"Where's Sten?" Nike asked as the stepped out of the cellar and into the keep proper.
"He's in the courtyard, with some of the other soldiers," Alistair said. "He was going to get the gate open. Which is the fastest way to the family quarters?"
That last was directed to one of the soldiers at his side, and they were directed down two halls and then to a lofty set of stairs. As they hurried upward, they could see a big oaken door standing open. Firelight was spilling through, shadows moving. The sound of clapping hands and music gave Nike pause, and she exchanged a hesitant look with Alistair, then looked toward Morrigan.
The apostate shook her head slowly in answer to the unasked question. "Just take it slowly, and be prepared."
Stepping through the door brought them into what had to be the family's dining room. A big fire was burning at the far end, the great dining table and chairs had been pushed against one wall, leaving a wide space. A handful of soldiers stood around this room, hollow eyed and slack jawed. They didn't give Nike and the others so much as a curious look as they came in.
Two people stood before the fire. One was a noble woman. Her eyes were clearer but exhausted and shadowed with fear and stress. Her shoulders stooped a little, one hand pressed to her belly lightly as if she had been or feared she would be sick. Her hair had the appearance of being neatly coifed, but strands were escaping their confines and it didn't appear to have been washed in some time.
The one standing beside her was a boy, and could be none other than Connor.
In contrast to the noble woman beside him (who must be Isolde, his mother and Eamon's wife, Nike thought) Connor was pink cheeked and in high spirits. His red brown hair was neatly combed, save a cowlick that stuck up at an odd angle. A bright grin was on his face, and he was laughing and clapping in time to the music and the antics of the man cavorting in front of him. A pair of musicians, themselves as slack-jawed as the soldiers, were producing a desultory tune from a lute and a pipe. The music was nowhere near as lively as the dancer or the boy's reactions would indicate.
The dancer was springing here and there, turning cartwheels and somersaults and spinning like a whirligig. When he stood a handstand Connor laughed even louder, cheering him on as if he'd speared a dragon.
"By the Maker," Alistair said, his voice low and horrified. "It's Bann Teagan."
Though he had not spoken much over a whisper, both the boy and the dancer jangled to a halt as if a horn had blasted through the room. The music trailed off awkwardly. As the dancer twisted around and grinned at them, she realized it was Bann Teagan. His eyes seemed fever-bright and almost spasming in their sockets, the grin on his face stretched so painfully wide that Nike's own cheeks almost started to hurt in reaction.
Connor's expression went from utter delight to dark and sharp in a heartbeat. Even across the room, Nike felt the weight of that gaze.
Isolde had jolted a little herself, and suddenly reached out, grasping for her son's shoulders. She spoke in a thick Orlesian accent. "No, Connor. Do not hurt them!"
"Be silent," the boy barked at her, and his voice was the voice of no earthly boy at all. The very sound of it seemed to send echoing whispers through Nike's head, and set the hair on her arms standing up.
The kid stepped away from his mother, moving over to Teagan's side and then squinting. "What is it, mother?" he asked. "I can't see it properly."
Morrigan leaned over a little, whispering in Nike's ear. "The child is not yet an abomination. The demon lurks its fingers through a tear in the Veil. They are coiled around the boy's mind. It makes it difficult for it to see our world as it tries to use uncooperative eyes to do so."
"It's a woman, Connor," Isolde told him, and as her eyes darted from her son to the newcomers, they were somehow both sharp and dull with fear. "Two women, and some men- "
"Shut up!" Connor snapped at her, then strode further, closer to them. Nike's hand gripped Far Song a little tighter, but otherwise she made no move. The child leaned forward a little, squinting even more, pursing his lips and looking almost absurdly like an elderly old prior trying to read on the privy.
Then the clench of his face eased and clarified, and at the same moment Nike felt something most unusual; the briefest sensation of a hand brushing over her hair, and then whispered words, purring but so faint they may have been her imagination.
I see what you desire.
"Well, so it is," Connor said, and he sounded pleased. "I didn't know they made women this pretty. She is young and bright, so unlike you Mother. I am surprised you do not tear her apart in a fit of jealousy!"
He grinned as if seeing such a display would be the most enjoyable spectacle, and behind him Teagan suddenly laughed in a high-pitched voice and thrust his fists into the air. "Jealousy!"
