peopleofthedas | Pitiless Games, Chapter 8: The Rag-and-Bone Shop of the Heart

Chapter Eight has had quite enough, thank you very much, and is known as The Rag-and-Bone Shop of the Heart. (And also on AO3.) Chapter is SFW; story overall is rated M.

Title: Old Roads: Pitiless Games
Rating: M (for the sexytimez, and for occasional graphic violence)
PC: Amell
Word Count: ~71k, ~10.5k this chapter
Spoilers: At this point, it's not so much spoilers as it might not make any sense if you haven't played through Origins/Awakening...
Summary: Amaranthine is destroyed, and Warden Amell travels to Vigil’s Keep to take command. But one either must play the game of politics or be used as a pawn, and like it or not, every last one of Kathil’s demons are about to come home to roost... Amell/Zevran/Cullen, post-Awakening, multiple viewpoints, Part 5 of Old Roads.

(I am trying this whole "posting the whole text to DW thing. We'll see how it goes.)

Eight: The Rag-and-Bone Shop of the Heart

Let us speak now of your children, mortals.

We see them, each trembling and knock-kneed,
raising their wavering power against those they have found themselves
caged unto. We see them, and we pity them.

For they die, those shivering children,
those children you dash against the rocks unwilling,
those tender children, those sweet children,
those children who open gently to our searching hands.

—From The Canticle of Demons, stanza six: of the Harrowed

Jowan:

They walked into the chantry as if to face down an enemy, flanked by all of the warriors they could bring without making it completely obvious that they expected trouble.

He, Kathil, and Alistair were in the center, Kathil carrying Cerys. ("I won't leave her behind," she'd said. "Maker only knows who would try something.") On her left was Cullen; on Jowan's right was Justice. The Mabari flanked them, walking a bit ahead. Behind them came four of Alistair's guards, three men and a woman.

("I'm a Grey Warden," Alistair had pointed out when Kathil had tried to dissuade him from coming along. "Drank the darkspawn blood and everything. Besides, I'd like to make it very clear that you have the support of the crown." Kathil had just shrugged and told him that he'd better change, then. Alistair had just been hugged by a very enthusiastic and extremely muddy Duncan.)

Revered Mother Leanna was waiting for them by the altar. She looks like she's spent years sucking on alum. She leaned heavily on a cane made of polished wood.

As they approached, the priest eyed them all and then inclined her head towards Alistair. "Your Majesty," she said. Then to the rest of them, "Wardens."

She managed to put an entire winter's worth of ice into that one word.

"Revered Mother," Alistair said. "We hear you have some wounded here. The Warden-Commander and the other Warden have some healing talent between the two of them, and thought they might be able to help."

The expression on the Revered Mother's face did not alter a hair. "No."

Alistair blinked, taken aback, but it was Kathil who answered. "Do share your reasoning, Revered Mother."

The woman drew in a breath, and straightened. Despite her pinched face and her hunched shoulders, she was still an imposing figure. She put Jowan in mind of one of the Sisters who'd been at the Tower, the one who would smack the back of your head if she caught you nodding off at prayers. "I have a responsibility to protect those in my care," she said. "That one—" and she gestured at Jowan— "is a known maleficar. You are an apostate, and possibly a maleficar. You may be able to hide behind the banner of the Grey, but that does not oblige me to allow you access to those who are wounded here."

Kathil cocked her head. "And so you cut them off from their best hope of a full recovery?"

"And how am I to know what you intend?" Mother Leanna asked, her voice going sharp. "The maleficar may wish merely to spill more blood, and from what I hear you are far better at taking men apart than you are at putting them together again."

There was silence for a moment, and Jowan was very aware of the Templars who stood with their backs to the walls. If a fight started here, they would shut down both him and Kathil in moments. They weren't helpless without magic, but the odds of them surviving would drop precipitously if both of them were hit with the cleansing.

Then Kathil spoke, and her voice held more than a little fatigue. "Revered Mother, this is not about you protecting those who are wounded, and I am already tired of your insistence that it is. This has to do with a disagreement that you have with me, as well as a troop of Templars you sent to take my daughter away from me."

"They were sent to rescue her," Leanna said. She did not back down, or flinch from Kathil's steady gaze. "We remove the children of mages for their own good, so they cannot be touched by the demons who torment their parents' souls. Little ones are so vulnerable, their minds so open."

"Oh, please." Kathil stepped forward; Jowan saw Cerys squirm a little as her mother's grip on her tightened. "Let's be honest with each other, shall we? The Chantry has an interest in controlling the Circle, which means controlling all of the mages it can find. Without the Circle, the Chantry loses half of its power. It does retain the other half." She inclined her head towards one of the Templars nearby. "I represent a threat to that control."

"You are very...visible. You should be setting an example, not flouting the law." Mother Leanna's face had gone to stone.

Kathil made a sound that was half sigh, half snort. "But I am setting an example. Just not the one that you'd like me to set."

The Revered Mother's face flushed. "Get. Out. You will not speak this heresy under the roof of the Chantry."

There were a few breaths of silence then, and for a moment Jowan almost thought he could see two opposing forces facing off. Not just a pinched old woman and a small, battered mage, but the shadow of dragon wings behind Kathil, the suggestion of thousands of raised swords behind Leanna.

Unstoppable force, meet immoveable object.

"Let us be clear," Kathil said. Her voice was an icy wind through the nave. "You are throwing Grey Wardens out of this Chantry. You are throwing the King out. And you are throwing out two of the people who saved your sorry sodding asses from the Blight." She paused and eyed the Revered Mother. "You may want to reconsider those words."

Mother Leanna was visibly taken aback. She'd made a tactical error, Jowan saw, and well she knew it. The Chantry, like everyone else, had a vested interest in remaining in good odor with the Crown. If it got back to Denerim that she had thrown the King out on his ear...

She'd be defrocked and sent off to some little village in the middle of nowhere to spend the rest of her days.

Jowan found the thought quite cheering, actually.

