Archive of Our Own ^beta

“We could get married,” Neve says, like it's nothing.

That's where it all starts. In the slowly rebuilding city of Minrathous. In the sea-lined edges of Dock Town. In the small, newly built apartment with a view of the market, where they stay, Neve more often than Lucanis, of course, but he’s there as much as he can be. On the bed where they're curled up, half-naked, content, talking about whatever. Marriage. Apparently.

Lucanis is mouthing lazily at the curve of neck-meets-jaw, right under her ear, when she says it. He stills.

“Married?” he repeats.

“Yeah,” Neve says. “It'd make some things simpler.”

He pulls away from her so he can see her face, leans back on an elbow. “You'd want to get married?”

“Well,” she says, “wouldn't you?”

“That's not the question.” But yes. He would. He's thought about it before. Thought about it with Neve, in particular. Maybe fantasizes, if you can call it that. But they haven't discussed it.

She sighs. “You remember, I once told you I wouldn't make things easy?”

“Yes.”

“I meant it. And I think it's true. You, on the other hand.” Neve reaches out and tugs him back in, presses their bodies together, so that her breath lands on the bend of his ear, her words so close as to sink into his skin immediately after they're said. “Despite everything we've been through… you’ve always been easy. No, don't take me the wrong way. Easy to be with, easy to love. I love you. I want what you want. And you want to get married.”

He kisses the skin under his mouth. “You have me figured out, tesoro. Alright. Let's get married. But not like this, after talking about it in bed.”

“I've already met your family,” she points out. Her long fingers trace up from the small of his back between his shoulders, leaving goosebumps in their wake.

Lucanis laughs. “I don't mean that. I mean a proposal. A proper one.”

He can't see her, but he knows her eyebrows shoot up. He can hear it in her voice. “You… want me to plan a proposal for you?”

Not what he meant, but he considers it. The idea is tempting. But it's not what he'd daydreamed about as a boy. “No, I'd like to propose to you. If you don't mind.”

“Hardly.” Neve snorts. “So you want the opportunity to make a grand gesture towards little old me? I’m flattered, but I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. Sure, if that's how you'd like it.”

“I would.” Lucanis presses his cheek to hers, lightly, his hand reaching for the bare skin of her waist, as he lets his mind wander. A fine jewel, perhaps. Is Cafe Pietra too obvious a location?

“You thinking about it already?” Her voice is amused. “What should I be expecting, here, then? Something of a typical Antivan style, whatever that is?”

“We do not have strict rules around such things. A gift or a word suffices, so long as it comes from the heart.”

“Couldn't be Tevinter. Everything around here has to have a twelve-step ancient process, it seems. For tradition.”

“Is that what your proposals are like?” he asks, curious. “A twelve-step structured plan?”

“Well, not exactly.”

“What, then?”

Neve hums. She shifts onto her back, and his hand slides to her belly, thumb moving in a caress. “It's hard to explain. You really want to know?”

“I want to get to know all my options.” The temptation wins out. He moves to roll over her, holding himself up on his elbows. Her hands lift and curl together at the back of his neck.

“I'll get someone to give you the details, later,” Neve says, before she tugs him down.

Within the week, Lucanis is standing in front of the Archon of Tevinter, quite casually present in the new base of the Shadow Dragons. And —

“My husband,” Dorian says, waving a hand towards a large Qunari sitting in the corner, with his feet propped up on a stool and his hands crossed behind his head. He wears a leather eyepatch, and a sturdy-looking ankle brace. And not much of a shirt, revealing skin with plenty of smaller battle-scars.

“The Iron Bull,” says the Qunari, glancing over Lucanis as well. “Been a while since I've seen a Crow in the flesh.”

“I'm not here on business,” Lucanis assures him. But he gives Neve a look. Raised eyebrow, the works. The look says, why am I here?

Neve just shrugs. “I didn't know anyone else who married someone not from Tevinter, but according to our customs.”

“Kind of a pain in the ass,” says The Iron Bull.

“Don't give me that, amatus. You cried at the end of it,” Dorian scoffs. The Iron Bull just grunts, but he looks relaxed.

“So,” Lucanis says tentatively, “how long have you been…?”

“Together? Long enough to make me feel far too old. Married? Not so long, since it was only a handful of years ago that he could even step into Minrathous without me feeling at the edge of a heart attack at all times. Publicly so? I'm frankly surprised you haven't heard, since it's been all over the papers recently.”

“Oh, it's very scandalous,” Neve says. “The talk of the town. Horror, distaste, muted jealousy. You name it.”

