"Little solider, little insect,
You know war, it has no heart,
It will kill you in the sunlight,
Or happily, in the dark."
-Bright Eyes, No-one would riot for less
Quentin clutched the bedpost for dear life still lurching with vertigo and yellow with fear. "S...sorry."
"It's fine," Elaria tried to keep her tone even, swallowing her annoyance and at the same time slightly relieved, climbing from the window with only rope for support was hardly her ideal exit. "We'll find another way."
What exactly that other way might be she was unsure. The bar was still packed by the sounds filtering through the floorboards. The occasional roar of traditional nameday songs twisted by gin and whiskey, the hub-bub and bustle and shrieks of the whores rose like a wave beneath them. None of it gave her much confidence of a sneaky exit.
A glimmer of an idea tingled in the back of her mind but she didn't much like the feel of it. Too much risk but what option did she have? Acting was just another skill missing from Quentin's repertoire. Though she could hardly blame him. She'd been much the same when Duncan freed her. Utterly useless at everything a soldier needed to do bar killing. She had learned. And the hardest lessons stuck best.
"Right," she stopped her pacing suddenly and Quentin jumped out of his skin. "We're going to celebrate."
"Er..." Quentin shuffled away from her like she'd a sudden bout of madness.
"We are going to go downstairs and mingle until something comes to me."
"M...m...mingle?"
"Yes," Elaria gasped. "You know, talk to people..."
"I'm...not very good at..."
"Oh for the Makers sake, come on," she grabbed his arm, his gambeson damp with sweat, his palms still shaking.
"Elaria..." he murmured. "There's something I need to tell..."
"Later," she hissed throwing the door open and dragging him into the stairwell.
Though the front doors were barred and the window shuttered Elaria had never seen so many people in The Painted Lady. Women who didn't work here were rare sights in the brothel but tonight, dotted between the miners and mercenaries, they drank as one. The whores snaked and swaned between the tables, laughing and joking, hardly dressed in the heat.
Her hope to go unnoticed by the rowdy bunch was quickly dashed. Madam Elsa was watching the celebrations with a ruddy smile and those gimlet eyes spied Elaria, trying to creep down the stairs, and in a voice built to silence called out. "And here's the hero of the hour!"
Elaria had never seen the Madam drunk before, but by her rosy cheeked grin and glazed eyes she was clearly in her cups. A rustle as the packed room turned to take their glance. Elaria tried to look nonchalant whilst her heart beat out of her throat. How in the void was she supposed to leave now? Quentin whimpered behind her.
Then the whispering started. Neighbours telling each other the story. She caught the word beheaded more times than she'd like and one whore was even helpfully miming the action to the man whose lap she draped across. At the mercenaries' table she heard snorts of disbelief as they eyed her, sizing her up like their next meal.
One of them stood, the steel knuckles on his breastplate glinting in the candle light. A young man, with a smile like a half-cocked bow and a swagger to his stance. He lifted his foaming mug in her direction. "I thank you, beautiful siren. For defending my home."
Elaria shrugged as the laughter began again. Cat-calls from the mercenaries' table, tittering from the whores. She let it wash over her.
"I am Rythen, Captain of the Stone Roses, these louts you see before you," he swept his free arm around the table to grunts and curses. "We are celebrating my name day and I would consider your company a fine gift."
"You will leave my guests alone, Rythen," Elsa puffed up her chest, red face darkening. "You're supposed to be protecting not flirting!"
"Oh, come Elsa," Rythen, self-proclaimed mercenary captain swept his mug towards the Madam, foam spilling on his neighbour, unconscious and folded up on the table. "You know I'll charm who I choose. And this one," his tankard lurched towards Elaria again, "has the honour of being chosen."
"A bloody dubious honour," one of the whores called out to a cackle of laughter. "Who'd want to ride that tiny prick of yours?"
"Jealousy does not become you," Rythen shot back and took a slurping draught of his beer. His unfocused eyes swivelled back to Elaria, now at the bottom of the stairs, and sidled her up and down like a flesh merchant might. She suppressed a shudder that had nothing to do with lust.
"Come, sit on my lap, sweet lady and I'll let you polish my sword," he elbowed his unconscious comrade and with a slip and a thud he fell to the floor.
