A Choice of Duty

By Deadly Off Topic

Part 4

And when that moment came to break, when it was time to come crashing down... it was her turn to be denied. "No! No! This is mine! Why... Why have you done this?" Her balled up fists pounded hard against Loghain's armor, but the futility of the situation stabbed it's pointy finger deep into her exposed gut as if to leave a terrible gash. Blooded and bruised, all she had in the end was more pain. Pain she couldn't simply bury away and hide anymore. "You planned this too... you weren't planning to leave this place alive. You took so much from me. How could you steal this from me, too?" Her voice was a rasp, barely a sound in the raging wind, but it carried to her companions. They stood awkward, disconcerted, in the tail end of smoke blowing up around them. Sten with his face averted and Zevran...

The dark skinned elf traced silent footsteps to stand behind her. She felt his presence as if he were an otherworldly being - as if he could hover in the air, disappear, but still be there. It was disconcerting. "Let it go, Elissa." His voice was unusually soft for the elf. All trace of what once could have been a smile, a joke or a sarcastic reply was gone in him. Truth be told, she didn't want to look at him, was damn glad she couldn't see him, because she could feel him looking down at her as if he was hurting. And he was. Everyone who had come with her had realized what her true purpose had been. Even Sten, who seemed to be ignoring the connotation of this bloody aftermath, he knew that she had come here to... had wanted to - die.

"I gave up so much... he took so much... and now this..." Her vision blurred as the first marks of tears snaked down her unprotected cheeks. No, not this, not now. She cursed at this weakness and wondered why she was able to feel so much pain, so much heartache ripping her chest to shreds. Every feeling and sensation she had long ago wound tight with an emotional corded rope was spinning itself free from its binding with no mercy - full regrets - and with as much pain as it could possibly bleed out of her.

Alistair.

His name. The man she had loved most in the world. The man she had in the end betrayed.

And that was when the real flood gates open.

"It wasn't your fault, Elissa. You did what you thought was right.." But the elf shook his head as if the words themselves sounded false. Very quietly and carefully, he backed away.

T*T*

Through the smoke and rampaging fire that plagued the city, as well as cutting through the numerous dark spawn he had easily dispatched with the aid of Wynne and Leilana, Alistair had only made it towards the centre of the city when the explosion of light rocked the tallest tower of the city. "Oh Maker, no! She didn't! Please tell me she didn't!"

Wynne was silent, her eyes simply raised to the pulsating white light ringing out from the tower's tip. Leilana however had dropped to her knees and was uttering prayer upon prayer. "Maker perserve us in..."

Somewhere in the background he could still hear Oghren yelling about beer.

T*T*

The icy dread that had stolen over Alistair seemed now to have fled. Instead he was left with a curiously detached emptiness. Was he so numb with the knowledge that she was dead that he had lost all feeling. No. That couldn't be true or else he wouldn't have felt this deaden ache suddenly drop kicking him to his knees. So this was it. This was how it was going to be?

Somehow he had thought it might be more painful, filled with heart wrenching sobs and fist poundings against the unforgiving ground. Instead, all he felt was this suffocating pressure in chest... as if someone was holding him so tightly and not letting him have a chance to breathe.

"I'm so-sorry Alistair." It was Leliana who hiccupped though a grimace of tears that lay a bleary wreckage down her redden cheeks. Where did she find the strength to speak? He didn't dare utter a reply. Couldn't. "I don't know what to tell you. It's not fair. She was so young."

Even Wynne who had come to stand beside him was still silent, though her grief face was buried in her aged fingers.

The sound of marching feet made him turn and rise awkwardly onto his own - who knew kneeling could numb the knees in such a short time, though it didn't help that he had dropped down into dirt and rubble. Ugh, who was coming? It didn't take long to realize that the procession of men, dwarves and elves that were making their way through were HIS soldiers who had gone following after the "Great" Warden.

If only he had found out sooner or marched faster... this was the tail end of the army that had been meant to fall under HIS banner.

As the procession worked its way to him, he watched the battered and broken take a moment to bow a head or remove helmet to show respect to a king who had not lead them into battle. ...to a king who only wanted to be a man tonight and find a woman he could not afford to lose. Alistair could only think back to before he had entered the burning wreck of the city when he had asked to be allowed to be man. It had seemed right at the time, but now it felt so very far away. As if he had been a different man in a different world at that time.