“However will they deal,” says Dorian, but he sounds smug. The Iron Bull snorts. Dorian smiles, and then walks over to the corner of the room where he is, taking a seat on the couch next to him. He gestures to the chair across. “Go on. Neve has given me enough context. We are generous and willing to help.”

There's only one extra chair. A little uncertainly, he turns again to Neve.

“Got some stuff I need to take care of,” she says, and leans in to press a kiss to the arch of his eyebrow. “Just remember, you wanted to know.”

“Alright,” he says, a hand reaching out and briefly squeezing hers before she pulls away, nods her goodbye to Dorian and The Iron Bull, and leaves the room. Lucanis moves over to the setup in the corner, and takes the free chair.

“So,” Dorian starts before he can even say anything, “you want to propose to our Neve.”

“Yes.”

“The Tevinter way.”

“Possibly, once I learn what the Tevinter way is.”

“How refreshing,” Dorian sighs. “I had to practically cajole this one into it.”

“You dropped hints you thought you were subtle until I went ahead and started it,” corrects The Iron Bull, amusement in the wrinkles around his eyes. “I just think it's a bit ridiculous, to have to stay apart for so long.”

“Stay apart?” Lucanis repeats, eyebrows pulling together.

“We'll get there,” Dorian assures him. “First, you must know how to start the proposal in the first place.”

He takes her to Cafe Pietra, in the end. It's just… well, it's selfish, really. He wants this to be the place where he remembers this day happening.

They have an evening coffee as the sun sets in radiant glowing hues behind them. Lucanis tells her about the roast in a low tone, describing the tenderness of the chocolate undertones and roughness of the nutty aftertaste, and she holds his gaze unflinchingly, a smile twitching at the edges of her mouth. They order a pastry and split it, but Lucanis only has a bite of his half before pushing the rest of it over to Neve, who raises an eyebrow like she knows what he's doing, but accepts it anyway. She puts the pastry between her teeth and holds it there for a moment while she reaches out and brushes a crumb from the corner of his lips.

How lucky he is, to have this.

A little later, they take a walk along the canals, chatting about the mundane and familiar — Neve's cases, Lucanis’ contracts, with a brief detour discussing Rook's latest antics — until Lucanis finally places a hand on her arm to stop them both, just under a streetlamp.

Neve glances at his hand, and leans back against the lamppost. “Is this it, then?”

“Depends on whether or not you let me say it,” Lucanis says, leaning into her. Much like the moths to the lamp above them, he's drawn into her presence even now.

“I want to know what you're planning. Maybe I'll find out for myself.”

“You know, most people don't work against the person who's trying to propose to them.”

“Who says I'm working against you? It's a case. A mystery. I'm on it. I have to be.” She puts her hands on his waist and pulls him a little closer. Then she moves one hand to lay on his sternum, possession in her touch. “Bet I can catch you in the act, whatever you're preparing. Bet I can find you, even if you're trying to stay away. Bet I can make you break, when I do.”

“You think you can catch a Crow?” he asks, a little professional cockiness slipping into his tone.

Neve smirks right back at him. For a moment, the force of her hand on his chest increases, and he feels the press of her nails on his skin through the fabric. “Already did, didn't I?”

Lucanis laughs. He takes her hand in his, raises it to his lips. “Neve Gallus,” he says, “I want to be with you until the end of my days. But as the customs of your people go, let us take our last two weeks apart. May you think of me often during my absence, such that when we come back together, it's the beginning of the rest of our lives.”

He presses something small and hard into her palm, and her fingers curl around it.

“Well, someone's done his homework,” Neve says, without looking at the item in her hand. She leans in and kisses him, the familiar warmth of her lips against his giving him strength.

“See you soon,” Lucanis says when he pulls back.

“Sooner than you think,” Neve promises.

“We'll see about that.” Let's fly, he thinks, and Spite unfurls his wings. Lucanis leaps into the sky, leaving her alone under the streetlamp.

“So… we can't see each other for two weeks?” Lucanis asks, a little lost. “How does that make sense?”

Surprisingly, The Iron Bull answers this one. “It's about building tension,” he says. “That slow burn. Bringing back some spice into a relationship, sometimes. Not that I'm saying you lack it. Not that we lacked it, either! Ha! But that's part of the idea.”

“Barring that unnecessary detail about our personal lives, much like what I would have said,” Dorian says. “The idea is to emphasize the difficulty of time spent apart, before a lifetime spent together. It's not too strict beyond that, as much as it is an idea that each person may carry out in their own way. Minimally, you could just write some letters and leave them for her to find. That's what many people do. But something tells me you're an overachiever.”

