It was Alistair who opened the door of Rìona's bedchamber, when Zevran knocked for the benefit of any nearby servant who might question his simply strolling in. It wasn't nighttime, after all, when he might slip in unnoticed. He knew quite well how much depended upon discretion right now. He must act as though this were a purposeful conference with the Grey Wardens, rather than anything more intimate.
Rìona was pacing furiously before the hearth, while Alistair took up position leaning against the mantle with his arms crossed over his chest. In a nearby chair, the wet-nurse suckled little Ella, for all that Rìona still attended that task whenever she could. Clearly, right now, she was too distraught to be of any comfort to the babe.
"Muirne," Alistair said calmly, "perhaps you might take Ella to Mistress Wynne and Mistress Leliana's chambers while we confer, at least until Lady Cousland is less agitated?"
Zevran's eyebrows lifted in silent approval. Did Alistair realize, he wondered, just how much more easily he was using that tone of polite command, these days? He was beginning to speak like a nobleman, like a king, rather than a peasant boy born on the wrong side of the blanket.
Murmuring an assent, the wet-nurse detached the babe from her breast and laced her bodice, carrying Ella from the room.
"I'm going to rip that vile bastard's heart out with my bare hands!" Rìona snarled once the chamber door had closed. "The nerve of him, coming here and declaring himself Teyrn of Highever! I shall see him to the Void before I ever allow him to profit from such a claim!"
"All right," Alistair said slowly, "I'm behind this plan so far. But—keeping in mind there's still a lot about politics that I don't know—I'm reasonably certain threatening him in front of witnesses wasn't the best idea. At least, Arl Eamon didn't think so."
"Your arl has the moral certitude of a pox-ridden rat!"
Alistair spread his hands in a placating, 'I'm-harmless' gesture. "Just hazarding a guess, but maybe insulting our host, and strongest ally,in his own home isn't a great plan, either."
Rìona drew herself up, sucking in a deep breath to turn her rage upon Alistair, and then caught herself. With a visible effort, she subsided, hanging her head as the tension drained from her rigid body. "You're right. You're right! Maker! I'm behaving like a madwomen. Since Ella's birth—" She sighed, shaking her head. "Wynne says it's common, and that it will likely pass in a few more weeks, but I'm not going to do us any good as a political asset in this state."
"Tell me what it is you need, mi Guardiana." Zevran did not dare call her by any more tender endearment by the light of day. Not until matters were settled with their Landsmeet. "You have said I am not to kill this man, Howe, that it is a task for your hands alone. Then we must move against him, yes?"
"Yes, but we must have cause," she said with an edge of frustration to her tone. "Otherwise it looks like premeditated murder. I could call him out in a duel on the floor of the Landsmeet chamber, after I bring my grievances before them, but frankly that's a great deal to leave to chance. He's a veteran of the Orlesian occupation and my father said he was a capable enough fighter, and my skills with my daggers are, as ever, sadly lacking. And frankly, I don't want him spreading his poison about my family to the nobles arriving in Denerim between now and the Landsmeet. We need a justification for confronting him outside the Landsmeet."
Restlessly, she began to pace again. Thankfully, however, she was deep in thought, rather than raging as she had been before. "We need to visit the contacts we made here in Denerim the last time. Sergeant Kylon, Master Ignacio, Slim Couldry. We need to find out what Howe has been up to, seek out some excuse for cornering him in his lair."
"Then that's what we'll do," Alistair said with a decisive nod. "Arl Eamon has told us we should sniff around Denerim and try to figure out what Loghain has been scheming, to get something more we can use against him in the Landsmeet. Shouldn't be that hard to get word on Howe's activities as well, right?"
"No, it shouldn't. All right, that's what we'll do. Zevran, please fetch Wynne. And Leliana, also. We'll put her skills as a spy to work for us."
There was a change that came over Rìona, when she donned her armor. Not the Dalish set; the arl's gruff hemming and hawing about needing to find her more appropriate armor—and Rìona's mounting defiance in the face of his prudery—had finally convinced Alistair to take action and play the mediator.
