Zevran laughed, taking the roasting hare off the spit. He cleanly broke it in two and sat on the log by Wynne, who took her half with an appreciative nod.
“You’re saying I of all people, have never been in love?”
“No,” she scoffed, licking one of her fingers, somehow gracefully. “I’m saying you’ve never known true love, Zevran.”
“I find that hard to believe,” he said smoothly, licking his lips as he shamelessly eyed the old woman’s surprisingly supple body, lithe and sleek under fitted red robes. “I have known many, many types of love.”
She chuckled warmly.
“Just because you have shared many beds, Zevran, does not mean you know what it’s like to be with a woman who truly loves you, to share her kiss.”
“Ah,” the elf said dismissively, taking a rather large bite of the hare. “All women kiss alike. True, there are levels of quality and,” he paused to swallow and laugh; “sincerity, but when you’ve got her where you want her…”
He shrugged and paused for a moment.
“Of course,” he picked up again, “all men kiss the same, too, though I’ve yet to meet the man who can kiss like a woman or vice versa. But that is beside the point.”
Wynne looked at him smugly but said nothing, as the two finished their meals in relative silence. When he had finished eating, Zevran laid the bones on the grass beside him. He unsheathed a dagger and threw it into the air, where it sailed a perfect arc and landed back in his hand, and he began to clean under his fingernails with the point.
“I was in love once,” he mused.
“Oh, yes?” Wynne said with a look of mischievous anticipation.
“Of course, she robbed me blind the next morning, and I had to kill her.”
“Zevran,” said Wynne, cocking her head and speaking as though to a very young child. “You really shouldn’t need me to tell you that that is not true love.”
“Oh, don’t be so cynical. I felt very bad about killing her, really. I must have mourned and pined for, oh… an hour? Besides, what do you know, oh, you of the magical bosom?”
“I know quite a lot, Zevran. You don’t get to be a grey-haired mage in Ferelden without seeing some things.”
She stared at the ground with a gravity that broke Zevran’s heart a little bit. Hers was a solemnity which spoke volumes of almost-happinesses and bitter disappointments, and one which even threatened the jollity of their faux-spiteful banter.
“Of this I’ve no doubt. Would you care to… show me some?” Zevran joked, trying to break the pall which smothered the mood. He attempted to appear casual, turning his attention back to his fingernails.
“Zevran,” she said, pleadingly, training her eyes on his downcast face. “Look at me.”
He looked up at her, noting half a teardrop thinking about trickling down her face.
Gently, she leaned into his slim body. She felt his fingers glide over her back just before she kissed him. She kissed him with fierce softness, and for that moment, nothing else mattered to either, not her sense of propriety or his pride of conquest, not the hurts of her past or the temptations of his present. She kissed him with love and admiration and annoyance and he reciprocated with every repressed fiber of tenderness in him. She tasted of stone and sorrow and he of wood and, naturally, leather.
As they pulled apart from each other, Wynne laid a soft, wrinkled hand on Zevran’s tattooed cheek.
“Tell me,” she whispered. “Have you ever been kissed like that before?”
Zevran stared into her eyes, looking slightly stunned.
“No, I- uh. I must say that’s a new one, by me.” He cleared his throat.
Wynne smiled and tucked a flyaway strand of blonde hair behind his pointed ear as she rose and started to walk away.
Zevran thought to go back to his fingernails. He looked around for his knife. It was still in his hand, embedded deep in the solid log they had been sitting on. He gave it a tug. Wynne turned around and smirked at the sound of his effort as he gave it another yank, though it stayed firmly put. He noticed her gaze and shifted his legs slightly, covering up a slightly more risqué effect of their kiss.
“Tsk, tsk,” Wynne chided. “What a waste of such a lovely knife to sheath it so.”
She turned and walked back to her tent, not having to turn back to see the elf watch her agape, in awe of the double entendre worthy of Zev himself.