A/N: And here's the epilogue, with a few questions answered and a bump in rating.

And Rise: Epilogue

At eighth bell, one hour after the sun sank below the horizon, there was a tap at her window.

She looked up from her desk, for a moment startled and confused. She had spent the whole afternoon waiting, though, and with another breath she was only nervous.

When she had finally left her room, it had been third bell. Her shift had been taken over by one of her lieutenants. Instead of patrolling the streets, she had settled back behind her desk with a fresh stack of paperwork.

There had been six deaths in the night attributed to the ghouls; the templars and guard had destroyed all known walking dead. The Chantry said the ghouls were the work of hunger demons, and called for a thorough search of the city for maleficar. Cauthrien had penned a letter explaining that the source of the outbreak had already been taken care of by the guard, and had it sent with a runner just before dinner. And through it all, even sitting at a long table surrounded by Alan and Dairene and all the others who asked where she had been and only hesitantly accepted her avoidant answers, she thought of his request.

Please be in your room tonight. It wasn't an order, wasn't a demand, and that made all the difference.

But she had thought he would use the door, at least. Rising, she moved to the window, remembering how he had stood there a night earlier, how his fingers had danced on the glass and the latch. He had tested it then.

She reached the sill. She could see nothing outside, not with the glare from her lamp, and she was glad for that. A pale face just outside would have made her rethink the whole thing, would have made her hesitate even longer before she undid the latch and opened the window.

"Nathaniel?"

"Here." His voice was not too close, and she was able to look to where he was before he came out of the gloom. He lifted a hand in greeting. "Going through the front door- would have raised too many questions. May I?"

His pale hand - ungloved, she noted, clean and unscarred, with carefully trimmed nails, a noble's hand still - came to rest on the sill, and with a nod she stepped back, turning from him. There was the rustle of fabric and soft thud of him entering behind her, and the closing of the window. She didn't look back until she had reached her desk and settled against the corner of it.

He dusted his doublet off, then took up a spot against the wall by the window, shoulder propped against it.

"So," he said.

"So."

"Did you sleep well?"

"I- yes. What happened? I remember the demon- nothing else." She remembered waking up, sore and in her street clothes, armor and arming garb set aside neatly. "Nobody saw you bring me in."

"I was careful. Though it is hard to move an unconscious woman of your size through that window, I will say," he said with a small, awkward laugh, looking to it. "The spell it hit you with at the end was flashy, but I don't think it did any damage. How do you feel?"

"Aching. But not bad - considering."

"Hm. Just so." He drummed his fingers on the wall, then lifted his head to meet her gaze. He didn't speak at first, but she could see the tensing of his mouth, the way his tongue peeked out between his lips. She was staring, she knew, but she couldn't find it in herself to look away.

"Is there anything you would like to know?" he asked at last. "About my- condition? I did promise you answers."

She bit down a wry laugh. "I'm not sure where to even start." Condition. Monstrosity, she had called it the night before. And yet with the day's light between them, it didn't seem quite so monstrous. "Is it- reversible?"

Nathaniel shook his head. "No. Not that I know of."

Cauthrien nodded, thumb brushing her lip as she thought. The pinpoint ache of the cut there made her pause, and she remembered, too, his breath hot on her throat, his tongue and teeth at her pulse. His teeth, she whispered to herself. "You prey on - the rest of us?"

"… Yes, I suppose that's the best way to put it." His tone was mild but she didn't miss the momentary flinch, the way his eyes slid from hers, the resettling of his shoulders. He cleared his throat. "But we're all killers in some way or another these days, I find. I try not to end life if I can help it, but that's- rare."

"How many of there are you?" Predatory creatures were always a threat, but even as she asked him, she knew the answer. The Chant said nothing of them. She had heard nothing of them in all her life.

"I don't know," he said, and the shrug accompanying it was a loosing of tension. "Not many, though. It's- dangerous, changing a person. That much I made her tell me before she died. That I survived was chance. Maybe she thought the three years she kept me apart prepared me in some way. Perhaps it did. But… the blood she gave me, to make me this - it kills most men." He rubbed at his neck, then shrugged. "So no, there aren't many of us stalking the shadows. You may never see something like me again."

Never see the like. Just as she had thought - had hoped - and it tempered her unease, her wariness. He was no ravenous blight wolf, at least not until blood touched his tongue.

And even then- he had retreated when she pushed, had pulled away of his own volition in the dungeon. He called himself a monster. She pursed her lips."You're okay with being what you are?"

"It's better than the alternative." He let his hand drop from his shoulder, then inclined his head. "Have I earned answers in return, then?"

She slid down into her chair. "I don't see why not. They won't be pleasant, though."

"I know as much, now." He shook his head, looking beyond her, gaze growing distant. "Did my father ever- speak of me?"

