I may have misjudged you a little.
Just a little?
I sometimes paint all humans with the same brush.
As long as it's such a pretty brush, I don't mind.
- Velanna and Nathaniel
Vigil's Keep was in a state of chaos. Though the stone walls fashioned by the dwarves held fast, the steady assault of boulders from a half dozen ogres eventually took out a section of wall; just a small section, but big enough that a number of darkspawn managed to get through. Bales of hay were set ablaze by errant fireballs, hastily aimed and cast. Most were from the emissaries, but quite a few belonged to the woman who now watched the aftermath of the battle from the edge of the forest.
Velanna hid behind an evergreen, the balls of her bare feet sinking into the moist soil as she stood on tiptoe. She struggled to see past the flames that reached toward the sky and cast the courtyard in an amber glow. Soldiers bustled about, carrying flasks filled with various poultices and salves, stacks of bandages piled high in their arms. They weaved through corpses that hadn't yet been cleared away and dodged the more persistent fires that refused to be put out.
A soldier tossed a bucket of water on the flames. As he lifted his arm up to wipe his brow, he stilled and turned his head as if someone had called for him. She followed his gaze to see Nathaniel hurry over. He stopped only a few arms' length from the fire, his face still and emotionless. When the soldier shook his head, however, Nathaniel's stoic expression crumpled into a concerned frown.
She froze. Her eyes closed against a feeling that was unexpected, though not foreign. For a brief moment, she considered returning to the keep, to the Wardens. Despite her volatility towards the humans, they had accepted her into their ranks and treated her as an equal. Though Amaranthine City proved to be as unkind to her people as she expected, the behavior of the Warden Commander and the humans at Vigil's Keep forced her to reevaluate the prejudice she'd held since her youth.
And Nathaniel . . . he had shown Velanna respect and kindness that she never knew before, even amongst the Dalish. He teased her, despite her provocations, and never held it against her when she pushed just a bit too far. He even shared stories of his own sister (Delilah?) when he learned Velanna had one as well.
Seranni. An image of her sister standing beside the Architect—brief but poignant—flashed in the darkness behind her eyelids, and she opened her eyes as that same feeling enveloped her once more.
Guilt.
Sprinting from her hiding place, she fled deeper into the forest. She clung to that image of her sister, whom she had joined the Order to rescue. Remembering Seranni reinforced that which Velanna believed since Arais recruited her: She did not belong with the Wardens, among the humans.
And there would be no going back.
"Did you find her?"
Nathaniel turned his head, meeting Justice's eyes. The milky film that covered the once brown irises was still off-putting, even after months of traveling together; it wasn't something one should be expected to adjust to easily, if at all. After a moment, Nathaniel shook his head. He had scoured the courtyard for any sign of Velanna, but she was well and truly gone.
He crossed to a pile of rubble and stared at it, his mouth set in a worried frown. When the ceiling had partially collapsed, courtesy of Dworkin placing an explosive too close to the keep, Velanna had been buried. At least, that's what one of the soldiers told Nathaniel when he returned from battling the last of the darkspawn. All Nathaniel had found beneath the heap of stone was a mangled bit of wire. One of the bracelets that once wound intricately around Velanna's forearm was the only evidence she had been in the keep at all.
Justice stepped up beside him, looking at the pile along with Nathaniel. "Do you intend to search for her?"
"What would be the point in that?" He searched the face of the man—or, rather, corpse—beside him. Translucent skin hung from cheekbones that, though once handsome, were now a ghastly shadow of what had once been. Dark, puckered flesh sharpened the hollowness of his cheeks. Though the possession had certainly slowed the natural decay, it was far from preventing it entirely.
"To return her to the Wardens," Justice stated, his tone matter-of-fact. The skin that once held an eyebrow lifted, as if to say, "Wasn't that obvious?"
"Even so"—Nathaniel pulled the twisted wire from his pack—"this was in the pile of rubble I found. No darkspawn that made it through the breach in the fortress wall survived long enough to make it into the keep itself. Velanna was only in here to avoid any debris that may have resulted from Dworkin's experimental explosives." He sighed. The moment when she nearly ignored his order to retreat to the keep came forth, but he pushed it away. No sense dwelling. "And even if I were to follow her, she could easily evade me. She's Dalish; if she doesn't wish to be found in the vast forest surrounding the keep, then she is lost."
Justice crossed his arms and stared pointedly at Nathaniel with those unsettling eyes. "Perhaps she does wish to be found, and is not even aware of it herself."
Nathaniel's eyes widened, his curiosity piqued. "Why would she run, if that were the case?"
