"The cultists. Shit!" I clamoured off of Alistair and rolled out of bed, grabbing my boots and shoving them on, hastily, as more crashes sounded from below. I quickly found and shouldered my dagger holster and slipped my trusty boot-knife back into place. "They couldn't have just waited another hour? So rude."
"Hey, get your armour on." Alistair ordered, in such a commanding tone that I almost didn't argue with him. "You're not going into any kind of combat situation in a dress."
"There's no time for that." I protested, as he buckled his own breast plate into place. "It's fine for you, a couple of buckles and you're done. I practically have to smother myself in butter to squeeze into my leathers."
"Armour. Now." He snapped, angrily.
"I'm fine." I replied, dismissively. "I don't plan on getting stabbed or shot, anyway."
He opened his mouth to argue, and his expression was thunderous, but the aggressive rattling of our bedroom door handle interrupted him, and we both looked from the door to each other and back again.
"Come on." I said, a sudden thought occurring to me as I ran to the window. It was still unlocked from the night before, and I slid it up as far as it would go. I leaned out, checking to see if my instincts were correct, and grinned, coming back inside just as the first boot came crashing against the door. "Get to the roof." I instructed him, ushering him to the window. "You can reach from here."
"And then what?" He asked, bewildered.
"The ladder we used this morning is still there." I explained. "If we can get around them, flank them...it's better than being cornered in here."
"Alright. Good point." He conceded as he leaned out, checking around, before climbing onto the ledge and hoisting himself up the short distance to the roof. I followed him, swiftly, kicking the window closed behind me as he pulled me up after him. My legs were barely out of view before the door was successfully kicked in.
"Where the blazes are they?" I heard a man's muffled voice yell, angrily, from below us as I scrambled to my feet.
"Grayson and Morrigan must be completely overwhelmed if those men were able to get past them." Alistair whispered, voicing my own fears. "Come on, let's-"
He was interrupted by the sharp whistling of an arrow as it passed between us, missing each of us by only a few inches. We whipped around as one, just in time to see the archer on the adjacent roof nock another arrow in his bow. My dagger was in my hand before I was even conscious of reaching for it, and it was embedded in the man's heart before I'd even thought to throw it. The archer crumpled like an accordion, falling from his perch and landing in an unmoving heap on the snowy ground below.
"Nice shot." Alistair grinned, grabbing my hand and pulling me towards the ladder.
"Tell it to Valour." I murmured, darkly. "I don't think I had much to do with it."
He seemed not to hear me, his eyes darting from one rooftop to another, but the rest of them seemed to be clear.
"Alright, I'll go first, I don't want you climbing down into an ambush." He said, matter-of-factly. "Stay low. Just in case."
I held the ladder in place as he climbed down, breathing a small sigh of relief when he reached the ground safely and beckoned to me that the coast was clear. I swung myself round onto the ladder and slid down the legs rather than climbing down the rungs, and I was with him again in seconds.
"Show off." He smirked, shaking his head.
Before I could respond, the ground floor window beside us erupted in an explosion of shattered glass as the limp body of an armoured man came crashing through it, crumpling into a bloody pile at our feet. Grayson's face appeared in the now open window.
"Some help would be appreciated." He said, quickly, before disappearing back inside. Alistair immediately kicked the unconscious man's body out of the way and climbed through into the room. I made to follow him inside when a yell behind me caught my attention. Half a dozen more armed men were running towards the inn, and, making a split second decision, I took off at a run, diving behind the building across the road, to where the archer's unconscious form still lay.
No, not unconscious. I realised, my stomach flipping over queasily when I saw the red pool of blood blossoming under him, staining the snow scarlet. I shoved the feeling aside, snatching the bow from the dead archer's hand and wrestling the strap of the quiver over his head, swinging it onto my back. I pressed myself against the wall of the building and chanced a look around the corner, retracting my head again just in time as a crossbow bolt splintered against the wall beside me with deadly force.
I steeled myself, nocking an arrow and rounding the corner again. I aimed for the cultist at the head of the group running towards me and fired. My next arrow was in my hand before the first found it's target, and I fired the next, and the next, until only one man was left. I reached behind me and grasped nothing but air.
