"Pst," Alistair nodded to her, "you've got some, uh, bandit juice still."
"Oh?" she rolled her eyes and then rolled her sleeve up to her elbow to reveal her arms covered in their day's work. Sliding closer to the table, she dropped her arm down and called to her dog. He woke from his dreams at her feet, and a slobbery tongue lapped up the gore across her skin. Alistair forgot about that vampiric quirk from the days of the blight, and he'd been happier in his ignorance. She must have caught his queasy stare because she offered, "He'd be willing to clean you off too."
"That's all right, I'm good."
The dog finished and flopped back down on the floor. White coated his muzzle like snow across the eaves, but he held up like a demon while they worked through the back alleys. Rolling down her sleeve, Lanny smiled, "You probably have fancy servants devoted to drawing the bath, one for holding the soap, and a last just to wash the king."
"Ha, I mention I plan on stripping off any layer of clothing and the entire palace scatters screaming to warn everyone. Not a soul for miles, which means I'm free to slide down the banisters without anyone yelling at me to stop."
"Buck naked, of course," she said lifting her glass as if in a toast.
"Is there any other way?" Alistair grinned. He was trying to cling to the last hours they had together before all that duty stuff came back. It was an odd tradition, one Eamon threw apoplectic and apocalyptic fits about, but the old Arl couldn't stop it. It was too ingrained now. The 'on a holiday' king of Ferelden lifted his own glass. "To Duncan," he said.
Lanny knocked her mug into his, "And the others lost at Ostagar." They both took a long swig of the swill, Lanny's entire face scrunching up in pain. It'd been too long since she'd last been back in town. She forgot how stomach churning the rot could get here, which was also its charm.
"I almost didn't think you'd make it," Alistair said. He cut off a section of their shared dinner and palmed it. Sliding his hand under the table, he tried to pass it off to the dog.
"It's tradition, can't mess with that." She inspected her nails and found more blood stuck under them. A few of the people whispered rumors of how once a year the king of Ferelden slipped into the streets to walk among them. Then most laughed it off because that idea was idiotic as sin. Why would a king go incognito just to have a day to himself? He didn't really walk among them anyway, he more stabbed those that were preying upon the innocent with a disguised mage at his side. Out of her grey warden armor, Lanny looked like any random woman who could command ice and fire with her will and look gorgeous while doing it. They came together each year - the three survivors of Ostagar - to try and memorialize it, or something. It didn't begin as a cleaning the streets to honor their fallen brethren. In fact, the first year Eamon and Isolde organized some fancy fete. Alistair had been shocked the newest Arlessa showed, her shoulder's knotted and her snarl in place while the judgmental gentry paced around her. Lanny looked about to snap off her own lead and nip people for getting too close. So, while the rest of the nobility got drunk reminiscing about a battle none of them saw, Lanny, Alistair, and her mabari slipped into the streets. At first it was just to get some air, then they ran into a surprisingly organized gang of lyrium smugglers. After that it was stab stab, explode, bite, ice and somehow became tradition.
"I'm glad you came. You've been damn near impossible to reach lately. Always, 'Sorry Alistair, off saving the world' this, and 'Can't right now, have to completely rearrange time. Try again later, assuming there is a later' that."
She snickered at his summation of her life, but the wear returned piece by piece. He did his part to ignore it and try to distract her. Not that she wasn't still as knock dead gorgeous as the first time he'd met her (and just as capable of knocking people dead). But the position she was placed in, the power she was given over others fit on her about as it did him. And that was his doing.
"Life keeps me busy," she responded.
"Oh come on, I'm a member of the same taint club. You can tell me all your dirty, grey warden secrets," he inched closer across the table, his head dropping low.
"You're impossible," she laughed, softly pushing against his sleeveless arm. It hadn't begun the day that way, but bandits never obeyed the laws of couture.
"You already knew that," Alistair smiled back. In this filthy inn, with every muscle in his body exhausted beyond belief and the diseased liver of a bronto gurgling in his stomach he felt at ease. Perhaps it was the return to his old life, if only in brief, or maybe it was getting to share only a sliver of it with her again.
