All she could hear through the swishing of the trees was a voice calling for something. There were no obvious words, but the intent was there - wanting attention and growing more indignant for not receiving it. Rosamund didn't much care at the moment, her fingers drifting up and down a small sprig of herbs. She wanted to pretend she wandered away from their caravan to pick them, but in truth she had no idea they were here.

At least her selecting a knife off the rack served some purpose, as she exhumed the thick and sticky stems. With a quick slice, Rosie lifted the fragrant herb that smelled of licorice and bore tiny, white flowers. At that she paused, her lips falling into a frown while she glared at the poor sprig as if it too betrayed her without thought.

The voice was growing closer, more easily finding her. She could move on, deeper into the woods to have a few more moments to herself. For three days she had to act as if everything was fine. They'd allow a bit of concern about whatever political maelstrom they were about to walk into, and maybe even a tear or two for their deceased squire but anything more drew questions from those around her. In particular, they wondered why the princess' dour turns seemed to coincide with an assassin vanishing into the fog.

"Rossie!"

Blinking off her hazy focus upon the white flowers, she whipped her head up in surprise. No 'My Lady' or 'Your Majesty.' That could only mean two people were chasing her down on foot. As she turned away from the dip into an underground cave, Rosie eyed up Myra with her cheeks pink and hair tugged back tight in ribbons.

"My," she began, before scrunching up her face and trying to lift her voice to something approaching happy. It wouldn't reach that high, but anything was better than eternal sorrow. "What are you doing out here?"

Her sister skidded to a halt, a hand wrapped around a stick she must have plucked from the ground. "Er, I was gonna ask you that. Wait, did you do that on purpose?"

Rosie shrugged, but couldn't deny a small smile at the thought.

"You know too many trixsy moves from all those fancy political schools."

"Not enough, I fear," she mumbled, her heart barely thudding in her chest. The tears festered inside of her rotting like rancid milk because she couldn't let them out. If anyone knew, if anyone cared, they'd care a great deal about this. And they'd be...disappointed in her choices. For certain.

Myra, as flippant as a sunbeam, drifted around the small glenn. She jabbed at a few of the similar herbs with her stick before turning to Rosie. "Are you taking clippings? What in thedas for?"

"Every little bit helps," she whispered, already bent over to slice off another.

"Well, yeah, but you know what that is?"

"Elfsbane," Rosie smiled from her botany lesson before turning over to her half-blood sister. "It's...it doesn't really hurt elves."

"Duh," Myra sidled closer, "be right silly if a tiny plant could do something to a full grown person. Unless it's poisonous, but then... Why's it called that?"

"Superstition. People thought that hanging it around your windows and doors would prevent elves from breaking into your home."

At that she snorted and rolled her eyes harder, "Sure. It's the elves ya got to look out for. Not like the humans are gonna take all your stuff and kick you to the alienage and be all - you should be grateful! I mean, um..."

Rather than let her dangle, Rosie sighed, "I understand. Though aren't you more human than not?"

"Sorta-ish. I forget how it all is supposed to work. Doesn't mean I can't care, though."

"You have that luxury," she muttered rolling the elfsbane into her pocket to save for later. It wasn't good for much beyond adding a bit of spice to tea. Whatever affect it supposedly had on elves must have been back in the old days because none cared now.

"So..." Myra bounced back and forth on her heels, "I can't help but notice there's someone missing from the ol' royal train coming 'round the mountain. If we had a mountain, aside from the Frostbacks. We should get more mountains."

Rosie wanted to whip her head away in annoyance, but it was difficult with her sister. Perhaps that was why, despite Myra being the bastard, born of the only woman the King loved, that Rosamund and Cailan couldn't hate her. She was so much like their father not just in face but thought, words. He'd have done the same in her place here, obfuscated with some silly comment about nothing in particular. And all his children adored him for it.

"What of you?" Rosie tried to turn the scrutiny back, but Myra didn't understand.

"Pretty sure I'm still in the caravan, unless this is your way of kicking me out."

She said it with a laugh, but there was always that otherness clinging to her. Neither elf nor human. Neither legitimate nor hidden bastard. Myra was confounding in so many ways. "I mean...your heart and it's," Rosie sucked in a breath at the word. "I should not have brought up the heart."

