.

The Spectral Breath

~~o~~

Chapter Eleven: Dwarven Shambles

His name was 'Master Dwyvaris Durnoch,' merchant of a guild marked in curses from a pit in Denerim that he could barely pronounce. She caught all that information and more simply by overhearing his morning argument with a halla and orange.

Lain over a poorly thatched cot, there was little the small stump of a man could do but watch as the beast ripped his sack of goods asunder and delve into the fruit peels and flavourings.

It was truly unfortunate for him that he could not act on it other than waving his fists. There were no bumps under his blanket were legs should have been, only thicker, smaller stumps. "Get outa here you ignorant shrew! Away with you! Away!"

The halla raised its snout, blinked profusely and sneezed.

The dwarf cringed, folding the blanket up to his hairy neck. "Damnation! No one's going to want to eat those oranges now… unless…" He glanced warily around the courtyard, cringing away when his glimpses landed on the dark-haired elf staring at him with a too bemused scowl. It could only warrant trouble.

"Mother Stone, I-I was only jesting, m'lady. I would never…" he chuckled, wafting his fist again for the halla to flee - it did not, "never sell rotten goods. No! No, miss that isn't what the Durnoch Family Supply is for, no miss. Though I swear the oranges lower in the sack are completely satisfactory for your purchase, if- well- do you like oranges?"

Lahris crinkled her nose. The smell was so strong it nearly had her eyes watering. No, she thought, I do not.

The dwarf licked his lips at her quietness, returning to shoo the halla away from his merchandise. "Come on, ram! Please just leave what little I have alone…" He groaned, rubbing the dust and grime from his cheeks and red-forked beard. "And this is how it ends. No legs, no dignity, just a small sack of oranges that even that creature has taken from me. Ancestor's bones, I'm damned."

"Damned?" the elvhen blinked, gesturing to the deflated sack. "How do you survive on only oranges?"

"Good salesmanship and a whole lot of Durnoch ingenuity is the secret to my trade, m'lady. Shame the family crest ends in the dirt, as it were. And look at these," he groaned, whacking the end of his cot with an oar-like arm, "they're gone too! If I'd known I'd lose more than just my stock in that blasted ruin, I'd have turned around and gone straight back to Denerim. Now my guards are gone, my supplies lost… while there's a damnable spirit perhaps gawking at us right now, laughing at my misfortune. Well, I'm a fighter, I am. I'm gonna go back there, take my supplies and teach that hag what it's like to cripple a dwarf!"

"You barely had much of a leg to keep anyway, shemlen. Truth be told. Could you even climb stairways?"

The dwarf bristled. "What kind of knife-eared question was that, ey? Oh, I see. I see how it is. Couldn't just let the cripple mourn in peace. You had to come and take a chunk out of me as well. This, this is why I don't deal with your kind in the alienages, rabbit. Too damned proud, even when you're living in the sticks."

Lahris offered him a hesitant smile. She caught the halla by the snout, coaxed it to one side and snapped a thread of twine from the spindle beside her. Sewing the breach closed, she dragged the sack to his cot, smiling further when his stubby fingers closed over the knot.

"The halla are curious creatures but they are gentle. Keep this close and they will not bother you further. Until you sleep, at least."

One opal eye swept down her form, from grey tunic and amber shawl to the leather waist-belt and mossy skirts. The badge of the Inquisition glinted bronze on her chest, though the intensity of his eye had her shiver. Lahris crossed her arms and shied away, even when an unknown humour caught his beard, causing a pearly grin to flash through the bristles. "Heh, much obliged. Doesn't mean I forgive ya, though."

"I would not dream of it, durgen'len. But I do require a favour."

"You're not a debt collector, are ya? If so, you might as well kill me."

She smiled, shaking her head. She spread her mantle over a wiry grass bed and sat by his cot, folding her legs together. "I am interested in the temple you found. The clan has known of it for ages but never set foot inside. I am going to go there soon, but I am not quite sure what to expect. You have seen this spirit for yourself. Do you know what it looked like? What it wished? Tell me all you can, Dwyvaris, and I shall make arrangements for you to come with me so you can retrieve your supplies. Unless you would like us to retrieve them instead-"

"No!" he interrupted, grinning sheepishly when her eyebrows arched. "No need, m'lady. You'd never get it all. Might miss half the stock. Alright, if you can get me into that cursed place, I'll tell ya everything. Just, don't leave me behind, ye?"