"There are people in this world that do not realize there are some things you cannot run from, because they are within. However, Velanna has tried to do just that." Justice walked past him and, with a sweep of his arm, gestured toward the gate. There was no flamboyance in the action; rather, he genuinely expected Nathaniel to go. "I suggest you find and tell her as much."
"Why can't you? They are your words of philosophical wisdom, not mine."
Justice's eyes narrowed; his lids were nearly transparent. "I am not the one from whom she needs to hear them."
With an exasperated sigh, Nathaniel unstrapped his bow and checked the tautness of the string, then replaced the bow on his back. Blindly counting the arrows in the quiver, he walked beneath the gate before turning back to Justice. "You're coming with me; there could be stragglers in the forest."
"As you wish."
Three days. Three long days, and Velanna couldn't seem to lose Nathaniel and Justice. The first night they hadn't gotten very close to finding her, though they had come near enough to alert her of their presence. When they returned to the keep, she was sure they had given up their pursuit.
How wrong she was.
Their presence returned rather abruptly the following morning, both of them carrying packs filled with supplies. She had needed to hurry to give herself an ample head start. Now, for the first time since she fled Vigil's Keep, she was worried they might actually catch up to her.
Closing her eyes, a wave of dizziness washed over her. She supported herself on a nearby tree, breathing heavily from her romp through the woods. Her stomach cramped, and she forced herself to think of the last time she had eaten; at least a day, to be sure. She hardly gave herself time to rest like this, let alone eat or sleep—she might have gotten six hours, total, since she left the keep.
She took a small sip of water from the skin she kept at her hip. She wouldn't be running so hard for so long at once if it weren't for her two pursuers. Why were they following her anyway? Her mind attempted to offer up an answer, but she wouldn't acknowledge it. That was a line of thought she would rather not follow. Instead, she cursed the two humans silently and leaned her head back against the rough bark of the tree.
The sun began to descend beneath the trees, and she whispered a soft prayer to the Creators. She was not sure of Justice's vision in the dark, but Nathaniel was a shem—he would be bumbling about the forest with the grace of a lame halla if he attempted to search for her now. If she wanted to restore her energy before either of them could resume their efforts, she needed to eat. Soon.
Pushing herself away from the tree with a grunt, she pulled her staff from her back and rested it upright against the oak. She removed the clasps that held her hair in place and shook her head gently, her flaxen hair spilling over her shoulders. She detested wearing her hair up, but it was necessary; she ran the risk of setting her hair aflame if she let it hang loose. After she removed her robes and folded them, she placed them beside the tree against which she had rested her staff.
Taking a deep, preparatory breath while tapping into the power within, Velanna began to change. Her bones became pliant as they took a new shape; her nose and jaw elongated into a snout, teeth sharpening into vicious points. She fell to her knees, fingers and toes merging as her limbs extended into paws, with claws that dug into the earth. A short bark escaped her when her hip joints popped uncomfortably, but otherwise, she felt no pain—months of practice had afforded her that comfort.
After stretching forward on her front paws to relieve the remaining tension, she lifted her snout to test the air. When she caught an enticing scent, she followed it through the oaks and birch trees that populated this part of the forest, careful to keep quiet.
A branch snapped deep in the forest, well beyond where he and Justice had decided to make camp. Taking his bow in hand, Nathaniel moved to the edge of the clearing, squinting into the darkness. The full moon was just bright enough to illuminate the forest through the trees, though he still didn't believe he could investigate the noise with any real results—especially if Velanna had made it.
He secured his bow on his back before wandering into the forest, ignoring Justice's calls. A shriek—that of a small animal—sounded to his left, and he started off in that direction. There was a snarl, followed by another pained squeak, and he quickened his steps. He slipped lithely through the trees, avoiding roots that protruded from the earth.
Dodging around a particularly large birch tree, he skidded to a stop, faced with the source of the sounds. A wolf with ashen yellow fur glared up at him, a rabbit carcass clutched in its jaw. Its pale green eyes glittered with an annoyed sort of surprise. Blinking once, twice, it finally clicked who was staring him down.
"Velanna?"
She dropped the rabbit, its small body crumpling into a lifeless heap. With a growl that sounded an awful lot like a warning, she took off into the woods, the moonlight shining off her fur like a beacon. When the suddenness of her departure wore off, Nathaniel hurried after her.
"Velanna!"
She shrank back into the tree beside her staff, the bark rough against her nude back. Even after a hasty transformation, she'd had no time to redress without risking discovery. Clutching her robes to her chest, Velanna shivered in the cool breeze that whispered through the trees. A twig snapped not far from the tree; she groaned softly. She shouldn't be surprised that he had managed to find her again so easily.
