Running on Empty: A Little Poison Never Hurt


We walked into the fog completely unaware of the shit-storm that awaited us. Lady Vivienne stood beside me, her staff held firmly as she walked, the orb at the top aglow with a light to break through the fog. We could see bits and it didn't seem as dense the further we went in, as decrepit cabins and walkways and overhead bridges came into reality. Humongous trees groaned above our heads and I tripped over a few mushrooms the size of my skull.

Carefully we picked our way through and I could see a tall and elegant statue of a feminine figure standing at the mouth just before the marsh. Andraste. I had seen paintings of her and figurines that one could cradle in the loneliest of hours, but nothing like this existed in Haven or what I knew of the Hinterlands. Nervously I wandered past her, my eyes bounced from one shadow to another, expecting an Avvar to peel out and strike me.

We came to a series of interconnecting bridges that looked about as steady as my nerves. Tentatively I took the first step on them and they creaked threateningly. I paused just at the first few boards and contemplated the path. They branched out over the water and deeper into the marsh. I didn't want to put us in danger of falling into the water, but never was I an eager beaver at the thought of wading through it.

"Don't touch the water." I gave the order over my shoulder with a glance at them behind me. Years of watching horror movies and playing the same types of video games sprung to mind. "Don't disturb anything if you can help it. If you fall, don't thrash."

Blackwall pierced me with a look. "You sound like you've had experience with undead before, m'lady."

"In a way." I answered vaguely, well aware that Bull was still within earshot. "I may not have encountered them up close, but... yeah." How to explain that the only experience I had with the undead or zombies was with hours spent on shooting them down in a virtual world. I hardly thought that my companions would understand the emotional turmoil I went through playing as Lee and Clementine from the Walking Dead.

Small, strange, greenish fires were lit in swinging lanterns that dotted the bridges. I dared not touch them for fear that they had something to do with the undead, like a ritual of some sort, and would have to ask Lady Vivienne to check them later once my missing patrol was accounted for and among us.

With no map of the place, I wandered along the right side and followed where the bridges dipped and meet solid earth. It was packed hard despite the surrounding marsh and barely gave under my boots as I squelched along over broken buckets and overturned carts. My curious gaze roamed over these forgotten things and it was strange that I could find no bodies among them.

"Might have all moved to the water." I muttered to myself, ignoring the looks my companions blinked at me. In the distance I could see a cabin bordered with large boulders and mossy rocks. Along the front I could see crates lined the front of the door. As tempted as I was to bust the door down and explore inside for evidence, I was also short a filtered respirator mask and hazard suit.

Also, movies had taught me not to go inside because zombies.

I signaled to my team, two and two, to scout around the edges of the cabin. Blackwall sided with me and Lady Vivienne led the way around the other side with Bull following close to her shadow. There was nothing behind it and we circled around toward the bridge that broke across the water. It came to an end at a hill and at the top I could spy a pillar through the fog. It was huge and circled by a packed platform, a few benches and crates were tossed around it.

"Is it just me, or does that fire look weird?" I asked my companions. I could see the fire at the top and it blinked with a bluish green tint. There was a metal mount on the side of the pillar and I shuffled closer to it, inspecting the item. It was rusted from the water and moisture of the area.

Lady Vivienne huffed. "It's Veilfire, my dear. Mages can interact with it and create it." She stepped toward me and I swung to one side to allow her space. Her hand came up and her eyes closed with concentration before a flicker appeared in the center of the holder and sprang to life despite the rain. It sputtered for a moment, and it was our only warning before the ground around us groaned and growled. The Mark in my left hand hissed and without a second thought, my hand flew up to my maul.

I snagged it just in time as the first dead body shambled its way out of the water and then a pair of long legged, screaming terrors pulled themselves from the ground as a portal of the Fade opened up beneath our feet. Quickly I bounced back and brought my maul down on the head of one of the terrors, but it slithered from my strike and morphed into its full form just a little ways from me. Blackwall stood at Lady Vivienne's back and guarded her as her lightning sparked from her fingers and diced through a few of the rotting corpses that approached.

