"What's that called?"

"Dawn Lotus." Anders explained patiently to the child clinging onto his back. "You helped me pull this up from the stream, remember? We need a bit more, though..."

"It was forever ago." The boy chirped in response.

"It was yesterday!" Anders laughed, shook his blonde head with an easy smile. "Maker, where did your mother go?"

"She flew away." Kai grinned, pointing up to the sky. "Can we go to the stream again? Please?"

"You just want to get more of those lizards." Anders accused with barely concealed laughter, shifting the child up higher so he could bend over and root in the pack. "Your mother should try turning into one of those for a change, hm?"

"Ewww, slimy!" The child squealed, equal parts delighted and horrified.

Dorian sighed wearily and impatiently, aggravated by the shrill sound behind him. Childish antics were a detriment to a serious scholar, such as himself. He sat on the ground, back against a tree trunk, shuffling through the papers. Maria monitored the rest of camp from the corner of her eye as she threw her blades into another trunk. She smoothed her hand down her right shoulder in aggravation, trying to soothe the burning sensation over her skin. Like bugs, she thought numbly, chewing on a limb that wasn't even there.

Maria bent to pick up another blade impatiently, tossing it up in the air once, twice. Then she threw it was as much force as she could manage. It embedded itself solidly into the tree trunk instead of joining her failures at the bottom of the tree.

She wished she could say she was getting better, but she wasn't sure. They'd been traveling with Chantal's small group since they'd joined, allowing Dorian to peruse the materials Chantal had. Elven lore, old warden tomes, a small library of obscure knowledge. Maria wanted to use the time to get used to her new body, but it wasn't working.

She heard the beating of wings in the air before she saw the bird land lightly on the ground, something white in its talons. It cawed once, but by the time Maria turned her full attention to it, Chantal Amell was brushing dirt off her breeches, the little white bundle at her feet.

"Mama!" Kai called from his perch on the warden turned murderer turned healer turned babysitter. "Can we go to the stream?"

"In a moment love." Chantal called back, bending to retrieve her burden. "I left a note in one of Leliana's drops in Verchiel to let her know you're well. I also retrieved these for you."

Chantal held out the white bundle with a shy smile. Wearily, Maria held out her hand and Chantal deftly untied the cloth, revealing two honey cakes sandwiched together. They were cool, but even so Maria could smell them. Vanilla, sugar, fresh sweet icing.

"You could have brought wine too. If you were making purchases." Dorian complained good naturedly.

"I'd have had to turn into a bear to get the wine bottle back. Or the cat. Not very discreet, I'm afraid." Chantal shrugged with an innocent smile. "You haven't been eating, but… I think Leliana mentioned in one of her letters you had a sweet tooth?"

Varric told her once it was common knowledge that the Inquisitor craved sweets, that her alchemists sweetened up her potions for her. No wonder it was, if Leliana felt it was fine to share.

"A cat?" Dorian asked curiously. "That seems less than useful. The bear and the bird I understand, but…"

Anders chuckled from behind them. "It's a rather large cat."

Maria examined the little cakes critically. Kai appeared beside Chantal, his small head just about level with her hand, eyes lighting up when he saw the cakes. "Can I have one?" He asked greedily.

"They're not for you." Chantal stated firmly, but Maria lowered her hand immediately, offering the cakes as Chantal sighed wearily. "You may have one." Chantal corrected.

"Thank you Maria." Kai chirped, taking one of the cakes.

"Now eat the other one." Dorian ordered waspishly.

"Hey, what happened to your other hand?" Kai asked as he shoved the cake into his mouth. His bright eyes met hers, innocent, curious.

Maria mouth went dry and she looked away immediately. Chantal took a deep, steady breath before she answered when it was obvious Maria wouldn't. "She was injured, mijito. Like my scar, si?" Chantal indicated the jagged cut on her face and Kai nodded, accepting.

"You throw the knives good." The boy said seriously. "Not like papa, but good. Better than Nate."

"I'm an archer." Howe grumbled fondly from his spot.

So was she. Her heart clenched and she bit her lip, hard enough to taste blood.

"Maria." Dorian called softly, tucking his papers aside. She couldn't bear the gentle sympathy in his tone, it poured through the cracks inside her like sand, irritating all the rawest parts of her soul. It reminded her of all the things she wouldn't be, all the things that died in the Crossroads.

