Fic: "Two Roads" Dragon Age Alistair/Loghain - Chapter 13
Fic: "Two Roads" Dragon Age Alistair/Loghain - Chapter 13
Authors: ac1d6urn and sinick
Summary: In which Alistair learns restraint.
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
Chapter 6: The Fade
Chapter 7: Names
Chapter 8: Flames
Chapter 9: Two Swords
Chapter 10: Pyrrhic Victory
Chapter 11: Life and Death... And What Comes After
Chapter 12: Sanctuary
Two Roads
Chapter 13: In the Sun
It was early afternoon when Loghain woke; the sun had moved far enough across the sky to send beams through the shutters onto his face. He blinked sleep from his eyes and took stock of himself. He was warm - a bit too warm, really, enough that he'd started to sweat - and his ribs were a barely-there twinge as he breathed. He was stretched out on his belly. On Alistair. Who was sprawled on his back, spreadeagled and snoring, utterly unselfconscious in sleep.
He makes a surprisingly comfortable mattress. Loghain lifted his head from the crook of Alistair's neck and shoulder, and grinned down at Alistair's blissful expression. He peeled himself carefully away from Alistair's body, wincing a little at the way their groins had stuck together, then huffed amusement when Alistair's snores continued unabated.
Loghain stretched and scratched lazily at his ribs, which itched with healing under the bandages, and then he palmed his chin, which also itched with a few days' growth. Now that he was awake - and had no intensely distracting young warrior writhing around and absorbing all his attention - Loghain realised that he really needed a bath. A shave too. Damned if I'm going to become a Duncan surrogate! He sneered, as he generally did when he thought of the man he'd always resented: first for stealing Maric away from the throne, then for beguiling Cailan to his death, and finally for being the thoroughly undeserving focus of Alistair's obsession. But for the very first time, Loghain's sneer was tinged with personal, physical triumph. I bet Alistair's not so obsessed with that bastard anymore, not after this morning!
As Loghain stood, Dog lolled out his tongue in a huge smile, stumpy tail wagging furiously, but he was smart enough not to bark while Alistair was still asleep. Loghain patted the capering, licking hound with one hand as he rummaged through their belongings with the other. When he'd found the soap, a rag and his dagger, he made for the door, grinning as he watched Dog sneak onto the bed and curl up beside Alistair, while Alistair slept on, undisturbed.
The day was bright and warm outside, unusually so: the Korcari Wilds' typical fog was a gray haze on the horizon, but for now the area around the hut was clear. The breeze stirred Loghain's hair, ruffling the strands as if with an affectionate hand. He turned his face up to the sun and stretched, reaching for the sky, feeling loose-limbed and relaxed. Rejuvenated, in more ways than one.
He unwound the bandages carefully. Under them was a now-dry layer of poultice, which as it crumbled away, revealed bruises: a riot of colour, now faded almost completely, from black to green and yellow at the edges. Brushing off the remaining scraps of old poultice, he shed his trousers and smallclothes, and walked into a nearby pond, soap and rag in hand.
The water in the shallow pool was even slightly warm from the sun, and it was bliss to scrub himself clean from head to toe. He smirked as he washed away the dried, flaky streaks of come that matted the line of hair under his navel; all the while remembering the urgent jolts of Alistair's hips, thrusting along Loghain's shaft, fucking his fist. Loghain's cock stirred at the memory, thickening as he soaped his groin with more than his usual care. Later, Loghain thought, savouring the unfamiliar tingle of anticipation. Soon.
To cool off, he sank to his knees in the shallow water: even then, it only came up to his chest. He had to duck his head to rinse the soap from his unbound mane. Straightening up, he eyed his reflection in the water and snorted at the stubble, before collecting his dagger and soaping his chin and throat.
As he drew the blade across his skin, his mind wandered. It'll be a relief to get rid of this lot. Maker, it itches! There's a reason I never let it get this long. And in any case, a proper Fereldan ought to have long hair and a smooth chin, like Maric. Alistair should too. Taking after his father would be a damn sight better for him than pining for an Orlesian-raised ne'er-do-well like Duncan.
He rinsed the soap off his face, and peered at his reflection in the pond, feeling his skin for any missed patches. Since Maric isn't here, it's up to me to set a proper example.
Satisfied with his shave, Loghain stood up, wringing the worst of the water out of his hair, and turned to walk out of the pond. As he did so, for the first time since leaving it, he faced the hut.
He froze. A chill raced down his spine, and despite the warmth of the day, his skin bristled instantly with gooseflesh. Even the water-heavy hair at the back of his neck prickled.
That hut. He knew it. He'd been here. Just once before, decades ago, but that day was etched into his mind like acid.
Flemeth's hut. He'd watched, powerless to intervene, as she'd led Maric across that very threshold, and poisoned his mind with prophecies that left Loghain's bold, blithe friend pale and silent, prematurely aged by dread. Maric had never told him what had gone on inside, and he hadn't had the heart to really ask, not when he could see the effect on Maric of the merest mention of that time, that place. This place!
Teeth gritted, he stormed up to that fateful threshold, wrenched the door open, and fixed Alistair with an accusing glare.
There was one good thing to be said about the time right after the Blight: sleeping in while not having darkspawn nightmares was brilliant. It made you feel normal and rested and human.
Alistair hadn't slept in like this for years: not since he was a boy, dozing on sunny summer mornings in Arl Eamon's barn. Alistair used to climb to the very top of the hay stack and dig himself in, unbothered 'til the sun rose above the treetops. The dry, rustling hay smelled sweet, of open fields and herbs and sun and summer, and if Alistair was quiet enough, he could stay up there until supper if he wanted to, or until someone remembered him and they sent a dog out to fetch him.
Now, stretching and turning to face the sunlight, Alistair smiled.
As he turned, his other cheek met something hairy. Dog? An odd sense of familiarity dawned. Wait. Loghain...
He opened an eye. The bristly fur under his chin was brown with an occasional burr, and smelled of swamp mud. Dog. Alistair winced at the hot panting breath in his face and the touch of a cold, curious nose. He lifted a hand to shield himself from eager licking, and squinted at the otherwise empty bed. Where's Loghain?
A wet tongue caught him this time, swiping at his chin.
Ugh. Alistair pressed his lips together and pulled back out of range of the slobbering, all the while trying to avoid being pinned by heavy paws. "Geroff me," he muttered, shoving the wagging, panting mabari away. "M'awake, see? See?"
Loghain wasn't in the hut, but when Alistair finally focused on the taint, he could tell Loghain was close. The taint felt quiet; Loghain's warmth was steady and untroubled. The sensation reminded Alistair of sunlit, rich brown swamp water, lying calm and flat as syrup, undisturbed by the breeze. It was almost as though Alistair was feeling Loghain's mood: placid and warm as the day.
Or maybe that's just me, Alistair thought, his smile widening as he stretched lazily, enjoying the pull and reach of sleep-warmed muscles. Dog seemed to take his stretch as an invitation and pounced, landing on Alistair's belly and driving the breath from him with an oof. "All right, all right, I'm up, you overgrown pup!" Alistair grumblegrinned. He pulled himself out of his sprawl and tangle in the blankets, rolling up to sit and fumbling to lace up his trousers. He ran his hand through his hair by habit and stumbled groggily about, squinting at the afternoon sun beaming with unaccustomed brightness through the shutters. And just as he rubbed the last of sleep from his eyes...
A sudden, sharp spike in the taint - Loghain's warmth rather than the painful burn of darkspawn - jolted Alistair into full wakefulness. The next instant, the door was flung wide.
"What in the Black City were you thinking, bringing us here? Do you have any idea what this place is?"
Loghain!
