Warnings: Blood, gore and drama. Attempted fight scene using DA game-play. Spoilery.
Introducing the Rogue!Male!Warden:
- Alienage elf background
- Romanced Zevran
- Made a Darkspawn taint baby with Morrigan (though I still have no idea what happened after that)
- Dual-weapon and bow specialties.
- Penchants for robbery and cheeky dialogue options
Disclaimer: Written for the love of it. No really, this fic ate my brain. Curse you, Fenris and your puppy eyes!
Walk Softly and Carry a Big Axe
Chapter Four
Fenris wasn't overly fond dogs, not when he had enjoyed being the quarry of hounds so often in the past, but Anders seemed to take after his beloved cats more than was strictly healthy. When a mabari's large, blunt nose pushed open the tavern door, Anders jumped and eased himself further down the bench. Fenris hid his enjoyment at the mage's expense and allowed his cool gaze to rest on the dog, waiting.
Following the mabari was an elf with smooth red hair and a mildly interested expression. He glanced about and his eyes, as golden as his dog's, lit on the two travelers. Apparently, they were easy to spot; this did not bode well for their future journey.
"Anders?" said the new man, approaching their table. The dog stuck to his knee, its heavy head swinging around, constantly searching.
"Oi!" The barkeeper shouted and waved an angry arm, but, Fenris noticed, remained safely behind his bar. "Don't bring that mutt in here!"
The stranger looked down at his mabari. "What'll you have, Dog?" The mabari whined. The elf looked back up and waved two fingers at the barkeep. "I'll take the house wine," he called. "The Dog wants ale. Dark. In a bowl. Something with bite."
"Another Ferelden," Fenris muttered darkly, easily recognizing that terrible, terrible sense of comedy that afflicted the nation.
"Another elf," Anders responded.
The barkeep must have decided that the new elf, armed as he was with a sword and dagger, and his rather large canine, were worth serving, after all. As the man settled at their table, a timid girl brought the two drinks. When she held the bowl and stared at the placid dog, fear obvious in her expression, the red-haired elf scratched behind the mabari's ears.
"Don't worry," he assured her. "He bites darkspawn, but he only licks little girls."
"In that order?" Anders asked, horrified. "Ugh!"
The girl didn't seem to mind. She set the bowl down and submitted to the mabari's slobbery gratitude with giggles.
The strange elf smiled indulgently, then turned his attention to the two travelers. "Well met. That's Dog and I'm, uh, well, people call me the Warden."
"The Warden?" Anders repeated. His eyes narrowed. "I thought I recognized that taint about you. But what do you mean the Warden? There is only one the Warden, and he wouldn't be in some dingy place like this with a big, stinking dog."
The mabari growled softly and the Warden patted him with an absent hand. "You do roll in an awful lot of dead things," the elf murmured to the beast, at which Dog whined. Then he smiled at Anders. "The Warden jumped at the chance to get out of Denerim. Alistair's idea of revenge is keeping me at his side. If I had to hear anything else about an Orlesian treaty, I was going to feign my Calling and live in an abandoned thaig."
"He wants revenge on you? Aren't you the Hero of Ferelden?"
"To Alistair, I'm 'that Maker-damned knife-ear who forced me onto the throne.' Amongst other things."
"You forced him onto the throne?"
The Warden nodded and drank. "Poor bastard. I mean, I love the guy. More of a brother than a friend, ever since the beginning. But better him than me. The Arl of Redcliffe and I forced him onto it, wedged the crown on his stylish hair and everything. Never forgave me." He frowned, almost a pout. "Most times I'm stuck in Denerim and darkspawn don't even have the decency to act out anymore. But sometimes something will come up and, if he doesn't notice, I'll take it on. Gives me a chance to stretch my legs."
"So you're hunting blood mages to 'stretch your legs'. Why do you need help?"
"Help?" The Warden chuckled. "Mostly it's the company. And politics. Alistair can't support the Circles too obviously, so he doles out jobs instead. Trying to convince the populace that they aren't all possessed." Noticing Anders' hard expression, the elf shrugged. "Sorry, that's not very kind, is it? I could actually use the help. Especially with magic and carrying loot." He leaned back and looked the mage up and down. "Your back looks pretty strong. How's your friend?" He nodded at Fenris.
"He's not my friend," Anders snapped waspishly.
Fenris met the Warden's stare with an unflinching, unwavering regard.
The Warden nodded slightly. "You'd make a fine reaver. You can be my friend, despite Anders' opinions. Do you have a name, though, so I know what to call when someone needs their head smashed in?"
"Fenris."
"A pleasure." The Warden tossed back the last of his wine. "Now, unless you men have anything better to do, I suggest we go hunting."
"In the dark?" Anders protested.
