The few but mighty Grey Wardens of Ferelden sat gathered around a series of campfires on the highest terrace of Ostagar fortress. The other denizens of the camp – Royal soldiers, Circle mages and Chantry leaders – tended to avoid them; since the old whispers of the Order's treachery had never quite died out. This suited the Grey Wardens well, since many of them had either been ostracised from (or had chosen to leave) common society, and had no desire to mingle with those not of the blood.

Instead, the Grey Wardens preferred their own company, gathering in small clusters and drinking the traditional beverage of ritewine. Cloaked in belching smoke from their campfires, they told stories that varied from the sacred, to the profane, to the utterly mundane; from tales of lost loved ones and long-dead comrades, to a colourful account of the talents of a Denerim whore. Warden humour tended towards the darker end of the spectrum; and as the night drew in and the ritewine drained, the jokes gradually grew more and more macabre.

The senior Wardens, several of whom were preoccupied with their own malicious internal whisperings, did not join in with the salacious humour of their men. They sat slightly apart, passing the occasional comment, but mostly focused with a grim singularity on the upcoming battle. From the increasing frequency of Darkspawn attacks, it was clear that the final battle was only weeks away. They alone were aware of the cost of destroying the Archdemon's soul; privately, each senior Warden present had already made their peace with the Maker.

A dwarven Warden with a tattooed face called across the campfire, made bolder by the liquid courage of ritewine.

"Here, Duncan!"

Duncan had been sitting on a low wooden bench some distance from the flames, inspecting a blunted blade with a frown deepening the lines on his deep tan complexion. He looked up at the mention of his name, dark eyes gleaming and opaque in the firelight; like the watchful stare of a wildcat.

"Aye?"

"D'you think the Wardens'll ever ride griffons into battle 'gain? Like in the old tales."

"Ha, Umrous," came a derisive snort from somewhere in the shadows. "You old drunkard, you'd fall straight off a griffon's back!"

The dwarf let out a responding gurgle of laughter, reaching out with a clumsy hand to turn the frying pan.

"Well, ser dwarf, if the griffons ever decide to return from extinction, I'll let you know," replied Duncan gravely, raising one eyebrow. "You can be the first in line to try one out, if you wish."

"Yeh hear that!" the portly Warden guffawed, slapping his knee and wheezing. "The Warden-Commander himself is signin' me up for the tactical griffon squadron!"

Just then, two figures manifested from the darkness; the taller quickly dropping the hand of the smaller as they approached the campfires. Duncan glanced sideways as they came near, his eyes still sharper than most even after five decades of use.

"Alistair, Flora," he said, raising his voice over the hiss of spitting fat from the sausages. "Here, young recruits, sit."

There was a soft, almost unnoticeable ripple of discontent amongst the other Wardens as they watched these two inexplicably favoured recruits sit on the flagstones at Duncan's feet. The lad – Alistair – had too handsome a face to be taken seriously as a soldier; while the lass was two coppers short of a silver – rumour had it, she couldn't even write her own name when signing the join-up papers. One Warden had overhead two Templars discussing the new mage-recruit in derisive tones; dismissing her as a threat to anything, let alone Darkspawn.

Over the weeks, several theories had arisen amidst the Warden ranks as to why these two recruits seemed to be so preferred. The boy had a well-bred accent, and could possibly have been the bastard of someone important; but the girl spoke with the soft, slightly hoarse tones of a northern commoner, and lacked all the mannerisms of nobility. A growing majority voiced their suspicion that she might be their Warden-Commander's lover - Rivainis were known to fancy redheads – but those who knew Duncan best knew the unlikeliness of this. The senior warden was not adverse to taking a partner into his tent on occasion; but not one a full three decades younger.

"Alistair," said Duncan, as the blond recruit stared off in pensive reverie. "How did the Chantry Mother respond to our request?"

"Oh," said Alistair, who had been envisioning himself drinking ritewine and joining in the bawdy jokes with his brethren. "She said that they can't delay the morning hymnal service for anyone, not even the Grey Wardens. Said that the Maker would be deeply displeased if He had to wait an extra hour before hearing the Chant!"

