My Love

by Sabrina Zbasnik

  The veil sundered deeper, a taste of metal rising in the air as she dug up whatever evil spell knotted in her brain. Even exhausted, Alistair pulled upon the emptiness in him and directed it at Lanny. Her head snapped back from the pressure, her eyes falling closed. Maybe it worked this time. Alistair advanced towards her, a grin rising along his cheeks, when she blasted a force powerful enough to smash the air from his lungs and knock him backwards. Unable to stay upright, Alistair tumbled ass first towards the ground. His back bounced off the bowing deck, while his unarmored head managed to meet with some convenient rope. It cushioned it just enough to be incredibly painful without giving him a concussion so he'd have a handy excuse to stop.

  "Uncle!" he called waving his sword limply in the air.

  "Maker's sake, Alistair. I barely even felt that," Lanny stormed as if he'd been the one to throw her off her feet.

  "Really? Maybe we should trade places then because I sure as shit did. Ouch." He rolled to his knees, grateful he'd kept up with the same pirate uniform as her. Breeches and a linen tunic were the only way to survive a constant wash of sea water across the feet and sprayed in the face. Struggling to rise while in full armor was a workout in and of itself.

  "This isn't funny," Lanny stormed as she paced to him. He looked up at her hand dangling in front of his face. For a moment he wondered if it was a trap, but he still took it regardless. She gripped tight and helped to haul him to his feet.

  Alistair shrugged, checking to make sure he hadn't broken anything important. "It's a little funny to see me sprawled out on my back."

  "I'm serious," she fumed and the self deprecating smile on Alistair's face slipped away. This wasn't the Lanny that shot sarcastic eyes at Isabela whenever Alistair mentioned his plan. Or the one who screamed 'You have to be kidding me!' when she learned why they were in Antiva. He spotted a fear running through her that he hadn't seen in, well, eight years.

  Grabbing up her staff, she returned to her sparring spot having not been shifted from it by him the entire time. "Maker only knows what we're going to find during this quest."

  "Hopefully, king Marric."

  "You know what I mean. Crows are one thing, and I've broken into my share of prisons before..."

  Alistair eyed her up, "Since when? Did I get left off your mailing list on accident because I'd love to hear those tales?"

  Lanny deftly batted his joke away, "But we're chasing down a witch, a swamp witch. Remember the last time that happened? Turned into a dragon, nearly ate us all."

  "Morrigan's bite was worse," Alistair sneered.

  She sighed, never having hated the swamp witch the same way he did. They even, against all Maker given sense, became friends. He'd never understand it. "You need to be at your best, okay," Lanny said, her eyes hunting through his while she pleaded for him to listen. Anyone else, Alistair could shrug off with a joke but she stung his soul.

  "I'll try," he said bowing his head.

  "Good, because I'm not taking your corpse back to Eamon," she smiled, but there was a barb inside. She damn well meant it. Throwing her arms up, Lanny commanded, "Do it again, and this time reverse the mana or drain it, don't do both."

  "You can tell the difference?"

  "Of course I can," she shrugged. "It's not something one forgets." They used to do it all the time during the blight. She'd thread apart the veil just for Alistair to yank it all away. It was the mage equivalent of pulling a girl's pigtails because you liked her, except in this case the girl kept insisting he "give 'em a good yank." She wanted to know how to fight mana drains, to prepare herself, or - sometimes he deluded himself into thinking - she liked any excuse to spend time with him. Sometimes, she'd even challenge him to dampen her mana during, uh... He rubbed the back of his neck to distract from that thought. It was not the time to be treading down that old memory.

  Situating herself, Lanny centered her body and prepared for his worst. Okay, Alistair, you can do this. Remember all the stuff they taught you, when you weren't scrubbing every pot and pan in the kitchen. The canticles were supposed to help, but he'd never found a single one that silenced the chatty part of his brain. Instead, he'd recite in his mind a silly little poem from childhood.The teeny-tiny bronto went chasing down the road. Up from the ground, a thousand darkspawn rose...

