There was a bird in Elissa's chest, beating at the ribs. Escape, however, was no longer an option; the starling, her heart, would need to be calmed.
An entrance? Into Howe's estate in Denerim? The Maker surely smiled upon her, surely saw the injustice done to her and given voice to her darkest desire. Yes, it was all well and good that they were truly going there to save Anora, the rightful queen, but in the back of her mind her purpose would align with the last wish of her mother.
Take the Cousland sword, and drive it through that bastard's heart.
Elissa had never known her mother to speak so; but her mother had been almost as much of a warrior as her father. She knew that both had fought in the wars against the Orlesians; she herself had been born in a time of peace fought for by people like her parents, like Howe (how could he? we were friends, of him and his family), like the legendary Loghain and Maric and Rowan. Normal people, noble in action and not in blood, though that came later and made itself perfectly apparent. When there was fighting to be done, everyone was in the same rank - do, or die. In peace...peace caused irrationality in everyone, and that was how her family had been undone.
The sword hilt in her hand was rough, almost unpleasant to the touch, and yet her palm itched to pull it out of its sheath and heft its weight. Feel the clean stroke through the air and wonder how she might do it. Parting his head from his body? Perhaps that was too kind. A stab to the gut, let him bleed out in agony like her father. Cut him at the knees so he might crawl like her father had to, in his last moments.
No, it was all too kind. Too kind. Frustration ran through her veins, for a moment finding a new reason to grieve at King Cailan's death - that there would be no proper justice brought to Howe, that he would not be hanged and quartered and drawn as traitors were meant to be. Staged before all of Ferelden so they might know what injustice had been done to a family of their own.