By Gods Forsaken

by inwardtransience

One day, the shadows will part, and the skies will open wide. When he rises, everyone will see. (How do you do a summary for something this big? Total retelling, Mahariel!Warden, mage!Hawke, Dreamer!Trevelyan!Inquisitor, worldbuilding, too many OCs, serious plot edits, primarily F/F.)

7. Lothering — II

9:30 Nubulis 16

Southron Hills, South Reach, Chasingard, Kingdom of Ferelden

---

Marian was dragged from sleep gradually, painfully, specters half-seen and voices half-heard lingering, pulling at her. Numb and delirious, it took her a moment to feel the cloth against her face, the hand against her shoulder.

The voice calling from above, high, panicky. "Wake up! Mari, you have to wake up, there's smoke coming from the village! Marian!" Bethany.

She jolted into motion, rolling over to sit up, quickly enough her head almost knocked into Bethany's. And then Marian winced, bent over hugging herself, as her entire body seemed to thrum with pain, overworked muscles aching and twitching with exhaustion.

She was so damn tired.

They'd managed to get home ahead of the darkspawn, though not by as wide of a margin as Marian would have liked. Setting eyes on her home — their land tucked in a valley between hills, hidden from the prying eyes of neighbors, Marian had been relieved to see the place still standing. She'd been certain they were ahead of the darkspawn, but the Teyrn's men... Well, she'd been glad to see nothing had happened to Mother and Bethany, that was all.

By the time they'd gotten home, Marian had been starving and exhausted, practically dead on her feet. She'd carried Carver half the way from Ostagar, but he'd been mostly recovered by then, and he'd ended up carrying her the last leg of the trip. She'd been light-headed from hunger and delirious from lack of sleep when they'd stumbled through the threshold, she'd remained conscious long enough to get down a few gulps of water and a sizeable bowl of porridge, telling the others to prepare to leave as soon as possible, before passing out right there in the kitchen.

She was in their bedroom now, she could see, hers and Mother's — it had been her parents' originally, but when the twins had been twelve or so she'd moved in with Mother to let them have the kids' to themselves. It was clear Mother had been through here, the linens cast about in a mess, the dresser practically disassembled in her haste to get to one item or another. Marian was surprised it hadn't woken her, she must have really been out of it.

Bethany was standing nearby, dressed and ready to go, thick leather and fur, a wineskin hanging at each hip, a third slung across her chest. "Are you hurt? I can try to—"

"I'm fine," she said, brushing off her sister's hands. All the magic Bethany knew Marian had taught her in the first place, she wasn't any better at healing than Marian was — besides, she wasn't actually injured, just sore from carrying Carver over her shoulder for miles and miles. "You said, smoke?" Marian pushed herself up to her feet, her legs shaking, then cringed, her hands bracing against her hips as her back flared in protest. Okay, ow...

"From the northwest. I think Lothering is burning," Bethany said, an obvious note of horror on her voice — and with good reason, all those people... "Carver said to wait to wake you as long as we could, and we haven't seen any darkspawn yet, but the village—"

"It's okay, Beth, I'm okay, let's go." She checked over herself, shaking her head in amusement despite herself. Apparently, Carver had just picked her up and dropped her in bed without bothering to undress her at all, she was still wearing the silverite scale armor Duncan had set her up with. Even her boots were still on, her daggers at her hips. Not that she was complaining, she'd waste less time getting dressed again this way. "Are we about ready to go?" Her first few steps were unsteady, her stiff legs not quite cooperating, but she smoothed out as she walked into the kitchen.

The place was a mess. The others had clearly torn through it, clothing and tools and cookware and trinkets scattered all over the place, four bulging packs sat waiting in the middle of the floor. Carver was there, still looking rather lopsided from Marian cutting at his armor healing him, looking half-panicked, torn between irritation and something else she couldn't quite read. Mom didn't look much like herself at the moment, bundled up much like Bethany — Marian couldn't remember the last time she'd seen Mom wearing pants — her dark hair, threaded with strands of grey here and there tied back in a slapdash knot, bits of it escaped in an asymmetrical mess. She had cradled in her arms a thick ceramic chest, lined in bronze accents. From the way her shoulders bent holding it, it was rather heavy. Mom and Carver were arguing, though she hadn't heard much she assumed over including the chest in their supplies.

Marian didn't have to listen to know exactly what was going on: she wasn't likely to not recognize her father's urn.

Mom and Carver both turned at her entrance, both speaking to her — Carver asking her to back her up here, Mom wondering if she was okay, if she'd slept enough, they hadn't woken her up too early, had they? Without a word, Marian stepped right up to Mother, wrenched the urn out of her arms. She whirled around, her boots scraping on the wood floor, returned the urn to its place above the hearth.

"Marian," Mom said, her hand coming to Marian's elbow, "we can't just leave him here, the darkspawn—"

She bit her lip, holding in an aggravated sigh. She knew that thin, shaky tone on her mother's voice, had heard far too much of it not so long ago — she was too damn tired to deal with Mom losing it over Dad again. "It's too heavy, Mother."

"We'll— We can move some of the things out of my pack, and—"

"No, Mother." Marian started toward the packs, give them a quick once-over, if Mother had been involved who knew what unnecessary shit she'd put in there.

"We can't just— I said I'd never leave him and I'm not going to start now, surely you or Bethany could—" Use magic to take off some of the weight, she meant, but she didn't know what she was asking. Yes, she and Bethany could use magic to make things weigh less, but they'd probably be doing that with all their packs (excluding maybe Carver's), and with how long they would be walking — and possibly running, for the first stretch — the amount of magic they'd have to put into that... The extra weight of the dense ceramic could well push one of them into burn-out. And if one of them burned out...

Sorry, Dad, but it's the only way I'm getting your family out of here in time.

Marian stormed back to the hearth, picked up the urn. She raised it above her head and — magic coursing through her body so thick it stung, the strength it gave her making the urn feel so light she hardly felt it — she threw it down, as hard and fast as she could, slamming it against the floor.

The wood cracked under the force, and the thick ceramic shattered, bronze-edged shards noisily dancing away, thick trails of white-gray ash dumping themselves across the floor.

"No! Marian, how could you—?!" And then Mother was bursting into tears, reaching for the urn, but Bethany wrapped her up in her arms first, holding her in place as she cried. She sent Marian a scandalized look, not so devastated as Mother but clearly offended all the same.

Carver, grim and solemn, just nodded.

While Bethany comforted Mother, wailing over Father's defiled remains — she hadn't liked doing it any more than Bethany had liked seeing it, but they didn't have time to talk Mom around — Marian stalked over to the packs, quickly searched through them. Food mostly, it looked like, some more water on top of the wineskins Bethany, Carver, and Mother were all carrying, some valuables, what little jewelry Mom had brought with her when she'd left Kirkwall, a few things acquired since, some fine lace, a couple little trinkets. Good thinking — they didn't have a whole lot in the way of coin, but they should be able to sell much of this when they got to Amaranthine, should get enough to buy their way across to the Marches. There were a few books in each pack, she noticed, which was fine, it was a toss-up whether Mother's jewelry or Father's books would fetch a better price. Almost nothing in the way of clothing, but that was fine, clothing was more easily replaceable, especially if they had money.

Speaking of money, Marian walked over to Carver where he was bent over one of the packs, rearranging things to be easier to carry, drew the sword he'd picked up during his short stint in the King's army. He jumped at the sound, whirling around to ask her what she was doing, but she didn't answer, went over to the door outside. She counted slats in the floorboards from the jam, one two three four, jabbed the point of the sword into the seam, leaned against the pommel. There was a creak of a strained nail, and then a pop, the floorboard coming loose. Marian handed Carver his sword back, dropped to her knees, pulled a small wooden box out of the hole in the floor.

"What's that?"

Instead of answering, Marian slid the cover open a few inches — inside were silver coins, a few dozen of them. Most buying and selling that ordinary people dealt with was done in bits, so when Marian did pick up a silver here and there she'd gotten into the habit of putting them away, saving them up in case of an emergency. She doubted it would come out to a whole sovereign added up, but with the bits they'd already distributed through their packs it was probably pretty close. Marian clicked the box closed again, held it out to Carver. "Put that in Mother's pack." She was the least likely to lose her things if there was to be any fighting.

"Right, good idea."

On her feet again, Marian whipped her coat off its peg, pulled it on. This had been her father's, heavy leather lined with fennec fur stretching past her knees, with a hood that neatly hid her face — it had always been big on her, she'd let Carver have it for all of a year before he'd gotten too broad in the shoulder. With her armor filling it out a bit, it was actually a pretty good fit now. "I'm gonna check the trails north quick. We're leaving as soon as I get back."

"We'll be ready." Carver tossed her a wineskin, she scrambled to catch a biscuit, bits of apples in the hard bread, a whiff of cinnamon reaching her nose. "Go."

Marian was out the door, stopping only briefly at the well to get a drink and fill her skin before, her breakfast held between her teeth, she drew magic around her like a whirling wind, and threw herself into the air.

The farm smeared into an indistinct blur of color under her, five feet, then twenty, then thirty. Normally, flying so near home she'd hug close to the curve of the hills, letting them break line of sight with the other farms to the west and north, but this time she didn't bother. She flew in an arc up, high enough the landscape for miles around was laid out before her — though in only vague features, the spell obscuring her vision too much to make out much in the way of detail — flew for a minute or so before crossing the river, arcing down again, hitting the ground with a heavy thump, skipping to bleed off speed. Biting through her biscuit, she twirled it in her fingers as she chewed, looking down on the large flat patch of land the village sat in.

