It was like a soft spring rain after a drought, that kiss; and the woman who gave it was like sunlight on water.
Nike melted under the warmth of that sunlight, wrapping her arms around it, holding it as close as it was holding her. She was unaware that they were both moving until she felt the stones of the wall at her back.
That hair was just as soft as it had looked. Nike's fingers tangled in it. The darkspawn, the bounty on her head, Ostagar and her family, even the woods seemed to melt away- and then jolted back into sudden and hard reality when a voice spoke from somewhere behind Adaon.
"Are you bloody well kidding me?"
A young man was standing at the edge of the ruin. He was young but looked tired and irritated, dark brows beetled over a strong nose and brooding, suspicious eyes. His black shag of hair was in need of a cutting, and his tunic bore a large patch over the left shoulder. In his hand he carried a bow and a brace with two thin looking squirrels hanging from it. Scratches lined one of his cheeks.
Nike startled at his voice, staring at him over Adaon's shoulder, but the blonde glanced over far more languidly.
"Of course you're here," she said. She half released Nike to face him more fully, but the hand at the small of her back never moved. "And I see you have quite the catch for the supper table."
"Look, I don't know who you are," the young man said to Nike, "but here's a dash of free advice. Run while you have a chance."
Adaon laughed, and said conspiratorially, "He only says that because he's jealous I get all the girls."
"Yes, all of them," he replied dryly. "Miss, that should tell you something. You're better off with a buzzard. At least they're loyal."
"Nike, may I introduce my insufferable and brooding younger brother, Carver. Carver, this is-"
Carver's irritated teasing vanished and was replaced with an alarmed look. He hurried over, dropping his voice.
"Nike? Nike Cousland? Do you know there's a bounty on your head-?"
"She knows," Adaon said calmly.
"It isn't safe for her to be here," Carver said angrily to his sister. "The soldiers are looking for the two wardens to show up, and they're not the only ones. In case you missed it, Lothering is full of frightened and starving people; people who could really use that bounty money. What if I had been someone else out in these woods, looking for food? Or on their way to gape at the Gully? She could have ended up in a cage just like that Qunari-"
"Carver, she knows all this. So do I. We're not-"
"Qunari?" Nike asked with a blink. She looked at Adaon. "There's a Qunari in a cage?"
"He's a prisoner of the Chantry," Adaon said. "Not sure what he did to get all their high holy knickers in a twist."
Nike had heard of the Qunari before, but she'd never encountered one. No one she knew had encountered one before, not even her father- so rarely did they venture outside of their lands.
To her brother, Adaon said, "We're being careful; something you could stand to learn."
"I'm not the one dragging a Grey Warden with a bounty on her head all over the Lothering woods because I think she's pretty," Carver said with a glare. Adaon didn't miss a beat, nor a centimeter of her calm.
"No, you're just the one sneaking out your bedroom window at night to run away and fight the Blight all by your lonesome, with not a single thought spared for anyone but yourself."
Carver turned red at that, but with his expression it was hard to tell if the red was from embarrassment, or fury. She kept on before he could speak.
"And I'm not dragging her around the Lothering woods just because I think she's pretty; although you are quite lovely, don't mistake me," she added the last smoothly to Nike before looking back at her brother, "We're out here to find more game than a tatty pair of squirrels because the Wardens are staying with us and need better feeding."
"I suppose you expected to find them under her tongue?" Carver snarled, and for the first time Nike saw Adaon angry.
"I will thank you to beg the Warden's pardon and keep your own tongue civil, Carver!" she said stonily. "Baiting me is one thing but she's been through plenty already without petty insults from you!"
To his credit, he did look a little abashed as he gave a stiff bow toward Nike. "Begging your pardon, Lady Cousland. I meant no insult…to you."
He glared pointedly back at his sister.
"Your apology is accepted, Master Hawke," Nike told him. "Food, however, is a real concern. You truly saw nothing else in the woods beyond our grey-tail friends there?"
She nodded toward the brace, and he shook his head gloomily. "Nothing, except a rather large raven that kept well out of the reach of my arrows. The woods have been picked clean."
"I would not shoot at that raven again," Adaon told him. "It belongs to the Wardens. You mentioned the Qunari. Did you go all the way to the Gully?"
"No, of course not. Won't be any game around there, not with the prisoner to gape at."
Adaon lifted her brow and looked around pointedly. "Do you see a lot of gaping passers-by in the woods today?"
He glared at her again, but it was the tired glare of one who knew the argument at hand had come many long years before this moment, and would continue many long years after it.
"Truth be said, no. I have only seen you two."
"No one is going to go gape at the Gully," Adaon said. "Everyone in town has greater things on their minds than the novelty of a Qunari in a cage, especially if it means venturing into these woods where the darkspawn may show up at any given day. That portion of the woods won't be hunted nearly as clean, and that sad Qunari may actually attract some looking for a morsel or two of their own, ghastly as it is to suggest."