These were broken and bleeding men who were not wardens and did not have their skills and abilities. OR Training! These were men who had fought to tooth and nail to the death despite impossible odds and they had survived. Well, most of them. Alistair saw the make shift stretchers the men carried between them. Some carried men who stirred or cried out as they were carried, but many more... ominously so, were the silent ones. These were the ones with their helmets placed just so over the face to cover as if they were death's shrouds.

Many people had died here... and horribly.

They passed by their king with hardly a word, just simply bringing him their dead so that he could, as their ruler, cast one last look at them. The silence was almost unbearable. It lay on Alistair like a thick blanket soaking in the heat of those wary, watchful stares. What did they expect from him? What did they want? He had always been just a royal bastard with no hope at all for the throne and now this! How could they still come up to him and see him as their king?

Alistiar found his pulse begin to pace. No, not this one...no, not this one either. Where was...where was Elissa's body? Was that what this new king was doing? The guilty thought sprang on him suddenly, twisting around him like a snake. They were bringing their dead to him and all he could do is look for her. For his warden. She had no right in making him king when he couldn't even take this responsibility on. No right at all.

"Yo, Alistair! Fancy seeing you here." Zevran's hail startled him, forcing him to look up suddenly. Dirty and soaked with the blood of the dark spawn he had killed, the elf trudge tiredly into view as he lifted, together with the help of Sten, a stretcher. A stretcher with a long shroud over it. The face covered.

Oh Maker give him the strength. But he could not move or force his legs to take the first step to make that journey to that stretcher. Instead, to his growing horror he found himself sinking to his knees, his head bowed over as if some invisible giant finger was pushing him down into prayer. It was in that movement that he did not see a frail, nearly broken woman keep step with that stretcher and then move off to the side.

"You could help a guy out, this is heavy." Zevran's tired voice surprised him. There was a distinct lack of grief in his voice and that stirred something in Alistair. How could the assassin not feel anything for her death? How could he stand there as if this was an every day thing to him? In a way it was, but that still bothered Alistair. Considering how Elissa had spared the elf's life, you could have thought he could be a bit more loyal. Alistair rose to his feet and stared at him. If the elf couldn't have the decency to show any respect to Elissa, Alistair at least should. He owed that much to her... owed so much and more.

T*T*

When the cover was pulled away and Alistair was on the verge of spilling tears, it was almost comedic, in a morbid sort of way, when he said flatly, "Is this a joke?"

Laying there peacefully, as if he was still slumbering, was the late Commander of the King's Armies, General Loghain.

"Do you want her dead that badly?" Zevran sounded so exhausted and tired that it took Alistair a moment to realize that the assassin had spoken words meant to be bitter and angry. So he did feel something for their warden. His, he silently amended. He didn't like that calm, watchful stare of his. It made Alistair feel that if it had been any other time those words would have been sharper... filled with threat. ...that maybe the elf might have a deeper reason to pick a fight with him.

"She's alive?"

"As much as you can say someone is alive who wished to be dead." Sten's deep voice spoke truth mixed with harsh realism. He didn't condone or approve of what he said, he simply just stated it as he saw it. Cold, impartial.

Alistair found it hard to look at the qunari. He could have sworn that Sten was glaring at him. Was everyone mad at him? Quietly the words pushed themselves out of his mouth, "Where is she?"

"I'm right here."

Elissa. Closer than I expected.

Alistair didn't know what to expect when he turned. He had thought to greet her non-committedly or even pretend that she hadn't just absconded with his entire army, but his voice would not come. It was in that movement as he turned that Alistair had his first good look at the Warden. At his warden.

Brown hair hung limply down her back, scratches covered her face and hands and occasionally there was a darker stain, her blood or dark spawn he didn't know, sunken deep into the surcoat she wore over her plate mail. Veteran of the battle was the first thought, but he saw more when their eyes met. So much more.