  Raising his head, he met Lanny's challenging stare eye for eye. She grinned while parting the veil, even more fade energy pouring into this world. Whatever she was going to hit him with was going to hurt, bad. The nothingness flowed through him, wrapping around his body like a giant snake or clingy blanket. As the edges of her body glittered from the fade energy racing through her, Lanny lanced her fingers forward to spill it all against him. That's when Alistair struck. Pushing every inch of his being into that nothingness, he coated it around Lanny, around the spell flying off her fingers. Only the barest push bounced into his shield, which he flicked off with a wave of his arm.

  Surprised, Lanny gasped at the drain. Then a wicked grin curved up her face and the damn woman dipped back into the veil. Instinct struck Alistair. Dropping his shoulder down, he barreled at the mage preparing another spell to destroy him. Energy crackled through the air thick enough to spark off every nail in the deck. Lanny had her eyes set upon him, but the templar used his other skills to take her down. His shield smacked into her chest and the force of Alistair's run shoved them both backwards until Lanny crashed into the ship's sidewall. Pinned tight, Alistair pushed his wooden sword against her neck.

  "You're dead," he said, pride engulfing him.

  She blinked a few times, then her lips quirked up, "So are you."

  "What?" He began to argue when he felt the hilt of her dagger knocking against his stomach. If she'd twisted it around properly, she'd have driven the blade up through his ribs and probably into his heart. Dead as dead can dead. His head fell down and Alistair threw his shield to the ground like a spoiled child. "Damn it!" He needed to be better, he knew it. He had to return to his old fighting form in order to find...the king. To bring the rightful ruler back to Ferelden instead of his broken and sorry ass.

  Lanny sheathed her hidden dagger, and she pushed his sword away from her neck with her pinkie. He expected her to shove him off her, but she let his limp arm crash into the wall beside her head. "It went better that time," she said, that fiery drill instructor banished. Now it was the gentle and calming teacher doing her best to help her most useless student.

  "Yeah, I lived for five more seconds before you killed me. Great improvement," Alistair sighed, his breath rattling in his exhausted throat.

  "Ali," her voice whispered. He broke from glaring at his shoes to find himself awash in her eyes. In the heat of faux-battle he hadn't realized that they were less than an inch apart, gasping for breath in the same space. With his hands splayed against the wall beside her, and hers resting near but not touching his hip, they'd be damn embarrassed if anyone suddenly walked in on them. They hadn't been this close since...since he broke her heart.

  Lanny's eyes that'd been as unbreakable as steel softened to compassion, "You can talk to me. You know that, right?"

  "I..." He watched her lips part ever so slightly in concern. Those thick, pillowy lips he'd wake to find himself yearning for. Her full, soft cheek he used to caress while kissing so he didn't accidentally hit her in the nose or something. Maker... His body trembled that had nothing to do with the pain in his backside or the headache rolling across his brain. It grew more impossible to rein himself back in with every passing day on this journey.

  Maric. Old pops himself. That was why they were here, why his butt had to be nothing but bruises. In his mind, Alistair could see how this would all work out. Maric would be rescued, huzzah huzzah, the one true king would take up the throne, and -- after warming it for eight years -- Alistair would be free. He could go wherever he wanted, do whatever he wanted, be with...

  "You're not talking," she whispered, those lush eyelashes fluttering as she eyed him up. "It worries me when you're not t
alking."

  "Really? I thought people loved it when I stopped talking. They throw delightful parades in Denerim whenever it happens. The Grand Cleric dresses in an oversized harlequin outfit to pass candy out to children."

  Her dangling hand rose and she held onto his arm. Those delicate fingers dug into his strained bicep - their first touch that had nothing to do with a handshake, a friendly pat on the back, or playing nice to the gentry in years. Alistair tried to look away without making it obvious, terrified that Lanny could read the want across his face. He shouldn't be thinking it, shouldn't be feeling it with his own dagger almost pressed against her stomach.

  "When you're not talking, you're thinking, and that never ends well for anyone," Lanny said.

  Turning to face her, every smart ass remark died on his lips -- which was sad because he had a good dozen prepped. Perhaps it was the lantern light, or the shadows of the hold but he'd never noticed a small ring of gold circling in the depths of her brown eyes before. Gawking at the woman as if he'd never seen her before, Alistair struggled to form a coherent sentence, then even a word.

