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peopleofthedas2011-02-24 03:03 pm
lady_june) wrote in peopleofthedas2011-02-24 03:03 pm
Entry tags:
Departure Pt 1
Hi there. First time poster, long-time lurker. Hope I'm doing this right...
Title: Departure (Part 1)
Characters: f!Surana/Ser Otto
Rating: AO (age gap, if that offends peoples)
Word Count: ~3k
Summary: Aleyra Surana heals a dying Templar, finding unexpected solace in his company as the world falls out from under her.
“I do not understand.”
Aleyra gave no indication she had heard the qunari, pushing at the hair falling over her forehead with the back of her wrist. Her fingers looked as if she had dipped them in strawberry preserve, though the real source of the stains was far more sinister. The little elf looked hopelessly adrift among the piles of soiled rags, bloodied clothing and discarded pieces of armor. Next to her foot, a pauldron sat upended, the bowl-like inside filled grotesquely with an inch-deep pool of blood. Orange candlelight burnished the pale girl’s face to a healthy peach, though the qunari suspected in proper lighting she would look ghastly indeed.
“I do not understand,” Sten repeated, looming over the grisly scene.
“What don’t you understand?” the elf girl finally muttered. A muscle worked in her jaw as pale, blue light emerged from the palms of her hands and soaked into the body sprawled upon the cot. If Sten listened closely, he could hear the sucking sounds of ravaged lungs breathing through open wounds. He had seen the pitchfork go in and assumed it would not be coming out.
“He is a Templar, is he not, kadan? Why would you waste your considerable powers on a man who would just as soon lock you up?”
The ways of elves and men never made much sense to him, but this seemed like the sort of absurd misuse of resources that could not go unchecked.
“Could be worse,” the girl replied. “He could want to put me on a leash.”
“It is an effective method, kadan, of restraining mages, despite your personal feelings on the matter.” Sten shifted, ill at ease, uncertain of whether or not she was teasing him or speaking in earnest. He was no champion at divining the strange inflections these Fereldans used to indicate sarcasm or jest.
“I heal Alistair all the time,” she continued, ignoring him. “You never complain about that.”
“Alistair is not a true Templar, also he is of your same brotherhood. I did not think you a simpleton – surely you can see the difference.” Sten sniffed, certain now that he was being made fun of.
Below and in front of him, the soft wheezing sounds of the Templar’s punctured lungs eased. The man had lost a considerable amount of blood, if the skirt of his uniform and his under-tunic were any indication. Some wounds were too deep and too serious to be dealt with on the battlefield. Sten had, against his better judgment and reason, helped Alistair carry the dying Templar from the Alienage row house to the home of an obliging elf. Cyrion was the man’s name. He allowed them to stay long enough to poultice the blind Templar’s injuries before they carried him the rest of the way to Arl Eamon’s estate. A stray dog had followed them, snuffling at the little trail of blood drops they left behind.
Now in the warmth and relative quiet of the Arl’s home, Aleyra could be left alone to perform her arts. The frigid Wilds witch and doddering old mage woman initially helped with the healing. That was hours ago. The one gave up from frustration, the other from exhaustion. But Aleyra stayed, and try as he might, Sten simply could not make sense of it.
“He is not a young warrior, kadan, and he has lost his sight. Why revive what is already broken?”
“Because I’m crazy, all right? I’m crazy and I can’t leave well enough alone.”
“I had come to that conclusion also.”
Aleyra huffed out a laugh, her fingers splayed across the angry wounds venting the man’s ribcage. Amid the chaos of healing and dying, she looked tiny, hopeless. But Sten knew better. He himself had felt his knee shatter from a dragon’s powerful swipe only to have that same nauseating pain disappear a moment later. The girl had a gift. It had taken him many months to think of it thusly, but he was no fool to condemn what had saved his life many, many times.
“You don’t have to stay,” she said, sweat gathering at her temples. Her corn silk hair was what the Arl’s wife sneeringly called “manly and unfashionable.” Lady Isolde was what Sten called “insipid and shrill.”
“What if he wakes and attempts to harm you?”
“He’s hardly in a state to cause any real trouble,” she replied, shrugging. “Besides, Alistair’s taught me all their nasty little tricks. I’m ready for him.”
“You’re weak, drained, I will not abandon you.”
