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Maker, he wants to hold her hand.
It’s a silly, boyish thought. At twenty, Alistair knows, he should be more interested in more commonly covered body parts, but he isn’t.
They’re walking north. There’s supposedly an old warden garrison – something about the Drydens and the reason the wardens were once exiled. But he doesn’t care about that. He’ll care about it later, when they’re closer. Right now, he’s watching the lovely Lady Cousland casually chat up an Antivan assassin.
He feels like he should be jealous, and part of him is. But she’s ignoring every single one of Zevran’s cheesy lines with nothing more than a few wry smiles. And so rather than jealousy, Alistair finds himself wanting to be a part of the conversation. Or at least, to walk beside them as they talk.
He wants to hold her hand.
He wants to tell people about it. Sing it from the rooftops. If there were any rooftops around. He could sing it from the tree tops, he supposes, but he’s not very good at climbing.
And besides, no one would want to hear it. Shale would just be disgusted. Sten would probably just stare at him like he’s insane. Leliana would giggle and tease him. Oghren would—Maker forbid—run with it and tell him where he should then put her hand. Morrigan… ugh. He doesn’t even want to think about that.
And he’s already made a fool of himself once, trying to talk to Wynne about this whole thing. ‘Pretend you’re a woman’, for the love of the Maker… He’s not doing that again.
So he lets himself drop back until he’s walking at the back of the group with Dog. “Aside from wanting to tell someone, I feel like you deserve to know. It’s probably only polite, actually. I should ask your permission.”
Dog whines at him, questioning.
“I would very much like to hold your lady’s hand,” he says. “And possibly do other things. A lot of other things. But right now, I really, really want to hold her hand.”
Dog barks. It’s almost encouraging. And, more importantly, it feels like approval.
When night falls, he sits beside her at the fire. She and Zevran have apparently talked themselves out, and Leliana has taken over instead, spinning the tale of the Knight Aveline.
Alistair doesn’t take his lady’s hand, but he rests his own on the ground beside hers, just close enough for their pinkies to touch. She says nothing, but leans over so their arms are pressed together, elbow to shoulder.
Zevran is surprisingly kind enough not to comment when he notices Alistair’s pleased blush.
Oghren isn’t.
They kill a dragon for Morrigan. It’s weird.
Well, actually they kill Morrigan’s mother, who seemed remarkably calm about it and turned into a dragon, and they did it so Morrigan didn’t get possessed by her mother. Also, there was a grimoire involved. And yet, he doesn’t suspect Morrigan wanted it for the book. It’s very weird.
But he’s the one to land the killing blow, hauling himself up onto the head and stabbing through the skull. He’s thrashed about all over the place, but eventually the dragon dies, and he manages to roll off and bounce back to his feet, sword at the ready just in case.
It’s only later, when he thinks about it, that he realises it’s probably the coolest thing he’s done in a while.
But as it is, he just stops for a moment, staring at the dead dragon, before looking over to Lady Cousland, who stares back, panting just as hard, her swords dripping black blood and hair in her face. They’re both exhausted, and hurt – aching from wounds opened, healed, and opened again, as well as overextended muscles. They’re both sweating and bloody and just plain gross, really.
And yet she’s still the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, and for a moment—just for a moment—he thinks she might think the same of him.
“Is… that it, then?” Leliana asks as she walks up to them, slinging her bow over her shoulder. “Did we win?”
Lady Cousland straightens to look at her, then shrugs and begins wiping down her blades to put away. Alistair tries for the same nonchalance. “We’ve still got to find the book.”
“Are you two alright?” asks Wynne. “You need to be faster with your healing potions, Alistair. I nearly had to resurrect you twice.”
“Well, yeah, but you didn’t!” he pointed out. “I had it under control.”
Lady Cousland chuckles but says nothing, as usual, already heading over to inspect the dragon’s corpse. She finds a key and leads the way into the hovel, where they find the book, and she puts it in her pack.
She doesn’t say anything as they head out and back to camp. But as they’re walking, she doesn’t take the lead for once. She makes sure to wait until Alistair is beside her, and only then does she begin walking. She takes his hand, laces their fingers together, and squeezes tight.
It’s sweaty and sticky and kind of uncomfortable, really.
But she doesn’t let go until they’re almost back to camp, when her dog runs out of the bushes to bark and dance around them, ecstatic they all made it back okay. She has to let go to stop him from jumping all over them.
Alistair doesn’t stop grinning all night.