"We should be going, soon. Dorian's almost done reading." Her voice sounded wrong in her own ears, too cool, too distant. Reflected in Kai's dark eyes, she looked like a lifeless doll. She pressed the other cake into his grasping hands, turning away quickly. "You can have the other one too."

"Mama?" The child queried, and she could picture him looking up in concern at Chantal behind her as she marched up to the tree, wanting an explanation for what happened.

"Come on love." Chantal said simply, sadly. "We'll go to the stream."

"Maria." Dorian sighed her name wearily, standing now, his voice coming closer as Chantal retreated into the woods with her son. "If you starve to death before I return you safely to your sister and our dear Varric, I'm going to be in an uncomfortable amount of danger. Please eat something."

Dorian asked Chantal to bring back the cakes. She should have known. She wrenched one of her knives from the bark of the tree. "Dorian, stop it."

"Venhedis, will you please just look at me." Dorian begged. One of the blades was stuck, she wriggled it back and forth intently, ignoring Dorian behind her. She should have known better, Dorian wasn't made to be ignored. He couldn't stand it.

Dorian's hand clamped down on her right shoulder, the one with the angry new scars tracing up over her pale, freckled skin. Even under the tunic she wore, the touch sent a surge of agony down protesting muscles and raw skin. She whipped away from him, the knife flying loose from the bark, dropping from her fingers.

She meant to catch it properly, but her fingers weren't quite deft enough. The blade sliced through her palm effortlessly, dug deep into the skin of her one remaining hand. She cried out in shock, letting it fall to the dirt while the blood welled up between her fingers.

An accident, a part of her whispered. Blood pooled in rivulets down her wrist, dripped onto the dirt. The dirt, she reminded herself, not the hard stones of the Crossroads, not the bed with the crisp white sheets where she'd given up hope.

Dorian's tan fingers were already pulling her hand towards him, apologetic and concerned, but she pulled it back, curled it into a fist that throbbed, blood squeezing through her fingers.

Her voice trembled. "Haven't I bled enough yet, Dorian?"

It would have been kinder if she shoved the bloody knife between his ribs. The pain lanced up her shoulder with a fury, matched the pain reflected in every line of his face. He mumbled something in Tevene, something soft and soothing and she didn't want it. She didn't want any of it.

"Don't you know I love you too?" Cole translated unhelpfully. "I can't stand to see you like this."

"Well, gotta love a cheerful dose of angst in the morning." Anders broke in. She couldn't remember him striding over, but he held out both his palms, a gesture of supplication. "Perhaps I should look at that before it gets infected. You know, you only have one now."

No, she didn't want that either. She closed her eyes, focused on the pulsing beat of her heart hammering in her head. Maker, why wouldn't they just…

"Please, Maria." Dorian whispered, his voice all broken shards and sorrow. It was the same way he spoke to his father, disappointed and sad. "Please, just… allow him to see to it. And if he is to do that, perhaps… it would be remiss to disallow him to check everything else."

She wondered what the price was for breaking as many hearts as she seemed to. It seemed only fitting the abyss inside her should choke out all the life from everyone else before she finally succumbed to it.

"It's alright, Maria."

Cole's voice echoed her own words said to him a hundred times. It's alright, Cole. It's simply a demon, we'll kill it. It's only Cullen's way of showing he cares, Cassandra did love her gift, promise, it's alright. It's alright. When she said it to Cole, what she really meant was "I love you." When Cole said it back to her, she heard the same thing underneath it. I love you, it's alright. I love you.

"Fine then." If they felt their love could wear away at this defeat, this broken husk of a thing left behind in the fire, then they could try. "Fine."

Anders dumped cold, clean water over her hand to get rid of the blood. He hummed something under his breath, something disturbingly jaunty. She thought she heard it in a tavern, once, a long time ago. He knelt beside her while she sat on a log next to their smouldering fire. "Easy enough, this." Anders grinned into her face, both awkward and charming. "I do silly voices when I heal up Kai's scrapes. Want me to do them for you?"

"Are you good at healing up your own knife wounds?" She asked darkly. Anders laughed, albeit nervously.

"Sweetheart, I'm beginning to understand why Fenris liked you so much."

"Call her sweetheart again." Dorian huffed. "I would like to see what happens when a man has his tongue ripped from his mouth."

