#leverette

Zevran’s parries were weakening. His daggers came up a little too late and his steps sank too deep in the sand of the river bank they trained on - close to water, to be safe, he’d said with a wink. The energy he’d had then was fading, and Leverette let the spell crackling along the length of his staff disperse. It made his palms buzz along its grip and he dragged the tip in the sand to ground the last of it. 

His arms and face felt hot in the sun and the look Zevran gave him did nothing to ease the flush. Levy twisted his hands around his staff until he couldn’t take the attention anymore. He understood not wanting to risk a glance away during a fight, a mock one or a real one, but where a determination had been, adoration was in its place. It still made something in Levy’s chest twist uncomfortably. Or maybe the shine in Zevran’s eyes was a fever? 

“Are you are okay?” Levy reached out, another spell already on the tips of his fingers. Maybe Zevran just needed a dip in the river? Some rest and better food than the scraps Morrigan stole from bandits no matter how many times he told her not to. There was a town nearby. Small from what he remembered of its shape on their map, but there had to have been a healer. At least one better than him and his lessons with Wynne. Levy couldn’t sense more than what he saw with his own eyes - muscle fatigue and dehydration from their sparring. 

The magic fizzled out when Zevran grabbed his hand and a different warmth took its place. It raced up his arm when Zevran interlaced their fingers. Levy obliged with a quick squeeze of their hands.

“I am never better, dear Warden,” Zevran said, closing the small distance between them. Leverette allowed him despite the stink of sweat on him. “And never prouder. Do not think I did not notice the spin you put on your staff. You have been watching me, no?”

Leverette licked his lips. His mouth felt dry. “Did you not want me to?”

Zevran hummed. “To know someone like you is watching... I should have been doing something else.” Leverette flushed a deeper shade of red. His breath felt too heavy in his lungs, the air too thin around him, when Zevran said things like that. And things like that to him. “But tomorrow, perhaps. I think we have reached some limits today.” There was that wink again, that knowing look, and Leverette wondered what limits Zevran was talking about. 

‘“I’m not...tired,” Leverette stared. “it’s just...with you I’m-”

“Breathless?” Zevran asked. He grinned. “My dear Warden, you may need to have Wynne check on me during your next lesson. For I feel the same affliction when I’m with you.”

He'd found a sturdy seat instead and planted himself there ever since, hands folded tight in front of him to keep the mana jumping restlessly between his fingers from igniting anything of importance. His heel had tapped a shallow dip in the muddy ground and there was soon to be another if he hadn't a distraction as his other leg took up the job.

Watching the comings and goings of the recruits had been something to do, and his wandering mind had drifted to wondering what they'd done before making their way to the Wardens - or what they'd done to get themselves there. It was a challenge when he had little experience of the outside world and its people and what sort of positions could be held, and he'd come to an abrupt halt when an elf sat down across the fire pit from him. Just what had he done to get himself there?

The elf looked as nervous as he felt - a pale face set with glossy, red-rimmed eyes. Long hair obscured half of his face but thin, intricate tattoos wound their way across his cheeks and up to a sweat-beaded brow in a delicate whirls. With his arms crossed over his knees, he was bent forward, deep exhales ending in a sharp whine as he wheezed. Perhaps he'd been forced into it. Leverette knew all to well of the templar raids on the Dalish clans in Fereldan; one raid might have pressed him into leave his home in search for another. Although, instead of a staff at his shoulder, there was a bird.

That, had Levy's attention.

Of all the people to see here, of all times -

The elf raised his eyes at the sound of his hiccup and there was no mistaking the deep gold freckled in the dark irises staring him down, gaze as harp as the thin line his mouth made as he frowned. Not when that same gaze had haunted his nights, watching him in the dark from one tree or another as he went through a bed time routine with his father at the cabin on the edge of the forest.

Something brightened in the elf's eyes, as well, and it broke through the clouds fogging his expression for a moment. Leverette struggled to his feet and made his shaky way over.

"You're...you're the elf. From -"

"You're the shem," the Dalish agreed. Levy couldn't look away from him.

"You grew you're hair out."

The corner of Fahleon's mouth twitched. "You grew wrinkles."

Levy rubbed at the space between his brows with a thumb and gave a weak chuckle. "The Circle will do that to you. You..what happened? After...after..."

"The attack?" Fahleon shrugged. "They left."

