We've come a long way from where we began

[ombranera]

WHO: Zevran Arainai, Alistair, & Open
WHAT: Zevran is not dealing with sentiment well
WHEN: Mid-Firstfall
WHERE: The tavern, the stables, his quarters, the healing tents, the courtyard
NOTES: Drinking, swearing, emotional vomiting.

It took a day or two to thaw out properly from the mire. To sleep, to scrub the muck from his skin, to feel alive again. Of course with the break from the mission and a quiet space to sleep it only served to remind him of how difficult it had been on the road. Of the sounds he had heard of the wardens tents. Of what their troubled sleep meant for one Warden in particular.

[ Tavern - OPEN ]

Zevran attempted to spend his days as he would before the arrival of the Grey Wardens. Some time working on his poisons and traps, some time in the tavern listening to gossip and spinning tales, playing joyful, soothing music for the weary souls within. But for tonight there was no music, there was no smiling. Zevran kept his back to the wall, his hand on a glass of wine or ale, bottle waiting for the next poor on the table beside him, eyes on something small and glinting he rolled between his fingertips. Sentiment. What good had that ever done him? What benefit did it ever hold? It was a weakness. It was an illness. And yet here he sat, sick with it. Normally the approach of company would earn a smile, a flirtatious remark- but for one night? He had no desire for masks.

[ Stables - CLOSED to Alistair ]

"As promised." The words were loose in a way only drink made them. Lulling and swooping rather than the clipped roll of his usual pattern of speech, but Zevran was at least a little drunk and looking to become a good deal more drunk before the night was through. Trouble was he trusted very few people enough to indulge as much as he desired in all of Thedas, fewer still in Skyhold. But here, staring at this ridiculous Warden in the hay with at least one dog? A warm twist of fondness bid him offer a very special bottle of Carnal, 8:69 Blessed. As he had said before, Alistair could not start his whiskey without something particularly exquisite. Between that, the carved rune stones still in his pouch, and a wrapped wheel of small cheese in addition to a bottle of his own brandy for the night? He would forgive being forced to drink in a stable. So long as it was in Alistair's company.

[ Zevran's Quarters - OPEN ]

Well this was mortifying. He had somehow misplaced his key- his spare key, and his spare, spare key in the course of the night- or he had locked all of them inside save for the one he'd slipped into Isabella's boot earlier in the day and now? Now he was crouched, fumbling with his lockpicks in a way he hadn't since his earliest years as a Crow. The lock was simple, he knew it was simple- he also knew himself to be terribly, terribly drunk. Enough so that he was not kneeling before the door in any attempt of stealthy entry and instead sitting before it, working with his picks while swearing a blue streak under his breath in Antivan, Common, with a spattering of Orlesian and even some Tevene. Until he sobered up? He would be at it for awhile. Brasca.

[ Healing tents / Courtyard the following morning - OPEN ]

Another reason why he rarely drank. The migraine. The cotton in the mouth feeling. The twist of wire that strung his guts together. Food was probably not a bad idea bu the smell of- well- anything made it twist sharper, tighter, like a dagger to his very middle. Not productive for eating anything that will settle his stomach. Water helps but it does not do much other than remind him that he should eat, but he cannot eat, and light and sound are an aching mass of unpleasantness he did not wish to linger on. Bundled tight in a cloak that was far softer on the lining than on the exterior, he stumbled his way across the courtyard to the healing tents. Perhaps one of them would give him something if he looked sad enough.

Comments

[slipshot]

He wasn't in Skyhold for long - just a couple of days picking up supplies before heading back out to the mire - but he couldn't help himself from wandering the halls, fingertips brushing the stone as he passed. It was just to get a sense of the place again, to be able to understand the odd longing feeling he had coming back.

It wasn't meant to be a trip to find a swearing, drunk Zevran sitting on the floor of the hall, trying to break into someone's room.

"Please tell me that's your room," he said by way of greeting, a grin slipping to his lips.

[dalishious]

This was--unusual. Merrick had only seen Zevran quite controlled up until that point, and to see him fumbling around and cursing was definitely a first. His immediate reaction was to point and laugh, but something about the way Zevran was acting gave him pause.

He reached for his own lockpick set and moved to his teacher's side.

"Let me do it."

[ombranera]

Oh. Fantastic. An audience. For a moment he squared his shoulders and turned to peer over his shoulder, frustration smoothing into a razor sharp smile, all the arsenic sunk back deep under a layer of honey. Nevermind that it was Gavin- this was a shade of him no one need know.

