Fic: "Two Roads" Dragon Age Alistair/Loghain - Chapter 6
Authors: ac1d6urn and sinick
Summary: In which we probe the differences between oneiromancy and onanism, and Loghain refuses to learn templar talents.
Rating: Adult
Alternative links: AO3 ffn
Chapter 1: The Spirit Charm
Chapter 2: The Ruins of Lothering
Chapter 3: The Canticle of Shartan
Chapter 4: The Map Case
Chapter 5: Of Cheese and Chasind
Two Roads
Chapter 6: The Fade
As he drifted in and out of the Fade, Alistair thought he sensed the darkspawn, like a growling black thundercloud closing fast on their tiny camp, borne ever closer on screaming storm winds. The Blight's over, they're dead. Gone. They're not real. Or so he told himself as he tried to relax and catch up on much-needed sleep.
The thundercloud didn't even slow down. It rumbled and roared and spread over the land, Blight more foul and corrupt than any plague. Ferelden seemed as tiny as Loghain's maps beneath that vast shadow of malice. It pulsed as it grew, devouring more land, more settlements, more people, with every shuddering, spreading beat.
No! Nononono! I have to stop it! Alistair ran toward it, his arms flung wide, his armor and weapons at hand. Solona's gone so it's up to me now.
The thundercloud snarled its insatiable hunger, its endless lust for destruction. It was a monster as vast as the darkness under the earth, stalking its prey. Stalking Alistair.
He felt it gaping to devour the entire world, until nothing was left. Not the sun in the sky, not the stars. Not the rosebushes that had somehow survived Lothering, or the warm, hay-filled stables at Redcliffe, or even the palace at Denerim.
Nothing was left. Ferelden was wiped off the face of Thedas. Even Loghain's treasured maps curled and shrivelled and burned, like autumn leaves in a bonfire.
The pair of amulets around Alistair's neck were beating dull and heavy against his chest, as if his heart had hammered its way out of his ribs. He ran toward the unfurling cloud, sobbing and screaming and knowing it was hopeless. Knowing he was running to futile death.
He ran anyway, because there was nothing else he could do.
Alistair must've taken to heart Loghain's order to get some rest, because after Loghain surveyed the perimeter, he returned to the campfire to find Alistair curled up fast asleep, with the hound happily serving as his pillow. They were both quiet, save for soft, peaceful snores. Alistair's head and one hand rested on the mabari's broad back, and Alistair's uncurled fist lay next to his mouth. His lips were parted, as if he was just about to suck his thumb like a child.
Loghain settled a few steps away. Part of him monitored the sounds of the swamp, the pipings of frogs and the distant questions of owls, listening for any break in the soothing sounds that might hint at intruders. Part of him felt the beat of his tainted blood, basking in the soft warmth of Alistair's proximity, yet waiting for the poisonous pang that warned of approaching darkspawn. But most of him stayed spellbound by the peaceful sight of the man and dog at rest. Loghain grinned to himself, amused by the fact that an experienced warrior could still somehow manage to look so very young and so utterly innocent in his sleep.
Loghain continued to stand guard, watching over the pair of them. Alone as he was, he felt free to let his gaze linger on Alistair's lightly-fuzzed cheek and jaw, the cords of sinew in his bared throat, the relaxed sprawl of his limbs, one muscular arm stretched over the blanket. Alistair's short hair glinted in the red firelight, bright as new copper wire.
The mabari's ear twitched and lifted, as he opened his eyes and studied Loghain in the dark. Suddenly he let out a faint whine, barely heard but unmistakable. Then, the silent spell of Alistair's relaxation was broken as his eyes started to flick to and fro under his closed eyelids. A grimace twisted his face and his body flinched in his sleep, hands tightening into fists as his breathing hissed through clenched teeth.
It looked like a bad dream.
Loghain reached inward with all of his senses and felt a seismic ripple of unease in the warmth of the taint; at the same moment, Alistair's sleeping body thrashed. He rolled over, panting, blankets bunched up at his chest, tangled in his fists. The arch of his back turned his face to the firelight, teeth bared in a snarling rictus. He whispered something frantic and choked that sounded like a templar's chant.
Definitely a bad dream. Loghain remembered his own well enough, and he wasn't about to let a prolonged nightmare ruin Alistair's alertness during the second watch. Enough.
Loghain knelt beside Alistair and laid his hand on the man's shoulder. Squeezed gently.
The chant stopped and Alistair drew a deep, shuddering breath, almost as frantic as his gasps after the apostate's crushing curse. Brown eyes snapped wide, glazed and blank with shock, as he flailed wildly, struggling to sit up.
"You're safe," Loghain told him, quiet but clear. "It wasn't real. Just a nightmare."
The uncoordinated thrashing stopped and sleep-dazed eyes blinked blearily, until at last Alistair focused on Loghain. "Ugh. That wasn't fun," Alistair mumbled, lifting his hands to his face and rubbing his eyes and cheeks. "Bleargh."
"Are you all right?" Loghain murmured.
"Yeah," Alistair ran his fingers through the cropped brush of his hair and shook his head, exhaling his frustration. "I... I bet it means we're getting close... to where we need to be," he suggested with a twitch to his lips.
"Perhaps." Loghain gave what he hoped was a reassuring smile, then he looked away, lifting his gaze to the stars and studying the familiar scatter of constellations. "It's still early. Try and get some more sleep."
"S'all right," Alistair gestured with one look at the sky and the moon setting into the fog. "Your turn. It's almost time for my watch anyway." He yawned cavernously and tried to stand, but his tossing and turning had tangled the blanket around his lower legs and feet. He managed to get to his knees, sleepily tried to shake one foot loose of the rumpled blanket, and staggered, still on one knee, overbalancing forward. One hand flew up reflexively to stop himself from falling flat on his face, and his hand closed on Loghain's thigh. He blinked down at his bedroll, fumbling dazedly with his free hand to untangle the blankets, leaning unconsciously all the while on Loghain. Only when he'd untangled his other foot, did he realise what - or who - he'd been using as support all this time. He drew back his hand. It wasn't quite the panicky snatch of unprotected skin away from hot coals, but it wasn't too far off.
Speaking of which, Alistair's face was doing a very good impersonation of hot coals. "Sorry," he mumbled, lurching to stand, kicking the last twists of blanket away from his feet.
Loghain reached out to steady the staggering man, hoping the gesture would be accepted as the simple reassurance he meant it to be. One hand closed on Alistair's shoulder. The taut muscle under his fingers was still warm with sleep. Alistair blinked, and their gazes met. It was then that Alistair's firelit eyes and his lopsided smile kindled something in Loghain, warmer than a touch, or even the heat of his blood at Alistair's proximity.
