oOo

It was soon after she had been talking to the two dwarves that she slipped over to me, just as I was about to go off for a morning bathe, handing me a carefully crafted Grey Warden hand puppet almost shyly. I blinked, surprised that Bodahn had not only been selling such a thing, but also that she had assumed – correctly – that I would like such a gift.

"Is this for me?"

Elissa nodded, wringing her hands for a few seconds before wrenching them apart to hang limply at her sides. "I thought you might like it. It reminded me of you."

"Wow. Thanks! Just—wow!" I just smiled helplessly at her, probably looking like a goofy idiot, but she seemed pleased at my response, flicking her eyes up to me and making a face I had come to know very well was her resisting a smile. After assuring me that I was welcome, she wandered off, helping Leliana with braiding her hair. I was giggling as I brought out my small wooden horse. Too bad I didn't have a griffon.

I couldn't help but feel elated all day as we set off again. We were now going in an arc vaguely following the east coast of Ferelden, bypassing Denerim but looping back a little once we ran into a fellow called Levi Dryden to arrive at Dryden's Soldier's Peak. It seemed sensible to secure the stronghold before we crossed the Bannorn towards the Circle of Magi. We had decided to do Orzammar last simply because travelling through the mountains to reach it took so long as traveling by boat across the lake was out and the northern passage had been closed for years… which meant that we would be visiting Redcliffe before doing the full circle around Lake Calenhad. If all went to plan. I had a feeling it wouldn't.

While I sympathized with Levi wanting to clear his family name, I hoped that the Wardens would gain some use of the tower, because we didn't exactly have time to go around completing personal quests if it didn't help us to fight the ever-encroaching Blight. When we arrived, the fortress, while a little ancient and crumbly in some places, was actually in pretty good condition.

As we continued to discover what had happened at Soldier's Peak, it seemed less and less likely that we would find the evidence Levi wanted… probably because Sophia Dryden had actually led a rebellion. Dryden should never have been made a Warden; her actions were always going to have been too politically charged, her motivations too far from the key tenets of the Wardens.

When we met the ghoul that she had become after her mage's mistake, I knew that it wanted something, but I could also sense it slowly gathering its power. I nudged Elissa slightly to warn her, and saw her head turn slightly in my direction and nod. When "Sophia Dryden" offered to seal the Veil and stop the rest of the demons entering from the Fade, I crossed my arms. She would want something hideous for that, I was sure. When she revealed that she wanted to 'see the world', I was confident that Elissa would shoot her idea down.

I wasn't wrong.

"No deal, demon."

Elissa didn't waste words after that, drawing her swords and leaping forwards. I huffed out a breath as I rushed to help her, sensing Morrigan fall back to the far wall as she prepared her own magic to combat the undead Sophia was summoning. I handled one trying to move into Elissa's left flank while Sten was dealing with two off to the far right, and Dal was already ahead of me, leaping in beside his master and taking down an enemy with a vicious swipe. I took stock after taking down my target and saw that Elissa had still been left fighting Sophia head-on whilst trying to fend off two other undead wardens, surrounded on every side. I saw another skeleton coming towards me from my left, but I found myself unable to take my eyes off Elissa as one of the undead managed to get his sword lodged in her right side as she parried Sophia and covered her left. I heard her cry out in pain and I wasted a few seconds bashing the skull of my own attacking enemy and sweeping my sword at his legs before rushing to her aid. When I arrived next to Elissa, she had put her dagger through Sophia's throat but was collapsed on the floor, clutching her side. I lifted up my shield over her and an attacking sword bounced off it. I shouted at Dal and Sten, urging them to finish off the last two undead.

Once I heard the distinct sounds of bones shattering, I turned towards Elissa. "Are you alright?" I panted, eyeing the blood covering the right side of her armour. Stupid question.

"Not too bad," she gasped anyway, wide eyes fixed on the ceiling. She gestured with a limp arm towards her pack, and I nodded as I rummaged around for something to help, trying to ignore the wild thumps of my heart caused by the abject terror I had felt when she had gone down – again. I gave her a tonic for the pain, watching her sweat and blood streaked face and noting every grimace as Morrigan fiddled with her wound, trying to get a grip on myself. The sight of her getting injured had frozen me – a rookie mistake that every sort of combat training, Templar included, made a point to correct. Embarrassing.

