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“…and the Maker raised her to watch over us from the sky.” Breynna says as she looks up at the stars above them. “Well, that’s the story that Leliana told me at least.”
“I should’ve guessed,” Alistair chuckles. “But that’s a sweet tale. I’d like to believe love is that eternal.”
“So would I.” And there, her hand is on his leg again. Even through his armor, he feels a little tingle of energy. And while she is staring up, getting lost in the multitude of twinkling lights, he swallows hard, staring at her hand absentmindedly resting on his thigh. They are sitting a bit away from the camp keeping watch, but they’re out here together. It’s because they are both Wardens and can sense the darkspawn before the others, but still… they are together and that’s all that matters.
Say something, his mind commands but his tongue feels thick and heavy. “It’s cold,” he manages, as if that was in any way, shape, or form even close to what he wants to say.
She looks back at him, nods in agreement and notices her hand. But she doesn’t move it, and he swallows harder at the implications of that. Suddenly, inspiration comes upon him and he unbuttons the clasps of his cloak and drapes it around her shoulders. She has her own, of course, but she looks up at him with a tender smile, appreciative of the gesture. Then she takes the cloak and draped one corner over his shoulder, huddling close to him so it covered both of them.
And she’s so close to him now, as close as armor permits, and Maker, he forgets to breathe for a moment. But when he does breathe, it smells like her mixed with the night and the clean smell of nature, and it’s about the best breath he’s ever taken.
*
“Oh, look at you,” she chuckles as he pulls his sword out of a recently deceased darkspawn. “I see you can wield that sword of yours very well.” But there’s a world of meaning behind her words and he doesn’t think she’s talking about the Meteor Sword anymore. And that’s when he realizes that she’s waiting for him to say something and his insides go all wiggly. He bites his lip and tries to act nonchalant.
“Oh yes, that’s me. Master swordsman - always at the ready. To… hack stuff… and kill things….” And his cheeks go flush as he feels the sentence slip away from him. He tries to catch it, but it’s slippery and he can’t. And now Breynna’s frowning at him, and he’s messed things up again. And when he glances over Oghren is laughing at him. And, Oh Maker, not again.
He’s gloomy as they trudge along the path. And when some more darkspawn appear he’s glad for the diversion. When he’s sticking his sword into the darkspawn he doesn’t metaphorically stick it in his own foot and he doesn’t seem quite as much as a bumbling idiot. For now.
*
Oghren pulls him aside at camp that evening when Breynna is preoccupied by girly things with Leliana. Oghren eyes him all over and this makes him a little nervous.
“You ever bedded a woman before?” Oghren asks him point blank. At least when Breynna asked he had a coy answer and a joke at the ready, but this catches him completely off balance. He just stutters and stammers for a moment and there’s no mention of shoes or lampposts, and Oghren has that laughing grin again. “Yea, that’s what I thought.”
“Look champ,” Oghren clasps him on the back hard enough to make him puff a little and that just makes Oghren sigh again. “Women aren’t as complicated as you think. And that one –” He motions across the camp to where Breynna’s sitting. “That one is practically gift wrapped and waiting on your doorstep for ya. Or, your tent-step as it may be.”
Breynna looks up just then and smiles, giving a little wave to them from where she sits with Leliana. “But I don’t know what to say,” he moans. “It always comes out… all…”
“Ass backwards, I know.” Oghren interrupts and Alistair frowns. Not the word choice he would’ve used, and he gets that flustered irritated look about him. “Now, don’t get yourself all in a huff. Ol’ Oghren’s gonna help you get her.”
He sighs, because he doesn’t know if this is a good idea but really, what does he have to lose? “Ok…” he agrees hesitantly.
“Great!” Oghren slaps him again and he tries not to wince. “I’ll have her in your bedroll in a week.” Then he looks at Alistair, standing awkwardly and unsure. “Two weeks, tops. I promise. OK, lesson #1….”
*
That night they’re sitting out on watch again. He thinks about Lesson 1: Compliments. All he’s supposed to do is say she’s ‘as pretty as a…’ and pick something around them that looks pretty. Ok, he can do this. This one is pretty easy.
“So… Breynna,” He takes her hand and she looks at him pleasantly. “I just wanted to tell you that I think you’re as pretty as a….” He looked around. There was a stone… no. A twig on the ground… no. A…
“Zevran!” he yelped.
Zevran suddenly came darting between the bushes. He’s mostly naked with his smallclothes wrapped around his middle and Dog’s bounding playfully behind him. Alistair and Breynna just gawk, open mouthed as they spring past and back toward camp.
“A, uh… really don’t want to know,” he says slowly.