The problem was, there had been no armor in the arl's armory that fit Rìona, and the set she had worn before acquiring her Dalish armor had been consigned to Bodhan Feddic as they left the Brecilian Forest. It had been Leliana's suggestion that they question the old village leatherworker to see if he'd sold the set of armor Rìona had traded him when they first came to Redcliffe because it had been too easily recognized. As it turned out, he had not for, though the arl's forces were badly in need of armor, there were none of Rìona's stature and size. And so Alistair purchased the armor back from the leatherworker, using the arl's coin and mischievously paying the old man a few sovereigns more than strictly necessary.
Zevran had never seen Rìona in this armor, which had been made for her, commissioned by her father. She looked every inch the noblewoman in it, and she carried herself as such. Tears had flashed in her eyes, the first time she gingerly ran her fingers over the laurel-wreath crest on the pauldrons. She'd been so ashamed and distressed at her disgrace, these past months but, wearing the armor, she remembered her proud lineage and bore herself accordingly.
She wasn't the only one. Grimly accepting his role as contender for the throne, Alistair had set aside the armor he'd acquired at Soldier's Peak with the Warden-Commander's crest emblazoned on the chest, and begun to wear the armor which had once belonged to his brother. He carried his father's sword and wore on his back the shield bearing the device of his own bloodline. While Rìona seemed to come into herself, wearing the crest of her house, Alistair was still distinctly uncomfortable doing the same. And yet he did so dutifully, and in the process shouldered a burden he'd never wanted to bear.
The change in Rìona's demeanor was reflected in their companions' behavior as well, as they remembered that it was Rìona who had led them through so many of their endeavors. Alistair was still nominally in command, and he did not defer to her as he once had. Rather, they began to act as partners, sharing the burden between them.
They made a regal pair, Zevran thought, taking pride in beholding them. And naturally, there were political benefits to the fact that they looked the part.
Thus arrayed, Rìona held her head high as they left Arl Eamon's Denerim estate. Anonymity was no longer a concern; all of Ferelden knew who they were and why they had come. They would make no attempt to hide it.
They sent Leliana off to survey the haunts of the nobility; the Gnawed Noble tavern, among others. There, she was to blend in and listen quietly to the concerns of the nobles pouring into Denerim for the Landsmeet. It would provide Rìona with insight into their particular grievances against Loghain, which she could then play upon to win their support.
After sending the bard on her way, they ventured into the city.
The refugee situation had gotten far worse, since they had last been to Denerim.
"Loghain has had to open the ports, to let in the ships that will carry away the few refugees with coin to pay for passage," Rìona remarked, as they surveyed the bustling docks, packed with desperate people bearing all their possessions in ragged sacks on their backs. "Not only Denerim, but Amaranthine and Gwaren as well. Rumor has it he won't open Highever port, though, as he considers it too great a security risk, being closest to Orlais."
For every refugee with coin to seek their fortune in other lands, there were fifty more who would never be so fortunate. The refugee camp outside the city gates was sprawling and squalid on a scale that could scarcely be believed. It made the back alleys of Antiva City look like the gardens of palatial villas. There was now more than one funeral pyre that burned night and day outside the city walls; it was the only way to address the sanitation issue, as people continued to starve to death even after the scant harvest. Disease was rampant, and anyone suspected of carrying the Blight sickness—however untrue the supposition might be—was summarily killed and burned by his own neighbors.
Even in Antiva, where life was corrupt and vicious, things were not like this. The filth and desperation were appalling, and he saw that knowledge reflected on Rìona and Alistair's faces. This was not the homeland they knew.
Once, Zevran might have enjoyed the chaos, the exhilarating sense of impending destruction hurtling toward them all. He would have laughed in its face and invited it to dance, to claim him as well, if it dared.
Now, he was most concerned that such sickness and pandemonium and refuse lay only a mile or so away from the manor house in which his daughter resided, consuming resources that might better be used to keep her safe. Ferelden would be much better off if more of these wretches died, rather than less.
Wisely, he refrained from mentioning either sentiment. No doubt his Wardens would feel dutifully obligated to point out the plight and suffering of all these thousands of pathetic souls. But Zevran knew also, deep down, they shared his selfish concern, and despised themselves a little for it.