Cauthrien shook her head. "No." No, he had spoken of Thomas and he had spoken of Delilah, but Nathaniel - Nathaniel, the lost son, the dead son - he had never been mentioned. It was as if Nathaniel had never existed at all.

But the man stood just a few feet away from her, looking now to the floor as his fingers flexed and clenched in rhythm. His voice was low but steady, controlled. "And did he truly have a hand in the worst of the Blight?"

"That and more."

"… Did he ever hurt you?" The question was quieter than the others, and the way his brow furrowed, his mouth tightened, was different. She felt her cheeks flush and she looked down as well, picking at a thread on the hem of her tunic.

"Only with words, but I grew very good at ignoring them," she said. "A farmer's mongrel bitch girl, I think was one of the nicer things he called me.Always comes to her master's heel. He was likely the origin of some of the more- colorful stories about me. He could not attack me directly with Loghain-" her voice faltered.

Loghain.

The memory of killing his image just the night before was still strong, tugging at all the old guilt and hurt. She took a deep breath. "With Loghain there. So he sought to undermine my influence in other ways. But no, he never touched me. I only saw his dungeons three times - twice to see his 'work' on Ferelden's behalf, and once to see for myself that he was dead."

Nathaniel sighed, splaying his hand against the wall. "That's something, at least," he said, then pushed himself away from the wall. He took a step towards her, then paused, glancing to the door a moment. "I believe you - about him. It is hard to, and yet I do. He was not the man I knew. But neither am I."

"Everything changed," she agreed, leaning back. Nathaniel said nothing in response at first, and in the flickering lantern light, she watched a procession of tensions across his brow, different in minute ways. For all his cleverness and dexterity, his affection for shadows, he was not his father. The nose was the same, perhaps, as was something in the timber of his voice.

But he was different, markedly so.

He finally cleared his throat, focusing his gaze once more and meeting her gaze. "One last question, if you'll hear it."

"Speak."

He smiled and laughed, sounding almost surprised. "Such a soldier," he said, and she couldn't help her return smirk, her shrug. "I- well. Last night, the demon- and before, in the street- I wanted to apologize." He canted his head and quirked a brow.

"That's not a question," she said, slowly, even as the heat of her body stirred at the mention of how close they had been, of how his lips had felt on hers.

"No, it's not." Nathaniel swallowed, then ran a hand through his hair. She watched the small flash of his tongue as he licked his lips. "The question is, do you want that apology?"

Want that apology.

Cauthrien's eyes widened, watching as he shifted his weight back, as he couldn't quite find where to look. He met her gaze for only a moment, then looked down to her mouth, her neck, and further still until he stared at the floor beneath her feet. Want that apology. She turned the question over. Did she regret those moments? Did she hold them against him?

No.

Nathaniel coughed. "What I mean is-"

"No, I don't want your apology. It's not necessary." The words brought his gaze up again, and she felt giddy from it, stomach twisting and hands trembling slightly. She pushed herself out of her chair, hand touching the edge of her desk until she took too many steps towards him to reach it anymore. "That's what you're asking, isn't it? If I enjoyed it?"

His throat bobbed and he breathed, "Yes. Yes, that's what I'm asking."

"I did." Neither moved closer by step, but she leaned in a little, and one of his hands reached out between them, then stopped, hovering short of her shoulder.

"I didn't hurt you?" He licked his lips again and she saw again the peek of fang, the quiet threat. Prey on the rest of us, he had said. But he hadn't risked her, not at all. Even with a desire demon pushing them forward, he had hesitated, he had been careful.

She took the last step towards him. "No. No, you didn't."

His breath hissed from him, and he tensed but stopped short of moving. His hand still stayed half an inch from her, his gaze still fastened on hers. "And you don't care that my father-"

"You're out of questions," she said, taking hold of his hips and pulling him hard against her, fitting her lips against his, hungry and eager.

She thought she might falter, with no whispering demon to fill her head with want, but it was the easiest thing in the world to press into him, to slide her tongue against his lips until they parted with a groan. He wrapped her in his arms, tugging her back with him as he stumbled in the vague direction of her bed, all preternatural grace lost in the trembling of his hands, the need in his kisses. His fingers tugged at the waistband of her leggings, but she couldn't break away long enough to let him at the laces, not until they reached the mattress and fell back onto it, all tangled limbs and searching fingers and sliding lips.

It was infinitely better without steel between them, without him bleeding out on the stone, without the fear and unknowing and stone beneath her. His touches were skimming, testing, nervous and hasty and needy all at once. He was trembling as he pulled her shirt over her head and cast it aside, fumbling then with the laces of her leggings while she kicked off her boots and worked at the fasteners of his doublet. She was inexperienced but had determination and curiosity on her side. It had been years since anybody had touched her, had plied her with kisses, and yet it was she who took the lead, who explored with her hands spread wide against his skin as she kissed along his jaw.

