Killeen was sitting on the wall by the gates with her boot off and her foot and ankle in a snowdrift when they brought the prisoner back down. The mage was unconscious again, but rather than cradled in Cullen's arms, her small, limp form was carried on a stretcher by two of the Spymaster's scouts.

And another difference — from the remarks Killeen overheard as the small party passed her, the mage was no longer a prisoner. The Seeker, for one, seemed quite convinced that the mage had had nothing to do with the explosion that had destroyed the Temple. Herald, someone said, of Andraste herself.

Killeen closed her eyes for a moment. He'll hear she's back soon enough, she argued with herself. And you need to keep your weight off that ankle or it'll take longer for the sprain to heal. And it's not as if him knowing sooner will make any difference to her, or to anything important.

She sighed. It will make a difference to Cullen.

There was no way she could get her boot back over her swollen ankle, so she tucked it under one arm and began to gingerly limp toward the tents where Cullen would be engaged in the frantic work of putting together some sort of fighting force out of what was left of their able-bodied soldiers and whichever of the refugees streaming in could hold a sword without cutting themselves. In fact, as she got closer, she could hear his voice raised at some hapless messenger who had brought unwelcome news.

"Tell Threnn I don't care if she has to dig the iron with her bare hands! Harritt can't make swords without metal, and we need swords!"

"Yes, ser!" the poor man gasped, making his escape so quickly he almost knocked Killeen down as she drew back the flap of the tent.

"Scaring him won't make him any more persuasive with the quartermaster," she said.

"Might make him run faster," Cullen muttered, eyes still on the document before him on his portable desk. "That woman, Maker's breath! I'd tell her myself but I'm not sure I trust my temper."

"Then here's some news to sweeten your mood: she's back. Alive. Not a prisoner or a suspect anymore, either."

He did look up then, face clearing. "Alive?"

Killeen noted that he hadn't needed to ask who she was, with a little twist in her heart that she supposed she'd get used to. "Out for the count, but from what I heard, they weren't worried."

Cullen stood. "I should … Lady Cassandra will want to brief me as soon as possible."

"Probably," Killeen agreed, and then, because it was what a friend would say, a good friend who was nothing more: "And if you happened to look in on the brave and beautiful Herald of Andraste at the same time …"

He blushed and stammered something in which Killeen caught the word possibly, and then frowned. "Should you be walking around?"

She accepted the change of subject with relief. "No. But I thought you'd want to hear straight away."

"Then sit down, for the Maker's sake! I don't need you half-crippled on top of everything else!"

"If you move your giant bear-clad self out of the way," Killeen said, "I'll sit in your chair and make a dent in those reports while you go and get briefed while sitting at the bedside of a pretty girl with an adoring expression on your face." She waved her hand. "Shoo. Away with you. Be off. And so forth."

He came around the desk, and Killeen hopped awkwardly aside. For a moment they were in each other's way in the narrow confines of the tent, and then Killeen solved the impasse by losing her balance.

Cullen grabbed her before she fell, hoisted her over one shoulder and carried her to the chair. "There," he said, depositing her. "Stay put. That's an order."

"Your every whim is my command, Commander," Killeen said.

"I'll be back shortly."

She pulled the stack of reports toward her. "Take your time," she said with as much innuendo as she could manage.

He blushed again. "Kill, you're going to be unbearable about this, aren't you?"

"Absolutely," she assured him.

Shaking his head, he ducked out of the tent, then startled her by ducking back. "Kill?"

"Still here."

"Thank you," he said, and was gone.

It set the pattern of the days that followed. The Inquisition formally declared, Cullen was one of the inner circle who met daily in the Chantry to plot their course, in the big war room Killeen never entered. Hours of his day were taken up with debating strategy and competing requests for help with the Inquisition's diplomat, the Seeker, the Spymaster — and of course, the Herald herself. Killeen herself sat in his tent, disposing of as much of the routine paperwork of supply and requisitions as she could for him, limping outside to keep an eye on the troops training, strictly forbidding herself to listen for his footsteps outside announcing that he was back where he belonged, that he was hers again, at least for a while.

Refugees and pilgrims streaming in to Haven stretched their accommodation to its limits. New tents were erected for the troops, but there were never enough. Cullen's tent grew even more cramped with the addition of a cot, then another for Killeen.

He didn't say that he could only share his tent with someone who already knew about the nightmares, but then, he didn't need to.

And it's not as if, Killeen thought as she stared up at the canvas above her and listened to her Commander's breathing in the dark, anyone is going to gossip.

No, there would be no rumours of anything improper between Cullen and herself. For one thing, everyone in the camp had seen Cullen blush and stammer and gaze like a love-sick puppy whenever the Herald stopped by to talk to him — which she seemed to make a point of doing, every time she was passing and quite a few when, it seemed, she'd had to invent an excuse to be passing.

For another, Cullen was gloriously handsome, having come out of the mess at Kirkwall with only the slightest scar — which did nothing but save him from prettiness and add a hint of danger to his charm. While Killeen herself … she raised her hand to run her fingers over her face in the dark, feeling the raised lines of scars that striped her from forehead to chin. And I wasn't in his league to begin with.

No, if anyone imagined Killeen to have a romantic life, they'd envision some solid sergeant, balding, under tall, with a broken nose and the ability to drink anyone under the table. And in her experience, no-one ever imagined ugly women to have any romantic life at all.

A noise broke into her thoughts. "Maker … don't …"

"Cullen," she said softly. "You're dreaming."

He stilled.

Killeen waited a moment. "You awake?"

No answer. She could hear him breathing steadily and slowly again.

Well, that's something.

She herself lay awake quite some time longer, eyes open sightlessly against the dark.