Talvinder wakes with a start, and almost as soon as her eyes open, she rolls to the edge of the small pallet she's lying on and retches into a conveniently placed bucket. Little comes out, just bile and a small string of saliva, really, but her body shakes, the taste of acid coating her throat and tongue as her long, heavy braid falls over her shoulder. When the wave of nausea passes, she lies back, looks around, tries to figure out where exactly she is. Savreen lies next to her on the pallet, curled on her side and covered in woven blankets. Her hair is braided too, thick curls combed and washed carefully, and she is clean, dressed in homespun cloth. They are inside a small house, laid out on the floor in front of a hearth, where the fire coaxes a slowly bubbling and boiling pot of stew along, and warms the sleeping lumps that are Abarie and Sher. The smell, of meat and salt and wild herbs and potatoes, makes Tali realize just how hungry she is, and she wonders when was the last time I ate?
And then she remembers. The Joining. The party. Alistair. And the meeting, and then the tower, and the battle, and the ogre, and her leg, and where is Alistair? Her heart drops into her stomach, and the hunger vanishes, replaced by a new kind of nausea. She sits, perhaps too abruptly, given the way her head spins, and then tries to stand, though she soon decides better of it. As she shoves away the blankets covering her own body, she looks to her legs. Where before her left leg had been broken, bone poking out of skin, it is instead scarred, but whole. There's a line there of lighter, pinker, swollen skin that knots together, slightly raised and devoid of hair. It runs a few inches across and down the side of her lower leg, with a smaller, star-shaped mark just above it, courtesy of the arrow that had lodged in her calf. Remembering more, she tugs the neck of her shirt away from her chest, cranes her neck to look at her underarm, and again, among the dark hair there, is the scarred mark of another vanished arrow.
Healed. She's been healed—but by whom? And who has dressed her in the shirt she now wears, who has replaced her kachera—the knot imperfect, but attempted—and who has laid out her belongings? Across the floor in front of her, both her armor and Sav's armor lies cleaned, their clothes folded, everything pristine. Everything she owns is here, from her father's kirpan to the bottle of conscription ale she'd thought lost, left in her tent along with the bedroll it's propped up against. It feels like magic, or some sort of trick, and it unsettles her. Hurriedly, as though she might lose it again, she lunges clumsily to grab the kirpan, closing her fingers tightly around it.
She receives her explanation sooner than she'd expected, when the door swings open and in walks a familiar figure, dressed in black and red, leather and feathers.
"Morrigan?" The young woman starts at the sound of her name, letting the door swing shut behind her slightly more loudly than she intended as she yanks her arm close to her chest, palm out, as though ready to hurl magic at an intruder. Next to Talvinder, Savreen shifts, but does not wake, and Morrigan, seeing it's only the two of them, relaxes slightly.
"Your eyes finally open, then. Mother shall be pleased. And even more pleased to hear that your faculties and memory are both intact." The vulnerability is gone in the blink of an eye, the return of Morrigan's confident stance and expression making Tali doubt that she ever saw it in the first place. With another glance around the room, Tali queries:
"Where…where are we?" Morrigan smirks slightly at the question, making her way to the fire and reaching for a wooden spoon to stir the stew. Sher huffs out a sleepy bark, but does nothing else as the witch's skirt brushes against his wiry fur.
"Why, in the Wilds, of course. Where else would we be?" That is as fair a statement as can be, truthfully, but it isn't enough of an answer for Tali. She shifts, restless now, the nausea growing once more in the pit of her stomach, and shakes her head, rephrasing her question.
"But how did we get here? What happened to the Darkspawn? The battle—" As Tali speaks, her words grow faster, tumbling from her lips and starting to bunch up on themselves. Morrigan turns about, letting go of the spoon in the pot, though it continues stirring.
"You were injured, but mother managed to save you. She rescued you and your comrades and brought you here, though 'twas a close call. What is important for you to know, and which you likely have already discovered, unless you are far dimmer than I give you credit for, is that you live."
"I don't—I don't remember—"
"I would assume, then, that you also do not remember 'twas I who bandaged your wounds, and mother who healed you. 'Tis no matter, I did not expect any thanks—though you are welcome, and welcome to give them."