Sudden energy filled Loghain's body, worlds apart from the peace he'd felt earlier as he'd stood guard over Alistair, and watched him sleep. Loghain's heart began to pound, tainted blood racing, and he wished desperately that he knew why he felt this strange, abrupt excitement. But he knew so little about the taint. Perhaps the uneasy surge he'd felt in the taint was the echo of some distant upheaval among the darkspawn, and it had affected them both: twisting Alistair's rest into nightmare, and seething still in Loghain's veins. Or perhaps Loghain had simply sensed Alistair's distress, echoing in his own tainted blood, driving it to a stronger beat.
Or perhaps the restless energy he felt now was the excitement of the wilderness, of freedom from the tapestry-and-stone cage of Denerim, of reunion with his first and oldest love: the land that had given him life, and which would embrace his body after his death.
When he'd travelled the Wilds with Maric, as a boy even younger than Alistair, it had been a heady time: he alone had held the young prince's life in his hands. Now that he was back in the Wilds, a thousand memories barraged him, revived by a thousand sensory impressions he'd thought he'd forgotten: the complex, wet scent of the swamps, the distant cries of marsh birds, the creeping fogs, the hidden bogs and treacherous turns of the road. They brought everything flooding back to him, as vivid as if it had all happened only yesterday: the tension and struggle and coiling anticipation, for the next victory or just the next breath.
And then there was this warmth, of another's touch. Beguilling, blazing. This sharp, heady reaction to physical contact wasn't new. Once upon a time, Maric's rare touch used to stir Loghain's blood just as vividly. Rowan's too, although Rowan stirred not only his blood but his very life: she could take his breath away with her mere presence.
After a long moment, far more intense than it should have been, Loghain let go.
It wouldn't do to hold on too long. Of course, the idea of some pleasure less solitary than his own hands was not unwelcome to Loghain, but he knew it was unwise. Alistair must have received a thorough introduction to campground trysts from Duncan, and Loghain could not boast of any similar experience.
It wasn't that Loghain had never heard of, or indeed never seen, such things. After all, these alliances were not that uncommon among the troops, and Loghain wasn't inclined to discourage them: from his observations, they relieved stress and promoted teamwork in battle. But it was a pleasure Loghain himself had never been seriously tempted by, because it simply wasn't worth the cost. Campground gossip being what it was, if he'd ever had any personal involvements, word would've got out, and that would certainly have eroded the soldiers' trust in the impartiality of their General's judgement.
And if Alistair was more experienced with men, there was a good chance that he'd pick up on Loghain's lack of such experience, and then take it the wrong way.
And it was the wrong way to take it. It wasn't Alistair affecting Loghain. ...All right, it wasn't only Alistair. It was Ferelden's wilderness, treacherous and untameable and unforgettable. It was Loghain's memories of a man long dead but still missed.
His best friend. His only friend.
Loghain took a step back from Alistair, breathing deep lungfuls of the damp, scent-heavy air, his roaming thoughts receding further into the past, retreating from the ambiguities of the present.
As Loghain stood lost in thought, Alistair shook out and gathered his bedroll into a neat bundle and used a spare belt to keep the blanket rolled until next use. When that task was done, he fired a quizzical look at Loghain. "Aren't you going to sleep?" he asked as he strapped the heavy scabbard to his belt and reached for his shield. "Didn't think I'd have to be the one reminding you to get some rest."
"Oh very well." As methodical as Alistair was about rolling up his blanket, Loghain was every bit as methodical, if not more so, with his roll of maps. He first studied the Immunity and Barrier runes etched into the hardened leather cylinder, checking that the runes' Lyrium was still bright, before he opened the map case and verified that the damp weather hadn't affected the precious parchments or inks within.
"Somebody's still obsessed, I see." Alistair rolled his eyes at Loghain, before throwing a conspiratorial glance in Dog's direction. He snorted amusement when he was met only with Dog's industriously digging hindquarters. Even as Loghain was indulging his obsession with maps, the dog was catching up on his determination to dig his way to the centre of the earth.
"Obsessed, hm?" Loghain looked up from stowing the map case in a saddlebag. He smirked knowingly at Alistair, "Like you with that rotten cheese?"
"It's not rotten! It's proper blue vein. And anyway, you're one to talk, with that huge roll of maps. Why do you need more than one, anyway?"
"Well of course I need more than one map! In case it's escaped your notice, Thedas has more than one country. And borders change over time," Loghain informed him with a smug smirk. "Just ask the Orlesians. Maric and I made a lot of work for their cartographers, reducing the borders of the Orlesian Empire."
"Ah, so it's a reminder then." Alistair shrugged. "If you're going senile, old man, can't you just write yourself a note: 'Yay, we won!' and spare yourself the trouble of lugging that big case around?"
"Maps are more than a reminder," Loghain replied loftily. "They are history, and art. They save lives by leading the lost out of the wilderness," he turned and gave the saddlebag and its precious cargo a proud look, "and they achieve the impossible: making sense of the vast maze of Thedas, and fitting the whole round world into the space of a single sheet of parchment."
Alistair looked a bit taken aback by Loghain's speech. He blinked, but rallied a moment later, firing back a cheeky grin and a teasing "Still sounds like a map fetish to me!"
"Fetish? You mispronounced 'intellectual appreciation'," Loghain grumbled.
"Ha!" Alistair waved him off. "Appreciation maybe, but not intellectual. Yeah, definitely obsessive." He made a face. "And a bit, well, disturbing."
"Disturbing?" Loghain bristled. "What's so 'disturbing' about collecting rare examples of the cartographer's art?" Hmph, it's far more disturbing to hear that he thinks that cheese hairier with mould than his chin is with beard, is some sort of gourmet treat. Not to mention this tendency of his to panic whenever his thoughts stray below his waist! How he manages to bathe is beyond me.
"Do you even have to ask?" Alistair snorted. "Two words for you: 'Mount Loghain'!"
"Hmph! Just so you know, it's a label, not an order."
"Hey! I should hope not! Given my experience with mounts, you'd be even less cooperative than your horse!"
"Oh? Just what is your experience?" Loghain smirked, enjoying the verbal sparring, and happily anticipating a payoff in the form of a spectacular blush any time now. "What exactly did you do to my poor horse? And why didn't she kick you from here to Orlais?"
"What?" Alistair stammered. "Oh Maker! I can assure you that is not what former stable boys do for fun!"
