Chapter 4
Flinching and an encounter
Garrett ran a hand over the prominent Varric-ish stubble that had accumulated on his cheeks in the 3 days it had been since he had shaved,he considered growing a goatee on his chin just for a change of pace,but no mustache
"how are you supposed to eat with one of those bloody things" he asked himself .
"What are you thinking about Garrett" Merrill asked leaning against his shoulder as they walked
"how one would eat with a mustache without getting food in it" he answered
Merrill giggled and said "why don't you ask Varric?"
"Varric doesn't have a mustache"
"but he knows a lot of things he might know that"
"Varric is also full of crap"
"I can hear you you know" Varric called from a little ways back then returned to his argument with Fenris about why he would not stop calling him "elf".
The only one not talking to someone was Isabela she was staring at Hawke and Merrill with something between curiosity and envy she remembered how he shirked from any and all contact towards him and the time he had nearly taken poor Varric's head off when he had touched his shoulder,of course she also remembered the time she slept with him he hadn't been hindered then though she supposed he was just "blinded by lust" as he put it.
That was was also the time she had seen the scars,the ones on the shoulders weren't bad just small red blotches with white lines over them like he had broken the bone and someone had had to cut into his shoulder to set it there were similar ones on his legand ribs though the blotches were bigger,but the worst of them were on his wrists and ankles they were rings of deep lines in his skin like one only got from the constant chafing of manacles. His were much deeper though like he had fought and fought and tore his thin wrists and ankles open to the bones sympathy and curiosity about what he had done to get those scars had welled up in her,only to be swept away by renewed waves of lust and ecstasy. She thought about asking him about them afterwords but she could tell it would've been a bad idea though she never stopped wondering about them.
Shortly after his mother was killed by that madman (who's intestines Hawke cut out while he was still alive and used to hang him from a beam) Isabela got her answer,he had disappeared right after they had returned and had his mother cremated. They had decided to split up Varric searched Low town,Aveline and Fenris searched high town, Sebastian and Anders search the wounded coast and Isabela was with Merrill searching sundermount,they were the ones that found him sitting on a rock near the frigid peak fingers interlaced with his chin resting on them staring so intently at the ground between his feet it should have long since burst into flames.
"Hawke" Isabela said tentatively,no response
"Garrett" Merrill said a bit louder but no less tentatively
His head snapped up startled by the use of his first name
"ah you've found my secret place of grieving wonderful" he said with his usual sarcastic demeanor "now go back to Kirkwall I'll be back tomorrow after I'm done grieving."
" Do you erm want to talk about it" Isabela asked uncertainly
Hawke sighed and replied dryly "no but if I've learned anything from Fenris I'm going to anyways"
Isabela and Merrill sat down on rocks of their own as he began to speak in a flat dispassionate monotone
"I have a total of 6 family members of them 4 are dead and 3 of those deaths I'm responsible for so the guilt is starting to wear on me"
"your mother dying wasn't your fault" Isabela protested
"neither was Bethany" Merrill added
Hawke raised a skeptical eyebrow "oh really my sister I drug down into the deep roads and because of that she contracted the taint so I had to cut her throat myself, my mother because I told her to look for a man instead of trying to arrange a marriage for me because I was irritated about it so she met that madman who turned her into a stitched together abomination and my father" he stopped there
"what happened to your father?" Isabela asked her curiosity overpowering her concern
"Isabela he doesn't have to tell us" Merrill hissed mortified that she would ask him that now of all times
Hawke drew a great slightly shaky breath "it's all right you've both seen my scars and I know your both curious so I suppose I should start at the beginning"
"wait Isabela knows about them to" Merrill blurted out before she could stop herself
"I slept with him before you did kitten"the pirate replied unable to keep the wolfish grin off her face
"anyways who's slept with who aside" Hawke cut in irritated that that had come out into the open.
"The whole mess started when I was 9 I think Bethany and Carver both were sick and bed ridden and while my parent's attention was on them I had wondered off to practice more magic this drew the attention of 2 templars who were nearby they were from the free marches and were hunting my father and his apostate children they knocked me out,shackled me and proceeded to interrogate me for the location of my family,and by that I mean they let my struggle till I tore my limbs to the bone struggling against my restraints and broke most of my ribs kicking me with those armored boots,then they broke my shoulders and shins so I couldn't keep struggling"
he paused for breath then observing the look of horror on Merrill's face and grim understanding on Isabela's he knew she had seen similar acts.
