On the Road, Part Two
Aedan clung to his family as if afraid they might disappear. Leliana understood his fear, she had done the same earlier, though she had paused to strip off her bloody gauntlets before drawing her children into her arms, running her hands over their heads and down their backs, checking for blood, wounds, arrows, anything horrible before she allowed herself to relax and hug them.
After Aedan had left the clearing she ushered the two small children back into the tent and told them to stay there. She then crouched in the opening and held still. Leliana could not sense the taint as Aedan did, but she still had many years training in the more covert arts. If something or someone approached the camp, she would be aware them in time to act, or so she hoped. For a while she listened to the sounds of Aedan and the guards running in the direction of the enemy. If they were darkspawn, it would be a small band. Odd groups still cropped up now and again, particularly now that the Wardens relentlessly drove them from hiding. Normally she might smell the darkspawn, if they were close enough. She drew a small amount of reassurance from the lack of stench in the air.
A soft rustle caught her attention. It almost sounded like the breeze stirring leaves at the top of the trees, but lower, towards the ground where the wind could not reach without gusting through the camp. Nothing else moved. Leliana cloaked herself in shadow, using the darkness and the opening of the tent to wrap herself in nothingness, fading from few. A soft whimper sounded behind her followed by an even softer "Shh." Rory comforting Grace.
Her children had seen her embrace the shadow before; she did it as a game, often, both to expose them to the skill and for their amusement. But not usually in the dark, at camp, when even small children could feel the tension in the air.
No other sounds broke the silence, but Leliana felt them approach. Two rogues, one forward, one stopping to lurk within the trees. A blade wielder and an archer, she deduced from the positioning. She could not be sure there were two, but she knew more than one shadow sought to flit through the camp. Given that one might be an archer, she needed to move herself away from the tent. A stray arrow… her mind could not complete the thought. Anxiety had sweat beading her forehead and creeping down her back, despite the cool night and Leliana took a second, not enough time but all she had, to compose herself. She could not be emotional now; she needed to be a bard.
Rising to her feet, Leliana drew the shadow with her as she moved away from the tent, skirted the far side of the campfire, not putting herself between the approaching rogues and the light, and stopped on the outskirts of the area they had occupied for the last two days. She hoped, she prayed, that the children might think her still in the doorway of the tent. That they would obey and stay put, that they would not forget the small lessons she had tried to teach them already.
A dark shape flickered past her peripheral vision and Leliana slowly reached to remove her twin daggers from their sheaths, the well oiled blades slipping soundlessly from soft leather. The shape moved to one of the guard's tents first, paused, then moved on. Ignoring the archer for the time being, the lurking figure would need to see a target in order to launch an arrow, Leliana stalked the rogue within the camp. Her feet sought the gaps between the wet and mulched leaves, the small pebbles and brittle twigs as if she'd been born in the forest. Toes soundlessly scuffed the ground first, moving distractions aside, then the ball of her foot rolled down within the supple leather boots she wore. Her heel barely touched before she moved forward again, silent, graceful.
The rogue paused longer by the second tent and Leliana knew he heard nothing within – he sensed her, stalking him. She stopped. After a moment, he moved on towards the third tent. Her tent, the one containing her children. Leliana moved as quickly as she could without breaking stealth, her daggers out to each side of her for balance and poised to strike. Before the rogue could even touch her tent, she struck, not to kill, a numbing blow to the side of the head delivered with hilt of her main hand dagger. The figure dropped soundlessly to the ground.
Though she resumed stealth as quickly as possible, the archer had its mark and immediately an arrow shot past, missing by a hair's breadth. Leliana dropped stealth before moving away from the children's tent, intending to draw fire in the opposite direction. As soon as she judged herself far enough away and at the right angle, she cloaked herself in shadow once more and headed towards the archer, side stepping in an erratic pattern, moving as swiftly as she dared while trying to maintain her stealth and silence. Panic and fear for her children and her husband began to erode her calm. Not now, she told herself, not now.
She had dealt with the aftermath of Val Royeaux better than Aedan had but knew her emotions still hung in a delicate balance. She did not use her weapons and her talents regularly anymore and after their recent escape from Marjolaine hoped she would not have to again, not for a while, if ever. She still trained, to keep Aedan company and for her own fitness, but training rarely included this element, the fear, the memories, the nervous sweat, or her children huddled together in a dark tent.
