Chapter Eighteen: Expedition's End

Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Age 2.

"I know that we've killed what must be every darkspawn and demon in this area," Emma complained, "but that doesn't mean that they need to start possessing rocks and coming at us that way! I mean, come on. Why can't we just not fight for a while?"

"You surprise me," Fenris told her. "I thought you loved fighting."

"Normally I do when my cause is just – which it always is – but I really just want to get back aboveground and be super rich," Emma explained. "And so all of this needless delay and rock-fighting is really annoying me."

Suddenly the possessed rocks they were fighting fell to the ground and a mysterious wind that came from nowhere assembled another rock creature.

"Stop!" the thing said in a low, demonic voice. "You have proven how strong you are and I would not see another one of these creatures harmed without need."

"They are just possessed rocks," Varric pointed out flatly. "And we're just disassembling them like you just did. How much 'harm' are we doing?"

"Maybe he means psychological harm," Merrill suggested.

"You really don't have a right to get all high and mighty with us," Emma said, glaring. She put her hands on her hips. "You're basically saying that the only reason you're going to stop the attacks is because you know that you won't be able to kill us. There's nothing about how it's wrong to randomly attack innocent spelunkers."

"You're still sticking to that story?" Fenris asked incredulously.

"I like being a spelunker," Emma sniffed.

"Does it really matter why I don't want these fights to keep going on?" the demon demanded. "You don't want to keep fighting these creatures and I don't want them to get hurt. It's a win-win situation."

"What are they?" Merrill inquired curiously.

"They feed off of the magical rocks," the demon replied. "And it consumes them so that all they can think of is feeding."

"So basically they're just a bunch of possessed lyrium addicts," Emma translated. "Wonderful."

"Calling them 'magical rocks' kind of makes you look stupid," Varric informed him.

Fenris' eyes narrowed accusingly. "You feed on them, don't you?"

"I do not want my feast to end," the demon conceded. "But what does that matter? This does not affect you at all."

"You're a demon and demons are evil," Fenris said flatly.

"Unlike Merrill, I actually agree with Fenris," Emma said, sounding a bit surprised.

"I don't like or trust demons!" Merrill protested.

"But you can't kill me," the demon protested. "The way out is blocked by a door that has a lock. In order to get out you will need to find the key and unlock the door and I know where the key is."

"Why aren't you trying to kill us?" Varric wondered. "I mean, I don't want you to, of course, but I'm still curious."

"I can't be bothered," the demon said simply.

"I hate demons and so I'm going to kill you," Emma announced, pointing her staff at him.

"B-but what about the locked door?" the demon demanded.

Emma rolled her eyes. "Please. I'm a mage. I think that I can handle one locked door."

They were racing along towards the exit (stopping briefly at the vault to grab more things to take with them and sell to make them all obscenely wealthy) when all of a sudden there was another mysterious wind.

"Damn," Varric swore.

The rock demon from before – probably – reformed and it was about twice as tall and glowing red.

"That is not good," Emma said, gulping. She then started running for shelter.

"Emma, what are you doing?" Fenris demanded.

"Don't mind me," she called back to them.

And sure enough they did not really have time to mind her because the demon starting attacking Merrill. When the demon was distracted, Emma stepped out from behind her hiding place and started shooting spells at her. When it did turn its attention to her she ran away and found another hiding spot until it was distracted.

By the time that that creature finally fell again, Emma was a little sweaty and out of breath and everyone else was severely injured.

"Give me a minute and I'll heal you," she promised. "I'm not as good as Anders is but since I'm here and he's not then you'll all simply have to make do."

"You're not possessed and he is so I suppose that's an improvement," Fenris said grudgingly. "If it were Anders and I wasn't stuck underground and didn't want my injuries to slow me down from getting back aboveground where I belong then I might refuse to be healed on principle."

"And I'm sure everyone would care so much," Emma replied. "Well…aside from the annoyance of you slowing us down."

"It wasn't very nice of you to keep running away and leaving us to be hit by the demon's attacks," Merrill said reprovingly.

Emma shrugged. "Hey, it's not my fault you weren't all doing the same thing."

"If we were all doing the same thing then how could any of us hit him?" Varric wondered.

Emma shrugged. "That's easy. Just run and cast. Or run and shoot. Or run and…whatever it is that Fenris does but that looks suspiciously like casting."

"I am not a mage!" Fenris growled.

"Perhaps not," Emma said, reaching out her hand to heal him and watching the lyrium on his skin practically sizzle in response. "But your tattoos might be."

"How can tattoos be mages?" Fenris snapped. "That's ridiculous."