"No, it is the Grand Cleric's bedchambers and I wish to enter." There's a sharpness to his voice he normally hid better. Ah, well.

[ombranera]

Aware. He should be more aware- over the patter of his own voice and the clink of the picks in the lock and the thundering frustration in his veins he did not hear Merrick's approach- as not prepared to reel it all in swiftly enough to paste on a smile. Fine, then. Let the boy see the blade beneath the fool. Zevran let his hands drop and his eyes narrow, voice flat and hard- openly suspicious.

"Why?" He was a teacher, someone that had a skill Merrick wished to learn. Wat favor was he attempting to earn with this?

[slipshot]

The sharpness got an eyebrow raise - he'd never seen Zevran so out of humour.

"Well, that's something I can get behind, at least," He said wryly - noticing the sarcasm but choosing to ignore it. He slipped his own lockpicks from his belt and waved them. "Shall I endeavour to aid you in this quest?"

[dalishious]

Merrick raised a brow.

"Because you clearly suck at it," he replied in his usual blunt fashion. He then nudged Zevran out of the way and started working on the lock.

[ombranera]

"As you like." He shifted to the side, slipping his own locks- somewhere on his person. At least this muscle memory had not left him due to drink. Gavin would open the door, he would slip in and sleep this- this weakness off and return to the mire in the morning.

[ombranera]

There was a coiled tension in Zevran's shoulders, one that did not let up for the offer of assistance- if anything it wound all the tighter at the sudden brush of contact. The only reason he did not lash out was- well.

His picks were expensive and stabbing him would bend the finely worked tips. That was all. Pragmatism. He moved to the side and slipped them back to where they were usually hidden on his person.

[dalishious]

After a minute or so of fiddling, the lock popped open. Merrick stood then grabbed Zevran by the arm to haul him to his feet.

"Come on. You need to sleep it off."

[byblow]

"Heeey," Alistair says.

It isn't a whine this time. Heeey, it's you. Heeey, that looks interesting. Heeey, he's going to stop his drowsy blinking--he hadn't been asleep, only drifting, maybe following the beckoning melody a little too deeply into his own head--and sit up in just a second. Two seconds. Three--

He snaps all at once into sitting, as if to wake himself up, and gives his head a quick, hard little shake to rattle the sleepiness out. The dog beside him sits up too, nose curiously following his hand to snuffle at the bottle when he takes it from Zevran for inspection. He doesn't turn down gifts.

"Got started without me," he observes. He does do that sometimes--observe things. He doesn't look up from the bottle while he scoots sideways on his pile of bales and loose hay to make space for Zevran to sit. "That's not fair. You're already smaller. I won't catch up."

[slipshot]

The smell of brandy wafted up to him as Gavin knelt down next to Zevran, sliding his lockpicks into place, his tongue slipping out from between his lips in concentration as he listened to the tumblers fall into place.

"Should have told me you were planning on drinking the entire bar," He murmured. Click, Tick-tick-tick-click. "I could have helped."

[ombranera]

He seems so young like this. Zevran always thought of the boy as that, the boy. The lost bastard of Ferelden, the last of the Grey Wardens- young and endlessly cheerful and determined even when miles below the surface, hip deep in darkspawn blood.

'Oooh, Zev, look at that. I think that mushroom just blinked at me.'

Finding the silver lining even when there was nothing but coal in the ground. A decade. And for a moment he thinks, perhaps, he should have taken the unspoken offer. Remained with him, with the Wardens. Taught them. Trained them. Never join them, oh no. What is in that cup would never pass his lips- he enjoyed life far too much. And that, perhaps, is where the root of his frustrations lie. That this boy that is no longer a boy is a large part of why he began to choose life in the first place.

And here he lay, sleepy and young and almost like they were on the road- save for the song. Lips twisted in a fond grimance, Zevran settles next to Alistair without complaint- which is unusual, and uncorks his own bottle of brandy- which is equally unusual.

"Then you are going to have to work at it." And perhaps he is just drunk enough to bump elbows with this man that he's come to trust, to care for- and is beginning to lose. "You can manage, I am certain."

[ombranera]

"Don't." He listed away from Merrick's hands, he could stand on his own. He had stood on his own for as long as he lived. "You have helped open the door. Congratulations. You may go."

Nevermind that he was peering at something that floated in the middle distance, hand wavering as he traced the wire that connected it to a spring within the room. Perhaps he should duck instead.