"I, ah—of course I didn't mean King Alistair—my apologies, sire, I didn't mean—" She paused and took a breath apparently struggling to regain her composure. "Of course the King is welcome to stay—"

"And I am still a Grey Warden," Alistair said. "I've made it quite clear to the Grand Cleric my opinions on Kathil as Warden-Commander. Do I really need to reiterate them?"

For a moment it looked like the wind had been taken out of the Revered Mother's sails. But then she rallied, took a breath, gripped the head of her cane more tightly. "With all respect, sire, simply because the Warden-Commander has the favor of the Crown does not mean she can come into my chantry and speak what she knows very well is heresy. The Wardens have no influence here." And well you all know it, her sharp look said.

Jowan expected Kathil to retort, but instead it was Justice who spoke. "Is it not the mission of this human religion to sing your Chant of Light from everywhere in the world?"

For the first time, the Revered Mother looked closely at Justice. She visibly paled, but otherwise maintained her composure. "It's the primary mission, yes, among others."

Justice gave the woman a long look, calmly measuring her. "Then why do you put your Chant in danger of having several fewer voices with which to sing it?" He sounded genuinely curious.

"Magic exists to serve man, and never to rule over him. Foul and corrupt are they who have taken His gift and turned it against His children. They shall be named Maleficar, accursed ones. They shall find no rest in this world, or beyond." The Revered Mother's voice was inexorable as a tide. "We do not treat with maleficars, Warden."

The spirit tilted his head. "And those are the words of your Andraste?"

Leanna blinked. "They are."

"It is strange," Justice mused. "Her words are clear, yet the interpretation seems to be in doubt. From what I understand, she was speaking against those mages who sought to rule over this world. And even in her words, she calls mortal magic a gift from her Maker. She does not mention blood magic. Merely magic that has been turned against mortals."

"Even if that is so, there is the matter of the law." Jowan could almost swear that the Revered Mother was enjoying herself. "The laws of the Chantry and the land are very clear, and for good reason. Blood magic is a foul perversion of a Maker-given gift, a power gifted by demons." The woman's face settled into a steely mien. "Come to me when you have seen a child gutted for his innocent blood, when you have seen a village slaughtered by a demon's minions, and tell me of tolerance. There must be none."

Justice raised one gloved hand. Jowan had seen that hand bare, recently; it was mottled with dark bruise, a bloodless fissure in the palm showing grey tendon and white bone. "I have recently come to understand that the human words for law and justice do not mean precisely the same thing. The law may be unjust. Justice may be unlawful." He paused, his drawn face thoughtful. "To blindly follow the law may lead to injustices. For instance, the Warden here is a blood mage, that is true enough. But the Commander has more of the scent of demons about her, despite the fact that she does not use blood magic."

Jowan's stomach flipped over. Maker, Justice, can you ever leave well enough alone?

But Kathil was just standing there, looking interested, and Jowan wondered what was going on here that he was missing.

Leanna was retaining an iron grip on her composure. "The Commander...has the scent of demons?"

"Indeed. Of course, so does this place." He gestured at the front of the chantry, and off to the side. "Particularly over there, at the edge of where the Templars have been able to close the Veil. I would not be surprised to see that place tear soon."

Jowan remembered the spirit saying something about that earlier, something about the Templars in the chantry pulling the Veil closed so tightly over that area that the weakened Veil in the rest of the city was having difficulty compensating. It was so strong in the chantry that it was causing localized weaknesses nearby.

Rather too nearby for the Revered Mother's comfort, it seemed.

She glanced at the Templar who stood closest to her, who inclined his head with a soft creak of metal and leather. "We were trying to tell you, your Reverence. We have been closing the tears as we can, but there aren't enough of us."

There was a single moment when Mother Leanna looked uncertain, as if she were briefly entertaining the idea that somehow her own Templars were in collusion with the Wardens. Then she took a breath. "We will discuss this. Sire, Wardens—you must excuse me."

"We can help move your people," Kathil said, exactly as if it had just occurred to her that they could be useful.

"Perhaps," the Revered Mother said, though it sounded like Over my dead body. "Please, you must excuse me."

Kathil nodded, motioned to the rest of them. They retreated through the doors of the chantry. Lorn stuck close by his mistress, eyeing the knights who stood motionless against the walls. Cerys started to fuss. Kathil took a deep breath, shifted the child in her arms, glanced at Cullen. "That went about as well as I expected," she said, keeping her voice low. "Let's head back."

The area outside the chantry held a commanding view of much of the city, and held a statue of Andraste and a bare Chanter's Board, currently unmanned. Behind them, the doors of the Chantry closed. "You took a risk there," Jowan said.

"A calculated one," Alistair replied. "She'd never hear the end of it if she actually started a physical fight with the King in the room. Not that I don't think she was tempted."

"And I cheated a bit," Kathil said, and a smile surfaced on her face and vanished like a fish flashing fin in a dark pool. "Justice and I did some reconnaissance yesterday. Once I understood what was happening to the Veil here, I thought that the Revered Mother might care about it if it was brought to her attention."

"Besides," Alistair added, "on occasion the chantry needs to be reminded that despite everything, we did save them."

Anything more he might have had to say was forestalled by the opening of the doors of the chantry. A woman slipped through the doors and shut them behind her. She was carrying a baby in her arms, wrapped in embroidered cloth. Jowan felt his chest tighten; the woman was Delilah Howe. Her shoulders were stiff, and her mouth was drawn. "Sire—Wardens—thank you for coming, but—surely there is something that could be done?" Her voice failed her briefly and she made a choking noise. "I'm sorry. I just—I'm so afraid that Albert is going to die and leave me alone, and I can't move him on my own. The Templars won't help me."

"I'm afraid we have to respect the Revered Mother's wishes," Kathil said. "But if you want to bring him out—Alistair? I think two or three of your guard might be able to get in and out without incurring the wrath of the good priest. I'd hoped to see the others while we were in there, but..." She made a helpless gesture, mouth twisting sourly. "I won't force the issue. The Templars may also help you move him, now that the fragility of the Veil within the city has been brought to the Revered Mother's attention."