She drew a surprised gasp and a chuckle from him as she nipped at his pulse, his hands dipping inside her smalls as he worked the leather of her pants down her legs. His touch firmed as their clothing fell away, as he pulled her to him and rolled her onto her back. His lips were everywhere, teasing kisses as she reached for everything she could touch, as she watched him kick down his pants and slide from his smalls.

He kissed his way down her stomach, hands moving ahead of his lips to dip between her legs and press them apart. She struggled to push herself up onto her elbows, twitching as his breath ghosted over the skin of her inner thigh, then over her sex. "Nathaniel-"

He murmured something inaudible in response, nuzzling against her leg and looking up to her. He smirked. She wanted nothing more in that moment than to roll them over, reclaim her position atop him, take him into her. But when she tried to move, he stopped her, arms looping around her legs and holding her still.

His lips found her pulse in her thigh and he suckled, just a few inches from her center, and she twitched, head falling back.

"May I?" he breathed, and she felt the light graze of teeth against her skin. The teasing prick of a fang made her groan and sink back onto the mattress. The promise of the strange, sinking pleasure of him drinking from her made her nod, whine wordlessly her assent. She felt him grin, and then fit his mouth over her skin, nursing at the spot until she bucked, toes curling and heels digging into the mattress.

And then he bit.

It was a small thing, a moment's pain in two points, and then came the heady rush, the feel of him drawing on her. She cried out, back arching and legs spreading to give him more access. She barely noticed at first when he slipped his hand against her sex, dipping two fingers between her folds and stroking gently. It was all the heat of his mouth, the flood of her into him, the dissolution of where she ended and where he began. His tongue slid over the tiny cuts and he moaned against her skin.

She did notice when he slipped a finger into her, though, pressing into the tight, slick heat and working her open with a few testing crooks. Cauthrien turned her face to the mattress, trying to muffle the moan in her throat, the whimper as he pressed his thumb against her nub, massaging in small circles. Her hands clutched at the sheets, anchoring her as he pulled away from her thigh, leaving sloppy, open-mouthed kisses as he worked his way up.

He pressed his other hand over the punctures in her thigh and she felt her pulse heavy against him. But she lost the sensation as soon as his tongue joined the second finger probing at her entrance. She groaned his name and rolled her hips against him, and he answered her with a breathy laugh, his fingers sliding home and his tongue licking a path up to her nub. He suckled at it, tongue flicking over it until she had to close her eyes tight, whimpering at every flash of pleasure. A part of her waited for the nip of teeth, the momentary pain and all-consuming pleasure, but he didn't bite. He used his lips and tongue and hands without a thought to his teeth, bringing her spiralling up and shattering, crying out his name and jerking beneath and against him.

His movements slowed, turning languid instead of hard and frantic, and then he kissed a path back to where he had drawn blood. He lifted the hand that pressed there, licking his palm clean and then the cut beneath it. She whimpered at the spark of pleasure, but he lingered only a moment, pressing a kiss to her that stilled the faint ache of the wound before he moved up her body. He kissed at her stomach, her breasts, her throat, and then he kissed her cheek and lips.

"Cauthrien?" he murmured, hands skimming up her sides. He cupped one of her breasts, thumbing at her nipple idly as she found her breathing again and her pulse slowed. She opened her eyes, looking blearily to him, lips parted as she squirmed beneath him. "That was good?"

"Thought I said," she mumbled, "that you were out of questions."

He huffed a laugh. "It's your turn then, isn't it?" Nathaniel said, grinning and wrapping his arms around her, rolling onto his back and pulling her close. His erection bobbed against her hip and she hummed, covering his mouth with hers. She drank him in, nibbling at his lip that tasted of her and her blood. It would have been easy enough to slip off to sleep like that, curled against him in the aftershocks of pleasure, but his hand slid down to her hip again, cupping it and kneading the flesh there.

She pulled away and rose up, moving to straddle him. She quirked a lazy brow as she pressed her hands into his chest. "Had enough to eat, then?"

"I can be a bit of a glutton," he said, eyelids fluttering as she rocked down, his length trapped between their bodies. He swallowed, his hands on her tightening. "I'm not sure I can ever have enough."

If he looked at her with something too much like honesty, like intensity, it was because of her blood in his mouth.

It had to be.

She rolled her hips again and he groaned, head falling back against the mattress. "Maker, please," he said, mouth hanging open as he sucked in deep breaths.

"When did you start wanting this? Me?" she asked, leaning down to kiss his throat and slipping a hand between them to take hold of the base of his cock, positioning him. She couldn't keep from trembling, need surging back to an obliterating roar as she circled her body against the tip. Beneath her he hissed and gripped her tight enough to leave bruises.