Lucanis doesn't answer. He crosses his arms over his chest, his mind whirring. He is both a perfectionist and a romantic. In this particular endeavor, he is doomed to a fate of extravagance, indeed.

“Neve will take this as a challenge,” he says. “She'll try to find me. Like a missing persons case.” The thought, far from being discouraging, makes his blood rush in excitement. A game, then.

“It happens sometimes that the pair runs into each other,” Dorian muses. “In such a case, you'd be forgiven, but you mustn't touch.”

“Noted.” Lucanis rubs his beard with a hand thoughtfully. “Am I allowed help?”

“Of course. It sounds like you've made up your mind already.”

“It is much more interesting than an Antivan proposal. And — I think Neve will like it.” A case with no consequences attached to it. Nothing but a chase for the thrill of it, a test for that brilliant mind. Yes, Lucanis has come to a decision.

“Then you'll need to get the hourglass,” Dorian says.

“What do you mean?”

“A little hourglass necklace, charmed to last two weeks and not reset no matter how it's turned,” he explains. “To mark the duration of the proposal. They should be sold at any jewelry shop in the city… not that there are very many of those right now, but you ought to be able to find one without too much difficulty.”

Lucanis nods. “I can do that.”

On the first day, Neve goes back to Minrathous, the eluvians smoothing the way for an easy trip. As always, she's tempted to stop by the Lighthouse, see an old haunt, but a place isn't the same without the people of its memory, and it's been a while since they've managed to gather. Besides, she has cases to wrap up, so she can focus on the newest mystery that's arrived in her life.

The hourglass hangs heavy around her neck, a comfortable presence. She never thought she'd be wearing one, if she's being honest. Let alone that it would make her smile when she catches a glimpse of it in the mirror.

Minrathous heals slowly. It may never be the city it once was, but perhaps it will grow into something different. The streets of Dock Town feel more alive by the day. Lately, street performers have emerged once more, like flowers blooming after a hard rain.

A small group of them has set up in the corner around her apartment. She lets the music flow through her as she passes. Then the tune strikes a memory in her, and she stops in her tracks.

Lucanis doesn't sing much. He gets embarrassed — and she likes it, the way he clears his throat and turns away, his cheeks turning a faint pink, so she once asked it of him, and he sang her an Antivan folk song about a man who crossed countries on horseback to escape Death, only to find her waiting for him at the end of the world. At least, that's what he told her it was about afterwards, laying together on his too-small Lighthouse cot. The Antivan long vowels and smooth consonants played together and around them in a way that almost lulled her to sleep in his arms.

This rendition is far more lively, and while the singer may be objectively better, she finds herself remembering Lucanis’ low voice in place of his.

Neve stands off to the side and listens to the rest of the performance. Claps when it's done, scatters a few coins into the upside-down hat when she approaches.

“Nice song,” she says. “Strange to hear Antivan on a Dock Town street.”

The performer, a young man with two silver front teeth, grins. “My Antivan's rotten as hell, but we had a special request. At least I knew the song.”

She tosses another coin in the air casually. “I'm curious. Care to share who, and where they went?”

He shrugs, and points to an alleyway across the street. “Some fellow in a fancy-looking outfit requested it just before our last song. Went that way.”

The coin clatters as it lands among the other tips. Neve stares down the alleyway, tempted.

Cases first. Then Lucanis isn't getting away from her.

It takes her until she arrives at the apartment to realize that she's smiling.

Lucanis never thought he'd be using the skills he gained as a Crow in his love life, but as he watches Neve go about her business from the rooftops of Minrathous, he can't help but be glad for the specific career he was born into.

Tracking, stealth, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. The only difference is that instead of a knife in his hand, he has… a bottle of his own favorite cologne. Which feels a little silly, frankly.

He leans over the edge of the building, careful. Neve is coming through this alleyway soon, within the next five minutes, which means it's his time. He's got a rope tied to an exposed rafter, and with it in hand he descends quickly to the ground; not even letting go of the rope, he sprays the gentle scent around the alley. Then it's quickly back up the building face for him, just barely in time for Neve to come around the corner.

Lucanis should leave. Staying to see her reaction is risky. But he wants to see.

He's never told her these exact words, but he loves the way she walks. Confident, even a little cocky, a smirk in the guise of a gait. But those steps slow to a stop a few steps into the little street. He doesn't have to be close to imagine the calculating look that must appear in her eyes when she smells it, smells him in the air, his barely departed presence.