"Thank you," Tali begins, remembering the scars. If Morrigan and her mother were the ones who healed her bones, the arrows stuck in her skin and flesh, then both must be powerful indeed. But there is one thing she has not answered. "The battle—what happened to the army? Who won?" There is a slight pause before Morrigan speaks, one that Tali might not notice in normal circumstances. Now, though, it seems that the pause is the time it takes for Morrigan to debate how gentle she ought to be with her next words. When Morrigan does speak, it is more solemn than it had been before, lips pursed slightly as she forms the words.
"The man who was to respond to your signal quit the field. Those he abandoned…well. The Darkspawn won your battle. You would not want to see what is happening in that valley now. Your friend…he is not taking it well." Her words run down Tali's spine like cold water, and she flounders, trying not to gasp for breath.
"My friend?" Tali grips at that one word, a lifeline in the rest of them. There is only one person she can think of, beyond Savreen. The nausea leaps into her throat, battling with hope. "Alistair? Do you mean Alistair?"
"I do not care to know his name. If you mean the suspicious, dim-witted fellow who was with you before, then yes. Unfortunately, mother managed to save him as well." Relief. Pure relief. That is all Tali feels, if only for a brief moment. As quickly as it came, though, it disappears, the intensity fading nearly immediately.
"But the others—what has happened to the other Grey Wardens? The King?" Once more, Morrigan remains silent for a heartbeat. This pause is more noticeable than the last, more heavy, too. She looks down, back at the stew in the fire, at the way her black skirt folds around her bent knees, and then back up again, straight into Talvinder's eyes, before speaking as bluntly and simply as possible.
"They are all dead. 'Tis a grisly scene, back on the field. Better not to know. Your…Alistair, was it? He has veered between denial and grief since mother told him. He is outside, now, by the fire, should you wish to speak with him." All of them. Every last one. The visions of the battlefield return to Tali's mind. Not hallucinations, perhaps, not nightmares. Duncan's eyes. Huguette. Dahna and Caomhin. Oswin, Wenalen, Marion. Roderick. All that blood. Again, she feels sick, and she reaches a hand toward the bucket, ready to retch once more.
"I need—I need to—"
"Recover the ability of speech and find your words, it would seem." Tali ignores Morrigan. She swallows. Speaks again.
"I need to get out of here."
"Ah, and there you have them. Well done indeed!" Again, she ignores Morrigan, or tries to, at least. It is difficult not to roll her eyes—at least Morrigan's rankling calms her heart a bit, distracts her from the panic and the nausea filling her otherwise empty stomach. "Before you run screaming into the wilderness, though, mother is, I believe, outside. She wishes to speak with you."
"Speak to me? What about?"
"How should I know? Beyond the notice I received when I saw her crest yonder hill with three unconscious fools and two dogs in tow, she tells me nothing of her plans." That piques Talvinder's interest, and she looks at Morrigan with renewed intensity, renewed curiosity. The witch's mother was not a large woman, nor even a particularly strong looking one. The image of her and her alone rescuing three Wardens and two mabari is a puzzling one.
"How did she manage to rescue us, exactly?" Morrigan scoffs, as if laughing to herself about something.
"She turned herself into a giant bird and plucked all of you from the broken top of that tower, carrying you here in her talons." Tali can't help it. Despite the faint headache it gives her, the pang in the top of her skull, Tali rolls her eyes. "If you do not believe that tale," Morrigan says, still smirking, "then perhaps you might ask mother about it yourself. She may even tell you."
"But why?" In response, Morrigan shrugs. She is disinterested in 'why's and 'how's, it would seem, but Tali wants to know, must know. When Morrigan does not offer an answer, she asks again. "Why us? Why save us? What good are we? The King was there, and the other Wardens—we're just recruits." With a sigh and no small amount of frustration, Morrigan finally answers.
"To speak troth, I do not know. I have wondered to her myself, and yet she tells me nothing. Perhaps you were the only ones she could reach. Personally, I would have rescued your king. A king is surely worth a better ransom price than three bloodied Grey Wardens and their pups." There is a hint of a joke, in Morrigan's voice, and Tali finds herself rising to it before she can begin to think why.
