Chapter 2
"I still can't really believe it happened."
Hawke was sitting on the steps outside of Gamlen's, cradling a pendant the palm of her hand. It was an old, unassuming thing; a black gem in a silver setting. But when she stared into it she thought she could feel something staring back…
At length, she looked up. "Hm? What was that, Aveline?"
The guardswoman looked troubled. Her arms were folded and she was pacing. "I said that I still… it's hard to believe it all really happened. That we didn't just dream it. The Blight, I mean. The witch. I was content thinking that nobody like that really existed, you know. That she was just a legend."
It was more than that, Hawke guessed. Aveline had been married to a Templar and while she wasn't especially devout, magic made her uneasy.
"Not to put too fine a point on it, but it's a good thing she was around," Hawke answered.
Aveline let out a heavy breath and nodded. "I know. It's just—this doesn't sit right with me."
"She helped us. We're just keeping our end of the bargain."
"Hawke, you know the stories as well as I do—better probably," Aveline scolded. "Should we really be doing anything to help her?"
Shrugging, Hawke presented the pendant in her opened palm. "Fine. Go throw it off the docks."
The redhead scowled stormily in answer.
"Didn't think so." Hawke slipped the piece, chain and all, into a pouch at her belt. "Look, we take it to the Dalish, they take care of it, and whatever happens after that? It's not our problem."
"No. I can't do that, Hawke. You know me better than that."
Marian laughed. Over Aveline's shoulder she could see Varric approaching from the Hanged Man. "Then what do you want? We can't have this both ways—honorably repay our debt and not… do that. Sadly, I don't think we'll find a way to get the job half done." She stood and stretched. "It'll be fine, Aveline. Whatever happens, we'll see it through." She leaned back toward the door of the house. "Carver! Beth! Let's get moving!"
"In the interest of our future together, I'd like to make it clear now that this? This isn't my thing."
Hawke laughed and glanced at Varric. Wherever the Dalish were, they were well off the road and they found themselves traipsing through the ancient, overgrown foot paths that wound around and through the rocky vegetation and sparse woods at the base of Sundermount. At one point in the far-flung past, this had been a place thoroughly travelled. Now there was a deathly chill in the air that even her leathers couldn't shield her from and a strange silence blanketed everything.
"Are you not a morning person, Varric?" she ventured.
"Hawke, this isn't morning. This is the Maker's ass crack of dawn," he grumbled. "But yes definitely that but this too—" A hand indicated everything around them. "The green and the rocks and the nature. Short legs and vertical planes don't go together. Can we go back to Kirkwall now?"
Her eyes moved between the path and the tree line, watching for movement and trip wires both. "No," she said, finally.
"I hate you."
"Hey, when you have to do a favor for an ancient witch as part of the deal you made to get your family to safety, you can expect to hear a lot of whining from me."
The necklace seemed to be burning her through her pocket, but that was surely just a trick of her mind.
Varric heaved a sigh and shifted Bianca's weight against his shoulder. "Fine," he said, "but is this for real? You're telling me that Flemeth saved your lives? I'm not Ferelden but I've heard the stories."
Hawke shrugged. "I'm saying that a dragon decimated two hundred darkspawn that were just about to overwhelm us and then it turned into an old woman who called herself Flemeth. Whether it was the Flemeth or not I guess I really can't say."
"When father taught me about the schools of magic he always said that shape-shifting was old magic—old and lost," Bethany added from behind them. She walked beside Aveline as Carver brought up the rear behind them. "I'm sure the Circles wouldn't teach it anyhow. It'd be too difficult for the Templars to keep track of apprentices if they could all turn themselves into mice."
"Or dragons," Carver muttered. Then he raised his voice to address Varric and his sister at the front, his tone agitated: "Shouldn't you be watching the path? Don't the Dalish trap the woods around their camps? And kill intruders?"
"And here I thought that Varric and I were just walking ahead of everyone because we have the nicest asses," Hawke called back. "Let the scouts scout, little brother."
"How do you even know they're here? We could be wasting our time," he replied.