Shit. My quiver was empty. The last man was upon me and he swung his sword at my neck, his eyes wild with rage. I back-stepped out of his reach and knocked his blade aside with my bow. It clattered on the frozen ground as I swung my bow back around, catching him hard in the jaw. He stumbled away from me, holding his face in his hand, before falling to the ground. Before he could scramble to his feet, I leapt onto his back and stuck a knee in between his shoulder blades, using my weight to hold him down as he struggled, and I took a deep breath, unsheathing my remaining dagger and slicing cleanly through his throat.
I rose to my feet, looking for any other challengers, and my eyes trailed over the carnage I had left in my wake. I returned to the body of the archer and retrieved my dagger from his chest, fighting waves of nausea the whole time. I heard a noise from behind me and turned to see that one of the men was still moving, groaning and rolling around in the snow, clutching the arrow in his stomach. I fought off a shiver that had nothing to do with the freezing air, and jogged away from him, around to the front door of the inn.
I burst inside just in time to see Alistair carve out a man's Adam's apple with a broken bottle. The floor was littered with bodies. Nothing else in the room was moving.
Alistair turned towards the sound of the door opening, brandishing his makeshift weapon, then tossing it aside when he saw it was me.
"Where's your sword?" I asked, and he jerked his head to the left. I followed his movement to see the body of a man pinned to the wall, a familiar hilt protruding from his stomach. "Ah."
"Grayson and Morrigan are upstairs, getting the rest of our things." He explained as he strode towards me. He took my face in his hands and I looked up at him, but he wasn't looking in my eyes, he was checking my head and neck for injuries. I brushed him off, gently.
"I'm fine." I assured him, casting a cursory glance over his vital parts in return. "You're okay?"
"You're not fine, you're bleeding." He replied, striding towards the bar and grabbing a clean-ish dish rag. I raised a hand to my neck and discovered that he was right. I hadn't felt it, but I guessed that the first projectile that had exploded beside my head had caught me a little. It was only a surface wound, and I was too full of adrenaline to even feel the pain yet, but he pressed the rag gently to the area, frowning in concern. "This is why we wear armour." He said, in the same tone of voice a school teacher might use when explaining to a five year old why you shouldn't eat paste.
"It was just debris from a crossbolt blast. It doesn't hurt." I assured him, replacing his hand with my own and mopping the blood from my neck, even as I moved past him to inspect the room. "Any sign of Henrietta?"
"Henrietta fled when the fighting started." Grayson replied, as he descended the stairs, with Khan following at his heel. Both master and mabari were covered in blood but neither of them appeared to be injured, so I doubted that any of it was theirs. He walked over to me and handed me my armour, which I accepted, wordlessly, throwing Alistair a guilty look. Grayson thrust Alistair's shield into his hands, looking from him to me, frowning. "What's up with you two?"
"Nothing." Alistair mumbled, turning from us to retrieve his sword, yanking it out of the wall with just a little more force than was probably required. Grayson raised a questioning eyebrow at me and I changed the subject.
"I suppose it was too much to hope that they would wait until we had a full party with us before trying to butcher us." I sighed, perching myself on a table and discarding the now bloody rag, wrestling my boots off to change into my armour.
"Look around." Grayson grumbled, irritably. "We're the butchers."
"They drew first blood." I replied, coldly. "It's just through luck that it wasn't ours. But I'm not sure the many Knights of Redcliffe that have fallen victim to them over the last few months would agree with your assessment of things."
I grabbed the hem of my dress and started to lift it up, when Alistair cleared his throat, pointedly, raising an eyebrow at Grayson, who swiftly turned his back to me while I changed.
I grinned, shaking my head. I was pretty sure Grayson had seen me in worse states of undress than my under-garments. Like when they had stripped me in the back of a wagon in Denerim, for instance, but I understood that Alistair was just being protective.
"Well...butchers or not...these are just the sheep." Alistair said, gesturing at the bodies around us. "Time to meet the shepherd, I reckon."