"Ah, I see... So, what do they do for fun? Each other?" Loghain could practically feel the flush flood Alistair's face at the question. It was so easy to yank the Chantry boy's chain. Not that Loghain was enjoying it... well, maybe a little. But from a practical perspective, whatever kept Alistair awake and alert for his watch couldn't be bad.
"What? NO!" Alistair gulped, and then murmured something that sounded suspiciously like a chant. "I can't believe I'm even talking to you about this! Any of it!"
"I can't believe a simple discussion has you so flustered," Loghain parried easily. "Why are you so tense? Just from thinking about something that should feel good."
"I'm not tense!" Alistair gestured wildly. "I'm just... I don't see the point."
"Oh, you're not just tense," Loghain drawled. "You're scared by the mere idea."
"I am not scared! I just don't see why the whole world is obsessed with that sort of thing all the time. Why is it that not leaping into other people's beds, or not boasting about your private affairs from every street corner, or - or not going through every brothel your money can get you into, is somehow unusual!"
Loghain huffed. "Did I even once mention brothels? For what it's worth, I agree with you there. Leaving aside the high chances of ending up robbed or diseased, I'm sure most people would rather indulge with someone they at least know, as opposed to some stranger whose only interest is coin."
"Exactly!"
"Fortunately, there's a whole world of possibilities that have nothing to do with brothels, and are even more pleasant."
"It's not 'pleasant'! It's serious!" Alistair cried. "And it can go horribly wrong! There's all those expectations, and what if you make a mistake and, and, and kids happen! And sometimes they happen when they really really shouldn't!" He released a weary sigh. "I should know."
Loghain winced at Alistair's last remark, and his previously intent gaze drifted away, to the distance, to the past. He gave a sigh of his own. "It can get very serious indeed," he agreed, "if men and women are careless with each other. But..." he studied Alistair's expression. Surely he won't be so upset if I mention people he likes. "...that's not the only possibility. For example," he confided, "I'm quite sure that, given half the chance, Leliana would've been happy to trip Solona and beat her to the floor."
"Oh, you noticed that too, huh?" Alistair's small smile was a strange combination with the persistent traces of blush. "I knew it! All that shoe talk. And that giggling from the tent when they were... um... trying on each other's shoes or something. And flowers." He shook his head, but the smile lingered. "Dunno what Solona was thinking giving her flowers. That was bound to be misinterpreted, even I know that." He nodded sagely at his own conclusion.
Loghain huffed dryly. "Shoes. Of all the things for a reasonably intelligent woman to be so obsessed about." He sighed, "In any case, what I meant was, I strongly suspect there was a fair bit of fun between Solona and Leliana." Loghain smiled to himself and looked at the lad, his gaze as direct and unwavering as the point of a poised arrow. "And then," he murmured, "there was you, polishing Duncan's blade."
"Yeah, but..." Alistair's eyebrows drew together, and his eyes widened at once. "By blade, you mean - wait, what? You mean you thought Duncan was...! and and and I was...! and we were...!" Alistair stuttered to a halt, doe-eyes so wide and dark, so utterly gobsmacked. After staring at Loghain for a long, breathless moment, mouth literally agape, Alistair gestured wildly and croaked out, "Why?"
It was a pity Loghain wasn't in any state of mind to bask in a well-earned sense of triumph at achieving the near-impossible feat of rendering the chatty brat speechless. Instead, he too was blindsided by Alistair's utterly astonished stare, his innocently stunned tone. "You mean you weren't?"
"Of course I wasn't! I was just polishing his blades! As in, actual blades! And actual polishing!"
"Well why weren't you?" Loghain cried. "You keep telling me you're not a templar, so you hadn't taken any vows of chastity. And you were obviously besotted by the man."
Alistair blinked. "I was?" He bit his lip. "Why would you even say that? No. You're wrong! I wasn't... besotted, I was just... Oh, Maker! Look, he was Duncan, and he was the first one who really believed in me, and he was my commander! And... we didn't know each other that well, it'd only been months... okay, many months, I suppose. But it's not like we could... how would that even work anyway? I couldn't just say, 'Hey, Duncan, fancy joining me in my tent tonight?' and he'd say 'Oh, Alistair, thought you'd never ask,' and we'd be..." Alistair ran his hands through his short hair. All the while, his face was positively incandescent with blush. "Right, what am I saying!" he cried, shaking his head fiercely. "Trust me, nothing like that ever happens between Wardens! Ever! There'd be no sense in even trying! Not with the Blight. And not even without one. It's Grey Wardens! There was duty, and recruitment, and ...stuff."
"But don't you see?" Loghain breathed. "There will always be 'duty, and recruitment, and stuff.'" Loghain's gaze was level and understanding, his smile rueful and wry. "Don't dismiss pleasure as something that's always meaningless, or selfish, or deviant, or wrong. Because it's not. Don't wait 'til you're my age, and look back on your life, and realise too late, that duty has crowded out everything else." Loghain sighed, so quiet his last words could barely be heard, "Even living."
"I..." Alistair drew a breath and said nothing else. Instead he absorbed Loghain's words in silence for a while. "...I see."
"Take it from someone who knows," Loghain murmured, low and husky and infinitely sad, "There's nothing you can do to get back wasted time."
Alistair met Loghain's gaze, and the look in his brown eyes was warm, questioning. He didn't say anything, just acknowledged the warning with a sigh and a silent nod. After a pause, he waved at Loghain's armor, awkward but trying to be nonchalant about it, "Did you - um - did you want your plate off?"
Loghain gave a small smile. "I'd like that." He turned his back, tacitly offering the hard to reach buckles. A sidelong glance over one shoulder gave him a glimpse of a young man whose expression was uncertain, and perhaps curious, but was free of the anger and bitterness that had filled him at the Landsmeet. What a difference their time together had made.
Alistair came closer and slid his hands over the buckles. He moved so quietly, it was as if he held his breath the entire time. Or perhaps it was Loghain who did the same. Deft fingers took care of the straps of Loghain's armor at an unhurried pace. Alistair's hands moved over the dragonscale covering Loghain's broad back with an odd grace and reverence, like a templar tending to Andraste's flame, like an apprentice over his master's anvil.
Loghain bowed his head and closed his eyes. Apart from that, he stood very still. Only his chest moved as he released the same slow, deep sigh that he gave the first time Alistair squired for him.
Alistair had told Loghain he needed to relax back then. The advice was even more pertinent now, as Loghain fought down a most inopportune response to Alistair's proximity, to his gentle, accidental touches.