What is she thinking about? Maybe their first real date outside late-night Lighthouse chats and impromptu dinners, when Lucanis had been nervous enough to overapply this very cologne, and Neve hadn't passed on the chance to tease him about it. Maybe the time they sat around her office at far too late in the night and went through both of their collections of scents, comparing florals and gourmands, having found something small and precious in common.

She's tilting her head to look up as he throws himself backwards, just in time to get out of sight.

His heart beats too fast for the almost-miss.

It's not until day three or so that Spite starts to make his opinions known.

He appears to Lucanis as he normally does when he wants to talk, as an ephemeral, dark projection of himself. Luckily, no one is around. Lucanis is sitting at a desk at one of the Crow hideouts — he doesn't trust anywhere else to be safe if Neve is looking for him — and Spite hovers over his shoulder, intrusive.

What is it, hisses Spite, staring down at his paper.

“A cipher,” he mutters. “Don't worry about it.”

Where is she, Spite asks.

“Patience,” Lucanis says. “We go without seeing her for a few days all the time. Longer, even.”

Not like this! She's. Right there! Close!

He sighs. “You were there when this was explained to us. Why do I have to explain it again?”

Should just. See her, Spite grumbles. If he hadn’t long ago lost the capability to be charitable towards the demon that lives in his head, he might’ve even been endeared. Spite may not love Neve the way Lucanis does, but he’s grown to or learned to care in his own way.

“Don't even think about it,” Lucanis warns him. “I won't have this ruined because of you. Ten days or so, and things will be back to normal.”

Spite snarls and makes a kicking motion at the chair, but of course it does nothing. He disappears, but Lucanis knows better to assume that is agreement.

He isn't planning on sleeping much during this period of time, anyway.

Neve hates mornings. Or no, make that more accurate: she hates the period of time after waking up, whatever time that is, morning or mid-afternoon. Today it's morning, because she's got a job to do.

She fell asleep, only a small handful of hours ago, with the hourglass still hanging around her neck; it left an indent in the skin on her sternum, pressed between her body and the mattress.

But not even its grounding weight can make her any less grumpy. She huffs on her own as she rolls out of bed, slumps in the chair in front of the mirror and starts trying to get her hair into something resembling order.

It's easier when Lucanis is there. He doesn't have the same resentment towards waking up as she does, and he isn't scared away by her crabbish demeanor — seems to find it endearing, which just goes to tell you that there's something really wrong with him. He usually leaves her be beyond a quick kiss to the side of her head, letting her wake up on her own time without bothering her with talk. While she fights with the demons of sunlight and movement, he usually makes her —

Two tentative raps on her door have her pause where she's picking up a pair of trousers from the floor. Now that's unusual.

Quickly, Neve slips the trousers on, and then picks up her staff where it lays against the wall.

“Who is it?” she asks warily, her hand on the handle.

“Delivery from Lucanis Dellamorte!” comes a squeaky voice.

Neve pulls the door open. A young boy stands there, both hands holding a large, steaming mug of coffee. She can sense the magic coming off of it: enchanted to stay warm across a trip, and to not spill. Oh, he planned well.

She takes the mug from his hands — it smells delicious — and puts it aside.

“Thanks. Mind answering some questions?”

The boy shrugs. “He said you'd ask! Sure!”

“Where'd he find you?”

“Outside the Cobbled Swan.”

“What was he wearing? Did you notice anything particular about the way he looks?”

“Um,” the boy pauses. “He had a cape. And he looked tired, like he needed the coffee himself. Bags under his eyes.”

“How much did he give you?”

He grins toothily, and pulls a jingling bag out of a pocket briefly before shoving it back in. “Plenty. He must be super rich.”

“Hm.” Neve crosses her arms, taps her fingers where they land impatiently. “Did you see him go anywhere?”

The boy taps a finger to his mouth, thoughtful. “He just went away. But I saw him stop and pick up a newspaper first.”

“Which paper?”

“The Imperial.”

Neve nods. “Thanks.” She considers offering the boy a coin, on top of his very generous pay from Lucanis, but he's already skipping off, no doubt satisfied by what he has already.

She doesn't know if it was an oversight or intentional that Lucanis didn't instruct the boy not to tell her anything. But either way, the newspaper is a lead. So is whoever Lucanis got to enchant the coffee — perhaps one of their friends?

First, though. The coffee. When she picks it up, feeling its warmth from the sides of the mug on both her palms, it's as if new life flows into her. Since it'll stay warm and not spill, she can even bring it along with her.