Her fingers twitched when the magic started to seep into her skin. She waited for the painful tingling from the anchor, holding her breath as the magic laced through her cut flesh, a warm wash of power that reminded her of Hawke.

Her missing arm tingled, but the anchor didn't react to the magic being poured into her. Maybe it really was gone, she hadn't been sure, hadn't dared hope there wouldn't be some lingering effect.

"Ta-da!" Anders announced with a flourish, tracing his thumb against a tiny pink line, no larger than a scratch. "I'll come back to it if I've got the energy after I look at the rest of this."

Her skin crawled with his touch but she bit her tongue. Anders looked at her, tipped his head to the side thoughtfully. "Could I convince you to take your shirt off?"

"Do you need it off?"

"It'd make it easier." Anders shrugged. "Promise on my grey warden honor, no inappropriate touching."

Maria didn't move. Dorian crossed his arms over his chest and Cole twisted the edge of his tunic. At the very least Howe busied himself as far away as possible, and Chantal had the boy at the stream, and…

Maker, Dorian and Cole had seen her unclothed. Half of Skyhold probably had the way she was nearly constantly interrupted with work no matter what (or who) she was doing. She'd whipped off her shirt hundred of times while out in the field, had no reason to feel ashamed, except…

"I can help." Cole offered softly. She didn't know what form his help was going to take, was almost afraid to ask.

"I promise as… as a favor to a man who did better for me than I did for him." Anders eyes were suddenly very serious. "Let me… let me try to fix something. For Varric."

She made the decision before she could think much more about it, tugging impatiently at the laces at her neck, loosening them just enough to reach down with her one hand and tug the cotton awkwardly halfway up. Her other arm, too stiff, too sore to cooperate.

Cole reached out immediately, gentle, tugging the cloth loose and smoothing it over his arms nervously as Maria revealed the length of her battered body. She couldn't look at the stub of her arm, but she also couldn't avoid the scars climbing over her shoulder, fading as they crossed her chest.

"What happened?" Anders asked, clinical and detached.

"My arm exploded." She stated lifelessly. She thought that much was obvious.

"The anchor was spreading from nearly the moment she emerged with it embedded in her hand." Dorian jumped it with the detailed explanation. "We noticed it at Adamant, the magic pushed through her skin when she opened a rift to save us from certain disaster. It continued to grow, more quickly after she sealed the breach."

"It hurt." Cole muttered. "It always hurt, but it got worse."

"The mark degraded, spiraled out of her control. It… it was quite bad." Dorian choked on an emotion that twisted his features into those of an old man for a moment. "There was nothing we could do to stop it. We theorized that cutting it off would cause a calamity nearly of the sort that caused the anchor in the first place. It was not something that could be risked."

"But you did risk it." Anders pointed out. "Someone cut through bone, quite cleanly."

"Yes." Cole whispered. "Cleaned his blade first. Wouldn't touch her with their blood. Vashedan, cowards…"

She didn't know it had been Bull. She wasn't sure she wanted to know it had been Bull. She closed her eyes, tight, against the thought of his greatsword slicing through her arm, the one that sliced down hundreds of enemies for her. Her big shield for a little dwarf.

"By then, the magic was gone. It had burned through her skin, there was nothing left but ash." Dorian said quietly. "We didn't wish to risk the corrupted tissue spreading. I cauterized it, another Enchanter had some small skill with simple healing spells. We wouldn't risk an Orlesian healer, not with… well, we had other problems."

"Right." Anders sighed heavily. "Well, the good news is, you're definitely going to live. Unless you plan on starving yourself to death, that is."

Maria didn't know if that was good news, but Ander's careful fingers were already brushing the stub of her arm. She tensed, crushed her eyes closed tighter. She couldn't watch, couldn't…

"Does he bring the crossbow to bed?"

Her eyes flew open immediately, glaring at the laughing honey eyes of the healer. "Isabela and I had a bet. You're probably one of the only people who knows the answer."

"For fuck's sake." She blurted out in exasperation. Anders grinned even more broadly.

"I bet that it sat on the mantle until he was done, then he cuddled it in sweet apology while muttering that she was the only one that meant anything. Then he took it apart and oiled it nice and carefully, to make it up to her."

"And Isabela thought he involved the contraption in the act?" Dorian scoffed. "How does that work?"

