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[Maria13]

Sorry for making you feel rough,but I guess sometimes nasty things happen to good or goodish people... As for Howe, he's clearly a sadist, who else would have his fancy bedroom right on top of his dungeon....

[Esbatty]

Maria13 wrote...

Sorry for making you feel rough,but I guess sometimes nasty things happen to good or goodish people... As for Howe, he's clearly a sadist, who else would have his fancy bedroom right on top of his dungeon....

no no, its not your doing, I've been pissed off at him since 2 hours after i first popped DAO into my 360.

...

M, you do good work.

[Addai]

Egad, that was hard to read. You are too good at this.

[Maria13]

Chapter 59

Dragon 9:35             Nublis/Drakonis                The West Road/Denerim/Val Royeaux          [Present]

"Now," Alistair reassured one-year old Niamh, whom he was dandling on his lap and who was busy sucking three of her fingers, "contrary to appearances, mommy Bregeth is not trying to kill auntie Rous… They are just… Pretend fighting… That's all… So don't let it worry you…"

"We are keeping—" said Rous, who appeared to be running very quickly out of breath since she was being held by Bregeth in an arm lock on the ground, "fit."

"Yes," said Alistair, "they are both keeping fit."

Bregeth pointedly did not say anything.

It was Alistair's impression that despite their efforts Niamh was deeply unconvinced by this explanation, she appeared to be watching Rous and Bregeth tussle with rapt attention, waving her free arm in the air and making the occasional boisterous but incomprehensible comment.

They have departed early the previous day but were already well behind schedule and Alistair had begun to regret not bringing an additional horse as he now thought it would have made the travelling back less stressful overall.

During their stay at the Dalish camp, Alistair and Rous had gone to some lengths to assist Niamh and Bregeth with getting used to the horses. However, there is only so much acclimatisation that can be done with a young child and a recalcitrant elf. Niamh seemed to enjoy riding on the horses' backs well enough and actually cried when they took her down but since she was only a toddler she did not have the best balance and was totally oblivious to the dangers of falling.

Alistair was carrying her himself in a leather chain mail-covered sling on his back. It would have been easier and more interesting for her if he could have carried her on his chest, then she could have looked forward, but he deemed this was too dangerous and too exposed. He couldn't really blame her for getting bored and crotchety as she was only able to see the back of his neck.

As for Bregeth, who was to sit behind Rous on Hope, she had maintained that the elven pelvis was too narrow for horse riding.

"But don't your people ride halla?" objected Alistair.

"Of course they do, Shem," replied Bregeth, "and I do myself, however horses are different, their backs are wider. It's not natural for an elf."

Alistair may have been a mere beginner student when it came to Dalish culture, however even he was aware that 'not natural' was one of the most serious objections that could be made.

During the first leg of their journey today, he'd sensed things getting a little testy between the two women. He had overheard some abrupt exchanges followed by awkward silences. So much so that every now and then he felt compelled to stop by or look back and ask, "Is everything all right?"

The answer was either a blank stare or a terse, "Yes." which did nothing to reassure him.

Therefore, when they had all stopped for a break in a little grassy glade just off the West Road and Rous had suggested she do some sparring with Bregeth so they could both release a little pent un energy he had agreed happily enough so long as they did not scare the horses.

It was barely a few seconds after they had both grabbed twigs which were meant to stand in for knives, squatted down and began to snarl at and circle each other that he had realised just how great a mistake he had made.

Meanwhile Rous had been able to slip out of the arm lock.

"Oh, foul, foul… Bregeth, no hair pulling…" Called Alistair.

"If your female did not unadvisedly leave her hair lose for fighting because she is seeking to entice you, I would have no hair to pull…" Remarked Bregeth.

"I am not…" Denied Rous, but Alistair did notice that she'd flushed a little, so perhaps there was something to what Bregeth had said after all. He pursed his lips.

"Anyway, we agreed there was no such thing as a foul…" Added Bregeth.

"And you made me arbiter, I say foul, it's a foul…" Said Alistair very firmly, "Besides that is absurd, how is there going to be no foul? You're not going to gorge each other's eyes out are you?"

It took him far too long to realise that he had just made a second mistake. "Oh Maker… Please forget I even said that…"

They scuffled a little more and then called a truce. Bregeth gestured for him to hand her Niamh and he did. "Now it's your turn. I will arbitrate."

"Please no." Said Alistair appalled by the idea.

"C'mon Ali, don't be such a bloody spoilsport…" Said Rous at her feisty best arm punching him and handing him his twig.

He sighed, "If you insist…"

Rous was good at feints and fast but not a patch on Lawler. Neither was Lady Cousland a Lady Helmi: she lacked the out and out aggressiveness and the low centre of gravity, although she wasn't lagging far behind in insouciance. Alistair was aware throughout their sparring of his heavier build and the overweening advantage it gave him. Therefore, for a while he played along and let her amuse herself, amusing himself by watching her attempts at harrying him and then, before his credibility became an issue, he made a lunge, pinning her to the ground. Rous flailed.

According to the rules of sparring at that point, he should have levelled his twig at her throat and compelled her to yield, but there was no way he was doing that. He threw the twig into the underbrush whilst still keeping her down. Oh, her squirming beneath him as she tried to wiggle away felt so sweet, his body was responding to it. Before he knew it, he was kissing her passionately. After a tentative struggle and some rather pointless pounding of his back with her fists, which only made him laugh, Rous reciprocated.

They were so involved that it wasn't until Bregeth cleared her throat that they realised that, still holding Niamh, she was standing just above them studying them carefully and arching her eyebrows.

"Round one to Alistair." She declared, and then, "This poor elf does not presume to understand the strange game these Shems are playing with each other; However, she does allow herself to observe that it seems there is something they both need to get out of their systems…"

Alistair glanced up at her, "Could you please give us a moment Bregeth?"

"Of course."

"Thanks."

Alistair got off Rous and extended her a hand to her help her get to her feet and began to brush himself down. "Sorry about that," he said, "excitement getting the better of me… Again. You're too attractive that's your problem… Or is it mine?"

"You've got nothing to be sorry about" said Rose brushing herself off in turn, "but I think Bregeth is right, this is becoming ridiculous."

Alistair straightened up, "Day after tomorrow we should be getting back to Denerim, two days after that, suppose we meet at around noon on the roof of Fort Drakon? There is one last thing I have to tell you, something serious, but I need to do it in the right place. Then it will be up to you to make up your mind as to what happens next."

He leaned over, stroked her cheek and added quietly, "Rous, I want you very much but I don't want to have a relationship with you under force pretences of any kind. You've been completely honest with me and I am under a duty to reciprocate. Nothing else would be fair; you've already suffered far too much."

Rous bit her lip and nodded.

"One other thing… is everything well between you and Bregeth? I was… I'm not very good at balancing out all the people around me."

"Bregeth's all right." Said Rous, "We're really just getting to know each other a little better, testing our limits."

"Well, much as I might enjoy imagining girls fighting sometimes, if you could do that without pulling each other's hair out, growling and rolling on the ground, I'd be much happier."

Rous laughed, "Point taken. I think we both just needed to relax a little."

After they set off again he began to regret saying anything about it. The sparring seemed to have worked and Bregeth and Rous were now as thick as thieves. Alistair got the distinct impression that he was their main subject of conversation. It was discomforting. They were casting some rather intense glances in his direction and whispering among themselves. After a little while, Bregeth even began to groom Rous by delicately picking leaves and other woodland debris out of her locks while they rode, talked and giggled. When they'd arrived at the inn three hours later Bregeth was still very busy.

                                                                                                            ~...~

Two days later, back in Denerim and having settled Niamh and Bregeth in their new home, which was just a few doors down from their old one, Alistair returned to his workroom in the palace to find his desk cluttered with correspondence. Heaving a sigh, he started sifting through it, putting the stuff in three piles, 'urgent', 'action required' and 'information'.

The only thing that really caught his attention was a letter from Fergus Cousland. Fergus' handwriting was untidy and irregular. The letter began 'Your Majesty', but several thick, deep scores had been drawn through this and then Fergus had written instead 'Dear Alistair 'and stuck with that.

'Please find enclosed...' a quick scan of the letter revealed that Fergus had finally got round to drafting his account of the time he'd spent among the Chasind in the Kocari Wilds and had sent Alistair a first copy. Alistair put it carefully to one side because at that moment he had more urgent matters to which to attend. However, before retiring that evening he picked it up again and took it to his bedchamber.

He began reading the memoir which what some sixty pages long just before sleeping that night instead of the dull as ditchwater but necessary reading matter that he usually imposed on himself, or, the more raunchy stuff that he tended to favour (occasionally) as a private treat.

He found it riveting, and he was perusing it for far longer than he should have done given that the next day was going to be a busy one.

In his covering letter, Fergus explained that encouraged by Oswyn, they had gone to visit Ferdinand Genitivi at his home in the Denerim market district. The Teyrn and the Chantry Brother, renowned scholar and travel writer, appeared to have hit it off famously and a visit to the tavern was followed by a nightlong discussion about different cultures and customs that Fergus described as 'amazingly inspiring'. Late the next day he had started his own memoir and Brother Genitivi had very kindly agreed to edit it.

Alistair managed to finish reading the rest of the chronicle the following day by taking odd moments out between appointments, audiences and other official business. He found it very rewarding both as an insight into the Chasind and into the mind of Fergus Cousland. There were a several very explicit passages. Obviously, honesty about emotional and other needs was a Cousland trait that the siblings shared.

He was particularly struck by the conclusions that Fergus reached in the epilogue:

"And so it was that I spent almost ten months living among the Chasind a peoples often described as savage, wild and uncivilised. Then I returned to Denerim…

I found out that in my absence my family had been cruelly slaughtered, including my three-year-old child and my property and my possessions usurped by the murderer; a person of purported 'noble' blood who had been a guest of my parents.

My beautiful sister who had gone missing was subsequently captured by the same monster and most brutally treated. Thank the Maker, she survived. With some honourable exceptions, this situation had been accepted by my peers and endorsed by those then in a position of power.

Barbaric and uncultivated the Chasind may be, but they honour the duties of hospitality and such murderous behaviour would not be tolerated among them. I think the time may have come in which we Fereldans should seriously question our own values and opinions of other peoples, especially when we so casually describe such values as uncivilized or inferior to our own."

An intelligent and controversial conclusion, he thought. Somehow, it made him a little happier that Fergus Cousland was officially first in line for the throne. He would be seeing Fergus the following week at the Landsmeet, he must not forget to compliment him, and, of course, he was having a meeting with Rous on the morrow.

It was late. He needed to sleep, although he doubted he would, given how concerned he was about that pending conversation. He wondered, idly, for a moment, what were Fergus's thoughts on his sister's new dreadlocks?

                                                                                                ~...~

Neriya had been sitting in front of the empty parchment for well nigh on an hour now at the grey warden compound in Val Royeaux. In that time, her right hand had occasionally hovered towards the inkwell and then retreated firmly back to her lap. In the background, she could hear Cullivan's voice long-sufferingly issuing instructions regarding the preparations for their journey to the circle at Kirkwall.

The purpose was for Neriya to increase her arcane magic knowledge. The circle's Chief Enchanter, an elf named Orsino, arcane magic was generally deemed to be an elven specialisation, had written back to say that he would welcome the chance to assist a member of the order.

Cullivan had adjusted surprisingly well to being a Grey Warden, and was respected more for being aloof and reserved than for being openly her partner, which was a good thing for both of them. Even from this distance, she could detect that his voice had just reached its ultra-patient mode. This meant that any minute now she would be hearing his hurried footsteps on the staircase, the door would be thrown open and she would have to deal with a minor fit of temper and plentiful cursing in Dalish about clumsy, uncouth Shems and their ways.

Time was running short she had to put together this letter to Alistair. He deserved no less and in any event, Quentin Du Plessis had virtually ordered her to do it.

A few weeks' ago she had finally pinned the Commander of the Grey in Orlais down, "This friend you keep saying I remind you of… Her name didn't happen to be Fiona, did it?"

Quentin had looked away and started stroking his dog Michelle.

"I see." Neriya had said, "Alistair's mother…"

"Yes." Said Du Plessis, "His mother. She always regretted deeply… Well that's all in the past now, isn't it?" He raised his shoulders and let them fall. He seemed sad.

"Do I have to tell Alistair—"

"Non. Not necessary. He already knows, he made his own enquiries some months back and the order responded to them."

"Ah."

Strange, strange, what did Alistair make of it when he found out? she wondered, what did he think? Would he have pretended he didn't know?

She almost snorted aloud. Of course, not, he was resilient; eventually he would take it on board and carry on, just as he had done when they were struggling against the Blight. Just as he had when he fell in love with her. Just as he had when she left him. He was a fighter and he confronted things directly, saw them through and moved on, however inconvenient or painful… It simply wasn't in his nature to deny them… Their daughter was in good hands; she would have much more assuredness and stability being brought up by someone like Alistair rather than by a waverer like herself…

The exception being Morrigan and her ritual.

And that had been her fault. She owed him… She owed her daughter too…

She picked up the quill, took a breath and wrote:

'Dear Alistair, I really hope this letter finds you in a better frame of mind than when we last saw each other. I must begin by apologising both to you and our daughter…'

That was the easy part; the difficult bit would be what followed.

[Addai]

Ooh, Neriya appears! And the plot thickens!

[Maria13]

Ha-ha... I'm always thickening plots...

[Esbatty]

I like Cullivan. I do not like the idea of Cullivan-Neriya. But, in all fairness, Hardened Alistair's ... uhh... not so secret proclivities are not my cup of tea either. (Let me just say, in grade school I never got a gold-star for "Sharing".) So Neriya's Letter and its possible contents as it pertains to Alistair troubles me so.

But its your story, and I am enjoying it thoroughly as it is told. But yeah, just had to put that out there. Now I gotta go and make it up to Alistair, for the sh*t I put him through during my DAO canon run, in fanfic form.

[Maria13]

Chapter 60

Dragon 9:35 Eluviesta/Cloudreach Denerim [Present]

When Alistair arrived on the roof of Fort Drakon at about half past eleven, he was very surprised to see a familiar figure leaning over the parapet looking down at the city below. Rous was dressed like a boy again, with matching dark breeches and a dark surcoat over a white shirt. He smiled to himself, he was really beginning to love her fluctuating way of dressing, and he wondered whether it was attuned to her mood. She turned around as if she had sensed his approach and he waved to her briefly, she returned the wave.

That day was dull and overcast especially for spring, the sky almost opaque white, there was a coldish wind blowing from the South.

"You're early," he said as he reached her, he noted she looked pale, and her face was slightly pinched, there were darkish arcs under her eyes. He guessed his own face looked similarly haggard.