Alistair squinted. There he was, framed in the brighter light from the doorway. Furious. Dagger in hand. Dripping wet. Naked! Looking less like a Chasind wilder on a rampage, and more like a wet dream. Alistair held his breath and stared at glistening water droplets as they slid over bare skin, tracing the contours of lean muscles criss-crossed with old scars, gleaming watery trails leading his eye down, down to where they dripped off the tip of... Maker! He's huge! Dammit I don't think even I'm that big, but we'll just have to see for sure. Still, he's not even hard and Andraste I really need to stop thinking and stop looking or I'll be hard and and did he say something? He did, didn't he? What...
"Oh, yeah," Alistair said at last, waving vaguely around while trying his best not to squirm or adjust himself. "This. Place. The hut. Um. Cozy, innit, for a witch's lair? Been sitting empty ever since she died."
"She died." Loghain echoed flatly.
Alistair didn't suppose he could blame Loghain for his skepticism; it probably was pretty hard to believe. Still, this was awkward. Alistair felt like one of the fishermen in the Spoiled Princess, bragging about his latest catch to a hard-to-please crowd of drunks and tavern wenches. 'And the dragon was THIS BIG.' But this wasn't some trivial catch-of-the-day to boast about. The Archdemon wasn't just a trophy, and nor was the Witch of the Wilds. So rather than getting annoyed, he just clarified things. And if he used very very small words and a reeeally patient tone of voice, could anyone blame him? "Yeah, I told you. We killed her. Remember?"
Judging by Loghain's glare, and the way his fist tightened on the dagger's hilt, Alistair's tone hadn't gone unnoticed. "You'd better be right about that. For both our sakes."
"Look!" Alistair took a deep breath and swallowed further unhelpful remarks, like 'Dead is dead, OK?' Instead, he settled for "I can show you where we got her. It's on a bit of a hill out the back."
Loghain stepped back from the threshold, extending one arm in an ironic 'after you' wave.
Alistair stared at him. Then he gulped and managed to haul his stare up to Loghain's face. "Er, you might want to... you know." He waved at an imprecise area below Loghain's waist and then pulled his own belt up. "Trousers."
Loghain grinned evilly. Far from making any move to cover himself, he actually propped his fists on his hips.
The defiant stance positively drew the eye to his outthrust... - Alistair blinked - ...hips. Yeah, his hips are outthrust too.
"I suppose I wouldn't want to offend dearly departed Flemeth's delicate sensibilities," Loghain drawled.
The utter git! It's hard ...difficult to focus, what with everything right there in broad daylight, and last time I never really had a chance to get a good look that far down, and now it's all close enough to touch and I really really need - to touch... No! Bad! - I need to not think about that right now! He blinked and shook his head to clear it, and looked up again.
Loghain's grin was wickedly teasing: a challenge if ever Alistair had seen one.
Alistair found himself rising to that challenge, in every way possible. Somehow, he managed to keep his gaze on Loghain's face, and actually return verbal fire, giving as good as he got. "Offend?" he snorted. "Ha! You'd be lucky if she let you have your trousers back! Just as well she wasn't around to nurse you back to health, like she did to Solona and me after she took us off the Tower of Ishal. She didn't give me back my clothes and armor 'til I asked really nicely."
Loghain boggled. "That's... disturbing on so many levels," he muttered. "I recognised this place, because your father and I met her here once. She left me outside and took Maric inside here alone, supposedly to 'prophesy' to him." The dubious expression on Loghain's face spoke volumes. "Poor Maric was never quite the same since."
I wonder if she... If Morrigan's my... Eww! Oh Maker! Don't even think about that! Look, right there. Naked Loghain! Ahhh. Much better! Alistair copped a healing eyeful, like an especially potent poultice applied right on his near-fatally wounded libido. He sighed relief and stammered distractedly, "So, er, the King too, huh?" Related or not, Alistair still couldn't bring himself to call King Maric anything other than his title. "What with him, and Solona, and me, seems like the Witch of the Wilds lured half of Thedas here..." An odd sense of foreboding struck. No telling what other tricks she's got up her sleeve. He shivered and had to remind himself, There are no sleeves. And even if there were still sleeves, somewhere, their owner's dead and gone, and so are her sleeves! "Ugh," he scrunched up his nose and scowled at the memory of how Flemeth had treated him. "At first she was all, 'What do you need your breeches for, boy, you've got nothing an old woman like me hasn't seen a thousand times before,' - and then, wham - 'Supper time soon, lad, count yourself lucky: everyone at Ostagar is dead and darkspawn prey.'"
Flemeth's cruel verdict, delivered in callously casual tones - Duncan! - had sickened Alistair, as fast and brutal as a kick to the gut, had burned his chest like dragon breath, scarring his very soul with loss. He sighed; suddenly the very air of the hut seemed as suffocating as a deep cave, making him long for the fresh air outside. "Well, come on, at least her bones shouldn't spring many surprises on us."
Loghain just nodded grimly. "This, I have to see." He rummaged through their packs, quickly pulled on trousers while Alistair really didn't watch, and followed Alistair out and around the back of the hut.
On the hillside, the dragon bones were half bared to the sun, half buried by the mud and greenery. The path flickered with broken and discarded scale, left behind as insufficient for armor or trade. Alistair followed the vertebrae of the dragon's outstretched neck to the skull, hollowed and washed by rains and winds like a massive boulder. If massive boulders had a bristle of spiky horns or fangs to bare in a wicked sneer.
Dog followed them, sniffing cautiously here and there, as if he too expected the dead dragon to rise up at any moment. He picked a lush, green bush through which Flemeth's tail draped, wagged his own twitching stump of a tail in the air, lifted his back leg, and marked his territory, with a determined bark followed by a swipe of back paws at the dirt.
Oh well, at least Dog didn't try and eat any of the bones. Alistair counted several steps from the back of the skull down to the curved path of the vertebrae right before it branched out into the ribcage, and nudged one broken bone with the tip of his boot.
This is where I got my sword in, and twisted. Turns out dragonbone's tough to crack... I never knew just how tough 'til then. "See?" he said to Loghain, reassuring himself as well. "Still dead. All dead. Just like I said. I got her right here."
Alistair glanced up Loghain, and smiled. What was I worrying about anyway? With Loghain covering my back, we could conquer so much more than a dragon.
Loghain stared at the bone, which indeed showed the unmistakable marks of a sword. Well I'll be... he was telling the truth after all! Then he turned that searching look on Alistair. Does he mean he delivered the killing blow? He's got to be pulling my leg! No man that recently out of his teens is that modest!
But Alistair didn't look even the tiniest bit smug, or sly. Or boastful, like Cailan would have looked. Instead, Alistair just looked vaguely expectant, as anyone might while waiting for a reply.
At last, Loghain grumbled, "It took you this long to mention that you killed the Witch of the Wilds?"
"What? No!" Alistair shook his head. "I didn't do it. We did! Solona threw every spell in the book at her, and Wynne kept healing us and" - Dog interrupted with a bark - "and if anyone did her in, it was Dog. He got right into her soft underbelly and bit her everywhere. If anything, they finished her off before I ever did."
Loghain nodded, eyebrows arched. Surprisingly mature for his age. Though his mood turned sombre a moment later. If only his brother had shared his attitude toward personal heroics, the poor sod would probably still be alive today.
Alistair bent down to knock on the hollow dragon skull. He startled as a pair of spiders skittered from the eyesockets, and then sighed in relief as they lost themselves in the grass. "Yeah, here's one dragon that won't be swooping down on anyone anymore. And just as well," he declared sagely, "Swooping is bad."
Loghain snorted at Alistair's verdict, but Alistair didn't look his way. His far-away gaze spoke of memories. Loghain studied his expression, trying to decipher the sudden shift in mood. Alistair's mouth thinned into a determined line. "She was wicked strong and fast," Alistair murmured at last, as quietly as if he was talking to himself, "all claws and fangs and fire. Maybe even meaner than the Archdemon, I don't know. Solona would know..." His forehead wrinkled. "I wish I could've been there to slay the Archdemon with her - for her," he stammered out and what followed was a great big sigh. "It was my job."
