Panny

Before

“You’re going to be amazing.” Dalia’s mother had stopped a boy in the street, short for his age and scabby-kneed. He looked startled and embarrassed by the frankness of her attention, but he didn’t pull his hand away when she took it. Whether he was trapped by some measure of ingrained politeness or he knew enough to recognize what the patterned trim of her mother’s robes represented, it was hard to say.

Dalia picked at the hem of her own, plainer skirt and sighed with exaggerated gusto. She briefly debated the merits of carrying the baskets of produce home on her own, but thought better of it. They were a heavy burden, even for the two of them and the tomatoes were already overripe, so the sun couldn’t possibly do them any worse. She tried not to be bothered by the dew seeping through her clothing or the promise of grass stains that would be next to impossible to get out later; it was difficult to be sure how long her mother would be when a Moment struck her and she didn’t much feel like standing for the duration.

She only became aware of how far she’d allowed her thoughts to wander when they were interrupted by a warm hand shielding her forehead. “There are better ways to track the sun than with your eyes, girl,” her mother said, an amused lilt warming her voice. “Though I suppose wiser folk have lost their sight to less worthy causes.”

“I assumed that you’d tell me if you saw me going blind at the bottom of your morning tea,” Dalia said, gently brushing her mother’s hand aside as she moved to stand. She half hoped her mother would let something slip; it was hard not to see the motions of the day as pointless when her mother could have just told her the outcome before they’d left the house.

“I don’t need portents of the future to tell me what common sense already knows. Come on – or else the tomatoes will be cooked before we have time to prepare them.”

The last time Dalia saw her mother, she did not realize it would be the last until she was already at the door, pack slung over her shoulder while her mother smoothed over the fabric of her scarf until it wrinkled anew. The aged lines of her face were deepened by sadness and Dalia wanted to reassure her that she would return soon; they would see each other again.

But her mother smiled gravely and squeezed her hand and Dalia understood that, no, they would not. She would not be coming home.

She wept bitterly for the realization and her mother hushed her, squeezing her hand tighter until both of their fingers ached with the force of the farewell. “You’re going to be so happy,” her mother said; the first and only prediction she'd ever made about Dalia's life.

Oh, Dalia thought, weeping like a child on her front porch, remembering all the unproven young folk her mother had promised greatness, is that all?

After

Dalia picked her way down the rocks slowly, even as Chance bounded ahead, eager to explore what new smells might decorate the world. She could be reasonably sure that her life did not end on this particular moment, but a fall would still leave her with a nasty headache that she had no desire to deal with. Besides, the dog’s lead would barely become worrisome before he’d peer around and reluctantly start trotting back, as if he needed to guide her.

Chance’s name had been a particularly capricious decision. She’d idly considered many possible contenders in the fortnight before she’d met the scraggly puppy who’d bitten her in an attempt to steal her lunch pack, but he’d been “Chance” from the moment she held him. The name had served well enough in the years they’d been friends since.

The flatter landscape of the ungroomed shoreline was a welcome respite and she carelessly kicked off her shoes before sitting on the damp earth. It was funny how dirt concerned her less the older she got – she had been such a fussy thing as a girl. Stains on clothes and wrinkles on skin, no different than footsteps on the ground; if you were going to leave your mark upon the world, it was only fair that the world leave its mark upon you in return.

Birds cried in cacophony as they circled over head and Dalia whiled away the moments by sketching the rough shapes of their flocking in the dirt beside her. She already knew what they would mean – she was still waiting on the last prediction to come to fruition, after all – but it never hurt to check. She was not as gifted in the Sight as her mother had been in her prime, but she could understand enough to trust her own interpretation when a sign was left for her.

The filmy, pale eyes that broke the surface tension of the water to peer at her were a welcome non-surprise. “Ah, hello, young lady,” Dalia said, smiling in greeting. Truthfully, she found it hard to estimate her sometime-companion’s age; the alien green undercurrent of her complexion bore none of the tells that Dalia had come to rely on, as humanoid as the woman otherwise appeared – from the waist up, anyway.

“Hello, Dalia,” the woman said, voice rasping in a way that always made Dalia’s throat feel vaguely sore. She had not told Dalia her name during their first meeting and at some point, Dalia had given up on guessing it. She figured that if it bothered the woman enough, she would say so. They talked very little in each other’s company, anyway; the silence never felt empty.

“I haven’t brought you anything today,” Dalia said, “but if you catch a fish, I’ll cook it for you.”