"Give the Revered Mother a bit to recover from the fit our visit has probably given her," Alistair said. "I'll send some of my guard for you and your husband in, say, an hour or so."

Delilah paled briefly, but recovered and dropped an awkward curtsy, the movement of a woman who'd been born to nobility but who hadn't needed to use most of those graces for years. "Sire. Thank you." She backed away and slipped back through the doors of the chantry.

Kathil turned and started walking towards the stairs. "Alistair, I'd like you to take Delilah and Albert back to the Vigil with you when you head back to Denerim. We won't be able to take them—we have to go to the Blackmarsh before we go to the keep."

This is the first I've heard of that. "The Blackmarsh?" Jowan asked. "Why?"

She averted her eyes; it was answer enough. "Had a tip that there are some strange goings-on there, and Justice has mentioned that the Veil was badly torn there recently," she said after a moment. She shifted Cerys in her arms. The infant was fisting her hands on the edge of Kathil's cuirass. "I like to keep an eye on places like that when I can."

And I wonder what's waiting on the other side of the Veil that you're not mentioning.

They returned to the camp outside the gates. There was a fresh crowd of people waiting at the gates themselves; word was spreading that the King was in Amaranthine, and farmholders were making the trip in to gawk at their monarch for themselves. Jowan was never comfortable with crowds. In his experience, they all too easily turned into mobs.

He slipped off to the back side of the Redcliffe camp; some of the soldiers were filling in one of the latrine trenches and digging a new one, and he joined in. He headed back to his little tent, and realized that someone had pitched another one right next to his. It was in the only relatively clear space in the camp that wasn't being used for some other purpose, true, but with a sense of unease he realized who the tent must have been put up for.

Emerging from the flap was proof that he was correct. Delilah Howe straightened and stretched, one hand on her lower back, and saw Jowan. "I suppose we're neighbors," she said, and gave him a weak smile. "The Commander says that the King will transport us back to Vigil's Keep in a few days."

Jowan nodded. "I'm sure Nathaniel will be happy to see you, and we have one of the best healers outside the Circle Tower at the keep. Though I'm sure Kathil and I will take a look at your husband in a bit."

Her smile was more genuine this time, and it lit her storm-grey eyes. She would have been pretty, if her face hadn't been so drawn and worried-looking. "I was so afraid, when the Revered Mother turned you away..." She trailed off. "Is it true? What she said about you?"

He'd almost forgotten that he didn't actually have maleficar branded across his forehead. It only felt like it, most days. "One of my schools is blood, yes. But I'm a Warden, first and foremost, and I haven't made any deals with demons." Unlike, say, the Hero of Ferelden.

Oddly enough, it looked for a moment like she might even believe him. "I see. And...you have healing skills?"

"Some, yes." He hesitated—how much to say about Anders? He didn't like the man, but he was a good healer. "There's a Warden at Vigil's Keep who will be able to do more."

Delilah raked her hair out of her eyes with one hand. "Albert is sleeping right now. He seemed to be less feverish as soon as he was carried out of the chantry. Do you think—"

The rest of her question was lost forever as a scream cut through the hubbub of the camp, and all eyes turned towards the source. Near one of the cook fires, a woman with light hair stood with her hands clamped over her mouth, staring down at a body at her feet. A body wearing very familiar dark armor, a shield emblazoned with the Warden griffin on it.

Justice.

"Stay here," Jowan said to Delilah, and started towards the woman. Kathil and Cullen were coming through the crowd as well, the Mabari at their heels.

As Jowan pulled up, he could see the woman was sobbing. "Kristoff...Ah, Maker, he just fell..." She shuddered.

Cullen said, "You knew his name, before. You must be Kristoff's wife. What happened?"

"My name is Aura, yes. I...I heard that the Wardens were here, so I came to see if Kristoff—what used to be Kristoff—his body—" The woman choked. "I just got here, he seemed to recognize me. I almost turned around..." She looked down at the armor-clad body. Justice was sprawled face-down, the palm of one hand turned upward as if in supplication "He just...smiled at me, and said, 'Now I see'. And fell down." She fisted her hands, pressed them against her chest. "I...I wanted to say goodbye. I am taking ship tomorrow, back to Orlais. But—I never—"

Kathil was silent, staring down at the body at their feet, a peculiar look of sorrow on her face. Cullen glanced at her, then reached out to rest a hand on Aura's shoulder. "I'm sorry for your loss," he said. "Take some time, we'll prepare...er...the body. Think about whether you want to take him back to Orlais, or if you want him buried here."

"He should be buried here," Aura said. She swayed on her feet. "He would have wanted that. Please...I should sit down..."

Cullen moved towards Aura, but it was Kathil who caught the woman as she began to crumple. She transferred Aura's sagging body to Cullen's arms. "You two find a place for Aura to recover. I'll see to the body." Her voice was rough-edged in a way Jowan had heard it just once before—the day they learned that Sati had died.

In the tumult that followed, with an argument about whether it could be properly called a funeral if there wasn't a priest and where exactly they were going to bury the body that Justice had occupied, as Aura sobbed in confusion and grief—her husband was dead, had been dead for half a year, and today she had lost him once more—Jowan tried to be helpful, awkwardly comforted Aura, helped dig the grave in the field just outside the walls where soldiers were buried.

The law may be unjust. Justice may be unlawful.

Jowan wondered who the spirit had been speaking to, just then.

And why.

Zevran:

Of course, the horse went lame.

Zevran's luck had largely been holding, but it had never extended to horses, carriages, and the like. He was forced to leave the poor creature at an isolated farmhold with some payment for its care and a promise that the creature would eventually be collected by someone from Vigil's Keep. It took him five days to get to Amaranthine, traveling rough and light and often late into the night. There was something hard and hot in his chest, and it took him some time to realize that he was—it was strange—lonely. He missed his family, and his tiny, vulnerable daughter.