"I couldn't sleep," she said, "I was worried, Alistair."

"Ah," he said leaning on the wall next to her and smiling weakly. "I'm sorry. I see you kept the dreadlocks "he said clasping and fingering one of the crinkly braids that had fallen loose.

Rous turned round so he could see that most of the rest were held in place by the ironbark knife.

"Do you keep that knife under your pillow at night?" He asked. "Bregeth does."

"Really?" Asked Rous.

"Oh yes. I remember on one occasion I had to wake her up and she went for it, nearly got it in my hand or arm or somewhere worse…"

"Anyway I thought I'll keep my hair like this until after the Landsmeet. And I think I might go dressed like this, too." She said posing flirtatiously, raising her chin, her right hand behind her head.

"Dreadlocks and dressed like a boy," he remarked, "You're going to get a lot of attention."

"Alistair, are you jealous?"

"Will I have a reason to be?"

Rous laughed and he knew she wasn't going to reply to that. Then, collecting herself she asked seriously, "What is it you have to tell me?"

He shook his head, "you know how it is when you have it all prepared in your mind? And then you don't know where to begin? Well that's how I feel now," he said.

"Fergus always says to begin from the beginning."

"That's fine if you know where the beginning IS," he pointed out. "This is such a mess."

"Start with the simplest thing, then." Rous said.

"The plaque," said Alistair turning towards the roof and pointing, to the black marble plaque, "Do you know why I put it there?"

"You tell me." She said looking towards it.

"One of the first things I did as King was put that plaque there. Because I want Ferelden to remember always that one day it was saved by an elven mage, a golem, a drunken dwarf, an Antivan assassin, an awkward Qunari, an Orlesian bard, a bastard almost Templar and even an apostate ****…"

Rous raised her eyebrows but Alistair continued, "The dregs of society, in other words. Most of who were not even Fereldan. Because they, WE were BRAVE because we BELIEVED, we saved the humble and the poor, and children but we also saved the arrogant nobles. Only us." He was getting carried away in his passion, angry almost.

"Alistair, I don't follow…"

"Who are you, Rous?"

"Why… I'm me, Rous, Rosaura… Lady Cousland, I guess."

"Exactly. The enemy…"

"The enemy?" She frowned, "Me? You're not making sense, Alistair."

"You're a noblewoman. We were scum. I'm scum."

"Alistair…"

"Maker assist me, I want you so much." He paused. "But on my unworthy shoulders has fallen the obligation to make something of this country. Rous, your class, it seems to me, have done nothing for the poor and underprivileged for centuries, and now it's up to me, a lowly bastard, to try and fix that."

"You know, Alistair, you sound so much like Fergus." She said thoughtfully.

He was mildly surprised, he rubbed the back of his head "I read his essay. It was unexpectedly lucid."

"You may think of yourself as scum, Alistair, and Fergus may be a grandee of Ferelden, but there are commonalities." Rous pressed.

He nodded. "I'll give you that. At the beginning.… Before Ostagar I mean, I said once sarcastically that there was 'nothing like a Blight to bring people together '; because it seemed to me then that I was living in the midst of a fractured and divided society. But now, those words may have come true. For some of us at least. What I was trying to say, Rous, is that if we are with each other, sometimes it's going to be difficult, get nasty. I think Neriya saw that clearer that I did."

"I think you underestimate me, Alistair," Rous turned her hands palm up in front of her and looked at them, "after what I have been through, criticism is nothing."

He nodded, "that may be the case. But it may not only be criticism. Ferelden is still unstable, should something happen… To me, to Anora. Politics, I mean… you could be dragged into it."

"That is a risk I'm more than willing to take.…" She looked at him her jaw set, lips pursed.

"I'd so hoped and feared you would say that." Alistair said softly, "But what would Fergus…"

"Fergus supports you, well you and Anora, though Anora a little less; but, anyway, should something happen, we'd be dragged into it just the same."

He nodded again. "Well, I guess that was the first thing, the most obvious point… Unfortunately, I'm not finished yet."

He looked over towards the plaque again and pulled himself together crossing his arms over his chest. "Some of the things you have said, I can identify with. Do you remember a remark that you made in Lothering about a good death? I should have died over there. Actually, I did, well not entirely …"

Rous looked puzzled.

"Let me explain. It all started after we had killed Howe, one of the prisoners we released was a senior Orleisian grey warden called Riordan. Before the Blight started, I had only been a grey warden for about six months, there were a lot of things I didn't know and Duncan died standing next to Cailan at Ostagar before he could tell me.

"Well, when we were gathering our forces in Redcliffe prior to marching on Denerim to attempt to stop the horde, that night, Riordan asked to speak to Neriya and me. In essence he told us that in order to slay the Archdemon once and for all, the grey warden delivering the final blow also had to die…"

Alistair shook his head.

"I never knew this, Rous, not even imagined… There is some complicated theological explanation that I still can't quite grasp, something about the Archdemon's soul migrating on death to the nearest tainted body, which would be that of the warden. Apparently, when it does this, it discovers that it cannot inhabit the warden, a being who is not a darkspawn, and its soul is destroyed, together with the warden's… If there is no warden, it goes to the nearest darkspawn and is reborn anew and the Blight continues. This is why as wardens we accept the taint into ourselves…

"At the point that Riordan told us this there were only three grey wardens in the whole of Ferelden: us, in that room. Riordan was honourable he assured us that as the eldest, the senior warden, his was the responsibility to strike the final blow and that he would do so if he could. But equally, should he fail, it would be down to either I or Neriya.

"Neriya looked sick, quite sick. She glanced at me, her eyes seemed swollen, her lips blanched and her face had a greenish tint to it. I wondered whether she was more fearful for herself or for me.

"As for myself, as soon as the words left Riordan's mouth I was determined the person who gave their life should be me. All the pieces of my haphazard existence seemed to come together for me at that moment. This was why I was conceived, a spare, this was why I was shoved into the Templars; this was why I had passed the joining. It was destiny. My destiny. I, the bastard that no-one would miss would be the one to slay that thing that threatened the whole of Thedas…"

Alistair sighed.

"But there was a catch, wasn't there? I should never have… I should never… Have loved Neriya. Given myself to her, accepted her in return. Maker forgive me, Andraste have mercy, I should have done what a good soldier would have done: kept myself at a distance. Retained my virtue, my purity. The affection that had sustained me for months, given me courage and purpose… I shouldn't have shared it with her… Just used it and done my duty to the last.

"Riordan fully understood the impact such news would have on us and suggested we retire to prepare ourselves for what was to come. I did that, I could see Neriya desperately wanted a kiss or an embrace but I simply nodded at her, there were tears running down her face now and silently she lifted her shoulders and spread her hands in a gesture of hopelessness or entreaty, I shut my chamber door behind me leaving her in the passageway.

"Sometime later, I don't know how much later, there was a knock on my door. Neriya stepped into the room, her expression intent and serious. She explained that she had been approached by Morrigan.

"Morrigan was an apostate who had joined our party early on, just after Ostagar. I couldn't stand the woman, there was something deeply selfish and mendacious about her, quite apart from the fact that she, well, her past seemed full of darkness, she was not right, Morrigan, not right at all. If ever there were a maleficar…

"Well, according to Neriya, she had a solution. The solution involved my lying with Morrigan, conceiving a child… Because I was a grey warden, the child would be immune to the taint…

Rous's eyes widened, and a look of incredulity crept over her features.

Alistair continued, "If I did that, she said, the Archdemon's soul would travel to the child rather than to the warden, in Morrigan's words, 'the child would call out to it like a beacon' and then Morrigan would use the ensouled child for her own ends. My first reaction, of course, was to say 'no', but Neriya begged me…

"Rous, I loved Neriya, more than my life, more than I can say, cherished every inch of her body, every ounce of her flesh… I love her still, wherever she is. And she loved me; it wasn't selfishness that motivated her, no, not at all… One of us was almost certain to die, and the other could not bear the thought of carrying on alone. And we were both young… We were trapped. Trapped by my heedlessness…"

His voice dropped, his head bowed. "Please understand." He'd hoped Rous would respond somehow, react, say something, even place a hand on his arm, but she stood transfixed.

He continued, "I spoke to Morrigan she assured me the child would come to no harm. According to her what had to be done had to be done that very night… Morrigan was not physically unattractive, quite the contrary. But she repelled me and always had, it was as if I could see her shrivelled little soul every time I looked at her face…

"So I lay with her.

"It was ghastly… Our dislike was mutual and she was unkind, she used me wantonly, gleefully… the body responds, but the mind is quite a different matter, and as for feelings…

He glanced at Rous. There seemed to be tears standing in her eyes. "Please don't…" He said quietly. She looked away, blinking.

"I think that is the most unforgivable thing I have done, anything else, really pales in comparison… I conceived a child, I did it to save Neriya's life and my life with Neriya, I don't know if you follow… What I mean to say is, if it had been me alone… or with Riordan and not with my love… I do now believe I would have gone through with it and to that very limited extent, I can forgive myself.

"It's odd, if I'd died, no-one would remember me and, except for Neriya, no-one would have cared. I doubt there'd even be anything to remember me by. It's a very strange sensation to stand here now, as King, and think over all that… I try to do it every now and then, though, because I believe it's good for me, it helps me put things in perspective.

"So you see, when I struck the final blow, Riordan had perished earlier in the battle for Denerim, I should have died over there, in my turn… In fact, I did die, if only for a few seconds… My whole body, sort of seized up, suddenly I couldn't breathe, my lungs had frozen. I felt my heart slowing and then stop beating and become still as a stone in my chest… A horrible feeling. I fell to my knees and heard a rattle emerge from my own constricted throat …

"And then… This is really difficult to describe, I felt my mind being torn apart, a little bit at a time, memories, thoughts, even feelings; goodbye grief, goodbye love… Like it was being ripped or slashed with something really sharp and remorseless, a razor, something like that… But the strange thing was… There was something that was still me beyond that, the last piece of 'me' as it were, something that I never knew I had until that day…"

Alistair paused. "I am hopeless at explaining things like this, I'm sure Neriya would make a far better job of it, it's very frustrating to know what you want to say but not be able to find the right words and to be left babbling like a newborn…

"But then whatever had killed me, shredded me, moved on. Presumably to the child. The innocent I conceived with… that woman. That is the worst thing I have done in my life and should I live to be a hundred— ha a hundred, I'll be lucky to see fifty… It will still be the worst thing… I passed, that poisoned chalice, and as a grey warden, I know a thing or two about poisoned chalices, to a child. To an innocent. To MY child, my child."

"How old—"

"Three, he or she would be three now…"

"Believe me; it's difficult enough to tell you all this Rous, knowing that you might reject me. But one day, Maker help me, I'm going to have to tell her, my other child… Niamh…"

Alistair was silent for a while. Rous stood almost with her back to him looking away, perhaps her lips were moving, he couldn't be sure, it could have been a trick of the light. He took a breath, continued.

"There were other consequences, too. Of course, what happened to me doesn't even begin to compare with what happened to you… or to Oswyn, but… When one is used in that way, against one's basic will either for sport, procreation or to satisfy another's lust, it changes you.

"Something inside you dies, perhaps the belief that physical love is always a manifestation of spiritual love. That is in itself is an absurd belief, of course, but one that I think many of us hold dear nonetheless.

"When you've been through something like that, it marks you; you're never quite the same again.… And no, I'm not comparing what I went through with what you went through, which must have been… Inconceivable. But… Well, I think it coarsened me in a way.

"I had been very proud to surrender my virginity to Neriya as she surrendered hers to me… That was very sweet. And awkward at the same time, a bit funny even… I recall at one point, speaking aloud and trying to convince myself to make love to her rather than just spending the whole night cuddling, kissing and chatting.

"But after what happened with Morrigan things changed. Things changed a lot. I couldn't quite be with Neriya again the way I had been before. Delight changed to discomfort, pleasure to… I kept having these intrusive thoughts. There were things I used to do with her that I could not now bear to do.

"Then things got very hectic. I was declared King. The grey wardens arrested Neriya and I and interrogated us following the slaying of the Archdemon. They suspected something... I had to marry Anora. And a few weeks after that Neriya… left.

"Suddenly I was alone again. Just like before. Just like most of my life. Oh yes, I was a King now, I had a wife, but I didn't want her and she didn't want me. I've never consummated my marriage to Anora, by the way, it just wouldn't… Well.

"So I dallied. I discovered in my present situation that it was very easy to ask for physical gratification and to get it. I felt I needed or deserved it, almost as much as drink. And if I didn't want to ask for it, I just had to loiter in certain quarters of Denerim at night and someone would offer it to me. And now I had plenty of money to pay for it.

"Some of my affairs were more serious than others. Some almost became something else, but for at least two years I was emotionally withdrawn, I just didn't want to get involved because if you got involved, I'd learned, you got hurt.

"And then Neriya returned, I thought it was a turning point, a fresh start. That she wanted to spend the rest of her life with me. But she was in two minds about us and eventually made her decision and left. So it happened all over again.

"And there you have it, the intimate story of glorious King Alistair in a nutshell…"

"So where is this child?" Rous asked.

"I have no idea…"

"You have no idea?"

Alistair hesitated, "As I said. Morrigan left just after the battle of Denerim… Neriya and I suspected she left for Orlais, and Neriya went in search of her but… No, I don't where that woman is… Or my child."

Rous turned away she was not making eye contact, but looking towards the horizon, beyond the sprawl of Denerim. "This is… This is…" Her hands gripped the edges of the parapet, her knuckles were white, her body rigid.

He detached her hands from the wall and took them in his, holding them tenderly. He studied her face, looking her in the eyes, "Let me tell you what I can offer you," said Alistair, "I pledge to you by my honour and by the Maker that I will be faithful. I will share everything with you, there will be no secrets between us. I will protect you and care for you to the very best of my ability. I will treat you always as an equal and respect your opinion.

"I can't guarantee we will have children, that is beyond my powers and in the lap of the Maker, likewise I cannot say we will have a long life together, but while it lasts I will do my best to ensure our happiness… and make provision for you when I am gone."

Rous exhaled. "Give me time, Alistair, I have to think about this, I have to… Work through it…" She glanced at him from under dark lashes her lips taut, "I'm sorry." She muttered.

"No, don't be." He replied gently releasing her hands. "This is a heavy burden."

Looking away from him again she added, "I'll see you next week at the Landsmeet. Perhaps I'll have an answer for you then, perhaps not… I don't know. Now leave… Please leave."

He kissed the nape of her neck. "Thank you for listening…"

Rous simply shook her head.

He walked away, each step separating him from her taking a deep effort of will; feeling as if he were dying inside all over again.

