Finn landed in a crumpled heap at the base of the wall. Ariane jumped out the window after him. A jolt of pain shot up her calves as she landed, but she managed to keep her balance. After checking that her swords were still in place, she grabbed the mage's arm and wrenched him to his feet.

'There is a door,' he gasped, rubbing the knee he'd landed on. 'It's not so far from the ground. I'm fairly certain you could have used it.'

'Be quiet.' She glanced around. The village was fairly empty this time of night. Lights glowed the windows in the windows of the rebuilt pub, but the streets were clear. Keeping her head down, she started towards the bridge which edged the village. Hopefully Dog would be able to find it in the dark.

Autumn was on its way, and a chill had settled into the air. The moon was a tiny sliver and offered almost no light. Ariane navigated around a wooden fence and towards the cornfield that backed the village. The harvest was still on its way, and the tall corn should provide some cover. No one seemed to have noticed their disappearance yet. Practice had taught her that there was still no sense in being cocky.

'Er. So. How have you been?'

They had reached the cornfield. 'We need to move faster.' She increased her speed to a jog, making him stumble.

'Been fine, Finn, thanks for asking...' he muttered.

Ariane ignored him, searching in the dark for Dog. He should have been at the bridge by now. 'Where are we going?' she asked Finn. The corn stalks slapped her face as she pushed through them, making it itch.

He yanked his arm away from her, looking alarmed. 'Well, seeing as I haven't seen you in eight years and you just made me break out of a building, I sort of thought you knew.'

She stared at him. 'Made you break out of a building? I rescued you! They were going to put you on trial, I heard them!' And mages don't come out of Chantry trials, she added silently. Not these days. Did he really not understand how serious this was?

'Yeah, but...' Finn's voice cracked as he craned his head around to look back at the Chantry. Bits of grass had collected in his red hair from the fall, and his hands were shaking slightly. 'Now they'll think I'm running away!'

'You are,' Ariane snapped. She winced at the harsh sound of her own voice and softened it. 'Come on, I wasn't going to leave you there. They would never have given you a fair trial.' No matter how kind the Seeker Leliana had seemed to her, she had heard stories of what happened to mages who were suspected of blood magic... and that had been before the civil war. Things were bound to be harsher now.

'What? But...' He put a hand to his forehead, shaking his head in disbelief. 'Oh, Maker, I'm going to be an apostate. Oh no, oh no, this can't be happening...'

'Although I'm starting to regret the rescue decision.'

They had reached a ragged-looking scarecrow. She leaned against it, the rough straw scratching her back. Kneeling, she began disentangling Finn's staff from her pack. It would be safer once they were both armed.

Finn paced back and forth, picking straw from his clothes. 'I think... maybe we should turn around,' he said slowly. 'That would probably be best. Yes. I should go back there and...'

Frustration took over. 'Go back? Gods, I remembered you as smart, Finn! Do you pay any attention to the world at all?' A mental image flashed into her mind – the Keeper of her clan, walking away with the Templars. There had been so many of them that resisting wasn't an option, she told herself. Besides, how were we to know the Keeper wouldn't come back? Now she knew better. 'Do you have any idea what would happen if they decided you were a blood mage?' she asked, finally separating the heavy wooden staff from her other equipment.

Finn stared at the proffered staff as though it was a cobra. 'But I'm not! I don't think. Maybe I could just go and explain-'

'Explaining seemed to be working out brilliantly for you, from what I saw.'

'No... But...' His mouth moved silently for a few moments. 'There's nothing else I can do,' he mumbled. He picked up the staff dejectedly and looked back at the lights of Lothering.

'You can leave.' She took his arm again. She had been wandering with the clan her entire life. She needed to remember how strange leaving somewhere familiar must be. 'I know you're not enthusiastic about travelling, so I'll try to get you as far as I can before I return to my clan, alright?'

'Far as you can? To where?'

'I was hoping you'd tell me. Don't you have some family around?'

'I... yes,' he admitted. 'My parents live in Amaranthine. I think.'

'You think? They gave you a name like 'Florian Phineas Horatio' and then didn't keep in touch? I thought you said they didn't hate you.' Ariane remembered how affectionately he had spoken of his parents eight years before. Resignedly, especially when it came to his mother's knitting, but it had been clear how much he loved them.

