So, a couple of brief history lessons so you're not confused by passing references in this chapter. First, before the late 19th/early 20th century, beds were made of thin mattresses piled atop each other. A household piled up as many as they could afford, stuffed with the best-quality materials they could afford. Straw was cheap and crappy, wool was middling, feathers were good, and down was the very, very best. Even in a wealthy household, the bottom mattresses would likely be stuffed with straw, and only the top one or two with down.

Second, both my editors flagged the word "shift" to ask if I meant "shirt." I do not. A shift is a long, loose undergarment, usually made of cotton or linen and therefore easily washed. It was worn against the skin to protect less-easily-cleaned garments from sweat. It was actually worn by both men and women for many centuries, and continued to be worn by women...well, at least up until corsets fell out of style. Have you ever tried to wash a boned corset (or stays before that, or bodices before that)? It's basically impossible.

And yes, I did got out and research these historical details just so that my fanfic would be period-appropriate where called for. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it, but I'm mildly crazy even on my best days.

Final Words

I stared down at my still-sparking hand in consternation. I hadn't questioned the Anchor's increased brightness, suddenly clearly visible even through my glove and gauntlet - it had been too useful in the dark tunnels. Perhaps, by that same token, I shouldn't question this, either. I had, after all, just destroyed two demons without any particular effort on my part, which was convenient since I was in no shape to fight. Or move my left arm at all, for that matter.

But the Anchor's sudden...eagerness - which might be an overly optimistic interpretation, but I would take optimism where I could find it - seemed like, at best, a double-edged blade. The Anchor had already tried to kill me when I first received it, expanding in concert with the expanding Breach. This felt uncomfortably similar.

On the other hand - which meant the one without the incomprehensibly powerful magic of certain death attached to it - I was going to freeze long before the Anchor managed to eat me alive. Long before. I had, at best, a handful of hours - an estimate I revised down considerably when I finally located an exit just beyond the place where the demons had been, and felt the first tendrils of frigid wind curl around me.

"Creators," I swallowed. "Creators - help me." I didn't think I wanted to die, but I was so tired and so cold already, and everything still hurt - which was good, really. As long as it hurt, I wasn't on the edge of death. But pain didn't make it easier to want survival.

I had been so certain I was going to die in the avalanche. I hadn't wanted it - hadn't even been remotely at peace with it - but I had been certain . Now I had to keep struggling on, even though I was facing near-certain death again, on multiple fronts - again - and I was just so fucking tired.

Just so fucking tired.

Swallowing a sob, I took my first step out into the wind and swirling snow.

It didn't take long to stop hurting - less time than I had feared. Or hoped? Something. It was bad. I knew in some distant corner of my mind that it was bad, although it was hard to remember why. I was so cold at first, and then I wasn't that, either. Not hurt, not cold, just tired - and for some reason I was walking uphill, always uphill.

The pass, I reminded myself - I was making for the pass. Hopefully. It wasn't as though I could see it. All I could do was struggle on uphill and hope I was headed in the right direction.

No one was coming for me. Everyone thought I was already dead.

I was about to be dead, so they weren't really that far off. I found myself thinking, for the first time in - weeks? - of my maela. What would she say if she could see me now? Oh, da'len, I told you not to trust them. The shemlenaan will never have your best interests at heart. Not like your clan.

"You wouldn't understand, Maela," I muttered under my breath at the image I had conjured up, probably representing all my own doubts about the course I had taken. "I volunteered for this. There was no one else - I had to - I saved so many of them - "

Humans, the Deshanna in my mind chided me. You saved so many humans. And for what? Without the Anchor, what future have you saved them for?

"It won't be like Redcliffe," I swore between clenched teeth. "He doesn't - he doesn't have the mages. Leliana knows about the - about the demon army - the assassination. The Breach is closed. It isn't the same. Still," I added before my projection of my grandmother could get away from me again, "I'm sorry I didn't tell you goodbye. I'm sorry - I'm sorry for so much. This wasn't what I wanted - how I wanted it to be. I never even introduced you to…"

I closed my eyes against the pain of that thought, and only then realized that my feet had stopped moving at some point. " Fenedhis ," I gasped, forcing myself to go on, even though I couldn't feel my toes or fingers - or nose - any longer. It was getting the better of me. Not long now.