Quentin lurched to the bottom of the stairs, still pale and sweating, the usually handsome lines of his face taut as though holding back some great agony.
Rythen's head twitched, his plump mouth sneering in contempt. "And who's this boy? A little puppy for the pretty lady?" He lurched from the table, kicking his fallen mercenary friend as he stumbled towards them.
"You'll...leave her be," Quentin grunted, shaking hands finding the hilt of his sword, looking like a statue about to shatter into a thousand pieces.
Elaria gulped down air, feeling woefully unprepared for diplomacy, tongue fat and useless in her mouth as the drunk mercenary lumbered towards them. Why had this seemed like a good plan?
Rythen threw down his mug, splashing the remnants of his beer across Quentin's boots. "Do you know who I am, boy? Shut that mouth of yours afore I shut it for you."
She had never seen such a rage in Quentin. Seen him half-shitting himself at the thought of killing a man, seen him sobbing himself stupid covered in slaver's blood, seen him blush and stammer and wince and apologise. She'd never dreamed she'd see him hit a man.
It happened all too fast. As trouble had a way of doing.
Why Quentin chose that moment to defend her honour she could hardly say. It's not that he'd never shown glimmers of being the white knight he'd just always lacked the courage. Perhaps he was making up for not climbing from the window. If that was the case she really ought to stop him pulling back that fist and slamming into Rythen's shocked looking face for a third time.
She didn't, because sometimes when you're in too deep you might as well have fun.
When the once-smug Rythen fell to the floor Quentin went to lurch after him and she finally jolted into action like a lightning hit rabbit.
She grabbed Quentin's elbow and he reeled backwards, coated in a thick sweat, jaw shuddering as he gasped in lungfuls of air. His dark brown eyes were black with pupil, unseeing. When she grasped his arm his skin was hot enough to scold. Something's not right...
Panic set in the same time as the scraping of chairs filled the room. Screaming. The sour stench of Quentin's sweat. She ignored his flaming flesh and took a firm hold of him as she did what only ten minutes before had seemed like the worse possible plan. With all her strength she propped him on his feet and hobbled as fast as she could towards the bolted doors.
Her fingers slipped on the iron bolts as the sounds of chaos shrieked behind her. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end and she glanced over her shoulder as she ripped the first bolt open.
Two of the Stone Roses had squirmed free of the trapping chairs and tables, fumbling with their weaponry as patrons skirted and slipped away, shouting and screaming. Her shaking hands drew back the third bolt and she shoved her way to freedom.
Cold night air slapped her in the face as she stumbled, light-blinded and blinking, into the utter darkness of the courtyard. She had a second to aim her feet before she plunged into the enveloping night.
She heard rather than saw Quentin behind her, his heavy puffs of breath, the rattle of his longsword at his side, murmuring some half-forgotten prayer as though it would help them now. The ground lit up beneath her running feet and she careened forward, nearly tumbling into the well, glancing the stonework with her hip and yelping like a mabari pup.
"Come back here you cowardly runts!" A voice taunted from the inn but Elaria was by no means goaded. She flung herself out of the courtyard, Quentin's hand in hers, hot and sticky, and into the deserted streets.
She bundled him into an alley as the footsteps resounded around them. She waited as he slumped against the wall, breaths still coming in desperate, heaving, gasps, eyes round and wild in the moonlight. She reached to cover his mouth as the footsteps thundered passed.
When the only sound was her heart knocking fast against her ribs she released him, wiping her spit stained hand on his gambeson as he shuddered back his breath.
"What in the void was that?" she hissed when no explanation was forth coming.
Quentin did sheepish better than a new born lamb. His shoulders sagged with the weight of the world and he muttered something nonsensical.
"What did you say?" she slapped his shoulder for good measure, like kicking a hang-dog when it's down. "Tell me," she grunted.
His mouth twisted around the words as though they were painful, rubbing where she'd hit him with a whimper. "Iranoutoflyrium."
"Say that again," she demanded, though she knew perfectly well what the Templar had said.
"I ran out of lyrium!" he shouted this time, suddenly all red-faced anger.
They stayed in the alley, staring at each other, not a hairs breadth apart. Elaria felt as though some giant hand had pulled the rug from underneath her. The Maker has a sour humour indeed.
"When...?"
"A week."
"Why didn't you say...?"
