He left Fenris sleeping. He deliberately did not look back; if he had, he feared he might never be able to leave. He dressed silently, gathered his few belongings, and leaving the amulet upon the pillow he left silently.
"You're really going then."
He glanced up as he swung the pack onto his shoulder; Lirene stood leaning a hip against the counter, watching him quietly, her fingers toying with a cloth-wrapped bundle. He nodded, and she abruptly straightened, shoving the bundle towards him.
"You'll need these; supplies for your journey. It's not much, but it'll maybe keep you going a while."
Anders nodded, taking the bundle and stowing it carefully in his pack. Lirene pulled out a pair of long-bladed daggers in a back harness and slid them across the table to him. "There's no point giving you a sword; you'd likely do yourself a mischief with it," she remarked drily; he smiled ruefully. "But a pair of knives may come in useful. Use them as you wish; sell 'em for more coin if you can't."
Anders eyed them askance. "I'm not sure that wearing them wouldn't be asking for trouble," he remarked. "I have no idea how to fight with knives. I've always been a healer."
Lirene shrugged. "Still, they may be of use. I didn't dare try to find you a staff; in some parts of the city, simply holding one is a death sentence right now. There's still war on the streets; the templars hold about a third of the city, and the front lines are changing on an hourly basis. Darktown belongs to the mages and the Fereldens for now, but there's no telling how long that will last."
"Maybe I'll find something in the Deep Roads," replied Anders. "Maybe some unfortunate who perished down there." He shrugged, pulling on the knife harness before pulling the pack onto his shoulder.
"Will you ever come back, do you think?" asked Lirene, her eyes softening. Anders shook his head.
"I think it best for everyone if Anders remains dead," he said quietly. Lirene regarded him sadly, then held out her arms and he stepped into her embrace, holding her close for a moment.
"Maker protect you and watch over you, Healer," she murmured.
"I owe you so much, Lirene," he breathed quietly. "Thank you so much for everything you've done for me these past ten years. I can never repay you."
"Go," she sniffed, pushing him from her sadly. "Live. That'll be thanks enough for me. Send word when – if – you can."
He nodded, stepping back. He raised a hand in farewell, then slowly left the shop, his footsteps and his heart heavy.
He tugged the hood up over his loose blond hair as he strode away, his feet taking him back down the old, familiar roads towards the deeper parts of Darktown. As he walked, he became aware of people emerging from their homes and hovels despite the early hour; voices whispering, words drifting to his ears as he strode on.
"The Healer!" "But... I heard he was dead?" "A ghost walks amongst us!" "The Healer lives?"
Pulling the hood lower, he kept to the side streets and alleyways as far as possible but still, calls and whispers followed him.
"Anders... Anders lives?... look, 'tis the Healer's ghost come to walk amongst us..."
I'm a ghost now? He supposed in a way, he was. Certainly his old life, his recent existance, had come to an end, bled out onto the cobblestones – perhaps Justice with it. He had searched deep inside several times now, but he could find no trace of the spirit he had shared a mind with for over six years. It was as though Justice had never been there; not even an echo. That disturbed him more than he thought it should; something just didn't feel right inside – as though in leaving, dying, whatever Justice had done, the spirit had somehow taken a part of Anders with him; but he was at a loss to explain just what was missing.
He was drawing closer to the entrance to the Deep Roads; the path Varric's brother Bartrand had led them all down so long ago. He had never dreamed he might one day walk this path alone. He paused on the broad paved terrace before the entrance, staring at the cracked paving stones.
He had stood here as Leandra pleaded with Hawke not to take Carver into the Deep Roads. Carver had insisted upon going anyway. Anders stared at the entrance, dark and forbidding, remembering the hopeless look of dread upon Carver's face at the moment he had realised he was dying of the Blight. The trusting look of hope in Hawke's eyes when Anders had suggested the Grey Wardens.
Other memories. A keep, far beneath the ground; a shared moment between two Wardens.
"Do you ever think about it? What's to come?" asked Carver.
"I try not to," replied Anders. "Apostates aren't exactly known for their longevity. And even without the Calling, a Warden's lot wouldn't be likely to be long anyway. Fighting darkspawn isn't exactly conducive to a long life. Most Wardens don't survive long enough to hear their Call."