"Tevinter is ridiculous, yes," Emma agreed. "Fortunately, none of us actually live there."

"I hate to say it, elf, but Emma might have a point," Varric mused.

Fenris shot him a skeptical look. "Emma never has a point."

"It doesn't really matter if you're actually magic or not because sometimes it looks like you can do magic and your average templar isn't really going to care to see the distinction," Varric told him.

Fenris was practically growling. "I can take your average templar and your above average templar, too. As I'm not a mage, they cannot render me helpless."

"They can't render me helpless either," Emma announced.

Fenris drew back, surprised. "They cannot dispel your magic."

"No, they can," Emma corrected him, shaking her head. "That just doesn't render me helpless. The last time a templar tried that I beat him to death with my staff. Those things are surprisingly heavy."

"I'm not sure how I feel about that," Varric admitted. "So I'm going to settle for pleased that my friend and business partner is so self-sufficient."

Emma laughed. "Well, yeah. I mean, what, was I supposed to rely on Carver to protect me?"

"He was standing right there, wasn't he?" Varric asked knowingly.

Emma nodded. "Lecturing me about being more discrete about my hidden mage status in front of everyone."

"I really wish that, that rock demon being such a devastating opponent, he had something to loot besides those giant rocks he was made out of," Merrill said mournfully.

"I do, too," Emma agreed reluctantly. "To make up for this, let's grab all the treasure we can find. Also, kick a rock or two that you think might have made up his body but be careful because if you kick a rock too hard then that can really hurt."

"Such wisdom," Fenris groused.

"Rock wraiths," Varric marveled as they started to walk up-hill and – hopefully – towards the surface, "are supposed to be dwarven legends. They're not even supposed to be real."

"I don't think telling them that will make a difference," Merrill offered.

"If only," Varric said wistfully. "I mean, can you imagine? 'I will destroy you!' 'Sorry, sir, but you're not actually supposed to exist.' And then…poof! It doesn't exist anymore."

" 'Poof'?" Fenris repeated, sounding disgusted.

"Yes," Varric said a little defensively. "Poof."

They stopped in front of a large door.

Emma tried the handle. "Yes, this is most definitely locked."

"Oh, if only we had dealt with that demon…" Varric said with mock-regret.

Fenris shuddered. "Don't even joke about such things!"

"Who's joking?" Varric asked innocently.

They walked for a few incredibly boring hours before finally making it back to the surface.

The first thing that Emma did was throw herself on the ground and start kissing it, causing everyone else to trip on her. Not that she let that bother her, of course. "Oh, beautiful surface! I will never ever under any circumstances leave you ever again! Ever!"

"Do you think you have enough 'ever's, Emma?" Fenris asked snidely.

"I'm not sure you should go around making those types of promises," Varric cautioned. "You never know what the future holds."

"I do," Emma said stubbornly. "It holds me not going back down to that hellhole ever again or any other hellhole like it."

"Yes, I know you feel that way now and that probably won't change," Varric allowed. "I don't much like the underground myself even if having stone sense is pretty sweet. Still, what if-"

"It won't," Emma insisted.

"But what if?" Varric pressed.

"Then someone is going to die and probably more than someone," Emma said, her eyes shining. She slowly climbed to her feet.

"…I'm scared," Merrill admitted.

"Probably for the best," Fenris told her.

"Do you think Bartrand is stupid enough to head back to the city?" Varric wondered.

"What's it matter?" Fenris asked him.

"I need to kill him, you see, so if he's here then it will make my task much easier," Varric explained.

"Bu why do you need to kill him?" Merrill asked, confused. "You said he tries to kill you all the time."

"He does," Varric admitted. "So in retrospect I probably should have seen this coming. I think he just misses Orzammar, personally. But this has been the most annoying attempt yet and so he must die. Besides, without you guys I might not have made it out in one piece."

"Since Bartrand expects you to be dead I don't see why he wouldn't stay," Emma opined.

"True but he's also very paranoid so I can see why he might not," Varric replied.

"If you need any help murdering your brother, I'd be glad to project and assist you," Emma offered.

Varric smirked. "I just bet you would. I'll let you know, I promise. I'm not Orzammar enough to relish the idea of killing him, believe it or not."

"So do we actually need to give our companions a share of the treasure?" Emma asked uncertainly. "I mean, my mother will definitely make me share with them but what about everyone else?"

"Well, no one else was a partner so I don't think they deserve as much as we're getting," Varric said slowly. "But Fenris and Merrill actually came with us and helped keep us alive so they deserve something even if no one else does."

