"Aedan, I've a question." The two had made it a day without running into the Templars again after their initial flight from Denerim. Currently they were hidden somewhere south of the city, though had moved more east toward the sea. When it was quiet, Solona could hear the roar of the waves banging against the cliffs from the ocean. Still, they wasted very little time when they put together camp, and only slept for a few hours at a time before moving on. They didn't even bother lighting a fire, knowing that the Templars hot on their heels would only find them out quicker for it.
Aedan was trying for a nap, his eyes closed and arm flung over his eyes with his head resting on the travel pack, wearing only a breast plate with the rest stacked by his side. Keran was nestled up at his side sleeping contently. "I've an answer. Though I don't know if it's to the question you're about to ask." He replied without looking up.
Solona spared him a scathing glance that he didn't see before resuming her train of thought. "Why… are you here?"
There was a long pause, and then Aedan drew a deep breath and sat up, leaning on one arm and looking Solona over carefully. "What do you mean?"
"I mean, why haven't you turned me over to the Templars yet?" The words of Mouse still nagged at her, and the doubt about Aedan's loyalties had slowly been eating away at her willpower to keep from putting thoughts into words.
"Why would I?" Aedan replied easily, regarding her with a slightly confused look on his face.
She was stunned that he could be so thick, wondering if he was putting on an act for her sake, or if he really meant it. "I know that I agreed to help you break in and kill Howe, but if I'm running from Templars constantly… I mean I'm not really much help. There's got to be a better option than me, right? My talents can only be worth so much."
Another heavy pause descended on the camp, the two staring at each other across the few feet that separated them. Solona was half worried that he'd agree with her, and at the same time was hoping that he would. It would be the right thing to do on his part, right? Turn her over to the proper authorities and then go about his way. It was hard to sneak into places with a bunch of men in heavy plate stomping around in your tracks. The silence and uncertainty was making her jittery, so she was about to say more when Aedan finally decided to speak up.
"I have to admit, I thought about it." He shrugged and Solona's heart plummeted, all of her fears finally brought to life. "But I don't think that you deserve the life that the Circle gave you, or the punishment that there is for leaving it. I thought at first that your skills would be useful to me, and so it would be good to have a mage outside the Circle's influence at my side. But after catching a glimpse at the kind of person you are, I don't think that the Chantry is right in its harsh treatment of all mages outside of their control."
Her stomach rose a little, her heart beating faster in her chest. She'd never heard of someone changing their mind about mages before. The Chantry was unwavering in its decree that mages were to be kept under control at all times. Templars might dally around with their charges, but at their core they all believed that mages weren't people to converse with, but things to keep locked up. "What are you talking about?"
"In Highever… I was taught many things. History, war, politics, manners, and of course about the Maker and the Chant. They tell you that the moment mages are let out on their own they turn into abominations and resort to blood magic. That they're crafty and deceitful, and they'll sooner bend your mind to their will than have a civil conversation." His voice was steady, a simple recitation of facts that was without personal bias. It was just a regurgitation of lessons that had been fed to him a distant memory ago. "But, I've not seen such a thing with you. You're clever and wickedly intelligent, but you wear your heart on your sleeve. It is… refreshing in a way to see somebody so honest, especially when you had no reason to be so with me. If you are an example of what normally comes out of the Circle… Well, my opinion of mages has changed somewhat."
Solona was speechless, happy that her representation of the Circle mages had been seen positively by at least one person. But at the same time she felt a sense of guilt gnawing at her conscience, knowing that she'd almost given into temptation to learn blood magic from Mouse. In favor of keeping their friendship intact, Solona chose not to mention this particular detail to Aedan, thinking it best that he wasn't made aware of the tough choice that waited for her ever time she fell asleep.
"What's more, I'd like to think that we were friends." A fragile little smile appeared on his face, the first bit of cheer he'd shown in two days. "These days it seems I have precious few of them. More to my folly if I left my only two-legged companion to her death."
Solona returned the smile with one of her own, feeling relieved that at least one matter was settled. She was confident that Mouse would have one less leg to stand on in their argument of whether or not she should give up her body as a host to the demon. "Thank you Aedan. You have no idea what it means to hear you say that."
"I may know more than you suspect." Aedan replied quietly, his gaze drawn somewhere above her head into the darkness of the forest, lost in silent thought. "We'll figure out a way to break your phylactery. Beat a path leading to the Brecillian forest and loose them that way before heading back to Denerim."
Solona nodded in agreement to the rough plan, her focus wandering. It was a good plan. Except for the part where they actually beat the Templars. So far they had managed to avoid the bulk of ten or so men following them. Either through luck or the fact that their heavier gear and armor slowed them down in the rough forest terrain, whatever the reason, she was grateful. They needed time to come up with some sort of strategy, or a place to defend from where they would have an advantage over the Templars. But that seemed a long shot at best, impossible being the more likely answer.
