"Don't look at me like that, Alistair," Athadra grunted as she wriggled her dagger out of the fat tavernkeep's back. The blade had lodged between his ribs at his spine, killing him nearly instantly but making it demonically difficult to extract. She hadn't turned around, but she could feel the other Warden glaring at her. The wound squelched and she heaved a satisfied sigh, finally pulling the dagger free. It wiped nearly clean on the barman's shirt, and she turned around, smirking at the tavernfull of eyes staring at her. "You all heard him; he said he were a coward, content to let you die in his place while he spent his nights swaddled up in his cellar. How many of your friends have died to keep him warm and safe?" That seemed to quell any protests before they could bud.
Alistair's harsh expression began to fade in minutes, rather than days, and she smiled at him. "You're going to talk me into the Void at this rate," he said, shaking his head.
She'd already spoken with Arl Howe's hired elf; from the way he talked, and Zevran before him, Athadra was getting a really bad feeling about this Howe character, but there was little she could do at the moment except try to survive until the next. She'd managed to convince the elf to fight, unlike she'd been able to do with the dwarf called Dwyn down by the docks. He had looked too formidable to waste the effort of killing, however, and would get to live through the night without fighting for his life.
The red-haired tavern wench, called Bella, peeked from behind a post. "I guess that means I'm out of a job," she lamented halfheartedly, though what she'd had to say about her boss while he still lived hadn't given Athadra much of a reason to want to keep him that way. When he'd boasted about his tactic for surviving, and then sneered that she wouldn't dare murder him in his own tavern, Athadra had had little choice.
"Maybe not," the mage suggested after a moment's pause. This tavern was really much nicer than the one she'd stayed at by the docks, after all...it would be a shame to let it go to waste. "If I'm going to stick around tonight and help you all defend your home, I'll need a place to stay and store my things. This tavern have any rooms?" Bella nodded, but said they were unoccupied. "Good. After the battle's over, you'll be working for me, 'stead of that bastard. And seeing as there's a Blight on, I'm not like to hang around too long."
The woman blinked. "Does that mean...I'll be in charge?"
Athadra nodded. "When I'm not here, aye. You'll have to run the place, make sure it don't fall into the lake. We'll talk more about it after we live through the next few nights. For now, get some food sent up to our rooms after we get there. I'm starving." Bella nodded again, and gave them free reign of the tavern's stockroom. Athadra was quite pleased with herself for orchestrating the impromptu business venture, even if the barmaid had looked a little scared of her during their exchange. She took keys for two of the tavern's three rooms. Alistair helped her carry some of the more useful items out of the stockroom, taking care to step over the tavern's former owner along the way. She gave the larger of the rooms to him and the Sten, and Morrigan offered no complaint at sharing the single-bed room with the elf until nightfall.
There was too little time before sunset to enjoy a nap, however, as inviting as that bed might have been; running about Redcliffe had taken the rest of the morning and much of the afternoon, mostly because Athadra kept pausing to shatter locks off of chests and rifle through their contents after Morrigan had frozen them. They'd found the boy, Bevin, and talked him out of his grandfather's sword to replace the nicked bandit's blade Alistair had worn since forgoing his Grey Warden longsword along with his armour. Instead the pair passed the time crafting some health poultices; Athadra also mixed up some simple poisons from the deathroot they'd gathered along the way, which she could spread over the warriors' blades just before battle. She didn't know if the concoction would affect walking corpses, which everyone claimed the monsters to be, but it was certainly worth a try.
Athadra and Morrigan also talked as they worked, mainly about their childhoods. Morrigan spoke of her first adventures out of the Wilds, about nearly getting caught by a Chasind man; she was able to convince Lothering's guards that he had been casting a spell upon her.
"That were very resourceful," Athadra mused idly.
Morrigan huffed, smirking slightly. "Men are ever willing to believe two things about a woman; one, that she is weak, and two, that she finds him attractive." She fairly hissed that last word, and Athadra nodded.
