The bann swept aside the priestess' unfinished letters, exposing a swathe of bare oak. A dribble of candle wax marred the smooth surface; a remnant of many late nights spent answering correspondence. He moved an ink pot and a paperweight until they faced each other across the desk. Overhead, a listless sun sent fingers of light through the high windows; dust motes spiralling in the sallow beams.
"They attack from the south and east simultaneously," Teagan said, gesturing at his makeshift map. "Most of their forces come across the bridge by the old mill, a smaller number attack the docks."
The ink well was the mill; the paperweight an improvised dock. Flora felt the dusty finger of memory beckon forth Cailan's far larger and more sophisticated strategy table, which she had seen twice during her six weeks at Ostagar. The Southron Hills lay supine beneath the king's scrutinising eye, their contours flattened out in ink on vellum. The map was crowded with tokens and counters; to Flora they seemed to be scattered at random, although there must (surely?) have been some militaristic logic to their placement. A golden crown no larger than a wedding ring had been placed boldly in the centre of the field. The last time that she had seen Cailan alive, he was hunched above the tokens of his men; shunting them relentlessly about the map with a feverish glint in his eye.
"They follow the same pattern of assault each night?" asked Leliana, leaning forward in the Chantry Mother's padded chair. "The - attackers?"
Alistair gazed unblinking at the improvised tokens as though the streets and crooked lanes of Redcliffe were etched into the wood. He had seen Cailan's map table once; when he and Flora had been brought to the king's tent and told that they would not be taking part in the final battle.
"Aye, my lady," replied Teagan, soberly. "But there's no tactic to the attack, they just- they just swarm . Mindless. I suppose that's something to be thankful for at least."
"And you're sure they're not Darkspawn?" Alistair asked, his brow creasing. "Darkspawn can be quite… swarm- y."
"I'm certain of it. I've seen the occasional Darkspawn over the years, and these are something else."
The watery veil of light slid across Flora's face as she leaned forward, bare elbows resting on the table. One stub-nailed finger came down beside the inkwell as she pinned herself to the field of battle.
"I'll go here tonight, then," she said, pressing her fingertip into the wood.
Teagan looked at the bitten nail, then up at her face.
"Alistair tells me that you're a healer."
"Yes," she replied, "but I can shield a bit as well. Nothing else . Don't expect fireballs."
Together, they devised a basic plan for Redcliffe's defence; using the contents of the desk drawers as counters. Alistair and Flora, represented by a bookmark and a thimble respectively, would assist the main defence at the old mill. Teagan would lead the men at the docks against the second prong of attack; if Morrigan and Sten proved biddable, they would be stationed at his side. Leliana would take up position on the tavern roof: within range of the mill, while keeping sight of the situation at the docks.
"We need all the help we can get. There'll be no town left if we keep losing men at this rate."
Teagan leaned back on his chair with a grimace: it was a penance stool, designed for contemplation, not comfort. Despite the lightness of the bann's tone, the recurrent battle of the previous weeknights had demanded a heavy toll. He seemed a half-score older than four decades; a man bowed beneath the burden of sudden, grave obligation.
"You have help," replied Flora, blunt as a training sword. "It'll go better tonight. Then in the morning we'll go to the castle and - and fix what's wrong."
She stopped speaking, but Alistair continued her thought process in his own head; then we get Arl Eamon's support, then we go to the Circle and get the aid of the mages, then we go to Orzammar and get the aid of the dwarves. In Flora's mind, their defeat at Ostagar was like the dropping of a stone into a pond: it had set in motion a chain of events that were as inevitable as the ensuing ripples. Any obstacle would be surmounted as the incoming tide flowed over rocks. He envied her assurance; he wished that he felt as certain.
Then we defeat the Archdemon, his figurative sister-warden whispered in his ear, and then we end the Blight. And everyone goes home. And I go back to Herring, and live happily ever after.