Once out of his armor, Loghain nodded thanks to Alistair and turned determinedly away, lying down on his bedroll, wrapping himself in his blankets and closing his eyes. But for a long while afterwards, the energy simmering in his blood kept his mind active, his heartbeat fast.
He blamed that energy on anything he could. On whatever twist of the taint had given Alistair his nightmare. On the nighttime song of the Wilds. On his memories of Maric, of Rowan. On the wide open sky arching above them like an upturned bowl, full of stars and darkness so deep that looking up at it felt like falling up into it.
He blamed it on one thing after another, until he could almost believe that what he felt wasn't simple, human need.
Almost.
The memory of Alistair followed Loghain into the Fade with the persistence of a desire demon. Only there, Alistair hadn't stayed kneeling at Loghain's feet. He'd risen to both knees and laid both hands on Loghain's thighs, sliding them around to draw him close. At that slow deliberate caress, Loghain's black scale armor had softened and fallen into shards, curling into plumes, floating around his naked body, caressing it with soft flicks. Weightless clouds of drifting feathers, black as crows, glossy as ravens. Loghain snatched at the spiralling quills, filling his hands with their sleekness, knowing exactly how he'd use them to fletch the deadliest arrows in the history of Thedas.
Then Alistair drove all thought of arrows and feathers from his mind by simply turning his head and nuzzling into Loghain's groin, as naturally as if he did it every day, opening his mouth and licking Loghain's cock, wetly, instinctively, enthusiastic and shameless as a puppy. Loghain rolled onto his back, moaning, floating in midair in the Fade's hazy dreamscape, naked and carefree and welcomed, adrift on a lazily rocking sea of languid, dreamlike pleasure, waves of bliss rising with unhurried ease to a tantalising peak, just out of reach, nearly there, nearly...
Abruptly the soft rocking jolted him harder, shaking his shoulder, shaking him -
- awake!
Loghain was panting, every muscle rock-hard; his erection throbbed angry as a wound. Extreme frustration exploded in an inarticulate snarl, because he couldn't give himself even the stroke or two that was all it would take to finish himself off, not in front of Alistair. Wild eyed, he clutched at his own knees in a last ditch attempt to stop his hands from converging on his aching cock. "What?"
"Um," Alistair answered, ever so eloquent, giving no concrete answer at all. "All right there?"
No! "Maker dammit!" Loghain cried, as no attackers descended on their small camp, as the skies didn't split in two, as the ground remained just as steady as before. "Why'd you have to wake me then?"
"Er, you were really restless. Moaning in your sleep. I figured it must've been really bad. Like mine."
Like mine... Loghain's hazy mind struggled to make sense of it. ...A nightmare. He thinks I had a darkspawn nightmare. "Well it wasn't." It was said in a grumble, but at least it wasn't the snarl or the swearing that would have more accurately conveyed his current mood.
Alistair must've picked up something from his expression though, because earnest concern was still clear in his face. Until Alistair's gaze drifted downward, and his eyes widened before he frantically looked away and refused to even glance in Loghain's direction. The blush rose up his throat, as distinct as a tide of blood, suffusing his face with a sunset-vivid glow.
Judging by Alistair's blush, it would be hard... difficult to say which of them was more embarrassed. Loghain bent his legs, pulling the blanket in a tent over his knees so it hid his erection completely. He fought the urge to curl up further, into a ball, so he could drop his forehead on his knees and not have to look at Alistair's incandescent face, and not have Alistair staring at him. If only curling up in a ball wasn't such an undignified posture.
Alistair looked distressed enough to flee, but instead he murmured to a nearby log more or less in Loghain's general direction, stammering through every word. "Er... Just so you know, like hair growth, t-that's part of the Warden changes too. Stamina. Yeah. I'm sure you've noticed. By now." He let out an awkward laugh. "A natural occurrence, really. I guess the taint does odd things to us all, despite the age, apparently," he said in a voice that could hardly have sounded less natural. He scratched the back of his head, like he had when confessing he'd left Loghain's maps behind: clearly it was a nervous mannerism. "I suppose we've both got that to look forward to for many years... a-anyway. Um. Chants!" he croaked, glazed-eyed and desperate. "Chants do help with that, oddly enough."
"'Chants'?" Loghain quoted, aghast. "That's the last thing I would've thought to do about it!"
And... 'age'? Where the fuck does he get off saying things like that? But Loghain's fury faded quickly enough as he realised, Oh, wait, he doesn't get off, not if he can help it. Poor bastard.
"Uh-huh!" Alistair's face brightened and he all but heaved a sigh of relief as Loghain allowed him to steer the conversation toward slightly less embarrassing waters. "Canticle of Trials, mostly, if you remember it, but any chant is good, really. You don't have to be a templar to recite them."
'Oh yeah, very funny,' Loghain was about to answer, but then he took in Alistair's earnest, helpful expression and the complete lack of any impishness or amusement. Loghain knew there was absolutely no chance Alistair could ever be serious about this but... apparently, he was. You poor bastard, Loghain thought. You might've escaped a templar's vows, but the Chantry's still got its claws in you, in so many ways.
"Here," Alistair gave an unsure smile when Loghain was too stunned to answer. "I can teach you Trials. S'easy to recite, really. Anywhere from 'my enemies are abundant, many are those who," he paused and cleared his throat, "r-rise up... against me.' Um. Maybe not Trials," he muttered. "But the Canticle of Threnodies is good, it'd make any spirit you had left wilt along with the flesh," he nattered on. "And - um - if all else fails, I haven't done it of course, but I heard others tried -" he lowered his voice, "if you're really, really determined, and not fond of, er, wilting, just recite the Canticle of Andraste and picture the, um, heavenly embrace in verse fourteen in detail."
...Ugh! Loghain did his best to keep the grimace of sympathetic revulsion off his face, listening in disbelief as the poor sod basically confessed that the Chantry had twisted him into using religious chants to repress his body's natural urges, instead of enjoying the simple, normal relief of his own hands.
"That'll... um, take care of it, hopefully. I believe Andraste would probably be tolerant of us trying to recreate the heavenly embrace in our minds. After all, we all need something to strive toward."
"Andraste," Loghain echoed, incredulous. "I see." His mind was blank with shock. All he could think was, You poor bastard. You poor, poor bastard.
Alistair just widened his nervous grin. "There's a verse for every occasion, right?" he concluded with a weak chuckle. "At least that's what the Chantry always says."
"I bet they do," Loghain drawled. Can't let the templars get too relaxed, or let them find pleasure anywhere other than their Chantry-regulated doses of Lyrium. "Thanks for the advice," he told the earnest lad, if only to stave off any more helpful offers of cock-wilting chants.
