Chapter 4
All that he wants now is just to shut his eyes and imagine that all this is only a nightmare. And then to wake up, to see smiling Duncan and bright Cailan with his childish heartiness and ecstatic gesturing, to hear that they have won the battle of Ostagar. That she lit the beacon and Loghain didn't escape from the battlefield and came to the rescue not as a hero he had been for so long time but also as a friend of Maric. And he shuts his eyes and sees Goldanna charging down to meet him, her eyes glowing with tears – tears of joy. And five ruddy healthy children, lively as grigs, are skipping after her… Aeris is standing at the precipice and staring into the distance thoughtfully; her eyes focused on the Tower of Magi emergent ahead, and beams of the hidden sun tinges her fair skin with a delectable shade of pink… She smiles at him and his new foolish jokes, and Duncan besides her says that she shouldn't listen to all this nonsense, otherwise the Grey Wardens will be at the risk of losing credit with her. And Cailan laughs as do all their crazy company, even on Sten's stony face softens with something reminding of a smile. And he exclaims, glancing at angry Morrigan: "What a sour face she has! Don't tell me the lamb was so bad," causing a new gale of laughter…
But he opens his eyes and discovers only walls of a sleazy village tavern.
Alistair Theirin, not a prince and not a Grey Warden anymore, glances with vacuous eyes at the brisk visitors of the inn. There is anxiety on their faces, and the fear of a new bale reflects in their gestures. It is clear what have frightened them. The war with a savage enemy nobody can fully understand – the Blight.
"What did the Landsmeet decide?" asked some voices affectedly.
"It is said the Grey Wardens killed Queen Anora and Teyrn Loghain! Who will defend us?" echoed the other ones.
"Nonsense! The teyrn is alive! He and the last of Grey Wardens will lead the army against the Blight!"
"One can expect anything of these Wardens…"
Alistair shuddered. To hear all of this was insupportable and he turned to the window. The sunrise will glimpse soon.
Before leaving Denerim, he dropped on his sister to say his last good-bye to her and the children. Not that Goldanna was happy to see her brother but, oddly enough, she accepted more or less calmly. Certainly, she was too tired and didn't want to haggle. Or may be she was just glad to receive some money from him.
Alistair shook his head. He had no desire to think about it now. Actually, he didn't want to think about anything.
Heavy drops banged on the window. It started to rain. Alistair lazily watched how clear water was slowly gliding on the smooth glass surface… There was about an hour before the dawn came… There was, however, no place for the sun in his pathetic life.
How had it happened?
He asked this question to himself hundreds of times since he had left Eamon's estate. And the answer every time escaped him as a predawn dream. Why had he hit her? Alistair would never strike a woman, even if it concerned Morrigan.
Alistair recalled the case when they had fallen into a trap in the Fade. At that time he wasn't able to tell the truth between the lies and became the demon's prisoner. And only Aeris saved him from his own illusions. For only Maker knew Alistair didn't want to wake up at all… Because in this strange, full of painful sweetness captivity he had a family.
Andraste's flaming sword, she is right. He's really a bad templar: not because he didn't recognize the hazard but because he didn't want to do it.
Alistair flashed a look at the window. Today Ferelden wouldn't see the goldish beams of a new sunrise: the sky was clouded over, and there was no break. A dead sky. A grey sky… Grey.
She's mistaken, Alistair thought. She can feel the taint in her blood but she doesn't know what it means to be a Grey Warden, although it is not only her fault – she has never seen the advantages of being a part of the order. Aeris looks at the world through the fog and smoke of magic and false estimations, and the world is unfamiliar to her. But what about Riordan? Is he mistaken either? Or the Grey Wardens are different from what he imagined?
Nonsense. Duncan was a Grey Warden and a true hero. He lived to the same laws as Alistair: "In war – victory. In peace – vigilance. In death – sacrifice." The Grey Wardens have no other laws.
A deep sigh broke out from his chest. He will leave this land soon. There is no sense to remain in a place where honour and duty are just empty words, and forsworn vows are dashed with blood of the innocent. Where Loghain Mac Tir goes scot-free, assured in his impunity. But Alistair needs to rest.
The former templar made the move and went to the bar. An old lady who was wiping a glass looked at him.
"Do you need something, son?"
Alistair eyed her with interest. No doubts, she was very pretty once and had played havoc with many young fellows. Her beauty hadn't abandoned her, transformed from riot of bright colours into noble fading attractiveness.
"Like autumn," Alistair thought, and his lips curved unwittingly in a smile when the mistress of the tavern shook her head watching him.
"A bed," the former templar replied. "Even if it means to sleep with bugs."
She smiled.
"Sorry, we haven't seen bugs here for a long time. And such a handsome boy can't spend nights with these foul insect."
The woman turned to a small cabinet behind her and took a key.
"Here," she said. "Room 16."
Alistair nodded. His gaze was taken by a pendant around innkeeper's neck – a big shell. Its smooth surface was shining even in the dusk. What surprised Alistair most is its colour: the shell was silvery-white, but the left side had some wondrous reddish shade.
"Nice pendant," he noticed.
The old lady brightened up.
"A gift from my husband," she explained. "He's a sailor. Found it on the beach near the Amaranthine ocean."
"The colour is… unusual."
"You mean this?" she touched the shell left side. "It's not its natural colour. Withered blood."
"Wow," Alistair gave the fancy shell a long look.
Blood and nacre. He'd never seen anything like that.
The lady chuckled and Alistair shuddered.
"Young man," she said smiling, "I've been watching for a long time. You've been sitting here for several hours and haven't spoken to anyone. You know, eating one's heart out is very painful. You need rest, listen to an old woman."
"You are n…"
"Yes, yes. Not old, and in the prime of life. Everybody always says the same. Go and sleep, or my husband will sling you out."