It was later than she'd thought, the sun only a couple handspans above the horizon — she'd actually slept a decent bit there, which explained how awake she was now, once she'd gotten herself moving. She was standing on a hill about a half mile south-east of the Chantry, a good four miles away from home, looking down on the village from an angle. The sun lit up the column of smoke rising from the village from behind, the dark cloud almost seeming to glow with a moody light, an orange mass hanging over the valley. Half the village was on fire, misshapen figures by the dozens weaving between the burning buildings.

Thankfully, it looked like the village had been mostly evacuated by the time the darkspawn had shown up. It was hard to tell from this distance for certain, but she spotted far fewer dark shapes on the ground than she might have expected, only a couple here or there. Marian hadn't been particularly close with anyone who lived in the village, she wouldn't say, but it wasn't like she wanted them to all die either. And Bethany would be relieved by the news too.

But she noticed a bigger problem than the state of Lothering itself: the darkspawn had hit it a while ago. By the state of the Chantry, nearly a burned out skeleton already, it could have been as much as an hour already, maybe more. And they were spreading across the field to the north, out toward west and east.

Perhaps, already between home and the road to Amaranthine.

Marian swallowed, stuck her biscuit back between her teeth, and took off again. Flying more east than straight home, she watched the land passing beneath, trying to make out familiar features through the distortion. There, that might be— She landed on top of another hill, and yes, that was the dirt trail threading along the eastern edge of the farmland surrounding the village, the informal border between the Bannir of Lothering and the unincorporated wilds of this part of the Southron Hills. Marian glanced around quick, launched herself into the air again, passing over the smeared shape of one hill, another, another, another—

Smoke, ahead.

Tipping back down to the ground, Marian landed rather harder than she meant to in her haste, ploughing into the dirt on her knees, nearly dropping her biscuit. In a dip in the land ahead was another farm. Glancing around quick, taking in the shape of the land around them, yes, this was Dennel's family — Marian had known him growing up, their time learning to read from the Sisters in the village had overlapped, though he was three or four years older than her. They'd been sort of friends for a while, but they'd fallen out of contact when he'd been getting married and Father had died, both of them suddenly very busy. They did some pretty regular trade these days, Marian offering skins from fennec and elk she brought down for whatever bits and bobs they needed he might have.

Dennel's house was on fire. Darkspawn were scattered here and there across his land in a teeming mess, though moving generally north and east.

Marian caught a glimpse of bright red-orange in the field, not far from the house, hair teased out by the acrid breeze — Seda, Dennel's daughter. Couldn't be older than, what, five or so, she was a sweet girl, Bethany had been a terror at that age...

Gritting her teeth, Marian turned her back on the murdered family, threw herself back into the air.

When she landed again a couple minutes later, her family were stepping out of their home, Bethany practically dragging Mom along. Mom wasn't openly crying anymore, but she did seem very out of it, her face almost eerily blank. She was cradling something in both hands, her eyes unerringly fixed on it: a shard of heavy ceramic, a vein of bronze along one side.

Marian swallowed.

"How's it look out there?"

Wrenching her eyes away from her mother, Marian said, "Ah, not good. Dennel's farm is overrun." Probably the only reason their land hadn't been hit already was because it looked like the darkspawn had hit the village first before spreading out — which meant the horde was south and west and north of them. "We'll have to go by the game trails, through the hills."

Blanching a little — at the thought that Dennel and his family were maybe dead (which Marian wouldn't be confirming for them right now), or just that they were uncomfortably surrounded — Carver nodded. "Come on, let's go," he barked, starting off toward the east. "If they're already at Dennel's we don't have much time."

"I'll be along in a moment."

Bethany and Mother already passing him, Carver paused to stare at her, frowning. Then his eyes widened a little, putting together what she planned to do. For a moment, Marian thought he might say something, argue, or maybe even cry, his eyebrows dipping and his chin quivering. But he just nodded, took a last glance at their home, then turned around, skipping ahead of the other two to lead them up into the hills.

Marian had actually been born in Redcliffe, they'd lived there her first few years, but it hadn't been easy getting by. Most of the land in the Arling was held by Banns or knights or freeholders already, and good work had been relatively scarce. Also, so near Kinloch Hold there had been many more Templars. Marian had already started to show signs of magic as a toddler, and Dad had been doubtful of their ability to hide her indefinitely — Mom said Dad had told her in no uncertain terms that he would rather die than let them take Marian and lock her up in the Tower, they had to move further away.

Lothering had been a convenient choice. The village had been the site of a major battle during the Rebellion, nearly flattened in the fighting, most of the farmland in its periphery abandoned. It'd filled up in the years since, but there had still been some good land for the taking by then. Her father had built this house. Not on his own, with some assistance from men from the surroundings farms, and not from nothing — there had been a farmhouse here before they'd come, but it'd been abandoned years previously, only some of the stones making up the hearth at its center remained.

Marian vaguely remembered coming here for the first time, she would have been three or four, she thought. It hadn't been finished yet, only the kitchen enclosed, they'd still been working on what was now her and Mother's bedroom. She remembered Father carrying her on his shoulders, looking around their little valley, explaining this was their land, it was theirs, no worrying about banns or knights pushing them around anymore, sitting in front of the hearth that first night, Dad explaining his family had been freeholders once, somewhere near Redcliffe (that he barely remembered them, taken away to the Circle at a young age), explaining what it meant, that this was their home, it was theirs. Not the words, she'd been too young to remember exactly what he'd said, but the meaning of it, reinforced over years working the place — each bite of a hoe into dirt, each nail in the walls.

Marian had helped build the second bedroom. Bethany and Carver hadn't been born in this house — Mother had spent the last month before and the first month after their birth in the Chantry, like most women of lowly means in the Bannir — but the moment it turned out they'd had twins (and that they'd both survive), Dad had decided they needed another room added to the house that would be the kids' when they got older. Marian had been little then, she hadn't been able to help much more than carrying tools or planks of wood from place to place, one at a time, hold things where they belonged while the first couple nails were driven through. She mostly remembered the breaks, sitting in the middle of the half-finished room with stew and cider (and the occasional bit of maple-almond brittle, a rare luxury), Dad and a few men from the area (including Dennel's father, actually), talking through the work to do yet, joking and laughing.

Dad had died in this house. In the bed Marian and Mom still slept in, in fact. (Mom had refused to ever leave it for some time afterward.) They'd held a vigil there, for a week, friends coming around to visit, and Carver was...

Her hand pressed against the scuffed wood next to the hearth, memories flickered behind Marian's eyes. Sitting around the fire, cooking or working on this thing or the other, Dad telling old Fereldan stories he'd picked up at some point over the years, the less dramatic of their magic lessons, between her and Father or her and Bethany, Dad getting revenge on Carver for hitting him in the back of the head with a snowball, the three kids all getting drawn into an extended tickle fight, Mom sitting in her chair poking at some sewing project or another, clicking her tongue in irritation but failing to hide her smile...

Their home. Theirs.

And Marian would rather die than let those damn Blighted monsters go tromping through it.

Smoke rose from the wood against her skin, and then burst into flames, quickly spread into crackling life, branching up and to the sides. Marian stepped into the kids' room, setting the very flammable bed alight first, then the dresser, painting a few streaks of flame across the floor and walls, the curtains Marian had stitched herself when she'd been, oh, eight or so, going up with a sudden whoomf. She moved to hers and Mother's bedroom, giving it the same treatment, until it was consumed in flickering red and yellow, the roaring echoing in her ears, back out into the kitchen, flames flying from the fingers of both hands, she didn't slow walking through the room, fire spreading behind her, covering everything.

She stepped back out into the open air through the thick, acrid cloud spilling through the doorway. The stinging in her eyes and the ache in her throat had nothing to do with the smoke.

She caught up with her family after a brief flight, just at the crest of the nearest hill to the east, the twisted, rolling landscape ahead hidden by brush and trees. They'd all paused, turning around to face their land, staring at their burning home as though transfixed. Carver was solemn, but unsurprised, he'd realized what she was doing, Bethany looked shocked, her mouth hanging open and blinking against tears.

Mom just looked empty.

Gently taking her shoulder, Marian turned Mom around, her other arm looping over Bethany. Pulling them both, "We have to go, now. Come on." Reluctantly, they allowed themselves to be directed away, their land before long vanishing behind the top of the hill.

Marian could hear the fire behind her, faintly crackling and hissing, but she didn't look back.

Just to the east of Lothering, between the River Drakon and the Highway both running east toward Denerim, was an outcropping of rough, jagged hills, protruding rock alternating with dark soil, the contours of the land creating natural trails between the bare stone at the peaks, steep and difficult to traverse, and the green valleys, trees and brush thick enough to slow travel. The hills made pretty decent hunting land, filled with all manner of birds, deer and elk, goats, the rare druffalo, occasionally boar or a pack of wolves might wander through. Marian had stumbled across a huge damn bear once, surprised enough she unthinkingly set it on fire, ruining its pelt — which was a shame, those things were valuable. (The meat had still been good, at least.) The place was craggy enough the hills broke line of sight in all directions in a pretty short distance, it'd been a relatively safe place to practice the more flashy magics. Marian had spent quite a lot of time in these hills over the years, practicing or hunting or gathering wild plants for one purpose or another, and so had Bethany and Carver, they were all comfortable out here.

Mother? Not so much.