She slipped, a lack of concentration and rising anxiety causing her foot to catch on the sharp edge of a rock setting off a series of steps that had her avoiding a patch of leaves in favour of a flat stone that then proved to be covered in moss. An arrow grazed her shoulder armour and Leliana fought the urge to close her eyes, to wince. Instead she advanced swiftly, dropping all pretence of stealth in favour of speed. The archer left his retreat too late. She flew forward, daggers extended, not wanting to take a life, but willing to. The man threw his bow aside, reached for a dagger, and succeeded in parrying her first strike. She followed up with a thrust to his chest which he swept aside with his other arm, and she felt her blade slide across leather and into skin as it was cast out wide. Bracing herself, she kicked out at her opponent, her boot catching him in the lower abdomen and pushing him back. Leliana immediately followed him back, knocking aside his dagger as he drove it up and out, an intended lethal strike. [i]Maker forgive me, he will kill me otherwise,[/i] she whispered to herself as she drew her main hand weapon across his throat, the white flesh exposed by the backward tilt of his head. She felt the blood spray out, droplets catching her cheek and she quickly turned her head to avoid more.
Turning on her heel as she backed away, Leliana tore her gaze from the corpse and ran back to the camp, sheathing one of her daggers, holding the other before her. The bandit she had incapacitated still lay in a heap before her tent. Dropping to her hands and knees, Leliana crawled forward, sticking her head through the flap. There they were, her two children, her warrior and her princess still clinging to one another. In the soft glow of the campfire, she could see their eyes were wide and frightened. She smiled, a tremulous effort.
"I am here, it is alright now," she whispered.
And then it wasn't. Cool steel touched her throat at the same time as a hand grasped her shoulder. Leliana wanted to cry out in anger, at herself – she had let her guard down. Grace made a sound, a soft cry and Rory failed to comfort his sister as his eyes rounded further at the sight of his mother being restrained with a dagger at her throat.
"If you're quiet, I won't kill you. We only want the Warden." The voice whispered low and deep and Leliana felt the words move the hair about her ear. "Drop the dagger."
Dropping the dagger, Leliana let silence be her only other response as a hundred questions tumbled through her mind. Who wanted Aedan, why did they want him? Would they ransom her or wait for him? What of her children…
This man might have information they could use, if she could get away from him without killing him she would try. But as a mother, her children had to come first. She let herself begin to tremble, let the pent up adrenaline seep from her muscles, simultaneously relaxing them and perhaps convincing the man behind her of her fright and supposed compliance. When the hand gripping her shoulder shifted slightly, his fingers flexing, she acted. Thrusting her head backwards, she rammed his nose, feeling the sickening crunch behind her as pain lanced through the back of her skull. His blade had nicked her throat as she'd wound up for the backward blow and she could feel the reassuringly slow trickle of her own blood. Not a deep wound. Next she turned and thrust and elbow backwards while she brought her other arm up to dislodge the arm now hooked about her neck.
"Ugh, bit…" the man tried to say, but the rest of it turned into a whoosh of air as her elbow met his gut.
Reaching for the dagger she'd dropped, Leliana whirled in time to find the man scrabbling back from her. She could see from his eyes that he intended to run. She flew after him, throwing herself at him and carrying him to the ground beneath her weight. They rolled in the dirt struggling to get their daggers up. His expression took on the fear and rage of a pinned creature and Leliana knew then she'd have to kill him. He would kill her to get free otherwise, or injure her badly in his attempt, and then no one would be there to look after Rory and Grace. Sacrificing grace for momentum, she threw her weight onto his dagger arm and then lifted her own weapon high and thrust down, feeling the blade pierce leather, slip through, skim past a rib and enter his chest. Leaving the dagger buried hilt deep in the man, she rolled off of him, wanting to avoid the blood, the mess, the sight of life leaving his eyes.
Scrambling to her feet, Leliana ran to the tent and stripped off her gloves, the bloody leather fingerless gloves, wiped her hands hastily on her legs and then flung her arms around her son and daughter. "Rory, Gracie."
Later, huddled in the circle of arms, her children and her husband, Leliana felt the pull, what Aedan might describe as the nothingness, the temptation to close her eyes and drift away from the awful landscape. She knew it to be the fatigue common after battle and she blinked it aside and instead told Aedan what had transpired at the camp.
"They were after you, Aedan. They were after you," she whispered finally.
He kissed her forehead. "I am here, I am safe." He told her he loved her and thanked her for doing what she would always do, watching over the children. She did not take offense at his gratitude; she knew what he meant by it and she only hugged him harder, grateful for the feel of his warm strength beside her.
-=0=-
The party reached an inn early the next afternoon and Aedan experienced an inordinate amount of gratitude at the news that the largest suite stood unoccupied and ready to accommodate his family. After securing rooms for his men, everyone parted ways for the same reason. Despite the constant drenching over the last three days, they all wanted to bathe.
