Loghain wonders if anyone has ever given him a warmer, more eager welcome than Dog who's currently barking happily, two steps ahead of him. He's been following in their footsteps like a shadow since they stepped out of their carriage and his enthusiasm has yet to wane. The only thing that seems to disturb the dog is the fact that he cannot always be with both Loghain and Elissa as they must tend to separate duties and sleep in vastly different parts of the keep.

In all honesty Dog isn't the only one who finds thatpart frustrating, Loghain concludes when they've been in Amaranthine for several days and he has yet to spend one moment alone with the commander. But this is of course how it is.

There is much to do, plenty of matters that they can occupy themselves with and part of him is glad for the distractions. However trivial they may appear, each and every one of them serves as a gradual shift back to comfortable routines. Returning to his old life proves to be a task in itself; he's been gone for a while and his place in this old keep had never been a clear one to begin with.

In some ways he is an obstacle here, he thinks, watching the Commander go about her daily chores. He brought nothing but misery to these parts of Ferelden and lords and ladies rarely forget even the smallest vexation – they hold grudges for not receiving invitations to formal events, the ghost of Celia reminds him in his head, surely you understand that they will never forget a civil war.

Returning, he is reminded once more of everything he cannot undo.

He's reminded, too, of the tension and trouble he could cause Elissa.

Vigil's Keep may have been given to the Wardens but to Loghain, it will always be clear that it's truly someone else's, that it's an old fortress already claimed by an arling full of people. He catches himself missing Gwaren of all the Maker-forsaken places in Ferelden. Back when he ought to have considered it home a little more often and with less indifference, he certainly couldn't muster up any warmer sentiments, but now he remembers the reconstruction work they had performed there, almost a year ago. There was a sense of restoration in those actions, he thinks now. A slow, certain way of mending what was broken. It surprises him to learn that he misses it.

Perhaps he merely misses a simpler time. That is what old men are wont to do, after all.

When he speaks to Elissa or holds her gaze across a room in this increasingly crowded keep he wonders if it's that he misses. Her. There had been clearer lines between them then, their places and positions sharp and steady.

Here, things blur in a different way.

Most of the other Wardens leave him alone – some of them even seem to actively avoid him which is nothing unusual, of course. The dwarf they had found in Kal'Hirol, however, shows no such hesitation in his presence.

"Were you held hostage?" she asks the day after their homecoming; Loghain is going over recruiting records and reports of their recent Joinings and stifles a sigh. "By the Wardens?"

"Yes. For a little while."

"What did they want from you?"

She perches herself on a locked chest near his desk, observing him.

It's a good question, he thinks. Initially he had the impression of being there for information, had thought that the Wardens and the darkspawn who were working with them would interrogate him. About the Archdemon, the ritual, the marsh witch, about any trace of his inglorious recent history they could possibly have managed to find. Then they had gradually let him understand that their purpose was different, though it would be a lie to claim he knows precisely what they had wanted. When he tells the dwarf this, she nods.

"We studied a lot of old Warden journals while you were gone." She grins, as though digging into this inglorious order's history is what she considers entertainment. He may have underestimated her, if that is truly the case. "Some of them seemed, well, sodding mad. Maybe they wrote them while they were drunk?"

She appears momentarily lost in this fantasy of hers.

"Did you have a point?" Loghain asks, putting down the documents on the desk again, in a pile that is slightly more organised than the one Elissa had made, though not by much. Through the window, he notices a large group of wardens approach; they're on their way to the keep from the barracks, which means supper is at hand.

"Not really." Sigrun shrugs. "Only that we found a few stories of Wardens who tried to make deals with the darkspawn. Like the one the Architect wanted the Commander to consider. Once, the Antivans almost agreed – they had been promised stability and military aid for their nation. At least that's what the records say."

"It seems to be a promise they hold dear."

"They wanted you to do the same?" She's even more intrigued now, sitting on the edge of the chest and not letting him out of her sight for a second.

Loghain nods. There seems to be little use in keeping secrets at this point.

