Chapter Text
Wynne wouldn’t let Alistair go out alone. He tried pointing out that he was a prince now and she couldn’t tell him what to do. She was unimpressed. She was of course, also right--he’d been thrown in prison all of one day before, and really couldn’t afford to go charging around on his own now. But it was well after dinner, and he’d considered throwing caution to the wind many times, before the others came back.
He was pacing in the front hall when the massive doors flew open under Sten’s hand, and the rest of their companions marched in behind. Sten was blistered and red all along one side of his face and one of Zevran’s hands was wrapped in wet cloth. Harper’s left sleeve was half burned off, and her expression was venomous.
“You’re burned!” Alistair exclaimed. “What happened?”
“Mages,” Leliana answered.
“Bas saarebas,” Sten spat.
“What, in the alienage?” Alistair asked.
“Mhm,” Harper said, heading straight for the pitcher of water kept on a side table. “Gets better though--Tevinter mages.”
“Tevinter!” Alistair yelped.
“Selling elves into slavery right out of the alienage--with Loghain’s approval.”
“Surely not!” a woman exclaimed behind him. Alistair turned to see Anora on the stairs.
“Surely yes, Your Majesty,” Harper snapped. “And did you know about that?”
“No! I struggle to believe that even in his current madness my father would do such a thing.”
“Guess the money for a coup has to come from somewhere,” Harper said, dripping bitterness. “Alright then, easier question. Did you know that people are living in abject, life-threatening poverty not a twenty minute walk from your fancy palace? The entire alienage? You ever been there? Ever seen it?”
“That would hardly be appropriate! I would never disrupt so many lives by intruding. If you believe I could raise the entire alienage from poverty simply by willing it, then you grossly overestimate my reach.”
“Did you try? No, never mind. Tell me another thing, Loghain’s daughter.” Wynne, newly arrived, put a restraining hand on Harper’s shoulder, but she shrugged it off. “When we were in Howe’s palace yesterday, all facing the same threat of death or imprisonment, who stepped up to save us? Cailan’s wife, or his brother?”
“We have discussed this!” Anora snapped. “It was understood! I may be in danger of death or disappearance, if--”
“Are you saying that Alistair wasn’t?” Harper was face to face with Anora now, or rather face to neck, eyes sparking.
“I have no idea--”
“You do! If even his beloved daughter is in danger from Loghain, then Alistair had no chance of making it out alive. He could have been dead before we could get him back. He knew that, and he stepped up anyway. He stepped up.”
Anora blinked down at Harper, either not sure what to say next or dazed by being addressed so harshly, and Harper was more than happy to go on.
“Now. I’ve spent the day cleaning up messes that either existed while you held power or are the actions of your father since you lost it, and I don’t want to hear a thing about how you’re the superior choice right now, Your Majesty. Arrest me for insolence if you can figure out how. I’m going to get out of my nice new robes, which are ruined because your daddy let Tevinter mages into Ferelden.”
Harper turned on her heel, passing a visibly horrified Eamon on her way out. Eamon hastened to Anora, speaking quietly to her as he led her away.
Alistair hadn’t said a thing. He probably should have, he thought. It was partly an argument about him, after all. But honestly, the larger part of him still thought that Anora was unquestionably better trained, more qualified, and more experienced than he was. Not to mention that she actually wanted to rule, which probably helped.
But Harper hadn’t been wrong, either, had she?
Things weren’t going to get less confusing soon.
*
Zevran was gone. Alistair headed to his own room hoping to find him, but he wasn’t there, and neither was the gear he’d left when he’d stayed the night.
After many wrong turns and accosting no less than three visibly discomfited servants for directions, he found his way to the baths, but no Zevran there, either. Sten and Oghren were, and Zevran had been minutes before, but neither had known or cared where he was going. Oghren did give Alistair an extremely disturbing leer when he asked, though.
He upset even more servants trying to find Zevran’s room, which was in the servants’ quarters. He watched their backs stiffen as he appeared, and thought uncomfortably of Anora’s comment about intruding in the alienage. Was that going to be him? Would he be forever cut off from sitting in the tavern, just being normal people? Would he spend the rest of his life with people jumping to attention as he appeared? Fanfares and official meetings?
All he’d wanted, really, was to belong. But even his sister had taken one look at him as he was now, and marked him as too high above her to belong with her. Maybe it had always been too late.
