One, two, Maric's run through
Three, four, the kingdom's at war
Eight, nine and now you die
Hawke stood on a vast glade in bloom. He knew this place. He recognized the four old trees growing in the middle of a glade. He recognized the large cottage he had called home once. Children were scurrying around him, but they were just shadows, just a fleeting memory of himself and his siblings playing a silly game. Samael tried to follow the children, but they just seemed to be always a few steps ahead of him. Their innocent laughter died away and Samael found himself standing above their graves. Bethany, Carver, Samael. Hawke exhaled in unspeakable pain and the whole scene shifted.
Once again he was running through the darkening gorges, looking for something he couldn't have possibly found; ever. His father's blood was on his hands. The path turned left and only now Samael realized it was a dead end. Something pale and dimly glowing in dark awaited him there. It was a white mabari licking its paw and not paying attention to anything else but the paw. The light emanating from the fur became dazzling and Samael shielded his eyes with a palm. When the light went out, Samael realized he was standing upon a precipice of a bottomless abyss.
"Jump," ordered a voice coming from his innermost sanctum. And he did.
When Samael looked down his legs were dissipating in thick shreds of mist slowly billowing above the ground. He slowly turned around, examining the vicinity, but there simply was nothing to be seen. Nothing but that weird fluffy mist as far as he could see. Nothing but that endless emptiness ringing in his ears.
A tall, ugly mirror standing on three golden talons appeared. Hawke was drawn to it against his better judgment.
"What is this foul game…?" he mumbled when the blind mirror resisted reflecting his silhouette. "What foul tricks are you playing with me?" he asked the mirror and touched its crazed surface. Whispers and distant giggling around Hawke made him to whirl around, but only his solitude yawned at him. "Is there anybody?" he shouted, but his voice sounded strange to him. "What do I fear?" he whispered to himself, wrapping his bare arms around him although he wasn't cold. "There's nobody here. Nobody but me. Do I fear myself? Or perhaps I fear for myself?" he kept questioning himself while staring into the mirror.
"Is there a murderer?" he asked the mirror.
"No," he answered his own question.
"Yes! I am!" he retorted a second later. "Should I fear myself then? Where am I anyway?"
"You should be more worried about why are you here," a serene voice entered Hawke's soliloquy. He slowly turned at that quiet, reasonable voice.
"Mother?" he asked in disbelief.
"Yes, my son," the ethereal silhouette strolled closer. "Don't fear me, my child," she stroked Samael's cheek in a loving gesture before she danced a few steps away.
"What am I doing here?" Samael asked in a small voice.
"You chose to be here, my son. What else?" Leandra replied and an unconcerned smile settled on her face.
"Now did I?" he muttered in disquiet and tried to touch his mother, but she dodged his hand.
"Aren't they beautiful?" Leandra asked with admiration and raised an eyebrow at her son when Samael clearly didn't understand her remark. He looked over his shoulder, then slowly turned to the new scene. A bed, a huge bed. Naked bodies intertwined together among the scattered pillows. Soft moans, scratched back, cigars and liquor. Samael wasn't surprised when Fawn emerged from the breathing bundle of heated skin, disheveled hair and hushed groans.
"I wondered when you'd get here," Fawn neatened his hair and patted the bed while his shark eyes flashed with provocation. "'Tis a most pleasant way to die - to expire of a surfeit of uncontrollable licentiousness and profane pleasures, don't you think?" he laughed a cathartic laugh. Greedy arms started snaking around Fawn's gorgeous body, inviting him back to bed.
"Die?" Hawke shook his head, ignoring Isabela who seductively blinked at him from behind Fawn's back. "Why do you speak of death, Hero of Fereldan?" he asked quietly and made a single step towards the bed.
"Samael," Fawn disengaged from his pleasant activities and gave Hawke an amused glance, "you are dying," he chuckled and continued fondling Bela's nipple.
"C'mon, Hawke," somebody laughed heartily at Samael's shocked face. "We all saw it coming," Varric leaned nonchalantly on the bed frame and slapped away naughty hands that were covetous of his chest hair.
"I didn't… I don't want to…" Hawke's desperate voice trailed off.