"Or, you know, I could have heard some reliable rumors from literally everyone in Darktown with lips." She looked at Varric and shrugged. "I guess a lot of elves are thinking about going back to nature."
"What would be the cons, exactly?" Varric wondered. "I've personally never been to Darktown and thought I really envied the people squatting there."
"Well, as far as I can tell, no one really knows why the Dalish are here. The general understanding of the Dalish seems to be that they prefer thick forests to hide in and there are a lot of places in the Free Marches better suited for that than here," Marian answered. "And I guess the mountain is cursed or haunted or something. It's a lot of Kirkwall superstition."
The dwarf beside her huffed with amusement, though there was concern etching itself across his features too. "Love me a cursed mountain," he muttered.
She shrugged. "It's probably just an area where father would say the Veil is thin."
"Let's hope it's just thin and not torn," Bethany put in.
"What's a few demons? I hear they can teach you all kinds of neat parlor tricks, Beth."
Her sister's bubbly laugh answered. "I'll pass. But thank you, sister."
On one hand, it was a pain in the ass to find the Dalish. On the other hand, the Dalish made it very clear that they had indeed been found with an impressive show of arms.
So, first impressions weren't going very well.
But mentioning the Keeper's name had been a bit like opening a door and the woman herself had been considerably kinder. She had even shooed away the hunters and chastised them for their poor manners, which was gratifying in its own right.
Then there was Merrill. Who knew blood mages could be so adorable? Hawke wanted thirty. But only if they all had such huge, puppy dog eyes and pretty tattoos, which she wouldn't make any real bets on.
But then—
"Ah and here we are."
Hawke remembered the woman that stepped down off the altar in her elaborate robe and armor. Their last day in Lothering, running for their lives through the burning ruins of what was once their home, were details that remained vivid and fresh in her mind even a year later and so too was the witch etched in her memory.
Flemeth.
The Flemeth.
Lothering was on the cusp of the Wilds and the Chasind were a frequent fixture in and around the small hamlet. Which meant children in the village had grown up on legends about the Witch of the Wilds, who devoured men and would steal children away in the night.
"Tell me, clever child: how do you intend to outrun the Blight?"
"I expected my amulet to end up in a merchant's pocket."
"No one would buy it. Maybe because there was a witch inside?"
The woman laughed, a luxurious, purring chuckle that bubbled up from the back of her throat. "Just a piece; a bit of insurance should the inevitable occur. And if I know my Morrigan it already has…"
Hawke couldn't explain her stupid, bald bravado when confronting the witch the first time. Maybe, in a way, she was already dead. She'd been dead since she had pulled Carver and herself out of the mud at Ostagar and she was living on borrowed time. So, yes, she had put herself between the witch and her family with her daggers drawn and she had been as sarcastic then with the witch as she would with anyone else that hadn't just breathed fire over an small arm of the Archdemon's horde.
"Oh, you I like!"
And those words still, in a their own little way, haunted her.
"We stand on the precipice of change, girl. And the world fears the inevitable plummet into the abyss." Flemeth was looking out over the cliff side, over the Dalish below and Kirkwall in the distance. Then she turned to face Hawke and a fierce, predatory smile pulled at her lips when their eyes met. "Watch for that moment and when it comes do not hesitate to leap! It is only when you fall that that you learn whether you can fly."
"That's cheap advice from a dragon."
The smile widened and Hawke would swear to anyone that asked that the woman had fangs. "We all have our challenges."
"Are we going to regret bringing her here?" Carver whispered.
"You don't already?" Bethany wondered.
"Regret is something I know well," Flemeth said, her golden eyes turned on the twins, who froze beneath her stare. She looked carefully from one to the other. "Take care that you do not cling to it; to hold it so closely that it poisons your souls. When the time comes for your regrets, remember me."
Hawke moved instinctively to block the witch's view of them and the woman smiled at her again before her stare turned on Merrill. "As for you, child. Step carefully. No path is darker than when your eyes are shut."
The Dalish bowed, her nose nearly touching her shins. "Ma serannas, Asha'bellanar."