Despite the bloodshed, the knot that had been in my stomach since we had arrived in Haven had loosened slightly. This was right. This was familiar. There was an enemy and it had a name and a face and we could fight it, head on, without all of the sneaking and the uncertainty. I was unsure at what point in my journey, between landing in Ferelden and hiking up the Frostbacks, I had become someone who found comfort in bloody violence. I was sure that if I thought too hard about it, I would probably have some kind of breakdown. Best not, then.
I would confront my demons later. Right now, we had another monster to slay.
"You're hurt." Grayson said, suddenly, when I was fully armoured and Alistair allowed him to turn back round.
"It's nothing. Just a ricochet." I replied, in the same dismissive tone I'd used with Alistair, conscious of my lover's eyes boring into me. "I don't even feel it."
This was less true than it had been when I'd first said it. It was starting to sting like a son-of-a-bitch, but it was bleeding less. I knew it wasn't anything serious, and I didn't want to give anyone any reason to fuss over me. I'd had a lifetime of being fussed over by each of them since my run in with Howe.
"It does not look like nothing." I looked up at the sound of Morrigan's voice as she sashayed down the stairs. I threw her an exasperated look, but she ignored me, approaching me and inspecting the wound. She pulled back, frowning in disapproval. "Tis poisoned."
"What?" Alistair demanded, striding towards us.
"No, it's fine." I insisted, covering the affected area with my hand. "I'm fine."
"Oh, you are fine, are you?" Morrigan asked, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
"Yes, I'm fine. There's no way it can be poisoned, the bolt missed me. It's fine. I'm fine. It's fine."
"Well, it sounds like everything is fine." She replied, and I narrowed my eyes when I recognised my own words and cadence from earlier. I grumbled, reluctantly removing my hand from my neck to let her see it.
"Call back jokes are cheap, you know." I muttered, before wincing involuntarily when she prodded the wound.
"I can slow the poison, but I do not possess the means of curing it." She said, sounding more annoyed than anything else. "Let us hope the elf returns before it kills you. This is his area of expertise, after all."
"I don't understand. It doesn't make any sense, how can it be poisoned when the bolt tip didn't even touch me?" I frowned, thinking out loud. I looked from Morrigan, to Alistair, to Grayson, and then back to Alistair, who looked like he might want to kill me himself. I winced under his glare and forced my face into what I hoped was an easy grin. "Well, let's not all just stand around and wait for me to die. That sounds frightfully boring. Let's go kill people until one of them tells us what poison they're using and where they keep the antidote."
"That is the first sensible suggestion you have made all day." Morrigan said, pointedly, and I knew she was referring to our Grayson conversation. She really wasn't about to let this go.
"You should wait here." Alistair said, shaking his head. "You can't risk going into battle like this."
"Oh no." I said, firmly. "No, no. No, we're not doing the whole "leave Lauren behind because she's injured" thing again. I wasn't down for it the first time and I'm not down for it now."
"This isn't a debate, Lauren. Would you please just do as you're told for once?" He snapped, and I frowned, glancing at Grayson, who avoided my eyes. Do as I was told?
"Before you throw a tantrum, Alistair, am I permitted to heal her first?" Morrigan drawled, not waiting for a response before placing her hand on my neck and closing her eyes, muttering under her breath. I felt a familiar warmth spread through my neck and into my shoulder as the magic did it's job. "There. I have not stopped the bleeding - tis good that it bleeds. But I have slowed the poison, and that shall have to do for now. You are lucky. It seems that only a small amount made it into your blood."
She retrieved the rag that I'd tossed on the table and pressed it to the wound, before ripping off a strip of fabric from the shirt of one of the bodies on the floor, and gently tying it in place. I watched her, curiously, as she worked, and I exchanged glances with Grayson, who looked just as confused as I felt.
"Since when were you a healer?" I asked, suspiciously.
"When it was decided that the old woman should stay behind, I thought it wise that I...practice. Should an emergency arise. Such as this." She said, with the air of someone confessing their greatest shame. "Be thankful."