Finn looked at her in surprise, then smiled shyly. 'You remembered my whole name,' he said, sounding oddly flattered.

Ariane felt herself blushing for some reason. 'It was hard to forget,' she answered, busying herself checking the state of her supplies. 'I think I might have lost a few syllables in there somewhere.' She shifted uncomfortably when he didn't answer. 'Your parents,' she prompted.

He shrugged, the smile falling off his face. 'The Templars stopped letting us read letters a few years ago. And...' He studied his shoes with sudden interest. 'I guess eventually my parents stopped writing. '

Ma serannas, she thought. No wonder he was so out of touch with the state of the land. Even the isolated Dalish had some contact with the outside world. 'I'm sure they'll want to see you. Amaranthine is only a few days off, okay? I can take you there.' It was out of her way, but she could hardly just abandon Finn to the Templars. She would have to hope her clan wasn't forced to move in the meantime. She willed herself not to be frustrated. Or at the very least, not to let it show.

'What if they're not there?' Finn said, sounding panicky. 'I mean... there's a war on, right? What if they've moved, or... or they've gone back to Orlais to see my mum's family, or...'

Ariane frowned. 'Or what?'

'Well... they might not want me. Anymore.'

'They're your parents,' she said gently. 'They gave you ridiculous hats and unpronounceable names. They love you.' At least family was dependable. Her time with the Warden hadn't been easy, and losing Banic had been harder, but she had always known her clan was with her. Surely human families couldn't be that different.

'Yes, but if I'm really an a... apos... not listening to the Chantry anymore, they could get in a lot of trouble. They could be arrested, or have their house taken away, or... Well, me being a mage was always a bit embarrassing, but now it could be dangerous.' He looked down at the staff in his hands, running a finger over the runes. They glowed slightly in response to his touch. 'I don't want to cause any trouble. Things are so...'

'Different,' Ariane said softly.

He sighed, and sat down heavily beside her. His long legs sprawled straight in front of him like a child's. 'Yeah.'

'It'll be okay,' she said. It seemed polite to pretend not to notice that his cheeks were wet. She rummaged around in the pack, finally finding a skin of water and offering it to him. 'The real world can't be that bad.'

Finn managed a strangled smile as he accepted it. 'You don't sound very sure.'

'Well, maybe I've been a bit cut off too,' she admitted. Definitely an understatement. 'The clans usually try to stay out of human politics.' If only the world had allowed them to stay that way. She shrugged. 'I sort of thought all this would blow over eventually. It's easy to get isolated.'

'It is - was - the same in the tower. I think this is the longest time I've been outside in about...' He thought for a moment. 'Five years?'

'Alright, that's...' Ariane frowned. 'A bit terrifying, actually. '

'Might be six.' Finn studied the beautiful stars with an expression of deep mistrust. 'I really wish the sky wasn't so big.' He pulled his knees up to his chin. 'You know, thinking about it I might actually quite like a trial. It would shake things up. Can we go back now?'

Ariane shook her head. No matter the inconvenience, she wasn't letting him return to people who hadn't let him outside in five years. 'We're going to Amaranthine.' She put a hand on his shoulder, willing her arm to be steady. 'It's alright, okay?'

'No, it isn't!' His voice rose in pitch again, and Ariane winced at the noise. 'I've been thinking that for years and years, every time they took something away, it's alright, everything will settle down and be the way it was again.' More tears gathered in his eyes, and he didn't bother to hide them. Water dripped from the forgotten skin in his hands onto the dry earth. 'But it won't. Nothing's alright, it hasn't been since... almost before the Blight.'

He exhaled in a rush, seemingly exhausted. Ariane would have expected herself to feel angry at Finn's display of self-pity. Instead she just felt tired. Forgoing courtesy, she pulled out a handkerchief and offered it to him. They sat in silence for a few moments, listening to the wind in the corn.

'I wish the Warden were here,' Finn said suddenly.

Ariane started chewing a pinky nail, a childhood habit she thought she had long ago abandoned. 'Yeah. Me too.' The thought of what the Warden would have done to anyone who interrogated him was cheering.