Aleyra turned at the waist, beaming up at him with a smile that made the qunari distinctly uncomfortable. The whining Templar boy had accused Sten of harboring feelings for the elf. He did, brotherly ones, but even that was too embarrassing to admit. He nodded in response to her unnerving expression.
“It could be a long night,” she added. Aleyra reached for a rag, wiping her blood-stained hands on an already scarlet cloth. “He’s… strong. I can sense his will to live. It’s faint, but I can feel it.”
“Nonsense. No one can feel such a thing.”
“Maybe not a bumbling oaf like you,” she bit back, smirking. The two points of her ears poked through the shaggy mess of her hair as she again attempted to shake the wild strands free of her sight.
“On the contrary, kadan. I do not bumble.”
“Trust me, Sten. I would have given up ages ago if I didn’t think he wanted me to keep going.”
Sten snorted, shaking his head. “Of course he wants you to continue. He wants to survive so that he may hunt you later.”
"Conjecture. He was perfectly polite to us in the Alienage.”
“Because he wanted our aid and would not risk offending you outright.”
“Just go,” Aleyra muttered, shooing him with a casual wave. “Go away if you’re going to annoy me all night. I need to concentrate and you’re not helping.”
Sten did not like being dismissed, nor did he like leaving his leader alone with a man sworn to hunt and imprison her. She was often given to troubling flights of fancy or danger, but this was altogether too reckless. The Landsmeet had been called. She would need all of her power and ability to weather that storm and then face the Archdemon. Sten took one step forward, kneeling. Even so, he towered over her. He put one hand on her shoulder, a personal risk of emotion that made his tongue sour in his mouth. Why touch was necessary to convey emotion, he could not imagine.
“I will fetch you lyrium, in the event he wakes and finds you enfeebled.”
“That’s thoughtful of you,” she said. It was that same tone that confounded him. Sarcasm, he decided, definitely sarcasm this time. But then she murmured, “It’s really not a bad idea. It’s smart to be prepared.”
With that, Sten stood, confident that his leader had regained her senses.
= = =
What did she see when she looked at him?
Aleyra wiped futilely at her eyes. This happened sometimes, when she was too tired and drained to dam the tide of emotion and the rush of feeling that came with casting. Wynne once told her that being a healer meant more than knowing when to bolster the spirits or salve the flesh – it demanded a deep well of sympathy, one that could leak and overwhelm at the most inconvenient times. But when she blinked through the haze of tears, Aleyra saw more than torn flesh and drying blood… There was a life there, ebbing beneath her very fingers and it tormented her to the marrow. She had been the sort to annoy the Templars in the tower whenever she happened upon a spider in danger of squishing. It got to the point where Templar Bran would simply nudge open the heavy door whenever he saw her coming with a jar or a precariously outstretched piece of parchment. He would nod and pat her on the pigtails and chuckle to his partner as she bounced away.
Bran told her later, on the day she left with Duncan, that he would miss conspiring in her innocent rescue missions.
When Aleyra blinked, she didn’t see just the wounded Templar, but her older brother, Saelren. The village healers had done all that they could and Aleyra watched, helpless, over the long months as illness claimed her brother, wasting him away to nothingness. That same innocent, gaunt face peered back at her now through the gauzy film of her tears. Foolish. She had been but a child, unaware of her powers or how they could manifest. Saelren’s death was not her fault, and yet it never stopped stinging like a personal failure. Aleyra dried her face with her sleeve and rededicated herself to the task at hand, sipping the lyrium Sten had brought. The flask tingled in her grasp. The cool fluid burned pleasantly on its way down.
At some point, Aleyra fell asleep. She woke, her forehead pressed to the Templar’s feverish side. He twitched, only a little, but enough to make her heart swell with pride. She could save him, she thought with a sleepy grin, she could save anybody. It dawned on her that he would be frightened and disoriented when he recovered enough to wake. She wondered what it must be like to live in complete darkness. She had stared, brazenly, at the milky orbs that seemed to know where to look, despite his affliction. Aleyra stood and went about the small chamber, flicking her fingers together. Flames leapt to wicks, dancing merrily in the lessening gloom. She had her own spacious quarters, but found the enormous bed empty and cold. Somehow, a cramped tent and tattered sleeping roll felt more comforting than a canopied bed that dwarfed and shamed her.
Even this room, with its suffering occupant and piles of bloodied rags, had her feeling more at home. Alistair accused her of reverse snobbery. Aleyra accused him of embracing these new, lavish surroundings with incriminating zeal. Royal blood, indeed.