His ankle was twinging as he walked, worse in the cold mornings. He made himself cups of willowbark tea on the nights he had a fire and tried to ignore it.

He'd hoped to have a chance to make himself presentable before looking for his family. But as he came up the hill and the walls of Amaranthine came into view, a certain Templar was at the edge of the fence that marked the edge of the refugee camp huddled outside the walls.

It was only a few moments later that Zevran found himself being caught up in a rough, almost desperate hug. "Thank the Maker you're back," Cullen said, and kissed him.

A few moments later, Zevran regained enough awareness to reflect that he was quite glad to be here. "I take it you missed me?" he murmured, conscious of dozens of curious eyes turned their way.

"Could say that," Cullen said, grinning as he released Zevran. "Now that you're back, we can leave."

He raised an eyebrow. "We are in that much of a hurry?"

Cullen nodded and picked up Zevran's pack from where he'd dropped it. "Kathil and the Revered Mother are having a standoff. There's quite the betting pool on who attacks the other first. Once Alistair left—three days ago now—the Templars started sitting at the edge of the Redcliffe camp. Watching. It's been...unnerving." They were passing between tents now, dodging around men and women hauling baskets and bags. "Justice is gone. Alistair had to leave, and he took his guard with him. Leliana's only just now been able to walk a little, but she's managed to talk the Redcliffe guard into keeping watch for us. But now you're here, we can leave."

"Back to Vigil's Keep?" Zevran asked.

"To the Blackmarsh. Southeast." Cullen caught Zevran's look and shook his head slightly. Ah. It was one of those things, was it?

His Warden, when they found her, was attempting to console a wailing infant. Leliana sat nearby, one leg splinted and bound. Three Redcliffe guards were nearby, far enough to not be obtrusive but near enough to be handy in case of trouble.

Kathil turned, bouncing Cerys, and caught sight of him. For a moment, she stood stunned, as if she had been partially convinced that he had been a figment of her imagination all along. Then she smiled, and the light came into her eyes, and she was one of the most beautiful things he had ever seen.

It was his day for being embraced as if he were a rope tossed to a drowning swimmer. Kathil was less rough, but only because she had Cerys in one arm. Her hand fisted around his weapon harness, she kissed him soundly and then simply stood, holding onto him. Cerys squirmed violently, her face screwed up, but ceased crying for the moment.

"I have returned, yes?" he said, somewhat unnecessarily. "Safe and sound, and successful."

"And late." She kissed him again and released him, shifting Cerys. "You were supposed to be here days ago."

"Horse trouble." He smiled at her, and was pleased to see the corner of her mouth twitch upward. Ah, he was not in so very much trouble, then. The annoyance covered worry, he knew. "I am given to understand that we must be on our way, yes?"

"Yes." Kathil glanced down at Cerys, moved her to lie against her chest with her head on her shoulder "The situation here has gotten..." She trailed off as she closed her eyes, the strain clearly showing on her features.

"Complicated?" he suggested. She nodded. "Well. Do I have time to bathe before we flee? The road rather lacked most of the niceties. Or even the basics, truly."

"Give Cerys to me," Leliana said. "Zevran, you and I must have a discussion, but later." She gave him a sly look. "Go, we will pack, yes?"

An hour later, he had washed, and had also witnessed the presence of the Templars of Our Lady Redeemer for himself. The Revered Mother led a service as he walked by, lecturing about the dangers of maleficarum. Her voice was clear, and carried well.

He supposed she had been at that for days. No wonder tempers in the camp were frayed and near snapping. All of his questions—what had happened to Leliana, why precisely they were going to somewhere called the Blackmarsh, what had happened to the dead but still lively Grey Warden who went by Justice—all those things could wait.

He was met at the edge of the Redcliffe camp by Lorn, who had evidently been sent to collect him. "You have been keeping an eye on your mistress for me, have you not?" Lorn gave a low woof and a brief wag, an affirmative if Zevran had ever seen one. Zevran followed the dog to the edge of the Redcliffe camp, where his companions awaited.

They had a mule and a cart, Leliana sitting perched on a pile of packs in it. She waved at him, and smiled. "And there he is, all pretty once more." The Tevinter child—what was her name again? Ah, yes, Murena—was crouched beneath the cart, peering out from between the wheel spokes. Lorn went to her and nuzzled her ear, and the child giggled. "Come, throw your things in here with me. Kathil and Cullen, they refuse to let me walk to the Blackmarsh, and I refused to let them send me back to Vigil's Keep with Alistair, so we have come up with a compromise."

He did so, settling his pack in corner of the cart. The mule's ear twitched at him. "Speaking of the Wardens—"

"On their way," Leliana replied. "They wished to speak with the captain of the Redcliffe guard. I am afraid the Revered Mother has decided that her quarrel with Kathil extends to them as well." She sighed. "I would have been able to make her see reason, but at the time I was forbidden to stand, much less walk into Amaranthine."

He pointed his chin at her knee. "What happened?"

"A great lout of a supposed bandit with a hammer happened," she said. "We were attacked on the way to Amaranthine—but, ah, that is a story for another time, when there are not so many ears nearby. And besides, here are our Wardens, ready for travel."

Zevran turned. Kathil and Cullen were indeed making their way through the camp, Jowan trailing behind them with Cerys in her sling. Cullen was in armor, Kathil and Jowan in shabby traveling clothes. It appeared they were not going to be advertising the presence of mages in their little traveling party for the moment.

Fiann ran up to Zevran, butting her head against his hip and trying to lick his hands. "I am glad to see you too," he said, amused. "So, shall we away?"

There was a squeak from around the vicinity of his knees; Murena peered out from beneath the cart, Lorn still trying to lick her ear. The girl emerged and went to take the mule's lead rope as Cullen came forward to embrace Zevran.

