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Brosca was still wiping the blood from her blades when they walked into town.
“Well, there it is,” Alistair said, just a touch of ironic grandness in his voice. “Lothering. Pretty as a painting.”
“Ah,” Morrigan said, as acid as ever. “So you have finally decided to rejoin us, have you? Falling on your blade in grief seemed like too much trouble?”
Alistair began an indignant response, but Sereda was already ignoring them. She had quickly realized squabbling would be a permanent feature of travelling with Alistair and Morrigan, and just as quickly learned to tune them out like so much background noise. She’d had practice: she’d led a company back in Orzammar. Soldiers could scrap about anything.
Instead she focused on Lothering. It was a small town, ramshackle around the edges, and crowded with refugees and townsfolk alike—just as that bandit had said, before Brosca drove him off with her blades. Sereda could see the heights of some human religious structure in the distance, and on the other side of town a tower with a wheel of sails attached, rotating slowly in the breeze. Unmanned and hastily erected palisades surrounded the bulk of the buildings, but of course the refugees had been left to put up their tents outside them. Close by, chickens clucked and got underfoot. The town was pungent with the animal scent of too many unwashed people in crowded quarters.
She thought it might last half an hour if it was overrun. Even that was optimistic.
“Anyway,” came Alistair’s voice from behind her as he made the valiant attempt to wrench the conversation back on track, “I thought we should talk about where we intend to go.”
Apparently satisfied at last with the state of her knives, Brosca slid them back into their sheaths. “We’ll need to hear some news before we decide,” she said, eminently reasonable.
“Yes, but we should at least make a general plan, right?” Alistair said, gesturing Sereda over to join the group. “I think what Flemeth suggested might be the best idea. These treaties—have you looked at them?”
“Looked, yes,” Brosca said. “It’s sweet of you to assume I can read, though.”
“I have,” Sereda said, aware as she did of a profound sense of injustice. Brosca was brilliant. Sereda had been trained on tactics and command, but this Dust Town thug wore leadership effortlessly, instinctively—better than she ever had. Brosca should have been allowed to excel. She should have been taught.
Brosca’s eyes rested on her for a long moment. Ashamed, Sereda looked away.
“Okay, well,” Alistair said, hastening to cover over the awkward pause in conversation, “there are three main groups we have treaties for: the Dalish elves, the dwarves of Orzammar, and the Circle of Magi. I also think that Arl Eamon is our best bet for help. We might even want to go to him first.”
Brosca spoke to Alistair, but she was still looking at Sereda. “Why are you leaving it up to me?”
“Well, I don’t know where we should go,” Alistair said, faintly exasperated. “I’ll do whatever you decide.”
“Sure,” Brosca said. “But what about you, Lady Aeducan? Going to follow a worthless duster?”
Sereda managed to suppress her wince at that. “You’re not worthless, and I’m not a lady anymore,” she said shortly. “You’ve got command, Brosca.”
She could feel Brosca’s shock at that, but the other woman didn’t let it unbalance her for long. “Morrigan? Thoughts?”
“You ought to go after your enemy directly,” Morrigan said immediately. She had clearly been itching to speak. “Find this man, Loghain, and kill him. The rest of this business with the treaties can then be done in safety.”
“Oh, yes, he certainly won’t see that coming!” Alistair said, bright with sarcasm. “And it’s not like he has the advantage of an army or experience or—”
“I was asked for my opinion and I gave it,” Morrigan snapped. “If your wish is to come up with reasons why something cannot be done, we will stand here until the darkspawn are upon us.”
“Okay, take it down a notch, both of you,” Brosca said. “Alistair, how do we find these people?”
Sereda let the chatter fade from her attention again while Brosca quizzed their fellow Warden on the topography of Ferelden. She didn’t need to care about this. It was remarkably freeing, not to have to worry about making decisions or keeping track of the details. Brosca would pick their first mission, and she would go where instructed. Simple.
Except for one thing. “I’ve been exiled from Orzammar,” she said, interrupting yet another meaningless spat between Alistair and Morrigan. “I can’t go back here.”
“We’ve both been exiled from Orzammar,” Brosca corrected her. “And we’re going to have to. We’re on Grey Warden business, and there’s fuck all the nobles can do about it. They’ll just have to see reason.”