She takes a long sip, closing her eyes. It's delicious.

But somehow not as good as those mornings when they're together, and Lucanis slips the mug towards her himself without saying a word.

Lucanis has been getting the hang of this. The little gifts and gestures seem to come naturally to him, only now he gives them without being present. But he doesn't want coffee to be the only part of this project, and so he heads to Arlathan, candles packed in a bag slung across his back. Enchanted candles — Emmrich had gladly helped out, just as he had with the coffee.

He, at least, is more discreet than Bellara.

There's a path by the water, with a grand view of the old elven ruins. While Neve and Lucanis had mostly spent their time together previously in the Lighthouse, and then in Treviso and Minrathous (mostly the latter), there had been a time when they had managed to get away for a little while — mostly at the insistence of their companions, who were far too invested in the state of their relationship.

Lucanis remembers it well. Neve taught him how to skip rocks across the water; he did poorly, distracted, wondering when the right time was to take her hand. Then he told her a story about a contract he'd once had, where he and another Crow found out a couple had both hired from them to kill the other, which brought up the tricky question of who would pay the last part of their fees if both died at the same time. They had gone back to the couple, negotiated up-front pay, and promptly taken them both out. Neve told him a story in return — and by this point Lucanis had bravely slipped her fingers between his own, the path down the river seeming longer than it had before, and yet too short — about a case where the local butcher had been framed for a murder, and his daughter had begged Neve to exonerate him. She tracked down the true killer, and nearly died at his hands; the butcher had been freed and the killer put in prison, but less than a year later was allowed back on the streets, whether by corruption or some other method.

“And you couldn't get him put back in?” Lucanis asked, wonderingly.

“Tried it. Another time when I learned the limitations of a private citizen.”

“I can kill him for you.”

Neve laughed.

The time stands out in his memory. He wondered if it does for Neve, too.

In any case, he would soon find out.

They're about halfway through into this game, and Neve has had frustratingly few leads. Lucanis, she has to admit, is doing better than she had anticipated.

She has been spending her days asking around for hints from anyone who might've seen him, and has gotten very little but glimpses and shadows. And what's worse, she can feel that the purpose of the system is working.

That is, she misses him. Even though they frequently go days if not weeks without seeing one another, she usually doesn't have to deal with these little reminders of his presence dogging her daily steps. She wants him there, not just out of sight, even in the mornings when she wants no one else around.

It's inexplicably annoying.

Her next lead comes from a place she doesn't expect. Tarquin walks in on her at the new base, leaning against the wall and crossing his arms, just waiting for her to acknowledge him.

Finally she bites. “What is it?”

“You seen the papers?”

“Not today,” Neve says distractedly, pacing back and forth in front of her desk, which has a note on it that she’d found, still wet with ink, when she came in earlier that day. From Lucanis, of course. She somehow expected sweet nothings or something of the like when she opened it, but instead he wrote about his day, about standing in the office without her there, writing that very letter. Between the lines was her own absence, clear in each word.

“You're in them again. At least in one.”

“For what? I've been busy. And not with anything that would put me in the papers.” Neve runs her fingers over a piece of fabric in her hands. Not just any piece of fabric — a handkerchief with the Dellamorte name embroidered on the corner, left folded neatly on her desk next to the note.

“It's strange,” Tarquin says. “Very boring case, and only in one paper.”

Neve pauses. Her hand drops. “The Imperial.”

Tarquin shifts in surprise. “Yeah.”

“Damn it.” Of course. She bought the paper the day the boy said Lucanis picked one up. Found nothing of note in its pages. But maybe Lucanis didn't need her to read that day's version of the paper. Maybe he needed it to have a look at a potential tool. And maybe he let the boy see him because he wanted Neve to know…

“Do you have the paper?” she asks Tarquin, whirling around to face him.

Surprised, he takes a step back. “Yes, here.” He pulls it, folded, out of his back pocket and tosses it to Neve, who catches it effortlessly and pulls it apart immediately.

The article is pretty basic, a generic case that would have gotten lost in the sea of generic cases that she's handled in the past. Her brows pull together as she reads — looking for something, some way to read between the lines…

She suddenly recalls the scent of orange blossom, the sound of the ocean crashing against the docks in a storm, an evening spent at the Cobbled Swan relatively recently, pressed together at a corner table. They ended up talking about encodings, ways that the Crows and the Dragons both passed information to one another without others noticing, and while both agreed that they wouldn't divulge their faction’s secrets to the other, they spent the rest of the evening creating their own, simple, rather silly, cipher.