Elissa met my eyes over The Shrew's bent head and gave me a crooked smile as she bent her leg and rested her left arm on it.

Something had changed since that day I had nearly hyperventilated in my tent, and she had been smiling more, her dry humour peeking its head further out of its shell. I'd flattered myself thinking that her sharing the fate of her family with me had been cathartic, but it was probably just that her loss was less raw thanks to time and that we were exhausting ourselves so thoroughly she didn't have time to dwell on it.

"This is what I get for doing the right thing."

"No, 'tis nothing less than you deserve for running in by yourself," Morrigan said acidly.

Sten was standing silently behind us all, a hand on Dal's collar as he kept the warhound in place. He didn't say anything, but I could sense he agreed.

"Oh, please!" Elissa scoffed as she removed her helmet to run a hand through her hair. "You knew I was never going to let it run around stealing from children and tripping up the elderly."

I snorted in amusement before I could stop myself and watched as Elissa glanced at me, chuckled, and then huffed out a breath in pain, lamenting how much laughing hurt her. I turned away and petted Dal absently as I scanned the body of Sophia and realized that she was still wearing the Warden Commander armour. I started down an ill-advised train of thought centring on why Duncan had never worn it, but was distracted by Morrigan's charming voice.

"There, all better. Do you think you'll be able to keep yourself out of trouble?"

Elissa pursed her lips at Morrigan's patronizing tone. "Yes, ma'am, will do." She said flatly as she collected her helmet and stood, and I could tell she was struggling not to show any discomfort because Morrigan was well versed in just about every area except healing, and no doubt she hadn't been able to dull the pain much.

A few minutes and a hazardous bridge later, we were in the study of the mage Avernus, the imbecile who had summoned the demons to aid the Wardens. As if that had ever ended well. When Elissa called me over with a terse voice, I looked away from a rather fascinating selection of books to see her standing stiffly, holding a crumbling sheaf of parchment, eyes still locked on the text. I joined her and looked over her shoulder.

I felt anger and horror wash over me in equal quantities as I read the entries on what he had done to the Wardens, especially when he was trying to expand the effects of the Taint. Why in the Maker's name would anyone want the Taint to run stronger in their veins?

Elissa finally raised her head and we shared a look of total and immediate understanding. She didn't move as I walked back over to the desk and knocked the vial off the table, feeling satisfied when it shattered into tiny little pieces and the liquid it contained started staining the floor. I glanced back to see Elissa nodding at me solemnly, shoving the book into her pack as Dal started sniffing curiously at the vial. I gently pushed him away, knowing that Morrigan was watching curiously. Sten was just standing there, as usual.

I moved back to Elissa and we agreed to do a quick search of the bookshelves to ensure there was nothing else that we didn't want falling into enemy hands.

While Avernus did have some notebooks detailing his descent into blood magic, and other unsavoury experiments, there was nothing of any immediate concern. When we actually met him – and I wasn't sure why I was surprised that he was still alive – he seemed to want to correct his mistake. I knew that Elissa was going to give him that chance, even though he really needed to do something about the bodies hanging off the walls. At any rate, we needed the Veil closed off.

The battle wasn't too hard, if a little lengthy and tiring. There were only so many times you could swing a heavy sword in one day before your arm just got tired. I had to resort to shoulder-bashing things with my shield.

Once it was over, the only issue left was the ancient mage. Elissa wouldn't agree to help him and then kill him, so I wasn't surprised when she told him to "continue his research… ethically" and warned him that we would be back to check on him. As we left Levi Dryden to get things up and running, I felt like we had done a good day's work.

When we were back at camp and Leliana pestered us for the details, I realized that I had never been left behind at camp. Elissa always made sure I was her the standard group of three, plus Dal who never left her side. I suppose I didn't either, though we had hardly known each other as long as she had had her hound. It had been… what, five weeks now? Six?

I turned to find her, and she was telling Leliana that she hadn't missed much. She fished the accursed journal out of her pack and tossed it onto the fire without pause in her conversation.

What kept Elissa's compass pointing north, I wondered as I sat and poked at the fire with a piece of forgotten kindling. What kept her so sure in her direction, so assured of her convictions?

"So, Alistair…"

Leliana was smirking at me in a way that I did not find reassuring at all.

