Nate hadn't thought it possible, but somehow, Kya looked even more haunted than the dwarven man that had died in a heap in front of them. And despite all the fighting and madness, despite the rather droll sense of humor from the newest recruit to their little band, she was again off in her own little world.
How she managed it down here in the Deep Roads he'd never know.
The feeling of the darkspawn was everywhere down here. It pulsed in the air; he could taste it in his breath. After a while, it was a bit like a bad smell – still there but something you got used to and able to ignore. To a point anyway.
If it had been up to him, they would have been back on the surface already. Kya didn't seem as disturbed by it; she said she'd spent enough time in the Deep Roads to not be bothered. He thought she was lying, but he had no way to prove it. But there was something in her expression that told him she had another motive.
Oghren and Sigrun, their newest tag-a-long, were sharing a bottle. Anders . . . well, he'd stayed behind at the keep, much to Nate's dismay. That thought worried him more than a little. The mere idea that he wanted the mage's company made him feel like he'd lost his senses. But Anders had a calming influence on Kya. Anders also tended to get her to talk when she needed to, which was something Nate had found himself completely unable to do lately – no matter how much he wanted to.
Wanted to and hated himself for it simultaneously.
But he felt like he didn't have any choice but to try. She had wandered off, just outside the circle of their firelight. Oghren seemed too busy trying to seduce Sigrun, and Sigrun was trying too hard to rebuff him that neither of them noticed when Nate scuttled off into the shadows after her.
He found her standing on the arch of a bridge, which still amazed him. A sodding bridge, under the ground and over a river as black as tar that smelled of old death and darkspawn. Certainly, she hadn't chosen the spot for the view. He padded up to her, not bothering to disguise his footsteps. He knew how she got when startled, especially lately. She'd almost singed off Oghren's beard just that morning.
"Commander?" he said softly, announcing his presence. Kya turned her eyes in his direction for quick moment but looked away just as swiftly. She took a deep breath, her hands flexing against the worn stone. She looked like she was a million miles away.
"Yes Nathaniel?" she managed to mutter out. She'd taken to using his full name again, setting a huge wall between them. Perhaps it was for the best, and even though her tone was more exhausted than irritated, it tugged at Nate in a way he was sure he didn't like.
Nonetheless, he pressed on. "Are you sure it's a good idea?" he asked, already knowing it was terrible idea. "To be out here in the dark alone, I mean? I know you can feel it too."
She nodded. "I can; but it's always like that down here. There aren't any nearby; it's safe enough."
"If there aren't any of those giant spiders you mentioned out looking for a meal," he added, and not terribly helpfully. But he needed to keep her talking somehow. What he really couldn't wrap his head around was how she managed to defeat the Blight, when she seemed so sodding fragile.
"I can handle spiders," she said, snorting. "I'd handled worse."
Nate raised an eyebrow, although he knew she wasn't looking. "I'm sure you have," he said. "But you've never seemed this close to breaking before either."
Kya's head snapped to him and her eyes narrowed for a moment, but the ire faded, replaced again by that strange, faraway look. She took a long breath, staring at him like she was trying to puzzle something out.
"Why do you care?" she tried to snap, but failed at sounding gruff. "I haven't failed to do my duty before, and I'm not about to start now." She swallowed hard enough for Nate to see her throat move. "Sodding duty." She snorted again. "I should just run off to Antiva and tell the sodding First Warden what he can do with his duty."
He knew she saw both his eyebrows rise at that. He tried to dredge up a suitably wry reply but nothing came to mind. He opened his mouth, thinking to force something out, but nothing came. Kya turned her eyes back to the oily water again.
"He's here somewhere," she said, almost more to herself than to him. "His corpse anyway."
"Who is?" Nate asked.
Kya looked back at him over her shoulder. "Loghain," she said in a tone nearing reverence.
"What do you mean?" Nate knew he looked genuinely confused, considering that was how he felt. It wasn't as if she could feel Loghain. Not that Wardens didn't immediately recognize the taint in one another, but from so far, love or not, she couldn't know such a thing on instinct.