"Even if she denies both quite strongly, on occasion," she added, and Morrigan's expression flattened. Athadra sighed, and prompted her to go on with the story. Morrigan continued, somewhat reluctantly, talking of a jewel-encrusted mirror she'd managed to steal from a trading caravan not long after that incident. They shared a laugh over Flemeth's furious response, but Athadra took note of the longing in the witch's eyes when she spoke of the shattered trinket.
"And what of you?" Morrigan asked, after a lull. "Have you any memories of your life before it was stolen from you?"
Athadra nodded. "I lived on a farm my mam and dad worked, owned by a shemlen, just North of Lothering." Morrigan raised an eyebrow, but did not interrupt. "My grandad were a mage of the Dalish, but he took up with an alienage elf and settled down in the country, he said for love." A smirk twisted over her face, and she wasn't surprised when the witch shared a snort.
"Doubtless there is more to that story," the witch suggested.
"Likely. He never told me anything else, though, and I never thought to ask 'till I were older, and by then I'd got taken."
Morrigan made a face. "I'd never allow myself to be shackled like that." She spoke softly, not trying to be unkind, but Athadra felt the sting nonetheless.
"Oh, I tried getting out three times. Got to the docks in Kinloch Hold, once, but they always dragged me back. Third time, First Enchanter Irving sat me down and told me I'd get the brand if I didn't stop making so much trouble." Morrigan hissed. Even in the Wilds, then, the Rite of Tranquility was known-a ritual to sever a mage's connection to the Fade, and thereby to magic...as well as emotions and apparent volition. That was the fate that had awaited Jowan, that had motivated him to tear through the basement of the Circle Tower looking for his phylactery. "But I managed to escape after all," Athadra said with a little snicker. "And I'm glad I survived...though the Chantry won't be, by the time I'm done."
"Oh?" Morrigan was just finishing up turning the last of their elfroot into a healing salve.
Athadra looked at her evenly. "Cailan's dead. Believe it or not, Alistair's his bastard brother." She nearly whispered now, and Morrigan took that cue to keep her shock to herself. "That's why I'm here, saving this rotting mudhole of a village; Arl Eamon has to live. He's got to put the boy in Cailan's place."
Morrigan grimaced. "And the nation will be ruled by a half-wit. Marvelous."
"Teagan were wrong, before," Athadra pointed out. "When he said that Cailan wouldn't risk the fate of the nation for his own glory. I were there. He did. Sodding fool took Duncan and the rest of the Wardens with him. Do you honestly think Alistair could do any worse?" When Morrigan had no answer, Athadra smirked. "And when Alistair is king, he's going to owe me." The smirk bloomed into a grin, which slowly infected Morrigan, who admitted that such a fate might not be so terrible, at that.
Morrigan glanced at the South-facing window, spying the long shadows slowly climbing up the near cliff. "It appears we shall have to finish comparing the merits between coming up in the Wilds or on a sheepfold another time. 'Twill be dark soon enough." She sighed, and Athadra felt a small smile cross her lips.
"I'd like that," said the Warden, as she gathered her things. "Talking again, at least. Maybe after we've dealt with these monsters and sent whatever caused them to the Void." Morrigan did not seem to object to the prospect, which Athadra took as encouraging; certainly the witch had taken no pains to hide her displeasure whenever it cropped up on their journey thus far. Just then a knock sounded at the door, and Athadra bid Bella enter with the food. It was simple fare, bread and soup, but the Grey Warden attacked it with such abandon that it might have been an Orlesian spread. Morrigan claimed not to be hungry and so willingly surrendered her portion, and by the time Athadra had finished eating, dusk was just beginning to settle.
Athadra didn't feel full, exactly, but she was no longer ravenous. She and Morrigan packed a pair of smaller bags apiece with essentials, mostly lyrium and poultices, and passed the poultice bags to the men when they met in the hall.
"You know, you never mentioned that Sten was such a great conversationalist," Alistair quipped, and everyone chuckled when the Sten grunted in response. Alistair checked that his new sword was clear in its scabbard and shouldered his shield, and the Sten nodded at Athadra, noticing the blade strapped across her back. Her shoulders ached from carrying it, but she trusted the lyrium to get her through the night. The rest of her takings from the Chantry and the town she left locked up in the room, trusting Bella to see that the objects were kept safe.
