Author's Note: A NSFW chapter has been omitted here, so if you feel like reading that, you can find it on Archive of Our Own or tumblr. Otherwise, here is a perfectly T-rated chapter to finish the story :)

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Some immeasurable time afterward they lie in a tangle of arms and legs, a stray bit of blanket caught between and under them. The smell of sweat and sex permeates the room, but where it might have bothered him before, Sasuke is surprised to find he does not mind.

He surprises himself even more when he is the one to break the silence.

"That was...unexpected," he ventures.

Sakura giggles, pushing herself up onto her elbow. "Really? All the foreplay up on the mountain and you think it's unexpected?"

"Foreplay?" he repeats, the meaning of the word not connecting to anything they have done before this. He takes a moment to understand to what she is referring. The realisation that Sakura has been as affected by watching him in battle as he was by her makes him smirk. "If that is the case, I am surprised you did not have your way with me the night we met."

"I didn't think it would be well-received," she replies dryly, and they both know she's right. She sighs, and curls into him, legs twining around his own. "Mmmm, your fingers. I've been imagining what those could do when they're not stringing a bow..."

Sasuke makes a face at the lewd tone but experiences a distant curiosity as to what his fingers might accomplish in the future.

Supposing there is one.

He dislikes speaking about such matters, but there is a world of complication that might ensue if they do not. Still, he is not sure the best way to raise the matter. Sakura is usually the more direct about these things, and yet she seems more content right now to trace invisible patterns across his chest and arms with her index finger.

He is tempted to let her.

But the sooner he knows the particulars of this sudden change in status, the sooner he will know if that's a possibility.

"This is likely an unwise course of action," he points out after several minutes of reluctant attempts to speak. "You have a Blight to stop. Distraction is not helpful at the moment."

"Well, if I'm distracting you, you're not as focussed a man as you pretend to be," she teases. "For shame, oh great Dalish warrior."

He shoots her an annoyed look out of the corner of his eye, making her laugh and sigh.

"I want to be happy," she mumbles, "while we can. It won't be easy, ending the Blight, destroying the archdemon...not to mention whatever political shitfest we get caught up in while doing it. It's likely one or both of us could end up dead before it's all over."

"I thought you were an optimist."

"I am...but I also believe in having a backup plan. Any dwarf who grew up casteless would," she tells him. "I aim to enjoy myself however I can until the big dust-up." She trails her hand down his chest. "And enjoy you."

Sasuke frowns at this. "So, this is...enjoyment."

That implication bothers him more than it should.

"You sound unsure. But I'm confident there was some enjoyment on your end," she purrs.

"That is not in question," he dismisses. "I would, however, question what significance our joining has to you. What is this meant to be?"

She goes tense.

"This is...whatever you want it to be," she says, but he catches a cautious note in her voice. "I realise that you have...commitments that may be at odds with anything I might want."

Sasuke processes this and then sits up abruptly. The movement displaces her hands and causes her to fall to one side. He frowns down at her for a moment, studying her tightly schooled features, and then smirks.

"You have been playing the Warden too long," he tells her. "You are so used to walking the line of compromise to win allies and support, you no longer know how to answer a direct question. It is a pity—that dwarven forthrightness of yours is one of your best qualities."

"What's that supposed to mean?" she demands, sitting up as well. She pulls the blanket up to cover herself, the modest gesture at odds with her usual confidence.

Sasuke shakes his head. "I have no stomach for talking circles around one another. You have feelings for me—and they go beyond our tryst here tonight."

The colour drains from her face, and her eyes flash with a tiny flare of panic. "I—"

"And I have no patience for the casual dalliances that others in our party might prefer," he continues. He allows her a moment to process this, and then continues in a somewhat softer voice. "It is true that it is better for us to avoid sentiment, especially in pursuit of our goals. But I am not one to deny a truth apparent to both of us. If I did not feel something for you, tonight would not have happened. Which you knew, or you would not have sought me out."

"I...hoped," she admits shyly.

Sasuke snorts. "It is inconvenient. It might have been better if we avoided this, but what us done is done. The past cannot be changed, or so I have learned."

"Would you?"

"Would I what?"

"Change what we did?"

"We have established that for once this is about what you want," he replies. "What future do you envision, Warden?"

And though the question is innocuous enough, they both understand he is asking more than that.

She gazes at him solemnly for a little longer than he's comfortable with, and then her shoulders square.