You sent him away, Deshanna reminded me. He would have stayed beside you if you hadn't sent him away.

"He would have died," I whispered.

For all you know, he is already dead. But I suppose, this way, at least you didn't have to watch it - not like last time. The image of Solas, neck broken, rose before my eyes, and I gasped as though struck, bending against the sudden flare of agony in my chest, and nearly toppled into the snow.

"Stop it," I snarled, forcing myself upright. "He isn't dead. I saved him. I saved them. I may die here, but I'm dying a hero - it's more than you or the clan ever thought I would amount to."

That isn't true, da'len. Up until the day your vallaslin failed, I was certain you would be a hero - but a hero to our people - not to a herd of shemlenaan and flat-ears. I saw her looking at me, her expression both disappointed and desperately unhappy. If you had just waited a little longer - had just been patient -

"I was patient for nine fucking years!" I howled at the empty mountain. "I may die here, but at least I finally lived!" I stopped, breathing hard, and realized I was hallucinating. "Fuck," I whispered. The echoes of my shouts were still reverberating across the stark stone faces surrounding me. It was difficult to say when or if my limbs were moving any longer - I had to concentrate on each leg separately, one after the other, to force myself to continue on. I tried to take another step forward and immediately stumbled, going down to one knee. And those fucking echoes were still bouncing back to me, taunting me with the illusion that I wasn't alone. They came back deeper, no longer anything like my own voice.

"Stop," I begged, half sobbing, half yelling, knowing I was only making it worse. I couldn't get to my feet, so I forced myself forward on one hand and my knees, sinking deep into the deadly softness of the untouched snow. It reminded me abruptly of waking that first time on the pile of mattresses in my little cabin in Haven, and the sense that I had been drowning. I laughed aloud. "Void take it all - I knew that bed was fucking halla shit, and now I'm going to die drowning in the same thing but cold." The laughter was too much - my trembling limbs gave up, refusing to organize themselves into a series of movements that would propel me through the smothering blanket of snow. "Fine," I muttered, managing to flop onto my back, "you fuckers want me to get used to sleeping on one of your beds, I'll die on something just as soft - show you how it's all...wrong."

Dimly I understood that I wasn't showing anyone anything, that it might be years - decades, even - before my frozen corpse was even found, but those feeble objections just made me laugh again. It was a fine joke, after all. Everything that had happened, and here I was freezing to death in exactly the sort of soft, pillowy bed I hated.

"Oh no, no, no no no." Dorian's voice drifted over me, though I couldn't see him. I hoped he would be better company than Maela. "I'm sure you have - a lot left to show me Inana, so I need you to stay here. Just a little longer, love, stay with me."

I groaned, blindly flinging out my hand and hoping it would make the hallucination go away. "Hate these beds," I grumbled.

"Well, this particular bed has the disadvantage of being cold and not actually a bed, so I quite understand your antipathy," Dorian's voice responded. Damn, I thought I had gotten rid of him. I didn't need phantoms circling me while I died.

The world lurched and I groaned again. "What now ?" It felt like I was moving, although I was fairly certain I was still dying in a snowbank. Maybe a wolf had found me and was dragging me off. That would be just my luck - no lessons for anyone then, because I would be wolf shit before too long. I hoped I could at least finish dying before the pack ripped into me. "I'm sorry," I told the Dorian hallucination, aware the words were slurring but unable to force my lips and tongue into any better coordination than my limbs, "I need to die now. But tell Solas - tell Solas I did it. He lived."

"I'm sure he'll be glad to know, but you'll have to tell him yourself, my dearest."

Welcome darkness was closing in. "Mmm." The sound was irritated, half a growl. How dare a Dorian who wasn't even real try to pawn off delivering my final messages on me? I was distantly certain that dying got one out of that sort of thing. It was too much effort to reproach him for it, though. My thoughts were dropping, one by one, into perfect silence, and all at once I did, too.

I woke.

That was surprising, though at the moment I couldn't recall why. It seemed a normal enough thing to do - I couldn't immediately remember a single time I hadn't awakened, in fact.

I was in camp. I knew it by the sounds of animals, conversation, and snapping canvas, and also by the padded but comfortably solid surface beneath my back. Though where the camp was located didn't present itself with any haste, it sounded like a large one. That was nice - our larger camps always reminded me of traveling with my clan.

