Chapter 7: Tracks in the Sand

The Wounded Coast was a maze at best and at worst a trap made by ill-natured little gnomes to capture dimwitted idiots traipsing around the coast at night in search for a single specific cave. Unfortunately, Aífe herself was starting to believe that she was such a dimwitted idiot. How else could she explain that despite a map and so-called reliable information, she was still in search of her query after almost three hours of scrambling through thickets and etching her way around stone formations?

She kept her head low as she carefully crept through a thicket that covered yet another cave entrance, more out of habit than out of the fear of being seen. There were not lights, no smell and no sounds. As she moved forward and crouched down at the entrance of the cave, she was almost immediately engulfed by shadows. The ground was sandy and wet and as she had expected, she found no human tracks – only a fox had passed several times in the last few days.

With a sigh she retraced her steps and followed the trail back she had come up, annoyance rising in her more and more. The dim shine of the stars and the sliver of moon that was visible tonight illuminated the tracks enough for her to see, but would at the same time conceal her until the very last moment from prying eyes. At the same time, however, it made the search even more difficult. Her hope rested in Grimm, who she had sent out to scout ahead and who would smell and hear any person in their surroundings long before she would detect any sign of them.

She fell into a slow trot, impatient to return to the others in hopes that they had found any traces. As she rounded a corner in the trail, she could make out a figure in the distance, sitting on a stone and looking out over the sea. She had not anticipated to meet up with them quite so fast. Coming to a halt she put her hand on the hilt of her dagger and only when she recognized Alistair, did she drop it again.

To her surprise he suddenly stood up and turned to face her, even though she was still quite a bit away from him and she had been sure she made no sound and was still concealed in the shadows of the overhanging slope. She hesitated for a moment, unsure whether she had accidently revealed herself, but then crossed the distance between them.

"I think it is time for answers", Alistair said when she was close enough. He crossed his arms in front of his chest and looked at her sternly. She noticed that the breeze blowing in from the sea had brought a bit of color to his cheeks and made him look slightly less of… well, of a drunk. His eyes were bloodshot and he had not shaved in days – perhaps out of laziness or protest or maybe he did not even possess a mirror. Had she not seen how steady he was on his feet and smelt no alcohol on him, she would have thought he was drunk again. She had even thought of sending him home when he had shown up – so late that she had not even expected him to come anymore.

Looking around him she could find no trace of Nelaros and cast the warrior blocking her path a speculative glance: "I take it Nelaros has gone ahead to see if he can find anything on the lower trails?" Alistair nodded curtly and seemed to get impatient. "Yes, and I wanted to talk. I want answers", he demanded once more and drew his eyebrows together in irritation.

She inclined her head in a nod and was unable to completely contain the grin that was tugging on her lips. "You have waited surprisingly long to ask the questions. They have been bothering you since we arrived at the coast", she commented. He shrugged as a way of answering and did not let her out of his eyes as she moved around him, to sit down on the stone he had occupied previously. "I was not sure you would come tonight", she said and he finally adverted his gaze. "I wasn't sure either", he murmured.

"You said this was no bad business", he reminded her then and she thought it sounded a bit like a challenge, like he expected her to bring out the shackles right there and then and handcuff the first best innocent passersby she could find. Perhaps he was fully anticipating her to subject somebody to insufferable torments anytime soon? "It is not", she affirmed, "I am here on a quest of sorts, one that is very important to me."

"Can you be any more secretive?", the warrior asked, throwing his arms in the air in indignation. "You said there will be answers once we are here and I have been patient until now. We are searching for some sort of cave and have to be very quiet and very secret about it, alright. We are to swoop out of the shadows, fine. So, let me ask once more: Why are we swooping?"

She chuckled at his words and shook her head at him, putting her arms on her knees to lean forward as she regarded him. "You almost sound like you are not very fond of swooping", she said and her smile faded when she saw his expression become more guarded, as though she had said something wrong. "Yes… Swooping is bad", he answered slowly, as if his thoughts had wandered off, but he kept looking at her imploringly.

With a sigh she leaned back and pondered the best way to address this all, without making a novel out of it and loosing herself in her memories at such an unfitting time. "Where in Ferelden are you from?", she finally started and his expression became exasperated. "Bear with me just a bit longer, I just need to know what you know and where I need to start", she said and offered him a smile.

"I was born in Redcliffe. I have travelled quite a bit since then. I have a grasp of Ferelden's history, geography and recent happenings, if that is your concern. Just talk, I'll ask if I don't understand something", he answered and she nodded.

"I am from Highever and when the Blight started, almost all soldiers were marched to Ostagar", she explained and watched him closely. At the mention of Ostagar he averted his gaze briefly, but showed otherwise no reaction. He had probably been there, she concluded, it would explain his scars. "After Mac Tir declared himself regent, he put the Arl of Amaranthine in charge of the Teynrir of Highever, as you probably have heard. To make things short – this was not a decision very well received and various Banns and lords protested. They were hanged as traitors." She dissected the topic and tried to concentrate on the basics, unwilling to dwell on any of the details at the moment. A hard glint had appeared in his eyes and he averted his eyes again, a muscle in his jaw twitching. She registered the way he had stiffened and wondered if he knew more about this all then she had assumed. He was not from Highever, of that she was sure – she would have heard it in his accent if he were.