"Well, thank you very much for that."
"I am only being practical. 'Tis the truth."
"I just so happen to be nobility, you know." Morrigan arches an eyebrow, that ever-present smirk widening just a tad.
"Really? I stand corrected, then. Perhaps I might ransom you yet! Do you also know the identity of the old king's bastard? With the young king dead, that would fetch a higher price still!" She is poking fun at Tali now, and Tali knows it, but her words have brought another question to mind.
"Coin is important to you, then? Out here?" Once more, a nonchalant shrug.
"Who says I would ransom you for coin? Gold may have its uses, to be sure, but power buys far more." With that, Morrigan lapses into silence. Talvinder follows suit, unsure what to say, what to do.
"Um, Morrigan?" she asks eventually, and the witch lets out a small hmm? "Alistair," Tali begins, picking at a small fuzz on her borrowed shirt. She can almost feel a blush rising under her skin, though why she refuses to acknowledge. "How is he? Is he…is he all right? Was he hurt too badly?" She thinks she sees Morrigan roll her eyes, but it could just be the firelight flickering in them.
"He was not wounded too badly, no, though he, like you, will carry scars. But if you ask me—well. I suppose it would be unkind to say he is being childish." At the dismissiveness in Morrigan's tone, Talvinder bristles once more, gripping the fabric of her shirt tightly.
"It would be very unkind," she says sharply, "those were his friends." His family. But Morrigan is not fazed by Tali's emotions. She shrugs, continues in a blasé tone.
"And do you think they would encourage his blubbering? If so, they are not the sort of Grey Wardens the legends note, or at the very least not the Grey Wardens of which I have heard tell." Her tone infuriates Tali, white hot anger coursing through her and bursting out of her mouth.
"And who and what have you lost, Morrigan, to cast your judgement so quickly on his grief?" For the first time, Morrigan appears truly startled by the substance of Tali's words, and she looks, really looks, at Tali, at her face, at the unwanted tears collecting in her eyes, at her slightly shaking hands. There is a perplexed look that crosses her face fleetingly, and then it is gone, and she nods, once again impassive.
"You make a fair point." A pause, and then Morrigan offers something, rather than waiting for Tali to ask. "Have you any more questions? 'Tis surely confusing, to wake up here with a scrambled head. And I am sure 'twill not be possible to stop you until the flow of your curiosity is ceased." She adds the last part with a bit more dry humor, but she doesn't fully seem to dislike the questions, or dislike the talking. Not wanting yet to venture outside, Tali casts her mind around, looking for a question she might ask. She might ask of survivors, of her brother and her cousin out in the Wilds, but the thought of hearing the worst turns her stomach. She could not bear it if Morrigan were to tell her of their death, and she isn't sure if she could stand to have her question go unanswered should Morrigan know nothing. For a moment, she opens her mouth, but then closes it, still unsure what to ask. "Well? Are you to sit there gaping like a fish? If you are finished, then I shall—"
"Why? Why would Teyrn Loghain abandon the King? What could he have stood to gain?" The question is desperate. She knows, really, that Morrigan will not have an answer. She expects it. But that knowledge cannot stop the words as they issue from her lips, into the quiet space between the two of them. Morrigan sits there, one eyebrow arched slightly.
"How should I know?" Tali shrugs.
"I simply can't…I cannot…I don't understand it."
"And you believe that I do?" Sensing the approbation in Morrigan's voice, Tali pinches the bridge of her nose and sighs.
"I didn't mean that I think you to be the same sort of person who would abandon their allies, if that's what you mean by that." Morrigan scoffs.
"Then what did you mean?"
"Loghain…he was friends with the King's father. Best friends, as my father tells—told it. What could ever possess someone to abandon, for all intents and purposes, his nephew? Not his blood, that's true, but as near to it as possible?" She lets her hand fall and looks back to Morrigan. The witch seems thoughtful, considering Tali's question. Though, she might just as easily be considering the stew she stirs again.
"I may not know much of your society," Morrigan begins, "but I do know that power, loss, resentment—all three are powerful things."
