Disclaimer: "Dragon Age: Origins" and all its expansions and additional content is the property of Bioware and EA Games. Large portions of written content within the game, as well as Dragon's Age: The Stolen Throne, and Dragon's Age: Calling, are the creation of David Gaider. Original scenarios and characters are used under the creative license of the writer, ItalianEmpress1985. No profit is being made and the following story is for entertainment purposes only.
Words From The Author: I haven't updated in over a month! Shame on me! I really didn't realize it had been so long. I'm in the process of readying a move halfway across the country, and it's a bit . . taxing, to say the least, but my utmost apologies dear readers. I know how antsy I get for a story I enjoy to get updated, and I don't want to be the cause of that antsy feelings in others.
But if anyone is concerned I've lost focus or passion for this story, I absolutely have not. Though writing Gwyneth down in the doldrums isn't quite as fun as writing her when she's a bitch, but she goes through the motions, just like everyone else. Though she'd never admit it, the snot.
Thank you for stopping in. Watch out for low flying dragons!
Chapter Fifty Five:
Ever Onward
I won't be made useless.
Won't be idle in despair.
- Jewel
June 18'th, 9:31, Dragon Age
She sat, humming beneath her breath and sewing without pause, fingers working lovingly at stitches made to the burial sack that held her darling mabari. Daylight suggested a lively day, but beneath that sun, the Queen of Ferelden was less than so. Gwyneth's liveliness was non-existent since she'd hobbled out of her tent, leaning heavily on Alistair's arm and favoring her wounded head and an ankle so wrenched and bruised it was a wonder it wasn't broken. The matter of banshees and what little she knew of them, had been the last length of words the queen had spoken, what scant offerings passed her lips after that, were barely sentences at all, the last a demand for a spare burlap tarp, and to be left in peace with Noble.
No one went near the queen, or interrupted, not daring to from embarrassment or the fear of reaction it would garner. Even her brother kept his distance, having gathered what was left of his men, finding his own peace in the chaos by way of bending his mind around what to do next. Plans it seemed, were not to be very altered.
Fergus refused the use of a cane, though his new captain, a Lord Vartel, offered to carve one from willow wood. The teyrn imagined he could as well, the minor noble born of a line of ancient craftsmen who had carved so skillfully as to defy the title of wood carver, to become, as his father had coined them, wood smiths. Even so, Fergus wouldn't use a cane, he'd stand tall and swallow his injuries down like a man, to show those under his rule, that the same strength was expected of them, in both ability and character. Men of the coast had to have a fortitude to match the land they called home, or risk being swept out to the Waking Sea by an ill tempered summer storm, and summer was indeed upon them.
The Teyrn of Highever sighed, watching the king pace about, discussing something with the newly named First Knight, the same Ser Boughton that had tended to his own injuries and that of his sister. For that, Fergus owed him thanks, and to the king as he'd already offered, but he knew that wasn't the end of it. He had to talk to his brother by marriage, and find a way to accept him as such, because Gwyneth was right. Done was done, and the matter wasn't very likely to be changed simply because of Fergus' displeasure.
Solutions weren't found in standing about with your thumb up your ass, and the Cousland heir had never been one to do so, always raring to go like an unbroken horse at the bit. He cleared his throat as he drew near, catching the king's attention and motioning him over. There'd be some effort made to find at least a fledgling manner of accord between them, but Fergus wouldn't let on so easily. Alistair would have to work for it.
"He seems to be taking things well enough, your new First." That dark red head made a nod in Boughton's direction as the knight knelt before the young Harold, passing him a steaming mug.
"Gwyneth's tea. She always said chamomile tea was best for a heavy heart. I would have asked her first, but to be honest, I don't think she's in the mood to talk about much of anything." Alistair's voice was somber, as low as Fergus had yet heard it, and the teyrn wondered at that, in that there was no victory or the pride that came with it to be heard in the king's tone. He had come out alive, after all, and to fair degree was Gwyneth's hero. Fergus scoffed at that, but there was no such pride to be found, only the same melancholia that seeped into their makeshift camp like water into a leaking boat. Alistair's eyes stared at the queen as if trying to decipher a very difficult puzzle, and Fergus doubted it was the first time his sister had made her husband guess at her mood. She was good at that.
"There'll be no talking to her for awhile now, at least not until she's done with his burial shroud." The teyrn offered, following the same gaze as the king.