"Yes," Connor said, and licked his lips in a way that would have given Nike shudders of disgust had it come from a grown man. Coming from a boy of his years, it moved right past disgust and into an almost primal revulsion. He inclined his head in a way that indicated his mother still standing over by the fire. "Kill her, woman. I'd rather have someone like you standing near me than that old harridan."
"Harridan!" Teagan echoed.
"I won't," Nike said evenly. "I do not answer to the likes of you."
The stark lust on the kid's face immediately twisted into furor. "I am an arl's son! You will obey me, servant!"
"You are not an arl's son," Nike said coldly, her voice never rising or wavering. "And I am not a servant. I am Nike Cousland of Highever, daughter to Teryns. I am not answerable to the boy you speak through as an arl's son, nor would be even were he an Arl. I am most certainly not answerable to the likes of you, demon."
"No!" Isolde moved forward now, gripping the neck of her dress with such force that she almost tore it. It was not Connor she spoke to, however; it was Nike. "He's not! He's not a demon. Please, please do not hurt him, he is my little boy!"
"Oh, your very voice gets on my nerves!" Connor said, clenching his hands over his ears with almost as much force as she clenched her dress. Isolde kept on as if she hadn't heard him.
"Please, you must help him. You must help us! It was that mage, Jowan. It was he that did this! My boy-"
"SHUT UP!" Connor turned and raged at Isolde, and the voice that erupted from his throat seemed to shake the very foundations of the room itself. Isolde recoiled from it so violently she fell into a sit on the floor, winding an arm around her head. The two catatonic musicians dropped their instruments, the lute giving a harsh 'twang!' as it clattered to the ground.
Every guard in the room save those few that had come in with them abruptly drew their swords. Their slack expressions did not change, but their heads turned and focused on Nike, Alistair, and Morrigan. Alistair drew his own blade again in reaction, and Nike tore an arrow from her quiver and set it to string, but Morrigan seemed only mildly curious as she regarded the bared blades now surrounding them.
Connor looked back at Nike, his fists clenched and breathing hard. "You will be my servant or you will be dead!"
I can give her to you.
That soft, almost non-existent voice in her mind again, languid and soothing, a sharp contrast to the murderous fury on Connor's face.
"Release these men and release that boy at once," Nike said, her eyes fixed on the blazing hate in Connor's. "Release them and go back to whatever pit you crawled from, worm."
The hate didn't scare her. In fact, it was almost painfully familiar. It was the same hate that hid in her heart, whenever she thought of her nephew's poor little body, or of her parents, or of her home. It was the same hate she felt toward Rendon Howe.
She feared many things in this life, even including what the demon might do to them, but she did not fear that hate.
Connor scowled again, then he took a step backward. "Kill her," he said, and then gave a dismissive flap of his hand in the direction of Alistair and Morrigan. "Kill them too."
As he turned away from Nike she saw that twisted, angry mask of hate fall away, leaving only a confused and frightened little boy behind it. Then Connor ran out of the room, Isolde calling after him frantically and pursuing him to the door.
Then the entranced soldiers closed in, a madly grinning Teagan hurrying to join them, and the fight was on.
"Teagan! Teagan! Oh, you killed him!"
Isolde all but collapsed over the unconscious Bann, gripping him and sobbing. Alistair, blood on the pommel of his sword, winced with boyish guilt. "Isolde- "
"You murdered him!"
Nike frowned, her arm aching. The fight had been brief enough, but brutal. The ensorcelled men had fought stiffly and without finesse, but they had outnumbered them even with the two or three soldiers that had entered the dining hall with them. Nike had gotten off a single shot before they were too close for comfort, then drew her dagger and almost immediately lost it as one of the broadswords swung her way. She had thrown up her arm almost instinctively, catching her attacker's forearm with her own. With the weight of mail and his sword in it, the block felt as if it had broken her arm, sending her dagger flying from her fingers and nearly sending her to the ground.
Alistair had intervened then, throwing the man back and giving Nike room to back up. Her arm had protested in hot agony, but she got Far Song lifted again…and then lowered. Just that fast, it was over.
Morrigan had taken two down as calmly as her mother had wrung the chickens' necks back in the Wilds. Alistair and the other soldiers had done for the rest, the Warden's final blow in the fight to slam his pommel into Teagan's temple, folding the grinning man like laundry.