Something in her had died... leaving her empty, bereft... broken. His warden was broken. What the hell had happened up there? Softly, he called her by her name. "Elissa-"

"We won," she said it simply as if that was all there was to it. Tossing her head up to the tower that was no longer awash in bright light. "Arch-demon is dead-"

"Elissa-"

"And now Loghain's dead too-"

"Elissa..."

But she didn't stop. Instead, she took steps away from her companions, away from him. "And I'm still alive." Crushing bitterness in those words, but she kept them so low as if she hadn't meant for anyone to hear. "What a joke."

But he heard.

Alistair shoved past everyone, ignoring the guilty feeling that he was pushing aside his duties as king for a woman who had turned on him. For a woman who had given up everything including him for her revenge. Instead he grabbed at her arm and jerked her around hard. "A joke? Is that what you think this is... I can't believe you. Do you ever stop thinking about yourself?"

"I-What?" Her sea-green eyes, more blue in the gloom of the night fires than green, snapped up at him. Good sign that. He still had time... still had a chance to wake that spark.

"You heard me. You didn't die up there. That's not a joke, that's amazing. That's a blessing!" He towered over her, his brown eyes furious. All this time he had been terrified to find her dead or worse. He'd never realized how much of his anger had been there, hiding beneath that fear. He let it come out now - let it ram into her from off side. "There's so many people who didn't make it. So many of them here who aren't going to EVER see their loved ones again. Don't you know how lucky you are?"

"Lucky?" She tossed her head back and laughed. It was the sort of laugh that sent goose bumps disturbingly down his spine. "Luck doesn't bring back my father and mother! It doesn't bring my brother, his wife and my poor, dear nephew!" Alistair had never seen her like this before. Hysteric wasn't the word he wanted to use on her, ever, but she was overwrought with emotional. It was like someone had opened the bottle marked "do not touch" and every shrill cry and scream she'd bottled up had come pouring out. "How is this lucky? Duncan and Cailan are still dead!"

He surprised himself with how quick he was. Alistair's fingers were on her wrists, firm hard, that he wondered if he could bruise her through the armor she wore. Although with that armor she was basically immortal. "No, it doesn't. But I'm going to be damned if I'm going to let you do this to yourself." And shocking her, while knowing full well he was causing a scene, he spun her face first onto the ground and began to unstrap that blood stained armor. "Now we're gonna talk and you're going to listen if I have to beat it into you."

"What the hell are you doing? Let me go!" She was face first into the broken pavement and kicking her legs and arms as if she were a tiny child squirming away from her parent.

"Oh no, not until we have a very long talk."

"I don't need to - LET GO!" Flail, kick, ouch that one was going to bruise later.

"Sten, hold her there, I'll help with this." Zevran didn't even ask, he just dropped down to his knees and helped Alistair hold down the warden as he removed her armor. "Are we taking it all off, cuz that's kind of kinky even for you-"

"What do you take me for? No! And mind what you're touching! I just want the plate off so that I don't break my hands if I have to hit her."

"Wow, you've come a long way, my friend." Zevran's amusement made Alistair want to roll his eyes.

"It's NOT what you think."

T*T*

They stood in the shade of what probably had once been a house, but was now simply a half-toppled wall. Anything of remote value had either been taken by the residents, stolen by looters or burnt in the fires of the arch-demon.

Elissa stood there in her soft leathers - her under clothes to stop the plate from grafting - with her head averted and her arms tucked in tightly. Looking at her, Alistair found himself appreciating the fine figure she made. Still so beautiful and so bloody tight-fisted. After her little hysterical moment and his equally uncalled for reply, she was back to being silent again.

As for him, there was just so much he wanted to say that he just couldn't find a spot in which to start. Ugh! This was so frustrating. This woman was a nightmare. Why was he bothering with all this? He was a bloody damn king now, he could basically do anything he wanted... with whoever he wanted. Why did he-

"He wanted to die more than I did." Her words surprised him. He hadn't expect her to speak, let alone say this. Alistair watched her fingers pinched the bridge of her nose as she took a deep breath. Just a little gesture, but it revealed so much in her and it left him aching to bridge the distance between them. So much alone... bearing so much alone. "And part of me welcomed it... I wanted to laugh. He messed up big time. Whatever services he did for Ferelden with one hand, he took away with the other."

