Over the following weeks, the fortress began to escalate preparations for the next assault against the Darkspawn. More soldiers arrived from Denerim, joining the encampment in the valley below. A contingent of Surface dwarves assembled a series of trebuchets on Ostagar's outer walls. As Kingsway gave way to Harvestmere, the weather quickly and noticeably cooled. Early morning hoarfrost began to form on the crumbling stone walls, and those on dawn duty could see their breath crystallise in the air before them. Everyone within the fortress reacted to the approaching assault in different ways. Some men sought comfort in the Maker, and the Chantry services grew more crowded. Others – Wardens as well as regular soldiers – became more dependent on the bottle. Duncan reprimanded those he caught drinking on duty, but he did not otherwise condemn them for seeking comfort where they were able.

To Flora's relief, she was quickly assigned a routine to occupy her time at Ostagar. Still overwhelmed by the vastness of the world outside the Circle - even during her childhood in Herring, she had never strayed far from the village - a schedule helped her find familiarity amongst strangeness. Duncan, oddly reluctant to send her beyond the ruined walls of the fortress, found Flora duties that kept her from straying too far from his supervisory eye. In the morning, she and Alistair would go down to the training ground; where he would spar with other recruits or practice strikes on wooden dummies. She would shield them against these blows, trying to follow Alistair's rapid and unpredictable choice of target. In the afternoon, she was assigned to the infirmary; run by Chantry priestesses and located in a small, isolated courtyard below the Wardens' terrace. If Duncan pinned back the canvas fold of his tent entrance, he could - and often did - look down on the sick and wounded, and the redhead kneeling beside them. Any Chantry sister contemplating cruelty to the young mender in their midst would soon be dissuaded by the Warden-Commander's warning stare.

In the evening, men and Wardens would gather around the campfire; along with the occasional royal soldier who wanted to escape the general's disapproval. They often numbered more than two hundred so over a dozen campfires were scattered at the rear of the terrace, blazing amber and ochre against the ruined stone. The lucky few sat on benches scavenged from decrepit living quarters, others sat on chunks of fallen masonry, most sat on the cobblestones. Downing multiple bottles of ritewine - the more senior, the more resistant their tainted bodies were - they exchanged stories; sometimes grim, often macabre. The bolder Wardens were the ones who had survived the most, and they had seen sights fit to make the blood curdle in one's veins. Duncan, who had seen the worst of all, rarely contributed. Unlike Loghain Mac Tir, who never socialised with the troops, the Warden-Commander was happy to sit and listen to his men; smiling or offering the occasional remark. The ritewine tasted like ashes on his tainted tongue, and so he barely drained a bottle over the course of an evening. As the most senior Warden present, he was afforded the luxury of a three-pronged stool. Alistair, lounging on the cobbles nearby, was joined by a cross-legged Flora; the two sitting near Duncan's feet like favoured children.

Duncan had tried his best to adopt an avuncular approach towards his new mender; aware of the scurrilous whispers flitting around the fortress. Ironically, he had behaved himself impeccably and not laid a hand on her. Alistair had heard rumours, but closed his ears to them; Flora was utterly oblivious. Instead, the Warden-Commander preoccupied himself with prying more details from Flora about her spirits; learning that they had been in her life for as long as she could remember, that they guarded her from demons in the Fade, and that the more powerful one was the spirit that assisted her mending. Flora, delighted to discuss her spirits without scepticism or suspicion, babbled like a released dam in her throaty, lowborn tongue.

Alistair, conversely, was in turmoil. Jealousy that their new recruit was a source of such interest for their commander mingled with confusion that Duncan would take such interest in a mage - one of the Maker's forsaken! He had not dared to take down the breastplate barrier between their bunks; reaching gingerly over with a long arm to rouse her at the arrival of dawn. The young officer was also annoyed that the breath still caught in his throat when he caught sight of her unexpectedly.