She stretched and began to clean up the floor, sweeping the soiled cloths into one large pile before shoving them into a hamper. Some elven servant would no doubt be called upon to take the laundry away whenever she wanted, and that made her uncomfortable, too. This place was one startling reminder of how lucky she was compared to her brethren. Soft footfalls drew her attention to the door, where Wynne stood in a brocade dressing gown. She leaned against the jam, watching Aleyra with a bemused smile curving her lips.
“I never thought I’d call Otto fortunate,” Wynne murmured, chuckling. “He’s suffered greatly in his life, and endured it all without complaint. And now he’s sidestepped death, and he has you to thank, child.”
“Do you ever… feel someone’s spirit when you’re healing them?” Aleyra asked, hovering at the end of the cot. The Templar had been stripped to the waist, his arms and armor scattered in the corner where Alistair had dumped them.
“Not always,” Wynne replied. She pushed off from the wall and wandered toward Aleyra. “Some spirits will call out to you, but some are shy. Why? Did you sense his?”
“Yes.” Aleyra nodded, gazing down at the slumbering man. “You’ve known him for how long?”
“Otto left the Tower when we were both still young. He was bright and strong, and an obvious choice for patrol. He brought back many a young mage, not all of them runners… though he had an affinity for those, too. One boy, Anders, was his particular favorite. He must have caught that fool child four, five times.” Wynne laughed again, hooking a gentle arm over Aleyra’s shoulders and squeezing. “I remember when they brought him back. I hardly recognized him. What that mage did to him…” Her grip tightened. Aleyra flinched. “Irving did the healing himself. He was… devastated that he could not restore the poor man’s sight.”
“Did they catch the mage that did it?”
“They did,” Wynne replied gravely. “I don’t have to tell you what his fate was.”
Wynne stepped away, going to the small bedside table and pulling a stool out from beneath it. She tugged the stool up to the cot and sat, taking the Templar’s hand and cradling it in her own. Aleyra had no great love for Templars, though befriending Alistair had certainly convinced her that they had compassion and tenderness like any other person. She pitied Ser Otto and hoped to see him recover, but Sten’s warnings rang in her ears. He was right. If given the chance, Otto would rather see her tucked away in the Circle Tower, not gallivanting across Ferelden casting spells whenever she bloody well pleased.
“I’ll watch him now,” Wynne said, peering up at Aleyra. She had never seen the older mage with her hair down. It floated like a pale nimbus around her shoulders. “I’m sure Otto will want to thank you later. I’ll have someone alert you if he comes to. For now, you’ve earned a long rest, dear.”
Aleyra nodded, hesitant to leave. She felt the heavy numbness in her limbs that came after long bouts of casting without sufficient pause. With one last glance at their resting patient, Aleyra shuffled out of the room and into the corridor. It was close to dawn, pink streaks of light breaking through the mullioned windows and spattering the stones with color. A few dozy servants scurried in the shadows, their backs bent with heavy loads of wood for fireplaces or loaves for the kitchen. She saw few humans about, only the guards unlucky enough to pick this shift to watch. They nodded as she passed, their eyes strange and bright behind their concealing helmets. She dragged herself up the main hall staircase, through the narrow chamber that led to the salons, and up the long, winding passage that led to the family’s private quarters. As she yawned her way down the hall, she heard the noisy rumbles of Alistair’s snoring through the door.
Somebody had lit a fire in the hearth when she at last tumbled through the half-open portal. Aleyra locked the door and shrugged out of her robes, dipping her hands into the basin near the hearth to wash her face and hands. It was like walking through a dream, going through the motions, her exhaustion sudden and eclipsing. Aleyra suspected that whoever was responsible for the waiting fire was not the same person responsible for the pile of books on her too-big bed. It was probably Leliana, going by the choice of books, the rogue doing her part to be supportive and kind. Sometimes Aleyra wondered what life would be like now if she had been condemned to suffer the Blight with less compassionate souls.
Aleyra read until she fell asleep again. The books comforted her, their dusty scent and solid weight reminding her of the Tower and childhood. Books were too heavy a commodity to keep on the road. They tore easily and couldn’t be justified when rations and healing poultices were more important. Now, however, Aleyra was glad for the small luxury. She sank into an Orlesian romance, amused by the improbable love story. She drifted to sleep with the book tucked against her chest, visions of gallant knights and feather-footed ladies keeping her company in the Fade.