Who would have thought he'd ever advocate the idea of uniting the nations of Thedas against the darkspawn – or any other threat for that matter? It had been a patently impossible concept to him and still is. But fate's sense of humour has proved itself twisted and dark ever since the Blight ran them over and left them grappling for high ground like little children playing at war. Now everything is impossible, yet it still happens.

"We discussed that. Nathaniel thought you'd make a deal with them. I told him you wouldn't." A grin splits Sigrun's face, then a shade of doubt creeps into it. "It probably wasn't very nice of us to make bets. Did they hurt you a lot?"

"No." He makes a dismissive half-gesture to go with his half-truth, getting to his feet. "You won your little bet, however."

Who would have thought he'd ever advocate the idea of uniting the nations of Thedas against the darkspawn – or any other threat for that matter? But fate's sense of humour has proven itself twisted and dark ever since the Blight ran them over and left them grappling for high ground like little children playing at war. Even those among them who had been forging battles for so long they could not remember a different life.

"Ha! I knew it." She heaves herself up and stands on the floor, legs wide apart and arms folded across her chest, like a statue. A statue with a smug look of victory colouring its face. "The commander and you are two of a kind."

"Don't tell her that. That's hardly a compliment."

"Oh?" Sigrun tilts her head, the corners of her mouth curled upwards. "Because you tried to kill her? I think she's moved past that. She was so heartbroken when you left, did you know? At one point she drank four bottles of wine by herself - she just kept going, no one could keep up. I thought she was even going to bed Anders, but I'm fairly certain she didn't. Shit. She'd kill me if she knew I told you that."

"Then why did you?" he retorts, harsher than intended, feeling irrationally angry on Elissa's behalf and slightly uncomfortable with the implications about the mage though this is hardly the time or the place for it.

The dwarf pauses for a beat, apparently considering his question very seriously.

"She keeps too many secrets," she says eventually. "I think it's a surface tradition. Never telling anyone how you feel. That just doesn't make any sense."

Once, not too long ago, she had asked if Loghain was Elissa's father, he recalls with the same annoyed twinge at the back of his mind as her words had invoked back then. A moment's cold clarity. Now they're tinged with the same streak of worry that accompany many of his meetings with his own daughter after the civil war – the knowledge that he's a disadvantage to be set aside yet she keeps insisting on protecting him, publicly defending him in deeds if not in words, stubbornly refusing to sever the ties.

"Some fine prize awaits you then?" he asks, to change the subject. Though she may be too nosy for her own good and ill-suited to the subtlety required for this kind of intimate existence among others, Loghain is rather fond of the dwarf girl. She fights with reckless abandon and seems unperturbed by surface life although it must be as foreign to her as anything he can possibly imagine. There's a raw strength in that, an irreverent sort of pride and toughness. "For winning the bet?"

"Oh. Yes." The dwarf looks a bit embarrassed for the first time. "It's a bit... private, so I don't think Nathaniel wants me to tell you what it is."

"Then by all means, don't." His words come out as more of a exasperated groan than anything else, fuelled by a genuine desire notto know what private promises the dwarf and Howe's surly brat have given each other to pass time this long, cold winter.

"Right." Sigrun's surprised chuckle makes Loghain feel as old as the stones around them, but it's a passing sensation and quickly erased when the doors swing open and Elissa stands before them, surrounded by a dozen Wardens.

"It's time for supper," she declares, unceremoniously dropping her sword on the floor. The Wardens scatter around her, heading for the promised meal, without doubt and with no audible protests.

"You're all bloody," Sigrun observes, rather needlessly considering the frozen stains on the commander's face that flare up in an angry shade of dark red in the warmth and light of this room.

"We've cleared out a flock of Blight wolves nearby." Elissa slumps down on a chair and hoists her right leg to remove the heavy boot that lands beside her sword with a thud. She repeats the procedure with the other leg and adds another snow-clad boot to the pile. Loghain wonders briefly if the servants' work load has doubled through her presence alone; she remains one of the sloppiest, most careless people he has ever met. "Varel tells me the farmers have been complaining about them for weeks."

"We've killed well over fifty already," Sigrun says. "I think Rolan and Nathaniel have kept count."

Elissa frowns. "Huh. I wonder why they're so lively recently."

