My Love

by Sabrina Zbasnik

  As her hands parted to release Gavin, he forgot about the assassin and focused upon Myra. "I was in the neighborhood and thought I'd pop by," he tried for a laugh. After the night he had he expected a grimace, but she cupped a hand along her ear, leaned closer to him, and then snickered.

  "It was this or the party down at the tanners, right? Hard choice, but this has better food."

  "I wouldn't trust the lemonade their either," Gavin said back, wishing he could amplify his voice. It always sat deep in his chest, the words dropping down to the ground with a plop. How he wound up with such a bass voice to his father's more striking tenor he'd never understand.

  Myra snickered at that, then spun back a moment to stare at the dancers. He feared she might vanish back into them, perhaps wow another boy with her acrobatics, but it was her elven friend she waved over. "Bryn," she giggled, jerking her head at the girl. "Do you know Bryn?"

  "Ah, not formally," Gavin stuck out his hand and the girl's wide blue eyes darted over to Myra, then at the ceiling. With a small giggle she slipped her thinner fingers into Gavin's mitts and shook. "Though," he remarked turning back to Myra, "the way you speak of her I feel as if I already know her."

  "That's the nicest," Bryn began before turning to her live-in sister and shouting, "What did you tell him about me?"

  "Only good things," Myra insisted before tapping a finger to her chin and whispering, "I think."

  "My, I swear to the Maker, if you told him about the..." Bryn's entire face slid over to the boy sitting in confusion and curiosity upon the feud. Suddenly she laughed, her cheeks struggling to make a great smile as if everything was fine. "Lord Gavin..."

  "Please, just Gavin. Squire if you need to yell at me from across a field." The last part caused Myra to snicker though he meant it truthfully.

  Bryn nodded her head. She was a girl somehow opposite in Myra in nearly every way. Short to Myra's staggering heights, Bryn's face was round and wholesome like fresh cream. Myra was many things but somehow wholesome never came to mind. Her face was clear, save a small mole upon her upper lip, while Myra's freckles had to rival the stars. She was more soft spoken as well, often ending her sentences as if they were meant to be questions. But in terms of getting along, the two were as inseparable as twins. He found himself very jealous of such a relationship.

  "How are you finding all of this?" Bryn asked, her head tipped to the side. She kept her hair short, the brunette ends curling around her pointed ears.

  "Confounding," Gavin admitted.

  "Loud, I bet," Myra added on seemingly to herself. Sensing his eyes upon her, she turned to her friend to say, "The abbey was so quiet. Like pin drop quiet. Denerim market square at 2 in the morning quiet. But with less murders and hooking."

  Gavin's cheeks lit up bright red at her assurance, "That's...um." His thoughts dropped off a cliff, the embarrassment swelling his tongue until it threatened to explode in his mouth. Both girls turned to him, no doubt expecting more witty repartee, or his explanation upon the lack of prostitutes at a healing abbey. Panic tipped up his stomach, Gavin grateful he ate light, when salvation came upon the strangest of heels.

  Prince Cailan sauntered through the throngs of people. He had no one on his arm, but there was a glass in his hands. Upon reaching the group he tipped it back to finish. With a cool eye, he turned to find Rosamund surrounded by her handmaidens towards the head table. "Don't tell me, dear sister has somehow completely bungled this and we'd all best be making for the mountain pass before they release the hounds."

  Snorting at her brother's words, Myra wrapped a hand around her elbow and turned towards their sister and princess. "I think we're safe for the evening. Tess and the rest of the skirts have her well corralled. And I hear they hid her sword again."

  "Maker's sake," Cailan scrunched his eyes up and pinched into the bridge of his nose as if he grew a headache, "we will never hear the blighted end of it when she finds out." In moaning, he nearly bonked his empty glass into his face.

  Bryn noticed immediately, and like a good servant raced to rescue the royalty from embarrassment. "My Lord," she began, "I can take that from you." Her fingers rolled up along the bottom of the glass, but Cailan's bright eyes popped open to focus only upon her.

  "How in our beloved Andraste's name are you not out on that dance floor this very minute?" he asked, clinging to his glass.