Title: Departure (Part 1)
Characters: f!Surana/Ser Otto
Rating: AO (age gap, if that offends peoples)
Word Count: ~3k
Summary: Aleyra Surana heals a dying Templar, finding unexpected solace in his company as the world falls out from under her.
“I do not understand.”
Aleyra gave no indication she had heard the qunari, pushing at the hair falling over her forehead with the back of her wrist. Her fingers looked as if she had dipped them in strawberry preserve, though the real source of the stains was far more sinister. The little elf looked hopelessly adrift among the piles of soiled rags, bloodied clothing and discarded pieces of armor. Next to her foot, a pauldron sat upended, the bowl-like inside filled grotesquely with an inch-deep pool of blood. Orange candlelight burnished the pale girl’s face to a healthy peach, though the qunari suspected in proper lighting she would look ghastly indeed.
“I do not understand,” Sten repeated, looming over the grisly scene.
“What don’t you understand?” the elf girl finally muttered. A muscle worked in her jaw as pale, blue light emerged from the palms of her hands and soaked into the body sprawled upon the cot. If Sten listened closely, he could hear the sucking sounds of ravaged lungs breathing through open wounds. He had seen the pitchfork go in and assumed it would not be coming out.
“He is a Templar, is he not, kadan? Why would you waste your considerable powers on a man who would just as soon lock you up?”
The ways of elves and men never made much sense to him, but this seemed like the sort of absurd misuse of resources that could not go unchecked.
“Could be worse,” the girl replied. “He could want to put me on a leash.”
“It is an effective method, kadan, of restraining mages, despite your personal feelings on the matter.” Sten shifted, ill at ease, uncertain of whether or not she was teasing him or speaking in earnest. He was no champion at divining the strange inflections these Fereldans used to indicate sarcasm or jest.
“I heal Alistair all the time,” she continued, ignoring him. “You never complain about that.”
“Alistair is not a true Templar, also he is of your same brotherhood. I did not think you a simpleton – surely you can see the difference.” Sten sniffed, certain now that he was being made fun of.
Below and in front of him, the soft wheezing sounds of the Templar’s punctured lungs eased. The man had lost a considerable amount of blood, if the skirt of his uniform and his under-tunic were any indication. Some wounds were too deep and too serious to be dealt with on the battlefield. Sten had, against his better judgment and reason, helped Alistair carry the dying Templar from the Alienage row house to the home of an obliging elf. Cyrion was the man’s name. He allowed them to stay long enough to poultice the blind Templar’s injuries before they carried him the rest of the way to Arl Eamon’s estate. A stray dog had followed them, snuffling at the little trail of blood drops they left behind.
Now in the warmth and relative quiet of the Arl’s home, Aleyra could be left alone to perform her arts. The frigid Wilds witch and doddering old mage woman initially helped with the healing. That was hours ago. The one gave up from frustration, the other from exhaustion. But Aleyra stayed, and try as he might, Sten simply could not make sense of it.
“He is not a young warrior, kadan, and he has lost his sight. Why revive what is already broken?”
“Because I’m crazy, all right? I’m crazy and I can’t leave well enough alone.”
“I had come to that conclusion also.”
Aleyra huffed out a laugh, her fingers splayed across the angry wounds venting the man’s ribcage. Amid the chaos of healing and dying, she looked tiny, hopeless. But Sten knew better. He himself had felt his knee shatter from a dragon’s powerful swipe only to have that same nauseating pain disappear a moment later. The girl had a gift. It had taken him many months to think of it thusly, but he was no fool to condemn what had saved his life many, many times.
“You don’t have to stay,” she said, sweat gathering at her temples. Her corn silk hair was what the Arl’s wife sneeringly called “manly and unfashionable.” Lady Isolde was what Sten called “insipid and shrill.”
“What if he wakes and attempts to harm you?”
“He’s hardly in a state to cause any real trouble,” she replied, shrugging. “Besides, Alistair’s taught me all their nasty little tricks. I’m ready for him.”
“You’re weak, drained, I will not abandon you.”
Aleyra turned at the waist, beaming up at him with a smile that made the qunari distinctly uncomfortable. The whining Templar boy had accused Sten of harboring feelings for the elf. He did, brotherly ones, but even that was too embarrassing to admit. He nodded in response to her unnerving expression.
