Boot their fangs out their heads! Show the little shits what's what!"
Zevran snorted, partly at Stella's remark and partly at catching Leliana beside her, nervously running her tongue back and forth over her teeth. He pushed on.
"I suppose the second happy ending, according to Taliesen at least, would be that out of the eighteen recruits of that year, we are the only two who survived to sixteen, when Crows are initiated." Zevran shrugged, a little awkwardly, as silence (beside a gasp from Alistair) fell. Leliana watched him with a sad, knowing nod; Stella, on whom Zevran had been banking to give a loud cheer, joined with Aneirin to give Zevran a pair of grim smiles he would rather not have seen.
"As it should be," Morrigan spoke up now from the back. "The ones to make the most trouble are often the first to go. And thus the herd of undesirables thins."
"Undesirables!" At this, Stella roared laughing, and Zevran blessed the Maker as the tension in the air was, for the most part, broken. "Someone should've bumped me off ages ago, then, Morri, shouldn't they?"
Morrigan watched the cackling mage with a wry smile. "'Tis a wonder I have not done it, myself."
Stella flicked her hair airily. "My dazzling looks and winsome charm have saved the day again, it seems."
"You had best hope they hold out, then."
Zevran turned to face the front again, and a quick glance to the right revealed Rhodri watching him gravely. With the vaguest hope of surprising her out of it, Zevran waggled his brows at her.
"You are giving me your very serious face, mi sol," he crooned. "Are you calculating the mathematical proof of my unending beauty?"
"No."
The familiar bluntness made him snort. "It did seem a long shot, given the conversation of the last few minutes."
Rhodri's eyes widened. "Ah-! Not that you're not-!" She stopped and shook her head, "Well, anyway, what I meant was: I was thinking about your story. About Taliesen."
"Mm?" He smiled. "What about it?"
"You were good to him. Very good to him."
"And he was good to me," Zevran said with a nod.
Rhodri frowned, a little stubbornly, Zevran would have said– and frankly, he had no reason not to say it, because stubbornness was absolutely what it was.
"... He was right to stop people from giving you trouble," she eventually said, and quickly added, "as he should!"
"So Taliesen will do for now, then?" Zevran chuckled. "Does this mean I should tell more stories about him?"
"As many as you like, dulcis," Rhodri said stoutly. "You can talk about whatever you like, as much as you please. I'm always listening."
"I might just take you up on that."
"Good."
—
An hour later, when it was dark enough for the party to step off the road and slap together the evening campsite, Alistair trudged over to Zevran and put a hand on his shoulder. With a grin, Zevran looked up at the huge man watching him with mabari-puppy eyes and a terribly cut-up expression (why were the Wardens, in particular, so insistent on doing this?).
"Hello there, my friend," Zevran purred. "You look terribly upset. Have you come to tell me you have accidentally eaten the last of my favourite jam again?"
Alistair gave a sad little laugh and bent down until he was eye-level with Zevran (that, too! Always bending down and catching his eye! Was it a Warden phenomenon? Or was it simply because they were so damned enormous?).
"No, I… look, it's just…" Alistair shook his head. "Your story today, about Taliesen. I'm just… really sorry, Zev. I didn't know it was that awful in the Crows." Appearing to catch himself, Alistair's eyes widened, and he added in rapid-fire, "I– I mean, I know you were a slave and all, a-a-and they don't live great lives anyway, but all the kids you were training with, killed? Maker, it's no better than in the Circle!"
Oh, no. Not again. At least Alistair was drunk the last time he dredged up his feelings, and was promptly hauled off by Rhodri when things got too sentimental. Rhodri, who was away setting up their tent, was nowhere near them, and Zevran couldn't bring himself to distract Alistair with a snowball to the face and run away.
… Or?
No, he definitely couldn't do it. And worse still, Alistair appeared to have caught onto this train of thought, because he pulled his hand off Zevran's shoulder and tucked it behind his back.
"Sorry, Zevvers," he mumbled, cheeks reddening. "Didn't ask, did I? I know Rhod's really the only one you like touching you, I just– forgot for a sec."