"I am. Thank you, Morrigan." I replied, smiling, before turning my eyes back to Alistair. His hands were on his hips and his head was bowed, jaw tense. I recognised this particular battle stance and my smile faded. "I won't stay behind, Alistair. I'm not a damsel in distress, I'm a Grey Warden."
"And I won't lose you for the sake of your pride." He roared, suddenly furious, and I flinched, subconsciously taking a step back from him.
"Morrigan, maybe we should go and check on things outside." Grayson said, pointedly, as Alistair glared at me and I stared at him, uncertainly.
They made a swift exit and we were left alone. An hour before, I couldn't have felt safer with him. Now, I was almost afraid. I couldn't remember seeing him this angry, not since…
"I'm sorry I didn't put the armour on." I said, quietly. "I didn't have time."
"I know." He replied, and I tilted my head to the side.
"You know?"
"I do. But it doesn't matter. You're hurt, and you're still taking risks. You could die, Lauren. This could kill you. Don't you realise that?"
"Oh, it won't kill me." I replied, dismissively. "I've been in tighter spots than this and I'm still here."
"It could. Doesn't that...I mean, aren't you the least bit concerned about that?"
"Well, of course I am. But being scared isn't going to change anything, Alistair. And any one of us could die at any time. Doing stuff that might get us killed is kind of our job description." I realised he wasn't angry, he was scared. I took a step towards him and reached out to stroke his face. "I'll be okay."
"You'll be okay." He replied, in a low, dangerous voice. "You'll be okay. But what about me?"
"What's wrong with you?" I asked, suddenly panicking that he'd been hurt.
"I can't keep doing this with you. I can't keep almost losing you." He replied, refusing to look at me. "I've watched the life drain out of you twice now. Once, at your Joining-"
"Not my fault." I reminded him.
"And again, in Denerim."
"Not my...well, that was a bit my fault." I admitted, wincing.
"So what happens the next time you decide to act first and think later?" He stopped himself, shaking his head. "I can't believe I'm even saying this. I've tried not to. After Denerim, after…"
"After I was beaten, abducted, mentally tortured, drowned, burned, flogged and beaten some more before barely escaping with my life, yes." I finished for him, before immediately checking myself. I hadn't talked about the torture. He had seen enough of the evidence on my body to guess at what I might have gone through, but I had never wanted to hurt him with the details. I wasn't sure where that outburst had come from. He flinched at my words and I shook my head. "Sorry, that was...go on."
"Look, I've tried not to be overbearing. I promise you, I have tried. Every time I tried to take care of you...I could feel you rolling your eyes at me. And then, I was forced to stand back and watch as Sten almost beat you to death in front of me, and you weren't even going to let Wynne check you over. You were coughing up blood and you ignored everyone, ignored me, when I begged you to stay at the castle, just for one more night, just to make sure you weren't going to drop dead from your saddle. That's not bravery, Lauren, it's not strength. It's madness. And then you made me feel like an overprotective nursemaid fussing over her charge any time I even hinted that you might need to rest or use a poultice. And now this?"
"Wow. You're making me sound like a real piece of shit." I said, sullenly. "I might remind you that I chose to push on despite my pain because I didn't want to delay saving the man who raised you."
He shook his head at me in exasperation.
"That's not the point. You just can't be this reckless with your life, Lauren! So, if I can't get you to drop this death-wish that you seem to have for your own sake, then maybe I have to try a different tactic.
"What. About. Me? If you die," He said through gritted teeth, "what about me? What happens to me? Because I can't...you can't die. I can't lose you." He turned to me and I cringed in shame when I saw the pain on his face. "I just can't. Don't you know what it would do to me if anything was to happen to you?"
"I think I might be getting a preview." I replied, clamping a hand over my mouth when I realised I'd just said the quiet part out loud. He threw me a wounded look, shaking his head at my glibness. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean that. I hear you, and I get it. What I meant to say was...when you get angry, it scares me because it reminds me of my father. One time he caught me trying to sneak liquor from his cabinet and he held me up against the wall by my throat."
"He...? Lauren...I would never lay a hand on you. How could you think that of me?" He asked, horrified.