Neve has it memorized, of course. Her fingers grow dark with ink as she traces the lines of the article to apply it.

The decoded message reads simply: A R L A T H A N.

Neve smiles. There's something wistful in it, and something determined. She knows where to go.

At the riverside in Arlathan, the Antivan Crow sets up his show, and leaves by the late morning. He's betting on a lot of things going exactly right — but they certainly aren't the worst odds he's ever faced.

And indeed, hours later, when he's long gone, the Shadow Dragon finds her way down to the rugged path by the water. Sharp eyes look around for evidence of his presence, but when she takes her first step on the path she stops immediately, because two candles at her sides light up in a little show of magic. She takes another step. Another pair of candles lights her way. As she walks down the rocky riverline more candles, stuck between rocks or in the dirt but neatly lined up nonetheless, light up with her presence, illuminating her way in the early evening.

When she finishes her quiet walk at the end of the path, she turns around and observes the way that the candles have lit. Then, with a twist of her staff, she sends a pair of bolts of ice down the way, bouncing off each candle to extinguish their flames. It's a fire hazard, after all.

It's a shame to put them out. Not as much as it is a shame that she walked alongside them alone, though.

It's been a long time since Lucanis has been to Rivain. Not since the gods. The eluvian trip is as easy as it always is, though, and Rook and Taash are even easier to find, on the shore digging around a washed-up shipwreck. There are formerly undead bodies littering the space around them, some still with arrows sticking out of them.

Rook, standing at the helm of the wreck, sees him first. She's decked out in gold and bright colors, clearly back to her old treasure-hunting ways. With a grin, she hops down to the ground and jogs over to him, bare feet deftly stepping around all the debris.

“Taash!” she calls out as she approaches. “It's Lucanis! Lucanis, hey. What are you doing here?”

“Looking for you,” he says, watching as Taash pokes their head out of the back of the ship and crawls out, making their way over. “I need… a favor.”

“Anytime,” Rook says immediately, sincerely. “Though you could also just come to hang out. What's up?”

“Well,” Lucanis starts, and then realizing he has no idea how to get into it, just finishes, “I'm proposing to Neve.”

“No shit!” says Taash.

“Whoa,” Rook says. “Like, marriage?”

“Yes. Except I'm trying to do it the Tevinter way.”

He gets identical blank looks from the both of them.

Briefly, Lucanis explains the restrictions around the two-week proposal.

“Is this a sex game?” asks Taash. “Did you make proposing into a sex game.”

“No, Taash, it's not…”

“Sounds like it.”

“It does kind of sound like it,” Rook says, and then when Lucanis shoots her a long-suffering look, “Sorry. Uh. Respect for other people's traditions, and all. Also, congratulations? What did you need my help for?”

“It's not that much,” Lucanis says. “You just need to promise not to tell Neve any details when she asks you.”

“Putting me in the path of Neve Gallus,” Rook mutters. “Some friend you are. Alright, hit me with it.”

There's a knock on Neve's door, again. Something that would've been a strange event, before Lucanis started sending deliveries to her door. Her hands still where they were tying her hair up, before she moves again, finishing the process with a casual air. Another three knocks.

She crosses her arms over her chest as she walks towards the door, already with a sneaking suspicion of who and what she will find behind it. Not the coffee boy. The impatience of the knocking gives this person away.

Knock, knock. Neve opens the door.

Rook stands there, looking by parts sheepish, vaguely guilty, and slightly confused. Then again, that's how she looks most of the time.

“Surprise gooseberry pie delivery?” she says, and holds out a box.

“I get that,” Neve says, cocking her head to one side as she rests a hand on the doorway entrance, long fingers tapping out a rhythm on the wood. “And why are you here with it?”

“Lucanis was worried about the rats,” Rook says. “Apparently he couldn't think of any better way to do it than to send me.”

“You?” Neve's gaze sharpens. “Not a random Minrathous passerby, paid off with an extraordinary amount of money and a threat to seal the deal?”

“Maybe he was afraid they'd steal the pie,” Rook shrugs. “It smells really good.”

“Give me that,” she says, and takes the pie to carefully set it aside.

Then she reaches out and grabs Rook by her exposed tunic, and drags her inside.

“Ack!” Rook squeaks as the door slams behind her, and she's tossed unceremoniously onto a chair. “I don't know anything, I swear!”

“Liar,” Neve says, but she's grinning. She plants her prosthetic leg up on the seat of the chair between Rook's thighs. “Don’t even try with me.”