"Warden," Sergeant Kylon greeted her with a courteous bow. "It's been months since anyone has heard any news about you. Some rumors had you for dead."
"No, Sergeant, not dead," Rìona said with a small smile. "We've been in Orzammar, putting together an army to defeat the darkspawn. Tell me, what's been happening in Denerim?"
Matters, it seemed, had gotten worse on that front as well. Arl Howe's elite, hand-picked guard were the scourge of the city, making no effort to keep order while adding to the chaos. Rumor had it, the Arl of Denerim was using them to quell political dissent. No one could confirm such claims, of course, but gossip had Howe's men spiriting away anyone who attempted to speak out against the regent's rule to be imprisoned and tortured in Fort Drakon, or in the dungeons of the arl's estate.
"He's keeping prisoners in his estate?" Rìona asked sharply, but Kylon shrugged.
"It's just rumor. No one can confirm it," the sergeant answered. "If he has, there haven't been any survivors or escapees to tell the tale, and the servants at the estate are terrified to talk about what they've seen. When they're not causing disorder in the streets, apparently they spend their time whoring. Sanga refused to let her workers serve any more of the Howe's men, at least until they stormed the Pearl and ransacked the place. Now she serves them because she has no other choice if she wants to keep the brothel open. Word is, not a night passes when they don't take new 'entertainment' to their barracks, and not every whore who goes in comes back out, save on her way to the pyres. Some of those girls they take are only whoring themselves because they're stranded here in Denerim, refugees whose families have died, trying to earn enough coin to take a ship to the Free Marches."
"Maker's breath!" Alistair groaned. "Has this entire city gone mad?"
"That it has, ser," Kylon said with a grim nod. "The nobles don't see, or don't care to see. Most of them won't step foot outside their estates, for fear the Blight sickness might come to Denerim. If they see chaos outside their windows, they assume it's the refugees stirring up trouble. Sometimes it even is. A lot of desperate people here willing to slide a knife between someone's ribs for their next meal. Keeping order's like trying to hold back the tide. Right now it's all I can do to convince these half-wits working for me that I mean what I say when I insist they aren't to follow the example of Howe's guards."
The sergeant stared at Rìona, the blunt-spoken wit which had so charmed her on her first visit to Denerim nowhere in evidence. "Whatever you're going to do to stop this madness, Warden, for the love of the Maker, do it soon."
"Is this enough to go on?" Alistair asked, when they had left the sergeant.
Rìona shook her head. "Not if it's merely rumor. We need some sort of confirmation. Come, let's see what Slim Couldry has been up to."
The thief and agitator turned out to be singularly useless, save for sharing the news that Loghain had commissioned a crown to be made for himself, which he intended to wear at the Landsmeet.
"A bold move," Rìona snorted after Couldry was gone. "Crowning himself before the Landsmeet. So much for the claim he made to Arl Eamon, that Anora rules and he merely leads her armies. He's after more than symbolic power. No monarch has ever sat upon the throne of Ferelden save by consent of the Landsmeet; it would overturn ages of tradition. I'm half tempted to do as Couldry asks and steal the thing, if for no other reason than to puncture his vanity. It's a pity we don't have time to get involved with petty theft."
It was from their unlikely ally, Master Ignacio, that they got confirmation that Howe was indeed taking political hostages. A small boy, the son of a minor bann, had been kidnapped, ostensibly for a ransom which would fatten Howe's starving coffers. Assisting in his rescue was a contract Rìona was only too happy to accept, but it turned out to be more complicated, as Howe's people didn't produce the boy. Howe intended to keep him until after the Landsmeet, to ensure his father's vote pleased the regent. Fortunately, Ignacio knew of this plan, as well, and his people conducted a raid to rescue to the boy, while Rìona and Alistair and their people created a distraction with the false ransom drop.
"What aren't you telling me?" Rìona demanded of Ignacio, when he explained the diversion and its results.
"It is not in the Crows' interest that the archdemon wins," Ignacio replied smoothly. "Therefore, I will say nothing more, save only that the Arl of Denerim is not your only enemy." Ignacio's eyes glinted coldly. "Beware you do not become so focused on one, that you lose sight of the others."
