Final Chapter: A New Life

Neither of them could believe it at first, when suddenly everything was over. The Blight was ended, the Archdemon was slain. Cat returned from the final battle with a huge triumphant smile on her face, pulling Zevran into a long passionate kiss. "Now let us get out of here," she whispered against his lips, her voice full of promise.

"Wait a moment," they heard Wynne say. "You need healing." Zevran watched the soft blue waves of magic wash over her bruised limbs, then he heard the mage gasp in surprise.

"What is it, Wynne?" Cat asked.

"The taint... but that's impossible..." Wynne muttered. "I could always feel it, when I was healing you, but now it's... gone."

Cat looked at the mage, her eyes huge with delighted surprise. "You mean, now the Archdemon is gone, I'm no longer a Warden? I'm free?" The old mage nodded, too amazed to speak.

Zevran didn't need to hear more. He took her hand and off they went, without even the briefest of backward glances. When night fell they had already left Denerim far behind them. No need to stay for the celebrations. Let Alistair claim the glory of saving Ferelden. They were free, they could go as they pleased. Zevran had never seen Cat so happy, so carefree, so untroubled. And by some miracle the healing that had liberated her of the taint seemed to have lifted the shadows of the past from him as well.

They spent the night at a small roadside inn, talking, making plans, nestling against each other on the bed. Her eyes were full of hope and joy as she spoke of what they could do together, where they would go. And when dawn was approaching he took her into his arms and they made love, softly and sweetly, and it was better than ever before, even though they dispensed with all games and tricks. When she cried with pleasure in his arms, he buried his face in her hair and kissed her over and over. "I love you so much, my Catalina, I love you, love you, love you."

It was at this point that the dream would shatter into pieces, every night. He'd wake up and he'd kick out the nameless stranger who had shared his bed, and as soon as he was alone, the memories of that final battle and its aftermath would come flooding back, leaving him stranded in the black depths of desperation again.

Once more he would see Alistair walk toward him, his face a mask of guilt and pain, carrying her shattered, broken body, placing her gently into his arms. And once more he'd kiss those cold lifeless lips, again and again, whispering the words he'd never managed to say aloud while she was alive. When they'd finally made him let go of her, he had taken out his dagger, cut off a single strand of her hair, and disappeared into the night. Oh, they had looked for him for a while, but he was Zevran Arainai, the undisputed master of stealth and secrecy, and if he didn't want to be found, he wouldn't be found. They'd given Cat a hero's funeral with all the trappings and honorifics. The Slayer of the Archdemon, the Saviour of Ferelden. By that time he'd already been far away. She wouldn't have cared anyway. She'd never wanted to be a hero. She had wanted to live, to love, to be free.

For some time he drifted all over Ferelden and beyond, never staying in one place, alone, unattached. The pain was his only companion, a constant dull ache that remained, no matter where he went or what he did, as if a part of his body had been cut off. He tried his hand at a few jobs and managed to pull them off, but he keenly felt her absence, like a hole in the air next to him, while he scaled rooftops, avoided traps, silently took out his opponents.

The nights were the hardest part. Zevran had never been a drinker, so he didn't attempt to drown his sorrows. Instead he lost himself in a frenzied succession of bed partners, pretty young men and women, their names and faces a blur. He would seduce them with practised ease, bed them, forget them. His body performed as it always had, but he was numb inside, not sure whether he would ever feel anything again.

The Crows caught up with him three months later. They knew that he no longer had the protection of the Warden, and he had grown careless. When he returned to his inn that night, alone for once, the arrow missed him by a hair's breadth. For a split second he was looking at the shaft, quivering in the wall next to his head, and he almost gave in to the overwhelming temptation to let them go on, let them kill him, finally end the pain. But then his reflexes took over.

Without a conscious thought he whirled around, blades at the ready, taking in the situation with a single practised glance, throwing himself into the graceful, lethal dance he knew so well. When he paused for breath minutes later, all five attackers lay dead on the floor. A quick search of their pockets told him they were Ignacio's men. Two nights later Zevran paid him a visit, making sure that the other assassin would never bother him again.

Oddly enough the incident brought him a measure of peace. It had shown him that he preferred life, even the pain-filled, tortured existence he was leading now, to dying. He wasn't done yet. When a handsome young Elven mage caught his eye at a tavern some weeks later, he walked over to greet the stranger, curious for the first time in weeks. Later that night as he disentangled himself from sweat-soaked sheets and silently snuck out of the other man's room, he was sure he would live. Not love again, not that, never, but there might still be something out there for him. And as time went by, the pain lessened somewhat, and the memories of her became a treasure he hid away deep inside, to be taken out and examined only in the rarest and most precious of instances.

Zevran had known for some time that Nuncio was on his trail. He had hidden in a cave on the slopes of Sundermount, north of Kirkwall, when the band of adventurers arrived to look for him. There were four of them, an Elven mage, a dwarf, a female knight, and their leader, a woman in fighter's gear. When they approached and he heard one of her companions cry out "Careful, Cait!" his heart beat faster for a second. A vivid series of remembered images raced across his brain as he took in the leader's appearance. Red hair, green eyes, a graceful body... but then he realized that the similarities ended right there. The woman called Cait was taller than she had been, and more muscular, with swirling dark red tattoos on her cheekbones, a seasoned warrior whose strong arms easily wielded the massive two-handed sword she was carrying.

She seemed confident and self-assured when she spoke, her voice clear and strong. "You must be the Antivan. They call me Hawke."

When he left the cave early next morning, Zevran was surprised to find that he was smiling a fond smile. She was indeed a formidable fighter. Nuncio's thugs hadn't stood a chance against their combined skills once he had persuaded her to take his side. And the night that followed the fighting had been just as memorable. As he made his way down the slopes of the mountain, Zevran found himself intrigued when he thought about the future. He was pretty certain that he would meet her again sooner or later and he wondered what would come of it. Her heart belonged to someone else, she had said.

But then, so did his.

* The end *

Author's note: Now, don't be mad at me. I love those two, but I really don't see how a Warden can ever have a happy ending without seriously stretching the laws of plausibility. Darkspawn taint is no small thing.
I promise I'll write more about the two of them, though, set at an earlier time. Watch out for 'Brandy Tasting' and 'The Dance of Love' - and maybe some more to come.
And for all you Zevran lovers out there - he is part of the cast in nearly all my Fenris/Hawke stories, with a special guest role in 'The Magic of the Moon Goddess' ;-).