(Wow, thank you all for the nice feedback! A bit surprising, considering how mean I'm being to the Wardens. I'm glad to hear so many people are enjoying it. Well... maybe not the being mean part, so much.)

33. Lost and Found

Something heavy landed on the ground nearby, and a Dalish accent said, "This was all I could find."

Kazar opened his eyes. He tried to turn his head at the sound of the voice, but doing so sent a fresh wave of agony from the vicinity of his collarbone.

"Don't move," Felicity's voice said wearily above him. She sounded tired, and frustrated. Then, her voice rose. "Thank you, Meila. Were you able to find anything in the mage camp?"

"I could not get that far in."

"So it's completely overrun, then." So Marnan was nearby too. She also sounded tired. And sad.

Kazar squinted, the world swimming in and out of focus. There was something green and splotchy above him. A tree. And beyond that, the bright, sunny sky. Hadn't it been raining? It felt like it had been raining… he was cold enough for it.

"What… about the Tower of Ishal, Meila?" Marnan's voice continued. She was somewhere to his right, but he couldn't see her, because it hurt to turn his head. All he could see was the stupid tree above him.

"I attempted to scout it, but it, too, was overrun. It is impossible to say whether the other Wardens would have gotten out in time."

"They had to have," Marnan said tightly, though it was obvious she didn't believe that any more than Kazar did.

His head was clearing a bit now, even if his eyes couldn't seem to focus right. They'd been in a battle, he remembered, and he'd been shot. Then they'd dragged him through the woods and… he couldn't really say what had happened after that. He remembered a lot of Felicity telling him to do things, and the burning pain of someone taking the arrow out of him… but everything else was pretty vague.

A dark form appeared in his field of vision. Ah, there she was now… his over-bearing know-it-all of a savior. Her hands were all gentle and caring for now, but he had no doubt that she'd turn stiff and self-righteous again the moment he did something she disapproved of.

There was the soft pop of a cork being removed, and then Felicity's hand spread something wet across his forehead. Something that swiftly began to feel like ice, seeping through his skin and into his veins.

"W-what's the id-dea?!" he stuttered hoarsely, every word stretching that arrow wound. He shivered in earnest now. "That's-s-s fucking c-cold!"

"Kazar! Language!" Yep, there it was. Like an annoying, bossy older sister.

"He's awake?" The red hair of the dwarf warrior appeared in Kazar's vision on the side opposite from Felicity. He squinted, but couldn't seem to make out her face.

His chattering teeth jarred the arrow wound, and he clamped both jaw and eyes shut with a groan. Ice coursed through him.

"I'm sorry if it's uncomfortable, Kazar," Felicity said, not sounding very sorry at all. "But I need to lower your fever, and the only means I have of doing so at the moment is warmth balm."

"I ha-a-ave a f-f-fever?"

Someone gently tucked covers tightly around his torso, though he couldn't say who, since his eyes were still closed.

"For nearly two days."

"How are you feeling?" Marnan asked.

"C-cold."

Felicity sighed. "Meila, have you had any luck finding help?"

"There are no settlements within a distance that we can reasonably carry him," said the Dalish.

There was a moment of silence, then Felicity reluctantly said, "Perhaps we should track down those apostates after all, then. I'd hate for my own concerns to endanger anyone's life."

"I have already attempted to do so."

"You… what?! But I said I didn't want you seeking them out!"

"And since when do you have the right to command me, shemlen?"

Kazar chuckled, opening his eyes and craning his head around just so he could see the glares they were giving one another. It hurt, but it was worth it. So much for them being the only ones who could tolerate one another.

"It doesn't matter," Marnan interrupted tiredly. "The end is the same, Felicity, is it not?"

Felicity harrumphed, but capitulated. "I suppose."

"However," Meila continued, "I'm afraid that I was unable to locate them, based on the instructions. Perhaps if you could be more specific, durgen'len?"

Marnan laid her head in her hands. "I cannot. These surface forests… the navigation of them is so unfamiliar to me, with no specific pathways or separate chambers. Without a guide, I get confused. I am sorry."

Meila nodded. "This is understandable. These mages are obviously quite skilled at hiding. I've found very little evidence of their presence here, and certainly nothing I can track. I do not doubt that this 'Morrigan' led you about in circles while guiding you, merely so that you would have difficulty retracing the path later."

Kazar squinted over at the other elf, and the question came out of him, unbidden. "Is that s-something D-dalish do?"

Meila looked at him coolly, but nonetheless nodded. "On occasions when we have reason to accept a stranger into our camp, yes."

"Oh." A particularly harsh shudder jerked through him, jarring his wound. He closed his eyes again against the ensuing flash of pain. "F-fuck."

There was a minute of silence while Kazar just shivered. Then…

"I… I am so sorry, Kazar," Marnan suddenly said harshly. "All of you. This is all my fault."