  "I'm..." Bryn's cheeks lit up brighter than anything Gavin's fumbling could cause and she shuffled her feet. "No one deigned to ask me."

  "Well that shall have to be remedied immediately," Cailan pronounced and with a flourish he dropped his empty glass into Myra's fingers. "You can take care of that, I imagine." Scooping both hands along one of Bryn's, he pulled the elven woman out onto the dance floor. Whatever words he was whispering near her caused the girl to keep giggling and blushing even brighter.

  Loaded down with her brother's dirty dish, Myra began to bang the bottom of the glass into her open palm. Beside her, Gavin tried to find any sense in all of this. "That was...something."

  "Ha, you should see him when he's really trying. It is kinda funny to watch him fail though. Not that it happens as often as it should. Girls are so stupid sometimes. He's a boy not the blighted tears of Andraste, just..." Her thought trailed away while Gavin stood listening. When he realized it wasn't the music that drowned it out but Myra's choice, he glanced over afraid to find she'd vanished. Those meadowy eyes were scrutinizing him, the focus seemed to be narrowed down upon his nose.

  "What is it?" Gavin reached up to cover the offending thing, afraid that on top of everything else he'd had a bogey up there for the entire evening.

  "Uh, nothing. Nothing at all, I..." Myra banged her glass a few more times before sighing, "Want to get some air?"

  Remain in this intricate step of politics, romance, and desperation, or abandon it all with a nice girl? "Yes, please," Gavin spat out.

  Nodding vehemently at his decision, Myra scampered out through the throngs of people. He had to keep tight on her tail. Even though she was nearly as tall as him, somehow her thin body could ooze into and through gaps in the crowd Gavin had to excuse himself around. When they reached the doors, Myra weighed the glass in her hand and a wicked smile lifted on her face.

  Spinning on her toes, she got a short run in and hurled the glass until it shattered against the far wall. "That's for being mean to my sister," she sneered at the offending thing that was tucked away in the corner. It didn't seem much of an act of rebellion, but a few of the grey hairs perked up and began to hunt through the crowd.

  "Ah shit," Myra grabbed onto his hand, "run!"

  Together they tossed open the doors, both giggling with the freedom when she suddenly paused and dropped his hand. Turning on a copper, she dashed back into the ballroom. Was she planning on apologizing for the broken glass? Did she change her mind and realize she wanted to remain? Before Gavin could think of a third question, Myra appeared.

  She lifted up her hands to explain, "Forgot my shoes." With a tight grip to her nearly forgotten footwear, both of them dashed down the steps and into the night.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  How To

  It didn't start out so bad. The dinner was fun, because Cailan and Rosie were stuck playing hobs to the nobs while Myra got to talk to one of the pikemen. They were kinda fascinating to her. Your job is to stand there and hold a stick. If you do it right, something gets stuck on your stick. If not, bye bye stick and bye bye you. Simple. Elegant. Stupid for the man forced to do it, but fascinating.

  The dancing was even more fun, Myra being able to finagle Bryn to her side lightning fast. They were a lot less stuffy here than in Denerim. There was no way she could have gotten away with one cartwheel, much less a backflip back home. Bea would have drug her dad in by his ear, then her mom would show up and it'd be a fifth blight all over again.

  When she first looked up to spot Gavin surrounded by a bunch of fancy skirts, she tried to play it light. They were all there to mingle
, maybe he was mingling. Then the one woman's mingling grew too cozy, her fingers pawing at the boy as if he was some horse she was going to buy at auction. Ugh. It was disgusting.

  Hating that she cared, Myra fell into a few rounds with some of the Highever boys that hadn't learned who she was yet. People always seemed to like her until they got either the bastard or the king's daughter bit. It was downhill every time after. By the time she spun away from a twirl, feeling like her head was dancing without her body, she spotted him standing alone.

  He looked the exact opposite of the boy she spotted in the meadow. Poor Gavin was twitching his fingers, his face all scrunched up in a nervous sneer while he kept turtling up his neck into his shoulders. It was an act of pity that drove her to strike up a conversation with him, nothing more.

  Okay. That was buyable. So why'd you talk him into abandoning the dance with you?

