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.)

24. Brotherhood of the Grey — I

9:30 Nubulis 27

Redcliffe, Chasingard, Kingdom of Ferelden

---

"Did you have any thoughts on what you wanted?"

Lýna just blinked at Lèlja, the unexpected question throwing her off for a second. "Qu'est-ce que c'est?" She was only mostly sure she'd said that right, it still wasn't clear when she needed that last c'est...sort of like it in questions in Alamarri, actually...

"What you wanted for clothing, I mean," Lèlja said, one corner of her lips curling a little with a smile. "The Arl's couturier will ask when they meet with you, but you should know what you want ahead of time. Car il n'y a pas assez de temps, we can ask them to rush the things we'll need for Orzammar, and our things for the Landsmeet will be ready long before it's time to meet up with Eamon again."

"Oh." Lýna didn't answer for a moment, finger idly playing with the edge of the parchment. She was practicing writing again, since she didn't have much else to do with her time as things stood — they came out looking shaky and uneven, enough even she sometimes couldn't tell what letter they were supposed to be. (It was extremely frustrating, but she was getting better at it.) She'd been telling Lèlja about the meeting with Eamon between attempts at drawing letters properly, had gotten distracted...

Glaring at the malformed letters on the page, she said, "I don't know, what would be good. How Alamarri dress, this isn't something I know well." She hadn't paid that much attention, honestly, and she'd only met a couple of their lords so far...

Lèlja hummed, her eyes trailing around the room. They were in the hall the Wardens had been put up in, sitting at the table. Alim had run off with Jowan to wash off the filth that'd built up while he was imprisoned, and Alistair and Keran left only a few minutes later. Supposedly to collect their potential recruits to ask if they were serious about it, but Lýna suspected at least partially so they could cool off somewhere away from Lýna — neither were happy about how she'd spoken to Eamon, but they didn't oppose recruiting Jowan (not after a little arguing about it anyway), and both admitted they couldn't think of any better way she could have handled that, so if they just needed some time to calm down that was fine. Solana was in a chair off in a corner writing something in a little book — working on that magic arrows idea, apparently — and Lacie was...somewhere, Lýna had thought she was in the room somewhere but she didn't see her. Maybe she'd left with Alim and Jowan, and Lýna just hadn't noticed.

After a second of thought, Lèlja nodded to herself. "Solana?"

"Hmm?" Solana didn't look up at first, clearly distracted by whatever she was writing. "I'm sorry, what?"

"Can we talk to you for a minute?"

"Yes, one second." She kept writing for a little bit, finishing something off, before pushing herself up to her feet, her heavy weird Circle gown thing swishing around her. (At least, Lýna assumed it was a Circle thing, most of the mages there had been dressed like this.) Her book folded under one arm, she crossed the room to stand over their table, and Lýna was again reminded how bloody tall she was, even for a human woman — not quite as tall as Wynne, she didn't think, but she had to be right around Ásta's height. "Did you need something, Sister?"

Giving Solana one of those warm, slightly-absent shaman smiles of hers, Lèlja said, "Yes, I don't know how much you heard from over there, but the Arl is hiring a... Pardon, est-ce qu'on dit 'seamster' ou 'tailor'? Je confesse, je ne sais pas quelle est la différence."

Lýna thought she understood maybe half of that, and she hadn't even been trying to learn this language that long. True, est-ce qu'on dit was one of the first things Lèlja had taught her, and je ne sais pas quelle est was very basic, but still, Orlesian was easy.

Solana returned Lèlja's smile with a flat sort of look. "La différence est entièrement connotative, et c'est une fine distinction. Vraiment, c'est peu importe ce que vous utilisez."

...Or maybe not.

"I'll use 'tailor', then. The Arl is hiring a tailor to outfit us, since it would hardly be appropriate for the Wardens to meet nobility without appropriate dress. If we were in Orlais I could help plan what should be done, but I think you're more familiar with the custom in Orzammar and Ferelden than I am."

"I suppose I am." Solana pulled out one of the chairs around the table and sank down — Lýna noticed she grabbed her gown over the thigh and pulled it to the side so it wouldn't catch on the chair as she tried to sit. "Fashions do trickle in from Orlais and Antiva — the southern cities, of course, it's too cold here for northern dress to be practical — but such things are never expressed quite the same in foreign lands. Though, as you might imagine, there are political elements to such things in the recent decades. At the risk of putting too fine a point on it, it wouldn't do to appear too Orlesian."

Lèlja's smile turned slightly brittle. "Yes, that was my thought. Though, I had wondered whether we need do much at all — or is it only rumor that Fereldan lords go about in armor?"

"It is and it isn't. Presenting well in Orzammar and in Denerim is our concern, yes? What the Lieutenant is wearing now," Solana said, nodding to her, "would suit just fine in Orzammar while in public. It is important to recall that Orzammar is a country at war with the Blight, and has been so for uncounted generations — whenever one leaves their home, they do so prepared for battle, or at least appearing to be so, whether they believe one will truly come or not.

"In private, however, more formal dress would be appropriate. No gowns, dwarves don't wear gowns, not even the women. Boots, flat heels, hauts-de-chausses, chemises, pourpoints. Dwarves typically don't wear justaucorps themselves, but they are familiar with the article through contact with the Orlesians, it wouldn't seem peculiar to them. Finally, you would need a cape, but no hoods or hats — among the dwarves, covering one's head is associated with criminals."

"Ah, see, I wouldn't have guessed that. If you arrive at a formal reception in Orlais without a hat or veil of some kind you'll seem almost scandalously underdressed."

Solana's lips twitched. "Yes, it's much the same in Kirkwall. Southern Alamarri are more like the dwarves in that way: a hat or veil wouldn't have the same association in Denerim but they also aren't obligatory, most don't bother. While in Landsmeet, assuming you're invited to attend directly, armour would be acceptable — there are martial traditions associated with the Landsmeet, it's a long story. Generally, only the lords and attendant knights would go in armor and women would wear gowns, but women fulfilling an explicitly martial role, such as Wardens, would be an exception.

"Meeting with lords in private however..." Humming to herself a little, Solana's eyes tipped up to the ceiling for a second, her fingers tapping at the table. "You could simply wear the same thing you did in Orzammar, I suppose — with the addition of un justaucorps, of course. The men, anyway, the women would be expected to wear gowns. I can't tell you precisely what the fashion of the day is, but I would expect—"

"No."

Both women turned to her more or less in sync. "I'm sorry?"

"No. 'Gown' is...like this, yes?" Lýna said, waving at what Solana was wearing.

Solana glanced down at herself, one of her eyebrows ticking up a little. "Well, not exactly — this is a robe, not a gown. But it's a similar idea, yes."

"I won't wear this. I don't know things you said before — I think those words were Cirienne, et je parle peu de ça—" Was that right? She thought that was right... "—but I won't wear gown."

Lèlja and Solana turned away from Lýna to stare at each other, as though both trying to decide what to say to that and who should say it. After a few seconds, rather hesitantly, Solana said, "That might be...a problem. A woman who refuses to wear a gown at all, ever, will be seen as eccentric at best — and not only in Ferelden, but almost anywhere you could go. Except Orzammar."

"I don't know this word, eccentric."

"Unusual. And not in a complimentary sense."

"Lýna,' Lèlja said, softly, drawing Lýna's eyes back to her. "Men and women dress differently. If a woman goes somewhere women are expected to wear gowns, but instead wears un haut-de-chausse et un pourpoint, she will be seen to be dressing as a man — people will find that peculiar."

Oh. She guessed that did sort of make sense. "Where I am from, this... With my People, we only wear gown when very young, or with child. If I wear this, I will feel like small child, and trying to deal with people like this... It is weird, it will distract me."

Lèlja and Solana stared at each other again. "...Ah. Well, I don't know if..." Solana let out a long, heavy sigh, her head shaking a little. "Right, well, to be perfectly honest, the Fereldans and the dwarves are already going to think you're foreign and strange, so they might just write it off as the Dalish woman being Dalish. If it would truly make you so uncomfortable, perhaps you can do without it — people will think it peculiar, but I'm certain it can't do any more damage than having tattoos on your face."

"Why is that bad?" she asked, trying not to glare at Solana too strongly — she was only telling Lýna what other people would think, there was no reason to get annoyed with her. "Only that it is what my People do?"

There was a slight hissing sound from her other side, she glanced that way to see Lèlja had winced. Solana's lips tilted into a smirk — though not a very strong one, there was a hint of reluctance to it, like it were forced to cover up something else. "I hate to be the one to inform you of this, Lieutenant, but here the only people who tattoo their faces are criminals. Yours are far more detailed and colourful than theirs, but even so."

...Oh. Somehow, that had never come up until now. "I see. I will not cover them."

"I wouldn't expect you to — while I don't know what they mean, I do know they're meaningful. I'm only telling you now so you'll understand what people are thinking if they show a negative reaction when they see your face, especially since it seems to be something the others haven't informed you of yet. Such responses may in part be because you are a heathen elf, yes — some of the stories that are passed around about your people are absolutely ridiculous — but that is not the whole of it."

"Yes, this is good." It wasn't good at all, of course, but it was better Lýna be aware of it than not.

Solana nodded, and changed the subject without another word. "So, colours. The Wardens' colours are blue and black and silver. I've met Wardens at formal events — black hauts-de-chausses, blue pourpoints, and black justaucorps are typical. There's also often Warden heraldry embroidered with silver, especially on the Commander, but I doubt whoever the Arl hires would have the time to do that."

"I can do the silverwork myself," Lèlja offered, "for Lýna's, at least. I would need the thread for it, but I'm sure there's some in town somewhere, we'll see if I can buy it off of someone." Solana gave Lèlja a questioning look. "When I was a bard, I did much of the needlework for my outfits, especially when I wanted something very particular — I can't shape my own clothes, I never learned to do that, but I can do the embroidery."

"That is an option, I suppose. Wardens will sometimes also wear the colours of their family, if they have any, though most often that is only the Commander. Do you know your family's colours?" asked Solana, an odd delicate tone slipping into her voice. "I understand most of the wandering clans were nobility before the Exalted March, but I wouldn't be surprised if this sort of thing had been forgotten over the centuries."

Lýna still didn't know what "nobility" was, exactly, but if she was referring to the families of the Council, then yes, the Maharjaj had been one of them. "Green, and white, and... I don't know how you say. Fjólublár?"

"I meant your heraldry, actually." It took a couple seconds for Solana to realize Lýna didn't know what that word meant. "Er, a drawing that represents your family?"

"Oh! Yes, I know that too. It's a— Hold, I have it here."

Both of the human women twitched in surprise, Solana leaning back in her chair a little, when they realized she was opening her top. She understood the Alamarri had this 'modesty' concept — she didn't really understand the concept itself, but Lèlja had told her it existed and tried to explain it — but she didn't really care. They'd be living in close quarters for who knew how long anyway, and besides, it'd be much easier to show Solana than try to explain it.

It took a little bit to get going, Solana and Lèlja suddenly a little awkward, but before long Lýna was explaining what the different parts of her blood-writing meant, that this part right here, a halla leaping through a shattered archway, was for the Maharjaj. (Was the archway supposed to be one of those mirrors she'd found in the ruins? Maybe, she still didn't know what those were...) One of the shards flying out of the archway was supposed to be the blade of...um, what was it called in Alamarri, the biggest thing in the night sky? Lýna had thought the smaller one was called the moon. Oh, they're both moons? ...That was confusing. Anyway, yes, one of them was supposed to be the blade of– the crescent moon, or it had been in the original Maharjaj stuff forever ago, they usually didn't put that detail in blood-writing.