"Two elves and a former Warden? Oh, yes, I noticed it all over you, too. We'll be just fine. From the reports, this coven is most active at night. I don't want another caravan to go missing." The mabari whined. "Oh, my apologies, Dog. Two elves, a former Warden, and the fiercest mabari ever to stalk Thedas." Dog yipped.
The Warden and his canine led them out. Fenris followed on silent feet, feeling strange to be flanking someone who wasn't Hawke, but who wore the dual weapons and the same cloak of deadly confidence. Anders kept his distance, muttering swears at dogs and arrogant elves.
"We can all hear you, human," the Warden called over his shoulder.
/.\/.\
They followed the highway west from Highever, with the half moon glowing yellow behind them and lighting the way. Fenris, unaccustomed to night travel, looked about with interest at what the darkness did to the surrounding countryside. Mostly, it looked like bushes. Dark bushes with twittering animals rustling about on their own business and the sweet scent of moist earth and plant life. Occasionally, he caught a high-pitched shriek from something getting eaten. Probably rodents. And, judging by the smug expression born by the mabari whenever he emerged from the brush, probably eaten by Dog.
After some time, Anders seemed to get over his irritation and tried to start a conversation. Both elves had their ears stretched for sounds of blood magic, so the conversation mostly went like this:
"Did you really kill the Archdemon?"
"Yes."
"Shouldn't that have killed you?"
"I don't want to talk about it."
"But the taint-"
"I don't want to talk about it, Anders."
"Did something happen?"
"Shut up, Anders."
After a sullen silence: "Did you really find Andraste's ashes?"
"I don't know. Maybe."
"What do you mean, you don't know?"
"They were ashes, they had Andraste's name and guardian and they healed the Arl, but I don't know for certain. I didn't put them in there."
"You traveled with an apostate mage, right?"
"Yes."
"What was he like?"
"She, and I don't want to talk about it."
"But what about-"
"Anders," Fenris murmured quietly. "I can't hear the blood magic over your prattle." For his ear caught a faint sound on the wind, like voices.
Anders had the presence of mind to shut up. They all paused and listened.
"May just be a caravan," the Warden said in a carrying whisper. "But perhaps not. Ready yourselves."
Fenris concentrated and summoned the strength of the lyrium under his skin. A moment later, he felt a second wash of power from an outside source. He glared at the mage. "I don't need your aura."
"You say that now," Anders snapped back.
"Thank you, Anders," the Warden said gracefully before they could start arguing. "I prefer close fights." He nodded toward Fenris. "I hope you don't mind a duellist on the front lines with you."
Fenris felt a pang, fear for Hawke mixed with the vast sensation of need for the man, and nodded tightly. "I'm used to it."
"You never could get Hawke to stay out of your way," Anders commented. "I can't even count the times I thought you were going to brain him when he pounced out of nowhere."
"Tell me about it." Fenris shook his head. "That man was asking for it."
"Who?"
"No one," Fenris quickly answered, not wanting to talk about the missing Champion.
"Of course you'd say that," Anders hissed.
"Shut up," Fenris snarled. If Anders kept implying that Fenris didn't care about the man, one day it might come true.
"Easy," the Warden interrupted. "We're on a hunt, remember?"
The two lapsed into uneasy silence.
The voices gradually became louder as they walked on, detaching from the general din of night noise, and were accompanied by smoke and light. The trio, the mabari still off in the brush, rounded a corner and found a camped caravan; two covered wagons, a small fire, and a lone watchman.
"Hold! Who g-goes there?" The tremulous call came from the caravan guard, a young human male in ragged armour.
"Grey Wardens," the Warden answered, coming into the light and holding his arms out at his sides. "We mean no harm. We're hunting blood mages tonight."
The lad, he couldn't have been more than fifteen, sagged. "Thank the M-maker," he stuttered. "I'm g-glad you're here, m-mesere. The others are with the horses, and it's a d-damn spooky night to b-be alone."
Fenris didn't think so, but he didn't know what it was like to have poor human senses. He'd seen Hawke walk into bedroom furniture often enough to know that it was a severe handicap, though.
"Be easy, lad," the Warden said. "Have you seen or heard anything?"
The trio joined the boy in the small circle of fire light, settling on the bits of log and stone used as seating. Elsewhere, Fenris detected snoring. He wondered where the voices had come from, if the boy was alone but for sleeping comrades.
"Only what was left of other c-caravans, m-mesere."
While the Warden conversed with the lad, Anders leaned uncomfortably close to Fenris. "How common is that stutter, do you think?" he asked in a low voice.
Fenris grimaced, uneasy with the touch of Anders' breath on his ear. "How would I know?"
"I've only come across it the once," Anders replied, mostly to himself, as he shuffled back on his own log. The blond's face looked stark and ghastly in the flickering light.
