A day out, the convulsions started.

Worry hounded him. Was he pushing them too hard? But if he did not, how could he get her to the healers at Haven before the fever stole her away forever?

The Herald thrashed through the nights, sweating, screaming, and she lay still as the dead during each day's ride. Solas had to hold her in front of him on the hart, for she obviously could not ride on her own. Her bay gelding rode at the end of their group, tied to Blackwall's huge mare.

Her pallor continued to alarm him as much as her blazing skin did. He stopped to douse her fully clothed at every stream, only continuing when her temperature seemed to have dropped a little.

The delays started to eat at him. He stopped stopping them altogether and rode through all day, all night. His magic fed stamina to the hart, though the buck clearly felt the rigors of the journey. His coat foamed. Blood flecked at his mouth.

Soon, Dorian and Blackwall bade him continue ahead, as their mounts had not the fortitude to keep up any more.

Tens of hours passed. Solas nearly wept with relief when he spotted the walls of Haven. He clutched the Herald as close as he could and forced the hart into a gallop.

It seemed too slow. His wearied limbs felt every painful jolt, every impact of hoof to packed dirt. He leaned close to whisper in the Herald's ear, "Vir sumeil, lethallan. We are close. Stay with me."

Guards on the walls saw him, saw his burden. A great cry of "Healers! Healers!" went up inside the walls. People came pouring out of the gate to see.

Cullen burst from the crowd, pushing people aside so Solas could ride the hart right in. Which he did, galloping right past onlookers to the apothecary, the closest thing they had to a hospital. Adan stepped out, wiping his hands on a rag. When he saw Solas approach at a gallop, the man put on a remarkable burst of speed.

He ran to meet the hart, and pulled the Herald down. Solas slid off and between the two of them, they had her situated in a cot in seconds. Solas collapsed in a nearby chair, and held onto her limp hand.

Adan busied himself checking her vitals. Pulse, color, temperature. He shot off questions to Solas fast as crossbow bolts. "How long?"

"Weeks."

"Where?"

"Since Fallow Mire. But she fell unconscious only four days ago while we were in the Hinterlands."

"That's a hard ride in three days."

Too exhausted for the long explanation, Solas said, "Magic."

"Did she eat something that made her sick?"

Solas shook his head. "I do not know. She was sick when I found her in the Mire. Then it only got worse."

Cullen, Leliana and Josephine all burst in, with Cassandra and Varric behind. From the sound of it, the entire inner circle, nay, the whole of Haven, waited just outside, shouting for news. Varric turned and shut the door on the rest of the gawkers.

The Commander said, fear and concern on his face, "Is she alright?"

"She's not dead," grumbled Adan. "But she's not responsive. I've seen brain fever like this. Starts in the lungs, then moves north. Sometimes they wake, sometimes they don't. The longer she's in a coma, though, the odds of her coming out become slimmer and slimmer. Sooner or later, she'll drown in her own fluids."

Gasps of denial filled the cottage. Solas saw Cullen's face blanch to white, as he was sure his own did.

Cassandra sputtered, "But surely, healing potions-"

"Mean next to nothing," interrupted Adan. "Even if I could force them down her throat, the stuff we have now? Weak and awful."

"Can we not acquire better?" Josephine asked, eyes round in distress.

"From where? She's our best alchemist." He pointed at the Herald.

Leliana hummed and stroked her upper lip. "How best to minimize the impact of this …."

Solas shot her a piercing glare, but it was Cullen who rounded on her with a growled, "'How best to minimize-?' You can never turn it off, can you? There she is, mere inches from death's door and you, you cold-hearted bi-"

"You really want to go out there and tell the Inquisition, your men and all the visiting dignitaries that their only hope may die in the next few days? Your silly infatuation and naive honesty would cost us all the support we've sweat and spilled blood for," she hissed, with a sneer. "Don't be a child."

Cullen took a threatening step forward and something shifted in the Spymaster's stance, a sinuous sway of deadly intent.

Josephine looked on in fright. Cassandra looked between the pair as though torn as to who to stand with. Varric stayed silent, exchanging a look with Solas.

"Enough," said Solas, weary. All eyes turned to him. "Your Spymaster is correct. Nothing can be gained by spreading this news too far. Say only that she is ill, but on the way to recovery."

The Commander's mouth twisted then smoothed. He sighed. "You're both right."

"Now, if all the politics are out of the way," said Adan, voice raising in vexation. "Everyone get out. I have tests and treatment to administer."

The leaders shuffled out, pushing everyone else before them. A ragged cheer went up at Cullen's shouted announcement of the Herald's safe return. The relieved mutters of the crowd dispersed as the mob itself no doubt did.