As Flora spoke, Teagan watched her; curiosity kindling within the general appreciation. Although the bann had never been to Herring, there was something oddly familiar about the girl sitting opposite him. It was not so much her looks - which were without parallel - but the cadence of her body: the lean of her weight on an elbow, the purposeful cant of her head as she spoke. Her accent was gutter Ferelden but the words were infused with iron.
"Who are your parents?" he asked suddenly, aware that this had nothing to do with Redcliffe's defence plan, and yet too curious to curb himself.
Flora did not realise that he was talking to her at first; only registering the angle of his question when Alistair and Leliana remained silent.
"Eh," she replied, astonished. "My dad fishes the Waking Sea. My mum makes hooks and sells 'em."
Beside her, Leliana made a small and unassuming sigh, her elegant fingers woven in her lap. It was a subtle enough noise to go unnoticed in Ferelden; in the oblique landscape of the Orlesian court, such a gesture would speak volumes. The bann, who had passed through Val Royeaux in his youth, glanced at her.
Duncan asked me who my parents were too, Flora thought, recalling one of their first proper conversations. I don't understand why everyone is so interested.
Her spirits made no response. Disconcerted, she pressed her fingertip to the thimble that represented herself on the makeshift map, rolling it in a compact circle. It slithered out from beneath her thumb and careened over the edge of the desk. Alistair caught the errant thimble in a swift thrust of palm.
"What can we do in the meantime?" he asked, returning Flora's token to its place alongside his own. "To help prepare for tonight's attack."
For reasons that he did not fully understand, Alistair wanted to divert the bann's attention from his oblivious sister-warden.
"The barricade by the mill needs repairing," replied Teagan, abandoning the penance stool and rising to his feet. "Owen - the damned smith - needs persuading to fire up his forge, or booting into the lake if he refuses. And there's a band of mercenaries down by the docks who haven't lifted a blade in the town's defence. The dwarf Dwyn won't even accept my coin, Maker blast him."
It was decided that Alistair should put his brawn to good use; several sturdy items of tavern furniture required breaking apart before they could bolster the barricade. Flora and Leliana would attempt to cajole the recalcitrant blacksmith and reluctant dwarf to lend their hand to Redcliffe's defence. They would reconvene before sunset to eat and confirm the final details of their plan.
As they retraced their steps through the timber-webbed hollow of the main chamber, Flora made a hopeful detour towards the sole wounded man; only to veer off hastily when he began to spout obscenities. Alistair shot a glower at the patient, almost retorting in a similarly colourful manner before remembering their location in a hallowed hall.
The bann, who had no such reservation, spat back: "Well, hurry up and die then, Hamunde, we'll be needing that bed later."
Flora retrieved her coat from where she had stowed it behind a rack of unburnt candles; tugging the loose wool around her arms. Rolling up the sleeves to free her hands, she followed the others out. Emerging from beneath the silent eaves was like surfacing from beneath the water: the air tasted fresh and their words came out clear, with no whispered echo in their wake. Even the sallow sunlight stung the eye after the Chantry's subdued gloom.
Alistair distributed the loaves and cheese from the tavern, wrapping the rest for Morrigan and Sten. Flora, her mouth full of bread, came up behind him; brushing his elbow with her own.
"You're going to help mend their … wall?" she asked, fascinated by the notion of a barrier constructed from physical matter. "Will it keep anything out?"
"I hope so," he replied drily, watching her pale throat flex as she swallowed. "Good luck with the dwarf."
Flora grimaced: she had met dwarves for the first time at Ostagar, and had been more than a little intimidated. They seemed to be terrifyingly intelligent; behind their voluminous beards lay a preternatural understanding of engineering, architecture and weaponry. When Duncan had first guided her round Ostagar's decaying terraces and towers, he had pointed out the dwarven fortifications that bolstered the crumbling stone. Their siege engines stood hunched and skeletal on the ramparts like a flock of long-legged birds.
"I expect that Sister Leliana will do most of the persuading," she replied, putting the last bite of bread into her coat pocket. "I'll see you at dinner."