It hadn't occurred to her just how rough the terrain might be for her. Marian forgot this sometimes, but Mom was starting to get up in years — she had to be in her mid-forties by now (Marian knew her birthdate but not what year she'd been born in, exactly), and she hadn't lived the easiest life in the world. She'd been a relatively pampered noblewoman back in Kirkwall, and the much harder living of a Fereldan peasant had taken a toll on her the first couple years here. Marian had been told, she used to get ill frequently — once rather badly while she'd been pregnant with Marian, Father had been concerned he might lose them both — and it had taken her a while to adjust to rougher furnishings, to working with her hands, she'd been tired and aching for years at the beginning. She'd gotten used to it by the time Marian had been old enough to remember, but it'd been a struggle.

She had participated in the fieldwork and the like, once upon a time...before Father's death. She'd been thrown into a persistent melancholy, it'd taken her months to even willingly get out of bed, years before she was even somewhat back to normal. She had her moments even now, she still wasn't the same. Marian wasn't convinced she ever would be. But, the point was, for a few years there Marian had taken on all the more strenuous work, assisted by Carver and Bethany first just a little bit, then more and more over the years. By the time Mother was active again, they'd had everything settled, she hadn't really needed to do anything.

So, Mother hadn't done anything more strenuous than little things around the house, a walk down to the village, for years.

She certainly wasn't in any condition to be rushing along these rough hunting trails.

They'd started off at a pretty good clip — not running, but definitely quicker than a normal walking pace, sometimes jogging on the down slopes — and Mother might have been able to keep up with that pace. Maybe. If it were on flat ground, the inclines were clearly harder for her. And then there were the steps up, occasionally, when wind and rain had worn away stone enough to form clefts, she would struggle with the steeper ones, sometimes needing a hand up to make it, where the others might have just easily hopped over. They didn't keep their initial pace for very long, picking across the hills significantly more slowly than Marian and the twins would travel on their own.

She'd been hoping they'd be able to get ahead of the horde to loop up to the Highway around South Bend, but at this rate, she didn't know if they'd make it. When they had to stop entirely so Mom could catch her breath for a moment, after a distance that couldn't be more than a mile and a half, Marian shared a worried glance with Carver.

"Bethany, do you think you can project Dad's strengthening trick outside yourself?"

She didn't have to explain why she was asking — Bethany glanced at Mom, worrying her lip between her teeth. "Ah, I think so. But the packs, and I won't be able to help..."

"Don't worry about those, I'll handle it. Let go of them now." Marian felt the tingling magics lightning the packs on the twins' backs vanish, Carver tilted a little at the sudden weight, Marian immediately re-upped them herself. "Focus on Mother. If we run into darkspawn, Carver and I will handle them. If they get too close, go ahead and fry them, but leave it to us otherwise." She paused for a second, trying to think if she'd forgotten anything. "Oh, and my rain-repelling charm will keep the taint away from you. Don't spend the effort keeping it up all the time, just when they get too close."

Bethany nodded. "Okay. If you need help, just say so. If we're stopped in a fight, I'm sure I could drop the spells on Mom for a minute." She'd practically have to — Dad's strengthening spell took a fair bit of magic, if she tried to keep it up on herself and project it into Mom and throw shit at darkspawn she'd probably burn out instantly.

Of course, if they were surrounded by darkspawn thickly enough they actually had to stop for a minute, they'd probably be fucked. But Marian just said, "Sure. We good to go?"

With Bethany's magic coursing through her, Mom was somewhat lighter on her feet. It was an obvious improvement, but not quite so much of one as Marian had been hoping for — projecting a spell that was supposed to work internally like this one was much more difficult than casting it on oneself, Marian assumed Bethany was giving her as much as she could. For a moment, Marian considered throwing in a little bit herself...bit she didn't know how their magic might interact inside of a person like that, and Marian already had several spells going at once herself. At least it looked like Bethany was doing alright, her magic still coming steady and strong after some minutes, so Marian guessed that would just have to be good enough.

They'd gone what Marian judged to be about three miles, the western sky burning with sunset even broader and more colorful than normal (from the smoke, maybe?), when they came across the first darkspawn.

They were curving along the southern side of one of the rocky outcroppings, Carver reaching where the southern trail met the northern one at the same time as a trio of darkspawn. He didn't have time to slow down, so he didn't bother, rammed into the lead one shoulder first. The thing coughed with the impact, a thin rain of droplets flung from its mouth — Marian cast her rain-repelling charm on Carver in a blink, before any of them could land — knocking it off its feet. He scrambled a couple steps back, reaching for his sword.

Marian threw herself into the air, arcing over Mom and Beth's heads, landing behind one of the trio, a magically-augmented stab of a silverite blade piercing nearly all the way through its neck. Carver cut down the one yet standing without difficulty, still reaching for his shield, moving to execute the one he'd knocked over, so Marian turned to the trail they'd come from.

These three clearly weren't all of them: rushing down the trail after them were...well, Marian didn't have time to count, but several, maybe as many as a dozen. Temporarily dropping a couple of her spells (if she burned out they were all dead), Marian flung a wave of energy out at the charging darkspawn knocking them all flailing to the ground. So they would stay conveniently stationary long enough for Marian to incinerate them all with a single spell.

Their high-pitched screams cutting off in a couple seconds, Marian turned back around. The three were dead, Carver was uninjured — there was a thin smear of black blood over his shoulder, they'd have to take care of that later, just in case, but it would keep for now. Bethany and Mother were staring at the dead darkspawn, wide-eyed and horrified.

Of course, they'd never seen darkspawn before, had they? They were unpleasant-looking things, ashen and jagged, leaking vile black fluids here and there. Misshapen, like someone had thrown them into the mill, grinding and breaking them, haphazardly pasting them back together afterward.

But they didn't have time to sit around and marvel at how completely disgusting the things were. Marian could hear inhuman howling to the north, still in the distance but far too close.

Over the next minutes, they stumbled across two more packs of darkspawn, both easily dealt with. Carver led them off faster, trying to get ahead of the darkspawn, but having to slow down to kill them quick didn't help — they never actually stopped, but the fighting did slow them down — and Mom was clearly starting to flag a bit, even the assistance of Bethany's magic not enough to keep her going forever at this pace.

After another half mile, they got into another fight, this one with a good twenty darkspawn, spread out enough Marian couldn't just kill them all with a single spell. While Carver held the trail as well as he could, stopping them from passing him and getting to Bethany and Mother, Marian flew up the slope a bit, coming up to a boulder overlooking the trail below. It took a few spells, fire and lightning, but she chipped away at them quickly enough, killing them all before they could overrun Carver.

They were just finishing them off when there was a yell from behind, a hissing flare of fire. Whirling around, Bethany had laid down a wall of flame, blocking off another group of darkspawn coming up from down the slope, two of them caught up in it, flailing and screeching. Marian threw off a bolt of lightning, flew back down to land near Bethany, the world snapping back into clarity just as her spill fizzled out, four steaming darkspawn laid out in the bushes. With a brush of her hand three more were launched off the ground, hit a pair of trees hard enough to smash bones to dust, streams of blood squirting out of their corpses, and even through the trees, the trunks splintering from the force, starting to tip over. Bethany tossed a fireball, immolating the last clump of them. Squinting through the mess, the blood and the smoke and the trees she'd wrecked just now creaking and crashing to the ground, and yeah, that was all of them, good.

Bethany had bent over, her hands on her knees breathing fast and deep, and Mom had actually fallen down, the sudden absence of Bethany's magic supporting her sending her right to the dirt. Marian stepped closer to her sister, opening her mouth to ask, but no, she could feel a crackle of wild magic around her, sharp with fear — she hadn't burned out, but it'd been close, she would need a moment to recover. (She must have thrown that fire before dropping her spell on Mother, very reckless, but she'd probably only had an instant to react, so.) Not that they really had a moment, they should keep moving, but they didn't have a choice in the matter.

"I'm slowing you down." Mother's voice was low and flat and empty-sounding, despite the breathlessness from their run. Marian didn't like it, reminded her too much of her down-swings. (She hated those, she never knew what to do, always felt terribly useless.) "You should— You could make it without me, just..."

"No," Bethany snarled, her voice surprisingly thick for how obviously out of breath she was. "We're not leaving you." This was followed with a glare at Marian, almost challenging.

As though accusing Marian of considering it. Which she wasn't — she shared a quick look with Carver — at least not yet. If it came down to it, if the only options were to leave Mother behind and get the three of them out, or all die together, she would leave her behind. Even if she had to knock Bethany out and carry her over her shoulder. Though, she wouldn't have to — that shared look had been enough for her to know Carver would do it himself, if it came down to it. It might seem heartless, to even think privately that she'd leave her mother behind if she had to...but she was certain Mom would rather spend her last moments praying they might make it than knowing her children would die with her.

Not that she planned on saying any of that aloud. Besides, it wasn't looking that grim yet. "Bethany's right. Take a breather, have a drink, a quick bite if you need it." She was looking at her sister as she said it, trying to make it clear she was speaking to her as much as their mother. "I'm going to hop up there," she said, nodding to the rocky peak of a hill over their heads, "take a look around quick. I'll be back in a minute."

As much as her father might have been less powerful and had less intuitive talent than Marian (according to him, anyway), he had known a lot more varied and intricate magics than she could ever come up with on her own. There were all kinds of things he'd learned at the Circle that had either been esoteric enough they weren't really worth studying for a farmer or required too much finesse for a child to pick up very well, and a few things that required other knowledge Marian simply didn't have. She might be relatively well-educated compared to the average person around — most people she'd spoken to in the Bannir could read, at least, if only barely — but she didn't have anything even comparable to what Father had had after years and years of constant study in the Circle.