"Yeah," Myra thudded a fist to her chest, "feels like I got kicked by a mule. And a healthy one too, not like the sickly thing Bann Loren had when I was little. What about you?"

"I'm fine," Rosie said so fast Myra folded her arms and glared. She may have received many things from their father, but her glare was not one of them. Hers cut to the quick like green acid. "As well as I can be."

"What happened?"

"In truth, I don't know," she'd gone over it numerous times in her mind, trying to understand where everything fell apart. What she could have done differently, how she could have convinced Anjali to stay. With her? With the caravan? Why? Because she...

"You were in pretty deep, huh?" Myra asked, her normally flighty voice weighed down in its mirrored pain.

Rosie began to shake her head no, but with each twist it pivoted until she was emphatically agreeing. She didn't want to be. It was a moment here and there, nothing more. Not as if she'd dreamed of umber eyes examining her naked body, or waited in anticipation for each touch of soft crimson lips. That would be foolish.

Congratulations, Princess Rosamund. You crowned yourself the fool.

Wiping a hand under her nose, she focused on her sister instead, "You were as well."

"Yeah," Myra flinched, not happy about having herself so exposed to anyone, "I guess. I dunno. I just..."

"Do you want to talk about what happened?" Rosie extended a hand she should have before. How long had her sister been hiding the breakup from her, from everyone?

"Not really."

"It's good to cleanse the soul."

Green eyes rolled at her, her sister glaring at the phony aphorism. "Maybe, but...it's complicated stuff."

"He didn't," Rosie reached over to wrap a protective hand around her sister, "there wasn't any pressure?"

Snorting, Myra laughed, "From Gavin? Because he's sooo the type."

"Then you...?"

"No, he did it. Sort of. It's...complicated, okay. Look, I get you're trying to be all big sister to distract yourself but I'm good. Not great, but fine. Talked it all out with Bryn."

Myra was trying to smile it away, but Rosie frowned deeper. Her elven friend wasn't even kin, but that was who Myra treated as her sister. Even called her as such. So while Rosie was left in the dark, Myra ran to her friend and bared her heart and pain.

Staggering back, Rosie tried to brush off a silly tear clinging in her eyes at the thought. Myra caught on quick, her locked off stance fading to concern, "Shit, Rossie, what is it? Her?"

"No," she licked her lips, feeling more wounded than it should be possible for a heart to be and still remain beating. "I thought...I understand, no I don't. Do you think me so cold and uncaring that I wouldn't care to talk about you - help you when you're in pain?"

"Ah shit, no, that ain't it at all." Myra stamped around, easily kicking apart a few seedlings that barely took root. "It's just, you were busy with stuff. You're always busy with stuff, important crown stuff, and I didn't want..."

Six years was a great gulf of difference for the two. While Rosie was figuring out schooling and forming friendships, Myra was mastering walking and how to put food in her mouth. By the time Myra reached the point of talking and building her personality, Rosamund was off to various finishing schools. Though their father would sometimes stop by and bring his other children as well, it was for brief spurts. And Myra, the little girl with the big blond curls was always running off and getting into trouble.

She hoped that as they grew older the differences would shrink, and maybe she'd be more than an occasional groan and object of authority for her sister. Perhaps that was never to be the case no matter what she did.

"I can't," Myra sputtered out, breaking Rosamund from her glare, "talk about what really happened. It's...it's-"

"Complicated?"

"Yes, and also bad. Not that he did anything bad, or I did. Just...a secret, kinda thing."

"Does your elven sister know?"

"Some of it," Myra confessed before wincing, "but not all. I don't, just trust me, okay. I didn't think you'd want to have to listen to me bawling my eyes out, or going on and on in despair, so..."

She drew her tongue over her teeth seeming to count them in thought. "I figured you were too busy with your girlfriend to want to simmer in my sadness."

Rosie gulped in the air, her head dropping low, "The Maker has a way of humbling us."

"Shit, Ros, you didn't need no humbling. Ah crap, do not tell me you're taking this as a sign."

"Why not? Is that not how I should read it?"

"What? Fucking no. Come on, you were with one girl. One. There's like...okay, I don't know how many girls are out there, but a lot. I could ask Lunet when I get back to Denerim cause she'd know, much to her wife's consternation."