It was alarming to see a few of them wielded swords. Not regular zombies, then. They smelled atrocious, but I had no time to deal with the moral ambiguity of necromancy or the fact that these bodies retained enough motorized skills to hold weaponry. I had a pair of demons to deal with that Bull managed to herd together and terrorize with a few blows from his maul. I flanked him and tried to snag a demon with my shaking left hand, hoping that the same trick I had used on the demon back in the Hinterlands' wolf lair would work here.

The demon seemed wise to my attempt and yowled at me, its maw wide and lined with rows of teeth. It screamed high in its throat and threw an arm out at me. I ducked, my heart raced under my ribs and I rolled as the clawed, twisted fingers slashed down toward me. With a terrified shout of surprise, I crashed into a zombie and it collapsed over me, spine and legs snapping from the force of my roll.

Clenching my teeth against the vomit that threatened to come up as the rotten, bloated organs spilt over my shoulder, I viciously kicked and rolled again to be back up on my feet. The maul swung around me like a baseball bat and caught two of them through the head as they wandered close. It was different watching an already dead head pop from bone-thin shoulders.

If we weren't in a dire situation with demons, I would have found it comical, and then promptly felt guilty for being an insensitive ass with the dead.

The two long, green-bean demons had kept their focus on Bull. Blackwall and Lady Vivienne were doing their best to keep the corpses from encroaching any further. As swift as I could, I came up behind the demons and managed to dive fast enough to catch one before it dove into the ground. My stomach turned from the blow as I landed on it against the ground, the demon's leg held tightly in my grip.

I couldn't hear my companions shouting with my blood rushing through my ears, adrenaline squeezed at my heart because holy fuck I actually caught it.

Panic flared in my throat and made me shut my eyes, but the Mark in my left palm bloomed with energy and the demon howled its displeasure as it disintegrated within my touch. Eyes open once more, I spied the second demon throw its maw open and dive into the ground. There was a brief pause of seconds before the ground opened up near Vivienne and the demon breached like a whale.

"I think not!" Lady Vivienne snapped at it. With a spin on her heel, the staff was twirled around her hips and the bulb at the top of the staff was thrust firmly into the cavity of the demon's ribcage. Her stony expression remained unchanged as electricity arched from her staff into the demon and the creature convulsed.

Hastily, I stood to my feet, but the amount of magic that Vivienne had poured into the attack seemed like enough as the demon choked on another scream and crumpled to the ground before its form dispersed into the foggy air. Holy shit that had been amazing to watch. I had seen Solas take down demons before with his magic, but something about the vicious efficiency of Lady Vivienne's magic was impressive.

Once the madness had died, three pairs of eyes took a sharp turn toward me. Immediately my hand raised in surrender with a shake of my head.

"Nope, not on me this time." My voice cracked as my adrenaline waned. "There was no rift or shit nearby, they just fucking appeared."

Lady Vivienne cast her gaze to the mount on the pillar. "Mm. It may be the Veilfire that allows them to pass through."

"Or it's a trigger." Blackwall offered quietly. His sword hissed as it was sheathed. "Perhaps a trap set up by whoever is commanding the corpses?" I withheld a snarl at that idea. I wasn't religious by any means, but playing with the dead was disrespectful in all regards. When someone died, they died. As far as I was concerned, they were to be left alone to rest. I cleared my nose with a hard snort.

"We can use it to lure out the rest of them." I said. A glance through the fog relieved nothing, no other pillars. "If there's more, we can use it to clear a path back to the main camp for our soldiers."

Blackwall smirked and nodded. "Aye. Sounds like a plan. Lead on, Herald." I nodded and turned to continue walking, but hot damn was I trembling in my boots. I had leapt into the fray of the fight on instinct, the sound of screeching demons had set me to move instead of retreat and there was a heady sort of high to the confidence I felt.

I could bet that was probably just the adrenaline, though.

The path cut down and through the marsh, a broken and crumbling wall of layered stones on either side. The soft fog grew a bit thicker and mist hung in the air. My hair and clothes were soggy from it and no amount of pushing my hair out of my face relieved the sticky sensation that crawled over my skin.