“Seriously, I'm just doing a favor for a friend,” Rook swears, her hands already up in the air.

“Mhm,” Neve raises an eyebrow. “What's the favor, exactly? Why did it have to be you? What's his angle?”

“I don’t know!” Rook squirms on the chair, pinned in place by Neve's stare and the heel of her prosthetic. “Maybe he wanted to throw you off!”

“Did you just see him? Where did he hand off the pie?” Neve demands.

Rook purses her lips stubbornly. “I promised I wouldn’t say.”

“Did you, now.”

“I won't go back on my word!”

Neve pauses, considering. “Tell me what exactly you promised, then.”

Rook blinks. Then she gets a crafty glint in her eye, a twist upward of the corner of the lips. “Oh. I promised that I wouldn't say anything related to the favor I'm doing him, which was this pie delivery.”

“Alright,” Neve says. “Fine. Now tell me everything else. Especially anything that might give me a hint towards what he's doing tomorrow.”

“Damn it, Rook!”

Lucanis should have known better, really.

When he arrived at his favorite Crow lookout of late that morning, Neve was already waiting for him. She stood with her back against the door, arms crossed over her chest, looking for all the world like she just happened to be there. But when he turned the corner and saw her, her head shot up and they made eye contact.

Lightning sparked between them, in that moment. A second of breathless yearning that hit Lucanis like a dagger between the ribs, the likes of which he hadn't felt since before they started on this strange and wonderful journey together.

Then he turned tail and ran.

Now, he sprints down Treviso streets. Only his better knowledge of the area, he is fairly sure, keeps her off his back. Normally, he would also have Spite, and she would have no chance, because he would already be leaping for the rooftops.

But Spite is being… uncooperative.

Let us. See her! Spite snarls in his head, causing him to grit his teeth as he runs. He doesn't even have a good response — knows that it must be grandly confusing for Spite to have felt the desire, the calling towards her that he felt in that moment, and to know he would be accepted if he followed it, and then to run away.

Lucanis climbs up buildings the long way until he’s dashing across rooftops. Here is the true city, the part that the Crows own, and even without Spite’s help he feels confident in his escape.

He can hear her. The clicking of her prosthetic against the shingles of the roof. But it’s about to be over.

With a leap, he grabs hold of the handles of one of their infamous ziplines, and takes off across the sky. Neve won’t be able to follow until he’s crossed and the zipline is ready for her again — by which time he will be long gone.

He shouldn’t. But unable to help himself, Lucanis turns his head to catch a glimpse of her as she runs up to the zipline and skids to a stop.

Oh, but she’s smiling. Grinning, even, with a hand on her hip as she watches him go. It makes it worth it. Makes it all worth it.

Neve’s got another source: the coffee boy, who’s still been showing up to her door each day like clockwork with that steaming cup, and coming around to pick up the mug in the evening. It felt almost too obvious to look into his coming and going, so she didn’t bother too much with him. But there are only a couple days left, and she needs something to work with.

She stays up until the crack of dawn, and waits outside the Cobbled Swan, in the shadows, a proper stakeout. She needs to know if Lucanis comes himself, or if he sends someone with the coffee, and at what time exactly.

It’s possible she was too hasty, because she waits there hours, and she wishes she had that coffee already. But she doesn’t have much time, and she can’t miss his appearance.

Before the sun comes up, when the first rays of light are just beginning to find their way to the city, the boy rounds the corner and sits on the stairs leading up to the Cobbled Swan. No wonder he was paid well, Neve thinks, tasked with the job of valiantly protecting an enchanted cup of coffee for hours before finally delivering it.

Then Lucanis finally shows. From where she’s seated behind a stack of crates, she can just see the entrance to the Swan, and she straightens immediately when she sees him. Neve watches him greet the boy, and he takes what she realizes is the enchanted mug and then slips into the tavern, unlocking the doors with a key and closing them behind him. She frowns in confusion before she realizes he must be making the coffee using their kitchens. Clever. He’s working with all sorts for this.

She has half a mind to go catch him in the act of it, but when she takes a careful step from her perch her prosthetic makes a tapping sound on the ground anyway and the boy looks up, instantly alert. Her frown deepening, Neve doesn’t move further. The boy would just alert Lucanis, and she needs to play the long game.

A few minutes later, Lucanis comes out of the tavern, mug in hand. He hands it to the boy along with a little pouch, presumably of money.

In a moment, in that darkness before the sunrise, he leaves so quickly as to practically vanish.