[Esbatty]

Damn, I miss Morrigan. Her and Alistair were the highlights of my Warden's life. I await Kirkwall Adventures Alistair! *prays he meets Serendipity at some point*

[Maria13]

Chapter 61

Dragon 9:35         Eluviesta/Cloudreach            [Present]

Denerim

The position of master of ceremonies of the Landsmeet, fell by turn to each noble house. The post could be carried out by the head of the House in question, one of their children, their spouse or even a designated official or servant. Once long ago a fractious bannorn nobleman (from where else would he be?) with intent to insult all his peers and his monarch had appointed the fourteen year-old girl who emptied his chamber pots as master (or mistress) of ceremonies. The chroniclers agreed that she proved to be surprisingly competent, and towards the end of her session someone proposed she should receive a stipend. The house voted to award her twenty-five silver, a princely sum in those days which she later used as a dowry to make a very good marriage.

Today the master of ceremonies happened to be Oswyn of Dragon's Peak appointed by his father old Bann Sighard.

Alistair was wearing charcoal grey, the two mabaris of house Theirin, which he had now permanently adopted as his emblem were embroidered on the left side of his surcoat. Mince, his real live mabari, was trotting at his side, Alistair did not quite understand why he had insisted on taking the hound along over Anora's initial protests, but it seemed right somehow. Perhaps it was because it was his dog who had kept him the most company over the last two weeks and he wanted to find some way to express his gratitude.

When Alistair and Anora entered the hall, Oswyn called the house to attention. There was silence as the monarchs took their seats on the two high-back chairs upholstered in blue leather placed on the elevated dais overlooking the large chamber. Meat obediently sat just to Alistair's left whereas Lawler stood to the back slightly behind the chairs his hands clasped in front of him twitching occasionally. Once she had settled comfortably, Anora quietly signalled to Oswyn declare the session open.

First order of the day was welcome, followed by a quick prayer to the Maker for those who had passed on, including the Bann of Southern who was not mentioned by name, and the presentation new members.

Alistair scanned the chamber and then looked quickly towards where he knew the Couslands were sitting. Fergus seemed engaged in a whispered conversation with peer next to him gesturing animatedly, whereas Rous, whose hand was resting on her brother's arm and who indeed appeared to be wearing male clothing, with her hair still in dreads, may have smiled shyly but certainly lowered her gaze when she saw Alistair seeking her out with his eyes.

Following a brief introduction Agus of Southern stood up to make his maiden speech, he was taller and more serious than the impetuous lad Alistair recalled from some months ago. Unsurprisingly, he seemed nervous. Alistair sat back and appeared to relax, stroking Mince's head, determined to show no concern as regards the possible contents of his oration whereas Anora leaned forward with her elbows on her knees and an expression of concentration on her face. They should have saved their concern, Agus's speech was as bland and general as most in such circumstances were, although he did shoot an unreadable glance in Alistair's direction, just before sitting back down, Alistair smiled briefly at him and joined in the polite applause.

Then Oswyn gave a brief presentation of the facts behind Blanche Brown's claim to the Arling of Southreach, although a summary of the contents of the most relevant documents had already been circulated to those attending.

Full-figured Blanche was looking tense. Alistair's mind turned to when he had met her a few days ago to discuss her entitlement; she had been bold, assertive and outspoken then. She would be at home amongst the nobility, he had thought. She was especially indignant at the way her mother, Dana, had been treated when her uncle, her mother's brother, Arl Bryland had died. Her mother had attempted to see her niece Habren only to be turned away at the gate of her keep by "some puffed-up Orlesian," she said. "It broke her heart, to be so treated," she added, "I am convinced it hastened her own death."

Alistair had already considered the originals of the documents in question quite thoroughly, as had Anora, and the interview was a mere formality. They both independently concluded the claim was good. Alistair had little doubt that any reasonable person would be equally persuaded. And so it proved. As the eldest child of Bryland's disgraced sister, Blanche was confirmed as the new Arlessa and burst into tears when the vote favoured her. Her four children cheered from the popular gallery. Oswyn had prepared a cloak with the Southreach device and draped it over her shoulders before escorting her to her newly allocated seat in the assembly where the peers sitting either side of her quietly congratulated her, smiling in welcome.

They were that to proceed to the second part of the Landsmeet when Fergus Cousland took to his feet. "There is another matter under this section that I wish to raise," He said. Oswyn nodded to him to proceed.

"It is now several years since the blight was quelled" said Fergus, "but there is one Arling in Ferelden that is still vacant… The Arling of Denerim." Fergus paused apparently for dramatic effect, "as all those present would be aware, in recent times this was first held by the late Arl Kendalls, whose only son and heir Vaughan Kendalls irrevocably disgraced himself by assaulting and kidnapping several citizens of the alienage, a heinous crime by any account. Said Vaughan subsequently disappeared, as did many citizens during the Blight, this being the reason why it remains unallocated..."

Alistair glanced at Anora who shrugged, from which Alistair deduced that she had no idea where this was going either.

"And then of course," Fergus continued, "The Arling was usurped as was my own Teyrnir of Highever, by one Rendon Howe. I will not go into the detail of the many infamies committed by that person. My proposal today is as follows, that all entitlement to the Arling be removed from both the Kendalls and the Howes and their descendants. In fact, I must say as an aside that one of my advisers has pointed out the Howes never held it legitimately in the first place... Be that as it may, the reason for proposing their removal is the that the holders disgraced themselves by the most reprehensible and abusive forms behaviour committed upon their fellow citizens and have shown themselves unworthy of such a title. I will then put to the assembly that the title Arl of Denerim be bestowed upon one…" Fergus raised his eyes from the parchment before him and glanced towards the dais, "Alistair Theirin, current King of this realm."

Shocked, Alistair jerked upright in his seat and then turning quickly whispered urgently to Anora, "Maker's breath! I had no idea, I was not consulted. I swear it." Anora whose eyebrows were raised, placed her hand over Alistair's in reassurance. "The Couslands are well known for embarking on frolics of their own," she muttered back.

"Ser Alistair, as is well known, is a commoner, and I intend no insult by pointing that out, although he has some royal blood from an indirect source…"

Alistair could not avoid rolling his eyes at this turn of phrase, Fergus's lips twitched, he seemed to have caught the gesture but he continued, "He is the first person in many centuries to be a sovereign of Ferelden without holding a title other than that of monarch. Since he has now been in power for some four years and has not in that time troubled himself to either steal, usurp or create one…"

There were a few guffaws from those assembled at this point and Fergus paused until they had died down, "I suggest that it falls to this Landsmeet to compel him to take one and enlist him in our ranks, whether he likes it or not..."

"Now there's cheek for you" said Anora but he noted there was something resembling a smile playing on her lips. Alistair reflected ruefully that suddenly everybody appeared to be having some fun at his expense.

"... Apart from anything else, not having a title gives him no right to vote in our proceedings, should he ever wish to do such a thing. I further suggest that the title in question be that of Arl of Denerim, which pertains to our noble ever suffering capital city that he helped save from total destruction in Dragon 9:31."

"As a consequence I would therefore ask the Landsmeet this morning to put to vote three things: Firstly to remove entitlement to the Arling of Denerim from the Kendalls, secondly to remove the same from the Howes and thirdly to bestow it upon the aforementioned Ser Alistair."

Alistair leaned towards Anora, "I don't think I should remain in the chamber for any of these votes... Would you agree?" Anora nodded, gestured to Oswyn and then when he approached whispered to him. Oswyn eventually announced, "His Majesty the King is excusing himself from this meeting until the three votes proposed by Teyrn Fergus are concluded."

Alistair stood and so did the Landsmeet attendees though he waved them down before leaving the assembly chamber with Mince at his heels.

Once outside he judged it best to stay within the general area, he did not have much idea as to how long the proceedings would take. So he found one of the stone benches placed in the passageways surrounding the chamber and sat himself down with Mince at his feet.

The corridors were abuzz with servants from the diverse noble households running on errands hither and thither for their masters and mistresses, nevertheless not a few of them stopped to look at him and then moved on when he ignored them. After a few minutes a serving girl approached him and asked him if he would like some refreshment Alistair asked for some water if that was not too much trouble.

He was just beginning to get very bored when someone came up and leaned on the wall next to him.

"I am so sorry," Said Rous, "I had no idea he was going to do this..."

Alistair shrugged, "I'll just have to grin and bear it, I guess..."

"I feel bad; it may have been me who gave him the idea... I didn't tell him anything about our conversation the other day except for that bit where you called yourself scum and said we were the enemy…" She paused, "Fergus… He grinned and said something like, 'Aye, I see where he's coming from, perhaps we ought to fix that…'"

"Don't worry yourself about it, Rous." Said Alistair, "But…"

Rous bent down and started scratching Mince's ruff, sinking her fingers into the fur just under his brown studded leather collar. "Nice little doggie, aren't you, just like my Barker…"

Surprised because Mince hardly ever let anyone pet him without at least a little growling, Alistair followed her features with his eyes almost not noticing the pretty good view he had of her cleavage. She turned her face towards him and said quietly batting her eyelashes, cheeks slightly flushed, "'Yes', Alistair, my answer is 'yes', I think it was always 'yes'… but there is one condition, it's a rather difficult, come visit me this evening and bring the… Adorable little doggie…" she said the last three words much louder so she could be overheard.

"I should go now." She said, "Until later."

"Later." Echoed Alistair, unable to say anything else because his mouth had suddenly gone dry and his heart was doing demented somersaults in his chest. Mince moped at his feet.

When Oswyn came to summon him back in he was sipping water lost in his own thoughts.

Anora turned and her blue eyes sparkling at him when he took the seat next to her again. "Welcome Arl of Denerim." She tilted her head. "You should smile, Alistair, but don't show your teeth and above all, don't wave."

"Thank you." He said curtly.

He sat down with what he hoped was not quite a closed-lipped smirk hovering over his lips.

"Obviously you gave some mind to your maiden speech while you were out there?" Anora asked.

"Maid—"

                                                                                          ~...~          

Alistair was intrigued to see that the Couslands lived in a house rather than an estate when they were in Denerim, even if it was one of those elegant four storey houses with balconies in an arcaded square he used to admire at a distance whenever he wandered through the city at night. He hadn't noticed the silver laurels that decorated the wide windowed frontage or the fact that the balcony surrounds and window frames were painted in Cousland green before, but now they seemed to stand out with an almost painful obviousness.

"I've come to see the lady of the house," He said to the major-domo who opened the door.

"The Teyrn will see you first, Your Majesty." Sniffed the servant.

"Very well." Said Alistair, what choice did he have? The servant sniffed some more as Mince trotted through the doorway in his wake.

He was ushered through a hall with the Cousland device set in tile in the centre and up a staircase and another. A heavy walnut door was pushed open for him and he entered into a well-lit library that smelt agreeably of recent sunlight, leather and dust.

Fergus stepped forward with an extended hand. "Alistair! How pleasant to see you in proximity rather than at a distance..."

Alistair noted that Fergus had changed his clothes whereas he still wore this morning's charcoal garments. The Teyrn slapped him heartily on the shoulder after pumping his hand.

"Lovely dog too..." Fergus put a hand out and Mince growled. Alistair almost felt proud of him.

"Well now..." Said Fergus. There were a few moments of awkward silence. Alistair would be damned if he thanked Fergus for the events earlier that day and it seemed to him Fergus was reluctant to congratulate him on that utter hash of a maiden speech.

"So you spend a week with my sister away from Denerim and she comes back with her lovely hair in I don't know what barbaric style held in place by a knife..."

Alistair sighed. "Sorry about that..."

Fergus shrugged. "Not your fault." Then he added, "I hear you were somewhat more inspired when speaking to the troops prior to entering Denerim than this morning..."

"I don't like surprises and anyway that was fighting, not... politics." Said Alistair.

"I am not going to apologise." Said Fergus.

"I came to see your sister..." Said Alistair turning towards the door and about to walk through it.

"Tell me... Speaking of fighting." Said Fergus. There was a quaver in his voice. Alistair turned back towards him, embarrassed by his own abruptness.

Fergus had crossed his arms over his chest and his head was bowed. "Who actually killed Howe?"

"Neriya." Said Alistair, "We'd developed a basic strategy by that point... I would target the mages, Neriya the warriors. Howe had two mages, they were powerful, it took me some time to deal with them."

Fergus took a deep breath, still not looking up. "Were there any last words?"

"Yes." Alistair paused, "I should add he died on the floor of his own dungeon amid convulsions as his blood congealed slowly in his veins as a result of Neriya's spell saying he deserved better..."

"He deserved better?"

"Yes. His precise words were 'I deserved better.'" Said Alistair softly.

"Thank you... Thank you... Alistair. We owe you so much..."

"You owe Neriya, if you owe anyone... Although it was a joint effort. Howe was... filth he deserved what he got." Alistair paused. "He is not worth troubling your thoughts over. Not yours, nor Rous's."

Apparently still overwrought, Fergus stumbled to a nearby chair and sat down heavily he was clasping his stomach as if in pain. "Has Rous..."

"No she never asked me."

"That's good." Said Fergus.

"Shall I ask one of the servants to bring you something to drink? It might help" Suggested Alistair.

"Ask for some wine, Alistair. Red."

"I'll do that."

Alistair took a seat in his turn whilst they waited for the servant. After a few minutes he said, "I read your essay... I liked it a good deal, Teyrn."

"Thank you." Said Fergus.

"I mean it." Said Alistair, "You went through quite a lot..."

Fergus grinned humourlessly.

"Tell me..." Said Alistair leaning towards him. There was a discreet knock on the door and Alistair hastened to open it taking the wine and the cups from the servant without allowing him to enter the room.

He set them on a small mahogany circular table pulled out the cork and poured a generous measure for each of them. Once Fergus had drank a first draught Alistair continued. "Were there many former Templars out there in the wilds?"

Fergus tossed down the first cup of wine and then let his eyes run over contents of the bookcase. "There were a great many Fereldan males there who appeared to have a considerable amount of training in fighting... But I didn't ask where they came from and they certainly weren't telling... I assume the answer to your question is therefore 'yes'... why do you ask?"

"As a former Templar... Just curious really..."

"I see." Fergus replied but he didn't sound convinced.

"And the Chasind woman who nursed you back to health automatically assumed that you would wish to marry her daughter."

"That's correct, yes. It was quite funny really, I suppose. A few weeks after coming back to my senses, I found myself attempting to explain to her that I already had a wife who I was quiet happy with, and no, I didn't want or need another... Eventually they brought in a Fereldan clan member who acted as interpreter..."

"Can I ask you something?"

"Go ahead."

"This Godfrey..."

"So she told you. She must trust you. Don't worry about him, Alistair, or his deputy or any of those involved..." Fergus waved a hand in the air and smiled showing his teeth. Through those gestures Alistair caught a glimpse of something else residing under Fergus's usual urbane aristocratic exterior. "I'm not entirely ineffective—"

"I never..."