"She wants to keep him preserved, we have some tinctures for that in our supplies, Maker be blessed for small favors, that we at least got that wagon out of Greenfell. We bring it in case any of my knights fall on the field, so they can be buried with their families, thought it won't last much past a fortnight." Alistair took a deep steadying breath. "The men I lost in Greenfell . . . I wish I could go back for their bodies."
Fergus understood, even if he knew it to be a foolhardy desire. "Your men and mine both served Ferelden with honor, but their bodies have to remain where they lie. To do anything else right now would put the rest of us at risk."
Alistair nodded, brushing a hand through his hair, the lengthening strands looking bright red-gold in the sun. "I know. I know that, but I still wish it was different."
"Everyone does, but my father often said that if wishes were coin we'd all be wealthier than the Empress of Orlais." The repetition came so easily to Fergus' lips, it was as if Bryce Cousland had only just said it.
Alistair bit back on the retort that Fergus was a fine one to say something like that, considering his family was the wealthiest in the country. Then he remembered that it might not be so anymore, after Rendon Howe ordered the sacking of the other man's home.
"What is to be done, the only thing to be done, is to go forward with what we do have. The Couslands have ever been that way, moving past what defeats life hands to us, to maintain the high ground at whatever cost, to always push forward when lesser men would wait behind for more comfortable days." He narrowed his eyes at the king beside him. "It's a philosophy you'd do well to adopt, if you want to keep your crown."
Alistair's eyes widened in outraged shock, the numbness of his emotions giving way to anger, that Fergus would pick a fight with him again, now of all times. "Are you going to really threaten me? After what we've just been through? Your whole family is mad!"
"You bite your tongue on that, you don't know my family worth a tit!" Fergus snapped, snorting through his nose, before he reined his temper back in. "My family has made the most sense of any one in this country, it's why we are the oldest line still living. With that said, you misunderstand me. That was no threat, but rather advice to keep the true threats at bay. You can't let your failure sour you, even Gwyneth for her grieving knows that. A man pushes forward through the sorrow, or he lets it drag him behind where it will kill him as swift as any sword." His face darkened, stiff with his own grief as Alistair watched him.
"I wish my boy was still living, I'd give my life for that. To see his happy face again, arms open to hug me as he always did. He'd have made a strong Cousland man, sure as the sun he would've, but Howe stole him from me. One of his rat bastard men ran my boy through, Gwyneth managed to tell me that much through her tears. My wife laying there dead beside him, my parents sacrificed soon after to buy my sister time enough to leave." Eyes stung in their sockets like smoke was blowing in Fergus' face, but he sniffed, squeezing them shut before he gathered himself together. "When I went back, most of Castle Cousland was burned, only the stone remained, and I couldn't find the bodies of any of my family, not even my little boy. My own blood, and their burial was no better than the rodents in the pantry that burned in the fire. You can bet your ass that I wish it was different, I wish so fervently that I can't sleep at night for the visions of them, haunting the inside of my eyelids."
Alistair looked away, feeling ashamed over his last words, and humbled beside Fergus' sorrow. He could think of nothing to say to that, but Fergus filled the breach for him.
"But I can't change what has already come to pass. Not by prayers, or blood. What I can do, is go on, take charge of the life that fate has shaped for me. Because my people are counting on me, my sister is counting on me, and Arl Wulff is waiting in Highever for news of Howe's leftovers. I have to move forward, and so do you." His words were weighted but steady, and he leveled his gaze at the king. When he said nothing, Fergus knew he'd gotten to him and let the subject of their talk go elsewhere. He nodded towards Gwyneth, watching as she continued to sew. "She'll be wanting to bury him at home. So you can stop looking at her as if your gaze alone will change her mind." Fergus' breath was low and clipped, turning to the silent, staring king beside him. Despite his words about moving past grief, it seemed clear that he wasn't going to press his sister until she was ready.
"I wasn't looking at her." Alistair's rebuke was too quick to be genuine, and he turned away, gesturing to the small boy, Harold, petting the sheep that had miraculously made it out of Greenfell, tucked away safely in the wagon until they'd let it out to chew on the grass. The boy held out tufts of the long yellow-green blades, the pink mouth of the sheep opening to take them away. "He's a brave boy. Ser Boughton told me he doesn't have any other family, or at least none that he knows about." Alistair's strongest suit might not have been artfully changing the subject, but the honesty in his statement made it easier.
"Mmm." Fergus rubbed at his chin in thought, nodding. "Yes. I'm at a loss with what to do with him, but I'll think of something."
Alistair felt irritation creep up his spine. "Who said you were the one to decide?"