As the sleep began to clear from my mind, it occurred to me that I was thirsty - and hungry, too. With a sigh, I stretched out my arms, getting ready to sit up.

Or at least I tried. The attempted movement caused my left shoulder to spasm and immediately cramp. My eyes snapped open as I remembered several things at once - Haven, the Elder One, falling into a mining tunnel, and then endless cold - and I looked around a little wildly.

Beside me, Solas sat up stiffly from a messy nest of a bedroll where he had apparently fallen asleep. The tent I was lying in was larger than the one I used in the field, likely because it was a makeshift shelter for supplies - I spotted humps that might have been sacks of food and more regular boxy things that were either actual boxes or bales of straw. Only three sides appeared fully enclosed. The canvas left a gap the length of my arm in front of me - I could tell by the change in color and the fuzzy lights that lay beyond. Solas - or someone - had put up a curtain of translucent magic to block the wind and encourage colder air to remain outside while warmer air remained within.

My gaze met Solas's, and the next thing I knew his hand was on my left shoulder, fingers easing the cramped muscle as he sank a thread of healing magic into it for good measure. "You tore several tendons with varying degrees of severity," he informed me calmly, even though, with his fingers pressed into my flesh, I could feel his disquiet. "They will take time to heal, even with magical aid. Does anything else hurt? You had minor fractures in two ribs which may cause you occasional discomfort for a day or two."

I shook my head slowly. "Thirsty," I croaked.

He helped me sit up and I realized I wore only a shift, somewhat too large even given the typically-loose nature of the garment. The neck gaped open wide enough to fall off both my shoulders, though at the moment only my left was exposed.

Solas brought a cup to my lips, and I recognized tea of feladara and gaildahlas, sweetened with honey until it was almost syrupy. I grimaced at the sweetness, even though I swallowed it down. "You have been unconscious for a full day," Solas told me, a hint of sternness in his voice, "and we had to administer something at intervals to keep your energy up."

"I see," I said. My voice was still a bit rough, but talking wasn't painful anymore. Beneath the blankets of my bedroll, I could dimly make out the glow of the Anchor on my left hand. "Solas - the Elder One, Corypheus, did something to my hand."

"I know," he replied swiftly. "I have...settled things as well as I may, though you will find the Anchor more efficient at gathering energy now."

"How did you know he called it 'the Anchor'?" I wondered.

"You talked in your sleep," he replied. "We have pieced together a great deal of what must have happened based on your fragments. In the short term, you will likely find this new capability useful, as you will be able to discharge the excess energy at opportune moments."

"In the long term?" I asked.

"The Anchor has always been a threat to you," he said steadily, though something told me he was working for his apparent calm. "That is no more or less true now. Only the timeline has - perhaps - been somewhat altered."

I gave him a sardonic look to let him know he wasn't comforting me. "No matter what I said while I was unconscious, I need to give you - all of you - a full account of what I learned."

"Inana," Solas said flatly.

"I'll rest afterward," I promised.

He caught my face in his hands, and I realized that wasn't his primary concern. His disquiet from earlier had unfurled into guilt and regret, self-recrimination and intense longing. " Ir'el abelas," he said quietly, thumbs skimming across my cheeks while his fingers traced my earlobes and his palms cradled my jaw. "Had I not urged you to avoid nurturing the shivas'lath, matters would not have become nearly so dire." His forehead came to rest against mine. "I nearly killed you."

"You did not," I told him, unable to summon any passion for the argument. I was still tired, and the wash of his feelings was only sapping my already-limited energy. " Corypheus nearly killed me. I assume you were the one who instigated the search for me." I couldn't think of anyone else who would have had reason to believe me alive. "I didn't expect it. I really thought I was going to die on that mountain. And in the mine before that. And facing down Corypheus before that. No one anticipated any of this."

"Even so, I cannot forgive myself," he whispered.

I made a disgusted sound in my throat. "Then you're going to torture me with your guilt," I pointed out, "which I already don't appreciate, and will only appreciate less as it goes on."

He was surprised. "I...had not considered that angle."

"Well, start," I advised him. "And get everyone else in here. I have things to say before I pass out again."

I don't remember if I've mentioned it, but gaildahlas is the Elvish word for embrium.