Her duty having been done to her counterpart - it was, after all, considered the height of bad manners to just drop a body in someone else's territory and not let them know - she left Don Cangrejo's sprawling estate and made her way north. It was late enough that nobody would check her crossing the good bridge back into the market district, and so she did so and headed northwest, up to the cobblestoned streets and whitewashed buildings of the Orlesian Quarter. The energy of the town had changed in a way she had not clocked during the daytime, but now that night had descended, it was as though the cacophony of drunks, streetwalkers, and general riffraff had been muted like under a blanket of snow. It still smelled just as bad, she thought, avoiding a very suspicious puddle as she made her way to the house where she'd spent her last night in Denerim. Now that she was not half catatonic, she saw it was part of a tidy little block, where townhouses and two larger apartment buildings faced onto an interior courtyard. She counted down from the end of the block, and knocked on the appropriate door.

This time, Anton Villais did not say anything as he opened it, and merely stood aside to let her enter. He closed it behind her and closed one, then two deadbolts, and then threw his arms about her, tucking his chin over the top of her head. He still smelled of woodsmoke, though it was now high summer and nobody was lighting fires unless they could absolutely not avoid it. She let herself relax, but only a little.

"You have no idea what you've done, do you," he said softly.

"I didn't ask for any of it," she replied.

"I know."

"I have to leave first thing in the morning," she said, "Before they realize I'm here."

"Ten, they said it was a massacre. That nobody could have made it out alive," he said, backing up, taking her by the shoulders, "And then, that it was your faction that betrayed the king, and if we saw any of you, shoot first and ask questions later… how on earth did you manage to get yourself into even more trouble than before?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," she said, sighing.

"Try me."

"Well, a witch of the wilds walked out of a hole in the world and saved me and one of my companions. Then I met a renegade nun, an exiled Qunari, an elderly mage, and a man who was very recently a member of the Antivan Crows, and…"

"You're right. I don't believe you. You've gone mad haven't you."

"I wonder about that myself most days," she said.

"You've gotten stronger," he said, moving his hands down her arms and squeezing where wiry muscles had begun to grow when before she had tended towards scrawniness.

"It's all the chopping," she said, "Wood and… other things. I need to know, did my people assassinate the arl?"

"Always business with you, isn't it," he sighed, "Look, I know about as much as you do. The Teyrn's personal guard is investigating it. They took it right out of our hands. If, indeed, there is another explanation, we will likely never know."

"Really," she said, "So it could have been an inside job. Kill him yourself, have an open seat for a loyal retainer, blame the elves?"

"Ten, why does it matter?"

She sighed. "Do you have any idea what we're up against, Anton?" she said, "Because I do. And the more time these ridiculous nobles spend making plays against each other, trying to fight their way to the top of the midden heap we call a country, the less time they are preparing for the absolute shitshow that is coming."

"So I'm guessing the word about it not being a true Blight is also bullshit."

"You didn't see them," said Ten, shuddering, remembering the cold iron of their armor, their livid faces far too close to her own. Indeed, it had been almost a month since she'd seen hide or hair of them herself, and was beginning to wonder if the whole thing had, indeed, been a dark fever dream. But no, if they had not been there, any number of people would still be alive, villages standing, and she back where she belonged and not running the roads trying like hell to stop them. "They're far away now, on the other side of the country, but they're smart enough to know how to bring down a nation. How to stab it in its heart."

"So I suppose there's no chance of getting you to run away to Antiva this time?"

"Be serious, Anton," she said, "This is… take the worst thing you could imagine, and then multiply it by ten, and you might get close. And they won't stop here. If Ferelden falls, they will make their way over the mountains eventually. They've already wiped whole villages off the map. The handful of the refugees at the gates are nothing to what's coming."

"I don't think I've ever seen you this frightened before," he said.

"You haven't," she said, "I'm not scared of drawing and quartering, but I am… I am fucking terrified of what will happen if that army makes it here."

"All right," he said, "So what can I do?"

"Just keep your eyes open," she said, "The palace is lying. I don't know why. Just… don't take anything they say without a grain of salt."

"I never did," he said, "But put yourself in my boots right now, Ten. The ghost of a woman I walked to her execution shows up and starts telling me the world's about to end. How am I supposed to feel about this?"

"However you want," she said, irritated, "I'm not here to spare your feelings, Lieutenant."

"No, you're here to get more information, like you always want from me. And I am, as I always have been, the fool eternally hopeful that you might grace me with a kiss before rushing off to the next very important thing you must do."

"That has nothing to do with this," she said, looking up at him imploringly, "That was always… separate."

