Nike didn't know how long she sat there in silence, looking at the small shale bottle in her hand. She and Ser Terrik had spoken at length, and he had told her quite a few things that were now swimming in her head.
He'd said some about the future. He'd said some about the past. He said some about choices and some about fate, and some about the ashes. But it was the bottle most of all that her mind lingered on.
"We could just leave," she said.
"You could, but you know what will happen if you do," Terrik said patiently. "I know you feel as if you will betray her this way, but she will forgive you."
"Better to ask for forgiveness than for permission?" she asked, bitterness in her voice. Instead of putting the bottle into her pouch as she had done the ashes (which were wrapped carefully in tied silk), she tucked it into the collar of her tunic. It would be stupid, she supposed, to ask what would happen to her if the bottle leaked in the next few minutes.
She got to her feet. Terrik said nothing, watching as she went back to the door of the chamber. Still, when she reached it, she looked back as if he had spoken.
"You are certain of all of this?"
"As certain as I was the four other times you asked," he said with a gentle smile. She nodded, and opened the door.
Leliana and Zevran were waiting for her, just where she'd left them. Zevran was sitting on the stone floor of the anteroom, tossing a dagger lightly from one hand to another. Leliana looked to have been pacing, and was the first to speak.
"There you are! Are you all right? Did you find the ashes?"
"I'm fine," Nike told her. "And I have the ashes."
"Truly?" Leliana looked simultaneously relieved and surprised. "What happened? What did you see? May I see them?"
"Not now," Nike said. "I'll tell you what I can later, but now isn't the time."
Leliana bit her lip lightly, clear disappointment on her face, and gave an understanding nod. Nike could tell just from the glitter in her eyes, however, that as soon as there was a free moment she'd be asking again, prying for details.
Zevran got to his feet and tucking his dagger away. "It should be no great trouble to leave this place without drawing the attention of that cult, and get back to the others."
"Not just yet for that either," Nike told him. "We cannot leave the cult or the dragon just be."
"You said that you had no interest in fighting the dragon," Leliana said. "Only in getting the ashes. You have done that."
"I don't have any interest in fighting the dragon, and I don't intend to fight it. I do intend on getting rid of it, however. Zevran, if I am cuffed behind my back, would you be able to show me how to escape them quickly?"
"I would indeed," the elf said, and grinned meaningfully. "I have a set of shackles in my saddlebag. I would be more than happy to use them on you. It won't take but a night or two of practice until you are escaping them deftly."
"No, I need to be able to escape them within the next hour," she said, ignoring his usual lascivious emphasis when he mentioned using them on her. "Do you have the proper tool on you?"
"What? The next hour?" Leliana looked aghast. Zevran, as well, looked concerned.
"I do have the tool," he said. "However, the instruction would be better served with actual shackles."
"We don't have the time for that," she said. "Show me how to use and conceal the tool and give me a quick lesson on how to use it to unfasten shackles as best you can. Then I want you and Leliana to retreat back to that corridor overlooking the courtyard where we saw the dragon, and get ready with your arrows. If you need to use them it should be obvious."
"I must protest," Leliana said. "Nike, we cannot allow you to – "
"Not asking for permission and your protest is noted," Nike said.
"I must as well protest," Zevran said. "Keeping your safety is my – "
"As well noted, and as well not asking your permission," Nike told him shortly. "You both need to trust me, and if you do as I ask I promise we'll get out of here without a scratch on any of us. Both cult and dragon will no longer be the issue they are now. If you cannot do that, then you need to leave me here alone to do what I need to do, because if you stay and do anything other than what I ask it will be disastrous."
"What happened in that room?" Leliana asked her, folding her arms.
"A lot that I have no time nor want to explain," Nike said. "I will tell you this. I have the ashes, and I have it on very good authority that if I do this we'll all be fine, the dragon will no longer be a threat, and the cult will be broken. If I don't, that dragon will wreak a havoc on the world that will nearly rival that of the Archdemon and the cult will spread like a cancer. I don't want to do this either, but allowing that to happen is not an option. Now which will it be? We are running out of time."
Zevran and Leliana exchanged looks, before the elf shrugged and drew a thin tool from his sleeve and began to explain its use.
The mountain air in the courtyard was crisp and biting, and the snow was falling steadily. Most of the cult was still out there, crowded around as the man orated. The high dragon was still there as well, the detritus of its meal still scattered about as it lazily dozed.
When Nike came out of the building, no one at first noticed her. Far Song was gone from her shoulder, the daggers gone from their sheathes. Only a single arrow was tucked in the side of her belt. The orator, a man she suspected was the mayor and the head of this cult, had his hands to the sky and was blinking against the snowflakes that clustered on his eyelashes and thick eyebrows, and as well did not notice her.