Summary: In which we probe the differences between oneiromancy and onanism, and Loghain refuses to learn templar talents.
Rating: Adult
Alternative links: AO3 ffn
Chapter 1: The Spirit Charm
Chapter 2: The Ruins of Lothering
Chapter 3: The Canticle of Shartan
Chapter 4: The Map Case
Chapter 5: Of Cheese and Chasind
Two Roads
Chapter 6: The Fade
As he drifted in and out of the Fade, Alistair thought he sensed the darkspawn, like a growling black thundercloud closing fast on their tiny camp, borne ever closer on screaming storm winds. The Blight's over, they're dead. Gone. They're not real. Or so he told himself as he tried to relax and catch up on much-needed sleep.
The thundercloud didn't even slow down. It rumbled and roared and spread over the land, Blight more foul and corrupt than any plague. Ferelden seemed as tiny as Loghain's maps beneath that vast shadow of malice. It pulsed as it grew, devouring more land, more settlements, more people, with every shuddering, spreading beat.
No! Nononono! I have to stop it! Alistair ran toward it, his arms flung wide, his armor and weapons at hand. Solona's gone so it's up to me now.
The thundercloud snarled its insatiable hunger, its endless lust for destruction. It was a monster as vast as the darkness under the earth, stalking its prey. Stalking Alistair.
He felt it gaping to devour the entire world, until nothing was left. Not the sun in the sky, not the stars. Not the rosebushes that had somehow survived Lothering, or the warm, hay-filled stables at Redcliffe, or even the palace at Denerim.
Nothing was left. Ferelden was wiped off the face of Thedas. Even Loghain's treasured maps curled and shrivelled and burned, like autumn leaves in a bonfire.
The pair of amulets around Alistair's neck were beating dull and heavy against his chest, as if his heart had hammered its way out of his ribs. He ran toward the unfurling cloud, sobbing and screaming and knowing it was hopeless. Knowing he was running to futile death.
He ran anyway, because there was nothing else he could do.
Alistair must've taken to heart Loghain's order to get some rest, because after Loghain surveyed the perimeter, he returned to the campfire to find Alistair curled up fast asleep, with the hound happily serving as his pillow. They were both quiet, save for soft, peaceful snores. Alistair's head and one hand rested on the mabari's broad back, and Alistair's uncurled fist lay next to his mouth. His lips were parted, as if he was just about to suck his thumb like a child.
Loghain settled a few steps away. Part of him monitored the sounds of the swamp, the pipings of frogs and the distant questions of owls, listening for any break in the soothing sounds that might hint at intruders. Part of him felt the beat of his tainted blood, basking in the soft warmth of Alistair's proximity, yet waiting for the poisonous pang that warned of approaching darkspawn. But most of him stayed spellbound by the peaceful sight of the man and dog at rest. Loghain grinned to himself, amused by the fact that an experienced warrior could still somehow manage to look so very young and so utterly innocent in his sleep.
Loghain continued to stand guard, watching over the pair of them. Alone as he was, he felt free to let his gaze linger on Alistair's lightly-fuzzed cheek and jaw, the cords of sinew in his bared throat, the relaxed sprawl of his limbs, one muscular arm stretched over the blanket. Alistair's short hair glinted in the red firelight, bright as new copper wire.
The mabari's ear twitched and lifted, as he opened his eyes and studied Loghain in the dark. Suddenly he let out a faint whine, barely heard but unmistakable. Then, the silent spell of Alistair's relaxation was broken as his eyes started to flick to and fro under his closed eyelids. A grimace twisted his face and his body flinched in his sleep, hands tightening into fists as his breathing hissed through clenched teeth.
It looked like a bad dream.
Loghain reached inward with all of his senses and felt a seismic ripple of unease in the warmth of the taint; at the same moment, Alistair's sleeping body thrashed. He rolled over, panting, blankets bunched up at his chest, tangled in his fists. The arch of his back turned his face to the firelight, teeth bared in a snarling rictus. He whispered something frantic and choked that sounded like a templar's chant.
Definitely a bad dream. Loghain remembered his own well enough, and he wasn't about to let a prolonged nightmare ruin Alistair's alertness during the second watch. Enough.
Loghain knelt beside Alistair and laid his hand on the man's shoulder. Squeezed gently.
The chant stopped and Alistair drew a deep, shuddering breath, almost as frantic as his gasps after the apostate's crushing curse. Brown eyes snapped wide, glazed and blank with shock, as he flailed wildly, struggling to sit up.
"You're safe," Loghain told him, quiet but clear. "It wasn't real. Just a nightmare."
The uncoordinated thrashing stopped and sleep-dazed eyes blinked blearily, until at last Alistair focused on Loghain. "Ugh. That wasn't fun," Alistair mumbled, lifting his hands to his face and rubbing his eyes and cheeks. "Bleargh."
"Are you all right?" Loghain murmured.
"Yeah," Alistair ran his fingers through the cropped brush of his hair and shook his head, exhaling his frustration. "I... I bet it means we're getting close... to where we need to be," he suggested with a twitch to his lips.
"Perhaps." Loghain gave what he hoped was a reassuring smile, then he looked away, lifting his gaze to the stars and studying the familiar scatter of constellations. "It's still early. Try and get some more sleep."
"S'all right," Alistair gestured with one look at the sky and the moon setting into the fog. "Your turn. It's almost time for my watch anyway." He yawned cavernously and tried to stand, but his tossing and turning had tangled the blanket around his lower legs and feet. He managed to get to his knees, sleepily tried to shake one foot loose of the rumpled blanket, and staggered, still on one knee, overbalancing forward. One hand flew up reflexively to stop himself from falling flat on his face, and his hand closed on Loghain's thigh. He blinked down at his bedroll, fumbling dazedly with his free hand to untangle the blankets, leaning unconsciously all the while on Loghain. Only when he'd untangled his other foot, did he realise what - or who - he'd been using as support all this time. He drew back his hand. It wasn't quite the panicky snatch of unprotected skin away from hot coals, but it wasn't too far off.
Speaking of which, Alistair's face was doing a very good impersonation of hot coals. "Sorry," he mumbled, lurching to stand, kicking the last twists of blanket away from his feet.
Loghain reached out to steady the staggering man, hoping the gesture would be accepted as the simple reassurance he meant it to be. One hand closed on Alistair's shoulder. The taut muscle under his fingers was still warm with sleep. Alistair blinked, and their gazes met. It was then that Alistair's firelit eyes and his lopsided smile kindled something in Loghain, warmer than a touch, or even the heat of his blood at Alistair's proximity.