One of the spells he had sharpened eyesight, to either look at something nearby in much finer detail or bring something at a distance into clear view. Dad had tried to explain to her how it worked, going off on a ramble about lens curvatures and reflective indexes for some minutes before realizing she didn't understand a single word of what he was talking about. She could use it, probably one of the more intricate, finicky spells she could cast, but he'd had to dumb down the language quite a bit to explain to her how to focus the damn thing.

Sometimes, Father had completely forgotten she didn't know any of the maths and sciences and shit he'd already known learning these kinds of spells. It had been extremely frustrating, and also sometimes made her feel very stupid, it'd been her least favorite part of her lessons with him.

The glow of sunset on the western horizon was dimming, night falling, enough the narrow valleys that made up these hills were rather too dark to make things out easily — but that was fine, she had another spell to help with that too. (And no, she didn't really understand how this one worked either.) Even with the assistance of magic, they were difficult to make out, but she did notice shifting forms in the trees here and there. There were signs of darkspawn to the west, to the north...

Taking a wider look at the features of the land around her, making a guess at where on a map she would be standing right now, Marian bit out a curse. Best she could tell, the darkspawn had already cut them off from looping back up to the Highway around South Bend. They might be spreading across the Kingsroad already. She was guessing here a bit, but she suspected they were cut off from the Highway, they would have to go further south and follow the river for a while — the horde would be slowed once they started getting to more well-defended lands further into the arling, but that wasn't for miles yet.

Or, possibly, turn south toward Gwaren. By an odd trick of geography, the major port cities of Ferelden — Denerim, Highever, Amaranthine, and Gwaren — were all more or less the same distance from Lothering. The travel distance to Amaranthine was longer, since sticking to the Highway you first went past Highever by the North Road or Denerim by the Kingsroad, but they were pretty close to the same picking straight across the Bannorn. Similarly, Gwaren was harder to get to. The Teyrnir was somewhat isolated, huddled against the sea at the southeast corner of the country, hemmed in by the Southron Hills to the west and the Brecilian Forest to the north. There were two ways into and out of the Teyrnir on foot: one following the White River north, through the trees toward Denerim, the other roughly northwest, cutting through the Hills toward South Reach.

If they crossed the river around South Bend, then traversed the wilds of the Southron Hills going east-southeast, they would eventually stumble across the road connecting South Reach and Gwaren. The isolated city did most of its trade by sea, looping north around the Brecilian Wilds to Denerim, or further north into the Marches, Wycome and Ostwick. It shouldn't be difficult to find someone to ferry them to Kirkwall from there. They might have to stop in Denerim or Amaranthine first, find someone else to take them across the Waking Sea, or maybe go up to Ostwick and walk to Kirkwall from there, but it was very doable.

Crossing the wilds to Gwaren was also very doable. On a straight line between Lothering and the Teyrnir, it was pretty much all unclaimed wilderness, but it wasn't a wasteland — there would be plenty of plants and animals for them to live off of, it shouldn't be a problem. The biggest threat would be bears, and maybe Dalish, but it was safe enough. It would be a hard trek for Mother, a week or two hoofing it over the rocky, forested hill country, but...

Yes, Gwaren. They were going to Gwaren.

Her mind made up, she dropped back down to the others, explained to them the change of plans. Mother looked exhausted just at the idea of travelling so far through the wilderness, but she didn't argue — especially not when Bethany backed her up immediately, Carver after another moment of thought. By now, Bethany had recovered from her near burn-out, Mother had caught her breath, so they set off again.

They travelled another half mile, coming across another two groups of darkspawn (both easily dispatched), when it started getting dark enough it was difficult to watch where they were stepping. So, after a moment of concentration, Marian filled the air around them with fadelight, the constant pale green glow illuminating their surroundings well enough nobody was going to turn an ankle, at least. She did find fadelight vaguely creepy — it didn't really seem to come from anywhere, the shadows it threw thin and at random angles, and no natural fire was so consistent, no hint of flicker — but they were still being pursued by darkspawn, they didn't have the option of stopping to rest until the sun rose again. They'd just have to deal with the eerie magic light for now.

They'd just crested another hill, they had to be only a couple miles away from South Bend by now, when Marian made out clanging and shouting from ahead. Someone else was out here, probably on the other side of the bend just there, in their own fight against a group of darkspawn. Marian paused a moment, glanced back at her family, thinking. Normally, there was no way in hell she'd consider travelling with strangers — she and Bethany would be openly using magic, there was no telling whether they'd be able to trust them or not. But the area was still filthy with darkspawn, Bethany had just had to drop her spells on Mother to defend them a second time...and they would probably be people from Lothering. That didn't necessarily mean they wouldn't be stupid about magic, but it it was possible whoever it was actually knew them. They'd hesitate, at least.

Marian glanced at Carver, tilted her head questioningly at the noises ahead. He nodded. "We could probably use the help."

"Right. Come on," she said, waving Bethany and Mother onward, "hurry!"

And it was a good thing they did: the fighters ahead were pinned against the rocky incline and on their last legs even as Marian and Carver rounded the bend. Taking a quick look at the placement of the dozen or so darkspawn, Marian threw herself into the air, arcing over to the other side of the fight. Aiming carefully around the beleaguered men, Marian summoned a thick column of flame, flaring almost painfully bright in the night, throwing dizzying shadows, carving through the pack of darkspawn. That had shaved off about half of them at once, but the rest were in too close, it'd have to be hand to hand from here. Spreading her rain-repelling charm over herself, Carver, and the two fighting men — dammit, only two, she'd hoped for more but oh well — Marian drew her daggers, darted across the charred streak on the ground, the stone hot even through her boots.

Between the four of them, the remaining few darkspawn were cut down quickly and easily. Well, three, one of the men wasn't fighting, leaning against the rock breathless and sweating, but that was fine, the other fought well enough for three or four men all on her own, swiftly and efficiently cutting down three of their attackers in the time it took Marian and Carver to each get one. On her own, because the figure Marian had taken at a distance for a man was close up obviously a woman, with bright orangish-blonde hair tied back in a tight bun (the edges gleaming vaguely blue in the fadelight), a pale, freckled face — surprisingly, because she was wearing heavy mail and scale armor in the red and yellow and white of the King, blazoned on her shield the twin mabari of House Theirin. She must be a knight personally sworn to the King to wear his colors, which was odd because Marian hadn't realized any women—

No, wait, Marian recognized her. They'd never spoken, but this woman had been one of the King's commanders at Ostagar. Right, okay.

With Marian and Carver's arrival, what had been a hopeless last stand quickly turned into a rout, all the darkspawn dead on the ground in seconds. As the last darkspawn fell — at the woman's hand, its axe knocked out of its hand by a slam of her shield, then neatly stabbed through the heart — the woman gave them both a hard look. The glare immediately softened, though, when Bethany and Mother stepped into view, apparently marking them as refugees fleeing for their lives and not worth worrying about.

"Keep back," the man said, a shaky hand appearing on the woman's shoulder. He quickly abandoned his attempt to pull her away, and instead ended up leaning on her, the woman nearly dropping her sword in her scramble to help support his weight. In his other hand was a heavy longsword, but he was clearly too weak to hold it properly, the tip not quite pointed at Marian. "She's an apostate."

Bethany groaned. "Great, in all the wilds we just so happen to run into a Templar? What are the odds on that?"

Pretty much zero, she thought. Marian hadn't even noticed until the man had started waving his pointy metal stick in her face, but yeah, that was the flaming sword of the Order etched into his chestplate. Perfect. "Yeah, sure, I'm an apostate — an apostate who just saved your lives."

"Wesley," the woman muttered, tired, worried.

"The Order dictates..." The Templar, Wesley, was very pale, sweat streaking his face, he could barely seem to catch his breath. He tried to point his sword threateningly at Marian's face, but it wasn't really working, the point wavering around drunkenly. "The Order..."

Choking back a flare of irritation, Marian slapped the flat of the blade with the back of her hand, "Get that thing out of my face." Somewhat to her surprise, the light hit was enough to knock it out of his hand, noisily clanging down to the rocky ground. The Templar must be even weaker than she'd thought. If he couldn't even hold on to his sword, there was no way in hell he'd be any help in a fight.

In fact, eyeing the blood seeping out of the seam in his armor over his hip, spilling down his thigh, Marian suspected he wasn't going anywhere.

"Love, it's alright," the woman said. Her voice jarred against her appearance a little, weirdly light and soft coming from such a large, rough-looking woman. "They saved us. The Maker would understand."

The idea that it was permissible to not kill them on sight just because they'd rescued them was a little absurd — the way Marian understood it, so long as she didn't use her Maker-given gifts to abuse and dominate the people around her, she wasn't doing anything wrong. But people tended to read it as Andraste saying magic is bad, despite that particular passage obviously being about people who misuse magic, and this was deeply-ingrained enough of a concept it usually wasn't worth trying to argue about it.

(According to Father, there were some scholars who believed Andraste herself had been a Dreamer, those most powerful of mages, and there was good reason to suspect. In the Chant, Andraste journeys fully conscious through the Fade (at the Maker's side), as a Dreamer might do — possibly she'd been dreaming in the Fade when she'd attracted the Maker's attention in the first place — and there's, well, something that's supposed to be a quote of the Maker speaking to Andraste, goes like this: Those who oppose you shall know the wrath of heaven, field and forest shall burn, the seas shall rise and devour them, the wind shall tear their nations from the face of the earth, lightning shall rain down from the sky — you know, poetical ways to refer to a powerful Dreamer with an army at her back seriously kicking Tevinter ass. Marian couldn't say for certain one way or the other, of course, but it didn't seem like an irrational thing to think to her.)