Brow furrowed, Flora peered up at his face as though scribing the planes and incised angles into the wax of her mind. It had just occurred to both Wardens that they would be separated for much of the afternoon; a prospect that disconcerted each in a subtle and inexplicable way. They had not been parted during the day since before the massacre in the valley below Ostagar.
Alistair nodded, and for a moment it appeared as if he were going to say something. The words melted on his tongue and he closed his mouth, disguising the severed sentence with a grin.
"Remember, you've got Bann Teagan's permission to throw the smith in the lake."
She smiled, and Alistair heard the bann inhale sharply beside him.
Eamon's brother did not let loose his breath until Flora and Leliana had made their way around a wall of stone and vanished from view.
"Maker's Breath," Teagan said in a hushed voice, as though they were boys whispering at the back of a Chantry matins. "If I'd known that women like that wash up on the northern beaches, I'd have visited them sooner."
"You didn't ask her to fix your arm," Alistair pointed out, a touch grumpily.
"I was too distracted," replied the bann, rubbing at his elbow with a grimace. "How do you get anything done with that sister-warden of yours around? But my mind is clearer now that she's gone. Let's head to the barricade and see what holes we can plug."
The blacksmith's workshop was closed up like a disapproving mouth: sealed and boarded tight. Flora ventured to the door and knocked on it; after they received no answer, Leliana skirted the building, peering through finger-width cracks. There seemed to be some small light and movement inside, a shuffling and shifting of shadow in response to Flora's persistent rap. There was a pile of empty bottles outside the door, the bottom layer cracked and splintered. A thin and half-hearted drizzle leaked from above, adding to the situation's general misery.
"Why won't you mend the armour?"
Flora saw no time for niceties: she was a girl who liked to find the shortest way to a point. When she gained no reply from the door, she put her mouth to the keyhole.
"WHY WON'T YOU MEND THE ARMOUR?" she repeated at increased volume, pressing her face to the wood. "OR AT LEAST LET PEOPLE USE YOUR WORKSHOP."
The desolate forge sat empty, tantalisingly close; a small cascade of wood piled beside an oven that dribbled cold ash. Flora returned upright, picking a strand of damp hair from her eyes. Hamunde's pained, obstinate face rose unprompted before her, his lips pulled back to show contemptuous teeth.
I've had enough of stubborn men, she thought to herself, prodding an ineffectual finger at the keyhole. Today has been full of them.
The lay sister seemed to share her sentiment; returning to the front door with a hand sliding into the pocket of her robe.
"We don't have time for this. Sunset is six hours away."
"Less," added Flora ominously, tilting her face into the rain. "It's cloudy."
The lay sister drew out an object that was quite clearly not a religious token: it was a length of steel, bent at strange and precise angles at one end. Leliana glanced over her shoulder - it seemed more out of habit, since no one else was around - and then inserted the elongated prong into the lock. There followed a rattle of metal, followed by a distinct click.
"Wha," said Flora in astonishment as the lay sister withdrew the lockpick, sliding it nonchalantly back into her pocket as though it had never left. "Burglarising tools!"
She gaped at Leliana as though a trove of pilfered gold coins and jewellery might come spontaneously spilling from the recesses of her robe. Leliana ignored the wide-eyed stare, pressing a palm to the door and shoving.
The door opened and they were hit with the sour odour of neglect; though its origin was impossible to discern. It might have come from the plates that bore remnants of mouldering food, or perhaps from the dozen empty bottles lining the dusty shelf above the grate. Most likely, it came from the man sitting in the midst of the chaos: a lack of shaving hid his features and his head hung limp. Based on the gradient of the stains, the clothing he wore had not been changed in a week.
"Créateur," murmured Leliana, flinching as though the odour had physically brushed against her. "What is the meaning of this?"
The man looked up, his eyes cavernous and yet lit with the tiniest flicker of hope. When he saw the two standing at the door; he slumped into gloom once more.
"Get out."
Flora, who was used to terseness, sidled into the workshop. The chaos made her neck itch: she felt an overwhelming urge to clean.
