Work Text:
“Alistair.” Leliana put out a hand to stop him from entering the dining hall. “More Wardens have just arrived. They're down in the courtyard. I need you to go and greet them.”
“Now? Can't it wait 'til after breakfast?”
She gave him that look of hers. “Now.”
“Alright. Maker. You were a lot more fun during the blight.”
The spymaster crossed her arms and waited for him to go.
It's too bloody cold to be out this early in the morning, he grumbles to himself, rubbing his arms as he steps down the stone walkway. And there are so many stairs. Someone should build a fort without stairs. For once.
He nods to several of the other Wardens, already up and working. Where do they find the energy? He stifles a yawn, making his way down even more stairs to where the healers' tents had been set up before the clinic opened.
Then he hears it.
Her laugh.
A jolt of electricity shoots through his heart as he tries to talk himself down. It's not her. How many times has he heard her voice, seen her smile, mistook some other dwarf for his Warden. It's not her, Alistair. He breaths through his nose, scanning the crowd of blue and white and silver, a dozen Wardens with their mounts.
A female dwarf with hair too dark to be her steps from behind one of the horses. His heart flips in his chest, but the tattoos covering most of her face put a stop to that.
“Sigrun!” He calls warmly, waving from the base of the stairs. “I didn't know you were coming.”
She has a mischievous smile on her face, practically beaming as she reaches back between two of the horses and pulls.
And Meila Brosca stumbles into view.
Alistair gasps, running before his brain can catch up with the sight of her. Oh, Maker. She's tired and cranky and rubbing her arm and glaring at Sigrun and she's there. In front of him. Alive.
He drops to his knees when he reaches her and grabs her fiercely in an embrace. Her hair is a wind-blown tangle, her jaw is rough with unkempt stubble, and her hard leathers smell like horse and a long night's ride. He doesn't care.
Her arms wrap around him. Her face buries in his neck.
“I love you,” is all he can say, whispering it again and again. “I love you. I love you.” He kisses her ears, her jaw, her cheeks, her brow.
Her hair is longer than it was the last time he saw her. He puts his hands on either side of her face, nearly as large as her entire head. She's so small. He kisses the brand beneath her eye. He's missed every single detail of her.
She's smiling, eyes glittering with tears. “Alistair.”
The sound of his name on her lips nearly breaks him.
“I love you.” He says it again, louder now.
“You keep saying that.” She rests her forehead on his. “It's like you missed me or something.”
“Don’t you dare.” He’s grinning as he raises a knee, gathering his arms around her waist and hoisting her into the air as he stands.
Meila braces herself on his shoulders, smiling down into his face as he lifts her.
And then she kisses him - Maker’s breath but it feels like coming home - even though the kiss is mostly teeth as she smiles against his lips.
The Wardens around them start whooping and cheering as he deepens the kiss, one arm around her back, his fingers against the nape of her neck, drawing her nearer to him. She can’t stop laughing, her rippling laughter vibrating between their chests, sounding like quiet moaning in his mouth. That laughter carried him through the blight, kept him sane when the Calling got weird, and the promise of it made him strong enough to be away from her, to let her go.
And now she’s back.
As the group of their fellow Wardens clap and whistle and shout their filthy comments, Alistair pulls back and says, voice low, “Tell me you’re staying.” It sounds like begging and he doesn’t care.
“I’m staying.” She nibbles at his earlobe and he draws a sharp breath. “Now let’s get out of here.”
---
It took all the concentration he had for Alistair to keep from running to his small room in the barracks in a full-on sprint. He nearly tripped over his own feet three separate times, watching his love’s face instead of where he was going. But eventually, they made it.
Meila stepped inside and Alistair slammed the door shut with both hands, pinning her between it and himself, leaning over her.
She bit her lip. “How long has it been?”
“Seven months, sixteen days and… something like four hours since you left me.”
Her smile had grown wide as he spoke. “I knew you’d be counting.”
“And you weren’t?” He kissed her forehead, ignoring the strain in his back as he moved down to her cheekbone, her jaw, her throat. She lifted to her toes, arms around his neck.
As he drew his tongue over the ridge of her collarbone she gasped, “Alistair!” Fingers curling in his hair.
That sound did things to Alistair that had not been done in exactly seven months and sixteen days, and he groaned, taking her by the shoulders and turning, shoving her back towards the bed.