Zevran, his mouth now having fallen open, went to protest, but Alistair, who looked like he was about to start crying, cut over him with a wobbly voice.
"I'm– I just want you to know that I'm glad you're here. With us. And not… you know, with… them."
Zevran, now unable to breathe, let alone speak, once again found himself silently begging the Maker for a quick, merciful death. And naturally, as his heart continued to spitefully pound in his chest, he dismissed all hope of an easy escape and forced out the only sound he could manage:
"O-oh," he whispered.
Alistair bit down on his lips, a huge, fat tear rolling down his cheek. He cleared his throat and pointed a huge finger at Zevran.
"Don't you go back to them, Zev," he warned. "D'you hear me? You mustn't ever do it."
"Eh?" (Marvellous, Zevran. When all other speech fails you, at least you can shriek like Cristofania.)
Alistair raised an eyebrow at Zevran. "What? It's not like you hate everything about the life you had, right? I do hear you when you warble away about all the wonderful things in Antiva. Cities, spicy food, hot weather… and you obviously like this Taliesen guy."
"Well, Antiva is marvellous, but–"
"And since Ferelden's basically the opposite of what you love about Antiva, I know that walking through Fereldan backcountry in late autumn wouldn't be your– why are you shrieking?"
A mortified Zevran slapped a hand over his own mouth to silence the cry that came unbidden (it cannot still be autumn it cannot it cannot it–) and now, having lost any hope of stopping the conversation, shook his head and motioned for Alistair to continue. At that, Alistair smiled– why, Zevran didn't dare imagine.
"You're a funny feller, Zev," he said warmly. "I bet a lot of people in the Crows thought so, too. And, you know, I get why you would want to go back sometimes."
Zevran threw another prayer to the same Maker who had denied his humble request for demise only moments prior, now asking for a perhaps smaller favour as he went to speak: a smidgen of articulation.
"I do not," he said calmly. "Truly, Alistair, in many of the ways that count, life as a Crow was not a good one."
Alistair shrugged with one shoulder. "Maybe you don't want to go back now. But you know, I was only a little bit older than you when Arl Eamon sent me away to the abbey in Bournshire. I've spent more of my life as a Templar recruit than not." A bitter smile twisted at the corner of his mouth, "It wasn't fun there. I wasn't well-liked, by the brothers or the other kids. The food was crap, beds gave you backache, awful schedule, family stopped visiting… the usual, you know?
"But the academics," he gave a warm chuckle now, "I liked those a lot. In the middle of all that misery, I had lessons to look forward to. And when I think about just them, well. Paints a much rosier picture than what it really was."
Zevran took a moment to administer a short self-test, in which he threw his mind back to his initiation racking and waited to see if the physical revulsion was any less, now that he had fondly recalled Taliesen. His stomach churned, fingers tightening into a fist– was the reaction weaker, though? Stronger? Both? Oscillating between the two? Fingertips numb, he bit down on his lips a moment.
"... Ah," he croaked.
"Anyway, I promise I'm getting somewhere with this," Alistair held up his hands in gentle request. "You remember last time we were in Denerim, and we had all that time off?"
"Mm?"
"Yeah. Lels and I spent a lot of it in the Chantry. She was praying, and I was talking to the archivists. Chantry's got heaps of relics and tomes, see, and, well," he closed his eyes and gave a blissful sigh. "I was in my happy place. And going in there every day, sitting at a cramped wooden desk talking history with people…"
"You were tempted to go back?" Zevran offered.
Alistair nodded and scuffed his boot in the snow. "I really was. Even though I knew damn well I'm leagues better off as a Warden, even though I knew my loyalty lies here, even though I love my life out here with Rhod and you and the rest of the party… even though there's absolutely no way going back to the Templars would let me stroke relics day in and day out, I still wanted to go back for a minute."
Zevran's heart gave a throat-constricting squeeze, and it was damned inconsiderate the way his eyes were prickling– even if it was only a little.