"Wait a moment, will you?" she hissed, trying to hold on to her composure. She stepped into her robes, pulling them up past her hips. Feathers tickled her arms as she slipped them beneath the pauldrons. Adjusting the neckpiece around her throat, she slipped the silver ring through the two holders and locked the clasp. When she was presentable enough, she moved from behind the tree, keeping her expression neutral and saying nothing.
He simply stared at her. Though the set of his jaw was impassive, a slew of emotions flickered in his eyes, something that looked like relief dominating above them all.
He took a step forward. "Why did you run?"
"I—" she began, but fell silent when another emotion presented itself in the eyes that searched her own: Hurt.
She realized she didn't have an answer for him. She had been certain three nights ago it was her desire to find her sister that forced her hand. Seranni had been Velanna's motivation since the darkspawn had taken the girl, and Velanna's path became clearer still when the Architect had all but flaunted Seranni before her. Now, though, staring up at the man who had treated Velanna as a friend, she was unsure.
She glared up at Nathaniel fiercely. "Does it matter? I'm leaving, and that's the end of it."
His usually stoic expression faltered, and this time she glimpsed frustration in his grey eyes. "Yes, Velanna, it does matter. I was terrified you would be dead beneath that rubble when it was cleared, only to find you had simply disappeared without a trace . . . without an explanation."
"Would you have let me leave if I tried to explain?"
For a long moment, he stared at her. Then he sighed. "I suppose I wouldn't have. And you knew that because of what I said after Arais left for Amaranthine City." He lifted a hand to cover his eyes, a ghost of a half smile lifting the corner of his mouth; a chuckle escaped his lips. "Justice was right."
She arched an eyebrow, his reaction sparking a mixture of confusion and irritation. "Right? Right about what?"
"He had a theory about why you left. In fact, he's the reason we came looking for you." He lowered his hand, taking another step forward. "I was certain we wouldn't be able to find you. He believed that you could be found, because you didn't truly wish to hide."
"That… is absurd!" Her calm façade was lost at the implication in his statement. "I had no intention of remaining with the Wardens after the Commander left me behind. Seranni could be down there, with the Architect, and I was denied the opportunity to find her!"
"I'm not thrilled we had to stay behind either, Velanna—I grew up in Amaranthine and would defend it to the death. I said as much after Arais left. But I can see now why she didn't bring you. You wouldn't have been able to focus on finding the Mother when all you can think about is saving your sister." He lifted a hand to cut off her argument. "I told you before the darkspawn arrived that my obligation is to the Wardens first, even if I would have much rather gone to Amaranthine City to make sure my sister made it out safely.
"When one joins the Wardens, one is supposed to cut ties with the life one had before. I am attempting to do that; you are not."
"I only joined the Wardens so I—" she stopped herself, breathing deeply. She smothered her anger beneath a blanket of feigned indifference. "I do not have to explain myself to you, shem."
"If you say so, my lady." That insufferable half smile continued to play on his lips. "I'm curious about one thing: You are Dalish, and you claim you didn't wish to be found. Yet you made it remarkably easy to track you these past three days. Why is that?"
Velanna realized her gaze had lingered on his lips as he spoke, and she hurriedly met his eyes. She tried to speak, but found words more skilled at elusion than she. Her eyes strayed back to his mouth—back to that damnable smile that only seemed to have grown during her silence—and she let out a decidedly feral grunt before she lunged at him, catching him off guard. One hand gripped each of his biceps as she pinned him against a tree. He went to speak, but she silenced him by moving a forearm to his throat. Raised to the fullest height she could reach, she was vaguely aware that her balance depended more on him than her own support.
A gentle breeze lifted her hair, wisps of blonde swirling about and brushing Nathaniel's cheek. He turned into the contact, his skin grazing the tips of her fingers. She cursed the infernal heat that coursed through her, her heart thrashing violently in her chest. She wanted to hate the man before her as she did most humans, but her inability to provoke him only caused her to grudgingly respect him.
She could feel the strain of standing on the balls of her feet beginning to take its toll. Rather than give up her power over Nathaniel, Velanna tightened her grip on his bicep as she pressed her forearm against his throat with a small amount of added force. Another gust of wind, significantly more powerful than the last, threw off her already precarious balance, and she teetered forward with a startled cry.
Nathaniel's free arm wrapped around her waist until he had a firm hold, pulling Velanna against him to keep her from falling. Resting her forehead against the arm at his neck, she stubbornly kept her eyes cast toward the ground; she feared what would happen if she looked up.