Your job? To throw your life away? Instinctively, Loghain bristled. Not on my watch! But Alistair's gaze stayed fixed on the distance, missing Loghain's instant scowl, and Loghain took the opportunity to take a breath, to think. His protective anger cooled as quickly as it had flared; after all, Alistair's attitude was far too easy for him to understand. He winced and shook his head. "As far as I was concerned," he replied quietly, "it was my job. My chance to make amends for my folly in trusting Howe. But," he sighed, and it was his turn for his gaze to turn distant, focused on the past, "in the end, Solona's claim trumped both of ours."
Silence fell after that, and Alistair turned to head back to the hut. He paused and looked back once he realised the sound of Loghain's footsteps had stopped. Loghain was crouched by the dragon's skull, prizing determinedly with his dagger at the base of one of the massive canines. As Alistair watched in disbelief, the socket cracked and with a grunt of effort, Loghain pulled the fang free. It was as long and sharp as a sword: just like the sword Loghain had carried all the way from Denerim. The one he - or someone just as irreverent - had taken from the skull of the Archdemon. He circled the skull, crouched by the other canine, pried it loose with the same casual, poacher's efficiency, as if removing Flemeth's fangs was no more significant to him than skinning and gutting his latest prey.
As if only then sensing Alistair's gaze on him, Loghain looked up. "Do you want any daggers?" He waved at the rest of the dragon's teeth: smaller, but no less pointed, no less sharp. "There's plenty here. It'd be a shame to let any go to waste."
Alistair blinked. This mundane matter broke him out of his thoughts of Archdemon. Ultimate sacrifice... Solona's sacrifice. Dragons are not a trophy... never a trophy!
But at least this way, Flemeth's relics wouldn't gather dust on a wall, pointless trophies to puff up some scavenging stranger's self-esteem, and they wouldn't weather and crumble uselessly into the earth either. This way was the only chance that they'd actually do some good.
"Yeah, I think I could use a new one." Alistair knelt beside Loghain, by the boulder-sized skull, working a couple of front teeth loose to see which one would break off first.
The mundane task was oddly freeing. He's right. We should make good use of what's left of her.
He turned a fang over in his hand, nodding to himself when it balanced well in his grasp. It might be the right size to keep in my boot. That idea reminded him abruptly of Zevran, who kept daggers in both boots, up both sleeves and probably in all sorts of other places Alistair really didn't want to think about. He could hear Zevran as clearly as if the elf was speaking right now: somehow that Antivan accent of his made everything he said sound naughty. 'A boot's an excellent place to keep a spare weapon, Alistair. You never know when you need a good blade to get you out of a tight spot. One minute you're walking, and the next: bam, you're all tied up with nowhere to go! They'd take your sword away; it's much too big to overlook. But then you could just whip out your dagger, and in one slash you'd find release!' ...Alistair hadn't acted on Zevran's advice at the time. He hadn't wanted to think about being tied up, or about finding release. Not right there, and certainly not with Zevran smirking at him as if he could read Alistair's mind.
Alistair was the one smiling now; he looked up from the fang and turned the smile on Loghain. "Good idea. Thanks for asking." He slid the dagger-sized tooth into his boot.
It was a perfect fit.
"Some cheese would be nice right about now, don't you think? … Mmm, cheese! I don't mind which kind, anything would do. There are so many different kinds out there: soft ones, hard ones, salty and sweet, fresh and ripe, nutty and funky, yellow and white and blue-vein..."
They were hunting.
Or at least, Loghain and Dog were hunting. Alistair had volunteered to tag along as snare carrier, and eventual game carrier; though so far there was no game to carry, and this was no coincidence. Judging by how Alistair was bumbling about carefree as a puppy and babbling happily at the top of his lungs, it looked and sounded as though his duties consisted of getting in Loghain's way, stepping on all possible dry leaves and twigs (and some impossible ones), and generally making enough noise to scare off every game animal in the Korcari Wilds.
Just like Maric was, right back at the beginning, when he was still more of a lost prince at heart than a wanted man. Before I taught him the basics of stealth. Loghain thought back to those early days, when Maric's life had depended on him: the game he hunted, the concealment and protection he provided, and he fought down a smile. Then he fought down a growl as Alistair gave him a friendly nudge. I suppose it was too much to expect that he'd be as sensible about hunting as he is about combat.
Alistair nattered cheerfully on. "... Just think of it: crusts like smoky red wood or fuzzy white velvet; centers full of holes or almost as runny as cream, mmm! Gooey. And cheesy. And brilliant! Melt in your mouth sort of brilliant. A whole world of 'em to taste." Alistair scratched the fuzz on his chin, and to Loghain's hunger- and taint-sharpened senses even that small scruffle was as loud as a panicked deer fleeing through underbrush, "I don't even know how many kinds I still haven't tried yet. Even the word's brilliant. Just saying it makes you smile, you just can't help it. Cheeeese. See? It's just that good. Like enchantment, only a hundred times better! I even tried writing an Ode to Cheese once, until they told me it was based on the Canticle of Threnodies and that would've been blasphemy. But I was just a boy then, not like now; back then I was always hungry and bored and chatty."
"Stop that!" Loghain hissed, shushing Alistair for the tenth time.
"Hm? Stop what?"
"If you scare off my quarry just once more, I'm leaving you here!"
"Hey, I'm trying to help!"
"Help what? Help us to go hungry? Shut. Up!"
Loghain had delivered that exact ultimatum on another hunting trip, long ago. Maric's resulting laughter had driven Loghain to within a hairsbreadth of throwing caution to the winds, wrestling the mouthy sod into the bushes, tying him up and leaving him as bait for whatever wild beasts should wander by. That would've shown the bratty princeling that Loghain meant business!
But Maric had to acquire some sense of self-preservation eventually - Better late than never! - and so, Loghain had held onto the tattered remains of his patience: doing his best to restrain himself from restraining Maric.
Loghain spotted a movement in the grass and nocked an arrow. He'd just drawn to full extension, sighting down the arrow shaft at the hare crouched in the grass, when there it was: eager breath curling in his ear, a single nudge of a heavily-muscled, overly-enthusiastic body against his own, pushing him just slightly off balance. But it was enough, at the critical moment of loosing the arrow, to send his shot wide of the mark.
"Sorry," Alistair husked. It was probably supposed to be a whisper, but it might as well have been a shouted farewell to the hare as it bolted into the distance. Even Dog gave a frustrated bark at their fleeing dinner, before turning to stare at Alistair, and sneezing pointedly.
"Did someone hit you with a clumsy curse, or do you just enjoy getting in my way?" Loghain snapped over his shoulder as he strode over to yank the wasted arrow out of the ground and shove it back in his quiver, "You've been all over me like a rash ever since you got up! Maker's sake, can you stop touching me every minute?"
"I'm really sorry, all right!" The sound rang in the air and Alistair looked at Loghain in a wounded, brittle way and lifted his hands in a gesture of surrender, as fast as if Loghain had aimed that arrow at him. "S'just..." He added, softer, "Not much room here, what with the trees and all."
'Trees', he says. This is a forest! Loghain boggled inwardly. This is the last bloody straw!
He strode up to Alistair and thrust out his free hand. "Give me that!"
"What? Oh," Alistair glanced down at the spidersilk cord dangling from his fist: spare bowstring which Loghain had planned to tie into loops for makeshift snares. "Course! Here!" he exclaimed with what sounded like relief, so helpful and trusting even eager as he handed it over.
"Thank you," Loghain replied with ironic precision, glaring at Alistair without a single glance down at his deft fingers as they sorted out the tangles Alistair had left in the string. Loghain tied a knot, widened it into a noose, running the near-invisible, silvery strand through his fingers, testing its strength, before he abruptly threw the noose over Alistair's head and pulled it tight around his shoulders in one smooth movement, yanking Alistair forward like a leashed mabari.
"Hey!"
