Ten really should have listened to Hanne's comment on 'drinking like an elf, sleeping it off like a human' because while perhaps he meant well, Alistair either could not or chose not to heed the warning to clear off before Avrenis Lin started making her rounds. And so Ten awoke right into an incredibly awkward standoff, with the chambermaid standing there frozen in the door, staring at her. Avrenis immediately shut the door again, with Ten hurrying out of bed and into the hallway to try her hand at damage control. As soon as she left her door, Avrenis's roughened hand clamped around her forearm tighter than any irons she'd ever experienced. The maid dragged her onto the landing outside the common room door with the wiry strength of a middle-aged woman who had spent six days per week for twenty years bringing armloads of things up and down stairs.

"Did he hurt you?" were the first words out of the chambermaid's mouth once they were beyond earshot.

"What? No!" Ten exclaimed, "Look, it's fine. I'm fine. Just… could you quiet down?"

"Oh, good, so you're not in danger, you're just stupid." She spat the final word out like it tasted bad. "Teneira, what are you thinking?"

"I don't have to explain myself to you." Ten crossed her arms defensively. I suppose I can't be too angry that she's a busybody when it comes to me when I've been paying her to be a busybody to everyone else.

"You know full well how men like him treat women like you." Avrenis enunciated every word like Ten was a child and wouldn't understand her if she didn't.

"I really do not want to be having this conversation with you," Ten sighed, rubbing her temples, "I am going to go on about my business, I suggest you do the same. Come on, I'll give you a hand with the firewood." She turned and started walking back towards the common room door.

"Sure, ask your aunt Pali what happens when you do what you please!" Avrenis called after Ten had gotten several paces away. She turned and looked at the chambermaid sharply. "That got your attention, didn't it. And you can't ask her, can you," Avrenis continued, "Because she died working herself to the bone raising that mongrel pup all alone."

Ten flinched. Shianni, of course, looked elfin enough that nobody ever looked at her twice. That means Reni must know more than the rest of them. "Reni, if you call my cousin that again, you and I are going to have a problem," Ten said, fighting to keep her voice level.

"I know you think I'm just being old fashioned, but I know what I'm talking about. You're young and think you know everything, but you don't. You never worked in service, you don't know how they are. You never even worked outside the Alienage until this summer. You don't know how they can pretend to be your friends, and then turn on you," Avrenis told her, "I saw what became of your aunty. 'Oh he's different,' she would always say, 'He loves me, he promised to take care of me…'" If the insult to Shianni had not already put Ten in a slapping mood, the mocking singsong these words came out in certainly did. "But it was all bullshit," Avrenis concluded, "With men like that, it's always bullshit."

Ten opened her mouth to argue that she was not her aunt, she was a grown woman, and she could do as she pleased, but was interrupted by hurried footsteps on the stairs, followed shortly by the butler. He strode right up and stood between the two women, "What is this commotion so early in the morning? This is downright undignified." The high-class accent had reappeared overnight, sweeping away any traces of the man he'd been the previous evening.

Ten was not sure how much of it Gwylan remembered, given the condition he'd been in, if he knew he'd drunkenly told her all about his secret sorrows, his second career, or that he had unlocked the door to his master's office and taken a piss in a potted plant therein hollering 'fuck you Eamon and your stupid stained skivvies' while Ten hurriedly stole everything in there that was at least ten years old and written in Orlesian. From the looks of him he was not suffering overmuch, but his eyes were slighly red around the edges and the smell of rum was wafting out of his pores. Talk about undignified.

"Gwylan, I caught the master's ward in this one's bed not fifteen minutes ago." She emphasized the word 'bed' like it was some sort of grand indictment.

There was a brief silence. Gwylan turned his eyes to Ten, then made a move that was half shrug half head-nod. "Is that all?"

Hm. All right. That's a surprise.

Avrenis looked at him, clearly thinking the same thing.

"I don't see why you're telling me about that. Now you owe me ten silvers," the butler said briskly, "You could have kept it to yourself and kept your money. I'd have no way of knowing." He put his palm out towards the chambermaid.

"You were betting?" Ten crossed her arms tighter, suddenly feeling a bit violated, "That's… pretty gross actually."

"Well don't feel too personally victimized, there were others. Nereidas still owes me for when we caught the third middle-aged man sneaking out of your senior mage's bedroom, and I owe Litha for Teagan managing to make it all the way to the privy before vomiting the other night," Gwylan said, "Come on, Missus Lin, pay up."

"This isn't funny." Reni groused, but put a handful of coins in his outstretched hand.

"Oh it's a little bit funny," Gwylan said, smugly counting the silver in his hand with one thumb. He turned back to Ten, "I've been listening to the two of you argue for months, I knew it was going to happen eventually."

"Ew!" Ten exclaimed, "You can't just wager on peoples'... personal lives."

"Can and do," Gwylan corrected her, raising his eyebrows. He pocketed the coins, "And, Missus Lin, I don't know what else you think I'm going to do with this information. She's not staff. I can't dismiss her or even reprimand her, really. There's nothing public about it and he's not even technically a member of the family, so there's no scandal there. They're guests. And, well, unless they're stealing the silver there's not much we can do about what guests get up to in their own time. So, if you would at least keep it down, if not return to your work, I would be much obliged."