-0-0-0-
Evening was settling over the market district of Denerim. Shops were closing down and people were heading home for the night. The guards that had been standing around twiddling their thumbs and pretending to do their job were moving off to go do other things. Probably more thumb twiddling. Or drinking. Or maybe something illegal.
Whatever the case, Kallian was watching from a distance as the last of them cleared her sight before moving to the next building and resuming the watch from there. The sound of feet followed in her silent wake, but she didn't turn to look, knowing that she'd find two other elves following her as they staked out their hunting ground.
It had been a little more than a week since she'd been free of her captors, and she'd put that time to good use. The Alienage was locked up tighter than an Arl's privy, so there was no returning home. Which meant that come nightfall she was easy prey for any guards that bothered to pay attention. It was practically a rule that any elves found outside the Alienage at night were in desperate need of a clobbering from responsible citizens, after all. So she'd done what she could to pull favors and find others that were in her same situation. Luckily enough, a handful had been eager to quit squatting in front of the Alienage gates and do something productive since they couldn't do anything else.
Four had started her little gang of misfits. One had washed out immediately when she uttered the words "picking pockets", and good riddance, too. She didn't need any weak-willed do-gooders tagging along with her anyway. The second no-go had gotten himself caught by the guards and hauled off to who-knew-where. The last two had proven more trust worthy and useful, though they weren't precisely thief material like Kallian was. Which was why she led the pack, and not them.
Pausing at the corner of a house, she scouted for likely targets. There were a few rag pickers, a trader or two still closing up shop, but there seemed a far more interesting target among the scattering masses. There were two of them, both looking extremely out of place by wearing full armor. One had a shield over his back with the emblem or some Bann or Arl on the face of it, a castle standing on a mountain of red on a field of white, and wore a set of armor that had seen better days. Human, she could tell by the height of him. The second was shorter, obviously an elf, and was apparently not your run of the mill servant. The bow slung across his back was probably the most shocking feature to Kallian, who had never seen an elf display a weapon so proudly. He was also very blonde, and the way he moved reminded her of an expert thief picking careful paths through the shadows in the dead of night.
"Huh." Must be the bodyguard for the shem. She thought silently.
"Kallian? What's up?" Oen, one of the ones following her asked, coming up behind her and practically breathing down her neck. He was tall as far as elves went, could probably pass as a human if he wore a helmet to disguise the fine features and pointy ears that defined elves by nature. They knew each other from the Alienage, the drab brown-haired brown-eyed man having been far less drab in the earlier days when they would pretend to be Dalish Crusaders versus the Evil Tevinters.
"By the ashy teats of Andraste, give me room to breathe. I've got a mark." She replied with an exasperated breath, elbowing Oen lightly in the chest to get him to regain a semblance of personal space. Childhood friend or not, she got jumpy when people invaded her personal space. Especially if they were male and roughly human-sized. "Pita," the only other elf woman who'd volunteered to join up with Kallian's insane idea of independence jumped at the sound of her name, her blue eyes taking up the majority of her frightened face. Her brown hair that had been so neatly tied back already seemed to frazzle. Inwardly, Kallian rolled her eyes. "You and Oen distract the two in the armor and I'll cut their purses. I'll run and meet you in the normal spot, 'aight?"
The two nodded and left their hiding place behind the building, walking straight toward the blonde man and his blonde-er elf/servant/guard thing. Kallian followed at a cautious distance, taking the long way around by making sure there were people between her and the marks at all possible times. When Oen and Pita got close enough, Pita suddenly broke out into hysterics that were so convincing, Kallian wasn't entirely sure that she was acting. Oen made a huge show of trying to ask for help, and soon enough practically everyone was staring at the two elves making a scene in the middle of the market square.
She made her move quickly, withdrawing the small knife she'd acquired through less-than-legal means and quickly cut the purse of the armored human then the one of the elf. She was about to make good on her run for it when the elf quite suddenly turned around and stared straight at her, some sixth sense having tipped him off to the theft.
Kallian didn't even blink, taking off at full speed into the darkness of the winding Denerim streets. She heard one of them call for her to stop, the other wondering what precisely had just happened in a very loud voice.
The sounds of the market disappeared, the rush of blood and the sound of her own breathing and the pounding of her feet on the ground taking its place. But there was something alarming that entered her senses as she took every winding turn she could think of on the go. There was someone following her, and they were catching up.