"What?" That was Felicity. "Marnan, no. We've been over this."

"And I stand by my apology. It was my idea to try to flank. I agreed with Duncan to let the front lines face a potential Blight horde. The guilt for this fiasco is mine."

"Marnan, that's not true!" Felicity cried.

"It seems to me," Meila put in, "that the greatest guilt here belongs to the man who did not answer the beacon as we did. If we are to be angry with anyone, let it be him."

"Now that," said a new voice, and all three women around him jumped, "is the most sensible thing any of you has said all day."

Meila's bow was out and drawn in a flash, an arrow aimed into the trees toward the voice. "Who goes there? Show yourself."

"Meila, be at ease," Marnan said. "That… is Morrigan."

"'Tis true," the witch said, stepping out of the shadow of a gnarled tree, "I am certainly myself. And you, it seems, are lucky to be alive."

Kazar squinted, having difficulty focusing. Felicity was still huddled over him, even while Marnan and Meila stepped forward to greet the new arrival. The witch looked exactly as wild and exactly as shirtless as she had been last time Kazar had seen her. Judging by the pink in the splotchy blur that was all he could make out, anyway.

"How long have you been watching us?" Meila said stonily.

"Touchy, are you? Worried that your infamous 'Dalish survival skills' are failing you? How very quaint. Did you not recently say that I was 'obviously quite skilled at hiding'?"

"Apparently, a while," Marnan said wryly to Meila. Then, she addressed Morrigan. "Then you know of our plight?"

"Yes, I am aware of the… state of your fellow Warden." At that, Kazar saw her cast a glance in his direction. He couldn't read her facial expression with how his vision swam, but her voice sounded… unconcerned. That wasn't good.

After a moment of silence, Marnan pressed, "Might you be able to help us?"

"Perhaps. But why would I want to help you?"

"What?"

"You come into my woods twice now, always asking and never offering. You ask me to take this creature in for healing, yet you offer nothing in return."

"What would you ask?" the dwarf said. "Wealth? Power?"

"Oh, but that is a question…" The woman began circling around the camp, eyeing them each in turn like a prowling cat. "What could I, a mage of some not insignificant skill, possibly want from you, four—and, let's be honest, soon to be three—Grey Wardens wandering lost in the woods, with no order behind them and nothing of their own but ashes and rubble? What might I want from you? Why, the answer is simple then, is it not? I want nothing."

Marnan's voice was confused. "Then you will help us after all?"

"No…" Kazar said hoarsely. "Sh-she's leaving m-me here to die."

"You make it sound needlessly malevolent," the witch said. "I am merely leaving you as I found you. That I announced my presence at all is merely a matter of chance on your part."

Marnan's axe came off her back. "You could truly be that cruel?"

"'Cruel' is a matter of opinion. Is it cruel for the wolf to strike at the weakest member of the herd, if it means feeding its young? Is it cruel for the spider to spin its web across the most likely path of the fly, when it would starve otherwise?"

"No," Marnan said sternly, "but it is wrong to leave a child to die when you are perfectly capable of doing something about it."

Kazar squeaked a protest. Child?!

The witch began to speak again, but Felicity's voice interrupted her.

"Perhaps… there is something we can offer you… Morrigan, right?" A wary nod. "You're an apostate, correct? A mage trained outside the Tower?"

"If this precedes some sort of threat, mage, I will not be taken in by it."

"Not… a threat. A trade."

There was a moment of silence. "I'm listening."

"Kazar and I were Tower trained. Between us, we possess a wealth of knowledge that you may not have been privy to during your upbringing out here. Uses of healing, primal magic, spirit magic… would it not be beneficial to supplement your current repertoire with somewhat more… standardized knowledge? If only to get a fuller range of magical skills?"

The witch thought that over. "And you offer to… teach me these Tower-taught skills? The pithy spells that your Chantry approves of? You really think that a fair trade?"

"Knowledge," Felicity said, quite firmly, "is always a fair trade, because only by having it can you ensure that it is never used against you."

The witch hummed thoughtfully. Then, quite suddenly, she said, "Very well."

"You'll help us?" Felicity squealed with excitement.

"Provided you hold up your end of the bargain… yes. I will show you and your companions back to my mother. She will be able to care for your companion there."

"Thank you, Morrigan," Marnan said dutifully.

"Gratitude is hardly necessary." The woman turned and started off into the woods. "'Tis a trade, after all."

Kazar found himself being shifted from the bedroll he was on onto a makeshift litter made of reeds and wolf skin. Ah, the usefulness of having a Dalish elf in the party. The transfer hurt, but he was just too tired, cold, and miserable to curse anyone out for it. Then, the litter was borne up, and he watched the tree canopies pass above him. Above that, solid and bright, was the clear spring sky.