But Neve smiles to herself. She has everything she needs to know.

There’s only one way he’s getting into Minrathous, after all.

If anything, Lucanis would have expected Neve to be waiting for him at the Minrathous eluvian far earlier in this two-week period. Who knows why she didn’t. Perhaps she found it unfair. Perhaps that’s why he got complacent, so close to the end.

When he steps into the first room of the old Shadow Dragon base, she ambushes him. Appears right out of nowhere, from the shadows in the corner — the Crow in him would be proud were he not so busy dodging her.

She’s too quick. Too prepared. As he turns she slams a hand on the wall just above his shoulder, inches from touching his face.

“Heading somewhere?” she says, leaning in. Lucanis closes his eyes, for a moment, just to take in her scent, the warmth he swears he can feel radiating from her. Any moment now, she’ll touch him, and the game will be up. He almost made it the full two weeks, just one day off. He did well, considering. And most importantly, Neve has enjoyed herself.

There’s a pang of disappointment, at having come so close to perfection, but he can ignore it.

But Neve doesn’t move. She simply stands there, her body caging him to the wall, her eyes pinning him to it like a clue to one of her boards.

“Aren’t you going to end this?” he asks, his voice coming out rough and unused.

“Won’t you?” she says. Her gaze flickers to his lips, and he feels its searing heat. She leans in just a bit closer, until her breath scatters across his cheek. “Lucanis.”

Unfair. He has always loved the way his name sounds coming from her mouth.

Spite, he thinks, I need you. He feels the rumbling discontent as answer, the vindictive taste of the creature inside him.

He raises one hand, and it hovers just above her waist; he shifts his head, and his own mouth is a slight movement away from touching the spot just under her ear. Neve likes that spot. It never fails to make her sigh, when he kisses her right there, and now he is close enough that he can feel the shiver that runs through her body. But he doesn’t touch.

She inhales, and her body slackens, and Lucanis immediately pulls back and away, sliding along the wall and putting space between them.

“Tomorrow,” he promises her, and demonic wings unfurl at his back, and he leaps away.

Neve doesn’t really know why she let him go. She had him right there. Maybe in the moment she wanted him to be the one to give in. Or maybe she just wanted to let him have it, in the end.

Either way — the day has come, the hourglass around her neck still dripping sand but almost empty on top, now. She has one last trick up her sleeve: she won’t make it easy for him. Just like she promised, way back when.

To the fringes of Dock Town, to the high rafters in the process of rebuilding, the ones that overlook the water over a dangerously high drop. These ones in particular are supposedly going to be seaside watch towers, looking out for traffic and pirates. She climbs up to the top of one and takes a seat on a flat wooden perch, her legs hanging over the edge.

Not long later, she hears quiet footsteps. She looks down and there he is, an easy drop below her, already looking up.

“Did you follow me up here?” she asks.

Lucanis climbs the last ladder, and slides into place right next to her. “No. I figured you’d go somewhere quiet. Somewhere where we could see the sea. And somewhere intentionally difficult to get to.”

“And you happened to make it here? Lucky.”

“Not so much,” he says. “You left me a clue.”

Neve smiles to herself. “So you found it.”

Well, she didn’t make it that difficult. Before she left the apartment, she took a last look at her board, littered with notes Lucanis had left her, sketches of the coffee boy and the musicians, a stick figure drawing of them Rook had left behind, a candle tied and hung from thread. And she pinned one more thing to it: her own patchy sketch of a watch tower, innocently lost among the other papers.

They sit in comfortable silence for a moment, and Neve imagines she can hear the last grains of sand in the hourglass.

“So,” Lucanis says slowly, “does that mean… it’s a yes? To… the proposal?”

She laughs at him. “Of course. I said yes two weeks ago. When I accepted the hourglass. Have you forgotten?”

A crease forms between his eyebrows. “I thought…”

“That the real proposal came now? No, the answer comes at the start.”

“Then what was all this?” Lucanis asks.

“Just a game,” Neve replies. “A fun one. Thank you.”

The hourglass, timed precisely, gives its last breath. It glows around her neck to signal its completion.

She puts his hand over his where it sits flat on the wood, and squeezes it. The first beat of touch in two weeks. Neve could swear something sparks at the contact, like flint striking wood. Lucanis leans in and presses his forehead gently to hers.

“I missed you,” he says quietly.

Her heart jumps at the words. She turns her head and kisses him softly, and he melts into her immediately, a sigh escaping his parted lips.

Yes, she thinks, she will marry him. And it’ll be easy.