Note: My thanks to Biff McLaughlin for beta-reading and taming the damage my wayward fingers do when they're on a bend.

Circling the Drain

The next morning I was surprised to find Alistair at my door. I invited him in and we chatted about things that wouldn't provoke either of us into an argument. He fidgeted a little and I could see he had something to say to me, but I didn't rush him. I danced carefully around certain topics trying not to inflame another fight. We discussed the upcoming Landsmeet and my discussion with Teagan about Eamon being hell-bent on putting Alistair on the throne.

Alistair shook his head. "I'm not even remotely interested. I've gone to see Eamon a couple of times since he arrived, just to say 'hello'. He keeps bringing it up even after I tell him 'no'."

Something prickled in my mind, but I couldn't figure out what it was. I just didn't know enough about this world to understand why Eamon would continue on if Alistair was rejecting it. It seemed pointless to me. I shrugged it off; it was probably nothing.

There was a little awkward silence as the topic was exhausted. Sudden Alistair reached for my hand. "I'm sorry, Lissy. I know I haven't been supportive. Riordan told me what you were doing was necessary. I just... I hate that man. I don't think I'll ever stop hating him even though I know we have to work with him. Even if everything you say is true, I can't forgive him."

His confession of his visceral hatred of Loghain was something. At least now that he had acknowledged it perhaps he could learn how to deal with it. I hugged Alistair. "I'm sorry too. I know I haven't been faultless in this. It upset me very much to have us so at odds. I know that it must be hard to see me spend time with him and to learn I even like the man you hate." I felt like a huge weight was lifted off me. "Did Riordan tell you about Garahel?" I asked.

"Yeah, Garahel, the Irresistible." Alistair laughed. "I wonder if that's on his tombstone in Weisshaupt?"

I laughed at the thought. "Here lies Garahel, the Irresistible. Great fighter, great lover and the savior of the world."

Alistair laughed harder. "He sacrificed much so that we might live."

I laughed with him, thinking of how sleeping his way across the Free Marches was a terrible sacrifice, but then I remembered he slayed the archdemon and thus died. My laughter dried up and so did Alistair's. "It scares the crap out of me, Al," I confessed. "One of us..." I couldn't go on.

Alistair hugged me tightly. "It scares me too. Why is that? We might end up dead anywhere along the line."

"I know, silly isn't it? It's just so... probable. The odds aren't in our favor with only the three of us."

Alistair nodded sadly and let go of me.

"We have an enormous job in front of us with a lousy end in store," I said. "We gotta do this as friends. The three of us are the only ones who understand. We have to be tight."

The tension that had been between us for a long time melted away. I showed Alistair my new trick of shooting steam out of my ears and nose and it made him laugh. I realized suddenly I could steam away the wrinkles in our clothes. This society was missing out on a lot by not embracing mages in their midst.

~o~o~o~

We were all eating our mid-day meal when we heard the clanking of armor and weapons. I paused with a wine glass raised to my lips and listened. I exchanged a puzzled glance with Alistair. Then there was a loud pounding at the front door and I heard a servant answer it. I turned my attention back to my meal, it was probably nothing.

The seneschal hurried nervously into the dining room and I rose. "What is it, Gerold?"

"There are soldiers at the front door, my lady. They're asking for the Grey Wardens. I believe they're from the Regent."

Loghain? I wasn't expecting any sort of military escort. What was going on? "Is the Regent with them?" I asked.

"No, my lady, it is just the soldiers."

Alistair, Riordan and I got up from the table and followed Gerold to the front door. Cauthrien and a few of Loghain's guards I recognized were there, as well as a number of soldiers I didn't recognize. There were about a dozen armed people. My stomach lurched.

"Sorry to disturb you, my lady," Cauthrien said, "but we are here on the Regent's orders. The Grey Warden, Alistair, is under arrest for treason."

My mouth gaped open. "What?" I looked at Alistair and he looked every bit as shocked as I did.

"The warrant is here if you wish to read it." Cauthrien handed me a document.

