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When Sigrun sat next to Theron in the common room, it was with unmistakable motherly concern. “It’s not a holiday,” she said, her voice heavy with significance. Theron looked at her to find her sweet face crinkled, looking distinctly as though she had tasted something sour.
“I asked around,” she said. “Velanna had no idea what I was talking about, but Nathaniel and Seneschal Varel said that no matter what calendar you use, today is not a holiday.” Theron nodded slowly. He was loosely gripping a green glass bottle, letting its weight rest on his thigh. It smelled strongly of apples in a sour, fermented way. Sigrun frowned when he lifted it to his lips.
“The Seneschal even said that there’s no holiday where you give gifts to your lover—well, their name day, and Satinalia, of course, but you give them to friends on those days too. What I’m saying is that Anders made this whole thing up!” Her voice pitched in excitement by the end of her sentence, and she stared at Theron, convinced that would get a rise out of him.
Theron simply finished his pull from the bottle. When he was done, he tucked the bottle between his thigh and the dark blue cushion padding the wooden bench. “I know,” he said softly, his voice steady and calm though his cheeks were flushed to high color. He made a cursory attempt at finding the cork, giving up quickly when he didn’t see it anywhere near his lap.
“You do?” Sigrun sat up straighter, inadvertently knocking the cork to the ground. It bounced once, enticing Ser Pounce-a-Lot out of his hiding place near the hearth. Pounce chased it, batting it to and fro until he was satisfied that it had been subdued. He picked up the cork, his teeth sinking deep into the spongy material, and carried it out of the room, leaving Sigrun and Theron amused, but without a means to stopper the bottle. “If you know, why did you let him go running off to Amaranthine for a gift? Aren’t you curious as to why he would make something like that up?”
“He’s a bit of a fool sometimes,” Theron said.
Sigrun was taken by the fondness in Theron’s voice. Though he was often in the common rooms lately, and usually with a bottle of wine or a flagon of ale, she had never quite so clearly heard him express his affection for Anders. He never denied it, not that anyone would have been fooled had he tried, but she had gotten the impression that Theron was a man completely without sentiment. Even seeing them kiss under the mistletoe had only reiterated what she was certain she already knew—Anders was passionate, and Theron was aloof.
“We all are though, aren’t we?” He asked, inclining his head just slightly to meet Sigrun’s eyes. Once again he wrapped his fingers around the neck of the bottle and brought it to his lips. It was special—not wine, not ale, but apple brandy, found in the deepest recesses of the Keep’s wine cellar and saved for an occasion. Anders’ made up holiday was special enough, and after he had kissed Theron on the cheek before leaving for Amaranthine, Theron settled in front of the fire in the common room with the brandy, sipping it slowly as he awaited his return.
“I really don’t know what goes on in his head sometimes,” Theron said, smiling. “But I don’t care.. He can say all the foolish things in the world; he can rearrange the entire bloody calendar if he wants to, I don’t mind. You know why?” He twisted around on the bench, delicately holding the bottle away from his body to keep it from tipping.
“Because you love him,” Sigrun ventured, too fascinated by Theron’s drunken confessions to continue attempting to solve the mystery of Anders’ fake holiday.
“Because I adore him.” Theron smiled, lovesick and flushed. “It’s against the rules, you know.”
“Of the Wardens?” Sigrun’s voice raised to an exuberant squeak.
“Of the Dalish,” Theron said. He tapped his fingers slowly on his thigh, his brow knitting in thought. “I was always taught that shemlen—humans—were unsympathetic, evil creatures. Why else would they have allowed the Exalted March to happen? Why else would they only allow elvhen to live in their cities inside filthy slums? Why else were they brutish and stupid, always misunderstanding our customs and attacking our hunters?” Sigrun’s jaw went slack as Theron spoke, but she held her tongue. Outside of giving strategy or directions, Theron never spoke so much at one time. She was not inclined to interrupt him.
As if he’d only really noticed she was there, he offered her the bottle. When she declined it, he tilted carefully to the side to place it on the floor near the leg of the bench. “I keep thinking that I want to find my clan again.” Theron’s expression changed; a sad smile creeping up the corners of his mouth. “I want to march into the camp with Anders at my side and tell the Keeper ‘this is the man that loves me more than anyone ever has. If he has no place in my clan—in my family—then neither do I.’’” Theron paused, then laughed, covering his face with a hand. “I would be driven out with arrows at my back.”
“I didn’t know,” said Sigrun apologetically, and Theron shook his head.
“How could you?” Theron stretched out his legs, sliding them out from underneath him and over the side of the bench. “It’s not as if Dalish clans are forthcoming about anything.” He cast his gaze down, staring at his bare feet. “Sometimes I think about what would have happened had I not been conscripted into the Wardens. I hated it so much at first…leaving my clan to be a leader of shems. I saw no worth in it, no glory that mattered, because in the end I would still be a knife-ear and humans would still be ignorant brutes bent on destruction.”
Sigrun was no fool—she understood perfectly now why Theron froze when Anders put a hand on his shoulder in the dining hall, why he seemed halfway between genuinely smiling and forcing it when they spoke.
“I wonder…if there had been some other Warden here…would they have given Anders back to the templars? Then I think that it had to be me, not just so I would understand how being isolated by my clan had left me ignorant, but because of Anders. He needs to be free, and I don’t trust anyone else to have freed him.” Leaning forward, Theron planted his elbows onto his knees, resting his chin in his hands. “But I’m selfish. I’m not altruistic. I just want Anders by my side.”
Sigrun patted him gently on the shoulder as she stood. “I don’t think you have to worry about that,” she said, beaming. This outpouring of information was far more interesting than any made up holiday. She gave him another pat before leaving the room, stopping only to wink at Anders in the doorway and incline her head towards Theron.
“You must be terribly drunk, love,” Anders said as he joined Theron on the bench, placing a light kiss to one of Theron’s delicate red-flushed ears.
“A little,” Theron said, unfolding himself to put an arm around Anders’ shoulder, burying his fingers in his fluffy feathered pauldrons. “But it helps, sometimes.”
Anders curled a tendril of Theron’s red hair around his fingertips, lowering his head and shoulders to meet Theron’s lips, having long ago learned what little glances meant that Theron wanted a kiss. His heart was knotted in his chest, painfully held back from bursting for fear that scooping Theron up and kissing him sound and sweet would make him retreat again into his darkness, only emerging when they were alone.
“I meant to bring you something from the shop,” Anders began, a note of disappointment in his voice. “But when I got there, it had sold. I’m sorry, love.”
“I don’t want things—combs and necklaces and trinkets and holidays you’ve made up for an excuse to give me gifts.” Anders flushed a bit, hiding it by kissing the top of Theron’s head. “I only want you, and I am so angry that it’s so hard to say that when I love you so profoundly.”
Gently, with near imperceptible tremor in his hand, Anders cradled Theron’s cheek, brushing a tear away with his thumb. “You don’t need to be angry, love. I know you care for me; you don’t have to say it if it’s difficult.” But as he spoke, a lump rose in his throat. He kissed Theron’s head again, gently, holding him to his chest when Theron slipped his other arm around his shoulders, digging his fingertips into the back of his soft robes. He cupped the back of Theron’s head when he felt his breath hitch, crushing him as close as he could as he felt him begin to cry.