From her expression, Brosca thought about as highly of their chances as Sereda—but that wasn’t her problem either. “Alright. What now, then?”
“Now we get our asses into Lothering,” Brosca said. “And as soon as we get a moment, Alistair, I want a look at your map.”
“Yes, ser,” Alistair said cheerfully, shouldering his pack.
“Good. Now let’s go.”
Sereda fell in at Brosca’s left shoulder, leaving Alistair, Morrigan, and the dog Brosca had named Bronto to take up the rear. Behind them she could hear Alistair and Morrigan falling into yet another argument about Alistair’s lack of leadership. Morrigan was disparaging, as she ever was. No doubt she thought the same of Sereda.
Sereda didn’t care. She had her shield on her arm and her sword at her hip and she was following a commander she could count on. That was all she had wanted from the Wardens.
“So,” Brosca said, her voice pitched low enough that the bickering humans wouldn’t hear them. “What was that about?”
Sereda blinked. “What?”
“‘You’ve got command, Brosca’?” Brosca said mockingly. “As if. What are you really planning?”
For a moment Sereda didn’t know how to answer that. “I’m planning to take your orders,” she said.
“You expect me to believe a noble—a fucking Aeducan—is willingly going to take orders from a brand?” Brosca said.
“Yes,” Sereda said, struggling to rein in the frustration that had flared up at Brosca’s words. “We’re surfacers. I’m no more noble than you are anymore. You’re better at it, so you’re in command. I’m not—I’m not scheming.”
Brosca studied her for a long moment, then said, “I don’t believe you.”
Sereda blew out a sharp breath. “Look,” she said. “I don’t know what you heard about my exile, but it demonstrated quite effectively that I’m unsuited to leadership. Bh—my younger brother outmanoeuvred me. I could tell he was up to something, but I couldn’t figure out what to do about it until it was too late to stop him. Trian died because I couldn’t decide on a course of action.”
She stopped, getting her voice under control; then, once she could speak without it breaking, she said, “I was meant to command Trian’s armies, so my father taught me to lead, but instruction isn’t the same thing as talent. You’ve got it; I don’t. I was ready to follow Duncan’s orders when he recruited me, but he’s dead, and you’re not. So,” she said, to Brosca’s astonished expression, “you’ve got command, Brosca. I’ll follow you.”
There was another long pause, Brosca considering her with a new expression. Sereda struggled not to fidget under her gaze. She felt like a raw recruit being faced down by a sergeant for the first time.
“You’re not what I expected, Aeducan,” Brosca said at last.
“Don’t call me that,” Sereda blurted, then pulled a face. “Please. I gave up my family name when I was exiled. Just—just call me Sereda.”
Brosca chewed that over. “Alright,” she said slowly. “Then I guess you’d better call me Natia.”
“Natia,” Sereda said. “That’s pretty.”
The corner of Natia’s mouth lifted into a smile, and Sereda felt something flutter in the pit of her stomach. “You know,” she said, “maybe we can be friends after all.”
They were two days out of Lothering on the road to Redcliffe when the sky opened up above them.
For a moment, Sereda had the disorienting impression that a dam had burst. She had seen rain already: twice on the road from Orzammar to Ostagar, and again in the Wilds on their way north to Lothering. But this wasn’t rain; this was the sky turned to water.
They were soaked to the skin in an instant. Through the crash of rainfall Sereda could hear Bronto barking, and then Alistair shouted over the storm, “We need to find shelter!”
Natia shoved her sodden hair out of her face. “How?” she yelled back. Sereda unwrapped a strip of leather from her wrist and handed it over; with a grateful glance Natia yanked her curls up into a sad horsetail.
Morrigan pointed: a cluster of boulders at the side of the road just ahead. “Remain in the lee of those rocks. I shall return presently.” Then she melted into the shape of a wolf and trotted off into the storm.
“May as well do what she says,” Natia grumbled; only Sereda heard her. “Alright, everyone, let’s hide by the boulders until she finds something.”
Sereda helped to haul Morrigan’s pack, and they piled the bags in the most sheltered spot they could find, hoping that would be enough to protect most of their contents. She stood between Natia and Sten—stoic as ever even in the face of violent weather events—and stared out into the rain as behind her Alistair and Leliana formed a wretched huddle of their own.