"You, too, Ser Solas," Adan grumbled, giving the elf a prod with a copper retort. Then the man turned away to fiddle with something at his workstation.

Solas's fingers spasmed tighter on the Herald's hand. "I am not going anywhere."

"Yes, you are. You can't be in here for this. It would be an unforgivable violation of her privacy." Adan turned and then Solas saw the basin of foamy water and sponges in his hands. The drying cloth over his arm.

"Oh. Oh," stammered Solas, standing with an awkward jerk.

"You need sleep and a good meal." Adan patted his shoulder. "Your cottage is but a few steps away. I promise to keep you all apprised."

"Thank you," said the apostate, dragging himself toward the door. He looked back at her, so silent, so still, and chewed his lip. "I will return in the morning."

His bed never felt more welcoming. His head hit the pillow, but he didn't really feel it. The Fade snatched him out of his body and carried him to a place where the cruel laughter of children filled the air with taunts-

"Lin'alas! Lin'alas! Lin'alas!"

And another word just out of earshot, something even uglier and full of malice. Solas strained, but exhausted to the marrow, could not find it.

In the deafening ring of the Fade, he heard another voice, speaking to him as if from underwater. "I can help. I want to help."

His eyes snapped open. The wan light of evening striped through his small window. Did he sleep through an entire day? Sitting up, Solas peered around. Something jangled alarms in the back of his head. Something out of place.

"Reveal yourself," he said to the air.

Movement caught his eye. A boy sat on his floor, pushing a pebble back and forth as though he'd been there for hours. Perhaps he had, but had only made himself noticeable right then.

Solas tilted his head, feeling out with his inner senses. His brows lifted in surprise. "You are a spirit."

Pale, watery eyes found his from under the wide, flat brim of his hat. They stared out from between messy locks the color of straw. "Yes. Spirit. Breathing. Being. Becoming."

It seemed like no possession he'd ever witnessed. No battle of two separate wills was being fought within the spirit. Yet, the boy's solid realness astounded Solas. A spirit, out of the Fade, made manifest in mundane flesh.

In this riven world.

Solas smiled.

"Yes. Wake, then wonder. Joy that he hasn't seen everything yet," the spirit rambled, eyes sliding off Solas into the middle distance.

"Have you … taken a name?"

"Cole," he said simply.

Then, Solas remembered the Herald and his eyes cut to the apothecary, worry warping the skin between his brows.

Cole appeared at the window, hands on the glass. "The cold seeps. It steals. She reaches, a child set ablaze in that winter, crying 'mamae.'"

"She is ill with fever."

"Not just. Another is there with her, holding, keeping her in the dark." Cole's face took on an otherworldly mien, an expression no mortal or fallen elvhen god could understand. His voice changed, becoming softer, sweeter, "Are you ready to hear?"

The echo, the memory of that demon and little girl shook Solas. He said, "Tell me."

"Find her. You can always find her. I can help." Then the boy seemed to pop out of existence.

Solas stood and went to his wash basin. Travel grime soon turned the water grey, but his thoughts turned elsewhere. Putting on fresh clothes, Solas strode out of his cottage to hear Adan yelling-

"I said herbs! Don't you dare bring that useless frippery in here!"

A soldier, carrying a huge bouquet of flowers, found himself shoved back out of the apothecary. The door slammed in his face. He looked around, sheepish, then shrugged. The bouquet he placed with all the others next to the door. Then he walked away.

Solas's eye passed over the riot of blossoms, noting how some of them came from far away indeed. He shook his head as he walked over to the apothecary and knocked.

"You better have an armload of spindlewee-Oh," Adan amended, as he yanked the door open. Then the man moved aside to let Solas enter.

Walking into the gloomy room, Solas stopped, gaze on the blond human sitting with the Herald, head tilted back, softly snoring. She still lay much as he left her, only stripped of her leathers. A clean linen shift covered her now, simple and shapeless. He watched close and just barely marked the rise and fall of her chest.

Clearing his throat, Solas said to Adan, "Any results with the tests?"

"Yes and no. I've treated the symptoms, bled her once already. She's stable, for now. But the underlying cause continues to confound me," the man growled, setting down a glass beaker with force. "If only she was awake, she could show me how to do that-that thing with the witherstalk. I wish she'd written it down."

A voice whispered at Solas's ear, "She studies. The Red Lady shows her. 'Letters escape me, child, so you must make a memory of your hands, each finger, width and length. Fingertip, second knuckle, first knuckle.'"

"Cole?" he said, turning, but only air greeted him.

"What?" asked Adan, distracted with his work.