The woman dove back into the water without another word, Chance bounding gamely up to the shoreline to bark after her, but too wise to stray where the current could grab him.

Between

Dalia blinked the sun from her eyes, floating spots and the imprint of her own veins dancing across her vision. It seemed that there was no such thing as a good day for bird watching. Too cloudy and she could see nothing; not cloudy enough and she risked her vision entirely. She gave up for the time being, even as the birds screamed mockingly above her.

The weather was nice for walking, at the very least, making the river water glimmer as she unhurriedly made her way back. The sounds of people at work had its own sort of pleasant rhythm – the drum beats of hammers kept tempo with the melody of idle chatter. She had traveled a lot in the time since she had first left home, but this town was the first where she had truly considered doing more than passing through.

Cilla was in the garden when Dalia returned to the small house with the thatched roof that they had been sharing for the better part of six months. Face caked with dirt and sweat, she still found a smile for Dalia as she re-latched the gate. “Good evening, Dalia. Good news, I hope?”

“No news,” Dalia said, “which might be good news by some definitions.”

Cilla nodded. “Then we’ll have some of the smoked meat tonight to celebrate. Why don’t you start a fire while I wash up?”

Dalia did as she was asked and they enjoyed a quiet meal by the hearth, complemented by easy conversation. It made it all the harder when Dalia packed her bags in the morning, leaving behind more than half the items in the house that might have been considered “hers”. At some point, her life had become too heavy to carry with her and that was how she knew it was time to leave.

Hard as she tried, she couldn’t avoid waking Cilla up and the other woman watched her with dismayed understanding from the end of the hall. “You knew this was coming,” Cilla said. She probably didn’t mean it as an accusation, but it sounded like one all the same.

“Yes.”

“For how long?”

Dalia crossed her arms, suddenly self-conscious. “Since before I met you.” She'd spent the first half of her life certain that the Sight had skipped her generation, but the remarkably clear path her feet now followed had laid those doubts to rest. She wished the rest of her doubts were as easily quieted. She wished the stars would use plainer language and offer more coherent explanations. She sometimes wished she had enough ignorance to believe that anything would last.

Cilla stared at her, nakedly aghast. “Then why even bother?”

“Do you wish I hadn’t?”

“I should say ‘yes’,” Cilla said, in a tone that made it apparent that the real answer was “no”. “I think I could have loved you, if you had given me more time.”

“Then it’s for the best that I’m leaving now,” Dalia said. She hovered uncertainly by the doorway, deliberating between a handshake or a warm pat on the shoulder. Cilla took the decision away from her by pulling her into a gentle hug.

“Is it your mother’s words that drive you?” Cilla asked, like she had wanted to for some time, but only felt free to voice the words when there was no longer anything to lose. “Or the lack of them?”

“She had no more control over the path she saw for me than I do to deviate from it now,” Dalia said, the stiffness of her body bleeding into her voice.

“I wonder why you need so badly for someone to tell you that you’ll be amazing, when it’s plain to see that you already are.” Dalia started to pull away, not in the mood for platitudes, but Cilla held her fast. Her voice was fierce when she spoke again. “I wonder Dalia – have you ever been happy? Even once?”

Always

“Happy” was a wind at Dalia’s back, strong and driving. She wondered if it would ever feel welcome.

She followed the curves of the river, current rushing like blood moved by a heartbeat. She knew how to do nothing else.

Between

Accidents were never accidents in truth. A slip of the tongue or the foot or the memory was just a domino tumbling in an ineffable game that a select few people could (sometimes) see the shape of (maybe).

It was for this reason that Dalia felt entirely comfortable hurling every colourful insult that she knew against the stars as she waded into the river after a puppy that she couldn't afford to feed anyway. She had half a mind to let the stupid thing drown, but her fool heart wouldn't let the thought take hold.

She had just pushed Chance onto the bank, shivering and water-slicked to half his normal size, when a small shift in the riverbed upset her footing - it was child's play for the current to do the rest.

When she woke after, it was to filmy eyes and the feeling of a wet, rough hand against her face. Oh, she thought, I didn't know they came this far inland. And then she made an unattractive spectacle of herself, coughing and choking on her own breaths as her rescuer wisely snatched her hand away.

Somewhere, fate was probably laughing. Sometimes, Dalia wondered if her mother would laugh along.