"What does that—"
"You say the King's father was this Loghain's best friend. Was. There is your loss. The King's son is not the King, runs things differently than his father did, is not Loghain's friend. There you have your resentment. And even someone with a head knocked about as badly as yours should be able to see the power, plain and clear." Tali pauses, falls silent. She considers everything Morrigan has said, considers the way Loghain acted during their meeting with the King at Ostagar.
"Perhaps you are right," she says. But there is more. There must be more.
"Of course I am. 'Tis obvious, the way resentment feeds into the desire for power." She stands, makes a small motion with fingers suddenly ensconced by magic, and turns the iron arm from which the stew pot hangs over the fire, angling it so the pot is moved farther from the flames. "Now. Have you any last, burning questions?"
As soon as Tali shakes her head, the door bursts open.
"Young man, I have told you—" A voice, one Tali recognizes as Morrigan's mother, snakes into the room. Sunlight glares in at them, and with the commotion, Savreen finally awakens, sitting upright and glancing around, dazed and blinking. Abarie and Sher look up, and Sher lets out a faint growl, but then it becomes clear that the one who threw the door open is—
"Alistair?" He stands there, just inside the doorway, backlit by sunlight, but it is unmistakably him. Behind him is the silhouette of Morrigan's mother. As he takes another step into the room, his features become clearer. He is wearing, like Talvinder and Savreen, a tunic of homespun cloth, over rough brown cloth trousers. When Tali looks a little closer, she sees no obvious wounds, but on his left cheek, there's a small scar, and his left ear has a little notch near its tip. His face, while it had been smooth at Ostagar, is slightly stubbled. And his eyes are ringed with red.
"You're alive?" he breathes. His voice sounds as though he could cry with the next breath, and Tali can see tears gathering again on the edges of his eyes. Tali stands on wobbly legs, reaching out on instinct to try and comfort him, to do something, anything. Frantic now, Alistair pushes the heels of his hands into the hollows under his brow, against his eyelids, then takes them away, blinking rapidly. When he sees that Tali is still there, closer now, and Sav is still there, gaining purchase of her surroundings, his face breaks into a tremulous, wavering smile. "You're alive." Morrigan's mother has caught up with him, elbowing her way past him with joints sharpened by age. Alistair winces, rubbing his side as she looks up at him askance.
"Now that you've made a commotion, are you satisfied? Here. See, your fellow Grey Wardens live. I have not readied them for the stew pot. You worry too much, young man."
"I thought you were dead for sure." Alistair seems to say it to both Tali and Sav, but his eyes—his eyes refuse to leave Tali. Meeting his gaze makes Tali feel vulnerable, makes her remember she's only in the long tunic and her kachera, not in her armor, as she suddenly wishes.
"As you can see," Morrigan interjects, her tone full of all the plain dislike she already holds for Alistair, "they are both very much not dead. Though I suppose 'twould escape the notice of the likes of you, should you not be told as much."
"Hey, what does that—"
"Yes, yes, girl." Morrigan's mother chastises her slightly, grabbing Alistair by the crook of his arm and steering him back to the door even as he glares at Morrigan. "We shall continue waiting outside, as we have done, and you, young man, will learn some patience while your companions dress themselves."
As quickly as he had barreled in, Alistair is gone again. Tali has little time, though, to think about the way his gaze lingered on her, especially as she turns to Sav, kneeling once again by her side. Next to her, her cousin blinks sleep and confusion from her eyes, but she doesn't seem to be as shocked as Tali was when she awoke—nor does her stomach seem to be quite so unsettled.
"Morrigan rescued us?" she asks, a faint sliver of suspicion creeping through her voice. There's an almost imperceptible lift to her eyebrow, and while Tali thinks that only she might notice—on account of how well she knows her cousin, after all—Morrigan scoffs once more.
"Are we to repeat my earlier interrogation? Your suspicion is ill-placed. Of course my mother and I saved you, and of course we do not have any ulterior motive, as that expression upon your face seems to suggest." Tali feels a twinge of shame at that, knowing that they're guests, trespassing on the hospitality of Morrigan and her mother. Based on Savreen's expression, that feeling resonates in her stomach as well as she sighs, bringing a hand to rub at her forehead.