"A song of skin. Each inch tied to specific recollection." Cole appeared behind Adan, looking over the alchemist's shoulder. But the man didn't seem to be able to see him. "Always looking. Always expanding. Testing, testing tests. Litmus for the testing."

Solas latched onto that last. "Do you have any litmus, Adan?"

"What, that lichen-y stuff? We use it to see how much acidity …." Adan's head snapped up and his eyes grew huge as he stared at the wall. "Maker, that's brilliant!"

Three long steps to the door and the alchemist wrenched it open, shouting, "You! Go to the Archivist and tell him I need some of that special paper we ordered from Val Royeaux!" Then his voice changed volume, if not tone, "Yes? What do you want?"

Solas leaned to one side a little to see Varric, hand up, knuckles ready to rap what had been a closed door. A small spray of daisies tight in his other fist. The dwarf thrust the flowers behind his back and said, neutral, "It's my shift."

Grumbling, the alchemist let him in.

Varric walked over to the sleeping Commander and shook his shoulder. "Curly. Wakey wakey."

"Whuh?" said the man, starting.

"Honestly, I don't know how you manage to sleep with Adan screaming like a mother dragon protecting her clutch in here."

"Oh, you know. Army life." He yawned and stretched his tall frame, then stood with a groan. "Get a few winks while you can, sort of thing. Sometimes mid-skirmish, if there's a quiet moment and you can find a corner to lean up against."

"No, thank you. I like beds and hot food and … comfort." Varric made a show of shivering. "You can keep your army life."

Adan jangled some glassware, shooting the chattering pair a glare. "One visitor, I said. One visitor at a time!"

Cullen frowned and pointed. "Well, what about Solas?"

"He's useful. Unless you have some esoteric knowledge of herbs, one of you must get out!" The alchemist pointed, stern as any elder.

Cullen shot the Herald a hang dog look and shuffled out.

Varric threw a smile Solas's way. "Lucky you. You get to be useful."

The dwarf sat on the recently vacated chair and put his feet up on the nightstand. He reached over to pat the Herald's hands where they clasped over her narrow chest. Then he started talking, low and soft. Solas listened for a moment, catching bits and pieces of story.

Then a page ran in with scrolls draped over his arms, all breathless and flushed. Adan grabbed one roll and turned the boy about, giving him a kick to the rear. "Out!"

Solas watched as the man flitted here and there, readying a small basin over a crucible. The stink of rushlight and fat filled the air as he lit it. Once the water began to steam, the alchemist dropped the crumbly, dark contents of a small glass jar into it.

Soon, the water turned a pale lavender color. Using tongs, alchemist dipped strips of the paper in the solution and hung them from little clips affixed to a hanging string over his small laboratory. Then he said to Solas, "Can you continue this for me? I have to replace her bed linens before sickness starts to fester in the cloth."

Nodding, Solas stepped forward and took over the simple task. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as Adan lifted the Herald. Varric reached under and yanked all the sheets off the bed, then took the Herald from the alchemist. With clean efficiency, Adan laid new linens down, then gestured for Varric to set her back in the cot.

"What is this?" Adan asked, running fingers over the small white blossoms woven into a circlet over her hair and forehead.

Varric looked around, puzzled as well, but he recovered with a shrug and gave the alchemist a crooked grin. "I brought them."

Adan made to remove them, but stopped and straightened with a huffed, "Silliness."

Cole whispered, just behind Solas, "She likes them. The smell. 'Bruisewort. A sip to make you hunger. A swallow to purge the pores. A draught to kill a baby before it can be born.'"

"I have finished with these," said Solas, deep in troubled thought. He stepped back to let the alchemist inspect the strips.

"If you happen to have any other inspirations, I'll be glad to hear them," said Adan, with a deep sigh.

Solas waited for perhaps Cole to say something, but the spirit just stared into nothing with a murmured, "She has gone behind the curtain again."

The apostate echoed Adan's sigh, and said, "Nothing comes to mind at the moment."

"We'll have some answers when these are dry enough to use, at least."


A/N: *cue dramatic music* Ze plot, she thickens. Also, flower crowns, ftw. I will always love flower crowns. They are the shizznat. (that's right, I just used that word) FLOWER CROWNS FUH-EVER. Anyway, wow, I can't believe I'm pushing 30k with this thing already. Oh, lord, I wonder how big the whole thing is gonna be. Whew. We haven't even gotten to Skyhold yet. Well, I hope you all hang in there. I think it'll come together pretty nicely in the end. That's what I'm aiming for anyway. Thanks to everyone who left reviews and comment, both here and on AO3. Love yous guys.