Sudden energy filled Loghain's body, worlds apart from the peace he'd felt earlier as he'd stood guard over Alistair, and watched him sleep. Loghain's heart began to pound, tainted blood racing, and he wished desperately that he knew why he felt this strange, abrupt excitement. But he knew so little about the taint. Perhaps the uneasy surge he'd felt in the taint was the echo of some distant upheaval among the darkspawn, and it had affected them both: twisting Alistair's rest into nightmare, and seething still in Loghain's veins. Or perhaps Loghain had simply sensed Alistair's distress, echoing in his own tainted blood, driving it to a stronger beat.
Or perhaps the restless energy he felt now was the excitement of the wilderness, of freedom from the tapestry-and-stone cage of Denerim, of reunion with his first and oldest love: the land that had given him life, and which would embrace his body after his death.
When he'd travelled the Wilds with Maric, as a boy even younger than Alistair, it had been a heady time: he alone had held the young prince's life in his hands. Now that he was back in the Wilds, a thousand memories barraged him, revived by a thousand sensory impressions he'd thought he'd forgotten: the complex, wet scent of the swamps, the distant cries of marsh birds, the creeping fogs, the hidden bogs and treacherous turns of the road. They brought everything flooding back to him, as vivid as if it had all happened only yesterday: the tension and struggle and coiling anticipation, for the next victory or just the next breath.
And then there was this warmth, of another's touch. Beguilling, blazing. This sharp, heady reaction to physical contact wasn't new. Once upon a time, Maric's rare touch used to stir Loghain's blood just as vividly. Rowan's too, although Rowan stirred not only his blood but his very life: she could take his breath away with her mere presence.
After a long moment, far more intense than it should have been, Loghain let go.
It wouldn't do to hold on too long. Of course, the idea of some pleasure less solitary than his own hands was not unwelcome to Loghain, but he knew it was unwise. Alistair must have received a thorough introduction to campground trysts from Duncan, and Loghain could not boast of any similar experience.
It wasn't that Loghain had never heard of, or indeed never seen, such things. After all, these alliances were not that uncommon among the troops, and Loghain wasn't inclined to discourage them: from his observations, they relieved stress and promoted teamwork in battle. But it was a pleasure Loghain himself had never been seriously tempted by, because it simply wasn't worth the cost. Campground gossip being what it was, if he'd ever had any personal involvements, word would've got out, and that would certainly have eroded the soldiers' trust in the impartiality of their General's judgement.
And if Alistair was more experienced with men, there was a good chance that he'd pick up on Loghain's lack of such experience, and then take it the wrong way.
And it was the wrong way to take it. It wasn't Alistair affecting Loghain. ...All right, it wasn't only Alistair. It was Ferelden's wilderness, treacherous and untameable and unforgettable. It was Loghain's memories of a man long dead but still missed.
His best friend. His only friend.
Loghain took a step back from Alistair, breathing deep lungfuls of the damp, scent-heavy air, his roaming thoughts receding further into the past, retreating from the ambiguities of the present.
As Loghain stood lost in thought, Alistair shook out and gathered his bedroll into a neat bundle and used a spare belt to keep the blanket rolled until next use. When that task was done, he fired a quizzical look at Loghain. "Aren't you going to sleep?" he asked as he strapped the heavy scabbard to his belt and reached for his shield. "Didn't think I'd have to be the one reminding you to get some rest."
"Oh very well." As methodical as Alistair was about rolling up his blanket, Loghain was every bit as methodical, if not more so, with his roll of maps. He first studied the Immunity and Barrier runes etched into the hardened leather cylinder, checking that the runes' Lyrium was still bright, before he opened the map case and verified that the damp weather hadn't affected the precious parchments or inks within.
"Somebody's still obsessed, I see." Alistair rolled his eyes at Loghain, before throwing a conspiratorial glance in Dog's direction. He snorted amusement when he was met only with Dog's industriously digging hindquarters. Even as Loghain was indulging his obsession with maps, the dog was catching up on his determination to dig his way to the centre of the earth.
"Obsessed, hm?" Loghain looked up from stowing the map case in a saddlebag. He smirked knowingly at Alistair, "Like you with that rotten cheese?"
"It's not rotten! It's proper blue vein. And anyway, you're one to talk, with that huge roll of maps. Why do you need more than one, anyway?"
"Well of course I need more than one map! In case it's escaped your notice, Thedas has more than one country. And borders change over time," Loghain informed him with a smug smirk. "Just ask the Orlesians. Maric and I made a lot of work for their cartographers, reducing the borders of the Orlesian Empire."
"Ah, so it's a reminder then." Alistair shrugged. "If you're going senile, old man, can't you just write yourself a note: 'Yay, we won!' and spare yourself the trouble of lugging that big case around?"
"Maps are more than a reminder," Loghain replied loftily. "They are history, and art. They save lives by leading the lost out of the wilderness," he turned and gave the saddlebag and its precious cargo a proud look, "and they achieve the impossible: making sense of the vast maze of Thedas, and fitting the whole round world into the space of a single sheet of parchment."
Alistair looked a bit taken aback by Loghain's speech. He blinked, but rallied a moment later, firing back a cheeky grin and a teasing "Still sounds like a map fetish to me!"
"Fetish? You mispronounced 'intellectual appreciation'," Loghain grumbled.
"Ha!" Alistair waved him off. "Appreciation maybe, but not intellectual. Yeah, definitely obsessive." He made a face. "And a bit, well, disturbing."
"Disturbing?" Loghain bristled. "What's so 'disturbing' about collecting rare examples of the cartographer's art?" Hmph, it's far more disturbing to hear that he thinks that cheese hairier with mould than his chin is with beard, is some sort of gourmet treat. Not to mention this tendency of his to panic whenever his thoughts stray below his waist! How he manages to bathe is beyond me.
"Do you even have to ask?" Alistair snorted. "Two words for you: 'Mount Loghain'!"
"Hmph! Just so you know, it's a label, not an order."
"Hey! I should hope not! Given my experience with mounts, you'd be even less cooperative than your horse!"
"Oh? Just what is your experience?" Loghain smirked, enjoying the verbal sparring, and happily anticipating a payoff in the form of a spectacular blush any time now. "What exactly did you do to my poor horse? And why didn't she kick you from here to Orlais?"
"What?" Alistair stammered. "Oh Maker! I can assure you that is not what former stable boys do for fun!"