"the worst of it came that night,one of them ah...well to be blunt raped me up the arse" he had to pause again to let Isabela gasp slightly "that's' why you won't let anyone touch you"
though unexpectedly there was no response from Merrill she just sat wide eyed and shocked looking. He was about to start snapping his fingers in her face when her normally bright eyes were filmed with tears
"oh Hawke I'm so sorry" she whispered
he grimaced and with a with an attempt at his usual sarcastic demeanor "you look like you suffered more than I did and no Isabela that's not it it's because people have tiny bits of electricity on their skin that I'm very sensitive to so it shocks the crap out of me every time someone touches me"
"just shut up and continue the story" Isabela replied
"yes well after that I freaked out and started shooting bolts of energy at anything I could swing my arms at one of those bolts hit my father and tore him up pretty good after he killed the templars for his heroic rescue he healed us both up,strapped me to his horse which I was not happy about and we rode like demons fleeing Andraste herself till we got back to everyone else and got moving again then everyone had to get used to the idea of no more touching Hawke and we lived happily ever after the end"
"so that's it,the mystery behind this" Isabela said as she reached her hand out towards him and he instinctively moved back
"Isabela stop it" Merrill said distractedly apparently still processing the story
"yes it is and if you tell Varric,Fenris,Anders,Sebastian,Varric or any other man I will bring the boot of the Maker himself down and use it to grind you both into dust now go back down the mountain"
"why did you say Varric twice" Merrill asked
"because he wants to make doubly sure we don't tell him" Isabela replied with amusement
"right because if Varric knows all of Kirkwall knows and I want to keep my pride as a man intact now back down the mountain with you go on go"
"not without you" Isabela replied determinedly
with a resigned sigh Hawke admitted "I was afraid of that,then your going to have to drag me down the mountain because I've been sitting on this rock for about 4 hours so I can't feel my legs"
Isabela and Merrill had both laughed at that and taken a wiry arm each and wrapped them around their shoulders despite his flinching and squirming and proceeded to drag him down the mountain. He had limped around for 3 days after that when anyone asked him why he told them he had the worst case of chair arse ever known and kept limping.
Garrett held out his arm to stop Isabela apparently lost in thought she bumped into his arm with a small yelp of surprise Fenris quickly held of a finger for silence then pointed to a dip in the road about 2 bowshots away they could see a dalish caravan and it was under attack,but by what they couldn't tell.
Once they ran closer and luckily hadn't been noticed they saw what they were about to face,they didn't look like anything Garrett had ever were all concealed in white steel armor but were taller than any man but shorter than any qunari and there were odd humps on their backs
"Merrill can you pin them in with an earthquake while I work up a blizzard" Garrett asked drawing his broadsword and dagger
"there are Dalish scattered among those things the spells would hurt them to" she replied urgently
"damn well then I suppose we should just go for the classic charge then since we're at their flank" Garret said with bloody cheer "usual strategy Varric,Merrill back us up while Fenris and I run in screaming like madmen to draw their attention as Isabela slips in and takes out the commander from behind"
"not if Bianca gets him first" Varric remarked loading her with a bolt with a miasmic flask tied to it.
"I'll take that challenge Isabela" replied
All at once Garrett and Fenris charged out as Varric and Merrill started shooting bolts and lobbing spells while Isabela used the commotion to flank the group,which from her guess was about 18 strong against the 5 of them.
"the odds are stacked against them here" Isabela thought to herself as a confident grin spread to her face
That grin quickly changed to a worried frown as she observed the battle. Fenris had intended to use his tattoos to phase through most of them and drag out their organs and tear the rest to pieces with his great sword,however it appeared the the creatures were lyrium-proof they had some kind of shell under their armor that he couldn't phase through he quickly noticed Hawke's spells weren't doing any damage either.
"stop throwing spells at them" he called "their shells are magic proof"
Hawke swore then repeated the message to Merrill and continued his fight.,And a tough fight it was these things were big,strong and well trained the white steel chain-mail wasn't to big of a nasuance it was the shell underneath that caused the problem,Not only was it magic proof but it was incredibly tough.
Garrett ducked a swipe from one of the creatures that was using what seemed to be a 7 foot spear with a 2 foot blade and swung at another's grieved shin his broadsword hit its mark and stuck in the shell,cursing he yanked it out and spun while using his sword to guard his other hand as he spun the dagger about in it so the blade face backwards and stabbed backwards underneath the beak (not chin he realized with a start) until he felt the blade sink 3 quarters of the way in then yanking it out without hesitation and flipping it back forwards to use it to send an oncoming sword sliding down the blade and off the rounded guard,that accompanied with the kick to the shins he delivered at the same time sent the creature stumbling forward with a broadsword laying open it's back.