"And what? You have plans all laid out?" Fergus arched a brow. "You'll forgive me if I say I rather doubt it." He sniffed, eyes going from narrow to wide, as the king let out a huff of laughter. "What could possibly be so funny?"
"Sorry, it's just that . . . sometimes you sound so much like her . . ." One long finger pointed in Gwyneth's direction, until Alistair sobered, not sure if he really found it that funny. Mostly it was just that the morning felt so unreal for the life threatening situation they'd only just managed to get out of, that he was struggling to find mirth in anything readily available. "I don't know whether to laugh or get the cold gruesomes."
Fergus sighed with the air of long suffering. "She is my sister, you know. We were raised together by the same people. I don't see how it's that strange that we're a bit similar." He shrugged with one shoulder, trying to spare the tenderness in the other, but from his slight grimace, the young teyrn wasn't so successful. "We weren't always like this." Silently musings escaped of their own volition, a faint smile of both warm memory and recent melancholy pulled at his upper lip. "There was a time that we both wanted to be quite unique from one another, to impress my father, or impress each other, I'm not sure which. But things are . . . they're different now, and being unique doesn't matter nearly so much as my family, and Gwyneth is the only one I have left. I suppose it has made me realize how much I love my sister, and it reminds me of what is really important. Our lives can't be taken for granted when fate is waiting with quill in hand, to write our names in the Book of the Dead."
What prompted the teyrn to share any personal anecdotes, Alistair couldn't guess, but he knew he wasn't going to press his luck, merely nodding. "We had a time of it in Greenfell, that's for certain. I'm still not sure what to have written in those warnings. Gwyneth told me she thinks those . . . women . . . are banshees. How can I write something down like that and expect people to take it seriously?" It was more a rhetorical question than anything, and he wasn't expecting an answer.
So of course, Fergus Cousland surprised Alistair by giving him one.
"Don't say anything about banshees, perhaps later, as your people demand to know what they're dealing with, but it's best to remain vague at first. Say simply 'creatures of unknown origin' or something equally nebulous and let the fear work its way in. You'll find people are often far more afraid of what they don't know, and their mind will invent enough awful images to keep them scared. You want them scared, Alistair, so they'll take your warnings to heart. Though of course there's always going to be some fool, or several, who want to prove their bravery or sate their curiosity, sometimes both, but for the most part, people will listen to their own fear of the unknown."
The king blinked, taking it all in, brown eyes bright on the face of the brother by marriage that, until just now, would have barely given Alistair any recognition as a leader, let alone offer advice on how to do it. "You haven't even been a teyrn for three months, how'd you get that all sorted out?"
Fergus lips curved upwards in a smirk of superiority. "I am the firstborn son of the greatest orator this country has known, and I'm not exactly a slouch in the realm of speech craft, myself. Or did you think personality and looks were all we Couslands shared?"
Alistair shook his head in self-humor. "No, I guess I didn't."
Fergus took a hold of his arm, making to lead the king away. "Come, we do Gwyneth a disservice by watching her. This time is her own, hers and Noble's. You won't get much from her anyway until she's done, and we have plans to make for when we arrive at Highever."
Her whole body ached as if in protest, and her heart along with it, heavy with the weight of hopelessness, frame taught as she stared at the shroud over her dearest companion, a mabari that had become more her child than a mere canine.
The day was drawing on and they'd have to leave soon. "We're going home, Noble." Gwyneth knelt down, stroking a hand over where Noble's head was covered. It'd been some number of hours, she knew, and there was no rest for the heart of a noblewoman, even when it was broken. When she heard boots moving over the trampled grass behind her, a sigh of acceptance escaped. She knew who it was even before he spoke. "It's time, isn't it?"
"Yes, pup, I'm afraid so. I'll have my men place Noble in the wagon for you, they'll be gentle." Fergus got on his knees beside her, wrapping a firm arm across his sister's shoulders. "I already told your husband that you will want to take him to Highever. No one is going to question that."
Gwyneth sniffed, turning to grace her brother with a loving smile. "I'd be angry with anyone else assuming my mind, but you . . . you sometimes know me before I've even come to know myself." She leaned into him, taking the handkerchief he offered to dab at her face. "Do I look a fright?"
"You are loveliest woman in all Thedas, but even such a woman can't be perfect after the night we had. Chin up, sweet, nothing is permanently broken, and once we've that bandage off your head, you'll be back to being the diamond of Highever." Fergus knew reassurances concerning his sister's beauty would always make her feel better, though with Noble gone and their company in such ruin, it was a cursory improvement of Gwyneth's mood at best, but at least it was an improvement. "Here, you lean on me and they'll barely notice your limp."