"Thought you had enough on your plate."
"Andraste's hairy tits, Quentin!" It was Elaria's turn to lean against the damp stone of the alley. "What exactly are you feeling?"
"Anger...," he whimpered. "Dizziness, an aversion to light. I keep...seeing things... I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."
She grasped his hand, tight in hers, yanking on it until he met her gaze. "We're going to get through this, I promise." She whispered. He clutched at her, gulping back a sob as he begun to shake.
"No tears," she muttered, gripping him firmly in her arms. "I need you to be strong, Quentin. Can you do that for me?"
He sucked in a desperate breath, still swaying, unstable on his feet. "I'll try."
"That's all we can do."
So it was she found herself buried in the templar's armpit, heaving him along, wrinkling her nose at the sour stench of his sickness. He muttered litanies, breath smoking in the spring air as he shivered and shook. It was asking for trouble, stumbling along like drunks at a wake in the middle of a curfew with mercenaries hounding for their blood and guards patrolling in force. Twice, her instincts bristled and she unceremoniously shoved, tugged and kicked Quentin into the concealing shadows. Twice the Stone Roses stormed passed, shouting but oblivious as she crouched, shivering with anticipation and worry and not a half measure of fear. Twice she thanked the Maker as their footsteps and voices dwindled into nothing.
Her prayers of thanks didn't last long.
Her eyes got used to the blackness, and though Quentin's head lolled like a neck-broke doll, his feet lunged forward on some deep impulse, slowly and with a swooning rhythm that gnawed at her anxious gut. Until his trailing foot caught something in the darkness. And they both toppled over, in the middle of the street.
Her head squelched against...something. Lights, sparkling and bright, twinkled across her eyes. She spluttered, found her face wet against squishy softness. She breathed and something filled her nostrils. She spluttered, choked, found her lungs crushed, ribs bruised. Kicking, bucking, shoving, wild as an unbroken horse and eventually, with a thud and a sigh she was free.
When she looked down she wished she wasn't.
A corpse had broken her fall. She gagged as she breathed in the tang of it, retched as she choked on a dead man's blood and fell to her knees clutching at her throat.
Her muscles seized, stuck somewhere between swallowing and spewing. The lights twinkled twice as bright. She tried to yell for but it came out a sloppy wet sound.
Then hands, blessed, thankful hands, seized her by the torso and thumped, pulling her upwards whilst thudding into her stomach. She spluttered and with tear prickled eyes heaved the blood from her throat and onto the dirt floor.
Breathless she turned to thank her saviour and found cold steel at her throat.
"You're a little thing, aren't ya?" a crooked face peered down the length of the blade. A crooked face cased in metal. A guard.
She shuffled backwards on arse and palms, the deadly point tapping against the collar at her throat. "What's this then? Some pretty jewels?"
She gulped. Thought of her dagger at her hip and wondered if he could stab her quicker than she could stab him. They were longer odds than she'd like.
"Please ser," she muttered. "My brother, he's...he's terribly sick..."
That crooked face leered closer, close enough that she could see his black pores, close enough to smell his sour breath. Close enough to shorten those odds considerably. "Do you think I give a rat's toss about your broth... ?"
And those were the last words he said. Elaria lunged like a viper, one hand swiping away his longsword that glanced painfully off her collar and the other flying through the air, fist clenched around a dagger to find a new fleshy sheath in the crooked mans neck.
He looked surprised, eyes bulging, swung his longsword in a deadly and final arc but Elaria was already swaying to her feet. She watched him die, panting in her breath, with her hands braced firmly on her knees. Only when he stopped twitching did she bend to retrieve her dagger.
Head still swimming, neck swollen and sore she reeled towards Quentin , still muttering sleep-filled prayers with his face squashed against the floor.
"Wake up," her voice croaked out, barely audible. She thumped him.
He moaned something and she, running low on patience, crouched next to him and firmly and roundly slapped his cheek.
On the fourth wave of her hand he grabbed her with a wrist-breaking strength, eyes snapping open, a spitting snarl on his usually placid face.
How long they stayed there Elaria couldn't say she was transfixed with shock and pain watching him snorting and breathing like a spear-poked bull.
"Quentin," she said his name with a flinch. He eyed her in the darkness, squeezing harder, hard enough to snap her wrist, hard enough to break her arm.