Her sweet and ornery eyes slipped away from him towards the door. They'd claimed the furtherest back table in the hopes no one would bother them, which seemed to be working as no one wanted near someone that ate the chef's special. "Oh dear," Lanny sighed, her fingers running the rim of her glass, "Looks like your cavalcade's arrived." As she threw back the last of her drink, Alistair turned in his seat to catch five palace guards peering through the dark corners of the nearly desolate inn in the hopes to try and find him. Well, good luck, guys. "It's been fun, but I suppose..."
He grabbed onto her hand, getting an arched eyebrow, but she only carefully set her glass down. Whispering, Alistair jerked his head towards the door, "Come on, we can sneak out the back."
"Are you serious? You can't be serious. Those are your men and women. Don't they work for you?" she whispered back even as she inched out of her seat along with him.
"Kinda, sort of in a way that's complicated and..."
"Eamon ordered them to find you," she translated his lack of an excuse.
"Yes, so let's go." He held her hand tight as they both crouched low and moved towards the kitchen door. The barkeep had to see them both but he'd either grown jaded by the claptrap that'd frequent a sticky inn so sight of the king and hero sneaking past barely registered, or this was a common tuesday for him.
"Wait, what about...? Dog," she turned around to her still slumbering pooch. He perked up from his not quite name. "Return to the room," she ordered. Before Lanny could watch to see if he'd obey, Alistair yanked her into the kitchen. He let go of her hand and, in a surprising burst of glee, broke into a run so he could slide across the table in the middle of the room. Lanny chuckled from the smear of flour in his wake and now across his backside, but she followed suit, her own sapphire robes turned nearly chalk white.
"Quick! Out the door!" Alistair shouted as if it was the hounds sent after him instead of a handful of guards who would only sigh at their strange king and ask if he could head home. The top half of the door was left open for airflow in the stifled kitchen, but the bottom remained latched shut. Rather than risk trying to kick it open, Alistair leapt up and, ignoring any possible threat to those crown jewels, he cleared the doorframe. It was the down part he hadn't corrected for, his shoes skidding across an icy patch of ground outside. Waving his arms for balance, somehow the king of Ferelden kept from smashing headfirst into the ice, but he had to hop in the least dignified manner possible.
Spinning around, he watched Lanny standing there with her arms crossed. "Is the show over?"
"I'd like to see you do better," he scoffed.
Whipping her hand out of her sleeve, Lana extended her fingers as if she intended to cast a complicated spell. Then she bent over, unhooked the lock on the door and pushed it open. "Ta da."
"Mine was more dramatic," Alistair grinned.
"Hey! Who's in the kitchen?" a gruff voice echoed from the bar.
"Run!" Lanny snatched up his hand now, fully invested in the game. Despite being nearly thirty, and technically owning the place, the pair of them ran through the streets of Ferelden as if they were a couple kids breaking curfew. A few of the late night denizens paused in their amble, casting a second look back and probably wondering if that really was the king being dragged by a small, dark-skinned mage, or if they'd had too much to drink or not enough.
"Wait," Alistair yanked back on her hand. They'd skirted close to the alienage in their running, the
houses shrinking in size and piling on top of each other. The haphazard building provided perfect hiding above. "Take the ladder up."
"Are you certain?" Lanny asked, even as she began the climb. "You better not be looking up my robes."
"What do you take me for, some drooling lecher? Don't answer that." Alistair joked as he waited below until she was almost at the roof, then he followed suit. Ferelden at the best of times stank of dead fish, sewage, and oddly enough, lilacs year round. He couldn't figure out the lilac, though the other two's origins were evident enough. Thanks to the winter winds blowing in hard off the mountains, most of the fish and sewage were frozen in place limiting their smells radius. Without the rush of battle, or the fear of his own guards catching him, warmth drained from his fingers clinging to the frozen wood as he climbed higher into the air.