Lýna was just explaining what the colors were supposed to be — apparently the one she hadn't known in Alamarri was violet (which sounded a lot like the Chasind word) — while Solana copied the drawing onto a fresh page in her book, when there was a clunk over by the door toward the outside. "Ach, fuck," Perry groaned rubbing the back of his hand. He was still practically standing in the doorway, a bundle of cloth lying on the floor at his feet. It looked like hurting his hand had made him drop that, but Lýna had no idea how how he'd done that — there was hardly anything there to bump it against. "Sorry, um, didn't know you was...whae'r the fuck this is."

"We're making plans for the wardrobe when we meet with the dwarven nobles and the Landsmeet." Lèlja looked weirdly sheepish, glancing between Perry and Lýna, no idea what that was about. "Lýna's descended from old elven nobility, you see, she happens to have her family's colors tattooed on her chest."

"...Right." Perry was mostly looking away, eyes directed up and well to the left, toward the opposite side of the room from the table, but Lýna noticed he kept glancing back her direction, almost shiftily, his ears visibly pinking. "Ah. I'll just...go, then..."

"You can stay."

Bent halfway over to pick up his things, Perry gave a sharp full-body twitch, head turning to stare up at Lýna. His eyes trailed a little down from hers, just for a second, before snapping down to look at his things again. "...You sure?"

Lýna tried not to roll her eyes. "Yes, I'm sure. It doesn't bother me, being seen."

"Ah...okay." Perry picked up his things and started into the hall, his eyes flicking back to her every couple steps. He kept moving until he was behind Lýna, by the sound of it plopping down onto the floor, a rustle of cloth as he sorted through whatever it was he'd been carrying.

Solana snorted. "I suppose that's one way to manage temptation."

"That ain't it, believe me." There was an odd, strangled hiss — Perry wincing, she thought. "Ah, I don't mean nothing for it, Lyna, only you're too damn scary for me to want you."

...Lýna probably shouldn't laugh at him. "Good."

And Solana laughed at him in her place anyway. Oh well.

A few minutes later, Solana had what she needed, so Lýna closed up her top again. (She might not care whether she was seen, but it was somewhat cold in here.) Solana leaned over the table, sketching something on a fresh page Lýna couldn't see from here, occasionally glancing at the bit she'd copied out of Lýna's blood-writing, ignoring the rest of them. Lèlja asked what the hooks holding her things closed were made of — she'd thought they were all ties, and while there were ties, those were just in certain places that might need to be loosened or tightened over the years — which quickly became a long conversation about how exactly Lýna had made all this in the first place. It wasn't that complicated, she didn't think? She hadn't tanned the leather herself or woven the cloth, and she hadn't made the hooks either (shavings left over from working with ironwood), and the rest was just...measuring and cutting and stitching, and none of that was hard. Well, to get the bits of armor on she just did the same thing she had to put the hooks in — the little rivets would usually also be ironwood, but of course the Alamarri didn't have any of that, she'd grabbed a bunch from the stash of the armorer at Ostagar and Owen here — which was a little harder than normal stitching, sure, but it wasn't that different...

Apparently, before coming to the Chantry Lèlja had never made her own clothes before — and the Sisters were expected to, so she'd needed to learn, it hadn't gone very easily. That was...weird. Was that not a normal thing for Alamarri to do? The People and the Avvar and the Chasind mostly all did...

"Hey, boss! We got a problem."

Lýna didn't have to look up to know who that was — Alim was the only person who called her that. Well, Alistair too sometimes, she guessed, but the voice was too high and smooth to be a human man. (She wasn't sure what that meant, but it might be the same as Chasind boas, which would make sense.) She looked up anyway, to find Alim stomping in through the door, Jowan following close at his heels. Both of their hair was still wet, and Jowan had changed into plain linen shirt and trousers, neither of which quite fit him properly, obviously made for someone else. Lýna saw Jowan was barefoot, reminded herself to get some boots made for him.

Hmm, Lacie wasn't with them, she must be off somewhere else...

"What is it?"

Stalking over toward the table, Alim growled, "I forgot about these damn things." He grabbed Jowan's arm, held his hand in front of Lýna — there was a metal band around his wrist, showing the bright, almost reflective sheen of silverite but it was probably polished steel. (They didn't really have steel in the south, she hadn't realized it was a different thing from silverite at first.) "I don't know how the hell Jowan didn't even mention them, these things are seriously fucking uncomfortable, would you have even brought it up if I hadn't noticed them?"

Jowan gave him an awkward, sheepish shrug of one shoulder. "I, um, well they've been there for weeks now, I've almost gotten used to it?"

"That's fucked up, I hate Templars, and also I kind of want to stab someone right now."

"That right there is why they started searching us for table knives on the way out of the refectory."

"In my defense, I didn't hurt him that badly, and also Sewin is an ass."

Hadn't Alim said he'd never gotten in a real fight before that first skirmish with the darkspawn down in the south? Oh well, not important. Lèlja was giving Alim a sharp, disapproving look, but before she could say anything, Lýna asked, "What is this?" She leaned a little closer, to get a better look, and felt... Well, it was magic, certainly, but usually magic had a tone to it — almost like a song, but it wasn't really sound, exactly, or at least not one she heard with her ears. This was more like a low, meaningless hissing, like the wind pushing flakes skittering across snow-covered hills. "Is this magicked?"

"Yes," Alim growled, "they're magic-restraining cuffs. A mage wearing them won't be able to cast magic, at all."

...Oh. She had wondered how exactly Alamarri kept mages prisoner, but she hadn't asked — Solana had been wearing similar things when they'd taken her out of the tower, now that Lýna was thinking about it. "I don't understand. You can open locks?"

"Not these — just as they'll stop Jowan from casting, they'll break apart any spell I try to cast on them. We'll need the key."

And that was also obvious once Lýna thought about it. "Yes. So we ask for key." Hopefully Eamon didn't have it, that might be...difficult.

"One problem with that: in a parish like Redcliffe there might only be one set of keys...carried by the Knight-Captain."

Lèlja gasped. "Oh. The Knight-Captain is dead."

His lip curling, Alim nodded. "Yeah, he died against the undead before we even got here — I'm not sure how that happened, Alistair handled them just fine, maybe he was taken by surprise or surrounded or something. It doesn't matter, we don't know where his body ended up, and he could have dropped the keys at any point afterward." Because he would have been animated like the rest of the dead, he meant. In fact, it seemed pretty likely that a well-armored figure like a Templar would have been at the front, where he would have been hit by Alim's fire trap, which meant this key had probably been melted to scrap. "It's possible the key was left in the Revered Mother's study, I guess we could ask, but I suspect the key is lost."

Yes, this was a problem — Jowan could still enchant with his magic locked away, but it would limit the things he could do, and he couldn't defend himself if he got in trouble. Also, she suspected it would make it far more likely he would die in the Joining. "Can we find another? The Templars at Lawgiver Hold, them most like not, but..."

Alim blinking down at her in confusion, Jowan actually asked first. "Lawgiver Hold?"

"Ah, sorry, this is what the name means, I think — 'Kinloch', kenna-lög. He is Avvar god, the Lawgiver."

"Oh, I had...no idea. I suppose the Avvar did hold the area for a time during the War of the Crowns... Hmm."

Lýna had no idea what the War of the Crowns was — which Jowan probably knew, it sounded more like he was talking to himself than anything — but it must have been a very long time ago. The Avvars Lýna had known said they'd been pushed out of the Long Valley by the Alamarri hundreds of years ago. "As I'm saying, can we get other key?"

Finally letting go of Jowan's arm, Alim let out a long hum, arms crossing over his chest, fingers tapping on his elbow. "The closest is probably in...Rossleigh? Assuming the Templars there will let us borrow it, it won't even be easy to get there — Rossleigh is the seat of the Arl of the West Hills, mostly in the Frostback foothills, the trek would be very slow-going. Edgehall might actually take less time to get to, especially if we sail up the coast, but I doubt they'd cooperate. Maybe if we send Alistair, but they, uh, wouldn't take you seriously there, I don't think." Jowan grimaced, obviously aware of whatever it was Alim was referring to.

Not that Lýna really needed to know, it was probably as simple as the Alamarri there especially disliking her People for whatever reason. "Can Owen make one?"

"Ah..." Alim blinked. "...maybe? The mechanism is damn complicated, but the lock on his door is pretty fine work too. It'd also have to be enchanted, but I can do that myself..."

"What lock is it?" They all turned to glance at Perry, almost in unison. He was still sitting on the floor behind Lýna with his bundle of linen, sections cut out of it using a knotted string as a guide — some Alamarri obviously made their own clothing, even if it wasn't all of them. "I mean, what kind of lock? ward, pin, lever, what?"

"Well, none of those, technically — as far as I know, the Circle are the only ones who use it. I think it's a Tranquil design."

Perry let out a little sigh. He set his work aside, sprung up to his feet, slowly paced over to the group gathered around the table. "What does it look like? Can you draw it?"

"Oh, well..." Alim frowned at him for a moment, obviously confused, but then just shrugged it off. A flick of his fingers cast light in the air, shaped into an object — a little metal rod, a disc at one end, looking almost like a coin with one edge fixed to the rod, a narrow boxy bit at the bottom. Another flick of his fingers made another glowing figure, probably the inside of the lock, though this one was harder for Lýna to pick out the pieces. "The key is slipped in through this track, given a quarter turn. Then the switch in the key is pushed down." The middle of the disc was slid down, the shape of the key changing, narrow bits sticking up out the top of the box part. "These break the enchantment in the cuffs, and also push the levers up — these things right here, see?" he said, pointing at the second figure. (Lýna didn't see.) "The key is then given a half turn, which releases the lock; the switch in the key is pulled back up so it can be removed again."

His eyes bouncing between the figures, sharp and observant, Perry nodded. "You know the magic bit?"

"The enchantment, you mean? It's nothing special, it just takes the presence of magic at some density to break the spell holding the levers down. I'd just burn some lyrium into the pins — a disruption will stop any spell from working, but you can't disrupt lyrium."

"Okay, hold on." Perry spun around on his heel and walked off, disappearing off toward the men's rooms.

Frowning, Alim turned to Jowan. "What the hell was that about?" Jowan just shrugged.

Perry was only gone a short time, returning with a roll of soft leather, shorter and narrower than his forearm. He walked up to the table and set it down near the edge, undid the buckle holding it closed, then unrolled it across the surface — strapped onto the inside of the roll with little cloth loops were a variety of little tools, though not any Lýna recognized. Some sort of looked like hooks that might be used in river-fishing, though too dull, the other end too long, obviously meant to be held in hand. Some looked like knives, though very small and narrow, the handles much longer than the blades, and some a wedge of a blade kinked off at a weird angle, looking a lot like a very tiny hoe. There were also a couple files, like what might be used for fine metal work, though again, not exactly like any Lýna had seen before.