"Yeees?" I said, as if drawing the word out would help protect me, glancing around to see where Elissa had gone and finding her talking with Sten. She was still a bit miffed at Morrigan – the two women were both too proud to come forward first. It would be a while until one of them made a peace offering.

"Alistair, it's terribly rude to ignore a lady when she speaks to you."

Leliana sounded amused but I apologised profusely anyway and pretended I didn't feel the heat creeping up towards my cheeks. I rubbed a hand across the back of my neck and cast around for a topic. "So what did you do while we were gone? Did you sew something?"

And she was off. Leliana was the party's seamstress and had become quite skilled at mending all sorts of tears and rips. If it weren't for her we'd all be bumbling about without underclothes, imagine the chafing. She'd started doing it as the only one with any skill in it (well, I assumed Elissa had some skill but she had adamantly refused to participate), but she also did it to pass the time now, using her smile on Bodahn until he let her perch on the back of his cart and knit or sew.

Leliana started describing in detail the green leaf pattern she'd decided to embellish one of her dresses with and I nodded along, eyes drifting.

Elissa was now—was she fighting with Sten? I tensed and got ready to leap up, but a second later they broke apart and it became clear Sten was teaching her some sort of hand to hand combat, gesturing to her stance and setting his own feet as she watched and tried to imitate. Then they were at it again, their attacks all far better suited to Sten's hulking form than Elissa's slight one. She would undoubtedly adapt it into her style though.

"Alistair?"

Oh cheesesticks. What had she been saying?

"Um, yes?" I said, looking at Leliana with my eyes wide in panic. She sighed and crossed her arms.

"I was saying, is there anything you would like me to alter? You can't want for only plainclothes, surely."

She was waving her hand at my attire now, with that faintly bemused look I imagined many Orlesians had when beholding the Ferelden masses and their uninspiring outfits.

"I must have missed my letter detailing appropriately formal attire for fighting darkspawn. All this time, I've been suffering along in my perfectly functional clothes without my embroidered doublet—" I broke off as Leliana whacked my shoulder, laughing as she poked her tongue out at me. "No, everything is fine for now," I reassured her.

"Alright, perhaps Elissa would like something done, then," She mused, a fingertip resting on her lip as she too turned her eyes to the spar. "So, what's happening between you and our faithful leader, hmm?"

Wait, what?

I looked back at her and she was doing that smirk again.

"Happening? Nothing's happening." I sounded a mite too defensive and all too guilty, which was bewildering as I wasn't lying.

"Oh, come now, Alistair. I don't think Wardens are meant to look at their commanders that way."

Had I been looking? I hadn't been looking. I'd been tending the fire and… occasionally taking notice of where Elissa was. That was all.

"Well, what can I say, I'm a terrible Warden," I joked. Self-deprecation, my old friend. I cleared my throat and stabbed the fire as if it were responsible for this conversation. "So, is there a point to this, other than trying to police my eyeballs?"

Blast it, that admitted I had been looking. Leliana was practically glowing with victory as I hung my head and stabbed the fire again.

"You should talk to her, you know."

"About what? The fact that I admire her leadership and impressive double-handed sweeps?" I responded glibly.

Leliana speared me with a look that reminded me of some of the older, sterner ladies of the Chantry. I supposed she'd been trained by them… and that I shouldn't provoke her too much.

"She trusts you," Leliana said simply.

I wanted to joke that that trust was ill-advised, but Leliana's statement seemed too serious for such a treatment.

Instead, I nodded, and hoped she would drop it. She did, and we had just started discussing the merits of asking Morrigan for some mushrooms to add to tonight's meal when Sten and Elissa joined us at the firepit, Dal loping along behind them to curl up next to his mistress once she had settled down cross-legged uncomfortably close to the fire, as she usually did.

"Elissa, would you like me to embroider something for you?" Leliana asked immediately, perhaps hoping that if she started now she might be able to wear Elissa down by the end of the year.

Elissa blinked at her slowly, breathing deep and looking exactly like someone who didn't much need dresses, what with her hair escaping from her braid and her forehead damp with sweat. "Why?"

"Every girl needs pretty dresses! That plain blue one you got in Lothering would look gorgeous with some silver detailing! And, would you look at that, I have some silver thread!" Leliana was beaming, enthused and clearly already planning what she would do to update Elissa's one dress.

"No, thank you," Elissa said shortly. Leliana's face fell, as did the hand that had been triumphantly presenting her sewing materials.