"You smell better now," Cullen said. Ah, it was good to be here, after days spent on the road that had been an unwelcome reminder of parts of Zevran's life he would prefer to forget. "Makes me wish we didn't have to be off again so quickly."

Kathil slipped in on Zevran's other side, the sharp scent of her skin familiar and welcome. They stood in that three-way embrace for a moment, and Zevran knew his tardiness was forgiven. Then they parted, and began to walk towards the Blackmarsh.

Once they were clear of Amaranthine, Zevran was filled in on everything that had happened while they had been parted, from the bandit attack and the suspicion of who was truly behind it to Kathil's confrontation with the Revered Mother. The story of Justice's ending was told by Jowan, who had of them all seen the most of it. Kathil, during the story, looked troubled, but did not speak. He could well imagine that losing one of those in her command would bother her. He knew, as most did not, that her original disappearance had been precipitated not only by Alistair's wedding but by a Joining gone disastrously wrong.

He didn't think any of them had truly understood Justice, but he had been in Kathil's command, and that he was gone was a loss for the order.

Around them, the green blush of spring that had been creeping over the land was intensifying, darkening. "And you were successful?" Kathil asked him just after they forded a muddy rivulet swollen with recent rain.

"It was a terrible tragedy." He gestured with one hand to indicate the world is a strange and twisted place, is it not? He had Cerys in her sling. He had missed her with a strange and urgent impatience, and now that he was back he was loath to let her go for very long. "Lady Packton visited her young lover on her way home. Who knew that she had a bad heart? Her exertions with her paramour quite undid her."

Kathil made a choked sound. "You didn't. Well, I suppose I said I didn't care how it happened, didn't I?"

"You did." He eyed her. "You are troubled?"

She'd gone reflective, her eyes absently searching the scrub at the side of the road. "I feel sorry for the person who woke up to a cold body and no explanations. Are you sure he didn't see anything?"

"He was sleeping like a babe in arms, my Warden." He glanced down at Cerys, who was napping in the sling. "As far as he or anyone should ever realize, her death was natural. I am very good at my job."

"You are, at that. And Liza Packton is no longer a threat. Without her needling and the leadership of one of the banns who were involved in an assassination attempt on Laurens, the rest will fall into line at least long enough for Varel and I to stabilize the arling." She glanced at him, and frowned. "Are you limping?"

"It has been a long few days, full of walking, no?" He shrugged. "The ankle will improve with some rest."

Kathil gestured at the cart, which as rumbling and bumping along ahead of them. "I think you're riding with Leliana the rest of the way to the Blackmarsh. Cullen! Hold up!"

He was rather unceremoniously bundled into the cart next to Leliana. It was not a large cart, as such, and the quarters were quite tight. He rode facing Leliana, their legs arranged so they didn't quite overlap, Cerys on his lap. "And has Kathil mentioned to you why we are going to the Blackmarsh?" he asked.

Leliana shrugged one shoulder and waved a hand at Kathil, who was walking next to Cullen and Jowan, involved in conversation. "Something about there being something waiting for us there, but she wouldn't say what, precisely." She leaned over the edge of the cart. "Murena, tell me three things you've noticed in the last thousand paces."

The girl looked back at them, curls mussed by the freshening breeze. She was still leading the mule, having taken charge of it the moment they had left Amaranthine. "Animal tracks leadin' right, through the scrub. White rocks piled up, three piles, two on the left, one on the right, maybe marking trails?" She paused, and pursed her lips. "An' the mule keeps breaking wind."

"Very good on the last, but I meant things about our surroundings, yes?" Leliana said. There was amusement in the way she narrowed her light eyes.

"Well, the smell is all around us." The girl sighed and kicked at a rock lying in the road. "Birds. Three different kinds. One little, in the...little trees?" She peered at Leliana.

"Bushes, my dear. They are called bushes."

Murena nodded sharply. "One big and black overhead. One singin', not seein'."

"Very good." Leliana sounded well-pleased. Murena grinned and pulled forward a bit on the lead rope. The mule made an aggrieved sigh, but picked up her pace. Cerys was gnawing contentedly on the knuckle of Zevran's index finger, a thoughtful look on her face. Her eyes were lightening a bit, he saw. She'd been born with eyes almost as dark as her mother's, but he thought he could see flecks of grey and brown in them now.

The road rolled past. Zevran settled back with his daughter on his lap and wondered what demons were waiting for them in the Blackmarsh.

Cullen:

The Veil here felt...strange.

He had felt it from miles away, and now they were past the border of the Blackmarsh the unsettling feeling of the Veil roiling was omnipresent and refused to be ignored. He stomach tried to flip over, and he swallowed.

"Are you all right?" Jowan asked. "This place is..."

"An old road," Kathil said. "A dangerous old road. More dangerous than most." She sounded uneasy. "I can feel whatever is living here without even trying." She paused, looking puzzled. "It feels—familiar. I can't say why."

Fiann, ahead of them, gave a single bark. People ahead, said that wagging tail. Then she circled back around to press her shoulder into Cullen's thigh.

"People live in this?" Jowan said. He glanced over his shoulder. "Maker's Breath."

"I feel little," Leliana said from her perch in the cart. "A sense that we are being watched. People without sensitivity to the Veil might feel nothing at all."

"Maker forbid any of them have mage children." Kathil drew a sharp breath. She was carrying Cerys in the sling, letting her nap after her last meal. "Let's go see if we can find out if they've been having monster trouble." They started forward, the familiar creak and rumble of the cart counterpointed by the sound of their feet.

Lorn whined, and cocked his head. Then he bolted forward, tail flailing. The healer-mage! The healer was here!

Cullen saw the blood drain from Kathil's cheeks as she stopped still. "Oh, no—"

But before he could do more than wonder, a form coalesced ahead of them.

Lorn bounded up to the form, which resolved into a woman wearing mage robes who dropped to one knee to greet the Mabari. She murmured something, too quiet for Cullen to hear, but her voice was familiar.

"Wynne," Kathil said, almost a moan.