The privileges of being uppity.

Chastened, Avrenis just looked at the floor as the butler turned on his heel and went back downstairs. "I shudder to think what your mother would say if she were here," she said once he was gone, going for the lowest hanging fruit there was.

"If my mother were here, it wouldn't be her business either," Ten replied, "And I suspect that she would know for a fact that I killed three men for what they did to that 'mongrel pup" and would not hesitate to kill one if he tried something to me I didn't ask for."

"I'm sorry I called Shianni that," Reni acknowledged, "That was well out of line and I apologize."

"Apology accepted, but you cannot actually possibly have thought I was in any actual danger. So this is about something else, isn't it."

Avrenis looked away, chewing her lower lip. "What were you told about your mother's death?" she asked, looking back at Ten but unable to meet her eyes.

"Well not much until this summer. My uncle and father were always tightlipped."

"What version did you get?"

"I was told that Pali had a…" she searched for the word, "A relationship with a knight in the service of the Arl of Denerim. My mother did not take kindly to her sister's virtue being compromised, so she challenged him to a duel and was killed in the process. Then afterwards Pali couldn't stand to look at the man who killed her sister so that's why Shianni doesn't have a father."

Reni made a noise that was halfway between a snort and a sigh, "That sounds like a Valendrian retelling if I ever heard one. Certainly tailored for a human audience."

"So what actually happened?"

Avrenis took a breath, and met Ten's eyes. "Come, sit down. It's a long one." She put her basket and bucket down and sat herself on the top stair. Ten, now certain that the scolding part was over and it was now on to family lore, sat beside her

"This was more than twenty years ago, remember. Pali and I both worked at the Arl of Denerim's estate. I started there first, I was twenty, already married, closer to your mother's age But Pali was… maybe fifteen. And yes, there was a knight, Ser Edric - they called him Red Ned - and he being a knight, must have been at least twenty-one. Oh he was a handsome thing, don't get me wrong, we all thought so, but we knew the rules. You look, maybe you giggle, swing your hips when you're walking away, but that is it. You do not talk, and you do not touch. But Pali… she was a romantic. Always one for the ballads. She started playing with fire, putting herself in his way. We warned her, me and the other girls, that if you give them the wrong idea they would just take and take and take."

"So he forced her."

"Not exactly. What he did was just… so much more insipid. He wrote her love letters, he promised her moon and stars, that they would steal away, find a cottage in the countryside where they could marry and have a family. And she believed him. She was a child. And then she found herself off her courses, she told him, thinking he would be delighted, and then they would go off to their cottage in the countryside. But, of course not. He went to his lord and made sure Pali was dismissed from her job and barred from the grounds. And she kept thinking that it wasn't him. It couldn't be him. He loved her, after all. She thought it was the arl's fault, and she begged me, every day after I came home from my shift, for news of him, if he was coming for her, where she could find him. I told her, every time, that it wasn't going to happen, that she needed to look out for herself. But she wouldn't, she just could not believe what he had done to her, and then it got too late to end the pregnancy and she was looking at raising the child alone, so… your mother went to talk to him."

"To challenge him."

"No. Adaia asked for maintenance. Nothing crazy, either, just enough to keep them in food and firewood until Pali could work again. He laughed, called Pali a harlot, said he had no way of knowing the child was even his, given how she carried on with everyone at the estate. That was what brought on the challenge. Swords at dawn."

"I'd probably have challenged him too," Ten sighed, remembering having to be physically restrained from beating the tar out of a poor stable lad for far, far less. This was never about me, was it. Ten felt her anger slowly dissolving at the edges like a loaf of sugar in a bowl of warm water. She saw it happening all over again, didn't she. Wishes she would have done more then. "But even I… don't know that I would win a duel to the death with a trained knight. If tricks weren't allowed."

"Oh it wasn't a duel to the death. It's more common now, but traditionally men and women never duel to the death. Only to first blood. Then, honor is satisfied, everyone walks away," Avrenis said.

"So he didn't have to kill her?"

"Have to!" Avrenis exclaimed, "The fight was already over when he killed her. He had lost. It took your ma about five seconds to slice him across the cheek. She helped him up, told him her sister expected twenty sovereign a month and went to walk away. He stabbed her in the back, Ten, right in front of everyone. But, he being human, and a knight, he got away with paying a fine. Made sure your aunty never worked in service again, that's how she wound up on the docks."

So my mother wasn't the firebrand people said she was. Or was she? Avrenis has no reason to lie. But neither did Duncan. But Avrenis was there. Or she says she was. There is one more person involved who's still alive, though. "What became of Red Ned?" asked Ten, "Also what a shitty nickname."

"Wouldn't know," Avrenis said, and crossed her arms, "I suspect he was released from the arl's service after that. It might not be illegal to stab an elf in the back in public, but it reflected poorly on his lord. I never saw him around after that."

"Could you… find out?" Ten asked.