After

Dalia cleaned the fish with practiced precision. Two pairs of eyes watched the proceedings with interest. If the woman was feeling generous today, maybe Chance would find himself treated to a slice. If she was not, well, the world was not always kind, even to mangy dogs who had mastered the skill of emotional manipulation. For her part, Dalia focused on the knife and her fingers and tried to take in little else. There were messier forms of divination and if she let her eyes make the connection, odds were she’d see the same message waiting for her. It was almost romantic, in a somewhat disgusting way.

“Why do you keep coming back?” the other woman asked. Somewhere in the midst of Dalia’s concentration, she had pulled herself closer to the shore, bare back dappled by flecks of water and sunlight.

"Do you not wish me to?" Dalia asked, feeling the echo of long ago conversations. Fate either adored patterns or Dalia was too lazy to vary her speech enough to avoid learning habits.

"That isn't what I said." The woman's mouth was a thin line to underscore the uncertainty of her expression. It was endlessly fascinating how many unconscious gestures their two peoples apparently shared. Dalia sometimes idly wondered if the woman had family or childhood friends that she might like Dalia to meet one day. Even more often, she regretted that she had kept no such connections and could not offer the same; a consequence of treating experiences as inherently transient, she supposed. "I just wondered if you thought you had to."

"Not that I'm not grateful," Dalia said, "but saving my life doesn't obligate me to cook for you for the rest of it, no."

"That isn't what I said," the woman said again; they both knew what they were dancing around. Dalia merely smiled and the woman narrowed her eyes before turning away, stretching her torso over the rocky shore as if it was no less comfortable than the finest linen. "Fine, what do I care what reasons you use to justify your nonsense."

“Because I’m ready to be happy," Dalia said, letting her eyes trail up towards the sun.

“That’s all?” The woman's voice rose sharply, unconvinced and uncomprehending.

The hay is sweet-smelling, cushioning her from the hard ground, but its edges prickle at Anthy's arms uncomfortably as she moves towards wakefulness. The walls of her house are familiar, but wrong. She shouldn't be here, she knows, but she can't bring herself to leave. There is silence outside the door and still she doesn't dare open it.

Her brother sleeps quietly on the ground next to her and he shouldn't be here either, but she's grateful that he is. She sits beside him and doesn't look at the door and doesn't try to think about anything - the world outside stays silent so it's not very hard.

She cannot say how long it is before she leaves the house - days, weeks, months. She has the strangest feeling that the sun only sets because it occurs to her that it should, but she knows that if her brother were awake she would be embarrassed to tell him of the silly, childish notion. At some point it occurs to her that she should be hungry and she realizes that she is; there is no food in the house.

The path through the forest seems especially clear today and it's not long before she finds the village, just as she remembers it. Windows are cracked open to invite the cool breeze, which stirs the white sheets hung on clothes lines, making them flutter and dance. Even so, she doesn't meet one person as she walks the street.

The baker's house is empty, but there's bread on the counter anyway. It's no longer hot to the touch, but still fresh enough that the smell of it clings to the air around her. Anthy hesitates for a moment, unsure if she should take it without asking, but then her stomach growls and her mind's made up. She cuts herself a modest piece and hopes that the baker won't mind too much when they return.

The village is silent the whole way back.

She never sees any people when she leaves the house and that's something of a relief. Nothing frightens her more than the thought of opening the door to see the crowd returned. She doesn't mind the quiet so much anymore; at least it's peaceful enough for her brother to sleep.

Sometimes she sees shadows playing along the walls in the spaces where the people should be. The shadows don't ask anything of her or bother her most of the time. Sometimes she stops to listen to their stories before it occurs to her that she should be getting back.

She develops a conscious aversion to the town square. She is as certain that she must not go there as she is that the stones that pave the ground are a clean white, uneven and asymmetrical, just as they have always been. There is a power in the superstition, she understands. She takes the long way round to avoid it.

Her brother doesn't understand her apprehension; he is as drawn to the square as she is afraid of it. She has to beg him not to go there, clinging to his arm like a child. For a moment, his face creases in irritation at her. And then he bends to one knee, wiping the tears from her eyes. "Not today then," he says. He never promises 'not tomorrow'.

The coffin is heavy on the white stone at the town square. It sits peculiarly out of place, like the mourners had abandoned it half way through the funeral. It gleams, polished and unscuffed, like this had only happened moments ago. She pries her hands under the lid and it lifts for her as she knew it would; the weight isn't real, after all. Her brother will not wait forever and she doesn't know what will happen then. For tonight, though she doesn't want to, she shoulders her burden again. She climbs the stairs to heaven alone; her precious, shining memories wait for her at the top, along with the price she pays to keep them.