"Anyway, I dunno," Alistair continued, mercifully oblivious to said prickling, "that moment might never come for you, but in case it does: don't you listen to it, all right? Not even after the Blight is over." His hand reached out toward Zevran's shoulder again, stopping when it was a whisker away. Alistair, as if only realising his limb had moved, went to pull it back again, and without thinking, Zevran took the hand and brought it the last little way to his shoulder– and Maker save him, he even gave it an awkward little pat. Pathetic.
"... Oh," Alistair's eyes watered anew, his smile wobbling dangerously. "Y-you're sure? You don't have to–"
"I'm sure," Zevran said firmly, and attempted yet another prayer that that was the last of the topic.
And then Alistair spoke. Again. Why did Zevran even bother trying to pray for something different? Why not simply lie down in the snow, arms and legs spread out as wide as possible and let the emotional outpourings plummet onto him as they may?
"This is nice," the Templar mumbled. "I hope you're happy with us, Zev, even if life maybe hasn't gone how you hoped it would. You're such a great guy." He sniffled and coughed, loudly, and Zevran (for whom panic was threatening in earnest) suspected that the entire thing was a barely-concealed sob. "I'd… I'd just really hate for you to go back to them. I'd be so worried about you."
Oh, death. Oh, death. If ever there was someone unsuited as the object of another's tears, it was Zevran. First and foremost because he didn't bloody deserve them, and of only slightly less importance: he still didn't know what to do about it that didn't involve putting the overwhelmed person violently, permanently out of their misery.
And frankly, none of this was fair, because Zevran was in a difficult position all his own. His eyes, no doubt due to some dreadful winter (AUTUMN!) allergy, were still itching– in fact, it was worse than ever– and being outside in the bitter cold, with a warm hand on his shoulder no less, Zevran found himself craving heat. Contact of some sort, any sort, to wick the cold out of his unfortunate Antivan body.
That, Zevran decided, was the best reason as to why he was now stepping forward and putting his arms around Alistair. The obvious reason, really: people died of the cold in their droves, and it wasn't as though the Archdemon was vanquished and Zevran could simply die at will. No, he was fated to work, wasn't he, and that behoved him to seek warmth wherever he could get it. And as Alistair's arms bracketed Zevran to his colossal barrel of a chest (the metal plate was already warm to the touch! Truly, these Wardens were like furnaces!) and hitched him off the ground, Zevran decided that it had been for the best.
Even though Alistair was sniffling. And still talking. And even though Zevran was probably dying as a result, at least he was dying slower than he would have with hypothermia.
But still, Alistair was talking. Still.
"We need you with us, Zev," he mumbled wetly. (Did you hear that, Rhodri? Did you hear it?) "Me and Lels… Jeppe, even Morrigan needs you. Don't think she'd know what to do with herself if you stopped those lessons with her. And Rhod…" He gave a weak chuckle, "Well, you only need to see the way she looks at you to–"
Zevran, letting out a frantic laugh, ripped a hand from where it was sandwiched between Alistair's arm and flank, and sealed his index finger over the Templar's mouth. Alistair laughed into said finger and nodded, and at this wordless guarantee of a change of topic (and, of course, once the screaming between Zevran's ears had stopped as a result) Zevran shifted his hand away again.
"All right, all right." Alistair said warmly. "So, point of all this: don't go back to them, all right? Tell me you won't and I'll leave it at that."
"Trust me, my friend," he mumbled in a surprisingly thick voice, "I will not be going back."
"Good." Alistair placed Zevran on the ground and gave his hair the most dreadful ruffle. "Right. Well, you'd better go on and help Rhod put up that tent," he jerked his thumb in Rhodri's direction, grinning cheekily. "Don't just stand here talking to me like a lazy little sod, eh?"
Alistair wiped under his eyes and sauntered away, whistling a tune as he went. And Zevran, with untidy hair and a partway kinked-off throat, could do nothing for a moment but watch after him. He thought of Taliesen, wondered as briefly as he dared if Taliesen thought of him from time to time. Had he forgiven him for leaving? Did he know that Zevran was happy where he was–and, according to Alistair, needed by at least four people now?
And one dog, of course.