'It's a bit stupid, I suppose,' said Finn, with a self-conscious laugh that failed to brighten his sad face. 'I can't see how he could fix it. '

'People would listen to him,' Ariane said dreamily. 'Like they listened during the Blight.' Ten years earlier, the idea of the Dalish, humans and dwarves all working together would have been ludicrous. Somehow the Warden had pulled it off. All of Fereldan's people had actually agreed on something. 'He brought us all together.' Too bad the alliance had only lasted as long as the Warden was there.

Finn smiled, more genuinely this time. 'I guess all we need is an Archdemon, then. That should solve everything.'

Ariane smiled back. 'Right. New mission. Find something so terrible that everyone has to get along. On second thought, it would probably be easier to find the Warden,' she added, remembering the devastation the Blight had entailed. It seemed like bad luck to even joke about such a thing occurring again.

Finn indicated the direction of the town with a jerk of his head. 'What did you tell them? I mean, he was what they wanted to ask about, right?' There was no need to explain which 'he' was being referred to.

'Same as you, probably. That he went through the mirror and he's gone.' Not wanting to lose the slightly cheerier expression on her companion's face, she continued. 'I may have also mentioned that he ditched us with a giant pissed-off guardian, but I've tried not to dwell on that too much.'

'It was an honest mistake!' Finn objected. 'I mean, probably. How would he have known it comes back to life?' Something occurred to him, and his face lit up. 'Oh! I forgot to tell you. I found some sections of your book, the one Flemeth's daughter stole.' He seemed to become aware of his wet sleeve, and rescued the tipping water bag. 'I would have written, but I wasn't allowed, and I didn't know where you were anyways...'

'What?' Ariane had long ago given up any hope of ever seeing the book again. 'Really? Where?'

'Well, not the whole thing,' he corrected quickly, holding out his palms in apology. 'Just some copied sections and I couldn't translate a lot of it, and there was some guesswork figuring out a lot more, but it would seem that an Orlesian scholar recorded and annotated some sections meaning to study the script and while she couldn't quite discern the content the copies-'

'Bloody humans,' Ariane muttered. 'Never stop borrowing our books. Oh, I didn't mean you,' she added, seeing Finn's wounded expression.

'But I remembered that it was important to your clan, so I copied out and translated what I could.' Talking about books had a visible effect on Finn. Some colour had returned to his face, and his voice sounded surer.

'For me?' Ariane asked in surprise. She tucked a lock of brown hair behind her long ear.

'Um. Yes.' Finn looked embarrassed now. 'Well, there wasn't a lot going on in the tower. Nothing exciting or horrifying like looking for the Eluvian, anyways.' His face became downcast again. 'It's all in the tower library though, so it's sort of a null point. I'm not allowed in there anymore, since the Templars cleared out.' He shrugged. 'It's all occupied by rebels now, I suppose.'

Ariane tried to mask her disappointment that the book was out of reach. 'That must have been harsh.' She had met Finn in that library. It had seemed like his natural environment.

'Awful,' he said gloomily. 'Nothing to read. You have no idea.'

'Did the Seekers take the copy?' she asked, trying not to sound too eager. She didn't want to get her hopes up, but the loss of the Keeper had been an enormous blow to the clan. Maybe the return of the book could get their spirits up again. 'Maybe I could request it back from the Chantry. It is ours.' Not that they usually cared about details like that.

'I... I didn't tell them, actually,' Finn said hesitantly. 'Well, I didn't think they'd care. Since the Eluvian is broken, the rituals aren't much good to them.' He frowned. 'Do you think I should have told them? I could go back and say-'

Ariane shook her head firmly. Something was buzzing at the back of her mind like a bee. Something she had seen in the Seeker Cassandra's report. 'There's another one,' she said suddenly.

'What?'

'The Eluvian... it's something the Seeker interviewing you wrote.' She struggled to recall the page of dense writing. 'There's another Eluvian in Kirkwall. They found it in the home of a friend of the Champion's.' One of my people, she thought. 'A blood mage,' she said instead.

Finn leaned forward in interest. 'Another broken one?'

'No. The mage had managed to repair it. They don't know what she was doing with it, but...'

'But what?'

Crazy half-formed ideas were swirling in Ariane's head. The Seekers had been after the Warden. The world was coming to pieces around them. She knew in her heart that the Warden would know what to do, and if he wasn't coming back...

'Oh... oh no,' said Finn slowly. The same idea had clearly just occurred to him. 'That's mad. That's completely bonkers.'

'Fine, fine.' She felt embarrassed for even having thought it. 'I was just thinking aloud anyways.'