"But he did so much more than that." Alistair was surprised at how calm he sounded. He should be raging. He had raged before, but all he felt was a cool distance from that. "He nearly destroyed the Grey Wardens, he let Duncan die for nothing and King Cailan, the son of his best friend... he betrayed. And on top of it he allowed Howe to-" It was the sight of her flinching for the words to come that stalled him. "Look Elissa, I-"

When she spoke, the words came like a blow to him - the hammer striking the anvil in the dead of night. "I was suppose to take the final blow. I planned it all to the last second. This was not how it was suppose to end."

Silence hung thick like a fog between them and they stood saying nothing for a long time. When Alistair did speak, he was deadly still, as he said the words whose answer he dreaded most. "And where was I in all your planning?"

He expected her to say nothing, perhaps even start walking away. Would he even stop her this time? But she was silent and in that damning silence, Alistair noticed for the first time that she was shaking. "Elissa, where was I?"

"Why?"

Tone, inflection, he heard the sob strangling itself in that word - her desperate attempt to hide it.

"Elissa." Hands gentle and soft, he found his fingers pressing lightly on her shoulders. Absently noting a tear in the fabric and the discolouration of the bruise showing through, Alistair knew that no one could be so strong as to be an rock, an island onto themselves. He'd made that mistake once thinking she was otherwise, he wasn't going to do that again. "I want to know. I need to-"

Her face lifted slowly to the sky and he could see the outline of her nose, her lips and the tell-tale sign of tears tracing down her cheeks. "You were meant to be king... safe away from all this. To live a long time, not cut short like Duncan, not like my-"

There was sudden understanding in those words as Alistair squeezed her shoulders again as if to reassure her that he was still here - that he was still hers. Was he? "So am I to believe you did all this in your elaborate way of keeping me out of harm's way? Of keeping me safe? The stealing of my army, taking Sten, Zevran and Loghain instead of the others, of making me king?"

He saw the tightening of her lips and the scrunching of the eyes as she took a deep breath. "Does it even matter anymore?"

Slowly, he turned her about. Taking extra care to do it gently so that she would not bolt. "It matters to me, Elissa. Did you do this out of love for me?"

The bleed mark of tears had stained her cheeks. She did not bother to wipe them away now. "Love? You said it yourself, what do I know of love? What I did I did it out of fear. If you were to die before I did, what would I have left?"

"If they heard you, they would be shocked," he said it casually, but inwardly he felt his heart race. It was silly and stupid of him and he felt guilty because of it, but those words left an odd feeling in him. Fear and Love, what were they if not a flip side of a coin. Hate and attraction; yearning and desperation... it didn't mean much in the end when the result meant the same. Looking into the tumultuous storm of her sea-green eyes, he knew she understood the same thing.

And still she tried to ditch. "I don't care anymore."

"I don't think that's true."

Viciously, she bit back, though who she meant to hurt more was no longer a certainty. "I should have died. It would have solved everything."

Alistair hated those words. "Do you really think dying would have solved it all?" and as he spoke, he felt it suddenly. That telltale sign of anger floating in his blood, the frustration and fury when she had turned her back on him, shutting him out, making him believe she didn't feel anything for him because she thought it was for his own good. How dare she make these choices without him. It was going to have to stop. "Do you?" It was the anger in his voice that made her look at him, let him see the uneasiness she felt... and the guilt. Broken spirit and all that crap, but Maker, didn't she use to be able to command anyone with that spirit of hers, but now it was him talking... him demanding that she take stock of him. Dangerously quiet, he spoke because he knew she wouldn't. "If you were to ask me, I don't think you wanted to die at all. I mean, you think you do, but deep down you want to live." And because he was right, Elissa turned her face away from the truth... from him.

It was in that turning away that Alistair dug into her shoulders and nearly jerked her half off her feet. "The way I see it now, Elissa," and the anger touching his words was swiftly turning into something else, "Is that as I'm your King - the king YOU MADE - and I can decide your fate or your punishment. If anyone decides about whether you live or die, it'll be ME!"

"And are you going to make such a choice?" Once he might have given into that veiled taunt, but not now. He was a different man now.