Then something moved behind his feverous eyes and the tension fell from his face and with a whimper he let her go.
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
She choked down her anger as she cradled her right hand in her left. "Don't...worry about it," she said, teeth gritted over the pain. "Can you move?"
"I...I think so," he muttered.
"Good, let's go."
She helped him to his feet and they skirted round the bodies, three guards, their armour flashing in the moonlight. The need to get away hit her stomach hard, mixed with a fear of whoever killed these men.
The night was quiet. None of the revelries drifted over the looming stone walls. All was still, but the thumping of her heart and rustle of her footsteps and Quentin's laboured breathing as he lumbered behind. She checked over her shoulder more times that she'd care to admit, eyes shifting to the slightest of movements. As they rounded the corner an alley cat's scream pierced the silence and she threw out her hand to stop the Templar stumbling forwards.
"What was that?" Quentin muttered, close enough that the heat of his fever warmed her like a fire.
She cocked her head, counting, waiting, patient as she could be only a street from the sewers. Her feet itched but her head taught her to be still. She turned to Quentin and pressed her fingers to her lips. He nodded, and slowly, soundlessly, they crept forward.
The second scream was louder, closer, and definitely human. The unmistakable sounds of steel being drawn and the whizz of arrows slicing not-so distant air. She motioned for Quentin to stay put, not waiting for a response as let her feet free to run.
The sounds of battle echoed through the streets and Elaria sped, blindly and desperately towards it. As she rounded the corner, boots flying, hands gripping her hilts, greaves digging into the soft flesh at the back of her knees, she prayed she would make it to the sewers before the fight found her.
Once again it seemed the Maker was not listening.
Shadows lurched and ducked and dived and span, moonlight glinted off swords and shields and helms. She couldn't count the men. Couldn't see. Thought to sneak around the battle but as instinct told her to duck an arrow thrummed past her head and she collided with a shadow that knocked the breath from her lungs and her feet from the floor.
They rolled together like lovers in a haystack. The roar of battle shrunk to the gasps of the body on top of her, tied together by their tumbling. Her hands gripped a breastplate, digging into the leather, fingers searching for a hole to stab into. She straddled him, went to fling her elbow into an unarmoured face when their eyes met.
A shaft of moonlight fell on Guido as he stared back at her, mouth hanging open, face a bloodied mess. No time to speak she ducked as another arrow flew over their heads, her hand slipped, thudding into him, forcing a moan from his lips.
This was hardly the place for interrogation. She leapt off him and they stood, flinging their backs against the walls, daggers in both their hands, breathing hard as chaos unfolded.
No way of telling friend from foe she hesitated. A gurgle to her left, a scream to her right, shadows running past. Who was out there in the sea of blackness she couldn't say. She swore, a syllable eaten by the grunts and groans and roars and screams. She went to fly into battle.
An arm held her back and a whisper told her to wait. She ignored him, tore herself free, keeping her head low as she ran, wary of the archers she skirted towards.
Shooting into the dark the man never saw her flank him, or sidle behind him. He whirled on some instinct, arrow notched and ready. She knocked it aside with a snap of her hand, as her knuckles swung out and found flesh. His breath stank of ale and as she pulled the bow from his shell-shocked hands she recognised the mercenary. Right before the heel of her boot crunched into the side of his head. He went limp. She knelt, shouldering the man's spilled bow, rolled him over and snapped the straps that held his quiver in place.
A cloud shifted across the moon and lunar light spilled onto the streets, painting the battleground in silvery hues. She crouched, eyes searching for her next prey. When her whirring mind caught up with her shifting eyes she stopped and swore underneath her breath.
The Stone Roses were fighting the guards and she should have seen it earlier, should have stayed with Guido pressed against the shadows. One of them spied her between the metal of his halfhelm and he ambled towards her, shield held high.
No archer, but she fired anyway, arrow thudding uselessly into his shield. Fumbling for her stolen quiver she drew, breathing too hard to aim, swearing as she backed away. The arrow skidded wide and into the night. Then the darkness returned.
She went to lurch forward but something held her back. She flung an elbow and met thin air. A voice hissed for her to stop and then hands were around her waist, tugging her away from the battle.