"She had several interesting and improbable theories about where he put it." Anders continued serenely. Maria opened her mouth to say something, anything…

But the distraction worked and before she could even realize she'd relaxed by a degree, Anders's magic surged into her. Then, just as quickly, he shook his head. "Sorry, just wanted to take a peek before I started. This is…" His expression darkened. "This is bad. Ruptured blood vessels, torn muscles, nerve damage. I haven't seen anything this ugly since we left Oghren in Ferelden."

Howe snorted in amusement. Maria didn't get the joke, but Anders shifted away from her, shaking his head. "You're going to need to lay down, and I need to go dig in Chantal's stuff for lyrium."

"I have some." Dorian unlaced his pouch and Cole spread out her cloak on the ground, smiling sweetly, shyly up at her. The same way he looked for her approval when he brought her coffee. Maria didn't have the energy to return his smile, could do nothing but allow herself to be herded like a weak kitten.

When she laid back on the ground, the necklace fell onto the cloth beside her neck. Anders eyes flicked to it as he knelt beside her. "He's serious about you, isn't he?"

"For luck." Cole whispered as Maria turned her face away. "As long as I've got both of you I'm…"

Varric's words in Cole's mouth. His hand touching her stomach, smiling fondly down into her face. She wore the blue tunic, the one Josie said brought out her eyes. He offered to sneak her out the back and she refused because she thought she could save her Inquisition. She thought it mattered. She'd been wrong. So very, very wrong. "Cole, stop."

Even she heard the break in her voice, the chasm of despair underneath it. She should have left, she should have gone with him. The anchor may still have killed her, but she might have had time. She may have…

Ander's magic sunk into her skin, a warm balm that reminded her, in a panic, of how her arm felt as it burned up. Her breath hitched, waiting for the inescapable surge of burning pain that came next.

"Please try to relax." Anders muttered. "If you survived this, somehow, a little healing isn't going to hurt you."

Cole's fingers tangled in her left hand. They were cool against her skin and he squeezed gently, his hat shadowing her face.

"She should be dead." Anders spoke softly, to Dorian she guessed. "This… I don't know how she got back up. How she's been walking around. I've seen men reduced to sniveling children by half this damage." He sounded like he was in awe, but all she could latch onto were those words. She should be dead, yes. That seemed correct.

"She's stubborn." Dorian muttered, but he sounded proud underneath it. She didn't know why. "Right, Cadash?"

She didn't answer but she allowed herself to grip Cole's hand tighter as the magic moved up, a slow steady wave. Anders hissed when he got to her shoulder. She heard the clink of the lyrium bottle, smelled the piercing clean, metallic smell of it when he uncorked it.

"It was moving towards her heart." Anders observed. "The scars don't go that far, but I can feel it. The muscles… there was damage."

Yes, she knew her heart was broken. He didn't need to point it out.

"Fixable?" Dorian asked.

"By your average healer? No. But, I'm rather exceptional." Anders preened.

She was starting to feel tired again. She closed her eyes wearily, letting the wave flow over her chest. She felt something loosening she didn't even realize was tight, a stutter in the rhythm of her heart beat itself back into proper sequence. Then the magic rolled lower, seeking, searching…

"Stop." The command didn't sound like a command and nobody paid it any mind except Cole, who squeezed her fingers back gently.

"Just checking to see if there's anything…"

She knew when he felt it. Everything inside her, the magic swirling through her, stopped cold in her stomach. She didn't know what he saw, exactly. Maybe it was the empty vacuum she felt where once…

Varric was happy if he had both of them. That's what he said.

"Sweet Andraste." Anders whispered in horror. "Did you know? Does Varric?"

She choked on a sob, unable to look at anything but the darkness inside her own eyelids, the abyss inside her own soul.

"Yes." Dorian answered wearily. "We knew."

He sounded like an old man. He sounded like his father. Defeated, bitter. Hopeless.

"Howe!" Anders shouted. Maria didn't hear the other man's response over the sobs, quiet, broken things that ripped her from under Anders's grip, that made her curl into her good side.

"No." Cole whispered in wonder, in awe.

"Howe, damnit. Get me some of that honey from Chantal's stash. I need ginger, too. If we have it. And see if you can toast some bread." Anders was pressing his fingers against her stump of an arm again, but it didn't hurt. At least there was that.

"Leave me alone." She begged, breathless, between sobs.

"Yeah, well. I'm not." Anders huffed, the magic spiraling back through her to that empty, aching space.