Not that she would have gotten the chance to argue about it even if she'd wanted to. After a brief hesitation, the Templar nodded at the knight's reassurance...and then his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed, nearly taking the woman with him.

Yeah. Marian didn't think the Templar was going anywhere.

They were apparently taking another rest, Mother sitting on a nearby cleft in the hill, Bethany's magic on her lifted, Carver chugging from one of his skins, digging in Bethany's pack for...oh, more biscuits, looked like. Catching the one Carver tossed at her, Marian crouched down next to the woman. She'd unbuckled a few things, exposing bandages wrapped low over the Templar's hip, soaked through with blood.

"That doesn't look good," Marian observed, took a bite of her biscuit. The woman grunted, didn't look up. "Marian Hawke. That's my brother Carver, my sister Bethany, and our mother Leandra."

The woman glanced up at her, just for an instant before turning back to the Templar, carefully peeling at his bandages. "Aveline Vallen. This is my husband, Wesley."

Marian bit her lip — Templars were sworn Brothers, like Chantry Mothers, they weren't allowed to marry. But okay.

"Wait, Aveline like Aveline of the Dales? The knight in the story." It wasn't a story Marian recognized, Bethany must have heard it from that new(ish) Sister at the Chantry, the Orlesian one. Leliana? She thought it was Leliana, they'd never really met but Bethany mentioned her often enough.

Aveline nodded, perhaps about to say something, but was distracted before she could. She had a bottle pulled from a pack, presumably a healing tincture of some kind, intending to treat her husband's wound. But as soon as his bandages were pulled away the hole in his side gushed, Aveline flipped the bandage back over, leaned down with both hands. The Templar groaned with pain, his head rolling against the ground.

"Uh, Marian? More of 'em over here!"

There were more darkspawn, coming around at them from the northwest, but they were easily dealt with, a couple spells from Marian killing them all while Carver slew the few that slipped past. A few seconds glancing around to make sure they were alone again, Marian returned to the couple, crouching down across the Templar from Aveline.

For all the tension in her, visible mostly by the taught lines showing in her neck, Aveline's face was remarkably expressionless. It was in the eyes, mostly — a vibrant green in the fadelight, darting over her husband, their surroundings, as though looking for some solution, anything — in her gloved hands — pressed tight against his side, unmovingly, as though she meant to hold his blood inside his body somehow.

"Neither of us know healing magic," Marian muttered. "Not for something like this. I'm sorry."

Forced out in a low hiss, "I'm not leaving him."

...Should they just leave? Aveline was clearly a damn good fighter, sure, but that wouldn't do them any good if she refused to abandon her dying husband even with darkspawn closing in. No obvious solution presented itself to Marian — she'd shattered Father's urn to help get Mother moving, but she somehow doubted Aveline would be willing to travel and fight with them if Marian killed her husband in front of her.

"Aveline." The Templars hand was coming up, unsteady and wavering, Aveline shifted the placement of her hands over the hole in his side so she could remove one of them, clasp his. "You...have to let—"

"You can't ask this of me!" The woman's voice had gone harsher, warmer with anger, but with a cracking edge to it, her eyes narrowing and her lips twisting. "Wesley, I won't..."

Oh, they would. Wesley was going to ask Aveline to put him out of his misery, to leave him behind, and Aveline was going to do it. Marian could see it, in the agony in his face, the hint of desperation, how tightly she gripped his hand, her jaw set, teeth grit so hard Marian thought she might hear it. She didn't need to wait and watch to know what was about to happen.

So she didn't. Marian stood, joined the twins around Mother, giving the couple a moment of privacy.

"How are you doing, Mom?"

"I'm okay," she lied. Mom's face was streaked with sweat, her hair, going gray at the temples, wet enough it was slightly shiny in the fadelight, plastered to her head. The fingers holding her biscuit (which she'd hardly taken a bite out of) were even shaking a little. But she didn't seem particularly focused on how difficult she was clearly finding their trek through the woods, her eyes drawn to Aveline and the Templar. She seemed slightly absent, looking at them but not really seeing

Marian assumed she was thinking about something to do with Father, but she really couldn't guess what.

"Are we almost to the river?" Bethany asked.

"It's another couple miles to South Bend, I think. After that, we'll be able to slow down some." It was common knowledge, wisdom passed down over generations, that darkspawn couldn't swim, but also that they preferred not to pass through water at all, if they could help it. That could be part of why the darkspawn had gone straight for Lothering, to use the bridge over the River Drakon there. At South Bend, the Drakon was shallower than in most spots along its length, enough one could simply walk across it, but was also spread much wider. The darkspawn wouldn't need to swim, but Marian was betting they wouldn't cross it anyway.

A sound slithered across the air, the wet shrunk of a blade sinking into flesh, the thin gasping and coughing of a dying man. It didn't last long, though, only a couple seconds — at a guess, Aveline had neatly pierced her husband's heart, killing him almost instantly. A bare moment later, Aveline was joining them. Her round-cheeked face was taught with stress, the glow of the fadelight revealing red in her eyes, a tear at one corner she'd missed while wiping the rest away. Really, she was bearing what she'd just been forced to do remarkably calmly.

Marian made a mental note to try not to annoy her. Scary lady, this one.

A quaver of grief on her voice — but, again, with impressive control — Aveline asked, "I suppose you intended to invite us to travel with you."

"That was the idea," Carver said, not unsympathetic, but gruff and casual. Making a point about not making a point about the Templar's death, she guessed. "Security in numbers, and all that."

"All right. Where are you headed?"

"Kirkwall, by way of Gwaren."

The knight blinked at Marian for a second, then nodded. "I can travel with you as far as Gwaren, at least. From there...we'll see." She probably didn't want to leave Ferelden — if she'd been personally sworn to the King, her duty had ended with his death, but she might feel some obligation to Anora up until the Landsmeet.

"Good. If you can—" Marian cut herself off as a long, deep growl split the night, echoed by dozens of higher screeches. That low one could be an ogre...or a bear had gotten into a fight with some darkspawn, that was also possible. Either way, the noises were coming from some distance off, not their problem just now. "If you could stay with Bethany and Mother, watch our backs while Carver and I take the front. Bethany is a mage, but she'll be busy helping Mom keep up, and she's not really much of a fighter anyway."

Aveline's eyes widened a bit, giving Bethany a speculative glance — she'd seen Marian cast magic, but she probably hadn't realized Bethany was a mage too. But after a second she nodded. "All right. I had little idea where we were going anyway," she admitted. "I'm not from around here."

"Somewhere around Highever?"

"Well, yes," the knight said, clearly surprised. "West Hill, it's not far from Highever. How did you know?"

Marian shrugged. "Accent." The Alamarri spoken along the northern shore sounded more Marcher-ish, and Aveline was definitely an Orlesian name — her parents must have either lingered in the country after the Rebellion or moved here for some reason, either possibility suggested somewhere toward the west of the country. So, Highever. "Anyway, let's get going. We're almost out of the woods now. Metaphorically, of course, not literally."

Carver rolled his eyes at her weak, terrible joke. He tossed a biscuit at Aveline, who was surprised enough she barely managed to catch it, before starting off toward the southeast at a jog.

Their short break was long enough for Mom to regain some of their strength, they made pretty good time over the next mile or so. She was even in good enough shape to talk to Aveline a bit between darkspawn attacks — and they did run into a few more of those, no more than a dozen at a time. (Aveline did more than well enough keeping them away from Mother and Bethany, enough the attacks hardly slowed them down.) Marian wasn't certain what they were talking about, the noises of Carver and herself clanging along, their breath hard in their throats, was enough to cover up the muttering from behind them, only the occasional word getting through.

She probably should tell Mom to save her breath — this was hard enough on her as it was, and the more she wore herself out the harder it would be for Bethany to keep her going — but she didn't bother. Mom was actually talking, she'd been all quiet and solemn and miserable since leaving home. Reminded Marian far too much of those awful melancholic moods of hers. If talking to Aveline was helping pull her out before she sank too far into it, well, Marian was glad for it.

Besides, they couldn't be that far from South Reach now. It was full dark now, the stars glittering overhead, they had to have gone, what, five or six miles at least. They couldn't be more than a mile, a mile and a half away from the river. They just had to keep going, and they would—

"Shit!" Carver yelled as they rounded the curve around another hill, his boots skidding on the rocky soil. On the opposite side of the hill, to the north, was a column of darkspawn, dozens, more than dozens, a hundred. Charging in their direction.

Standing a couple rows in, sickly glistening beads accenting its somewhat more carefully-crafted armor, was something Marian recognized from her short stay in the Korcari Wilds, something she hoped to never see again: a darkspawn mage.

Thankfully, Marian only spotted one of them. Pointing, Marian shouted, "South, go!" Drawing one of her daggers, she threw herself into the air. As close as the darkspawn were, only thirty feet or so back, she traversed the space between them in a blink. Zeroing in on what she hoped was the mage, details were so blurred she couldn't be certain, she arced over the heads of the front ranks, then slammed back down, landing not on the ground but directly on the mage (it was the mage, good), the force of her impact driving the silverite blade right through the scale armor covering the mage's chest, through its sternum and its heart to clunk into its spine.

