The Wardens knelt in the loam around Kel's body, silent in their grief. Fenris, feeling very much the outsider, had stepped back to give them some privacy and to stand guard. Even Alistair didn't notice his retreat. He looked numb, but less haggard than the others. His was the face of someone who'd seen too many friends fall in battle. Fenris looked away, scanning the treeline and feeling his own pang of regret. He'd not known the big man long, but Kel had always been friendly towards him, and he'd seemed like a good man. Despite the way he teased the others, he'd often gone out of his way to watch his friends' backs in battle. It was leaping to Alistair's defense that had cost him his life.
Fenris shifted his weight, feeling worn out and stretched too thin. His skin burned and his body ached. Everything hurt, but there was no salve or medicine that could cure him. He hated the feel of his clothing against his tattoos, and equally hated the lightest touch of the breeze on his flesh. Danarius had used him once before as a walking talking lyrium potion, and he recalled the pain well. It had taken almost two days for him to be able to activate his abilities again, and longer than that for the last of the pain to fade.
He shrugged his shoulders instinctively, as if trying to shake off the burning that wrapped around the bands in his neck and back, and sent Bethany a brief glance. She and Feila were holding hands tightly, crying silently now. He'd told her to use him, but his regret tasted sour in his mouth. Idiot, he chided himself. If she hadn't tapped into his lyrium, there might be more than one body laid out in the dirt right now. As much as the familiar pain haunted him with memories and caused him physical discomfort, a part of him insisted he'd made the right choice. It might be Bethany lying there if he hadn't offered himself.
It might be Alistair.
He shrugged again, mind in a turmoil, and returned his attention to the trees. Vorin had also stepped away from Kel's body earlier and was glowering at his feet. Fenris couldn't decide if the man was upset over the delay or his comrade's death. The man was hard to read. Feeling Fenris's eyes linger on him, Vorin looked up, grimaced, then came over after a brief hesitation.
"I owe you my life, elf," he said grudgingly, glaring at a bush rather than meet Fenris's eyes. "If you hadn't hauled me up and done that thing with your tattoos, I'd be a goner. Prob'ly most of us would be."
Fenris acknowledged the reluctant gratitude with a slight nod, but Vorin didn't notice. He'd gone tense, eyes roving the woodlands, hand on the hilt of his sword. "They're gatherin' together again," he said quietly. "I can feel 'em. They're out there workin' themselves up for another go at us. Andraste's puckered ass, there's got to be a nest of 'em around here somewhere." He turned and raised his voice to a surly shout to get his Captain's attention. "Alistair! This ain't the place for cryin'! We don't have long!"
Alistair shot him a heated look, but then he must have sensed the presence of the creatures as well. He placed a hand briefly on Bethany's shoulder, then got to his feet. "We can't stay here. We're clearly outnumbered, and now we're down a man. Some of us are injured..." his eyes flickered to Fenris for the briefest moment, but Feila was already overriding him.
"What about Kel?" she demanded, refusing to get to her feet. "How are we going to get him back?"
There was a long, heavy silence.
Finally Matwog said, quietly, "Kel's no lightweight, Fei. We can't carry him all the way back and fight off darkspawn snapping at our heels."
"We can't just leave him!" Bethany cried, jumping up.
"We have no choice," Alistair said. "We have to get out of here fast. We can come back for him-"
"Do you have any idea what those things will do to him?" Feila protested. "I've seen what the darkspawn do with the bodies of their enemies. They stake them in the ground or hang them from-"
"That's enough," Alistair snapped, looking raw. "I'm not losing more any more of us. We can't take him, Feila, and you know it. We'll be slowed down too much, and you can feel how many darkspawn are coming just as well as I can. Bethany's out of lyrium."
"But Fenris-"
"I can't do that again," Bethany admitted, eyes dropping. "I... I'm not sure how much more of that he could take. It felt like I was killing him."
"If we don't stop arguing about it, they'll be right on top of us any second," Thomas interrupted loudly. "We have to get out of here."
"You know Kel would want us to go," Matwog agreed, swallowing hard and looking down at the body of his friend. "He'd be hopping mad that we're taking this long to get running."
"We can take them!" Feila said fiercely.
"There's too many of them. I'm not taking that chance." Alistair caught and held her gaze, face made out of stone. "We're leaving. That's an order."
