By the time she reached Denerim it was pitch black out. Oghren and Nate had both insisted they stop hours ago at an inn, but Ellie was having none of it. They tried to point out the dangers and she had laughed at them, after the last year anything the road to home could throw at her was nothing at all. Six hours had separated her from home. Another archddemon itself couldn't stop her. She was going home tonight.
She was going home to Alistair tonight. And she would do it if she had to cut through an army to get there.
True, letters had been waiting for her at Vigil's Keep from him and for that matter all along the road home. Every place she had written from he had written back to, even knowing as he did that she would be long gone. It had made her smile to see them, to read them as they camped at night on the return journey. Some of them had been silly things, lack of cheese or stories about being overrun with mabari pups. Others had been about the breach or the Inquisition or the rebel mages and she knew that she had missed so much, been gone when he needed her help.
Her faithful mabari trotted by her side as they approached the front gates, their only light from the torch she carried and the stars overhead. It was so quiet and the gates were locked. Things were still troubled she supposed. Despite the freezing temperatures and the light flakes of snow drifting from the sky she lowered her hood as they approached. No reason to be mistaken for some sort of assassin and shot now, though she doubted the only assassin she knew had ever worn a hood and covered up his hair.
She rapped hard on the gates and a peephole slid open.
"No one comes in at night! King's orders. Come back tomorrow."
"I think the king will excuse you this once."
The guard squinted at her and then his face lit up. "Your Majesty! You're back! You're alive! Oi! Open the gates!"
They swung open slowly and Ellie stepped through them, smiling slightly.
"Maker, I can't believe it," the guard said. "Things have been in a right state without you Your Majesty."
"You're Whittle, aren't you?" Ellie asked. She and Alistair had always tried to learn the names of those who guarded the city or at least the faces. They had spent many nights in the barracks, interacting with the soldiers, helping the ones they could. She remembered Whittle in particular, he had appealed to them for help for his sick daughter and then the girl had begged to be allowed to work in the kennels with the mabaris.
"That's me. I'll never forget how you and the king helped me and my little girl. The king still comes around to the barracks, but he hasn't been the same since you've been gone."
"I'm back now," she said.
"And we're all better for it." He bowed. "I won't keep you My Lady, but will you be wanting an escort to the palace?"
"No I can manage thank you. No reason to drag more people out of bed." She didn't want to be surrounded by people, didn't want to have to deal with them or put back on her queen mask just yet. If there was one thing she appreciated about the road it was the freedom.
"Be safe."
"You as well."
She sped up as she made her way through the city. No one was out and about, it was far too cold for even the most desperate to try to thief tonight
The flakes came down heavier as she trotted along the road and she smiled to herself as she passed a row of frozen lampposts on the path to the palace.
The guards at the palace let her in with similar exclamations and for a moment she paused to collect herself. She could hear people in the main hall, leftover from dinner she supposed, but something told her he wouldn't be there and he was the only person she wanted to see.
She saw no one as she sprinted up the steps, down the halls, towards the royal wing of the palace and their rooms. Finally she was looking at their door and for a moment she hesitated. It had been a year. The longest they had been separated and she was overcome with sudden shyness.
Her mabari whined at her feet and she tried the handle; it was open. She slipped inside to a darkened living room. The door to their bedroom was open, the room also dark, but through the cracks under the closed door to what they used as a study shone a small light.
She walked slowly across the room and knocked softly.
"What?!" The door was thrown back and he was in front of her, scowling. Realization dawned on his face, annoyance replaced with a huge smile. "Ellie?"
She threw herself at him then, any eloquent words she might have had failing her completely. He laughed and hugged her tightly, lifting her off her feet then setting her back on the ground, clutching her like he would never let go.
"You're back! You're here! You're back!"
"I'm back." She pulled her head out the crook of his neck to look at him. He was smiling now, eyes lit up, but he looked tired. There were lines on his face that hadn't been there before.
And there was something else.
"Maker, but I missed you-"
"Alistair!" she half cried, utterly distracted. "What did you do to your hair?"