Lorn barked, bowing in front of Wynne's image, then bounced around in what looked like sheer joy. Wynne smiled, and—

Right.

He had almost forgotten.

The clench of an unnamable something around his stomach had nothing to do with the way the Veil billowed and shuddered and everything to do with the fact that his dead mother was standing in front of them.

"A demon?" he heard Zevran ask.

"Look how Lorn is acting," Leliana replied. "Andraste have mercy. It's her."

She walked towards them, her skin losing the luminescence of the Fade, as if reality were seeping into her body. Wynne looked younger than Cullen remembered. Her braided hair was ginger streaked with white, her skin clear and unlined. She stopped about five yards distant, and studied all of them briefly. "I know this is a shock." Her voice was like ice sliding down Cullen's spine. "I had no way to send a message, but you are here anyway. Which likely means that someone has meddled."

Kathil found her voice. "Wynne, you—what are you doing here?"

"Ah. As to that..." She spread her hands. "The demon who held this place left a vacancy behind, and I thought that my presence would be less malevolent than that of anything else that might be attracted to a place such as this. In time, the Veil will strengthen, but it will take a very long time, and the process is fragile. A mage casting a spell without proper precaution, a Templar trying to strengthen the Veil with too heavy a hand, any of it will set the process back years." She looked at Cullen, and her eyes softened. "Touching the mortal world has also become a habit, of sorts. When the Veil at the Circle Tower was closed, I wished to find another place."

Lorn came to Kathil, and she dropped one hand to his back. "I have to ask. Are you Wynne? Or are you just something that looks and sounds like Wynne?"

Wynne folded her arms. Cullen realized that he wanted her to say yes, give them an unambiguous answer. Instead, she shook her head, slowly. "It is complicated, little one. And in truth, I am not sure I know the answer. What makes a soul? I have all of Wynne's memories, my hopes, dreams, fears. But I am also...not what I was. Touching the mortal realm keeps the part of me that is Wynne alive. I cannot escape the conviction that I am both Wynne and the spirit that sustained me for so long."

"That's a bit like what the despair demon said about you," Kathil said. "I wondered why she never took your form, but she only takes the form of the dead to us, doesn't she? And you're...not."

"Nor truly alive, but somewhere in between." Her expression darkened. "You keep terrible company, little one. Moros is the very last citizen of the Fade that a mortal should get involved with. You may think you know her, but I assure you that you do not."

"I've made a mistake or three in my time," Kathil said. "Her name is Moros, then?"

Wynne nodded. "Despair, Suffering, Inevitability, Fate. She embodies all of them, and there are few more powerful. But that is a discussion for another time." She drew a shaking breath, and looked at Cullen. He was standing frozen, his hands gone numb. "I am sorry." Her voice broke. "I wanted to tell you. I fought with Greagoir and Irving over it. They both argued against it, saying that it would only wound you, confuse you, make you doubt your commitment to the Chantry. I ended up leaving the Tower for a few years. Traveling, until my heart was strong enough to wall away the secret."

"You knew who I was?" His voice seemed to be coming from a very long way away.

She closed her eyes, bowed her head. "I knew the moment you walked in the door as a Templar initiate." Then she straightened, and took a startled breath in. "Someone is coming," she said, and vanished.

Cullen blinked, tried to swallow. A man came around the turn in the path ahead, and waved at them. It seemed to take him a moment to take them in—there are a nervous glance at the armor and swords they bore—but then he spied Murena leading the mule and Cerys on Zevran's lap in the cart, and he relaxed. Cullen supposed that bandits didn't generally travel with children.

It turned out that Jerem was the ostensible leader of the new settlement that was springing up in the Blackmarsh. They were rebuilding tumbledown houses, fishing in the lake, planting gardens, and avoiding the old manor house where the demon had made its home for so long.

It was all cold mud and colder lakewater, and the buzz of the Veil's wounds on Cullen's senses, but the place had potential. It was a far cry from what Jerem told them that night about how the Blackmarsh had once been, all too recently.

On the way into the village, they passed a partially constructed dragon skeleton, supported by wooden scaffolding. Piles of additional bones lay nearby, sorted by size and shape. The skull's empty eye sockets stared down at them as they passed. "We've got a scholar here, studying the place," Jerem told them. They were huddled in the kitchen of one of the few houses with a roof in the village, crouched close to the hearth. "He's working on stringing together a complete dragon skeleton. He's making a study of the bones, you see."

"It seems like asking for trouble, somehow," Kathil said with a frown. She had Cerys at the breast, and the firelight over her face made the hollows under her eyes apparent. Cerys had been fussy for the last few days. She didn't seem to be ill, just louder than usual. "I'm not sure how smart dragons are, but if one passes by and sees it, it might take offense."

"Or they might be frightened away by their bony cousin, yes?" Zevran said.

"You can ask the scholar about it," Jerem told them. "He'll be by tomorrow morning."

"And you have no problems with monsters? How about darkspawn?" Kathil shifted Cerys to her shoulder and started rubbing her back as the infant fussed sleepily.

"Just the occasional blight wolf, and by the time they make it here they seem like they're slowly starving to death." He stooped by the hearth and wrapped a cloth around the kettle handle. "This was a good place once. I think we can make it one again. Winter doesn't last forever, after all."

Leliana stirred. "I like that hope. It is a nice change, in this country full of pessimists." In response to Kathil's look, she shrugged. "I know, I know, the Blight, the occupation, the rebellion. Fereldans are good at grim determination. But hope? Hope is more difficult, I think."

"You hang around with Grey Wardens, my dear," Kathil said. "It's a rather skewed perspective on things. Now, is someone willing to take this child for a bit while I have some of that tea that Jerem is making?"

Cullen rose. "I will. I want to go get some fresh air anyway."

She handed the baby to him with a small smile. "You're getting heavy, baby girl," he told her. He wrapped her up and took her outside, into the chilly spring night. Fiann padded along next to him, looking up and cocking her ears.