My Mark pulsed and with a suddenness that startled my companions, I stopped. My left hand came up and in the glitter of the fog they could see it glow just the tiniest bit brighter, pulsing like my heartbeat. Lady Vivienne stepped forward and her eyes scanned the fog with me, but she spotted the wraith before I did. Without a word, her staff tapped the ground and sparks arched from the bulb and tangled the wraith.

Tentatively, I proceeded forward. There was an immense sense of relief that dropped through my stomach; though I was hesitant to rely on the Mark for anything aside from demon hunting, the fact that it could assist with finding them in this thick as fuck fog was a blessing. Mixed blessing, but still one I wouldn't question.

Another bridge was before us, this one shorter and the ground after it faded into the distance. Dubious, I gave it a glance and looked around for any other paths, but this appeared to be the only one. Mouth twisted with displeasure, I stepped onto the creaking boards and watched each step to leap away before a board snapped under my heel.

Across the bridge, another pillar of stone was jutting up from the ground and this one had a collection of dead shambling bodies already pacing around the hill's base. My companions answered my glance over my shoulder with nods and quietly as we could, we crept forward. I waved Lady Vivienne to the pillar to light the Veilfire as the rest of us took up positions to prepare for another fight.

It went much the same as the first, if not a little better. We knew what to expect this time, and so my levels of panic and anxiety were manageable. As long as I could focus on the goal of clearing the path for my soldiers and getting to them while they were still alive, then I could drive through this. The undead moaned as they were cut down, arms and hands grasping at our ankles as they fell, and the demons were a thorn in the side, but we were capable.

Lady Vivienne was a devastating force to behold. She withheld nothing when battling the demons and showed no hesitation as she systematically slew one undead after another. I kept near Blackwall and with our backs together, dealt with any undead that dribbled up to us from the water. Cleared of the annoyances, Bull and I once more herded the demons close enough so that I could touch them.

This second time around there was a tremble of exhaustion that came up from my arm. A lameness, a numbness that came up from my fingers to my shoulder, as if the muscles had already been used to their fullest extent. It was worrisome, because did the number of times I use the Mark against a rift or demon count against a charge I had? Was my arm now similar to a magical item?

Did this mean after a certain amount of times, would I lose my arm?

Once the battle was finished and the world settled around us, I studied the palm of my hand critically. I would have to mention it to Solas again, because the exhaustion plus the numbness were side-affects to a poison to which I had no antidote. Bull's shadow came over my shoulder and my fingers clenched around the Mark and my palm before it lowered to my side.

"Yes?" I turned to glance at him and found a book in his hand. The leather was tattered and soggy. I reached out to take it, his hand hesitant before he released it to me. I flipped through the pages as we ignored each other. Most of the writing had been washed away, but some of it was legible and though I struggled, I wasn't going to let anyone beyond Bull know of my failures with literature.

I could see keywords, taken it, followed me from the circle, saw what I've done, the demons, and the rest continued on and on.

"Seems you were correct, guys." I said loud enough to catch everyone's attention. The book was snapped shut in my hands and I passed it to Vivienne when she was close enough. She took it with a raised brow and scanned it. "We've got a mage playing with demons."

"Hmph." Vivienne huffed. "Well. It seems they've remained close by. We shall find them and put a stop to this."

"Are we to do that first, or after?" Blackwall prodded gently. "We have soldiers who may not have much time left."

"These are Avvar, my dear." Lady Vivienne sighed and folded the book away into her traveling sack. "It is more than likely the Inquisition soldiers are dead, either from their brutality, or this plague."

"Yeah, well." I half snarled at her insensitive answer. My nerves were still raw and having them flare up constantly was aggravating. "When I see their bodies, I'll believe it. For now we leave the mage, they'll have to come out and reset these pillars if they want their demons back." Vivienne took note of my response and eyed me critically before she nodded, leaving the discussion alone.

Yeah, I already had it with Bull, I don't need it with you, too.