Duncan let out a sigh, draining his bottle of ale and letting it rest in a low dip in the ancient flagstones.

"It would be far easier if the Chantry just agreed to work with us, rather than engage in this pettiness," he murmured, with a soft rumble of regret to the words. "If the king can let go of old grudges, why can't they?"

Alistair gave a cheerful shrug, already eyeing the sausages frying noisily in the pan wedged over the fire. There were six of them, their skins blackened from ash and near-about to split.

"Don't know. I swear to the Maker, I didn't sass them!"

Duncan narrowed his eyes down at his young recruit, pursing his lips.

"I should hope not, Alistair. Now is not the time to antagonise our allies."

There followed a long silence, and then a hiss as a volley of crimson sparks surged upwards into the darkness. The dwarf Umrous reached out to grab the pan from the flames, then cursed as his clumsy lunge knocked it sideways; deeper into the bone-white heart of the fire.

"Ah, Stone's Balls!"

Flora, who had been sitting cross-legged and quiet beside Alistair, glanced up. She had not spoken a word since they arrived; clearly not accustomed to idle socialising.

Leaning forward, she stretched out an arm towards the flames. A gleaming gold sheath formed around her sleeve, coating her fingers in a thick, almost waxy sheen. The conversation and bantering of the other Wardens died off as they turned their heads to watch, eyebrows drawing together with wary curiosity.

With skin protected from the heat by the clinging lustre of her magic, Flora's hand passed through the flames as though they were as water. She grasped the handle of the pan- which had thankfully not upended its contents into the coals – and drew it carefully out of the fire. Not wanting the dwarf to burn himself, she placed the pan on the flagstones and slid it gently towards him with her booted toe.

The dwarf took the pan by the handle, shooting Flora a suspicious look.

"Alright, boys, who wants a sausage? And I ain't talkin' about the ones in your drawers!"

Duncan turned down the offer of food – there was little that appealed to the taste-buds in his tainted condition – but Alistair accepted eagerly, having not eaten for several hours.

He was about to take a large bite when he happened to look sideways, and saw Flora still sitting patiently with an empty plate. A quick glance down back at the fire provided an explanation. A final sausage had just been placed into the pan to fry, a sad and slightly misshapen afterthought of raw meat.

"Here you go, Flo," said the fundamentally kind-hearted Alistair, after a moment. "You can return the favour once yours is done."

He broke his sausage in half and gave one end to his solemn-faced sister-warden, who mumbled her thanks as she took it gratefully. From behind them, Duncan gave a muted sound of approval.

"Here, Dora?"

Flora looked up, fascinated and appalled by this mangling of her name. The speaker was the blunt-speaking, roughly-shaven swordsman known as Stene, who had originated the hated one-trick pony nickname.

"It's Flora," she replied, and the warrior looked astonished that she had corrected him.

"Flora." He somehow managed to make her common, northerner's name sound simplistic and foreign on his tongue. "You're just a healer, right?"

Duncan looked up, but the warning writ across his hawkish features was half-lost in the evening shadow.

Flora dropped her eyes to the remains of her sausage, knowing instinctively what was to follow. The same question had dogged her through years at the Circle, exclaimed by her instructors, demanded by her fellow apprentices; even hissed at her by suspicious Templars.

"So why can't you cast from any other school of magic then, eh?"

"Dunno."

"Have you ever been able to cast from any other school of magic?"

"No."

"Can you kill a Hurlock with your magic?"

Such useless queries! Don't get upset, child, you should be used to this by now.

Flora shook her head, morosely. Stene opened his mouth once more and then a stinging voice lashed across the campfire, sudden and shocking as the cracking of a whip.

"Enough!"

Duncan rose to his feet, embers of anger gleaming in the coal-dark depths of his eyes. His shadow, broad and augmented by the armour of a senior officer, fell across those gathered about the campfire. Stene went abruptly silent, amputating the next question before it could emerge.