Ignacio left them with that cryptic warning, and they were left to attempt to puzzle out his meaning. Leliana's intelligence provided no assistance in the matter. Many nobles were uneasy with Loghain's regency, but the threat of the Blight had them willing to throw their support to whomever seemed most well-positioned to defeat the darkspawn. Few were actually against the Grey Wardens, however, and none to the extent that they might be this enemy whose threat Ignacio had intimated.
When they returned to Arl Eamon's estate, Rìona was fretting and looked restless and unsatisfied. Zevran had seen her like this before, many times. This was how she had been on their first trip to Denerim, when he'd begun using pleasure to distract her from her troubles for a time. He wished he could do so now, but neither he nor Alistair had shared her bed since they had left Redcliffe, and they had not made love to her since before the birth of the babe. In Redcliffe, she had not been healed from the birth enough for pleasure, and then, once they left for Denerim, it had become a matter of discretion. There were too few rooms in the arl's estate; doubling up was required. Rìona shared her room with the wet-nurse who helped her care for the babe, and Leliana and Wynne shared another. Even he and Alistair did not share pleasure, now, for Sten—too large for any bed within the manor house—slept on a bedroll on the floor of the chamber Zevran and Alistair shared.
There was no privacy to be had, and Zevran found himself thinking wistfully of the leased house to which he and Rìona had retreated on their last visit to Denerim, when in search of privacy. But even that would be a risk, now. She was no longer anonymous, and they did not know who might be watching their activities. It was still weeks until the Landsmeet and, until then, they all had to be careful to conduct themselves with the utmost propriety.
It was frustrating, and infuriating. In a secret gesture of contemptuous defiance, Zevran waited until Sten was snoring on the far end of their bedchamber that night, before slipping under the bedclothes and waking Alistair by taking him into his mouth. Alistair awoke with a gasp and quickly stuffed a pillow over his own face to silence his moans, as his flesh swelled and hardened against Zevran's tongue.
Alistair whispered a curse when Zevran emerged from under the bedclothes sometime later, licking his lips. Pleased with himself, Zevran rolled over and listened to Alistair's breathing resume a more sedate pace. He smirked when Alistair pressed close to his back, lips seeking out the point of his ear as large, questing fingers wrapped around his shaft. Then it was Zevran's turn to bite the pillow.
It was good to have release, but the furtive caresses weren't what he wanted. He wanted to pleasure and enjoy his Wardens properly, and give them ease from their burdens, and he had to remind himself again that it was necessary to bide his time, until their position was secure. Waiting was not a game he enjoyed playing.
The next morning, Alistair and Rìona were summoned into a conference in the arl's study and emerged grim and tense. Rìona's eyes blazed with a determination Zevran had not seen in many months, while Alistair's face was drawn into concerned lines and worry etched his brow. He gestured for Zevran and Leliana to follow them and they made their way to the library and closed the doors, after assuring no else was within.
"We have to go!" Rìona said without preamble.
"Under other circumstances, I would agree," Alistair argued. "But considering what Master Ignacio told us just yesterday about having other enemies, and not fixating on just one, I can't help but think it's a little too convenient that this information should be offered up to us so freely right now."
Leliana beat Zevran to the obvious question. "What information would that be?"
While Rìona paced, Alistair explained. "We just met with a woman who claims to be Queen Anora's maid in the arl's study. She says Anora wants to work with us, that the queen feels the situation with Howe and Loghain has gotten out of control. As a gesture of 'good faith' she's sending word that Howe's men are bragging they have a prisoner from Highever in the dungeons of Howe's estate. From the description, Anora is convinced it might be Lord—Teyrn—Fergus."
"Your brother?" Zevran asked, glancing at Rìona sharply. She looked back over her shoulder slightly, crossing her arms tightly over her chest as though hugging herself, and nodded.
"Maker preserve us!" Leliana breathed. "Is the information reliable?"
"That seems to be the question," Alistair answered unhappily, as Zevran stepped behind Rìona and, despite Leliana's presence, laid a hand upon her shoulder. She stiffened for a moment, before leaning against him.