She giggled. “I missed you.”
“Finally you admit it.” He watched her crawl backwards across the bed as he nearly ripped off the armor he had just put on an hour ago. “I was starting to worry you hadn’t thought of me at all.”
She pulled at the buckles on her own armor, giving him a look. “Yes. That’s why I wrote to you nearly every single day. Because I wasn’t thinking of you.”
Stripped to the softer blue linen under layer of his armor, Alistair joined her on the bed, lying beside her with his hands over her head, kissing her. Gloriously kissing her, her upper lip sharp with stubble, her lower lip soft and pliant and warm. He felt her hands – rogue hands, quick and precise – making short work of his belt and his body went weak, nearly crushing her beneath him. “Maker,” he sighed. “Don’t you ever leave me for that long again.”
Her teeth grazed his Adam’s apple and he groaned again. “I’m never leaving you, Alistair.” The belt was free and now the buckles were being worked open, rising higher and higher, exposing his thin undershirt. Her lips moved to the hollow of his throat, to his sternum.
His eyes rolled closed at her touch and he quickly opened them again. He didn’t want to stop looking at her. Didn’t want to lose sight of her for even another second.
“Never?” He asked, breathless.
“Never.”
She knew every place he liked being kissed. He knew her touch like his own skin. Even after all this time apart, they worked each other masterfully, never forgetting the steps. As he pulled her leathers off much less gracefully than she had removed his armor – warrior hands, all strength and no finesse – he remembered their first night together. How shy they had been, and how worried, but for different reasons.
---
He’d been speechless, taking in the sight of her body, compact and made of nothing but curves. She’d drawn her arms across her chest, hiding. “Are you sure it doesn’t bother you?” She’d asked.
“Bother me?” He couldn’t stop staring.
“Human women are… different.” She tucked her knees up, hiding more.
“Yeah. They are.” He wasn’t really listening. He wanted to run his tongue along the shape of her, trace her outline with his fingertips. “Maker.”
She’d winced at his words, hand reaching for her shirt. “I… maybe this was a bad idea.”
“Wait, what?” He blinked. Shit. “Am I that terrible at this? I…” Had he ruined it already? “I’m sorry. Tell me how to do this. I don’t…” He rubbed at his jaw, trying not to stare at the shape of her calves, the fullness of her thighs behind them. “I can barely think around you when you’re covered head to toe in blood and guts, let alone… Maker’s breath. Can I touch you?”
One of his hands moved to her arm of its own volition and her skin was so soft. How does she have soft skin in the middle of running around killing darkspawn? He slid his thumb up to her shoulder, muscles tense there. He rubbed at them a little, feeling her knees press against his chest. She’s so warm.
Wait… He pulled his hand back. “I never actually let you answer, did I?”
Her eyes were on him, large and dark in the low light of their tent. “It doesn’t bother you?”
Had she asked that before? “Does what bother me?”
Her eyes dropped down to her knees. “Since being on the surface… I’ve gotten the impression that human men find dwarven women… unattractive.” She bit her lip. “I mean, we’ve talked about this. You said…” Her eyes crinkled at the edges, nearly a smile. “You said a lot of things. But I wasn't sure if that might change after...” She shrugged, indicating her distinct lack of clothing.
Oh. Alistair settled nearer to her, unsure how to hold someone who’d made themselves into a ball. “I said you were beautiful, and amazing, and resourceful, and one of the scariest badasses I’ve ever seen. All of those things? Still true.” He put a tentative arm around her back. So soft… Focus, Alistair. “I’m really bloody terrible at this whole… thing. I just want you so badly. I’m all hands, and probably doing this wrong. Please. Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”
After a little more reassurance, she had unfurled like a flower, arms and legs opening, guiding him to hover over her. He kept whispering his clumsy endearments and each one made her smile, made her pull him closer, kiss him deeper.
When she wrapped her small deft hand around his length, he groaned loud and his arms shook where they held him up.
“Better not touch you too much.” She grinned up at him. “Or you’ll be done before I’ve even started.”
“I’m sorry,” he panted. “I just-“ His voice broke off in a moan as she stroked him slowly, just once, up and back down. “Oh Maker.”
She bit her lip. “You certainly are… um. Well-endowed.”