A shared look; sympathy flashing between them both; understanding of a shared fate. A moment of brotherhood. He'd missed that since leaving Vigil's Keep.
He bowed his head, lost in memories. So many memories. Seven years since he at last made his successful escape from the Circle, and he'd packed more living into those years than many men twice his age.
He lifted his head and stared back the way he had come. Kirkwall. His home. He had thought of Vigil's Keep as home once, too; he had been forced to leave there, much as here, solely by his own actions.
Both times stemming from having taken Justice into himself. Becoming an abomination.
And yet, if he were to be somehow taken back there, back to that day at the Keep... could he honestly say he wouldn't make the same choice? In many ways, it had not been a choice. Had Rolan not pursued and harassed him...
"He just went crazy. His eyes were glowing... His bloody skin cracked open and it was like he was on fire inside. Just kept raving... something about injustice, a revolution. Thought I was going to have to put the blighter down like a mad dog, then he just collapsed."
"Damned mages."
He opened his eyes, struggling to stand. Everything felt wrong; the light too bright and yellow (but the sunshine has always been that colour) too harsh, the shadows all wrong (but we're no longer in the Fade), nose assaulted by stenches and revolting smells (horses in the stables, fresh bread baking, stale ale spilled last night in the great hall, the midden heap out back – the smell of any Keep throughout the Free Marches), his ears assailed by sounds (fellow Grey Wardens, the smith's hammer, the rumble of cartwheels, life, life, all around us).
One voice stands out. Rolan, the former templar turned Grey Warden... but he wears the white; the white griffin on his chest plate stands in contrast with the steel-grey sword-of-flames on his companion's armour . He has betrayed me (us) as I (we) knew he would. Once a templar, always a templar.
I (we) had no choice. Rolan had come for me (us). Maleficar or no, the badge of the Grey Wardens would be no protection for me (us) any longer. I (we) had no choice.
We had to meld. It was my only chance to live.
He shuddered, pulling himself back from old memories. Justice had been so close, so vibrant, so present in his mind that day, right up to that moment when Rolan had confronted them. And then there had been that horrible blank time in which he knew nothing before awakening...
No. He did remember. He just didn't want to. Didn't want to remember the white-hot rage that had burned within him/them as Rolan thrust the sword into his chest and he/they laughed back at him. Tore the blade from his hands. Then ripped him apart bodily. Blood over this/heir face and up his/their arms, covering their hands; the air thick with the coppery tang of blood. Blood in their mouth. He could still remember the taste; blood laced with the lyrium the templar had imbibed before confronting them.
And suddenly I'm alone, standing in a burning forest, with the bodies of templars and wardens at my feet. So many, and I didn't even know they were there. Didn't even know I had killed them, but the evidence is all around me. Not the aftermath of a battle as I've known it, but a bloody abattoir of rent limbs and torn and eaten flesh.
He reeled, clutching his head. "No... NO!" he screamed, desperately trying to drive the memories from his mind – in vain, all in vain. "Where is your justice now?" he screamed at the stones. "Answer me that, Maker! Damn you! Is this my penance? Is this my punishment?"
Only the echoes of his own voice answered him. "Where is my justice?" he whispered, looking around himself hopelessly. "Am I going mad?"
He heard a foot scrape a stone behind him, on the path leading back towards Darktown; he spun on his heel in time to see a dark figure rise from behind a stone. It stood in the shadows, obscured; he was aware of a pale face framed with dark hair, large green eyes that gleamed softly with tears in the faint light that filtered down from high above. Dark grey lines marked the heart-shaped face.
"Merrill?" he murmured, taking a step towards her. The elf shook her head sadly.
"Dareth shiral, lethallin. Lath sulevin, lath araval ena."* She turned and fled, her bare feet making no sound upon the cracked stones.
Anders watched her until his eyes could no longer pick out her slender figure from the dark shadows, and then he turned slowly back towards the entrance to the Deep Roads.
Calling up a small globe of magelight, he carefully made his way in.
*"Safe journey, my dear friend. Be certain in need, and the path will emerge."
With acknowledgement to Jennifer Hepler for the story of Anders and Justice's joining and immediate aftermath.