Flemeth seemed pleased and then looked back to Hawke. She drew near in a few, graceful strides. "Now the time has come for me to leave," she said and she held out a hand. In her armored palm, amidst the clawed fingertips, was a heavy coin pouch. Her black lips pulled again into a secretive smile as she placed it gently in Hawke's hand. "You have my thanks. And my sympathy."
With that the witch turned way and the others stepped back as magic began to gather and pull around her. There was heat and blinding light and then a dragon took wing from the cliff side.
Hawke didn't look at Aveline, but she felt the woman's presence beside her. They had been inseparable for the last year, working off their debt together and trying to stay alive in the Undercity. They had even shared a bed at Gamlen's before Aveline got a job with the city guard and could claim a bunk for herself and few things forced bonding quite like making cramped living space work.
"You're worrying," the rogue said.
There was the rattle of plates as Aveline shifted her weight from one hip to another. "I have to worry." She eyed Marian sideways. "One of us has to worry."
Hawke shrugged. "We paid a debt. We've paid lots of those. What happens now is out of our hands."
Aveline caught Hawke's eye with a quick glance. "You don't even quite believe that or you wouldn't have to keep saying it."
Marian sucked in a breath and sheathed her daggers. "Can you see the future, Aveline?"
"Of course not."
"Then it is what it is." Hawke bumped her hip into her friend's and then turned away from the altar. "Come on, we have to speak to Marethari again."
"The Veil was so thin on that mountain and what Merrill did… I just… I need to pray for a bit."
Carver and Aveline saw Merrill to the Alienage and Varric offered to walk Hawke and her sister to the Chantry at the younger girl's request.
Though, when they arrived, the dwarf immediately declined to go inside. There was a no weapons policy on the grounds and he wasn't about hand Bianca over to anyone. "Besides," he said. "Holy ground makes my nose itch."
Chantries with their stained glass, smelling like candlewax and incense, and filled to their righteous bosoms with Templars had never, not in all her life, felt right to Hawke. More to the point, she had never felt right in a Chantry. Not in the humble chapel back at Lothering and not here in this great edifice presided over by the Grand Cleric.
After all, she was the daughter of an apostate. How could she ever belong among a church that denied mages the basic right of family? How could she worship alongside people that didn't want her or her brother and sister to even exist?
"No weapons in the Chantry."
Hawke paused to eye the Templar who spoke. The lad was posted just inside the church's doors, tall and too lean by half for the armor he was fitted in. He was wearing a helmet and the bucket limited his peripheral vision, so he didn't see or pay mind to Bethany as she ducked her head and edged her way around him.
Marian felt a bit persecuted, honestly. She had quite purposefully concealed her knives and unless the boy could see through her clothes how in the hells would he know? Unless he simply assumed the worst of anyone that looked Ferelden? And what constituted looking Ferelden honestly?
Poorness, probably. Dusty clothes, worn shoes, that lingering waft of dog.
Marian raised her hands, exposing her empty, calloused palms and fingertips. "You caught me. My plan to commit unarmed murder on holy ground in broad daylight in front of a dozen witnesses has been foiled. Well done."
"Serah, present your weaponry. Please."
He sounded so young. She couldn't get over it. It was like Carver was trying to give orders in his manly voice. She couldn't help but laugh a little. "How old are you?"
The Templar coughed. "That is not—"
"Hawke."
The chastisement the Grand Cleric could fit into one's name was probably a skill learned over many years of honing guilt as a weapon. Even so, Elthina's lips were pulled into just the tiniest ghost of a smile as she approached with her short, patient strides. Everyone in the hall, from the petitioners to the sisters, parted to accommodate her approach, bowing deeply in respect as she passed.
Marian had the good grace to look a bit sheepish as she ducked a quick bow to the woman. "Grand Cleric," she greeted. "You look well."
Elthina nodded her head to acknowledge the low bowing Templar who then backed away out of respect. She looked then to the young woman before her. "Are you tormenting our poor Ser Kerran?"
"I prefer to think of it as pestering."
The Grand Cleric shook her head and motioned for the young woman to follow her as she turned away.
Hawke did without question and the two of them walked together into the heart of the Chantry.
