She knew she shouldn't have left Oghren, Alistair, and Morrigan alone. But all she wanted was a damn bath and the stream nearby had been so tempting. She thought leaving Trout was the best solution, but when she returned to their camp, she found the other two groups had arrived from their efforts scouting the forest, but Oghren was sleeping in the midst of the general excitement, Trout at his feet.
Well. There were two distinct possibilities. The first, and most troubling, that Morrigan snapped and incinerated Alistair, then went on the run. In a second, less likely but still probable scenario, was that Ali murdered Morrigan and was burying her body somewhere the werewolves wouldn't get it out of deference to Chantal.
"Bleedin' didn't know I was their nanny." Oghren mumbled with a yawn when she woke him. "Soddin' nugbrains will slink back in their own sweet time."
"Oh really." Chantal drew herself to her full height. Thankfully, Oghren was one of the few people in the world she could stand head and shoulders above despite her own slight build. Thank the Maker for dwarves. "And if they've gotten eaten by werewolves? Attacked by sentient trees?"
"At least they don't have to listen to anymore poetry." Oghren chuckled sleepily. "Heh. Poet-trees."
She was going to light him on fire. Before she could summon the mana to her fingertips, Zevran tsked from behind her. "Mi amor, they are quite deadly. I would not wish to be their enemy, si? I assure you they are fine."
Chantal whirled swiftly on the balls on her feet, glaring at Zevran. He held up his hands defensively, blocking her indignant fury with nothing more than a charming smile and a loose bunch of kindling he clutched in one hand. "Alas, I wish even less to get on your bad side. If you must smite anyone, I insist you return your attention to Oghren."
"He's jealous." Oghren scratched at his beard with a slightly wobbly wink in her direction and a rather pointed leer. "Once you try dwarves, there's no going back Warden."
"Yes." Zevran's smirk danced on the pointed knife's edge of mischief. "According to his last wife, there's also no going back to men after Oghren."
Chantal couldn't get pulled into this right now. Oghren huffed, loudly, "Knife-eared pipe-cleaner, I oughta…"
She pinched her nose and closed her eyes so tightly she could see stars. "Stop!" She ordered. The whole camp seemed to freeze, dropping into silence. Chantal let out a long, deep breath and opened her eyes again. Everyone stared at her, waiting for her next instruction.
Oh if Ser Gregor could see her now. His templars never even snapped to attention so quickly. The thought, brief as it was, surprised her, but also ignited something warm in her chest. Something bright and sweet. She lowered her eyes to Trout who whined, ducking his head in shame. She pointed into the forest while holding Trout's eyes. "You're the one who was in charge, you better help find them."
Trout barked, jumping up in excitement, his whole rear shaking while he twisted in a tight circle, smelling the ground.
"Oh, Chantal, child…" Wynne smiled benignly. "I wouldn't worry. They'll come back when they're ready."
"Well, it is a good thing they don't get to decide when they're ready." Chantal declared peevishly while Trout darted off down one of the paths. She stalked off after him, halfway down the path before she heard Leliana giggle behind her. The other woman playfully snaked her arm through Chantal's as if they were going for a pleasant stroll through the market. She hummed in the dappled twilight, smile amused and indulgent.
"What are you up to?" Chantal asked suspiciously. Leliana widened her eyes, smiling in faux innocence.
"I am accompanying my dearest friend to look for two of our missing companions!" Leliana chirped sweetly. Chantal didn't buy it for a moment as Trout pressed his nose back to the dirt in front of them then veered off down a more overgrown trail.
"I can't believe them." Chantal vented, ducking beneath a hanging branch. "Fate of the world in the balance, but all they do is snap at each other! Andraste knows what they're fighting about this time."
"Oh Chantal…" Leliana giggled, but didn't elaborate. Chantal speared her with what she hoped was a rather reproving gaze. The redhead simply shrugged. "Perhaps all is well."
It wouldn't be when she dragged them back to camp by their respective ears and made them do all the work of cooking tonight. Trout barked happily up ahead, diving through a bush. Chantal pushed through the briars as well, opening her mouth to begin scolding immediately.
The sight before her made her close it immediately. Two pale, long limbed fingers were staring at Trout as he barked and circled, falling to his back in his joy at having found them. Morrigan sat astride Alistair, her hands balanced on his chest, and Alistair's own clutched at her bare thighs.
Bare. Nude. Completely, utterly naked. They both were as devoid of clothing as the day they were born. Chantal froze as their eyes swung from Trout to Chantal and Leliana. Chantal gawked at them like a fish out of water, felt her color rising to her face.
"Oh!" Leliana snapped her fingers as if the thought had just come to her. "There is an Antivan phrase for this, yes? I believe it is 'in flagrante delicto', but we should ask Zevran to be certain."