Surely I should have grown used to that face by now, he chided himself. It's just… nice looking, that's all.

On one crisp autumn morning, cold enough that the dawn frost still edged the cobbles with silver, Alistair and Flora took up their usual spot in the corner of the training courtyard. Most of the other wooden dummies were in use, falling victim to assault by hammer, mace and blade. Arrows embedded themselves with dull thuds in targets placed against the courtyard's crumbling southern wall. Despite the lack of space, there was a reluctance to venture near the corner occupied by the two junior Wardens. Three dwarves, a race renowned for their suspicion of magic, chose to share a battered training dummy between them, rather than use the one close to Flora. Alistair was torn between indignation - on behalf of his sister-warden - and quiet empathy, understanding their wariness.

As a result, Flora and Alistair had three training dummies to themselves. Alistair, his own shield propped against a crumbling wall, had positioned himself between them. With the swiftness of youth, he was administering - very light - blows to each dummy at random; striking at their sightless faces and torsos. Flora, perched precariously on the wall with her toes wedged into the mud, summoned shields around each one in turn. Alistair had learnt the hard way that he needed to make his assault a delicate one, lest he wrench his sword-arm against the steely resolve of the barrier.

"Poor Porrick," she observed, bitten fingers twisting idly in her lap as a shield sprung up around the leftmost dummy. "You keep going for his manly bits."

Alistair, who did not appreciate her serene and unruffled state in the face of his sweating redness, scowled. Without giving her warning he struck two of them rapidly in a row, letting out a yell of triumph as his blade struck true on the second.

"Ha! Killed Simon."

Flora almost fell off the wall with indignation.

"It's Seamus," she corrected, outraged. "And you didn't say that you'd be attacking two."

"Well, the Darkspawn won't be giving any warnings," replied the supercilious Alistair, triumphant at having finally landed a blow. "You ought to be ready for anything! Oh, that's mature. Are you sure that you're nineteen, not nine?"

This was in response to Flora sticking her tongue out at him. The next moment, shields had blossomed around all three of the dummies simultaneously. Alistair gawped, while Flora gloated.

"You never said that you could shield more than one thing at once! Why didn't you do that from the beginning?"

"Ha ha ha," said Flora, then lost her balance and fell off the wall. "Ow."

Alistair made no response; the air prickled with wary silence. When Flora emerged from behind the wall, a pair of their fellow Wardens were standing nearby, armoured and armed. Their striped tunics were their only similarity: one man was bearded and thin as a blade, the other bald and barrel-bellied. The expression on their faces veered between contempt and amusement; laced with something else as they laid eyes on Flora.

Flora, dusting herself off, reflected that although the Wardens were nominally a brotherhood; these two did not appear very familial. She noticed that Alistair still had his sword in hand; swinging it with deliberate casualness near his thigh.

"Morning, Gehan," he said, lightly. "Jonty. Need anything?"

"Just on our way to accompany a scouting patrol," replied Jonty, his chest puffed with self-importance. "King Cailan is due back from the hunt tonight, and we need to make sure his route is clear."

Alistair suppressed a sigh: the king's presence inadvertently put the entire fortress on a half-manic edge.

"Well, have fun," he said, spotting that Flora had come to stand, open-mouthed, at his side. The eyes of both men swung towards her; Gehan pointed a gloved finger.

"Mage! Want to come with us?" he suggested, suppressing a leer. "We have need of your... services in the Wilds."

He bisected his question with a deliberate pause. Alistair stiffened with indignation, Flora - as usual - was oblivious to the insinuation.

"Man!" she replied, having forgotten his name. "No, I'm supposed to stay here."

"Are you certain?" the leaner one wheedled, unsuccessfully suppressing a smirk. "We could kill a few Hurlocks together. Great bonding experience!"

"Mm," replied Flora vaguely, losing interest and wondering when the cook-tent would allow her early access to the great cauldrons of vegetable stew that served as lunch for the masses. The nobility had their own cooks and camp followers; the scent of roasted meat often wafted down to a chorus of wistful inhaling nostrils below.