Unlike a leashed mabari, Alistair - stunned and stumbling - went down like a felled tree. He would've hit the ground too, if Loghain hadn't held him up, whipping the bowstring swiftly around both Alistair's wrists and cinching it tight. Alistair's hands bunched into fists, but he didn't struggle, didn't push back, didn't yank his hands out of Loghain's hold. It was damned peculiar, since after all the time they'd spent in combat together, Loghain knew Alistair was as strong as he was.
At last Alistair's wrists tensed, finally testing the bowstring that bound them. He stopped when the spidersilk dug into his bared skin, unprotected by gauntlets or gloves. "Wow. Strong stuff," he said approvingly at last. "That'll, er, show those rabbits what for!" His tone - simple happiness a minute ago - was now breathless and overly-cheerful and maybe just a bit concerned underneath all that nonchalance.
Good. About time he started paying attention. Loghain gave a noncommittal "Hmph," and crouched over Alistair, finishing the job. Hogtying a grown man really shouldn't have been so easy. The one time Loghain had tried before, Maric went down spluttering and wriggling, elbowing and kicking Loghain at every opportunity, never giving in even though his long blond hair tangled with the cord, punctuating his struggles with an occasional 'Hey!' or a triumphant 'Aha!' or a wordless yelp of surprise. In the end the devious sod had kneed Loghain in the solar plexus, winding him enough to roll on top of him and give a premature shout of victory. Loghain bucked and threw him off, and they tumbled together head over heels into a muddy ravine, roughhousing and laughing all the way down.
But Alistair didn't fight back at all; he didn't even shout. As the spidersilk stretched around his ankles and back to the wrists, he gave a soft gasp - 'Ohh,' - far too quiet in comparison to his earlier, cheerful chatter. He steadied himself, elbows spread, knees apart, and froze there: so still and so tense, his eyes wide and his breath catching. He stared up at Loghain, cobweb and dew from the grass glinting silver in the short brush of his hair. Even though the bowstring that stretched across his bare chest was taut enough to dent his thick pectorals, the expression in Alistair's eyes as they gazed up into Loghain's, still bore a shocking resemblance to adoration.
And then, just when Loghain began to doubt that interpretation, doubt the intensity of Alistair's reaction, he saw Alistair's soft mouth open in a silent pant. A pink tonguetip slipped out to wet his lower lip.
That sight shocked the old, familiar remembrances of Maric right out of Loghain's mind. Instead, more recent memories clamoured for his attention: his earlier encounters with Alistair. Leaving him tied to a tree, that first night, watching Alistair wriggle with something less than absolute determination to break loose. Then, releasing Alistair from that crushing cage of magic, seeing him sprawled in the dirt, panting and overwhelmed, dazed with ecstasy. At the time, Loghain had thought it merely the joy of being freed, but later he'd realised there was more to it than that.
Now Alistair faced him with the same reaction he did then: suppressed, strong need. Loghain crouched beside him, leaning forward in fascination, gazing into wide eyes, pupils dark with desire. He was close enough to feel heat from the blush that burned not just on Alistair's cheeks but also his throat and even his upper chest. As if it had a will of its own, Loghain's hand lifted, pressed fingertips to Alistair's flushed throat, needing to touch that heat with his own flesh. Alistair's head fell back and his throat arched into a taut bow, pressing vulnerable skin into Loghain's hand, cartilage bobbing against Loghain's fingertips as Alistair swallowed convulsively. As if Loghain's touch was a spark to kindling, Alistair's whole body began to writhe, slow and sinuous. Every muscle sprang into high relief as he tensed against the restraints, pitting his strength against them, holding back only when the spidersilk began to bite.
It was a most enticing sight, and Loghain growled appreciation, even as he too began to move: tying knots and drawing strands ever tighter around Alistair's limbs. Quiet grunts and gasps of muscular effort - his own to restrain, Alistair's to resist - were the only sounds. Taut, jolting movements - Loghain's arms, Alistair's body - rustled the grass as the last ends of the bowstring were looped and knotted.
When the last knot was tied, Loghain rocked back to crouch an arm's length away from Alistair. He studied the knots with a critical eye, nodding to himself as they held. With a wicked smirk, he reached out, and pulled the dragon tooth from Alistair's boot. "Didn't think I'd forget this, did you?" he purred, twirling it mockingly between his fingers, learning its balance, before throwing it. It hissed through the air then thudded into a treetrunk.
Alistair's stare left Loghain for the first time, flicking to the flash of the flying fang. His eyes narrowed, studying its landing place, sizing up the distance. Loghain had judged the height of the throw very carefully. The dragon's tooth was now quite high for someone lying on the ground to reach, but not completely impossible, not for someone as fit as he knew Alistair to be.
It'll be interesting to see if he takes the out I've just given him. Slowly, Loghain rose to his feet, standing over Alistair with his fists propped on his hips. A sharp-edged, triumphant grin dawned as he stared down at the man lying bound at his feet. I know what you crave.
Alistair looked up at him. Those eyes were so wide, so dark with sheer want. Loghain's breath caught in his chest, as he himself was caught in that gaze, unwilling to resist.
And why should I? He remembered Rowan's words to him, that he was still a man with a lot of life left. Anticipation spilled gooseflesh down his spine and thickened his cock. Judging by the flicker in that amber-dark stare, Alistair had a fine view of the latter, from his angle. Yes, Loghain thought, looking down as Alistair stared raptly up at him, I know what you crave...
… so I'm giving it to you.
There was a rare rumble in Loghain's voice as he asked, "Do you know why I'm doing this?"
Alistair gulped. "...Testing?" he said in a thick voice. "The snares?" The question said clearly that even he didn't believe the flimsy excuse.
Loghain snorted and shook his head, nudging Alistair gently in the ribs with his boot by way of encouragement to "Try again."
Alistair's arms tensed and his fingers moved, trying to reach under the silk binding his wrists, much like a lockpick clumsily thrust into a keyhole. The nudge of Loghain's foot seemed to wake Ailstair's defiant side; his chin lifted and he gave a quick flash of a smirk. "To keep me quiet?" he replied archly, "Well, frankly you've done a rotten job of it. You used up the whole string and I'm still talking!"
Loghain drew a deep breath, strangely invigorated by the sheer ballsiness of Alistair, challenging him while lying helpless at his feet. He raked Alistair's bound body with a deliberately assessing stare, spiced by a lopsided, predatory smirk. "Oh, I don't need to tie you down to stop that mouth of yours," he purred, angling his hips to punctuate the implication behind his words.
"Wellll... like I said. I'm still talking." Alistair practically bounced up as he rocked back and forward once: no small feat while bound hand and foot. His mouth twitched and then an impish smile broke through. "So you must like hearing me talk."
Brat, Loghain thought; amused and letting it show, knowing it was the best way to tease back. "Did you ever consider that I might want to leave your mouth free?" he parried airily, "So that you can learn to govern it?" He left Alistair's side, circled round so that he stood by his feet. "Now," he added in businesslike tones, "I'm going to go and hunt -"
"You're leaving me?" Alistair raised his head higher, even though he had to twist in his bindings to do so. "But I thought -" he wriggled and bit his lower lip, giving the bulge in Loghain's trousers a meaningful stare. "- I thought we were done with hunting for the day."
"Oh, you'll find I'm not 'done' with anything I do, until I get what I want." Loghain rumbled. "I should be able to catch enough for both of us -" Dog barked and he snorted, "- all of us soon enough, now that you won't get under my feet."
Alistair's shoulders sagged; his whole posture wilted. "Wait!" he called in a small voice. "I'm still tied up."
"So I see." It took an unexpected effort for Loghain to steel himself against Alistair's woebegone look. "After I've caught enough, I'll come back. And if you've managed to hold your tongue, then you won't have attracted any ...attention while I'm gone." I'll feel it through the taint, if he's in trouble. Plus, there's always the dagger. And there's not even any echoes of darkspawn around this place. Flemeth probably scared off generations' worth of them. Still, if a rabbit decides to have a nibble of that underbrush he calls a haircut, it'll serve the silly sod right.
"Hey! " Alistair called out after Loghain, a single note of tension - desperation - in his tone. "How long will you be?"