We continued down the hillside and around and more of the strange, glowing lanterns appeared to light the way. I followed them cautiously and was surprised to find that they led us to a small cave which opened into a small clearing. It was surrounded by a section of high boulders and rock. With a blink, Blackwall and I took a moment to check the place over and then grinned at each other after a minute or so of inspection.

"Thinking what I'm thinking?" I chuckled.

"Aye." He nodded. "Good place for a camp. Defensible, not too close to the water, and has a clear path to the main camp."

"That's what I thought. Lady Vivienne," I asked and once I had her gaze, I tipped my head a little beseechingly, "if you wouldn't mind setting a rune or something in the rock for us to find later?"

"Of course, my dear." She walked back out to the mouth of the cave and I leaned over to watch her touch the bulb of her staff to the rock. A flare of magic lit the fog and soon enough she was returning. Satisfied that we were making progress, I hiked up my high-water boots higher and trudged on from the potential campsite.

The campsite clearing funneled toward another pathway lined with a crumbling stone fence on either side. A few trees dotted the edges of the marsh and the fog lifted slightly. With a bit more vision, I was less prone to stumbling over the rocks in the road and could see further up along the way.

"No sign of the Avvar who want to challenge me." I murmured into the faint light of the area. The place was quiet and unnaturally still. No birds or animals aside from the massive pot-belly looking pigs that wandered around. I frowned as I walked, "I don't see any sign of the Inquisition's soldiers, either."

"They're alive." Blackwall attempted to placate me from behind. "And if they aren't, we'll get ours." I shouldn't have been encouraging violence like this, but I was already on the path to destruction, I might as well see it finished. We crossed over another low bridge that was barely raised from the water and onto the next mass of land.

There was a pulse in my hand and I stopped again to look around. My companions paused with me and waited, but I couldn't spot demons or wraiths or a rift. I held up my left hand and all of us could see that the emerald shimmer of my palm had gotten brighter, pulsing insistently. With a swallow and a hard exhale, I pushed us forward, my right hand high over my head to grip the handle of my maul.

A cabin appeared and we slowed to a cautious trot. Part of the roof of the cabin was gone, either smashed in or peeled away by wind. The door was also destroyed and the windows blown out. Curious and careful, we wandered up to the cabin and found that it was something more akin to a storage house that was missing it's whole southwest side. There were tables and sacks of soggy materials but what caught my attention was Bull going stiff just beyond my peripheral vision.

There I could see the stirrings of a rift, closed and dormant, but dangerous. A rattlesnake coiled in the bushes that waited to strike. I can't leave that there. I nodded to Bull in thanks for having spotted it and approached. Through the fog I could see another figure standing close to it and with a tentative step, I wandered over to them.

They were massive. As big as Bull if not more so, bulky either because of the furs they wore from the head down or due to the muscle mass that was hidden under it. A monstrous maul sat on their shoulders and with sharp eyes they spotted me and turned. This might be the Avvar. Or one of them. Fuck if they're all that big, I'm so boned.

"So you're the Herald of Andraste." His voice rumbled like deep, humming church bells. My back straightened immediately. He chuckled, "My kin want you dead, lowlander, but it's not my job. No fears from me."

It offered little in the way of relief, he was still fucking huge.

My head tilted, "Why aren't you with the other Avvar?" The opening of the rift was at my back and it electrified my skin to have it there. I didn't want to tango with that until I got this Avvar in front of me squared away. The last thing I wanted was two unruly dance partners than wanted more than just to step on my toes.

Hence, I kept my hand lightly on the handle of my maul.

"Trying to figure out this hole in the world." He snorted with a shift of his feet. "Never seen anything like its like. They spit out angry spirits. Endless. What the Sky's trying to tell us, I don't know." He said that with a most definite capital S and it made me wonder if perhaps this holding of hostages was more than just a call for attention. There was no rule to say there could only be one god.

"They're caused by the Breach in the sky." I offered, partly confused by his words. "It was some kind of magic gone wrong."