"I don't, I don't know where that came from, I…" I backed away from him, stumbling, shaking my head, trying to clear my thoughts. That was not what I was going to say. It was like my brain-to-mouth filter had been disabled.
The poison...
"The poison." I blurted out, unable to stop myself. "It's making me say things."
"You really have to stay here. Please." He said, desperately. "You can't fight like this."
"I can fight. I must be able to, if I just said it, because I don't think I can lie." I replied, knowing as I said it that it was true, and suddenly panicking. "Oh no. I need to be able to lie. I know too much!"
I turned away from him so quickly that I tripped over one of the bodies on the floor, falling into a table and bursting my nose open.
"Hey!" Alistair cried, leaping over the corpse that had tripped me and turning me around to face him, frowning when he saw the blood pouring down my face. "Morrigan!"
Morrigan and Grayson re-entered, and from their expressions, I could tell that they'd been eavesdropping on our conversation the entire time.
"Oh, can you not keep your blood inside of your body for even a moment?" Morrigan snapped, as she approached me, healing my nose with a disapproving tut. "Lyrium does not grow on trees."
"It comes from Titans." I said, happily, wiping the blood from my face before shaking my head again with a start, realising just how dangerous I was in my current state. "You have to gag me." I said, looking around wildly for something I could use.
"The poison's doing something to her. She can't stop telling the truth." Alistair explained, numbly.
"Oh! Well, that sounds interesting." Morrigan said, her eyes flashing wickedly. "I wonder what secrets might come tumbling out."
"Your mother extends her life by possessing the bodies of her daughters." I said, quickly. "It's all in the grimoire, I've just been waiting for you to find it so we can go and kill her for you."
"Truly?" Morrigan replied, though she didn't look surprised. I guessed she'd reached that part already and had been biding her time, waiting for the best moment to make her request. "That is most kind of you to offer. Is there...anything else?"
"Yes!" I gasped, horrified as the words left my mouth. "Any Grey Warden who kills an Archdemon dies in the process...shut up, shut up, shut up!" I cried, breathlessly, fisting my hands in my hair and screwing my eyes shut tight, trying to stop myself, but I had no control over it.
"Hold on." Alistair said, slowly. "You're saying that to end the blight, even if we do everything right...one of us has to die?"
"Not necessarily." I squeaked.
"Gag her." Morrigan said, suddenly.
"Why the sudden change of heart?" Alistair asked, narrowing his eyes at the witch, suspiciously.
"Because she doesn't want me to tell you about the mmph mmph mmph mmph." Morrigan clamped her hand over my mouth, silencing me, for which I was grateful. But she also seemed to be cutting off my air supply, for which I was less grateful. I wriggled out of her grasp, and Alistair stepped in between us as she lunged at me again, glaring at her. "There's another option, too. We can recruit Loghain, after we remove him from power, but if we do that you'll abandon us and go to Kirkwall and spend the rest of your life as a miserable drunk."
It took Alistair a moment to realise this was directed at him, and he blinked at me in surprise.
"I wouldn't do that!" He protested, indignantly, looking from me to Grayson and back again. When he saw the look in my eyes, he squinted at me. "I would? I would...but why?"
"Because you have the temperament and reasoning skills of a small child!" Morrigan spat.
"Because you think it's a betrayal. Because it's his fault that Duncan died." I explained. He just looked even more confused, before shaking his head.
"No, it isn't." He argued. "Duncan died at Ostagar."
"Yes, because Loghain quit the field...holy shit, no he didn't. I changed it." I realised, suddenly. I grinned up at him, before realising with horror everything that I had just said. "Would somebody please gag me?" I yelled.
"I don't know..." Grayson said, looking at me curiously. "Maybe we should let her speak."
"No, enough. Stop this." Alistair demanded. "This isn't fair. She has no control over what she's saying."
"Morrigan, Grayson's in love with you." I blurted out, turning to Grayson who looked like I had just kicked him in the face. "Morrigan loves you too. So does Lelia-" I slapped my own face, hard, but I could feel the word-vomit coming back up, and I slapped myself again.