"As long as it takes. Now hush!"
Authors: ac1d6urn and sinick
Summary: In which Alistair learns restraint.
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
Chapter 6: The Fade
Chapter 7: Names
Chapter 8: Flames
Chapter 9: Two Swords
Chapter 10: Pyrrhic Victory
Chapter 11: Life and Death... And What Comes After
Chapter 12: Sanctuary
Two Roads
Chapter 13: In the Sun
It was early afternoon when Loghain woke; the sun had moved far enough across the sky to send beams through the shutters onto his face. He blinked sleep from his eyes and took stock of himself. He was warm - a bit too warm, really, enough that he'd started to sweat - and his ribs were a barely-there twinge as he breathed. He was stretched out on his belly. On Alistair. Who was sprawled on his back, spreadeagled and snoring, utterly unselfconscious in sleep.
He makes a surprisingly comfortable mattress. Loghain lifted his head from the crook of Alistair's neck and shoulder, and grinned down at Alistair's blissful expression. He peeled himself carefully away from Alistair's body, wincing a little at the way their groins had stuck together, then huffed amusement when Alistair's snores continued unabated.
Loghain stretched and scratched lazily at his ribs, which itched with healing under the bandages, and then he palmed his chin, which also itched with a few days' growth. Now that he was awake - and had no intensely distracting young warrior writhing around and absorbing all his attention - Loghain realised that he really needed a bath. A shave too. Damned if I'm going to become a Duncan surrogate! He sneered, as he generally did when he thought of the man he'd always resented: first for stealing Maric away from the throne, then for beguiling Cailan to his death, and finally for being the thoroughly undeserving focus of Alistair's obsession. But for the very first time, Loghain's sneer was tinged with personal, physical triumph. I bet Alistair's not so obsessed with that bastard anymore, not after this morning!
As Loghain stood, Dog lolled out his tongue in a huge smile, stumpy tail wagging furiously, but he was smart enough not to bark while Alistair was still asleep. Loghain patted the capering, licking hound with one hand as he rummaged through their belongings with the other. When he'd found the soap, a rag and his dagger, he made for the door, grinning as he watched Dog sneak onto the bed and curl up beside Alistair, while Alistair slept on, undisturbed.
The day was bright and warm outside, unusually so: the Korcari Wilds' typical fog was a gray haze on the horizon, but for now the area around the hut was clear. The breeze stirred Loghain's hair, ruffling the strands as if with an affectionate hand. He turned his face up to the sun and stretched, reaching for the sky, feeling loose-limbed and relaxed. Rejuvenated, in more ways than one.
He unwound the bandages carefully. Under them was a now-dry layer of poultice, which as it crumbled away, revealed bruises: a riot of colour, now faded almost completely, from black to green and yellow at the edges. Brushing off the remaining scraps of old poultice, he shed his trousers and smallclothes, and walked into a nearby pond, soap and rag in hand.
The water in the shallow pool was even slightly warm from the sun, and it was bliss to scrub himself clean from head to toe. He smirked as he washed away the dried, flaky streaks of come that matted the line of hair under his navel; all the while remembering the urgent jolts of Alistair's hips, thrusting along Loghain's shaft, fucking his fist. Loghain's cock stirred at the memory, thickening as he soaped his groin with more than his usual care. Later, Loghain thought, savouring the unfamiliar tingle of anticipation. Soon.
To cool off, he sank to his knees in the shallow water: even then, it only came up to his chest. He had to duck his head to rinse the soap from his unbound mane. Straightening up, he eyed his reflection in the water and snorted at the stubble, before collecting his dagger and soaping his chin and throat.
As he drew the blade across his skin, his mind wandered. It'll be a relief to get rid of this lot. Maker, it itches! There's a reason I never let it get this long. And in any case, a proper Fereldan ought to have long hair and a smooth chin, like Maric. Alistair should too. Taking after his father would be a damn sight better for him than pining for an Orlesian-raised ne'er-do-well like Duncan.
He rinsed the soap off his face, and peered at his reflection in the pond, feeling his skin for any missed patches. Since Maric isn't here, it's up to me to set a proper example.
Satisfied with his shave, Loghain stood up, wringing the worst of the water out of his hair, and turned to walk out of the pond. As he did so, for the first time since leaving it, he faced the hut.
He froze. A chill raced down his spine, and despite the warmth of the day, his skin bristled instantly with gooseflesh. Even the water-heavy hair at the back of his neck prickled.
That hut. He knew it. He'd been here. Just once before, decades ago, but that day was etched into his mind like acid.
Flemeth's hut. He'd watched, powerless to intervene, as she'd led Maric across that very threshold, and poisoned his mind with prophecies that left Loghain's bold, blithe friend pale and silent, prematurely aged by dread. Maric had never told him what had gone on inside, and he hadn't had the heart to really ask, not when he could see the effect on Maric of the merest mention of that time, that place. This place!
Teeth gritted, he stormed up to that fateful threshold, wrenched the door open, and fixed Alistair with an accusing glare.
There was one good thing to be said about the time right after the Blight: sleeping in while not having darkspawn nightmares was brilliant. It made you feel normal and rested and human.
Alistair hadn't slept in like this for years: not since he was a boy, dozing on sunny summer mornings in Arl Eamon's barn. Alistair used to climb to the very top of the hay stack and dig himself in, unbothered 'til the sun rose above the treetops. The dry, rustling hay smelled sweet, of open fields and herbs and sun and summer, and if Alistair was quiet enough, he could stay up there until supper if he wanted to, or until someone remembered him and they sent a dog out to fetch him.
Now, stretching and turning to face the sunlight, Alistair smiled.
As he turned, his other cheek met something hairy. Dog? An odd sense of familiarity dawned. Wait. Loghain...
He opened an eye. The bristly fur under his chin was brown with an occasional burr, and smelled of swamp mud. Dog. Alistair winced at the hot panting breath in his face and the touch of a cold, curious nose. He lifted a hand to shield himself from eager licking, and squinted at the otherwise empty bed. Where's Loghain?
A wet tongue caught him this time, swiping at his chin.
Ugh. Alistair pressed his lips together and pulled back out of range of the slobbering, all the while trying to avoid being pinned by heavy paws. "Geroff me," he muttered, shoving the wagging, panting mabari away. "M'awake, see? See?"
Loghain wasn't in the hut, but when Alistair finally focused on the taint, he could tell Loghain was close. The taint felt quiet; Loghain's warmth was steady and untroubled. The sensation reminded Alistair of sunlit, rich brown swamp water, lying calm and flat as syrup, undisturbed by the breeze. It was almost as though Alistair was feeling Loghain's mood: placid and warm as the day.
Or maybe that's just me, Alistair thought, his smile widening as he stretched lazily, enjoying the pull and reach of sleep-warmed muscles. Dog seemed to take his stretch as an invitation and pounced, landing on Alistair's belly and driving the breath from him with an oof. "All right, all right, I'm up, you overgrown pup!" Alistair grumblegrinned. He pulled himself out of his sprawl and tangle in the blankets, rolling up to sit and fumbling to lace up his trousers. He ran his hand through his hair by habit and stumbled groggily about, squinting at the afternoon sun beaming with unaccustomed brightness through the shutters. And just as he rubbed the last of sleep from his eyes...
A sudden, sharp spike in the taint - Loghain's warmth rather than the painful burn of darkspawn - jolted Alistair into full wakefulness. The next instant, the door was flung wide.
"What in the Black City were you thinking, bringing us here? Do you have any idea what this place is?"
Loghain!
Alistair squinted. There he was, framed in the brighter light from the doorway. Furious. Dagger in hand. Dripping wet. Naked! Looking less like a Chasind wilder on a rampage, and more like a wet dream. Alistair held his breath and stared at glistening water droplets as they slid over bare skin, tracing the contours of lean muscles criss-crossed with old scars, gleaming watery trails leading his eye down, down to where they dripped off the tip of... Maker! He's huge! Dammit I don't think even I'm that big, but we'll just have to see for sure. Still, he's not even hard and Andraste I really need to stop thinking and stop looking or I'll be hard and and did he say something? He did, didn't he? What...