Breynna nods and then slyly looks back at him. “So I’m as pretty as a Zevran, huh?”
Oh Maker.
*
The next night he manages a, “I think you’re as pretty as a constellation.” And while it might not be most poetic compliment ever, it makes her smile and this makes him happy. Maybe there’s a chance, he thinks. A small chance, but still there.
Lesson 2: Innuendoes. This might be a little more challenging, but she’s already opened the door by doing it herself. Oghren said all he had to do was take something she said, and resay it, but all slow and seductively. Laaaaaammppost. Or, to take a question she asks and make it a statement. “You want blank? I’ll give you some blank.” This is easy. He’s got this.
But it takes awhile because they’re both tired and the night is cold, so conversation is slow. They’re sitting there and then he feels something in his hair. He swats at it and a bat flies up, scared. And he’s scared, and he knows he shouldn’t be, but he hates bats.
“Oh! A bat!” She cries out as if he doesn’t know, but he’s trying so hard to be calm and collected so he forces himself to seem composed. And they’re talking now, so he puts his new knowledge to use.
“Yes,” he says. “It’s a baaaat.”
She looks at him quizzically. “What do you mean by that?”
“What do yooooou mean by that?”
“I don’t…” She furrows her brow, obviously confused. “Why do you keep doing that?”
“You want some of that?”He leans in close, like he’s a desperado. “I’ll give you some of that.”
She gets up with a ha-rumpf. “You’re being as weird as Sten.”
And he rubs his neck, feeling discouraged, as he watches her stride off toward her tent. It looks like he’s keeping watch himself tonight…. Again.
*
“OK, Lesson #3,” Oghren begins but Alistair holds up a hand, sighing.
“Oghren, I really don’t think this is helping. It’s hopeless.”
“That’s no attitude to take!” Oghren chastises him. “Do you think the archdemon just rolls over and takes the sodding ropehog in his wing when he gets down?”
“….No?”
“You’re sodding right, he doesn’t!” Oghren barks, but he’s pretty sure Oghren’s drunk at this point, and even if he weren’t, Alistair is completely, hopelessly lost as to what his point might be.
“OK! Lesson #3 is Making a Move.” Alistair sighs loudly. Talking is hard enough, but Maker, he might as well go jump into Lake Calenhad before he completely loses it by trying to add actions in too. But he listens politely as Oghren explains and somehow he makes even holding hands sound like an incredibly dirty thing and Alistair feels his ears going bright red.
*
That night he doesn’t even try lesson #3. He’s perfectly happy that Breynna is just talking to him again after the previous night’s fiasco. He can’t explain it, but for some reason she actually seems… more interested, if that was actually possible. She must’ve taken a few too many hits to the head from the last ogre they encountered, he rationalizes.
*
But this night is different. Really different. They’re sitting there and she’s looking at him instead of the darkness in front of them. And her hand is wandering again, and Maker, she has this hungry look like….
“Didn’t you have enough dinner?” he chuckles. “You look like you’re about to eat me all up!” And he realizes what he just said, and he doesn’t know if he should laugh or go fall onto his own sword to spare his embarrassment. But she just smiles, no, grins.
And she leans in close to him, still grinning and says, “Maybe I will eat you all up.”
And suddenly his mind flashes – Lesson #2! – and he doesn’t know what to do, but he knows this is good. So he says, “Or, maybe I’ll eat yoooou.”
And he doesn’t know why, but this makes her eyes go wide and she practically launches herself at him.
“You’re as pretty as a….” He starts – Lesson #1 – even though this is going all out of order now. But all he can see is her because she’s knocked him to the ground and is kneeling over top of him, grinning wildly and unsnapping her chestplate buckles. “You’re as pretty as a…. Wow! You’re pretty… much naked under that armor!”
And now his eyes are wide and he’s staring at her barely clad chest and nothing is really meaning anything to him except for her. And she’s here, kissing him. And she’s pulling his armor off. And then he feels a cool wisp of night air down below and he’s a little worried because it’s cold out here, but no, she’s still smiling. In fact, she seems rather giddy about this whole thing.
“Oh, that.” He says casually. “I can, uh, I can give you some of that.”
And for once, he’s said the right thing and the right time. And it’s the best thing he’s ever said.
*
A little while later, there’s a rustle in the bushes and Zevran pops out with Dog at his heels. And his small clothes are blowing in the breeze, but there’s no one to comment this time. As he leaps toward the campsite, he vaguely makes out the shapes of the entangled Wardens off in the dark and he laughs in approval. If Oghren could help Alistair do that, there was no telling what he could do for Zev….