"Ignore me..." Said Fergus, "Rous doesn't know. Best that way."

"I see."

"I shouldn't keep you much longer, Alistair; she'll doubtless tell me off if I do."

Alistair hesitated. "She can be a bit scary when she gets angry, can't she?"

Suddenly Fergus's face lit up, "So you know already?"

"Oh yes..."

Fergus quaffed another cup of wine. "Just one thing more..."

Alistair paused with his hand on the door handle.

"Treat her well."

                                                                                             ~...~

"There's beef pie," Said Rous, "or some cold cuts..." They were in the kitchen on the ground floor and she'd seated him at a wooden table that was probably used by the servants when there were enough of them around. The table was next to a huge cast metal cooking range, still radiating heat.

"How—"

"I thought you would come straight here..."

"Pie please."

She bought out the remains of what had been a handsome beef pie with a rich thick pastry crust and a metal fork from what was obviously the larder at the other side of the room. She also filled a tankard with some ale and set that in front of him. He was reminded of Bregeth by the casualness she seemed to have taken to feeding him.

"And..." Rous bent down and scratched the mabari's head.

"Mince," said Alistair, pausing just before putting a forkful of pie in his mouth. He had just remembered that he really was hungry. Rous flinched at the name.

"Really? That's..."

"Appalling, I know. I was going through a bad time when I got them... " He said chewing looking down speculatively at the tightly muscled hound who had just started whining seeing his master begin to eat.

"Them?"

"Meat died... Well he was killed, actually."

"Like Barker..." Rous paused, "But my excuse is I named him when I was just sixteen. I'll get 'Mince' some chicken."

"Thanks." And then, "Did you make this?"

Rous shook her head. "No embroidery is about as domesticated as I get…"

"Embroidery…" He looked at her speculatively, "So that was no lie…"

"No lie." She said, "but I'm not great at it either… It's… Calming, sometimes."

"Well, it's nice pie anyway…"

"We have a good cook… An old guy."

"A guy… Huh. So…"

"Finish eating, Alistair, then we'll talk." She said pointing to the remains of the pie on his plate. He obeyed. In the meantime, she pulled herself half a tankard and began to sip it sitting opposite of him for a moment the only noise in the kitchen was Mince slurping and growling as he consumed the cold cuts.

Eventually Alistair polished off all the food on his plate and a second helping, just to show willing and raised his hazel eyes to her.

"The condition is this." Said Rous, looking at the coarse grain wood of the table. "That you do what you can to find your other child—"

"—"

"No." She said, "Let me finish. The important thing is that you should make the effort. Once found, if you do find it, deal with the consequences accordingly… If it is a monster or a danger… I don't think any of us who survived the Blight can afford to be idealists, Alistair… But I think either way, whatever the result, you need to search for it, even if you never find it, even if it is dead; at least you will be able to say that you tried your best and look Niamh in the eyes when she is older… Because if you don't Alistair, and if you don't start now, I guarantee that the time will come soon enough when you will not be able to live with yourself, nor anyone else with you..."

Modifié par Maria13, 04 avril 2011 - 05:11 .

[Esbatty]

Why does nobody trust Morrigan? Just because she comes from a shady background, heckles everyone mercilessly, and uses the occassional spot of Blood Magic, doesn't make her such a bad person. I mean they cut a deal for their lives and everyone is out to break it. What happened to people's word being a bond?

...

And damn if Mabari stories are always so damn tragic. Fereldens and their Dogs, indeed. I just love the idea of a nation that reveres and prizes them so. That the rich and nobility not only send troops but also their dogs to war. There are whole militia forces based entirely on the training and use of the Mabari War Hounds, that coupled with the fact that Mabaris are smart as hell, have personalities, and chose their "Master"... they're perfect to represent the Theirin line. Especially Alistair.

I love that you touch on all the little things in addition to your wide personable cast, if only I could grasp the date system they use in Thedas. I barely, just barely, got a grip on the naming of the centuries and whole colon system, yet it you use it so easily. Kudos, M.

...

But damn, I just can't see Morrigan as some kind of "muahahahaha" bad guy. But I totally get Alistair's dislike of her. The way you set up that she "ruined" intimacy for him, and him just totally embracing his Warden-amplified appetite for the fairer sex.

Also what is with the Theirin boys and Loghain's Daughter? How can none of them touch their own wife? She is an incredible woman, is she that intimidating? *sigh*

Now I'm rambling, sorry. Keep up the awesome, Maria. I'm still awaiting the contents of Neriya's letter.

[Maria13]

Esbatty wrote...

Why does nobody trust Morrigan? Just because she comes from a shady background, heckles everyone mercilessly, and uses the occassional spot of Blood Magic, doesn't make her such a bad person. I mean they cut a deal for their lives and everyone is out to break it. What happened to people's word being a bond?

...

And damn if Mabari stories are always so damn tragic. Fereldens and their Dogs, indeed. I just love the idea of a nation that reveres and prizes them so. That the rich and nobility not only send troops but also their dogs to war. There are whole militia forces based entirely on the training and use of the Mabari War Hounds, that coupled with the fact that Mabaris are smart as hell, have personalities, and chose their "Master"... they're perfect to represent the Theirin line. Especially Alistair.

I love that you touch on all the little things in addition to your wide personable cast, if only I could grasp the date system they use in Thedas. I barely, just barely, got a grip on the naming of the centuries and whole colon system, yet it you use it so easily. Kudos, M.

...

But damn, I just can't see Morrigan as some kind of "muahahahaha" bad guy. But I totally get Alistair's dislike of her. The way you set up that she "ruined" intimacy for him, and him just totally embracing his Warden-amplified appetite for the fairer sex.

Also what is with the Theirin boys and Loghain's Daughter? How can none of them touch their own wife? She is an incredible woman, is she that intimidating? *sigh*

Now I'm rambling, sorry. Keep up the awesome, Maria. I'm still awaiting the contents of Neriya's letter.

Dear Esbat

You make some ruddy good points.  The genius of the plot of DA:O is that it there weren't many inarguably bad characters (Howe, Jarvia and a few others being the exceptions).

Well, one reason for distrusting Morrigan is that it seems she was sent with the wardens under somewhat false pretences, in that it was always her intention to secure a pregnancy. OK, so from her POV she more than earned that favour through services rendered and in any event, it seems that the plan wasn't entirely Morrie's but more Flemeth's.  To a certain extent I go along with this Morrie was used by Flemeth as much as she used Alistair or whatever warden.  I don't think I've set her up as a total bad guy just as rather selfish with her own aims, I even leave room for doubt that she may actually have loved the child more than she was ready to admit even though it was taken before she could properly bond with it.  Now, to a certain extent like Alistair, she does not want to think about it and just gets on with it. Neriya actually rejects her own child so, every one is hurting...

The sexual intimacy thingy... Many guys as do many women like to believe that they are capable of disassociating sex from feelings.  I really don't think that's the case, it's just something we all like to pretend.  Morrie seems to have quite a lot of sexual experience and may be used to using sex to get what she wants or takes a very practical approach to the act.  Alistair doesn't and he is still rather innocent or naive when it comes to sex and what happened messes with his head quite a bit whereas Morrie can take it coolly.

Yep, I do like shaggy Mabari tales...

Anora is an incredible woman because she is logical and practical, rather like Morrie, the Theirin guys are not, they are primarily driven by emotion so this would make the relationship with her difficult. As I see it even if she marries Alistair I can't see her coming to love him or him her, they are just so damned different and there is also the 'yuck' factor, in that she was his half-brother's wife, and I see this as applying equally to Anora and Alistair.

It was a good ramble, I like discussing this kind of stuff!

[Addai]

Don't blame Maria for my Cailan's (in)actions. lol

Great chapter, Maria. Rous has a good head on her shoulders.

[Esbatty]

@M: Did not expect such an equally lengthy response. It was really rambling by me, it just, your and Addai's stories trigger thoughts in me that "Why does.... yada yada yada?". I know you don't paint Morrigan as mustache twirler (eww eww... think sexy morrigan thoughts... much better), and I actually did not consider the child/pregnancy to be any kind of "payment" for her "services rendered" but that does kind of paint it in a new light for me should I ever do another female warden run.

And I kind of see the whole Alistair v. Anora thing. Although if he could manage it with Morrigan whom he actively despises, uhhh... I dunno. I got my Canon Warden shacking up with every possible harpie available (Morri, 'Nora, Velana) so yeah ya got me there. Thats just personal preference tainting (ha!) my views.

I do enjoy that a non-Warden Cousland does enjoy Alistair's company. The whole Cousland-roughshod upbringing make them, at least to me, the most Ferelden of all the Nobility. So right there is a shot at a Theirin-Cousland to take over the throne.

@Addai: Oh hell no, I'm not blaming Maria for Cailan, I'm blaming the DA Team for Cailan. The cheating s.o.b. friggin' pullin' a Maric but without even half the heartache and turmoil of his own Father's upbringing. F**k that. Maric only bedded 3 women in his life, and he loved them all. Okay ranting again. Stupid Cailan gettin' Duncan killed for sport.

[Maria13]

NSFW

Chapter 62

Dragon 9:35          Eluviesta/Cloudreach         Denerim              [Present]

He looked just like a man, she thought, readying himself for love. He was dressed quite soberly as usual, black or perhaps navy blue, no insignias on the surcoat this time. No need to show off. Not in that way anyway, but his surcoat was undone and his shirt slightly looser around the neck than usual. She could see that damned amulet glimmering below his throat amidst the light golden fluff of chest hair. She felt like reaching over, grasping the amulet, pulling him towards her and riffling the hair with the tips of her fingers… There'll be time enough for that later, she told herself.

The meal was excellent, roast pheasant with roast potatoes and sweet juicy peas but she found herself putting the food in her mouth and not really tasting it. Their conversation also seemed to languish, although every now and then she caught him glancing at her and looking away quickly when she had spotted him.

Half way through, Rous said, "Are you not just a little nervous, Alistair?"

Alistair, who appeared to be tucking into his food, glanced at her again, "I would dearly like to say I was not."

"We should really have done it… spontaneously;" she said, "then we wouldn't find it so nerve wracking."

Alistair's eyes went somewhat vacant for a few moments as if he were seeing something that wasn't there, and then he put his pheasant leg down. "There is one thing…" He said.

"What?" Asked Rous.

"Well…" He said. He pressed his lips together a little tightly and wiped his fingers on his napkin, "I could offer, to do anything and everything you told me to… Then you would be completely in control…"

Rous looked at him askew, "You would?"

Alistair steepled his hands. "I've done it before, with women I've trusted…"

Rous snorted.

"Sometimes you learn an awful lot like that, you know," He added, "Letting the lady have the upper hand…"

Rous tossed a pheasant wing at him, he didn't quite manage to duck it in time and it hit the tips of his hair before falling to the floor. "Really? What would be the point? This lady might as well have stayed at home and amused herself…"

Alistair used the napkin to wipe the ends of his previously neatly arranged hair and then retrieved the pheasant leg from the floor carefully setting it aside. "You haven't taken to the idea then, I gather…"

"Alistair, sometimes I wonder… Do you take anything seriously?"

"It was a serious offer, Rous."

"Making love is a joint venture… I want you to enjoy yourself as well and do what you find pleasurable…"

"Fair enough."

For dessert, there was gingerbread, custard, and roasted apples in toffee sauce. Despite looking busy, she had noticed that Alistair was not eating much more than her. She felt sorry for the cook.

She started pushing the stuff she couldn't swallow around on her plate.

"Finished?" He asked.

"I think so." She replied.

He got up and came around the table Rous stood expecting him to pull back the chair for her. However, suddenly in what seemed to be a single swift fluid motion, he pulled her up into his arms.

"Alistair…" She said.

"Just relax," he whispered in her ear, "trust me, Rous."

"But whyyy… Why this?" She said wiggling her feet clad in red satin with silver embossments in the air.

"This particular thing, taking you to my bedchamber, this is how I want to do it. This gives me pleasure." He said. "It is what we discussed earlier." He planted a slushy kiss on her cheek.

"Does doing this make you feel big?" She asked as he fumbled for the door handle while he cradled her.

"I do not need anything to make me feel big." he replied firmly, finding the handle and pulling it down.

"Well that's alright then," she said sarcastically.

"Rous," he said, conveying her down the corridor, "You feel so tense, just relax, will you? You know me, trust me just a little more."

She sighed but then she found a rather delicious tender part of his neck just below his ear and started to kiss and nibble it.

"Better." He remarked, he seemed to be enjoying this new attention, she noticed his neck was coming out in goose bumps.

"You are not going to throw me onto the bed and then jump on top of me are you?" She said after a little while. He showed no sign of flagging or tiredness.

"That was not my plan… Unless you tell me that, you want me to… Then, well, I'll consider it."

"I don't want you to. Not today, anyway…" She said still sulky.

"Good, because I wasn't intending to." They rounded a corner, "Look, there's Lawler…"

"Oh Maker!" Exclaimed Rous and buried her face in his neck and clung to his shirt collar.

Embarrassed by her embarrassment Alistair shrugged as best he could at Lawler and then added. "He knows what to do, that should make you feel safe, Rous."

"But he knows!" She mumbled.

Lawler opened the bedroom door for them "And so does Fergus…" Alistair objected, "And… Look, we need someone to keep us safe so someone else doesn't walk in on us. That person is Lawler, the one keeping us safe, I mean, so he has to know…" and they walked through. He paused, Lawler pulled the door closed behind them, Rous was still hiding her face against his neck. "Well, I guess you may have a point… Welcome to my not-so-private private life…"

Alistair set Rous gently down on her feet on the flag-stoned floor.

"And welcome to my bedroom…"

                                                                                        ~...~                

Rous gasped, of course, she had been in his bedroom before but now there were dozens of candles scattered throughout it given it a beautifully calming atmosphere full of random splashes of light and shadow.

She looked at Alistair; he was smiling at her delight. "Alistair… Thank you, this is beautiful…"

"Am I forgiven for daring to pick you up now?" He asked.

"Of course you are…" She spun on her heels like a child looking around the room. There candles everywhere. Then she noticed that the bed had been neatly made with a corner of the sheet turned down… and scattered with rose and Andraste's grace petals. "This is so thoughtful… I…"

Rous took a step towards him and wrapped her arms around his neck. The kiss they shared was gentle but intense and they were both flushed and slightly out of breath following it.

"Let me…" She said at tugged at his surcoat. He relinquished it gracefully with a laugh and she draped it over one of the chairs in front of the fire.

"Now," Rous said, and methodically loosened the laces of his shirt and then laid her cheek against his chest listening to the slow thud-thud of his heart. Then she helped him lift it over his head and placed it with the surcoat.

