It just keep getting weirder.
Kya was beside herself. They'd found Kristoff's corpse, as she had expected but hoped against. And now, he was walking around the camp looking for all the world like a newborn kitten. Well, if newborn kittens brandished swords and wore armor, that is. Justice, as Kristoff's body now called itself, wandered off into the underbrush. Kya considered calling after him, but then thought better of it. If he wanted to traipse around, who was she to stop him, it . . . whatever.
Of course, to get to this point, they'd traveled into the fade and been kicked back out. Killed some undead Orlesian sorceress that shape shifted into a thing and then, just as the icing on the cake, killed a spectral dragon that looked like the archdemon's little sister.
After all of that, Kya couldn't figure out why she wasn't like Oghren, sprawled out on her back asleep and dead to the world. But sleep was something most Grey Wardens just didn't get to do it seemed. And she wasn't the only one. Despite giant purple circles under his eyes, Anders was still awake, staring blankly into the fire and Nate . . . was off somewhere, presumably gathering wood for their pathetic little fire.
As much as she hated it, she would have given her right arm for the Vigil and its privacy right about now. But she knew she couldn't drag them any further, not after all of this. So they'd settled for just on the outskirts of the marsh, where the mist wasn't quite so cloying. But it was still here. It made every sound seem like a possible attacker coming.
Kya was on edge, to say the least.
She watched as Anders fiddled around in his pack, still looking like he was half not here and rather uncharacteristically quiet. She heard a twig snap and her head snapped up in unison with his. Kya felt a little crackle of pathetic electricity flare around her fingertips. If this was something that needed killing, they were in some serious trouble.
Instead, Nate appeared back out of the mist with an armload of half wet wood. He noted their feverish looks by nodding his head. He dropped the armload of wood on the ground next to the fire and crouched, feeding one of the limbs to the flames. The fire died for a moment, but then flared up again with its new fuel. It should have made Kya feel warmer, these bright, dancing little flames. Instead, she shivered.
Anders sighed and went back to digging in his pack. His face got a silly little grin as he fished Ser Pounce-A-Lot out of his pack like he was a forgotten and rumbled tunic. The kitten seemed completely unperturbed and mewed once before starting to purr so loudly Kya could hear him over the crackling of the fire.
"Are you telling me you've had that cat in your pack this whole time?" Nate asked, looking dubious.
Anders raised a sardonic eyebrow at him. "I didn't say a word."
Nate shook his head. "How can your pack not smell like a sewer?"
Anders frowned and with his free hand lifted the pack up to his face, sniffing delicately. He made a bit of a face and then shrugged, as if it was completely normal for his pack to smell of kitten. And of 'cooped up in a leather sack kitten' no less.
Kya chuckled almost unconsciously, leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees.
"What?" Anders asked, smirking. "You want me to share? Do you want the kitten?" he said, holding out Ser Pounce-A-Lot in one hand. "Or the leather sandbox?" he added, holding up the pack in his other.
Kya held up both her empty hands, waving him off. "No thanks," she said. "This marsh smells bad enough without any help."
Anders gave her a look of mock offense. "Suit yourself," he replied. "More for me then. And now that I have my kitten, I can finally sleep."
With a great deal of noise and commotion, he flopped his pack on the ground, curled up on his side and rested his head on the pack. He snuggled Ser Pounce-A-Lot against his chest. Anders made a contented little sound and in seconds was snoring faintly.
Kya glanced up at Nate. "Apparently I need to get a kitten. If it meant I could get some sleep."
"It seems to work for him," Nate said, raising an eyebrow. "But I somehow doubt it's a cure-all for insomnia."
"Maybe I should just start drinking," Kya said, nodding her head at Oghren. "It seems just as effective. And with a slightly less offensive odor."
"I hope you don't mean the dwarf smells better than the kitten," Nate said, a little smile creeping on to the corner on his mouth. "Because I'd rather sleep inside Anders' pack than spoon with Oghren."
Kya barked a laugh, loudly – almost too loudly - and she slapped her hand over her mouth. Nate looked pleased with himself. She discovered she was equally as pleased to see him look that way. She liked it when he let his guard down.
Anders made an irritated sound at Kya's laugh, wriggling himself into a ball. Kya gave him a look, the sort usually reserved for small children and puppies. She looked back up at Nate, pressing a hushing finger over her lips.
"Yes, yes," Nate whispered, getting back up on to his feet again. "We wouldn't want to wake sleeping beauty."
Kya gave him a lopsided grin. "Good idea. He gets even more unbearable without sleep," she said, keeping her voice soft. "Now if only I could sleep."
"That would be nice, wouldn't it?" Nate agreed. He was looking down at her with a conflicted expression and after a moment folded his arms across his chest. That turned Kya's smile into a frown. Slowly she got up on to her feet, trying to ignore the throbbing ache of her muscles. She made her way around the fire to stand next to him.
"Nightmares?" she asked.
He shook his head. "Not really, not since that first one."
"Hm," Kya replied noncommittally. "That's good. Not normal, but good."