"But whyever not?"

"I have no need for dresses." Elissa started undoing her braid and combing through it with her fingers, oblivious to Leliana's distress at her dismissal.

I turned to comfort the disheartened woman. "She can't be trusted with nice dresses anyway Leliana, you should just make some for yourself."

"I can be trusted with them, I just prefer not to wear them," Elissa protested, one eyebrow raised in challenge.

"Such flagrant lies! Need I remind you of what happened last Harvest?"

Elissa scoffed at me bringing up a story she had most certainly told me in confidence and pretended to flick some fiery logs in my direction. I yelped as a burning ember landed on my leg from her efforts and jumped up, hopping on one foot as I tried to brush it off. Leliana was exclaiming at my misfortune and Elissa had stood but instead of helping she was just waving her hands around uselessly. Sten was sitting there with Dal, and he was definitely rolling his eyes on the inside. I shook a fist at him as I passed and he sighed, his huge hand clamping around my leg and holding it still as I finally removed the bit of hot whatever-it-was stuck to me.

Elissa had a hand over her mouth as I gingerly limped back to my spot. I realised after a second she wasn't doing it in horror, but to try and contain her laughter instead.

"Blast it, this isn't funny! You've injured me!" I informed her heatedly, poking through the hole in my trousers to check the skin below. I had a nice little hairless red patch there now.

"You shouldn't have provoked me," she rebuked, her eyes shining with her mirth. "That's what you get."

"This is abuse! I demand an adult!"

Leliana giggled as she considered the smoking hole in my clothes. "Well, I shall need to repair these now."

"Let me change into something else then," I said.

"It will only take a minute. Come," she insisted, gesturing that she wanted me to take them off. I shook my head in vehement denial and she folded her arms, tutting angrily. "Alistair!"

I looked at Elissa for support but she was nodding in agreement and not even looking as she ran her hands through her hair for knots. "Traitor," I muttered as I stood and tore my boots off, my trousers following as I did the quickest undress of my life and sat back down again, trying to preserve my modesty with my long shirt and thanking the Maker the ember hadn't also ruined my underclothes.

Leliana got straight to work and I didn't even protest as she started using that accursed silver thread and some bright blue fabric to mend the hole. I jumped as I felt Elissa's hair brush across my bare leg and looked across to find she'd scooted across to sit next to me and was inspecting the damage from her attack. Her finger reached out and traced the tender skin, causing goosebumps.

"Ow," I told her pointedly.

She shrugged. "You've had worse."

I'd been about to reply something utterly witty, when I realised why she hadn't just leaned across.

"How's your injury?" I asked, and she looked at me askance.

"It was nothing, really."

I raised an eyebrow.

"No, really," she insisted as she straightened, looking like she was trying very hard not to instinctively slouch over. She rolled her eyes at my meaningful frown and abruptly stood up, lifting her shirt and saying as she turned to present her side "See? No scar."

A little stunned at the nearness of her, I stared at the pink patch of skin now at eye height. No scar, but it looked tender and sore… Elissa wasn't as obviously muscular as I'd imagined – I'd pictured her body much closer to my own. She was softer and rounder, all graceful curves like something on a statue of Andraste.

I realised I hadn't replied and glanced up at her to find her looking back at me, her eyes a little wide. She looked down at herself almost in surprise and dropped her shirt.

"Y-yes, that's all well and good, but does it hurt?" I stammered belatedly as she sat back down.

"It's fine," she repeated, folding her hands in her lap and looking at them.

"There, all done!" Leliana exclaimed as she stood up and presented my new trousers to me in a flourish.

I'd actually almost forgotten about my state of undress. Almost.

"Fabulous," I informed her as I snatched them out of her hands and stood to pull them on, not bothering with tying the laces at the top nor with my boots. I didn't hide my sigh of relief as I flopped back down. When I looked up again, Elissa had vanished from the firepit.

"You see?"

I turned towards Leliana. "What?" I asked, frowning in confusion.

She sent me a look that was clearly meant to be charged with lots of meaning and glided off towards the other side of camp and Elissa's tent, her materials in tow.

I looked at Sten. He stared back at me impassively. I looked at Dal and he huffed and rolled onto his back.

"What?" I asked the firepit at large. Sten shrugged.

"…But what about dinner?"

oOo