#motleysins

[beruthielthequeen]

assassin’s fate

@motleysins

Berúthiel regarded the elf across from her a moment, her expression openly assessing. For this meeting, she had chosen to forego the formality of the throne, the great hall, the watching eyes. She had also foregone the intimacy of her chambers; despite the desk, the bookshelves, the work spread out upon both which legitimized them as a choice for business, everything she’d heard of this elf indicated he might take her meaning somewhat differently.

She might not mind that, later; he was very handsome, after all, and she was not incognizant of it. But not from the word go.

So the library it was. Not Dorian’s nook, though she could just see him across the open space which cored through the entirety of this low tower, bustling about his shelves with every indication of industry. No, she had coopted another of the tables, in another of the nooks, dislodging the earnest young scribe who was, for some reason, very concerned with verifying the location of all of Varric’s books.

“Dorian tells me,” she said finally, “that your efforts in Antiva on our behalf were very successful. He also tells me you are a handsome pain in the ass.” She laughed, and leaned back, and recrossed her legs. “Adding, of course, that he is in a position to know, being a handsome pain in the ass himself.”

A small white cat padded at her leg with one paw and she bent and scooped the cat into her lap without breaking her train of thought, scratching at the small pointed ears idly. “Leliana seems to think you would be of some continued use; and I have to say I agree.” She smiled at Zevran. “You will be well compensated for your work, should you choose to join us.” 

Dorian had also told her about their... difficulties, at the beginning. Berúthiel felt none of the moral qualms that had apparently afflicted Dorian in Antiva; she needed good people for her organization, and she was not above appealing to whatever impulse in them would best convince them to join her. If Zevran’s was coin, she was practical enough not to care. 

Leaning forward, she set a purse on the table between them. “An advance.”

[brightflight]

“I’m thinking of changing my alias,” she said thoughtfully. “Champion is so... I don’t know, it just lacks a certain something. I’m thinking the Black Hawk. Whaddya think? Too much?” All right, so maybe she’s read too many Black Fox tales in her life, what of it?

@motleysins

[brightflight]

!!

through hawke’s eyes || accepting

It would be so easy to dismiss him. In fact, she thinks that’s what he wants. He laughs, and he flirts. He struts and displays himself like a rooster to a hen, fluffing his plumage and cawing so loud and bright and cocky you’d be forgiven for thinking there’s nothing in his skull but more feathers. And that’s the point. 

The first time they’d met, she’d decided he looked like fun. He’d been fun, too, keeping her up until the early hours of the night with his bedplay and his laughter. She’d tasted every one of the tattoos which striped his skin like chocolate drizzled across a rich pastry; but that meant she’d seen all of the scars, too. If he was a confection, he certainly wasn’t one which you’d put on display in a shop window -- not without wrapping him in bright colors first, to disguise all his history and delight the eye with beauty.

Not that the scars bothered her. She had a thriving and growing collection of her own, of course. But where hers had been gathered mostly due to mischance and mishap, some of his were far too regular and far too cruel to be anything but deliberate. She remembered, when she thought of them, that he’d been a Crow. Rumors about Crow training reached her sometimes, through her contacts in the undercity and the network of mercenaries and thieves she called friends and colleagues. He seemed like confirmation of the worst of them.

Yet somehow, he could still laugh. She understood that, too. She laughed, and she joked, and she allowed people to underestimate her. Maybe he was doing the same thing. Maybe he was keeping everyone at arm’s length, just like she did -- even the people she loved the most, she kept just a little outside her reach. It would hurt less, that way, if they left her. Or that was what she told herself, and sometimes even believed.

His teeth were very white against the tawny gold of his skin; his pale hair caught the light like good Fereldan wheat in late summer, beneath an afternoon sun. Yes, he was beautiful, gorgeous when he threw his head back in a brazen laugh which made his throat throb and his chest heave. He was beautiful in darker moments too, when his smile was as slow and sweet as rich honey, when his accent dragged across her skin like silk.

She always watched his eyes, when they were together. His mouth was so good at lying, even to itself; but his eyes showed the shadows, rich and deep and dark, which enrobed him.

[authorizedbiographer]

“We could always laugh at him.”

Varric cast a sardonic look at the Crow, then back at the slowly advancing behemoth of a lowlife in front of them. The fellow was the last remaining member of his particular weird street gang – Dexy’s Midnight Runners? Or was it Doctor Teeth and the Electric Mayhem? Varric had lost track – but he didn’t seem to mind too much, just grinning at them with a mouthful of yellowed chompers. Had to be at least half-giant or something, given his size and the lack of anything like intelligence glimmering in his eyes.