The first to spot her was a child, a little boy probably no older than seven. His eyes rounded and he tugged at the sleeve of the mother beside him. As she turned to hush him, her cheeks bright and red with cold, she saw Nike and gasped.
Nike didn't pay her or the others any mind. Her eyes were on the mayor, and as she strode up to the back of the crowd with cold-feathers of white gathering on her hair, more and more ruddy faces with their plumes of misty breath were turning toward her.
The villagers themselves seemed taken aback by her boldness, and as she reached the edge of the crowd they, at first, started to part to let her through in a reflex of civilized action. The mother drew her boy closer to her.
She was a third of the way through them before what was happening seemed to sink in, and the first indignant exclamations lifted into the air. The mayor, jarred out of his revelry, looked down and saw her for the first time with a face that was simultaneously annoyed, dreamy, and confused.
Men shouldered forward and grabbed hold of her. Nike didn't resist. The rest of the crowd retreated a bit more, shouting questions at each other, her, and the mayor. Nike's stomach was a riot of nerves, the hostile crowd of the Gauntlet vision and her all-too-real burning at the stake still very fresh in her mind, but she let none of it show.
"You!" The mayor said at last, his voice cutting over those of his flock. The angry crowd started to quiet down a bit, and the men hauling her stopped a few feet in front of him, puffing and blowing. They sounded like irritated cattle, and for a terrible moment she had to struggle not to laugh. "Who are you? How did you get here? Blasphemer! Defiler!"
"My name is Nike Cousland. I came for the ashes," she said.
Many in the crowd hissed like cats. One of the men holding her punched her in the shoulder. His fist was like rock, and the pain that dug through her arm was hot and instant. She recoiled reflexively from him and that only latched the both of their grips on her arms even tighter.
"How dare you!" the mayor's voice was now little more than a growl as he stepped closer. "You admit to seeking to steal from us? To stain our pure Lady with your dirty, unworthy hands?"
"Andraste doesn't belong to you," Nike told him. "You are the thieves. Thieves, liars, murderers, and worshippers of a Wurm!"
Now the mayor hit her, his slap ringing out and branding red fingermarks over her cheek. Then he gripped her chin hard, his breath washing over as he shouted. "This! This is what I was talking about! This is the wickedness of the outside world, an abomination that seeks to steal your lives, your children, and even your Lady!"
To Nike he said, "Andraste has been reborn and will cleanse the world of you, the heathens and the wicked. She will burn you and your towns and your cities with fire, tear low your haughty self-importance. Only we, the truly faithful, will remain."
"No," Nike told him. "You have made yourself judge, lifted yourself up with pride, daring to pretend to speak for the Maker and His Chosen. That dragon is not Andraste, you are not a prophet, and I'm going to prove it."
He barked a laugh, and she winced faintly. Not from the sound, but from the smell. His breath was fetid.
"And how are you going to prove it?"
"I'm going to kill her, and then you."
More laughter. The men holding her joined in, as did several of the others. The laughter of some sounded nervous and forced, and while she could not see them she could sense part of the crowd moving back even further. Afraid of her? Afraid of rousing the eye or the wrath of the mayor?
The mayor released her face, then looked at the men holding her. "Strip her of her weapons, and shackle her."
As they quickly frisked her, the arrow removed from her belt, the mayor folded his arms. "I have made myself nothing. I will not judge you. Andraste alone will have that honor. And you will die like all the blasphemers, in our Lady's cleansing fire."
Whether in their haste or inexperience, or just their ingrained hesitancy to touch certain parts of a woman's body without leave, the men frisking her did not find the delicate shale vial she had tucked into her tunic. Chained shackles were fastened around her wrists, the metal so cold it was almost hot. They did, indeed, put her hands behind her.
The mayor waved the other men back as she was restrained, then took her arm himself. "You will be the first to die, but you will not be the last."
"I will ask you to repeat that when you have my arrow through your throat," she replied. "But you will find you're not able to."
Yanking her hard, he turned toward the dragon and crossed a few steps over the empty space between the gathered crowd and the dozing beast. The crowd began to gather back closer together, clustering once more.
"Great Andraste, First and Chosen of the Maker, our beloved Lady!"
The dragon's eyes fully opened and it lifted its head curiously. The sheer size of the monster seen from above had been daunting; this close it was horrifying. Its head alone was the size of a small house, and each dark claw was half her height. One strike by those claws would not eviscerate her, it would tear her completely in half. Nike barely heard the mayor's words as he continued, shoving her forward a step or two.
"This is a murderer, a blasphemer, a heathen trespasser, and a defiler! We know that you can see into her heart, oh Lady! She is yours to judge, in mercy and in grace! We humbly submit her to your will!"