"I know that, lowlander." He growled briefly. "I'm talking about the Lady of the Skies." Yuuuup. More gods. Fuck, was this some sort of religious fiasco they're trying to settle? It would make a bit more sense now, as big as Cassandra would like to think the Inquisition was, we were still only a minor force of power. Religion and not prestige seemed much more likely an offender.

Why didn't I think to ask about that? Damn it.

"Do you not know Her? Can't you see the warnings she writes through the bird flocks in the air?" He asked with genuine concern. I had not a single doubt in my mind that one blow from his maul would splatter me to paste, but to hear the tilt of confusion in his voice painted an image of a giant teddy bear. My mouth fought an awkward smile at the thought.

"Preposterous superstition." Lady Vivienne remarked from somewhere over my shoulder. Instantaneously my eyes shut and I resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of my nose with my hand. Vivienne, that is not the kind of intolerance I need right the fuck now. Honestly, I could understand differing opinions, but in the middle of hostile territory?

Must be nice having that kind of confidence to survive backlash.

"Preposterous is what you wore to a bog, Orlesian." The Avvar took it in stride. My hand did come up at that point to smother down a smile. Though I wouldn't have opened my mouth so readily (at least while I was still in the danger zone) but it was hilarious to hear from someone else's mouth. Lady Vivienne simply raised a less-than-amused eyebrow.

"Excuse me," I parlayed sweetly, "but the other Avvar kidnapped an Inquisition patrol. Are they all right?" The giant's eyes came back down to me and I played unassuming. I was too close and not fast or strong enough to win out in a battle of strength, so killing him with kindness was my next best bet.

He nodded. "A few were injured in the skirmish, but they were alive, last I saw them." A deep, rattling sigh of relief escaped me, my bones sagged heavily under my skin and over my organs. He chuckled, eyeing me with a bit of amusement. "Someone's trained them well. They killed more of us than I thought they would."

Just... gonna take that as a compliment.

"So then... I thought the Avvar wanted to fight me?" It was a careful prod. I was mildly fearful of reminding him of his kin's purpose with the Herald of Andraste. It seemed my companions were just as nervous, since Bull and Blackwall stiffened with hard glances between my face and the Avvar before me.

"Our chieftain's son wants to fight you." He stressed the word like an insult. "I'm called in when the dead pile up. Rites to the Gods, mending for the bleeding, a dagger for the dying. That's what I do." My eyes popped wider and I gazed at him with new respect. He's a fucking shaman. Holy shit, that's awesome. It should have made sense to me, multiple gods, the Avvar being called a tribal people, and this man's complete disinterest.

Did Bull pick up on that, I wonder?

He snorted, "I don't pick up a blade for a whelp's trophy hunt."

"Right." I answered, then tipped my head in farewell. "Thank you for the information. We won't be bothering you from here on, but um. I do need to deal with this here." I jabbed my thumb over my shoulder toward the swirling, closed gateway to hell behind me. The Avvar shaman blinked at me and then up to the closed rift.

"You can fix the holes in the air?" He asked with pure disbelief.

I grinned, feeling stupidly adventurous. "Sure can. Wanna stay and help?"

"Yes." He suffered no hesitation, his expression stern under his helmet. "If I can, I will. I was sent here to help Her." With a nod, I turned back to the rift and gestured to my companions with a flick of my right hand. Blackwall and Bull kept a wary eye on the Avvar. Perhaps I was being a bit too trusting to let him help in the fight; he might take advantage of it and kill me anyway.

That feels like more work for him, though.

"Ready and steady, guys." I drew a deep, echoing breath and raised my left hand as I held it in my lungs. The warmth in my palm spread and the closed rift in front of me crackled, spitting Fade fire as it was torn open and a whip of light connected us. Lightning struck hard near where we stood, drawn in by the sudden shift of energy. The air split open as I yanked on the tendril of Fade that connected me to it and spirits poured forth, screaming.

My palm lit like fire, a flare from my hand. My ears were ringing with terrified screams and my bones rattled from my shoulders down. Wraiths appeared next to me and both my hands drew up to take the handle of my maul and I smacked it down on its emerging body. The Avvar shaman next to me growled and the glint of his maul followed on my other side, catching a ghoul by surprise.