Rosie couldn't stop the laugh at her sister's attempt to race in tell her to buck up. It was so genuine, Myra truly thinking that all she needed was another pretty face to revive her heart. "The old there's plenty of fish in the sea routine?"

"Okay, a mermaid might be tricky, but I heard of a guy up north..." she began before cracking a smile. "Don't, just keep out here with us, okay."

"Myra, I don't have a blighted clue what you're talking about."

"That's fair, I'm not sure myself. But I'm tired of crying, of curling into a ball and doing my best to not act like it feels like someone slapped me in the side of the head."

"As if all the color of your world's been drained."

"Your stomach's trying to puke itself," she nodded.

"And happiness is as impossible as walking on a cloud."

"Ya know," Myra jabbed at the air, "you could try to walk on a cloud, but I think you'd get one step before woooosh. Aaahh. Boom."

Rosie sighed, wanting to throw her arms around her sister. She knew Myra's thoughts on such family contact and settled for a half hug instead, "There are other boys out there too."

"Maybe," Myra muttered, "none as cute as him though."

"On that I shall have to take your word."

"You have to at least give me he's got pretty lips. Super pretty lips, that are warm and squishy, but strong too..." her head hung down to her chest and she groaned, "And I just made myself feel worse. Great."

Crimson tattoos that crisscrossed her body, hips that curled outward towards a supple bottom. Calves thin but powerful that ended in long and lean feet with surprisingly cute little nails, rounded like plump kittens. Oh Maker. She was in deeper than she feared.

"I wish I could mourn, cry, do all that stuff you mentioned," Rosie blubbered, wanting to be free of all of this mess, "But..."

"Are all them standing around ladies giving you shit for it?"

"They don't know, aside from Tess, but she's playing along with the others."

Myra extended a hand as if she had plans to take over the entire forest, "Here's what we do. First, we steal a bottle of booze from the stores."

"I'm princess. I don't need to steal."

"Psh, and I'm the bastard daughter who the King let's get away with murder. I could walk right up to the steward and say, 'give me that bottle.' The stealing's the fun part. Then we get drunk, cry over some really treacly story. Bryn has a few."

Rosie snorted at the thought, "My ladies in standing are practically drowning in them. Which heartache do you want? Chevalier who is promised to another, Chevalier who's a total arse the whole time but she loves him anyway, or Chevalier who dies just after their consummation and of course she winds up pregnant?"

"I knew the court reading was bad, but...what's with all the Chevaliers? Don't tell me they got a thing for horses up in the higher stands cause..." Myra began to chuckle at the thought before shuddering. "No, what we need is one of Bryn's old elf stories. Everyone's bonking everyone before a fight breaks out and kills half the cast. Lots of eye gouging to get through though."

"Sounds..." Rosie scrunched her nose up, not in a particular mood for graphic violence. But maybe that was what her sister needed at the moment. "Like a plan," she amended with a smile.

Myra snickered and sighed. Together both sisters began to move out of the clearing, when a low growl erupted from the trees. Myra froze, her head swiveling around in concern while Rosie tried to follow suit. Another growl broke, lower and to the left.

"Uh, Rosie, you have any idea what noise wolves make before they're about to attack?"

"No, why?"

Her sister's eyes bugged out and she pointed towards the underbrush, "Cause we just found out."

Snarling from the dark shadows of the forest emerged two wolves. They looked battered, mange having rotted their hair to reveal scabs of grey skin below. Ones ear was ripped off but both mouths were full of fangs being bared down upon what could be the first sign of food in some time.

"Myra," Rosie tried to slide in front of her younger sister, but they were pinned by the wolves. They could try to run, not that it would help. Her heart pounded, Rosie glancing quickly from both rabid mouthed beast to try and keep them in view. Together both sisters stepped back, slowly, as if the wolves would suddenly realize they didn't want to eat them.

"Nice doggies," Myra whispered in a calm voice, when one snapped, its jaws biting through the air where her hand had been. "Okay, not so nice. They looking a little...bad to you?"

"Not the time to care, Myra," Rosie muttered. She drew her fingers tighter around the knife in her hands, but it was at best five inches long. It would strike, but not without putting her hand and arm right in the wolf's biting range. Why didn't she take her sword with her?