"Two sovereigns," Avrenis replied after a moment's thought, jutting her chin out defiantly, "And a promise you're smarter than your aunty."

"Well I'm about ten years older than she was, so I already have that going for me," Ten said, "And I have never been one for the ballads. Not even when I was fifteen."

"So what is it, then?"

"Not your business, is what it is."

"No, tell me. Put my heart at ease."

"Shit, Reni, fuck if I know. Bit of fun before I die? What am I supposed to do, just live like a cloistered nun? Have a different lad in every town and village? I mean I probably could, but it seems like so much work."

"But…. but." Avrenis said, "Why can't you just remarry? Look, I have this nephew, he's twenty-eight, also widowed, no kids. He has a print shop in Ostwick, but I'm sure he'd be willing to relocate for someone of your standing…"

"What, so he can suffer the same fate as the last one the next time someone wants to get to me?" she said, "Every new person I care about is one more weakness and I already have too many of those. Now can you find the man who killed my mother or not?"

The chambermaid's light green eyes assessed her briefly, "Fine."

Her pocket two sovereigns lighter, Ten returned to the common room, already exhausted. The cause of all the trouble was seated at the table, squinting at some documents. "Bit of fun before you die, huh," he said, not looking up.

Not in the fucking mood. "Oh fuck off. If you heard that, you heard the rest of that conversation, so you know you've already caused me enough trouble today, it being barely seven in the morning."

"Well I didn't hear the whole thing. I woke up alone, went looking for you and got the tail end of it. What happened to your arm?"

She looked down to see that the outline of Avrenis's bony hand was showing in purple and blue on her forearm. She shook her head. "Remember when I told you to clear off before the chambermaid came around?"

"You could get her in trouble for that, fairly sure they're not supposed to manhandle guests."

"I'm not going to do that and fuck you for suggesting it."

"Are you actually angry at me?"

"Moderately, but I'll get over it. Are you actually angry at me?"

"Are you more honest with the chambermaid than you are with me?"

"No."

"Then no."

"What are you looking at there?"

"Dalish treaty. Hard to know who it's with, how many, or where we'll find the right group of them," Alistair said, "Now that we can focus on, you know, our actual job."

"I was thinking about that. There's a few ex Dalish in the village me and Zev got stuck in down to the south. The elder's got some sweet face tattoos. They might know."

"Let me guess, they're not going to let any of the rest of us in."

"Well last time I got there I was fully unconscious and I don't want to find out. It's a fortress, if a primitive one. Watchtowers in all the fields. Palisade around the houses. I get the sense they shoot first, ask questions later," Ten said.

"Right. So you're just going to steal off with Zevran for a few days then."

"Clearly the entire point," she said dryly.

There was silence for a moment. Outside one window there was a steady drip of an icicle melting.

"What happened with the maid?" Alistair asked. Ten looked up at him, thought about telling him to mind his business. No. Fuck that. He wanted this, he watched me get insulted in the middle of the street, he also gets to live with the nasty assumptions.

"She thought you forced me," Ten said, "That's the bruise on my arm. She thought she was dragging me to safety."

He flinched. "You set her straight, right?"

"I did. So now she just thinks I'm an idiot."

"That's not fair."

"Well, ninety plus percent of the time there's this particular pairing, it's one of the two things I just mentioned, so no, it actually was not unfair of her," Ten said, "And she's seen it happen before. That was what we were talking about."

"And what tragic tale of the poor elfin maiden did she tell?"

"I don't really care for your tone," Ten said, "And if you must know, it was the one that ended with the death of my mother."

"Well it wouldn't be a day ending in 'y' if I didn't put my foot in it at least once."

"At least you're self-aware."

"I thought you said your mother overreacted to her younger sister carrying on with some knight and fought a losing duel."

"That is what I had heard before… but that was the version told to me by a human man. It only makes sense that an elfin woman might see things differently. Bit of a cheap shot, I think, using the tragedy of my own aunt to make me change my tune."

"What's the new version?"

"That the knight put her aside when he found out she was with child. She couldn't believe that he actually didn't love her, that he'd been playing a game the whole time."

"And this was supposed to make you change your tune, how?"

"To convince me you're just taking advantage of my youthful innocence." She tried to say this with a straight face, but failed, and they both laughed for a reasonable amount of time. "But suffice it to say, that was why my mother challenged him and when she drew first blood, he stabbed her in the back while she walked away."

"Well… there's no truth to be had, is there," Alistair said, after considering it for a moment, "All you're going to get is different stories told by different people. You could track down that knight, if he's even still alive, and cut bits off him until he tells you what he thinks you want to hear. There's no guarantee that's going to be any more or less accurate than the versions you've been told."

"I know," sighed Ten, rubbing her eyes, "But, the shit of it is, whether he killed my mother honorably or otherwise, he still never claimed Shianni. They struggled when my aunt was alive, and after she had her accident... Those were lean years. I paid the rent and cooked the food and went hungry more nights than not. But I did all that and her own father was out there somewhere, doing nothing. Even a pittance would have helped."

He appraised her briefly from across the table, "You're going to track him down and cut bits off him, aren't you."

"It's already in motion."