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Author's Note: Holy Interlocking Batman! It's almost over! Yup, that's right. Only a small handful of chapters left. Got them planned out and mostly written though so hopefully no more long waits between updates. You guys have been fantastic. Please enjoy.
Interlocking
Chapter Thirty Seven: Victory and Loss
"She is silent for a moment, and then looking to the dried blood along her hands. It isn't hers." - Krem and Harding find each other in a world torn apart. A story told in brief glimpses.
Harding sets out a good half a day before the main force. Her scouts and the Inquisition's allies sabotage Corypheus's forces along the route to the Wilds. Setting flames to their camps. Picking off advance scouts to deter their progress. Using the natural lay of the land to alter and impede their advance. She loves it. Lives for it.
She finds purpose with the Inquisition. A need. A reason.
She remembers the dull and uneventful life of a sheep-herder. The quiet, empty promise of old age. In the most monotonous way. She thinks she would still like to be grey. Still like to live to see the generations unfold. But not if she is to see it from idleness. Stagnation. Not if she is to sit, purposeless and unfulfilled, at the calm edge of life while the world passes her by.
She wants to be in it. Knee-deep and buried in it. Full of it. A part of it. Bursting with it.
She wants the world to remember her.
The Inquisition is where she belongs. She feels the power of such belonging with every arrow she releases, every order she shouts, every gleaming hill she conquers.
They continue on.
Harding forges the way.
Harding is perched along a large rock outcropping that overlooks the path to Mythal's temple from base camp. Not far from the ground, but still high enough to see over the next rolling hill where another batch of red templars ploughs toward the temple. She signals to two of her scouts across the open clearing, where they sit concealed in tree branches. They nod and send their ravens off into the air. Turning to gaze back down the path they came, Harding whistles, sharp and quick.
A regiment of soldiers, accompanied by Bull and the Chargers comes over the hill through the brush. She can see Krem beside his commander, bright-eyed and muscles taut with anticipation. She is relieved to find the main forces have arrived without difficulty. Bull makes his way just below her perched position.
The qunari hefts his battle-axe over his shoulder and smirks at her. "What've you got, shortstack?"
Harding raises a brow but quirks a similar smirk. She holds onto a tree branch with one hand, her other holding her bow beside her. She shifts her footing in the rock to angle a look down at him. "Looks like a full regiment just south. No sign of Corypheus though."
Bull nods, rubbing at his chin with one hand and looking off in the direction she motions to. "Alright then." He turns so that his bellowing orders are heard across the crowd of soldiers. "Inquisitor's on their way. We'll clear a path to the temple entrance and then hold position there. The rest is up to the Inquisitor. Move out." He nods one last time to Harding and advances.
Her gaze flicks beside him to Krem and she catches his wink and his smile. "Go get 'em," she chuckles.
He gives her a salute and adjusts the maul in his grip. He follows Iron Bull, and the regiment of soldiers accompanies the Chargers over the next hill.
Harding watches them go and is filled with that same thrilling purpose.
Every swing of his maul, every heavy pant of breath, every twist of muscle and grunt of pain is for her. To bring him back to her. He cuts down another red templar. Another. And another. Until it is unending. Until it is the steady, constant stream of blood and wrath and war.
When it is done, when he stands in the clearing, heaving labored breaths and leaning on his maul, Bull's hand clapping against his shoulder, it is still for her.
Krem glances back through the dense forest where he knows Harding is waiting.
It is always for her.
It is already late into the evening when Morrigan and the Inquisitor make their way out from the Temple of Mythal and the Chargers escort them back to base camp. The Inquisition forces head back to Skyhold in the morning. Krem finds Harding assisting some of her wounded scouts when he sets out to look for her.
Harding sits back along a log before a fire, sighing heavily as she wipes her forehead with one hand. In the other she holds a bundle of bandages. The healer she is speaking to takes the bandages and says something that Krem cannot hear from his distance. Harding nods, a soft smile lighting her features, and the healer leaves. The dwarf takes a long, steady breath, her hands braced along her knees. She looks up when she hears Krem's approach, her face bright with the shifting firelight. She smiles and reaches a hand for him. He sighs at the sight of her, unharmed and smiling. He takes her hand, settling along the log next to her.
There is a long moment of silence between them as they simply take in the sight of each other, their fingers laced warmly between them.
Harding takes a calming breath in and turns her gaze to the fire, rolling her neck to release the strain of muscles there. "Long day," she remarks.
A soft sound of agreement leaves his lips. "But a victory."
Harding cocks her head at him. "Any trouble in the temple?"
"Nah," Krem begins, his free hand moving to rustle through his hair. "Inquisitor took the main charge. And those Sentinels didn't bother us much. Though I doubt it had less to do with any lack of battle skill on their part and more to do with the Inquisitor's slick tongue. Just glad we didn't have another enemy to fight in there."
Harding leans her head along his shoulder. "Enough blood has been spilled," she offers softly, her eyes on the fire. Her gaze flicks over to the bodies of her wounded scouts lying on cots nearby.
Krem notices her gaze and unlinks his hand with hers to wrap his arm around her. "Take any casualties?" His voice is anchored in that deep understanding, that sorrowful knowing that tells her he is with her. That she does not feel this alone. His fingers run lightly over her arm as he holds her.
She is silent for a moment, and then looking to the dried blood along her hands. It isn't hers. "Yeah," she croaks, the words suddenly dragging in her. She clears her throat. "Yeah, a few."
"I'm sorry." It is all he can offer.
But Harding knew this going in.
Lighted torches flicker around the camp. The steady moans of the wounded sift through the air around them. Somewhere in the distance there is a howling, buried deep in the tangled woods. Stars gleam bright and constant above them.
Harding shifts in her lean so that she can look up into Krem's face. She eyes him quietly a moment, her mouth parted in thought. He blinks at her. And then she smiles. Slow. And small. Telling of reassurance. Of hesitant relief. "I told you we'd find each other," she whispers. "When it was over."
Krem's eyes rove over her face, his gaze softening. He leans in and meets her mouth with his. It is slow, and warm. A sharing of breath. The tender melding of their lips as he feels her flutter of eyelashes against his cheek. He pulls from her then, but keeps his mouth close, his lips hovering just over hers.
She blinks at him, something needful in her gaze, a hesitant, desperate look that tells of more than intimacy. More than the physical. Something inside her calls to him.
"I never doubted it," he breathes against her lips, before he leans in once more.
Her shaking hands grip at him. She has lost many tonight.
But she has not lost him.