"There likely is an alpha wolf hiding in some lair," Loghain points out. "Do you want me to send scouts to investigate?"

She looks up, a few strands of sweaty hair falling into her eyes as she removes her hood. They have torn apart all the rules and their carefully drawn maps, but he isher general and they are back in Ferelden with Ferelden's duties and hopes to steer them so this is what they do. The expression on Elissa's face tells him she agrees.

"Yes." She nods and returns her attention to removing the bloody pieces of metal from her body. "Thank you."

When they're the only two Wardens remaining in the room, Loghain allows himself the freedom to watch her; it feels like a rare luxury or an indulgence he isn't certain he should give in to, but he does all the same. If he's being honest that, too, had found its way into the way their previous lives were organised.

"Blasted bloody winter," his commander grunts to herself, shedding the breastplate with a little grimace. There's a half-healed injury on her chest, Loghain knows, wishing he didn't. When they left Orlais is had been a festering wound, holding no promise of healing smoothly. "It'll be the death of us."

"You're Fereldan," he points out, silently amused even if he knows better than to show it. Her sour tone is often merely a cover, hiding that dark stream of humour that he finds so ridiculously appealing, but today she's closed around her own misery, her skin an impenetrable armour.

Even so, or perhaps because of it, he find her very much the same woman as the one he left only because he was being dragged away. She's grim and gritty, ungraceful and magnificent and as he observes the way she sits back, dragging her hands back through her hair, he can feel a shift in the room when the thick fabric of old shadows and ghosts that he has always associated with her seem to be rendered transparent. There are times when Loghain watches the Commander of the Grey Warden and wonders if he has found a living, breathing looking glass because in the depths of her eyes he sees a young man who knelt before a king without a throne. He sees the king, too, in all his charismatic goodness. And the queen, firm and arrogant and unshakeable.

In this room, during this shaky truce in their long war, he sees Elissa for the first time in a very long time. Shamefully long overdue he sees her, unattached to everything else, disentangled from the threads of his own life.

The older he gets, he finds that memories have a way of moving through him at the oddest of times; they're sharp and clear stabs of the past, the layers of time blending so seamlessly it often seems there is no difference between then and now.

But there is and she is currently giving him a questioning glance before slipping on a pair of leather boots and pulling a tunic over her head. With hands used to the motion she cleans herself up, wiping blood and sweat off her face with a damp towel that she promptly throws over the armour when she's done. She steps over her discarded belongings and heads towards the door – and the meal. Loghain follows, still watching her with that odd and rather pathetic desire to savour the moment coupled with an even odder sense of knowing something is wrong with her but not knowing exactly what.

"What?" she asks, appropriately but for a completely different reason. As she turns her head to look at him, something softens in her face and he can see the faint outlines of a smile buried there.

Loghain shakes his head, briefly. "Nothing."

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.

.

The keep lives on the ebb and flow of the Warden's whereabouts and now more than ever the sense of old secrets overwhelmes her. Secrets of these old buildings – the old paths leading from the keep straight into to the very heart of darkness – and the old truths about the Order now counting the Vigil among its scarce resources.

It's a world of its own, Elissa thinks now as she braves the stiffly cold grounds, wrapped in a fur cloak. A silent place, sealed off from the rest of Thedas. A convent, or a cage. No one is being kept here against their will.

Well.

In her head she rattles off the names of the Orlesians to make them seem more real, wills them to belong here. Installing twenty new Wardens is more of a task than she would have imagined, though she had hardly imagined it at all until they had all been safely escorted to Amaranthine and there are moments when she regrets bringing them along.

They're becoming too many, she thinks irrationally these days, thinks it when she's on the verge of sleep or bleary from just waking up. It's too much, too many lives, too high a number.

She knows their names, barely, and she knows she can count on their loyalty. Beyond that she finds that she has no urgent need for further ties of friendship or obligation, wonders when she watches them in the dining hall in the mornings if she will ever feel closer to them than she does here and now, considering them mere currency in their war. Better some unknown Orlesians than honest Fereldan farmers.

It's a heavy thought, an ancient weight in her body.

