Loghain found himself rather wondering where the group of them were off to; they'd left Denerim by the North Road, heading somewhere northwest rather then travelling southwest, toward where the darkspawn horde was.
"Where are we going?" he asked, his curiosity finally overcoming him.
"A couple of places. Orzammar, to start; we'll be passing close by it on our way around the north end of the lake anyway, and I have a couple of things I'd like to take care of there before we continue south to Redcliffe. And we'll be making another detour on the way."
"Why Redcliffe?" Loghain asked, puzzled. It seemed a rather out-of-the-way place to be heading, even if it was the home of the dwarf's main ally outside of Denerim.
"Because that's where the army is mustering; we'll meet up with everyone there."
Loghain frowned, still feeling perplexed. "But why muster there? It's hardly the place where the darkspawn are most likely to attack," he pointed out dryly.
Right snorted, gave Loghain a look. "Unfortunately we didn't have much choice about where to hold the muster," he said dryly. "Seeing as there was the small matter of a civil war preventing us from gathering some place more logical."
"Point taken," Loghain said, feeling stupid for not having realized that on his own. He resumed his previous silence.
In late afternoon he was given an opportunity to see for himself just how well the warden and his companions worked together; a group of bandits decided their group looked like easy pickings. Loghain quickly slipped his shield onto his left arm, drew his new sword, and took up a defensive stance, snarling taunts at the oncoming men to lure them into concentrating on him. The other two warriors fell into step to either side of him, the elderly mage moving in behind the three, so that they formed a living shield between her and the attackers. The two rogues split off to either side, the mabari scampering along at Right's heels, all three looking for opportunities to dart in and damage their enemies. It was clearly practised moves they were all making, a formation they had used previously, though the position Loghain held now would have been the bastard's before. He was standing in another man's place once again, though at least this time it was not the shoes of a dead man he was striving to fill.
The golem, which had been trailing some distance back, thundered up to their little group, falling in protectively behind the mage. He saw fear in the bandits' eyes for the first time, as they began to realize they may have bitten off more then they could chew. It was a nasty, one-sided slaughter after that, ending with the majority of the bandits dead, only a few of the smartest or luckiest escaping into the surrounding woods.
"Fools," he muttered, and crouched down to tear a strip off cloth off the ragged tunic of one corpse, carefully wiping his blade clean before sheathing it, while the dwarfs and the elf ruthlessly searched the corpses for anything worth salvaging. Prudent of them, he thought approvingly.
The group made camp, something they were obviously as well-practised at as their fighting. He stood still for a few minutes, watching as they efficiently assembled a firepit, began gathering firewood, and fetching water, the elf sorting through backpacks and setting out ingredients for a meal. Loghain did not like feeling useless, and asked Right if they had a spare bow.
"Might. What do you want it for?"
"Hunting. There should be game around here somewhere," he responded.
The dwarf nodded, and went sorting through their gear, soon turning up a surprisingly fine bow, as well as a quiver full of arrows.
Loghain's eyebrows rose at the quality of the bow. "Very nice," he said, running a hand appreciatively along its curved shape. He quickly divested himself of his armour, leaving himself clad in just wool leggings, leather stockings, and padded gambeson. He strung the bow, slung the quiver over his back, and headed out into the forest, slightly surprised that the dwarf was not insisting he either stay in camp or be accompanied, but appreciative of the chance for privacy.
He could almost relax enough to truly enjoy the hunting, and found himself thinking how long it had been since he last did something like this. Years. Before Maric sailed away and died, that last visit the two of them had made to Gwaren together, slipping away from their guards – foolish of them, yes, but they'd both needed a break. They'd had a comfortable day together, briefly reliving their long-ago youth, when it had been just the two of them, not yet quite friends, travelling alone together in search of the rebel encampment. He remembered the shock and exultation the rebels had displayed at Maric's unexpected return, when they'd thought him dead at his mother's side.