"It's me," he whispered and she dropped the useless bow as Guido pulled her into the night.
There was no time to think, no time to argue. The darkness made the fight impossible but all around her unseen foes screamed and grunted, not knowing who they attacked, not knowing who they killed. Guido forced her against the wall and she gulped down air, keeping hold of his hand.
He limped as they skirted round the wall and she heard his muffled gasps. She squeezed his hand and he stopped.
"You're hurt," she hissed. She felt him nod and shuffle onwards. She had no choice but to follow.
They put some small distance between them and the battle, squeezing into a doorway, close enough that she could smell the blood on his face, see a glaze to his eyes.
She fumbled in the darkness and her hand finally found the handle of the door. She pushed and though the wood creaked feebly it budged not an inch.
"Do you have a pick?" she whispered and heard him pat himself down. He grunted as he lowered himself to the lock and she shifted out of what little light there was, peeking out from their hiding place, into the utter blackness. She listened rather than looked, straining to hear any evidence that the melee spilled towards them.
The scrape of hinges and she sighed, taking one last look into the night before following Guido.
She closed the door behind her and even her night eyes couldn't penetrate the blackness. The smell told her all she needed to know. He'd led her to the sewerhouse.
"What happened?" she whispered, the darkness seemed to insist upon it. "Where are the others?"
It only hit her then that she'd left Quentin in the confusion. She swore, went to stumble back into the night only for Guido to grab her again.
"They'll be fine," he grunted. "Stay...here."
"I can't...Quentin...he ran out of lyrium. He's half out his mind and without armour, I need to..."
"He's not your responsibility," but he let her go, slowly lowering himself to the ground, a moan pushing its way out through his gritted teeth.
She knelt. "What happened?"
"Stabbed in the leg," he hissed. "You can't go out there, its madness..."
"Just...stay here."
"I can hardly follow you," he muttered, words filled with spite. "I think they hit the bone."
"My pack?"
"Dropped it..."
"Bugger," she gripped his arm. "We'll need it to stitch up that wound...just...stay here. Try not to move."
She stood, shuffling towards the door, blinded by the dark.
"Elaria..." he hissed and she turned back, heard him lick his lips. "Don't...don't die, alright?"
"Never again," she smiled though he couldn't see and pulled the door open.
The moon winked from the black face of the night and she slid into the shadows, creeping back to where the shields clashed and the dying still filled the air with their groans. She tried not to picture Quentin as one of them, fighting without his armour. Tried not to remember ordering him to take it off. Tried not to think that she'd signed his death warrant.
She came upon the first corpse, its black eyes staring blankly towards the stars, arrows jutting like proud tails from his torso. She turned his slack jaw towards the light. Not him.
Another was slumped against the wall and as she approached she stepped in the blood pooling around his corpse. Moonlight glinted off two dropped daggers. She ducked to see his face anyway. No-one she knew.
Corpses littered the dark street, so many that she had to take care of her footing. Guts and blood and bones, all open to the night air, or spilling on the ground. Methodically she examined them, forced herself to look at their faces, search their eyes, finding men she vaguely recognised, guards and mercenaries alike.
As she crept too close to the battle she stopped her search and grabbed for her hilts.
Two sets of shadows were dancing, steel glinting menacingly to her left and right. She waited.
When golden hair glinted in the moonlight her heart leapt in her throat. She watched him duck and dive, circle the guard until she could see his face pulled tight in concentration. She smiled, a wild thankful grin.
Zevran feigned left and stabbed right, catching the guard off balance as she hurtled towards him. She cried out as she lunged and the guard turned to see her, eyes wide, as Zevran's dagger reached around and with a thrust, lodged into the man's chin.
He yanked his dagger free, stepped around the spray with the grace of a dancer. His teeth glinted in the moonlight as he saw her and he chuckled deep in his throat. "We're still ridiculously awesome."
She shook her head as he looped his arm around her shoulder. She leaned against him for a second, relief flooding her at the sound of his heart still beating.
"A little help!"
Elissa's daggers were little match for the dual axes of the mercenary. She backed up, weaving underneath the ferocious swings, stabbing where she could, parrying when she had to. Elaria stepped behind him as he raised his axe high, grabbing hold of the shaft with one hand and stabbing with the other.