Not just catching up, but catching up quick! 'Andraste's flaming feet, he's fast!' Desperately she tried to loose her pursuer by knocking down anything that stood against the walls to try and get him to trip up and loose interest.
Suddenly she was yanked back by the elbow and slammed into a wall, her breath leaving her in a great woosh at the impact. Leather creaked, and she looked up to see a pair of very dark eyes boring into her own, looking very, very pissed. He had her pinned against the wall, his grip firm on her arms and his stance that of someone who was ready to fight. The blonde elf was breathing hard, but not nearly as much as Kallian, who felt like her lungs were on fire.
Gee, near a month in prison and you're practically useless. She cursed her own mortality. She was about to speak and offer back his money in exchange for going free when something odd about his face finally registered. He had tattoos. Lots of them. "By Andraste's blessed bloomers, you're Dalish!"
The elf snorted. "And whatever gave me away?" His tone was bitingly sarcastic and laden with an accent that she wasn't familiar with. "Give back what you stole and I'll consider lettin' you go."
That snapped her back to the present real quick. "Oh, yeah, sorry." With shaking hands she lifted the pouches of money that she'd stolen between them, offering them up for him to take.
"Tch, a flat-ear runs off with my money and only says sorry for it." The elf muttered, snatching the purses back and holding onto them tightly, taking a step back. "Well? What are you waiting for? Scurry away now. Shoo!" He gestured toward the streets, making motions toward Kallian like one would a stray dog begging for scraps.
She very nearly punched him in the face for it, just barely reigning in that impulse before she could make good on it. Instead she turned and left, having no desire to get tangled up with a well-armed Dalish man that seemed the sort to run one through if you got on his bad side. But she didn't run too far, taking to the roofs instead and tracing her steps back. She followed the elf, he being apparently unaware that he was being followed as he picked his way back to the market place. He met up with the human from before and made some aggravated gestures, tossing the human his pilfered pouch of coins. To Kallian's great surprise, the human didn't retort or make to punish the elf, but instead had the sort of look on his face that a puppy made when it had it's nose flicked. The two left together, heading out of the gates of the marketplace.
With curiosity burning in the back of her mind, Kallian slid down the roof and dropped to the ground, taking up a light jog to go find Oen and Pita. The two were in a pre-arranged meeting spot just outside of the Chantry grounds in the shadow of its stone wall. Both looked a little worried and curious at the same time.
"So?" Oen asked, looking disappointed when he didn't see anything in Kallian's hands.
She shrugged in response, standing a few feet from her cohorts. "The elf caught me up and took his money back."
Pita sniffled, and Kallian was sure that the woman was going to cry. "Don't worry 'bout it. I'm sure we can lift at least one purse at the docks before the night is over."
Oen's shoulders slumped, and for a moment he looked like he'd just heard that his entire family had been mauled to death or something similarly gruesome. "We can't keep doin' this Kallian. The guards are going to get suspicious."
"Ha! As if the guard cares that a few knife-ears are runnin' around makin' trouble. You heard the guard captain the other day. 'Army of Bastards!'" Kallian rolled her eyes. "The new Arl what's put himself in the castle don't know a thing 'bout hirin' good goons. He only knows how to recruit the bad ones. As long as we don't do nothin' too big, they ain't gonna care. No murderin', at the very least. Seems to be the only thing that gets those lot jumpin' to duty." Which for them was both a good and a bad thing.
It was true that the recent flood of sub-par guardsmen made it insanely easy to carry out petty crimes in broad daylight for anyone with a marginal amount of skill. However, it also meant that the commoners were being more cautious without the security of an active guard to put them at ease. Which meant that pick pocketing probably wouldn't be enough, and they would have to resort to robbery in order to buy bread and other necessities. There was also a sharp increase in violent crimes. More and more were wandering the street with mayhem in mind, their courage bolstered by the lack of any real form of punishment for committing heinous atrocities against the citizenry. It was only illegal if you got caught, after all.
With a sigh, Kallian turned and headed out of the alleyway, Oen and Pita following along behind their leader. "Let's just do this. I don't wanna go hungry again tonight."
A/N: Internet cookies to the first one to correctly guess who we just met this chapter! I'm excited to see if you guys get it.
P.S. Are any of you architects or at least somewhat in-tune with medieval floor planning? If you are, and you don't mind some mild story spoilers, please shoot me a note. I've got some questions. If you don't know, don't worry about it; it's not that big of a deal. Just trying for some historical accuracy. Also, anybody that is deeply knowledgeable about the political system of Ferelden in concerns with the Landsmeet? I'm afraid that I've got some questions that the DragonAgeWiki can't answer for me. Again, if nobody knows, it's alright. I'll just make up something that sounds plausible.