"P..." Rosie tried to swallow the shake in her breath, "please tell me you have a weapon."

"Stick," Myra raised her little stolen switch as it could do anything. She lifted the branch up a bit and waved it towards her wolf, the notched ear. It didn't even blink at the leaves and twigs scraping near its eye. Something was very wrong with them.

"Oh," Myra smiled wide, "and this." While the wolf was distracted by her stick attack, she lifted up her fist boiling in red fire. Rosie had only seen her use if effectively once, and even then it ended in disaster. What if she set the woods aflame? They'd be trapped here in the middle of a forest fire.

Sliding to the side, Myra waved her burning fist right in front of the wolf and a lick of flame more controlled than usual, leapt from her fingers and right onto the mangey fur. It shrieked in pain, forgetting the food before it and scrabbled into its brother. Fires danced from one wolf to another, both now panicking as the stomach churning scent of burning hair filled the air. Smoke billowed from the attack, tinging the crisp forest air and making it hard to breathe. Both wolves were dancing on their paws, eyes wide in terror, while Myra kept her hand raised and fingers out.

"Myra!" Rosie called, coughing into her fist as smoke burned its way down her throat.

"I...I can't close it off." The wolves were shrieking now in pain and fear, both slamming into trees and underbrush they'd no doubt set on fire. Twisting around fast, Rosie slammed her hand over Myra's flaming fingers. Heat singed her flesh, as if she foolishly touched a griddle, but when her sister's fist closed it vanished along with the flames.

Alive but burned badly, the wolves yelped and scattered into the woods. If they were lucky, they'd find a river to leap into. And why do you care about mangy wolves that were about to kill you? When your sister and her need to show off nearly...

Rosie twisted to Myra, about to berate her for letting the spell get out of hand, when she spotted fear rising in her eyes. She didn't mean for it to happen. It was an accident, just like at the party. "My..." Rosie moved to wrap a hand around her to calm her down, when she heard a new growl. Louder, deeper, and moving at top speed.

This wolf was white as a ghost, its paws barely treading through the ground as it lopped into a run right at the two that tried to kill its pack. Rosie spun from Myra who was struggling to find a spell, but there wasn't time. She could barely think save stepping in the way of her younger sister.

Ice blue eyes glared murder at Rosie, the wolf's lips ripped back to reveal fangs about to plunge into her neck or stomach. It was huge...the wolf easily 200 pounds and longer than Rosie herself. She had no hope, and no chance. Sensing the blood in the air, the wolf leapt off its paws, jaws extended to sink right into her flesh while its body would crush both girls under it.

Her hand lashed out, the knife jamming upwards just as the wolf was about to bite down. It slipped up through the mouth, teeth scraping against Rosie's wrist as the blade, guided by the wolf's body, impaled itself through the skull and struck right through its brain.

A scream ripped out of her throat, her arm throbbing in pain as the wolf's body crashed into both her and Myra. Without anything to brace them, they both smashed into the ground under two hundred pounds of white fur and bone. Dear sweet Maker! Her back cried out as it bounced into Myra's bony body. Oh no. What if she crushed her sister?

"Myra?"

"Still alive," she gasped. "You?"

"Yes," Rosie laughed, her arm literally down the throat of a wolf. A dead wolf whose hot blood was scorching out of the knife wound and down her wrist and forearm. Very alive, and slowly being crushed. "Trapped a bit, but the creature's dead."

"This is a bit?" Myra groaned. Rosie could feel her sister trying to push from inside her prison. "You have to shove it off, Rossie. I can't. I can't get you off me."

Okay. She could do this. Or she'd die under a wolf's carcass. Rosie tried to yank her knife out, but it was stuck inside the skull. Abandoning it for later, or someone else to retrieve, she placed both her hands upon the wolf's still chest and began to shove. Its own blood stained the snow white fur, and as foolish as it was, she felt a tear rising in her eyes at such a beautiful animal being ended.

Not the time, Rosamund. Get out, then mourn. "Ah! Come on. Come on. Come on!" she cried, twisting the bones and warm fur with everything inside of her. It barely budged, the dead head flopping onto her chest, its bloated tongue lolling close to her cheek.