"It is a beautiful day the Maker has given us," Elthina began. "I have been attending to the Chantry's gardens, though the sisters persist in telling me that it is not done; that a woman of my position should not attend such menial chores. I fear we have lost our way when any of us in the Chantry are considered too good for honest work." She shook her head and then looked to Hawke. "I trust you have been keeping yourself occupied. Leandra tells me that you are always busy; running all over the city on some errand or another."
"Well, you don't make money sitting still."
The woman raised her brows. "And this is your sole pursuit? Coin?"
Hawke grinned "Well, I tried to earn bread with my smile alone, but it didn't work out."
It was a strange thing, their acquaintance, but maybe not completely unexpected. The Grand Cleric had welcomed their mother back to the church personally and as it was Hawke that escorted Leandra to and from services they had been immediately introduced. And for some reason, no matter what dark corner of the Chantry Hawke tucked herself into while waiting for her mother during service, the old woman always found her.
Elthina's lips curled a little as she clasped her hands behind her back. "Ah, you joke," she said. "But you serve your family with admirable dedication—dedication that comes at the expense of your own desires. There are those who could learn from your example, Hawke."
"I wouldn't recommend it. Unless a constant headache and crushing anxiety are their thing."
The Grand Cleric stifled what was most definitely a laugh behind her hand then and shook her head. When she had regained her composure, she looked back to Hawke. "So, have you come for confession?"
"How does that work? If I went to confession and apologized for being a mercenary, am I covered until I take my next job? Just in case I died in between, you know."
"Marian Hawke!"
Being chastised by the Grand Cleric might have held more weight if the woman wasn't always fighting to contain her amusement.
So Marian went on. "Besides, if I went to confession, what then would the Maker and I have to talk about when I died?"
Elthina was smiling so widely that her gray eyes were sparkling. "You and your clever tongue would think of something, child!" she said, her tone still one of a scolding parent. Then it softened. "We are holding services in an hour. Will you stay?"
They had stopped to stand together just beneath a marble arch within the main sancutary. Further in, Hawke could see Bethany at one of the pews, her head bowed. Looming over them all was a great statue of Andraste and the smaller likenesses of several Anointed, which she found intimidating as all the hells. She looked back at Elthina. "Tell you what, if you come to the Hanged Man for a drink someday, I'll stay for a service. A bit of tit for tat?"
At this, the Grand Cleric couldn't seem to help but give in and laugh aloud. It drew looks from others in the church. She reached out and grasped Hawke's arm. "You are a very charming heretic. Your father was impossible too, I remember," the woman said with great warmth. "But thank you. I am given few chances to laugh anymore."
"I'll have you know that offer was sincere."
"As was mine," Elthina said, placing a gentle hand upon Hawke's shoulder and patting it with great tenderness.
The rogue smiled back. "Thank you, Grand Cleric."
The woman nodded genially and Hawke bowed again. She lifted her head and watched Elthina as she walked away, further into the Chantry. Then she turned and began the long ascent up the steps to the balcony above.
Thankfully, Hawke wasn't forced to linger very long afterward. It didn't seem like she had so much as settled into her usual bored trance against one of the walls when she felt Bethany's hand tuck into her elbow.
"What did you and the Grand Cleric talk about?" the mage asked on their way to the doors.
"Gardening and eternal damnation. The usual."
Bethany wrinkled her nose in consternation at her sister's refusal to answer properly, but did not pry any further in that direction. Instead, she went a different way. "You're the only one I ever see her talking to, you know. That isn't from the church, I mean."
Marian laughed. "That's no surprise, is it? Our father destroyed his phylactery and escaped the Circle here. Face it, Beth, the Amells might have been known for their wine cellars, but the Hawke name is pretty famous here too."
"Do you think that means we're being watched?"
They stepped outside, leaving the heaviness of the Chantry behind them for the salty, bracing freshness of Kirkwall's unbearable midday swelter. "I doubt it," Marian said, waving to Varric, who was leaning against the far wall and idly inspecting Bianca for trace imperfections. "The Chantry has a long memory, but Kirkwall has an even longer list of problems. Right now, we're just refugees."
"I hope you're right."
