The journey from Highever to Ostagar may as well have taken them through the Fade, for all the attention Elissa paid it.
So while it seemed too little time had passed for them to be in Ostagar already, the tower loomed against the sky with a distinct silhouette, one she had learned when Brother Aldous had been drilling her on architecture. She nearly stumbled when she realized all over, with a sort of gut-clenching inevitability, that she would never see her parents again.
Something about the knowledge of the weeks that separated her from them seemed to hurt more than the initial physical separation.
Duncan caught her elbow before she could trip all the way, and all but dragged her inexorably onward. At Ostagar was her brother, Fergus, now Teyrn, now widower, now childless. And it was her duty to inform him, to admit to her failure. If only she had been willing to be married, she'd never have had this burden laid upon her.
The hound at her side growled at Duncan for touching his mistress, and nipped at the joint of his armor. She had a hazy recollection of the faithful minion drawing blood when Duncan had attempted to force-feed her, but blinked it away. "Down, Max."
The command was raspy, her voice hoarse from disuse. Duncan cast a sidelong glance her way, but quickly returned his gaze to the rough inclination of the path they were on, allowing here the barest hint of privacy. She wondered how long it had been since she had last spoken.
Max licked her hand enthusiastically, and she managed a smile at his antics.
They strode through the gates with very little ceremony. It seemed appropriate, she thought.
The king met them partway across the bridge, harried and rushed and pink cheeked, and Elissa fought her way through the layers of cotton protecting her mind from cold reality, just in time to hear Cailan say, warmly, falsely "Bryce Cousland's youngest? I don't believe we've ever actually met." in response to her introduction.
She allowed herself half a moment's scowling resentment at being ignored, at having her father accused of such a social faux pas as to never have presented his daughter to the king, before she firmly forced it down beneath the layers of her newfound stoicism.
"Are you not even aware that my father is dead?" she said, hating the way her throat clenched. Dead.
The word echoed through her head like an Abomination's spell... distracting and paralyzing and soul sucking, but she heard Cailan's promise for revenge, and felt his attention roaming critically over her person.
"Thank you, Your Majesty," she said politely, voice coming more easily. She attempted a curtsy, but aborted it when she realized she wore mail and not a gown.
It was not five years ago, though the farce was the same.
He denied her desire to see her brother, for no reason that she could determine, and all she could think to do was smile and remember etiquette and decorum. This man meant nothing to her, could mean nothing to her.
"I apologize; there is nothing more I can do. All I can suggest is you vent your grief at the Darkspawn for the time being."
She raised an eyebrow at him, wondering at his intentions with that remark. Was he angry with her for coming here as a warrior, or as a Grey Warden recruit? Was he genuinely apologetic and offering a pretty boon as a favor?
The puzzle his behavior presented fascinated her; though she had been better at it before, the art had grown rusty with disuse once she'd abandoned feminine wiles for swordplay. Those thoughts brought her fully into the present, and instead of her mother's pleading, her father's horrible, wheezing breaths and bloody coughing, she could hear Duncan and the king conversing, see their bright armor glinting in the sunlight.
She smiled more, and made more appropriate commentary, and otherwise succeeded in feigning interest.
Elissa tried not to gaze too obviously at the familiar back as Cailan jogged away again, off to save the world.
She'd seen fighting though, and she doubted Cailan knew what this Blight might mean.
Duncan ordered her to find a fellow named Alistair and check in with him. She wondered if she'd be assigned a tent, with an assigned cot, and limited rations and only one blanket, like her father's men were when they're on the march, but couldn't bring herself to ask. Duncan cut a forbidding figure. Perhaps this Alistair would be more approachable.
***
He wasn't.
Not through any fault of his own, as far as she could tell; but as she approached the figure that had been pointed out to her by the helpful merchant on the courtyard level, he turned just enough that she could see his face.
She stopped short. He carried on arguing with a disgruntled looking mage while she stared. One could easily mistake this man for Cailan.
Sure, his hair was short and practical, unlike the elegant style Cailan maintained, and his mail was dented and repaired and scuffed from wear, where Cailan wore polished, untried plate.
But he had the same cut to his jaw; the same slant to his eyes, though they were brown instead of grey; and the same carriage. Both were the sons of a king.
He noticed her staring, finally, and welcomed her as the newest Warden Recruit, and dropped vague hints about some sort of ritual they were supposed to undertake.
She feigned interest. It was a specialty of hers, often unused, and it had come into play twice today. She wondered if that was a failing on the men's part, or on hers.
It didn't seem to matter.
He made a clumsy little pass at her, and she deflected it with poise and courtesy, enjoying his blush. It seemed genuinely innocent.
"I suppose I should meet these other recruits then, shouldn't I?"
"Sure thing! Take your time, we don't have to leave until tomorrow, considering how late it is. I'll meet you at the rear gates then, just past sunrise?"
"Yes ser," she said, making a sketchy salute and allowing herself to smile when he laughed.
She wasn't going to find Ser Jory or Daveth. She was going to gain an audience with the king.
It took little effort to gain entry to his tent, where he had stripped off his armor and was bent over a desk, doing paperwork of some sort.
She cleared her throat delicately, waited for him to turn his attention to her.
"Elissa," he said warmly when he saw her. "To what do I owe this pleasure?"
That made her hesitate. Why was she here?