Out of reflex Garret sent a bolt of lightning at the staggering wounded creature,what started out as a curse directed at his own stupidity turned to a cry of delight as the saw the lightning enter the wound and it collapsed twitching then became still.
"Merrill" he called
"I'm hear" she called back
"magic only works on the bastards if they're wounded" he responded and knowing what would come next "just aim for the ones with blood on them love"
"wait they've all got blood on them" Merrill shouted concern coloring voice
"wait" he looked as he half decapitated one then his sword stopped "their blood is blue-green"
"ew"
was all he could hear from her then one creature with a bolt from Bianca in its shoulder was ripped to shreds as its blood turned into razor sharp spikes,Garrett wasn't very fond of blood magic but damned if it didn't come in handy!
Now that they knew they could use spells on the wounded ones which seemed to be all of them they went down relatively quickly.
"whew that was one helluva fight" Isabela said cheerfully rejoining the panting group
Garrett took a deep breath and asked "how many of them did you actually attack anyways"
"oh well you know a few" Isabela replied airily not bothering to hide the grin on her face
Garrett merely turned away and went to talk to the remaining 4 elves Merrill and the others following close behind once they got close the elves came out from inside the triangle of caravans they had made,and one of them had white hair and an intricate tattoo of a tree on his forehead.
"Mahariel" Merrill whispered whispered to herself "ma-" she started to cry but was stopped by an upraised arm and a tragic shake of Garrett's head when she looked again she saw it wasn't him,this elf was older than Mahariel by a good deal,not old enough to have a full head of white hair but still much older than Mahariel.
Color blooming in her cheeks Merrill fell back beside Isabela in an embarrassed silence. The Dalish elves meanwhile had crept warily closer,the white haired one then spoke as warily as he walked
"we...thank you for the assistance of you and your companions shemlen"
"your welcome elvehn" he replied remembering how when Kenshen was teaching him the bits of ancient elven he knew he had told him if he ever met a dalish to call them elvehn instead of elves or elf
"they'll like you better for it" he had said
"not much of a difference is it" Garrett remarked
"it is to them" Kenshen had said with his trademark brand of waspish patients "it's what they called themselves in their empire before it was crushed by tiventer,of course they've been holding a grudge against humans for about 2000 years so you should consider yourself lucky if your not turned into a no- longer breathing quiver for their arrows on sight"
"so what happened?" Isabela asked
"they attacked us what more do you need to know shemlen" the dalsih replied coldly
"good to see the attack didn't make them lose that lovely dalsish hospitality" Varric muttered
suppressing a grin Garrett asked "where are the rest of your clan? I only see a few elven corpses"
"they took the halla and fled into the forest" the dalish answered back losing most of the coldness on Garrett though his tone was still guarded.
"need help rounding them up" Isabela asked in a friendly tone even as Garrett and Merrill cringed and the elves stiffened
"we can find them on our own shemlen"the dalish replied in a tone cold enough to freeze an ogre solid
"now please if you would leave us we must find our clan mates and mourn our dead."
"very well then"Garrett said then barked "come on you lot we can still get a bit of ground covered before nightfall". As they picked their way through the ruined Caravans and scattered belongings Garrett called over his shoulder "dareth sheral!" to which he got silence,not a good sign.
"what do you think made them so mad at me" Isabela wondered aloud
"when you said round them up" Merrill answered quietly from beside Garrett the only thing she had said in awile,which was odd for her considering how talkative she was and that she was reunited with her best friends whom she hadn't seen in months.
"huh?" Isabela replied confusedly
"when you a human said round them up" Garrett responded "to them it was like you were treating them like livestock or slaves their really touchy about that kind of thing"
"I can tell" Isabela said spitefully "pfft freaks"
"The Imperium used blood mages to slaughter and enslave their people" Fenris cut in with a hatefull glare at Merrill who,still in her gloomy funk ignored him.
"it was 2000 years ago Fenris" Garrett said shooting a venomous look at the elf who quickly dropped his glare "you'd think they'd have gotten over it by now"
"hm there's a town up ahead" Varric interrupted as much to keep Fenris and Garrett from starting another argument about elven slavery as to notify them all
"let's go"Isabela added "I'm sick of sleeping in-woah" she said as a violent explosion mushroomed from the center of the town.