At last Morrigan returned, shaking the worst of the water from her fur before she slid back into her native shape. “There is a copse of pines a few minutes down the road,” she said. “The branches have done enough to keep the earth… somewhat dry.”
She had spoken true: though rain pattered down miserably between the branches and the wind blew fitful gusts through the trees, the ground with its carpet of springy needles was only wet, not soaked. Sten directed Alistair in the placement of ropes, and together the two of them tied branches off into a serviceable shelter while Leliana, Sereda, and Natia dug out the tents and did their best to set them up without tracking in any mud. Morrigan had vanished again—no doubt to lurk in a snug hollow as a squirrel, or some such, Sereda thought. Bronto was splashing in the puddles.
Their canopy of branches was enough to shelter two single-person tents, and one of the larger ones. “I’ll share with Sereda,” Natia told Leliana, who was patiently trying to coax a fire from some damp wood. “There’s less of us to fit.” Sten and Alistair got the two-person tent, by unspoken agreement: Sten was so tall he couldn’t sleep properly in a human-sized single, even alone.
Sereda unrolled her bedroll—mercifully mostly dry—and wrung out her shirt as best she could before she sat at the mouth of the tent with Natia. “Well. That was interesting.”
Natia laughed, an unexpectedly bright sound against the backdrop of drumming rain. “I almost thought I’d fallen into a lake. I’ve never seen anything like that in Orzammar.”
“I have. Once,” Sereda said. “Well, not in Orzammar, in the Deep Roads. A passageway beneath a flooded cavern. The roof had caved in.”
“See, that’s a sensible way to get yourself drenched,” Natia said. “I still can’t believe water just falls from the sky out here.”
Sereda had to smile. “It’s like another world. They really weren’t joking about that.”
“In more ways than one. Did you know Alistair told me the nobles in Ferelden have to win their people’s approval? If your farmers don’t like you...” She blew a raspberry. “They’ll up and swear allegiance to someone else.”
“What, really?” Sereda said. “And the nobles don’t punish them?”
“They can’t,” Natia said gleefully. “That’s just how it works. You keep your people happy, or you lose them. Even the king.”
“Wow,” Sereda said, and then, “Orzammar would absolutely fall apart.”
“I know,” Natia said, and then they both broke into laughter—Sereda’s a low chuckle, Natia’s practically cackling.
“You know, you’re not what I expected either,” Sereda said, when they’d both subsided.
“Yeah, no shit,” Natia said. A wary edge had crept back into her voice. “How, exactly?”
“Well—I never really thought about the casteless,” Sereda said uncomfortably. “I never had a reason to. When you spend your life in the Diamond Quarter… nothing outside it seems to matter. You have more important things to pay attention to.” She blew out an exhale that was half sigh, half weary laughter. “Stupid things, in retrospect.”
“Stupid things half the nobility will backstab you over,” Natia said wryly.
“Exactly,” Sereda said. “Balancing votes in the Assembly to get some inconsequential writ passed. What some scholar has written about your family in his latest book. The politics of wearing or not wearing a gift someone gave you. What fabric to have your dress made from, and what that says about your favour. Utterly petty, deadly concerns. It’s easy for other things to get lost in all of that, especially when no one ever encourages you to think about them.”
“So what do you think, then?” Natia said, leaning back on her hands and stretching her legs out in front of her. “Now that you’ve gotten up close and personal with Dust Town’s finest.”
Sereda was quiet for a moment. “I think you might be the cleverest person I’ve ever known.”
Natia laughed. “Come off it. I can’t even read, remember.”
“You’ve never been taught to read,” Sereda corrected. “Natia, you looked at Alistair’s map for thirty seconds and memorized every landmark. I’ve heard you calculating distances and the food supplies we’ll need in your head. Every time we’ve been attacked since Ostagar you’ve known what to do, and you’ve adjusted your orders on the fly when the battle shifted. If Orzammar gave you an army you’d win us back the Deep Roads. And they’ll never give you the chance, because you’ve got a brand on your cheek.”
Natia looked astonished, her mouth hanging slightly open and her eyes on Sereda’s face. Fighting down a sudden surge of self-consciousness, Sereda forged onward. “If someone like you could come up out of the grime of Dust Town—no training, no education, nothing—who else is still down there? What kind of potential are we throwing away on clinging to our castes?”