Under Isolde's furor, Nike could see Alistair diminishing again, almost visibly turning into the little unwanted boy Isolde had treated so cruelly before sending him away from the only home and family he'd known.
"Leave off," she said sharply, before she was even sure she was going to speak. "Isolde Guerrin, get on your feet. Teagan isn't dead. I can see him breathing from here. Get hold of yourself!"
She felt almost an immediate stab of guilt as the clearly exhausted woman gaped at her, then slowly got to her feet, but that guilt vanished quickly as the gape closed, the chin lifting proudly.
"How dare you speak to me like that? I am Lady Guerrin, wife to the Arl, and- "
"And you will address me as 'Your Ladyship,' my Lady," Nike said tersely. "For I am the daughter of the Teryns of Highever. Your husband himself is answerable to me, so don't imagine as his wife you can speak to me like that!"
Inwardly, she cringed a little. She deserved respect for her standing- or, what had once been her standing- but she had never been one to rub her titles or her standing in the faces of others so callously. This woman was a terrified mother and wife, whose husband lay ill and whose child had become the puppet of a demon. Nike didn't know the horrors that Isolde had seen over the last few weeks. But somehow, she could not dredge up more than the most tremulous feeling of pity and sympathy for her.
Many in Ferelden had seen and were seeing nightmares and horrors Nike didn't want to imagine. Nike didn't imagine herself a cruel person, but this woman…
"I am sorry, My Ladyship," Isolde said miserably, but her head never lowered from its proud position. "Please, forgive me. Have pity, my son- "
For some reason, her asking for pity only made Nike angrier. Her tone grew even colder, even softer as she lifted her brows.
"Pity?" Nike asked. "Good men and women died at Ostagar- they have my pity. Families have been forced to flee from their homes, tormented by darkspawn- they have my pity. Tell me, Isolde, what pity it is that you think you deserve from me?"
"My husband, Eamon, he is deathly ill! Connor only wanted to help, and he- "
"And he foolishly tore the Veil and made a pact with a demon, leading to who knows how many deaths. These men here," Morrigan gestured at the bodies around them. "Dozens more in the village? We should pity you for turning your son into an abomination?"
"No! Connor is not an abomination! He isn't- this is the mage's fault! Not my Connor! He didn't do this, that mage- "
"The mage you hired to train your son in secret?" Nike asked.
Isolde looked ill, eyes darting from Nike to Morrigan and back. "He…I-I…C-Connor was just a little boy! He- "
Her eyes landed on Alistair, and for the first time she seemed to recognize who he was. Her frantic look changed ever so slightly, just for a moment, to a look of venom. Then she was reaching toward him, pleading.
"Alistair-!"
"Do not speak to him!" Nike told her. "You do not get to speak to him! You are speaking to me."
"Nike," Alistair started, and he sounded gentle and sad. "This isn't going to help anything."
Nike knew he was right, knew she was being needlessly cruel. She took a deep breath, and nodded to him.
"We need to deal with this situation," she said, trying to keep the bitterness from her voice. It was not easy, not with her arm throbbing at her. Not with the memory of Morrigan laying there dying in raven form from a bolt in her chest, or the one of Adaon and her family being driven out of their home by the darkspawn, and all the rest of it from Rendon Howe down. She turned her attention from Isolde to her companions. "Thoughts?"
"Much as I loathe the idea of hurting a child, if Connor is an abomination there is no other alternative," Alistair said.
"But he's not an abomination, not yet," Nike said, and looked at Morrigan. "Is there any saving him?"
"With the aid of the mage down in the dungeons, it may be possible," she said. "However, it would be difficult and dangerous to try- "
"Anything!" Isolde said frantically, overhearing. "Anything you can do! Connor is innocent in all this. I-I did what I thought was best but please, do not punish my son for my sins. He is a good boy- "
Nike looked at her and felt an inner quaver as Isolde nearly cringed at the expression, lowering her head and avoiding Nike's eyes.
"Please," she said again more softly. "I will do anything. I will do anything to help Connor."
"Where is he now?"
"He-…he probably ran to his room," Isolde told her. "Violence frightens him."
"All right. If you want to help then send for Jowan," Nike said. "Get him out of your cells and bring him up here. We'll see what he says, and see what we can do."