"Gehan," Alistair interjected, steel beneath the lightness of his tone. "Didn't Duncan make some comment about… well, I'm sure you remember. I wouldn't test his patience if I were you."

Gehan scowled, shooting the junior officer a dark look from beneath bristling eyebrows. His tone veered from cajoling into contemptuous, a cloud settling across his face.

"Didn't want her anyway," he retorted, defensively. "Is it true that she can only cast two spells? Pathetic. No wonder she was recruited to be the Warden-Commander's bedwarmer. One trick pony!"

He made a mocking neighing sound; his companion stamped his boots on the dusty ground. Flora, who had endured four years of mockery at the Circle for her limited range, gave an ambivalent shrug.

"She's not Duncan's - oh, just go away," snapped Alistair, hoping that the flush had not crept beyond his collar. "I hope you run into a pack of Hurlocks."

Before Gehan left, he deliberately knocked the head from one of the training dummies with the edge of his shield. Smirking, he sauntered away across the courtyard; his companion scurrying in his wake.

Flora looked down at the dummy's featureless wooden head, which had rolled to a halt near her toe.

"Seamus has been decapitulated," she intoned solemnly, reaching down to retrieve it. "Rest in peace, Seamus. We will not remember you."

Her dolorous comment roused Alistair from a fog of irritation. Forgetting that she was a mage for a moment, he grinned at her and took the head; wedging it back in place atop the dummy.

"Seamus has been resurrected," he said cheerfully, wondering if there was any truth in Gehan's comment about Duncan and bedwarmers. He knew that Duncan appreciated beauty, and rarity, and Flora embodied both. On the other hand, her inexperience made her seem younger than nineteen years; and he could not see their commander taking advantage of such immaturity. "Praise the Maker, it's a miracle!"

Flora was so pleased that he was being kind to her that she beamed back at him. He blinked rapidly, the hollow of his throat pinkening, then swiftly averted his eyes.

"...Shall we go get some lunch?"

"Yes," she said, then, thoughtfully, "what's a bedwarmer?"

Alistair felt beads of sweat breaking out across his forehead.

"A stone that you warm in the fire," he improvised, quickly. "And put in your bed to… heat it up."

Flora looked confused for a moment, her pale eyes fixed unblinking on his. A trickle of perspiration ran down Alistair's long, fine-hewn nose.

"But I can't heat anything up," she replied at last, dolefully. "I ain't that kind of mage."

"Never mind," her brother-warden said, desperate for the conversation to be over. "Gehan is an idiot. Come on, let's go and get some stew."

An anaemic autumnal sun yielded without resistance to evening; the stars pricking through a wash of peach and palest lilac. A single moon was visible, a ghost of a crescent visible above the distant foothills of the Frostbacks. Ostagar, never a cheerful place, took on an especial dourness at nighttime. Shadows draped themselves like funerary banners over crumbling walls; a mildewed dampness hung in the air and coated the lungs with each inhalation. King Cailan, son of Maric and ostensible leader of the efforts against the Darkspawn, had been absent from the fortress for the past fortnight. He did not dread the arrival of autumn - he had braziers and fur-lined cloaks and piping hot meal stew on demand - but relished the beginning of the hunting season. While his troops drilled and patrolled and shivered with nerves and cold in their windblown tents, their king cantered through the forested valley with a pack of Mabari tearing around him; terrorising the local wildlife. The spoils of the hunt had arrived with his retinue: three horned stags, eight roe-deer, and a grey-whiskered boar. Cailan enjoyed a jest: carried proudly at the head of his procession were a half-dozen nugs skewered on a lance.