As he stepped onto the roof, he spotted Lanny circling against the rare flat surface in Denerim. She had a hand on her hip while she stared down at the people still moving through the city despite the night or cold. "They never look like ants, people always say that, but I don't see it. To me I see people."
"Hm," Alistair hopped off the ladder and a full blast of cold air whipped through the tight buildings. His teeth knocking, he chattered, "I don't get close enough to the edge to see, myself." Despite the dipping night, Lanny seemed unaffected, her own disguise a lighter robe atop little more than fancy pajamas. "How are you not cold?"
"I'm a mage, remember?" she smiled while stepping closer to him. In her eyes he spotted the flicker of flames dancing against those even warmer browns. "Here," slipping her fingers out of her sleeves, she touched against his bare arm. Maker! Her touch was hotter than the burning sun of summer. The warmth of her finger enveloped around his body and he felt a sudden urge to press all of her skin against his. Shaking it off the second it rose in his mind, Lanny's fingers vanished away leaving in their wake her old warming spell.
"Forgot about that," Alistair said.
"That I'm a mage? Really? You would have been a terrible templar," she smirked. Without any fanfare, Lanny plopped onto the roof, her legs folded up under her.
"Damn straight," he said while joining her. "Terrible templar, terrible king. So-so warden, I suppose."
"You're not such a terrible king," she sighed, her head tipped back to gaze upon the stars. Even with the drooping laundry lines of Denerim in the way, they could still see a beautiful cross section of the Maker's bounty glittering across the sky. "You haven't had anyone try to overthrow you yet. I'd say that's a good sign."
"Ignoring the fact said king just ran away from his own guards for no good reason," he sighed, his own neck craning back so he could try to trace the stars. "Hey look, Satinalis."
"That's not Satinalis," Lana said.
"Sure it is, with the three stars connecting like a wonky belt..."
"That's Fenrir. Actually, that's half of Fenrir. You have to--"
"No, I'm certain it's Satinalis. Read it in a book once," Alistair continued, his finger trying to trace the constellation in the sky.
Lana snorted, "Well, either the book was wrong or you are in your remembering because you can't even see Satinalis at this time of night during the early winter months. It rises in...what?"
He didn't wipe off the giant grin across his face, "You being all...you know, you about stuff. Having to get it right and thinking everyone else is as clever."
"I don't, I mean, I try to...It's still not Satinalis."
Lanny lapsed into her own brooding silence, a familiar one he came to know over the years. She used to fill it with chatter, an almost terrified prattle of facts when they first met. Though, to be fair, he did the same. Once she grew used to him and got over that whole awkward first stage, hers fell away. Alistair had no excuse beyond needing to escape the void, usually with his foot planted firmly in his mouth.
"How are things in the ol' Arling? Bann...what's-her-name still giving you trouble? I could send a few more tax collectors her way to mess things up."
"Don't be daft," Lanny shook her head. "She'd have them shot on sight. No, things have quieted down for once. There's always darkspawn, of course."
"Of course." The one remaining thing they shared was the taint in their blood. They never talked about it beyond an occasional nod to the never ending hunger or the one night when seriousness wiped away their lighthearted mood and they made a pact together. "So..." Alistair stirred up the frost coating the roof with his finger while also stirring up shit, "how are things between you and that mage guy? What was his name? Rufus? Ruffian? Ruffles?"
"You know his name isn't Ruffles," Lana said, her voice flatter than the roof's edge. Alistair shrugged, well aware of the name but not about to give an inch. Lana returned to gazing at the stars, "Over before they even began, I'm afraid."
"What? Why? He sounded so...is there a nice way to say interesting when you really mean boring?"
"Just because you didn't grasp his theories on the circumstantial output of fade energy when redirected through a crystal focus doesn't mean he was boring."
"He wouldn't have known a joke if it crawled up his backside and danced the remigold," the king of Ferelden moped.
"I regret ever introducing you two," she sighed, but her eyes glittered for a moment as she met his. There didn't seem to be too much love lost for the man.
"So you wised up and broke things off?"
"No, he discovered a new muse who wasn't as 'intimidating' and I found myself grateful for that bolt dodged."