I read it while Riordan peered over my shoulder. "Conspiring to overthrow the Regent and Queen? I'm sorry, this is wrong," I said to Cauthrien. I looked at Alistair. "Al, do you know anything about this?"

"I... what? No! I haven't conspired to do any such thing. Eamon keeps at me but I'd never do that."

"You've been to see Eamon..." I said, remembering. It was beginning to sink in. Of course, Alistair being seen in proximity to Eamon would set off all sorts of alarm bells for Loghain. I'd told Loghain about Eamon's plan. Perhaps he had assumed they were working together to overthrow him and Anora. Of course those visits would look suspicious. Even worse, what if Eamon had done this on purpose? What if he had done this intending to sacrifice Alistair so that we would abandon our support of Loghain?

"Lucy, what is going on here?" Riordan asked.

Did Riordan even know Alistair was Maric's by-blow? I don't recall telling him anything about that and I didn't know if Alistair did. "It's just a misunderstanding," I said, panic rising. On the very verge of the Landsmeet the alliance I had painstakingly wrought was teetering on the brink of destruction. If any of us did the wrong thing now it was over. I grasped Alistair's arm to reassure him. "Al, you need to go with them. We will untangle this mess. I'm not exactly certain what is going on, but I promise you we won't abandon you."

"I did nothing, Lissy." He looked to Riordan. "Brother, don't let this happen!"

Riordan looked conflicted. I was afraid he would draw his weapon and then we could kiss the alliance goodbye. I placed a hand on his arm and shook my head. "Please, trust me, Danny. This can be resolved without bloodshed." He looked at me, his brows drawn down. I really, really hoped he trusted me enough to listen to me.

He nodded at me. "We will have you out soon, Alistair. One way or another."

Cauthrien turned to me and said, "The Regent wishes to speak with you right away, Warden Cousland."

"Yes, of course." I wanted to speak with him too. Boy, did I want to speak to him. Actually, right now I wanted to throttle him.

"Please leave your weapons here," Cauthrien told us.

I took off my weapons and placed them on a table in the foyer. Alistair looked like he was about to resist but I took his hand and looked into his eyes. "Please, trust me in this." He looked at me for a long moment and nodded. He took off his sword and shield and let them clatter to the ground.

We were both escorted to Fort Drakon. Cauthrien stopped me in the entrance but most of the soldiers continued with Alistair. "Don't harm him!" I warned them. "It'll be your jobs if you do." Why would they listen to me? Most of them knew nothing about my connection to Loghain.

"He'll be fine, my lady. The Regent gave instructions to treat him well." Cauthrien pointed down the hall, "He is here." I followed her down the hallway and she opened a door for me and waited outside.

Loghain was standing in front of the fireplace; he turned to look at me as I walked in.

"What is going on, Loghain?" I glared at him.

"Sit down, Lucy."

"No. You've just arrested my friend and one of the three remaining Grey Wardens in Ferelden. I don't want to sit." I walked over to him and grabbed his arm. "Why are you doing this?"

He looked into my eyes. "You knew nothing about Alistair and Eamon plotting to overthrow my daughter and me?"

I shook my head, stunned. "You know how hard I've been working to make this alliance work. I've covered things up for you! I've told you Grey Warden secrets. I've risked... everything so we could prevent a civil war and could keep the country stable to fight the Blight."

"And yet you didn't know your fellow Grey Warden was plotting against me?" Loghain said, wryly. "Didn't you slap me for not knowing what Rendon Howe was up to? I'm not the only one who needs to watch their allies more closely."

"Alistair wasn't plotting against you. What evidence do you have?"

"He met with Eamon on two occasions and my spies tell me the topic of conversation was naming him as Cailan's successor."

"I already told you that Eamon wanted to do that, but Alistair would never go along with it. He knows he isn't qualified to rule and he doesn't want to." I paused to think. I hadn't thought about Alistair going to visit Eamon. It never even crossed my mind it would be a problem. God, I was naïve at times. In my world it might get you watched by the FBI but not arrested, unless they had good evidence against you. But this wasn't my world and I just didn't know how things worked. There was no Bill of Rights protecting us from the paranoia of the leaders.