Her world is a storybook. Everything functions according to a precise set of rules, a role to play - predictable, comforting. Everything moves inexorably toward a set conclusion.

"Is it the coffin that scares you?" Akio asks and Anthy goes cold at the words. "There's no one in it, you know." There's almost a mocking undercurrent to what he certainly means to be a comfort. She knows that he would not have been able to lift the lid alone.

"I know," she says anyway. After all, they are both in their house together.

Akio looks upon the castle in the sky with wonder as she leads him up the staircase and then at her with something resembling the love and adoration she remembers. From this moment, it is not hers any longer. She'd always intended it for him anyway, hadn't she; she doesn't know why it bothers her.

He looks at the doorway at the end of the long walkway and doesn't see the coffin. "What's on the other side of that?"

"You don't remember?" she asks and then feels badly for saying it.

Akio doesn't seem to notice, pulling at the door. It doesn't move.

Akio becomes obsessed with the door - a piece of his castle locked off to even him. There is nothing that Anthy can do for him. The castle is his now and the lid is too heavy for her to lift alone.

The people start to fill the spaces in the world where the shadows don't live. Anthy sometimes wishes they wouldn't, but her brother needs them; what is a prince if there are no people, no hierarchies, no princesses. Anthy doesn't always know where he finds them. Sometimes he lets her help, lets her choose. Sometimes he uses her memory because that's all he requires of her. She never leaves; she's afraid her world might disappear if she did.

"I couldn't do it without you," Akio tells her, reassuring, when she wonders at his interest in all these people. She wonders what it costs him to admit this to her.

The shadows tell their stories to anyone who will listen. Anthy doesn't always remember which of them are true.

There is an appeal to the ritual of the duels - a superstitious sort of power. Anthy relishes in being the object of power in her own way. They are, still, her brother's - as much as the castle is his; evidence of his design is all over them. They offer him a vain sort of honour, no more tangible than the promise of eternity behind a sealed door, but more immediate. Anthy wonders if they are the means or the end.

Akio collects people in abundance, far more than he needs. As long as he gives them a reason to remain, most of them aren't concerned with leaving.

He would fill every hall with the plain and the unimportant if it would help him weed out just one more who matters.

Anthy does not like the duelists often - shallow, grasping dreamers that many of them are. She likes some less than others. There is one, one cycle, that she particularly loathes and she takes steps to be rid of him sooner than the ritual meets its completion.

Akio is furious with her and she is afraid. It is not the first time that she is scared of her brother, but it is the first time that she understands that fear.

She learns to be subtle from that point. Careful. There must be enough players for Akio's game, but it doesn't really matter who wins; none of them ever succeed, curled and broken on the floor while her brother batters at eternity with a sword. She learns the weight of a properly timed smile or an unpleasant memory.

She finds she prefers it like this, with the duelists fighting for her instead of just over her. As long as Akio can see the evidence of his own control in the world around him, it's fine. She wouldn't take that from him anyway; she has stolen him away from the world, but she dares not steal any more of him away from himself. She can live with these small moves - a stone making ripples on a pond without smearing the sun's reflection. It's fine. She's fine.

Her world is a spider web. Things stick there - the dead, memories, time - to feed the things that designed it. Spiders, Anthy knows, do not stick to their own webs. She reminds herself of this frequently. She is not stuck.

Anthy understands Akio's fascination with adolescence, why he chooses to suspend time within that moment. There's a logic to the school, to the comings and goings of groups of people, to their world moving with the times even as it remains separate from them, but that's not the reason. He likes the volatility of it. The unrealized potential and peaking emotion and vulnerability and growing understanding.

She does not ask why he does not choose to remain in adolescence while the world around him does. She knows the answer.

Orphans often make for good heroes. It's like the less connections a person has to the world, the more use stories have for them. Stories love orphans.

Akio loves orphans too. Orphans and runaways and people dissatisfied with the life they inhabit. They can come and go and reality doesn't flinch for missing them. Memory will make allowances for them if they steer it toward the path of least resistance.

They call it 'Ohtori' now. She likes the rhythm of the word, even as she's indifferent to the man it was named for - kindly, but prone to speaking to her like she is a child. He doesn't remember that he had once dueled for her just as none of them ever do. Akio wastes nothing and no one, uses even the forgotten and the dead until they're all used up. Anthy is different than any of them; Akio still can't do it without her.