Emma made a face. "But I don't like them. That's why I took them in the first place!"

"We're right here, you know," Merrill pointed out.

"She doesn't care," Fenris told her.

"So I guess if I have to pay them then I'll give everyone else the same amount even though they did absolutely nothing. But some of it has to come from your share, Varric, because I don't think we can be friends if you have more money than I do," Emma told him seriously.

"Did I ever say I wanted to be friends?" Varric asked curiously. He shook his head. "Still, I'm thinking of starting a series of books based on you and that would be easier if I hung around so…why not? I can't begin to tell you how wealthy we're going to be, especially if I either hold most of it back so as not to flood the market or flood the market and sell so quickly no one has time to realize I've flooded the market. But you go home, I'll settle all of that."

"Sounds good to me," Emma said cheerfully and promptly walked away leaving the other three to deal with whatever else needed to be done.

When Emma got back to her house, she was horrified to spot three templars in the main room and Bethany dressed in mage robes.

She looked from the templars to her sister, aghast, and tried to decide which to address first.

"Bethany, what in the world are you wearing?" she finally demanded. "It's…it's hideous!"

"It's mage robes," Bethany said patiently.

"I know! Hideous!" Emma cried out, shielding her eyes.

"Well she's a mage and she's going to live at the Gallows from now on so she kind of has to wear it," one of the templars, Cullen, told her.

Emma's eyes narrowed and she summoned a giant fireball. "Are you saying that that's her slave outfit?"

"No, of course not. Just because we take mages away from their friends and families and lock them up in terrible conditions with an insane knight-commander that makes me – who was banished from the Ferelden Circle for being too hard-core – appear like the voice of moderation and reason is no reason to start throwing words like 'slavery' and 'prison' around," Cullen said disapprovingly. "You can still visit and everything."

Emma's fireball grew bigger. "Is that so? How very nice."

"I suspect that you don't mean that," one of the other templars told her suspiciously.

"Serah Hawke, please be advised that lighting templars on fire is a finable offense," Cullen cautioned her.

Emma momentarily brightened and the fire dissipated. "I could totally pay that now! Not that I would, of course, since I hate templars on principle. But I could. And you're not taking Bethany."

"Sister, please," Bethany pleaded. "Let's not have any more bloodshed."

" Any more bloodshed?" Emma asked, surprised. "I haven't even started yet!"

"And I can already see how it's going to end. Please just…let this happen," Bethany requested.

"How did this even happen? I've been gone for about a week! It took us a week to get down there but that shortcut was something else. Bartrand didn't know what he was doing when he left us to die…" Emma mused.

Bethany looked like she was going to ask but decided against it. "I don't know. I haven't even used any magic and you clearly summoned a fireball and yet no one seems to notice it."

"That's because Emma gets away with everything," Carver replied as he stepped into the room. In full templar regalia.

"I will stab you," Emma said flatly.

Carver winced. "Is now a bad time to mention that I'm joining the templars?"

"What the…but they're going to enslave Bethany! And I'm totally a mage, too!" Emma cried out.

Carver cast a nervous look at the templars but they appeared not to notice this confession. "Look, this has nothing to do with any of you. Well…it might have something to do with Aveline not letting me into the guard but aside from that…I just need to find myself and I couldn't find any Grey Wardens to join."

"Did you try mentioning the Archdemon? Apparently that's like a dog whistle for them," Emma confided.

Carver eyed her strangely. "No, I did not."

"I will never speak to you again if you do this," Emma threatened.

Carver rolled his eyes. "If I could only be so lucky. See, Mother? I knew she would judge me. I'm glad to leave."

"You don't mean that," Bethany chided. "You were fretting earlier that Emma wouldn't care what you did."

"Well she's still being annoying," Carver said, quickly rallying.

"Bethany, say the word and I will kill them all," Emma vowed.

Bethany moved forward and gave her sister a quick hug. "I know. But I guess that maybe I'm tired of running and I don't want you to have to be on the run because of me anymore."

"I'm just as much of a mage as you are," Emma pointed out.

"Yes but you're not like me," Bethany told her. "You're so much braver and stronger and equipped to handle life on the outside than I am."

"There can be no turning back once you do this," Emma warned.

Bethany smiled at her. "I think we both know that that's not true. If I say the word you'd storm that place to free me."

"I might do it anyway," Emma told her.

"Alright, let's hurry this up," Cullen said, sounding bored. "I'm on a tight schedule."

With that, the five of them – the templars and the twins – left the house.

"…I…What…What?" Emma demanded incoherently.

"This is all your fault," Leandra accused. "I told you you should have taken your siblings."

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