For a moment it looked like Feila was going to contest his decision, but then she glanced around at the others and seemed to notice for the first time just how haggard they looked. She took in a shuddering breath and nodded. "Just... let me say goodbye."
"No time."
"Damn it, Alistair!" she exploded.
"Too late," Fenris said sharply, drawing his sword.
The others drew together automatically, weapons leaping to their hands. Thomas hissed a curse. The shrieks of the darkspawn and the sound they made as they crashed through the undergrowth were uncomfortably close- and coming from all sides.
"We can take 'em," Feila repeated, but sounded a little less sure of herself.
"Not if there's another wave after this one," Matwog argued, the hint of a whimper in the back of his throat. "And another one after that."
"We'll take as many of them down as we can," Alistair said grimly. Fenris backed up so he was back-to-back with the man, holding his large sword in a tight grip. Alistair spared him a brief smile before nodding to the other Wardens. "It's been an honor."
Then the darkspawn burst into the clearing, screaming for blood.
xxxxxxxxxx
It was amazing what the Wardens were capable of when fueled by grief and rage.
The first few unfortunate darkspawn who arrived on the scene were slain in moments. Standing in a ring with Kel's body at their center, the Wardens took on all comers. Bethany clubbed darkspawn with her staff, and Feila picked off the further darkspawn with her bow until she ran out of arrows and was forced to draw her daggers.
Fenris felt odd fighting without the help of his lyrium boost. Within minutes his muscles began crying out against the abuse of swinging such a large sword without pause. To make matters worse, the wound he'd sustained from the darkspawn's blade in the first skirmish was beginning to sting something awful. Gritting his teeth, he ignored his own exhaustion. Alistair's face was streaming with sweat. It wasn't just the weight of the sword and shield he had to contend with, but his massive armor as well. Bethany began lagging first, unused to such desperate physical exertion.
And still there were more darkspawn.
When Bethany faltered, Fenris stepped closer, fighting an internal battle. Could she use him again? Danarius had never used his markings to much extent, had never had the need to. How much of himself could he offer before she used up what he had- or killed him?
Not that he was being left with much choice. Matwog went reeling from a heavy blow to the head, and Fenris shouted to Bethany over the clamor, "Try it again! We need your magic!"
"No!" she retorted immediately, straightening up and cracking her staff against a genlock's shins. "It might kill you, Fenris!"
"Do it or we all die!"
"Don't you dare!" Alistair barked.
Fenris risked throwing the other man a quick glare. "Stop being stup-"
"More on the way!" Vorin called in warning, indicating a disturbance at the fringes of the battle.
Fenris sliced off the head of a hurlock in a burst of furious desperation and reached out to seize Bethany's arm to get her attention. "Do it! Now!"
She hesitated, staring at him with agonized uncertainty.
"Oh, Maker," Feila gasped, and the shocked relief in her voice jerked their attention to the fight once more.
Backup had arrived. And it was on their side.
A small party of armed men was hacking their way through the darkspawn from the rear, taking the enemy completely off guard. The Wardens let out a ragged cheer, and for just a moment the fighting faltered as the darkspawn turned from one threat to the other, clearly uncertain what to do without a leader to guide them.
Alistair seized the moment, flourishing his sword in the air and gathering his friends with a rallying cry. "For the Grey Wardens!" With a shout the other Wardens surged after him, cutting a path through the darkspawn to reach their new allies.
There were nearly a dozen of the fighters, and it didn't take long for the darkspawn to falter and break. Too many of them were being slaughtered. The rest took to their heels, shrieking in hate and fear. Soon only the sounds of panting and creaking armor remained in the little clearing.
"They're Crows," Bethany whispered, pointing out the symbol emblazoned on the armor and shields of many of the fighters. Fenris glanced at her, confused, but just then someone laughed, stepping forward from the ranks of the rescue party. It was an elf in leather armor, handsome and covered in the blood of his kills. "Ah, so this explains things at last," the elf said in a rich Antivan accent. He slapped Alistair on the arm in a friendly greeting, grinning from ear to ear. "The last batch we ran into seemed to think we were Wardens. I should have known you were stirring up trouble, eh, Alistair?"
Alistair stared back at him in numb surprise. "Zevran?"