The darkspawn she was perched on toppling over, Marian dropped the various spells she was holding, the green glow of fadelight blinking out, and called fire to her hand. She cast a circle of flame over her head, poured power into it, the burning ring expanding in a blink, the darkspawn around her screamed as the magic seared into them. And then she pushed more power into it, her eyes itching and her throat tingling, the flames burning higher and hotter, rushing out from her like ripples cast across water.

Wrenching her dagger from the mage's chest, Marian took a second to catch her breath — hot and dry from the fire around her, tainted with the sick reek of burning darkspawn flesh, too familiar already — to let the strength she'd expended trickle back into her from the Fade. Once the tingles and the light-headedness had passed a bit, she shouldn't be in danger of burning out anymore, Marian took flight again.

Her family (plus Aveline) hadn't managed to get very far. That was possibly Marian's fault — to pull off a trick like that, she'd need to drop the fadelight and her magic lightning the weight of their packs, that didn't make rushing along easier. But, thankfully, Marian had incinerated the first few ranks of darkspawn, that overpowered fire spell she'd improvised probably taking out a couple dozen of them at once, and the rest of the darkspawn had slowed in their advance, reeling in animal confusion. For a second, Marian wondered if they were repulsed by the few lingering wisps of fire, but the Grey Wardens knew certain more powerful darkspawn had some degree of control over portions of the horde. Killing their leader must have dazed them for a moment.

But only for a moment — they recovered quickly, thundering after them in a black tide, screeching, inhuman howls splitting the night. By then, Marian had already reupped her spells, their group had returned to their previous speed — a bit faster now, with the encouragement of the approaching horde — her crazy gamble had opened up several yards between them. Carver in the lead, forging through the wilds toward the river more south than southeast now, Marian stayed at the rear, mostly scrabbling backwards, throwing fire and lightning back at their pursuers.

She was killing so many of them, oily smoke gradually filling the air in that direction, but there was only so much she could do and keep her other spells up at the same time, she was already pushing on the edge of burn-out, warmth building in her chest and her heart thudding in her ears, odd metallic tingles stretching from the tip of her tongue down her throat and up the back of her nose, dizzy enough she stumbled now and again, nearly falling down on her ass. And there were more of them, and more, and more, and more. How many of the fucking things were there?

She couldn't keep this up for much longer. They had to be near the river by now, right?

Hearing shouts from ahead, Marian whirled around. Another group of darkspawn was ahead, only seconds away from Carver, she couldn't see the whole group from here but too many for her brother to kill on his own. And, stretching above the pack, was that—

Yes, that was definitely an ogre. Marian had seen them before, helped kill a few at Ostagar, contributing to massed spellfire from a safe distance. She'd never been this close to one before. The thing was huge, easily ten, twelve feet tall, its hard, muscular limbs as thick as tree trunks, the torso a thick mass of rippling flesh, you weren't hitting anything important in there with anything short of a hard steel spear or a brilliant shot with a ballista. Its face was unnaturally skeletal, the skin stretched thin enough it was noticeably paler than the blue-ish gray tone elsewhere on its body, twisting, kinking, asymmetrical horns stretching from the back of its head, like some horrible fusion of a giant and a ram.

It bellowed, low and harsh and teeth-grating, temporarily overpowering the howling of the rest of the darkspawn. Right, that had been an ogre she'd heard before, not a bear. Good to know.

(Not really, it was pointless to know, they were all going to die.)

They couldn't stay here, far too many darkspawn to fight off quickly both ahead and behind, they could go downhill to her right, into the trees, but no, the brush would break line of sight and made it impossible to hold any kind of line, the darkspawn would just surround them and pick them off one by one, which left—

"Climb!" she shouted, pointing up the steep, jagged edifice to her left. "Up, go!" It wasn't ideal, but darkspawn were relatively clumsy, would come up slowly enough they wouldn't be overwhelmed so easily, and at the top they'd have the advantage of being able to see in every direction, Marian and Bethany could throw magic at anyone getting too high. The others hesitated, staring at the steep hill face, "Go!"

They started climbing, but Marian didn't follow immediately. Instead, she threw herself through the air toward the ogre. It had started lumbering toward Carver — crushing another darkspawn underfoot, because darkspawn were shockingly terrible at not killing each other by accident — its motion slowed and its features blurred as the magic took her over. The only weapons she had on her were her borrowed Warden-crafted daggers, which were excellent for dealing with smaller darkspawn, but simply weren't long enough to cut all the way through to an ogre's heart. So she aimed higher than she had with the mage before.

Which meant she was flying right at jagged, taint-speckled fangs and the thing's huge damn horns, but she tried not to think about that.

Even in the blink it took Marian to reach it, its head lowered a bit, lumbering forward and reaching for Carver with clawed hands, throwing off her aim, Marian cut off the spell in mid air. She reached for one of the horns, looping her elbow around it, her upper body coming to a halt with a tendon-tearing jerk, she funnelled magic into herself almost instinctively to take the edge off, her feet continuing on past her, swinging up over her head. A careful flick of force pushed "up" at the ogre "above" her, a little help from the Dalish speed- and balance-improving magic Lýna had helped talk her through, and Marian's feet landed on the ogre's shoulders, her hips slamming into the back of its head, squished between the base of its horns, her hand slapping down on the top of its head stopping her from flipping right over.

The ogre had staggered back at the weight dragging at one of its horns, abandoning its attack on Carver, reaching for her instead, but its sharp, jagged fingers never reached her — leaning forward over its face, Marian lifted her dagger with both hands, and jabbed it into the ogre's eye. It screamed, her ears ached, lurching under her, but that hadn't killed it, her dagger was too short to pierce its brain, but she'd expected as much, an instant later she channeled lightning through the silverite blade, directly into the inside of the ogre's skull.

Putrid steam pouring out of ears and nose and eyes, the ogre went silent immediately, started teetering over.

Marian threw herself into the air again, using the motion to pull her dagger out of its ruined eye socket, flying straight to the top of the hill her family were still climbing. A quick fire spell incinerated the gore sticking to her dagger — because that was disgusting — she took a quick glance over the top of the hill. Wind and rain had worn the tip of the stone down to something mostly flat, not a lot of space but it would be enough room for the four– five of them to move around a bit. Though, small was also good, less circumference for Marian and Bethany to watch. Right. Okay.

(She tried not to think to herself that it looked like a good place to make a dramatic last stand, like something out of those stories about knights and old heroes Carver liked so much, it wasn't a last stand, they were going to live, she refused to seriously consider the possibility they wouldn't.)

Oh, Maker's breath, that was the river right there! They couldn't be more than a half mile away! Son of a bitch...

Carver made it to the top of the hill first, quickly followed by Bethany and Mother, Aveline just behind them. They all took off their packs, piling them toward the middle, where Mom stood anxiously flanked by Carver and Aveline, waiting with swords drawn. With a bit of fiddling, Marian modified her fadelight spell, forming it into a ring, shining on the sides of the hill, none of it hidden in shadow.

She could see now the group they'd run into was somewhat smaller than the one that'd been chasing them. But they were enough. The smaller group to the south spreading across the base of the hill on that side, the larger on the north side, meeting both east and west somewhere in the middle, they were completely surrounded. And there were more darkspawn, a trickle coming in through the trees, along the narrow trails in all directions. Darkspawn received orders of a sort through the magic of the taint, Duncan had said, from the archdemon or the more powerful darkspawn. Apparently, somebody up the chain had decided to put a coordinated effort into killing the people responsible for wiping out so many of the darkspawn in this portion of the wilds.

It was almost something worth bragging about, she thought, that the archdemon itself considered her (and her family and Aveline) enough of a threat to eliminate specifically...if it didn't look like the evil thing might very well succeed.

Between herself and Bethany, it wasn't too difficult to keep the darkspawn from climbing up the rocky hill — a bit of fire here or there, the burning figures would tumble down the side, hitching against the legs of the horde surrounding them. Marian kept the heat of the flames lower than she might normally, partially to save her strength, and also because (mostly) whole bodies provided a much better obstruction than incinerated ones. Torch a few darkspawn, and they fell flailing, in their death throes knocking over a few more, if she was very lucky even setting a few of them alight from contact, the slowly rising ring of bodies forming a barrier the approaching darkspawn had to pick their way over to even get to the hill, slowing them down a little.

Which was good, because keeping this going wasn't exactly easy. Between her fadelight spell, forcing enough strength into her limbs to keep moving, and the almost constant flinging of fire, run over here, toss some more, and here and here and here, around and around, despite the simplicity of the magic involved it was still pushing her spell-casting abilities to the limit. And then throw in the arrows... There weren't very many, probably because the darkspawn didn't have a great angle to hit them at — they didn't have direct line of sight on Carver and Mother and Aveline, that wasn't exactly an easy shot to make — and there seemed to be few archers among the horde here, so they didn't have to deal with a constant rain of arrows. (Mom was still huddled down among the packs, just in case.) But a few would find their way toward Marian or Bethany now and again, they'd have to slap them out of the air, and that was another bit of magic expended, and...

Marian paused for a moment — bent double with her hands on her knees, breathing heavy — because she had to, if she burned out now they would all die, and she could feel herself teetering on the edge, the river of power flowing into her from the Fade churning and flickering. And she heard a clang of steel on steel, whirled around in time to catch Aveline slice a hurlock open shoulder to hip, give the thing a solid kick, knocking it back into a second darkspawn crawling over the edge, both of them toppling off, and Bethany was there — her hair shaken out of her braid, messy and tangled, her face streaked with ash and sweat — a flash of fire following the two down, presumably torching several more Marian couldn't see from this angle.