She was quite familiar with this part of his body but she nevertheless took the opportunity to study it in detail at her ease. His torso was criss-crossed with small scores, he even had, a very long a scar running from his right armpit to below his waist but they were not as bad as her own were, they had healed much better. It didn't matter, rather she spent some time admiring Alistair's perfectly muscled arms, his broad chest with a light sprinkling of golden hair, a very flat stomach, a tight navel and a beguiling trail of the same fine hair leading down from it…

Rous did what she had wanted to do earlier that evening and skimmed her hand just above the surface of his chest riffling his diaphanous hair. Following that, she traced the trail of the scar from his armpit with her index finger to the waist of his breeches as if following a path on a map. He stood very still and very straight as she did this, watching her through his long lashes, allowing her to indulge herself.

Then standing directly in front of him she pursed her lips and placed them around one nipple and then the other, noting that they were at exactly the same height as her mouth. This elicited more of a reaction from him and he bent over her resting his head lightly on top of hers, his arms enfolding her against him, breathing deeply as Rous kissed and touched him until they resembled two tight little pips.

After a time Alistair nuzzled her, "Lovely one," He rasped, "You are doing terrible things to me…" and then he let her go and walked over to his bed very jerkily. Once he got there, he sat on the edge of it and began pulling at his boots.

She followed him and got on the bed behind him, draped herself over his broad smooth back and kissed his neck. She felt the muscles there contract as Alistair beamed. Having got off one boot and sock, he began tugging at the other. Once he had done this, she made sure she was standing in front of him, he made a move to begin to loosen the ties of his breeches, but Rous intervened saying "Allow me."

                                                                                                ~...~     

Rous seemed to have recovered from her nerves and her grumpiness and had gotten into the swing of things; she was now kneeling fumbling eagerly with the laces at the front of his breeches.

Just the sight of her doing that in green satin dress with the low cut bodice was really exciting him and now when he dared to opened his eyes he was catching alternate glimpses of her elegant white hands busy at his tight groin and the sweet warm valley between the peaks of her breasts.

She looked up, "Got you…" A cheeky smile lit her whole face touching her eyes, which sparkled. She made a move to tug his breeches open but he stopped her stood up and lowered them himself.

"Now," he said, helping her to her feet, he noticed her eyes were still fixed at the area below his midriff, "it is hardly fair, is it? That I should be like this…" He said chucking her under the chin to tear her gaze away from his tautened smallclothes, "whereas you are still in that admittedly, very fetching, dress."

"As you say, Alistair." She replied and twirled so he found himself looking at the bare nape of her neck and the intricate lacing, which sheathed the robe to her so tightly.

"Ah-ha," He said, attempting not to sound intimidated. There appeared to be several sets of ties, some overlapping. "How…"

"Richelle helped me get into it…"

"And I am expected to get you out of it by myself? I see…"

She giggled, "I know you like a challenge…"

He pulled her right up to him and whispered in her ear, "Suppose I fetch some scissors?"

"No, Alistair, no. Absolutely not, those ribbons are pure silk…"

He took a pace back and set to it cursing occasionally but getting more and more aroused as he went on his fingers slackening and then unthreading the tiny tightened knots. Each one he managed to unravel, a small triumph.

Finally, he had them all, he pulled the fabric apart and exactly as if it were designed to do so the satin dress fell with a brief sigh of resignation pooling around Rous's feet. She stepped gracefully out of it as if she were stepping out of a shallow puddle.

She was now only wearing stays, smallclothes and translucent stockings all in black silk and her dainty scarlet pumps.

His breath caught in his throat. She was more attractive than most of the desire demons he had seen. Rous had lowered her face and her hands were in a clinch over her stomach. A few loose strands of coppery red hair framed her features and flickering candlelight drenched her pale skin in shifting golden hues. Even the scars he could pick out added to the overall effect, they made her human and fragile, something to be cherished and handled with great care.

Before he had a chance to give some voice to his admiration she had slipped by him and arching her foot on the bed, her slipper on the floor had set about undoing a garter. "No," Alistair said quickly removing her fingers from the binding. "Those you should leave on. Definitely on."

"Alistair…" She said, "If I leave them on they will tear…"

"Rous, Rous, Rous, Rous, Rous…" he took her hands to his mouth and started covering them with kisses. "I will buy you ten pairs of stockings, a thousand and ten of them if you wish but tonight leave those on…"

"Very well," she said, "Since you are asking so nicely, she batted her eyelids.

                                                                                                    ~...~

He led her to the bed, "Come here" he said laying down first and pointing to the space next to him.

She did and they both lay down. Alistair pulled her face to his, his hands on her cheeks. Rous put her arms around him. His lips were slightly rough and his soul patch tickled her chin but his tongue was smooth and eager and, as before, he moved it enticingly exploring her mouth with ease engaging teasingly with her own, their still partly clad bodies rubbing up against each other and both of them smouldering in the candlelight.

He wrenched his face away. "Maker, I enjoy this so much…," he said quietly. Under long blond lashes, Alistair's eyes were suffused with yearning. Rous could only nod mutely in agreement.

They kissed again and it was as if they were alone in the world as if they lay on the bottom of a deep placid sea, the waves moving unhurriedly above them. One hand moved from her face to her hips stroking languidly the smooth skin between her stockings and her smallclothes.

And then he reached behind her for her stays, she wondered for a moment whether he could continue to kiss and release them at the same time… The answer was yes; unlike the dress, they were not laced but hooked… Then one of his hands hesitantly cupped her left breast fondling its roundness his fingers teasing her nipple until it was quite taut. Shortly after Alistair's other hand moved to the other breast, she stilled as he fingered the rough scar over its mound.

Rous jerked her face away from his. "You…" she said. His hand was still in place.

"What?" he asked softly, his lips were wet and slightly inflamed from their kissing, his hair tousled. "I like and desire every last bit of you, Rous."

She shut her eyes and submitted to his caresses.

                                                                                                        ~...~

After a little while, he stopped stroking her. She opened her eyes slowly only to find that he was on his knees facing her, "Pull them down will you?" He said gesturing towards his smallclothes.

She kneeled in her turn, grinned up at him, nicked his chin with the edges of her teeth as she slid her hands into the sides of his smallclothes, and slowly eased them over his hips.

His erection sprung free. He was well endowed and his c*** curved slightly upwards in an elegant bow both solid and hefty, a single bead of moisture already shining at its pinnacle. Alistair's pubic area was covered with a light fleece of tight golden curls, a shade darker and a little coarser than the hair on the rest of his body. Once he had wiggled out of the smallclothes, he remained on his knees in front of her as if begging for her attention.

Rous toyed awhile with the taut little curls awhile and then reached down and took hold of his balls lightly squeezing them. Alistair gasped.

She bent down further and tugging gently at the delicate ridged skin of his scrotum, feeling his gaze burning into the back of her head, put out her tongue and with the very tip of it, touched the shy slit at the apex of his c*** and lingered there detaching the pearl. She sensed Alistair's stomach muscles tighten as he inhaled. He clenched his hands but kept them at his side. Then, unable to help herself, Rous caught the entire bud of his sex in her mouth and swirled her tongue around it. It was firm but velvety smooth, Alistair tasted slightly salty with a fresh after-tang, a hint of spring blossom.

She let him go, knelt upright again, and looked at him smacking her lips. "You are so bad," He said in a low voice playing sensually on the syllables, "so, so bad…" and suddenly Alistair pulled her face to his again. He clasped his hands either side of her jaw licking eagerly first around her mouth, then her lips, then his tongue against hers, then almost to her throat. She placed her hands fingers slightly curled against his chest and yielded to him.

                                                                                                ~...~

Once he broke the kiss Rous put his hands on the delicate silk sheath around her loins and said, "Now you."

Alistair smiled and tugged… "Oh, Andraste… Ahhhh, you're red there, red and pink…"

"Well what did you think I would be?" Rous said putting her hands on her hips in mock annoyance.

"I don't know…" He said shaking his head feeling genuinely baffled, "I imagined… It, YOU, look beautiful there, so beautiful, I never… I can touch, right?"

"Of course you can…" and she thrust her hips forward exposing more of her moist softness to his greedy gaze.

"Bad girl." He said looking down at her and grinning.

Alistair gently moved his finger through her dewy red curls up the length of her parting delicately the tender portals of her flesh there. Rous closed her eyes leaning her forehead on his shoulder and moaned very quietly. He touched her some more looking for that special place and one of her hands grasped his wrist, not trying to stop him but urging him on. He could listen to the little sounds she made while he caressed her like this for aeons.

Eventually Rous lifted her head from his shoulder and said in a husky voice, "I want to feel you inside me"

She lay back.

                                                                                                  ~...~

He leaned over her and gazed at her below him, taking in her face, her dark lashes and green eyes, her breasts, her shapely legs in the black stockings and lastly the flash of red and pink between her thighs.

"But…" He said hesitantly, "I am rather… It's been a long time for you and… Look, I don't want to hurt you."

Rous laughed. "Do you worry about that with all your lovers?" She asked,

Naked and erect as he was, Alistair felt himself flush a little, he always knew when he was with an intelligent woman. They had the unnerving habit of asking rather good questions at moments like this. "Sometimes." He mumbled.

Rous sat up. "Oh Alistair… Really… You are so… Impossible." She put her arms round his neck and started showering his face with kisses.

He sighed.

She lay back down again. "I am sure I will be fine… Please."

"Alright. As you wish" Alistair said. He held the base of his c*** and put against her sex staying quite still for a moment, taking a breath, and then angling his pelvis, he thrust forward. Rous gave a muffled cry as he entered her and he felt her digging her fingers into the muscles of his shoulder.

His head was suddenly swimming, she felt warm and smooth around him. Overcome by gratitude he stopped to kiss her, Rous's eyes were closed and her breathing was agitated. He felt one of her hands ruffle his hair as he pulled his head back up and then, unable to help himself, he circled his hips again and with another push followed by another he buried himself as deeply in her as was possible.

This time the pleasure was so intense coursing down his entire length; he groaned and felt his fingers clawing on the sheets.

                                                                                                ~...~

Rous felt his balls tight against her entrance. Catching their breath, they both locked eyes.

"Good… right?" Said Alistair. His face was quite flushed and his eyes a little unfocused, there were beads of perspiration on his brow. His hair stuck up in several different directions. She knew she must look pretty much the same.

"Yes," Rous replied breathlessly. "Yes. Yes, very good."

She could not recall the last time she had been so full, there was some discomfort there but also a very satisfied, intimate warm feeling that seemed to throb right in the core of her body, slowly seeping through all her limbs.

Rous drew her knees up towards her waist but feeling that was too passive, instead, extended her legs dug her heels in against the mattress and flexed her pelvis, with a small cry, urging herself towards him, giving herself to him, attempting to impale herself even more deeply on his hardness.

"I…" Alistair said and then he put his mouth against hers once again and she attempted to wrap her legs around his middle but found that he was too broad so she had to content herself with resting them trembling on his thighs. For a while, they were lost in each other, their bodies joined at the mouth and at the hip as if they were one.

Eventually Alistair was compelled to tear his lips away from hers it seemed his urge to thrust had become unbearable. He found a rhythm, took all of his weight on his arms and they simply shared their pleasure amid quiet moans and murmurings.

Lying under his body looking up at his wide chest and feeling him move in her core, Rous felt overwhelmed and yet sheltered, safer and more protected than she had in years. She realised that she had needed this intimate physical contact desperately but had hardly dared to hope that she would ever experience it again, after life had thrown so many things at her.

She closed her eyes allowing herself to drift away on a current of pure sensation.

                                                                                                           ~...~

Soon Alistair felt her spasm around him, "Maker…" she said and then a little later, "Maker!" again, and then Rous opened her eyes and looked at his face and said, "Alistair!" in a rich strange voice full of desire that sent shivers down his spine, through his balls and to the tip of his c***.

Finally she almost screamed "Maker!" and for a brief moment her hands clenched her body contracted and went utterly rigid and Alistair could feel her fists pounding on his back and hear his own groans in response as her sex pulsated urgently around his hardness, then she sank back limp, pliant and at ease, eyelids fluttering.

A little later, still moving, he opened his eyes briefly and saw tears staining her cheeks. He paused to gently lick them. He did not know whether it was that sight, the slight saltiness, or both things that pushed him over the edge, but he began to shudder and convulse in turn feeling an almost unbearable heat coalescing in his groin until his passion too crested and Alistair released himself into her with a loud cry of fulfilment.

                                                                                                     ~...~

Sometime afterwards, when they were lying together side-by-side recovering their breaths, holding hands, Alistair asked, "If I told you I loved you, would you mind?"

"I love you, Alistair," Rous said quickly before he had properly beaten her to it.

"Bugger." He said gravely, "I wanted to say it first."

Modifié par Maria13, 06 avril 2011 - 04:48 .

[Esbatty]

"Bugger" lmfao

I met King Alistair again on this Pro-Ferelden Mage Hawke playthrough, and I seriously want to revisit an Alistair/Alistair+Anora ran Ferelden in an expansion pack or a future sequel. He is just too much fun with a Snarky Hawke. And if Orlais is involved... okay I'm gettin' teary-eyed... we could quite possibly meet Fiona. *lip quivers*

[Maria13]

Glad you liked it Esbat!

[Maria13]

Chapter 63

Dragon 9:35           Eluviesta/Cloudreach            Denerim              [Present]

"Oswyn," said Alistair, looking out of the window onto a fine spring day "thank you so much for your help last week at the Landsmeet."

Oswyn was looking well, Alistair had thought, his blond hair had grown somewhat since Orzammar and he'd kept the beard, which was very trim. He looked older, without looking old. Alistair wondered for a moment whether he should go for a full beard himself… He guessed he'd have to ask Rous now. Anyway, he had more important things to think about than personal grooming at the moment.

In response, Oswyn riffled nervously through the goodly pile of papers in front of him on the large table and then replied. "My father was very happy. He actually told me afterwards it was a dream come true. He said that when he returned home with me following my captivity by Howe, he had feared I would never the same again. Either physically or mentally. He was so proud that I could carry out those duties in front of my peers including those who had heard I had been… broken… I was... It meant a lot to him… Come to think of it, it means a lot to me as well." He almost added as an afterthought.

Alistair glanced briefly at him. "That's good… when we met about a year ago, I'm… Well, I can't claim to be a great judge of character." He tugged at the left cuff of his shirt, "But I saw you had it in you, you were making an effort… I admired that. I admit I also thought to myself, 'I can use this.' Though that Landsmeet was tricky at times."

"But Landsmeets, you know Alistair, never go to plan. There is always something."

"Indeed." Said Alistair, "and this last something was called Fergus Cousland."

