Disclaimer: I don't own Dragon Age or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other fans like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

Rating: T+

Spoilers: May contain spoilers for Origins, Awakening, Origins DL content, and Dragon Age II as well as the novels The Stolen Throne and The Calling.

Chapter Seventy-Nine: Funeral Rites

Getting out of Amgarrak thaig was not an easy proposition. First and foremost Bethany and Bannistre worked to heal the many wounds the party had suffered. Though he was badly injured himself, Loghain refused healing.

"See to the others first," he said, when Bethany attempted to tend his wounds. He stood in weary silence by the shrouded figure of the dead elf while the others rested.

"How do we get out of here?" Varric asked. "We've been in and out of alternate planes so many times, I'm not sure which one is which anymore, let alone which way is out."

"Near where we found Olmec's body, there was a hole," Loghain said. "I smelled fresh air - surface air. We'll try to open up the passage and get out that way. Maybe our new friend the golem can dig it out for us."

"Leave…to the surface?" Jerrik said.

"You'd rather stay here?" Loghain said. "It shouldn't be far from where we are to Orzammar: we can have you and your brother home long before there's any threat to your 'stone-sense.'"

"This thaig is valuable. I cannot leave until it's been thoroughly explored."

"This thaig is a death-trap. Frankly I don't want to open it up to the surface, but I want out of here even more. You want to explore this place, come back with your own damned team and on your own damned time. If you want my advice, seal this place off and forget it ever existed."

"My family will probably consider we've already lost too much. We can't leave without at least making certain we've recovered everything we can."

"Lord Jerrik. You've got your brother, a golem, and a passel of research telling you how to make your golems more effective. Consider it a win and let's get going."

"Listen to him, Jerrik," Brogan said. "We have to get out."

Jerrik looked torn, but after a moment he said, "You're right. Let's go."

Loghain expected Shale to grumble about putting the silent golem to work enlarging the cave-in that led to the surface, but she merely sniffed and said that such menial tasks were well-suited to such an inferior specimen. The golem obediently dug away at the rocks and crumbled ceiling until the hole was large enough for all, including the golem and Snug the bronto, to exit. They all climbed out via the pile of loose rubble, cautiously, Loghain last.

"We'll have to seal this hole somehow," he said, as he clambered out of the ground with his grim burden on his shoulder. "A task for later. Let's find a place to make camp and try to figure out where we are exactly."

"What are you going to do with…?" Elilia asked, and gestured to the shroud.

"Build a pyre. Not a state funeral, perhaps, but the best we can do for him at the moment."

"Not afraid you'll start these trees on fire?"

"I smell Lake Calenhad. We'll build the pyre on the lakeshore."

Elilia sniffed the air. "I don't smell anything."

"With this nose, I can smell the lake from Denerim. Trust me, it's nearby."

She put her arms around his neck and kissed the tip of his nose. "I like your nose," she said.

"You can use it as shelter when it rains."

"Stop being mean to yourself."

"Someone has to be."

"You're still blaming yourself for Chatterly's death." It was not a question.

"Shouldn't I? He didn't even have any business being there."

"And I'm the one who told you to let him come, so the fault is mine."

He put his arms around her waist and rested his forehead briefly against hers. "I am responsible for the lives under my command."

"Chatterly wasn't your soldier."

"And that makes it worse. I should have been more cautious."

"You stayed directly in front of him all the way through the Deep Roads. You couldn't have been more cautious."

"If there weren't room for improvement he'd be alive right now."

"Darling. Shit happens."

He sighed, but made no attempt to argue the assertion. He shouldered his burden again and led the way through the woods to the lakeshore.

"Can you tell where we are?" Elilia asked. In response, Loghain pointed south. Far away, on the furthest edge of vision, the smooth surface of the great lake was broken by a dark shape. "What's that?"

"Redcliffe castle," Loghain responded. "Ten, eleven miles away as the crow flies. We're fortunate we seem to have arisen on the west bank of the lake. It won't take us long at all to take Masters Jerrik and Brogan home."

He lowered Chatterly's body to the rocky ground. "Why don't you and the others find a place nearby where we can pitch camp? I'll take care of this."

"Right. Looking for a campsite…upwind. You sure you don't want someone to help you with this?"

"I'm sure."

"All right." She hesitated only a moment before turning to the others and gesturing them on. Loghain waited until they were out of sight and then began to gather dry driftwood and brush for the pyre. He knew it would not have to be a particularly big stack. He had no oil with which to increase the temperature of the blaze, but he wasn't worried about an incomplete incineration. The flames he breathed were hotter on their own than any oil fire he'd ever witnessed.

He built a low brushwood bier and laid the body, bedroll and all, upon it. He stood over it for a moment, thinking he ought to say something, but no words occurred to him. Finally he simply breathed in deeply and let it out in a plume of boiling flame.

He watched the pyre burn down, a process that took considerably less time than an ordinary funeral pyre. When there was nothing left but black ash and embers he took the short-handled camp shovel from his pack and began to shovel the still-smoldering remains into the lake. It was common practice for lakeshore dwellers to bury their dead in the water; in Redcliffe the pyres were set on small wooden boats that were allowed to burn until the water put out the fire. Loghain understood as few others did the reason why the fishermen who plied the dark waters pulled up such famous great lunkers, fish bigger at times than the boats that went out in search of them. Lake Calenhad fish were well-fed on half-burnt human remains.

Loghain never ate fish pulled from Lake Calenhad.

Elilia came back through the woods as he stood staring out at the lake, the shovel on his shoulder. He'd finished disposing of the remains.

"Is everything okay?" she asked.

"Yeah. Just wool-gathering," he answered. "Why? What did you come back for?"

"For you, partly. Mostly for the camp shovel, though. We can't dig our latrine without it, and Oghren is making ominous noises. No one wants to deal with that."

He handed it over. "I'm not quite done here."

"What's left to do?"

"Just one last thing."

The lakeshore was surrounded by red sandstone bluffs. Loghain went to the cliff face of one of these bluffs and took out his skinning knife. Elilia watched as he carved words into the soft stone with considerable ferocity.

"Do you really think that's true?" she asked, when he finished.

"Who's to say it's not?" he said. He replaced his knife in his belt and put an arm around her shoulders. "Let's go."

They walked away. The monument he left behind was hardly permanent, but he'd cut it deep enough into the friable stone to last a very long time indeed, barring landslides. The deep-cut words said:

HERE WAS LAID TO REST SABINE OF TREMMES, "CHATTERLY," AN ELF TOUCHED BY THE MAKER'S HAND.