Dwyvaris Durnoch spent most of the morning brandishing her with his tale, with eloquent gestures of heroism and destiny. He had originally sought a short-cut north back to Denerim, but did not wish to risk bandits along the road. Though armed with mercenaries, he theorised travelling through the forests would be an easier calling. And so he wandered the paths with his company, only stopping to camp for the night. When one of his men returned on news of a ruin, he took up the opportunity to "explore" and "adventure," though Lahris expected it was more in the way of finding valuables he could cart back home to sell.

He mentioned the ruin being dark, dismal, but otherwise free of spiders. Though one by one his men did not return, and he was left alone to fend off the darkness, that he described as "madder than a lord caught screwing." She did not truly understand that expression, even when the dwarf wiggled his brows and gestured to an arrow and sheathe.

"And what of the spirit?" she asked, elbows on knees and hands beneath her chin.

The ginger dwarf instantly blanched. "Beyond terrifying, m'lady! One moment I was swinging my axe, daring it to come at me with its razor-like jaws! But it must have snook up from behind, for the last I remember was blacking out entirely. I barely remember waking until the dawn rose over my eyes like Andraste herself was urging me, 'survive, Dwyvaris! Survive! All will be lost without you!' So I scrambled, I did. I clawed. I shimmied. Andraste herself showed me the way with the sun as her face, the trees her neck, the mountains her breasts-" he coughed, "Your Dalish must've found me later but my supply was lost. And I am a poorer merchant for it."

Her shoulders slumped forward and a frown tugged at her lips. "So, you never saw what actually took you then."

"Now, now wait just a moment there, lady. There is something." Dwyvaris fingered his snubbed nose, itching a nostril and groaning deep. "It said- darn it, what did it say? Far mule ran! No, no, varse fool damn. No, no…"

"Was it Var'sulahn?"

He clicked his stubby fingers. "You can bet my left buttock it was, miss. Though what it means, I haven't a clue, honestly. Sounded gibberish to me. Maybe elf speech."

Lahris nodded once, then rose from the ground. She bowed curtly. "Mas serannas, Dwyvaris. I will see what the Dalish can do with your lack of legs. They are very good at crafting aravels. Perhaps they can use that for you."

She turned to leave, only before she mangaged to make any real progress the dwarf had called her back. "There might be one more thing you ought to know, lady. I remember a portrait in the keep."

She turned to face him again, with green eyes taking in his measure. "A portrait? Of whom?"

He squinted in the shade of the old oak tree, twiddling his knotted beard as if truly seeing her for the first time.

"Of you, lady."

~~o~~

Lahris always liked nature.

She had been born a nobleman's daughter in her time, in a place with a name no longer known to any scribe. If she squinted just right she could imagine her father's pavilion. Initially stone crafted into intricate curves, marbled in a variety of mosaic colourings that would have a rainbow flush in jealousy.

There were tall redwoods strung across a valley from close to distance, a garden harbouring gatherings of crystal grace with shadows dappling tinkling streams. Ramps strung from the earth connected the lands together and magic twined through the branches, keeping an air to the world that granted utter contempt.

She raised a hand over the post beside her, imagining a bloom of pink flowers on the other side. A writing desk would have been the central ornament. Her sister would often use it as a study. Closing her eyes, she could almost smell the scent of honey and ginger. Las'enasal had always chosen that perfume when courting the lords by her family's estate. Though granted with many suitors, Lahris had always been the one to drive them away.

She smiled at the memory of her sister's own confession of love. Her own idyllic dalliances were the same in every way, bright and naive. Yet she never quite realised when patronising her. If only she had listened to her own words.

Those times were long gone. Sat along the wooden parapet walk peering out over the lower forest, legs dangling over the balustrade, she had come to realise that nature was always the same. It was only the people that changed.