"I am sorry, Morrigan. I did not mean to accuse you of anything, especially not after what must have been a great trouble to you. It…it's just that…well. Quite a lot has happened and it is hard…not to be suspicious." Morrigan sniffs and crosses her arms, but she doesn't argue, not with that logic. Instead, she flicks her wrist, bringing the stewpot up into the air ahead of her with a lazy curl of magic.
"Yes. Well. The stew is finished. You should both get dressed, quickly. 'Twould be a shame for it to go cold before it is eaten." An air of finality rings about her words, and she stands and heads for the door herself, following her mother and Alistair, taking the stew with her. When the door shuts behind her, Tali and Sav are left in near silence, just the fire burning low and the snuffling of Abarie and Sher filling the space around them.
It takes everything for Tali not to cry the instant she turns back to Sav, but there is still no time for tears. Perhaps there will be later, she does not know, but not now, certainly.
"Are you all right?" she asks instead, swallowing back the painful lump in her throat. For a moment, Sav doesn't answer. Instead, she looks about the room, taking it all in. Only after she seems sure of their surroundings does she speak.
"Morrigan really saved us." Her words are phrased like a question, but spoken as a statement, one with no small amount of incredulity.
"It would seem that way, yes. She and her mother." Savreen thinks for a moment, then nods.
"Perhaps I misjudged her." It's the same thought Talvinder is having, but she also wonders if she ever stood a chance at predicting Morrigan's actions, or if she ever will.
"I'm not sure what to make of her, really. She seemed ready enough to sell us out if the need arose." Another nod from Savreen.
"But she hasn't yet." Abruptly, she stands, wavering a bit on her feet as she does so, then stretches, revealing a thick line of knotted scar tissue on her thigh that turns Tali's stomach to see. "Which is not what I had expected." While Tali still wonders at what other scars her cousin might have earned on top of that tower, Savreen looks around for her clothes, finding them neatly folded among her other belongings. That gives her pause again, and she looks back to Tali with a questioning curve to her brow.
"Magic," is all Tali can say, shrugging her shoulders. That earns her a slight chuckle from Sav, who grabs her clothes.
"I definitely misjudged her, if she's gone to the trouble of mending my salwar."
With Morrigan's words in their ears, the cousins dress quickly and make their way outside. They find themselves blinking as the early evening sunlight meets their eyes after so long in the dark hut, enjoying it even as their eyes water. Overjoyed to follow them out of doors, Sher and Abarie bark and gambol, chasing frogs, butterflies, marsh birds, anything that moves. A few paces ahead, situated on a small peninsula of turf mostly surrounded by marshy puddle, Morrigan, Alistair, and Morrigan's mother sit awkwardly at a roughly hewn wooden table. Well, Alistair and Morrigan sit awkwardly—Morrigan's mother seems either not to realize the tension between the two, or not to care, not as she spoons up Morrigan's stew from a simple clay bowl. If Talvinder were ever the betting kind, she would put gold on the latter.
As he notices Tali and Sav, though, Alistair stands abruptly. There is a barely touched bowl of stew in front of him as well, but that is far less important to Talvinder than the way his eyes are still red, puffy and pained-looking. She knows—perhaps too well—that there is nothing she can do to heal the hurt, but oh, how she wants to.
"I'm sorry for barging in like that, earlier," Alistair says. He doesn't take a seat again until both Tali and Sav have sat on the bench across from him and Morrigan, who slouches there with her chin resting on one hand, prodding and stirring at her stew with a spoon in the other. "I shouldn't have—I was just—well. I'm so glad you're alive." As he speaks, a fresh sheen gathers along the edges of his eyelids, and he rubs at them furiously. Morrigan, though, sighs, and takes the moment to roll her own eyes.
"Yes, yes. You were afraid you would be alone. We've gathered." To his credit, Alistair doesn't rise to the bait. He simply squeezes his eyes shut and clenches his jaw, waiting a moment to speak again.
"Duncan—he's dead. The other Wardens, even the King. None of it seems real, you know? And it—I mean, Morrigan said you were fine, it's just hard to believe anything at all, after all that. And if it weren't for Morrigan and her mother—" At that, Morrigan's mother ceases eating, instead slapping her hand lightly on the table and pointing her spoon at Alistair.