The planetarium projector is a curiosity. Not for the technology inside it - she doesn't understand it, but it doesn't matter. It is at once elegant and lumbering, marvelous and abominable.

Akio adores it. He marvels at its lights and images the way he once gazed at the castle. He spends days in a false night sky under his command.

Anthy stares up at the sky above Ohtori from her balcony and wonders how the true heavens compare.

Akio's car is another one of his treasures. Anthy suspects that he prefers it over the horses because animals have always liked her better; it's a cruel enough thought that she almost confesses it aloud. He takes her for a ride when he first brings it to Ohtori, talking to her with a childish enthusiasm about how the engine works. She holds that moment to her heart on later rides, when the car becomes part of the game; it is for that moment alone that the car continues to run without fuel or need for repair. If Akio ever notices, he doesn't acknowledge it.

Akio tolerates her friendship with Chu-Chu because he finds it 'cute' - the way she dresses him up, the way she speaks to him like he's a person. Akio rarely means 'cute' as a compliment even when he says it as one.

Anthy doesn't know if Chu-Chu is someone she's conjured for herself or a real thing that's slipped through the cracks in her world. She doesn't know if the distinction matters anymore.

Akio's borrowed sword clashes uselessly against the door again. Anthy doesn't know where the duelist it belonged to is anymore, lost track of them sometime ago. She can't bring herself to care.

Dios stares up at her from the walkway - the ghost of the prince she killed to keep her brother. His gaze never wavers from where she's suspended in the air, an unflinching and dispassionate regard. "Have you ever looked down at your academy from this height?" he asks, as if making idle conversation. She doesn't bother because she knows what she'd see; her whole world is a coffin now.

Anthy's brother has always been drawn to people at their lowest. Who better to save? Who could be more deserving of all that he gave and gave to a world that could only ever need him?

Akio still gathers them to him - the heartbroken, the helpless, the hopeless. And they are equally compelled by Akio's power and promise. Moth and flame indistinguishable.

Who is it that Akio's trying to save now, Anthy wonders.

Her world is a greenhouse. Things that would never survive in the harshness of the outside world can flourish there. It may be artificial and enclosed, but really, the life they might glimpse beyond the glass would be so much worse to endure. She reminds herself of this frequently and tries to understand.

She enters the castle alone. Akio would be angry if he knew, but Akio isn't here. Her memories catch and tug in strange places and she knows Akio is working his charms and that soon it will begin again.

This castle is the one place where the prince of her memories is eternal - pristine in white, untouched by time or cruelty, even if he must loathe her now. He is always in his castle just as she is always in Ohtori, the two of them bound by her sacrifice.

Except that, this time, he's not. "Where did you go?" She doesn't expect an answer, but she gets one.

That Moment tears itself free from the tangle of her memories, crisp and clear, flung before Dios and a young girl and a coffin.

In an instant, she is furious, betrayed. She wants to take her brother's precious castle and shake it apart like a child's toy. "Why?" she asks and it's all the questions she wants to ask and none of them.

When Dorian awoke, the world was shaking. That in and of itself would no longer be considered unusual - the world could be expected to regularly shake, crumble, and burn at varying intervals - but the rock dust in his facial hair meant that they would probably have to move before the sun finished rising.

The Iron Bull stood at the mouth of the cave. It was impossible to tell how long he'd been up; none of them looked anything less than worn these days. He nodded once at Dorian in greeting before jerking his chin in the direction of the latest explosion. "Gaatlok."

"Have the Qunari moved on the South, then?" Dorian peered into the dim pre-dawn gloom, but the only movement he was able to detect was a couple of birds flitting among the trees, dark feathers almost invisible.

The Bull grunted. "Not so sure about that. They definitely sent agents when things went tits up in Orlais, but with the Vints at their borders? The Antaam should have dug down to defend Par Vollen."

"Is it possible that someone else is using the powder?" It was a sign of the times they lived in that that was even a question worth asking.

"Ordinarily, I'd say no. But, well...shit." Dorian chose not to pay the Bull the discourtesy of acknowledging what he didn't say - that exactly how fucked they were depended entirely on who had the powder now. Either the Venatori had gained ground and the situation in Par Vollen was worse than they'd realized or the Qunari were rattled enough to give up one of their most carefully guarded secrets to save the world. It was hard to say which possibility was the most unsettling.