The dragon, indolent with food, only continued to look at her curiously. The mayor cautiously took another step forward and shoved Nike hard. She stumbled to her knees in the snow, and then struggled back up to her feet. The dragon's attention, much like a lazy house cat, perked up at her motion.
That would not do. Sometimes, one had to prod the cat, comfortable by its fire, to get it to hunt the mouse.
"Yes, greetings false idol!" she shouted at it, striding forward across the courtyard toward the monster, fighting against every bit of her that wanted to run away from it. "Hello, to the Goddess of Sloth and Indulgence! Bonjour, pampered house pet to liars, murderers, and cowards!"
Her words were making the cult behind her gasp in shock, and many of them started to shout angrily. That was good. She doubted the dragon understood her words, and they were not for the dragon anyway. She wanted noise, and motion.
She wanted to rile it.
Behind her, she had slipped Zevran's thin tool out of her sleeve and worked it into her palm. Her fingers felt numb and fumbling.
She stopped halfway between crowd and beast. The dragon had definitely been roused now, head held high. Its eyes shifted over her head toward the crowd and Nike shouted again, as loudly as she could. She simply cursed and ranted at it, insult after insult pouring out of her, and even started kicking snow toward it. What she said and did wasn't as important as simply regaining its attention.
"Come on, you Wurm! Prove yourself!"
The false Andraste hefted itself to its feet, it's great tail lashing through the snow and sending up a great sweep of it, nearly as high as a wave. Its eyes had returned to her, its neck swaying intently as it planted its feet. Behind her, the crowd was beginning to cheer.
Nike felt the tool finally catch properly, and the shackles came loose just as the dragon pulled its head back and bared its teeth. Between them, she could see glimmers of firelight and whisps of smoke.
A roaring jet of flame belched out as the shackles dropped into the snow. Nike flung her hands up in front of her. She felt the heat pass over her as launched into a clumsy somersault. She skidded some, and snow filled her nostrils, but the flame missed her.
Surging back to her feet, her fingers like ice against her skin, she snatched out the vial from its hiding spot just as the monster recovered from its blast, maw gaping and teeth gleaming. As hard as she could, she flung the tiny vial into that cavernous target, and watched as it struck the creature's tongue and bounced upward. It hit the roof of the dragon's mouth and the lid popped free, the vial itself cracking. An infinitesimal splash of clear liquid flashed for only a single moment.
Instantly the dragon recoiled as if she had shoved a sword up through its soft palate. Its mouth snapped shut and it thrashed. One massive hand swiped at its face but it was already tipping, already dying. Its tail smashed into one side of the courtyard and she heard the shatter of stone.
Nike didn't pause to watch. There was no time. She bolted across the slippery, snow-clogged courtyard back toward the crowd. Many were just gaping at the dying monster, shocked and disbelieving – the mayor among them. More were clustered back in fear against the building, and some of these were starting to flee inside.
Nike reached the crowd just as the dragon fully collapsed to the ground with a slam that sent the cobblestones shaking underfoot. She tore the arrow out of the hand of the stunned man who had taken it from her, and was halfway through the crowd before he started to realize what had happened.
"Get her!" she heard the mayor scream, his voice frantic and furious, so high-pitched his words were almost indiscernible as language.
A man stepped into her path and she dodged him, crashing into another who tried to make a grab for her. She tore away from him only for the hand of yet another to hit her on her sternum, jolting her backward.
The raven came out of nowhere, beak and claws slashing. The man who had pushed her fell back with a cry of pain, and Nike didn't even try and stop her own fall. She hit the ground, already curling into a protective ball.
Morrigan appeared, a raging tempest of fury. Sweeping her staff in an arc in front of her both wind and fire tore in a scythe-like blade, cutting through flesh and clothes and leaving a momentary cyclone of screams and ashes behind it. The moment the fire-scythe had passed over Nike she was up again, and on the run.
The crowd was broken and running. People, some of them on fire, scattered screaming in all directions. Nike reached the edge of the courtyard just below the open-air windows where they had first spotted the cult and the dragon below them, skidded to a halt, and looked upward.
Far Song, dropped by Zevran, tumbled toward her. She caught it, whipping around and setting the singular arrow to its string and let fly.
The mayor, fleeing himself, was nearly to safety. His flying coat was singed with Morrigan's fire and as he looked behind him, wide in both eye and mouth, Nike could see the side of his face was burnt and bloodied as well.
Her arrow took him in the throat, skewered it through, and sent him careening and skidding over the ice and snow.
"Repeat it, mayor!" Nike called to him as he slid to a halt, spitting warm crimson over cold white. She lowered the bow. As he fell still, she added softly. "You'll find you're not able to."