"You must fire your forge," demanded Leliana, imperative as any tall hat-sporting Chantry Mother. "There's armour to be mended. Redcliffe needs you."
"I don't give a shit about Redcliffe," retorted the blacksmith, his words furred with drink and misery.
"Why not?" The lay sister prickled with outrage, her eyes sharp as shards of blue glass.
"No one in Redcliffe lifted a blade to help me. Why should I repair theirs now?"
Leliana flung out an encompassing hand, her slender fingers very white and clean in comparison to the filth surrounding them. A fly hurled itself against the smeared windowpane, buzzing in mindless alarm as it failed to reach the light.
"Men have died defending your home," she said, the tone of her voice sliding into a more mellifluous entreaty. "We saw them on the pyre as we arrived. Those who survived may not be so fortunate tonight, especially if their arms and armour are broken."
The man made no reply, staring at the old burns that mottled the backs of his hands. The flesh, stretched taut and shiny, betrayed many decades spent at the forge; the fingers more leather than skin.
Flora, who felt sorry for the fly, nudged the door open a fraction wider to let it escape. A sliver of jaundiced sunlight cut across the room like a streak of greyish-yellow paint; the smith turned his face away with a grunt of irritation.
"Owen," she said, recalling his name lodged within the bann's earlier complaint. "What wouldn't they help you with?"
He made a gesture as though to wipe his eyes, though his hand never reached his face. The defiance leaked from him and he sat with the hunched stoop of a prisoner.
"My daughter, Valena. She's a maid for the lady Isolde, up at the castle. I've not seen her in a week and no one will help me look for her. Bastards!"
Leliana folded her lips, restraining the thought that the other townsfolk most likely had their own relatives at the castle to worry about. Flora brightened up, seeing an obvious solution.
"We're going to the castle tomorrow," she said, picking up a crumpled blanket from the ground and folding it over the back of a chair. "We'll look for your daughter."
"No one can get in," retorted the blacksmith, his face hollow and mutinous. "It's locked tight."
"So was your door until we came," replied Leliana, graciously. "And we're taking the tunnel entrance."
"The old back passage is clogged with rocks. You won't get past."
The man seemed determined to shred their plan to the bone, to reveal any possible flaw so that he did not have to fall victim to the intoxicating lure of hope.
"The arl asked me to make enquiries with the dwarves once - see if we could get our hands on some of their matlock powder, blow up the stone - but nothing came of it."
Flora, who had spent much of her four years at the Circle assisting the Tranquil with their domestic chores, had collected an array of soiled cutlery into mouldering tankards.
"We can get through," she said, sorting knives from spoons. "My brother-warden is the strongest person I've ever met. We have a Qunari with us too."
And, she thought, but did not say, if they fail, I'll just shove us through with my shield. And hope that it doesn't bring the castle down on our heads.
The blacksmith looked up at her; curiosity igniting in the wells of his weary eyes.
" 'Brother-warden'? Who are you?"
"Flora," Flora replied, wiping her grubby hands on the hem of her coat. "I'm a Warden. We've come to help. Oh." She remembered suddenly that there was a price on their heads. "Don't tell Loghain Mac Tir."
"Is he here?"
"Dunno." Flora looked over her shoulder, as if the general might have been crouching behind a nearby holly bush. "Probably not."
The two redheads left the blacksmith with a promise that they would search for his daughter during tomorrow's expedition to the castle. Owen did not sound overly optimistic about the prospect of finding her alive - especially considering the horrors that had been surging forth nightly from the castle gates - but a shred of hope was better than none. As the distance grew between themselves and the smith, they heard the sibilant hiss of air forced through bellows as the fire was stoked.
Flora perked up as they navigated the warren of lanes, the earth and stone dropping away beneath their feet as they descended to the lake shore. She was curious to see how the southernmost tip of Calenhad compared to its northern cousin; which she had peered down upon each day from the slatted windows of the Circle.
"They've built over the water," she told Leliana; following the bard through a gate that swung loose from its hinges. "Houses on wooden legs. Like pirates. I saw them from the bridge. You couldn't do that on the Waking Sea: they'd get swept away."