"I think that is enough for now." Dorian interrupted sadly. "Perhaps…"

"But it's still there." Cole was smiling, she could hear it in his voice. "Heartbeat that isn't hers. Soft, a flicker. Small, but safe. Safe."

She heard the words, but they didn't make sense. They didn't make sense at all. She tossed them around in her head, let them bounce around the hollow void of her heart.

"That… that is impossible." Dorian's voice shook. "You're wrong."

"I'm never wrong." Anders corrected. "Or, well, at least about this kind of stuff. Here, here…" Without further ado, Maria felt two large hands over her stomach even as she tried to curl further in.

"Do you feel it?" Anders asked, the mana spilling from him, through Dorian, through her.

Through the flicker inside her in the void.

"Andraste's blushing buttcheeks." Dorian laughed, the sound out of place, wrong. It was a laugh of wild relief.

Then Anders was shoved out of the way and Dorian was embracing her, burning warm against the line of her back. "You mad, impossible, brilliant creature."

A spark illuminated the abyss inside her when Dorian laughed into her shoulder, his hand resting tight against her abdomen. She couldn't hope. She couldn't… "Dorian, it can't…"

Tears still wet her cheeks, slicked her eyelashes together into points. She could hardly breathe past the emotions clawing up her throat. Panic, relief, despair, joy. Dorian was crying too, she could feel his tears on her bare shoulder. "Of course. How dare we doubt it, hm?" He teased, his voice breaking on every syllable. "Our little warrior, just like it's mother. Too stubborn to know better."

The sobs broke again, but she didn't even know why she was sobbing now. She twisted, buried her face into Dorian's broad chest, pressed her hand over his as she keened, rocking against him. Words were falling from her lips, protestations that she couldn't, she only had one arm, this couldn't be real, she was dreaming. Dreaming and she'd hear a wolf howl somewhere in the distance.

"Marguerite." Cole's hushed voice trembled with awe. "Growing in the sunshine in the gardens. Kirkwall at her feet."

Kirkwall.

Varric.

Skyhold, Solas. The Maker and Andraste. Cassandra's protestation that she knew, she knew.

The man wearing her father's face said he could make her fight. He said he'd provide the miracles.

"Varric." His name felt right again, like it hadn't since before that last awful dive into the Crossroads. Sparks drifted up from the fire Howe was banking up. She thought she felt them catch fire inside her soul. "I have to…"

She could fix this. Maybe not all of it, but she could dust off the shattered pieces of Varric's heart and hand them back to him. She could…

Could she stop a would be god? Could she stop Solas with one hand and her (less stunning now) good looks?

No, a part of her whispered from the shadows.

Maybe, another part answered, a tremor of hope in the darkness.

"You have to eat." Anders directed. "And I need to finish looking at you."

"Is it alright?" Her tongue felt clumsy and her hand shot out to grab his arm. "Is it…"

"The fetus itself looks normal." Anders placed his hand on her lower back, considering. "Some swelling around the uterus, nothing I can't take care of. Sweetheart, as long as you don't starve it to death, I'd say we can expect a little ball of chest hair in…"

She didn't let him finish. She didn't care. If he asked her, she'd help him blow up Halamshiral. She threw her remaining arm around his neck, choked him in her grip as she embraced him. "Thank you." She whispered, numb with shock, dazed, bewildered, thrilled. She couldn't blink the tears away fast enough. She didn't execute him. She hadn't wanted to anyway, she hated executions, but she was supposed to. The Inquisitor was supposed to. Luckily, she wasn't the Inquisitor. Not anymore. "Thank you."

"Is she strangling him?" Chantal asked from where she emerged from the forest, one hand clasping her son's, the other cradling a bushel of dawn lotus and spindleweed. Kai clutched a fistful of dirty rocks and Maria laughed at the sight, the sound too harsh, but it fanned the spark inside her.

"No." Howe was smiling. "I think, perhaps, Anders has finally not made a mess of something."

"Shocking." Anders strangled reply was also full of mirth. "I'm as surprised as you lot, honestly."

She didn't go back to the house while Nanna was there, sneaking in only when she knew the woman was out to grab whatever she wanted or needed. Nanna didn't step foot near Fynn's forge, but somehow, business kept going. Mostly, Maria thought wryly, because both of them resorted to using Bea to relay messages.