"Ah, I see... So, what do they do for fun? Each other?" Loghain could practically feel the flush flood Alistair's face at the question. It was so easy to yank the Chantry boy's chain. Not that Loghain was enjoying it... well, maybe a little. But from a practical perspective, whatever kept Alistair awake and alert for his watch couldn't be bad.
"What? NO!" Alistair gulped, and then murmured something that sounded suspiciously like a chant. "I can't believe I'm even talking to you about this! Any of it!"
"I can't believe a simple discussion has you so flustered," Loghain parried easily. "Why are you so tense? Just from thinking about something that should feel good."
"I'm not tense!" Alistair gestured wildly. "I'm just... I don't see the point."
"Oh, you're not just tense," Loghain drawled. "You're scared by the mere idea."
"I am not scared! I just don't see why the whole world is obsessed with that sort of thing all the time. Why is it that not leaping into other people's beds, or not boasting about your private affairs from every street corner, or - or not going through every brothel your money can get you into, is somehow unusual!"
Loghain huffed. "Did I even once mention brothels? For what it's worth, I agree with you there. Leaving aside the high chances of ending up robbed or diseased, I'm sure most people would rather indulge with someone they at least know, as opposed to some stranger whose only interest is coin."
"Exactly!"
"Fortunately, there's a whole world of possibilities that have nothing to do with brothels, and are even more pleasant."
"It's not 'pleasant'! It's serious!" Alistair cried. "And it can go horribly wrong! There's all those expectations, and what if you make a mistake and, and, and kids happen! And sometimes they happen when they really really shouldn't!" He released a weary sigh. "I should know."
Loghain winced at Alistair's last remark, and his previously intent gaze drifted away, to the distance, to the past. He gave a sigh of his own. "It can get very serious indeed," he agreed, "if men and women are careless with each other. But..." he studied Alistair's expression. Surely he won't be so upset if I mention people he likes. "...that's not the only possibility. For example," he confided, "I'm quite sure that, given half the chance, Leliana would've been happy to trip Solona and beat her to the floor."
"Oh, you noticed that too, huh?" Alistair's small smile was a strange combination with the persistent traces of blush. "I knew it! All that shoe talk. And that giggling from the tent when they were... um... trying on each other's shoes or something. And flowers." He shook his head, but the smile lingered. "Dunno what Solona was thinking giving her flowers. That was bound to be misinterpreted, even I know that." He nodded sagely at his own conclusion.
Loghain huffed dryly. "Shoes. Of all the things for a reasonably intelligent woman to be so obsessed about." He sighed, "In any case, what I meant was, I strongly suspect there was a fair bit of fun between Solona and Leliana." Loghain smiled to himself and looked at the lad, his gaze as direct and unwavering as the point of a poised arrow. "And then," he murmured, "there was you, polishing Duncan's blade."
"Yeah, but..." Alistair's eyebrows drew together, and his eyes widened at once. "By blade, you mean - wait, what? You mean you thought Duncan was...! and and and I was...! and we were...!" Alistair stuttered to a halt, doe-eyes so wide and dark, so utterly gobsmacked. After staring at Loghain for a long, breathless moment, mouth literally agape, Alistair gestured wildly and croaked out, "Why?"
It was a pity Loghain wasn't in any state of mind to bask in a well-earned sense of triumph at achieving the near-impossible feat of rendering the chatty brat speechless. Instead, he too was blindsided by Alistair's utterly astonished stare, his innocently stunned tone. "You mean you weren't?"
"Of course I wasn't! I was just polishing his blades! As in, actual blades! And actual polishing!"
"Well why weren't you?" Loghain cried. "You keep telling me you're not a templar, so you hadn't taken any vows of chastity. And you were obviously besotted by the man."
Alistair blinked. "I was?" He bit his lip. "Why would you even say that? No. You're wrong! I wasn't... besotted, I was just... Oh, Maker! Look, he was Duncan, and he was the first one who really believed in me, and he was my commander! And... we didn't know each other that well, it'd only been months... okay, many months, I suppose. But it's not like we could... how would that even work anyway? I couldn't just say, 'Hey, Duncan, fancy joining me in my tent tonight?' and he'd say 'Oh, Alistair, thought you'd never ask,' and we'd be..." Alistair ran his hands through his short hair. All the while, his face was positively incandescent with blush. "Right, what am I saying!" he cried, shaking his head fiercely. "Trust me, nothing like that ever happens between Wardens! Ever! There'd be no sense in even trying! Not with the Blight. And not even without one. It's Grey Wardens! There was duty, and recruitment, and ...stuff."
"But don't you see?" Loghain breathed. "There will always be 'duty, and recruitment, and stuff.'" Loghain's gaze was level and understanding, his smile rueful and wry. "Don't dismiss pleasure as something that's always meaningless, or selfish, or deviant, or wrong. Because it's not. Don't wait 'til you're my age, and look back on your life, and realise too late, that duty has crowded out everything else." Loghain sighed, so quiet his last words could barely be heard, "Even living."
"I..." Alistair drew a breath and said nothing else. Instead he absorbed Loghain's words in silence for a while. "...I see."
"Take it from someone who knows," Loghain murmured, low and husky and infinitely sad, "There's nothing you can do to get back wasted time."
Alistair met Loghain's gaze, and the look in his brown eyes was warm, questioning. He didn't say anything, just acknowledged the warning with a sigh and a silent nod. After a pause, he waved at Loghain's armor, awkward but trying to be nonchalant about it, "Did you - um - did you want your plate off?"
Loghain gave a small smile. "I'd like that." He turned his back, tacitly offering the hard to reach buckles. A sidelong glance over one shoulder gave him a glimpse of a young man whose expression was uncertain, and perhaps curious, but was free of the anger and bitterness that had filled him at the Landsmeet. What a difference their time together had made.
Alistair came closer and slid his hands over the buckles. He moved so quietly, it was as if he held his breath the entire time. Or perhaps it was Loghain who did the same. Deft fingers took care of the straps of Loghain's armor at an unhurried pace. Alistair's hands moved over the dragonscale covering Loghain's broad back with an odd grace and reverence, like a templar tending to Andraste's flame, like an apprentice over his master's anvil.
Loghain bowed his head and closed his eyes. Apart from that, he stood very still. Only his chest moved as he released the same slow, deep sigh that he gave the first time Alistair squired for him.
Alistair had told Loghain he needed to relax back then. The advice was even more pertinent now, as Loghain fought down a most inopportune response to Alistair's proximity, to his gentle, accidental touches.
Once out of his armor, Loghain nodded thanks to Alistair and turned determinedly away, lying down on his bedroll, wrapping himself in his blankets and closing his eyes. But for a long while afterwards, the energy simmering in his blood kept his mind active, his heartbeat fast.