"We're not going far," he told her. "Just to sit outside for a little bit."

Cerys was heavy in his arms, and though he could see her nose wrinkle in the flickering light cast by the torches, she didn't start crying. She was already so much bigger than she had been when she was born, and it seemed like every time he looked at her she had changed subtly. He eased himself down onto a rickety bench, and Fiann laid down at his feet.

The silence lengthened, grew expectant. He jumped when a splash nearby announced the presence of some night-roaming animal. This place smelled strange—neither pleasant nor unpleasant, a subtle fecundity that he assumed would be far stronger when it was warmer. Cerys wrapped a hand around his index finger and muttered.

"So this is my granddaughter, is it?"

He looked up. Wynne stood there, arms folded, looking...uncomfortable. The light was fading from her skin. "It is," he said. "Do you want to see?"

Because right now, it was important that he act like all of this was normal. Even if it wasn't. At his feet Fiann flicked an ear back and forth, expressing cautious interest in the healer-mage.

Wynne nodded, and he turned Cerys so Wynne could see her. "Three months old in a week or two," he said. "And we've already had two attempts by the Chantry to take her away."

"I assumed." Wynne reached out a hand, and brushed a hand over Cerys's cheek. The baby made a gurgle and reached for Wynne, dark eyes wide and interested. This close to Wynne, Cullen could almost feel the chill of her, the hair-raising tingle of the Fade at the back of his neck. "It's important that the Chantry not get ahold of her, Cullen. But I imagine that you know that, don't you?"

"For any reason other than the fact that Kathil would start killing Templars and not stop until they gave her back?" he asked. "And Zevran and I would help." He was a little breathless, making that statement, realizing the truth of it.

Fiann, at his feet, sniffed the hem of Wynne's robes. Then she began to wag, her expression relaxing. The healer-mage is strange, said the tilt of her head. But she smells kind.

"That's some of it." Wynne straightened. "And when humans despair, Moros has power. But...the Chantry is not universally made up of well-meaning people, Cullen. The priests are humans as much as the Templars are. And it owns some very bad places. Not all children of mages are taken to a little village to be raised." Her gaze was fixed on Cullen's face. "Some are taken to the Aeonar, if their parents are judged to be dangerous enough. Children taken to the Aeonar do not survive, Cullen. Even if creatures that gather at the Aeonar do not take them, the priests...leave the babies alone. They do not touch them except to feed them and keep them clean, and they do not speak to them.. They believe that one day, one of these children will survive, and when that child speaks it will sing in a language that will travel directly to the Maker's ear. The babies die, from lack of love."

He realized that he was cradling Cerys protectively against his chest. "How do you know this?"

"All mortal knowledge is available if you can learn to listen to dreams." Her expression was closed, betraying nothing. "And it's only due to Greagoir's intervention that you did not die there. He became Knight-Commander just before you were born, discovered what was to happen, and interfered."

"You were thought to be dangerous," he said.

She laughed a little. "I would not tell anyone who your father was, and I was a very angry woman. Nearly mad, if I were to be honest. But in the end, the Tower was all I had. It was home and family, employment and purpose. And despite everything, I still believed in Andraste and her mission."

Cerys squirmed against Cullen's chest. He forced himself to relax, shifted her so that she was lying in his arms. "Do you know if Cerys will be a mage?" he asked, both eager for and dreading the answer.

Wynne shook her head. "There is no telling. Perhaps in a few years...but even then, nothing is certain until a child mage casts their first spell. Magic runs strongly in her mother's bloodline. I would not be surprised, either way."

"Ah." He looked down at Cerys, who was rubbing her eyes fitfully. I wish I could have known who you were, when I was younger. He couldn't bring himself to say the words. He had been so good at wrapping up that pain and hiding it away that it refused to be spoken of, even now.

Sometimes, there was no speaking a secret at all.

When he looked up again, Wynne was gone. He ignored the stab of disappointment in his chest and rose. He'd take Cerys inside, and hope that she might sleep at least for a few hours. They would be bunking in the little kitchen tonight. There would be no privacy whatsoever, another disappointment.

There is time, he reminded himself, and took his daughter indoors.

Wynne:

How could it possibly be that the child she had given birth to was a man grown, with a daughter of his own? Hadn't it been just the other day that she'd felt the quickening of another life inside of her body? Everything had changed, that day. Wynne had been so young, and had thought herself so sophisticated and wise.

She'd been wrong, of course.

But now—look at Cullen! It had been years since she'd had a chance to really look at him. He was off the lyrium, and a Grey Warden. We did all right, she whispered to her memory of Greagoir. As young and foolish as we were, we made a fine son between us.

She roved Forever-winter, just this side of the Veil from the Blackmarsh, the gentle touch of the warming waters belying the name of this district, her home. A fragile home, it was, but there were good people coming to live here.

Wynne would care for them, and with any luck she would get to see her granddaughter grow into a woman.

She felt the presence of Moros before she saw her, a pressure on her mind, a stirring in the waters of the Fade that heralded her presence. She stood still, reading the currents.

"Am I not kind?" came the voice of Moros, from everywhere and nowhere. "Am I not benevolent? I bring to you your family, little Faith. I bring to you the son your mortal vessel lost. I bring to you the Thrice-bound, and her mates."

Wynne turned. Moros had Fade-waters eddying around her feet as if she were wading, and where she stepped the water tuned to blood. She was pale hair and paler skin, devouring black eyes, red lips. "What do you want, Moros?" Wynne asked, keeping her voice neutral.

"Merely to visit with my friend, and see her demesne. I love a good reunion, don't you?" She gestured negligently with one hand. "Besides, I am eager to see how the next act of our little challenge plays out. You are about to have visitors, little Faith. I wonder what you will do. If you do anything at all."

Alarmed, Wynne reached a tendril of awareness towards the roots of Forever-winter, extended it to the Veil. It was delicate as a spider's web at dawn, and it trembled where mortals stepped.