  "What?" she asked, trying every trick in her arsenal to get him to open up. Her lips lifted in a smile and he was gone. Leaning his head to the right, Alistair bent his knotted knees to catch her luxurious lips in a kiss. For a heartbeat, Lanny stood still, uncertain what to do. In the back of his mind, he knew there was a good chance he'd find himself splayed across the deck again but the risk seemed worth it. He needed to do this, needed to know if there was even a chance.

  She didn't crack open the forces at her disposal to banish him with a curt word or broken rib. Her own lips parted in a hungry sigh and she knotted her hands behind his neck, pressing deeper into the kiss. That was his cue to grab her waist and lift her up to him. Eight years faded away to nothing at the taste of her, like licking lightning if it was coated in sugar, and from the floral scent always ensnared across her skin even without any perfume. They melded together in a strange cohesion that shouldn't work, one neither of them seemed to have forgotten. He didn't want it to end, terrified that if he stopped kissing her then they'd have to talk about it, reason away why they shouldn't do it again. And he couldn't go back to before, not again. Not to the furtive glances risked when her back was turned, the almost but not grace of her skin upon his, the sweet smile she'd brandish that he yearned to feel pressed against him. He thought he'd ached for her before; stepping away now would kill him.

  Absence made the heart grow fonder and other bits much harder.

  Sadly, breathing was something both of them seemed to need and it was Lanny who slipped down, dragging her tempting lips away from his. Her eyes slowly opened and she gazed up at him. He couldn't read her. When she was thinking like that, this enigmatic blanket wrapped around Lanny rendering all obvious emotion down to an unreadable expression. Whether she was happy, or mad, or gassy was impossible to tell until she spoke up.

  "Alistair," she whispered, her fingers parting through his scruff on the way to beard-central.

  "I know," he said, accepting that this wasn't going to happen. It could never happen. They'd spent so much time and work becoming friends, burying past hurts. To blow it all away now would be a travesty -- one he feared they might never come back from.

  But Lanny didn't shove him away. Instead, she raised up on those tiny toes of hers and also pulled his head lower. Her hot breath washed over his ear, pushing the last of his buttons. "Did you lock the door to the hold?"

  "I, uh..." he tried to whip his head back at the hatch above them as if that could jog his memory, but she held him tight.

  "Never mind, I have it." Waving her fingers, she blasted ice thick enough to coat the hatch sealing them off from the rest of the pirates. "That should give us an hour or more."

  "Lanny, are you..."

  Her palm pushed against his lips, the chill of the spell clinging to her skin but melting quickly from his own ragged breath. "Shh... that's enough talking."

  By all that is good and gooder in the Maker's eyes, Alistair never imagined that he'd feel Lanny again. He'd never taste her, smell her slick skin, roll his fingers across her landscape. She'd been the one to lead all those years ago, patiently offering up directions and keeping him from breaking anything on accident. Now, with her pressing her lips to his, her body against his, he couldn't help himself. Alistair's hands slipped down the curves of her body, flirting with her breasts but not committing, trailing the inner knot of her waist and flaring out at her hips. Her bones undulated below his fingers as she hopped back and forth to keep high enough to reach him.

  Maker, but he loved that, the way she'd scramble to cover their height difference that was almost out of reach. The woman never gave up for anything. His fingers dug into her back while his thumbs caressed the sides of her stomach. He used to dribble water across the flat terrain and watch the droplets roll back and forth as she twisted her hips. Extra points if she managed to get a drop into her bellybutton.

  Breaking off the kiss, Alistair whispered in her ear, "Hold on tight." Lanny barely had a chance to dig her fingers into the back of his neck before he rolled his palms around her backside and lifted her off the ground. She yelped in excitement, wrapping her legs around his waist for balance. He could write sonnets, and odes, and other frilly poems about her backside. They'd be purpler than dusk and probably not rhyme, but he could do it. Ample was the disinterested way to describe it. Lush, intoxicating, like grabbing onto a pair of firm but comforting pillows, fun beyond compare. He'd probably go for one of those, add in some more adjectivey adverbs, and then find he had to rhyme orange.

