CHAPTER TWO

Vhenan – heart

Three years passed.

Three years of pain and misery since Myra had lost her child that fateful night sleeping beside Trewyn's grave. Tensions between her clan and the humans of Wycome had only grown. The Duke had funded efforts to cut down the forests surrounding the city to allow further farmland expansion. The clansmen fought back against this expansion, of course. The forest was their home. Wycome already cut into the sea of trees and the Dalish had allowed it, but if they allowed this expansion, where would it end? Would these bastards cut down an entire forest to feed their gluttony and greed?

Myra pleaded with the Keeper to take immediate action and attack any humans that dare cut down a tree in their forest, but the Keeper refused. "We must try to act with peace towards aggression, da'len, lest we count ourselves among the aggressors." Reluctantly, Myra had visited the Duke of Wycome with a small party of the clan's swordsmen. The Duke would not grant them audience and the expansion continued.

"There is plenty of forest for all who wish to reap its benefits," the Keeper had said, but there were a number of clansmen that shared in Myra's fear and hatred. She often dispatched groups to patrol the perimeter of the forest, checking for any further expansion and killing anyone that ventured too far into the woods. As for herself, she took to the dangerous job of scouting ahead, further than the perimeter, to spy on the humans and gather any information she might deem useful for the clan.

It was on one of these reconnaissance missions that Myra saw him.

Myra had known about the family living on the small patch of farmland for a while. She had assumed they either had little money or little interest in expansion, since their farm had remained with a shack on a few acres of land for the past two years. Its stagnant nature had pushed it to the bottom of Myra's watch-list, so she only spied on it every so often. Now happened to be one of those times, and part of her regretted coming.

At first, Myra could only stare, mesmerized by the way the farm-boy's muscles stretched and contracted as he plowed the fields. His tawny hair blazed bright as a flame when the sun ignited it. He stood straight and wiped the sweat from his brow, panting from the hard labor.

Then, Myra felt disgusted with herself and the way her heartbeat quickened as he looked in her direction.

She ducked her head behind the tree, like a little girl hiding from a boy she liked. After her racing heart slowed, she took one last peek at the human.

No. She scolded herself. He's one of them. Her heart protested, but she forced herself up and returned to camp.

That night, Myra's head reeled with confusion. The Keeper had noticed her unease and asked her if she wanted a tea to help her sleep, but Myra turned her down. I don't need the Keeper's help to do something so natural.

But the way she tossed and turned under her blankets said otherwise. Eventually, it gave way to pacing in circles around the perimeter of the camp. Hair that flamed in the sun and a gaze that pierced through the shadows flooded her mind. She was on her 10th lap when the halla began to get restless.

Well, this isn't doing me any good. She reached over to pet one of the silver beasts, rubbing its neck affectionately. "Maybe if I just…see him again." She whispered to the halla. "Maybe it was just a trick of the light. Maybe if I just see him, see that he's one of them…" The halla's big eyes looked at her unknowingly. She sighed, wishing the halla had answers.

A short time later, Myra had already found her way to the same spot where she had first laid eyes on him. The air smelled of smoke. A small light shone through the night, but through the moonlight and her adapted eyesight, she made out a pipe and the smoke rings the farm-boy blew. She watched with curiosity. Some of the clan used such pipes, but she had always wrinkled her nose at the smell. Now, she wanted to go back and try one for herself.

She dared to creep closer, figuring she could sneak a closer look at the man with the night to shield her from his dulled human vision. The closer she got, the more she was able to make him out: the cotton of his shirt and scratchy wool trousers. The night concealed her cautious approach, however, it did not conceal the twigs that snapped underfoot when she was but an arm's reach behind him.

"Who goes there?" He bellowed, leaping to his feet. His hand reached for his belt, and she instinctively reached for her back, but both found themselves without their weapons. Myra's eyes widened. By the Dread Wolf, how could she have forgotten her staff? He seemed just as terrified of the hilt missing from his belt.

The elf poised to run at a moment's notice, but she did not retreat. Part of her hoped when she saw his eyes, green as the forests in spring: lively and kind. He poised as well, ready to fight, but she recognized the way he placed his feet that he stood ready to defend, not attack.

"I have no quarrel with you," she spoke softly. "Tell me to leave, and I shall, and you will never see me again."

"Why are you here?" He rocked on his feet, keeping his muscles ready. "What do you want?"

Myra bit her lip and felt a blush rise up from her cheeks. Could she find it in her to admit the true reason she had come? She felt so foolish.

He lowered his guard. He seemed to sense her embarrassment. "What's your name?" His voice was as kind as his eyes.

"Myra," she said.

A hint of a smile crossed his lips. "Hello, Myra. My name is Darrell."

Over the next month, Myra visited Darrell's farm every day. When the sun beat down, she was the breeze that cooled him. When the labor seemed too much, she was a rush of strength. She was the song in the rustling of the trees that he began to whistle while he worked.

They only met under the cover of night, after most had wandered into the land of dreams. One tree stood taller than the rest, a stone's throw from his farm. Darrell had carved their first initials into its trunk, and thus it became their meeting place.

They would sit together at the base of the tree as he smoked his pipe and told her stories of life in Denerim during the Blight, impoverished life on a veteran's penance in Wycome, and farm life. Every aspect of him enchanted her: his muscular frame and rough skin, his bulbous nose and crooked teeth, his cracked lips that blew perfect smoke rings… Everything about him was new and exciting.

He told her about his family: how his ma patched their clothes and wove blankets for the winter; how his pa had gotten injured in the Battle of Ostagar and his left leg never fully recovered; how his two little sisters milked the cow and collected eggs from the hens every morning.

She told him nothing, and he accepted that. "You never have to tell me anything you don't want to." He could read her the same way Trewyn used to, sensing how she felt without her saying a word. Oft-times, she felt he understood her better than her own clan did.

Their reprieve didn't last long, however. Love couldn't cool the hot sun that beat down overhead and dried up the soil. Love couldn't make the crops grow in spite of the drought. And love couldn't feed his family. The fork in fate's road came a few months later when his family's cow fell ill.

"I don't know what's wrong with her," he said, pacing in front of their tree. "I'm no healer, and we can't afford to pay one. What will I do? We're almost out of wheat, if that cow dies, my family will surely starve."

Myra came to him and wrapped her arms around his waist. "Let me help, vhenan. My people know much. They might know how to nurse your treasured animal back to health."

Darrell looked at her dubiously. "But so many people in your clan hate us, you've said it yourself. Why would they help me?"

"Because I asked. I am First to the Keeper. They will listen."

But Myra could not make them listen. After years of bloodshed on both sides, even the Keeper said it would be best not to meddle in human affairs.

And so when the cow passed, Darrell gave her his pipe, and the next day, he was gone. A Grey Warden passing through the area had taken pity on the family's fate, and offered a valuable jeweled ring of Orlesian make in exchange for Darrell's conscription. Eventually, Darrell's family left the shack and moved into the city.

They never knew about Myra, how she pleaded with her clansmen to help them, or the distrust she began to harbor for not just humans, but all peoples.