Lýna heard a gasp, glanced up at the faces of the others around — they'd all gone wide-eyed with surprise, one of Jowan's eyebrows arching upward, Lèlja's hand had come up to cover her mouth. Even Solana had looked up from her drawing to give Perry a suspicious sort of look. Clearly, they all knew something Lýna didn't.

Perry pulled one of the long hooks out of its loop. Carefully, gripping the metal with both hands and pressing at it with his thumbs, he slowly bent the hook into a slightly different shape, the bottom flatter and the tip curling back and to the side a little — the metal was thick enough it was probably difficult, but Lýna also got the feeling he was being especially cautious about it. Once he was done, he turned the thing under his eyes for a moment, glancing back and forth at the glowing figures still floating in the air, before holding it out toward Alim. "Can you magic that?"

"Ah...yes?" Shaking his head to himself, the glowing figures blinked out. "Give me a second, I need a lyrium potion..."

Over the next couple minutes, Perry had Jowan sit in one of the chairs at the table while he took another, turned to face each other. He went back to his things on the floor to grab a length of string — without knots in it, left over from his measuring earlier — using one of the little knives to cut it into smaller pieces. By the time Alim came back, Perry was bending another hook into the proper shape, occasionally checking it against the one he'd already made. The very basic enchantment hardly took any time at all — Alim twisted off the cap of one of his lyrium potions, dipped the tip of each hook inside, casting some kind of spell on it, when it was done the tips glowing blue-silver, barely, so dim Lýna could hardly tell. Once Alim was done with each hook, Perry took one of his bits of string and tied it into a loop, one end of the string near the tip of the hook and the other at the opposite end of the curve, then made a third loop once the other two were done, the three strings making a short chain.

Lýna had no idea at all what good this was supposed to do, but it was obvious he thought he could unlock the cuffs, so she sat silent and just watched.

"You know the hooks are going to bend," Alim said.

Perry shot a short look at him. "You know your Fade crap, I know this. So shut up."

More amused than offended, his lips twitching into a reluctant smirk, Alim lifted both hands in surrender.

Jowan's hand placed on the table in front of Perry, he slipped the hooks into the lock one at a time, gingerly turning them in place, then picked up a file, pulling one end of the middle loop out of the way, slid the file through the hooks and strings. While he worked, Lèlja asked, "Where did you learn how to do this? I thought you were a blacksmith's assistant."

"I was." Bending down close over the table, his nose nearly touching the back of Jowan's hand, Perry's voice sounded a little absent, focused more on what he was doing than what he was saying. "E'n I weren't born so, were I?"

"But you were a thief."

"Yeah." Perry pulled up on the middle loop of string, pressing down on the handles of the hooks with his thumb, but shook his head after a second, started fiddling with the hooks again. "An elf boy what none look after, living in the city, how else do he eat? Where I learned this, nowhere and e'rywhere, I figure shit out to live, when I were young. I stopped when some stupid woman decided she want me for a husband, and I found me good work — blacksmith's assistant, you see."

Lèlja smiled a bit at the some stupid woman decided she wanted me part, though Lýna wasn't certain what was so funny about that. (It was clearly a joke, since she didn't think it likely Perry would just insult his own wife like that, but she didn't know what the joke was.) Alim also seemed faintly amused, but he was still giving the top of Perry's head a skeptical stare. "I'm calling nugshit on that one. If you quit, I can't imagine you'd still have this shit sitting around — you wouldn't need it anymore, and someone might find it and ask awkward questions."

Perry let out a little sigh. "Yeah, these are new." Again, he carefully pulled up the loop, pressing down on the handles of the hooks — this time, after a second there was a high, thin click. She wasn't the only one who heard it, Jowan's eyes sprung wide, Alim muttered Andraste's tits, shit (which sounded rather blasphemous to Lýna, but she doubted Alim cared about that sort of thing). Holding everything together in a tight grip, Perry started, slowly, rotating it all in place, bit by bit. "I got them to...not thieve, for som'in else."

"What did you get them for?"

"That there's a sad story."

"I'm curious anyway."

Forcing out a much thicker sigh, Perry glared down at the lock for a second. "Fine." A last gentle twist, and the metal band around Jowan's wrist clinked open. It took a little bit for Perry to extract his things again, untwisting the strings a little, then pulling out the file, then the hooks one at a time. Jowan sat back in his chair, rubbing at his wrist — wincing a little from pain, but his lips still pulled into a grin. "In Wintermarch, near about after First Day, Audrey got fever, a bad one. That's my wife, Audrey."

"Where is she?" Lýna asked. They had Lacie with them, she didn't see any reason they couldn't bring Perry's wife along. She realized this might not be the way Alamarri did things, but where she came from a war-band never ranged too far from their families, so nothing would happen to them while their protection was away. Especially with a Blight on, that just seemed reasonable.

Perry glanced up at her, just for a second. "Denerim. She's family there." Lýna remembered there was an elven rebellion going on in Denerim right now, Perry had seemed a mix of viciously pleased and anxious telling her about it — and no wonder, if his family was there and he wasn't. Clearing his throat, he dragged Jowan's other hand up onto the table in front of him, started poking the first hook in. "Anyhow, Audrey was sick, and she lived, but it was...hard. She was fearful sick for days, there was time there I thought she weren't gonna make it. And after, she was yet weak, and... She couldn't work, you see. And for me staying home to care for her, I...

"In South Reach, there's many peasants, more than there's work for us. I don't come to work, he thinks, fine and good, I'll just hire another elf — they's only elves, and they's all the same, ain't they?" Perry had the second hook in place now, started carefully slipping the file inside. "Audrey was well again, and I go to the blacksmith I was helping, but he haen't work for me no more, and that was that.

"My boy, Walder, our eldest." Perry pushed down on the hooks, the lock giving off a little click — he'd gotten it much quicker the second time. "He knew what I did, before. People in the quarter know, he hears things, he couldn't not. He knew it weren't going well, he saw I... I was trying to find work, not coming and going the same no more, and I start passing meals so Audrey and the kids can eat, drag it on a little further."

"The kids?" Lèlja asked, a wary, anxious sort of edge to her voice. Lýna was guessing she'd seen something about where this story was going, but Lýna hadn't figure it out herself. "You have more than just Walder?"

"Yeah." Perry paused a moment, one hand coming up to rub at his eyes. "Walder, he's ten. The girls are Meghan, Hilde, and Kattrie — Meghan is eight, the twins are five. Lindon is two."

...Okay, bringing along five children might be slightly more complicated than just Audrey, but Lýna would still rather have her people's families with them than off who knew where. They'd have to find them when they got to Denerim.

"Anyhow, Walder. He saw things were bad, and he wanted to help. If he only said something, I... Some kids from the quarter, they get this madness in theys heads, they go off to the market. Walder stole bread. He was caught."

"Oh, no," Lèlja sighed.

Something hard and cold on his voice, Alim said, "You were talking about your son before. After Lýna killed those bandits, Keran was defending her line of work, and you asked her if she thinks a hungry child who steals a loaf of bread deserves to die. You were talking about Walder."

"Oh, no, Perry..."

Grimacing, he didn't look up to see their sympathetic faces, still glaring downward at the lock. "Yeah, I was talking about Walder." A last twist, and the lock came undone, and Jowan was freed. While Jowan sat back in his chair, a twitter of smooth, bouncing magic on the air — healing his wrists, looked like — Perry kept fiddling with the lock, pulling out the hooks one by one, avoiding their eyes. "They took him, threw him in the pit. We didn't know where he was, he... He came home near a week later. You know what the punishment for theft is?"

Everybody in the room winced — except Lýna, who didn't know what they were talking about, and Solana, who was frowning instead. "If you're talking about what I think you're talking about, that sentence isn't supposed to be executed on children. The parents pay restitution, or labour if they don't have the coin, proportional to the value of the goods in question."

Perry shot Solana a flat, cold sort of look. "He's an elf."

Apparently that was answer enough, because nobody had anything to say to that.

Lýna had questions, though not about that part — she assumed the Alamarri arls and whatever else were harsher with the elves among their people than the humans. "What is the punishment?"

A shadow of a hateful snarl on his face, Alim said, voice sounding a little stiff and stilted, "If you're a commoner stealing from another commoner? You lose a hand."

Lýna blinked. She thought about it for another second, but no, that still didn't make sense. "I don't understand. This doesn't balance."

"What do you mean, balance?"

"I don't know, I don't have the words." Besides, she suspected the Alamarri thought of these things in very different terms than the People and the Avvar did, or even the Chasind for that matter. "If someone harms another, in return he is to balance this harm, yes? In whatever way makes sense for what that harm is, it depends, but the idea is the same. To take someone's hand, this doesn't help to balance the harm that was done, this is only more harm.

"Also, this Walder took food, because his family was hungry. Why is he to be punished at all? He took from merchant, yes, not another person who needed it? This is as it should be?"

"Um, no," Alim said, looking an odd combination of uncomfortable and amused. "In Ferelden — or any modern kingdom — the purpose of punishment is to do significant and obvious harm to people who do bad things, so other people won't want to do those same bad things."

...That didn't really seem to be helping to Lýna, but she understood the Alamarri were different from her People, this was just another example. No point in lingering on it. "I see. And taking food is a bad thing?"

"Stealing is a bad thing, it doesn't matter what you're stealing."

"But..."

"Lieutenant, the Kingdom doesn't guarantee its people food to eat," Solana said. Her voice was softer than normal, sympathetic, though Lýna wasn't sure what she was showing sympathy about. "If you don't grow it yourself, and you don't have the coin to pay for it, you don't eat."

"No, truly? But the Arling feeds the people here."

"This is an emergency — a fraction of the produce is owed to the lord, and part of the justification for this is to act as a stockpile in anticipation of droughts, or pests, or war. In any normal circumstances, the Arl wouldn't open his stores to the public like this."

...Lýna had absolutely no idea what to say to that. A community not caring for their own people was so entirely outside her experience, she didn't... How did that even work? Why should people respect the word of their arl if he didn't care for them? She didn't understand...

Silence lingered for a moment as Lýna pondered that. Finally, Lèlja asked, her voice low and cautious, "What happened?"

Perry sighed, rubbed at his cheek with one hand. "He... He was sick from the pit to start off, and... You know, when they... They use a hot iron, so they don't bleed out, you know?" A few more winces crossed the room — if they were thinking along the same lines as Lýna, imagining what it must have been like for his son to come home after days missing, his hand hacked away, flesh charred black and dead. "And that don't stop your blood from going bad, and... He didn't make it. He died a couple days later."

"Perry, I'm so sorry..." Lèlja moved, as though to reach out to him, take his hand or something, but seemingly checked herself. (Lýna didn't think she'd ever seen Lèlja and Perry talk to each other before, she probably wasn't sure that'd be taken well.) There were a few more noises of sympathy from people, which Perry just kind of ignored, staring down at the table, fiddling with his hooks.

Alim, standing nearby, set his hand on Perry's shoulder — he twitched a little, glancing up at Alim, but didn't try to shake him off. (She actually had seen Perry and Alim talk to each other, so.) "What did you do?"

"I killed them." Perry slipped the hooks back into their pockets in the leather, started rolling it back up. "I got this from a friend," he said, patting the roll of leather. "I sent Audrey and the kids to Denerim. I broke into their homes, and I killed them. The guards what grabbed him, the axeman what took his hand, the magistrate what sentenced him. I killed them all."