"We'd better go," she said with a sigh, and turned first. She whistled when she reached the floor, and Garahel turned away from the elf called Berwick, whom he'd been set to guard. The elf swallowed hard and strung his bow, rising to leave with the rest of them. The last remnants of Redcliffe's militia filed out behind them, parting with Athadra's band immediately; they would take up positions around the Chantry to protect the infirm holed up there, while Athadra, Berwick and the haphazard company she'd collected since Ostagar would form the front line against the creatures.
She made it to Ser Perth and his half-dozen knights just as the last rays of sunlight filtered past the bridge. No one spoke, not even Alistair; the barely-contained fear rolling off of the men who'd fought this battle before was palpable. Athadra managed a cynical laugh when Garahel sauntered over to a nearby tree and marked it as his territory, but even the dog's mood was serious. Athadra shrugged inside her armour; the leather had been repaired and re-worked by the village's blacksmith, Owen. It fit so comfortably that Athadra considered keeping the promise that she'd paid him with, to look for his missing daughter in the castle. Even the Sten's armour had been refitted, and sat much better across the man's enormous frame.
The Warden unshouldered her flatblade and removed the cloth, passing the last few moments of evening by honing its edge. Many of the knights, Alistair, and the Sten saw fit to do the same, and soon the small plateau was hissing with stone scraping over metal. Finally Ser Perth let out a whoop, and Athadra looked to the bridge, holding back a gasp at the green-hued cloud she saw billowing out of the castle and leeching its way across the gap. The knight pitched a torch into a heap of barrels, crates, and palisades which straddled the path from the castle's bridge down to the village proper. The lot had been doused in oil during Athadra's coup in the tavern earlier, and the nature of the path meant that the monsters would have to run through the flames or climb down the sheer face of the cliff the road cut through.
Run through the flames they did, howling and ravening. Alistair gasped, and Athadra could recognize the ruined faces of what must have been villagers. Many had simple weapons, some even with armour, and they were slowed but little by the flames, though fire caught on their clothes and melted their flesh. Athadra's eyes and ears focused straight ahead; for several moments, she lost all sense of her companions as she leapt into the fray, swinging her flatblade in wide arcs. She saw a few ghouls in templar armour passing through the burning oil, and forged her way through the corpses until she met them and cut them down. Her focus lifted slightly when she realized the last of the fiends had fallen, and she limped back toward the line, her face and arms stinging from burns.
A new wave of corpses descended upon them, and another. Each time Athadra's company fought them to the bonfire, aided by Berwick's arrows and Ser Perth's knights holding their flanks. Morrigan managed to freeze many of the monsters, and Athadra sundered them into a thousand pieces as though they were locks. Before she knew it, she was laughing, trading barbs with Alistair about who'd downed more. Even the Sten was calling out battle cries in his own tongue. Whatever guided the corpses must have been dissatisfied, for after that third failed attempt, a messenger from below told of ghouls emerging from the lake to assault the village directly.
Athadra told Ser Perth to hold his men at the chokepoint, even Berwick, and took her band down the winding path of the hill, all the way to the steps of the Chantry itself. She fought alongside Murdock and the militia, who'd already taken a few casualties. The arrival of the Wardens, Morrigan, and the Sten halted the militia's retreat, though, and together they pushed the corpses back to the docks. For hours they fought to save Redcliffe, or what remained of it, until Athadra felt woozy from exertion and from imbibing too much lyrium. Just before daybreak the attack halted, and the few monsters that remained turned back to the water; dawn saw them climbing up the finger-island all the way back to the castle.
Fighting the night through was more than worth the satisfaction Athadra felt as the revered mother proclaimed the village saved, her voice shaky as she praised the mage...though, of course, the Chantrywoman didn't mention the role of magic in giving the villagers their lives. Teagan pronounced the victory complete enough to lead a sortie into the castle itself, which was set to begin at midday-after the saviours of Redcliffe claimed a few hours' rest from their labours.