With him around, we made short work of the rift. The screams died out faster (or I was growing numb to them), but my arm still tingled with uselessness after I sealed the rift. It was starting to become alarming. I hope there aren't more demons or rifts here, I'm not sure how much more of this I can take. It took longer each time for the nerves in my arm to work again and with a maul as my only weapon, that wasn't a good thing.

"Hmph." The Avvar looked to me and assessed. "Perhaps there is something to this. Take care on the road, and watch the water."

I tipped my head to him again and watched him leave, my curious gaze at his back. To think they make them that big. I hope the chieftain's son isn't much the same.

"You know, Viv, you're not bad with that staff." Bull's voice echoed behind me, the first real thing he had said since we arrived. I hadn't treated him much better, keeping my mouth shut, but that didn't stop the pulse of jealousy that fluttered up my arm and into my chest. I trudged through the mud and moved onwards, letting them trail behind me.

Lady Vivienne sniffed. "You will address me as Enchanter Vivienne, Court Mage to the Empire of Orlais, or Madame de Fer. Not Viv."

"Oh." Bull stalled. "Right. Ma'am. Sorry, ma'am."

"Hmm." She started. I could practically feel the satisfaction (must've been the Mark). "Yes. Ma'am works as well." He went quiet again after that and whatever jealousy I had felt slither up my soul had disappeared in a puff. He didn't deserve that, but growing accustomed to Lady Vivienne was a bit hard. She was an acquired taste, for certain.

I lead us over yet another broken bridge that kept us from the water and there was a small chunk of land that popped in between one bridge and the next. An old fire-pit lay wet and cold in the center, bodies around it, as if huddled for warmth. My heart ached at the sight. We can't let this spread. What if we catch it? It couldn't get to the Inquisition and my soldiers were at risk of having it.

"Give me a second, guys." I reached into my traveling bag and rummaged for my gloves. Curious as well, Lady Vivienne followed in my shadow and also drew on her gloves. As we approached, the smell hit us. I fought back a gag and raised my arm to my nose for a breath, calming my clenched throat before moving forward.

"It's so wet here." Blackwall grumbled from behind us. "Why haven't the dead rotted away?"

"That's exactly why." I answered him with an absent mind. "Lady Vivienne, if you could pass me a vial?" She did so after finding a few in her bag and carefully she handed them to me. On my belt I reached for my small knife and slowly began to carve off what I could of skin and muscle. I'm so sorry, but if you can help us cure this, your death won't be in vain.

"What do you mean?" Blackwall asked, his tone warring between curious and disturbed.

"Decomposition of a body is slower in water or moist areas because the... bugs and parasites that normally break down human flesh and fat can't exist in cold temperatures." A momentary blip in the flow of conversation as I struggled to think of a replacement for bacteria. Wasn't certain if they had discovered those yet.

Lady Vivienne glanced at me with a sharp eye and I ignored it. Right. An orphan wouldn't know that, would they? Fuck it. I'm so tired of acting like I'm fucking uneducated. Let them guess. Let them wonder. It could backfire on me, potentially. What dark secret or lifestyle was the Herald hiding that she knew about decomposing corpses?

None, really. Just a lot of time spent on Wikipedia when boredom struck me. Don't judge.

"I suppose you do have a bit of knowledge with the undead." Blackwall replied after a few seconds too long. I snorted and didn't continue with the line of conversation. In each vial I took samples of each body and then carefully corked them back, making sure nothing of my glove touched the flesh or the edge of my knife. I stood and turned to Vivienne and she held her hand out expectantly.

"Oh." I was dumbfounded. "You don't have to - okay." She took them from my hand with a sigh and sheepishly I wanted until the vials were tucked away in her bag.

"For research, my dear. I am not against the study of nature or our world, but you are more likely to be in close combat." She answered lightly. My throat cleared with a hasty cough and I nodded, ashamed once again that I had assumed something of her. Once she had cleared them away, I remained in front of her, head ducked.

"Yes?" She asked, amused.