  She squirmed in his grasp struggling to maintain her upright posture as he pushed her against the wall. Even with her own pirate breeches in the way, he felt the heat from that part of her he wasn't supposed to dream of grinding against his own pelvis, all of it begging for relief. And that was when he realized his mistake.

  Lanny's lips kissed along his jaw, her bottom one ruffling up his patchy facial hair as she worked towards his ear. Pausing to catch her breath, she asked, "What now?"

  "I think I miscalculated. Usually you're in robes, so... What's with this sudden pants wearing?" He dug his fingers into her generous scoopfuls blocked off from easy access, feeling the line of smallclothes beneath.

  Shrugging, she smiled that mischievous grin, "When on a ship, do as the pirates do."

  He should put her down, let her adjust herself and then they could figure it out. But, what if in the interim Lanny sobers up, realizes that this was one big mistake and then it's back to throwing him overboard for starting it all up again? To hide the whirring of his mind, Alistair kissed her neck, pushing her body flatter against the ship and also into him. Maker's breath, that borrowed corset lifted her glorious breasts higher than normal. He wanted to bury his face in them and never come out. Smothered to death by cleavage, it seemed a kingly kind of end.

  "Anything, yet?" Lanny asked, but her own breathing was raw on the edges, a hungry look in her eye. She seemed to want to get on with it as much as he did.

  "Can you make clothing disappear?"

  "Yes, but that involves throwing them out the window," she smirked. "Hm..." The woman, the little mage who carried around an entire nation's worth of books, unclasped her legs from his waist. Alistair groaned from the additional stress on his arms, but he took her full weight in his hands. Maker, he did need to work out more. Lanny kissed him hard, not some soft petal touch of lips. Her lips outflanked his at every turn, that tasty tongue of hers rolling around with his in ecstasy. While distracting Alistair, her legs climbed up the wall behind her and she pushed off.

  After spending an entire day falling on his ass, he took the tumble well, managing to hit nearly every vertebra on the way down before adding another bruise to his ass. What he wouldn't give for her ample cushioning to stick the landing. Lanny tumbled with him, she didn't have much choice as there wasn't time for him to let go. But she had enough presence of mind to flip her feet out
and catch herself.

  "Andraste's ass, what did you do that for?" he whined even as his hands rolled over her hips and across her waist, lost in those womanly curves.

  She slid down to her knees and bent her face to his, that canyon of cleavage darting into his field of vision. "Because now I can do this." With almost no help from the stunned man, Lanny grabbed onto the collar of his shirt and tugged it off. It should have been a bit harder what with him and her body pressing it into the floor, but she made it look effortless. Magic. Whenever she did something he couldn't explain, it was magic.

  Laughing at her tossing his tunic to the side without a care, Alistair watched her eyes devour his naked chest. Eight years was a long time -- from barely twenty and now into his near thirties, things had to change. But Lanny didn't seem to notice or care about the squishy parts he should have honed down before starting this journey. Her fingers followed his trail of golden chest hair down and down towards the waistband of his own breeches. Reaching out quickly, Alistair caught her one wrist in his fingers. Those beautiful eyes rolled up to him from the challenge. He squeezed once around her slender wrist extracting a moan from Lanny. That quirk of hers was hard to forget, and damn fun when they first found it together.

  He tried to pull her higher up, when he felt the waistband of his breeches fall slack. Damn, she'd managed to untie it with only one hand.

  "I still have some of those old skills," she smiled, catching on to his indignant face.

  "Do you break into houses to pass the time in Amaranthine or is this just a Satinalis and Feast Day thing?" Alistair joked, but he wasn't about to truly damn her nimble fingers. No, they should be celebrated instead. Have monuments built in their honor, and... "Ah, ha ha ha," his whole body lifted up off the floor as those lock breaking fingers slipped under the loosened waistband. Unable to help herself, she parted her fingers through his pubic hair like she intended to style it. Then she darted right for the main entertainment.