“Woah,” Natia said. She still sounded a bit stunned. “You’d be thrown out of the nobility for talking like that back home.”
“I know,” Sereda said, and had to bite down a laugh. “Good thing they threw me out already, I suppose.”
Natia shook her head, turning back to look out at the driving rain with a slight smile on her lips. “I guess you don’t miss it, then.”
“I don’t know,” Sereda said. “I miss—the way things were. It would be easier not to have to think about it. I wish Trian wasn’t dead.”
“I get that.”
“But at the same time…” She trailed off, then shrugged. “I don’t miss having to care about every little action. It’s like a weight’s been lifted off me. Out here I can just—be. I’m not Lady Aeducan, or Commander Aeducan. I’m just Sereda. It’s… nice, not to be locked in place.”
“Getting recruited into the Grey Wardens is probably the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” Natia said. She laughed, a little bitterly. “That’s kind of grim, all things considered, but it’s still true. Says a lot, doesn’t it?”
Sereda nodded. Her hand found Natia’s and squeezed it gently; a moment later, she felt Natia’s fingers wrap around hers and squeeze back. Together they watched the rain in silence, softly breathing in all the potential futures of life on the surface.
Leliana’s voice interrupted Sereda’s musings. “Natia, Sereda, the food is ready.”
Sereda shook herself, turning towards the fire pit. Leliana had managed to get a credible blaze going, the damp wood popping and smoking as it burned. The aroma of a simple barley and turnip stew wafted towards them, delicately flavoured with herbs from Leliana’s small store of seasonings—Sereda hadn’t learned to identify the scents yet, but it did smell good.
“Come on,” Natia said, hauling her stocky body to her feet. “We’d better not keep her waiting.”
“No, of course,” Sereda said, and got up to follow her over to the fire.
Noise and light spilled out of the Redcliffe tavern when Sereda pushed the door open in the evening.
It seemed like the whole town was packed into the common room. Most of them had been here for some time already, celebrating the defeat of the walking corpses that had been plaguing Redcliffe for the past week. Sereda was one of the last to arrive: she had spent the afternoon taking a nap after her long night fighting, then inspecting the militia’s remaining arms and armour with a soldier’s expertise. After pronouncing them as well equipped as they could expect to be, she had gone in search of her companions and a deserved rest.
Lloyd had perished in the defence of the town. Bella was running the tavern now, and wouldn’t hear a word about them paying for room and board. While Sereda was glad of the free beds—their coin would only stretch so far—there was another aspect to Bella’s charity that didn’t occur to her until she was standing in front of the table the company had claimed for their own.
Namely, Natia was roaring drunk.
“Sereda!” she crowed, toasting her with her pint and slopping something that Sereda dearly hoped was only ale all over her hand. “Sit down! Drink!”
“I don’t think this table needs any more drunks,” Sereda said, amused, but nevertheless she did sit down and signal Bella for a mug of her own. “What happened to Alistair?”
The Warden in question was sitting across from Natia, face down on the table with his head in his arms. He groaned, turning a bleary eye on Sereda. “Do you think she’s a demon? I think she might be a demon,” he said.
“Couldn’t hold his liquor,” Natia said, throwing back her mug and draining the last of it. She slammed it down on the table, making Alistair start, and hollered, “Another round!”
“The Warden challenged him to a drinking contest,” Sten said, as Bella appeared at their table and set down two fresh mugs. The Qunari was sitting next to Natia on the other side of the table, sedately sipping something golden-brown that came in a small earthenware cup. “The contest itself involved the use of a knife. He forfeited, eventually.”
“I feel like my head is going to fall off,” Alistair moaned. “I’d have stabbed myself in the hand. I need my hands!”
Sereda patted him on the shoulder. “Just be glad Morrigan wasn’t here to see it,” she said. The mage had disappeared again, Ancestors knew where to; no doubt she had decided the crowded tavern was not to her taste and left for quieter locales.
“Ugh,” Alistair said, burying his face in his arms again. “Nobody tell her. She’s nasty enough as it is.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Sereda said solemnly, taking an experimental sip of her ale. The flavour was unexpectedly light on her tongue, almost toasted—nothing like the deep, earthy notes of mushroom ale. She was surprised to find she liked it. “I think I’ve seen the warrior caste playing that game,” she said, turning back to Natia. “Take a drink and stab the table between your fingers, right? First to bleed or forfeit?”