The new bunch of Warden does, however, add life to the tired old stones, a notion of something new that seems to breathe between the restored walls and the half-mended history. The Howes of days past would likely even approve, Elissa thinks, when she remembers her history lessons. Not that their approval from beyond the grave means anything but there's a sense of rightness in it all the same.

Everything is frozen around them but there's a relenting softness in the air today, as though nature is offering a faint promise of spring around the corner. They deserve it after this cold, turbulent year that has ended in this snowy nightmare – Maker-forsaken cold as some people call it, worse than the sodding Blight others claim. Elissa looks over at the guards on duty and the handful of servants that remain here, struggling to maintain their obligations regardless of season or weather. Again, that dread creeps up her spine.

Too much, too many.

Then she finally reaches the guard barracks where she is told Anders has taken up residency while she's been gone, quickening her steps as she approaches the door. Her body feels warm despite the cold, her mouth sticky and dry at the same time, her head swellingwith each hour that passes.

He greets her in the doorway, as pale and sickly-looking as she feels, and shoves the door shut behind her before she's had time to even turn around. For a second they're face to face, pressed tight together by the small space in his quarters. Anders is the first to look away. There's a membrane of watchful fear around him, as though he waits for something to attack them. Weirder than usual, Nathaniel had said when she asked for his opinion. She's willing to give him right on that account at least.

"How have you been?" she asks without preamble, mostly because he doesn't give her the impression that their conversation will be a lengthy one and she has a badly nursed wound that makes her light-headed every time she raises her arms.

"Oh you know, darkspawn, nightmares, the tainted blood thing." His tone is forced, strained, but he tries to smile his most radiant smile even so.

Elissa leans against the desk that takes up most of the floor space that is not occupied by the bed. Anders stops in the middle of the room and stands there for a while, looking at her as though there are things he needs to say but he remains silent.

Of all the new recruits, he's the one that touches something in her. It's the streak of light in him, she thinks, that patch of goodness that could so easily be twisted into bitterness or cynicism or something darker still. The Circle, for all the good she assumes it must do, also creates mages unable to survive outside of it because they lack defences, lack experiences, lack everything that cannot be built from two empty hands and a lifetime of longing. Barren creatures always crave more.

Anders, Elissa figures, must be about the same age as her but a string of escape attempts and a supposed list of romantic endeavours aside, he's hardly lived. She feels an odd desire to protect him, though she isn't certain against what.

"I need your help," she says instead.

When she removes her tunic and sits on his desk wearing nothing but trousers and a breast band she half-expects him to make some remark, offer a trite innuendo, leer at least a little bit. The mage she remembers recruiting some months ago would have. But Anders merely leans closer, all dry hands and furrowed brow and a voice that sounds more serious than she can remember it.

"This is a fatal injury," he says.

"Oh."

The pain his gentle prodding causes is quite overwhelming and when he notices how hard she clutches the edge of the table, he relents, giving her a searching glance instead. "It smells of some sort of venom and... magic?"

Her throat dry and tight, Elissa nods. She hadn't expected it to be thatdangerous, has put off having it examined for nearly a week now, after all. Poison and magic. A stupid combination, to be certain. There's a memory at the back of her mind of Arl Eamon and magical poisoning and she closes her eyes.

"Can you remove it?"

"I'm a mage, not a miracle worker."

"That's not very reassuring, you know." Elissa opens her eyes again, staring straight into Anders' midsection and praying silently that he wears smallclothes despite some stray remarks in her memory that suggest the opposite. She distracts herself by examining his belt which seems gaudy, even for a mage. It has runes engraved in the leather and green stones that look diamond-hard and glitter vaguely in the light that surrounds them.

Anders makes a sound that is caught half-way between a sigh and a grunt. "I know."

Then, without alerting her, he begins to heal her wound and for a little moment when everything spins and her chest makes an inward noise like it's tearing itself open, Elissa considers crying. She hasn't cried from physical pain since she woke up in Denerim with more scar tissue in the making than actual flesh from her neck down but this, she thinks and clenches her teeth, this is death.