"Oh well, yes." Agreed Oswyn, "but I think that is a matter we need to talk about."

"What is there to say?" Asked Alistair.

Oswyn sighed, "Quite a lot, really." Alistair's eyebrows went up at that and he glanced at his friend questioningly. Their meeting was to discuss the lyrium but Oswyn had planned to bring the subject of Teyrn Cousland up at some point. Since they were now discussing him, they might as well continue, "to start with, publicly at least, Fergus is the next in line to the throne after you and Anora… So in my view, whether you like it or not, you are going to have include him in some of your long-term plans."

It was clear from Alistair's expression that this suggestion did not meet entirely with his approval. Nevertheless, Oswyn persisted, "That was somewhat blunt but, as you know, I have taken the opportunity to get in myself with him, he is not at all ill-disposed toward you, quite the contrary, in fact."

It was Alistair's turn to sigh.

"By the way," Oswyn said, "I saw Rous here this morning… are you and she—"

"Yes." Said Alistair still looking out of the window.

"Well, that should make things easier, surely?"

Alistair pursed his lips and shook his head.

"Well, perhaps not, then." Said Oswyn. "Believe me I am very sorry to have to draw your attention to something you might not find entirely agreeable. However, I think it's my duty to do so, and if I didn't, I would be negligent."

"You sound like one of those arbiters, Oswyn…" said Alistair, "Don't get me wrong, I don't dislike the Teyrn, in fact I know him to be a thoroughly decent man. But… we do seem to be coming at things from different directions."

"But surely, then, as long as you are both heading for the same destination, you can find some common ground?"

"Do you know," Said Alistair, "that the other day when I went to collect Rous to, well…? Bring her here… I took him a gift and he accused me of attempting to exchange a case of wine for his sister?"

"He did?"

"He did. Then, in front of me, he opened the case I'd brought him and began examining the different bottles I had selected, reviewing each of them one by one and eventually he said: 'At least it's a superior case. Eclectic. Very versatile.'"

Oswyn laughed, Alistair scowled somewhat at his own reflection in the window.

"It's his way, Alistair. That was probably backhanded praise. He has a very dry sense of humour and is extraordinarily protective of his sister… which is hardly surprising…" As he said this, Oswyn realised he was speaking to someone who had grown up with no immediate family. No parents, no sisters, hardly a brother. Little wonder he was finding these new interactions confusing. "What did Rous have to say about it?" He asked.

"She said Fergus was just joking… Fergus is always just joking… I wish he would be serious sometime, or make clear that he is in jest…" Alistair sounded peevish, put out.

"Alistair…" Oswyn folded his hands in front of him.

"Yes?"

"You never really had a family, did you?"

"And what— No."

"Sometimes this is how family act, they have their foibles, their little ways, their mannerisms… That thing at the Landsmeet, when Fergus said he was trying to make you join our ranks… Yes, he said it humorously, but I think he was serious at heart, Alistair. He wants you to be one of us, not a bastard not an outsider… That is good, especially since you and Rous… You should try to look at things differently; he could be a most valuable ally."

Alistair did not respond. Oswyn continued, "You need to think, as well as of the politics, of the position this may put Rous in… I imagine you've told Rous you have a daughter?" He expected no less of Alistair, a born truth-teller he thought.

"Of course. Yes."

"But she is not only your child, obviously. She is also, like it or not, an heir presumptive …"

Alistair shook his head very adamantly, Oswyn, insisted, "Fergus doesn't know this and he is potentially next in line… but Rous does… That might put her in an extremely awkward position in future."

"But Niamh—"

"Do you honestly think Fergus could be a danger to her?"

"I… No. He doesn't seem personally ambitious. Anymore than I myself am, he is not like Anora… And what happened to his child…"

"I agree entirely with that assessment." Oswyn cut in. "The Couslands are the Couslands… That is what they take most pride in being. They plough their own furrow, that's how my father likes to describe them." Oswyn paused, "Ultimately it may have been that independent streak that cost Bryce, Eleanor, Oriana and little Oren their lives…"

"I shall think on it. Consider it… Now we were going to discuss this lyrium…"

"I was coming to that; I think the issues are related…" Said Oswyn tapping the papers in front of him.

"How?"

"Highever is a port…"

There was a pause, "I thought we spoke of Jader…" Said Alistair.

"We did, but Jader is Orleisian… We are seeking to undercut the Chantry here. I've had a re-think. I believe using Jader may make it too risky, though of course it is nearer to Orzammar. But to a certain extent it is in the wrong direction if we want to get the lyrium to the Free Marches and Antiva and so…"

Alistair was silent for a while. "What of West Hill?"

Clack-clack, Oswyn could almost hear it in the room with them the satisfying thwacking sound of two stout staves coming into contact. Yesterday he'd been at the Chantry. No, not attending a session of the chant; he doubted he'd do that willingly ever again. The dwarves had the right of it, he thought. Taking on some of the novices, brothers and sisters in an informal staff fighting competition. He hadn't won, but he'd come a close second to the brother nicknamed 'Brother Bear' because of his size. Brother Bear was so large he had almost split the plank on which some of the face offs had been held.

Oswyn segued back, "What of it? As a port it is too shallow and too sheltered, larger vessels will have difficulty with it."

"I see…"

"Alistair…"

"Yes?"

"When we were at Orzammar… Do you recollect telling me about a certain Isabela?"

Alistair blinked rapidly a few times, "No… I don't…"

"You were pretty drunk…"

Alistair sighed, "What has that got to do…"

"She was a captain? Of a ship named 'The Siren's Call', you were laughing about that, 'Well it certainly called to me…' you said."

"Ah."

"And have you heard of something called 'La felicísima armada'?

"The what?"

"It means 'the happy fleet' or 'the merry crew' or something of that ilk in Antivan, or is it Nevarran? Insofar as I can work out they're a bunch of Rivaini 'privateers', whatever that means, 'pirates' probably… who have made informal arrangements to act in concert or at least not undercut each other when dealing with the Qunari at sea. The agreement concerned is called the 'Llomerynn Accords'… "

Alistair sat down in the sturdy chair opposite him stretching out his legs and crossing them, eyeing him with something like anticipation. "Do go on Oswyn, this is all fascinating stuff…"

"Obviously the 'Llomerynn Accords' may now be applied, sometimes, to other activities… They're more like guidelines, apparently. Amazing what you find out hanging around Denerim port at night in the guise of an inexperienced land lubber with itchy feet looking to join a ship, perhaps... and being a little careless with your change in the taverns…"

"Do be careful such research doesn't get you killed Oswyn… I found Isabela for the second time, like that," Said Alistair, "And in terms of personal risk, it's not to be recommended, Lawler told me off… As for Isabela, I'd met her before and… Well I obviously bored you with all the sordid details in Orzammar…"

"By the way, it's 'Isabella' with two ls now…"

"I shall bear that in mind…"

"She's one of the stars of the armada… They actually call them 'estrellas' or 'stars', someone with a certain level of authority. Ultimately undefined, of course…"

"Well, this is quite educational."

"I've really been having fun…" Oswyn grinned and his whole face lit up his blue eyes shining. "And do you know…"

                                                                                                 ~~...~~

"Alistair, are you listening to me? Are you?" Rous asked.

They were on the horses the following day in their favourite place, the beach just outside Denerim. It didn't matter that it was stormy. It was nice to rise early together from the warm, comfy bed, don their riding gear, creep quietly to the stables, prepare Dusk and Hope and be here just the two of them a few hours after dawn.

"Yes, I am yes…" He said smiling at her in what he hoped was a reassuring manner he'd realised he'd drifted away for a while. "Just a lot to go over." He said rubbing the back of his head.

He and Oswyn had moved on from discussing the logistics of selling the lyrium to what they hoped to do with the proceeds.

Food first, Alistair had said, then recovering ground lost in the Blight making sure every inch of cultivable land was properly used with the aim of becoming self-supporting like in the old days. Then education. Anora had managed to secure agreement from the Landsmeet to spend some of the state's revenues to found a university. Alistair had backed her in this in return for her support for the setting up of schools in the poorer parts of Denerim. That had caused harrumphs from some of the older, more conservative set in the Landsmeet according to Oswyn and a few grumbles about 'upstart over-educated plebs', but it had passed.

After the meeting with Oswyn, which had lasted two hours longer than anticipated, he'd had a meeting with Crabbe who had been carrying out an inventory of the assets entailed to the Arling of Denerim. Alistair had been pleased to note that there were at least a dozen town houses some of which could be turned into schools, he hoped and another to permanently house Niamh and Bregeth.

All of this had made for a very tiring day and when he'd gotten to bed that evening, inevitably late, he had needed sleep more than anything else. It was beneficial that he had already discovered that falling asleep in Rous's arms was a good deal easier and more restful than alone in an empty bed.

He'd just summarised most of this, as they were riding this morning, for Rous's benefit, he knew it would be a bad idea to have such a conversation at bedtime, and then he'd added, "I need to talk to Fergus…"

"Talk as in… 'TALK'?" Rous asked.

"Exactly."

"Shall I make the arrangements?"

"If you don't mind. I'd like to see him in the palace…"

She was silent for a little while then she asked, "Is he getting on your nerves?"

"Well…" Alistair glanced at the Amaranthine Sea, it seemed restless today, or was that him? Black flecked with white, the hard cold sheen of flint "But that's not…"

"He gets on everyone's nerves sometimes you know, even mine. But… It's what makes Fergus, Fergus and I still love him." She concluded defensively.

"I know that, of course I know that, Rous, he's a good guy. It's just business…" Then he added, "Next week we're meeting the bloody Grand Cleric… better arrange it for after that." Rous nodded tritely. His good girl.

Putting politics aside and coming back to what they were at Rous asked him "You want to do this don't you?"

"Oh yes, yes indeed… and so does he," he said leaning forward and patting Dusk's flank "for weeks now, I sense he's been dying for it" as if to confirm his words, Dusk capered eagerly beneath him.

"Well repeat—"

"I start at a trot and then move on to a brisk, constant canter. Then I take my weight off the saddle, support myself on my knees and the stirrups, lean forward a little and loosen the reins because Dusk will need to extend his neck but making sure I keep a good grip on them. I coax him with my knees on his flank to accelerate. When I want to stop I steady his pace with the reins and sit back down."

"And?"

"And, he'll need plenty of space to slow down so I must ensure I give it to him."

"And?"

He thought he'd covered everything so he shrugged, "I dunno…"

"Most important of all: Don't break your bloody neck, Alistair, because I'll miss you and blame myself."

He grinned very widely as he circled Dusk on the strand. In the poor morning light, it looked almost the same hue as the stallion. "Here goes then, wish me luck."

Rous kissed her fingers and put them briefly against his cheek as he trotted by her.

Their trotting soon became a canter, Dusk seemed as fidgety this morning as he was, or was he as fidgety as Dusk? A good sign he guessed, they were both in tune. He kept the canter up for at least five minutes then he raised himself somewhat from the seat, adjusted the reins. Under him, Dusk seemed to quiver and then shudder and then became perfectly calm… And then…

He flew; there was no other word for it, although sudden the movement was so fluent so simple… Alistair at first found himself struggling a little from sheer surprise but then remembering his lesson he relaxed into the new stance, coursing through the spray, feeling the adverse wind whip his face and hair and his blood pounding in his ears. Without being able to help himself he began to shout and whoop as he hadn't done since he was a child, a very young child, a child who as of yet knew nothing about unhappiness…

                                                                                               ~...~               

Following at a lively trot in Alistair's wake Rous heard something that at first she thought may have been a scream and for a moment she panicked, but that was followed by another sound, something a bit like: "WOOOOOO WHOOOOOOOOO!" She smiled to herself. The boy was having fun, she thought.

Modifié par Maria13, 08 avril 2011 - 11:45 .

[Addai]

Oswyn remains awesome, as always!

I still want the usurper to go away so that Neriya can come back to Denerim.

[Maria13]

Chapter 64

Dragon 9:35 Molioris/Bloomingtide Denerim [Present]

"She is late." Complained Alistair, not attempting to conceal his annoyance.

"The Grand Cleric is always late," replied Anora, "it is one of those traits that she uses to put us in our place. Do not show that it is bothers you, because I warn you she will take full advantage of that."

"I like her already," replied Alistair.

Anora clapped her hands, "you know, Cailan was exactly the same, he used to make it evident that she got up his nose something awful, and she always took advantage of it."

"Cailan and was not wrong then. How often did you and he meet her?"

"Oh, some five or six times."

After about a further half an hour the door open, a figure supported on the arm of a young female novice entered the room. Elemena wore a fine brown felt cape with a hood over her robe. Whereas the robes of Chantry mothers was mostly orange with some detailing in red, that of the Grand Cleric was mostly red with some detailing in orange. The novice helped her up the dais and assisted her to take her seat on the high-backed chair. The Grand Cleric, who clutched a sturdy ebony walking stick in her left hand, smiled at her gratefully, which she apparently took as a sign of dismissal leaving discreetly closing the door behind her. Elemena lowered her hood.

Grand Cleric Elemena extended one bony hand with sinews like cables and slightly long finger nails that resembled a bird of prey's talons, so that they could kiss the signet ring adorned with a large moonstone engraved with the face of Andraste.

Alistair made way for Anora to kiss it first, and then he did likewise. They then took their seats on the twin chairs in front of the dais.

"Our children, it is good to see you last." Elemena had grey eyes and they seem touched with beneficence as she said this.

Anora smiled briefly, Alistair likewise, though perhaps his smile was slightly more forced.

"Now then…" The Grand Cleric cleared her throat. "I well know you must be very busy. So this old lady will not keep you longer than necessary… The reason…. Oh, please give this aged mind of mine some time… Well, then, let us start with where we are…" Elemena propped up her stick so it lent on the arm of her seat, "you are the sovereigns of this beautiful land of Ferelden, and I, for my many sins, am the highest representative of the Chantry here. It is my fervent belief that regular contact is needed between us in order that this country of ours be directed in the most enlightened and morally responsible way possible. I appreciate that both of you, my children, have been most occupied of late. So much so, in fact, that you may have overlooked the importance of a harmonious and constant relationship between us. Consider me your benevolent aunt, as it were…" Having arrived at this point, Elemena smiled. "Now please, do tell me what is you have both been up to."

Alistair glanced at Anora who said, lowering her eyes, "Your Grace, we have prepared a summary of the most salient activities in which we have been engaged during this past year."

"Aha," said Elemena, "how very kind of you, my daughter," She put out her hand.

Anora rose from her chair and following a small curtsy, handed the Grand Cleric the manuscript in question.