"A civil war broke out in the North and it lasted until the Arl was killed in Denerim and Mac Tir no longer bothered sending troops to fight the rebellion", she continued and Alistair nodded curtly. "Some weeks before it all ended… Well, people vanished. Servants that had been ordered to the castle – elves from the Alienage, girls from the farms, stable boys, even grown warriors. Only after order was restored, we found out they had been sold into slavery and been shipped off. I assume they needed more money for war and they had full control of the castle and the harbors – nobody could stop them at the time, really. Nobody even knew until we found some remnants of records."

She watched him closely when he looked at her again and saw a bitter smile appear on his lips as he shook his head. He was not very good at hiding his feelings, it was easy to read him. There had been surprise beneath that anger and he had opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it again. They remained like that before he finally spoke. "I thought Loghain only did that in the Denerim Alienage."

He spoke the name like a curse that he rarely used – careful in the pronunciation, painfully controlled. Once again she wondered, how much he knew. The wheels in her head kept turning. A soldier under Mac Tir's command? Perhaps even a captain? Perhaps just a conscripted soldier or one that had barely escaped Ostagar only to be hunted by Darkspawn and other tainted creatures? It was not use pondering it now.

"Many do, what happened in Highever is less well known. They did it very cleverly – small groups, no information leeks, no warnings. Almost no records. Whoever knew too much, was either paid for silence or killed. Denerim was full of people that still held power – Highever was utterly at their mercy", she answered him. The words tasted bitter in her mouth and she was quick to focus on something else – the chirring of a few hidden crickets, the smell of the sea, the closed flowers swaying in the wind. Only when she looked down at her hands did she notice, that she had buried her fingernails in the skin of her palms, leaving angry red marks. She folded her arms in front of her chest and looked up at Alistair.

"Since almost a year now I have been looking for those people. I have been in Orlais, in Tevinter and the Free Marches. Some I could free, others were already dead. Those I could find and free I sent back to Ferelden. I came to Kirkwall, because I had tracked down yet another group that had been sold to Tevinter first, but then some were sold yet again and arrived here some days ago. Kirkwall is… a popular harbor for such business. I have found out that they are hidden here on the coast and that they will be shipped to Antiva very soon. They are children – none older than ten years. That is why we are here. I want to get them back to Ferelden. I could not tell you this earlier, the more anybody knew, the higher the risk somebody would get wind of this and they would be shipped off before I could get to them", she ended finally.

He was quiet for a while, processing the information. His gaze wandered as he tried to come to term with what had been said – to a stone at their feet, her eyes and then off into the distance. Then, finally, he asked: "Why me?" She could see that he really seemed bothered by that question and stood up, dusting off her bottom. "I stumbled upon you", she answered and shrugged.

By his expression she could tell she found her own joke far more amusing than he did. Pity. It was one of her better ones. "You are Ferelden, you are a warrior, you are in no guild, you don't seem overly fond of money. What more can I ask for?", she tried again with marginally more success. He still did not seem fully satisfied, but she could truly not offer him more than that because there was little more to it.

"Logic would be a good start", he mumbled and she decided to not get offended. She had been accused of a lack of logic or generally smart behavior at various points of her life and she liked to think she had proven those accusations wrong in most cases. Not all, but then – who was entirely sane anyways?

Grimm's arrival saved her from an answer. He came running towards them, sliding down the overhanging slope and finally stopping at her feet with a huff. There were burrs in his fur and one ear was bent backwards, showing the pink inside. "You found something?", she asked and he huffed quietly in an affirmative. As she bent forward to fold the Mabari's ear back to its natural position and remove at least the biggest burrs, she could see Nelaros coming up the trail in a slow jog.

"Grimm found a cave up ahead, it is close to the water. There is a fire at the cave entrance and I saw two sentries positioned at the outside, it might be what we are looking for. It fits the map we got roughly", the elf reported and she nodded. "Good, about time. Let us move fast, it must be almost midnight and most of them are hopefully asleep by now. We will have to be quiet – the last we want is to alarm whoever is inside!"

They had to follow a thin trail that was barely visible now at night for quite a time with Grimm leading the way, until finally the Mabari slowed down and came to a complete halt behind a high rock formation. Following his gaze, Aífe motioned for the three of them to wait for her there and etched her way forward until she could see the entrance of a cave not far from them. It was situated below a slope and a fire was built in the cave entrance. She could see one man sitting close to it and another one who was standing a few feet away, gazing out at the sea. Waiting for a few moments she listened quietly, but they were not speaking and she could hear only the crackling of the wood in the fire. Both had dark skin, but otherwise looked quite different – one had shaggy brown hair, the other one had black curls and equally dark tattoos on his face. They wore standard leather armor and standard weapons, as far as she could tell, and seemed alert. Too bad. No sleeping sentries tonight, it seemed.