A thin call, that of an old person, came from one of the wagons. "Excuse m-me," the young guard begged and went to answer.
Fenris listened carefully and saw an expression of concentration on the Warden's face as he did the same. However, he didn't catch much of the interaction within the wagon, other than that the lad was explaining his and the others' presence.
"Where do I remember that stutter?" Anders threw a pebble into the fire, causing an eruption of sparks. "Andraste's well-turned calf, that's annoying."
"You're annoying," Fenris informed the mage.
"M-my g-grandmother wants t-to m-meet you." The lad returned and stood awkwardly, just within the circle of light. His stammer seemed to be getting worse and he looked nervous. More nervous than anyone should be of their grandmother.
"We don't want to wake anyone," the Warden said mildly. "We'll be on our way soon enough."
"Nonsense," came the harsh word of a crone. A hunched figure crawled out from one of the wagons, well bundled in a cloak, only wisps of white hair showing. "Even on the road, one must be a good host. Everett, build up the fire, lad."
"Are you sure, g-grandmother?" the boy asked. "Three G-Grey Wardens-"
"How could we not? Build the fire!"
Fenris didn't have much experience with family, beyond a sister who sold him out to Danarius, but he was quite sure that grandmothers didn't normally snap at their descendants in such a way. Everett, though, hurried to obey, and started to pile wood on the fire.
"You aren't worried about attracting attention?" asked the Warden.
"Oh, no, not when you're here," she replied. She hobbled over to the Warden's side and sat with the aid of a crooked walking stick. She patted the Warden's arm with a withered hand, dark and sick on the fingers.
"Your hand," Anders immediately noticed. "You have an illness, madam? I may be able to help."
"Soon, dear," croaked the woman. "You can help me soon."
This was an odd response, though there really was no accounting for the elderly.
After some minutes, the fire had become a raging inferno. Anders, the smug bastard, very quietly cast an arcane shield on himself, protecting him from the worst of the heat. On Fenris' already sensitive skin and eyes, it was terrible. He eventually backed away and leaned against a wagon wheel. Only the crone and the Warden seemed at all comfortable.
"M-mesere," Everett stammered when he noticed where Fenris had moved. "G-get away from the wagon. The other sleepers-"
"Oh, don't worry, dear," the crone called. "They're already awake."
That was all the warning they received.
Fenris saw the crone pull a glinting blade and shove it into the Warden's side before the man could react.
Then something big-something fleshy and putrid-exploded out of the wagon and landed on the Tevinter fugitive. Fenris, bolstered by the lyrium, shrugged off most of the weight. Then, with the power so ready and willing, he spirit pulsed whatever was trying to overwhelm him.
In the small space that gave him, Fenris took a moment to assess the sudden battlefield. Anders stood by the fire, whirling his staff and shooting spirit energy at the crone and the dark-robed figures rushing out of the woods. The Warden was staggering to his feet, holding his side, still glowing with Anders' green healing. He swigged a healing potion, unsheathed his weapons, and whirled into battle.
The foe who had landed so ignobly on Fenris was more like ten people all bound together. The elf bared his teeth at it; it was only half the size of the monster First Enchanter Orsino had become in Kirkwall, but it was just as disgusting and just as good a reason to be rid of mages altogether. It roared at him, showering the slender warrior with blood and spittle. Fenris brought his maul up and roared back.
At some point, there was a dread howl that gave their opponents pause. Then the mabari appeared from out of the darkness and overwhelmed one of the more powerful blood mages, tearing the man's throat out.
In the chaos and frenzy, Fenris forgot about his companions. At least until the recombinant he fought got in a lucky hit that sent him flying across the clearing and slamming into the fire. He screamed and rolled away from it, writhing in pain and anger.
"Don't need the aura, he says." Anders stood over him, his eyes glowing with Justice, but his aspect that of the healer. He bent and held out a hand, already alight. "Just today, two for one deal, I might even throw in a barrier to keep you on your feet."
Fenris was in no shape to argue. He took the mage's hand, felt the cool relief of magic, hated himself for wanting it, and took off, back into the fray.
"A little thanks would be nice!" Anders called after him.
After that, the monstrous thing from the wagon didn't take long to kill, especially when the Warden, having dispatched the last dark-robed mage, joined Fenris. Like Hawke, he dashed around like a mad man, stabbing here, stabbing there, pointing out where Fenris' blows would be most effective. The maddened recombinant, now spouting blood and disease, random and unnameable body parts falling to the grass, took a few more desperate swings before succumbing to their concerted efforts. It collapsed to what may have been its knees, groaned, and fell.
Fenris wiped blood and gore off of his forehead and shared a triumphant grin with the Warden, before he remembered that this wasn't Hawke. He quickly lost the grin and turned away.