"Fine," he said, and tied the brace to his belt. "But I'm coming with you."
"We do not need a chaperone," Adaon told him with irritation. He just grinned tightly at her, and finally she shook her head. "Very well, lead the way, oh great Lord Squirrel-Bane. By your leave."
As they started off again, heading deeper into the woods, Nike asked, "What is the Gully?"
"Cutter's Gully," Adaon told her. "It's where they used to execute criminals years ago. The nicer ones got a quick beheading; those guilty of a bit of nastier knavery were locked in great iron cages with no food or water until they died, and their bones left as an example. People from town would come to gawk at them, spit on them, or pelt them with refuse. We haven't had someone locked up in all of my memory, until now."
"Is that what the Chantry intends to do to this Qunari?" Nike asked. "Just leave him to rot away? What could he possibly have done to deserve that?"
"I'm not entirely sure what his crime was," Adaon said. "However, they do not intend to just let him rot away. Oh no. In their great wisdom- they intend him to be torn apart by the darkspawn when they come through, as an example of the Maker's great and expansive mercy- may He take them all."
There was no question of the bitterness that Adaon clearly felt about this. Nike supposed that- this particular barbarism aside- no mage, apostate or no, held any great love for the Chantry. Reaching out she took hold of Adaon's hand, and the blonde's sour expression was immediately replaced by that warm grin. She squeezed the Warden's fingers lightly.
After going for a few minutes in silence Nike called ahead to the young man some paces away. "Carver, if you don't mind indulging me- why is it that you and your family believe that Alistair and I are innocent of betraying the King?"
He looked around in some surprise. "Adaon, you didn't tell her?"
"The first time she asked we were in Mother's company," she said airily. "And you know how Mother is about our little venture to Ostagar. The second time she asked, we got a little bit distracted. And then you arrived. Much to my endless joy."
"Was it that, or was it cowardice?" he asked with a wry and amused twist to his mouth.
"Oh, totally cowardice," Adaon said, dead-pan. "I went all the way to Ostagar, had to hide myself and Rumble so that Brand and his friends wouldn't recognize us, and from the Templar and the Circle mages so I wouldn't be caught as an apostate, all because I am such a coward. Now, let me see. Why was it you were in camp and not in battle again? The overflowing fountain of your own bravery would accept no more than boldly and nobly covering their rear, was that it?"
"I already told you. I was ordered to stay back to help guard the camp."
"Oh yes, indeed. I recall now."
He gave her a snort as if she were totally useless, and spoke to Nike. "They had a handful of us stay back to guard the civilians- you know, the smiths, the servants, and so on. Where I was set to post, I could see the near side of the bridge. I saw you both, you and the other Grey Warden, on the ledge looking into the valley below. When the trebuchets started firing, you went sprinting across the bridge."
"You actually passed me," Adaon said to Nike, picking up the narrative. "I was coming over the bridge from the other side. I had heard that Carver was set to guard and misheard where his post was. It was a bit chaotic; you understand. I went right by the Tower yard and passed you two not long after you started across yourselves. There was fighting when I went by the Tower. Swords clashing, magic flashing everywhere, the snarls of those ugly things; I gave it no thought at the time save to get past as quickly as I could. I reached Carver and only a handful of minutes later- the stubborn mule was shocked I was there and kept arguing my good sense-"
"You had a wooden sword, 'Day," he said. She ignored him.
"-the darkspawn suddenly came out of the dust across the wall, and through the back of camp. The only way they could have gotten there was from the direction of the Tower or the path down the back to the Wilds."
"I know that path," Nike said softly.
"Then you know that there is no clear way there from the Tower, so somehow they got in on two quarters," Adaon said. "When I heard that you two were being blamed for letting the darkspawn in, well- it was impossible, wasn't it? There was fighting at the Tower before you two had even hit the bridge, and I'm sorry- I don't know how long it would take normal folk to breach the Tower in such a way as to let the enemy through in such numbers, but for a mage it would have taken some doing. Not something that could have been accomplished in only the handful of minutes between when I'd seen you and when the first of the hurlocks came charging in."
"And we were together when you saw us," Nike said slowly. "So, one of us could not have let them in on the pass to the Wilds."
"Right," Adaon said, and shrugged. "As I said, innocent."
Couldn't you tell Loghain that? Nike thought. If he truly thought they had betrayed the King by letting the darkspawn ravage the camp and hit them from the flank, wouldn't the testimony of these two be enough to show their innocence?
No, that wouldn't help, she told herself. They would have been scrutinized, and Adaon's identity as an apostate mage would be uncovered, and likely that of her younger sister. And to what benefit? Would they even have believed the word of a proven apostate mage who had infiltrated their ranks, and her brother- a man who was little more than a poor farm boy?
Nike doubted that very much. Their testimony would serve no benefit to her and Alistair, and would have ended only in misery for them as well. She could not begrudge them their silence.
Licking her lips slightly she asked a question she did not particularly want the answer to. "The camp…what happened then? How did you survive? Did others?"