"Do not speak of me as though I am not present, young man." Morrigan snickers and makes a show of hiding it in a spoonful of stew when Alistair glares at her. Before long, though, he turns, chagrined but chastened, back to the old woman.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend. But…well, what should we call you? You've still not told us your name." Morrigan's mother regards him for a moment, then turns and busies herself with filling two more bowls of stew for her new guests. She is silent as she does so, appearing completely unbothered. With deliberate movements, she places the bowls in front of Savreen and Talvinder, along with two lacquered wooden spoons. Tali takes her eyes off Morrigan's mother to begin eating with alacrity, finally silencing the growling in her stomach. Then, as the old witch picks up her own spoon once more and readies herself to take another bite, she speaks, in that same stern voice as always.
"Names are pretty, but useless. If you wish to have one, though, the Chasind folk call me Flemeth. I suppose it will do." Her words are ever louder as they're spoken into the near silence, punctuated only with the sounds of marsh animals and birds. In shock, Talvinder turns her head up from her nearly empty stew to stare at the old woman—at Flemeth—and then Alistair speaks, his voice incredulous.
"You don't mean—the Flemeth? From the legends?" She doesn't respond, but when he looks around the table for some sort of answer, the smirk Morrigan gives him seems to be all the proof he needs. He turns back to face Flemeth, who calmly ladles more stew into her bowl. "Daveth was right—you're not just any witch, you're the Witch of the Wilds, aren't you?"
The Witch of the Wilds. A terrifying figure, ancient, unknowable, wise beyond any reckoning of mortal man, a remnant of the Old Elvhen—those were the stories Talvinder and Savreen had grown up hearing, most often from merchants travelling to Highever from the south. Next to Tali, Sav's eyes are wide. It's a revelation, to be sure, and it sets Tali's mind reeling. This is the Witch of the Wilds, and she has had them to her hut, tended their wounds, and now fed them stew. Which, coincidentally, tastes quite good. Talvinder wants to say something into the silence that has descended, yet again, onto their small group—anything—but her tongue is tied. The best she can do is to speak the first words that she can swallow properly.
"I thought you would be older," she blurts out. Flemeth looks at her for a moment, and then her face breaks into a smile, and she laughs, clapping a hand on Tali's back. Across the table, Morrigan barely hides her own laughter in her bowl. Savreen's expression, Tali notices when her eyes dart over to her, is slightly pinched, her eyebrows raised, lips pursed, and eyes squinting. In response, Tali offers an apologetic shrug and a half smile, as if to ask her cousin what else could I have said? But soon Flemeth's laughter has waned into chuckles, and she speaks again.
"You flatter me, young woman. Yes, I am a Witch of the Wilds, whatever that may mean. I know a bit of magic, and it has served you all well, has it not?" Savreen is the one who responds now, before Tali can put her foot in her mouth again.
"Indeed it has, Lady Flemeth. We are most grateful. To you and your daughter." The smile still on her face, Flemeth regards Sav now, thoughtful. Her posture changes, and she sits straighter, bringing her hands to rest on the table in front of her. The smile doesn't slip from her face, but her expression changes—grows more intense, enigmatic, less readable.
"Gratitude and manners are well and good, but I must ask: what is it you intend to do with the lives I have saved for you all?" This seems to be some form of cue for Morrigan, who stands, clears away the now empty stew pot and the dishes, and, without a word, vanishes back into the house.
"I beg your pardon," Savreen asks, brow furrowed. "But what exactly do you mean?"
"And you have it. But my question remains the same: what is it you intend to do?" Flemeth's stare is penetrating as she looks at Alistair, Savreen, and Talvinder, each in their own turn. When her eyes fall on Tali, she finds it hard to hold Flemeth's gaze. All she can think of are Flemeth's earlier words, spoken almost in this very spot: Death knocks at the door for you all, follows your every step.
"Well, Alistair is the true Grey Warden here—" Savreen begins, giving Tali an excuse to break eye contact with Flemeth. Alistair starts, a new, more frantic look in his eye.