"When the Blight is over, and Naruto is Konoha's king, and Kakashi goes back to avoiding Templars, and all the others...return to their lives...I want to go with you. Wherever you go."

"You are a Warden," he reminds her. "Will you not have commitments?"

"As I understand it, Wardens stop Blights and fight darkspawn," she replies. "There are darkspawn across the entire continent, and I can fight them just as well in Oto as anywhere else the Order could send me. If they even still want me."

She leans close, clutching at his hand and clasping it to her heart.

"I want to travel," she goes on. "I want to see the world and be able to appreciate it, instead of hurrying from place to place, rallying troops, and questing for sacred urns, or fulfilling treaties. I want to visit the ocean, because I've never been there but I hear it's nice, or see the ruins of ancient civilisations forgotten even by my ancestors. I want to eat food that doesn't come out of a cup and walk through a town without worrying about being arrested because I'm a Grey Warden or casteless or because someone sees me as a threat to their power. I want to take the time to stop and help people who are sick and dying, and who we haven't had time to help because we need to fight the damn Blight. And I want to do all of those things with you."

Sasuke's mouth goes dry.

For a brief instant, he can see the future she has envisioned. It is brighter than anything he's considered, filled not with endless years of lonely wandering in the cold, but a warmth and light. Enduring spring instead of bleak winter.

But neither of them is free to experience that.

Perhaps his doubt shows on his face because hers arranges itself into careful blankness. "Of course...that's just what I want. It could be...we don't want the same thing."

Her wording is careful, with nary an inflexion to colour it, but he can see the vulnerability that flashes in her eyes at the inkling he might not share her vision. He's not sure how to explain that he wants to, even if it is not meant to be.

"I do not know," he admits at last, and it is more heartfelt than he expected. "It would depend on how the next few months, or even years, go. How successful you are at ending the Blight."

"How successful we are. You don't think I'm going to do this thing single-handedly, do you?" she twits him, hopeful humour coming back to her. Since his reply was not an outright refusal, she seems comforted. "No matter the circumstances, it will take a while. We still need to heal Arl Hiruzen. That's at least a week before we get there. And he'll know what to do about the political situation in Konoha. We can leave that to him, thank the Ancestors."

"Hm."

"And we have to get Naruto ready to rule once we take Danzō out of the equation."

"An effort as difficult as the Blight itself."

"That could take months," she says in would-be-innocence.

"Even years," he agrees, catching the byplay.

"Beyond that, we still have treaty-bound allies to seek out for the Blight," Sakura goes on, rearranging herself so she is lying on her side now. Sasuke mirrors her movement until they lie facing one another, scant inches apart. "We already have the mages at the Circle, thanks to Kakashi, but once we heal the Arl, we still need to approach the elves and the dwarves."

"Neither option seems appealing."

"Tell you what—you go deal with the dwarves, and I'll approach the elves," she suggests.

"No. I may be an outcast, but I am still less likely to be shot approaching a Dalish camp than you or the shemlen are."

Sakura sighs. "I know...I just...the idea of going home is terrifying. What if it turns out my parents are dead after all? What if that ghost in the temple was just trying to make me feel hopeful?"

He does not answer because it is a possibility; instead, he reaches out for her hand, threading their fingers together. Sakura's eyes go unfocussed for a moment, pain and longing there, before she masters herself. She sighs, squeezing his fingers, and then relaxes.

"And it's not just that," she continues as if there was no lull. "I may be a Warden now, but the people back home will only ever see me as casteless. It will take a lot of punching people in the face to get them to listen."

"You said they were bound by treaty to aid the Wardens."

"Yeah. They'll honour the treaty, but they'll take their time about it. By the time the dwarves decide on anything, we might all be dead from the Blight."

"I have no doubt you will engineer some plan or other. You usually do."

"Mm, now you sound like the optimist," she murmurs, leaning forward to kiss him. He automatically returns the gesture, and the next minutes or aeons pass in a slow, lazy exploration of each other's mouths.

Just as he notices his lower extremities stirring with interest once more, she pulls back, gracing him with a gentle smile. "I'm suddenly very confident. We'll figure something out. Maybe offer political alliance through Naruto. Open trade routes or a dwarven presence in the kingdom..."

She trails off, adopting the planning face he has seen so often. He can only imagine the complex network of plans she might yet come up with but discovers he is not curious about any of them anymore.