"Maybe to you it was," he said. He loosed her and turned away. Then sighed and turned back, "That was unfair of me."

"Nothing about this is fair," she said.

"Were you going to spend the night?"

"I don't have to," she said, "Do you want me to leave?"

"No," he sighed, "Don't go. I had… I had thought about this happening far more than I like to admit, even to myself. I pestered the couriers every morning for news of the battle. I guess I had hoped it would have gone better, that you'd come back victorious, and then… oh I don't know. And then the body counts came in. I grieved, Ten. I full on lost my shit, couldn't get out of bed for a week and I couldn't tell anyone why. Now, I just have no idea what to…"

"Would it be easier if you still thought me dead?"

He was quiet for a long moment, "Yes, but… that's not how this city works. If I hadn't run into you at the Paloma, if you weren't here now, I would have heard a rumor, Kennit or someone would have told me, and then I would have been left to drive myself mad again."

"Well I do have to leave again," she said, "In the morning."

"I know," he said, "But promise me that one day, if we make it through this, there can be a time when you have nothing to worry about except me."

Well that's a tall fucking order. Who the hell does he think he is?

"What I can promise is that," she said, "For the next six to eight hours, I will worry about nothing but you."

"No crimes?"

Who the hell does he think I am?

"Six to eight hours. No crimes," she said. She ran her hand along his face.

"No plotting?"

"Absolutely none."

"No demanding information from me? No asking me to plant anything anywhere? No spying? No…"

She rolled her eyes and kissed him the way she had in her kitchen all those months before, and instead of being thrilling, it was comforting. His was the first familiar touch she had felt since she'd been cast out of her hometown, and she reveled in it. As promised, there were no crimes or plotting or darkspawn or nagging companions or price on her head, just skin and heartbeats and soft laughter. And then there was sleep.

She awoke later than she intended to, her head in the crook of his shoulder, to a horrific racket from upstairs. She couldn't hear exactly what was being said, but a woman was pounding on the door to the flat on the second story and shouting - in what language she could not tell.

"What the…" she said, sitting up, pulling the sheets over her breasts, just in case she had mistaken where the noise was coming from.

"Oh no," Anton sighed, "I can't believe I forgot…"

"Forgot what?" Ten asked.

"I'm so sorry, Ten, you're going to have to go out the window."

"Excuse the fuck out of me?"

"Into the courtyard out back. It's the first floor, you'll be fine. Just… Andraste's left tit I cannot believe… I'm an idiot. Teneira, I forgive you for literally everything you have ever done that even slightly hurt my feelings, but you need to go."

"What, did you get a wife in the last two months?" she asked.

"No! I'm not the one who goes around getting married all over the place, stop projecting," he said.

"Then what on earth is…"

Footsteps thundered down the stairs outside and stopped in front of Anton's door. A fist banged on the door with all the force of the guard seeking to execute a search warrant. "Anton!" a woman's voice came shrilly from the other side, "I expected this of your good-for-nothing brother, not you!"

"That would be my mother," he said, "My older brother lives upstairs, and we are both late."

"To what?" Ten asked. She hurried into her clothes, haphazardly lacing herself up.

"It's Saturday. It's when Maman brings all of her bastards home and makes us eat breakfast together and tell each other about our lives. Just… trust me you don't want her finding you here."

"Oh, so she can jump into bed with an elf and have an entire son about it, but when you do it…"

"I didn't say it made sense!" he protested, "Look, I just... don't want to have to explain myself, and also, you said you needed to be off quickly. That will not be happening if she corners you."

There was another series of raps at the door. "Anton! Anton! Did I hear a girl in there!?"

"Andraste's left tit, how old are you?" she demanded.

"Far too old for this," he said, "I'm so sorry. This is so embarrassing."

"Well, I wouldn't want you to get beat with a shoe on my account," she said, and headed for the window. It really wasn't too far a drop, and there was a convenient tree right outside it that she could swing down from. She threw her pack out before her. He gave her a boost to the window sill and kissed her hard, first on the forehead, then on the mouth.

"Don't even think about getting yourself killed out there," he said.

"I'll do my best." She slithered through the open window and managed to tear her sleeve as she got to the ground. He shut the window behind her.

She bent down to retrieve her things, and cursed. Of all the ridiculous things…

"Psst!"

She looked around, hefting the strap of her pack onto one shoulder.

"Up here!"

She looked up, shielding her eyes from the sun. On a higher branch of the tree she had just climbed down, straddling a branch outside the second story window, was a familiar Antivan elf. His blond hair was tousled, coming out from where he usually tied it back. He was not in a great position, on a sturdy branch, but one which did not offer many hand holds.