He flung her over his shoulder for her troubles and she tumbled to the floor, letting go of her dagger and rolling to her feet in time to see the axe-wielders throat opened.
The three of them stood, panting, staring at each other. Elaria retrieved her fallen daggers and sheathed them.
"We have to get out of here," Elissa glanced up and down the street, the sudden silence unnerving after what seemed an age of battle. "The guards will be here soon enough."
"Ichiro," Zevran craned his neck towards the alley.
The boys shadow was hunched as he staggered from between the buildings. Zevran took the pack he held and Elaria the one on his back. Ichiro's breaths were coming in short sharp gasps and she patted him on the shoulder reassuringly. Elissa was already stalking away.
Elaria gently nudged Ichiro towards Zevran. "Take him to the sewerhouse, Guido's there..."
Zevran reached to clasp her arm. "Where are you going?"
"Quentin's still out here," she covered his hand with her own and squeezed. "I have to find him."
Zevran opened his mouth as though to argue, but sighed instead and shook his head. "If you're not back in an hour I'm coming for you."
She nodded, and went to turn away but he held her firm. His eyes said a thousand things his mouth would never say. She smiled up at his furrowed brow.
"Let me take the pack at least," he said and she handed it to him.
She watched them retreat with not a little apprehension. He glanced once over his shoulder but quickly looked forward again.
Elaria set to work.
The two closest corpses were not Quentin and neither was the third. Dead was not how she wanted to find him but she couldn't fool herself. He'd been out here on the edge of the battle, half-mad and barely armed. She retraced her steps, finding the bowman that she'd killed joined in death by others, guards and mercenaries silent together, indistinguishable. She wondered how many had been killed by friends, not knowing each other in the dark as she did not know them now.
As she came to where she'd tumbled into Guido her hopes were sinking low. Quentin was not a corpse but that gave her little faith. Guilt twisted in her gut and she carried on her grim search.
Twenty three in all. Twenty three men never returning to their families. Twenty three families left with a void where there had been a father, a lover, a brother. It's kill or be killed, she let the words soften each blow and soon dug deep enough that the hardness within toughened her heart to each slack face.
When she heard the whimper so wounded was her hope that she didn't stop. It could've been anything, she shrugged and started to wonder whether Quentin could've tried to get back to the inn. Then she heard it again.
She found him in the shadow of two barrels.
Blood stained his gambeson. He clutched at his arm, making sounds in his throat like a wounded dog. She rushed to him, had to squat over him in the cramped cover he'd found.
An arrow had pierced through his bicep, shattering bone and cartilage to come out the other side. He screamed when her hands brushed the wound and she quickly darted back.
"Quentin, can you hear me?" she fumbled for his face, pressing her blood slick hands against his forehead and finding it hotter than ever.
No response. She dragged his good arm, his shield arm, though his shield was nowhere to be seen, and tugged and pulled until it draped round her shoulders like a dead weight scarf, bruising the back of her collar into her neck.
She wound her other arm around the back of him and into his arm pit. Heaving until the cords of her neck stood on end and it felt like her organs would drop out of her. She managed to drag him half a foot before collapsing next to his unconscious figure, gasping for breath.
"Looks like you need some help, my dear," a shadow fell over them and her heart skipped a beat before she recognised the voice.
Between her and Zevran they managed to carry the Templar, avoiding the arrow poking out of his arm like a gruesome bone, shuffling along in desperately time consuming steps. By the time they reached the sewerhouse they were both exhausted. She banged on the door with her fist and it flew open in a burst of light.
They'd found torches and lit them. The blaze left white sears on her vision. She rubbed her eyes with her knuckles as someone took Quentin from her arms.
"We have to leave, now."
"I agree, we can't waste time here."
"He's not going anywhere."
"Then we leave him."
She blinked back the notches on her vision. Elissa's hands were already wrapped around the ring of the trapdoor, pack slung over her back, her mask of indifference firmly in place. Guido stood next to her, ready to limp on, face downcast and shadowed, mouth clenched over the pain.
Elaria unsheathed her dagger, turning her back on the pair to crouch next to Quentin's shaking form. "Help me get his shirt off."
"You're not serious?!"
"We need to leave, if they find us..."