"They didn't come for you when it was over?" Fahleon shook his head and Levy felt something in his chest loosen. "Is it...is the house - is it still there?"

"Last time I checked." Levy blinked. "It's been a while since I've needed to. I don't know the current state."

"Thank you," Levy sighed, and he thought his legs would give out if he didn't sit sometime soon again. There was space besides the elf, and he took it, flushing when it earned him a set of raised brows. "It's a strange place to meet up, isn't it? Funny, too, I suppose."

"I'm laughing on the inside."

Levy snorted. "How did you end up here?"

"Darkspawn got me sick. It was die then or die later."

The elf didn't ask for a reciprocating answer, but Levy felt he deserved one anyway, and the words tumbled out of his mouth before he could stop them. "I had a high risk of demon possession. The First Enchanter thought to protect me by putting me though the Harrowing to prove to the templars I was capable and Duncan just happened to be there when I came out of it, Enchanter and all." He shrugged.

"That's the problem with all the shem towers. Nothing better to do than talk about demons. Start seeing them everywhere."

"And what do you see all the time?"

"Elfroot."

He'd never talked to the elf before. He'd felt his presence, sharp and heavy as it was on his shoulders, constantly. It had grown into a sort of comfortable weight, after a while, when he'd grown used to being watched. He understood it to a point - he and his father had been trespassers in an area known for trespassing. It was easier to put an end to the problem before it became a problem, and the hunters assigned to watch for any signs had done their jobs effectively. In the Circle, the feeling of eyes was a sick and twisted feeling, felt in the gut more than on his shoulders. It never became comfortable, only taking a tighter hold of his insides and yanking when it pleased to remind him that he would never be free. His hands sparked again and he wiped them on his pants.

"Can you..." Levy licked his lips. "Can you watch me, again? In case I do something stupid."

“Don’t turn around. It’s behind us.”

“Don’t,” Zevran breathed, almost silent, if only because Levy wouldn’t listen to him no matter how loud he called out to him. Levy used to find it unnerving, the way the assassin could look into his eyes with his smirk and know his thoughts before they’d even fully formed. It was growing into a comfort now. More so, now. He wouldn’t have to waste his breath to explain his plan. He didn’t have much left in his lungs in the first place. “Amor, do not turn around-”

The staff shook in his hands as Levy used it to steady himself. A sliver worked its way deep into his thumb as his grip slipped down a crack in its worn surface. One more spell could break it for good. But it was only one more spell Levy needed to take down The Mother. 

He wasn’t good at much, Levy knew that, as he felt the wood under his palms heat. He wasn’t brave or selfless like Alistair, or steadfast and stubborn like Morrigan. And Zevran... Zevran was too much to compare to, though he liked to think he had the better hair. It didn’t make up for his cowardice or his nerves as thin as string. He curled his fingers tighter, wincing, and caught a glimpse of the flames licking between his knuckles as the brood mother knocked another chunk of the ceiling free to rock him from his feet.  

He wasn’t a good mage. He wasn’t much better of a Warden. A worse friend. A terrible lover, he thought, ignoring Zevran’s repeated set of pleas. The crackle of fire overtook what the shouts of Oghren and Sigrun called to each other as the stone above them continued to fall. He let it burn, hotter, brighter, further, until his hands turned red and cracked.

Last Kiss

“You can stay,” Zevran said. He sat on the edge of the bed, the heels of his feet just touching the floor as he swung them back and forth. “You have done too much for the Wardens already.”

“As a whole, maybe.” Leverette frowned as the excuse came to mind. There was no relief in the truth of Zevran’s words, as much as there should have been.. But truth didn’t ease the burning guilt in his stomach. Somewhere, somehow, he had caused this mess. “But not to this Warden.” His argument felt stale even to his mouth now that he said it, but Levy still found himself stuffing his pack with another set of robes. 

“One Warden or them all - you do not have to go just because they ask. You owe no one nothing any longer.”

“She didn’t ask.” The fact that a letter was sent to him at all about the plans to find Alistair in the Fade was a small mercy all on its own. He still would have gone along if Meji kicked the door down and dragged him with her, but it was nice to have a warning. To have time to doubt. To fight like this. Levy sighed and found a pot of oil he hoped wouldn’t stain his staff the next time it needed polishing. 