So many times Maric had been thought dead, even in just the few years of the rebellion... Small wonder he'd never been able to believe that Maric was dead, when there was no more evidence for it now then there'd been after Queen Moira's death, after their disappearance following the disastrous battle at West Hill, after Maric snuck off with the Grey Wardens into that mysterious expedition into the Deep Roads. One of the few secrets he'd never divulged to Loghain was just what had occurred on that trip, beyond the fathering of a bastard son.
In a small clearing not far from where they are setting up camp he spied some rabbits browsing, and was pleased when his skills with a bow proved still good enough to feather two of them before they could escape down into their warren of burrows. He carried the limp bodies back to camp and skinned and cleaned them, the mabari making short work of the guts, before handing them over to the elf to add to the pot for that night's meal.
Some time later, while he sat and stared into the flames of their fire, the dwarf appeared at his side, two plates heaped high with rabbit stew in hand, and offered one to him. He grunted in thanks and accepted it, eating hungrily, surprised by his appetite. A day spent mainly in walking and some fighting had taken more energy then he'd have believed possible; clearly he was still out of shape from all the time spent either lost in drink or sitting behind a desk this last year.
"How well did you know Maric?" the dwarf asked curiously, sitting down beside him and starting in on his own plate of stew.
Loghain gazed at him silently for a long moment, then gave an infinitesimal shrug and looked away. "He was my friend. If he'd wanted to conquer the Fade, I would have led the charge."
"How did you meet him?"
The faintest ghost of a smile touched his face for a moment, as he remembered that first fateful meeting in the night. "I was hunting – well, poaching, to be entirely honest – when a boy my own age came stumbling out of the woods. He was so dirty, you'd have thought he'd been dug up out of the ground. He was running away from the traitorous boot-lickers who'd just murdered the queen. Though I didn't know it at the time. He was bloody, exhausted, and obviously being hunted. I offered to take him to my father's camp. I didn't find out who he was for a while, though."
Right looked at him curiously. "That's it? That's the whole story?"
"I know a bard would make it out to be better, but it isn't a story to me," Loghain answered quietly, intently. " I lived it. There were no heroes or villains, no great deeds, no endings, happy or otherwise."
"What made Maric such a great king?" the dwarf asked. It was only the honest curiosity in his voice that made Loghain attempt an answer. There was no simple answer to that question, just as Maric had been no simple man.
"There are men who inspire such devotion that everyone around would lay down their lives for him. And there are men who come and go from this world, and no one notes it," Loghain said, softly, voice on the edge of hoarseness as he thought of his friend, his king, his master. "What makes them so? Your guess is as good as mine. Maric was remarkable; that's all I can say of him."
Zevran walked over just then and split the remainder of the stew between their two plates. Loghain frowned, noticing that he and Right were the only two to receive seconds. "Extra rations for the Wardens?" he asked, raising an eyebrow ironically. "Special privilege?"
"No. Necessity. You'll notice in the days to come that we need considerably more food then non-Wardens. What would adequately feed the rest of our companions would be slow starvation for us."
"Ah," Loghain said softly. So that explained his ravenous appetite since waking this morning. "And what other wonderful changes can I expect to learn of in the days to come?" he asked sourly.
"Nightmares; pretty nasty ones, especially now that the archdemon is on the move," Right said grimly. "And you can sense the darkspawn; they can sense you too. We'll be magnets for any in the area. Which at least has the advantage of attracting them to those best able to deal with them. Long term changes... well, let's not worry about those until we actually survive this Blight."
Loghain grunted. "A good plan," he agreed. "I'm turning in."
He added his plate to the pile of them by the fire, then walked over to where he'd left his pile of gear earlier, wrapped himself in a blanket, and lay down, still armoured. Nightmares. He snorted softly. They'd have to be something pretty remarkable to beat the nightmares he'd been having on his own since Ostagar. Ignoring the throbbing of his head – he'd had little to drink today, save a glass of watered wine with each meal – he closed his eyes and willed himself to sleep.