"The man was boring and an idiot, then. Have to be to break things off with you," Alistair joked with a wry grin stretching his cheeks. Lanny paused, her eyes blinking. She stretched up, about to call him on it, but instead she shook her head and slipped back down. It wasn't worth it.
"Now I'm regretting even telling you of his existence," she chose instead, but there was no malice in her words, only a world weary exhaustion. "What about you? How is your wife?"
Alistair scrunched up his face at the mention of his own baggage. No, that was a mean way to think of her. She was more like a millstone Eamon knotted around his neck. If he even thought of slipping away from her, the noose would tighten more dragging him into the mud. "Alive, I assume."
"Come now, I had the opportunity to meet her a few times. She seemed very nice."
"That's just it, that's all there is. Nice in the morning, nice when stepping in dog shit, even nice after catching me ankle deep in the throne's seat with barking dogs all around. It's not normal. I keep waiting for her to crack and scream murder through the halls, but no matter what I do she blinks those squiggy green eyes and smiles like a Tranquil. One day I'm gonna yank on a candle sconce and discover her secret chamber where she bathes in virgin blood or something."
Lanny's warm hand landed upon his and she sighed, shaking her head. So maybe the queen didn't go in for ritual sacrifice, probably didn't, that would make her interesting. "She was your best option, after all."
"Right, best..." he twisted away. It took years for them to reach this point without any pain ringing through their words. Even still, he couldn't fully hide away his regret. It was a dumb choice then, and it was still one now even if there was no other option. "No little princes or princess' yet, though."
"I...I'm sorry."
"The waving I can handle, no problem. Parading up and down the streets shaking babies and kissing hands. I've even figured out which fork to use when eating," he paused from Lanny's wrinkled nose about his still abject failures in dining, "but I can't do that whole siring thing. Well, not again." Lanny hadn't told him much about her run-in with Morrigan beyond it being complicated and that she had a son. He had a son, except he didn't. It was doubtful Morrigan would even tell the kid he had a father - maybe she'd convince him he was born of a dragon. Though, given the grandmother that might be true. Another bastard brought into the world with a royal father doing his damnedest to ignore it all. It bit into Alistair's soul if he stopped to think about how he was following in Marric
's footsteps, so he did his best to never try.
"Right now, Eamon and the queen are looking for an acceptable substitute. It's a tiny bit strange to walk in on the look alike tryouts and have copies of your face staring guiltily up at you. Ferelden has more blondes than seems normal. Maybe it's something in the water." He banged his toes against the ground savoring the twang as the pain ratcheted up his leg. It seemed like something he deserved.
"Ali," her soft voice broke through his funk and pulled him towards her, "you're worth more than...your uh--"
"Baby batter?"
"Maker's breath, you're terrible," she snickered shaking her head and trying to bury a laugh.
Stretching his back out across the cold roof, Alistair notched his hands behind his head and gazed up at the stars. "Too bad there's not another bastard of Marric's out there to step up to the plate and get that job done. I mean, maybe there is, given my own ignominious creation. That'd solve a lot of this mess."
"Or," Lana joined him in laying back upon the roof, her body so close her elbow almost knocked into his chest. "Perhaps your father cared for your mother, more than anyone ever realized. It can happen."
He twisted up on his side to look over at her. The edge of her eyes flitted over but she remained facing the stars. "Lanny. Sweet, kind Lanny. Always hoping to find the best in people."
"You make me sound like a naive school girl. I can be as cynical as the next person."
"Oh, sure, right. Hello mister elf assassin that just tried to kill us. I'm going to give you another chance to aid us and hope you don't try and kill us again."
"It worked, didn't it? Zevran was vital during the blight," she stuck up for the elf.
"Hello mister drunk dwarf that vomited on my shoes and whose wife nearly killed us. I'm going to let you join us and hope you don't piss all over the food."
"Oghren's not so... all right, that one's still biting me in the ass."
"Hello giant rock statue that keeps calling me it and loves to talk about skull crushing, will you be my friend?"
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