It was too easy to forget what color was once they'd left the unnatural blazing ruby of lyrium veins behind. Now it was nothing but the deep russet of endless stone and earthen brown. He used to see color in his companions: the deep green of the blood mage's tunic, the brilliant crimson blaze of Lysandra's hair, the golden glint of the dwarf's ridiculous jewelry. The last of the color had been leached from them a week before, as the rock wraith's collapse cast a thick, even coating of deep, endless brown over all of them. He missed the crimson the most and swore often under his breath that he couldn't spare a single drop from his dwindling canteen reserves to scrub a finger's worth of the dirt away.
"Is that?" she said and narrowed her eyes. Torchlight drowned the emerald in flickering shadow. "It can't be…"
Ahead, far enough ahead that he could only make it out squinting, something pierced the gloom. A hint of late-afternoon blue, perhaps. They'd all shuffled for the last several hours, though the weight of the earth overhead had bowed and slowed her more than the dwarf or the damned mage. In fact, the two engaged in endless prattle behind them. He blocked all of it out as her back straightened and her step lightened.
"Perhaps," he said.
"Oh, thank the Maker!"
As quickly as the words came out, she was gone, a blur of brown in a field of more brown. Endless brown.
"You think it's safe to run off like that?" Not that his words stopped her. Had they ever?
Venhedis!
"You know, Daisy, when we get out of here…"
Several of the dwarf's words drifted away as he took off after her, torch in hand.
"…diamondback deck…"
He kept the torch at arm's length; the flame stretched out too far in the wind his motion stirred. The roads here were in worse condition than he'd feared when he'd shouted after her, and only the torch's limited light kept him from losing his balance on the jagged stones underfoot. She had no such light with her. He trailed her, but no matter how fast he forced one foot to follow the other, her lead lengthened. Watching the stones beneath didn't aid him any, either. That she hadn't yet lost her balance was a minor miracle. Then again, she had always been fleet-footed, far more so than he could ever manage. Slowly, the torchlight seemed to diminish in the faint blue glow, and the torch itself sputtered its last. Her sharp cry echoed in the narrowing passage and the darting brown figure collapsed.
"Lysandra!" His own foot wobbled on a particularly unstable hunk of rock.
"Flames." The small curse, though whispered, came clear as a spoken word to his ears.
It seemed she hadn't knocked herself out and the lack of endless moaning and groaning seemed to indicate she hadn't mortally injured herself. Still, far too much distance remained between the passage's opening and Kirkwall's gates for even the tiniest injury to go ignored. At least her fall gave him the chance to catch up. He faintly made out her twisted smile when he crouched next to her.
"And so the mocking commences," she said.
"Is there a reason you ran off like a fool?" He didn't intend his words to sound quite so harsh.
"All right, I guess the mocking will wait until the rest of our little company arrives."
"Are you injured?"
"Only my pride."
"In that case, it must have died long ago."
"Very funny."
She struggled to her knees, and winced as she put her weight on one foot. She steadied herself against the wall and tried the second. She grunted as she failed, her clearly injured foot slipping. He gritted his teeth and steeled himself for the burning as he wrapped an arm around her waist.
"I'm fine."
"Yes, that's exactly the word I'd use to describe you."
She muttered a chain of curses beneath her breath but still gave him half a smile as he hoisted her to her feet.
"Can you walk?"
"I…" She stepped forward on her bum foot and bit her lower lip. "…can, but…"
He kept a grip on her as the dwarf and the useless mage caught up.
"Take a look at her ankle," he said to the mage.
"Hawke, are you all right?" the mage asked, ignoring him completely.
"I won't die, but walking isn't the easiest thing I've done."
"And so the heroine takes a fall," the dwarf said. "The old legends have come to life before me."
"Maker's breath!"
"Witch, make yourself useful and examine her ankle!"
"May the Dread Wolf take you! You know full well I'm no healer."
"As I suspected, you're completely…"
"Fenris, stop it! It's not Merrill's fault I'm an idiot."
This wasn't the first squabble she'd headed off, and it likely wouldn't be the last, though they had less than a day's journey back to Kirkwall at a normal walking pace. Who knew how long it would take at Lysandra's new limping pace? It didn't bode well; even her normal equanimity had crumbled to the same dust that refused to fall from his armor. He should have made more of an effort to tolerate the mage for her sake, but another week underground hadn't done any favors for his own temper. If that mage had been half as competent as Bethany or, Maker forbid, the abomination, the battle with the rock wraith wouldn't have taken the last of their potion stores. And Lysandra would be walking, rather than slumping against him in a half-pained stagger.
"Dwarf, you don't have a single vial of potion stashed away in some hidden place?"
"I don't have any hidden places, elf. Why don't you ask Hawke about hers?"
"The Maker must hate me," she muttered.
His cheeks burned almost as much as his markings. "I speak of your coat, dwarf."
At least the rear chatter had dwindled to nothing as the surface light intensified. He'd adjusted to the burning where her armor jammed his into his markings, and the pressure of her hand on his shoulder. He contented himself with alternately watching the ground beneath and the wince-smile-wince-smile as Lysandra put one foot ahead of the other. Human women had always seemed sturdy, but she felt far lighter than he expected, and his arm didn't have to reach far to completely encircle her waist. Then again, human women usually had flared and pronounced curves to support. Things could certainly have been far worse than being left to embrace a beauty and being embraced in return.
"Tell me again why you asked the blood mage to accompany us. What was it you said? 'Because I didn't want to be the only woman on this expedition?'"
"Not again! Is it really so hard to understand why I wouldn't want to be stuck underground for weeks with nothing but men?"
"I was the only elf. Is that so different?"
"And now you're not, thanks to Merrill."
"A seeker of demons isn't 'an elf.'"