When he finally found Zevran’s room, his first reaction was hot anger. Zevran’s room wasn’t half the size of his own--it wasn’t one sixth the size of his own. Twelve of this dank little closet of a “room” could have fit in Alistair’s room with space to spare. The low cot had a worn out straw tick and one scratchy blanket. The only other furnishings were an upturned crate next to the bed, a reed light, and a bucket.
Zevran’s things were there, but no Zevran. He waited for a bit, lying on the too-small bed with his arm thrown over his face, and then got up, kicked the wall, and set about finding his way to the dining hall.
When he got there, Harper was eating alone. She was wearing an older robe, much patched and straining to cover her ample frame.
“Alistair!” she smiled and waved him over. “Come on, sit. They’ve brought me enough food for an army, and everyone else has abandoned me.”
He sat, reaching over for a roll.
“Well, you look more cheerful,” he said. “You were really on fire earlier.” He winced as soon as he said it, but Harper burst out laughing.
“Literally, eh? Oh, yes, I’m still pissed. You would be too if you’d seen that place. No one should live like that. But you know me. I’m a simple girl, I like a hot bath and a good feed.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t with you.”
“Don’t be. You look much better and it goes a long way to helping me not burn this place down.”
Alistair laughed. For a bit, there was companionable silence as they both stuffed food in their mouths.
“You know, it’s interesting,” she said, swallowing a massive mouthful of stewed rutabaga and lamb. “Everybody was in a furor when they took you prisoner. I was ready to chew through stone. But Zevran! Oh, I thought when I went to sleep I might just not wake up, and if I were Ser Cauthrien I would stay awake forever.”
Alistair laughed. “If she stays awake, we’ll get her anyway.”
Harper smiled, and then let the smile fall away. “What I’m saying, Ali-boy, is that he took your capture very personally.”
Alistair could feel his face flame up. “Well, you know. Everyone falls for my irresistible charm. That was my plan for the Archdemon, did you know? Just flutter my eyelashes and ask him to please climb back down a hole. It’s foolproof!”
“Eyelashes like that? We can’t fail.” Harper grinned, but only for a second. “But Alistair… look, I want you happy, and I need you focused. Like Zevran wasn’t today. I even tried to leave him here, but he wouldn’t have it.”
He was pretty sure he was red from the roots of his hair to his neck now. “I don’t...uh...I’m sure whatever you’re implying…”
“You know what I mean and you know I love you both. But it’d be real great if you could figure it out.”
Alistair squeezed his eyes shut before looking back at her.
“I’m trying,” he said. “I’m just...trying.”
He rather thought he had figured it out. But now, it was becoming clear that wherever he was, Zevran was not.
Harper stood up and clapped him on the shoulder. “I have confidence in you. Now then, gonna go talk to Eamon about where we can find all these various nobles we need votes from. Politics! Save the world with politics!” She snorted, and strode out of the room without a backwards glance.
Alistair sat, the last chunk of apple forgotten in his hand, and stared at the joinery of the stone wall. Finally, he got up, and set out to find Zevran’s room again.
It only took one round of questioning and two wrong turns this time. Zevran was sitting on his narrow bed, putting a new strap on a buckle by the light of a lamp he’d probably ‘borrowed’. He looked up and smiled brightly. A little too bright. Not the smile he made without thinking, but the one to disarm. Alistair wondered, with a little twist in his stomach, why he needed disarming.
“Found you!” he said, with a little false cheer of his own. “I was worried about your hand. Alright, now?” He reached out, and Zevran let him take the hand to examine it, but the touch didn’t still the twisting of Alistair’s gut.
“Perfectly well, thank you. Wynne takes good care of us all.” He withdrew the hand, and there was nothing lingering about it.
Alistair dared to sit next to Zevran, though the cot creaked under their combined weight.
He cleared his throat. “I ah...I may have missed you today. Worried about you.” He thought he felt Zevran soften a bit against his side.
“There was no cause to worry about me, I assure you. Harper had the situation well in hand.” Zevran smiled at him, this time a little softer. Alistair took courage from it, and turned towards Zevran, reaching for his cheek.
“Well, I worried anyway, so there.” He leaned in, eyes on Zevran’s face, heart racing, until his lips brushed against Zevran’s.
