The morning of her wedding dawned bright, though little sunlight came through the dirty windows. Ten preferred it that way. Not so easy to look in. She awoke to Shianni shaking her. The dear girl had evidently been up for hours, clearly much more excited about her cousin's wedding than her cousin was. Shianni and Soris, though both cousins to Teneira, were not related to each other. Shianni was the daughter of Adaia's sister, while Soris was the son of her father Cyrion's sister. Cyrion's good fortune to find a match for his daughter, who had a female relative, cousin of some order, who needed a husband, unfortunately did not benefit Shianni as it did Soris. Ten felt a little guilty, knowing that Shianni, though a bit younger than her, really, really wanted to be married and Ten seemed to have all the luck. She resolved that once she was a married woman and her station in the alienage legitimized, she would write to one of her contacts in Redcliffe and see if she couldn't call a favor due.

"Come on, Ten!" Shianni squealed, "It's your wedding day, no sense in dawdling about. Anyway, the word is your groom is the handsomest lad seen around these parts in ages!"

"I'm up, I'm up," Teneira grumbled, "Have you been drinking already? Nevermind, don't answer that."

She tied her hair back and brewed a pot of tea, something with a jolt to wake her up and get her through the day. She tried to get excited, she really did. She'd never really been one for chasing boys around, like Shianni had, when they were adolescents. She didn't see the big deal about the boys of the alienage – anyway, they would all be given in arranged marriages – what was the point? When she was younger, she didn't remember how young exactly, she'd resolved to figure out what the big deal was and let one of her neighbors put his tongue in her mouth and his hand up her shirt. She left the encounter more confused than ever.

When she'd lain with a man for the first time, it had been an act of self-defense. It was common knowledge that, more likely than not, an elf woman would be subject to some nonconsensual or semiconsensual sexual activity at some point in her life – after all, how meaningful was saying "yes" when saying "no" meant that you would never work again? Or that your father or brother would be punished for your recalcitrance? Her aunt Pali had suggested it – find a lad you like, and lie with him. That way a human won't be able to claim your virginity as a prize. She wasn't sure that that was much better, either way the humans were controlling what you did, but she did as her aunt said, and seduced a stable boy who worked with Soris. She'd slept with a handful of lads since then, mostly to get the upper hand in a business transaction or secure an informal treaty, but sometimes just after a few too many pints of beer. There was something to it, she had to admit, losing herself and the world around her, and drinking in another person while for a few minutes or hours, nothing else mattered. What she didn't understand is how everyone seemed to think of it as somehow important.

It really wasn't until the week before that she'd understood what all the squealing and whispered gossip was about. Kissing Villais had been a show of power – that she had done before. Power she understood. But the jolt of excitement that went right from the top of her head to the bottom of her feet, she didn't really get that. And the times she had had to stop herself in the corner behind the sentry box. It had felt urgent - which thrilled her, but also terrified her. She hoped that she might have a taste of it, something like that with this stranger that she was supposed to marry. After all, there was nothing special about Villais. He was pretty, but she'd taken prettier to bed and never had a problem putting her feet on the floor and walking out in the morning.

Thinking on this, she let Shianni braid her hair into a dozen strands and tie the strands at the nape of her neck. Her cousin fussed over her for near to an hour, fixing every out of place hair, plucking her eyebrows, and painting her face with pigments that she was sure had cost much too much for the girl's meager budget. She barely recognized the woman in the mirror when Shianni was done with her. Gone were the bags under her eyes, the scars she had, the few blemishes that dogged her hairline though she was well into her twenties. Her cheekbones and forehead had been highlighted with something that caught the light, her eyes traced in thin dark lines that made her eyelashes look full, and her mouth covered in something shiny and sticky that gave them a glow. She knew that she was fairly goodlooking as women went, but today, she felt as though she could turn a head or two. Imagine, she thought, women who have time for this nonsense every day! How would we compete?

She slipped the beaded wedding dress over her head. She'd picked out the fabric, but it was Shianni who had done most of the work, sewing glass beads onto the collar of the silk shift, making sure it hung right on Teneira's narrow hips. Shianni, satisfied with her work, pronounced her as good as she was going to get, and went off to change herself. Quickly, Teneira opened the chest where she kept her "emergency kit." She strapped one small knife to her thigh. The soft kidskin boots that she had planned on wearing had precious little room in them, but she managed to tuck two small vials, one containing the venom she harvested weekly from the Reverend Mother, the other containing a powerful neurotoxin produced by a particular breed of eel that haunted dark waters underneath the docks. There was no room under her clothes for a proper dagger, but she had needles. She coated them carefully with sedatives, put them in a leather pouch where they would not stick her by accident, and hung the pouch on her belt as though it was something much more innocent.