[ombranera]

"If I wanted company I would have said as much." And he had- but not the company of just anyone in Skyhold. There was a level of trust involved in being...like this...that very few people held for Zevran. And the one that did caused the drinking in the first place. "But, perhaps, next time."

[slipshot]

"I'm not going to butt in where I'm not wanted, Zevran," Gavin replied, but there was no hurt in it. His voice was gentle as he got the final tumblr into place and stood to open the door - getting it open a few inches before he was forced to wait for Zevran to move in order to open it further.

"And that includes the present, by the way. If you'd rather I left you alone, you need only say so."

[ombranera]

"..." Well when Gavin replied like that, he felt like an ass. He often felt like an ass and cared little for things that made him feel poorly when he wasn't as shining and happy. But if Gavin would not begrudge him his poor humor- He did not think too hard on it. He pulled the door open and ducked down- one hand hooking in the front of Gavin's shirt to be certain he wouldn't set off the trap at eye level either. "Stay low until you are through."

[slipshot]

He was not quite expecting the sudden catch at his clothing - especially since Zevran hadn't answered him (which he wasn't sure was permission to stay or a silent request to go) - but he managed somehow not to just stick a limb or his face into the danger zone.

He ducked down as Zevran bade him, crouching as he shuffled inside, working on the assumption that Zevrran would not warn him about traps if he wasn't meant to get inside in the first place.

"Old habits die hard?" he wondered aloud, half a tease. "Just how close was I to death, there?"

[ombranera]

"As far from it as I am home." He pulled the door closed behind them, pulling the pin from the spring to shut off the trap. "Itching powder- and a dye. I suppose I am getting soft as I grow older."

Inconvenient traps rather than lethal. He sighed and settled down on the small padded mattress he'd managed to scrounge together, quit and blanket and pillow smelling of dried grass and dogs. Alistair had slept here recently. Zevran squashed a grimace and lit the brazier in the far corner for warmth, a lantern for light, and settled back on the mattress to attend to his boots.

The room was sparsely furnished- a table covered in vials and powders and springs and wires, where he worked. Clothing folded neatly off to one side, a few bottles of wine and brandy on the windowsill. Trinkets, gifts laid out near a multitude of daggers and scraps of leather used for the repair of his armor. It was all terribly homey in it's own way.

Zev's Room~ I mean, he gave her a key and all.

[easternseaqueen]

"Zevran Arainai. Feeling a bit out of sorts? Or just looking for this?" purred a familiar Rivaini voice. The key dangled jauntily from her finger.

"And here I thought it was a gift. Sort of a permanent invitation, if you will. I do hope I'm not mistaken."

That he did

[ombranera]

"...It is a gift. I simply have locked the rest inside." Or lost them in the hay with Alistair. Ears drooping he sat back on his heels, peering up at Isabella. Honestly- it was not a bad view at all.

And she's gonna use it!

[easternseaqueen]

"Poor thing. Good thing I came along to fix it, hmm?"

Reaching over his head, she fitted the key into the lock and it opened with a soft clank.
"There now, all better. Now you won't have to sit out in the cold."

Bless

[ombranera]

"I am fortunate indeed." Listing to one side to lean against her legs was terribly tempting, and terribly easy. He did so without thought, nuzzling into the skin there, letting himself drift warm and oddly empty, aching in ways he didn't think he could.

"I am not so certain about the cold. It would be so much warmer with some company..." He was far too deep into his cups to rise to the occasion, but his hands were skilled enough, as was his mouth, and he had missed Isabella terribly.

[dalishious]

A trap. That was so typically Zevran that Merrick didn't pay it much mind as he rolled his eyes and ducked under the wire. He felt confident that Zevran wasn't drunk enough to accidentally walk into the trap, and set about disarming it.

"You could have said something," he grumbled.

The Healing Tents

[eolasemah]

As Zevran stumbled toward the tents, a girl, seated at a small table, lifted her head to watch him approach with wide-eyed concern. She was clearly Dalish, and had donned a cloak herself while she worked on portioning out the right herbs for poultices, which was what she'd been doing before she was distracted.
She stood to take a few timid steps toward him, her smile pleasant but shy. "Andaran atish'an," she said, "what is it that ails you?"

[ombranera]

"Defeats the purpose to warn someone about a trap." He muttered, ducking under the wire and walking a few more steps into the room but-

Something caught on his shoulder- a wire? A hook? What-

A low hiss and a puff of powder descends upon them both, bright blue and gradually working from a light tingle to a vexing itch.

"...secondary trap. I forgot I set that one." Brasca.