"I knew it was coming," she said, hanging her head down, her hair falling forward to cover her face. "I tried to pretend it wasn't happening . . . Loghain was too strong for the taint to take him so soon . . . but I knew it was. The letter from Montsimmard only told me what I already knew." She turned to look at him, her face still hanging down and half veiled by her hair.
"He's gone," she said. "The Calling that I told you about, it took him and by now he's dead under a heap of darkspawn."
"I, uh . . . ," Nate stuttered. "I really have nothing I can say to that."
"Didn't expect you would," she sighed. Kya turned around and half sat on the stone railing. "I know he'll hardly be mourned. I know what the world thought of him Nathaniel. I know what I thought of him too, for a long time." She shook her head. "They'll say it's too good an ending for him, to die a Grey Warden, passing through the gates into the Deep Roads with fanfare, no matter how small."
"Maybe, maybe not," he replied. He just stared at her then, unable to finish his thought. He knew how it felt to love a traitor. It was different, true. His father was blood, his father was . . . his father and that sort of love isn't something you get to choose. Kya chose to overlook what Loghain had done, the bitter man the world knew, and loved him anyway. And loved him clearly in a way most people never get the chance to know.
Maybe that was what he was really jealous of in the end.
"It's not like I didn't know this day would come," she continued. "But I know this is the closest to him I can ever be again. By the time my Calling comes . . . he'll be nothing but dust."
"Maybe so," Nate said, coming and standing next to her, leaning back against the railing as well. "But does it really matter?" He noted her questioning expression and continued. "Look, maybe you don't realize this, because it's come so easy for you, but most of us don't get loved at all. And you . . . Maker . . . the King of Ferelden and the Hero of River Dane loved you. Don't you get it? Not everyone gets those sort of chances." He looked away, trying to ignore her watching him. "He's dead, yes. But you got loved. Maybe you should think about that instead."
Before she could reply, Nate stood up quickly and took a few steps away. That was more telling than he'd intended. But damn her if she just didn't understand. Maybe she'd been raised in a tower without her family, but after finally admitting to the truth of his own memories, maybe she was the lucky one. He may have loved his father, but it was clear the sentiment had never been returned. It was stupid to keep living in denial.
He took a breath and another half step forward.
"Nathaniel," she said, freezing him in place. "Nate," she amended quietly. "You're probably right. But I've always been selfish; some things don't . . . can't change."
He glanced back at her over his shoulder.
"Some things really ought to," he muttered before marching away. He could feel her eyes burning holes in his back but he refused to stop. Maybe she wanted his company now, but she'd pushed him away one too many times. He had his pride, such as it was. Bruised and battered maybe, but still his. Somehow, standing there felt like defeat, or at least the bitterest form of victory.
If she wanted his company, she'd have to come to him.
Besides, there were things that needed killing and if nothing else, that was something he was good at. It was a sad legacy; that thought. The last of the Howes and his greatest deeds were corpses littered with arrows. He'd always lived his life in a mode of perpetual 'maybe someday' but with things as they were – with the taint in his blood and death around every corner – his legacy could only be what was already. There might be no 'someday' to look forward to.
All he saw when he looked ahead was a cold soldier's bed and lifetime of protecting people that hated him. Perhaps a little part of him understood Loghain better than he realized. Perhaps they were more alike than he'd care to admit. Nate only wondered if the bitterness that had etched lines into Loghain's face was eating away at him already.
Nate curled into a solitary ball and feigned sleep, listening to the odd inflection the two dwarves used when they spoke to one another. Oghren complained about his wife and the alcohol seemed to have mellowed Sigrun enough to commiserate with him.
"Felsi," Oghren muttered, his tone muddied by drink. "She doesn't get it, she doesn't know that fire in your belly from battle; it's better than the strongest ale. You know it, don't tell me you don't know what I'm talking about."