Gwyneth tried to smile, to find humor in something, anything. "Haven't I leaned upon you enough? One should think you'd grow tired of it."
Fergus rubbed a thumb across one of her cheekbones, making her look at him. "Never."
"Liar." Her lips made the attempt to smile again, only drawing back down when her eyes fell back to her mabari. "At least he can go home. Ser Gilmore . . . Fergus, his father shall be so upset. To leave him there, in that village, with those . . . those things!"
"He died defending us, doing his duty as he's always done. Father instilled all the best qualities in Roland." Fergus helped Gwyneth to her feet, watching her face to notice that his words hadn't swayed her.
"I kissed him you know, when he helped Mother and I get out of the Great Hall. Howe's men swarming against the doors, and Gilmore was there, standing as the last line of defense with the few guardsmen we had left that weren't slaughtered during the initial attack." Her mind took her back there, the smell of smoke from burning flesh and wood.
"You did what? Gwyn, why would you kiss him? You weren't . . ." He trailed off, looking wary and confused.
"No, nothing like you're thinking. I thought he was going to die, a noble death that his father and mine would both be proud of, and there was nothing to thank him with, nothing I had in that moment as a token. So I kissed him." She smiled wanly. "Later, when he survived, I was concerned he'd make some affair of it and leave me in quite the awkward position. He never said a thing, not once." Gwyneth shook her head, wincing and hissing through her teeth and the unexpected pain that caused. Fergus looked worried, but she waved him off. "And now, Ser Gilmore is dead, and there was no token this time, and we can't even give him a proper burial. To survive against all odds, only to be killed in Greenfell by bloody banshees, just like my sweet Noble . . ." She sobbed into her palm, accepting her brother's arms about her. "It seems so useless, a waste."
Maybe Alistair's own thinking had gotten to her. "Gwyny-Gwyn, we can't go back, not even for brave Gilmore. It's far too dangerous."
She nodded, closing her eyes as they threatened her with tears again. "No. No we can't, but it feels so . . ." A voice fraught with grief and weariness rose several octaves in an anger that was entirely Gwyneth. "Damn those fucking banshees! I want them slaughtered, the whole lot of them! They took my Noble and I want them to suffer, as I've suffered! Our entire company nearly wiped out, and all we went to Greenfell for was supplies, a hot meal, and some sleep, and we all could've been killed!"
"But, we're still here Gwyn, not everyone is lost. You have to take comfort in that, you must gird yourself against this. I know you can and whatever you need to help you, tell me, and I'll see it done." He murmured against the bandage on her head, holding it gently against his shoulder.
Gwyneth smirked, lifting her face to him. "You are being quite solicitous Fergus, highly unlike you. I seem to recall how easily we angered each other before. I must have truly looked as if I was dying to make you this nice."
"Or maybe I just realized how much I loved you, when faced with losing the last family I have left." The teyrn's voice had a great quality for delivering speeches, the posh lilt with the deep tonality of leadership, and when he got serious, that was never more obvious.
But Gwyneth had long ago become accustomed to the gravitas of Cousland males, her own affectations making her uniquely immune to falling under the spell her brother's voice could weave, just as he was immune to her own vocal mystique. Though now, she sounded nothing more than morose, an accurate representation of how she was feeling. "Yes, and that's more than many have." Her eyes sought out the young boy from Greenfell, the only child they'd been able to find. "Master Harold, what are we going to do with that lad?"
"Your king asked me the same question, though he didn't much care for my reassurance that I'd think of something."
Gwyneth couldn't help the grin on her face, making it past her mood. "He does get rather put out when a Cousland assumes control, though he wasn't always like that, believe me. Now, though, Alistair's gotten a taste for leadership, and he'll not be letting it go without a quibble, at the very least."
"Your doing, dear sister? Shaping our nascent king?"
"Of course, to a degree, it was the main objective of this marriage initially, my influence in both name and my ability to bring out the strongest traits in my allies. But some of it was his own ability, he just needed to stop struggling against that Theirin blood. Calenhad's influence in his veins was buried for quite a while."
Fergus' eyes narrowed shrewdly, but not unkindly. "You like him, don't you? He's your friend."
