My first waking vision greeted me by the glare of sunlight in my eyes and a scowling woman's face hovering over my own. I would have jumped from my bed were it not for the unnatural stiffness to my limbs. I groaned and blinked until I shaped out dark hair and slightly sun-warm skin against the blinding background that was the morning sun.
"I-Isthalla?" I muttered. The scowl deepened on the woman's face, and after another blink I noticed the absence of her tell-tale red tattoos and pointy elf ears. Morrigan frowned down at me. Oh, right.
Well I am certainly an ass.
"Good to see you are finally awake," she chastised. I groaned and tried to sit up, Morrigan forced to assist as I came to terms with how sore my arm was.
"Maker's balls I feel like I've been hit by a battering ram," I clenched my teeth and swung my legs over the cot, pressing one hand to my aching head. I heard Morrigan huff and crouch beside me before running a hand over my arm. I jumped when foreign pain shot down my arm.
"Ouch, that hurts!" I yelped while trying to pull away. She slapped at my hand and continued to work away the bandaging.
"Well of course it hurts, you blundering oaf," she snapped. I didn't appreciate the name-calling. "You were attacked by a werewolf."
"Wh- Wait what??" I said. She tsk'd while removing the last of the bandaging. Beneath was what looked like use to be my arm. Instead was a mangled mess badly-stitched together.
"You've been cured, though I don't suppose your wounds have healed so quickly," she continued. "Now that we can properly address them."
"Can someone please explain to me what's happened?" I groaned in frustration while squinting my eyes against the unforgiving rays still penetrating my eyes. "Maker, it's hot."
"It is a moderate temperature and you are only just over a fever," she corrected. I hated how she talked down to me like that. I tried to show my frustration, but she would not grant me the honor of looking up. I looked down instead to my arm, which now glowed with a green light. She was working my arm over with healing magic, or attempting so.
"Shouldn't Wynne be doing this?" I said once I recalled Morrigan was no mage for healing magic. Wynne should have much less difficulty mending my wounds, rather than Morrigan having to tax her magic so. I was met with the most vicious glare only seconds after the words left my mouth.
"If you would prefer, I shall let you sit here and rot in your festering wounds and ungrateful attitude!" she barked. My chest jumped in alarm.
"No, no, no! That's not what I meant at all," I laughed while trying to raise my hand to stop her, and grimaced when I felt that horrible pain shoot up my shoulder again. I groaned and dropped it dejectedly at my side. Morrigan paused. After a moment of hesitation, she returned back to my side and continued to work over my shoulder.
"Pray tell me you have a better explanation," she bit back. I sucked in a breath when my arm began to throb. She was not being kind with her magic.
"I only meant that, well - Wynne has a knack for this sort of thing, doesn't she?" I attempted. Still no response. Another pulse up my arm, and I tried not to wince. "I just didn't want you to become frustrated."
She relaxed after this, finally. After a few more minutes in silence, she decided to grace me with conversation.
"For the moment, Wynne's assistance is employed in another part of camp," she explained. Her eyebrows raised on her head and mouth tightened in that I'm-still-irritated way I recognized as her attempt at being civil. I tried not to smile. "She's needed for more… complex wounds now under mend for the Dalish."
"The Dalish?" I straightened and looked about me. Small groups of elves stood about, and only then did I become aware of the large, mythical land-ships named aravels that circled the camp. "The Dalish…" I smiled, completely enamored by the legend I now sat in the middle of. "Maker, I never thought I'd see this in my lifetime."
"Well recall it quickly, for we depart at noon," she rejoined me in conversation. I glanced down.
"Noon? Why so soon?"
"Are you attempting to play a fool, Alistair, because I quite tire of it!" she barked. Though I felt offended by her insistence at belittling me, I pressed on.
"Uh, hello-" I pointed at my head. "I've been unconscious for Maker knows how long. Not exactly aware of what's going on here." I paused then, crumpling my brow, turned to Morrigan. "What exactly happened?"
Possessed by some brief spark of kindness, she finally loosened her scowl a bit and stopped healing my arm for a moment to speak. Her eyes looked up to me.
"We were attacked in the woods, do you not remember?" I worked through the fog of my mind, faintly recognizing the memory though not fully grasping it. A brief flash of yellow eyes and fangs seared my mind. I shook my head.
"Not really, no…" Though annoyed, she did not chastise me for my lack of knowledge. I was grateful.
"We were attacked by werewolves. Both yourself and Leliana were… infected. So to speak," she shifted her eyes about. "Your fellow Warden took Sten, Wynne, and Zevran out into the woods to hunt down a forest creature that supposedly had the cure.
"After three days the elves' Keeper went to find them," she looked away, "and shortly after returned and claimed all to be cured. No Keeper to speak of."
"Well," I sucked in a breath and put my hand back to my head. "That's certainly a lot to take in." I looked across camp with a sudden frown, then turned to Morrigan with remembered concern. "Is Isthalla all right?"
What looked like anger faded behind an unreadable mask of error I had undoubtedly conjured. Morrigan's face grew ill and tight as she drew to her feet and pressed her mouth together.
"Fine," she ground out and stormed off. My eyes followed her across camp until she disappeared behind the trees, then drew my attention to another rapidly-approaching mage of equal disdain.
"Dunno what that was all about," I laughed half-heartedly and nodded towards Morrigan's flashing figure between the trees. She glanced back in half-interest, then stopped directly in front of me with her arms cocked. She surveyed me in an odd way, still unchanged, and spoke.
"How are you feeling?" she asked. Genuine surprise entered my expression when I responded; it was unusual for Isthalla to concern herself with others, much less someone like me. I smiled.
"Well other than the nearly-dying part, I think I'm all right," I chuckled. She wasn't amused. I sighed loudly and rolled my head to loosen my neck. "Honestly just a bit sore all over. I haven't been sleeping on rocks, have I?"
When she didn't respond I dropped my good arm back down and stopped smiling. She looked more troubled than usual, and I felt compelled to ask what was wrong despite knowing what always happened when I did ask. Either with a hex up my arse or a new reason to send me a nasty glare over her shoulder for the rest of the day. I suppose I could chance it.
"Are you feeling all right?" I tried. She bristled, as expected, but rather than lash out I watched her completely crumple into her own body - which was tiny as it was, making her seem too terribly small. Sometimes I forgot she was a foot my size.
"If you feel anything unusual, come to me straight away," she did not address my question. Then, flashing her fire-eyes at me added, "that's an order."
As if I didn't know already.
Honestly, I didn't understand the hostility from all the women. Or perhaps it was a witch thing. Did witches somehow line up their monthly flow perhaps? That might explain some things. I swear, it was like trying to appease an angry cat sometimes. A really, really angry cat.
"Wynne thought you might like this," she interrupted my thoughts and dropped something into my lap then briskly walked away. I was still a bit confused by the time I looked down. In my hands was a small carving of a stone dragon. Every scale was meticulously detailed, and the eyes were painted a bright gold. Impressed, I turned over the tiny statue in my hand and admired it. When I looked up to thank her, she, too, was gone from my sight.
"Huh," I mused aloud, still turning over the present in my hand. I held it up to the morning light and smiled. "I think I'll call you Sam," I decided. "Would you like that name? Of course you would, you're a statue." I let it rest in my lap again, hands cradled around as I regarded my new friend.
"Statues can't talk back," I explained. "In that respect, we are very much alike my friend." I ran a thumb over the smooth stone surface, then looked back up to the places where my misplaced companions had stormed off too.
"No one really listens to a statue," I sighed.