"Zev, what the fuck are you doing up there?" she asked.

"I could ask you the same thing! Come on, give me a hand."

She shinnied up the trunk, pulling herself to a branch below him and offered her hand for balance as he got in towards the trunk. She jumped back to the ground, and then he scurried down after her like a squirrel. When his boots hit the cobblestone, he looked around, "Now, I suggest we run."

The shouting from the first floor flat had reached a volume usually reserved for commanding troops. "Do not lie to me, ungrateful boy! I know what I heard! You think you are a big man now, cavorting with some guidoune like a common criminal! I know she must have left this way!"

The volume was made worse when the window creaked open and the head and shoulders that could have belonged only to Madame Villais poked out. She was younger than Ten had thought, probably in her mid forties, and her face was done up as though she expected to attend a gala event, not a breakfast with her haphazardly conceived sons.

"You, there, elves in the courtyard! Surely you must have seen what méchanteries my boys have been up to!"

"We are but humble gardeners, Madame!" Zev called, "We were only watering the…" he looked down. The courtyard was, aside from the tree, entirely paved with flagstones.

"Anton! Airon! Why are the elves in the courtyard lying to me? Have you paid them off?!"

Ten turned her head away from the window quickly, grabbed Zev by the elbow, and took off through the alley between the buildings on the opposite side, and out onto a main drag where shopkeepers had begun to set their wares out for the day.

"Hey!" a guard called from the end of the street, "What are you two doing here without an escort?!"

"That is for Alienage elves," said Ten, "We are from out of town. And we were just leaving. To… uh, return to our master."

"Yes. He is very important and very scary, and it will cause a dreadful diplomatic scandal if you delay us," Zev added.

"No, I don't believe that for a second," he said, advancing slowly towards them, "It's posted everywhere, no elves are to leave the Alienage without a guard, so you can come with me quietly or I can drag you both of you filthy knife-ears to the city jail and you can explain it to the magistrate."

"I'm not even from here!" Zev protested, but Ten had a hand on him again and sprinted the opposite direction. She cut down another alleyway, into another courtyard, up a spiral staircase and onto the balcony of a very alarmed citizen who had been taking his morning smoke.

"Sorry," she said, "Can we cut through your flat?"

"I…" the man said, "I guess?"

"Thanks! Maker smile upon you!" she called as she charged through his back door, through an absolutely filthy bachelor's pad, and out to the front balcony where she leapt the railing and landed, bending her knees as the hard cobblestones punished the soles of her feet.

"Gate's that way!" she said, and took off in that direction, dodging stalls and hawkers' wheelbarrows, nearly bowling over a group of nuns on their way from morning prayers, and finally getting out through the city gates and the safety and anonymity of the rabble camped outside.

"So what were you doing there?" she asked, stopping to catch her breath. The last thing she needed was getting questioned by the rest of them as to why she was redfaced and panting first thing in the morning.

"Same thing you were, I imagine," said Zev, grinning.

"Wait… were you upstairs?"

"Well yes, I suppose I was on top of you all night and did not even realize it."

"I am going to be so sorry I asked this, but were you… on top of anyone else?"

"A gentleman does not tell."

"Your pants are undone."

"I could say the same of your bodice. And you did not let me finish. A gentleman does not tell. I, however, will give you all the sordid details. I made the acquaintance of a most talented gentleman of the night while I was here securing the contract several weeks ago. I will have you know I am impressive enough that he slipped me his address before I left in the morning, in case I ever got back to town. And, well, I'm sick of sleeping on the ground."

"Really. So the brother upstairs is a… professional," said Ten. File that one away for later. How one brother winds up a hooker and the other a copper must be quite an interesting story. I wonder if the mother knows, but then… why would she care if they had overnight guests? Or is it the elf thing… probably the elf thing.

"All in all this was very much in character for me," he said, "You, however. I didn't know you had it in you, you little doxy! You're so usually so … tightly laced."

"Oh please," she sighed in irritation, "Just because I don't want to fuck you doesn't mean I don't want to fuck anyone."

"Oh, but admit it Teneira, the jury is still out on that first bit isn't it."

"Well if I'm not wrong, after last night, it's borderline incest, so don't get your hopes up."

"Ah, you Fereldans are so uptight."

"What, it's 'uptight' to think it's bad manners to bed your lover's brother's lover? No, I think that's standard across the nations."

"Ahh, I see, that is why the good madame was pounding on both doors."

They were interrupted by a voice from behind them. It was familiar, but Ten could not, at first, place it.

"I can't decide if I really, really want to know how this conversation started, or if knowing would make me want to stab myself in both ears."