“You know it!” Natia cried triumphantly. She appeared to have lost all control over her volume. “Now you have to play me! Honour of your house.”
“I’m an Aeducan, my house doesn’t have any honour,” Sereda said, making Natia break down in hiccuping laughter. “And I think you’re drunk enough for two already.”
Natia pulled herself together, barely. “You’re just scared I’d beat you,” she said. “I’m sober enough for catching nugs.”
“Paragon Varen’s ass, you are,” Sereda said, while beside her Alistair mouthed ‘for catching nugs’ in perplexed awe. “You’re practically falling out of your chair. Someone here ought to stay conscious to make sure we all get to our beds.”
Natia leaned forward on one elbow, grinning cheekily and waving her mug. “But does it have to be our beds?”
Sereda laughed. “You’d certainly have enough takers, after last night.” She glanced around the tavern. Many of the townsfolk were occupied with their own celebrations—or clustered around Leliana, who was playing what Sereda assumed were Fereldan tavern favourites on a borrowed lute, to Bronto’s howled accompaniment—but there were also plenty who were sending intrigued looks in the direction of their table.
It wasn’t only Natia who was drawing their eyes. But Sereda couldn’t say she was interested. She turned back to her companions.
“You’re in no fit state to go climbing into anyone’s bed,” Sereda said, swallowing a laugh as Natia cheerfully swayed in her chair. “I’m not even convinced you can stand. Finish your drink and I’ll take you up to the room.”
“Don’t need to stand to fuck. Just gotta sliiide down to my knees,” Natia said wickedly, causing Alistair to choke. “Get a pretty girl to lift up her skirts, I’m good to go.”
“All the pretty girls here are human,” Sereda said mercilessly, completely failing to restrain the grin that was tugging at her mouth. “You wouldn’t be able to reach.” Alistair was coughing now, his face bright red. Sten sipped at his drink, unaffected.
Natia cackled, throwing back the last of her drink. “All the pretty girls? You’re not doing yourself enough credit, gorgeous,” she said, staggering to her feet.
Sereda set her ale cup down and stood, catching Natia’s arm just before she toppled over. “I’m also not wearing a skirt,” she said. “And you’re drunk. Come on, o glorious commander, let’s get you to bed.”
With some effort, Sereda eventually managed to wrangle Natia up the stairs and down the hallway to the room they were sharing. She propped the other woman against the wall while she wrestled with the lock, opening the door to reveal a small but neat room with two single beds, a little table, and a clothes press. She wound her arm around Natia’s ribcage, half nudging, half carrying her over to one of the beds, and dumped her unceremoniously onto the mattress.
“Oof,” Natia said, her voice muffled into the pillow.
“Come on, on your side,” Sereda said, prodding Natia until she rolled over. “Give me your foot.”
After a moment to process the instruction, Natia extended her leg. Sereda pried off first one boot, then the other, dropping them next to the bed. Fortunately, Natia had removed her leather armour already; Sereda did not want to have to figure out its straps and ties with its owner in her present state. Instead she merely undid the sash that held Natia’s trousers to her hips, tugging them down and leaving her dressed in just a linen shirt and her smallclothes.
“Oh, you’re stripping me now?” Natia said. Her eyes were closed, but there was a teasing lilt to her voice. “Thought you said I was too drunk.”
“You are too drunk,” Sereda said, smiling. “Your trousers have dirt all over them. I’m not taking anything else off.”
Natia shifted, turning her head and opening her eyes slowly, eventually focusing on Sereda’s face. “You could, you know.”
Sereda briefly felt the world spin. “What?” she said.
“Meant what I said. You’re pretty. And I like you,” Natia said. “I’d eat you out. Totally. Any day.”
Seemingly satisfied that she’d made her point, Natia closed her eyes. Sereda stared down at her, somehow overcome with an impossible fondness, and brushed Natia’s curling black hair away from her face. “Oh, you are going to have such a headache in the morning,” she said.
“Am not,” Natia mumbled. “Never get hangovers. M’invincible.”
Sereda laughed softly, tugging the blanket out from under Natia and tucking it up around her body. “I’ll just pretend this never happened. You’ll thank me for it. If you remember this, which I doubt.”