  Because...shut up, that's why. Myra tried to shake off her brain's thoughts by hopping onto a bannister running the length of the staircase. While Gavin took the stairs like a normal person, she stepped with her feet completely sideways down it. The focus needed to keep from face planting was enough she nearly forgot he was even beside her.

  At least until the boy gasped out, "I will never understand how you don't fall. I'd fall."

  "The trick is to picture the ground and how much it would really, really hurt if you did. Then don't do that," Myra explained. Getting a good feel for her balance, she picked up speed, dashing forward. At the end of the bannister was some iron mabari statue squatting on its haunches. The iron dog looked like it wanted a treat, the stubby tail sticking out to the side. Reaching the end, Myra scooped her hands upon the dog's head, pushed her legs up high and skirted her ass right over the top.

  With a simple plop, her feet landed upon the ground and she turned backwards with her hands extended. Gavin had to increase his gait, jogging down the steps to join her. For a moment he looked at the dog she sailed over and grimaced as if it should be impossible to pull off. Myra'd been leaping over, under, and around worse since she was twelve. Her sister once joked that they should enter Myra into the steeplechase. After seeing some of the horses that year, she probably wouldn't have come in last.

  "You're doing well," Myra said, her feet slowing as they circled around the silent courtyard. She suddenly realized she had no idea where she was going to take the boy she invited out. Great thinking there, Myra. Way to really plan ahead.

  "Oh?" Gavin slowed up as well. The awkwardness hadn't entirely fled his body, but he didn't have his chin tucked up against his chest either. Progress.

  "Captured a deadly assassin, helped to stop a bandit plot..."

  "As I seem to remember, it was you who stopped the bandits."

  Myra waved it away, "Promoted to bodyguard for my sister, and on our first fancy stop you had a whole bustle of ladies begging for a dance with you." She was trying to be light hearted, to compliment him, but the boy's face dropped.

  "How did you...? You could tell?"

  "That they were circling you like a pack of wolves that spotted a limping deer?" Myra plucked at her lips as if in thought. "It's not that hard to tell, even if you're not taught to do that shit. The 'ladies' at these stops live for this stuff. New blood, some fancy toy to play with that they've never had before. Pick, prod, toss back for the next one."

  He fell silent and she turned from gazing out at the grey and black gardens to try and catch his eyes. "Did no one warn you about that?"

  "It seems there is a lot I was not...informed of," he grumped as if being saddled with good looks was such a burden.

  Would that be his excuse? He's too pretty for the common woman? No, not pretty. Pretty implied fine features that would shatter like glass. His could cut glass, maybe shatter a few bricks too. Even now there was a ruggedness to him she didn't spot in the other squires. His broad nose and jaw would get better with age. And, damn it, Mom! Myra did not care what he'd look like older, if he'd look better older. That was all the lady Solver's doing, teaching her to look and anticipate people, to know them inside and out.

  "What...?" Myra stirred her slipper on the ground wishing she'd worn real shoes. They'd barely had any warning there was to be a stupid dance and she grabbed the first thing she could out of her wrecked luggage. "What happened?"

  "I..." he pursed his lips together. Even by the starlight and fire of the hall in the distance Myra could spot the edge of his bottom lip glistening. It highlighted the swipe of pink before his lips trailed off to become a tempting tan. And you're staring at him. Stop doing that!

  Shuffling on his feet, Gavin glanced over at her and sighed, "I don't know how to dance."

  "Is that all?" Myra gasped. She'd expected something else, anything else but that. The boy's haunting amber eyes crossed into a stern look at her flippant response, but she was too busy sliding over and grabbing his hands to care. "Here," Myra extended his hands out, "I'll teach you."

  "What?" he looked about to shy away back into his shell, but she had a tight grip when she wanted to. All that climbing and not wanting to die, probably.

  "Don't panic, it's easy."

  "Says the girl who can climb up a sheer cliff like a mountain goat," he was in full on grumbling mode. Normally, Myra would prod at someone behaving like a bee flew up their trouser leg but it was oddly captivating when he stuck out his bottom lip. No, damn it. Forget that stuff, focus on whatever you were going to do.