Gwyneth sighed. "He was. For a time." She tilted her head, watching the object of their discussion as he helped what knights he had left, his blonde hair lit brightly under the mid-afternoon sun. "Not really so much anymore, but then, I suppose that was to be expected. Marriage is more of a burden than a blessing, especially at our level of nobility, but he and I have entered into an agreement of sorts. For a . . ." She paused, thinking of how to phrase it. "A cessation of hostilities to find the benefit of an amicable partnership by way of giving one another time to find how we'd better like to interact."
Fergus laughed, boldly albeit painfully, a hand at his ribs soon after. When Gwyneth glared at him, he had to fight even harder not to chuckle. "Oh, Gwyn, only you would make a marriage bed into a political agreement. 'A cessation of hostilities' with your own husband?" He barked again, silver eyes watering in a mirth quite refreshing for its honesty. "Priceless, pup, you are absolutely priceless."
Gwyneth huffed. "My marriage is political, and it requires a . . . shall we say, delicate touch? At least I'm trying, if Anora was in my place instead, she'd have taken the reins away from Alistair right at the start, and many would say she would have been right in doing so. It was no secret that we bore no love each other, she and I, but I'll give her this much, she was damn good with quill and parchment, a brilliant mind for sneaky trade agreements, to be sure and many of the common people adored her for both her prowess and her more simple roots. To them, they'd have seen my husband as an upstart. Alistair Theirin, Maric's by-blow, untested and unfit for the throne. The people would have admired him as a hero, but not as a king, and Ferelden would not have seen all that he can do."
Fergus tried to sound unimpressed, but Gwyneth had a way of making her point of view sound as appealing as a dip in a cool pond on a hot day, and it was difficult not to react. "Or are you just saying that because he saved your life?"
"Our lives, he saved us all. A hundred years from now, children will read stories of the great hero, Alistair the Dragon King of Ferelden. He'll be taller, his hair color will change a hundred times, and I'll be reduced to his pretty trophy wife, but they'll remember his deeds."
It was Fergus' turn to scoff. "Bah. I think you underestimate your value in these tales. I think you'll be the fearsome beauty, whose very gaze could set a man on fire, and with a flick of your wrist even the mountains would bend beneath your unshakeable resolve. Your eyes, they'll stay the same, sharp and eerie silver, like the Thorns of Dead Gods you wield with a vicious intent. They'll never know you trip over your own feet on the battlefield and cringe when there's blood in your hair. Though there might be a note or two on your fancy for Tevinter gowns and raspberry tortes." He grinned when he saw Gwyneth fight her amusement at his teasing, trying to look dour, but then, he sobered. "You saved Master Harold, that thing would've gotten him for certain if you hadn't intervened, and that's no fairytale."
"For all the good it did. Look at him? Poor lamb." She tutted beneath her breath.
"I think he'll be alright, I truly do."
Gwyneth smiled, knowingly. "You have a plan after all, don't you?"
"Don't I always?" Fergus' grin thinned out. "Father wouldn't have approved, but I think . . . I should like to squire him at Highever, take him away from his old life. All that's left in Greenfell is death, and he shouldn't enter into young adulthood with that black shadow nipping at his heels."
Gwyneth's eyes went wide with shock. "But . . . Father always said that to squire those of less than noble birth led to untrustworthy men at arms. He was very adamant about it and look at the results."
"Yes, look at what his trust bought him, his own death!" Fergus snapped, eyes darkening. "I am hardly going to be singing the praises of peasants made into nobility. Maric tried that with Loghain, and Ferelden wasn't better off for it, but this . . . this is different. Gwyneth, you must see that this is the best thing for that boy, at his age, being raised under a Cousland banner could shape him into a better man than he'd ever have been otherwise." More quietly, he continued. "And no one need know that he was common, we could say he was the last surviving son of the mayor of Greenfell. Who with us would argue that? Your husband, his knights, my men . . . you? The people accept what truth we shape for them, if we're skillful enough at it, and we convince young Harold of this. Do you truly think he'd object so strenuously? What else does he have, Gwyn?"
She bit her lip, looking once more to Noble and shuttering her eyes against the sight. "Helping him won't revive the dead, you know. I thought . . . I thought it would. I told myself that if I could save him, this one boy, that it wouldn't hurt as much that I wasn't able to help your son, my poor, sweet Oren." She choked on a sob, teeth stinging the flesh of her mouth. "It didn't help."
"No." Fergus turned away from his sister, to watch the boy. "But it doesn't make it worse either."
"Alright, Fergus, alright." She sighed into her acceptance, nodding mutely, staring at Noble as two of her brother's remaining men bowed to her, moving past to gently pick up her mabari. Gwyneth had thought her tears were gone, but she felt them building at the corners. "I'll see to his appearance, see that he's bathed and get him some proper attire when we get to the next outpost."