The Warden-Commander glanced down at Flora, who was still sat wide-eyed at his feet. He dropped a hand to her shoulder, resting his fingers gently on the striped material of her tunic.

"Walk with me, young sister."

Flora scrambled obediently to her feet, wondering whether she was in trouble.

Warden Stene let out a little snort as this most junior and senior of pairings disappeared into the shadows together.

"Told you Duncan was knockin' her off," he commented, bluntly. "He's gone and took her back to his tent for a quick shag"

"Duncan is not… doing that," retorted Alistair indignantly, reaching out to turn the second pan around in the flames. "He wouldn't."

In fact, Duncan had taken Flora only a short way off into the camp – just beside the tent emblazoned with Mac Tir's livery – and then turned to face her, his voice low and earnest. Flora stood before him, shifting anxiously from foot to foot.

"Young sister," he repeated, dark eyes anchoring her pale, confused stare. "Do you remember what I said to the First Enchanter when I conscripted you?"

Flora nodded: the words were emblazoned into her mind, as though branded into the soft matter of her brain.

"'This girl has a rare and powerful gift from the Maker," she repeated, dutifully.

"'And her talents are wasted in the Circle,'" finished Duncan, softly. "'Out in the world, she can do great good; and the restriction of her abilities is no hindrance if what she can do is so potent.'"

The Warden-Commander gave a slow nod, his eyes moving over Flora's solemn, strangely familiar features.

"I would have recruited you based on that shield alone," he said, blunt as ever. "But when I read in the Templar notes that you had an uncanny ability to neutralise toxins, I did harbour a hope that you might be able to do the same with the Blight-sickness."

Flora had indeed demonstrated her ability to do such, removing the taint from a wounded soldier on her third day at the fortress. She swallowed, an odd sensation brewing deep in her belly. It was one wholly unfamiliar to her, a peculiar warmth that filled her lungs akin to her own strange magic.

What is it?

Pride, child.

"Never forget that I chose you for exactly who – and what - you are, Flora of Herring."

Flora, who had never received such explicit praise in her life, gazed up at the senior warden in enthralment. Moments later, an extremely uncharacteristic beam crept across her face; the full mouth that she had inherited from neither one of her parents curling upwards in a rare smile.

Duncan smiled kindly back at her, a flicker of curiosity passing across his prematurely lined features.

"You remind me a great deal of someone, little sister," he said, in a low voice that came from many miles away. "I wasn't sure before now, but…hm. Where did you say Herring was, again?"

"The north coast," she replied in a distant voice, still repeating his earlier words in her head.

"Bann Loren's land?"

"No, in the teyrnir of Hiver – sorry, Highever. Hiver is what we call it."

Duncan glanced at Flora once more; a long and appraising stare that took in the dark red hair, the distinctive grey eyes and the fine-hewn cheeks that almost certainly did not come from the peasant stock that she naively claimed.

"Hm," he said at last, keeping his reservations to himself. "Let's get back to the fires, young sister. I fancy that I do have an appetite, after all."

As they approached the campfire, Duncan slowed his pace, causing Flora to stumble to a halt behind him. There were far more silhouetted figures gathered around the fire than there had been previously, and one of their number was clad in resplendent golden armour that reflected the flickering flames like a mirror. No ribald humour or bawdy jokes rose from the gathered Wardens; technically they owed fealty to nobody, but it was instinct to bow their heads in the presence of royalty.

"Ser Duncan!" announced King Cailan, his eyes shining with boyish enthusiasm even at this late hour. "I have need of my little shield-mage!"

OOC Author Note: So this chapter expands a little more on why Flora is so continually obsessed with Duncan, remaining so long after his death. He was the first one to explicitly name her strange form of magic as a gift from the Maker, thus transforming her from embarrassment to asset.

Just as a little side-note, I commissioned an image to use as the cover-image for my sequel to the Lion and the Light. I posted it on my new commissions-only tumblr, thelionandthelightartwork . It's so beautiful and gorgeous, by the talented Louminx who I actually think depicts Flo better than any other artist I've commissioned.