His voice was implacable. "I don't know what his response was; my spies didn't hear it. Lucy, I won't risk Eamon dividing the country by trying to put a puppet on the throne. I am sorry, but Alistair is a risk to the stability of the country, especially if Eamon announces to everyone at the Landsmeet that Maric left a bastard."

"What if Alistair renounces all claim to the throne in front of the Landsmeet?"

"I don't trust that Eamon will leave it alone. He'll be back at him sooner or later."

I glared at Loghain. "Can't you see? The problem here isn't Alistair, it's Eamon. You should be throwing Eamon in prison!" I slammed my fist into my open hand. "What if he did this just so you would arrest Alistair knowing it would break our alliance? You may very well be playing into his plan."

Loghain shook his head. "You could be right, but I can't arrest Eamon. He's too popular to touch. That would catapult us directly into a civil war."

"Fuck!" I swore. "Why did I ever get that cure for him?" I slumped down into a chair finally, feeling defeated, and buried my head into my hands. "Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!" I cursed at myself. "I didn't know... I just didn't know what the hell I was doing. I was rescuing a nice, old man. Alistair's foster father."

Loghain said nothing for a moment but I felt his hand on my shoulder. "Don't blame yourself. Like you said, you didn't know." He squatted down beside my chair and said softly. "I trust you. Maker knows, I shouldn't. I saw what happened to Maric with that bard... he almost lost everything. I know you want this alliance as much as I do, but this is a threat I can't ignore."

"I wish I could go back in time and redo everything." Sten had been right. It was a waste of time getting those goddamned ashes, even worse, it jeopardized everything. Everything! Eamon should have died. I looked up at Loghain, my eyes pleading. "What if I could fix it? What if he were dead?" I bit my lip, realizing I was proposing murder.

Is this worse than anything else I've done? I killed that pig in Howe's dungeon, how is Eamon any different? Oh, right. He's Alistair's foster father until he let his wife run him off. What do I tell Alistair? "Sorry Bro, I killed your foster father. Sure hope you don't mind, but you know, Blight and all - he had to go." Obviously I don't tell him. I dress in black and attend the funeral and give him support through the difficult times ahead. Someone had pulled the plug on the morality bathtub and I was circling the drain.

Loghain looked at me with surprise. "Are you proposing to murder Eamon?"

I nodded. "I will do it, if you let Alistair go free."

"If Eamon is murdered my hand might be suspected." Loghain stood up and looked at me.

"What if he had an accident? Or died suddenly of a heart attack? I'm sure I could make it look accidental. I travel with an assassin after all."

He put his hand on his chin, thinking. "That would solve a number of problems." He shook his head. "I can't ask you to do this. You're not an assassin. I won't make a murderer out of you."

"I keep telling Alistair we have to do what we must to end the Blight. It would be hypocritical of me to balk at this, just because Eamon seems like a nice, old man." I stood up and walked over to the fireplace. "Flemeth told me about this. Perhaps this was what she saw."

"Flemeth is a crazy, old witch. Don't do this, Lucy."

"Is there another way? If there is, tell me, but I won't give up Alistair. He's my friend and my brother. The country needs all of us to end this Blight."

"All right. If Eamon dies, I will free Alistair." He walked over and embraced me. "I'm sorry, Lucy." He looked me in the eyes, his own looked sad and pained. "You and I are walking a very grim path together. I took the Regency so Anora wouldn't have to do these things, make these decisions and be tainted by them, but you..."

I looked up at him, hating him and yet caring for him at the same time. "I just want this fucking Landsmeet over so I can get on with my job."

He laughed. "I know the feeling."

"When it is done, I will let you know." I knew my face was grim.

I turned to leave but he caught my arm. "Lucy." He pulled me into him and kissed me. I couldn't respond; I felt sick. He rubbed his thumb across my cheek. "I'm sorry," he said again.

"It is what it is." I turned from him and left. Cauthrien escorted me out of Fort Drakon.

I walked home slowly, plotting a murder.