As she left the house, she encountered Soris, moping on the front stoop. She sucked in her breath sharply. Soris moping could mean one of a few things, and on his wedding day there was one that was more likely than the others. In all likelihood he'd snuck a peek at his bride and been… disappointed.

"Ain't like you're much to look at," she admonished him. Men were all the same, expecting to have a lovely woman while they themselves were asymmetric in the face or fat or, as in Soris's case, pale and freckled. For many it was as though it had never occurred to them that women were people with desires as well.

"I could dream," he sighed.

"I'm sure she's not that bad," Teneira said, "Maybe she's a great cook."

"You look amazing," he said, "Your husband might even be impressed." He gestured with his chin over to where two elves, a man and a woman, were chatting underneath the vehnedahl. The woman was plain, but not ugly, though her ears did stick out like the racist caricatures of elves that occasionally graced the illustrations of human books. The man, though quite pale, which she should have anticipated; Cyrion had told her at some point that he was a goldsmith by trade, was, as Soris had suggested, very handsome.

"What's his name again?" she asked her cousin, realizing that in all the hubbub that had gone on for the last week, she had not bothered to find it out.

"Nelaros," Soris said, "The girl's Valora."

"I'm sure she'll give you a dozen fat and beautiful children," Teneira said, clapping him on the back and going to say hello.

"That's hardly a comfort, Ten!" he called after her.

On her way over, her father interrupted her by quite literally standing in her way. It was the only way the old man could be sure of having his only child's attention, in the years since she'd become grown and positively uncontrollable.

"I would have a word with you, daughter," he said. She smiled a tightlipped smile at the old man, and nodded, not wanting to fight about whatever he wanted to fight about. Cyrion was of a mind that women, his daughter in particular, should stick to soft power. Marrying Adaia, even though he knew exactly who she was, had been the only act of rebellion the poor man had ever committed. He had made the mistake of thinking that he could marry the beautiful, wild, creature, and tame her once he'd locked her up. She understood her father's concerns, really, but he just simply didn't understand that some things were necessary. He wasn't from Denerim - he wasn't even Fereldan - he'd grown up in the Free Marches where the elvish population was large enough that nobody ever tried the absolute bullshit the humans of Denerim had. He'd only moved to the city as a young teenager, following his older brother, who was his only family. But he'd never learned, even in the thirty-something years he'd been a resident, how things worked. He truly believed, even after all that he'd seen, that all the elves needed to do was keep their heads down, and they would be left alone.

"What is it, Dad?" she asked, though she knew very well what it was.

He sighed, "You look like your mother."

"No I don't," said Ten, "I look like you. I've always looked like you. And I'm doing what you want, at long last, so if you have a lecture for me, I'll thank you to keep that in mind."

"I want this for you for your own protection," said Cyrion, "I had hoped that perhaps, with a marriage, your little… conspiracies… might be at an end."

"I'm not a crime boss, Dad," she insisted, a fact which she seemed to point out to him on at least a weekly basis, "Any more than my mother was. And you chose her. You had the freedom I did not, and she is who you chose. So don't look at the regrets you have in your own life and take them out on me. Like I said, I'm doing what you want."

"I don't regret marrying your mother, my girl," he sighed, "That's not where I was going with this. I know you and I have not always seen eye to eye, and don't get me wrong, I am proud of you in my way, Teneira, but…"

"But what, Dad?"

"You're getting married now, to a nice man with a good trade," Cyrion said, "Don't you think you ought to give up your…"

"My alchemist's stall?" Ten asked, "My garden? My little pets?"

"You know very well that's not what I'm talking about," he whispered furiously, "This whole… crime boss business, whatever it is you do."

"I'm not a crime boss, dad," she said again, "I'm just a negotiator. I make sure things run smoothly and nobody gets too big for their britches. People listen to me here. It wouldn't be wise to let that go."

"I wish I were a young man again, back when I still knew everything," Cyrion sighed.

"I'm a grown woman, Dad," she said, "And I have been for many, many years. A fact which you have been reminding me on at least a biweekly basis since I was sixteen years old and you started your little campaign against my spinsterhood."

"I know you fancy yourself a public servant," he said, "And if you were human I am sure that you would be high up in the arl's, or even the king's, council chambers. But there comes a time when every one of us must accept their lot in life."