She had to keep moving. Drawing a shaky breath, she forced herself to walk, toward the opposite side of the hill from Bethany, aching muscles shivering with every step, fire reluctantly sparking to life in her hand.

She didn't know how long they'd fought at the top of the hill, shuffling around in circles, throwing fire at anything that moved, Marian and Bethany both slowing enough darkspawn were starting to slip through, though in a thin enough trickle Aveline and Carver could handle them, but it would get worse, she could barely see straight anymore, her skull seeming to vibrate with her magic's exhausted protest, the thread connecting her to the Fade strained, fraying, nearly torn, trying not to cough from the vile smoke rising off burning darkspawn, it could have been hours, or minutes for all she could tell, the whole thing one long blur, a nightmare of flames and screams and shifting shadows under the eerie green glow of fadelight...

She was finally pulled out of her single-minded struggle by a voice splitting the air. Not a human one, far too loud, harsh and high, a screech that seemed to stab into her ears, lower tones beneath it, the stone underfoot seeming to vibrate. Marian blinked to herself for a moment, shocked out of motion, but no, she had to keep moving, they would die if she stopped.

"Is that another ogre?" Carver shouted over the noise of the battle. But no, that wasn't an ogre, their voices were much lower than that.

"No." Aveline had gone still and... It was hard to tell, in the fadelight, but she looked pale under the flush from exertion, staring toward the southwest her eyes wide with something not too far removed from terror. "No, I think that's a—"

There was a deep whoomf sort of noise, the air around them seeming to shudder once, hard, Marian's head ringing from the pressure, she teetered dizzily. And then another whoomf, nearly taking her to her knees, and then another, this time accompanied by a repeat of the stone-shivering, ear-stabbing cry, high and low and too loud, monstrous.

Marian had never seen one before, not even from a distance, but she still knew what that must be, approaching from the southwest.

Dragon.

The strength went out of her legs, her knees slammed into the stone, the fadelight flickering out, the only light the stars above and the smoldering fires below.

Marian couldn't fight a dragon. On any other day, when she was fresh, maybe, but now? teetering on the edge of burn-out, half-dead on her feet, surrounded by darkspawn she was already just barely keeping back? No, she couldn't fight a dragon, not like this. Especially not if it was the cursed archdemon, swooping down to finish them off itself — and what else could it be, a dragon coming toward them now? — no, she couldn't fight that.

They were going to die. She couldn't even fly out with the twins, not now, not with a dragon tailing them. They were dead.

She'd failed.

Before she could barely even articulate the thought to herself, the dragon was looming out of the darkness. An absolutely massive creature, too big, she reeled instinctively, it was as large as their whole damn house and then some. And it was beautiful, in its way. Scaly skin glinting a reddish violet in the firelight, and despite its size it had a grace to it, its narrow body (relatively speaking, the thing was huge) twisting sinuously as it wheeled to a better angle to sweep past their little hill, almost seeming to dance on the air, despite the violence of its wing-strokes, sharp shadows thrown by even, symmetrical, smooth-lined teeth as light spilled from its mouth, and Marian couldn't look away, tears pricking at her eyes, as fire surged into life from between the dragon's gaping jaws, slicing across the air, a cloud of flame stretching down to the earth, and...

It missed.

The fire struck the earth like a physical weight, the stone under her seeming to jerk with the impact, and the noise was incredible, darkspawn screeching and fire roaring and rock splitting from force and heat...to Marian's right, a wave of flame washing over the ground at the base of the north face of their hill. The heat did tear at them, yes, more intense than the hottest summer day, sand picked up by the scorching wind stinging at her skin, but...

What?

The dragon banked to the south, keeping up a constant stream of deadly fire, the volume of it incredible, far more than Marian could ever hope to cast, covering the ground to the east. Its body tilted up, backflapping hard, its tail a dark shadow whipping through flames reaching for the stars, it turned to face west, impossibly light on the air, some instinctive part of Marian declared it simply impossible, this thing could not be real, and it was spewing out another burning river, this time covering the south face of their hill — Carver was standing too close to the edge, cursed at the hot air slamming against him and yanking his hair around, stumbling backward and fell on his ass — the dragon tipped forward (again, it shouldn't be able to do that, it had to be magic), curving around the south side of their hill to the west, covering the ground in a thick blanket of heat and light the whole way.

No, seriously, what?

Turning back around, the dragon dipped closer to the ground, there was a cacophony of crashing and cracking, one clawed paw dragging through the trees, shattering everything in its path. And then the dragon was wheeling right toward them, slowing with a couple hard backflaps, the air shuddering, this was it, it was finishing them off now, Maker, this thing was big, it reared back, its serpentine spine curving, its rear claws gripping the edge of the hill, and yellow-orange light spilled out of its skin, too bright, like the sun suddenly appearing in the middle of the night, Marian winced and had to look away, and there was a roar of wind, flipping her hair over her head, and...

The dragon was gone. In its place, a harsh silhouette against the flames still stretching high behind her, was a woman, the head of a genlock gripped in her hand. The woman lifted it up to look at it face-to-face — she had to be strengthening herself with magic, but even then Marian doubted she could pull that off herself, genlocks were fucking heavy — and she spoke to it. It wasn't Alamarri, Marian didn't know what it was, harsh and sibilant and cruel, and there was magic on her voice, something clawing at her throat, stinging at her eyes, a threat beating her over her head, she couldn't help but cringe away.

Was this woman...speaking through a genlock...to threaten the archdemon? Marian couldn't imagine what else was supposed to be going on here, but, Maker, how was that even a thing...

Her message delivered, the woman dropped the genlock over the edge, into the fires waiting below. And it was then Marian recognized her, finally. Long hair, a solid silver-gray from age, matching the thick wrinkles stitched over her face, her hands, wearing a long dress in a Chasind style, littered with beads and feathers, glinting in the firelight and fluttering in the breeze. Her eyes, almost seeming to glow in the night, a pure brilliant inhuman yellow.

It was that witch. The one Marian had met in the Wilds...she hadn't caught her name, Morrigan's mother. She-of-Many-Faces, Lýna had called her.

The one that was almost certainly a Dreamer, perhaps an abomination, and, Alim speculated, maybe possibly the actual legendary Flemeth.

She'd just appeared, out of nowhere, in the form of a huge fuck-all dragon, and saved their lives.

...What?!

Marian felt a gauntleted hand on her arm, looked up expecting to see Carver. It was actually Aveline, her eyes, green even without the fadelight reflecting off them, fixed on the impossibly powerful Chasind witch, sword held ready in her hand. "Are you with me, Hawke?"

For a second, she just blinked stupidly up at the knight — nobody called her that, the only person she'd ever be called just "Hawke" was Father. "Oh, uh, I'm—" Marian cleared her throat, wiped at her face quick, the silverite backing her glove scraping at her cheek. "Yeah, I'm not hurt, just tired." A glance over her shoulder, and Mother was fine, Bethany wrapped up in her arms. It looked like Bethany had burned out, or at least gotten very close to the line, pale and sweaty and delirious, but she was still breathing, she'd be fine. Carver was uninjured too, standing between their sister and mother and the Chasind witch, his sword and shield raised and ready — though, Marian noticed, the tip was wavering a little, Carver exhausted enough he probably didn't have much fight left in him. But he was fine, they were all fine.

Huh. With how many darkspawn they'd fought their way through, that they were all alive and uninjured had to be some kind of miracle. And here Marian wasn't even certain whether she believed the Maker truly existed or not — Bethany and Mom were the religious ones, she and Carver had always been more agnostic. She almost felt like thanking someone, but she didn't know whether anyone was even listening, which...was kind of awkward...

Well, how about thanking the creepy shapeshifting mage, that seemed like a good start.

While Marian pulled herself to her feet — with rather more help from Aveline than she liked, her knees shivering so badly she could barely stand, her back flaring with agony — the old witch spoke, her voice low and smooth, cracking only a little with age. Quiet enough Marian was surprised she could hear it over the continued crackling of the flame. "Well, well, what have we here?"

The witch sauntered across the few steps separating her from Marian and Aveline, with all the swaying grace of a lady at court despite being, well, a barbarian Chasind wilder. Aveline's weight shifted, easy for Marian to feel it hanging on to her arm, the better to put herself and her sword between Marian and the witch. Marian tightened her grip around her arm, when Aveline glanced down gave her a hard look, glanced at the naked blade, shook her head. A very skeptical look on her face, Aveline sheathed her sword anyway — probably hadn't been enthusiastic about fighting a mage who can turn into a fucking dragon to begin with, hadn't taken much convincing. Marian turned to gave Carver the same look, but he didn't move right away, doubtful eyes flicking between Marian and the witch.

"I hear of a great battle," the witch continued, her voice with that eerie absent tone again, "a band of heroes fleeing the Blight, entrapped in a desperate last stand against the rising tide. I come, and I find...you." She stared at Marian, but not really at her, instead through and past her, looking into something here and not-here.

For a long moment, nobody spoke, the air filled with the roaring and snapping and crackling of the fires all around them. Marian's mouth opened, and before she could really think about it, "You know, hero, I don't think anybody's ever called me that before," spilled out. Oh, that was stupid...

The old woman's lips twitched with half a smirk. "They will."