Not wanting to lose her interest yet, he once more tilts her chin toward him. "Leave your machinations for daylight."

"There's a lot of planning," she protests, but it is half-hearted. "If I'm to leave this place in good hands before we go find your brother, everything has to be arranged, and we have little time to do it in."

"Before we go...?" he repeats, pausing in his pursuit of her mouth.

"You said it was your duty to your clan," she reminds him. "It's the first thing you'll do when this is all over, and I aim to be by your side." He draws away from her, and she tenses. Apprehension crosses her features. "That is...unless you don't want me there."

"It is not that," he says, unable to look away from her even as she suddenly seems too bright for his gaze. "The deed I must carry out is distasteful. It is not something I would want anyone to bear witness to, and you...I do not want..."

"I wouldn't be coming to bear witness," she says quietly. "I would come with you because he's your brother and even though you would do this out of duty, you love him. It will hurt when you succeed. And I want to be there to hold you together in case you you can't."

He has no idea what to say to this.

"No heart is resilient forever, Sasuke-kun," she whispers. "At some point, even the strongest stone can break, especially when it's been worn away from many years of force."

He shakes his head, mystified. "You do not know me. Not for as long as you have known the others."

"And considering all of us could die tomorrow, knowing you a day is the same as knowing you forever."

"I doubt that is how it works..."

"Besides, in that time, haven't I shown myself to be an excellent judge of character?" she counters. He cannot argue with that; Sakura can read people in a way he never could. "If your soul was as irredeemable as you seem to think it is, do you believe I would have asked you to come with us that day we met? Do you think I would have opened myself to you the way I did tonight? I've seen darkness. I fight it every day, and more often than not, I kill it. It never even entered my mind to put you in that category."

And because he knows her, he knows this is true.

It is a sobering, terrifying notion, but at the same time his heart leaps in something like excitement. Or confidence.

Do not let yourself be drawn in, his rational mind and experience cautions him. She is beholden to the Wardens. You have sworn yourself to vengeance. Her childish dream is doomed already.

He wants to say so, but she gazes at him so intently that he holds back the words. There is something about this woman that instils hope—and his life has been lacking in such a thing for a long time.

"As you said: we could die before that ever happens," he reminds her.

"It's just one future before us," she tells him. "I don't care what we do, as long as we're together. Whether it's for the next thirty minutes or the next thirty years."

He has trouble catching his breath. "You can see a future where we live another thirty years?"

"Well, like you said, I'm an optimist," she grins. "Also, as stubborn as dirt."

"I am...beginning to understand that."

He does not think he will ever understand this woman or the way her mind works. But in that moment, it occurs to him he does not mind that in the least.

Images of the past few days filter back to him—of Sakura making faces over their tasteless rations or holding his hand as he struggles to remember his parents faces. Of her standing over the body of the dragon, fierce and fearless, to the deadened eyes of the clone he killed. Sakura struggling comically to catch up with her long-legged colleagues through the snow, to her vulnerability in the darkness as she waited for him to accept her advances, to the ecstasy on her face in the moment of release. The way her eyes sparkle when she grins at him and the sound of her laugh.

Shit.

He finally knows what this, with a certainty that should not be so concrete, especially in the face of their current circumstances. And though his brain and logic reprimand himself for allowing this, he has also never been one to deny a fact once it has been made so clear.

"Sasuke-kun?" she questions.

He reaches out slowly, tracing his fingers over the rhombus-shaped brand on her forehead, gazing down at her in wonder.

"Ar lath ma, vhenan," he tells her, the words forming on their own and half without his permission. And yet, as startling as it is to say them, that they are true is without doubt.

"What's that mean?" she asks, curious.

But he shakes his head, not ready to share that with her yet. Whatever his own realisations, it is far too soon.

"It means, I could use someone handy with an axe," he tells her instead, attempting to sound casual and unaffected.

She sees though it, of course, and for a second her cheeks flush and the smile she offers him is joy and hope and that word he cannot share with her in a language she understands. Not yet.

And then that shifts into something else, and she adopts a speculative look.

"Hm," she pretends to consider, and presses herself in close to him. Her fingers slide southward. "Is there anything else you think I'm handy with?"

He does not manage to answer before her fingers slip below his navel and encircle him where he is already stiffening.

"Dwarves," he groans. "Always so crass."

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Translations:

Shemlen – quick children; elvish name for humans

Ar lath ma, vhenan – I love you, my heart