Planks creaked under foreign pressure on the ironwood. Lahris watched the shadow cross her with a hand inching ever closer to her staff, though there was no need. It was the apostate. He peered over the Brecilian calm and complacent. Though robed his skin radiated over the rampart, and she had to wonder if she would have to cover him up in bandages to prevent the wild creatures from seeking him out as a tasty morsel.

She laughed at the mere thought, causing him to cast his gander her way. "May I ask what amuses you so, da'len?"

Lahris drew a knee up to her chest, smirking. "You would not understand even if I told you, hahren."

He arched his brow once, his own small smile rising over his confusion. "I've had the privilege of meeting your Keeper personally."

"And? Was he how you expected?"

The elf crinkled his nose. "He was… not what I expected."

"You mean he listened to you."

"Yes. Though I doubt my words held much sway. Even open to listen I doubt he will ever adhere to them. It was probably purely wasted breath in the long run."

"I never took you for an elf to give up so easily, Solas."

Her gaze caught the shimmer of a pool not far through the undergrowth - a grove of ancient evergreens brooding over waters black and cold. She had found Assan in those waters once, drowning in the bog. It was her poor hunting instincts that caused a tumbling fall into a nearby brook. Drenched in mud as foul as dung, it was not one of her finer moments.

Her focus shifted to the canopy. Above to the east the foreboding shift of cloud presented far hills and small mountains cornering them from the sea. Birds fled from the cliff to the Brecilian often, though they seemed to be the only life that came from such a place.

"You know I caught my curse searching an old ruin?"

Solas nodded.

"The temple is here. Far away enough to be a two day journey but still very close. After I found the relic, the Keeper and his huntersman found me and helped me back to health. I hardly had any understanding of who or what the Dalish were. To me they were just elves in fur skins. It was only when I spoke to Keeper Athron that they made sense."

She heard the tap of his staff hit the floor. Solas lowered to sit by her side, his own legs crossed. "That's why you brought me here."

Partly. "You could barely find anything on the curse I harbour, hahren. I thought, if you saw the ruin yourself, you might find a way to cure it, or at least stem the pain."

His features turned sympathetic. "Does it still cause you pain?"

Her right hand swept over her left arm, catching it at the fold. It had continued to hurt ever since she left Skyhold. "There is supposedly a spirit in those ruins as well. I know I'm not strong enough or knowledgeable enough to deal with it. You could."

"Ah, so that's why you wanted me here."

"Amongst other reasons," she muttered, drawing her sleeve further over her arm. The mere sight of the black marks had her gut churning uneasily. "There was a dwarf who went there. The spirit… hacked both of his legs off in the fight and left him to crawl out of the ruin barely alive."

Solas blinked. "Hacked off?"

"To the little stumps he now has, yes."

A fear caught his eyes, as if hoping that very incident would not taint her view on spirits. "Spirits do not wish to harm the living, da'len. They are curious, brilliant creatures that would never resort to violence unless provoked."

"Then we are dealing with a demon."

"A bloodthirsty one at that, I fear."

Lahris swallowed thickly. The spirits in her time had been far more pleasant, organising libraries and filling apothecaries with troves of lyrium. One had even guided her home once, lost in the forests as a child. To see what spirits were in the present day, of their revolting other visage truly unsettled her. The elves of her time would have seen her new world as an utter nightmare. But she had been through a nightmare before and survived.

"You will not leave me alone in that ruin, will you, Solas?" she asked, ignoring the hiccup of fear that slipped through her words.

It took Solas a moment to register her request, but when the understanding came, pity shined in those deep grey eyes. "I would never."

She nodded thoughtfully, reaching out to take his hand. It was only a small gesture. A caress of flesh, nothing more to her. But it caused his fingers to still when through hers, like the object of touch at all was foreign to him. Just as it had been for years to her. But she needed the contact. She needed to feel the truth in his veins. The promise in his pulse. She needed to know that what he promised was true. To be left alone in the sanctum would only consequent her death.

"Then we go at dawn. Thank you, hahren. For everything."