Quentin muttered something in his sleep and she stared at his ashen face, twitching and grimacing. His jaw, stubble like gruesome reeds in pools of drying blood. The angular lines of his face only sharpened by the torchlight. When they'd left the city there had been no darkness round his eyes, no jutting of his cheekbones. She had done this, made him a hollow man, a husk. Led his fragile boyish nature into the gaping maw of battle. She had not done enough to protect him. And she could not leave him now.
She clutched the dagger and, careful of her shaking hands and the occasional shiver of his fever, she began to cut the fabric away from his wound.
There was a scuffle behind her but she concentrated on her work. She had seen worse wounds, much worse but the nature of a bad wound had usually been mitigated by her magic. The arrow needed to come out, that much was clear. She breathed in deep. Should she cut the arrow head off and pull it through? She'd seen Wynne do such a thing before but on a conscious man, not one in the grips of lyrium madness.
"I need help," she whispered and then became suddenly aware of the shouting behind her.
"I'm not staying here to die."
"You will or..."
"Or what? Will you slit my throat or just watch someone else do it..."
"He needs our help!"
"Shut up, boy, you don't get a vote."
Elaria sighed. "Guess it's just you and me, my friend." Gingerly she bent his arm, shuffling to better light the wound. He whimpered, jumping and she whispered reassurances that she doubted he could hear over the argument or the fever. She would have to cut the arrow head off, she decided, and pull the shaft through. The feathers of the quiver poked out of the back of his arm like a gruesome plumage, no space to cut there, tight to the skin as they were.
Bracing her knee on his shoulder, she grasped the arrowhead and ever so gently, wary of breaking off pieces of the shaft, she began to saw.
It didn't take long for the pain to wake Quentin.
She felt him tense underneath her and quickly let go, thinking to move off him, to reassure him that she was helping. There was no time.
His shoulder flung upwards and caught her in knee. His scream was unnatural. She stumbled backwards and the force of her spine meeting the floor juddered right to her skull. She shook it off and opened her eyes and found she couldn't breathe.
Something wrapped around her throat. She struggled to focus, blinked, rasping breath uselessly. A face, once familiar and unfamiliar looked down on her. A terrific angry face, eyes glinting like pickaxes, staring right past her. Flecks of spit hit her face. Quentin squeezed.
He said something but she couldn't hear. She could feel her rapid pulse against his fingers, beating the life out of her in a desperate rhythm. Her hand brushed useless against his chest, like the last flutterings of a bird's wing. A protrusion, something wet and sticky. Hot water, her dying mind thought, he's leaking hot water.
Then suddenly the hands went slack around her throat.
She took a huge, grateful lung of air, gasping and shuddering. Something caught in her mouth, like string but she breathed through it anyway. And realised it was hair. And that she was being crushed by a dead weight.
All was silent and still. And that was wrong somehow. Her ears were ringing and her heart was pounding and there was a horror creeping up her spine but she couldn't say why. What was crushing her? Why was she so wet?
And then she remembered.
"Quentin?" she choked out.
Silence. Stillness. Panic.
"Quentin?" she yanked her hands free of the prison between them. They brushed against hot stickiness. Blood...she was beginning to realise. Blood.
She pushed him off and her heart sank into her boots.
Her dagger was in his chest. Her dagger. And she didn't know how it had got there and she couldn't say she remembered it leaving her hands or feeling it jerk between his ribs but there it was. Undeniable. Her dagger and him...slack and lifeless as the twenty three corpses outside.
"No."
She grasped the dagger and yanked it free. No response. She covered the wound with her palm. Nothing. She said his name, over and over. Not a flicker of life.
All was still and quiet.
"No."
She fumbled for a pulse, fingers pressing deep into his veins. She pressed her ear against his chest, pleading with any gods that were listening to grant her this reprieve.
She felt a hand, warm and alive on the back of her neck.
"My love," Zevran whispered. "He's dead."
An: Hard chapter was hard! Several re-writes later and I'm a little happier with it but I still don't feel I've done Quentin justice. Poor kid. On a slightly happier note I have uploaded the beginning of the short story I promised you last chapter- 'A Bitter Requiem.' Would love to know what you guys think. Oh! And a shout out to Maradeux, who has left me some lovely reviews and also writes some wonderful Zev-focussed Antiva based fiction that you should all go and read! *phew* As always let me know what you guys think!