Leliana bathed the children first before settling them into their cot while the chambermaid refreshed the tub for them. Aedan joined his wife in her bath. Though his gaze lingered on her lithe form, he made no overtures; he simply washed himself tiredly, then drew her against him and hugged her, before leaning his head back over the side of the tub and closing his eyes. He had fought to stay in Thedas since the early hours of the morning. He tried to occupy his mind with simple tasks – returning to camp, removing more bodies, searching them for clues, burning them. His men broke down the tents and folded away the damp tarps and they had loaded the wagon and set off in the misted rain that had returned with the dawn. Placing one foot in front of the other, he walked beside the wagon where the children rode and napped and tried to talk with Leliana, Ser Travers, the guards, mindless conversations, anything to keep him rooted in the present and on the road.
In the past he had walked off his anger and his rage, he had reveled in the silence of the road and a stride that swallowed the miles. The quiet exercise seemed his enemy now.
"Aedan?"
"Mm…"
"Don't fall asleep in the tub, I cannot carry you to the bed," Leliana whispered and though her voice sounded as tired as his, he detected something else.
"Mm," he answered and opened his eyes, rolling his head over to look at his wife.
The temptation to drift still beckoned and he knew that this time it would be sleep, harmless sleep, not escaping into the numbness. But still he fought to stay in Thedas, this time for Leliana. He wanted to make sure she was alright. She'd had to kill two men, one in front of her children. While no stranger to death, and she had confessed a certain pleasure in her previous profession during the Blight – the thrill of the hunt and the chase – she had changed much since. No one he knew enjoyed killing, but Leliana's past made it particularly distasteful to her, harder in a way. Of course, there was also their recent experience in Val Royeaux. She'd had to make choices that had nearly broken her spirit.
Hauling himself out of the tub, Aedan held out a towel for her and as she stepped into it, he bundled her within the soft folds of cotton and hugged her tightly. They slipped into clean night clothes and between clean sheets. Aedan almost didn't dare put his head on the pillow, he wanted to let go so badly. Instead he pulled Leliana close and whispered to her.
"Are you alright, Leli?"
Her head moved against his chest in a tentative nod and then stopped and he heard a softly muffled, "No. Not really."
"Me telling you that you made the only possible choice doesn't help, does it?"
A gentle shake of the head.
"Oh, Leli." He kissed the top of her head. "I will tell you that I understand then, and that… I am here for you." How many times had she said that to him? Why did it not feel like enough in return?
She seemed to snuggle closer, maybe it was enough.
Quietly, he tried something else. "I'm sorry. I should have left a guard at the camp with you," He hadn't because he'd not suspected anything but darkspawn or ghouls, he'd felt them and they'd been in the other directions. Human's did not travel with or collude with the tainted… But he did not want to have that conversation with her now. He and Ser Travers had touched on it, briefly, during the walk that morning, the coincidence, or lack of it, in the timing of the bandits and the ghouls. None of this lessened his guilt. "I'm sorry," he said again, more softly.
"How could you have known? You felt the taint... I should have been safe." Leliana lifted her face from his chest and he kissed her forehead. Her eyes closed briefly and when they opened again, they were filled with sadness. "I was so frightened for the children, Aedan," her voice caught.
Aedan stroked her back gently and let out a soft sigh. Despite his fears, he was glad he could be the strong one for a change, the one to comfort and reassure. "But you kept them from harm," he said. He kept his voice calm, inside he felt anything but. His children had been in danger and they'd had to see things he'd rather they had not. The repercussions of these events would be unpredictable.
"They are just children, their world should be safe, Aedan! The complications of our lives should not affect them."
He didn't realise Leliana had started crying until she sniffed, he'd thought she trembled from fatigue or fear or both. "Oh, Leli," he said and raised her wet face. The sight of tears in her blue eyes wrenched his heart. She so rarely cried. Stroking the hair away from her face he continued speaking in soothing tones. "They are safe. I won't leave you again. I'm sorry." Then he simply held her until she calmed.
It wouldn't always be like this, would it? Looking over his shoulder? Hadn't he fought for years to prevent incidents like this – families being threatened by the tainted? Aedan could feel stirrings of the rage trying to take hold and he quenched it. His anger could serve no purpose here, just as retreating into nothingness helped no one. He had made a choice, to stay with his family and that is what he would do.
Aedan didn't let himself fall asleep until after Leliana had. He held her until her tears dried and her breath became even. They exchanged no more words, they didn't have to. She knew he was there with her, for her, really there, and that was more important than anything he could say.