Mortals. Many mortals, slipping along the byways of the Blackmarsh. Some of them with the distinctive feel of Templars.

Movement was merely a matter of thought, and Wynne was pressed against the Veil, watching. Men and a few women, all in armor, all armed. It was a clear night, moonlight making stark shadows beneath the trees.

This could not stand.

She would not allow it.

There was not much she could do without damaging the Veil more than it already was. She considered her options, and chose the least of the evils.

Thought was action, and Wynne was no stranger to battle.

Lorn:

The healer-mage is here, but not here.

It is very strange, how she simply appears as if she was always there. Humans don't usually do that, unless they are his human, who occasionally does something similar.

He is lying across the doorway of the little kitchen, gnawing on a most excellent bone that Fiann has brought him. Fiann is asleep and snoring, her own bone clasped between her front paws. Lorn is keeping watch. This is one of those places, those places where the things that are only part shadow hunt. He must stay watchful.

Instead of the shadows, though, the healer-mage is here. She smells like bitter herbs and forge-flame. If she had sensible ears, they would be flattened against her head. Something is wrong, and he remembers this.

They have done this before, after all.

"Lorn," she says. "Rouse Kathil. Quickly, quietly. There are men coming, many of them. I will hold them off, but she must be away before they find her and Cullen and the rest."

He whuffs softly and the healer-mage is gone. But Lorn knows what he must do, and the air that flows under the door brings with it the smell of steel and sweat and something sour and foul. His human calls that smell righteousness. He thinks that is perhaps not the right word, but he knows no better one.

The growl in his chest rises and thrums, and his human wakes.

There is no sleepy blinking, no yawns. She is simply awake and looking at him.

Men coming. Armor, swords...knights.

One scratch on the floorboards with a heavy paw, and there is a moment when human-mind and Mabari-mind are in communion. She understands.

They must run.

His human's elf wakes, and the dust-knight, and the rest. They are swift and silent, donning armor in haste, shouldering packs. "Lorn, lead us out," his human says. her hand on his shoulder. "Show us a clear path."

But there is no clear path.

The smell and sound of knights is all around them, and the air has gone slick and trembling. The only direction where there are no knights is into the lake behind them, and the human pups cannot swim.

The healer-mage said run but Lorn's heart says fight, and he pauses, trying to make the two agree somehow.

There is a creak and clatter from by the town gates, and a flash of something white in the moonlight. Dust and bone. There were excellent bones, by the gates. Some of them piled up for the taking, but others somehow cunningly strung together. A dragon made of bones—most of one, at least.

It was the most wonderful thing he has seen in some time.

(Think of all of the chewing. And the gnawing. And how very long it would take him to dismantle it, bone by bone!)

And now, it is moving.

It twitches and something cracks, and then the whole thing shudders and it breaks free. Something dark flies by it; an arrowhead makes a brief ringing sound and bounces off.

The bone dragon spreads incomplete wings and begins to attack.

"Jowan, don't," Lorn hears his human say. "No magic. We can't risk it."

"No magic? What do you call that, then?"

"On our side. I hope." The dragon surges forward, and Lorn's human lays her hand on his shoulder.

Dragons scream when they're attacking, but this one clatters. It snaps its jaw at a knight, who jumps away. Lorn understands this game; it is called distraction and keepaway. The dragon made of bone is a large thing, and dangerous, and the knights are moving to attack it. Their line becomes ragged and disappears as they clump.

The bone dragon clatters towards the knights, ignoring sword-blows and arrows, and the way is clear.

He surges ahead, Fiann beside him, and his human behind him. The dust-knight is carrying the singer, who has a hurt leg and cannot run. They move, quickly, and Lorn picks a path that will take them through shadow. The bone dragon is making scraping, clattering noises, and Lorn understands this as part of the distraction.

One knight, too near, turns towards them, and before his human can ask Lorn is on the knight, tearing an unprotected throat, blood hot on his tongue. Fiann takes over the lead as Lorn makes sure of the knight, who did not even have a chance to scream. His people move past them, into the swamp-smelling dark. The knight quivers and stops moving.

He kicks dirt at the body and runs to catch up.

They move through the night, dropping to a fast walk and then a slower one, but always, always staying in motion. They pass from the place where the shadows hunt to one that feels more solid. He thinks they will stop, but they do not.

They keep moving until dawn comes. Lorn's human calls a halt and a rest; they will catch their breath and move on. All of them are tired, even Lorn. The singer's pup slumps against a tree trunk, her eyes closed. Lorn's human comes to him, kneels down, ruffles his ears. "Good dog," is all she says. He leans into her hands that smell of dust and lightning.

Yes. He is.

Her pup is asleep in the cloth she uses as a substitute for carrying the pup by the scruff of the neck. (He is given to understand that one does not pick up human pups that way.) He noses the pup, gently, breathing in milk-scent and young-thing-smell. The trouble is somehow connected with the pup, is all he understands. But his human is fierce, fiercer than anything, fiercer even than Lorn when it comes to protecting her pup.

This too he understands: that his human will do what she must in order to protect her pup, and her pack. For they have a pack, now—his human's elf and her dust-knight and Fiann, the mouse-mage and the singer, the singer's pup. Back at Lorn's new territory, there is the thorntree-dwarf and the old warrior who smells like tapestries and honey, and so many others. It is a good pack, he thinks. Even if the carrion-knight is gone, there are many still remaining.

"We're going home," she says, her voice soft and inexorable. "And then we'll decide what to do. Because by the Maker I am Warden-Commander of Ferelden, and the Chantry will recognize that fact and call off its dogs. There is no excuse for this."

He licks her hand. Home, then, to their big den made of stone. Then they will teach the ones that pursue them that they are not to be trifled with.

He drifts off for a bit then, his human's hands touch his hot and sore paws, a cool prickling coming from her fingers. In his dreams, he and his human walk thousands of roads and never stop, always and ever onward.

Now that my ladder's gone,
I must lie down where all my ladders start,
In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart.

-Yeats