Bea didn't particularly care for the arrangement, leading to a rather severe uptick in Bea pickpocketing both Carta contacts, their own workers, and of course Fynn. The only one who didn't complain about it, however, was Fynn. Thank Andraste for his patience.

"Magpie, Pyrophite's toxic when it's untreated." He rumbled as Bea slipped a shining square of metal into her jacket pocket. "If you leave it up against bare skin, you're going to get a rash."

Bea rolled her eyes and retrieved the small square, dropping it with a clatter on the table.

"Tell Nanna I'll handle that shipment to Markham." Maria instructed, rolling up one of her letters.

"Can you… just come home and tell her?" Bea whined, trailing after Maria. "I'm not your raven."

"Is she ready to apologize?" Maria asked. Bea sighed, as long-suffering as if she was twice her age. "I didn't think so."

She was going on nearly two months without seeing her grandmother. At first, she divided her time up between Fynn's forge and the motley assortment of taverns she frequented. But...slowly, it just got easier to keep coming back to Fynn's night after night, to slip in his back door with the key he gave her, to sit with him and spin stories and share drinks, or when he'd gone to bed already, to sink in beside him and wake tangled in his arms.

"Right then." Bea wilted. "See you down at the docks."

"Don't steal anymore coin from Pete's crew or he won't work with us anymore." She reprimanded.

"Not the boss of me, Maria." Bea replied in a lilting sing-song, picking up another piece of metal and examining it closely.

"Yes I am." Maria stated severely, twisting Bea towards the door with one arm. "I'll stop and get you something to eat, though."

"Oh! That place that puts lamb on a stick?" Maria fought the urge to wrinkle her nose.

"Sure, if that's what you want." She sighed, dropping a kiss to Bea's temple and taking back the piece of metal from her hand. "Now, go. I'll see you in a bit."

The bell on the door clanged as Bea wandered out into the late afternoon. Maria stretched, casting a critical gaze around the forge. All the apprentices had gone home for the day, Fynn would be finishing up soon.

"You could choose not to commit crime tonight. I'll make you dinner instead." He offered darkly, pushing his hair from his sweat stained brow.

"With your cooking, I'd prefer taking my chances with the criminal element." She teased, flipping her hair over her shoulder. Fynn sat his hammer down heavily, turning to take her in. "Maria…"

"Do you know how handsome you look when you're about to lecture me?"

He laughed, the tension breaking instantaneously. "You're mad. Raving mad."

"Sounds like the perfect temperament for a criminal." She winked roguishly, humming as she picked up her coat. "I'll be back early tonight. Unless you want me to go sleep in the pub."

"You're better than smuggling lyrium." He muttered darkly. "And better than sleeping in the pub like an urchin."

She laughed this time. "I'm sure lots of street urchins would be glad to sleep in the pub, Fynn."

He held his arm out and she slipped to his side, brushing her lips against his cheek. "Besides, we both know I'd be hopeless at smithing. I've not got the patience."

Fynn huffed in agreement, tipping her chin to his lips. "Not smithing." He agreed. "But you're better than this and you know it."

She didn't, but she almost believed him when he said it. His eyes dropped from her to the folded letter beside his hammer, the one Bea's arrival distracted them from. A demand from Fynn's father, furious and impatient, that Fynn stop avoiding the guild dinners. "You're better than them." She said in return, pressing her lips to his. "I see you, Fynn."

He smiled into her kiss, the smile that was soft, sweet. Her smile, the one he only gave to her. "I see you." He repeated gently. "I'll wait up."

She didn't care for the roasted bits of meat on sticks covered in sticky spicy sauce, but if it would make Bea happy, Maria guessed she owed her. At least they smelled somewhat fresh that evening, the scent wafting from the little cart, the meat sizzling inside.

She wound a piece of hair around her finger as she waited, watching the comings and goings on either side of her. She saw the guards approaching, a trio of burly men in clanking plate armor and chainmail, but she didn't consider anything might be amiss. Didn't think to wonder until one slid behind her and placed a heavy hand on her shoulder.

"Serah Cadash?" He questioned in a low voice, his gauntlets digging into her right shoulder. With an air of practiced innocence, Maria looked up, eyes wide.

"Yes messere?" She simpered dumbly, a ploy she wasn't sure would work. This was a mistake, surely. Nanna wouldn't forget to pay them off.

"You need to come with us, girl." One of the other men growled, grabbing her upper left arm.