"Would you mind heating my blade up so I can still use it?" I asked quietly, sheepish with my shoulders hunched under my ears. "I don't want to accidentally infect anyone if I can help it."

"And fire stops the spread of the plague?" Blackwall asked as Vivienne took my blade in her gloved hand and murmured a spell. The metal slowly grew white-hot and she held it for nearly half a minute, steam coming from the blade as the fog and gentle rain hit it.

"Not stop it, necessarily." I answered carefully with an eye on him. "But... I guess it's like the Blight from ten years ago." I could recall what Leliana and told me of the Blight. The Warden Commander and (King) Alistair never explained what made a person into a Warden, but they had warned their companions against touching the blood. Like an extremely contagious STD. No fluids.

"The Blight?" Bull murmured once I took my blade back from Vivienne. The metal might be brittle and tarnished now, but I would rather have it disinfected and be a dull thorn in someone's side than having no knife at all.

"Yeah, so from what I could understand of it, the Blight was exactly that, a blight." The next bridge we came upon was broken in several places. We would end up touching the water, or at least Bull would, as I doubted he was going to trouble with picking his way over the fallen posts and planks like I would.

"Be careful, we can't cross this without getting wet. Stay alert." I drew my maul and rested it on my shoulder like the Avvar shaman had done, and walked slowly through the water to make as little waves as possible. "But, anyway. The Blight was something akin to what happens to plants when they're blighted. It's a bug, a disease that just jumps from one living thing to another."

"This we know, darling." Lady Vivienne answered, perhaps to further me along in the discussion. I flushed, briefly embarrassed that I may have sounded like I was lecturing them.

"Right, so. This plague might be the same, but it spreads through water. I have a sneaking suspicion that the Blight was passed along the same way, or through blood." I continued. Gently I pushed the water-lilies away and lamented the fact that such a lovely plant now floated upon rotting corpses and disease.

"Water-born diseases are always so excruciatingly painful." Lady Vivienne remarked as she gracefully followed from behind.

"They are." I replied, saddened. "In any case, the fire itself doesn't stop the spread of the plague, but heat does. Like the bugs I told you about that decompose bodies? They can't survive in extreme temperatures." It was a loose explanation of how plagues and viruses worked, as well as bacteria that lived in these waters.

"So this plague, then, it lives in the water?" Blackwall eyed the murky, blackened marsh like it would strike him.

"Probably. Now that we know, if you slip and fall, close your eyes and shut your mouth." I glanced back at my companions before making my way over the broken bridge. Gingerly I tried to walk along the edges of the planks and I was nearly toward the end before the second to last one snapped under my boot.

Fucking. Beautiful.

Naturally, my body pitched sideways and from my peripheral vision I spied Blackwall making a hasty leap to catch my arm, but I didn't need two of us tumbling into the water. My eyes shut and my arms tucked into my sides and the viciously artic water bit my skin as I was swallowed. Expelling water from my nose and my heels purchased ground under me, I righted myself and breached from the water.

An arrow caught me in the shoulder and I bit the inside of my lips to keep from screaming. Heeding my own advice about keeping the water out of my body, I threw myself onto land and a hand flew up to my shoulder. Don't pull it out! my thoughts screamed between my ears. You'll bleed out faster!

Adrenaline surged through me. My companions were a ruckus as they felled the undead that rose from the water at the disturbance. Frantically I scurried up to the side of a boulder and patted my bag down for vials of potion. I could find none. Blind, mute, and shaking from pain, I whined in the back of my throat and pressed against the wound. The blood seeped through my fingers and my shaking intensified to a rattle.

"Herald!" Blackwall's voice echoed over to me. Pain shot through my arm as I raised it to let the Mark shine as a beacon of my location. Soon the thundering footsteps of my companions drew near and shadows passed over my closed eyes.

"Stop!" Lady Vivienne commanded, her voice a solid ring of authority. "Don't touch her. Do not touch that arrow, Warden. Let me see to her."

"She's bleeding out." Blackwall growled. "We're all out of potions and healing herbs." Vehemently, I shook my head and held out my hand for Vivienne. Her warm, slender fingers found mine and she firmly grasped my arm and my shoulder, the clatter of her staff twittered from the ground as it rolled over rocks.