"Velanna," he whispered hoarsely, stroking her side as he held her—just tight enough to support her, but with enough slack that she could pull away if she wished.
But, may the Dread Wolf take her, she didn't want to pull away.
She slipped her hand to the back of his neck, lifting her head as she pulled him to her. Their lips met tempestuously, a turbulent release of the vexations this shem—this man—caused. Her fingers tangled in his dark brown hair, clenching into a fist as she sought to get closer to him.
She bit his bottom lip, hard, and pulled his hair roughly as her mouth moved over his, in a series of deliberate attempts to provoke him, but each ended as fruitlessly as the last. His hands rested on her back, tantalizingly close to her backside, and she fumbled through her memories, grasping at any viable ammunition that she could use against him.
A thought came to her as he began to massage her gently: The only time he had been anything but stoic and unaffected was when she had mentioned his father. A simple query into the history of the ill-fated arl now gave her exactly the fuel she needed to light a fire beneath Nathaniel Howe.
Velanna tore her lips from his, placing her hands on his shoulders for support as she trailed kisses along his jaw to his ear. She nipped at the lobe before she whispered harshly, "You're a coward."
His hands hesitated as they moved over her back. "E-Excuse me?"
"You must be." Her teeth grazed his earlobe. "Why else would you continue to follow your father's murderer? You can't make a name for yourself, so you join the Wardens and follow those more powerful to feel as if you're worth something. Just... like," she paused before hissing out the last word with venomous malice, "him."
His hands gripped her waist, and he shoved her backward with leashed violence. She stumbled before her back pressed into the tree she'd hidden behind. There was a muted thud—her staff falling to the ground, no doubt. Ragged breaths teased the skin at her jaw line in warm bursts as he lowered his head. His hands moved to cup her shoulders, making the role reversal that much more apparent.
"I am not my father," he growled, and his lips brushed her ears with a ghost of a touch that sent a shiver down her spine. When he pulled back and she met his eyes, there was ferocity in their grey depths; they looked like steel in the forge. She couldn't remember having seen him quite so impassioned.
It was . . . exhilarating.
His lips found hers again, commanding and insistent, and—Creators—everything she had hoped. He tore at the clasp that held the wrap at her throat in place, pushing the pauldrons down before gently biting the newly exposed flesh that joined shoulder and neck. His hand slipped beneath the silken fabric that covered her breast and squeezed firmly, and she cursed the gasp that escaped her as she arched into the contact.
Groaning in anxious anticipation, her hands worked on the buckles at the waist of his armor. She pushed the loosened straps aside and slid her thigh up his leg, lifting his gambeson to gain access to the waistband of his breeches and small clothes. As she lowered them, he tore the length of fabric that acted as the skirt of her robes clean off, along with her own small clothes.
The hand that had been kneading her breast slid downward, but before she could protest, he had slipped it between her thighs. His fingers tickled the sensitive flesh there as it moved upward, and she fought the urge to squirm under his touch.
At first he simply cupped her, sliding his hand back and forth. Velanna whimpered when he at last slipped a finger within her and thrust rhythmically, with no less force than his tongue as it pressed into her mouth. Her fingers wound in his hair, pulling him closer as he moved within her.
Another finger joined the first, and she couldn't help the moan that vibrated in her throat. His thumb stroked the sensitive nub and ignited a blaze in her belly. She writhed beneath him, no longer able to contain herself. It felt good, nearly too good, and the heat burned her from the inside out.
Just when she thought she could take no more, her breath shallow and coming in pants, he withdrew his hand. She growled in protest and pulled back to glare at him, only to widen her eyes in surprise when Nathaniel's hands slid around to her backside. Holding her tightly, he lifted her, the exposed skin of her back scraping against the bark as he pinned her with his upper body.
He entered her, hard, and she cried out, his lips silencing her mid-cry. The kiss was as stormy as their joining, each clash of their hips maddeningly perfect. She snaked her arms around his neck, holding herself to him, matching his movements with rivaling fervor.
With each thrust, the flames of her desire were stoked into a towering inferno; she could hardly breathe for the intensity. The heat was overwhelming, as if she were engulfed by a blast of fire. Velanna bit down on the inside of her lip as the tension built to a near painful release, and the coppery tang of blood tickled her taste buds.
Her muscles stiffened as waves of pleasure crashed over her, though they fed the flames rather than smothering them. Nathaniel quickened his pace, extending her climax unbearably. She balled her hands into fists, burying her face in his neck to muffle her screams. He gave a guttural cry as he went rigid with his own release, shuddering violently with each spasm, his arms pulling her as close as possible.