“Really?” He laughed. “I grew up with a dozen other boys. I have fairly sufficient evidence that I am average at best.”
“Hmm. Must be a human thing.”
“Is it… a problem? I don’t-“ She ran a thumb along his slit, spreading the bead of moisture she found there. He collapsed onto just one elbow, burying his face in her neck. “What are you doing to me, woman?”
She nibbled at his jaw. “Don’t like it? I can stop.”
He silenced her with a searing kiss.
---
Now, a decade later, seven months since the last time, he still muttered his praise into her skin, still trembled when she skimmed her hands along his back, his sides, braver fingers teasing at his hips, surer lips drawing down her neck.
Alistair flipped them, laying back against the pillows with her straddling his stomach.
“Going to make me do all the work?” She arched a brow. “You realize I've been on the road for two weeks. Just to come here. Just for you.”
He laughed, hands spanning her hips and pushing her back, trying to get her body where he's wanted it for months.
For as small as she is, you'd think a seasoned warrior like myself should be able to manage her, but-
Oh. The soft curve of her ass against his cock. He breathed her name.
She's always been the one who managed me.
---
In that tent in Fereldan, the first time, with the draft coming in through the fabric and the hard ground beneath his knees, she'd instructed him every step of the way.
“Like this?” He asked, holding himself above her, still paranoid he might crush her.
She had tied a thin leather strap from her hair around the base of his shaft. “It'll help,” she had said. “Trust me.”
Alistair wondered if he should find her experience intimidating, but honestly... “I'm so glad you know what you're doing.”
Meila pressed a hot kiss to his chest. “Hey, this is new for me, too. I've never been with anyone so...”
“Handsome?” He grinned.
She rolled her eyes. “Tall.”
This again. Alistair was nervous enough without her constantly pointing out their differences. He already felt like a big, stupid oaf pawing at her, rough and unpracticed where her movements were quick and fluid and-
She'd taken him in hand again, sliding the tip of him up the hot length of her, languidly using him to stroke herself. Her breathing was heavy and sweet and her eyes were closed. If he'd thought she was beautiful before...
“Wow,” he whispered, bending down to kiss her, shoulders protesting at the contortions it took to bring his mouth to hers but it was worth it. “You're incredible. You know that, right?”
Meila giggled and used him to stroke herself again. “You're incredible, too.”
“Really?” He hated the neediness in his voice, and swallowed to keep it down. “I mean...”
She threw her arms around him and lifted her body against his. He could feel the soft give of her breasts at his chest, and the angle of her hips against his made him moan.
“I love you, Alistair.”
He knew there was a goofy smile on his face. She'd said it before, but she didn't say it often. Every time was like nothing he'd ever felt before.
Her hand slipped around his length again and he groaned. That, also, was like nothing he'd never felt before.
“Are you ready?” She asked.
“Aren't I supposed to be asking you that?”
“Alistair...”
“Yes.” He kissed the top of her head, the closest part of her to his mouth. “Yes I'm ready.”
Everything she did to him, every single move she made right now felt so amazing, he wasn't sure what was going on until her calm voice directed him again. “Okay, now... just thrust your hips a little.”
He rolled his hips experimentally and she groaned beneath him. That sound – knowing he was what caused that sound – was almost better than how she felt around him. Almost.
But then he gave another thrust, deeper and a touch wild, and she hissed, hands pushing back on his hips. “Stop!”
“What? What's wrong?”
He knew he'd slipped out of her because he was suddenly very cold where he had previously been deliciously warm.
“You...” She winced. “I don't know. I think you're too big.”
He swallowed. Shit. “Oh.”
“You're just so... long.”
Alistair leaned back, sitting on his knees, her legs still propped against his hips.
“And here I always thought that was a good thing.”
“Alistair...” Pity in her voice. He hated that.
“I'm sorry.” He rubbed a hand through his hair, ruffling it, trying not to look at her. “I'm sorry I-” I do everything wrong. I'm an idiot no one's ever wanted, and finally someone does, and all I do is make a mess of everything.
He glanced at her from beneath his elbow, peeking really, afraid to see what expression she'd be giving him, but...
The look on her face was steady, determined, and heated – the look she got in battle when her focus had narrowed to just one thing. Meila rose to her knees, hands on his chest, tipping him back. Fire in her eyes as she crawled up his body, moving his limbs where she wanted them.
