Chapter 2

The Waking Sea

Sailing, Hawke had decided, was not as glamorous as Isabela always made out... In fact, it was downright horrible at times.

It had been... some hours since they departed the Marches, and the sun was dipping perilously towards the horizon, scattering fiery orange and deep purple to the high winds. Isabela was still at the wheel, swinging them left and right over the waves, even as the wind buffeted their faces from dead ahead. Varric was perched on the bow, watching whatever was hurtling towards them, while Hawke, Aveline and Anders helped with the rigging and so on at Isabela's behest – in reality, that meant Anders scurried about, addressing the ropes with surprising familiarity, while Hawke and Aveline watched on clueless. Everyone except Isabela had fixed themselves to the guardrail with a length of rope about their waist, just in case the increasingly stormy seas should invite them overboard, but the pirate queen was completely nonplussed about the way the boat rocked and bucked on every crested wave, and stood firm-footed behind the wheel.

Hawke attempted to move up to the aft deck, but was knocked to her knees by a particularly vicious swell. Nonetheless, she picked herself up, and marched towards Isabela. The pirate's expression barely flickered at her approach, but she acknowledged her with a brief call of:

"Problem, Hawke?"

"Where are we going?" the mage inquired, above the crash of a breaking wave.

"East," Isabela replied.

"Why?"

"Because the wind's going west. We can outrun any templar galleon into the wind. Besides, if you want to get away from the templars and the Chantry, west means Orlais, and that's not a good start!"

"What does east mean, then?"

"The open ocean, east of Amaranthine! Beyond that... Rivain? The Chantry isn't too strong there..."

"You just want to go home!" Hawke teased, a grin breaking over her features.

"Damn right," Isabela joked, with a matching grin. Then, her face fell slightly, and she added, "There is a small problem, though..."

"What?"

"That."

She was pointing slightly off to port – or was it starboard? It was left, anyway –and after a moment's confusion, Hawke realised exactly what she was talking about. The coast of the Free Marches was visible in the distance, framed by an orange glow from the falling sun, but just beneath that sun, she could make out a wall of vehement, stormy grey, tinged violet at the top by the sunset glare. A storm was closing in, and Isabela's face, normally light and trouble-free, was actually displaying some worry at the sight of it – a nervous stare, a bit lip...

"Why are we sailing right into it?" Was Hawke's first question, and it seemed the most obvious.

"Because it'll drive west along the whole of the Waking Sea – no matter which way we go, it'll reach us eventually, and if we went the other way, we'd have to shelter in an Orlesian port."

"And... why didn't you mention this before?"

"Well, I was trying to come up with a solution first. That way I would have looked, y'know, quick-thinking, and smart..."

Hawke scowled at her, and Isabela replied with a guilty smile.

"Doyou have a solution?" the mage persisted.

"Yes, but not a very good one," the pirate sighed. "Like I said, we can't head west to Orlais, too many templars, and at a guess, I'd say the same holds true for Nevarra. We'll never make Rivain or Antiva, the storm's between us and them. That just leaves Ferelden or the Free Marches."

"And most of the Free Marches is searching for us," Hawke nodded – her heart was racing as she realised what the 'solution' was. Were they about to head home?

"Exactly. If Sebastian's as good as his word, we can't go anywhere near Starkhaven's port. Long story short, the Free Marches are out. The only place we're going to find any safety is the Ferelden coast – find an inlet, anchor the ship, and ride out the storm below deck."

"Do you know of any such inlets?"

"A few... There's a big delta on the coast near West Hills, but that means going back the way we came..."

"We'd be running away from the storm," Hawke noted, positively.

"Yes..." Isabela mused, "but we'd have to go back past Kirkwall, and I'll bet that strait's packed with templar ships now. We'll have to run into the storm and hope they don't follow. Assuming you don't want to dock at Highever-"

"Too conspicuous," she nodded, in agreement. "Avoid the cities, if you can..."

"Right. Well, the rest of the Coastlands are too open, we'd just get smashed against the cliffs. Sailing all the way round to Denerim harbour would be almost impossible, and no less conspicuous..." It seemed to Hawke that Isabela wasn't so much talking to her as reviewing the maps long-imprinted on her memory, and talking aloud to herself. "That just leaves the Amaranthine region. There's a narrow passage through the middle of Brandel's Reach..."

"Isn't Brandel's Reach the raider hideout?" Hawke interrupted, nervously.

"Yes, so we'll give that a miss," Isabela nodded – as she did, she swung the ship to the right, and Hawke almost sprawled across the deck... "We can avoid Amaranthine port if we stick to the far side of the waterway, and then duck into the bay south of the city. It's the safest place I can think of, and it's mostly unpopulated..."

"Sounds good enough to me," the mage agreed, and turned to leave, but Isabela called out, jokingly:

"Hawke! You owe me at least a couple of handsome deckhands for this..."