"Really? She has the ears and every last bit of the suspicion."
He'd bitten back laughter as Lysandra had tried more than once to chat with the mage around their nightly campfires. Clearly, the Dalish had no interest in warming up to the shem who had only taken her along out of desperation. He'd only quietly admitted to himself that perhaps his own desire for Lysandra's company had done much to sour the mage's manner. Lysandra's dark mutterings had amused him as the mage had glued herself to the dwarf instead.
"You could have asked Aveline."
"Who is busy consolidating her hold as captain. Besides, we still needed a mage."
"A healer, you mean. You chose well, didn't you?"
"Yes, well... How was I supposed to know she couldn't heal? Beth picked it up almost instinctively."
"You know much of magic, it seems."
It took effort, but she did finally manage a laugh after contorting her face in ways one might think impossible. "I've known four mages, Fenris. Three of them knew how to heal. Was it much of a stretch to think the fourth would as well?"
"And how were you to know that the dwarf's brother was a bastard?"
"That one… Well, that one shouldn't have been a stretch, really." She shot a black look backward. "I get the sense that your objections to Merrill run deeper than mere magery, even mere blood magic."
"There is nothing mere about magic."
"Right." She giggled.
"Such differences should be discussed later."
"Then, the short version?" She'd put just the right amount of pouting into her smile, and just the right hint of pleading into her tone that he had no choice but to try and humor her.
"You realize there can only be one true elf people, according to her kind. They roam about the land like bandits and vagabonds, but those of us who prefer civilization are frowned upon. They forget their ancestors once lived in homes and cities just as we 'flat ears' do. They sneer at us, even as they rally around a mage ruler."
"This is about magic?"
"This is about power. They claim to represent all of us, but they do nothing to help their suffering kin. They deny us, even as they say they preserve the heart of what is elven."
"I… I guess I've never thought about what it means to lose your entire past."
"Most humans haven't."
"I'm sorry."
He shifted her into his arms and forced his way over the high rock outcropping that had nearly destroyed a wagon's worth of supplies when the expedition had first made camp. He squinted against the fading light—had it been high afternoon, he would have been blinded—as he picked his way over crevasses and projections without his arms to balance. Her trembling nearly threw him off kilter as he finally found the crumbling path that offered at least a little stability underfoot. He felt a faint wetness against his neck and her hair tickled him where it fell against bare flesh. She didn't make a sound as he let her down, but her tears had brought color where they washed the dust away. Unfortunately, that color wasn't the cream of flesh, but a much less welcome red.
"Lysandra?"
"We're out… Oh, Maker, I never thought we'd…"
Out. He gripped her and helped her down the path to the waiting beach. He'd never had much of a taste for water or waves, but the faint echo of crashing surf eased the edges of his temper as the blood mage's bare footfalls disturbed the rocks behind.
"Hawke, wait! I do have some skill with elfroot, if we can find some. It should help your foot." Not even the surf could blunt the edge of the mage's voice or deflect its path as it sliced its way down his spine.
It was up to him to ask the obvious as Lysandra stared straight ahead. "Then why didn't you gather any?"
"Even you flat-ears can't be so ignorant as to believe that plants grow in darkness." Flat ears. What else could one expect from the arrogant?
"Please, just stop, both of you! I can't…"
He'd forgotten what a real sunset looked like, unencumbered by foundry filth, the dust and grit of human industry. Sunset over Lowtown looked much like the bellowing of night-fires, bright orange and red that blotted out the true colors of the sky. Deep yellow and the surrounding faint hints of orange had washed the translucent blue from the horizon as he staggered with Lysandra down the path. He half-remembered the pure Seheron sunsets, the deep hues of purple and pink as the sun finally slept.
"Could you set me down on the beach?" she asked, her voice broken. "I have to…"
"Do humans like sunsets? You've never seemed like you truly appreciate nature, Hawke. Most of the alienage folk keep their eyes away from the skies. I suppose alienage elves are much like shemlen that way. Wait, I wasn't supposed to use that word, was I? It's rude, isn't it? Oh, I'm so…"
He shot the mage a glare and tried not to smirk as it withered her.
"I'll take a look at your foot when you're settled," the mage said finally.
"Good."
"Merrill?" she said. "Thank you."
Lysandra's eyes hadn't shifted from the skies ahead, and she seemed not to notice as rock gave way to pebbles, and pebbles to the grit of Kirkwall's rough sands. He shifted her back into his arms and set her down. The sun had fallen a little more to the horizon, and the sky's brilliant pink glinted in her still far-too-liquid eyes. He settled in beside her as waddling footsteps behind interrupted his thoughts.
"And the heroine broods with the broody elf," the dwarf said, "ruminating endlessly on her fall."
"Varric." The voice, deadly calm, despite the small rill that ran down her cheek. "You should go compose your ballad, 'The Great and Ironical Fall of Lysandra Hawke.'"
"Please, Hawke. I'm much better than that."
"Then go prove it. Or set up camp, or, well, anything besides using that damned word ever again."
"Have it your way. Coming, Daisy?"
A little peace, finally, as pink gave way to deep red. The colors reflected in the waves, and in the hollows of her cheeks. The red ran deepest in the final droplet that finally made its way to her jaw. It lingered there for far too long before it fell to her encrusted armor. She stared enraptured at the red's fading as he watched the sunset play over her, reflected here and there where he'd inadvertently rubbed away the brown from her armor. He'd seen few colors quite so brilliant.
"We camp?"
"Do you see any other option?"
"True. You're a little too heavy to carry all the way to Kirkwall."
"So you have been working on your flattery." She smiled, and all the other colors turned to nothing more than darkness.
"Perhaps a little."
"I've never seen anything this beautiful." She nodded at the deep purples that now dominated the sky.
"I have, maybe once or twice."