"I can't," she gasped. She wasn't the warrior in the family, she played at it. Little Rosie and her little sword, running around pretending she could take on an army but she knew the truth. Her parents kept her out of any real combat because she...she was terrible at it. She was too short, too slow, too bottom heavy, too...

"What the shit are you talking about?" Myra shouted, mercifully still breathing even with her sister compressing her lungs. Don't stop. Maker, her father would end her if they lost Myra. "You so can."

"No, I'm not-" tears burned in her eyes.

"Yes, you are. Whatever this are is. Wolf wrangler. For shit's sake, you kicked that Lord Eldon's ass and made it look like you were barely even fighting."

"That was..."

"It's not different. You get mad, you get scary, same as the rest of us. So get scary!"

It was a foolish peptalk, but Rosie did as told. She thought of all the people who talked above her, who treated her like pretty furniture, who...walked out on her and left her heart crumpled in the dirt. A feral roar erupted out of Rosamund's throat, her fingers digging into the meat and fur of the wolf as she shoved with every muscle in her body. It lifted a bit, allowing Rosie to fill her lungs before the damn thing finally slid straight off of them and onto the ground beside.

"Ah, ha ha ha!" Rosie laughed, jabbing a finger at the wolf, "I did it. I conquered you."

"That's great, now..."

"Oh, right," she tumbled off of her sister who looked rather flattened. "Myra are you-?" Rosie reached over to try and help her, when Myra sat straight up.

A great laugh rumbled in her chest as she drew her hands back through her hair. There was a little shake at the end of her fingers, while Rosie's heart was beating so fast she feared it might explode. "Damn, Ros, that's..." she looked over at the wolf and whistled, "you did that. Ain't no one gonna mess with you when they see that. Ooh, you should call yourself the Wolf Queen. Maybe make a crown out of its head. Or a cape."

"My..." Rosie waved a hand through the air and took in a deep breath, "I'm just glad we're both alive, and I'd really like to throw up now."

"Bushes are over there," Myra laughed, jabbing towards them.

She wasn't kidding, her stomach churning at the thought of how close she skidded towards death. But instead of giving in, Rosie got to her feet and offered a hand to Myra. As the two of them stood, Rosie reached over to give her sister a pat on the back.

But Myra surprised her. Not caring about awkwardness or their strange family ties, Myra wrapped her arms fully around her sister in a great hug. It stilled Rosie's heart a moment, her forehead meeting against her tall sister's shoulder while they thanked the Maker and each other for surviving.

"Maforath's spotted pecker!" a voice called from behind them. Rosie wiped off her tears and moved to look at whatever soldier found them, only to have her jaw hit the ground.

Anjali stood there, her eyes wide as she stared in shock at the dead white wolf, before they whipped back to Rosie. Not caring that she walked away, or what she did to her, the assassin ran over and began to babble, "Are you hurt? There's blood. Maker's sake, I...I ran as fast as I could, but..." Her fingers curled up Rosie's gore caked hand, slathering it in love, almost as if they didn't want to leave.

But she did.

Rosamund ripped her arm away from hers and glared, "What are you doing here?"

"I saw the fireball and feared that...I knew she'd be here," Anjali jabbed a finger at Myra who had both her hands digging into Rosie's shoulders. "But you were here and if..."

"That doesn't seem to jibe with what you said earlier. I thought you had no more use for me," Rosie glared at the woman while she felt it in her heart. The part terrified that she would die in this glen wanted to curl up in Anjali's arms and babble incessantly about how grateful she was to see her. The princess refused to bend.

"I never..." Anjali froze a moment, her fingers twisting around her daggers as if to help her think.

"You left her!" Myra spat out, suddenly jabbing right at the assassin. Anjali glared, her lip rising but there was no denying the truth. "Make stupid faces all you want, I don't care. I won't let you hurt my sister again."

"Again? It wasn't supposed to be..." the woman broke down, her head collapsing to her chest.

Rosie tried to take command of the situation, her voice cooling as she eyed up her ex-lover, "What are you even doing here? I thought you were going to track down your friend alone?"

"I...I thought about it, then I realized-"

"You had no idea where she was," Rosie filled in, but Anjali's tear filled eyes snapped up to hers causing the princess to gasp in shock.

"That I couldn't stand the idea of you being in pain, in danger, or worse. What if she...? She could pull some trap and you'd be caught in it, and...and I couldn't live with myself."