“It could be a long night,” she added. Aleyra reached for a rag, wiping her blood-stained hands on an already scarlet cloth. “He’s… strong. I can sense his will to live. It’s faint, but I can feel it.”
“Nonsense. No one can feel such a thing.”
“Maybe not a bumbling oaf like you,” she bit back, smirking. The two points of her ears poked through the shaggy mess of her hair as she again attempted to shake the wild strands free of her sight.
“On the contrary, kadan. I do not bumble.”
“Trust me, Sten. I would have given up ages ago if I didn’t think he wanted me to keep going.”
Sten snorted, shaking his head. “Of course he wants you to continue. He wants to survive so that he may hunt you later.”
"Conjecture. He was perfectly polite to us in the Alienage.”
“Because he wanted our aid and would not risk offending you outright.”
“Just go,” Aleyra muttered, shooing him with a casual wave. “Go away if you’re going to annoy me all night. I need to concentrate and you’re not helping.”
Sten did not like being dismissed, nor did he like leaving his leader alone with a man sworn to hunt and imprison her. She was often given to troubling flights of fancy or danger, but this was altogether too reckless. The Landsmeet had been called. She would need all of her power and ability to weather that storm and then face the Archdemon. Sten took one step forward, kneeling. Even so, he towered over her. He put one hand on her shoulder, a personal risk of emotion that made his tongue sour in his mouth. Why touch was necessary to convey emotion, he could not imagine.
“I will fetch you lyrium, in the event he wakes and finds you enfeebled.”
“That’s thoughtful of you,” she said. It was that same tone that confounded him. Sarcasm, he decided, definitely sarcasm this time. But then she murmured, “It’s really not a bad idea. It’s smart to be prepared.”
With that, Sten stood, confident that his leader had regained her senses.
What did she see when she looked at him?
Aleyra wiped futilely at her eyes. This happened sometimes, when she was too tired and drained to dam the tide of emotion and the rush of feeling that came with casting. Wynne once told her that being a healer meant more than knowing when to bolster the spirits or salve the flesh – it demanded a deep well of sympathy, one that could leak and overwhelm at the most inconvenient times. But when she blinked through the haze of tears, Aleyra saw more than torn flesh and drying blood… There was a life there, ebbing beneath her very fingers and it tormented her to the marrow. She had been the sort to annoy the Templars in the tower whenever she happened upon a spider in danger of squishing. It got to the point where Templar Bran would simply nudge open the heavy door whenever he saw her coming with a jar or a precariously outstretched piece of parchment. He would nod and pat her on the pigtails and chuckle to his partner as she bounced away.
Bran told her later, on the day she left with Duncan, that he would miss conspiring in her innocent rescue missions.
When Aleyra blinked, she didn’t see just the wounded Templar, but her older brother, Saelren. The village healers had done all that they could and Aleyra watched, helpless, over the long months as illness claimed her brother, wasting him away to nothingness. That same innocent, gaunt face peered back at her now through the gauzy film of her tears. Foolish. She had been but a child, unaware of her powers or how they could manifest. Saelren’s death was not her fault, and yet it never stopped stinging like a personal failure. Aleyra dried her face with her sleeve and rededicated herself to the task at hand, sipping the lyrium Sten had brought. The flask tingled in her grasp. The cool fluid burned pleasantly on its way down.
At some point, Aleyra fell asleep. She woke, her forehead pressed to the Templar’s feverish side. He twitched, only a little, but enough to make her heart swell with pride. She could save him, she thought with a sleepy grin, she could save anybody. It dawned on her that he would be frightened and disoriented when he recovered enough to wake. She wondered what it must be like to live in complete darkness. She had stared, brazenly, at the milky orbs that seemed to know where to look, despite his affliction. Aleyra stood and went about the small chamber, flicking her fingers together. Flames leapt to wicks, dancing merrily in the lessening gloom. She had her own spacious quarters, but found the enormous bed empty and cold. Somehow, a cramped tent and tattered sleeping roll felt more comforting than a canopied bed that dwarfed and shamed her.
Even this room, with its suffering occupant and piles of bloodied rags, had her feeling more at home. Alistair accused her of reverse snobbery. Aleyra accused him of embracing these new, lavish surroundings with incriminating zeal. Royal blood, indeed.