Well, at least Bea would notice when she didn't show up. Maria batted her eyelashes up at them as they pulled her from the line.

"I'm always glad to help." She pleaded innocently with a smile. "I so respect the efforts the guards make to keep us safe here in Ostwick."

"Shut up Carta slut."

Maria choked on a flash of anger and the sick dread that rose up her throat. They were steering her towards a coach and fear made her braver than perhaps was wise. She couldn't get in a coach with them, couldn't risk being forced out of Ostwick. If they threw her in lockup, that was all well and good, Nanna would find her there, but if she ended up in a shallow grave outside the city…

She feinted to the right as if she'd twist from their grip, then pulled suddenly to the left. The move shocked the one holding onto her arm, causing him to let go, but not the man with his claws in her shoulder. He tightened his grip and snarled violently before he pitched her forward onto the cobblestones.

She pushed herself up to her knees as quickly as she could, but the guard's gauntlet was in her hair, pulling her back to her feet and then his other fist slammed into her face so hard her eyesight swirled, warbled. She tasted blood on her lip, could feel a throbbing in her jaw that brought tears to her eyes.

Still, she fought. Her elbow ached from where she shoved it into chainmail. She kicked, she screamed. She saw an urchin, Maker she hoped it was one she paid to watch, streak off. It didn't help her at the moment. She couldn't draw her bow against guardsmen in the street and even if she could, she was already boxed in by three smelly, gangly humans, easily two whole feet taller than her apiece. Two of them picked her clean up off the street and threw her into the carriage, slammed the door behind them. A bolt slid into a lock and Maria fought the urge to scream in frustration.

"Sorry, girl." A man's amused voice drawled. "I'd have sent an invitation, but I knew you wouldn't come. Not for me, anyway."

Her skin erupted into gooseflesh and she looked up from the floor of the coach directly into hard, cold eyes set in an old, tired man's face. He tutted in exasperation, reaching out for her chin. She jerked away quickly, pushed herself into the farthest corner of the coach she could get into, as far away from Fynn's father and his covetous glare as possible.

"Told the bastards not to mark up your face. Humans, right?" He sighed wearily, settling back into the seat. "We need to talk, girl. Make yourself comfortable."

"You have to wake up." Cole whispered urgently, his fingers gentle on her face. "He's in danger."

"Cole?" She groaned, pushed herself up rather more smoothly than she had in days. She ached still, soreness lingering from hours sleeping on the ground. "Sweetheart, what is it? Who…?" Without thinking, she brought her hand to her stomach, sheltering the small fragile life that still grew.

Cole pressed his finger against her mouth, angling his shadowy head towards the forest and standing, beckoning her to follow. Maria pushed away from her bedroll, leaving Dorian's sleeping form. She tugged her boots on quickly, letting Cole take her hand and pull her quietly into the shadows.

She heard them before she saw them. A gentle whispering she couldn't quite make out, then one shape suddenly clarifying into two different figures at the edge of the trees. An elf, his sharp features angled down towards Chantal. She had her hands on his chest, his rested on her waist, both of them pressed as close together as they could be while they spoke.

It was a sweet moment, one that hit a chord in her heart, especially when one of the elf's hands brushed a lock of loose hair from Chantal's face, back behind her ear. She couldn't imagine why Cole dragged her out to observe this reunion, not until she heard a fragment of the conversation in Chantal's low, careful voice. "Anders won't like it, I'm afraid. But I can't see any way to keep her from chasing him down. I would go if I were her."

"Of that, mi amor, I've no doubt." The elf laughed, deep in his throat, voice dripping like fine wine. "If I thought it prudent, I'd have tried to extract him myself. Unfortunately, these look the type to kill a hostage if provoked."

"Of course they do." Chantal murmured. "Zev… this is a right mess."

"At least it is not us this time, si?" He asked cheerfully.

Maria felt something cold sink into her stomach, a block of icy fear that made her step forward boldly. The two lovers in the trees drew apart almost guiltily, as if used to being caught. "What's happened?"

Chantal called a ball of light to her hand, let it illuminate the space around them. Her dark eyes surged with sympathy. "Don't panic." She began.

Maria swallowed, hard, moving her hand to cover her stomach again, to shield it. "I won't."

Maria Cadash didn't panic. She fought. She fought tooth and nail, just like the baby inside her had. "I won't."