"I'm not sure. You obviously remember me... why—"
"Oh, I didn't mean to upset you. I just thought perhaps you wouldn't want Duncan to know of our previous, ah, acquaintance? You may be his recruit, but you are still a woman."
She remembered their first meeting, him saying she shouldn't be alone with a man. Always the white knight, then, she thought drily.
"Thank you, Your Majesty."
He chuckled. "Call me Cailan, Elissa."
"Thank you, Cailan," she said, voice dripping with irony.
He stood slowly, stretched his back and groaned before taking a step over to where she was standing. "You cut your hair," he noted, reaching to tug at the short ponytail she had bunched it into. "I like it." He smiled his most charming smile, and she smiled back.
"Mother didn't. She despaired of my ever marrying."
"Do Wardens marry?" he mused. "I never cared to check." He touched her cheek.
"I suppose they might, for love."
"Little Elissa, ever the romantic," he said, before tilting her head back so he could kiss her.
It was the same, and yet, so different. She remembered this, and knew how to respond, parting her lips and whining a little bit, pushing into his personal space so her breasts pressed against his chest, just as muscular as before.
He pulled back to smile at her, and to ask permission. "May I undress you?" he said, voice low and growling, almost palpable. She shivered and nodded her assent.
"Only if I may undress you," she added with a low chuckle.
"Of course, darling."
He stripped her clothes off sensually, kissing every inch of skin as it was exposed, leaving her trembling with want.
She sighed and leaned in for another long, intimate kiss before she relieved him of his own clothes.
She spent a long moment admiring him with a heated gaze until—"Come here," Cailan growled, and dragged her against him. His lips roamed along her throat, sucking bites into her skin. His hands were busy elsewhere.
He freed her hair, let it fall in waves around her shoulders, and let his hands caress along her spine to cup her backside.
She cupped his face with her hands, drew him back up for a proper kiss, and contented herself with that.
Then, his roving hands slid around her torso, gently caressing her abdomen before one sank lower, lower still to cup her sex.
She pulled her mouth away from his and bit her lip to keep from whining at him, but he sensed her reaction, laughed, low and sensual, against her cheek.
"Good?"
"Yes, yes!" she sighed.
He pulled away, drew her to the cot at the edge of the tent, laid her down on it. She spread her legs, knees bent, and smiled up at him, welcoming.
"Eager, aren't you, darling?"
"Tomorrow I might die," she responded gaily. A dark expression flickered across his face momentarily, but he smiled at her in return.
"You'll make an excellent Grey Warden," he said. "I envy you the chance."
She pulled on his hand until he came to her so she could kiss him into silence.
She stroked his muscled back, kneading the skin to elicit groans of pleasure, while he brought his hand down between her legs with practiced grace.
He broke the kiss just long enough to say her name, and then his fingers were doing lovely things to her, wrenching out whimpering moans.
"Please," she said finally, unable to take any more of this... this teasing. She knew he was waiting for her to be absolutely ready, because he always did; but she was ready, and impatient.
He obliged her demand, pushing into her slowly, breaking their kiss to bury his face in the spread of her hair, groaning.
She arched her back, pushing back against him, heady with want and need and desire. She could have this much, would have this much.
After a moment of breathless stillness, Cailan pulled out a little, and began thrusting with a slow, tender rhythm, one she easily matched. His hand remained between them, doing delicious things to her.
He brought her to orgasm slowly and exquisitely, forcing her to cry out and clutch at him as she rode through it. His smile after she came, self-satisfied and genuine, was exactly as she remembered it.
He thrust into her a few more times before finding his own release with a guttural groan, a hand on her bicep pressing fingers so tight as to leave a ring of bruises. He collapsed, boneless, on top of her, petting at her hair and saying her name over and over like a benediction.
After a few minutes, he shifted. She protested weakly, "Don't go,"
"We can't sleep like this."
"I don't want to sleep," she said.
"And I don't want to crush you." He pulled off of her, handed her a blanket that had landed on the carpeted floor of the tent. She wrapped it around herself, already suppressing shivers after losing the heat from his body.
She pulled herself off the bed and onto the floor, curled up in the blanket.
Max came to her eagerly from where he'd been laying across the tent flap. She let him lick her fingers and face, scratched him behind the ears and felt guilty for not having treats.
Cailan watched them from near the desk, and she couldn't help the way her gaze kept returning to him.
Finally, he joined her on the floor, grabbing a second blanket and sprawling haphazardly next to her.
"A Mabari warhound," he said.
"His name is Max." Max looked up.
"I see," Cailan said, then. "Max, do you want a treat?"
Max's ears perked, his tail wagged even more fiercely, thudding against the carpet. Cailan held out a handful of Mabari treats and Max climbed over her lap to get at them. She laughed.
"Good boy," Cailan said, before laughing himself.
The comfortable silence lasted for several minutes, Max happily jumping from lap to lap to soak up the attention, before Cailan interrupted it.
"I'm sorry, you know, about your parents... and about Fergus. Loghain suggested I send them out scouting straight away, and I never thought..."
She reached to take his hand. "It's okay. Duncan and I should have easily beaten the army here but I was not myself."
"You should write him a letter, at the very least. As you said, this might be your last night on earth. And it is probably better he read it in his sister's hand than hear it from a bare acquaintance's lips."
And Cailan would know, she mused. She wondered idly who had informed him of his father's disappearance and presumed death.
"Thank you, Cailan." This time, her voice held no irony.