nota bene: Previous chapter was never meant to be posted, but a mess-up involving a sleep-deprived author and a wrong document upload had it exposed the public eye anyway. I don't feel like fixing my mess, so make of that what you will.

A/N: Still itching. Still scratching. Having weird dreams lately and finding ways to shake them off. Question for the day: If you get hit by a Sleep spell, then by a Horror spell and shortly afterwards by yet another Sleep spell, how likely are you to dream anything even remotely sane? Answer: not very much at all. Trying present tense on for size because why not?

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Sleep It Off

After which none of the Wardens will look at the phrase the same way again and the Warden-Commander will wish she were insomniac more often.

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The morning is crisp but sunny and with promise of warmth yet to come. The crowd had already trickled into the little square by the tree and she is climbing up the small wooden platform only the stairs are wet with blood and she can't remember why but it doesn't matter because she is going up to get married and she knows she does not want to but they all told her that she should and so she does.

She looks up and Nelaros is standing there with huge corpse flies buzzing around his mouth and everyone told her she should straighten out her wedding dress but no one told him to close his chest and clean out the blood and Oh Maker, I don't want to get married to a corpse! but she cannot say it because it sounds wrong and no one listens to her anyway.

She climbs the last step and Soris is mouthing for her to hurry up and she is trying but her dress is too long and she can't but somehow she does and Nelaros is smiling but his ribcage is still open and he rips something out of it and says "I give you my heart."

And then Sister Boann turns around, only it's not Sister Boann but Mother Theolid and she starts talking about the bacon and the veal but no one is listening to her because Vaughan is climbing up the stairs and is pointing at her and I gotta run, I gotta run, I gotta RUN!

But she can't run because Soris is clutching her sleeve and Vaughan is shouting and the guards are coming in and the whole Alienage is looking at her except for Shianni who is looking at a bottle and whatever you're drinking cousin, give it here, now!

Vaughan is all bloody and he's shouting "It was her! She did it! She killed me!" and everyone is looking at her now and she wants to run, run, run but she can't because Nelaros is holding her hand and Maker, her arms hurt!

And Vaughan sees that and he looks at Valendrian and he says "Cut off her arms so che can't do it again." And Valendrian nods and How can you nod and let him cut off my arms?! But everyone else is nodding, too, and suddenly there is an anvil in front of her and she's kneeling at it and it's big enough to stretch her arms across it and she starts to panic, really panic, but she can't move!

"Cut off her arms! Cut off her arms!" Everybody's chanting and the Alienage is burning but she can't stop it and Maker, Duncan is going to cut off her arms!

And Duncan steps forth and he has a big, big axe in his hands and it's Oghren's axe, but Oghren is somewhere, drunk, and he can't help her and Duncan, you can't do this! I am tainted! You'll kill us all! but Duncan doesn't mind and he gives the Goblet to Soris and says "Make sure you pick up all the blood."

"You did it! You damned us all!"

"You caused this!"

The guards are pushing through and they're beating everyone and she wants to tell them that it was not her, it was Arl Howe, but nobody's listening and she cries out to her father, Daddy! Don't let them do this! It wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault!

But her father nods and he is calm as always. "We don't want to be seen as troublemakers" he tells her. And she's the troublemaker and she brought all this upon them and now they're going to cut off her arms so she can't do it again and then she can get married and be a grown up like she's supposed to but she doesn't want to!

And now Duncan is raising the axe but it's no longer Oghren's axe, it's Darkspawn axe and her arms are stretched out on the anvil and she's kneeling and she can't move!

Run! RUN!

She wants to run but she can't. Her dress is too long and she can't run and she's not fast enough and Duncan will catch her anyway and why won't she just be a good girl and let them cut off her arms and then get married like she should but daddy I don't want to!

"Don't be a troublemaker," her father tells her.

But it wasn't me - It was Arl Howe! HE did this, not me. Not me!

But they don't listen to her. She's the troublemaker. And Arl Howe is dead and she killed him, too, and then Nathaniel is scowling at her and he takes the axe (and where did Duncan go?) and says "She killed my father" but it was his father that did this, not ME! and so he should do it becuse there can be no unrest in the Alienage and we shouldn't be the troublemakers and then he swings the axe high and-

She squeezes her eyes shut because she can't look and then-.

-and then straight down

Maker, NO!

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GASP!

She jerks up, her eyes wide open and in the gloom of the stone cell she sees Nathaniel crouching down by the rusted steel bars, probing the lock with a makeshift tool.

"Please don't cut off my arms," she mumbles, her voice small and eyes expectant.

Nathaniel blinks once , frowns and looks to Anders for clues. Oghren opens his mouth to speak but Anders glares at him sharply and he clams up without a word. With no help forthcoming from the mage, Nathaniel does the first thing that comes to mind.

"All right. I won't," he says simply, and hopes that whatever's going on this helped and he can go back to probing the lock.

Before anyone can say anything else, the elf slumps back onto Anders' chest and buries her nose in it.

"It wasn't my fault," she informs the mage as her eyes close again.

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Relief.

Her hands are safe.

And maybe the Alienage won't be burning this time.

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