"My lot in life is to keep the peace in this neighborhood," she said, "Mind you, you live here, you keep your shop here. You ought to be very glad that we have not had a riot in ages. That the good folk of Denerim have not assailed us with torches and pitchforks."

"I can't protect you," he said.

"Of course you can't. Elf men can't protect their own women," she said, "That's how we learned to protect ourselves." She turned her back to him and stalked off. What she said was true, but a painful truth. Her father could not protect her, neither could her cousin, and her new husband would not be able to either. She fingered the pouch at her waist, remembering Villais' warning. She hoped and prayed that she had been right when she teased him, that he had invented the whole thing to try to get her alone.

By this time, she had been noticed. The pale man who was to be her husband hurried over. She smiled, and he paused, about a foot away. They looked at each other awkwardly. Out of nowhere, they both started laughing.

"This is awkward, isn't it?" she said.

"Quite," he agreed, "I'm Nelaros. I guess… I guess we're to be married."

"I'm Ten," she said, putting her hand out.

"You're ten?" he asked, confused, "You don't look… I didn't… you're joking right?"

"Maker's breath," she swore, "My name is Ten. Short for Teneira. I'm maybe twenty-three on the young side. Probably twenty-five? Maybe six?"

"Oh!" he exhaled a short breath of relief, "Me too. Somewhere around there. So, I'm guessing you also have spent the last ten years rejecting matches too?"

"Actually yes," she said, "So here we are, both a bit old for this, and probably less ready for it than either of us were ten years ago. I can see why my father approved of you."

Nelaros chuckled, "Well, if you must know, I was a package deal with my dear neighbor Valora. Whole thing was her idea, and there was no making a match for your brother…"

"Cousin," Ten corrected him.

"There was no sending a bride for him without also sending along someone for you."

"Ahh," she said, "So I'm the clay beneath the gold veneer. I hope you don't feel too shortchanged."

He chuckled and grinned, "My father was eager to be rid of me as well, if you must know."

"And here she is now!" he exclaimed, "This is my dear friend Valora." She looked up to see that the plain girl had joined him. Up close, she really wasn't all that plain. Her skin was pale and delicate, as was generally thought to be beautiful. It was just that her ears were quite… something… but her eyes were a brilliant hazel that sparkled in the sunlight. Teneira looked behind her to see that Soris had come to join her after all. She seized him by the arm and pushed him in front of her.

"This is my cousin Soris," she said, "I wish you a dozen fat and beautiful children."

Nelaros began laughing again as both Valora and Soris blushed red, "She's been hearing that for weeks."

"Come walk with me," she said to Nelaros, "I'd like a word in private before we're eternally bound."

"Maker save us all," he chuckled. They took a turn around the Alienage, and she informed him softly of exactly who it was he was throwing his hat in with. He listened to her, obviously not quite sure if she was joking as she described the sorts of things she did, the types of codes she enforced, and the informal treaties she had with various guards, and other neighborhood bosses.

"Look, I'd hate for you to get into something without your eyes open," she said finally, "If you don't want to marry me, I won't blame you. In fact I'll make it happen, I'll announce I'm pregnant with another man's child and make a scene so embarrassing that nobody will blame you for abandoning me at the altar. I even have another single cousin my father can ceremonially offer to you in my stead."

"That's quite an offer, Teneira," Nelaros said. He was silent for a moment, "You know, my younger sister was taken advantage of by the man who owned the shop she swept." He blinked quickly, and Teneira could see that he had tears in his eyes, "I went after him with a knife one night in a dark alley. I meant to kill him, but he was faster than I was. Took off a couple of his fingers, though… it wasn't enough, though, wounding him. She drank a jug of rat poison. If you're the one that prevents things like that from happening, or sees that the people who do it are punished properly… I wouldn't dare ask you to give that up."

"I'm glad we understand each other," she said. She was surprised by the size of the weight that his approval of her took from her shoulders. He was a good man, she could tell that much, and she had always been good at sizing others up. He was a good man, and handsome, and approved of her line of work where the last two men she had spoken to demanded that she abandon it. And, as Cyrion had warned her, if she rejected this suitor as well, he would give up, resign himself to being the father of an old maid, and never make another attempt.

"I am as well," he said, "I think we both could certainly do worse."