Adaon looked at her with understanding. "The unvarnished truth of the matter is, we ran. They came flooding in like judgement itself and there wasn't a soul left in that camp that didn't turn and run. It was chaos."
"Oh, knock it off," Carver said, but when he looked at his sister again it wasn't just irritation in his eyes. "I know this may be hard because of lack of practice, but be honest with a girl for once."
"It is incredibly rude to refer to a woman at least three years your elder as a 'girl', Carver," Adaon said, but she wasn't smiling now and seemed almost…
Bashful? Nike stared at her in wonder. No, not possible. I know I've only known her a morning but that surely cannot be.
He let out a sigh and said to Nike, "The actual 'unvarnished truth' of the matter is, we didn't just turn and run. My sister is a lot of the reason many in the camp managed to get away. It's true, 'Day!"
He grew defensive as she gave him a look. "She risked her own life and being caught out as an apostate mage; put herself between the camp and the oncoming darkspawn and magicked all over the place-"
"Magicked!" Now Adaon did let out a laugh. He again ignored her.
"Brambles here, balls of fire there-I never saw anything like it. Whatever warning the people in camp had, whatever chance they got, she was it."
"I'm pretty sure I saw you swinging your sword a time or two," she said, and he harumphed.
"Well, there's that," he admitted. "And I was some help."
"And we did run."
"Yes, in the end, of course we did. There wasn't any other choice."
"And, the others in camp?" Nike asked.
"Others managed to escape as well. A few are even in town," Adaon told her, then added with a gentle expression. "However, you were the only two Wardens who survived."
Nike nodded. "Yes, that I did know," she said. "However, my brother- I was unsure if he stayed in camp or went to fight. He was wounded previous to battle and was recovering with the mages. I did not have a chance to see him before that terrible night. He could still have been there. And there was an elven maid, a servant- Tahja."
"I know no names," Adaon told her kindly. "But Carver and I will make inquiries around town, see if we can't track them down."
"Discreet inquiries?" Carver asked her, and she rolled her eyes.
"No, I was going to ask every refugee and sell-sword for ten miles about- 'Hey! Do you know the Grey Warden's brother and elf-friend? Yes, the selfsame Warden that has a huge bounty on her head? Why do we want to know? Oh, no reason. No, we're not hiding her at our house, why do you ask?'"
"I would appreciate any news, thank you," Nike said.
Suddenly Holly was at her side, muscles tense and alert as she gave a low, almost inaudible growl. Nike had almost forgotten the two mabari had been happily following them. She dropped Adaon's hand as she halted mid-stride, and immediately reached for her bow. Carver did the same, and Adaon pulled an odd-looking chunk of wood from her belt. All three stood in cautious silence for a long moment.
"Holly?" Nike whispered. The dog gave a low sound again, not quite a growl, and took a single step forward. Nike looked toward the trees and thick brush that the hound was staring at, and nodded. Then she inclined her head to one side, and immediately the two Hawkes fell back a few paces, neither making a sound.
There was an odd feeling in her gut she couldn't quite pinpoint. It was like a small hook anchored in her diaphragm had started to be pulled, reeled in ever so slowly on an invisible line. It was such a strange and alien sensation that she knew immediately what it had to be, the memory of a conversation echoing in her ears.
"The darkspawn would not get up this far along this route without us noticing."
"Still, there could be scouts couldn't there? How are you sure there are none close?"
"Oh, something in my gut," Alistair said lightly.
The sensation was so faint that Nike had not noticed it was there before Holly had come to her side.
As carefully and silently as she had ever moved on a hunt, Nike edged toward the pull of that feeling. She heard Holly start to step after her and gave a quick jab of her hand, an order to stay. Holly wouldn't like it, but she was still healing, and Nike didn't want to risk her again.
Foot by careful foot she moved toward the pull in her gut, setting an arrow to her bow and scanning for anything unusual at the same time she strained for the faintest sound.
A shape shifted in the shadows and she lowered her stance, drawing her arrow to her ear. Then, something bounded forward out of the trees- large, gray and brown, and tautly muscled. It flailed even as it lunged, dark eyes rolling wildly, and thick curds of foam streaming back from its gaping mouth.
Nike fired, drew, and fired again. The first arrow landed in a heaving chest, the second in a soft throat. The form crashed down to the forest floor, tried once to lurch up and lunge forward again. The white foam mingled pink and red with blood, and as large as a mirror one eye shimmered frenetically.
She fired, and the arrow sank deep into that eye, and the beast went down. The clawing of a sharp foot, a final heaving groan of breath, and all went still. That tiny tug in Nike's gut had stopped. Straightening, she heard the Hawkes approaching behind her.
"Well, blast it all," Adaon said with a sigh, as she regarded the eight-point buck bleeding black on the forest floor. "Doesn't it figure? Enough meat to feed the family for a month, and it's gone and got itself poisoned with the Taint."