...Marian had no idea how to respond to that. So she didn't. "Thank you, for coming. If you hadn't we would have..." She trailed off, not quite willing to voice the thought in earshot of her family, weirdly embarrassed.

"You would be dead now, yes. And that is..." The woman's head tilted, eyes narrowing slightly, Marian felt herself stiffen at her attention, like fingers brushing the back of her neck. "...undesirable. Your road was supposed to lead you north, child."

Okay, why was Marian dying undesirable, exactly? She meant, obviously Marian would rather not die, but she wasn't certain she liked the implication that the old witch had some kind of interest in her life one way or the other.

Before she could figure out what the hell to say now, Carver was appearing at her other side — his sword, thankfully, sheathed. "We are headed north. To Kirkwall."

"Kirkwall, hmm? Yes..." She trailed off, staring at Carver now — he tensed, his hand twitching, as though resisting the urge to go for his weapon. "What a twisting, jagged path fate has laid out before you. Even standing in the shade of the tallest tree, little boy, the smallest ant casts a shadow all its own. It would do you well to pay more mind to the path ahead of you than the footprints left behind. Not that I imagine you'll listen, no, not until it's far too late..."

By the lopsided frown on his face, Carver seemed to have no more idea what to make of the witch's cryptic ramblings than any of them had meeting her in the Wilds. Marian, having already been exposed to it once, recovered first, moved on before Carver could find his voice again. (She would have to explain that later, she could feel the other's curiosity on the air, that she wasn't acting as surprised as she should.) "I don't suppose you could lend a hand, burn all the darkspawn between here and Gwaren."

"Why would I do that?"

...Good question. "Could you teach me how to turn into a dragon, then? Because that just looks damn useful."

The woman smiled, slowly, her lips gradually stretching, too-yellow eyes sparkling in the finally fading firelight. "I could, perhaps, if it is something you truly desire. Though you may find the first step too high a barrier."

"Um...what's the first step?"

"First," she said, softly, barely above a whisper, "you must die."

"...Oh." Of course, she was talking to a cursed-in-the-sight-of-the-Maker abomination, she'd nearly forgotten. "Right, I'm good, then. I'll figure something out myself, I guess."

The witch chuckled, deep and rumbling — less like the voice of a little old woman, Marian thought, and more that of a dragon. "Yes, you do manage that, don't you." Her voice going absent again, her eyes out of focus, "Cast into chaos you fight...and all the world shall tremble before you."

Those who oppose you shall know the wrath of heaven.

Marian swallowed. "Uh..."

"We are both in luck, I think," the witch said, smiling all nice, abruptly returned to the here and now. "I may just help you yet."

Oh, um. "Well, that would be great. Anything you can do to get us past the darkspawn..."

"And we're just supposed to trust you?" Leaning in to Marian, Carver hissed, "We don't even know what she is!"

"I know what she is," Aveline said, her voice sharp despite the unease on her face. "The Witch of the Wilds."

The woman's smile widened. "Some call me that. Also Flemeth. The Harbinger of Vengeance. She-of-Many-Faces. The All-Mother. That mad old hag who talks too much." Her eyes flicked to Marian, her lips twitching. "A huge, fuck-all dragon."

"Ah...did I say that out loud?"

Chuckling, the witch admitted, "No."

...Okay. Because that wasn't creepy at all.

"In exchange for my assistance sending you on your way, I would require a...small favor."

Carver twitched, suspicious, but Marian cut him off with a hand on his elbow. "And what small favor is this, exactly?"

"Nothing you would find too onerous. It is a delivery, you might say." The woman — who apparently was really Flemeth, the witch in the old stories, she'd just given the name herself (which meant she was, what, six hundred years old, at leat?) — raised her hands, pulled her hair aside, reached for the back of her neck. After a moment of fiddling, she pulled a necklace out from under her dress, silver glinting in the starlight, the dim glow of fires below. Pooling the chain up in her hand, she held it out toward Marian.

The metal was warm against her skin, more than she'd expected, almost hot to the touch. It was obviously enchanted, magic tickling at her. The pendant was vaguely triangular, several bands curving in what looked sort of like claws, or fangs, it was hard to tell, at the center a tiny little crystal container holding...well, Marian wasn't certain what that was. Swirling green light, like the Fade, though dusted with sparks blue and silver and red and violet, shifting around in their tiny space as though caught in a slow dance. It was pretty, if very weird. "What is it?"

A sharp note of impatience slipping into her voice, Flemeth (it felt so strange using that name for her) said, "A complicated bit of old magic I haven't the patience to attempt to explain to an untrained child. Suffice to say, it is a device of incredible value, but one that is absolutely harmless. Your family will be in no special danger travelling in its vicinity."

That was really all Marian needed to know about it, honestly. Of course, Flemeth was probably only saying it because she realized that was all she really needed to know, which was sort of creepy, but Marian was trying to just run with it. "Okay. Good to know." Marian managed to get the necklace clasped around her own neck, might have fallen over without Aveline's hand on her shoulder. It took a bit of fiddling around — the armor she'd sort of permanently borrowed from the Wardens had been fitted to her as much as was possible for something that hadn't been shaped with her in mind, there wasn't a whole lot of room — but she shoved the pendant under her collar, the warm, tingling metal coming to rest over her heart. "Where am I delivering this to, exactly?"

Flemeth was smiling again, the expression slightly crooked — the kind of tolerant smile adults gave silly children when they did adorable, childish things. "Not so far from Kirkwall, there is a mountain. Sundermount, the locals call it. The area is abandoned — it is an old place, and a scarred place, the site of battles long forgotten, the land still littered with the bones and the spirits of the fallen."

"Sounds pleasant."

The witch's lips twitched. "So long as you carry that pendant, they will not trouble you. Some time after your arrival in Kirkwall, you will hear of a Dalish clan lingering near the foot of the mountain. You will approach their Keeper, and show her the pendant. She will know what to do. Follow her directions from there, and your debt will be paid."

"Right." That didn't sound...too bad. Spirits and shit walking around in the real world was always a scary idea, but if the pendant would protect her, fine. (Flemeth wouldn't lie about that, right, she wanted Marian to do something with it, she had to be able to get there.) Approaching the Dalish might be iffy. She'd learned from Lýna that Dalish weren't really so hostile as a lot of people made them out to be, but they could still be... Well, Lýna was a scary girl, very intense, Marian didn't think she liked the idea of being surrounded by a whole clan of them. Especially after what little Lýna had said about their mages, they sounded...well, scary, they sounded scary. But it was fine, they probably wouldn't just out and kill her for no reason. Probably.

She was definitely going alone, though. It sounded like it would probably be fine. Certainly no more dangerous than Ostagar, or their flight through the hills just now. But she still wasn't going to drag the twins into that. She was the one making the deal with the creepy old witch, she would fulfill the terms, alone. If it did go badly, and she got hurt — by demons, by undead, by Dalish, whatever — at least her family would be safe in Kirkwall.

"Okay. You've got yourself a deal, Witch of the Wilds," Marian said, holding out her hand. Flemeth took a couple steps closer, clasping her arm — her skin was cold, that was unsettling. "Get us to Gwaren, and I'll make your delivery."

"Marian—"

"It's fine, Carver. I know what I'm doing." Well, no, she didn't really know what she was doing, but that wasn't exactly an unfamiliar feeling was it? She'd figure it out. She always did.

The ancient witch chuckled, seemingly delighted, inhuman yellow eyes glinting in the night.

---

By the way, there is some road renaming going on here. There are three main sections of the Imperial Highway (built ages ago by old Tevinter), that run through Ferelden — starting where they meet in the northwest corner of the country (near the border with Orlais), one turns south around the west side of Lake Calenhad, east through Redcliffe and Lothering, marking the southern border of the Bannorn, turning northeast through South Reach and ending at Denerim; a second loops around the northern tip of the Lake then runs east, marking the northern border of the Bannorn and coming close to (but not actually passing through) Highever and Amaranthine, and meets the first road again at Denerim. The first is called the Kingsroad, the second is called the Pilgrim's Path.

(The name refers to a time where people making a pilgrimage to Andraste's birthplace would, starting from Cumberland in Nevarra, follow the highway through Orlais to the southwest, looping around Lake Celestine to turn east, continuing through what had been an independent elven country at the time but is southern Orlais now, crossing the Frostbacks and then Alamarri/Chasind lands all the way to Denerim; other sections of the Highway go by other names now, but the length all the way from about Val Firmin to Denerim usually references this pilgrimage.)

There is a third section of Highway, splitting from the Pilgrim's Path at the northern tip of Lake Calenhad, running along its eastern shore, through Lothering and all the way south to Ostagar. This segment is usually called the North Road — it's not in the north, but people in the western Bannorn and the Lothering area primarily use it to get to Highever, so it's the road to go north.

[Those who oppose you...] — Andraste 7:19

---

Don't think I'm entirely happy with this, but hey, it works. Woo.

Yes, both Bethany and Carver survive. I think it's slightly ridiculous to introduce a character only to immediately kill them off before the audience can even get to know them at all, just for drama points. (Or, for balance and party management reasons, given this is a video game, but you know what I mean.) Personally, I think DA2 could have greatly benefited from a storytelling perspective by having Bethany and Carver's character arcs going on in parallel. So that's what I'm doing.

And Flemeth isn't exaggerating about Carver having a "twisted, jagged path" ahead of him. That poor boy... xD

The next chapter is nowhere near finished, and I really should try to write some for the collab fic at least, so no idea when it'll be coming. But that's life for you.

—Lysandra