The room went dead silent for a long moment, feeling heavy and solemn. Or, everyone else seemed to be feeling so — Lýna thought that seemed like the right and proper thing for Perry to do, but by the expressions on everyone else's faces... Well, she wasn't sure what to call that, but clearly like they thought this was a very significant thing Perry had done, in the sense that he'd crossed some sort of line and they didn't know how to feel about it.

Was this why Perry had joined the Wardens in the first place? He had suddenly appeared in the Wardens' camp back at Ostagar and asked to join, out of nowhere. Lýna recalled there'd been some speculation at the time that he'd been hiding from something or someone, but nobody had any idea what. They must have been looking for the person who'd killed the magistrate — from what Lýna had heard, an Alamarri magistrate was similar to a Chasind law-speaker, but she didn't really know for sure — maybe somebody had seen him...

Not that this made any difference to Lýna — Perry had had the right to exact revenge against the people who'd murdered his son. (According to Chasind law, anyway, for the People or Avvar it was more complicated.) If anything, Lýna thought she might respect him a little more than she had before, both because he'd had the nerve to do it himself and that he'd actually managed to pull it off. If he'd gone to the Wardens for protection afterward, that was all to the good, as far as Lýna was concerned.

Turning to eye Lèlja, Perry said, "And don't you ask Andraste forgive me, Sister, 'cause I don't need it. They killed my boy. They had it coming." Perry bounced up to his feet and stalked away, slipping out of the hall towards his room, leaving a tense, uncomfortable silence in his wake.

Before anyone had quite found their voice again, Lýna left the table too. She picked up the bundle of linen and things Perry had left on the floor and followed after him. She hadn't been back here much, she wasn't entirely certain which of the men was sleeping in which room, but it wasn't exactly difficult to check each of them until she found him. "Perry."

He twitched, an oath hissed through his teeth. He hadn't been doing anything yet, just standing in the middle of the room rubbing at his face with both hands — Lýna noticed red in his eyes and pink on his cheeks and throat, but that wasn't really a surprise, given what they'd been talking about a moment ago. "Shit, Lyna, you're too damn quiet, you know that?"

Lýna gave him a weak smirk. "I am as quiet as I mean to be." She had been trained to move quietly, after all, in environments with far more obstructions than Redcliffe Castle. "You forgot this."

"Oh, uh, just pitch that on the bed, then. Thanks."

She walked further into the room, Perry closely watching her the whole way — confused, wondering what she was doing — let the bundle flop down onto the blanket. She didn't leave right away, instead walking right up to Perry, and she took his hand, her gloveless fingers (writing with gloves on was impossible) lacing together with his. Startled, he made to pull away for an instant before freezing, staring wide-eyed down at her.

"We can't go to Denerim now," she said — low, solemn, heavy with promise. "But when we do, for Landsmeet, you will find your family. And they will come with us. Whatever comes, they will be cared for. Yes?"

"Ah..." He swallowed. His eyes fell closed, and he nodded, a little shakily. "Um, yes. Thank you, Lyna."

Lýna gripped his arm with her free hand for a second before letting go, and she walked out of the room without another word.

She'd decided, back at the Circle, that she would have to learn the ways of the Alamarri — she would be living among them indefinitely, most likely for the rest of her life. She would have to adapt. And that was right and proper, for a person to adopt the ways of one's new people. If Lýna had decided to run away to join Stone-River Hold, as she'd seriously considered doing when she'd been a small child, she would have taken the ways of the Avvar for her own, and that would have been that.

But just because she was taking on some of her new people's ways of doing things didn't mean she had to accept all of them. And this wasn't new, she'd never thought she would become Alamarri in full — as she'd insisted to Lèlja before their first lesson on the Chant, she had absolutely no intention of worshipping their god instead of hers. (And she wouldn't pretend to either, no matter that it might make Alamarri less uncomfortable with her.) As much as she did need to adapt, there were some things about how the Alamarri lived that she strongly disagreed with, and she didn't see why she should adopt the Alamarri way when the Alamarri were wrong. It might be acceptable for an Alamarri lord to go so far as to let his people go hungry, but that wasn't how they did things where she came from.

Lýna would take care of her people — it was written in blood on her arm, after all.

---

9:30 Eluveista 18

Redcliffe, Chasingard, Kingdom of Ferelden

---

Their new recruits were...mixed.

While the rest of them had been at the Circle, Perry and Keran had been approached by people asking if the Wardens were taking recruits — which obviously they were, there was a Blight on, that was a stupid question. Altogether, there had been nineteen. Perry and Keran had started working with them right away, assisting with the locals getting things back together and putting a few different weapons in their hands, seeing if any took to one over the others. That was done more by Keran than Perry, truly, the human woman had far more experience in how people were trained — while she'd never done it herself, she had been trained and had seen it done with others, so had a much better starting point.

Lýna and Alistair and Alim had talked to all of them one on one, over the next week or so, and that nineteen had been cut down to thirteen. Three had lost people to the undead and were clearly unwell. Perhaps they would have done well in the Wardens if they had more time to find their feet again, but as they were these three wouldn't suit — Lýna wasn't going to spend effort and resources training and equipping people who were just seeking death. (Several others had also lost people to the undead, yes, but they weren't so badly lost to despair.) There'd been an altercation one day, and after asking around a little bit, Lýna had dismissed one of the recruits involved — she wasn't interested in training and equipping rapists either, especially if they were depraved enough to assault their comrades. (Honestly, Lýna had been tempted to kill him, and she probably would have if he hadn't been caught early enough.) Two more had been dismissed after being terribly rude to Lýna and Alim.

Neither of them had been particularly offended, by this point they were both used to humans speaking to them like that, but Alistair had insisted — he'd argued that people who had such an obvious low opinion of elves would cause friction in the group, and almost certainly wouldn't follow Lýna's (or Alim's or Perry's) direction, which made sense. Lýna had assumed they would get over it given time, or would at least bury their inconvenient beliefs as needed to oppose the Blight, but Alistair knew the Alamarri better than her, and if he thought it was necessary to be rid of them so be it.

And so there were thirteen, nine humans, three dwarves, and an elf — Morden, Gailen, Dairren, Halrys, Edolyn, Merrick, Wynvir, Gwenys, and Cennith; Sedwulf, Aiden, and Edrick; and Justien. (Lýna mostly had all their names straight, but she might mix up a couple of the human men or Aiden and Edrick sometimes.) All of them had helped in the fight against the undead at one point or another, but before that hardly any of them had ever held a proper weapon in their lives. Halrys had spent a couple years as liðsmaður to a local bann — apparently not a proper knight, but Lýna didn't know what the difference between a knight and a warrior following a lord was, both sounded like liðsmenn to her — so had a fair bit of training, and even his own sword, shield, and decent (but not great) armor.

He was pretty much the only one. Wynvir and Sedwulf had definitely fought before, but just random scraps with whatever they had on hand, they hadn't been taught properly. Morden, Merrick, Aiden, and Justien could shoot decently well — Morden had been an archer in the King's army, and the rest were hunters — though none were excellent. Justien was actually the best shot of the four of them (but of course he was, elves tended to have an edge on humans), which Morden seemed to take as some kind of personal slight — if he'd decided to take that out on Justien, they might have had a problem, but instead he'd spent hours shooting at targets every day, practicing, so that was well and good. All four had improved since Lýna had first seen them, but none of them were anywhere near herself, or even Lèlja. Good enough, though, especially with companions to back them up, they'd be fine.

The rest were a mixed bunch. After a bit of experimenting, Sedwulf, Wynvir, and Gailen had been handed swords and shields, would be given heavy armor once they could cobble enough together — they would be shield-bearers, like Alistair and Keran and Fergus. Those three, along with a few of Fergus's men, were working on training them up, which was good, Lýna hadn't expected the help from Fergus. (One evening, over dinner, Fergus had admitted he didn't have anything better to do, so he might as well.) According to Alistair, Wynvir was taking to it well, and might actually turn out pretty good if given time, Sedwulf was abrasive but talented enough to make up for how annoying it could be to deal with him sometimes, but Gailen was lagging behind. He wasn't hopeless, he just wasn't learning as fast as the other two, if he survived the first couple serious fights they got into Alistair thought he'd probably be fine.

Edrick, the last dwarf, had been handed one of the Arl's crossbows, and an axe just in case, and while he wasn't great with either of them, Lýna thought he would do. The others were harder to figure out. Cennith and Dairren hadn't the skill with a blade to do well as a shield-bearer, and Edolyn and Gwenys (women) hadn't the strength to carry around equipment that heavy — apparently, women were more rare among Alamarri shield-bearers than their warriors in general for that reason, Keran somewhat exceptional in being able to mostly keep up with Alistair. Though Alamarri armor was very heavy, Lýna wasn't sure the men would fare much better. Unfortunately, none of them were particularly good with a bow either, and none of them were quick enough to fight like Lýna (or even Perry). They hadn't been sure what to do with these four.

Until, looking around Owen's forge one day, Lýna had spotted the spears hung across hooks on the wall, and she'd remembered certain Avvar warriors she'd seen. She'd grabbed an armful of them and walked out — one of Owen's assistants (the job Lýna assumed Perry had once had) just gave her a nod on the way out, as the Arl had given the Wardens leave to take whatever they needed — then handed them out to the four humans, along with the hand-axes they had left. And she'd told them about those Avvar in the south, not as strong or as quick as the others, but clever, using their longer reach to keep their opponents at range, picking them apart on their own or distracting them so shield-bearers or archers could cut them up with ease. It was a less straightforward style, took more caution and cunning, but with a bit of thinking and a bit of care these were some of the most effective warriors she'd ever seen, could easily make the difference between life or death for the whole group.

She'd left out that every single one of the warriors she was thinking of had been women — Dairren and Cennith might take that the wrong way.

It'd been a couple weeks now, and their new recruits were coming along, though not quite as well or as quickly as Lýna would like. As much as Eamon and his people were being accommodating, it took time and resources to make armor. Owen had had some stuff already sitting around, which had been split between the Wardens and Eamon's own newly-recruited warriors, but that was hardly enough. It was being done, part of the Arl's repayment of their aid to his people, but only little bits at a time, only really starting to see new things in the last day or two — Lýna had asked Redcliffe's leather-workers to make the boots first, since some of their new recruits hadn't had any footwear at all when they joined, and only Halrys, Sedwulf, and Morden had anything suitable. Lýna and Alistair had prioritized outfitting the shield-bearers, since they'd be right at the front of any fight, and then the spearmen, but even the shield-bearers weren't fully protected yet, it'd be some time before they could even start on the archers.

Keran wanted to wait to leave until they were all fully outfitted, but the Blight wouldn't wait for them, Lýna didn't want to stay here that long — she and Fergus had decided to leave the morning after Summerday (an Alamarri holiday, a couple more weeks away), they would just have to make do with whatever they had by then. Alistair said the Wardens' embassy (whatever that word meant) in Orzammar would have spare things lying around they could use, hopefully that would fill in any gaps.

As far as their training went, that was also mixed, but Lýna was actually more optimistic about that than properly equipping them. Their archers weren't great, but they were decent, and slowly improving every day — Lýna wouldn't match them against Chasind hunters just yet, but give them a month or two and maybe they'd have a shot (especially after the Joining). Their shieldbearers were hardly comparable to Alistair or Keran or Fergus, but they were coming along, it'd be fine (especially after the Joining). The spearmen were having more trouble...

