peopleofthedas | Menage 18: Ornaments of Gold

Title: Ornaments of Gold (Ménage 18)

Words: 1879

Rating: G

Characters: (Alistair)/Philoméne/Zevran featuring Sigrun and Mischa

Summary: Morning after talk, then a short side trip to Amaranthine for buying, selling, and awkward confrontations.

He hadn’t fled, but when he opened his eyes to her, she could see that part of him was surprised to still be there, waking up to feel her draped over his chest. However much time she had devoted to proving that she wasn’t interested in using him and throwing him away, it still had to be learned again in the new context. “Good morning,” she said, laying her head on his shoulder.

A small, peaceful smile crept onto his face, and he curled his arm around her waist. “Mmm. Good morning, my Warden.”

“Tua cocca.”

“Indeed.” His eyes softened. “A man of my history does not assume that words spoken at night are true in the morning, but I am pleased to find that it is so.” He pressed his forehead to hers and brought a hand up into her hair. “But before this promise goes out into the daylight, I must ask something.” His thumb brushed across her cheek. “If, at some point, Alistair and I were also intimate. Would that disturb you?”

She blinked. “Why would it disturb me?”

As usual, she made him chuckle. “Many women are not so generous.”

“It’s not as if the two of you would go off somewhere and leave me out when I wanted you, is it? It wouldn’t be about not wanting me, and leaving me behind.”

“No.” He kissed her head gently. “Never that, on my word. I am sure Alistair would say the same.”

“Then it’s only sensible that any combination of the three of us be allowed to express how we all feel about each other.”

With a soft, incredulous laugh, he stroked her hair. “As always, you are a wonder. …Any combination, hmm? Has Alistair spoken to you in that regard?”

“I know that he wants both of us, and that that includes wanting us both at the same time, and seeing us together. I have no objections.”

“Ah, good.” He nodded firmly, rolling toward her so that he could put both arms around her. “Best for all of us that these things are clear, I think. I am glad we will all be in agreement.” His smile widened and became more playful, his eyes glinting. “Then we will have to prepare a very warm homecoming for Alistair, will we not?”

“We will! But first, we’ll all have to finish our errands.” After a quick kiss, she hopped out of his arms and the bed. “Let’s try to settle this alleged issue with the Dalish quickly, and then we’ll be free to… plan.”

Not deterred in the least, Zevran surged out of bed and caught her around the waist from behind. “Ah, but first,” he purred into her ear, “we must take Nathaniel’s precious supplies to the city, hmm? A little wine, a little dancing… there would be no harm in that.” He swayed her back and forth slightly in illustration. “A little more practice between ourselves?”

With a laugh, she covered his hand with hers and leaned back into him. “So, you’re just as much a flirt when you’re serious?”

“Oh, yes.” His eyes were alight. “Even worse when I am serious.” He gave her a long, smouldering kiss and stroked her hips before releasing her and going to pick up his clothes from the floor.

After a quick breakfast, they gathered up Sigrun and set off for Amaranthine. She was increasingly chatty and curious about surface things, and once Zevran discovered her fondness for daggers, there was plenty of conversation on the road. Philoméne nearly forgot she had any reason not to enjoy a trip into town; but their reception at the gate reminded her. The guards, though just respectful enough for protocol, were unmistakably brusque, and their captain stood and watched Philoméne and her companions pass by with an icy glare.

Sigrun seemed to cringe instinctively, and Philoméne thought about the duster’s mark on the dwarf’s cheek. “They’re not looking that way at you, Sigrun,” she said. “It’s me.”

“Why you? I mean, I know about the whole human-elf thing, I’ve heard of that. I didn’t know it was that serious.”

“Well, I’m the first elven Arlessa, and that’s not going over well with everyone. And the guards in particular… well. I misinterpreted a request to get supplies back into Amaranthine as quickly as possible, and… I might have re-opened a smuggling route.”

Zevran chuckled and swooped in to plant a light kiss on the side of her forehead. “Ah, my dear Warden. Your talent for finding trouble is impeccable.”

On the other hand, the merchant quarter was perfectly welcoming, not least because they were arriving with a shipment of goods already paid for and legal to sell. Philoméne decided that they might as well browse, and started wandering from shop to shop. Because of this, she soon thought the merchants cared less about the smuggling question anyway: the man who purported to be the grocer, for example, had a peculiar number and variety of staves tucked away in the back of his shop. It was also disturbingly easy to buy poisons.

“Old Crow recipes, several of these,” Zevran confirmed over her shoulder as she was studying a bottle. “They have more presence here than further south in Ferelden.” He touched her hip lightly and sighed into her hair. “To be honest, I am not sure I like this whole business of you being an Arlessa here. A place this dangerous should at least be more stylish.”