The Bull had held his left arm so strangely still through the exchange that Dorian almost feared something was wrong with it - some unmentioned injury after a battle resurfacing with dire consequence. Then he noticed the paper crushed and nearly hidden within the Bull's fist. Of course, he should have realized - it was the wrong season for crows. "How is Cremisius?"

"The Chargers turned up a lead on where that demon army came from. Apparently this Elder One's got in good with the Wardens." Dorian swore colourfully. "You kiss your mother with that mouth?" It was, very pointedly, not a Qunari turn of phrase. Maybe a slip, a blur between the line of cover and assimilation. Maybe a deliberate prod. Dorian hadn't divulged much of his own history beyond the immediately necessary and if he had any suspicions of his own, the Bull's face never gave the game away.

"She taught me most of those words, actually."

The Bull laughed - sharp, but genuine. "Good for her."

They tied a red strip of cloth around a tree branch about twenty paces from the cave where they'd made camp, location carefully chosen so that anyone approaching from the front who might be looking for such a thing would spot it before anyone else who might have found the cave would spot them. Provided the whole forest didn't burn down by nightfall.

"We could try to send one of the birds after her," the Bull said. "It would be risky - might lead them to her, might lead them to us - but at least she wouldn't come back to a burned down forest."

Dorian could feel eyes boring holes into his back, but he ignored them and turned to give the Bull his most blandly despairing expression. "Have a little faith in our companions, will you? Sera will know where to find us."

"Yeah? One of your 'feelings' tell you that?" He didn't quite stoop to drawing air quotes with his fingers, but the sentiment was there. Dorian's smile was a grim answer. "I wish you'd knock it off with that cryptic crap."

"Maybe I will, once you stop answering questions I didn't ask."

"Ben-Hassrath. It's not something you turn off." The Iron Bull shrugged. "If I could figure out how you do your thing, maybe it wouldn't bother me so much."

"You never know - I could be communing with the Fade, consorting with demons. We Tevinters do so love our party tricks." The Iron Bull only snorted, glancing at him sidelong through his one eye. "What, not going to vow to put me down should I ever succumb to the dark arts?"

"Think we've got enough people trying to kill us as is."

"Regrettably true."

"Keep blowing up the other guys and you're good with me."

When they finally turned around, Dorian was unsurprised to find nobody there.

Dorian had nearly bolted after noting the man's obvious Tevinter origin. Only the knowledge that they'd already found him and that there was probably nowhere to go stayed him. That and he'd agreed to this meeting, fool that he was. Might as well see it through.

The man stood politely on his approach. "Cremisius Aclassi, representing the Bull's Chargers."

"Dorian," he said and admitted no more, even when Aclassi raised an eyebrow in clear invitation. Anger at his father still ran deep, but he would not willingly lead danger to his doorstep. "If I'm not mistaken, that's the mercenary company contracted to the Inquisition. My, whatever brings you to my neck of the woods?"

Aclassi returned to sitting at his table and indicated that Dorian should do the same. "Someone in the area's been doing some damage to Tevinter mage camps. Didn't expect it to be one of their own, though."

"You expected correctly," Dorian said and couldn't resist a toss of his head. It was so hard blending in when standing out was your first line of defense. "I am not with the Venatori."

"Trust me, if I thought you were, we wouldn't be talking right now."

"Of that, I have no doubt." There was a dark-haired elven woman at the bar with a dagger on her belt; that in and of itself wasn't unusual. That she had spoken to no one in the entire time she'd been there was. "As charming as my company is, surely this is more than a social call."

"Our commander is feeling out his opportunities, should he be inclined to break his contract."

Dorian tried not to show how badly that prospect startled him. He had his own reasons for being wary of Inquisition forces, but last he'd heard, even the Chantry had begun expressing reserved support after the Herald of Andraste managed to unite the Templars and mages under one banner. "Well now, that sounds bad for business."

"It's not a choice we'd be making lightly."

Dorian gestured to his tattered robes. "I'm afraid I'm rather short on funds at the moment. Shocking, I know."

"We're not asking you to hire us."

"Then what are you asking for?"

"Information to start with. These...Venatori, did you call them? Seems like you know more about what's going on with them than just about anybody's willing to say." Aclassi leaned forward, elbows resting on the table, body language carefully open. "If I tell my commander this is worth our time, maybe we give you a little more firepower to throw at them, maybe we have your back next time they decide to retaliate. I'm sure we could work out something mutually beneficial."

"So, what? You're proposing a partnership, then?"