“You do not even know what you are doing! Enough mages have forced their way into the Fade, and those mistakes have only just been corrected.”

“I know you didn’t like Alistair but trying to find him is not a mistake-”

“This is not about him this is about-”

“-me being a mage?”

Zevran glared at him. “Do not put words into my mouth.”

Levy couldn’t sort out the guilt boiling inside him to figure out which part of it came from making Zevran angry. He avoided the elf’s eyes instead and finished securing a knot at the top of his pack. “I’m a Warden, Zev. I have to help them. And...and they’re both my friends.”

“And I am?”

“Terribly persuasive,” Levy admitted. He hoped it was enough of an apology. “But even you can’t stop me from going, I’m sorry.”

“And if I said please?” Zevran wasn’t glaring anymore, but there was still a hint of something behind his eyes. For some reason, that made it even harder to look at him. 

“What a pair we make,” Zevran chuckled and Levy made a face as Zevran shifted under his hands. Leverette gripped his arm tighter and finished wrapping the last of the newest wounds. The bandages were already staining a light shade of pink. Levy made another face and pushed for a wave of healing magic, crude as he was at it. 

“That almost sounds like an insult,” he said, and passed the roll of bandages over to let Zevran wipe at the drying blood on his forehead. He flushed when Zevran’s hand stilled against his cheek. “Is it in an insult?”

“Not in the slightest. I’ve just been...thinking. Admiring.” Leverette dropped his gaze with a cough. “To think, a Crow and a Grey Warden, an assassin and a chosen hero, a flea and the sun-”

Leverette lifted his hand to cover Zevran’s, still cupping his face. “Now that’s an insult.”

“It a truth-”

Leverette linked their fingers together and snorted. “You’re more than that. You’ve always been more than that. To...to me.” 

“This, my dears, is how, you hold a staff,” Leverette heard Zevran say, and he rolled his eyes in a gentle pass before returning his gaze to his books. Most of the mage children had gathered in the Warden’s library for their studies, and while Leverette looked over what to teach them next, Zevran tried to keep them occupied. There was, he knew from experience, nothing worse than a bored apprentice. “And this is how you hold a dagger.”

Levy snapped his book shut and even Zevran’s shoulders jumped at the noise. The grin on his face, however, held no trace of guilt. Neither did half of the children’s, and Levy had to wonder where they were leaning that trick from. He sighed. “Zev.”

Zevran lifted his hands, knife free, up in apology. “There are other skills to learn in this world. You teach them magic and I teach them, well...”

“Stabbing?”

“My, is that the only thing you can do with a knife?” Zevran asked, and Levy flushed in more than just embarrassment at the look the elf gave him. “What about skinning an animal? Scaring a man out of his wares? Whittling? Ah - how about-”

Leverette knew for a fact that Zevran had knowledge of all three. And then some. Which wouldn’t be spoken of that day. “How about learning how to ask a man nicely for his wares? We can count coins.” There was a chorus of groans that only made him put his hands on his hips until the children rose from their groupings around Zevran and dragged themselves to the tables scattered around the library. He sighed as Zevran rose to his feet. 

“I’m not trying to raise a bunch of thieves.”

Zevran hummed. “They may need to know it some day.”

“Hey, hey,” Leverette said, feeling Zevran stir besides him. He caught Zevran with a hand against his cheek before he could shift too far and frowned when the skin beneath his was still too hot. His fingertips when purple with the ice magic that laced between them, but he endured it as the sweat beading Zevran’s brow rolled off and the glaze across his eyes cleared. 

“What is this?” The blankets piled high across him made it difficult for Zevran to move in their cocoon, but he tried his hardest to escape their weight. It was a valiant, if wasted, effort, and Leverette straightened them out, tucking the corners down around Zevran, after the strength ran out of him. “Was this your plot all along? To string me up and poison me?”

Leverette snorted. “You caught me. I only pretended to fall deeply in love with you so I could get close enough to make you sick.” He returned his hand to the elf’s forehead and sighed when Zevran lifted his head up and into the cooling magic. 

“I knew it. I did warn myself that every kiss of yours was a danger. I shall exact suitable revenge, mark my words.”

“Is that so?” he asked, and he pressed a quick one to Zevran’s shoulder. “I think that’s the fever talking.”

“An assassin never lies and a gentleman never makes a promise he cannot keep.”