"No, you can't pull that on me—all the Grey Wardens in Ferelden are gone except for us." His voice starts to rise, in pitch and in volume, and his hands shake. "I've lost—we've lost everyone! For the love of the Maker, don't—don't go walking away from the Wardens now. I can't fight this Blight alone." His breath comes out in pants, and he half stands, palms pressed flat to the table, as he catches Tali's eye. "Don't leave me alone," he echoes.
I won't, she wants to say. I promise, I won't. But when she opens her mouth, nothing comes out. The look she shares with him has to be enough, it has to be.
"Our family is gone, too. We know how you feel." It's Savreen who voices what Talvinder wants to have said, but when Alistair responds, again he looks at Tali, only tearing his eyes away to Sav when he remembers she's the one who spoke.
"Then you know I have to do something. We have to do something. We can't—they can't have died for nothing. They gave us a chance to fight the Blight." Flemeth nods absently, as if thinking about something else, and when she speaks, it is as though she is miles and ages away.
"Ah. To have lost so much, knowing you will lose more before the end arrives. It would be difficult not to hope anyway, not to cling to anything, however inconsequential. You three have much in common." Her piercing eyes land on Sav, and Tali watches as her cousin stares down the Witch of the Wilds. Under Flemeth's gaze, Savreen refuses to shrink. Something passes between the two of them, and when Sav speaks, decisiveness in her voice, Flemeth smiles.
"We will find the Archdemon. We will fight this Blight." The words, grim and resolute, worm their way under Talvinder's skin, and she finds herself nodding in agreement. Sav looks to Tali, black eyes finding her grey ones, and Tali sees a determination in their endless depths. Perhaps Flemeth need not be right—perhaps this hope is not inconsequential. Sav's eyes seem to twinkle, as though full of a thousand far-off stars, a thousand wishes caught in a black sky. Perhaps the gamble of a future is not too high a price to pay.
"That's all well and good, but…by ourselves?" Alistair's voice, his question, though realistic, breaks the spell, cuts the cord that seems to be holding the tension of the moment. When Tali looks to him, he rubs his hand across his lower jaw, his brow knotted together. "No Grey Warden has ever defeated a Blight without the armies of…a half-dozen nations at their back, at least. And I—" There is guilt in Alistair's expression, shame, or perhaps embarrassment, as though he wants to hide from something. "I don't really…know how." With a scoff, Flemeth speaks again.
"How to kill the Archdemon, or how to raise an army?" Before he can answer—and he is about to answer, if the way he inhales and opens his mouth is any indication—Flemeth continues. "Have the Wardens no allies these days? Are the treaties I saved all those years useless?" Alistair shakes his head, his thoughts still heavy on his forehead.
"Of course not. Duncan said that there were treaties signed at least by some of the Fereldan Dalish clans, the Dwarves of Ostagar, the Circle of Ferelden—and those treaties are binding, no matter how old. They're obligated to help us during a Blight. But…"
"But?" Sav waves a hand, exasperation breaking through her composure. "But what?"
"Cailan is gone. Whatever support he would have offered us is gone, too. Duncan sent envoys to the Wardens in Orlais and at the fortress in Weisshaupt, but Loghain—" Alistair spits out the man's name as though it's poison, bitter and sharp— "despises the Orlesians. Without Cailan—Loghain is likely to have already taken steps to stop them. We have to assume our authority is…compromised, at best."
"Can't we bring Loghain to judgement, then? Deal with him first? Then the Landsmeet would do the army raising…for us." The suggestion feels foolish as it leaves Tali's mouth, but she watches something like fire spark in Alistair's eyes at the words.
"An attractive idea." Flemeth's interjection startles Tali ever so slightly, but the witch takes no notice and simply continues speaking. "But revenge will only distract you." A warmer red begins to rise in Alistair's cheeks and on the tips of his ears and he vigorously shakes his head before answering.
"It's not revenge if it's necessary. We can't deal with the nobility before we bring Loghain down. Whatever his insanity, he obviously thinks the Darkspawn are a minor threat. Why else would he leave us to die?" In the face of Alistair's anger, Flemeth's demeanor makes her seem almost bored.
"An excellent question, young man. Men's hearts hold shadows darker than any tainted creature. Perhaps he believes the Blight is an army he can outmaneuver. Perhaps he does not see the Archdemon as the true threat."