~o~o~o~

Riordan was pacing the foyer when I got back to the estate. It was possibly the most emotional I had ever seen him.

"What is happening, Sister? Why was Alistair arrested?"

I had been debating all the way home what to tell Riordan. Do I tell him I'm going to murder Alistair's foster father? I didn't really know how committed Grey Wardens were about that whole do whatever it takes to stop a Blight thing. Maybe it was just lip-service. Clearly I was pushing the envelope here, or it seemed that way to me. What if I told Riordan my plan and he refused to let me follow through? What if he insisted we try to fight the regime instead? I had gotten all the way home without figuring out what to do. I dug a coin out of my purse and flipped it. Heads.

I pulled Riordan into my room and shut the door. "Did you know that Alistair is Maric's son?"

Riordan shook his head. "What? Seriously?"

I nodded. "I'm so new to this world, I don't always understand the implications of these things, but his foster father, Arl Eamon, has been trying to talk him into taking the throne. Alistair isn't interested and won't agree to it, but Eamon intends to force the issue at the Landsmeet. This will divide the Landsmeet and possibly plunge us into the civil war we've been trying to avoid."

Riordan rubbed his scruffy chin. "If Alistair won't agree to it, why would he insist?"

I frowned. "I can only guess, but I think perhaps it is because he knows that Loghain would arrest Alistair to prevent this, and that would cause us to abandon Loghain." I shrugged. "Or maybe he thinks eventually he'll talk Alistair into it. Loghain got wind of this and thought Alistair and Eamon were conspiring to overthrow the current regime."

Riordan's gaze was piercing. "Did you set him straight?"

"Yes... I think Loghain believes me that Alistair is just being used as a pawn in this. But it doesn't matter! If Eamon goes in front of the Landsmeet and declares there's a Theirin heir waiting in the wings he will divide the Landsmeet and we could well end up with the civil war we've been working so hard to avoid."

"So he wants to get rid of Alistair so it won't be an issue?" Riordan asked, his brow furrowing.

"I pointed out that Alistair isn't the problem here, Eamon is." I waited, looking at Riordan to see if he might follow my logic.

"So why doesn't he arrest Eamon?"

"He is too popular to touch. If it looks like he has done something to Eamon, we could end up in civil war as the Landsmeet revolts."

Riordan threw up his hands and huffed with his exasperation. "So, you came up with a solution?"

I nodded. I walked over to the brandy decanter and poured him a generous amount. "Sit down, Danny. Have a drink."

He took the drink from me and eyed me suspiciously. "I take it this isn't good news?"

"I learned from the best how to break the bad news," I said, smiling wanly.

He gulped it down. "Go on then, let's hear it."

"Arl Eamon needs to have an accident before the Landsmeet."

Riordan sighed and put down the glass. "You mean he needs to die? Lucy... there must be another way."

"If you see it, tell me. I'm all out of ideas."

Riordan got up and paced the room. "We could replace Loghain and Anora."

"Not without a civil war. I've been hard at work recruiting nobles to support them."

"We could blackmail Eamon."

"I don't know that we could dig up anything that quickly on him and there's no guarantee it would work," I said. "We have five days until the Landsmeet."

Riordan sighed and sat down. "I don't see another way. What do we tell Alistair?"

This was just horrible. I had just reconciled with Alistair. We were friends again; now I had to kill his foster father. "He can't know, of course. I'll just tell him I managed to persuade Loghain. Which is true. We don't need to tell him everything."

"Do you have a plan yet, Sister?"

"Not yet. Let's consult with Zevran. If anyone should know how to pull this off, he would."

~o~o~o~

Note: Thanks for the reviews! They really make my day. It helps me to know if I'm connecting with my audience, so your feedback is always welcome... in fact, craved.

(Spoiler Alert for The Stolen Throne) The reference to Maric losing almost everything was in the book "The Stolen Throne" when Maric falls in love with Katriel, an Orlesian bard who is spying for the usurper. She betrays him horribly and the rebellion is nearly lost, almost everyone is killed.