"Have you been following us the whole time?" Rosie cried, her fingers digging tight into her palms. For once she wanted to hit something as much as Myra did. All this time she mourned silently to herself, while Anjali was just off in the distance watching like some demented ghost.

"What in the ever-loving void is wrong with you?" Myra spoke up for her. "You don't dump someone then follow 'em around. That's what creepy stalkers do. Who I help put down."

"I bet you do, flint strike," her eyes hunted over Myra who took to the nickname about as well as Gavin did.

Rosie didn't need this. She could let her sister have a crack at Anjali, no doubt it'd end about as well as the squire fighting her did. But it wouldn't solve the problem. "Myra," she turned to her sister who was snarling more than the wolves, "Let me handle this."

"I ain't leaving."

"Just...give me a few minutes with her? Please?" Rosie begged, her hands clasped together.

Her sister grimaced at the look and sighed, "Okay, but just a few, and I'm going to stand right here ready to fireball her at the first word."

"Thank you," Rosamund said, while mentally praying it didn't come to that. She didn't touch Anjali's arm but walked away from her sister and the dead wolf.

By the time she reached beyond Myra's hearing, Anjali whispered, "You won't really let her set me on fire, will you?"

"No," Rosie shook her head, "she's more likely to catch the forest in doing so." The assassin didn't laugh at her joke, probably because it wasn't one. "Why? Why leave? Why make it such a huge issue about how only you can stop Tenna? How you're the only one to put an end to her dastardly plans? Only to wind up hanging around on the edges of our caravan?"

She expected a smart ass remark, probably due to her life around her father and Myra, but Anjali folded in on herself. From the moment they met, she'd been larger than life. Always right on the edge of Rosie's vision, not in a creepy slinking way but a comforting sort. The woman seemed unbreakable, but she crumbled now right at Rosie's feet.

"When I abandoned my mother's place for me in this world, I turned my back on everything that life entailed... My family, my friends, my own village."

"You can't return?" she gasped.

Anjali simply shrugged as if she made peace with it long ago. "It happens. A life without boundaries, I belonged to no one and no one belonged to me. I thought in Tenna I found a similar soul. She couldn't return home either and she was less than pleased with her mother."

"Wishing her dead certainly counts," Rosie mused to herself.

"I didn't think it was... No, I suppose there were times when I was sporting bloody blisters in my shoes and hungry from a lack of work that I spoke of killing my own as well. Desperation can choke out empathy rather quickly."

"Why are you telling me this?" she glanced over at Myra who was prodding her stick into the dead wolf.

Anjali breathed in deep, her fingers wrapped around herself in comfort, "Because I was wrong. Tenna is a dark mirror of what I could become. I'm tired. Tired of running from town to town, job to job, hoping that somewhere I'll find a distraction long enough to hold my attention. A moment here or there to make life worth waking up for."

Swallowing the heart spun words, Rosie shifted in her stance, subconsciously mimicking Anjali's pose as if she was about to embrace her dangling hands. The assassin pawed at her cheek and sighed, "I've done a lot of bad, I know it. I...will own it when pressed," her head lifted and Rosie started to find tears dripping out of those umber eyes, "but I couldn't let you get hurt. I couldn't bear the thought of you...of you chipping a nail much less, for the love of our Lady, what were you doing out here near a nest of blight wolves?"

Rosie blinked in surprise at the sudden change in venom as if Anjali transformed into her personal spirit guardian, "We didn't know..."

Anjali threw her hands up in the air and spun around in anger, "What's the point of having knights if they can't even suss out a blighted wolf pack running around? Hm? And," her anger faded in an instant to pure sympathy, "your arm." She reached towards Rosie's blood soaked one and she let her lift it. "Your beautiful arm with those stark blue veins."

"It's not so bad, most of it's the wolf's," Rosie tried to explain turning towards the dead creature, but Anjali wouldn't stop stroking her fingers up and down the blood encrusted skin. Maybe she couldn't. Maybe she was already blaming herself for not being close enough to stop it.

"Why are you really here?" Rosie whispered, her eyes honing in on Anjali's that kept staring at Rosie's barely scraped skin.

"As I said, if Tenna hurts..." the assassin began before she lifted her gaze and fell mere inches into Rosie's.

