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Chapter 1: Surprises
A cool breeze blew over Elissa as she stood outside the forest. Wanting to escape from all of the commotion at the keep, she had gone for a walk that she hoped would keep her thoughts from other, less pleasant things. Like how many people had died at the keep when she chose to save Amaranthine, though she had less trouble with that since she firmly believed more people would have died if she had chosen differently. Then there was the fact that people had already died during the Joining in her short time as Warden Commander, and if their faces were already haunting her dreams how many more people could she submit to that?
Unfortunately, all of those things had been occupying her mind since five minutes after she left the keep.
"Well, there's no one around to hear me, so I think I'll just start talking to myself to distract me. Not that me rambling on to myself isn't weird or possibly bordering on insanity. I should have brought Ivan along. Yes, that dog would have been good company. Or I could have taken Ser Pounce-A-Lot along and spent the whole time anticipating what Anders would look like when I returned. My guess is he would look like a crazy cat lady with his ponytail coming out, a wild look in his eyes, and-"
"Have you taken up tree-whispering since leaving Denerim, my dear? Personally, I've always wanted to try that, and with an expert such as yourself to teach me I think I'd be pretty good at it."
Elissa whirled around, a look of pure joy on her face. "Alistair!" she cried, throwing herself into his arms. "I thought you weren't going to arrive for another two weeks!"
"I knew you wouldn't mind, so I decided to come early and surprise you. It worked rather well, considering how loud I am when I try to be sneaky. I'll just have to only sneak up on you when you're talking to trees. Umm... what was that about, anyway?"
Elissa sighed deeply. "It's a long story..." She told Alistair everything that had happened at the keep since she had arrived. At the end he only stared ahead in silence. As the minutes dragged on Elissa began to worry that he disapproved of the choices she had made. She had been so sure he would have agreed with her regarding saving the people of Amaranthine and killing the Alchemist, or at least understand her decisions. It took all of her self-control to refrain from screaming at Alistair to tell her what he was thinking. Finally he spoke.
"Wow. I can't believe I let you come here all alone. If something had happened to you... I'm just happy you're safe."
Relief flooded through Elissa's body. Of course Alistair wouldn't blame her. He never had before, why would he now? "Me too. Come on, let's head back to the keep. I'll show you what repairs we're doing."
Upon reentering Vigil's Keep, Elissa couldn't help but be proud of what had been accomplished in the week since the darkspawn attack. The walls and the area immediately within them had suffered the most damage, but they were already halfway done thanks to the dwarves in charge of construction.
"Hey Warden!" a voice yelled from across the courtyard. Oghren ran up to Elissa, his face red with rage. "Those sodding bastards in the kitchen won't give me any more ale!"
Elissa placed a hand on her hip and let the other cover the small smile that was beginning to form in a vain attempt to hide her amusement.
"You think this is funny? I'm about ready to go into a berserker rage and you're laughing? Get those sodding fools to give me my drink!"
"Is the thought of no drink really enough to send you into a berserker rage? As a Grey Warden you may want to exercise a tiny bit more control than that," Elissa commented wryly. She knew that she should really get Oghren a drink, but at the moment he was just too entertaining.
"Wait, Oghren's a Grey Warden?" Alistair asked, obviously stunned.
"Don't look so surprised, pike-twirler. The warrior caste of Orzammar are some of the best," Oghren replied, puffing out his chest with pride.
Laughing, Elissa said, "Don't worry, Oghren. I'll speak with the kitchen staff about your need to be constantly inebriated." Oghren muttered his thanks along with some curses at those working in the kitchen and went back to the fort.
Elissa turned to Alistair, who still wore the stunned expression he had when he learned of his new brother in arms. "You know, my old nan always told me if I Ieft my face in a funny expression for too long it would freeze that way."
"Heeey! People would kill for my face even if it was frozen into something resembling a darkspawn."
Chuckling, Elissa replied, "Is that what they told you in the chantry?"
"No, in the chantry they told me that I would never amount to anything. It's obvious they were just jealous."
The last comment combined with the self-assured look on Alistair's face and the happiness having him around again brought her was enough to send Elissa into a laughing attack. "It's... not even... that... funny..." she managed to get out between spurts of laughter.
"I have that weird feeling that comes when you're not sure if someone just insulted you or not," Alistair responded with a cocked eyebrow.
"Not... meant to... insult..." Elissa gasped, finally beginning to catch her breath.
"Are you okay to go inside?" Alistair asked.
"Yeah, let's go. That should be my last crazy person action of the day. Should be anyway..."As they entered the keep the aroma of dinner wafted towards them. Elissa's stomach rumbled loudly. "Maybe we should head to the dining hall," she suggested.
"Your stomach and I couldn't agree more," replied Alistair, and the couple headed down the hall. After arriving they took a seat next to Oghren, who was still sulking.
"Shoot, I forgot to talk to the cook," Elissa murmured. She excused herself, leaving Alistair alone with the wrath of Oghren in withdrawal. After a fight with the cook about how much money they should be wiling to spend on alcohol, she returned with a tankard of ale to find an uncomfortable looking Alistair and Oghren with his battleaxe drawn. "Whoa! What's going on over here?" she exclaimed as she rushed to their spot in the room.
"This filthy nug-humper was stealing my food!" yelled Oghren.
"Did not! My hands were nowhere near his plate when he pulled out his axe and demanded that I fight him like a real man for his food," Alistair retorted.
He said that a little guiltily, Elissa noted. "Oghren get over here and drink some ale!" she yelled, and slammed down the cup for emphasis, causing the drink to slosh up and over the sides. Immediately Oghren put his battleaxe away and sat back down in his seat, then grabbed the ale and started drinking.
"Did you take his food?" Elissa asked Alistair after she had sat down.
Alistair looked guiltily at his hands. "I asked him if he was going to eat his chicken leg. He mumbled something that sounded like a yes to me, but as soon as I lifted my hand he accused me of trying to steal his food!" he said in disbelief.
"Well, you did try and take food from a Grey Warden. What would you have done? Especially if you were suffering from withdrawal."
"Hmm, I see your point. It's good to be around people that eat as much as I do, though. In Denerim some of the nobility had been giving me nasty looks around mealtime."
Elissa's thoughts wandered back to when her family would entertain visiting nobility in Highever. They always at least had the decency to be polite to her face. The worst she had experienced was poor attempts to hide their surprise when a noble learned that she practiced using daggers and a bow daily with Ser Gilmore. Elissa knew that some of the nobles had brought their concerns about that to her parents since they were the ones that allowed her to spend time that way. What the other nobles had to say about her Elissa learned from the castle staff. According to a former maid, one noble's daughter described her as "a crazy freak that should learn to focus on what was proper". That was definitely among the nicer things people had said.
"There's definitely no need to worry about that here. We all eat like starving pigs," Elissa finally responded to Alistair.
"Thank the Maker!" Alistair cried. The two then continued with their meal.
Just as Alistair was getting up to get thirds, a messenger ran over to Elissa. "For the Warden Commander," the young man said. Elissa took the envelope the man handed her and opened it. As she read the contents her face grew pale.
"What is it?" Alistair asked worriedly.
"The Grey Wardens in Weisshaupt want to know how we survived killing the Archdemon. They've already left and will arrive in Denerim within a week. We're to meet them there." Elissa wondered if everyone could hear the distress in her voice.
Alistair reached for the letter and Elissa gave it to him, glad she wasn't alone in this. "Well," he said after reading the letter. "I guess we should leave in the morning."
"Yeah, I guess we should," Elissa murmured.