"Going to squeeze that in before you leave, are you?"

Alistair looks sideways, eyebrows raised and up-and-down glance evaluating—but there's still fondness in the corners of his eyes and mouth, not quite tucked out of view, to soften the haughtiness of it. He's only sparring. Not fighting. Not for now.

"I'm not actually yours to order around, you know," he says. "If you want me running errands, you have to be nice to me." And stay. He has to stay. Stay, Alistair thinks at him very hard, like a prayer.