Chantal was going to dump Leliana in the nearest stream. Her hands flew up to her face to shield her eyes and that motion seemed to break the spell holding everything frozen.
"This, this… this isn't what it looks like!" She could hear Alistair's armor clattering as he fumbled to try and pull some of it back on. "See, there was some kind of poison… poison plant. And we stumbled into it, so we needed to bathe and…"
"Will you stop blathering!" Morrigan didn't seem to be in a hurry to put her clothing on. At least, Chantal couldn't hear any rustling of robes. She also didn't sense any mana being pulled, so Morrigan wasn't preparing to smite them. Yet.
Thank the Maker. It wouldn't be fair to duel another mage when she was sans a stitch of clothing. Chantal risked a peek through her fingers and saw that Alistair at least managed to get his breeches on, although he was trying to put his head through the hole in his shirt made for his arm while hopping up and down attempting to shove a boot back on.
Morrigan calmly stood in front of both her and Leliana, arms crossed sternly, eyes bright with fury. "So, tis fit to spy on me?"
"I was not spying." Chantal lowered her hands, frowning at Morrigan even as Alistair toppled over. Trout whined and nosed him with a bit of alarm. Chantal ignored them. "I… I honestly thought you'd both gone off to murder each other."
"I am simply here for the show." Leliana looked positively gleeful, watching Alistair groan and writhe with embarassment with rather keen interest. "Continue on, do not mind me."
"And now you know we have not." Chantal couldn't be sure, but she thought Morrigan may even have been blushing under her fury. "So, shall I bow after this performance?"
"If murder is still on the table, at least make it quick." Alistair groaned. Chantal didn't bother looking down at him. Instead, she took a hesitant step forward.
She'd caught something in Morrigan's gaze, something that reminded her of a cornered bear or a spooked cat. Angry, of course, but also frightened. Puffing itself up larger than it had to be, and all Chantal could think about was Morrigan's mother. Mothers, after all, were supposed to love their children.
Even if Chantal had no mother of her own, she had Wynne, and Wynne did love her, wanted what was best for her, even if she was insufferable and wrong half the time. At least Wynne had not raised her like a lamb for slaughter, waiting to murder her and crawl into her skin.
Chantal's skin prickled and she reached out as if to soothe a wild animal. "Mori…"
Morrigan stiffened, instantly wary. Chantal pitched her voice low to soothe. "It's not a crime to… to like someone."
"Even Alistair." Leliana chimed in agreeably.
"Thanks." Alistair finally had his head through the right hole in his shirt, staring at Morrigan's back with something like gentle concern. He lifted up her robes and shook them out gingerly. At the sound of fabric rustling, Morrigan turned and ripped them from his hands, throwing them over her head.
"There is nothing here but sex." Morrigan snapped, grabbing her abandoned staff. "Lust. Anything else is simply a delusion."
Morrigan had her back to Alistair, she missed his shattered expression, but Chantal didn't. Luckily, Leliana stepped in smoothly. "Surely there is nothing wrong with a bit of delusion? All love in fact starts…"
"Love!" Morrigan scoffed, but it was not Leliana she pinned with her harsh yellow gaze. Chantal bore the brunt of it, of Morrigan's distrust, her fury. "To indulge in love is to indulge in delusion. A Grey Warden such as yourself cannot believe otherwise."
Love. Love. Zevran's lips at her neck, his arms around her, his warm smile and playful purr. The way he made her laugh, the way the sun seemed to glow just a bit brighter around him. Her lips felt numb when she answered. "I'm not sure what I believe."
"Then you are a foolish girl. One who has been too long cooped up in a tower and knows nothing of…"
"Stop it." Chantal ordered, but unlike at the camp, her fiercest companion did not fall in line. Morrigan drew herself up instead, eyes crackling, her mouth opening into the sneer of a wild, wounded animal.
"He doesn't love you." She spat venomously. "Tis all a game to him, just as it is to me."
"That isn't true." Chantal tried to remain calm, controlled. Her mana surged beneath her skin like an inferno, but she was a commander. She was a Warden. She did not lose her temper, she did not cry or scream or pull down lightning and storms from the sky.
"Lie to yourself if you must." Morrigan snarled. Before Chantal could say anything else, even Morrigan's name, even a suggestion of where exactly she could shove her misplaced fear and rage, Chantal felt the whirl of mana. The next moment she watched as Morrigan took off in a flutter of sleek black feathers.
"Well." Alistair's shoulders were hunched forward like a wounded child's. "That went well."
Leliana whirled, wide eyes panicked, apologies already spilling from her lips. Chantal frowned and shrugged her own wooden shoulders. "She'll come back." She declared, more confidently than she felt.
"And if she doesn't?" Alistair asked the ground. Chantal didn't know what to say, so she said the only thing she could.
"We end the blight. We stay together." She repeated it like a mantra. Her little family. Her home. Her love. "That's all we can do."