Anders stood by the scattered fire, his staff held before him. Several metres away stood the crone, her withered hand at her throat, her face hidden in shadow.
"You were beautiful once," Anders said loudly. "Why won't you show your face, Hope?"
The Warden came to Fenris' side and glanced at the warrior. "Hope?" he mouthed. Fenris shrugged.
"Time changes all things, Anders," she said. "Though you look well, very well. Will you have pity on an old woman?"
"You aren't old," the mage replied.
"No? How about you look at my hand?" She threw it.
Anders gave a little shriek as the thing landed on him and swarmed, spider-like, toward his face and closed on his throat. He clutched it and stumbled backwards and promptly tripped over a log and onto a burning piece of wood.
"Dog!" the Warden shouted and ran toward the crone, his weapons out and ready. The mabari bounded at her, snarling.
This left Anders to Fenris.
Oh, Maker, help me, the elf sighed internally. How any self-respecting man could lose a fight to a single hand was beyond him, but Anders was doing a fine job of it, squirming about and turning blue. His watering eyes stared with abject terror up at Fenris.
The elf knelt and pried the bony fingers away from the mage's throat. It took more effort than he had expected, but the lyrium supplied the strength he needed to finally, one by one, snap the fingers off.
Even broken, the hand proved a savvy enemy, as it jumped off of Anders and scurried toward the bush.
"Stop it!" Anders choked out.
Fenris didn't need to be told twice. He took two running steps and brought his maul down on the thing.
An all too excessive quantity of unholy ichor went everywhere and, somewhere behind them, the crone screamed.
"She... she kept her power..." Anders tried to explain through his damaged throat.
"Shut up, Anders."
The crone writhed on the ground at the Warden's feet, shrieking and clawing at the air with her remaining hand. Her cloak had long since fallen away, revealing a terribly disfigured body. When Fenris and Anders approached, she hissed at them.
"Hope... what did you do... to yourself?" Anders stared down at her sadly.
"You loved me once," she croaked. Something under her wizened skin moved, like a host of insects. "But you left us. You did this to us."
The mage shook his head silently. When Fenris met his distraught gaze, the man nodded once and then turned away.
Fenris, for the last time that night, lifted his maul.
/.\./.\
"Not too bad, if I must say so," the Warden said conversationally as they walked back to Highever. "Look at these amulets and rings. And this belt!" He held up the items for examination, then pressed the belt against Fenris' waist. "I think this is a bit more streamlined. Maybe it will help you attack faster." When Fenris made no response, the other elf shrugged. "Fine. I guess we'll just sell them and share the money."
Anders was unusually silent, still rubbing the bruises on his throat. For some reason, he hadn't healed them yet.
For a while, Fenris ignored the mage and kept his thoughts to himself, but those thoughts constantly turned to Hawke and what the man must be experiencing now, at night in Danarius' keeping, and he was curious by nature. So, the moon having traveled behind them and leaving their faces, once more, in darkness, Fenris matched his pace with Anders' and asked, "Who was she?"
"Another blood mage," Anders replied hoarsely. "What does it matter?"
"She said you loved her."
Anders glanced to the side, expression inscrutable. "And?"
"So either that means love, to you, is something fleeting and inconsequential, or you are in great pain. As your ally, I should know which."
The mage snorted. "Stop talking sense, elf, it frightens me."
"You didn't answer my question."
"I don't want to."
"It's important. How am I to trust you?"
Fenris could almost feel the heat of Anders' brain as it tried to work through Fenris' reasoning. The man finally sighed. "All right. After Kirkwall, the group that I told you about, the renegade mages trying to carve out a life, she was their leader."
"And you were lovers."
"Yes." Anders looked away, into the distance, his profile thoughtful. "She wasn't some old hag at the time. And I was... I was very lonely. It was nice, for a time. She had this thing where she would grow flowers and I would pick them and make little chains-"
"That's a lot of detail, Anders."
The mage cleared his throat and rubbed it again. "Right, ah, well, as I said before, they decided to attack a little town, somewhere in the middle of nowhere, still recovering from the Blight. I fought with her, but she had hidden part of herself from me. Well, I suppose I did, too, for that matter. But she had been devising some power reconciliation spell and it tore her mind apart. That was just before I fled."
"I see."
"I know, I know... Another mage, another bad decision, we should all die, etc., ad nauseum." Anders' shoulders fell. "You don't have to tell me. But yes, I loved her, and yes, it hurts, but Maker knows I've dealt with this before."
"Cheer up, Anders," the Warden interrupted. "I've known many, many good mages, and I only had to kill a handful. Besides, you have the darkspawn taint; no demon will want to possess you."
Dog whined his agreement.
"That... isn't very helpful," Anders said. "But thanks. I think.