"I can see that, my dear." Lady Vivienne answered with a stiff lip. "We need to be very careful. She fell into the water. Healing is not my area of expertise."

"What?" Blackwall snarled. "Then why bring you along at all?"

"Blackwall." Bull rumbled at the same time I snapped my fingers and hopefully attracted his attention. Despite not seeing him, I could feel his gaze and I straightened my index finger at him and shook it. We're not going to have that kind of slander now, thank you. He went silent and Lady Vivienne took a hard exhale.

"Ma'am." Bull stepped closer. "We can pull out the arrow and cauterize the wound. It... won't stop the plague if it's already in her blood, but..."

"It will give her a chance, yes, I know." Vivienne exhaled again. Cauterize? Christ, please... no. My body shook under Vivienne's hands. Rationally, it made sense. If Vivienne couldn't heal me like Solas could, then to stop the spread of disease or infection, I would have to have it burnt shut. Stitches now, with no way to sterilize my skin or the equipment, was out of the question.

I spat a wad of saliva off to one side to clear my mouth. "If you're g-gonna do that, do it n-now while the shock is still going through me." Adrenaline was my only drug now. There was a beat of silence, but Vivienne must have agreed because the next moment her deft hands were divesting me of my leather shoulder pad and the straps that kept everything else in place.

My skin prickled at the exposure and a shudder ran up my body, half my chest bindings exposed with my shoulder and neck. Her hand came to my shoulder and my eyes shut tighter, my other hand gripped hers desperately and she held on without hesitation.

Cauterization, with a mage handy, is fucking nothing like it was in the movies. There was no build up, no long moments to watch a knife or poker be brought to you after sitting in a fire for who knows how long. It was instantaneous. In seconds she pulled the arrow from my shoulder and before I could gasp in pain, a deep, gnawing, hissing heat flashed over, into, and under my skin.

I held my voice for all of a nanosecond before I screamed.

It was over nearly a second after and I slumped over slightly from the dizzying pain. A sob choked up and angrily I gripped the edge of the leather I wore over my thigh. A few seconds passed as I breathed hard and attempted to control my shaking. My head shook out and tentatively I held my hand out.

There was a sound of a sudden tearing of cloth and it was placed into my hand. Hastily I wiped at my face and eyes, but I could still feel some slivers of blood that marked the side of my face. It would wash off in the rain. A swallow was forced down my throat and after a handful of seconds more, I stood with Vivienne's help.

"My dear?" She questioned, a glance over my face.

I gave her a shaky nod.

"Herald?" Blackwall peered over Vivienne's shoulder. I avoided his look, my shoulder howled in pain with every movement. A sunburn gone catastrophically wrong and there was nothing I could do for it. No potions, no cold towel, no aloe, fucking nothing. Bull left and retrieved my maul as Lady Vivienne helped me with my armor, ruined as it was.

"Harritt's gonna kill me," I murmured weakly and allowed Vivienne to tighten my straps, "told me if I came back with another hole, he was gonna send me out in nothing but underthings."

"I will endeavor to be certain that you look fabulous if it happens." Vivienne soothed me with her conversational tone. "Maker knows, now seeing what you wear under all that, I will have to do so anyway." Blackwall looked away from the conversation, his gaze meeting Bull's as the Qunari came up beside the court mage with my maul.

She stole a laugh from me, shaken as it was. "F-fuck you, Vivienne." My maul was back in my hands and the pain was starting to dull. I would have to be careful after this, because cauterizing the wound did not guarantee a clean getaway from infection. I hoped Harding had potions left, because I didn't want to chance waiting until I saw Solas again.

Once my weapon was upon my back, I straightened and winced. Pain screamed up and down my arm, but I would have to force it to fuel me, rather than hinder me. I still had a mission to finish and now I prayed that Avvar was as big as the shaman I had seen, because I was going to give him hell.

"C'mon." I croaked and trudged up toward the next pillar. "Rage is gonna be one hell of an anesthetic."