He blamed that energy on anything he could. On whatever twist of the taint had given Alistair his nightmare. On the nighttime song of the Wilds. On his memories of Maric, of Rowan. On the wide open sky arching above them like an upturned bowl, full of stars and darkness so deep that looking up at it felt like falling up into it.
He blamed it on one thing after another, until he could almost believe that what he felt wasn't simple, human need.
Almost.
The memory of Alistair followed Loghain into the Fade with the persistence of a desire demon. Only there, Alistair hadn't stayed kneeling at Loghain's feet. He'd risen to both knees and laid both hands on Loghain's thighs, sliding them around to draw him close. At that slow deliberate caress, Loghain's black scale armor had softened and fallen into shards, curling into plumes, floating around his naked body, caressing it with soft flicks. Weightless clouds of drifting feathers, black as crows, glossy as ravens. Loghain snatched at the spiralling quills, filling his hands with their sleekness, knowing exactly how he'd use them to fletch the deadliest arrows in the history of Thedas.
Then Alistair drove all thought of arrows and feathers from his mind by simply turning his head and nuzzling into Loghain's groin, as naturally as if he did it every day, opening his mouth and licking Loghain's cock, wetly, instinctively, enthusiastic and shameless as a puppy. Loghain rolled onto his back, moaning, floating in midair in the Fade's hazy dreamscape, naked and carefree and welcomed, adrift on a lazily rocking sea of languid, dreamlike pleasure, waves of bliss rising with unhurried ease to a tantalising peak, just out of reach, nearly there, nearly...
Abruptly the soft rocking jolted him harder, shaking his shoulder, shaking him -
- awake!
Loghain was panting, every muscle rock-hard; his erection throbbed angry as a wound. Extreme frustration exploded in an inarticulate snarl, because he couldn't give himself even the stroke or two that was all it would take to finish himself off, not in front of Alistair. Wild eyed, he clutched at his own knees in a last ditch attempt to stop his hands from converging on his aching cock. "What?"
"Um," Alistair answered, ever so eloquent, giving no concrete answer at all. "All right there?"
No! "Maker dammit!" Loghain cried, as no attackers descended on their small camp, as the skies didn't split in two, as the ground remained just as steady as before. "Why'd you have to wake me then?"
"Er, you were really restless. Moaning in your sleep. I figured it must've been really bad. Like mine."
Like mine... Loghain's hazy mind struggled to make sense of it. ...A nightmare. He thinks I had a darkspawn nightmare. "Well it wasn't." It was said in a grumble, but at least it wasn't the snarl or the swearing that would have more accurately conveyed his current mood.
Alistair must've picked up something from his expression though, because earnest concern was still clear in his face. Until Alistair's gaze drifted downward, and his eyes widened before he frantically looked away and refused to even glance in Loghain's direction. The blush rose up his throat, as distinct as a tide of blood, suffusing his face with a sunset-vivid glow.
Judging by Alistair's blush, it would be hard... difficult to say which of them was more embarrassed. Loghain bent his legs, pulling the blanket in a tent over his knees so it hid his erection completely. He fought the urge to curl up further, into a ball, so he could drop his forehead on his knees and not have to look at Alistair's incandescent face, and not have Alistair staring at him. If only curling up in a ball wasn't such an undignified posture.
Alistair looked distressed enough to flee, but instead he murmured to a nearby log more or less in Loghain's general direction, stammering through every word. "Er... Just so you know, like hair growth, t-that's part of the Warden changes too. Stamina. Yeah. I'm sure you've noticed. By now." He let out an awkward laugh. "A natural occurrence, really. I guess the taint does odd things to us all, despite the age, apparently," he said in a voice that could hardly have sounded less natural. He scratched the back of his head, like he had when confessing he'd left Loghain's maps behind: clearly it was a nervous mannerism. "I suppose we've both got that to look forward to for many years... a-anyway. Um. Chants!" he croaked, glazed-eyed and desperate. "Chants do help with that, oddly enough."
"'Chants'?" Loghain quoted, aghast. "That's the last thing I would've thought to do about it!"
And... 'age'? Where the fuck does he get off saying things like that? But Loghain's fury faded quickly enough as he realised, Oh, wait, he doesn't get off, not if he can help it. Poor bastard.
"Uh-huh!" Alistair's face brightened and he all but heaved a sigh of relief as Loghain allowed him to steer the conversation toward slightly less embarrassing waters. "Canticle of Trials, mostly, if you remember it, but any chant is good, really. You don't have to be a templar to recite them."
'Oh yeah, very funny,' Loghain was about to answer, but then he took in Alistair's earnest, helpful expression and the complete lack of any impishness or amusement. Loghain knew there was absolutely no chance Alistair could ever be serious about this but... apparently, he was. You poor bastard, Loghain thought. You might've escaped a templar's vows, but the Chantry's still got its claws in you, in so many ways.
"Here," Alistair gave an unsure smile when Loghain was too stunned to answer. "I can teach you Trials. S'easy to recite, really. Anywhere from 'my enemies are abundant, many are those who," he paused and cleared his throat, "r-rise up... against me.' Um. Maybe not Trials," he muttered. "But the Canticle of Threnodies is good, it'd make any spirit you had left wilt along with the flesh," he nattered on. "And - um - if all else fails, I haven't done it of course, but I heard others tried -" he lowered his voice, "if you're really, really determined, and not fond of, er, wilting, just recite the Canticle of Andraste and picture the, um, heavenly embrace in verse fourteen in detail."
...Ugh! Loghain did his best to keep the grimace of sympathetic revulsion off his face, listening in disbelief as the poor sod basically confessed that the Chantry had twisted him into using religious chants to repress his body's natural urges, instead of enjoying the simple, normal relief of his own hands.
"That'll... um, take care of it, hopefully. I believe Andraste would probably be tolerant of us trying to recreate the heavenly embrace in our minds. After all, we all need something to strive toward."
"Andraste," Loghain echoed, incredulous. "I see." His mind was blank with shock. All he could think was, You poor bastard. You poor, poor bastard.
Alistair just widened his nervous grin. "There's a verse for every occasion, right?" he concluded with a weak chuckle. "At least that's what the Chantry always says."
"I bet they do," Loghain drawled. Can't let the templars get too relaxed, or let them find pleasure anywhere other than their Chantry-regulated doses of Lyrium. "Thanks for the advice," he told the earnest lad, if only to stave off any more helpful offers of cock-wilting chants.