Leliana said nothing, even when Alistair stepped close and embraced Rìona from the other side.
"It is a trap, Guardiana." Zevran kissed the crown of her head once before pulling away, lest a heedless servant ignore the closed doors and walk in on them. "You know it must be."
"I don't have any choice." Rìona wiped her eyes, pushing Alistair away when he attempted to draw her closer. "If it is a trap, she's used the only bait I cannot possibly refuse. If there's a chance Fergus might be alive, I have to take it."
"If it's a reasonable chance, then sure. But really, how likely is it that he's alive?" Alistair demanded, and Rìona drew herself up as though stung. "He was scouting in the Korcari Wilds, surrounded by a horde of darkspawn. The chances that he made it out are—"
"Slightly higher than the chance that you and I might be plucked off the top of the Tower of Ishal by an ages-old abomination and carried to safety, I'd say," Rìona snapped. "Do we really want to quibble about long odds?"
"All right, that's a fair point," Alistair acknowledged. "But why would Anora offer this information to us? Erlina may have claimed ignorance, but we know Anora has Cailan's letter. She knows you were meant to supplant her. Why would she want to help you, or believe that you'd be willing to work with her?"
"Do we know she has Cailan's letter?" Rìona asked. "For all we know, Gainley's ambassadorial courier met with darkspawn or bandits en route to Denerim. Or perhaps we've finally discovered the one rational person in Denerim who is actually willing to put the Blight ahead of politics and power struggles."
"Guardiana..." Zevran chided softly, and Rìona hung her head.
"I know. I know! I'm sorry. I admit, it's unlikely, at best, that Anora is as sincere as her offer of alliance sounds. But whether she has Cailan's letter or not, whether the information about my brother is valid or not, I have no choice. If there's any chance, no matter how slim, that my brother is alive, I must go and try to free him. After all, what if Howe intends to use Fergus as a hostage against me?"
"Oh, Maker..." Alistair groaned, and Zevran found himself nodding unwillingly.
"We know Howe is taking political hostages to sway the votes of the Landsmeet. What if he threatens to kill Fergus if we don't drop our opposition to Loghain? What shall I do then? Can you possibly conceive of a worse scenario? Shall I condemn my own brother to death? Again?"
Alistair lifted his head. "Again?"
Rìona laughed bitterly. "Oh? Did I never tell you what Duncan had me do? How he neglected to tell me that withdrawing the army from Ostagar would mean abandoning Fergus in the Korcari Wilds until after Cailan had already issued the order?"
"No. You never told me that." Alistair looked stricken.
She began fiddling absently with the binding of a tome on one of the shelves of the library, her voice soft and filled with sorrow. "I begged him to find a way to stop the withdrawal until Fergus could be located, and he refused. Would you put me in the same position, Alistair?"
"Of course not!"
"We knew we'd need to confront Howe one way or the other. We've been looking for a reason to do just that. This is it. This is our reason. Ultimately, it doesn't even matter whether Fergus is actually there or not. This is the excuse we were seeking, to end Howe."
"Perhaps you're right," Alistair conceded. "But what about Ella? Will you put yourself in harm's way—either to rescue Fergus or to fulfill your vendetta against Howe—and leave her an orphan?"
"I have no choice," Rìona said again, softly. "Whether it's Howe or the darkspawn or the archdemon himself, I must leave my babe to fight. And a part of me withers every time I think about it, but what sort of lesson will I be able to teach her about duty, if I fail to do my own?"
"I still don't like it," Leliana fretted. "At least give me an opportunity to scout the estate—a day or two, perhaps—and see if I can get any better information."
"You will scout the estate," Rìona said, drawing herself up in that way she had, that said she was once again shouldering the mantle of command. "One day. I want to know the comings and goings of Howe's guards. The rest of us are going to the Pearl. Howe's men consider it their personal property these days. We're going to 'acquire' some of their armor while they're otherwise engaged. One day, no more. The longer we wait, the longer Howe has to make demands of me in exchange for Fergus' safety."
Sighing, she faced them, her jaw thrusting stubbornly forward. "Tomorrow we make our move."