But Zevran’s lips didn’t answer his. After a second, Zevran turned his face, pulling away from Alistair’s hand.
“I am sorry, but...no. No. I mean no offense, I simply...no.”
Alistair drew back, stung. “Is something wrong? Did I do something?”
“No! No, I...do not wish to talk about it.” Zevran was avoiding his eyes. The cold sickness was starting to fill Alistair’s belly again, seeping outward.
“Please, if I’ve done something wrong--”
“Enough!” Zevran snapped. “I have said I do not wish to talk about it! Can you not understand that?!”
Alistair’s eyes stung. “I understand you just fine, I just--”
“There are other things besides me for you to focus on, I am certain! Do--do those!”
Silently, Alistair got up, and left. He didn’t look back when the door clicked shut behind him, and he didn’t cry, because kings-to-be don’t cry in front of servants.
But there were no servants in his room, and his pillow wouldn’t tell.
*
Alistair made no impassioned speeches the next day. He tried to find the fire he’d felt with Bann Harvren, and he thought he pretended alright, but it wasn’t the same. Face after face passed in front of him-- the imprisoned templar’s sister, Bann Something, Arl Wolf or Rolf or...he’d have to learn eventually.
Harper did a lot of the talking, and gave him more than a few quiet looks. He couldn’t tell if they were worried or annoyed. She had every right to be annoyed. This was his place, these negotiations were for his throne, and all he could really think about was the emptiness inside.
Finally, the last appointment was done, the last round of bowing and mutual assurances of respect and exhausting smiling was over, and Alistair was sitting in the dining hall again, stuffing stew into his mouth without tasting it at all. Leliana and Morrigan were teasing Sten further down the table, Oghren was asleep with his face nearly in his plate, and Harper was across from him, eating steadily and silently. Zevran was...elsewhere. Clearly, where was none of Alistair’s business.
Across the table, Harper put down her clay beaker with a thud. “Well!” she exclaimed, suddenly bright and businesslike. “That was a day, for sure. Now for shopping.”
Alistair’s mind stumbled at the sharp turn. “Shopping?”
“Well, I’m not going to fight in this! Great for the cleavage, sure, but it’ll split at the seams if I flex. Turns out I got muscles under the chub now and this thing can’t handle both. So you and Zevran are going to take me shopping.”
“Shopping?” Leliana came to attention down the table. Morrigan sneered.
“Harper, you really don’t have to...I’m not sure he wants…” Alistair sighed. “I think he’s probably avoiding me.”
“Yup! That’s why I’m doing it. Alright, Leliana, get ready, you’re in!”
Harper found Zevran by the simple expedient of telling the hovering steward to find him. Which definitely should have occured to Alistair before.
Zevran came trotting into the entrance hall shortly after the rest of them, with his usual cheerful smile. Dirty dishes had been left to the servants (Alistair didn’t mind that part of being Important), money had been fetched, and the group set off, all in high spirits.
Well. The appearance of it, anyway. Harper and Leliana trotted ahead, heads together, gleeful discussions about color and complexion drifting back. Zevran and Alistair walked behind, keeping pace in silence. Alistair was inclined to feel rather venomous about Harper’s blunt approach to “fixing” things. Better that than more stewing on what he could have done wrong.
“Alistair,” Zevran said. Alistair looked up, but nothing else was forthcoming at first. Finally, “I...I feel that I really must apologize. I do not know what to say, but I feel I owe it to you to try.”
“You don’t owe me anything,” Alistair muttered.
“On the contrary! I owe you more than I can ever repay.”
“Is that why you kissed me? Because you owed me? Because I don’t need--”
“No! No. I kissed you because I wished it, just as I have said. It is just...that…I am acting like a child, I realize. Let me try to explain.”
Alistair waved a hand for him to go on.
“An assassin...must learn to forget about sentiment. It is dangerous. You take your pleasures where you can, when life is good. To expect anything more would be reckless.”
Alistair had a sudden burst of realization. “Rinna…”
He thought perhaps Zevran flinched, ever so slightly.
“I had thought,” Zevran said, and trailed off. “Truthfully, I do not know what I thought. You are a very beautiful man--”
“Maker! No I am not!” Alistair thought his ears would catch fire.