"Then we convince everyone that that isn't the case. But we have to start somewhere!" Alistair's voice trembles, his hands balled tight into fists that force his knuckles to pop out in stark relief. Sometime as they sat at the table, the sun began to set, and now it casts deep shadows on his face, lining his features like a skull. Tali glances at Sav, who shakes her head. This is his argument.
"And who will believe you? Unless you think to convince this Loghain that he is mistaken? A brief, polite chat—"
The noise of Alistair slamming his fists on the table makes Tali jump. Quicker than she notices, he stands, fury in his eyes.
"Stop talking in circles! You told us not one moment ago not to let revenge distract us, and now you shoot down every suggestion I make? Loghain—Loghain just let his own king die, and destroyed Ferelden's best hope at surviving this Blight in one swoop. This is more than some petty revenge, no matter what you think, especially when his power and position mean we can't do what we need to. Not to mention, if Arl Eamon knew what he did at Ostagar, he would be the first to call for his execution!" His outburst complete, Alistair stares down at Flemeth with red-ringed eyes, while she meets his gaze impassively. But something in Alistair's words plucks at a thought in Tali's mind.
"Arl Eamon? The Arl of Redcliffe?" The question demands Alistair's attention, and as he looks away from Flemeth, he deflates slightly and then sits back down. There's a faint tremble still in his fingers, but he hides it quickly by tucking his hands under the table. He nods, and begins speaking again, trying to calm himself.
"Yes. He—he wasn't at Ostagar. He'll still have all his men. And he is—was—Cailan's uncle. He's…I know him. He's a good man, well respected in the Landsmeet, as well as across all groups of the nobility."
"You think he'd side against Loghain?" Alistair takes a moment, considers Tali's suggestion, and then nods ever so slightly.
"Eamon and Loghain have never seen eye-to-eye. We have a better shot at convincing Eamon than anyone else, and I'm sure he'd be able to sway the other members of the Landsmeet to our side." Sav leans in, steepling her fingers together in front of her lips, then she speaks.
"If Arl Eamon sides with us, then perhaps we'd have the authority to act on the treaties while we wait for the other Wardens to arrive." She looks up, first at Alistair, then at Tali, and finally at Flemeth. "It's as good a plan as any." His tension and anger momentarily forgotten, Alistair nods vigorously.
"Then we go to Redcliffe and appeal to Eamon for help. He's an honorable man, he'll have to see what's right. And once he's on our side, then…the Elves, the Dwarves, the Mages, even the Templars…they'll have to help us, won't they?" Alistair's voice goes up in a half-question at the end of his words and his eyes land back on Flemeth, as though he's asking what she thinks. In response, she shrugs.
"I may be old," she says with a half-smile in the backs of her eyes, "but earlier you said you didn't know how to raise an army. These Elves, Dwarves, the Circle, your Arl, who knows what else—this sounds like an army to me." As Tali looks at Flemeth, really looks at the expression on her face, she wonders if the old witch had meant to push Alistair to this conclusion the whole time. Across the table, Alistair narrows his eyes for a brief second, as though realizing the same thing. But he takes it in stride, looking to Savreen and Talvinder one last time.
"So can we do this, d'you think? Go to Redcliffe and…build an army?" Guru help her, but Tali thinks they can. It is her turn now to shrug, to glance awkwardly at their small group, and speak.
"That is…that is what the Wardens do, isn't it?" Alistair, bolstered by her words, nods.
"It's always been the Grey Wardens' duty to stand against the Blight. Right now, we're the Grey Wardens." With a faint laugh, Savreen looks up to the sky, where the moons are now rising. The faintest tinge of orange rests along the horizon now, giving way to purple, blue, indigo.
"I doubt it will be as easy as that." Tali reaches over, takes her hand.
"We have to try."
"The young woman is right," Flemeth says, standing at last. "But not before you sleep. The day is old, and the Blight has waited hundreds of years. It can wait until the morning."
With that, Flemeth turns back to the house. Tali and the others follow her, and that night as she sleeps—despite all the hope she wants to carry—she dreams of nothing but blood.