"Oh, yeah," Alistair said at last, waving vaguely around while trying his best not to squirm or adjust himself. "This. Place. The hut. Um. Cozy, innit, for a witch's lair? Been sitting empty ever since she died."
"She died." Loghain echoed flatly.
Alistair didn't suppose he could blame Loghain for his skepticism; it probably was pretty hard to believe. Still, this was awkward. Alistair felt like one of the fishermen in the Spoiled Princess, bragging about his latest catch to a hard-to-please crowd of drunks and tavern wenches. 'And the dragon was THIS BIG.' But this wasn't some trivial catch-of-the-day to boast about. The Archdemon wasn't just a trophy, and nor was the Witch of the Wilds. So rather than getting annoyed, he just clarified things. And if he used very very small words and a reeeally patient tone of voice, could anyone blame him? "Yeah, I told you. We killed her. Remember?"
Judging by Loghain's glare, and the way his fist tightened on the dagger's hilt, Alistair's tone hadn't gone unnoticed. "You'd better be right about that. For both our sakes."
"Look!" Alistair took a deep breath and swallowed further unhelpful remarks, like 'Dead is dead, OK?' Instead, he settled for "I can show you where we got her. It's on a bit of a hill out the back."
Loghain stepped back from the threshold, extending one arm in an ironic 'after you' wave.
Alistair stared at him. Then he gulped and managed to haul his stare up to Loghain's face. "Er, you might want to... you know." He waved at an imprecise area below Loghain's waist and then pulled his own belt up. "Trousers."
Loghain grinned evilly. Far from making any move to cover himself, he actually propped his fists on his hips.
The defiant stance positively drew the eye to his outthrust... - Alistair blinked - ...hips. Yeah, his hips are outthrust too.
"I suppose I wouldn't want to offend dearly departed Flemeth's delicate sensibilities," Loghain drawled.
The utter git! It's hard ...difficult to focus, what with everything right there in broad daylight, and last time I never really had a chance to get a good look that far down, and now it's all close enough to touch and I really really need - to touch... No! Bad! - I need to not think about that right now! He blinked and shook his head to clear it, and looked up again.
Loghain's grin was wickedly teasing: a challenge if ever Alistair had seen one.
Alistair found himself rising to that challenge, in every way possible. Somehow, he managed to keep his gaze on Loghain's face, and actually return verbal fire, giving as good as he got. "Offend?" he snorted. "Ha! You'd be lucky if she let you have your trousers back! Just as well she wasn't around to nurse you back to health, like she did to Solona and me after she took us off the Tower of Ishal. She didn't give me back my clothes and armor 'til I asked really nicely."
Loghain boggled. "That's... disturbing on so many levels," he muttered. "I recognised this place, because your father and I met her here once. She left me outside and took Maric inside here alone, supposedly to 'prophesy' to him." The dubious expression on Loghain's face spoke volumes. "Poor Maric was never quite the same since."
I wonder if she... If Morrigan's my... Eww! Oh Maker! Don't even think about that! Look, right there. Naked Loghain! Ahhh. Much better! Alistair copped a healing eyeful, like an especially potent poultice applied right on his near-fatally wounded libido. He sighed relief and stammered distractedly, "So, er, the King too, huh?" Related or not, Alistair still couldn't bring himself to call King Maric anything other than his title. "What with him, and Solona, and me, seems like the Witch of the Wilds lured half of Thedas here..." An odd sense of foreboding struck. No telling what other tricks she's got up her sleeve. He shivered and had to remind himself, There are no sleeves. And even if there were still sleeves, somewhere, their owner's dead and gone, and so are her sleeves! "Ugh," he scrunched up his nose and scowled at the memory of how Flemeth had treated him. "At first she was all, 'What do you need your breeches for, boy, you've got nothing an old woman like me hasn't seen a thousand times before,' - and then, wham - 'Supper time soon, lad, count yourself lucky: everyone at Ostagar is dead and darkspawn prey.'"
Flemeth's cruel verdict, delivered in callously casual tones - Duncan! - had sickened Alistair, as fast and brutal as a kick to the gut, had burned his chest like dragon breath, scarring his very soul with loss. He sighed; suddenly the very air of the hut seemed as suffocating as a deep cave, making him long for the fresh air outside. "Well, come on, at least her bones shouldn't spring many surprises on us."
Loghain just nodded grimly. "This, I have to see." He rummaged through their packs, quickly pulled on trousers while Alistair really didn't watch, and followed Alistair out and around the back of the hut.
On the hillside, the dragon bones were half bared to the sun, half buried by the mud and greenery. The path flickered with broken and discarded scale, left behind as insufficient for armor or trade. Alistair followed the vertebrae of the dragon's outstretched neck to the skull, hollowed and washed by rains and winds like a massive boulder. If massive boulders had a bristle of spiky horns or fangs to bare in a wicked sneer.
Dog followed them, sniffing cautiously here and there, as if he too expected the dead dragon to rise up at any moment. He picked a lush, green bush through which Flemeth's tail draped, wagged his own twitching stump of a tail in the air, lifted his back leg, and marked his territory, with a determined bark followed by a swipe of back paws at the dirt.
Oh well, at least Dog didn't try and eat any of the bones. Alistair counted several steps from the back of the skull down to the curved path of the vertebrae right before it branched out into the ribcage, and nudged one broken bone with the tip of his boot.
This is where I got my sword in, and twisted. Turns out dragonbone's tough to crack... I never knew just how tough 'til then. "See?" he said to Loghain, reassuring himself as well. "Still dead. All dead. Just like I said. I got her right here."
Alistair glanced up Loghain, and smiled. What was I worrying about anyway? With Loghain covering my back, we could conquer so much more than a dragon.
Loghain stared at the bone, which indeed showed the unmistakable marks of a sword. Well I'll be... he was telling the truth after all! Then he turned that searching look on Alistair. Does he mean he delivered the killing blow? He's got to be pulling my leg! No man that recently out of his teens is that modest!
But Alistair didn't look even the tiniest bit smug, or sly. Or boastful, like Cailan would have looked. Instead, Alistair just looked vaguely expectant, as anyone might while waiting for a reply.
At last, Loghain grumbled, "It took you this long to mention that you killed the Witch of the Wilds?"
"What? No!" Alistair shook his head. "I didn't do it. We did! Solona threw every spell in the book at her, and Wynne kept healing us and" - Dog interrupted with a bark - "and if anyone did her in, it was Dog. He got right into her soft underbelly and bit her everywhere. If anything, they finished her off before I ever did."
Loghain nodded, eyebrows arched. Surprisingly mature for his age. Though his mood turned sombre a moment later. If only his brother had shared his attitude toward personal heroics, the poor sod would probably still be alive today.
Alistair bent down to knock on the hollow dragon skull. He startled as a pair of spiders skittered from the eyesockets, and then sighed in relief as they lost themselves in the grass. "Yeah, here's one dragon that won't be swooping down on anyone anymore. And just as well," he declared sagely, "Swooping is bad."
Loghain snorted at Alistair's verdict, but Alistair didn't look his way. His far-away gaze spoke of memories. Loghain studied his expression, trying to decipher the sudden shift in mood. Alistair's mouth thinned into a determined line. "She was wicked strong and fast," Alistair murmured at last, as quietly as if he was talking to himself, "all claws and fangs and fire. Maybe even meaner than the Archdemon, I don't know. Solona would know..." His forehead wrinkled. "I wish I could've been there to slay the Archdemon with her - for her," he stammered out and what followed was a great big sigh. "It was my job."