“I’m not sure I like it either. And I think they would have been just as happy with – yes. A human steward. That could work. Though it would still leave me being Warden Commander.”

“If you wish to be free of it, you will find a way. I have every confidence in you. And then you and Alistair and myself will go to someplace warm and pretty for once, hmm?” He paused, looking elsewhere, and gestured with his chin. “Sigrun is fighting her instincts to steal that bit of crystal. Perhaps we should distract her.”

“You think she’s a thief?”

“I know that she was a thief. I know her background, and I know that look.”

Philoméne moved casually around to the table where Sigrun was gazing at the wares with, it was true, an undeniable intensity. “Is there something you like?” she asked lightly, surveying the goods.

Sigrun laughed nervously. “Oh, lots of things. Shiny things. But I shouldn’t.”

“I could buy you something. It’s no trouble at all.”

“Oh, bless your heart, but no. It’s not so much…” she trailed off for a moment, then gently took hold of Philoméne’s arm and led her off a few paces from the table. “It’s not so much that I want the things,” she went on in a softer voice. “I don’t know where I’d put them if they were for me. There’s certain things I used to do for money when I was a duster, you know? I’m not proud of it, but it’s in there. Old habits. Anyway, I should probably head off toward something that wouldn’t be so easy to pick up.”

Fortune seemed to be against her in that: as she turned, she bumped her shoulder against another dwarven woman, of all things. The passerby had a severe bun, and when she turned, a severe face, and after a second, a look of bitter recognition washed over her features, and she said with a voice full of acid, “It’s. You.”

Sigrun cringed. “Mischa!” she sang with absurdly false cheer. “You live on the surface now?”

Mischa’s glare turned nearly murderous. “I have to. He thought I was the one stealing from the shop.”

She was trying to speak in a low tone, but the strain was making it carry a bit more than Philoméne liked. Before she had a chance to decide what to do, Zevran stepped smoothly between the dwarves, easing Mischa back two paces without seeming to be pushing her.

“Pardon me, bellissima,” he smiled as he made a little bow, his Antivan accent noticeably thicker than usual. “I am a stranger here, and it is such a relief to find a gem such as yourself in all this human rabble, hmm? You will know what is worth knowing about this city, surely.”

Philoméne smiled faintly before using the distraction to back Sigrun away in the opposite direction. “We should go,” she whispered.

Sigrun was stricken, and not quite meeting her eyes. “I can’t just go. It’s true. It’s my fault. I owe her…something….” Her gaze wandered down to her hands; she was fidgeting with the ring on her right index finger. The one she’d taken from her dying comrade in Kal Hirol.

Philoméne recognized it and shook her head. “You don’t owe her that. Here.” She grabbed out a coinpurse and pressed it into Sigrun’s hand, glancing over to confirm that Zevran still had the other dwarf distracted with his flirtations. “Give her some money to help her rebuild, if you like. That would be just as good a gesture, and more helpful really.”

An uncertain look; an authoritative nod in response. Sigrun sighed but smiled just a fraction, then set her shoulders against a difficult task and walked back toward Mischa. Zevran kissed the confused woman’s hand and took his leave of her, returning to Philoméne quietly. At once he escorted her back to the table and made a show of admiring a necklace of glass beads, wondering how it would look on her neck.

She smiled and leaned into him slightly. “Very nicely done,” she murmured, “but I think it will be all right now.”

“It appears so,” he answered into her ear; he was turned sideways so that he could easily look at either the shopkeeper or the dwarves. “She is paying the woman off, then? She seems content with that.” He lifted the necklace and traced it flirtatiously across the top of her chest. “The colors suit you, cocca. I would like to see you wear it.”

“Should I buy it, then?”

He chuckled. “If you buy it, then it does not make much of a gift! Allow me.” He swept her hands up to his mouth and kissed them, with a sultry glance upward and more languor than he’d given the gesture with Mischa, and then turned to confirm his interest to the merchant with an attention-capturing flourish.

Meanwhile, Sigrun came back toward them, looking astonished. Mischa was walking away down the street.

“Thank you,” Sigrun said. “I…that was good. That was a good thing to do. She said it was worthy of…respect.” She said the last word as if she had never had to pronounce it before.

“It was,” Philoméne smiled. “You are.”

Sigrun stood and blinked, and said nothing.

Zevran turned back toward Philoméne with his prize in hand, and with a bewitching grin he fastened it around her throat. She passed her fingertips over the beads, enjoying the texture of them. With a contented sigh he lowered his forehead to touch hers, still grinning.

“Yes,” he murmured. “That pleases me very much.”

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Menage 18: Ornaments of Gold

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