"In the alley- when I saw you fight-" he breathed through gritted teeth. "Maybe earlier. Maybe when you watched for me when your men went on ahead. I don't know. I just know I want this." Nathaniel bucked his hips up and she bit down a sigh as he pressed just an inch into her. "You. I-"

"Quiet," she said, and sank the rest of the way onto him.

She didn't know when her fascination and curiosity (and frustration) had turned to this wanting - if it had been when he took her blood, or later, or earlier. But the feel of him burying deep into her, the sound he made, a broken sigh through his teeth, made her ache for more. She rose up and took him in again, faster this time, and again; she found a rhythm that made him cry out in shuddering sighs, guide her hips against his. She pinned him down, took his hands from her hips and caught her fingers around his wrists, leaning over him to keep him spread out beneath her.

He fought her, arms and belly and legs flexing beneath her, and she thought that he could overpower her, he could turn them over, he could take her as she was taking him. But she kissed him and he let her have him. He worked hard up against her but didn't wrestle her down. He met her thrust for thrust and kiss for kiss, and though old memories came back of a boy on a farm in southern Amaranthine, fumbling in the hay fields or in the barn, they were nothing of a match for this. It had been nothing of this kind. It hadn't been this give and take and balancing, this overpowering violent need, this matching of thundering pulses until, finally, Nathaniel gasped her name against her lips and broke her hold, wrapping his arms around her and tugging her hard against him while he jerked and spasmed and settled deep inside of her.

His lips found her pulse and he nuzzled against her throat, even as she worked her hips in little circles. He moved in careful, shuddering thrusts, the final inches she needed until she too came down, another over-hot and too-good moment where her world condensed to the feel of her pulse and the points where their bodies met. She sagged against him, nestling into his arms and gasping for her breath against the crown of his head.

She felt, distantly, his teeth prick her neck, felt the warm and heady flow of blood from her to him. She sighed and let him roll her over, felt him slip from her as he nursed at her throat. He drank slowly, lapping at each droplet and coaxing the one after it to the surface. He hummed, and she laughed, eyes sliding closed.

Her first lover in over a decade, and she was perfectly at ease as he took her life's blood.

He didn't drink for long, kissing the scratches closed and settling down beside her. His hands skimmed over her body, tracing patterns and learning curves. He pressed his cheek to her temple.

She reached out to stroke her fingers along his arm, his shoulder.

She could feel his chest rise and fall. He breathed, or chose to breathe, like any other man. He was warm, too, and she could feel his pulse - fainter, perhaps, and slower, but there. If he had died five years ago, it was hard to tell, and she nuzzled against his jaw, opening her eyes again.

"I have another question," he murmured, and she laughed, a distant and languid thing.

"Do you?"

"Mm." He settled his arm across her belly and pulled away enough to look at her, all mussed dark hair and pale eyes. She twined her legs with his and he smiled for a moment, then kissed her brow and murmured, "… What did the demon show you? Was it- this?"

The memory made her go still and stiffen for just a moment, breaking through her boneless ease for a breath, and then she shook her head. "No, not this," she said, fingers dancing down his hip. "It showed me the past, not- the future."

He chuckled, quiet and smiling against her skin. "A good way of putting it. Though-"

"Amaranthine?" she said, watching him lazily. She could see the hook of his nose even if she couldn't see his eyes. "You leave soon, don't you?"

"Tomorrow night, before midnight." He pulled away, this time with enough distance that she could feel the comparative chill of the room. He gazed down at her thoughtfully, brow creased with concern, or apology.

She thought of asking him to stay. To remain, to visit her again. The future. But longing did not decide the truth; they both knew that too well. The man who had killed Rendon Howe lived in Amaranthine now, and though the Warden did not deserve to die for his actions, she could say nothing against it if he wished it, if he had learned it. So instead she only asked, "Why?"

"To find my sister. If I'm lucky, it will only take a month, or two." He dipped his head to kiss her shoulder.

"And then?"

"And then if I return to Denerim and find for a few nights a small room with heavy enough curtains to keep me from the sun, I shall be a happy man."

Cauthrien couldn't help her smile, relief settling into her limbs alongside pleased exhaustion. With a touch she drew him down beside her and he came gratefully to her arms, nuzzling against her cheek and twining his legs with hers. The aches and pains of the previous night's adventure were already beginning to fade; no scar lingered on her palm and no wound tore at Nathaniel's belly. The catacombs had been sealed and their questions answered.

She knew of a few places that fit that description that were within the pay of a guard captain.

Two months was not so long a time. It would pass easily enough, with the promise of what might come at the end of it all, and there was work to be done in the city. There were ever more papers to sign, men to arrest, and tavern seats to slide into and think of the time a dead man approached her with a question.

A/N: Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed reading, because this was an absolute blast to write. Please consider leaving a review!