Sigrun made a soft chuckle. "I do, Duster or not. Every day in Dust Town was a battle – out here it's just more honest. I know what you're saying. Even if I could, even if I wanted to, I wouldn't go back. I couldn't go back. Even if some snotty noble wanted to make me his mistress. It doesn't matter. I'll die out here one way or the other and it's the only way I know how to be." She made a little sound Nate couldn't completely identify. "People like us can't have nice things."
"Oh aye, that's the truth," Oghren said, punctuating his sentence with a less robust than usual belch. Nate heard the sound of crunching footsteps. "You know what I mean, dontcha Kya?" he slurred. "You know."
"Maybe," Kya replied, she voice sounded rough. "But even so, don't you think you owe Felsi something?" She sounded far more serious than she ever did talking to Oghren. She usually didn't bother. "She's your sodding wife and the mother of your child and . . . she loves you."
"Hmph," Oghren grunted. "Don't matter, not enough for her to understand me."
"You know," she said. "I'd give anything to have had the chances you've had Oghren; and here you sit pissing it away like its water." She snorted. "Some of us don't get choices."
Nate resisted the urge to chuckle, sad though it might be. Apparently, his words had more of an impact of her than he'd expected. He listened for a bit longer, looking for some opportunity to conveniently "wake" and see the expression on Kya's face when he did it. But instead their voices all blended together into a white noise and lulled him into a fitful sleep.
And by Andraste's lily white ass, he wished it hadn't. He also wished he'd dream of darkspawn; however insane a notion that was. Instead, and as always, his sodding father and his disapproving eyes, the taunting, the abuse. Before he'd only let himself remember in dreams, pushing it deep so it wouldn't break him. But now there was no more reason to. He was free to hate his father without repercussions.
He was free to spit on Rendon Howe's grave and tell him exactly what sort of a man he was.
Problem was, he just couldn't get past his blood. As he finally woke to the rough shaking of a hungover and irritable Oghren, with the smell of some fungal ale so thick around him it could gag a maggot, his mind decided to slap him, just a bit harder for good measure.
Kya standing over his father as he died, the last words she'd told him bubbling out of his father's mouth along with his life's blood.
Maker spit on you. I deserved . . . .more.
And he did, the Maker that was. He'd been spitting on Nathaniel Howe from the first day he refused to do some disgusting thing his father requested of him and became the family disappointment. Nate wondered if he did too – deserve more - than the shit mess that he'd inherited. But what did a man like him deserve really; a man who couldn't even please his own father; traitor and murderer and Maker only knows what else?
Nate jolted awake finally, hoping to the Black City he didn't look as horrid as he felt. Kya was leaning on her staff a few paces away, watching with a wistful, wan smile. Sigrun was standing beside her looking equally amused, but a great deal less sad – which was impressive for a dead woman.
"Andraste's blood," Nate swore, pushing Oghren away harshly. "Your breath is more deadly than your axe."
"Ha," Oghren snorted, kicking Nate in the thigh before pulling his axe off his back, but wincing at the sound. "Want to test that lad?" he said through gritted teeth before stumbling and nearly dropping his axe. Sigrun snickered.
Nate stood up gracefully, towering over Oghren. "What are you gonna do down there? Bite my legs off?"
Oghren grumbled something incomprehensible before struggling to fasten his axe to his back.
"Eh," he finally snipped. "You ain't worth cleaning the blood off my armor."
Nate forced a grin and looked up. He tried to swallow the lump in his throat that rose from seeing the answering grin on Kya's face. It didn't work. He gave up and shrugged, that weird flip-burn-leap in his chest when her smile widened.
"Come on then," Kya said, half snickering at them. "There's more to do than just sit around here. We've got places to be and people to kill."
Nate nodded and grabbed his pack and bow. At first, he made no move to follow, he just watched her entirely too carefully. Somehow, as she always seemed to, she noticed and glanced back at him over her shoulder. She gave him an odd knowing smile.
"You too, Nate," Kya said. "You owe me a drink, in case you forgot."
Nate knew he looked equally pleased and shocked. He also knew that he immediately blushed like a virgin maid. Normally, he would have been mortified. Today? Not so much.
More indeed.