The morning had been as uneventful as it was clear, and the guards found what little amusement they could by watching the cloaked figure approaching the keep, using its stick to keep balance.

"Is the Commander here," came a woman's voice, strangely accented, "Stavros?"

The guards exchanged a curious look.

"Who asks?"

"Someone with an appointment," the woman answered, "tell him he made it a year ago. I... I am sorry, but it is a private matter."

The guards exchanged a worried look.

"A year ago," the one on the right said, "wasn't that?"

"I'll tell him," the other croaked out, and he was off without another word.

"Leave us," Stavros said to the pair of guards who led the cloaked woman into his office.

"But Commander," one of them began.

"I said leave us," Stavros growled, the promise in his eyes as they met the speaker's of just how many different types of hell he could make the rest of their career plain. The guards nodded and did not so much withdraw as retreat.

Once the door was closed Brialora pulled the hood of her cloak back.

"I wasn't sure whether I'd see you again," she said.

"I made a promise, didn't I? Too bloody stubborn not to keep it. You too, I see."

"Me too, yes," Brialora replied with a nod, "What of the others?"

The ghost of a smile that had begun to form on Stavros' face died, taking hers with it.

"They saved as many as they could," he said. "I wometimes wonder whether we should have gone with you. How-"

"I saved as many I could also."

Neither asked exactly how many had died, nor expressed sorrow for the other's loss; each understood the lack of need.

"So that was how it ended," Stavros said as the day's last light shone through his office window, "shortest bloody Blight in bloody history, and good bloody riddance to it."

"I'd heard rumours," Brialora replied with a nod, "It is good to know they are true. But I must away to rejoin my clan." Their numbers had been few in the days immediately after they had fled the keep, but they had gathered other survivors from other clans that had been shattered by the Blight. She had not been born to them, nor they to her, but they were now hers, and she their Keeper. As Stavros is to his people in his way, she thought, unsure of exactly why this pleased her.

"Safe journeys to you then," he replied, "live well, elf."

"Live well, human," she answered. They shared a final smile, and she was gone into the night.

"And is that all true?"

Brialora had been telling the tale of the Keep and its defenders to all those at the Arlathvhen who had cared to listen, and one of the girls had remained behind, waiting until the others had gone to rejoin their clans before she spoke.

"It is how clan Ir'Abelas came to be, yes," Brialora replied, "and it was how I learned that there is good to be found in the shemlen just as there is in the elvehn. A lesson we can all do well to mind, da'len. You're sael to the Keeper of clan Lavellan, are you not?"

"Yes, amelan," the girl said, "I am called Nyddirtha."

"Keep this lesson in mind, Nyddirtha, and may it serve you well in times to come."