"Get us there in one piece, and I'll give you the damn ship!" Hawke called back, with a grin, then added, "And Varric!"

If Sara Hawke disliked sailing, then Carver Hawke hated it. He was fine as a passenger on a big ship, but a crappy little thing like this? It was pretty feeble, as boats went, and he wished Isabela wouldn't toss it about so, as if it were a battered ragdoll...

He had been relegated to the hold by the others after losing most of his lunch over the port side, and was sat here in utmost boredom, just trying to ride out every sway and buck of the boat's thin hull beneath his backside. The caravel's cramped hold – designed for lightness, not size – reminded him ever-so-slightly of the ship they had departed Lothering from, during the Blight. Cramped beneath the deck, feeling sick, leaving everything behind... at least that had been a big ship though, it hadn't creaked and groaned like this every time it was presented with a wave, and it hadn't leapt about like a wasp-stung mabari.

Merrill was looking even worse for wear. The elf, sat opposite him in the hold, had her knees up to her chest, and her slender face was buried in them, looking as green as her garb. Her staff was abandoned at her side – Carver's sword, too, was discarded against the far wall – but it slid about with every movement of the ship, and Carver had an unspeakable urge to grab it and move it away, before the sharp spike on the head found someone's leg.

"Are you alright?" he murmured, finally, with a tender undertone his voice had only recently come to possess. The Wardens, his extended family, had mellowed his personality as much as they had honed his skills...

"I'm... fine," Merrill sighed, unconvincingly, still speaking from between her own knees. "The Dalish, we're... not that good with boats... we prefer dry land, to be honest."

"Ah... I think I might be Dalish, then," Carver groaned, as another buck of the ship sent a nauseating jolt through his stomach.

Merrill looked up for a moment, appraisingly, then managed the weakest of smiles and decided:

"Nope. Nowhere near pointy enough..."

"I was... wait, are you talking about my ears?"

Merrill shrugged, and buried her head in her knees once more with a dry gulp.

"Why did we let Isabela steer the ship?" she moaned. "She can't even walk straight! Her hips just waggle all over the place..."

"I think that's intentional."

"Oh."

There was an awkward pause, and Carver stole a glance at her face, even buried as it was in the folds of her garb. Merrill hadn't changed much, really. She didn't even look that much older, not like he did. The only real change was in her eyes – the previous, faraway daze had been replaced by a harder expression, one grounded in reality and horror, and one which he was sad to say he recognised. He didn't want to pry into what had happened, especially not now of all times, but something had clearly stolen her nerve.

"How have you been?" Merrill murmured, out of the blue, lifting her face up to look at him. "Sorry, it's just I haven't seen you in years, have I? Five, is it, six? Not since you went off into the Deep Roads. I mean, I heard about you from Hawke, a few years back, and she always talked about your letters, but – oh, lethallin, I'm sorry, I'm rambling again aren't I?"

"A little," Carver laughed, weakly. It rang true, though – Merrill hadn't accompanied them on Bartrand's expedition, and she hadn't been with Hawke during the qunari raid, when he and Stroud had been in Kirkwall. It certainly didn't feel like six years since he'd seen her, though... it seemed as natural and friendly as the day he'd departed for the Deep Roads.

"Sorry," she apologised, again. "Talking takes my mind off the sickness..."

"Then keep talking," he muttered. Even as he said it, however, his mind was on other matters. Namely, how long were they going to be on this boat? The journey to Kirkwall from Ferelden had taken the best part of two weeks, but that had been from the very southernmost areas of Gwaren. He didn't know where they were headed this time, or how fast the caravel was. He abandoned his thought process as Merrill spoke up, suddenly:

"I missed you."

"Huh?" Carver replied, dumbly.

"We all did," she added, rather hastily...

"Really?" he muttered, sceptically.

"Well, I don't think Anders did," Merrill murmured, pensively. Carver scowled, not at the elf but at the mental figure of the mage above deck. Seeing his reaction, however, she added, "Oh, it wasn't anything horrible! It's just, he was a Warden, wasn't he?"

"Yes..."

"So, whenever Hawke got upset, about you being gone, he'd just tell her how good the Wardens were, how well you'd be doing..."

"I... okay, I suppose that's not so bad... Wait, did you say Sara got upset over me?"

"Sara? Who's Sara- oh, right, Hawke! I should probably stop calling her that, shouldn't I? I mean, she's a Hawke, you're a Hawke... I'm getting off the point, aren't I?"

He nodded.

"Haw- Sara... wow, it feels odd calling her that... Anyway, she was really upset when we lost you! From what I heard, she gave Varric all the treasure to sell on, told Anders she'd meet him later, and disappeared off onto the Wounded Coast... Just sat there all night, until dawn – Varric was the one who found her, and he dragged her back to Kirkwall before she froze..."