'Good, because it would never work. It's not the same at all. Flemeth's daughter knew what she was doing, she had a complete copy of the text, she knew where to...' He paused, frowning slightly. He ran his fingers through his hair, his expression shifting to dreamy consideration. 'Huh. Maybe if... but then...'

'But what?' Her embarrassment slowly changed to excitement.

Finn opened his mouth to answer. Suddenly with a crash, Dog charged into the clearing, snapping stalks of corn as he ran to Ariane. She leapt to her feet as Dog whimpered softly.

'Oh, hi!' said Finn wonderingly. 'He still awfully big, isn't he?' He eyed the Mabari's teeth nervously. It responded with a wide, panting grin. Ariane realized with a sinking feeling that there was blood on Dog's muzzle.

Ariane grabbed Finn's arm and yanked him to his feet. 'They've noticed we're gone. We need to get out of here.' Silently she prayed that Dog hadn't injured any of the Seekers too badly. They could still hope to escape undetected if the alarm hadn't been fully raised. 'This way.' She started to run towards the bridge, shouldering her pack as she went. The straps twisted and dug into her shoulders.

As she ran, a sharp tug on her leg made her stumble and she spun, swiftly drawing the smaller of her two blades as she regained her balance. She looked around wildly. No Seekers. Instead, Dog tugged at the leather which covered her chain mail, whining. Finn slowed to a halt behind her, holding his staff awkwardly.

'What's he-'

A heavy weight slammed into the back of her helmet, driving her to her knees. Her ears rang. Instinct kicked in and she rolled to the side just as a club crashed into the ground where she had been, raising a cloud of dust. A fawn blur hurtled past her and a man cried out. Shaking her head to clear it, she struggled to her feet.

Her attacker lay prone on the ground, with Dog snarling at the man's bloody throat. Finn stood behind her in open-mouthed horror, staff dangling uselessly from one hand. Ariane narrowed her eyes. The man who had hit her was no Seeker. His armour was battered leather instead of plate, and he was armed with only a spiked wooden club. She glanced at his face. He was painfully young.

In the second it took her to observe the scene, two more men sped out of the corn. One of them gave a yell of rage as he saw the prone form of his friend. Common bandits, Ariane realized. Probably thought we were farmers. She drew her other sword and shifted into a defensive stance, cursing her stupidity. Next time, she would listen to the Mabari when it tried to tell her where the danger was. 'We don't want a figh-'

The larger of the remaining bandits lunged at her before she could finish her sentence, wielding his sword far more effectively than the first had used his club. She parried with one blade and lashed out with the other, only to have him dodge her. She felt a warm trickle from under her helmet where the club had hit her.

The other bandit seemed slightly less enraged, but no less dangerous. He levelled a crossbow at Finn, eyes gleaming from under his leather cap. 'Hand over your gold and weapons, and we'll make this-'

His chest heaved, and his voice cut off. Slowly, his face froze in an expression of horror – literally froze, Ariane realized, seeing the pale sheen of ice spread over the man's skin. Seizing the moment, she whipped her sword at the larger bandit while he was distracted. He parried again and stepped back, only to trip over an enraged Dog. He fell in a pile of limbs under the warhound's snapping jaws. The frozen man stared out from under a layer of frost in wide-eyed terror, mouth open in a silent scream. A heavy, cracked stone shape hurtled out of the dark and into his chest. The bandit shattered into a thousand pieces, pinkish ice crunching as it hit the ground.

Ariane breathed heavily, looking around for reinforcements. None came. Her head still pounding, she turned to check on Dog and Finn. Dog was still growling at the corpse under his paws. Finn was standing rigidly, face dead white.

'You could have left one for me,' she said. Her throat was raw.

'I think,' said Finn hollowly, 'I might throw up.'

She stepped over the bandit corpses, trying not to look too hard at how thin the men had been, or how old their equipment was. There had been no honour in this fight. The civil war had left so many desperate. Once more the Warden flashed into her mind, but she dismissed the thought as best she could.

'Come on,' she said, waving Finn forward from where he had frozen. 'I can see the bridge. Amaranthine's a long way yet.'

Sorry for the lengthy chapter - I was having a hard time figuring out where to split it up. As always, if you have time, please add a review! I really appreciate any and all suggestions.