...but then, they happened to be their recruits who had the least experience with using any weapon of any kind, or any kind of fighting in general, so of course they'd be slower to pick it up. It didn't help that the role they'd be playing was more complex than hulking behind a shield and taking openings when you could get them — Lýna and the others were teaching them not just how to hold their weapons, to fight against other warriors one to one, but how to fight in a group, plugging up vulnerabilities in their own line and exploiting vulnerabilities in their opponent's. Since shieldbearers were less mobile, pinned with their opponents face-to-face, this was less of a concern for them, but it was something the spearmen needed to learn to get the most use out of them.

To help practice this, Lýna had split the Wardens in half — though this actually solved multiple problems she'd been thinking about all at once. For one, there might be situations where they wanted to split up, for whatever reason, and it would be better for the people in each smaller band to be well-balanced and accustomed to working with each other. There were also a few tense relationships between some of their new recruits — unsurprisingly, they'd mostly all been born in Redcliffe or the surrounding area, they'd known each other all their lives — and dividing them into two bands was a neat trick to make it so they didn't have to work together directly. Separating Dairren and Aiden in particular had worked wonders in getting them (and everyone around them) to actually concentrate on what they were doing.

They had two bands that could work more or less independently, one under Alim and one under Keran (though Lýna hadn't told either of them that detail yet). Altogether they had six shieldbearers — Alistair, Keran, Halrys, Gailen, Sedwulf, and Wynvir — five quicker warriors — Perry, Dairren, Edolyn, Cennith, and Gwenys (not counting Lýna) — five archers — Justien, Morden, Merrick, Edrick, and Aiden (not counting Lýna or Lèlja) — and four mages — Alim, Solana, Lacie, and Jowan (not counting Morrigan or Wynne). Because their numbers and skill sets were uneven, it'd taken a little creativity for Lýna to get something she thought would work.

The first group was made of Alim, Alistair, Perry, Sedwulf, Justien, Edolyn, Gailen, Merrick, and Dairren. Lèlja and Morrigan would be fighting with this group, though they weren't Wardens, and Jowan would also be with them, but just to heal and cast barriers and the like. The second group had Keran, Solana, Lacie, Wynvir, Halrys, Aiden, Gwenys, Morden, Cennith, and Edrick. Lacie technically wasn't a Warden, but she was one of their people anyway so Lýna thought she should count, and Wynne would also be with this group, like Jowan focusing on protection and healing.

There had been a few complaints with how they'd been split up, mostly from the mages. Alim and Lacie both wanted to be on the same team, but Lýna had split them that way on purpose, to better balance the skills with different magics they had, there wasn't much she could do about that. (Also, it was just better for bonded warriors to not be in the same team, it could lead to distractions too easily.) Morrigan complained about being put with Alistair (and also Merrick), but the alternative was Keran (and also Cennith and Wynne), which Morrigan agreed would be worse. Solana also didn't want to be with Wynne, but she could at least be polite with the elder mage, while Morrigan (the one Lýna would switch her with) really couldn't — they'd started insulting each other's gods within five minutes of meeting, putting them together was just asking for trouble — so Solana had grudgingly conceded.

By this point, they'd done several little practice fights already, one group against the other, swords and spears and axes guarded with wool and leather, arrows with these little rubber tips stuck on — though that didn't work with silverite blades, which would cut straight through the guards, Lýna and Alistair both had to borrow other weapons for practice. The exception was the mages, of course, they couldn't participate, except for a few times Jowan and Wynne, to get the others used to fighting with a mage covering them. There were a few hiccups now and then, but Lýna thought they were turning out pretty well. Better than they'd been at the start at least.

Though, there were problems with Lýna participating — she'd noticed pretty quickly that, no matter which team she was on, that team always won. Perry and the spearmen were doing a decent job of guarding the shieldbearers' flanks (not great, but decent), but Lýna could make them fold easily. They'd managed to take her out twice, but both times had required every available person they had to gang up on her, once even splitting up their shieldbearers, which had had their line quickly falling apart anyway. As mildly frustrating as that was, Lýna wasn't really surprised. She'd been training since she'd been a child, and she'd been fighting a war for years now — that Perry and the spearmen couldn't match her should really be expected. The groups were more easily matched when she wasn't fighting, so that just had to do for practice.

Solana assured her it was actually fine for the commander to not really have a firm place in the group like this. If the groups were split, she could simply go with the one that would be in more danger or had the more critical mission, or maybe she would stick closer to an important ally, or she could take opportunities the groups weren't mobile enough to handle, whatever, the Wardens were actually more versatile like this. Besides, actually being Warden-Commander would mean a lot of dealing with their allies and managing the group overall, she might be too busy with other things to stick with their warriors all the time anyway.

That last thought made Lýna uncomfortable, but she had to admit Solana was probably right.

They'd also practiced fighting all of them together, against mixed groups of Fergus's and Eamon's men. Those mostly went in the Wardens' favour, to the apparent surprise of their new recruits — Fergus's men in particular were far more experienced and better equipped. By the time they started doing these big practice fights, though, the Wardens already had some experience working together, so they were just more coordinated than the teams Fergus was able to slap together on short notice. Which Lýna took as a very good sign: darkspawn didn't use much strategy at all, just swarming over people, covering each other's weaknesses while they picked apart a superior force was exactly what the Wardens needed to be able to do.

Most of their recruits might not be excellent warriors individually, but as long as they worked smoothly as a group that didn't really matter. After all, it wasn't like darkspawn were particularly skilled warriors either.

So, their equipment and combat training was coming along, slowly but surely, which left one glaring deficit Lýna could think of. Most of the Wardens — meaning all of them, not just the recruits — had been raised in cities or towns, or for Alistair and Keran forts like Redcliffe, where all their needs were provided for (even if only provisionally, as in Perry's case). A few of them had been hunters or trappers, or at least had a little experience in these things, but even they didn't really know how to live off the land if they needed to. Few had ever travelled any significant distance on foot with limited supplies — even the full Wardens, their first time had been the (unusually rushed) walk from Ostagar to Redcliffe. Lýna insisted their march to Ostagar with the army in the first place, accompanied by trains of huge wagons loaded with supplies, didn't count.

Given their approaching journey to the dwarves, and how their fight against the Blight was likely to go, that was going to be a problem. So, around two weeks into their month in Redcliffe, Lýna took a couple days to teach them all the basic things they needed to know. How to figure out which plants were edible and which weren't — at least with reasonable certainty, she couldn't teach them everything in such a limited amount of time — how to tell different kinds of trees apart (which required asking Lèlja or Alim or Solana what their names were in Alamarri at times), which they could use to fashion equipment (rough bows, arrows, sleds or wagons, rafts, whatever) out of, or use for firewood, or were too wet or thin to be useful for anything; how to orient yourself based on the shadows on the ground and the stars or the sky, and pick out landmarks in case your view was interrupted; how to identify firm, stable ground so you didn't lose your footing, especially in rocky hills like the land around here (when she explained the contrasts in colour and texture to look for in wetlands, Keran let out a groan, probably thinking she should have asked at the time — in Lýna's defense, she hadn't realized the humans didn't already know all this, she'd thought they were just too clumsy to use that knowledge properly); how to arrange a campsite, taking various things like the layout, the local plants and animals, and the size and balance of the group into account; how to identify signs of animals that could be hunted, or trails that might lead to the water source they used, or warnings of others that might be a danger (like bears, there were a lot of bears around here); and so forth and so on.

It might have sounded like a lot of things, and some of the recruits grumbled about having so much information thrown at them, but Lýna was really just telling them the basics. Stuff cobbled together from her own training or that she'd picked up from her time ranging with Avvar — things it had taken her years to learn, altogether — limited just to the things she thought they might need to know in the near future, leaving out all the stuff about how or why things worked the way they did that she'd also been taught. And without all the stories and legends that went with a lot of it, of course. (Some of them would probably react badly if Lýna started talking about her People's gods like that.) Surprisingly, Keran had come to her defense on this one, insisting that this sort of thing was Lýna's area of expertise, so if she thought it was important they damn well better listen — she hadn't expected that.

Once Lýna had gotten through all of that, the whole group — excluding Morrigan, who already knew all of this anyway, and would rather spend as much of their remaining time at Redcliffe in the library as possible — took a trek up into the nearby hill country for a few days, when there happened to be a break in the spring rains. Lýna made sure they didn't have enough supplies for the whole trip, so they'd need to forage and hunt if they didn't want to go through the whole thing hungry. She'd had a word with the mages beforehand telling them to limit the assistance they gave, to not heal minor injuries or hunt with magic — Wynne had been reluctant, but part of the point was to make sure their recruits would be able to survive if they got separated from the mages, which Wynne had agreed was a good idea.

It went very well, better than Lýna had expected. There had been some complaining at first, but it wasn't that bad — Lýna had heard much worse from the full Wardens during their run from Lothering to Redcliffe. In fact, Lýna suspected most of them ended up enjoying themselves. Once they were a decent way up into the hills, removed from any obvious Alamarri presence, Lýna told them they had the rest of the day to do whatever they felt like, come back here around sundown and they'd eat. Of course, they didn't have a whole lot on them for food, so they should all return with something to contribute, but otherwise they were free to explore and play around, whatever they felt like.

Lýna lingered in the campsite, so she didn't see what most of them got up to, but she would hear stories from various people over the next few days. Some of them found a spot where a stream pooled at the bottom of a short waterfall — the same stream they were using for water, Lýna assumed, though she didn't know if the pool was up or down from the campsite — and spent most of the day there, swimming and climbing and napping. (That group came back with a variety of berries — early in the season, so rather sour, but edible — and several little clawfish — which was still peculiar, Lýna had thought those only lived in the sea.) Justien and Morden got into a shooting contest, climbing up into the trees from where they tried to hit the same target through all the branches and stuff in the way, cheered on by a few other recruits, which was a pretty interesting game, Lýna guessed. Justien "missed" badly once when he spotted a rabbit and hit that instead — he'd hit a little further down the body than he should have, but it was still a good shot. (They'd also come back with a bunch of nuts and herbs and things.) Alim and Lacie snuck off, and were caught at it by Wynvir, Gwenys, and Edrick, they were still teasing the mages and joking around back at camp that evening. (The pair of elven mages had cheated, using some kind of magic to attract animals to them, squirrels and beavers and rabbits, then instantly killing them before they could flee...and accidentally ruining much of the meat anyway, because neither of them knew what they were doing. Edrick and Gwenys carefully stripped them all, planning to sell the skins and furs, in much better shape than the meat, which was good thinking, they were forgiven for not actually bringing any food back themselves.)

A bit into the afternoon, Merrick, Sedwulf, and Gailen returned dragging a sizeable elk behind them — Lýna watched them pull the large animal into the clearing, struggling against its weight, with an exasperated sort of smirk. There was far more meat on that thing than their group could eat in a day, especially with everyone else picking things up as well, so they'd end up needing to carry a lot of it back if they didn't want it to go to waste. Merrick was aware of that, of course, he suggested they have it all smoked back in town, add it to their supplies for the trip north. Most of the skin was perfectly fine — Merrick had managed to hit it right through the eye, nice shot — so they could sell that to the tanner when they got back too. This one had pretty decent antlers, they could also get some coin for that, unless Lýna wanted to use them for something. But no, not really, go ahead — she hoped Merrick knew how to butcher that thing, because she wasn't doing it herself. (She could, but it was a little big for her to work with comfortably, and she had her own work to do.)