  Raising her hands up into the first formation, Myra's brain tossed out 'Not as if he'd ever look twice at you anyway' to get one last stab to her self esteem. Thanks brain.

  "I'll show you the...think of it like the base dance. Everyone knows these few steps, it's what you cut your teeth on, and then as you get older you learn a bit more fancy stuff to do with it."

  "Fancy like those twirls and dips and twists?" Gavin turned to her but his shoulders were relaxing out of their carrying the whole world state.

  Myra snatched up his fingers and placed them on top of hers, "I prefer to add something fun like plate spinning or lion taming, but yeah, I guess there's always twirls." She cracked up at her stupid joke but froze at the sound of the boy beside her laughing as well. Good thing it was nearly black as pitch out here so he couldn't see the blush burning on her cheeks.

  "Okay, first thing you do is step like this. Step, step, step," she shuffled her feet as if they were half the size they really were. "Raise up a bit on your tiptoes like you're trying to sneak out late at night."

  "Like this?" Gavin's far too great form somehow daintily lifted onto the very tip of his toes as if it was no bother.

  "How in the Maker's name are you so good at that?" Myra tried to copy him but her tiny toes screamed in qunari curses that Qimat taught her. There was no way she could get up on them. With a sly smile, she bent the crook of her elbow towards Gavin's side. "Did you give the stuffy ol Commander the slip?"

  "No," Gavin swallowed, his eyes darting around as if he'd been caught being naughty. That'd be the day. "The abbey would sometimes require quiet days and...my mom would make a game out of it."

  "Oh that one. My Mom tried that too. 'Myra, let's see how long you can go without talking.' 'Oop, I lose. So, Mom...'" She giggled at the memory, her mother often turning her own special shades of red while suffering her daughter's jabbering jaw. Reiss liked to claim that when Myra was a five year old, her mother lost her voice for an entire week from trying to answer all of her daughter's questions. That seemed mostly unlikely.

  Catching on that she was supposed to be teaching and not thinking about home or her big warm bed, or the way Lunet would sometimes sneak in a special pink donut just for her, Myra shifted her body. With a careful step forward, she tugged the cargo ship with her. Gavin, while light standing on his toes, was less so moving on them.

  "Think of clouds, or water and how it flows over floors when you spill it," Myra began. He wasn't getting it. He'd shuffle forward at intermittent speeds, his toes all but nipping into the back of
her heels. Then he'd overcompensate and lag behind, tugging Myra's arms back over her head. It'd be funny to watch, she'd have to give him that.

  Biting onto her lip, she began to tap the beat through her fingers against his. "One, two, three, step, step, step." You're holding his hands. Yeah, I'm trying to teach him how to dance. You're dancing with him. If this is dancing, swallowing a bucket of leeches is medicine. You're enjoying it.

  "Not like water, forget that," Myra shouted all of a sudden. She craned her neck to spot Gavin's eyes open before he pursed his lips. He thought he had it. "Think of a fight."

  "Dancing isn't combat."

  "Sure it is. Dancing is combat but with sharp tongues instead of swords, and quick toes instead of...shields? I'm not so good at the metaphors. In a fight you read your opponent, right? You anticipate their moves and counter with your own." The boy's stupidly handsome face nodded. He leaned tighter to Myra to try and listen to her advice. It wasn't too close to be anything but friendly, but she could smell a combination of a juniper oil and that man musk that would turn her stomach. But it wasn't doing that this time. She wanted to lean closer and sniff more. No, Myra. You're treading into weirdo territory again.

  "Here," she shook her head and leaned away as if to get into position. The garden's sun baked fragrances filled her nose instead of boy. It helped clear her head. "Watch me, and prepare to counter my moves."

  With a breath, she stepped off. At first Gavin hung back, their tether straining as he seemed to be eyeing her up from behind. Myra was about to tell him he had to remain by her side for it to be a dance, when he suddenly darted closer to her and began to match her right foot for left. They paraded around the garden, her arms screaming for a release as they'd been held in the same stupid position behind her shoulder and to the side for too long. But he was starting to get it, really starting to get it.

  "Okay," Myra paused them up and dropped her hands. Her puny biceps cried in bitter relief but it was a short victory. "I think you're ready for the next bit. Twirling."