"That's... new," Carver muttered, looking down at his feet. It was certainly weird – Sara had never cared too much what happened to him... He chided himself for thinking that – the Wardens had mellowed him, but it seemed some of his old bitterness still hung on in there.

"It's really not," Merrill assured him. "She cared a lot more than she ever said..."

The young Warden merely smiled at her, and then, eager to get off the awkward family talk, asked:

"What about the others?"

"Well, Fenris was always moaning about not having another real warrior to spar with..." – Carver chuckled weakly at that – "and Isabela missed teasing you... I think Aveline and Varric took it worst, though – err, not counting Sara..."

"Oh? I wouldn't have imagined those two breaking up over anything..."

"Well, Aveline was protective of you and Hawke – Sara! – since Lothering... And Varric? He was... guilty. He persuaded the two of you to join the expedition, so he blamed himself for what happened to you."

"Stupid dwarf," he muttered, wryly. "His brother was to blame, not to mention those tainted creatures – I hear Bartrand got what was coming to him, and I've had a lot of chances to pay the darkspawn back..."

"You have? When was that?" Merrill inquired, slow on the uptake yet again.

"These last six years?" Carver hinted, slowly, then added, "When I was a Grey Warden?"

"Oh, right..."

The ship jolted again, with particular vigour, changing directions quickly enough to topple the thin elf to the floor. She lay there for a moment, as the usual pink tinge – momentarily reclaimed by her cheeks – gave way to ghostly white and sickly green once more. An immense feeling of pity for her sprang through Carver's being – she was suffering even worse than he was, poor girl...

He shuffled over to sit next to her as she picked herself up off the floor, and the two of them were silent – rather instinctively, he slipped a hefty, armoured arm around her, and felt her slightly cold, slender form huddle into the crook of his shoulder.

"Better?" he murmured.

"Much," she sighed, eyes clamped shut. "The floor isn't spinning quite so much now..."

"Varric! The storm's getting pretty bad, are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Hawke, just tell me Rivaini knows where she's going!"

Through the jagged slants of rain, Varric saw his old friend slump down next to him, with a weary sigh that was drowned out amidst the storm. She mustered up enough effort to grab the rope around her waist and tie it to the bow rail, before sliding down onto the deck once more. Her blonde hair, swept back from her brow and into a rough ponytail, was sodden, broken into rain-soaked strands. Little rivulets were pouring down the jagged metal sections of her armour, and the robes between them were sticking doggedly to her pale human skin. Tiredly, the Champion pulled her hood up over her head, trying to keep off the worst of the rain, but she still looked utterly miserable.

Besides the two of them, tucked into the ship's bow, only two of the others were on deck – Isabela was at the wheel, dogged as ever, and Anders was tugging at the mainsail's guide ropes. Aveline had disappeared beneath the deck, to check on Carver and Merrill. A few hours had passed since sunset, and the sky was no longer tinged with fire – it was a deep indigo, with only a crescent moon providing illumination. Even that was sporadic at best, as it flitted through the clouds...

Slowly, Varric turned his marksman's eyes to the coast, running level with the caravel's side. They were hugging the rocky cliffs of the Ferelden Coastlands, and the templar ship was making extraordinary progress with Isabela at the helm – they were already east of Highever, and Amaranthine couldn't be more than a couple of hours away.

"She knows," Hawke muttered, after a long pause, using an infinitesimal drop in the wind to make her words audible. "We're heading just past Amaranthine, Isabela says there's a bay to shelter in..."

"She'd better be right..." the dwarf rumbled. "But where do we go from there?"

"I think she's got it into her head that we head north, to Rivain..."

"Ancestors, she's got to be kidding!"

"Why?"

"Rivain? Llomerryn, home of the Raiders? You know, those lovable scoundrels we've been massacring on and off for the last seven years? And, hell, I shouldn't even have to point out the qunari presence!"

The dwarf was gratified to see Hawke biting her lip in doubt, even as that lip, and the rest of her face, and the rest of his, were battered by the rain. Bianca, mercifully waterproofed, was holding out against the rain, but Varric wasn't doing quite so well as his weapon. His hair, usually settled into a look of pristine messiness – the dashing rogue look – was soaked and clumpy, and his leather duster was coursed by little sluices of rainwater, sliding down him to pool on the deck below.

"Where else could we go, then?" Hawke piped up, but Varric had a feeling she already had a destination in mind – the same one he did.

"You know what I'm about to say, don't you?"

"Ferelden?"

"More... specific. There are templars in Ferelden too, the only way you're going to avoid them is by finding people to protect you..."

"So...?" she persisted. "Varric, where did you have in mind?"

The dwarf played a roguish smile across his features, and muttered:

"Vigil's Keep."