"No," Rosie flexed her fingers in Anjali's grip, causing the caked on blood to splinter and flake. With her clean hand, she drew them towards the back of Anjali's head, "Why are you here?"

"I can't leave you," Anjali gasped, her lips trembling as the words fell free, "I tried and..."

Tugging into the nape of her neck, Rosie plunged those plump lips onto hers. They fluttered a moment, tears still tumbling inside of them, but as the kiss lengthened Anjali melted into the woman she knew. The woman she wanted to trust again. Lapping along Anjali's bottom lip, Rosie pressed another kiss - more succulent than before - to her salty mouth. She'd been sweating in the run to save her life, or crying at the thought of failing.

"You did, and it hurt me," Rosie said, their foreheads brushing tight to each other. "More than I thought possible."

"I can't ask you to forgive..." Anjali whispered, her eyes shut tight while her tongue licked against the lips Rosie drank from.

"You can try, Anjali," she curled both her hands against her cheeks, the crimson of the wolf's blood matching against the scarlet tattoo. "Stop running from your problems. Stay with me, help me."

"Be with you?" she asked, her eyes filling with hope.

The answer caught in her throat. With their bodies pressed together, an image Rosie never thought would happen again, she wanted to shout yes. But she remembered the pain of Anjali walking away. She wouldn't change overnight, she'd still be startled by the smallest setback and want to run. It'd take years for her to find the bones to settle down somewhere safe and build a home.

It would be smart for her to cut Anjali out of her life now. To let her return home, or go back to her days of flitting from job to job. For whatever reason, Rosie turned back to Myra and her sister's advice flashed in her mind. She risked it once, what was once more?

"Give me time," she answered. "I have to trust before I can..."

"Earning a beautiful princess' trust," Anjali tried to smile through her tears, "I'm not even certain how I managed it once. But I will try, for you, Sapheela."

She wanted to kiss her again, but Rosie stepped back. Time would require a cooler head, and sex would only mess with it, convince her to fall deeper than she should. Wiping a hand over her forehead, Rosie paused at the sight of the dried blood still stuck to her skin. "We should return to camp," she ordered to Myra who hopped to her feet.

"We ain't leaving this thing, are we? Be a waste of a good pelt, and meat, and an awesome crown. Come on, you know you want to," she darted back and forth on her feet in excitement at the image. As if the rest of thedas didn't already think of Ferelden as barbarians, imagine the titters if their princess began to wear a wolf's head upon hers.

Anjali walked closer to the wolf, causing Myra to narrow her eyes, but she didn't attack. "Nothing?" Anjali laughed.

"I knew Rosie'd take you back, she's a soft touch like that. But you do it again and..." Myra didn't raise fire on her fingers, but jabbed to the dead great wolf.

"Noted," Anjali muttered. She bent over and lifted apart the wolf's jaws. Reaching deep in with her own arm, she gave a great grunt and extracted the knife Rosie embedded into its skull. "Here," she tossed it to the princess who barely caught the bloody blade. "Adds to the story if they see how tiny your weapon was to take down the beast."

Myra cracked up a moment, her laugh splitting the trees. "But not if you're a boy, eh? Tiny weapon, cause... Oh come on, it's funny. Don't glare at me, Rossie, it's funny."

"As you say, sister," Rosie smiled, barely able to suppress the laugh Myra was digging for. "If you wish to keep the wolf, how do we get it out of here?"

"We could carry it together?" Anjali threw out, staring at the massive thing, its gnashing teeth and stabbing claws all dangling at the ready to swipe apart skin. Rosie sighed at the idea but it seemed to be all they had.

It was Myra who popped up and groaned, "You're both daft. There's an entire caravan of boys whose job is to carry shit. I'm gonna go get them to help."

That...made sense. Rosie turned to Anjali who shrugged, seemingly impressed at the logic in Myra's words. Her sister began to run out of the clearing to their camp when she suddenly shouted, "And try to refrain from snogging 'cause I don't know who all will be coming with me!"

Rosie's cheeks turned beet red at the thought, her eyes darting over to Anjali who had a soft smile on her lips. They didn't kiss, the princess serious about taking it slow, but Rosie let her fingers slip into Anjali's for the duration of their time alone with a snow white wolf.