"Hush, my baby," Leandra crooned and turned the limp Samael back to the mirror. "They are coming," she whispered into his ear. Spectral hooded silhouettes started emerging from the fluid mirror surface, one by one, making a neat silent row in front of awestricken Hawke. "Go ahead," Leandra batted her eyelashes at Samael and pushed him gently forward. Samael's hand trembled as he pulled down a hood of the nearest standing ghost of his past.
"Meeran!" he breathed out and staggered back from the person he had killed years ago. If he recalled well, he had cut off Meeran's head. This gruesome memory was confirmed since Meeran's neck was adorned with crude stitches.
The Red Iron's erstwhile leader grinned viciously at the one who had taken his life from him. It was like some kind of signal since all ghosts pulled down their hoods and turned their bloodless faces towards their executioner. Feynriel, a young Templar woman with slashed throat and long blond hair, Charlie the Crab Claw, the Crow Sven Sieggbard, Haydée, Raen Morrell, the Arishok, Petrice and others were still walking through the mirror, waiting in silence for Samael to look at them.
Hawke's hands soared up, clenching his head in despair. The worst part was when he wasn't able to even recognize many faces; faces of people who had died either by his hand or as a result of his actions.
"Murderer… Traitor… Thief…" ghosts started hissing at him, condemning him for what he had done to them.
"Don't pay attention to those fools, Hawke," Fawn's lazy voice ripped Samael out of this waking horror. "Conscience is but a word that cowards us, devised at first to keep the strong in awe," he rounded up his explanation and tossed the woman squirming on his lap away. "You and me know better, right?" he approached the shaking Hawke and gathered him into his soothing arms. "What did you say the Revered Mother in Lothering, hm? Do you remember, my friend?" he asked Samael when he calmed down.
"How do you —" Hawke pointed out the obvious discrepancy.
"It doesn't matter how do I know. I just do," Fawn sneered and let go of him.
"Well, I was at my first and also last shrift. I told her everything," Hawke breathed out and shook his head like the memory lingered. "Everything," he repeated and glanced at Mahariel. "It was liberating," he continued.
"And what did she say?" Fawn asked with a crafty smug on his face.
"She said…" Hawke's voice cracked. "She abhorred me. She hated me. She ordered me to repent for my sins."
"And what did you do?" Fawn laughed and stroked Hawke's chest.
"When she said 'repent', I said I didn't know what she meant," Hawke's lips tweaked into merciless grimace. "I killed her before we left Lothering. I couldn't risk her knowing about me."
"Chantry, right…" Fawn rolled his eyes, shamelessly pawing Hawke now. "Always poking their noses where they're not supposed to."
"So how do I get out of here?" Hawke glanced around him, impatient to get out of that ghostly place.
"The ship," Varric gave him a hint and rolled his eyes like he couldn't fathom Hawke needed help with something that obvious. And a ship indeed flowed inaudibly through the mist and stopped right in front of Hawke who was once again speechless. A freaking ship. Right here in the middle of nowhere.
"Hello, ma vhenan. I was delayed. I apologize." Merrill's petite cold palms clutched Hawke's warm hand and she watched him as she lifted it to her lips and kissed it fondly. A ladder rattling down the ship sent Hawke back to his senses since he stared in rapture at the beautiful Dalish elf.
"Only one of you can enter the ship," Elthina peered down at them from the decks and awaited the one who was permitted to leave this place and go back to the world of the living.
"I'll go then," Hawke spoke into silence and let go of Merrill's hand.
"You'd leave me here, my love?" Merrill asked simply.
"Try to understand, Merrill. I have… I need… I must finish what I've started." Hawke's fingers stroked Merrill's lovely cheek. "If this means I have to do it without you, I can live with that."
"Vengeance?" Merrill looked up at him. "You'd sacrifice my life to it? And what about my people, Samael? What would they do without a Keeper?" she continued, but there was nothing but kind sorrow in her eyes.
"I…" Hawke glanced around him in uneasiness. "I'm sorry, Merrill. I love you, but —"
"But you love yourself more," Merrill finished the sentence for him. "Go then," she kissed him, savoring that one last kiss before his departure. Not knowing what else he should say or do, Hawke climbed up the ladder and went straight below decks. Hawke's eyes roamed around the little cabin and he gasped in surprise when he had spotted a silhouette sprawled on the cot. It was Merrill.
"I thought…" Samael shook his head, feeling utterly confused.