"Of a kind. If you're interested."

A familiar hat at the edge of the room. Ah. He probably shouldn't have felt as relieved as he did, still worried about the implications of that partnership. It would certainly simplify negotiations in the here and now, however. "If you would excuse me for a moment." Aclassi's eyes followed him to the door. When he passed the bar, the elven woman shifted slightly, but didn't get up. His caution, at least, hadn't been misplaced. As to whether their offer was legitimate...well, he'd know for certain in a minute. Either way, he had a feeling this would be his last night in this village.

The Inquisition had gained something of a reputation for accepting help from all quarters. An objectively positive attribute when one considered the nature of the problems they were facing, but politics were rarely so sensible.

Alexius had been certain that the Herald would come for the mages. So had Dorian. He had hidden and waited and planned and hoped, but each day the sun rose to share the sky with the breach and Alexius's magic grew more reckless in its application and help never arrived. And then Felix disappeared.

Dorian nearly gave himself away searching for him, certain that even now Alexius would have never let anything happen to him, but turned up nothing. He had no time to grieve over what he feared to be true; if Felix was...gone, then he was truly without allies.

He didn't quite run the full distance to Haven; despite the Inquisition's work, the roads leading out of Redcliffe were still plagued by battles between Southern Templars and rebel mages and neither group bore much love for the Imperium. Misdirected as any confrontations may have been, taking that risk wouldn't have left Dorian any less dead for the effort.

None of that danger had prepared him for the dread conjured by his first meeting with the Herald of Andraste.

Dorian had been the first offer of help that the fledgling Inquisition had turned away, even if it had happened so abruptly that few even knew he'd been there. It would turn out that he was something of a trendsetter in that regard.

Well, of course there had been Cole, if one counted him. Nobody did.

Dorian and the Iron Bull had become incredibly proficient at fighting back to back within a relatively short time - they'd had no choice in the matter. They were better when they had Sera to fill the gaps in their abilities, of course, and nothing compared to the early days when they had the full strength of the Chargers at their disposal. However, with the Bull's axe at the front line and Dorian thinning the herd through fire and lightning, they were more than enough to deal with small groups of the Elder One's followers and rift spawn. Flatteringly, the latest encampment they'd harangued seemed to think there were more than merely two rebels hiding in the hills.

Unfortunately, that meant that when they scoured the area, they came out in force.

It was a stupid mistake, really. They'd mapped the area, marked the locations of the rifts. They should have noticed which way they were being driven much earlier.

The fear demon lived up to its name when it split the Iron Bull's back; the sound of his shout would reside in Dorian's dreams for many nights to come.

Sera's addition to their group turned out to be a...rocky transition point. Dorian had only barely moved on from his - somewhat unwarranted in hindsight, admittedly - tense beginnings with the Iron Bull. His sense of social etiquette was finely honed for success at parties hosted by the Imperium's upper class; he was at a bit of a loss when it came to dealing with an angry elf from Ferelden who looked like she'd never met a barber and had a not-totally-unfair grudge against more than one category under which Dorian could be classified. That she and the Bull already got along so well almost made things worse. Sometimes Dorian almost thought he felt the stirrings of camaraderie, but just as often he was certain that their differences were irreconcilable.

"So what happened between you and the boss, Sera?" The Bull was using his 'conversational' tone - the one that put townsfolk spooked by the sight of a large Qunari at ease. "Last I saw, you two were pretty friendly." And there was the subtle current of innuendo in his tone that made previously skittish townsfolk bat their eyes and smile. Dorian stared sullenly into the fire and wished they'd chosen somewhere warmer to rebel against forces threatening the world.

"Didn't fit the Inquisition." The mocking lilt of her voice suggested it was a direct quotation. "Arse."

"That's the nature of power, unfortunately," Dorian said. "You get a little taste of status and you can't even hear the voices of the little people anymore."

"It's not like that," Sera snapped. "You didn't even know her, so shut it."

It was on Dorian's tongue to point out that Sera hadn't really known the Herald for that long either, but he turned away, unexpectedly scalded by the rebuke. When Sera wandered away, muttering something about "finding somewhere to piss without rashvine" and "bloody Magister pissbag, what does he know", the Bull casually bumped Dorian's shoulder. He might have passed it off as an accident of girth, except that they hadn't touched once in the entire time they'd been sitting.