“I have spent every night for the past... weeks? Months?” She bit her lip, lowering herself to put her mouth by his ear, the warmth and softness of her chest brushing his cheeks. “Ever since you gave me that rose and blushed and made me want to kiss you. Ever since, I have gone to bed every night wondering what it would be like to be with you, Alistair.”
Emotion throbbed in his chest and in his stomach and lower and “Maker...”
“I don't want to stop now.” She licked the pink shell of his ear. “Do you?”
---
“Mmm...” She rocked her body gently back, eliciting a breathless cry from him. “Did you want something?”
“How can you tease me after all this time?”
“Don't you want to savor it?” On that word – savor – she rocked her backside against him again.
“No. I don't.” He pushed on her hips again and she laughed, the dark laugh that kept him up at night, hands slipping beneath the sheets. “I missed you too much for that.”
And in a blink, she turned from sexy goddess to blushing, giggling girl in love. “I missed you, too.”
“Then-” He cleared his throat. “Then fuck me, Meila. Fuck me like you missed me.”
Her eyebrows lifted and she grinned more. “My, aren't you desperate?”
Alistair sat up quickly, wrapping his arms around her body and pulling their chests together as he sank his mouth into hers, one hand going to the back of her head to hold her close, drink her in. When he pulled back, making sure to stop mid-kiss so he could see her face – oh that face she made when she wanted more – lips glossy and open, eyes fluttering, chest rising with heaving breaths.
“Yes,” he pressed his forehead against hers, shaking his head. “I am.”
Desperate to hold you close and safe and mine . Desperate to be with you, to always be with you. Desperate to be loved again, loved by you , by the only one I've ever loved. Desperate to feel the way you make me feel – like I can do anything, be anything as long as you're there to pull it out of me, to find every good thing in me and give it life.
“Meila,” he said instead, lifting her hips and settling her on his lap, adjusting himself so when he lifted his hips against hers, his shaft slid against her lips and the tip of him connected with the sensitive tip of her, her hips rocking heavy against him. She went without protest this time, sighing, voice moaning high and sweet as he gathered her up in his hands, drew his thumbs across her nipples the way he knew would make her – she writhed against him, his name a gasp – and he grinned.
He scooted back on the bed, holding her against his body as he did so. She giggled, clinging to him. Oh, he loved it when she clung to him like that, wrapping herself around him and relying on his strength to hold her.
With his back to the wall, Alistair guided her body in earnest, using his hands to move her against him. She kissed his shoulders, his throat, biting lightly, her hands going to his hair to hold his face against her neck as they moved together. He kept quiet, listening to the sounds she made, the heady gasps, the yes, the inarticulate groans, and his favorite – the quiet whispered “by the Stone, Alistair,” just before she came, the only time she ever swore like that – and suddenly she was throwing her head back from his, arching her back and letting out a soundless scream, all breath and creaking in her throat, rutting hard against his body and he followed, one low moan as he gripped her body tight.
Then they were dissolving, panting, laughing against each other's skin, hot kisses turning sweet and tender.
“You've made a mess,” Meila said, peeling their bodies apart.
Alistair grinned. “Always with the complaints.”
She made a face, reaching for one of his discarded shirts and wiping the sticky mess from her stomach, then tossing it at his face.
“Gross,” he said.
“It's your mess.”
He cleaned himself off quickly then threw the shirt away, pulling her body back to his, stretching his limbs out against hers, tucking her beside him.
“I love you,” he said.
“I know.”
“Say it back.”
“Hmm...” She tapped her chin thoughtfully. “I don't know...”
He nipped her shoulder. “You are horrible.”
“And yet you're the one who loves me.”
Alistair let himself gaze at her a moment, then said again, “Say it back.”
Meila beamed.
“I love you, Alistair.”
---
Alistair didn't cry when he held her in his arms for the first time in almost a year. He didn't cry when he kissed her, or when he took her back to his bed.
But when he woke up and stretched, jaw popping on a huge yawn, and his hand connected with soft, bed-mussed hair, and he turned to find her there. Sleeping. Lips parted. Wincing awake. One green eye opening and her gravelly morning voice saying, “Watch it. It's too early for that.”
Alistair wept.