"You betrayed me down there." Merrill's voice was quiet and calm. She flipped over to her other side to face Hawke. "You could have sent me here instead, but you preferred yourself over me," she continued while watching him with those big doe eyes Samael had fallen in love with years ago.
"I know and I hate myself for doing it," Hawke whispered in return. "But I would have done it again," he finished his honest statement and wondered for a second why he had to hurt her like this. "So why are you here then? I thought only one of us could go," he asked again, impatient to know.
"I betrayed you too," was her proud answer. "I answered the same question and I chose myself over you."
"So we betrayed each other and yet we remain together…" Hawke's thoughtful voice dissipated as he sat down on the bed right next to Merrill whose arms slipped immediately around her man.
"Don't you understand, my love?" she smiled when he clasped her palm into both his. "It doesn't matter what we said. It's our deeds that define us. No matter what happens, we will always end up fighting side by side until the end," she sat up and cuddled by Hawke's side. She seemed content with how things were.
Everything was suddenly crystal clear for Samael. Now he knew for sure they deserved each other. No one better. No one worse. Just each other. They were destined to be together. Forever. And never.
oOo
Hawke's mind lingered between the worlds of consciousness and oblivion. The pain he had been experiencing for hours was beyond his limits and he had been repeatedly falling into troubled dreams only to wake up into gruesome reality. He tried to crawl to Ichabod's shack, but his tattered body wouldn't listen to that simple command.
The sunset at the lakes was beautiful. Hawke's eyes shot open in shock like for a hundredth time that day and he slowly realized the pain was fading and it was being replaced with something much worse. Every muscle within his body seemed to be asleep and the shattered left hand was turning dark blue. Two broken arrows still remained stuck in his body while the third one had only its sharp end still inside of him. Nobody knew where he went. Nobody was searching for him. His body was destroyed and his tormented soul was trapped within. The wave of panic made Samael gasping for air and squirming helplessly in the dry sand as his mind was relentlessly creating new images of what would have happened if he died there. Well, the Templars said they weren't supposed to kill him, but those morons obviously weren't able to follow even that simple order since Samael felt his life creeping out of him. He winced and fell into half-sleep, half-unconsciousness again.
"Stop it…" he murmured an hour later. His hoarse voice was barely audible through his dried lips and his body was about to give up this fight. A warm, huge and coarse something brushed his face again and Hawke groaned in frustration.
A neigh.
Hawke called upon his very last strength and opened one eye. The horse standing above him seemed huge. And strangely enough he was looking at him. Hawke blinked and tried to move his limbs one by one. He started breathing heavily when his whole left arm refused to do anything and it seemed to be simply dead. Just a long paralyzed something which wouldn't be even attached to his body if it wasn't stuck in a sleeve of his under tunic.
"Occela…" Hawke licked his chapped lips and his throat felt indeed like he had sand in there. "Apparently I am bound to be your eternal burden… my… friend…" he managed to whisper with long pauses. The horse clipped his ears before he fell to his knees, nudging Hawke since he was obviously falling asleep again.
The tears of pain and despair flowed down Hawke's cheeks as he finally managed to sit up after ten minutes of trying. His whole body and mind writhed in ultimate unwillingness to move, to keep breathing, to survive. Yet his right hand started slithering towards the silver mane which was supposed to help him on the horseback.
Hawke moaned when his hand clutching the mane relaxed against his will and he slowly collapsed back into the sand. His eyelids fluttered and then closed in acceptance of the inevitable.
oOo
Many things had changed since Merrill took up the Keeper's staff and not every Dalish elf approved of them. Time is the most powerful healer, though, and even the most relentless elves accepted Merrill when they saw for themselves their new Keeper cared about nothing but their welfare.
Merrill knew well she would have to do much harder if she wanted to gain their trust, but she deserved their respect nonetheless for her endeavour to keep them all fed, safe and satisfied. And she did her very best to prove them every day that she was worthy to be their Keeper, although it was difficult. The evenings were the worst part for Merrill; strolling around the camp as though it was a prison, disconnected, stolid and alone. Creators, so alone, like an elf surrounded by his whole clan could have been. When everything just seemed unbearable for Merrill, she put her First in charge and vanished into night shadows, prowling around Sundermount or staring at distant Kirkwall for hours.
Despite Merrill's eccentricity, the respect she had been building among her brethren was growing day by day until it was put to an insidious test one evening. Merrill was exhausted after that one particular day. The elves had been repairing damaged aravels all day after the last night storm, two half-dead apostates begged the Keeper for food and shelter and she also had to settle a quarrel between Master Ilen and his apprentice. The sky darkened during the late afternoon, threatening to rain again and the elves spontaneously gathered around the fire, glancing up into the skies with worries.
Veryan examined their Keeper and noticed she was nervously playing with her odd black ring again; just like many times during that day. It was same ring she refused to take off, ever. The Keeper's First frowned, but swallowed back his question and held a silver chalice with mead towards her instead. Absent-minded, Merrill took it, nodding her thanks. She closed her eyes and the voices of her brethren around her started merging into a persistent racket. She sighed when the ring twitched on her finger, sending shivers throughout her body. She moaned when that ominous cold wave reached her very core, stealing the heat of her blood from her.
Merrill didn't notice the elves fell silent after her almost inaudible groan and they were watching her; some of them were concerned, some of them suspicious.
"Keeper…?" Veryan dared approach the Keeper and she jerked when she felt the cold hand on her feverish skin. She wildly looked up at her First who was now gazing somewhere behind Merrill's wooden fretwork armchair.
Something stood in silence at the edge of dancing light coming from the fire. Merrill slowly rose from her seat and started slowly approaching the huge silhouette. Occela made a hesitant step forward and neighed when he spotted the one he had been seeking. The elves stared in rapture at the marvelous stallion which looked like made of silver night shadows and stars. Merrill's hand shyly reached for Occela and the elves gasped in surprise when she swung up on horseback and rode into the woods without a single word.
Veryan watched the Keeper with his eyes narrowed, shaking his head mildly when Merrill simply mounted the stallion and disappeared. The elf knew when the troubles were coming towards the Dalish clan and this was the case no doubt.
oOo
Somebody roughly shook Veryan in the middle of night.
"Keeper?" he asked in alarm when he recognized her petite figure standing above him.
"Come with me," she replied impatiently and walked out of her First's tent. Veryan scrambled up on his feet and followed her like a second shadow. Merrill's tent was lit up by several candles, but something entirely else snatched Veryan's attention. A human was lying on Merrill's cot; motionless, encrusted in dried blood, sand and dirt and with two broken arrows protruding out of his torso. When Veryan came closer he recognized the human he had seen the night an assassin tried to take down the Dalish Keeper.
"Remove his armor," a quiet plea came while Merrill was rummaging through one of her bags. Her moves were hasty, if not straight hysterical.
"But —" Veryan protested; his eyes set at the lifeless human face.
"Do as I say!" Merrill's quiet plea turned into spiteful command. She marched to her First, challenging him to defy her. Veryan set his jaw, grasped a knife and carefully slit Hawke's jerkin open, then the pantaloons, leaving him just in his smallclothes. He shuddered when Hawke's bruised body appeared beneath the shreds of leather. Each arrow wound was encircled with nasty dark purple spot. Veryan got a hold of himself again and lifted Hawke's left arm, his eyes widening when light landed on the shattered hand. He was convinced the arm would have to be cut off.
"His blood has been poisoned," he murmured, "infected and spoiled," he put the dark blue arm down gently. "I think this needs to be cut off," he gestured towards the badly wounded limb. "But I suppose it doesn't matter now. His spirit is striving to stand and his Maker's side and there's nothing we could —"
"Shut up and start healing, Veryan!" Merrill sizzled at her First and gulped the tears while her hands were frantically searching for potions, herbs and anything that could help right now.
"Merrill," Veryan approached the panting Keeper and placed a sympathetic hand on her shoulder. "He is barely alive and —"
"Well, keep him alive then," Merrill shook his hand off her. "I haven't chosen you as my First just because I liked you, Veryan," she added after a moment of silence and bolted out of her tent. Hushed curses in elvish were hearable from her aravel as she was searching for one last thing she needed. She returned to her tent, not daring look at Hawke as she checked the small table with potions, various herbal decoctions and lyrium flasks. Veryan's eyes were set at the staff Merrill held in her hand. A staff he had never seen before – a powerful staff, a corrupted staff of which crystals shone in gloom.
The both elves moved the cot with, as it turned out, an incredibly heavy human right to the center of a tent, kneeling by it each from one side. Their fingers hovering above the human's body, their eyes locked, the elves started channeling their healing abilities straight into Hawke's withering body. None of them spoke, none of them moved unless they reached for a flask of lyrium.
"It's not enough," Merrill let out a tormented groan. She stood up languidly, clenching her head. The lyrium, the treacherous lyrium was circulating in her veins, singing to her of power and damnation.
"We are far beyond the safe dose of lyrium. You do know that, I hope." Veryan didn't bother with standing up; he simply collapsed on his side, panting and nursing his pulsing temples.
"There are other possibilities," Merrill mocked his defeatism with a fanatical sneer on her face. Wordlessly, Veryan looked up at her, watching her breathlessly as she pulled out a long dagger. The blade twinkled in the light of candles and big hot drops of blood started falling on Samael's pale bluish skin.
Unfathomable gust of wind ruffled Veryan's long silver loose hair when Merrill grasped her staff and her own blood started coursing down along the drake scale pole, while Hawke's body arched up, glistening with bland red light. Intrigued, Veryan approached the cot and watched in amazement as Hawke's body literally drank the drops of blood, feeding on them, consuming them along with their mistress.
"Not… enough," Merrill ululated through her clenched teeth, throwing her head back as though in great pain. "Give me your hand," Merrill glanced wildly at her First, hesitant, like she expected Veryan to run away. But he just nodded, reaching his hand towards her in mute agreement. Merrill would never know why he decided to help her, but she was simply glad he did. It seemed only Veryan noticed a strange black annulet hanging on a silver chain around Hawke's neck, the very same ring the Keeper was wearing and just like her he obviously wasn't able to part with it.
oOo
The first thing Hawke noticed after awakening was the pillow. Oddly enough it smelled of humid dirt, herbs and rain.
"You've awoken then. Rather unexpected, I dare say," an unfamiliar voice interrupted Hawke's sluggish musing about the pillow.
"You again?" Samael groaned when he was able to swivel the head enough to see the elf sitting on a fur, reading. "Does this mean…?" Hawke gestured with his right hand around him and gulped. His mouth felt like a desert.
"Yes. You are at the Dalish camp, shemlen," Veryan confirmed the human's assumption and stood up. Hawke had a dozen other questions, but his gaze slipped at his bandaged arm. His breathing hitched as he realized he wasn't able to move the fingers.
"M-my hand…" he stammered, looking at the elf and his inanimate arm in turns.
"Calm down," Veryan's eyebrows knitted as he approached the tattooed human whose chest started heaving in panic.
"I can't feel it! What… Who… Maker…" Hawke's desperate voice went on and on while he was groping the left arm with his other hand.
"Calm down, shemlen," Veryan repeated slowly and placed a comforting hand on Samael's bare shoulder. He indeed felt sorry for the young warrior and the pure dismay within his eyes, but this commotion would help nobody. He sighed and reached for a colorless potion by the bed. "Drink it," he gently caught Hawke's hand fumbling for the arm and supported his head, so he could drink the sleeping draught.
Having no choice but to drink the fluid, Samael took it in obediently and a merciful veil of weariness enveloped him immediately. He felt his head being gently laid back on the pillow, then dark dreams devoured him entirely again.
"Hmm…" Veryan watched the sleeping human while rubbing his chin. "Let's check on our other patient," he muttered and left the Keeper's tent.
oOo
Hawke felt much better when he woke up second time. He tried rather tentatively moving his limbs and he exhaled in relief when he was able to move even the fingers on his left hand. The standing up was a challenge though, but he was both restless and relentless. His eyes glanced around the dim tent – bags with untied strings, empty lyrium bottles scattered around, a wooden mortar and several other things Hawke didn't even want to know what they were, including a long knife with dried blood on it.
Shaking his head to clear it up a bit, Samael swayed out of the tent, holding his bandaged left arm on chest for protection. He regretted leaving the tent a second later though, when he realized probably the whole clan was sitting by the fire, watching him and his uncertain pace. Samael noticed well their glaring and hushed comments, but he didn't care. His eyes were seeking only one person, but she was nowhere to be seen.
"Come and sit here, shem," a lanky elven woman hastily approached Hawke and led him to an empty seat among the elves. Before he knew it, Samael was seated with a bowl with hot soup in his palms. He cast his eyes down along with his mumbled thanks, but the silence around him was more than uncomfortable. Veryan slowly strolled towards the fire from a far corner of the camp, nodding at the human like he was supposed to follow him.
"Where is she?" Samael asked the only question that mattered to him right now and he felt like punching the taciturn elf who took his time before replying.
"The Keeper asked me to escort you up the path leading to Sundermount as soon as you're able to walk and —" Veryan started explaining, but he was rudely interrupted.
"I'm perfectly capable of walking, as you can see. Thanks for asking," Hawke snapped and started stumbling up the path, leaning on the trees occasionally. Veryan just shook his head about the foolish young human, but he did follow him to look after him just as he was ordered to. The path started meandering and just like that, Merrill stood right in front of Hawke, cold, calm and proud.
"Leave us," the Keeper turned to her First with a terse order. Veryan bowed and started descending down the path again, not a glance behind him. Merrill waited patiently for her First to disappear, only then she threw herself into Hawke's arms with a choked sob, cupping his face with her palms. If Samael expected anything this certainly wasn't it. Merrill was shaking uncontrollably within his embrace, clenching his borrowed under tunic desperately. And he held her tight since she seemed to have lost all ability to stand.
An almost inaudible hiss of pain escaped Hawke's lips as much as he tried to suppress the pain coming from his wounds. Merrill pulled back, realizing she was supposed to be the strong one right now.
"How…" Samael shook his head, watching his elf with curiosity.
"Occela came for me," Merrill replied, blinking frantically to dissolve the tears standing in her eyes. "We found you at the lakes. You looked like —" Merrill's voice cracked. "I thought I was too late," she peeped after a moment. Then she coughed, trying to calm down and remember there were important things to discuss right now. "Hawke, I picked up a few things lying around you or in that tumbledown shack," she handed him a greenish duffel bag.
"Thank you," Hawke breathed out, weighing the bag in his healthy arm. He saw well on Merrill that there was yet another pressing matter to discuss. A cold feeling squeezed his heart, when Merrill took the bag out of his hand, clasped it into hers and started walking up the path. They strolled in silence and Samael felt the heartbeat in his throat. They reached a small even place and Hawke halted when he realized the soil was loose in the corner and there was something painfully alike to —"
"No…" a single word full of unspeakable pain slipped out of Hawke's lips. In trance, Hawke let go of Merrill's hand and made those few steps leading to a fresh grave. Samael leaned forward to read the one word carved into a plain white headstone. Then he jerked, brushed his forehead and read it again. It didn't matter how many times he had read that single word set in stone; he still didn't understand it for he didn't wish to understand.
"Leave me," he said to Merrill without looking at her, his voice hoarse and low, right above the whisper. Samael didn't notice when Merrill left as he fell to his knees in front of his friend's grave, reading that one ornamental word burning an indelible mark into his soul.
Charon.
oOo
Next few days blurred into one tormenting experience for Hawke. The bag Merrill had given him rested in the corner of her tent, unopened. Samael didn't talk to anyone, didn't eat nor did he sleep. Every morning he grabbed the daggers Master Ilen had borrowed him and trudged up the path, followed by the eyes of Merrill and the whole clan. The Keeper was wise enough to leave him alone for a few days, but his self-destructive behavior bothered her beyond the bearable point.
When Hawke set off on his lonesome journey the next day, he had no idea a shadow was sneaking right behind him; watching him, guarding him, despairing. As always Hawke stripped an elven under tunic and folded it in grass, yet there was an odd solemnity to his moves Merrill had never seen before. Samael stretched and pale scars on his tanned skin glowed in the morning sun. He gripped Master Ilen's exquisite examples of elvhenan craft from the old times, their blades damasked with pattern wielding, the hilts magnificent in their simplicity. Samael stared at the weapons for a while, motionless, only then he twirled them in his hands, swinging them freely in perfect arcs.
Merrill forgot to breathe at first. She indeed intimately knew the body whirling around the glade right now as Hawke started working through the fighting stances. An involuntary gasp of longing slipped through her lips, but then something else caught her attention. The blade simply fell out of the assassin's left hand. Samael murmured something and picked up the weapon with a bulldog expression on his face. Again, he faced off with the invisible enemy and, again, the blade slipped out of his hand and thudded indecently on the ground. This scene repeated countless times, until Hawke let out a mighty howl of anguish and hurled the other dagger into a tree trunk. His healthy hand then grasped his crippled arm by the wrist, smothering it, punishing it for not working properly.
"Hawke!" Merrill couldn't bear his despair anymore and walked out of her cover. Samael let go of his hand, lowering the head in shame.
"How long have you been here?" he asked finally when it was obvious Merrill just wouldn't leave him to his frustration.
"Long enough," she touched his bandaged arm briefly, but pulled her hand back when he shuddered. "You're overloading your arm, Samael. This must stop." Her voice was shaking during her speech as though she knew the arm would never be all right; ever again.
"It will never work again, right?" Samael echoed her thoughts and his healthy hand soared up, raking through disheveled hair in despair. "Right?" he asked her; his voice growing stronger. "And you insist on calling yourself a healer?" he roared a second later, kicking a pebble in his way and turning his back at her.
Merrill inhaled deeply, forcing herself to remain silent and calm. Here was Hawke's unbelievable arrogance and ingratitude again!
"I'm sorry about your hand, Samael," she spoke into silence, making a hesitant step towards him. "I really did my best," she touched him briefly. "I'm sorry it wasn't enough," she gulped the bitter tears back when her gaze landed on his bandaged arm which was hanging down helplessly.
"Save your pity for somebody who would appreciate it, witch," Hawke growled and stormed out. If Samael decided to stab her right in the heart then, it wouldn't hurt more than these words.
oOo
Merrill paced around the camp for a while, ignoring her brethren glaring at her, whispering behind her back about the odd influence the shemlen seemed to have on their Keeper. She rubbed her tired eyelids, convincing herself Hawke would come back at any minute by now. Nobody was coming though. She gave up and disappeared in a tent she used as storage for her books and other things since she insisted Samael would stay in her own tent.
It was around midnight when a shadow crept through the Dalish camp. Samael watched the sleeping Keeper in the light of a single flickering candle, beating himself up for his earlier harsh words. He pulled his hand back several times, before he finally let it touch Merrill's porcelain skin. She stirred and her eyes opened slowly as though she had been waiting for this bitter-sweet awakening.
"Merrill, I —"
"Shhh, ma vhenan," she brushed a finger across his parted lips. Maybe it was her lovely face which forced him to throw away his mask, maybe he just couldn't bear anymore the thought of what had happened to him at the lakes. His father – captured. His mabari – slaughtered. His friends – in danger. Everything he had considered as granted – gone. He collapsed down to his knees, vaguely realizing Merrill's thin arms encircled him right away. He huddled in her embrace like a lost child, letting the tears of humiliation to flow freely.
"That hand," Samael sobbed and tried to clench it into fist, unsuccessfully, "that stupid hand just won't listen to me." Merrill was crushed by his heartbreaking wailing; cry of a proud warrior who was robbed of his ability to fight, to defend, to kill.
"I'm so sorry, ma vhenan. I'm truly sorry, but I was barely able to save it. Any other would have just cut it off. I really tried my best, you have to believe me, please, ma vhenan…" she pleaded with him, unaware of the fact his despair ran much deeper than just the crippled hand.
"I'm done, I snuffed it, it's over," frantic, bitter words of defeat were rushing out of Hawke's mouth. "Once everybody learns I'm unable to fight, they'll just swoop upon me and when they're finished with me I'll have nothing left to lose," he looked up at her and shook his head, broken by this powerlessness.
"Nobody knows," Merrill surprised him with this confident reply, brushing stray hair strand off his face. She realized there was nothing he couldn't ask of her, nothing she wouldn't do for him, if it only ended with them being together, completing each other, making each other whole again because they both felt as though they were torn asunder ever since their dissension.
"Nobody knows, but you and me," she pulled away from him just enough to look deep into his eyes. "Let's keep it that way," she whispered and gathered him back into her soothing arms. Hawke lowered his head into the cleft between her breasts, hungrily reveling in the scent of her. Merrill carefully considered her brethren's reaction if they found out the shemlen slept in her tent. Only then did she pull Hawke up onto her creaking cot, wrapping them both into thick blankets and furs.
The candle sizzled and went out just like Samael's hope that the things would get better someday.