The lay sister was more focused on the matter at hand.
"Did the bann mention anything about why this dwarven mercenary won't fight?"
Flora thought back to the words exchanged in the circular, book-lined study; the bann's complaints tossed back to him by the vaulted ceiling. Parts of the conversation eluded her; slithering out of reach as she grasped for them.
"Don't remember."
"It's probably to do with money. I haven't got the coin to pay for a band of mercenaries."
"Nor have I," said Flora unnecessarily: she had never had money of her own, nor handled it. "Maybe he'll barter?"
Exchanging one thing for another was the usual practice in Herring: coin was only useful if one was going to Highever.
The bard appeared dubious, glancing over her shoulder.
"But we have little of value to trade. Let's see what he says first."
Once the growing town had crowded as far up the cliff as the builders dared, the townsfolk decided to reclaim space from Calenhad instead. A series of haphazard jetties and wharfs rose from the placid lake; mostly supporting warehouses and storage sheds. A brave few chose to build their dwellings above the silt-blurred waters; the shallows of Calenhad perpetually muddied from the influx of various streams. The dwarf's house perched on its own elevated wharf: squat and well-secured with nail-studded boards. Smoke drifted from a hidden chimney, blown sideways as it emerged by an easterly wind.
Flora, distracted by a small boat tethered at a nearby quay, hurried to catch Leliana up. The drizzle had eased, leaving the wood underfoot slick as seaweed.
The door was shut fast. Leliana reached out and rapped her knuckles imperiously against the wood.
"Open up," she called, raising her voice so that it would penetrate within. "Redcliffe has need of you!"
There came no reply. Leliana looked over her linen-clad shoulder at Flora, who gave a vague shrug; at a loss for how to proceed.
"Why don't you use your robber's tool again?"
"It's not a robber's tool ."
Despite her denial, Leliana withdrew the slender silver instrument from her sleeve once again, reasoning that it worked well enough last time. The metal glinted in the sallow sunlight; sliding easily into the iron maw of the lock. The bard's wrist twisted, but before any further progress could be made a hoarse-voiced threat slid beneath the door.
"Break into my house and I'll shove your pick so far up your nose that you'll unlock your own brain."
Leliana's eyebrows shot into her hairline. As she returned upright, the door swung open to reveal a scowling and squat figure, flanked by two hulking guards. All three were armed with weapons of crude efficiency. The central figure - a dwarf, with a sallow, yellowish complexion and the shadow of ink across his brow - looked the two up and down with an animal sneer.
"When is the bann going to get the message into his thick skull?" he demanded of his two gaping cronies. "I don't want his coin. And I don't want the services of his women. Practically bald- " this was aimed at Leliana, "and scrawny."
The latter insult was directed to Flora, who misheard and thought that he had called her prawny. Believing that he had complimented her, she beamed.
The bard was not, however, smiling.
"Créatuer! Bann Teagan hasn't sent us as payment. Ugh." Leliana grimaced and gave a little shudder, as though brushing the suggestion off in disgust. "We've come to request your services in the fight against the undead."
A contemptuous bark emerged from the dwarf's throat, prompting obligatory snickers from the men flanking him.
"You're a poor excuse for a fool. I'd leave the jokes to others."
Flora interjected, a faint crease scored across her brow.
"She's not a fool. Why won't you help? Ain't it your job to fight?"
"Aye," Dwyn replied, meeting her stare with a flinty eye. "To fight. Not to get massacred at the hands of - whatever they are. No, I've got a week's worth of supplies here and I ain't leaving."
He cast a meaty hand behind him, to where barrels and crates were stacked towards the ceiling. He was not lying; there was enough food stored up to feed a village. Flora gazed at the stockpile with vague disapproval, but then remembered that they were trying to persuade the dwarf to join them and thus ought not berate him for his selfishness.
"But you've got a much better chance of surviving than the others do," she said, ignoring the covetous stares of the two hulking figures on either side of the dwarf. "And if everyone gets killed, what will you do then?"