Your job? To throw your life away? Instinctively, Loghain bristled. Not on my watch! But Alistair's gaze stayed fixed on the distance, missing Loghain's instant scowl, and Loghain took the opportunity to take a breath, to think. His protective anger cooled as quickly as it had flared; after all, Alistair's attitude was far too easy for him to understand. He winced and shook his head. "As far as I was concerned," he replied quietly, "it was my job. My chance to make amends for my folly in trusting Howe. But," he sighed, and it was his turn for his gaze to turn distant, focused on the past, "in the end, Solona's claim trumped both of ours."
Silence fell after that, and Alistair turned to head back to the hut. He paused and looked back once he realised the sound of Loghain's footsteps had stopped. Loghain was crouched by the dragon's skull, prizing determinedly with his dagger at the base of one of the massive canines. As Alistair watched in disbelief, the socket cracked and with a grunt of effort, Loghain pulled the fang free. It was as long and sharp as a sword: just like the sword Loghain had carried all the way from Denerim. The one he - or someone just as irreverent - had taken from the skull of the Archdemon. He circled the skull, crouched by the other canine, pried it loose with the same casual, poacher's efficiency, as if removing Flemeth's fangs was no more significant to him than skinning and gutting his latest prey.
As if only then sensing Alistair's gaze on him, Loghain looked up. "Do you want any daggers?" He waved at the rest of the dragon's teeth: smaller, but no less pointed, no less sharp. "There's plenty here. It'd be a shame to let any go to waste."
Alistair blinked. This mundane matter broke him out of his thoughts of Archdemon. Ultimate sacrifice... Solona's sacrifice. Dragons are not a trophy... never a trophy!
But at least this way, Flemeth's relics wouldn't gather dust on a wall, pointless trophies to puff up some scavenging stranger's self-esteem, and they wouldn't weather and crumble uselessly into the earth either. This way was the only chance that they'd actually do some good.
"Yeah, I think I could use a new one." Alistair knelt beside Loghain, by the boulder-sized skull, working a couple of front teeth loose to see which one would break off first.
The mundane task was oddly freeing. He's right. We should make good use of what's left of her.
He turned a fang over in his hand, nodding to himself when it balanced well in his grasp. It might be the right size to keep in my boot. That idea reminded him abruptly of Zevran, who kept daggers in both boots, up both sleeves and probably in all sorts of other places Alistair really didn't want to think about. He could hear Zevran as clearly as if the elf was speaking right now: somehow that Antivan accent of his made everything he said sound naughty. 'A boot's an excellent place to keep a spare weapon, Alistair. You never know when you need a good blade to get you out of a tight spot. One minute you're walking, and the next: bam, you're all tied up with nowhere to go! They'd take your sword away; it's much too big to overlook. But then you could just whip out your dagger, and in one slash you'd find release!' ...Alistair hadn't acted on Zevran's advice at the time. He hadn't wanted to think about being tied up, or about finding release. Not right there, and certainly not with Zevran smirking at him as if he could read Alistair's mind.
Alistair was the one smiling now; he looked up from the fang and turned the smile on Loghain. "Good idea. Thanks for asking." He slid the dagger-sized tooth into his boot.
It was a perfect fit.
"Some cheese would be nice right about now, don't you think? … Mmm, cheese! I don't mind which kind, anything would do. There are so many different kinds out there: soft ones, hard ones, salty and sweet, fresh and ripe, nutty and funky, yellow and white and blue-vein..."
They were hunting.
Or at least, Loghain and Dog were hunting. Alistair had volunteered to tag along as snare carrier, and eventual game carrier; though so far there was no game to carry, and this was no coincidence. Judging by how Alistair was bumbling about carefree as a puppy and babbling happily at the top of his lungs, it looked and sounded as though his duties consisted of getting in Loghain's way, stepping on all possible dry leaves and twigs (and some impossible ones), and generally making enough noise to scare off every game animal in the Korcari Wilds.
Just like Maric was, right back at the beginning, when he was still more of a lost prince at heart than a wanted man. Before I taught him the basics of stealth. Loghain thought back to those early days, when Maric's life had depended on him: the game he hunted, the concealment and protection he provided, and he fought down a smile. Then he fought down a growl as Alistair gave him a friendly nudge. I suppose it was too much to expect that he'd be as sensible about hunting as he is about combat.
Alistair nattered cheerfully on. "... Just think of it: crusts like smoky red wood or fuzzy white velvet; centers full of holes or almost as runny as cream, mmm! Gooey. And cheesy. And brilliant! Melt in your mouth sort of brilliant. A whole world of 'em to taste." Alistair scratched the fuzz on his chin, and to Loghain's hunger- and taint-sharpened senses even that small scruffle was as loud as a panicked deer fleeing through underbrush, "I don't even know how many kinds I still haven't tried yet. Even the word's brilliant. Just saying it makes you smile, you just can't help it. Cheeeese. See? It's just that good. Like enchantment, only a hundred times better! I even tried writing an Ode to Cheese once, until they told me it was based on the Canticle of Threnodies and that would've been blasphemy. But I was just a boy then, not like now; back then I was always hungry and bored and chatty."
"Stop that!" Loghain hissed, shushing Alistair for the tenth time.
"Hm? Stop what?"
"If you scare off my quarry just once more, I'm leaving you here!"
"Hey, I'm trying to help!"
"Help what? Help us to go hungry? Shut. Up!"
Loghain had delivered that exact ultimatum on another hunting trip, long ago. Maric's resulting laughter had driven Loghain to within a hairsbreadth of throwing caution to the winds, wrestling the mouthy sod into the bushes, tying him up and leaving him as bait for whatever wild beasts should wander by. That would've shown the bratty princeling that Loghain meant business!
But Maric had to acquire some sense of self-preservation eventually - Better late than never! - and so, Loghain had held onto the tattered remains of his patience: doing his best to restrain himself from restraining Maric.
Loghain spotted a movement in the grass and nocked an arrow. He'd just drawn to full extension, sighting down the arrow shaft at the hare crouched in the grass, when there it was: eager breath curling in his ear, a single nudge of a heavily-muscled, overly-enthusiastic body against his own, pushing him just slightly off balance. But it was enough, at the critical moment of loosing the arrow, to send his shot wide of the mark.
"Sorry," Alistair husked. It was probably supposed to be a whisper, but it might as well have been a shouted farewell to the hare as it bolted into the distance. Even Dog gave a frustrated bark at their fleeing dinner, before turning to stare at Alistair, and sneezing pointedly.
"Did someone hit you with a clumsy curse, or do you just enjoy getting in my way?" Loghain snapped over his shoulder as he strode over to yank the wasted arrow out of the ground and shove it back in his quiver, "You've been all over me like a rash ever since you got up! Maker's sake, can you stop touching me every minute?"
"I'm really sorry, all right!" The sound rang in the air and Alistair looked at Loghain in a wounded, brittle way and lifted his hands in a gesture of surrender, as fast as if Loghain had aimed that arrow at him. "S'just..." He added, softer, "Not much room here, what with the trees and all."
'Trees', he says. This is a forest! Loghain boggled inwardly. This is the last bloody straw!
He strode up to Alistair and thrust out his free hand. "Give me that!"
"What? Oh," Alistair glanced down at the spidersilk cord dangling from his fist: spare bowstring which Loghain had planned to tie into loops for makeshift snares. "Course! Here!" he exclaimed with what sounded like relief, so helpful and trusting even eager as he handed it over.
"Thank you," Loghain replied with ironic precision, glaring at Alistair without a single glance down at his deft fingers as they sorted out the tangles Alistair had left in the string. Loghain tied a knot, widened it into a noose, running the near-invisible, silvery strand through his fingers, testing its strength, before he abruptly threw the noose over Alistair's head and pulled it tight around his shoulders in one smooth movement, yanking Alistair forward like a leashed mabari.
"Hey!"
Unlike a leashed mabari, Alistair - stunned and stumbling - went down like a felled tree. He would've hit the ground too, if Loghain hadn't held him up, whipping the bowstring swiftly around both Alistair's wrists and cinching it tight. Alistair's hands bunched into fists, but he didn't struggle, didn't push back, didn't yank his hands out of Loghain's hold. It was damned peculiar, since after all the time they'd spent in combat together, Loghain knew Alistair was as strong as he was.