Speaking quietly so that his breath ruffled the strands of hair floating just above her left ear, Alistair said, "I think your death sentence should be a long one. And since you so thoughtfully made me king and I'm going to need a wife that actually knows what she's doing-"

"Do you know what you're even saying?" He heard the shock in her voice and knew this little trap of his had sprung around this frightened little deer. There would be no way out now.

"Quite well. What better punishment for you than being stuck married to the man you turned your back on. I'm sure there'll be nights where we'll need to make a heir, but you'll be up to it, right?" He had raised an eyebrow as if expecting a reaction, anything from her, and he wasn't disappointed when her eyes flung wide open.

"What?"

"Well, there's going to be some nights where I'm not exactly wanting to try for a heir, but the practice wouldn't hurt some-" He couldn't keep the smirk from spreading across his lips. Not exactly what he had planned, but if he had to look back on this little improvision he would not have a changed a thing. Especially not the part of trying for a heir.

"Alistair? What the hell are you saying?" Her eyes were huge and bright, the colour changing with the flickering embers of the coming dawn. Her arms had suddenly surged with energy and she was pulling back to look at him. To look at him like she use to-

"That's the Elissa I know."

"How can you joke like that? After everything's that happened. People are dead, Alistair. Everyone we know has died. Everyone I know... is dead." The rasp of her voice pulled him from the devilish mood he'd fallen into and he watched the woman he had thought he had come know suddenly break completely. Her face dropped down against his chest, her hands clung in fists against his tunic and she whispered words that stung him. "Why am I alive when my entire family is dead. Everyone I have ever loved is dead. Why do I keep surviving? Why - why - am I still alive?"

Elissa's chest was heaving and exhaling rapidly and the mewling sounds she made... he almost didn't recognise as coming from her. She was crying. Such a simple statement, but it caught his breath away.

"I want my family back, but they're dead Alistair. And the man who put them there, he's dead too. There's nothing left for me..."

Was this what had driven her all this time? His poor, dear Warden. Without a place to hold onto now that her revenge had been taken from her, where was she going to stand?

"No, that's not true." Alistair's hands clasped around her back, pulling the fragile woman - the same powerful woman that could slay dark spawns - into the protective warmth of his arms. But Maker didn't she feel good. Didn't this feel right. "How can you cut me out of this picture, Elissa? I'm still here. Didn't you once say we were each others family."

"How can you say that after what I," and she hesitated on the words as she lifted her gaze to him, her fear of admitting her mistake, her fault... was that so strong?

"You did?" He finished it for her. Helped her where she needed to go, what she needed to say. Helped her because she had no one else to help her. Poor miserable Elissa, alone... in the Maker's abandoned little world. But Maker, he still loved her so much. He'd be damned if he'd let this continue as it was. "Maybe I'm doing it because I'm not that strong, that I still need you... that I'm clinging to you... maybe..."

He felt the blood boiling in him... it was there still all that anger, the rage and frustration... but it was only a small part of the whole. It said nothing else of the raging emotion of love and desire, of pain and heartbreak... of shards of glass broken from the that mosaic of their relationship that could be, if someone took a kind, careful hand, ... remelted...remoulded... reshaped. "Or maybe you made strong enough to realize that I don't "need" to have you in my life, but that I want you to be in it. By the Maker, Elissa, you helped me in ways no one else ever did. In ways that only now can I barely start to appreciate the whole of it. I make my own decisions... I'm not afraid of the man I could be... should be. Even though I'm King, I'm a man first and I have to make choices that that man can look into the mirror and accept. Elissa, you shaped me. Without you I'd still be stuck out there.. Probably with no pants on."

He didn't know where that came from, but that brought a quick fleeting smile, a painful chuckle, to her lips. It was enough to let him know that he could still affect her.. that he could make her laugh still... and it was with that chuckle that he let go one of her wrists and brought his hand up to her face to wipe the tears from her cheeks with his thumb. "But shaped though I am... your job was never finished. You are my other half -I still need you here with me."

"Haven't I done too much." And he knew she meant isn't it too late.