"Thank you, child." Said Elemena. Holding the manuscript close to her face, she scanned it most carefully, her lips moving as she went, shuffling the leaves for a fair few minutes. When she had finished perusing it, she lowered it to her lap and beaming at Anora. "Please, dear child, I would be most grateful if you could summarise this for me."

In a voice as clear as a bell, Anora, enunciating very carefully as if she were, thought Alistair, back at school, set out the summary that they had agreed beforehand. It tallied very carefully with the contents of the manuscript they had just handed to the Grand Cleric.

Elemena listened attentively with her head tilted to one side nodding encouragingly every now and then. When Anora had finished, smiling tightly, she asked one or two basic questions. Once the answer to these had been supplied, she leaned back into her chair.

"I am so grateful, my children. I see you have been commendably busy overseeing the welfare of the citizens of Ferelden. I can find no fault with the contents of the actions you have just disclosed to me."

Like an idiot, Alistair grinned. The Grand Cleric raised her eyebrows, "however, there are certain matters that I would like to address with you individually. Anora, my sweet, may I start with you?"

Anora bowed her head reverently, "it would be an honour, Your Grace."

"Well then," said Elemena, "If Alistair would please excuse us."

Alistair got up, bowing stiffly and with a quick "Your Grace." left the room.

                                                                                                                 ~...~

Some twenty minutes later, Anora exited the audience room to find Alistair pacing nervously in the corridor outside.

"How did it go?" He asked her in a low voice.

Anora shrugged, "I really don't know why she bothered, it was very superficial, if a bit strained. She wishes to see you now, Alistair."

His stomach in knots due to his vestigial fear of revered mothers in positions of authority, Alistair knocked politely on the door of the audience room.

"Your Grace, I understand you wish to speak with me."

"Come in, my child, sit yourself down."

Alistair did as she bade. "My boy, it seems like yesterday when we first met at Ostagar, and you were running errands for me."

If there was something Alistair had learned from his harsh upbringing in the Chantry, it was not to open your mouth unless you were asked a direct question. Making gratuitous statements could box you into all sorts of awkward corners and cost you dearly.

In the ensuing silence, Grand Cleric Elemena ran her eyes over him very slowly, taking him in. Alistair attempted to suppress his urge to squirm.

"That senior of yours… In the Wardens, what was his name?" She asked eventually.

"Duncan, Your Grace."

"Yes, that was it, Duncan of Highever, a very pragmatic man. I was sorry for what happened to him, I pray for him still… And your half brother, of course." She added, it seemed almost an afterthought. "How old are you now, Alistair?"

"Twenty-eight."

"Ah, you are but a child still and how old is Anora, do remind me?"

"Thirty-five, Your Grace."

Elemena was quiet for a while the only sound in the room that of her finger nails drumming on the wooden arm of her chair. Finally she said, "These games you've been playing, young man, with the lyrium, the mages, the Chief Enchanter, my Templar Commander and such, do you not think that you will eventually tire of them?"

"Your Grace… Lyrium? I am afraid..." Alistair stuttered.

"Do go on." Said the Grand Cleric.

Alistair took a deep breath, "As for the mages and my exchanges with the Chief Enchanter, those are not 'games' but actions taken on the basis of my sincere concerns for the well-being of some of my most vulnerable subjects."

"You mean mages, mages already under the Chantry's merciful and charitable protection." Elemena shook her head censoriously.

Alistair felt himself bristle, an abrupt reply rising to his lips.

"But it is clear to me that such a topic of discussion is going to be unproductive, at least today. Allow me to move on, then. Allow me to advise you as a devout parent would, young Alistair. My advice is this: you should concern yourself more with begetting an heir… A legitimate heir, I mean, one whose heritage is fully human." She paused looking at him attentively as if to let that sink in.

Alistair eyes flashed with momentary defiance. He may have been mistaken but he thought he saw Elemena smile. However, the smile vanished before he could properly say it had ever visited her face.

"As yours is, of course…" she finished primly. "And leave other matters to your elders… You are still too young and inexperienced in matters of state to dabble in such heady things…"

"And yet I slew an Archdemon…" Alistair, reining in his temper, objected mildly.

"Oh, my sweet boy… Indeed, you did, but prowess on the field of battle does not automatically translate as prowess in other fields of endeavour. It will certainly not beget you the child you need and, no doubt, yearn for. Only prowess, or is it potency? I do confuse these things; you know, on the field of feathers, and the Maker's blessing, of course, will get you that."

Alistair was silent. Again, Elemena seemed to expect some sort of comment, but he remained mute.

"Ah, you resent my meddling. But, child, I can help you in ways that no one else can…."

Alistair was tempted: he fell. "In what ways?"

"You want her, do you not? The Cousland girl, I mean." The Grand Cleric leaned forward she had lowered her voice, her tone was cajoling. "She of the red hair and pretty green eyes."

"I…."

"Oh, you colour, it is agreeable to see that if you retain such delicacy of spirit. It cheers my old, cynical heart. She is a good choice, Alistair, mark me: good breeding, healthy, active, and fertile no doubt... Anora is such a sweet, obedient, little thing, but regrettably it seems she cannot give you what you most wish for and her age runs against her."

Alistair cringed inwardly he had been prepared to be mildly disapproving of the Grand Cleric he didn't expect to find her utterly loathsome. He might as well learn what he could, he thought. "If that were the case… What would you propose?"

"Well… Supposing, say, that your current queen were barren, or could be deemed to be barren…" Elemena added carefully, "That might be good grounds, perhaps, on which to request a dissolution of the marital bonds…"

"You mean a divorce?" Said Alistair.

"Yes, in effect, with the Chantry's blessing."

"I see."

"But let us go a little further…" Elemena's grey eyes wandered, "Say, for example, this naturally would be extremely odd, that your marriage to Anora had never been consummated…" Alistair tried desperately to suppress a nervous toss of his head, "In that instance, a divorce would not be necessary. Or say, further, that there were other grounds that rendered the marriage invalid…"

"Which—" he pressed.

"Oh, I don't know… The fact that she was previously married to your brother, perhaps…" The Grand Cleric shrugged elegantly.

"My half brother, you mean."

"Fair point, child." Elemena met his eyes briefly and smiled approvingly, he thought. "There are degrees in consanguinity…" She acknowledged, "But so long as some basis in sacred doctrine can be found, together with say, a precedent…"

"What then would be the consequences?" Alistair asked seeking to cut to the chase.

"Why… There would not be a valid marriage in the first place which means the divorce or a dissolution, however you wish to term it, is not necessary…"

"And in that case?"

"In that case, we would just have to present the relevant facts to the Divine in a persuasive manner." The Grand Cleric smoothed her scarlet silk robe over her knees. "If the Divine adjudged them to be sufficiently convincing then she would simply issue a declaration to the effect that your marriage was void. An annulment."

Alistair's mouth, worked somewhat at the last word. "I understand." He said after a pause.

Elemena's coarse hands clasped each other and over her knees, "You see, young man, there are many things I and the Chantry could do for you. With your consent, of course, I could be of great assistance to you, to the young Cousland girl, even to Ferelden. And after so much suffering Ferelden, Andraste's homeland, deserves a chance, a future of certainty, would you not agree? And all to the greater glory of the Maker. "

Alistair gave the briefest possible of nods. He felt sick inside. He tried to ignore that, not let it interfere with his expression, demeanour or voice. "And in exchange, for such generosity, Your Grace, what would you ask?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing?" His voice sounded hollow to himself.

"Next to nothing," stressed Elemena, "only that you put all your efforts, or most of them, into conceiving that heir, or heirs for all our goods and that once such a child arrives you allow it to be raised by the Chantry so it is not lacking in moral direction and discernment."

The very thought of any child of his, let alone sweet Niamh, enduring the same privations and miseries of his own childhood put Alistair's teeth on edge.

"And what of Anora?" He asked quietly. "What of her?"

"Ah, it is so, so sad… I would offer her sanctuary, an honourable retirement. She has many skills your current queen, who knows? She may welcome the opportunity to set aside all worldly cares and ambitions and use them for the benefit of the Maker and Andraste…"

"And were she not to be so easily persuaded? I need to explore all the angles, you see" Alistair explained.

"In the circumstances it may be unreasonable, irrational almost, to refuse such a generous and graceful offer… If she were to do that…" The Grand Cleric lowered her head and let out what appeared to be a heartfelt sigh. "You would not be the first to whom I had offered to succour in this way." She added.

"Cailan? You mean you made the same offer to Cailan?" He allowed his incredulity to get the best of him.

"There are many troubled souls… But my lips are sealed, even as concerns the affairs of the deceased."

"Suppose…"

Elemena raised her hand, "You are impetuous by nature, this I know. Think well on my words, young Alistair. You have a week in which to decide whether or not to accept this assistance I offer you. Think of what has been said here, and also what has not been said… Should you not agree…" The Grand Cleric let that hang in the air betwixt them for a while, "Then we both must needs abide by the consequences."

Alistair rose from his chair, almost clicking his heels. "It shall be as you say, Your Grace."

"Good. Go then with my blessing, child." Elemena held out her gnarled right hand again, he gathered himself, touched his lips quickly to Andraste's cold, impassive stone face and left the room.

"For now." The Grand Cleric added under her breath once he had closed the door carefully behind him.

                                                                                    ~...~                            

At first Alistair was surprised to find Anora pacing up and down the same corridor in the same way as he had done previously, on reflection, however, it was not so strange after all. He was about to open his mouth to offer her some platitude about the meeting when she grabbed him firmly by the arm and all but pulled him down the passageway. They quickly came to a door on the left, Anora opened it and ushered him inside. It turned out to be little more than a broom cupboard, there were pails and mops, aprons, dusters, mousetraps and, of course, brooms.

"Tell me." Anora said without further ado.

Alistair hesitated, "it was much the same as you said," he replied in what he hoped was a reassuring voice, "there was nothing of any substance, nothing of significance."

Anora was looking grimly at the wall just above his head. "I see," she said, her jaw set, "then there is nothing further to say."

Before Alistair even had the chance to add anything she had opened the door and was making her way down the corridor towards her own quarters.

                                                                                                  ~...~

That night he retired with a heavy heart to his room. Rous was as enticing as she had ever been but he was just not in the mood. She stroked his hair and face, kissed him, embraced him and eventually helped him undress for bed where she snuggled up against him.

Alistair tossed and turned until well past midnight unable to conjure sleep, going through in his mind the conversation with the Grand Cleric again, and again. The more he went through it, the less he liked it and the more he fretted. Finally, when the fire in the chamber was nothing but ashes in the grate he threw his bedclothes aside and got up.

"Alistair..." Rous mumbled drowsily.

"I'll be back soon, pretty one," he said, "there is just something that I meant to do earlier and it slipped my mind…"

"What…."

"Go back to sleep, Rous." He said firmly. In virtual darkness with only a scintilla of moonlight venturing through the curtains he put his small clothes on, his shirt, linen breeches and finally, pulling on his boots without bothering with socks, picked up his cape and threw it around his shoulders.

Once outside his bedroom and bypassing Lawler's startled expression, with a gruff, "Look after Rous." he made haste to the other side of the floor.

The guards outside Anora's chambers looked surprised, too, as well they might. Ignoring them, he banged his fist on Anora's stout bedroom door. He waited awhile and then banged again.

Finally, his impatience getting the better of him, he said out loud, "Anora, for love of the Maker open up, it's bloody cold out here and you are no more asleep than I am."

Hair loose holding an oil lamp she opened the door in her white floor-length nightdress and stood aside to let him in. He strode past her and sat on her bed. "Those guards are going to get the wrong idea entirely." He remarked.

"What is it, Alistair? What do you want?"

Alistair sighed swinging his feet, "To apologise and make amends."

"Whatever for?" Anora asked frostily.

"I am not going to tell you everything we discussed. There were several other matters that may concern people I am bound to protect. But as regards you, Anora, this is what the Grand Cleric had to say…."

Before he had fully finished, Anora had turned her back to him. Her shoulders were shaking and her face was in her hands.

[Addai]

Poor Anora. Much as I dislike her, she had a rough and lonely row to hoe.

[Esbatty]

'Nora!!!!!!!!

...

I am so upset at the damn Grand Cleric. How dare she upset Alistair, he was feelin' so awesome with his ruses and schemes and then pfft... she even had the audacity to bring up Duncan.

[Maria13]

@ Addai, agreed on the dislike & the toughness.

@ Esbat, soz but tension is tension...

[Esbatty]

LOL, no need for explanations, M. I whine... alot. Its part of my charm. I also like cheese, but am neither blonde nor a prince. But I am a bastard. Good times.

...

Its my inner Vann Cousland that is disturbed for his friend and wife.

[Maria13]

Chapter 65

Dragon 9:35  Molioris/Bloomingtide  Denerim  [Present]

About an hour and a half later Alistair returned to his bedchamber and began removing his clothes with the same haste as he had put them on.

"Alistair," said Rous from the bed, "where the hell have you been?"

"I thought I told you to go back to sleep, Rous." He said.

"As if you telling me to do something were enough to make me do it…" Said Rous.

"Well, anyway, make me some space, I'm a bit cold here."

When he got under the covers he was shivering, Rous made some fussing noises and then pulled him close to her. "Thank you." He said his teeth chattering, her body was as warm as a freshly baked loaf she smelled as delicious, he was a lucky man.

"So tell me…" She said, her nose almost touching his.

"Can't it…" Rous had reached down and clasped him very gently, "Oh!" He said.

"No." Replied Rous.

"Very well, then." Alistair sighed, more with contentment than anything, Rous had begun to run her hands up and down his length.

"I went to see Anora."

Rous released him and sat bolt upright, "Anora! At this time of the night…"

"Lie back down Rous, I'll explain." He said tiredly, Rous did as she was told this time and grasped him again.

"So?" she asked.

"I met alone with the Grand Cleric and she said certain things to me…" Alistair said and then he added, fidgeting a little, "You know, Rous, this simply isn't fair, you're literally pumping me for information…" Rous's hands on him felt soft but firm and she was moving them in a way that…

"Hard life you have, Alistair." Said Rous without an ounce of pity in her voice.

He pressed on, "Certain things about Anora, and other things… But… Ah… After the meeting I lied to her and told her we'd discussed routine stuff. Stupid thing to do… Whilst lying here earlier… I realised…" Alistair took a deep breath, "what a stupid thing that was to do because… Oh… I'm an awful liar… And Anora… Can read me like a bloody book, and… Thinking about it, she needed… To know… Maker! Oh…" Alistair blinked, "What that woman had said.…"

Alistair appeared to give up any attempt at coherence. He closed his eyes, turned over and lay on his back, his chest heaving Rous kissed his cheek feeling the light stubble abrade her lips and cuddled up into the crook of his arm.

"Please don't stop." He said softly.

She didn't.