Turned out, Merrick did know how to do that. The three of them were rather slower and clumsier than Lýna was used to from hunters — they didn't have all the tools Merrick was used to on them — but they got it done eventually.

Herself, Lýna never ranged very far from their campsite. She spent most of the time sitting with Lèlja, talking about the Chant. This wasn't the first time they'd talked about the Alamarri religion, but mostly they'd just covered the basics — how the Chantry was organized, what the difference between a Mother and a Sister was, some of their rituals and holy days, that sort of thing. Today Lèlja went back to the beginning, to the Chant itself, reciting verses — she'd brought the book she'd accidentally stolen from the Chantry in Lothering, but Lýna suspected she had most of it memorized anyway — and then talking about what they meant. Lýna's Alamarri still wasn't perfect, and the language was old and poetical, so sometimes she just didn't understand it very well, but there were also discussions and decisions that had been had or made by Andrastians over the generations that were also important to explain — explaining less what the words themselves meant, and more what the Chantry believed the Chant meant in using them, if that made sense.

Instead of going through the book cover to cover, Lèlja had decided to go through it in the order the events had happened (which apparently wasn't the order the parts were normally put in). Which meant they were starting with something called the Canticle of Threnodies, what Lèlja said was a collection of hymns pre-dating Andraste, probably from the height of the First Blight. The first four chapters (as they were called) were different songs, lamentations, about how humans had turned away from their god out of pride in their own power, or were foolish and had been deceived be demons (the Tevinter dragon gods, it meant), the same idea said four times from different angles. People talking about how the Blight was a punishment for their hubris, which was an idea Lýna had heard before (though she still thought it was strange).

In the fifth chapter, it actually started in on a proper story, starting all the way back at the creation of the world. The Alamarri believed there had been nothing, but then "the Maker" had created the Beyond ("the Fade"), and then spirits, and then the Golden City, where he lived. He got tired of spirits, thought they were boring (which sounded kind of harsh to Lýna...), so he separated the earth from the Beyond (creating the Veil), and then made humans, and retreated back to the Golden City to watch what they'd make of it. A few of the spirits got jealous of the humans for being the favorite children, so decided they would whisper at humans in dreams, appearing to them all special and dramatic, trying to get worshipped as gods; the Maker got angry, cast them out of the Fade and deep into the earth, from where they kept whispering at humans, scheming to take their revenge — they became the old Tevinter gods.

Now, there were parts of this story Lýna thought were kind of interesting. There seemed to be a big thing about Naming in there — that was a thing Chasind and some Avvar did, giving something a name in an effort to define it and gain some power over it. (Not really magic, though it could be magic, it was mostly just a sort of religious ritual they did.) Like, the world before the Maker made everything was specifically described as silent, and he created the Fade by speaking — an act Lèlja called the First Word — and from there every creation he did was by coming up with words to describe them, and then they existed, just because he said them. Lýna thought that was kind of interesting. She also suspected it had something to do with why their beliefs were formed into a chant, something they were supposed to say (or sing) over and over and over, as though trying to sing their beliefs into reality itself.

Maybe that didn't entirely make sense, or she just couldn't find the words to say it right — Lèlja didn't really get what she meant — but it felt right to her, clicking together in a way she found satisfying.

The story itself was complete nonsense, of course. The Chant so far didn't really seem to understand how spirits worked — which she guessed made sense, since they hated magic so much they weren't likely to listen to mages, who would know better. The "Golden City" was the palace of the First of the Sun, the place the People of the Heartwood had gone to seek the favour of the Venýriś — Lýna kept that to herself, she and Lèlja were just going to disagree on that one. Also, this story claimed humans came before the People, when the opposite was definitely true — Lèlja pointed out that the original Tevene says people, not humans, that it had probably been intended to mean everyone (which Lýna thought was at least a fair middle ground).

Also, the Maker casting out the "old gods" makes no sense. For one thing, if he was angry at them for subverting his precious humans, burying them deep underground didn't actually accomplish anything — the Chant even admits they just kept talking to people as before anyway — and also...weren't they supposed to be dragons, not spirits? Apparently, a lot of Andrastians thought these spirits had convinced people to help them cross the Veil and possess the bodies of dragons, and then the Maker had moved them deep underground, which at least made some sense, Lýna guessed.

(Of course, talking about demons convincing people to worship them, the Chantry was probably also referring to the Venýriś, but Lèlja didn't come out and say that.)

Lèlja asked her what the People believed, how their gods created the world, which had an extremely simple answer: they didn't. First, there had been only the Sky — the Beyond was sometimes just called the Sky in stories, because they used to be the same thing — and the spirits had always been there, because they and the Sky were sort of not separate things, and the Earth had sung itself into existence — no, Lýna didn't know who'd done that or how, only that they were called Earthseeds, or Hearts of the Mountain, and that they were the ones who'd created the physical world. Where the Sky and the Earth met, living things came to be, first plants and animals but eventually the first elves. In time, her People's gods rose to power — they had not been born divine, but had ascended to divinity, by their own efforts and their own brilliance. The Veil didn't fall until thousands of years later, probably, maybe at the same time the Wolf sealed the gods away, she wasn't sure. Stories disagreed on the order of the fall of the Veil, the arrival of humans, the Wolf's Great Betrayal, and the Quickening, so Lýna kind of assumed they must have been pretty close to each other.

Lèlja was kind of surprised that the People didn't believe their gods had created the world and everything — didn't they call them the Creators? Yes, well, some of them did (it wasn't common in her clan, but it was in Mẽrhiᶅ's), but by that they meant they'd created crafts and forging and cities and writing and art, all of the things people did. The Sky had always been there, nobody had created it. The suggestion that someone had, even a god, was honestly kind of absurd. Spirits were made out of the Sky, right, everything that was alive was, including people and animals. Their Maker could think and feel, but if he'd made the Sky, then what the fuck was he made out of?

The dumbfounded look on Lèlja's face was honestly kind of funny.

While they talked, Lýna sat with her bow in her lap, her eyes trailing over the nearby trees. Lèlja jumped the first time she picked it up and loosed at a nearby duck — nailing it right in the heart, because of course she did — but she hardly reacted as Lýna picked off a few more birds over the course of the day, expecting it now. She didn't pick up her kills right away, took a fox nosing around later in the afternoon as a sign it was time — there was a bush in the way, she threw a rock at that one instead of trying to shoot it. Lèlja seemed slightly disgusted when Lýna returned to her seat and started plucking and skinning them, her lip curling, but she kept talking about Chant stuff, so. Most of them were on the small side, so she didn't end up with many feathers that were any good for fletching — she saved the rest anyway, there was probably someone back in Redcliffe who could use them for something — but they were perfectly edible.

Building a cookfire took quite a while — theirs was a relatively large party, and at this point Lýna still had no idea what all everyone was bringing back. She swept clear a sizeable space of ground, formed a circle out of a bunch of rocks carried from the stream, their tops all flat (which would be important later). Gathering firewood, enough to last well into the evening, was not a small project, but thankfully people had started trickling back by then. She decided to build a ringfire, the larger logs stood up against each other in the middle, the space between their bases and the rocks filled with smaller bits and the driest kindling she could find.

Of course, once it was put together, getting it started was the easiest thing in the world: she just told Alim which parts of it to set alight in which order and he took care of it.

As the sun dipped lower through the trees, everybody had found their way back to the clearing. Lýna had already set slices of the skin from her birds to fry on the flat faces of the rocks, in fat taken from Merrick's elk, herbs from Justien and Morden's group, and salt from her pouch (She'd used a fair bit, she'd have to refill that when they got back to Redcliffe.) Apparently, that wasn't something that Alamarri did, which was weird, it was very common in the south — after convincing them no, really, it was good, try it, they snacked on the skins, berries, and nuts while preparing everything else.

Several little stew pots — a single one big enough to feed all of them would have been difficult to carry — were carefully placed around the fire, bits of Lýna's birds or Justien's rabbit or the elk or what little was salvageable from Alim and Lacie's catch (or a mix of them, depending on the pot) set to boil with a few different kinds of roots and onions Lèlja had tracked down while Lýna had been working on the fire pit. Lýna was pretty sure some of those should be out of season, but they were perennial, she must have gotten lucky — or her god had pointed her straight to them, who knew. (There were advantages to having shamans around, after all.) Some thin slices from the birds and the rabbits replaced the skins on the stones. A few of the men carefully fashioned some simple spits to roast cuts from the elk, which probably wouldn't have turned out too well without mages on hand to magically harden the wood and guard it against fire, but Lýna decided to let that one pass. It wasn't significantly worse of a cheat than Lýna having Alim start the fire for her.

The clearing was filled with the smell of the cookfire — smoke and meat and herbs — and the chatter of their band, talking and joking and laughing. As the sun dipped below the hills, night beginning to fall properly, the wineskins were passed around (mostly mead, no actual wine, she didn't know why they called them that), and the feast went on.

Lýna didn't talk much. She hadn't much at things like this even back home — she'd been a quiet child in general, for a variety of reasons, and that had never really changed much. Sitting near the fire, talking to just Lèlja or Solana or whoever stopped by for a moment, watching the rest of them, was the way she preferred it.

At one point, Alim and Lacie kissed rather...enthusiastically, to laughter and teasing from several of the others. Lýna shook her head — she was starting to think those two might be a little odd.

The noise and activity in the clearing gradually simmered down, quieter and calmer, as the stew pots and wineskins were emptied and the night deepened. In time, Lýna decided the moment had come. She stood before the crackling flames, signaled Solana with a nod. "The Wardens were forged in fire."

Lýna's voice filled the clearing — not overly loud, but reaching from one end to the other unnaturally evenly, propelled by Solana's magic. Everyone perked up, surprised, some with an edge of fear (most were still unaccustomed to magic), those who'd figured out what was going on quicker shushing the others or nodding at Lýna. She paused a moment, partially for effect, but partially just to gather her words. Her Alamarri was coming along, or so everyone else claimed, but it still wasn't perfect. To try to get around any awkwardness or confusion, Lýna had tried writing out what she would say beforehand (which had been a pain), massaging out mistakes or miswordings with Solana. She didn't have the paper with her, of course, so she wouldn't be reciting it word for word, but she'd thought working it out like that had helped anyway.

"When the first Wardens gathered, the Blight had ravaged the world for generations." Solana's word, ravaged, it was a good one. "None had seen the like before, mindless monsters that spread deadly magics like plague, led by a corrupted god. Many believed it was, truly, the end of the world, that all would be devoured, elf and human and dwarf to disappear for all time. They came together — elf and human and dwarf, warrior and mage and slave — desperate to find some way to end the Blight, by any means necessary. And so in the fire of the First Blight the Wardens were forged.