Once the king had been bathed and dressed in the Theirin crimson and gold, he announced that he wished to address the men of Ostagar, alongside his two commanders. The largest courtyard, which in Cailan's absence had been converted for more useful purpose, was swiftly cleared and turned back into a space for a rapt audience to gather. A wooden platform had been assembled at one end, draped with the assorted banners of Theirin and Ferelden. These had been stored improperly and had to be hung strategically to hide the mildew. A dozen vast braziers lined each side of the courtyard, casting a shifting pool of light over the piecemeal cobblestones.

Not all of the troops gathered at Ostagar could fit into the courtyard, so the leaders of each division chose a selection of those who could be trusted not to fall asleep. Cailan, resplendent in golden armour, paced back and forth across the creaking wood and gesticulated at a handpicked group of several hundred weary, dutiful men. He was flanked by two far less glamorous figures: the Royal General, clad in dull pewter and sporting his usual scowl, and an expressionless but keen-eyed Warden-Commander.

"SOON," bellowed Cailan, his gauntlet catching the firelight as he thrust a fist into the air. "Soon, our enemy will make their final assault. Soon, they will feel the true might of the Fereldan blade!"

The men in the audience silently cursed their respective captains for inflicting such a trial upon them. One dwarf had fallen asleep on his feet, swaying rhythmically to the droning rise and fall of the monologue while two men struggled to support him at either elbow.

"And that day will go down in history," Cailan continued, his face alight with sheer, glowing excitement. "It will become legend. And my name will be remembered FOREVER as the man who saved Ferelden, equal - if not exceeding! - the legacy of my father!"

Beside him, the Royal General ground his teeth, his sallow face waxy in the firelight.

Thirty feet above the wooden platform Alistair and Flora were leaning over the crumbling ramparts, resting their elbows on the stone. This provided them with a good vantage point across the courtyard; with a view of both the platform and the weary audience. Alistair had abandoned his sentry position on the southern rampart: there was no sign of movement in the valley below, except for the fires burning in the army camp; pinpricks of flickering heat amidst the shadow.

Flora, her elbows propped on the lichen-covered wall, was peering at the golden head beneath the crown, gilded armour gleaming brilliantly in the torchlight.

"That's the king?" she asked in a whisper, although her words were barely audible in the face of Cailan's bellowing. "The yellow one?"

"Mm," replied Alistair vaguely, casting a suspicious eye at the gathering clouds overhead. "Maker's Breath, it had better not start raining. I've left my socks out to dry."

"The king of Ferelden?"

"Yes."

Flora leaned so far over the ramparts that an alarmed Alistair gripped her by the belt, envisioning his sister-warden crashing onto the platform in front of a gobsmacked Cailan and audience.

"The people of Ferelden shall have no more cause to tremble in their beds at night! Our nation's children shall grow and live to be old men and women, free from the fear of Blight. I, your King, shall achieve this for you!"

"He's not my king," she observed, confused. "Wait, what does a king do?"

"He is your king," corrected Alistair, tightening his grip on Flora's belt as she peered over the crumbling stone parapet. "He's everyone's king. Well, if you're a human . The dwarves have their own king, and the elves - who knows who leads them? Anyway, a king is in charge. He tells everyone what to do."

"He's never told me what to do," replied Flora, eyes

wandering over Cailan's finely hewn features and curling, arrogant mouth. "He's never been to Herring. If he showed up and tried to tell the fishermen what to do, they'd throw rocks at him. Hm, he looks a bit like you."

There was a fractional pause before Alistair gave a little laugh.

"Nonsense. I'm much more handsome than Cailan Theirin."

Flora tilted her head and gave him an appraising look.

"Yes, you are," she said, solemnly. "Your chin is nicer."