What a time to be out of bolts! And the rest of the crew wasn’t in any better shape; Hawke shrugged at him, her grenade belt empty and both her main daggers still sticking in the corpses of a couple of Behemoth’s buddies. She still had her smaller blades, but against Behemoth it’d be like taking down a dragon with a sewing needle. Zevran was empty-handed too, it seemed, having thrown his last blade right into the eye of Dexy. Or Doctor Teeth. Whoever.

“Yeah, we could try that,” Varric agreed. “Nothing more devastating than a well-aimed insult. Personally, however, I’d suggest something else.”

Honestly, this was why you didn’t send three rogues to do a warrior’s job. Shoddy planning, is what it was.

“Run!”

[authorizedbiographer]

“We are all fools in love.”

Varric leaned back in his chair and interlaced his fingersacross his chest, leveling a long look at the Antivan elf. Zevran was perchedin his own chair like the bird his profession declared him, eyes shining brightand keen. Sometimes it was easy to underestimate the assassin; he joked andpulled little pratfalls, flirted his way through the tavern and told hisstories carefully slanted to downplay his own actions in them.

Varric, who made a living out of telling stories, could seeall the rough bits where the edges of Zevran’s tales didn’t quite line up.Places where shit had been left out, or spun for effect. Oh, Zevran was good atit, maybe; but you can’t kid a kidder. Varric liked him, but that didn’t meanhe quite trusted him. Especially not with Hawke’s heart.

“Love, is it? All right, Crow; let’s just say I buy that for halfa second. Hawke deserves someone who’s going to be there for her, not alwaysflitting around, one day here and the next day gone. Reliable. She’s already lostenough in her life. I know you think she’s strong, and Maker believe me, sheis. Shit she’s gone through…. But she’s got her limits, like anyone. You say you love her,you better start acting like it.”

[brightflight]

MY TURN, FIVE TIMES KISSED

for @motleysins, in response to this.

ONE

He kisses your fingers. His eyes are the color of the whiskyhe buys; you can feel the heat spreading in your throat. The drink, his kiss,his eyes. You are happy to be burned. “Careful,” you tell him, laughing. “Don’tthrow words like enchanted around inKirkwall or the Templars will knock down your door.” But you take the drink;your skin is flushed. 

TWO

You take him to bed, of course. Both of you knew it wasinevitable, right from the start. (Your friends rolled their eyes when you lefttogether, but Isabela only smiled.) You trail kisses down his chest, lick sweatfrom the hollows of his hips. His skin tastes like the sea, smells of smoke andleather. He is speaking words you do not understand, pressing them into yourbody with his lips and his tongue, scribing them with his teeth… they feel likea prayer, they sound like the Chant. You rock to the rhythm that he sets and yousing it with him as the moon rises.

THREE

And that would be that, but you see him again. And again. Heis in the tavern, smiling where he leans against the bar. He is in the market,sucking the last sweet meat from the stone of a peach and grinning. He is sharpeninghis daggers in the alley shadows; you nod as you pass, one predator respecting the territory of another.His teeth are very white in the darkness. He comes to your bed sometimes,reeking of blood and sweat; or you go to his when your own is too empty and toocold, when you cannot face the hollow echoes of your house. There is an honesty to it,even when you do not speak but only kiss him as though you are drowning and heis air. Each smile on the streets begins to feel like a kiss. You miss him whenyou do not see him for a little while. You dream of his lips and the smell of leather and eyeslike whisky, burning you awake.

FOUR

And one night you go to him, your body feeling bruised andsomething deeper aching too. He reaches for you with that easy smile and yousidestep him, wrapping your arms around yourself. You tell him that’s not whatyou want, not now. You start to talk, telling him about the life you once hadand what it’s become. A family, a home. Gone to ashes and gone to embers. Youtell him how it feels to be a knife, knowing he will understand that much. Whatis he but a knife, himself? His smiles can be cutting; so can yours. Heis surprised at first, but you keep talking. You tell him things you’ve told noone, not even your pillow at night, not even your dog. And he does not laugh.His jokes, like yours, are set aside for a little while. And then he talks too,and you realize you were right. He does understand. He does. He’s the same, aknife in the darkness, a blade unsheathed and dripping. You make quite the pair, you think, and almost laugh. Two knives.Two daggers. (And are you a pair? Are you a matched set?)

Later, in bed, he curls around you and you feel his lips onyour neck. His hands are shaking and you take them between your own. You’re apair. You are. You turn in his arms and kiss him again. He still tastes likethe sea.