She stretched and began to clean up the floor, sweeping the soiled cloths into one large pile before shoving them into a hamper. Some elven servant would no doubt be called upon to take the laundry away whenever she wanted, and that made her uncomfortable, too. This place was one startling reminder of how lucky she was compared to her brethren. Soft footfalls drew her attention to the door, where Wynne stood in a brocade dressing gown. She leaned against the jam, watching Aleyra with a bemused smile curving her lips.
“I never thought I’d call Otto fortunate,” Wynne murmured, chuckling. “He’s suffered greatly in his life, and endured it all without complaint. And now he’s sidestepped death, and he has you to thank, child.”
“Do you ever… feel someone’s spirit when you’re healing them?” Aleyra asked, hovering at the end of the cot. The Templar had been stripped to the waist, his arms and armor scattered in the corner where Alistair had dumped them.
“Not always,” Wynne replied. She pushed off from the wall and wandered toward Aleyra. “Some spirits will call out to you, but some are shy. Why? Did you sense his?”
“Yes.” Aleyra nodded, gazing down at the slumbering man. “You’ve known him for how long?”
“Otto left the Tower when we were both still young. He was bright and strong, and an obvious choice for patrol. He brought back many a young mage, not all of them runners… though he had an affinity for those, too. One boy, Anders, was his particular favorite. He must have caught that fool child four, five times.” Wynne laughed again, hooking a gentle arm over Aleyra’s shoulders and squeezing. “I remember when they brought him back. I hardly recognized him. What that mage did to him…” Her grip tightened. Aleyra flinched. “Irving did the healing himself. He was… devastated that he could not restore the poor man’s sight.”
“Did they catch the mage that did it?”
“They did,” Wynne replied gravely. “I don’t have to tell you what his fate was.”
Wynne stepped away, going to the small bedside table and pulling a stool out from beneath it. She tugged the stool up to the cot and sat, taking the Templar’s hand and cradling it in her own. Aleyra had no great love for Templars, though befriending Alistair had certainly convinced her that they had compassion and tenderness like any other person. She pitied Ser Otto and hoped to see him recover, but Sten’s warnings rang in her ears. He was right. If given the chance, Otto would rather see her tucked away in the Circle Tower, not gallivanting across Ferelden casting spells whenever she bloody well pleased.
“I’ll watch him now,” Wynne said, peering up at Aleyra. She had never seen the older mage with her hair down. It floated like a pale nimbus around her shoulders. “I’m sure Otto will want to thank you later. I’ll have someone alert you if he comes to. For now, you’ve earned a long rest, dear.”
Aleyra nodded, hesitant to leave. She felt the heavy numbness in her limbs that came after long bouts of casting without sufficient pause. With one last glance at their resting patient, Aleyra shuffled out of the room and into the corridor. It was close to dawn, pink streaks of light breaking through the mullioned windows and spattering the stones with color. A few dozy servants scurried in the shadows, their backs bent with heavy loads of wood for fireplaces or loaves for the kitchen. She saw few humans about, only the guards unlucky enough to pick this shift to watch. They nodded as she passed, their eyes strange and bright behind their concealing helmets. She dragged herself up the main hall staircase, through the narrow chamber that led to the salons, and up the long, winding passage that led to the family’s private quarters. As she yawned her way down the hall, she heard the noisy rumbles of Alistair’s snoring through the door.
Somebody had lit a fire in the hearth when she at last tumbled through the half-open portal. Aleyra locked the door and shrugged out of her robes, dipping her hands into the basin near the hearth to wash her face and hands. It was like walking through a dream, going through the motions, her exhaustion sudden and eclipsing. Aleyra suspected that whoever was responsible for the waiting fire was not the same person responsible for the pile of books on her too-big bed. It was probably Leliana, going by the choice of books, the rogue doing her part to be supportive and kind. Sometimes Aleyra wondered what life would be like now if she had been condemned to suffer the Blight with less compassionate souls.
Aleyra read until she fell asleep again. The books comforted her, their dusty scent and solid weight reminding her of the Tower and childhood. Books were too heavy a commodity to keep on the road. They tore easily and couldn’t be justified when rations and healing poultices were more important. Now, however, Aleyra was glad for the small luxury. She sank into an Orlesian romance, amused by the improbable love story. She drifted to sleep with the book tucked against her chest, visions of gallant knights and feather-footed ladies keeping her company in the Fade.