                                                                                              ~...~

Once things had reached a resolution and they had cleaned up somewhat Alistair said. "Anora cried… I can't stand to see a woman weeping…"

"So you put your arms around her?" Rous guessed.

"I did, yes, it doesn't…"

"I know."

"She never cries." He added, "But she cried tonight, and she was saying something like 'it's happening all over again…' with her face against me."

"Go to sleep."

"Yes. I have that meeting with your brother tomorrow… I think you should attend now… and Oswyn…" Alistair punched his pillow to plump it up before putting his arm under in and turning towards his side of the bed.

"Don't fret. Go to sleep, Alistair." Said Rous snuggling down against his back.

"Yes…"

                                                                                                    ~...~

They had got up a little later than usual and were eating at a small table in his bedchamber: scrambled eggs on toast and lots of butter, cheese and warm milk.

"Yes," said Alistair, "you should come to the meeting, I've sent a message calling for Oswyn to be there too."

Rous just nodded her mouth was somewhat full.

Once she'd chewed and swallowed and licked some of the butter off her fingers she sat back and asked, "What exactly did the Grand Cleric say?"

Alistair removed his spoon from his mouth and began to tap it on the edge of the plate but he didn't answer.

"Do tell, love."

"Rous…"

"Well?"

"Do you want to be Queen? Queen of Ferelden?"

The question caught her holding a napkin and Alistair immediately noted that she'd started to twist and wring it in her lap.

"But An…"

"Forget about Anora." Said Alistair pointedly, "forget about me. Just answer the question… Theoretically, in the abstract."

"When I was a child…" She began, "what little girl doesn't want to be a Queen? I used to pretend to be one and boss Fergus and Gilmore around, I guess at the time that's what I thought being a Queen was all about… Bossing people, getting them to do what you wanted… But now? After everything that happened… I'm just happy to be intact, just happy to see the sunlight coming through the window here, to wake up in the morning next to you… I don't know, it's not that I'm not ambitious… but I'm a Cousland anyway, and there is nothing better than that…"

Alistair smiled.

"So anything else would just be extra hassle, I could do without, I think… So I guess the answer to your question now, this morning, is 'no'." Rous concluded. "Why are you smiling at me?"

"'I am a Cousland there is nothing better than that', I wish I could pull off that phrase with such a straight face."

"Oh well," Rous said digging into yet more scrambled eggs from the serving dish, "but you still haven't answered my question."

"Rous," said Alistair gravely, "you will never be Queen, we will never be able to get married…"

"Is that what that stuck up **** told you?"

"No. To be precise what she told me was that she could assist me in divorcing Anora and marrying you, so long as I concentrated on conceiving an heir and basically left the Chantry up to its own devices…"

"She knew about our relationship?" she said looking up at him.

"She knew…" He said meeting her eyes.

Rous appeared to turn that over, "And obviously you're not going to do that." It was a statement not a question.

"Would you like me to?" He said with his spoon poised in midair.

"And have you be some sort of stud? Some sort of bed warmer? A really lazy part of me would love that… And a really lazy part of you would be very accomplished at it, I'm sure…"

Alistair lowered his eyes and shook his head. "Milady, you over-estimate my humble talents…"

Rous laughed, then she said. "But that isn't really you or me is it? Neither of us like anybody else telling us what to do, and we're not particularly lazy. Not yet, anyway."

"I didn't become King just to screw my way across Ferelden…" He said seriously pouring himself some warm milk. "Though at some point, I admit, I may have seen that as a perk…"

Rous tackled the extra scrambled eggs on her plate, buttered herself another piece of toast and ate it. "Making love always makes me hungry," she remarked, then she frowned thoughtfully. "What did you do Alistair? It sounds as if you really managed to rattle her…"

"Ah well, I think you're just going to have to wait for that meeting."

"Anyway." She said carefully wiping her hand on the napkin and rising from the table. "There's something I forgot to give you yesterday…" Rous went over to where some items she had brought with her were stored in a chest and began sifting through it. She pulled out something white went over to where he sat and handed it to him.

"And this is…?" He asked.

"Well unfold it…"

He did, "A shirt, a very nice shirt…" It was of slightly heavier material than he was used to wearing but it felt crisp and expensive… "An embroidered shirt, in fact." Alistair said noting first of all the red mabaris, on the left breast.

"Those are not actually embroidered but appliquéd, it's an Orlesian sowing technique." Explained Rous. "And I didn't make the shirt itself, it comes from Antiva but…"

Looking further he discovered two little reds hearts embroidered onto the peaks of the collar and scallop shell design around its edges and the cuffs were long and feathery with light stitching that resembled lace.

"That's a traditional Ferelden style." Said Rous, "But you're missing the best…" She got up and showed him the hem. There was some lettering there, in pale blue silk…

'Alistair is a bastard'

Spelled out twice around the hem, from the front to the back separated by a small Cousland laurel situated exactly in the centre of the back of the shirt equidistant from the two side seams.

He laughed, a deep happy sound, and put his hand on her cheek. "I don't know whether to praise your stitching or chide you for being a naughty girl, Rous…" He said and gave her a gentle kiss on the lips.

"I stated working on it when we had that wager… I suspected I would lose and it was originally intended to be a peace offering… Or perhaps a last ditch attempt at seducing you. I imagined the wreath on the hem falling just above… Well. I was laughing a good deal while embroidering which is always a plus. Fergus called it the 'bastard shirt' and dared me to give it to you… So…"

"Did you make a wager with Fergus?"

Rous looked away. "Five sovereigns."

Alistair whistled, "You Couslands certainly don't do things by halves."

                                                                                               ~...~

Oswyn got to the meeting some twenty minutes late. Alistair was sitting with his legs crossed on the table with Rous at his right discussing horses with Fergus seated on his left. With a brief "Good day" Oswyn leaned his staff against the wall, straightened his padded surcoat and took a seat next to Rous, muttering a brief apology for his lateness.

"Ah, Oswyn." Now we can start." Alistair lowered his legs and sat upright.

Rous, eyed Oswyn's staff. "I was in the middle of practice," Oswyn explained.

"By the Chantry?" Asked Alistair.

"Yes."

"They love big sticks, apparently… Well, the reason I've called this meeting," said Alistair, "is because yesterday I had an audience with the Grand Cleric."

"I see." Said Oswyn immediately lacing his fingers on the table in front of him. "So what did good mother Elemena have to say for herself?"

"Nothing, I was particularly happy to hear." Replied Alistair. He gave a brief summary of the conversation he seemed to be slightly wary of Fergus, Oswyn thought, and he kept a few things back, "Basically she knows far more about me, my ancestry and my private life then I am happy with her knowing." He concluded

Oswyn glanced across the table Fergus, whose brows were lowered.

"And," continued Alistair, "she would be quite happy to use such knowledge against me unless I quote, 'stop playing games', as she calls it."

"Her timing could be significant." Remarked Oswyn.

"Explain?"

"Did you not first arrange to see her at the end of last year?"

"Yes, Firstfall or thereabouts. But she kept postponing, although the initial delay was ours."

"Hmmm," said Oswyn, "just about the time that old Beatrix died, then."

"It hadn't occurred to me," said Alistair, "so you think she was speaking authoritatively on behalf of the new Divine as well as herself?"

"I think we have to assume so, it would be safest…"

Fergus cleared his throat, "Can this humble Teyrn enquire as to what they have on you, Alistair?"

Oswyn exchange a long glance with Alistair, who in turn fixed his gaze on the table. "This doesn't leave this room, Fergus." He said severely.

"My word as a Cousland." Replied Fergus.

Alistair explained briefly about his Elven-blooded origins and about Niamh.

Fergus more than anything looked faintly bemused, "Theirin and Elven blood, little wonder Rosy finds you irresistible."

"Fergus!" Chided Rous.

Alistair simply looked grim.

"I recognise, at this juncture, that this is no laughing matter for those concerned and I appreciate your depositing your confidence in me, Ser." Fergus said, addressing Alistair.

Oswyn nodded in his direction approvingly.

Alistair worked his shoulders and looked up. "Way forward…" He said.

"I presume you don't want to accede to the Grand Cleric's suggestion." Asked Oswyn.

"No." Said Alistair.

"Well, then…" Said Oswyn.

"Just send dearest Elemena a single word reply: 'No', sign it and let her go bugger herself." Suggested Fergus belligerently.

"I was thinking along those lines myself." Said Alistair.

Oswyn held up hand, "I wouldn't do that, not at this stage anyway."

"Why not?" Asked Alistair pointedly.

"Your Majesty, they are being astute, it would be behove us to be astute in turn." Oswyn glanced at Alistair focusing on his shirt, clearly visible under his loosened surcoat "with all due respect, if your Majesty is a mabari, make the most of the leash you have been given, then ask for longer one, before taking all the risks of breaking free."

Alistair smiled but Oswyn remained serious.

"Very well." Said Alistair.

"We should ship that lyrium." Said Oswyn.

"Lyrium?" Interjected Fergus.

"In a week, hopefully in less than a week we can get it to Highever." Said Oswyn gazing directly at Fergus. "In the same period of time we may be able to make arrangements here in Denerim for an appropriate ship to collect it and take it to the Free Marches, as discussed. Once we have explained, I'm sure the Teyrn will be more than willing to assist us, if only in return for the confidence that His Maj—, Alistair has just shared with him. If the Teyrn would allow me, Your Majesty, I'll be more than happy to brief him after the meeting."

Fergus shrugged.

Rous grasped Alistair's arm, Alistair put his hand over her hand and said, "I'll brief Rous."

"Good." Said Oswyn.

"Now," said Alistair, addressing Oswyn, "about Anora; last night I informed her of the substance of the Grand Cleric's audience with me as concerns her. You may disagree that…"

"We have to deal with things and facts as they are in these meetings," said Oswyn, "but in any event, I do not think that informing Anora was a bad idea. Of course, there's always the possibility, I emphasise the word possibility, that she might attempt to broker her own deal with the Chantry. But I do not see what she has to offer them. I'm sure Anora will be thinking along the same lines as we speak, she is, after all an intelligent and resourceful woman."

He paused, "obviously it hasn't been proven beyond doubt that she is actually infertile," Oswyn paused again clasping his hands, "it is possible that it was Cailan and who had problems in that department, after all, Cailan went through a pretty 'sociable' stage and as of yet no bastards of his have come to light."

"I imagine," said Fergus, "that since Cailan died about, what? Five, six years ago, any illegitimate children he may have sired would have come forward by now."

"It seems reasonable," said Alistair, "however, let us not forget that my own existence was concealed for over twenty years."

The others nodded.

"If I could go back to the question of Anora," said Oswyn, "as Elemena ever so tactfully said, time is against her. Further, she may no longer have the undivided unconditional support that she once did, and as I said, what could she offer them that you can't Your Majesty? "

"Don't forget 'won't' Oswyn."

"But the Chantry is clearly looking to the future, Your Majesty, anything Anora gave them would die with her. They have, even to an extent written you off, focusing on your descendants rather than on yourself. It is your legitimate human heirs that they would seek to fully influence, not you. Therefore we should assume they have more than written Anora off since they would consider there is no possibility of her conceiving a legitimate heir at this stage and nor would she have any more popular support than you would have."

"Yes, and the reason for writing me off is again obvious." Rous looked at Alistair somewhat sadly as he said this and Fergus in turn, looked interrogatively at his sister.

Alistair seemed oblivious to these interactions. "As I told Rous, the more I was turning that conversation over in my mind last night, the less I liked it. And the Grand Cleric did warn me to pay as much attention to what we had said as what we hadn't said…"

"Ah," added Fergus, "but that may well be just a simple ploy to encourage you to believe that they know more than they actually do. To unnerve you."

"Agreed." Said Oswyn.

"So would you say then…" Alistair said somewhat cautiously, "Going back to our previous point, that as regards Anora the best way forward would to be to propose… An alliance of some kind? Maker, that sounds ridiculous since I'm married to the woman but…" Rous's hand gripped Alistair's arm a little tighter. He patted it somewhat absent-mindedly and murmured, "Sorry love."

"Look at it logically." Said Oswyn, "Because I think the Chantry has. Your chances of conceiving with Anora even if you did the deed, are low. Anora's chances of conceiving with someone else are low too, but additionally she would face the almost insoluble problem of having that relationship legitimised. Otherwise she would have to pass off the child as yours.

"Your chances of having a child with Rous… may be somewhat higher and simply because you are a male and younger, as dearest Elemena flagged up, your opportunities for successfully dissolving the marriage one way or another and remarrying without sacrificing too much popularity are considerably higher, but of course there would still be a risk, Anora is not unpopular… That's why they made you the offer and probably not her. You too, could attempt to pass off an illegitimately conceived child as yours and Anora's, but that's risky…

"Obviously the easiest solution for Anora would be if something happened to you… But then she would still face the problem of conceiving…"

"This is beginning to make me feel a bit dizzy, Oswyn, all these notional conceptions." Said Fergus.

"I'll cut to the chase then, Your Majesty, if you wish to remain in power and if Anora wishes likewise, it is my view that you will last far longer together than attempting to go your separate ways… Unless one of you voluntarily retires…"

"I'm not leaving Ferelden to Anora, not now, not when being King has already buggered up my life and I'm starting to have plans, and I'm fairly certain she won't quit the field either…"

"Then my view is you are both better served seeking a renewed accommodation…"

"Suppose we have…" Rous looked nervously at Alistair, "children?"

Alistair in turn looked at Oswyn raising his eyebrows.

"Well… They'll be…"

"Little bastards." Supplied Fergus helpfully, "Blood is blood, Cousland, Theirin… Elven… whether begotten on one side of the blanket or the other… Remember Gilmore, Rosy? Excellent lad…"

"How could I… Not a day goes past…" Rous buried her head on Alistair's shoulders. Everyone was silent for a while.

Fergus went very red and cleared his throat, "Rosy, I didn't mean… It wasn't my intention…"

"I know…" Snuffled Rous.

"I just meant… Look, I'll shut up before I put my foot in it again. But you know what I mean…"

Rous nodded.

Alistair touched Rous's cheek gently. "I think should tell Anora about Rous and I…" He said.

"It may be a way forward…" Oswyn said cautiously.

"Since she's going to find out sooner or later, anyway."

"It will be tough." Said Oswyn.

"Yes, don't envy me… Everything's tough… Every damned thing I take on. But, well…"

Alistair got up and Rous followed. They made for the door but once there Rous took a few steps back and put out her hand towards Fergus wiggling her fingers. With a sigh and theatrical roll of his eyes at Alistair and Oswyn, Fergus reached for his belt bringing out a money pouch.

Slowly and carefully he counted five gold pieces into her palm. Rous pocketed them with a contented smile and taking Alistair's arm they walked out.