At last Alistair's wrists tensed, finally testing the bowstring that bound them. He stopped when the spidersilk dug into his bared skin, unprotected by gauntlets or gloves. "Wow. Strong stuff," he said approvingly at last. "That'll, er, show those rabbits what for!" His tone - simple happiness a minute ago - was now breathless and overly-cheerful and maybe just a bit concerned underneath all that nonchalance.
Good. About time he started paying attention. Loghain gave a noncommittal "Hmph," and crouched over Alistair, finishing the job. Hogtying a grown man really shouldn't have been so easy. The one time Loghain had tried before, Maric went down spluttering and wriggling, elbowing and kicking Loghain at every opportunity, never giving in even though his long blond hair tangled with the cord, punctuating his struggles with an occasional 'Hey!' or a triumphant 'Aha!' or a wordless yelp of surprise. In the end the devious sod had kneed Loghain in the solar plexus, winding him enough to roll on top of him and give a premature shout of victory. Loghain bucked and threw him off, and they tumbled together head over heels into a muddy ravine, roughhousing and laughing all the way down.
But Alistair didn't fight back at all; he didn't even shout. As the spidersilk stretched around his ankles and back to the wrists, he gave a soft gasp - 'Ohh,' - far too quiet in comparison to his earlier, cheerful chatter. He steadied himself, elbows spread, knees apart, and froze there: so still and so tense, his eyes wide and his breath catching. He stared up at Loghain, cobweb and dew from the grass glinting silver in the short brush of his hair. Even though the bowstring that stretched across his bare chest was taut enough to dent his thick pectorals, the expression in Alistair's eyes as they gazed up into Loghain's, still bore a shocking resemblance to adoration.
And then, just when Loghain began to doubt that interpretation, doubt the intensity of Alistair's reaction, he saw Alistair's soft mouth open in a silent pant. A pink tonguetip slipped out to wet his lower lip.
That sight shocked the old, familiar remembrances of Maric right out of Loghain's mind. Instead, more recent memories clamoured for his attention: his earlier encounters with Alistair. Leaving him tied to a tree, that first night, watching Alistair wriggle with something less than absolute determination to break loose. Then, releasing Alistair from that crushing cage of magic, seeing him sprawled in the dirt, panting and overwhelmed, dazed with ecstasy. At the time, Loghain had thought it merely the joy of being freed, but later he'd realised there was more to it than that.
Now Alistair faced him with the same reaction he did then: suppressed, strong need. Loghain crouched beside him, leaning forward in fascination, gazing into wide eyes, pupils dark with desire. He was close enough to feel heat from the blush that burned not just on Alistair's cheeks but also his throat and even his upper chest. As if it had a will of its own, Loghain's hand lifted, pressed fingertips to Alistair's flushed throat, needing to touch that heat with his own flesh. Alistair's head fell back and his throat arched into a taut bow, pressing vulnerable skin into Loghain's hand, cartilage bobbing against Loghain's fingertips as Alistair swallowed convulsively. As if Loghain's touch was a spark to kindling, Alistair's whole body began to writhe, slow and sinuous. Every muscle sprang into high relief as he tensed against the restraints, pitting his strength against them, holding back only when the spidersilk began to bite.
It was a most enticing sight, and Loghain growled appreciation, even as he too began to move: tying knots and drawing strands ever tighter around Alistair's limbs. Quiet grunts and gasps of muscular effort - his own to restrain, Alistair's to resist - were the only sounds. Taut, jolting movements - Loghain's arms, Alistair's body - rustled the grass as the last ends of the bowstring were looped and knotted.
When the last knot was tied, Loghain rocked back to crouch an arm's length away from Alistair. He studied the knots with a critical eye, nodding to himself as they held. With a wicked smirk, he reached out, and pulled the dragon tooth from Alistair's boot. "Didn't think I'd forget this, did you?" he purred, twirling it mockingly between his fingers, learning its balance, before throwing it. It hissed through the air then thudded into a treetrunk.
Alistair's stare left Loghain for the first time, flicking to the flash of the flying fang. His eyes narrowed, studying its landing place, sizing up the distance. Loghain had judged the height of the throw very carefully. The dragon's tooth was now quite high for someone lying on the ground to reach, but not completely impossible, not for someone as fit as he knew Alistair to be.
It'll be interesting to see if he takes the out I've just given him. Slowly, Loghain rose to his feet, standing over Alistair with his fists propped on his hips. A sharp-edged, triumphant grin dawned as he stared down at the man lying bound at his feet. I know what you crave.
Alistair looked up at him. Those eyes were so wide, so dark with sheer want. Loghain's breath caught in his chest, as he himself was caught in that gaze, unwilling to resist.
And why should I? He remembered Rowan's words to him, that he was still a man with a lot of life left. Anticipation spilled gooseflesh down his spine and thickened his cock. Judging by the flicker in that amber-dark stare, Alistair had a fine view of the latter, from his angle. Yes, Loghain thought, looking down as Alistair stared raptly up at him, I know what you crave...
… so I'm giving it to you.
There was a rare rumble in Loghain's voice as he asked, "Do you know why I'm doing this?"
Alistair gulped. "...Testing?" he said in a thick voice. "The snares?" The question said clearly that even he didn't believe the flimsy excuse.
Loghain snorted and shook his head, nudging Alistair gently in the ribs with his boot by way of encouragement to "Try again."
Alistair's arms tensed and his fingers moved, trying to reach under the silk binding his wrists, much like a lockpick clumsily thrust into a keyhole. The nudge of Loghain's foot seemed to wake Ailstair's defiant side; his chin lifted and he gave a quick flash of a smirk. "To keep me quiet?" he replied archly, "Well, frankly you've done a rotten job of it. You used up the whole string and I'm still talking!"
Loghain drew a deep breath, strangely invigorated by the sheer ballsiness of Alistair, challenging him while lying helpless at his feet. He raked Alistair's bound body with a deliberately assessing stare, spiced by a lopsided, predatory smirk. "Oh, I don't need to tie you down to stop that mouth of yours," he purred, angling his hips to punctuate the implication behind his words.
"Wellll... like I said. I'm still talking." Alistair practically bounced up as he rocked back and forward once: no small feat while bound hand and foot. His mouth twitched and then an impish smile broke through. "So you must like hearing me talk."
Brat, Loghain thought; amused and letting it show, knowing it was the best way to tease back. "Did you ever consider that I might want to leave your mouth free?" he parried airily, "So that you can learn to govern it?" He left Alistair's side, circled round so that he stood by his feet. "Now," he added in businesslike tones, "I'm going to go and hunt -"
"You're leaving me?" Alistair raised his head higher, even though he had to twist in his bindings to do so. "But I thought -" he wriggled and bit his lower lip, giving the bulge in Loghain's trousers a meaningful stare. "- I thought we were done with hunting for the day."
"Oh, you'll find I'm not 'done' with anything I do, until I get what I want." Loghain rumbled. "I should be able to catch enough for both of us -" Dog barked and he snorted, "- all of us soon enough, now that you won't get under my feet."
Alistair's shoulders sagged; his whole posture wilted. "Wait!" he called in a small voice. "I'm still tied up."
"So I see." It took an unexpected effort for Loghain to steel himself against Alistair's woebegone look. "After I've caught enough, I'll come back. And if you've managed to hold your tongue, then you won't have attracted any ...attention while I'm gone." I'll feel it through the taint, if he's in trouble. Plus, there's always the dagger. And there's not even any echoes of darkspawn around this place. Flemeth probably scared off generations' worth of them. Still, if a rabbit decides to have a nibble of that underbrush he calls a haircut, it'll serve the silly sod right.
"Hey! " Alistair called out after Loghain, a single note of tension - desperation - in his tone. "How long will you be?"
"As long as it takes. Now hush!"