The wind changed direction. carrying the rest of the king's speech towards the Tower of Ishal. To a pink-cheeked Alistair's relief, Flora had returned her attention to the platform. Her gaze fell on Duncan, and she thought that he looked weary, and older than he had done when he had first recruited her. As if sensing her scrutiny, the Warden-Commander lifted his chin, raising his eyes to the ramparts. The silver griffin on his breastplate seemed to move against the reflected firelight. She waved at him surreptitiously from above the battlement; the corner of his mouth flickered. Cailan, who had spotted Duncan's slight angling of the head, followed his gaze. His eyes fell on Flora, who was now whispering something to Alistair; who had to stoop to close the foot's difference in their height. At once, a look of almost predatory hunger formed on his handsome, weak-chinned face, as though Flora were one of the hapless roe-deer in the forest. After a moment he roused himself, and continued his speech with similar bravado.

Ah, fuck me, Duncan thought irritably, having noticed the king's sudden captivation. Can I threaten the king with castration like I did Gehan?

Oblivious to Cailan's interest, Flora was looking at the third man on the platform. He stood slightly apart, and seemed as though he deeply resented being forced to attend. Greying hair was pulled back from a grim, gaunt face, while a long scar twisted the corner of his mouth. He was listening to the king's impassioned speech with a sceptical expression, lips pressed tightly together.

"We saw him when we arrived here," she breathed, recalling his scowling presence. "He's from the north, like me."

"That's Loghain Mac Tir- "

"A northern name!"

"Yes," continued Alistair, frowning at her interruption. "He's the teyrn of Gwaren, commander of the Royal Army, and Cailan's father-in-law. He only enjoys one of those positions - guess which!"

Flora had just spotted Gehan standing at the periphery of the crowd below, and was wondering whether to fling a clump of moss at his head.

"Hm," she said, returning her attention to the platform. "Dunno. He's looking at the king like he hates him."

"You're probably not wrong," replied Alistair, drily. "And he's not a great fan of being a teyrn, either."

"Ugh! Who would be?" Flora pulled a face: she had little time for those who claimed elevation through blood.

"Come on, it's starting to rain and I want to rescue my socks."

The drizzle only lasted a half-candle, but it was sufficient to drive most of Ostagar's inhabitants inside their tents for an early night. Fortunately, Cailan had finished his speech quickly and fled from the encroaching rain, scuttling like a golden beetle through the maze of terraces, courtyards and decrepit stairways with his entourage in hot pursuit. Instead of a half-dozen fires in the Grey Warden encampment, only two burned away in defiance of night's gloomy shroud.

Alistair, trailing a yawning Flora and still secretly hoping to be accepted into his brethren's ranks, was seated at one. He took tentative gulps of ritewine, listening to a grizzled dwarf describe an ambush by a Genlock; gesticulating with an ominous finger towards his missing ear. Flora sat cross-legged at Alistair's side, darning a hole in his sock with a needle and thread. She did not drink the traditional beverage of the Wardens: alcohol purified itself into water and yeast on her tongue. There had been a few mocking neighs as she sat down: it seemed as though Gehan's one tricky pony nickname had spread.

Duncan joined them a short time later, having escaped Cailan's company. The firelight could not disguise the deep furrows across his tawny forehead, nor the shadows carved beneath his eyes. Still, he summoned the energy to laugh at a joke from the dwarf and accepted a bottle of ale, downing it in three long draws. Placing it on the dirt at his feet, he noticed Flora busily mending a pair of woollen socks that were far beyond length of her own small feet.

"Young sister," he said, amused. "I hope you'll be getting some recompense from Alistair for such generosity."

Flora turned her face up to him, the flames transforming the dark red of her hair into burnished copper.

"It reminds me of mending nets back home," she replied, somewhat wistfully. "I don't mind it."

He looks older. And weary, like he's spent all day hauling boats up the beach.

Duncan, mindful not to look too long upon her firelit face, was about to ask his captain for tomorrow's patrol schedule when Flora tapped her fingers gently against his knee.

"I'm sorry that I couldn't be your bedwarmer," she said solemnly, regretful that she could not heat up stones to warm Duncan's blankets. "I don't have the right skills."

Alistair almost fell into the fire. For the first time in a long time, Duncan was lost for words.


AN: rewrote the whole chapter haha