The mercenary let out a nasty laugh, making a mocking gesture with fist to chest.
"Then, Stone help me, I'll take to the lake. Not particularly keen on the water, but these idiots assure me they can row."
Flora could envision the dwarf's plan: a crowded boat, frantic oars carving through the water, the town of Redcliffe shrinking in their wake as flames and violence devoured the last of the standing structures. It brought to mind Lothering, hunched defiant and defenceless in the path of the Darkspawn horde. Yet again, Flora hoped fervently that the villagers had paid heed to her warnings.
I ran through the refugee camp yelling, you have to go, you have to leave, she thought to herself, feeling a little sick. I told everyone I mended that they had to go. I couldn't have done anything else. The Templars were chasing me.
While Flora fell silent, lost in her brooding; Leliana picked up the torch; injecting a charm so convincing into her words that there seemed to be nothing calculated about them.
"The people of Redcliffe would be so grateful for your help," she coaxed, determined to try every angle. "I'm sure that they would be able to come up with a reward for your assistance."
The dwarf flung down his anger like a gauntlet, inflating until he seemed to grow several inches.
"I told you, woman ," he snarled; as the fingers of his guards slid towards their weapons. "I'll not lift my blade in defence of this nugshit heap. I've spent too much time in the ground already, I won't be put back into it before my time. I've got years of the sun on my face and whiskey in my belly ahead of me."
"Year," corrected Flora.
Leliana glanced sideways at their mender. Flora was blinking, a watery gold aura dissipating through her eye.
"What?" The dwarf, wrongfooted, made a squinting face.
"A year of the sun on your face," said Flora, patiently. "Maybe eighteen months, if you lay off whiskey."
"What do you mean?"
"Your liver," she said, bluntly, "is a mouldy turnip. You've drunk so much, it's pickled like a mackerel. It ain't got much life left in it."
Dwyn stared at her, momentarily lost for words. "The fuck?"
"I'm a mender. Your skin is like glass to me," Flora replied, solemnly. "When I want it to be."
His eyes rolled from side to side like small pebbles in a jar, his mouth opened but no words emerged. Eventually the dwarf forced some scepticism from his throat.
"I don't need a liver," he retorted, with false assurance. "It's never done nothing for me."
"A liver," corrected Flora, recalling a previous anatomy lesson from her spirits. "Is like a little Flora in your belly. It cleanses poison in your blood. It is VERY important. And yours looks like a… a shrivelled old mollusc."
The dwarf blinked rapidly and she guessed that he was cataloguing an array of bodily quirks determinedly ignored: an itching of the skin, a swelling of the flesh, a pain in the bowels. Flora's diagnosis had not come as a surprise in totality. The fleshy stub of his lower lip curled; his fingers clenched into fists. The reminder of mortality stung like a thorn sunk into the soft underside of the foot.
"Come and find me tomorrow," Flora said, gazing at the yellowed paunches beneath his eyes. "I'll mend it for you. I fixed a lot of livers in Herring."
Dwyn let out a hoarse and incredulous bark.
"Stupid girl," he said, roughly. "You missed out the part where you only fix me if I agree to fight."
Flora shot him a mildly appalled look.
"I don't bargain for my mending," she replied, sternly. "I don't ask for anything. I'll heal you tomorrow, whether you fight or not. We have stuff to do today."
She turned towards the door, Leliana at her side. Before her boot had claimed a single step, the dwarf called in her wake; a discordant note in his voice.
"Wait! What if you get killed?"
"Hm!."
Flora's fingers took hold of the iron ring that served as a door handle. As she grasped it, the mercenary leader let out a hybrid snarl of frustration and resignation.
"Barzûl! Fine. We'll fight. But only because I need my liver fixed."
AN: I wanted to have Flora persuade Dwyn to fight in a slightly different way from what happens in game - she's not eloquent enough to talk him into it, but her healer's eye gives her an advantage! Anyway, this chapter is so long haha but I'm loving the chance to go into so much detail!:
