Four men were hunching over the ailing fire they'd managed to kindle in the frozen wasteland. They were all of different nation, different profession and definitely of different mind; yet they were traveling together with the common intention. The taciturn Brother of the Chantry hailing from Rivain, the sickly elven healer of the Kirkwall Circle of Magi, one Templar hulk of a man also from Kirkwall and the crude headsman from Anderfels who seemed to be unable to get his hands off the polished great-sword which had taken so many lives the headsman himself lost count years ago.
"Stop squeezing toward me, ya bugger!" a mumbled threat was carried away by the howling wind as the headsman lashed out at the pale little mage who had been shivering in his robes during the whole journey north. "Or I'll squeeze ya back all right," he hawked before he spat out a huge brownish spit, watching it as it turned into ice disturbingly fast.
"Disgusting…" the Brother granted the headsman an outraged glance as he tightened his heavy winter cloak lined with fur around his torso.
"If ya has anything to say, say it into my phizog, priest!" The headsman seemed to grow taller and wider with every word.
"L-l-leave him alone!" the little one burst out squealing and the headsman's nostrils flared in rage to the little one's presumption.
"Silence! All of you!" Templar's thunderous voice overpowered them, ending the quarrel at once.
None of them was aware they had been watched by the pair of vigilant black eyes for two days now. Fawn's horse was an Antivan thoroughbred and the poor beast froze to death last night, so the Hero of Fereldan was forced to quite ingloriously continue on foot. He indeed thanked the Creators for the blizzard raging all day and evening, so Meredith's envoys were not much faster on their horses than he was on foot.
"Did you hear that?" the headsman flinched and glanced around; his eyes fruitlessly trying to pierce the whirling snow. The four unwilling companions looked up in disquiet, turning their backs towards the fire as they started searching the vicinity.
"Old jumpy whiskey-soaked wimp…" the Templar hissed at the headsman, but even his eyes were roving around the endless white wasteland.
"We should all calm down," the Brother placed his soothing hands on both men's shoulders, but there was but one calm soul in that Creators-forgotten land, and that soul was huddled among the stunted trees not even sixty feet from them; calm and motionless as he pleased.
"I'm tellin' ya this ain't gonna end well," the headsman's sneer was gone and suddenly he was grateful for other three men by his side. Well, two and a half, since he didn't consider the tiny elf a man.
"Stop that croaking, old man," the Templar growled the doomsayer silent. "I am bound to escort you to the prisoner and see to it that the execution is carried out in the name of the Knight-Commander Meredith. And escort you to the prisoner I will," he added after a moment, as though he was not sure whether he was telling this to his companions or to himself.
So, the Templar woman in Kirkwall was not lying. They are one merry bunch of murderers indeed.
"Who would follow us through this Maker-unkissed barren anyway…" the Templar attempted to sound jovially, but his voice was choked by the strengthening blizzard.
Just little insignificant old me…
"Do you even know for whom are we carrying the death sentence, Templar?" Apparently, it was the mage's turn to sound timorous and yet he dared address the Templar directly.
Well, I do.
"Don't know. Don't care," the Templar shrugged, but something was preventing him from sitting down and tending to the fire.
Creators, I haven't been so cold since the Fort Drakon…
"It's Hawke," the Brother deferentially pronounced the name which carried such weight throughout the Free Marches. "It's the old Malcolm Hawke. Do you really think his son is going to let us execute him like some petty horse-thief?"
And they say the Chantry folks are born stupid…
"His son—" the Templar rudely interrupted the priest and his words were abounding with spiteful mockery, "—is confined to his showy mansion and jumps as Meredith whistles. Champion of Kirkwall my ass…" he snorted and spat out as if that fancy title had left bad taste on his tongue.
And it appears his son has a puppet of his own that jumps as he whistles.
"And who said he's going to do it himself?" the little mage asked the next logical question. "Doesn't he have like his own little private army?"
Huh, I thought I'd freeze here to death. Now I think I'll expire of boredom instead.
"I will not listen to your wailing anymore," the tensed Templar lost his joviality when he scolded his companions, looming over them, and thus he had missed the silent shadow figure slowly materializing out of the snow dancing around it in wide circles. The Templar didn't even have to look behind his back to realize someone was standing there; motionless, ominous, biding time, until the reasons of his presence here in the middle of nowhere were known.
"Y-y-you are welcome to warm up your chilled flesh at our fire, pilgrim," the mage took a hesitant step towards the stranger. As though commanded by some invisible power, they all glanced at their pitiful pile of charred wood that did not deserve to be named a fire anymore.
"We have only a little to share with you, fellow wayfarer, but join us in this terrible weather," the Brother showed his palms in peace to the ever still newcomer.
No response came.
"State your business, vagrant!" the headsman shrieked as he reached for his ageless steel companion. He'd just had enough of the silent stranger. "Are you deaf?!" he ripped the longest blade Fawn had ever seen from an unadorned plain sheathe that spoke of age and long hard use.
The headsman's head started playfully bouncing through the freshly fallen snow, spraying it with dark drops of steaming blood, and the heavy great-sword fell inaudibly into the snow as well which mercifully accepted it and covered it and its sins along with it. No one moved at first; too appalled to do anything, and it was at this precise moment Fawn chose to answer the question.
"Greetings, my fellow travellers," he nonchalantly swung the blood-stained sword through the frosty air and performed an obeisance which would at different time, different place, was considered graceful and irresistible. Then he stated the obvious: "I've come to kill you."
oOo
After his rash departure from the Gallows, Hawke realized with unbelievable slowness this whole poisoning business was the most stark raving mad idea he had ever conceived.
"This is too soon," he kept hissing through the clenched teeth as he stumbled through the gate leading to Hightown and his innards started to knot as they were squeezed by the cold claw of merciless poison. '"No, no, no…" he moaned as he was barely able to stand on his feet; still far from home. The white walls of Hightown liquefied in front of him; the world turned upside down, wailing of the newborns and dying ones was equally echoing in vast emptiness of his mind.
An old man in tattered rags, staring out of the little barred window with longing for his freedom, yet his eyes were burnt-out.
Plodding forward while leaning heavily against the wall, Samael had not yet experienced the worst symptoms of poison. His arms clearing away the spider's net springing from the walls, the burning eyes frantically blinking in search of a single clear picture about what was going on around him, a lone thought forcing him to keep walking; just to make yet another step forward, step home, step leading to the nice blackened kettle filled with warm swirling antidote.
Someone giggled and Hawke turned his head just in time to glimpse an emerald eye disappearing around a corner. Hawke tried to call out at her for he knew who she was, but not a single sound got through his swollen tongue and bloodless lips. Stalking Merrill's ghost seemed like a good idea indeed. He had been doing that for years after all, so why not now?
Two men holding blades at each other's throats although any of them would die for the other one first.
"Feeling a little lost, sugar?" That voice came to Hawke through the shimmering barrier of silence as he kept studying the texture of the walls beneath his fingers. The wall was white no longer and at this point Samael was vaguely aware it was supposed to be white in order to find the Hawke estate and save himself. "Maybe I can help you find what you're looking for," the same voice suggested when no response came from the swaying, muttering stranger.
"Wh—" Hawke rasped before the cough threatened to tear his lungs apart. "Where… am… I…" he managed to wheeze.
"Lowtown, sugar," a slow response came as the whore took a cautious step backwards.
Having really no other choice than to beg for help, Hawke launched forward and grasped the woman by her shoulders. His whispered plea was unfortunately smothered by the woman squealing for help for it was a foolish and simple creature indeed. "Devon?" she shrieked as she tried to shake the rough hands off her. "Devoooon!" she burst out screaming for her pander who was always nearby, looking out for his consumer goods as he lovingly called his flock of flesh.
The world spun with Samael as he was no longer the master of his own bones, flesh and mind. He felt a little bit the coldness of a short blade pressed against his gut, the woman's boney fingers groping for his pouch of coins attached to his belt and a pair of popping out eyes – savage dark eyes set deep in eye-sockets of a ruthless man who may have been human once.
Hawke was the only one who glimpsed the shadow slip behind the backs of his sneering captors who took him no doubt for some drunken high-born who had gotten lost in Lowtown; never to emerge from it again. There was a low growl, less than a snarl, the muscles contracted, the black claws scratched up dirt, the fur bristled, all that without any real sound of lethal threat, but Devon must have heard something nonetheless because he started to turn just as the mabari made its leap. All three of them went down together while the woman started screeching yet again, though it did not occur to her to run away.
Even when the fight to death between the beast and a pander took place right next to Hawke, the sounds of it were distant to his ears. The hound's jaw was working its way infallibly to the man's throat while he barely kept the ferocious beast off him with his one arm while the other one; the one holding the short blade, was entangled in his cloak.
Finally the arm broke free while Devon howled a victorious shout, pointing the cruel heartseeker right into the mabari's well-built torso. There seemed to be nothing to stop the man from plunging the blade through the fur right into the mabari's heart.
Nothing and no one, unless Samael stopped lying there like a fucking rag doll, waiting to be fucked up by some Lowtown fucking worm! Hawke scolded himself properly as he grabbed the sharp end of blade with his both hands, feeling as the blade cut well and cut deep into his numb flesh. This gesture of sacrifice was enough for the mabari to have the man under the jaw finally. His last cry lasted less than a second before the hound wrenched back its head with what was left of the man's throat in its maw.
"Cha… Charon?" was the first self-evident thought which formed in Hawke's muddled mind as the hound padded closer, sniffed at Samael's bloodied fingers, then licked at the cuts with a wet rough tongue. It was only at this moment Samael was finally able to take a thorough look at his unexpected saviour.
It was the white mabari.
oOo
Unaware of the dire situation Hawke was in, Fawn seemed to forget how he had ended up in the middle of northern wasteland as he stood above the headsman's corpse. Three things then happened.
The Brother; his eyes the size of an egg, fell to his knees and his hands clasped in prayer as he started rocking back and forth, frantically muttering the first part of the Chant of Light he remembered. The mage shrank back as Fawn threw his heavy winter cloak away and ceremonially pointed his sword at him. If the Templar was surprised about how things got out of hand so quickly, he recovered just as fast from that shock when he engaged the arcane warrior in a vicious battle which ended as suddenly as it had started.
The three companions were kneeling in the trampled snow, the fourth one was cooling beside them and his body was slowly disappearing beneath the falling snow. The only hearable sound right now was quiet hissing as the wounded Templar kept frenetically reveling in shallow breaths while he was pressing his hands onto the grave wound Fawn had inflicted upon him.
"B-by the mercy o-of our Lord—" the Brother started whimpering as he bowed his head, unable to grant Mahariel a single straight look.
"Who's Lord?" Fawn chuckled, cocking his head as though intrigued by the murmuring priest. "Yours? Mine?" he continued and the Brother only squeaked out when Fawn's sturdy leather boots lined with fur and disappearing beneath the silver shin pads stopped right in front of him. "As for you, Templar," the elven blade carved a narrow trail in the snow as he strolled towards him, "I really have nothing to say to you," the scornful whisper died away as the blade whizzed through the freezing air and Templar's head joined headsman's one in their private rolling party.
"Next?" Fawn raised an eyebrow at the two remaining companions.
"Come no further for I will stop you," the tiny elven mage stepped forward with his staff drawn, but tremble in his voice and shivers on his skin somehow smothered the gravity of his words.
"What is your name?" Fawn nonchalantly interrupted the act of bravery as much as folly.
"My… What?" the tiny mage stammered.
"Your name, maggot!" Fawn's nostrils flared in disfavour.
"Raenion of the Kirkwall Circle," the quiet answer came from the startled mage.
"So, Raenion of the Kirkwall Circle. You dare…!" Fawn's eyes burnt in blatant ire when he turned to the skinny daredevil. "You dare raise your staff against one of your own?!" he crept towards the mage as he pronounced his accusation. Such solemnity; such justifiable outrage was emanating from the Hero of Fereldan at that horrifying moment, that he indeed looked like an ancient prince of Arlathan – the very son of the Creators who had fallen away from their grace.
The priest forgot to pray in sight of such astounding scene, the staff dropped out of Raenion's loosened fingers as he genuflected in front of the pure-blooded elf. "My lord," he faltered, "forgive me," he bowed his head in acceptance of death for straying away from the way of the Dalish. For serving the Chantry, for kneeling in front of the humans, though he knew nothing else in his lifetime since he had been born captive, knowing no other life than the one at the Circle.
The Brother's hands convulsively clenching in his tawdry pray, the Sword of the Brecilian Forest outstretched and ready to strike, Raenion's arms laid gracefully by his sides as he meekly awaited with his eyes closed the ultimate death blow until it indeed came.
When Raenion's eyes shot open, he was the only one alive apart from Fawn.
"I've never laid my hand nor my sword upon one of my brethren," Fawn kneeled down to face the astonished mage. "Though your face is not marked with Vallaslin, though you no longer recognize your ancestors and no longer pray to the Creators, I hereby liberate you from the Chantry's yoke," Fawn's long pale fingers gently traced the bloodless face of an unexpected kin he had found in this frozen wasteland. "Take the horse and go in peace, my brother," he rose to his full height, bringing Raenion up along with him.
Fawn thoroughly searched the corpses, seemingly unaware of Raenion intently watching his every move. He indeed found what he was looking for – the flat leather satchel which bore all documents required to carry on Malcolm's execution, detailed orders of the whole operation and two fat pouches of silver coins to pay off all spending. Only imperceptible sneer of satisfaction twisted his beautiful elven face when Mahariel stripped the Chantry priest naked and carefully folded the holy shroud into his drawstring bag. Oh, he would need one of those very soon, if he was not sorely mistaken.
"Wait!" Raenion shrieked in panic when it was clear Mahariel intended to simply turn around and leave. "What am I to do?" he reached his liberator by running. "What am I to do now?" he hung on Fawn's lips in suspense, waiting for any guidance from his fellow Dalish.
"Do whatever you like," Fawn shrugged and bent down for his heavy traveler's cloak.
"Whatever I like?" Raenion repeated the words as though Mahariel was insane.
"Precisely," Fawn fastened the cloak on his left shoulder with a massive elaborate clip and threw the satchel and his own bag over his other shoulder. "Namárië, my brother," he briefly touched Raenion's forearm. "Until we meet again," he granted him a lofty mirthless smile, mounted the best horse and left.
Long stood Raenion of the Dalish there, watching the prints of Fawn's horse in the snow until they slowly disappeared.
oOo
Hawke was unwilling to believe, as he tumbled down by some door and then looked up, that there was a rapper shaped into a hawk head hanging right above his head, telling him he indeed tumbled at the right spot. The white mabari led him through the early morning chilling shadows, through the terrors caused by the venom when it unfolded dreadful scenes in front of his eyes, accompanying him through the purgatory and out again until the Hawke estate mercifully shadowed their silhouettes.
"Help… Anybody…" Hawke rasped as he clawed at the door which started twisting and vibrating beneath his fingers. The white mabari helped him in his endeavor by poking the door with its paw.
Two pairs of arms grasped Hawke underneath his shoulders, but he didn't seem to perceive the dwarves anymore. "Shooo!" Bodahn attempted to drive away the white mabari, but it just glanced at him with superiority and sneaked inside between his legs. Devastated by his Master's frightful state, the old butler was for a moment able to but wring his hands and yowl in dwarven tongue while Sandal simply stood across the room, picking his nose and trying to comprehend what had gone wrong this time.
"Evaliir'Enevahr," a quiet voice entered Bodahn's heart-rending wailing. "Calm down," she repeated in the tongue of men. Hawke's body was writhing in uncontrollable spasms by then, gall oozing out of his mouth as though his guts were boiling. The worst sound came from his choked gurgles as he tried to catch the breath and scream in unspeakable pain at the same time. Merrill took her time as she strolled towards the man lying on the cold floor since Bodahn didn't dare set him on a divan from which he would have fallen down no doubt. "We've got only little time left," she whispered to herself when she realized the spasms were relenting a little. "Move him!" Her order slashed the silence interrupted only by Hawke's attempts to breathe which was dreadful enough sound to listen to since it sounded as though he was being ripped apart from the inside. "Leave us," she ordered the dwarves once Hawke was settled on the carpet in his bedroom, still trashing around and bawling incoherent pleas.
Bodahn had no idea what was happening in that room behind closed door, but he was indeed glad he was not forced to witness it. Inhuman roars of inhuman pain were soon replaced by hushed groans, until there was nothing but cadaveric silence left. It was only then when Bodahn dared tiptoe towards the door, too afraid to open them, and even more afraid not to. A sigh of relief melted on his lips as he glanced around the devastated room, stopped at the empty pot of freshly boiled anti-venom, Merrill's myriad of flasks with potions and decoctions which were currently spilled everywhere, some objects he even didn't want to know what they were, until his gaze found two beings curled up together on the mattress with no blankets or pillows on it.
There was no way to tell where Merrill ended or where Samael started in that entanglement. Just as there was no way to guess what would any of them do were they to lose the other.
oOo
Malcolm Hawke was most certainly not what you would call a polite prisoner, or a silent one for that matter. It was as though he took into his head he would resist to whatever the guards would require of him to do which had been leading so far to the sad fact he was beaten up all the time and the guards made his life just as miserable as he pushed their buttons every Maker's day.
He would throw the shallow earthenware bowl with some gunge instead of food against the wall, shouting as long as they brought him yet another shallow bowl with the same gunge; only wooden this time, so he would not smash it as well. Malcolm would then spurt the smelly water they had been providing him with into the guard's face, guffawing like a mad man until the retaliation came. Then it was usually the guards who were guffawing, but Malcolm considered it a fair deal. Sometimes he would stay awake all night long, singing from the top of his lungs seemingly never-ending Kossith tunes, until he was knocked unconscious by the guard on duty who had lost his nerve with the insufferable mage. Then there were days when Malcolm remained curled up in a ball; apathetic to anything and anyone around him, which were usually followed by days when he provoked fights, shattered anything breakable around him and if nothing remained, then he clawed at walls with his bare hands, shooting spells in all directions, and raged around his confined cell or banged anything he had on the iron bars, driving the already frenzied guards straight mad.
That urgent hammering on the chapel door came in the early morning, well before dawn.
"State your business!" the shrimpy Templar barked through the cracked open door.
"For the love of our Maker, let me in, please let me in! Let me in!" the priest whimpered until his plea turned into wordless wailing. Briefly examining the newcomer, the Templar obeyed and shut the door tight behind the Brother's back. Fawn considered that sound as his death-knell, and he shivered indeed beneath his borrowed Chantry tunic. He prayed however the guards would not spot the suspicious blood stains all around his disguise; the silent witness of the real priest's decapitation.
"Captain? Captain! You've got to see this!" the Templar squalled over his shoulder as he observed the trembling Chantry Brother with perverted curiosity.
"Thank you, thank you, Maker's child," Fawn clumsily patted the imp's shoulder, "may He repays you your kindness—" he kept murmuring, but the sly voice inside of his head had yet another postscript to add.
… and may He blesses my blade as I thrust it into you, Templar.
"What happened to you, you Chantry rat?" the imp chortled as he playfully bashed the shy Brother between his shoulder blades.
"I beg your pardon," Fawn squealed and tremulously headed further into cosy side room which appeared to be former sacristy where the fireplace was crackling and emanating soothing warmth and light.
"What's this goddamn racket all about?" the Captain swayed into the room and Fawn needn't bother turning around to realize there was an enemy indeed fit to fight the Hero of Fereldan. A huge beefy-guy with hands alike to shovels; his seasoned face was beardless with a pair of watchful eyes and hollow cheeks. Though he was not an old man, only a few wisps of ginger hair yet remained to him, sprouting above his ears in dramatic curls, but those he had grown long as a woman's. His Templar armor was battered and unadorned, and it looked like it had been protecting the warrior in many scuffles. Above his left shoulder the ragged leather hilt of the blade strapped to his back was visible; a two-handed great-sword which was simply too long to be worn at his side.
Before anyone could answer the question, Fawn whirled around and performed a ludicrously deep bow, nervously tugging on the hood to pull it as much over his face as he could.
"Brother Wardell at your service, honorable men of honorable Templar order," he pronounced with the purest Rivain accent he was able to fake. "As agreed, we rode out of Kirkwall three days ago with the execution order, but as you can see, only I was blessed enough to actually reach the Swan's Swamp – charming little place you have here, let me give you that," Fawn kept muttering his thoughts as they came and he even managed to empty the imp's goblet of wine to which the shrimpy Templar frowned. "The bandits chased us down one by one, until they got all but m-m-me," Mahariel mewed his story while his eyes secretly roved around the room, getting familiar with the surroundings.
Only one way out, high oblong latticed windows, cold tall stone walls; the Templars had clearly turned this once holy place into a stronghold for the prisoners, and into a trap for the strangers.
"You don't say," the Templar colossus grumbled as he kept twirling what was left of his hair around his finger. A gesture definitely not fit for a warrior, as Fawn had noticed. "And how come an inexperienced Chant of whatever thumper escapes the horde of dreadful bandits while the other three guardians fall to an ambush?" the Captain asked a seemingly relaxed question, but a warning bell rang twice in Fawn's head. The Templar Captain knew much more about Fawn's story than he was prone to admit, but just how much exactly remained to be seen.
"I had a narrow escape indeed, enlightened by the Maker's grace for it was He who decided to keep me alive to deliver the Knight-Commander's orders." Fawn ceremonially handed the satchel over to the Captain; cautiously keeping his face hidden from the Captain's inquiring eyes. "I am to speak to the condemned man, soothe him in his last hour and see his sinful soul off to the Maker's hands. For He forgives those who repent in their la—"
"Pardon me, Brother, but I've got a question for you." The Captain sauntered toward the man of faith and Fawn knew at that very moment his carefully concocted ploy was doomed and Malcolm along with it. What exactly had gone wrong though? Did Raenion run straight here? Had Fawn been spotted during his journey north or even while he was dealing with the headsman and his fellows? There was yet another obvious alternative but Fawn forbade himself to even think about it. About him.
This wishful shy thought was mercilessly murdered the moment Zevran Aranai strode into the room. His face was unreadable at first when their eyes locked into a long telling gaze. Some weird hurting grimace then twisted the Crow's face as if he was in pain, vicious sneer distorted his handsome features, an odd longing flashed within his golden eyes which were infallibly set on the newcomer whose face was still shielded with a hood.
"Yes, our mutual friend informed me of what's happened." The Captain dryly stated the obvious and ordered his men with but his eyes to get ready and hold the strategic spots around the chapel. "Will you remove your hood by yourself or do you require my assistance to do so, elf?" he mocked the ever still silent and motionless fake Brother of the Chantry.
"No need," Fawn replied with his husky melodic voice and the Rivain accent magically disappeared. He slowly turned away from the Crow to face the Captain, inch by inch, as though he was teasing Zevran to leap forward and bury every blade he had on him into the back of a man who had betrayed him. In the meantime, Fawn's mind was frantically working on the solution for he desperately needed to come up with a smart plan if he was to succeed and free Malcolm and now even himself from the hands of zealots and Templars. And even if he managed that, he'd still have a ghost of past right behind his back, waiting for an opportunity to strike him down.
Zevran appeared to forget breathing when Fawn's arms soared up and the men around tightened their grasp on their weapons at the same moment. One graceful move and the hood was thrown back and Fawn's silverish hair shone in their elven beauty. Not a muscle moved on his face decorated with Dalish elaborate blood writing. Not a single move gave away his agitation after his arms slowly descended down by his sides again.
Zevran's eyes were hungrily drinking in the phantom of his conscious he had been chasing, the memory of what could have been, the excruciating memorial of love and betrayal. Finally, finally he would be able to pay off Fawn's perfidy and pretended love with blood and thus complete his only business unfinished. Just to throw a blade, put a sword through that treacherous pretender, smother life out of him while screaming from an inch into his face about the pain Fawn had deliberately condemned him to live with.
While was Zevran contemplating the worst possible death he could have come up with to avenge his wounded pride, Fawn realized he could not afford to dally and wait for others to decide this dead-end situation. Ripping the Chantry shroud off him, he hurled it against the Captain's face for he posed the only real threat for Mahariel probably in this whole village apart from the Antivan Crow. By the time the Captain managed to free himself from the fabric with much swearing and brandishing around, four of his men were already dead or dying.
Zevran hissed some spicy curse when he was swept off his feet along with the others when Fawn thrust his blade into the wooden floor to nourish a powerful spell, enabling him to escape. And while his better judgment was brazenly yelling at him to get the hell out of that forsaken place which could easily turn into his tombstone, he headed for the dungeon. Knowing they were right after him, Fawn flew down the breakneck stairs and barred the door behind him as effectively as he was able to.
Once alone, if only for a single breathtaking minute, Fawn listened attentively to the sounds of the frowsty underground. Water dripping off the vault in an unnerving staccato, mice rustling in the moist haystacks, oppressive silence into which the clamor of the approaching Templars crept.
And music. Mellifluous deep tones sang in a foreign tongue. It was hair-raising to listen to such lovely tune in such a dismal place. Fawn's legs unconsciously carried him to the cell from which the song burdened by the sadness of the mortals emanated before it abruptly died away.
"Malcolm?" the elf asked the man huddled in a corner. His question was very quiet, right above a whisper. "Malcolm Hawke?" he strengthened his voice when no reaction came from the old man dressed in shreds of fabric of doubtful color and quality.
"He ain't here," a hollow answer finally resounded out of the cell. "He ain't even among living no more," the same voice grumbled this time. "How could he in this Maker abandoned sty?!" he cackled before the waves of devastating cough took over his body.
Fawn whirled around when the barred door jerked in hinges as the Templars tried to wreck it down. "I'm out of time," he desperately watched as the door was about to yield. A loud clang followed when Fawn shattered the lock on Malcolm's cell with a haste spell, but even that wouldn't wake the old mage up from his mulish indifference.
"Let's go!" Fawn attempted to drag Malcolm up to his feet, but he jerked before the elf could actually touch him.
"I ain't going nowhere, elf! Leave me be!" Hawke's hostility caught Fawn off his guard, so he rather stepped back, though the frantic thuds on the barred door did not let him forget the Templars were about to flood the dungeon. "I won't go. I cannot go…" the old Hawke muttered merely to himself.
"Ud'Raan...!" Fawn swore in his own tongue before he snatched the elder man by his shoulders and roughly pulled his unwilling body up. "Listen to me, old man," he demanded. "Listen!" he shook him as his voice thundered throughout the dungeon, when Malcolm's face stubbornly remained turned away from him. "I'm not going to die here, do you hear me?! And neither do you! I've sworn an oath to your son I would bring you back unharmed and unharmed I shall b—"
"My son?" Malcolm's face lit up with hope and his milky white eyes shone with moisture, though he still seemed to have difficulties to look at his liberator. "My son is coming for me? Of course he is! He's my son!" he kept on blubbering while his boney fingers were desperately clutching Fawn's leather breast piece wrought with silver.
"Malcolm?" Fawn shook the old man again to end his ramble, but fear dominated in that word this time as the petrifying suspicion crept up on him. "Can you see me?" he asked in a small voice, knowing the answer already.
"No," Malcolm breathed out before he broke down into tears. "No, I can't. They keep me drained out of my powers all the time," he kept sobbing when he hid in the arms which he could not see like an abused child. "I have some unique circumstances, as you can see," he remarked through the bitter tears and briefly touched his eyelids with two uncontrollably quivering fingers. "Normally I draw my ability to see from the Fade, it is exhausting indeed, but I manage. But now—" he faltered and ran the fingers through the veil of matted hair, smudging the tears across his face with his other hand.
"All right..." Fawn murmured when he had finally clear overview of what they were facing. "All right," he repeated, "we can still do this. It could still work. Right..." his voice faded away as he led the old blind man toward the door leading further into the dungeon. He shoved Malcolm through it and made a stand right between the cellars when the barred door were breached.
"They're here!" The first beast of a Templar entering the dungeon howled as a famished rat smelling fresh blood. The Templar horde was half-way across the vast cellar when Fawn was done with his devastating spell. The massive vault became loose and the scenery of men being buried beneath the brash was not for weak minds to behold. Once the screaming and moaning died away, Fawn's narrowed eyes inspected what appeared to be the grave of many members of an honorable Templar order.
"That should slow them down a little, I suppose," he droned when he picked up Malcolm who obediently sat where he had been thrown earlier.
"What was it?" Hawke asked in awe. "It sounded as if the whole damn chapel just collapsed on us..."
"Maybe, just maybe, it did," Fawn retorted as he wrapped his left arm around the weakened old mage. "We must hurry," he dismissed any other question Hawke might have had.
After a half an hour they climbed out of what appeared to be an elaborate system of underground tunnels, only to realize the Captain had been waiting for them the whole time right there.
"Impressive," the Captain uttered a sound when Fawn seemed unable to find his wits for now. "Give up the mage, elf. There's an execution to be done and I would not see it marred by some knife-ear," he slowly unsheathed his deathly great-sword Fawn had admired before.
Mahariel was at a loss there. He was alone against many and his only ally was an old blind man.
"Look at him," the Captain continued in his mocking soliloquy, "scared like a little birdie, pissing its pointy-eared pants wet like a bitch afraid of master's whip!" he spluttered his spiteful outburst at Mahariel and his men rewarded him with clamant laughter. It occurred to Fawn, that the Captain may have not been familiarized with a fact the elf, as he abusively addressed him, was also a mage. Otherwise he would have mentioned it, right? So, Zevran kept this viable information from him, did he? Why? Well, Fawn knew exactly why. Zevran wanted him for himself. He wanted to hold Fawn's life in his own hands, to live through that eluding moment when Fawn's fate was at his whim, before he naturally decided to take his life from him.
But now – Zevran stood there among the braying Templars, ghastly pale, taciturn, motionless; just his eyes frantically roving around the glade the fugitives emerged at from the tunnels. Fawn was aware this was not how the Crow pictured their ultimate clash. He would have no doubt preferred they met alone during some starless warm night at white beaches of Llomeryn and fucked each other silly before trying to kill one another. No; watching Fawn being pierced by myriads of arrows, stuck through and through with Templar blades only to be decapitated afterwards most definitely didn't fit into Zev's romantic idea of their brief bloody reunion. But this was an immediate outcome of his precipitate actions when the Crow decided to lure Mahariel into a trap.
Some hysteric thin voice within Fawn's head was trying to convince him there still was a chance to pull this off. To fulfill what he'd promised to Samael. To himself.
"Do you want the mage?" Fawn stepped forward and looked straight into the Captain's face. "Come and claim him, but only over my dead body," he proclaimed and watched as the Captain was growing nervous. He indeed must have seen something much more than an insignificant elf within Mahariel, since his vicious sneer slowly faded and he glanced around the glade in sudden insecurity.
"Archers...!" he suddenly raised his hand in direct command to nock the arrows and aim at the elf. "Shoot the son of a bitch!" he roared a second before the blade thin as a needle ran through his throat. The command had been issued; the arrows had been released, only to get repulsed off the elf and Malcolm by the shimmering silver barrier. Zevran's heart missed a beat and then another when he was given the privilege to see once again that painfully familiar arcane shield which had been once protecting him too what seemed like eons ago.
Stampede through the woods which were growing thick and impassable turned into bloodshed. Fawn dragged the half-unconscious Hawke along with him, driving off whoever dared stand in his way, but not without a price. He sustained several minor wounds, yet that was not what worried him the most. Zevran had disappeared right after Fawn fled the glade and the Hero was sure he would be waiting for him somewhere for he would have done the very same thing.
Right after Fawn had put his sword through yet another Templar hell-bent on capturing them both alive, it happened. The elf indeed registered some scuffle not far behind them, but then an alarmed single voice shouted "No!" and Fawn felt the arrow piercing his flesh, tearing it mercilessly apart. The arrow hit him viciously from behind into the shoulder blade, knocking him down to his knees.
As Mahariel knelt there, thinking about what had happened, he heard from great distance Malcolm's panicked voice shouting something irrelevant; he heard the sounds of a nearby battle, yet all that seemed insignificant. Did just Zevran shoot him in the back? Well, it definitely sounded like what an Antivan Crow would do. But Fawn had never perceived Zevran just as the Crow. He may have done things; awful things to him, but they did not justify a cruel arrow stuck in his back. Or did they?
Someone landed in a skid right in front of the wounded arcane warrior, gloves fell through the freshly fallen snow as the warm hands cupped his face where a gentle smile froze as the memories of happier time whirled through Fawn's head.
"No, no, no, I didn't want this, I swear, Fawn, look at me, you must know I did not wish for this..."
Fawn was able to make out Zevran's tanned face which looked rather inappropriate among the heaps of snow, hear his ardent endearments in the ear, feel his arms wrapped tight around him.
"If you just stopped lying for a minute," Fawn heard himself responding in bitterness. "This is precisely what you have wished for during all those long sleepless nights which you were not able to fill even with whores, liquor and good kill. You whispered of vengeance night by night, I know you did. Now you have an opportunity, oh mighty Zevran Aranai of the infamous Antivan Crows – an opportunity which shan't ever repeat again," Fawn's face twisted in stabbing pain as he wrenched his shoulders out of the Crow's grasp. "You better seize it and do whatever you have to do," he licked his numb lips and bit the lower one as the pain prevailed. Oh, he would rather die a thousand times before Zevran would see him begging for his life.
"You're right," Zevran set his jaw and rose to his full height; looking down at the ever still kneeling elf in solemn silence, "I should have done this a year ago," he whispered as he drew the sword which looked like a larger replica of the needle-like little blade Fawn had seen before.
"You should have," Fawn called upon his strength which was abandoning him quickly and shrugged, so his face was warped by yet another wave of pain pulsing within the arrow wound. "You could have," he slowly looked up at his tormentor who looked like Fawn's words couldn't cut any deeper. That long intense gaze of the eyes blacker than the bottom of an abyss reminded Zevran that he indeed had many possibilities beyond count to take the life of the Hero of Fereldan for they had been lovers for many months. They fought many battles back-to-back, they went through many adventures side-by-side, they lay in each other's arms every night and when they didn't, they equally considered such night as wasted. "Do it," Fawn commanded the hesitant Crow.
Speechless after such direct behest, Zevran heaved the sword and watched the lethal blade and Fawn's resolved face in frantic turns.
"Do it," a hint of threat in those two words was now evident as Fawn's eyes narrowed in defiance.
"I'll do it…!" Zevran kept gulping the words he had yet to say to Mahariel, but couldn't.
"Sure, you'll do it. Now do it. Do it! DO IT!" Fawn lost last inhibitions as he kept shouting at the Crow over and over again to end his life and their misery along with it.
Fawn would never know whether Zevran Aranai would have killed him right there, at that remote place of twisted trees and frozen rocks, so unknown even the maps did not describe it in detail. Out of nowhere, a fist with a rock in it appeared and smacked Zevran over his head. He went down without a sound, though Fawn was able to catch his head and feel the stream of steaming blood which had started oozing out of the shallow cut right above the ear.
"Enough of the drama, pony-boys," Malcolm yanked the Hero up on his feet, oblivious to his severe wound.
"You see me…" Fawn pointed out the obvious as he tried to breathe the worst pain away.
"One of them Templars had lyrium on him," the old Hawke uttered when he started tending to the arrow wound. "I'm sure in my condition it won't last long, so you better hurry."
"I better hurry?" Fawn's raised an eyebrow and hissed when Malcolm unexpectedly broke the arrow, leaving there but a stump, so it could be pulled out at first convenience. "I hope you meant we.
"Fawn," Malcolm bitterly cackled, "can I call you Fawn? I think we've been through quite a lot of shit together to reach that enigmatic first-names basis," he pressed the bandage around the arrow stump and dexterously fastened it there; once again ignoring the guttural groan of pain escaping Fawn's lips.
"You and your son, you two are more alike than I thought," Mahariel droned in discontent about how roughly, yet efficiently, his wound had been tended to. A bottle of healing potion stuck between his lips prevented him from sharing his other findings though. "Well, I've been better, I suppose, but it'll do," Fawn cautiously tried to move, only then he realized Malcolm was no longer by his side. He was leaning on the dead tree, inhaling shallow sharp breaths, shivering.
"What are you looking at?" he lashed out at the elf who was watching him in poorly hidden disquiet. "I've told you it would fade in no time. Soon I'll be no more than a blind crippled geezer again. There's nothing you could do to get me out of here alive," he shook his head and clawed at the tree bark in despair.
"Yes," Fawn slowly concurred with the old Hawke, his face thoughtful and distant. "Yes, there's nothing I in particular can do to help. However…" he fell silent as though he went through some inner fierce fight.
"However what…?" Hawke snorted and his arms slid down along the tree in acceptance of freezing to death.
"However…" Fawn murmured merely to himself. "Ugh, that's preposterous!" he shouted himself quiet. "But it is the only way," he remarked after a moment of arguing with himself. "So humiliating. So, so humiliating," he kept spluttering curses at his invisible advisor dwelling clearly in his head and then he kept swearing in Elvish tongue for a while before he strode toward the wilting old mage. "Malcolm Hawke," he addressed the mage and there was an odd stubborn resolve written all over his pose, "promise me that whatever now happens, you retrieve this sword and you carry it with you anywhere we go." Fawn then slowly unsheathed the blood-stained Sword of the Brecilian Forest, eyeing it, caressing it like a lover's body, before he ceremonially handed it over to the dumbfounded old mage.
Malcolm could have asked myriads of questions he had on his mind at the moment; he just didn't. He accepted the sword with a subtle bow and an oath on his lips instead.
"So, so demeaning…" Fawn sighed once again, but this time he sounded weary and reconciled with what was about to happen.
If Malcolm Hawke was amazed by the rite of the sword-keeping, what happened in the next second left him plain in awe.
When Zevran Aranai awoke after he was knocked unconscious, he found himself lying under the huge spruce tree, all swaddled in furs and cloaks of the fallen and his needle blade was missing. Out of himself with burning rage, he returned to place where he had been hurt, only to find nothing at all; no trace of the fugitives since the blizzard got worse and destroyed any trail they might have left behind them.
Darkness of his marred revenge took over Zevran's mind. He rampaged around the woods and when he reached the village again, he went completely berserk. At the end he was the only living soul far and wide and only the silent swamp could tell where all the villagers went and Zevran knew the swamp would keep his sins hidden forever.