She smiled, and took his arm. Elder Valendrian, the man who ran the day to day affairs of the Alienage, or at least who thought he did, was waiting to perform the ceremony. He was chatting with a human, an older male, early fifties perhaps. He wore the shining plate of a knight, but his head was uncovered, and Teneira could see that he kept his hair long and his face bearded. She looked at him suspiciously as they approached the elder. The human said nothing, but she could feel his eyes upon her. It wasn't in an untoward way, though, she felt. His eyes lingered on her thigh where she kept her knife, and she knew that he had discovered at least that one secret.

She looked at him and put a finger to her lips. The human smiled, seemingly impressed by her boldness.

"Well well!" she heard the cry raised over the chatting crowds that had gathered for the spectacle, "What do we have here?"

Her heart sank as she looked up to see a small group of human men. She fingered the pouch of needles at her waist and looked to the human man Valendrian had been talking with, but he had disappeared sometime in the intervening seconds. This human man, though, was exactly who she had feared laying eyes on in the weeks since Eddin Rasphander had found himself the recipient of a summary and ignominious demotion.

"Isn't it cute, Braden?" he asked, "They're playing at getting married. It's like they think they're people."

"Not today," one of Soris's groomsmen, a stable lad, started. He fancied himself a tough guy, and she supposed he might have been under certain circumstances, but Teneira raised her hand and he was silent.

"Well if it isn't the Arlessa of the Alienage?" he said, coming much too close for comfort, "You say jump and every elf asks how high, I see. And is this your Arl? That's just precious."

"How can I help you, Ser…" Teneira asked, keeping her voice soft and eyes on the ground.

"You don't recognize Bann Vaughan?" he exclaimed, "The son of the actual Arl of Denerim?"

Ten's heart sank. He's come himself, and he's brought friends. This cannot be good.

"You will not kneel before nobility?" he asked, putting his hand roughly on her shoulder and shoving her to the ground. She caught herself on one knee, taking the opportunity to seize one of her little needles from the pouch while everyone watched in horror. With her eyes on the ground, she raised her hand slightly, planning her strike. She did not see Shianni approaching the Bann from behind, and until her needle had struck home, deep in the bluish vein on the back of Vaughan's hand, she didn't see that Shianni had struck him over the head with a pot. The young lord passed out, from the blow to the head or the needle in the back of the hand, she was not sure which. She grabbed her needle out of his vein quickly and hid it in the folds of her dress.

"She just knocked him out!" one of the men in the group of humans exclaimed, "That little elf girl just knocked him right out!" The other men started laughing a bit.

"Arl's son or no, he ain't gonna live this one down," one of the others said.

"Bet she's this fiery in bed!" one of the others exclaimed. Shianni just stood there, paralyzed by the magnitude of what she had just done.

The humans slung their friend, one arm over each of their shoulders, and got him out of there. The gathered elves looked over at the sentry box, where Kennit, the old guardsman, was dozing. Depending on how hilarious the friends found Bann Vaughan being knocked on his ass by a drunken wisp of an elf girl, there was the possibility that they would have gotten away with it.

The wedding proceeded. That was the way of the city elves. Something odd happens, you stop and look for a moment, then you go on about your business. Teneira could not concentrate on the ceremony, but offered her consent when prompted. Her mind raced. She hoped that there would be at least a couple of days before retribution for this particular incident. The sedative she'd given him was somewhat powerful, but since she could not afford the fancy syringes that human alchemists and doctors used to administer drugs intravenously, she was reduced to giving him a very small dose, only that which a sewing needle could deliver. It would probably last less than an hour, even when compounded by the blow that Shianni had delivered.

What she was worried about was Shianni. Nobody had seen the needle, and if he were preoccupied with his head, Vaughan would probably not notice the pinprick wound on the back of his hand. That was unfortunate. Teneira could protect herself. She was not so sure that she could protect Shianni.

Her train of thought was interrupted but her new husband taking her hand and sliding onto the third finger of her left hand a thin band of gold, and then seizing her about the waist and kissing her passionately, if clumsily. She smiled, and reciprocated, though her cheeks burnt scarlet, realizing her father was right there and watching it. Beside them, Soris had gingerly kissed Valora on the mouth. Shianni clapped happily, and somewhere in the crowd, a fiddler started to play a merry tune.

Over the heads of the crowd, she looked over to see that Anton Villais had been standing there, watching the whole thing from the shadows. He smiled with his mouth but not his eyes, and saluted her. She waved back. Uneasily, Teneira went back to the crowd to receive congratulations, but knew that she had not seen the last of this Bann Vaughan.