Alistair laughed and stood up. He felt a lot better as if this woman had a gift to heal invisible wounds.
"Thanks," and he went up in order to finally slip his memory in the embrace of the Fade.
--
They thought it up when she was six and he was seven.
Even now, despite that she has already grown up, that their friendship, full of long talks lasting for hours, stealthy understandable glances and old yellowed scrolls, is dead but still isn't buried, Aeris cannot but smile, recalling the strange spellful time of their childhood.
Jowan called it the game of mice and cats – the game of mages and templars.
In those rare moments when the endless ocean of books that must have been not only read but also learnt by heart didn't overtake them, Aeris and Jowan played in templars.
Aeris still remembered the tremulous feeling these steel-clad men with emotionless, dead eyes caused in her once. She felt reverent fear of them, carefully watching their silent figures. Jowan laughed at her and told that the templars should have been scared of mages: they had no power to overmaster sunbeams and inweave from them a flaring with gold web; they couldn't understand how it's possible to mix ice and fire, light and darkness into the one shimmering whirlpool.
Aeris only returned his smile and sketched a shrug. Jowan always took it as consent and went on pattering that they could change the world.
Oh, how she regretted it now! Maybe, if she had paid more attention…
But there are mages and templars, and it's impossible to see who is a hunter and who is a prey.
This couldn't be even called a game – just one of them watched the other during his sleep. And Jowan had never been able to keep silent more than ten minutes, and had never been able to suppress a laugh.
And then mages and templars disappeared, and only children with their jokes and games remained.
Now Aeris, looking at dormant Morrigan, didn't laugh. She saw how anxiously Flemeth's daughter was sleeping, rolling over and muttering something. Morrigan's face looked pale and sick, during her sleep she seemed to be weak and defenseless – Morrigan the Warden knew would never let anybody see her in such a state.
The witch had rejected her offer to get Wynne up to heal her arms, and Aeris had had to use a great amount of bandage and all her short knowledge of the healing magic to somehow smooth the situation.
"One more night like this and I'll go mad," she thought.
Aeris had a wild longing to sleep and was thinking of lying down when someone knocked at the door. Aeris went out.
Loghain was waiting for her in the passage.
"How is she?" he whispered.
"Fell asleep."
"I was in her room," Loghain looked around, his expression uptight. "There is nothing, only a broken mirror."
"So, you think, she wounded herself? It's out of character for Morrigan."
"The guardians didn't see anybody," said Loghain briefly.
Aeris looked him up and down. He had already checked everything. This man always dots his i's and crosses his t's.
"Those are fragments left from the mirror," declared Loghain, showing her a gold frame with cracked glass. Aeris had given this mirror Morrigan beforetime. "I thought you would like to have a glance."
Aeris reached forward, disposed her had over the mirror a few inches of it. The Grey Warden closed her eyes, merging into the world of her own sensations. A wild, furious and cruel power, like a brutally storm was winnowing from the mirror, Aeris felt that the broken glass was pulsing. The mage started to gasp for air. She needed to see right through the deeps…
"Ah!"
"Warden!"
Aeris opened her eyes. Loghain took her by the shoulders. The remains of the mirror were thrown down.
"What's going on?" asked Loghain. His cold bright eyes demanded an answer. It seemed he had been trying to awake her not only once.
"I… don't know… The mirror… something is wrong. I think it was used by a mage. I can still feel the magic in these fragments… And the power of this magic scares me."
He just nodded and released her.
"So, the witch was attacked through the mirror? Or she saw something in it?"
"Very much so."
"You said a name, when you saw the witch."
"Flemeth, Witch of the Wild. She is Morrigan's mother. She saved me and Alistair in Ostagar."
"Witch of the Wild," repeated Loghain with thoughtfulness. "And why did she attack her own daughter?"
Aeris suddenly realized she was examined. But there was no use hiding something: their company had been already thinking of confronting Flemeth, and Loghain, whether or no, would find out the truth. Besides, he is a Grey Warden now, and if she cannot trust him, whom she can trust at all?
Oh Maker, she wants to sleep so much!
"We suspect that Flemeth is going to… take Morrigan's vital force and possess her body. And now, if you don't mind, of course, I suggest getting some shut-eye. We both are tired."
"It seems I was right about the Grey Wardens' tradition," Loghain said and folded his arms. "But you have a point. There is much to do tomorrow. Although you never answered why you had left."
Aeris sighed. This man wasn't going to surrender. He looked very exhausted but his blessed stubbornness, by all appearance, overruled everything.
"Tomorrow, Loghain. Tomorrow."
Funnily, but he just gave a nod and turned away in order to leave. He had already disappeared round the corner when suddenly Aeris piled after him.
"Loghain!"
The former teyrn stopped.
"What's the matter, Warden?"
Breathless Aeris stayed forward to him, the gaze of her yellow eyes held his tired, sick face. At that instant she was facing not the Hero of River Dane she had read many books about and not a former regent who was trying to destroy her order and her friends, but an unhappy man that had seen the light and realized that he, trying to save what he loved, had fordone his country and his soul. There was no more a mask of gravity and dark sarcasm on his face, and Aeris thought he wanted to rest, nothing more.
"I should have said it before… When you fall asleep you will…"
"… see the Archdemon. The Orlesian told me," Loghain noticed coldly.
The words abashed her.
'Er… very well. Just wanted to warn. I could ask Wynne to give you somnific to…"
"There is no need, Warden."
He walked away leaving her to stand alone in the dark corridor.
"Maker, help us," Aeris sighed and went to her bedchambers, knowing that she would not sleep. She would meet Eamon in a few hours, and they would decide what to do, and now she would have to guard Morrigan's sleep and recall the old game in templars.