He leaned forward and pressed her body against the tree, and pain registered vaguely where her back had been scratched raw by the bark. She suppressed a whine of discomfort as she came down from her high, but she was still aware of just how right it felt, the two of them joined so intimately. Velanna kissed his neck gently, surprising herself with such a show of tenderness.
Something had changed, and she found herself anxious to hold onto it.
He felt like an errand boy.
No, that was hardly fair of him. Nathaniel was more than willing to do anything Velanna bade of him, caught up in the glow of what they had shared. After he returned from his trip to the camp he shared with Justice, bearing a multitude of supplies—blankets, dried meat and cheese, and a spare set of her robes that he brought from the keep, just in case—he hadn't hesitated to venture back into the forest for the herbs she requested.
When he came back to the clearing once more, he found Velanna kneeling in the grass, facing away from him. The sight of her back—flesh torn and ragged, wounds stopping just above the blanket she had wrapped around her waist—gave him pause.
The bloodied mess was a testament to how little gentleness he had shown her. He wished he could take it back, to not allow her comment to affect him as it had, but the comparison she made to his father . . . she hadn't been all that far off, and it scared him.
Glancing back down at the pouch he held in his hand, he started forward. She looked back when she heard him approach, and a shadow of smile ghosted across her lips.
"I have the ingredients you asked for," he said, holding the pouch in front of her.
"Thank you." She took it, nodding her head, and turned back to the work area she had made. Her mortar and pestle rested on the torn section of her robes, with various vials that she'd had with her. She set out the new ingredients he'd brought and set to work on a remedy for her wounds, crushing herbs and powders together until a smooth paste formed. Setting the pestle to one side, she lifted the mortar in the palm of one hand and pulled her pale hair forward with the other, a few errant strands sticking to the wounds.
"Allow me," he offered, kneeling behind her and helping with her hair. Velanna didn't argue as he took the ceramic bowl from her hand. Dipping his first two fingers into the poultice, he applied it liberally to her back. She inhaled sharply, cursing at first, but soon fell quiet enough that he could hear the sounds of the forest. Cricket songs surrounded them, and croaking frogs, and somewhere in the distance, the mournful hoot of an owl. It was soothing, and something inside him opened up to thoughts he had struggled with during his search for elfroot and deep mushrooms.
"Velanna?" he murmured. She turned her head, her eyes half closed. She seemed . . . at peace. "When I first met Arais, I was a prisoner. She could have had me hanged for trespassing on my family's forfeited lands—I tried to reclaim some of what was lost and, at the time, had thought to perhaps avenge my father's death. That was no secret. In retrospect, I can understand why she let me go. I believe Arais knew that, if given the chance to do what was right, I would rise to the occasion.
"It took me a few days of traveling alone before I knew I had to return. And I have not once regretted my decision to join the Wardens."
Leaning into his touch as he massaged the poultice into her wounds, she sighed. "Is there a point to this?"
"Yes." He chuckled, amused that she still clung to her abrasive attitude, even after the intimacy they'd experienced that night. "I mean to say that if you still wish to leave, I won't argue with you. I know you will come back to the Wardens." He paused, reaching a hand around to touch his fingertips to her chin; she looked up at him, her eyes narrowed. "To me."
She turned to face him fully, wide-eyed and wary. "Do you mean that?"
He simply nodded in response.
"I promise nothing, Nathaniel. My only reason for joining the Wardens was to find Seranni. I swore to myself that I would rescue her from the Architect, and I will keep my word."
"The choice is yours . . . my love." He rested a hand on her cheek with a soft smile, knowing her decision had already been made. "Your loyalty to your sister is admirable. Never lose that, Velanna."
He urged her into turning her back to him once more. He secured bandages over the wounds before he stood and helped her to her feet as well. She handed him his pouch, and he secured it on his waist. Drawing Velanna into his arms, he kissed her softly. She would remember he was capable of gentleness; there was nothing more for which he could ask.
Forcing himself to pull away, he touched his fingers to the tattoos beneath her lips; he wanted to memorize those markings, to know what they meant, but now was not the time to ask. He brushed her hair behind her ear, her bangs stubbornly clinging to her forehead. That whisper of a smile returned to her lips, but she was otherwise impassive. With a certainty he hadn't felt since he decided to join the Wardens, he looked her directly in the eyes.
"We will see each other again. I have faith in that, if nothing else."
A big thank you to Herebedragons66 for betaing this for me and giving me that wonderful summary. It was a horrible mess before she got her hands on it, and I'll be forever grateful for the amount of work she put into revising it while working on her own beautiful story!