Natia grumbled something that sounded vaguely like words. Sereda patted her shoulder. “Goodnight, Natia,” she said, and went to bed.
As soon as the doors were opened, Sereda couldn’t stay in the tower a minute longer. They still needed to talk to Irving about bringing the mages back to Redcliffe to deal with Connor, but that wasn’t her problem. Natia could make the arrangements. No one would miss Sereda for a while. And so, while Natia and Wynne went to talk with the First Enchanter, and Bronto followed Leliana over to inspect the quartermaster’s wares, Sereda slipped out the front door and around the side of the tower. There she found a convenient rock to settle on, and sat down to stare out over the lake.
Natia found her half an hour later. “Thought you might be out here,” she said.
“Are we getting ready to go?” Sereda said. She began to rise.
But Natia flapped a hand at her and dropped into a seat by her side, letting her pack thump down on the grass behind them. “We’re not going anywhere, don’t worry. The mages are in no fit state to leave with us.”
“Irving agreed, then?”
Natia nodded. “He did. We move out in the morning.”
Sereda shuddered. “No offence, but I don’t think I’m going to be able to sleep in the tower tonight. I’ll pitch a tent in the courtyard.”
“No, I’m right there with you,” Natia said, pulling a face. “That was a fucking piece of work, wasn’t it?”
“Tell me about it,” Sereda said. She flattened her hands onto the stone on either side of her legs, imagining for a moment that it was another, bigger Stone. “If I never see another demon it’ll be too soon. I thought the darkspawn were bad, but at least they leave your thoughts alone.”
“Hear, hear,” Natia said. “Oh, on that note,” she added, turning back to her pack and rooting around in it briefly. She unearthed a bottle of wine and presented it to Sereda. “Found this in the tower. It was dusty, so I don’t think any demons got at it. Drink with me?”
“Please,” Sereda said fervently. Natia grinned, wrestling the cork from the mouth of the bottle, and took a quick swig.
“Oh, that’s strange,” she said. She passed it to Sereda. “It’s made from fruit, you know. Leliana told me.”
“Huh,” Sereda said, taking a swig of her own and letting the odd sweet-sharp-warm taste of the wine flood through her mouth. “Well, here’s to the endless creativity of surfacers.”
“Paragons’ tits, don’t say that, some of them are creative enough to summon demons,” Natia said, swiping the bottle back with a laugh.
Sereda wrinkled her nose. “True. To the endless variety of surfacer alcohol, then.”
“Now you’re talking,” Natia said, and toasted her with the wine.
Sereda smiled, feeling herself relax into Natia’s companionship, sloughing off the horrors of the past couple days. “We should play a game,” she said, nodding to the bottle in Natia’s hand. “To make up for you being too drunk to challenge me last time.”
“I did challenge you,” Natia said. “You’re the one who turned me down. Probably for the better, but still, you’ve got only your own responsibility to blame.” She hummed. “Do you know ‘shaper or grifter’? That’s good for two players.”
“Is that the name of a game? No. How do you play?”
“It’s simple. I’ll tell you two things about me,” Natia said. “You have to guess which one’s true—the memory—and which one’s a con. If you guess right I drink, you guess wrong, you do. Then we trade.”
“Straightforward enough,” Sereda agreed. “Alright, go ahead.”
Natia considered, chewing on the inside of her cheek. “Okay, got it. I used to be a noble hunter, or I can recite every poem written by Paragon Lynchcar.”
It couldn’t be that simple, could it? “You used to be a noble hunder,” Sereda said.
Natia grinned. “Drink.”
“No!” Sereda said. “You? By the Paragons, where did you learn that?” she said, taking the bottle from Natia’s hand and tipping it back.
“My sister, Rica,” Natia said. “She’s the noble hunter. Beraht had her taught to read. She used to practice her recitation by reading to me from the Noladar Anthology of Dwarven Poetry.”
“Your memory must be incredible,” Sereda said. “I’ve been reading Lynchcar since I was a child, and I don’t think I could recite even one of his poems.” She thought for a moment. “Alright. I don’t have the same mother as my brothers, or I had my first command when I was sixteen.”
“Stone below. Even nobles can’t be that crazy, can they? You don’t have the same mother as your brothers.”
Sereda sighed and took another swig from the bottle. Natia laughed. “So who was your mother, then?”