She moved back silently and returned to the others, crouching down in front of Grimm in order to cradle his head between her hands. "Just two outside?", she whispered and he answered with a low hum. "More inside?" Again the hum. Looking up at the two men, she motioned for Nelaros to draw his weapons. "I distract the guards and try to dispatch them.

Keep yourself hidden for the moment – and if you see a good chance, feel free to take one off my hands", she said in a low tone and saw Alistair furrow his brows out of the corner of her eye.

"How do you know they are the slavers?", he asked quietly but obviously upset and she drew up one eyebrow. "They hold guard in front of a cave at midnight at the Wounded Coast close to the water, wearing armor and some mean-looking daggers. I am pretty sure they are not here on a field-trip with the Chantry", she answered in a whisper.

"They could be homeless or refugees", Alistair insisted and she could see Nelaros casting her a troubled look. Jeez. Somebody was being awfully social today.

"Then they are very well fed and equipped homeless refugees", she retorted, "I will not kill them, if I can avoid it. Should it turn out they are harmless little fishermen that got lost on their way home, I will apologize and even look sincere about it." Both men looked not completely satisfied, but at least Nelaros nodded and took his bow off his shoulders, testing the string. "Once they are unconscious, you will move down – quietly – and bind them. I will move into the cave, you will wait for my sign before you follow me into it", she instructed. "Sign?", Alistair asked and she pointed at Grimm, who happily wagged his tail. "He will be the sign. Stay put, Grimm, until you hear the signal. Boys, keep ready."

With those words she moved in a wide circle around the upper slopes of the cave and circled around so she could advance on the guards from the other side, where she had seen ample cover. It took her a while until she had quietly moved into position, as she had hesitated when the standing guard had looked into her direction, hand on his sword's hilt. Finally, when she was close enough and hidden behind a boulder, she took a flask from her belt, carefully opening it and pouring the content over the blade of her hunting knife into it, before she also poured a bit of it over her left gloved hand. Only when she had put the flask away did she take a rock and throw it somewhere behind her in the bushes.

The rustling immediately set the two guards on alert and they pulled their weapons. Flexing her muscles she got ready, moving deeper into the shadow. She heard them talk – Orlesian? No. Antivan, she thought – and only after she threw a second stone, one guard slowly walked along the trail to inspect what he had heard. He was very careful and moved slowly, and she could almost feel the eyes of the other one scanning the surroundings. There was sound from the other side, probably Nelaros' doing. A quick glance showed her that they were not looking at her anymore and she darted out of her hiding spot, pressing her hand over one man's mouth and pulling him back with her, already slashing his arms in several places with her hunting knife. Biting back a grunt she endured his trashing, wincing when his elbow hit her rips and he kicked hard against one of her legs. He was strong and she had a hard time holding him contained and quiet. Thankfully the poison worked fast once it was in his blood stream and within moments he stopped moving. Scrambling to her feet, she moved out of the cover and found the other guard to be already stumbling about, eyes rolling back in their sockets and his brow dripping blood. Darting forward she grabbed him and pulled him away from the fire into the darkness, hand pressed over his mouth and nose, while she quickly slashed his skin with her knife. He went out like a candle and she put him down, anxiously waiting for any sound or movement from within the cave. When moments had passed without, she stood up and carefully moved to the entrance. Her heartbeat sounded loud in her ears and she prayed that nobody had heard or seen anything. Killing them would have been much easier and smoother, but Alistair was right. She could not be sure they were the slavers until she actually saw the children. Still, she had little doubt. She knew she was getting close now. Taking a deep breath she moved into the cave.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Author's Comment: Thanks again for all of you who follow this story. =) I am not utterly satisfied with the chapter title yet, but didn't want anything too epic, as there'll be much more important chapters in the future. Sooo... title is subject to change, if my brain can come up with something better!
In any case, I have finished my Master degree now (\o/ YAY!) and from now and have something such as freedom! So I hope that updates will follow more regularly now - especially since we're getting a bit closer to the actual plot of my story. I hope you can enjoy this chapter and that you find the set-up at least somewhat interesting; it is never mentioned in game like this, but it only makes sense to me - and it explains one of the reasons why Aífe is actually in Kirkwall of all places and what she's up to! As for Alistair... he doesn't know the half of what he's gotten himself into yet. :D
There will be many ill-natured gnomes at work! Hehehe!
I do still, however, lack a beta who is willing to dissect my work and check for spelling/typing errors and also for parts and bits that lack logic. If anybody is interested, please let me know. At this point I want to thank Emma again for actually taking the time to read through this and assure me that it's good enough to upload. Thanks!
That being said, please feel free to let me know what you think of this chapter, how to improve my writing and storytelling and whatever else you feel you want to say, I'm happy for any and all reviews/feedback! Chapter 8 should be up soon! X'3