"Gwyn, you don't have to do that. You're a queen, we can hire on a serving maid at the next stop before we reach Diets."
But she'd have none of it. "No, I want to do this, Fergus, I need to. There must be something to occupy my mind, or I'll fall apart and my people need me at my very best. We'll all arrive in Highever without anyone knowing what we've been through, how tired we are. If a squire of Highever he is to be, than he shall look the part of one. Truth is what we make, you are right in that, and appearance is what keeps everything together."
Inside she was hurting, inside she was frightened, but outwardly Gwyneth would insure she was everything a queen should be, and the citizens of Highever would greet their wayward daughter without ever knowing anything was amiss.
The sun felt too hot, peeking through the thickened trees like a great flame trying to lick at her flesh, burning her alive.
A fever had hit suddenly in the night, the beast inside her clawing at her mind and innards in kind, screaming within her womb like the unnatural being it was. Long fingers clutched at her swollen belly, and she hunched over in pain, even the moss covered bark of the tree next to her feeling excruciating when it touched her sweating, taut skin.
It was far too soon, she knew that, had made every preparation necessary and absorbed as much knowledge from her mother's mad scrawl as she could, but it wasn't enough. Because she'd been prepared for the wrong thing. It was suppose to be the body of a human babe growing within her, only possessing the essence of the powerful archdemon, but something went wrong.
She'd gone over it a hundred times in her mind, but the mage could find no fault in the ritual itself. 'Perhaps twas the wording that was off, perhaps twas that fool Alistair, something wrong with his seed.' But no, the monster inside her hissed within her mind, biting at it with unnatural words, teasing her foolishness, her arrogance.
'Did you never consider, vessel of mine, that you never knew what you were doing to begin with?' His voice, beset with the rolling laughter of the ethereal, like a thunderclap across her senses.
That he could speak, that he could interact in such a way, and use her to reach out to . . .
Morrigan stopped, refusing to think of her dearest Gwyneth anymore. That had been her fault, to yearn for the woman, to miss her, and Urthemiel had latched on to that, used it to go after the object of his terrible interest.
It was too late for her, she knew that, had fought against it so adamantly that the clarity that all her fighting meant nothing, was sharp and brutal. Her hands clasped her belly, and she smiled through the pain.
"Not yet, foul one. You may think you have won, but I shall see to it that she knows, that she is ready for you. Do not think me so helpless in that, false god."
The angry hiss from her womb stabbed up into her ribs, but Morrigan only laughed. "Bellow if you must, beast, but all your planning will be for naught, because she is going to kill you, your would be bride. I shall be watching from the Fade and I will smile at your failure."
Urthemiel roiled within the skin of the babe he had stolen, sucked away its essence for his own use, settling inside it and making it grow abnormally fast. A quickening of godhood that would prove a difficulty for him. Morrigan knew this as she knew everything else. They shared a life-force, and Urthemiel could hide nothing from her even as she could hide nothing from him.
'You have to get to her first, insolent whore, and do you think she can aid you? Some little mortal? I'll have her womb for my needs, just as I now have yours, and she will give me an heir, a conduit for my power and your pitiful existence will have only mattered for the entrance it provided for my initial form.' He threatened, hateful laughter bubbling up from where his thoughts sat, seeded inside her own. 'Do you think to tell her that you loved her, but you could not think what to do with such emotion? That you were ashamed to feel that way, for another woman? Do you think she'll still love you, that she'll save you?' He cooed in mock sympathy, cruelty in his intentions.
In her worst moments, Morrigan had thought to cut him from her belly, but he'd kept her from any such action, a strength over her movements that made her more angry than frightened. That he'd dare to control her as if she were a puppet. Yet, still, she would make up for the mistakes made during the ritual that had led to this, and the god that thought himself so mighty, would pay for daring to climb so high, and take so much.
"I will get to her, I will tell her everything. My will is stronger than yours, dark one, and you cannot stop me, and even when I am gone, my intent will still live. It will be hers and she will destroy you." The mage gritted through her teeth, rime forming above her upper lip, sweat matting her ebony hair to her skull, dripping down her face.
Urthemiel's 'birth' would be soon, and she had to hurry. Already Morrigan felt the veins across her stomach swelling with the effort her skin made, to keep from splitting open.
'You are going to die, a painful, agonizing death.' The ancient god mocked.
Morrigan grinned, trudging forward and leaning heavily on her staff. "Yes, but so are you."