"But where I come from we have a saying: until the bear leaves, the wolf and the lion are friends." Not a great translation, but she and Solana hadn't managed a clearer way to say it without getting rather long, it was close enough. "The Archdemon was slain, the darkspawn were pushed back, and the peoples of the world thought the danger was passed. But the Wardens knew the Blight, and they knew it would return. But how to keep together wolf and lion — elf and human and dwarf, warrior and mage and slave — when the bear seemed to have left? If they were to survive, to still be here when the Blight returned, they needed something stronger than an enemy to join them.

"Where I come from, connections are also forged in fire — we do not mean an enemy, but..." Lýna spread her arms, copying the gesture from Stone-River's Storyteller. "...this. Alliances by the sword may not last longer than the sword is needed, but alliances by the fire — different peoples come together with food and drink, talk and laughter, in time even marriage and children — these are deeper. Connections not made just out of desperation to live, but of life, the heart of what people are, shared with each other.

"Knowing this, the Wardens were made not an army, with generals commanding soldiers, masters and slaves, but a brotherhood in common. And so they were then, so we are now. Once you have done the Joining, there is no leaving the Wardens, this is so. Our lives before are as nothing, all of it left behind, this is so. A Warden is not peasant or slave, farmer or craftsman, noble or king, but a Warden alone, this is so.

"All that is so, but the Wardens are brothers and sisters, tied together as tightly as kin, not in blood but in purpose. There is no leaving the Wardens, that is so. But the Wardens live in common, as we have for this feast tonight, care for each other as brothers and sisters do. Once you have Joined, you will always have a home with us, for the rest of your life."

Lýna let another dramatic pause linger — partially to let that thought sit, and partially just because she was still uncomfortable with the next bit. She didn't know how to read some of the expressions before her, flickering light and shadow playing across their faces. The fire really didn't help figure it out. A lot of them seemed surprised, that she would say something that...sentimental — she knew the recruits tended to think she was a "cold, hard bitch," as Dairren had put it once (where he hadn't known she could hear). Lýna realized she wasn't...particularly expressive about things sometimes, and could easily give the wrong impression because of it, this was something people had noted to her before — Ásta had spent a couple years thinking Lýna inexplicably hated her, Tallẽ had thought she was uncomfortable with the match (she kind of had been, to be fair, just not for the reasons he'd thought) — but she found the conclusions people drew from that somewhat baffling.

Even the full Wardens looked somewhat taken aback, Keran especially, through Alim was giving her an attentive sort of look, head tilted in curiosity — not surprised, just interested. When he noticed she was looking at him, his lips twitched into a smirk and he nodded a little, so, this sentiment from her wasn't at all unexpected to him, at least.

Lèlja, she noticed, was giving her an intensely warm, almost glowing smile. Didn't now how to read that one...

Anyway, she should move on before people started wondering whether that was it. "But, as in a family, there are different roles Wardens must play. Groups must be arranged, training led, lands held and supplies gathered, secrets kept, moves planned. And so there must be officers. But we are in a difficult time, now. The Wardens of Ferelden are so few, and so we have not built up as we should. Our Commander died at Ostagar, alongside one lieutenant. Another lieutenant was in Denerim, held by an enemy, and is beyond us even if he yet lives. I am the only one left.

"But not anymore. Keran, Alim, stand up." Mutters and whispers swept the clearing, people glancing at each other, as Alim popped up to his feet in a blink — and then teetered slightly, must be a little drunk. Keran was a little slower to stand, having wasted a few seconds staring at Lýna in shock, blankly blinking. Lýna repeated what Duncan had said to her as well as she could remember it, though changing some bits to match the situation. "I am raising you two to Warden-Lieutenant, as of now. The First Warden in the far north is meant to confirm these things, and I can't reach him now, but take it as so in any case. You are to lead the bands we've put together during training, until we need to change things. Understand?"

Even those in the clearing who hadn't been surprised a minute ago were now. Lýna assumed nobody would have guessed that, if she were to promote a couple Wardens, it would be these two.

Though honestly it hadn't taken that long to come to a decision. The only full Wardens they had right now, excluding Lýna, were Alistair, Alim, Perry, and Keran. She was always going to promote Alim — in fact, she recalled thinking to herself during the fighting at Ostagar that she should talk to Duncan about it. Alim might seem rather silly most of the time, but he was a very competent mage — and more importantly, creative, making that ice bridge on the tower had been a neat trick — and was very knowledgeable about the Alamarri and their lands, which would be useful. The only doubts she'd had were whether he had the nerve to make terrible but necessary decisions (Wardens oppose the Blight, by any means necessary), and whether he could lead well. She'd thought he might make a good constable, where neither of those would be as big of a problem.

Having watched him over the last month, she didn't really think those were a problem anymore. She was a little concerned about how his band would do on their own, if they would follow him, but it should probably be fine. As far as she could tell, Alim had a much more Avvar style of leadership than the Alamarri she'd seen — he was very friendly with his people, teasing and joking around, but could be somewhat frightening when he was crossed. (At least in part just because Alamarri were frightened of magic in general, but Lýna wasn't opposed to exploiting that when it suited her.) He apparently wasn't doing it on purpose, which could make it difficult to leverage on purpose, but Lýn was sure Alistair and even Sedwulf would step in to keep everyone together if necessary. And Alim's reluctance to do terrible but necessary things had weakened since Ostagar — from his quiet contemplation of the bandits she'd executed on the highway outside Lothering, to stepping back and letting the Templars kill the rest of the rebel mages with little protest (though he had been angry and sad for the rest of their stay at the Circle) — still reluctant and uncomfortable with such things, but willing, which would do.

Perry wasn't an option, though not for the reasons she might have thought when they'd met. She'd noticed as soon as Ostagar that he was a much better fighter than she'd expected (not excellent, but quick and clever enough to do well), and he'd done well leading his wing against the undead at Redcliffe, and very well dealing with people here while they'd been at the Circle. Of the other Wardens, he'd probably been the most willing to make terrible but necessary decisions from the very beginning. (Which had seemed a little weird at first, given how skittish he'd been around Lýna at first, but with what she now knew of his past it made far more sense.) He was uneducated — Lýna had learned a week ago that he couldn't even read very well — but he was surprisingly good with people, and knew a lot about how Alamarri life really worked, as his and Keran's differing views of the role of this land's soldiers showed. He might not be 'honorable' as the Alamarri knew it, but he was turning out to be a surprisingly good Warden.

There was one simple reason she couldn't pick him: he was an elf. She was always going to promote Alim, and if she promoted him and Perry then all three of the Wardens' leaders would be elves. The humans of the Alamarri would not stand for that, they wouldn't take them seriously — Lýna hadn't even had to ask Solana to know that. She could only have one of them, and she'd picked Alim.

So she'd been stuck with Alistair and Keran, both of whom had issues. Alistair was the only Warden whose raw skill and training came anywhere close to hers — if he leaned into his Templar magic he could even beat her in a duel (with single blades, and as long as she didn't cheat, which she always would in a real fight). He might not be very creative strategically — forming a proper shieldwall against the undead instead of, say, setting the whole hillside on fire — but he could be clever tactically — doing crazy shit like, say, throwing his shield at the back of a Dread Knight's head. Lýna didn't know how the Templar magic worked — Alistair (and everyone she'd asked) insisted it wasn't magic, but it obviously was — but it was obviously useful stuff. He might joke around and goof off a bit, but when things got serious determination took over in a blink — he was clearly completely dedicated, focused on what mattered with every fiber of his being.

Which Lýna guessed was leftover from his Templar training — as much as she might be uncomfortable with even the idea of warrior shamans forcing their faith on everyone else, Alistair's loyalty was to the Wardens now, and she'd take what she could get.

Also, while Lýna, Alim, and Perry might not be, Alistair was what Alamarri considered to be an 'honorable' sort of person, which made the other Alamarri gravitate to him. Seemingly without either side realizing it was happening, which was kind of funny — like Lýna, the Alamarri would have grown up with stories about what a good person was, how a good leader should act, it was just natural they'd be attracted to someone who fit the role. But, in a way, that was exactly the problem: Alistair was not capable of making necessary but terrible decisions. His arguing with her on the highway, about taking Lèlja along (at first, he'd gotten over that one), recruiting Solana and Jowan, her matching of bluffs with the Arl... No, he might make a good Alamarri leader, but not a Warden one. For all his dedication to their mission, he was just too soft.

And he might make a good Alamarri leader, but Lýna wasn't actually convinced of that. She hadn't missed how extremely uncomfortable he'd been with Eamon's effort to make him king, how relieved he'd been when Lýna had absolutely refused to allow it (however uncomfortable he'd been with the words she'd used to say it) — as much as Alistair might have some of the traits Alamarri prized in their leaders, he wasn't emotionally suited to do it, he didn't want it. Even how, when they did have those arguments about decisions she'd made, once Alistair had made his opinion known and she remained firm he just accepted that and moved on, even that suggested he just wasn't suited to it. He had no confidence in himself and his choices, certainly not enough to make hard choices for his people, no, it just wasn't in him.

Which left only Keran. She was noble, so had been taught many things growing up like Solana had, and was also a fully-trained warrior, so had plenty of skill there. Similar to Alistair, she was 'honorable' by Alamarri standards, so had an edge at convincing Alamarri to follow her (though somewhat overshadowed in that by Alistair being right next to her). She didn't have the confidence issues Alistair did, which would actually make her the better leader, despite not having quite the same appeal to the Alamarri. (Lýna had gotten the impression that while people in the north would follow women, they preferred men for the role.) In most circumstances, she'd be the exact sort of person the Wardens would look to promote.

There were a couple problems, though. Keran was, often, too 'honorable', had issues with the sort of things Wardens must do — and, since she had higher confidence in herself than Alistair, was more likely to stick to her opinion on the matter. She could be convinced, though. Like, with the bandits on the highway, the argument that they'd just keep on preying on people if the Wardens left them landed better than the others, and Solana and Jowan, she...

Well, she'd come around on Solana pretty quick, but not Jowan — at least in part, Lýna assumed, because Solana insisted she hadn't actually done blood magic at all, where Jowan didn't even try to deny it, just said he'd been scared and desperate (which Lýna thought was reasonable, but Alamarri and magic) — though she had changed her mind over the last couple weeks, after seeing for herself how soft and silly and rather harmless Jowan seemed. (Lýna got the feeling Alamarri expected mages who used blood magic to be...different, somehow?) She still didn't like Morrigan being around, but she was quiet about that one at least. She didn't like the way Lýna had spoken to Eamon...but mostly just because she'd been rude — Keran had admitted that Eamon wasn't Lýna's Arl, so she couldn't be expected to obey him just because he said so, as Alistair kind of seemed to, but she could have been more polite about it.

She wasn't swayed by Lýna's argument that Eamon had been rude to her first, which was slightly annoying, since that was completely true. She suspected they were working on very different codes of what was acceptable behavior between people, because in the south his consciously delayed hospitality (done as a power-play) and condescending barbs would have more than justified her relatively mild hostility — if they were Avvar, she could have challenged him to a duel for his holdings over the insult, and nobody would have disputed her right to do so. But okay.

Really, Keran didn't like Lýna just in general...in much the same way she didn't like Morrigan. According to Lèlja, it was in fact the exact same way: Keran had admitted to Lèlja (who'd later told Lýna) that she was seriously uncomfortable with following a heathen elf, just on principle. See, Keran was very pious (the word Lèlja used), she didn't like that Lýna didn't follow the Alamarri god, thought it... She thought that Lýna's judgement was inherently questionable, that she must be less reasonable and less moral for this alone — now that Lýna knew a bit more about what the Chantry taught, probably worried Lýna was more vulnerable to being manipulated by demons, since they believed other people's gods were demons. Which was some of the worst self-righteous nonsense Lýna had ever heard, but there was nothing she could do about that.