“You truly do not know. It is irresistibly charming. It would not be difficult to dismiss attraction as that alone. But when you were captured...I was so greatly…angry. No, I do not have the word--”
“Boys!” Harper called back. “This is the place.”
“Tch!” Zevran exclaimed. “Later.”
Alistair was left alone in the street, understanding both more and less than he’d thought he’d known before. Sighing, he followed the others into the shop.
Harper had led them to a tailor’s shop. Several gorgeous dresses and a fur-draped man’s tunic and pants hung in the front of the shop on wooden stands. A man, presumably the tailor, rose from his work to greet them.
“Leli, Alistair, Zev, this is Eldwyn. Eldwyn, Arl Eamon’s steward sent us to you. I need new robes, and quickly.”
Eldwyn smiled broadly. “A friend of Master Darnell’s is a friend of mine. What can I do for you?”
The conversation quickly devolved into fabrics and measurements and darts and pleats and how to set the sleeves for freedom of movement, and Alistair had nothing to do but awkwardly stand around. He kept looking at Zevran, who gave him a strange sort of half-smile back, but the shop was far too small for private conversations, so he just shifted from foot to foot and waited.
“Now this handsome young man, he could do with a bit of tailoring himself!” Alistair came into focus to realize that the Eldwyn was standing in front of him, looking him up and down with one eye closed.
“Sorry?”
“Never be sorry for those shoulders!” Eldwyn said, winking. Leliana giggled, and Harper snorted. “Do you know, I think I have something…” he trailed off, turning towards the stairs at the side of the shop. His voice came down the stairs as he went. “Just a moment, please! I have an order that never got picked up.” Alistair looked at Zevran, bewildered, but Zevran just raised an eyebrow and shrugged. Leliana clapped her hands excitedly.
In a moment, Eldwyn was trotting back down, something heavy and dark green draped over his arm.
“Off with this!” Suiting actions to words, he began to wrestle Alistair out of the stiff jerkin Eamon had made him wear. Bemused, Alistair shrugged it off and let Eldwyn stuff him into the doublet he’d brought down. The fur mantle was apparently a separate piece, and went on last.
“Perfect!” said Eldwyn, pulling Alistair to the long mirror.
Alistair stared, and someone who wasn’t quite Alistair stared back at him. The mantle emphasized his shoulders and flared upwards, framing his neck and jawline. Down the chest there were bands of felt applique--traditional Fereldan geometric designs, beautifully worked. The sleeves fit perfectly, with no binding of the armpits. The cut snugged closely around his waist, flaring over his hips. It was far finer than anything he’d ever worn before.
“I look...like an absolute toff.”
“You look like a king, Alistair,” Harper replied, voice hushed.
Alistair’s eyes darted to Zevran, but while Zevran was looking at him, his eyes were most definitely not focused on his face.
“How much?” Harper asked.
Eldwyn quoted a frankly horrifying price.
“We’ll take it,” she said.
Alistair aspirated his own spit and began coughing violently. “What?”
“Hush, Ali-boy. We’re getting it.”
*
After a bit of negotiation over the last details of Harper’s outfit and matching pants and shirt for Alistair’s, they left Eldwyn and headed back to Eamon’s. A block or so down, though, a cart full of baled wool had crashed into a wagon full of onions and jackknife, blocking the entirety of the narrow street. The wreckage had accumulated an angry hand-cart driver, half the neighborhood, a guardsman completely failing to restore order, and half a dozen laughing street boys.
“This way,” Harper shouted over the noise, and turned down the alley that opened up to their right. As they moved away from the noise, she added, “It’s got to reconnect eventually, right?”
The alley opened up a few yards on, but bare steps before they reached it, Zevran suddenly threw his arm across Alistair’s chest.
“Wait! Something--” Zevran stopped, and then whirled.
Alistair glanced back, and froze. Two men he definitely hadn’t seen before were standing a few feet inside the alley, aiming bows at them.
“Brasca,” Zevran hissed.
Harper had seen the men now, too. “What the fuck--” She stopped as Zevran pushed past her and into the open space at the other end of the alley.
“What do you want?” he shouted.
“Ah, Zevran,” another Antivan voice replied. “Cautious as ever.” As Alistair followed Zevran out of the alley, a man stepped out from behind a wall, looking down on them from an elevated back stoop.
