1.

"You will be my First, Merrill," Marethari tells her. But she doesn't want to be a First. She doesn't want to grow up to lead these scary strangers who pat her head amiably like they've known her for a long time. The magic at her fingertips, the small sparks of blue lightning that once delighted her, have betrayed her. They have marked her as different—different in a way she does not understand, but one that means she has been given over to people she has never met to be this First one day.

Merrill stands in the center of camp as it packs up to move onward once more. The sails of the aravels look the same as the ones of her home, but they are liars…pretenders. And as Marethari comes toward her, Merrill flees, biting her fingertips to stamp the blue lightning out.

Through her tears she promises the Creators she will gnaw away the magic if they will just return her to her mother.

They never answer.

2.

She presses a palm to the Eluvian shard tucked to the cloth sack attached at her hip and wonders if the price was worth it.

Hahren na melana sahlin

The words tumble from her lips in sync with Marethari but her mind is far away. Far away to a time in the past when the shrouded body in front of her was full of life. When Mahariel's hands were not cold and stiff in death but warm and pressing down gingerly on her bare breasts the nights they'd shared together.

Emma ir abelas
Souver'inan isala hamin

She tries to blame Tamlen but cannot bring herself to be so cruel to her old friend. The blame belongs to no one, but she wonders if trying to salvage this shard of Dalish history defiles the memories of her friend and her lover.

Vhenan him dor'felas

She will make their sacrifices count. By some small miracle, the mirror shard did not infect her with the strange illness that took Mahariel's life. It must have spared her for a reason. Without a reason, she is alone.

In uthenera na revas

With tears clouding her eyes, Merrill leans down to softly kiss the shrouded forehead of the young woman she loves more than she thinks she can bear.

3.

"Your debt is paid in full," Marethari assures the tall, brunette human standing across from her. "Please take Merrill away from here."

Though she has prepared for to hear them, even though they are said because of her own actions, the words pierce straight through Merrill's heart. She glances over at the young woman meant to lead her away from here…from the only home she remembers beyond snatches of vague memories of her mother.

Bile and shame rise in Merrill's throat. Why can't Marethari just understand? She cannot let the Eluvian go…their people deserve it. Her beloved Mahariel, just over a year gone, deserves it.

Swallowing her words, Merrill turns away from the Keeper who held her as a small child when she'd cried for her mother or from nightmares; away from the one person in the world who should understand what she is trying to do.

"Are you ready to go?" the human asks. Merrill sees concern in her eyes.

She wants to say no, but she has no choice.

"Yes."

The cloth pack holding the glass shard bumps against her thigh as they walk away.

4.

Molly Hawke's hands trace a delicate outline of Merrill's hipbones through the cloth separating fingers from flesh. Merrill's giggle is lost into the kiss they share in the flickering light of the lantern in the window.

"I missed you," Molly murmurs against her lover's cheek.

Merrill finds it harder and harder to find the motivation to return to her home in the alienage when the comforts of polished wooden floors and a giant canopy bed beckon to her from the Hightown estate. But the broken Eluvian calls to her nonetheless; she has sacrificed too much to abandon it for anyone.

But Molly is not just anyone…she is a center to gravitate to, a laugh when life seems unbearable, and a whispered affirmation of love between sheets in the middle of the night. She is the home Merrill thought she'd lost forever when Mahariel died.

"I'll always come back to you," Merrill says.