You give a little bit of yourself to the person you're healing, Wynne says in her memory. It can be detrimental for a weak or inexperienced mage; this is why we train our healers rigorously in the Circle. Elissa looks into Anders's eyes as his hands cover her wound and fills her with a dull pain that hums in her blood and seems to seep out into every part of her, singing to every inch of her body.

She looks into his eyes, anchors herself in him and in the stream of white light that floods out of his body and into hers. It makes a sound, the magic. A low, dwindling sound that -

Blue.

Elissa blinks once, twice, opens her mouth to ask about the shifting colour because Anders is glowing, crumbling in a light that doesn't seem anything like the healing magic she has become familiar with over the past two years. A blue glow around him bursts through the white light, tears it apart, boils beneath his skin and she has the instinct to push him away, her hands on his arms and her heart thumping loudly in her chest.

Then everything goes dark around her and when she can see again her wound has closed – though the corners remain angry and frayed – and Anders has turned his back on her, cradling his head in his hands and making a whimpering sound.

"Are you-" Elissa straightens up, looking down at her wound again. Her head has cleared up, the fever seems to be waning and Maker, she can lift her arms without risking a complete meltdown followed by serious head injury.

"You'll be fine."

"Good. Thank you." She takes a step in his direction, tries to look him in the eyes again. "Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry," Anders says hoarsely, turning away from her quickly as though she's a too-hot hearth. Reflexively she reaches for him, grabbing hold of the hem of his sleeve. For a fraction of a moment the air seems to still in anticipation, then Anders pulls away from her so forcefully that Elissa nearly loses her balance and has to grab hold of the desk again for support.

"Anders."

"I'm sorry," he says again, sounding angry now. "I'm drained. I should... rest for a bit. Take the potions on my desk for the pain."

There are moments, Elissa thinks, watching Anders move further away from her in the small room. Rare moments when the layers of time and place seem to overlap, becoming momentarily transparent so that everything shines through them and nothing is left in the dark. Those are the moments when you ask important questions and receive answers that do not try to mask the truth.

Loghain in their camp outside Denerim, a burning nation as their backdrop. You tell me: what do you want?

Fergus in what once was their home, his eyes dark fires that had found no escape. How?

The outlines of Anders' back in front of her now, three steps and endless stretches of time separate them. What have you done?

But Elissa doesn't speak as she heads for the door.

And the moment is gone, if it ever existed at all.

.

.

.

Judging by her dull headache and the unpleasant, blurry edges to her thoughts it ought to be bedtime, Elissa reflects as she sits in her office.

It's not. The afternoon light from the windows is still harsh and bright and cutting.

"Commander," Varel says and a forcedly patient tone in his voice suggests he's been repeating her title a few times already.

Elissa blinks, lifting her gaze from the sweetened tea in front of her. Bed rest for a couple of days, Anders had told her in passing as they met in the throne room. When she thinks about that, her mind flickers back to the other scene with him this very morning. While she can't claim to be an expert on mages she has never seen one react to anything the way Anders had reacted and the possible reasons for it have wormed their way inside her head where they spin around, relentless and prodding.

"Yes?" she manages.

"As I was saying, there is some unrest among the Wardens. They talk."

"Recruits gossip worse than fishermen," Elissa sighs, echoing her father in a different life, speaking of guardsmen talking among themselves about things that had not concerned them. Is Lady Elissa to remain unmarried? Is she in some kind of predicament? Was she not to be sent to Gwaren after all?

"That may be so." Varel raises an eyebrow. "But you have been back for six days without having held any kind of counsel even with your senior Wardens. They're growing suspicious."

She groans. "There's nothing to be suspicious about."

"I know that, Commander. They don't, however."

The morning after their return, Elissa and Loghain had informed every Warden at Vigil's Keep of the conflict in Orlais – in brief explanations and with little room for speculation, but they had wanted to take the wrap off things as quickly as possible. Apparently it had not been enough. Of course it had not been enough, she reproaches herself. War breeds conflict, she should have been more forthcoming. Her own exhaustion should not be the scale on which she weighs possible ways to handle her soldiers, but she has been beyond tired since Orlais. At least Anders had managed to heal her - she makes a mental note to reward him in some subtle way that he won't brag too much about to miss entirely.