"Stop that!" Alistair scolded me, grabbing a hold of my wrist to stop me from punching myself.
"She's right. We should gag her." Grayson said, quickly, his face burning scarlet.
"Agreed." Morrigan replied, darkly.
I screwed my eyes shut in concentration, trying to clear my mind of all of the things I knew I wasn't supposed to say, when an idea struck me.
"There's a fire starting in my heart, reaching a fever pitch and it's bringing me out the dark," I started to sing, figuring as long as I was singing, I wasn't speaking, which could only be a good thing. "Finally I can see you crystal clear, go ahead and sell me out and I'll lay your ship bare."
"Good idea." Grayson muttered, sourly. "You couldn't have thought of it twenty seconds earlier?"
"See how I leave with every piece of you, don't underestimate the things that I will do. I had a sex dream abou-" I sang, before gasping and shoving my fist in my mouth, cutting off the words before they couldn't be taken back. I stumbled to the bar, throwing tankards and plates aside as I searched for something I could use. The only dish rag left there looked filthy, and I held it up in front of my face, wrinkling my nose. I could feel the word "Cullen" trying to burst from my lips and I closed my eyes and chose the lesser of the two evils. I stuffed the rag into my open mouth, retched a little at the foul taste and tried not to think about the words "teeming" and "bacteria".
Morrigan ripped another strip of cloth from the same dead man's shirt from before, and I let her tie it around my head, keeping the gag in place. I told them that Fen'Harel would awaken from his slumber in nine years and try to destroy the world, and I sighed in relief when their blank expressions confirmed that the gag was effective. I beamed at them, but my smile swiftly disappeared under their individual glares. I shrugged at them, gesturing at my neck - it's not my fault! - and pointed at each of them, in turn - you're the ones who kept me talking! - and they each rolled their eyes in unison. Except Alistair, who still just looked concerned.
"Come on. Let's get to the Chantry. The sooner we end this and get the antidote, the better." Alistair said, approaching me and placing a hand on my shoulder. "You know how I feel about this. But I'd have to tie you to a chair to get you stay behind, wouldn't I?" He asked, sadly.
I looked into his eyes and hated myself when I saw the pain in them. I wanted to lie to him. I wanted to stop it from hurting. I choked back a tear as I nodded, apologetically, and he closed his eyes, returning my nod in reluctant acceptance. I flinched, looking up at him with wide eyes, and he shook his head.
"I'm not going to tie you up." He assured me. "Are you certain you can fight like this?"
I nodded, emphatically, and hugged him, trying to convey the truth that the gag prevented me from saying. I love you. I would die for you. But I'm going to try really really hard to live for you, because you were right. Leaving you scares me more than dying does. And I'm so sorry. I'm sorry I'm like this.
"Mmph mmph mmph." I said, as he released me from the embrace, and he smiled down at me, sadly.
"I love you too."
"Let's go." Grayson said, making his way to the door. "None of us are dying today."
"Mmph." I agreed, following him out of the inn, wondering miserably how far-reaching the consequences of the truths I had just shared would be. I might have done less damage if I'd just tossed some hand grenades around the room.
AN: I can hear you asking "two chapters within 24 hours?" and first of all, how dare you. Second of all, I don't know what to tell you, this is my process apparently. I go a year between uploads and then give you 15,000 words in a week, what more do you want from me. Being snarky in your author's notes is a good way of getting your readership to leave you reviews, right? Right. I'm happy with my choices.
Never33: I'm glad you're glad I'm back! I've had a little time on my hands the last couple of days and will hopefully be able to write a little more for the forseeable. But you know what I'm like, take that with a grain of salt lol
Chimera Spyke: Good to hear from you again! I just figured I'd lost you due to my ridiculous hiatus. Yeah, the last chapter took a toll on my spirit and I couldn't keep editing it, I just had to exorcise the demons by putting it out there into the world. I'm a bit happier with this one. I just decided to have some fun with it again, so I hope that comes across!
Please review, and I'll try to get the next one up in short order. I've been playing Inquisition recently and I'm so determined to get to that point in the timeline, so I really will try to be a bit better at updating.