FIVE

It has been years. He is yours, you are his. You understandhim now when he murmurs praises against your mouth; you’ve learned. You snap out obscenities to him sometimes, just to make him laugh for you. But when he kisses you,when he whispers gloria, gloria al cielo,now you know it for a prayer.

[spiritmark-archive]

Antivan Nights

@motleysins

“This had best be the right place,” he muttered to himself, “or I’m going to be dreadfully annoyed.”

‘Meet me at the height of the moon in the square with the fountain of Asha Campana and the cat,’ the scrawled note had specified. What it hadn’t said was just how many fountains and statues of the Queen Mother of Thedas there actually were in Antiva City. From long and bitter experience, Dorian would say there were at least as many as there were wine shops in Antiva City -- which is to say, more than he cared to count. The multitude of wine shops was pleasing. The multitude of statues... not so.

It had taken him days of poring over maps and questioning the locals to track down the single fountain in the city which boasted a seated figure of Asha Campana with a housecat curled upon her lap. Or he hoped it was the single and sole such statue; if it wasn’t, he’d give up the mission and get roaringly drunk in the closest wine shop instead. 

“Leliana, this ‘old friend’ of yours had best show himself,” Dorian thought, seating himself at a bench placed conveniently beneath a lamppost and within the sound -- though not the overspray -- of the plashing fountain. He supposed, though, that even if the fellow didn’t show, at least he’d have had a lovely little holiday someplace warm for once. The Inquisitor had sent him, along with a small contingent of scouts, to one of the nicer bits of the map this time. It was Antiva, of course, so it was only nice as compared to the utter arsehole of Ferelden or the frozen armpit of Orlais... but nice all the same.

Even the nights were warm, and the air was properly humid and salt-scented. Egad, how one’s standards did fall!

So thinking, he settled himself into the warm Antivan night to wait for his contact to appear. Hopefully with dispatch.

[spellwoven]

@motleysins

The camp was quiet. 

Leliana sat near the fire, strumming gently at her lute and humming, some tune Wystan didn’t recognize. Wynne and Alistair were talking quietly; every once in a while the older woman laughed, a surprisingly girlish sound. Morrigan had pitched her tent far from the others, as usual; if Wystan squinted, he could just make out the witch-woman’s figure moving about, silhouetted against the trees behind.  Shale was motionless and silent as, well, a stone; Sten seemed to be competing with it for the title of “most taciturn warrior in the camp.”

The fire popped and crackled; the big mabari at Wystan’s side yawned and turned on his back like a pup, paws twitching as he chased hurlocks in his sleep.

It was so calm, so peaceful. The big mage could almost forget all the fighting and the blood and the terror. The remembered bitterness of darkspawn blood in his teeth and the sounds of screaming. The singing, the music that came in his dreams. There were stars overhead, a profusion of them scattered across the darkness like brilliant bits of quartz winking in a matrix of black stone.

He’d forgotten how many of them there were. In the years he’d spent in the Circle, he’d forgotten the stars. How could he ever have forgotten?

Wystan shifted his weight, leaning forward to place a big hand on the mabari’s bared belly, scratching at that spot which apparently always itched, given how Jack always reacted. A back leg started thumping and Wystan laughed; but then winced as the bandaged injury on his side pulled.

Ambushed by hired assassins. Apparently Loghain was none too thrilled that a whole two Wardens had escaped the battlefield alive. Set aside the fact that they were two of the newest Wardens, the least experienced, the least knowledgeable. What they did know -- about Loghain’s treachery, leaving his King behind to die, leaving men and women of the armies behind to die -- was more than enough to damn them.

Drawn by the direction his thoughts had taken, Wystan looked across the quiet camp again to the place where the newest member of the ragged little band had tossed his bedroll. The assassin himself, or would-be assassin. A saucy little shit of an elf who’d claimed he’d be loyal if Wystan made him a better offer. Why had Wystan taken him up on it, decided to trust him? He didn’t know. Something in Zevran’s eyes, maybe.

Grimacing with a dull stab of pain, Wystan rocked himself to his feet. Jack stirred and he made a gesture with one hand; the mabari rolled himself back over and closed his eyes again. Across the fire, Wynne’s eyes were sharp; Wystan was aware of them on him as he made his way over to the Crow, sitting alone just outside the cheery circle of fire-glow.

“Hello,” Wystan said simply, dropping to an easy hunker beside the much smaller man and smiling at him. “How you holding up?”