“A cousin of Pyral Harrowmont’s,” Sereda said. “Her name was Ylisa. I don’t remember her, she died when I was very young.”
“And your brothers’?”
“We all had different mothers, actually. Trian’s mother was our father’s wife, Lady Militsa Bemot. Bh—my younger brother’s mother was a noble hunter.”
“Huh,” Natia said, looking at her sidelong. “And now he’s going to be king.”
Sereda sighed. “Very probably. I suppose it’s interesting from a political perspective.” She shrugged, shunting it aside. “Not my problem, though. Your turn.”
“Right,” Natia said, and cleared her throat. “I’ve never eaten nug, or I’ve never fucked a man.”
That startled a laugh from Sereda. “Oh, come on, too easy. You’ve never fucked a man.”
“Damn right,” Natia said, grabbing the bottle back and taking a deep swallow. “And I’m not about to start now.”
“Please don’t, we’re in public,” Sereda said mildly.
Natia barked a laugh, nudging her shoulder. “Go on, your turn. Give me a dirty one.”
“Pushy,” Sereda said, but Natia’s transparent ploy had worked: she was smiling again. “Alright, try this, then. I’ve never fucked a man, or I’ve never been fucked by a man.”
Natia shrieked with delighted laughter. “Paragons. You’ve never been fucked by a man. Of course. Did you use a device, or do you have your own equipment?”
Sereda grinned, taking her turn at the wine. That had been worth it for the glee in Natia’s eyes. “A device. I don’t have that kind of equipment,” she said, gesturing vaguely at her crotch. She sighed wistfully. “I had to leave it in Orzammar. Too bad. It was a really nice one—carved obsidian and nugskin leather straps.”
Natia let out a low whistle. “In Dust Town we mostly used polished bone, when there was any to spare.” She canted a glance at Sereda, a flush creeping over her tanned cheeks that Sereda didn’t think the wine was responsible for. “So, did you use yours on women, or was it a men-only affair?”
Sereda snorted. “No, I fucked women too. Mostly women, really. It’s just, sometimes a man’s so pretty…”
“Oh, really?” Natia teased. “Any men I know?”
“Stone below, no,” Sereda said. “Alistair’s sweet, but—no. I like a bit of experience. And Sten is… Ancestors, he’s so stoic, it would be like fucking a rock face. No,” she said, laughing. “Not my type.”
“So who is your type, then?” Natia said, just a touch too casual to be innocent. “Leliana’s pretty, and you know she’s got to have experience.”
“Ye-es,” Sereda said, drawing out the syllable as she considered Natia. It wasn’t in her nature to dance around the subject. “Natia, you’re fishing. What is this about?”
Natia shrugged, cutting her gaze away. “It’s just—I made an offer, and you said I was too drunk, but I thought you were into it. That you’d talk to me about it when I sobered up. But you haven’t said anything. If I misjudged—sorry. Is there someone else?”
“Oh,” Sereda said, and then, “oh. I thought—I’m. I’m surprised you remember that. You were very drunk.”
“Sorry,” Natia said again. “I’ve made you uncomfortable. I shouldn’t have said anything. We can just pretend this never happened too, if you like.”
“No! No,” Sereda said. “I thought—you were drunk, I didn’t think you meant anything by it. I thought you wouldn’t remember, and you’d be embarrassed if I brought it up. You were serious?”
“Sereda,” Natia said, “seriously: I would eat you out for hours if you wanted me to.”
Sereda’s skin didn’t show a flush like Natia’s did, but nevertheless she could feel her face heat all the way to the tips of her ears. “Oh,” she said faintly.
Slowly Natia began to smirk. “So, is that a yes?”
“It is absolutely a yes,” Sereda said. “Not right now, I mean, we’re still in public. But yes, I am very interested.”
“Well… how about,” Natia said, lifting the bottle from Sereda’s lap and holding it up, “we finish the wine, and set up a tent… and then we’ll see where the evening takes us?”
Sereda smiled. “I’d love that,” she said.
Natia’s mouth was warm under hers, and still touched with the fragrance of the wine. The first press of their lips was cautious as they tentatively leaned into each other, but then Natia shuddered and wound her fingers into Sereda’s hair, and the kiss swiftly turned close and heated.
Sereda rather thought it tasted like potential.