Blood...
It had become such a part of her life that she almost didn't notice it anymore. Blood on the stones under the woman whose throat she had slashed. Blood on the Chantry banners that hung behind them like a bank of grim judges.
Judges…
The thought caught at her mind a moment as she wiped her blade on the red and white gown of her victim. So long now, she'd been set up as judge and jury. Happily stepping into that role when Justinia had called her. Set so strongly in her righteousness that for years she had turned a blind eye to the river of blood she'd left behind her. A river that had swept her up and taken her...here.
Here…
Here in a space where she could slay a woman in front of Andraste's gaze and feel nothing. She stopped and looked into the featureless face of the statue a moment. Featureless was how she felt these days. A tool with no soul of her own.
"Forgive me."
She wasn't even certain why she'd said it.
In anger at her own weakness, or perhaps in fear of the humanity it betrayed, she stepped over the body and strode through the door to the open air. Breathing in the fresh breeze that cleared the iron tang of the blood from her nose. And brought with it another scent that caught her fractured attention.
Roses…
She'd loved them at one time. But it had been so long since she'd allowed herself anything so human.
Human…
Her long silenced humanity reared it's unpracticed head and almost without volition she turned to the hedge the scent seemed to come from.
And there was a rose. It was white and perfect and so like 'her' rose that for a moment she felt transported to youth and faith and wholeness as she plucked it and held it to her nose to savor.
"What are you doing, Sister Leliana? We need to go."
The Inquisitor's voice held both fear, likely because of the body that lay cooling inside in it's own blood, and impatience. So she shook herself from the strange reverie that had held her and strode to her place at the Inquisitors side.
It wasn't until later she realized she still carried the rose, cupped in her hand like a treasure.
