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His Warden, his big strong Mahariel, was sleeping for the first time in days. Zevran smoothed the lines off his brow, frowning at the idea that he was being tormented even in his sleep.
He traced the blood ink tattoos on his Warden’s face with calloused fingers. There had been scarcely a night in the past couple of years when Zevran had not returned to sleep in those big arms. The prospect of losing him did not please him (it terrified him, actually, but to put a word to that feeling would make it so much more real). He’d gotten too used to that embrace.
The Calling. Before it had been a vague dark cloud in the distance, something that would trouble them when they were older, more prepared. Not now. That insidious whisper wasn’t supposed to take him from him now.
“Zevran,” whispered his Warden, eyes bleary with sleep. “I’m having bad dreams, Zev.”
His voice sounded so tired, so broken, that Zevran locked away the fear in his heart and smiled down at Maiti. “I’m here, my love,” he said, wishing he remembered how to say it in the Dalish tongue. “I’ll always be here.” Right until the very end.
Maiti turned, sheets rippling around them, the sweat on Maiti’s brow shining in the moonlight.
The lullaby came unbidden from Zevran’s lips, a lost memory from the whorehouse piecing itself back together. He hummed it, hand smoothing back damp red hair. His Warden stopped trembling the more Zevran hummed, so he sat with his back against the headboard and stared out the window into Antiva City and sang to keep the Calling away.