"Nothing about being a Grey Warden has been normal so far," he said. "Why start now?"
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence that leapt up around them. Kya shifted her weight from one foot to the other, looking carefully at her scuffed boots. She tried to think about polishing them, about paperwork waiting on her desk, about anything other than this difficult quiet.
And by Andraste's ass, Loghain had just left that morning. But that was the problem, wasn't it? Before he'd come and then gone again . . . well, things were strange but somehow normal. Two young people, looking at each other like young people do, and to hell with the rest of it. It had been easy to forget they'd only met because Nate had wanted to kill her. It had been easy to forget that she'd had some semblance of a life before that included a lover. With the long road to Denerim between them, looking at Nate and seeing a man instead of just another Grey Warden was perfectly normal.
But nothing seemed normal about it now.
"Well," Kya said quietly, clearing her throat and turning to look at him. Nate looked at her out of the corner of his eye at first, slowly turning his head to meet her eyes. Kya opened her mouth, trying to think of something to say to break the undeniable tension but discovered she was completely at a loss for words.
Nate's brow furrowed. "Well," he echoed her.
Kya looked away quickly, folding her own arms around herself. They stared at the fire then, in silence, for what seemed like an eternity. The snapping of the embers was so loud, Kya was convinced she could feel it inside her head. Or maybe that was the thudding of blood through her ears. She had no idea what it was about him, but standing this close to Nate made her feel like her head was about to explode.
Alistair had told her once that she made him feel that way. She knew now that it was his way of trying to tell her that her loved her. And he'd told her that, right before she took him to her tent for the first time and . . . well. . . it was best not to think about that too much. She was having enough problems already.
Finally, she sighed, reaching up to cradle her forehead in her hand. She rubbed her temples.
She had the urge to speak again, but this time her guilt hit her with full force. Here she was, standing here with throbbing equally in her temples and elsewhere with Loghain's sweat hardly dry on her skin. No matter what Loghain had said, no matter what she thought he might want her to do, how low was this? How could she be so callow, so dirty? It was as if she was only capable of thinking with her appetites and not with her head. Or even with her heart.
But her heart wasn't thinking very clearly right now either.
She glanced over to find Nate staring at her intently, but the moment he caught her eyes, he looked away. Kya took a deep breath, trying to calm herself.
"This isn't going to work," Nate said abruptly.
Kya looked over at him, but wasn't able to meet his eyes. "What isn't?"
"This," he repeated. "Whatever thisis."
Kya snorted. "And what is it?"
"I . . . ," he started, but stopped when they finally made eye contract. Kya did her best to mask her confusion with a hard expression. "Nothing," he said. "It's nothing."
"Clearly," Kya snapped in reply. She closed her eyes, trying to ignore the fact that it felt like a flock of tiny birds had taken up residence inside her rib cage. She was a lousy liar, and she knew it. But nonetheless, she pressed on. Heart and whatever else was thoroughly trumped by guilt.
She opened her eyes again to look at Nate, but now he resolutely refused to look at her, staring at the fire like it held secrets he intended to ferret out.
"Goodnight," she snapped in annoyance, although more with herself than with him. "Nathaniel."
She made her way over to curl up next to Anders. She snuck a look at Nate over her shoulder as she laid down, back to back with Anders, cradling her head on her arm. He looked like she'd slapped him.
Kya closed her eyes, feigning sleep, despite knowing it wouldn't come. She burrowed herself against Anders. His bony shoulder blades poked into her back, but that was a little discomfort in comparison. She listened as Nate paced around a little before sitting down rather hard. She heard the distinct sound of his boot digging a trench into the dirt. Then the sound of another limb being fed into the fire. And then silence.
It was that same eerie silence that had pervaded everything since they set foot in the marsh. The veil might be closed now, but it was still thin. Kya wanted to blame her discomfort on that; or on the battle, the dragon, the talking darkspawn, anything really. Any one of a dozen reasonable things to have her tied in knots and any one of those things would have been enough to send any reasonably sane person into fits.
After all that had happened to her so far in her short life, none of those things really seemed to be that much of a problem. Kill or be killed was an easy enough thing to understand.
Her heart was an entirely more difficult problem. She knew Loghain had a point in all the things he'd said to her. He couldn't be with her for long, orders to report to Orlais or not. She knew he could already feel the beginnings of the Calling, despite being a Grey Warden for such a short time. There was a very good reason most Wardens were joined young. Of course, youthful stupidity was certainly another factor.
Kya wanted to dream that Loghain was going to come back. Or that she'd manage to get this mess under control and then she'd be free to follow him to Montsimmard. But she was a lousy liar, and wasn't able to lie to herself about this any more than she could lie to herself about anything. Loghain said he'd managed to lie to himself for years. Kya had no idea how he did it.
Truthfully, Kya loved Loghain with all her heart, even so. Even knowing she'd never see him again. But just as truthfully, her heart was telling her that it very much wanted her to get closer to Nate Howe. It told her that he was what she wanted now, even if it didn't make any sense.
Sometimes, she wished she could just cut her heart out of her chest and be done with it.