He lifted his head, let his gaze travel over the smoke rimmed sky and dark patches that winked in through those dirty grimed clouds as dawn's light peeped through with touches of pinks. "Maybe if I was another man... a man you didn't hardened when his sister tried to gouge him for money, not love... maybe I wouldn't have bothered dealing with such a hard headed, stubborn woman. But I'm not that weak guy anymore... you taught me to take charge of my life... to make of it what makes me happy. To take what I want... and what I want is..."

And as she looked up at him with those sea-green eyes of hers, open and honest for perhaps the first time in their weakness, Alistair could see that she was terrified and ...lonely... so terribly alone.

"Elissa, I want us... a partnership... together." His hand turned and cupped her cheek as if there was a promise of something more even though all he did was look at her - staring into her being - shearing away with the trappings that hid the truth that this was a very frightened young woman. To think she had been scared the entire time-

"Partnership? As in to work to bring the wardens back to Ferelden?"

"In part." Pulling away from her, Alistair scratched at the back of his head nervously. "As a king and I wasn't joking about it earlier, I do have to marry."

"What does that have to-" But it was the way he looked at her, the way his gaze brook no other way of thinking that let her quick thinking pick up what he was saying to her. "Alistair, you don't mean-?"

"Seeing as your second in line to the throne, I am pretty sure no one will be complaining."

"Why?"

With a shrug, he gave her his back suddenly. "Depends exactly on what kind of "why" question you are asking? Are you asking why am I forgiving you? Why am I not yelling at you? Why would I marry you? Or are you asking something else completely? I can't really answer it without knowing why, myself."

"All of it and maybe something else." As she leaned against the broken wall, Elissa slid roughly to land on her behind, knees tucked in and arms wrapped around them. "I don't think I know myself."

"I'll admit I was angry, furious over what you did with Loghain. Why let him live? After all it was his fault that we both lost people we loved... and I will admit that I hated you for that. HATED your decision because it was a betrayal to me..." And he was amazed that he could speak and say this without the anger and hatred that had built up in himself. He was surprised that he could talk about it with such a calm, nonchalant way of saying. "But... the more time that passed after that.. The bitter silences that we exchanged when we were together afterwards... I hated that more...It wasn't right that.. None of it was."

She was looking at her feet and didn't see him turn, but when she spoke, she heard his footsteps... soft and slow... and careful. "I thought I could make it easier for you. If you could just hate me. It would be so much better for you to have something to focus on."

"And you know me so well. You knew that would work.." There was accusation in his voice, but the words were soft, not poisonious as once they could have been.

"Which is why I don't get this now... why you're here offering me so much... so much undeserved." She buried her face in her arms, tears spilling free to spill down into her brown leathers.

His hands were soft on her arms and his voice equally so. "Because under it all, I never stopped loving you. Dear Maker, Elissa, do you think all I just saw of you was a beautiful, sexy woman that I wanted to bed? ... that if that beautiful, sexy woman scorned and hated me - that my heart would close?" She did not lift her face, left it buried, but Alistair's fingers gently ran through her stringy, sweat soaked hair. "And when I was finally able to just think about us - to think about what went wrong with us. It was then that I finally understood what you had done... the sacrifice you were planning... that you intended."

Her voice sounded muffled, trapped as it was between her hair and her knees. ""In war, victory. In peace, vigilance. In death, sacrifice."

"Things I had forgotten. The reasons I accepted being a Grey Warden in the first place which I..." Which I almost let go because of Loghain...because of you.

When she lifted her face, she found Alistair sitting beside her, his legs crossed. They were silent for a while, saying nothing. In the background people still moved and the sound of Leilana's harp was playing... but if it wasn't for any of that they could have fancied themselves alone. "So what now?"

"We tend to the fallen as well as seek out survivors."

"And-"

And he knew she meant "what about us?" He offered his hand, "We rebuild."

"You're not like the man I used to know."

He found himself smiling at her. A grim, painful smile, but a smile just the same. "It's all about growing up and accepting the bitter pills that come my way." He offered his hand to her. "But I guess you're not the woman I thought I knew...however..." And he drew her close so that his breath fanned her ear. "I'm willing to start again if you are."

Author's Note: I keep forgetting that ffnet doesn't like break inserts and in fact removed the ones I had. The T*T* is my work around it.