“And so here is the mighty Grey Warden at long last. The Crows send their greetings, once again.” The man was looking at Alistair, and it took him a minute to realize that he really did look like he must be the leader, right now.
“Same fucking trick,” Harper muttered. “They used the same trick!”
Zevran sidestepped, putting himself between Alistair and the man above..
“So they sent you, Taliesen,” Zevran said. “Or did you volunteer for the job?”
Taliesen. Alistair’s stomach dropped.
“I volunteered, of course!” Taliesen replied. “When I heard the great Zevran had gone rogue, I simply had to see it for myself.”
“Is that so? Well, here I am, in the flesh.” Zevran spread his arms, hands empty and open.
“Zevran,” Harper hissed, “what--”
“You can return with me, Zevran.” Taliesen’s voice had changed--gentler, persuasive. “I know why you did this, and I don’t blame you.”
Zevran shifted tensely.
“It’s not too late. Come back, and we’ll make up a story. Anyone can make a mistake.”
A bubble of silence grew, touching Alistair with freezing fingers. What if--would he really go back--
“I have not made a mistake,” Zevran said.
Alistair breathed again.
“What?” Taliesen’s voice was incredulous. “This whole thing has just been some--some foolish tantrum--”
“I have not made a mistake,” Zevran repeated, “and I am not going back.”
“You’ve gone soft in the head! The Crows will make you pray for death, you fool!”
“They’ll have to get through me, then,” Alistair said.
“Us,” Harper said.
Taliesen laughed. “That was the plan, yes.”
“I am sorry, my old friend, but the answer is no,” said Zevran. “You should have stayed in Antiva.”
“Zevran, don’t do this.” Taliesen said it softly this time, pitched for Zevran's ears.
“Taliesen. I regret that it was you who came.” Zevran drew his dagger. “Harper, bows?”
At that cue, Harper whirled and flung a fireball at the archers behind them. The shouts covered the satisfying snap of bowstrings parting, but Alistair knew that it was there. Taliesen bellowed at his men to attack, and Alistair drew his sword.
He had no shield. They were not totally unprepared to defend themselves, of course, not with everything that had happened, but this was supposed to have been a shopping trip! He sprinted for the men behind them, before they could draw fresh weapons. Leliana beat him to the first of them.
Taliesen had brought six men. Maybe even skilled men. It didn’t matter against the four of them. The fight was over in less than two minutes, clean, all dead except for Taliesen.
Taliesen was on one knee, bleeding heavily from a wound in his thigh. Zevran’s dagger was leveled at his throat. Alistair climbed the stairs and leveled his sword at Taliesen. A slight tremor was rippling through Zevran’s blade.
“You don’t have to do this, Zevran,” Alistair murmured. Zevran didn’t look up.
“Harper,” Alistair called. “We could conscript him?”
“If he’ll swear, I guess” she said, climbing the stairs herself. Leliana stood on the cobblestones, watching them all with worried eyes.
“You can join the Wardens,” Harper said. “Past crimes don’t matter there. You see that we’re--”
Taliesen spat. “Fools. Stuff your Wardens. The Crows would find me anywhere. They will find you. Just kill me.”
“Well fuck you anyway,” Harper snapped.
Alistair watched that little tremor ripple down Zevran’s blade again.
“Zev...you don’t have to do it. I’ll--”
“Cowards,” Taliesen laughed, and then lunged forward.
Before Alistair could bring up his blade, Zevran’s flicked through Taliesen’s throat. Taliesen fell to the ground with a bubbling wheeze, hands flying to his throat.
Zevran stared for a second, and then turned and walked back towards the alley. His face was blank, expressionless.
“Maker take it, now there’s blood all over my robes,” Harper grumbled. “Leli, help me with this guy.”
Alistair followed Zevran, and caught him up in the alley. Zevran was leaning against one wall, staring at the wall opposite. Alistair stood in front of him, itching to touch him, no idea what to do.
Zevran let his head fall back against the wall. “And there it is,” he said. “Taliesen is dead. And I am free of the Crows.”
“Are you really?”
Zevran shrugged slightly. “They will assume that I am dead along with Taliesen. So long as I do not make my presence known to them, they will not seek me out.”
“And are you alright? About...Taliesen?”
Zevran finally focused on Alistair.
“Truly, I do not know.”