Archive of Our Own ^beta

A queen might always run away with the help of a sky pirate looking to raise his bounty.

She ascends the gangplank slowly, her eyes cast down at her feet, her thoughts in turmoil. What is she doing here?

If I asked you to take me away, would you? Her voice uncertain, her hands clasped tightly so as not to tremble. It was easier when she could simply make demands of him. Time and affection seem to have stripped the ability from her; she can only ask, now, and fear for his answer.

A crooked smile, a considering look, Just name the time and place, Your Highness.

That is what she is doing here. It is so little and yet so much that she can hardly comprehend it.

He smiles at her from the top of the gangplank, reaches out his hand. “There’s a big sky out there,” he tells her, “waiting for us.”

She takes his hand, lets him lead her inside.

***

The desert spreads out below them, dusted with gold, threaded with blue and green where the Nebra makes its winding way though the dunes. It is breathtakingly beautiful. It is hers.

Some days, she wishes it weren’t. Today is one such day.

“Where would you like to go?” he asks.

She watches the landscape pass below, a beautiful blur of color and responsibility. “I care not,” she replies softly, swallowing the lump in her throat. “Take me anywhere.”

He looks up at her, his expression considering. He is not a foolish man, she knows; it is no surprise when his smile grows dangerous around the edges, when his voice drops as he tells her, “Be careful of the promises you make, Your Highness – or those you imply.”

She meets his gaze, holds it. Her heart is beating very fast. “I always keep my promises, pirate,” she tells him, her tone sure, composed. She is sure of nothing, but being queen has given her this much, a career gambler’s ability to hide her thoughts and emotions. She gambles every day, but especially now, here, with him.

“Far be it from me to deny you,” he tells her. “Setting course for anywhere.”

***

The alleys of the skycity are narrow, the cobbled streets rising and falling like ripples. It is sometimes hard to breathe so high above the clouds, but they traverse the streets with ease and duck out of sight of the crowds and the blue-garbed parijanahs. “We needn’t behave like thieves,” she hisses at him; he laughs and pulls her tightly against him into an alcove between two shops.

“I have stolen something far more precious than they can fathom,” he murmurs into her ear, his breath hot and his tone full of promise. She shivers. “How many pirates can say they’ve absconded with a queen?”

“I am not a queen today,” she tells him.

“Then my prize is greater than even I have realized,” he replies, his voice rich with amusement and something else. Sincerity. “People might know and consider a queen, but Ashelia remains a mystery to all but a select few.”

She says nothing, biting her lip to keep a smile from forming; he so rarely uses her name.

***

The tavern is small, smoky, and crowded. Someone tries to eke out music on an out-of-tune accordion in the corner, the attempts largely unheard as pirates laugh, argue, tell tall tales. She is pressed between him and a man the size of a behemoth with wild hair and a garish green eyepatch. The stranger’s laugh shakes the table like an earthquake. “High class number, your…”

“Amalia,” she says smoothly. It is a name worn to comfort and discarded years ago, but if Queen Ashelia is not the type to drink herself to lightheadedness in a pirate tavern, Amalia seems to thrive on it. She has lost count of the mugs of ale she has been brought, and knows with certainty that if she attempted to stand, she would not be able to remain on her feet.

“Watch your tongue, you cur.” She is pulled back against her companion’s chest, drops her head onto his shoulder, gives the stranger a challenging look. The ale has made her brave. “She may cut it out if you do not.”

“It would not be the first time,” she – Amalia – says.

The stranger laughs, long and hearty. “I see you’ve not lost your taste for danger, Balthier.”

He laughs too; she feels the rumble of it against her back. “You’ve no idea.”

***

Her hands are not as a noblewoman’s should be, being neither soft nor frail. They are covered in calluses and scars, hard with years of swinging swords, spilling blood, fighting for freedom and justice and sometimes revenge. She is not ashamed of them, but feels strangely uncomfortable as he lifts one of them to his lips, places an open-mouthed kiss on her palm.

They are not the hands of a noblewoman, but they are, perhaps, exactly the hands suited to a warrior queen. Perchance it is that which gives her pause; she cannot fully escape it even here, with him, but when his eyes meet hers, hot with desire, she knows it will not matter.

Even in the captain’s quarters, the bunk is small, cramped. She holds to him tightly so as not to tumble off, his skin hot and slicked with sweat under her hands, his mouth avid on her neck and shoulders, his pulse hammering at the base of his throat where her lips linger.

She can hear the sound of the ocean, somewhere in the distance, but it is overwhelmed by their harsh breathing and the pounding of her own heart.

***

They wade in the surf, soaked to the knees, squinting against the light of the sun. She feels different than she has in years, lighter somehow, perhaps not happier but certainly more at peace. He is smiling at her, cocky, sure, projecting his usual arrogance despite the fact that his pants are rolled up to the knee and his shirt unlaced almost to the waist. She closes the distance between them, presses against his body, and kisses the salt from his lips, reveling in the heady feeling of power and freedom as his arms come around her to hold her steady as the waves come and go. She has spent most of her adult life fighting to be queen; it is a comfort, in this moment, to simply be a woman.

“You are a marvel,” he murmurs against her lips.

Her own curve up as she answers, “No, I am not.” She does not know how to explain that it is exactly this which is so wonderful.