Lýna wondered whether telling Keran that her People's gods were sealed away somewhere they couldn't be reached — save for the Wolf, whose words she would immediately distrust (and also the Mother, but she would strategically fail to mention Her) — so it was impossible for them to manipulate her, would help at all. Probably not.

So she wasn't entirely happy with the idea of promoting Keran, but between her and Alistair Lýna thought she was the better choice. Also, raising someone who disagreed with her might actually be a good thing. Between them, Alim and Keran rather neatly displayed the two styles of thought common in their people — Alim's might more agree with her (or could be easily talked into agreeing with her), but she thought Keran's was actually more common. It was good, Lýna thought, for the others to see that she was respectfully listening to Keran's thoughts on things, even if she ended up not doing as she recommended. From her own time watching how all kinds of groups worked together, she knew it was sometimes even more important for people to know they were being heard and that their concerns were being taken seriously, whether they ended up getting their way or not.

And sometimes Keran did get her way. She'd seemed surprised when Lýna had agreed she could stay in Redcliffe instead of coming to the Circle, apparently having thought Lýna would drag her along no matter what she said. When she'd found out how bad things at the Circle had been, Keran had even apologized and said she should have come with, and been surprised again when Lýna had insisted her apology was unnecessary — she couldn't have known, and she'd done good work for them in Redcliffe, it was fine. Lately, they'd had several disagreements about training the recruits — particularly, Keran kept having them do drills on their own, practicing certain movements without an opponent over and over and over, which Lýna thought was silly and pointless but Keran insisted was useful — but Lýna more often than not just went with Keran's ideas, no matter how strange they seemed. Keran knew how the Alamarri trained their warriors far better than Lýna did, when it didn't seem like Keran was obviously making things worse Lýna saw little reason to intervene.

That had helped a little bit, she thought, in convincing Keran that Lýna wasn't some crazy, violent savage who couldn't be reasoned with. Not a lot, but it was better than it'd been in the beginning.

And occasionally agreeing with Keran was even better for morale reasons than just listening to her, so.

No, she wasn't happy with it. But, as few as the Wardens were, she simply didn't have any other options. Keran would just have to do.

(Lýna hoped she wasn't making a mistake — prayers for advice to both the All-Mother and the Lady of the Skies had gone unanswered.)

Once Alim had worked through his uncertainty, face shifting from one uneasy expression to another, he grinned. "Sure, boss, I'll do my best," he chirped, Solana's magic carrying his voice as well. Lýna didn't really doubt that.

Keran shot Alim a look, frowning a little. But only for a second, she turned back to Lýna with a serious sort of nod — she still seemed a little shocked, but she was pushing past it, at least. "I understand. I will serve to the best of my ability." Lýna didn't doubt that, either, whether she would or not hadn't even been a consideration. Keran hesitated, just for a blink, before adding, "I am honored you would entrust me with this responsibility, Lieutenant."

Had Keran ever actually used her title before? She didn't think so... "Ma ghý midhèra dy-ma, Lieutenant." Keran would have no idea what that meant, she didn't speak a word of Deluvẽ, but Lýna wasn't certain it even translated into Alamarri at all. "And there is one other thing," she said, as people started shifting and talking, moving to congratulate the new officers. They settled back down immediately, curious — though again, the magic probably helped. "Should the Warden-Commander die, with no chosen successor," another of Solana's words, "the officers choose the next from among themselves. We face a Fifth Blight, and yet we have no commander. And so we must choose one. I put forward myself."

There was a short beat of silence, filled only with the crackling of the fire and the rustling of the wind.

Then Alim snorted. "You know, Lýna, you're a little too serious about everything sometimes."

...She had no idea how to respond to that.

But apparently she didn't have to, because Alim continued on after a couple seconds of fixing her with a crooked, teasing, exasperated sort of look. "You've been the boss of us since Duncan put you in charge back in Ostagar anyway. The only difference a fancy new title is going to make is that dwarven and Fereldan lords are far more likely to take the Warden-Commander seriously than they would some lowly lieutenant. So, I second — Lýna should be Commander."

There were a few snickers at that, though Lýna wasn't certain what Alim had said was so funny. Keran didn't speak right away, watching Alim, eyes flicking between Lýna and Alistair and, weirdly, Lèlja. She might put forward herself, Lýna thought. In a vote between them, Perry would choose Lýna (he didn't like Keran much), but Alistair could go either way. Getting four of five wouldn't be ideal, but three out of five would be a problem, Lýna would rather discuss what Keran's objections were and see if they could be talked out before having a vote, but if that didn't—

"I concur. Lyna has been our Commander since Duncan fell at Ostgar, and it is time we acknowledge it."

Lýna blinked — she...hadn't expected that. And apparently she wasn't the only one who was surprised either, a wave of mutters swept through the clearing, glances thrown back and forth. (It wasn't really a secret that Keran had issues with Lýna's leadership.) But she gathered herself quickly, nodded back at her. "Alistair and Perry, before it is decided you both get a vote too."

Confusion and disbelief took over Keran's face, and not just her, spreading to most of the ones she could make out — apparently, they hadn't really understood what she'd meant about the Wardens being a brotherhood. (Though it shouldn't come as any shock, didn't Alamarri tradition also include choosing their own leaders?) Alistair was the first to respond, pushing himself up to his feet to speak. "Back at Ostagar, just after Duncan promoted you in the first place, the three of us — me, Keran, and Alim — talked about how he probably meant for you to take over if the battle went badly. I thought then that, of the five of us, you were the most suited to it, and you haven't changed my mind since. You have my vote." His lips curled into a smirk. "Just don't let it go to your head — I can still pick you up and carry you off with one hand."

Lýna gave him a look. "Yes, yes, very funny. You know I'm small for my People too, I hear this always."

"Sure," Alistair said, grinning, "I have noticed that. It just means you're even more adorable than the average elven girl. Deadly, but cute and tiny — like a baby dragon."

There was some scandalized chuckling at that, wary glances flicking over to her, as though worried how she would react. Lýna just rolled her eyes. It was hardly the first time Alistair had said something like that...

That left only Perry, eyes flicking to him as he still stood there, indecisive. Which was a little odd, Lýna had expected Perry to be far more certain in his support of her than Alistair. After another couple seconds wavering under their gaze, he gave Lýna an apologetic grimace, and turned a little to the left, facing Lèlja. "Ah, Sister?"

Lèlja had spent the whole night sitting right by the fire — she'd set her armor and boots aside, leaving her barefoot in pale linens, the cloth glowing with reflected firelight. From where Lýna was standing, she could make out the smile on her face, but she sat between the fire and most of the crowd, to them she was probably little more than a pale silhouette against the flames. "Yes, child?"

Lýna managed to hold in a snort — she was pretty sure Perry was older than Lèlja. But that was just a thing their shamans (or not-shamans) said, so Perry didn't react. "I were thinking... I don't mean nothing for it, but Lyna ain't..."

"You have concerns following a woman who does not sing the Chant," Lèlja said, a soft, understanding sort of tone on her voice. For a second, Lýna thought she must be guessing totally wrong, Perry had never given any sign that that bothered him before...but then he nodded, a little sheepishly, shooting her another guilty look.

...Huh. She'd had no idea.

Lèlja's smile weakened a little, a more solemn, serious cast coming over her. "I imagine the Clerics might have something to say on the matter, but the Chant itself is clear. Shartan and his rebels did not acknowledge the Maker, and even through the end and beyond most never did. That Lýna stands here at all is proof of that — she is descended from those among Shartan's rebels who chose to keep to their people's traditions. And yet..." Her smile widened again, more warmth slipping into her voice. "...the Bride of the Maker called him Brother all the same. As Tevinter of old threatened both our peoples, so does the Blight. I have no doubt the Maker would prefer we live together than die apart."

Tension gradually dribbled out of Perry's shoulders as Lèlja spoke, and then he nodded. "Right. Right, that makes sense. I agree, it should be you, Lyna."

She nodded at him, the last of the tension vanishing as...well, as she didn't get angry with him for that whole thing, she guessed. (Honestly, she was mostly just wondering how she hadn't noticed all this time that that bothered him.) "All right. It is so."

There was a short silence — everyone watching her, waiting — before Alim again broke it with a scoff. "What, is that it?" He started walking toward her, carefully picking over Wynvir's legs (and almost tripping), shaking his head. "Your flair for the dramatic is ridiculously hit-and-miss, you know that?"

"What...?"

Alim bent over to snatch a wineskin from next to Lèlja's foot. Turning back to the crowd, he lifted it up and called, "To the Warden-Commander!"

There was a scramble for more wineskins, everyone hopping up to their feet after him — a couple lost their balance, had to give it a second try — more drinks were raised, and then there was a lot of shouting, Lýna winced at the noise.

There were more calls after that one, repeated by the rest of the crowd, loud enough it was quickly giving Lýna a headache, she was having trouble picking out some of the words. Eyes kept flicking back to her, and then there'd be another call from someone, to and about her, she noticed — to be repeated back, or in a couple cases followed with laughter, like when someone said may she terrify the Archdemon as much as she does Sister Eda. As it went on, Lýna felt her ears burning, tried not to look uncomfortable.

She didn't know much about the Alamarri, but this seemed very similar to an Avvar heiðraminni — a ritual where they shouted out one of their people's accomplishments to the stars, calling on the gods and their ancestors to see and favor them. And that comparison made her feel kind of...weird.

Not bad. Just weird.

(She should just be grateful this had gone so well, she guessed...)

---

[She wasn't sure what that meant, but it might be the same as Chasind boas] — Like irl English borrowed "boss" from Dutch "baas", the Alamarri word is ultimately from Anders, which ended up making its way around during the Qunari wars — Anders forces were involved in the liberation of Tevinter (6:72 - 7:23) and the war on the Minanter (7:55-74). For various reasons, the Marchers deeply distrusted the other forces involved in the war on their lands (Tevinter, Nevarra, Orlais, and also Starkhaven)...which was wise, considering the major powers partitioned the Marches in the aftermath. The Anders were generally considered the most trustworthy of the bunch, so were the ones the locals preferred to deal with. There were even plenty of intermarriages and stuff, and a fair number of Anders ended up staying behind in the Marches after the war, resulting in a few borrowed words here and there and even a couple tiny Anders-speaking pockets in the Marches (mostly in Ansburg and Markham). It's just a native word in Chasind, though.

Phew, that took a while. And why is this so long? Jesus...

I've been kind of trying to write for The Plan lately, and having limited success. My writing has been kind of all over the place lately, it's been fucking impossible to focus on anything. Just today I even had a breakthrough on the scene in Echoes I was stuck on (in my head, haven't written anything yet), which, uuuuggghhhh...

Point is, yeah, don't expect any updates for any of my fics anything like consistently. The next chapter contains the first bit that could properly be called romance content — past the 400k word mark, talk about slow burn, lol — and I have been kind of looking forward to that scene, so I may or may not get it out quicker than this one (which I struggled with). We'll see how it goes.