"Very well," she says. "Let them know that there will be a gathering tomorrow morning."

The seneschal nods. "I will take care of it."

"Thank you." She manages a smile, though she can feel the muscles in her face protest a bit at the effort. "Is that all?"

"Not yet, I'm afraid. His Majesty sends his regards and he wants you and Loghain to travel to Denerim as soon as your other duties allow." Varel hands over a letter marked with the royal seal. "I have no doubt that the visit is further explained in His Majesty's private correspondence to you, Commander."

"Right." She places the letter on top of the ever-growing pile of things she ought to take care of today or tonight or anywhere between now and tomorrow morning. "I'll have a reply ready before nightfall."

When he exits the room, Elissa sinks back in her chair and shuts her eyes, promising herself that she will merely take a brief moment's rest and then dig right into today's long list of tasks.

The next thing she knows, her neck feels like stone and her back is sore as though she's been walking for hours. It's dark around her. She looks up in an attempt to orient herself in these surroundings and realises that she's still at her desk, in the middle of her massive pile of work. The dark wood of the table is black in the dusk and the light from a door that's opening somewhere else settles against it in trembling, uneven patterns.

"Elissa," Loghain says behind her.

"What?" She tries to glance over her shoulder but the muscles in her neck protest wildly at the idea and instead she has to heave herself up straight, using her hands and arms. This is not worthy of the Commander of the Grey, she decides, squaring her shoulders somewhat. While the pain from her injury is mostly gone, it seems to have been replaced by a stiffness in her entire body.

Loghain walks up to the desk; she can feel the nearness of his body as it brushes against her arm and there's an instinct, base and quick and awkward like most of her long-denied needs, to reach out for him and hold on.

"I spoke to the mage," he says, leaning down over her, clearly intending to personally make sure she gets that bed rest the healer had ordered.

May the Maker spit on Anders, she thinks but her anger is very efficiently interrupted by Loghain's arm around her waist, pulling her to her feet in one swift motion that reminds her of how strong he is. She leans heavily on him.

"He always exaggerates." Elissa wonders how her body can feel so immovable, how her limbs can be so indescribably weary that every step makes her wince.

"He didn't give me any details." There's a hint of irritation at that confession, she notices, and smiles inwardly. "Though I'm certain you are correct."

"Oh. Well, I'm in no danger." As though her body wishes to embarrass her further, her words are accompanied by a sudden wave of nausea that upsets what little momentum Loghain's aid has given her. "Just some aftermath of an injury."

"You slept through supper," he says pointedly.

She briefly considers showing him the magically mended flesh but he seems to be taking no interest in that at the moment, focusing solely on getting her to bed. And then, of course, the double meaning of that expression makes her chuckle, since she's still half-delirious from the potion-edged sleep and has the emotional maturity of a stable boy, according to Fergus.

Loghain frowns when she looks at him but he doesn't ask any questions. His face is so near, she thinks, curling her fingers harder around his shoulder; she remembers the way he tastes, the warm scent of his skin, the deep, hungry notes in the way he kisses.

They walk slowly through the corridor, one step at the time. He may be strong, but she's built like a warrior and made even heavier by her condition. When they reach her bedchamber, Loghain opens the door with his free hand, while keeping the other firm around her waist and Elissa grants herself the liberty of resting her forehead against the curve of his neck.

Too much. The thought fleets in and out of her head as he lowers her onto the bed and she all but protests by clinging to him, too long to pretend it doesn't happen.

It does happen.

She wants to remain in his embrace, chaste as it is, wants to drag him down over her and feel awake again, alive. There are words in her mouth waiting to be spoken and she wants to say them now, with one foot in the Fade, because these kinds of words are a rare commodity between people like them who are built for battle, for war.

Maker help me but I love you.

Too much.

"If you do not remain in this bed, I will send Sigrun up here to knock you out." His voice is low, it dances against her skin and into her blood.

She smiles, eyes closed, already drifting back to sleep.

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A/N: Thank you for reading and for remembering this dusty old thing. Special thanks to those of you who take the time to let me know what you think.

I promise there will be Explanations in the next chapter.