"Don't mind her," the Bull said, "she's got some hurt feelings to sort through, but I think she actually likes you. Just...maybe sleep with your boots on for a few nights. Can't promise you won't be sticking your footsies in druffalo dung otherwise."

In his delirium, the Bull kept calling him 'Kadan'; a sentiment he at least understood, even if he was missing the context. He wondered who it was the Iron Bull saw when he looked at him through the haze of fever.

"A nail hammered too harshly splits the board, spoilt and rendered without purpose. A tool is beyond use when that use is beyond sense. Tama, is this all I'm meant for?"

"Is that supposed to mean something to me?" Dorian let Cole linger in the corner of his eye as he squeezed the makeshift washcloth again before applying it to the Bull's forehead. He silently fretted over how quickly it seemed to grow warm, but truthfully knew too little about healing to judge what was normal. He wondered where Sera was now - not that her bedside manner was likely to be any better, but at least she'd be company.

"The Iron Bull is here and not here. Pain splits the darkness, but beyond that, heat burning through to the center of him. It makes him think of the jungle."

"Infection will do that to you."

"You wanted to know. You want to understand, but you won't ask."

"Not my business, really." Dorian waited for the rejoinder, for his private thoughts to be flung out in front of him with as much care as the wind had for leaves; Cole seemed stubbornly resistant to the idea of boundaries. It wasn't that he was looking forward to it per se, but only a few of his acquaintances had any talent for banter and right now they were...well. He'd take an argument if it was the best he could get. It never came and the next time he found the courage to raise his head, he was alone in the camp with an unconscious Qunari.

He sighed and stared at his hands, pruned with water, but still dirty under where the nails had cracked. "Precisely." Nobody answered him.

Sera had an arrow notched, but the tip was nearly in the demon's face without firing. Dorian slammed his staff against the ground, hasty and formless in a way that his tutors would have scolded him for, but the demon hesitated as ice spread over its body. Then the Iron Bull came from behind, axe swinging in a hard arc.

"Shit, yes." The Bull slammed his axe into the ground next to bits of shattered demon, hollering enthusiastically in victory. Sera's arrow soon joined the odd collection, rolling briefly through the grass as she nearly fell over in laughter.

"By all means, let's stop to celebrate in the middle of a battlefield like savages," Dorian said.

"Oh, lighten up, Dorian. You know, you're not half bad when you're not being a tit."

"Such praise. Am I swooning? I think I might be."

"He means 'thanks'." The Bull ruffled Dorian's hair roughly, catching him in an unprepared squawk. He reached to do something similar to Sera, but she rolled nimbly out of his path, cackling unsympathetically at Dorian's plight.

"Let's do that again," she said.

The Bull released Dorian, hefting his axe over his shoulder with a grunt. "Not so big on the demon part, but as long as it ends with its fleshy bits on the ground, fine by me."

"Ugh, gross. Ruined it now."

Maker help him, maybe Dorian was a little bit fond.

He worried about Sera. He listened for the whistle of arrows in the wind and searched for red among the colours of the forest. She had taken care of herself for many years before she'd met them, he knew. She had more resources at her disposal than even the Bull; Ben-Hassrath contacts could be pulled or compromised, but there would always be 'people'. But the Inquisition's reach grew by the day and Dorian feared never knowing almost more than confirmation that the worst had come to pass.

He worried about Cole - kept expecting to see him in shadows or hear him whenever he set off alone, but didn't. He hadn't for days and that was the problem. He knew from experience that Cole could bleed, red and terrifyingly like a human; he didn't know if that was normal or if it meant the same thing to spirits as it did to people. Cole was a bit...unprecedented.

He still worried about the Iron Bull most of all.

When a physical relationship developed between Dorian and the Iron Bull, it was not that much of a surprise, really. Centuries of war and cultural strife did not actually render tall, muscular horned men any less attractive - quite the opposite, as it turned out. Physical, however, was all that Dorian anticipated it ever being. A nice, no-strings attached romp for the end of the world. Neither had anything to gain out of pursuing more nor anything to lose out of staying as they were. Simple enough.

The cuddling, he was less prepared for. The Iron Bull slept with his face awkwardly mashed to the ground, angled to give his horns clearance, all so he could sling one arm over Dorian's waist to pull him to his chest. Dorian had become used to Ferelden's cold - or, rather, he had become used to the inevitability of feeling it. It settled in his bones, deep like an ache, something that no proximity to campfire could ever chase away. The Bull's body heat didn't change that, but it was still...considerate. More so than he would have expected or asked for.

Dorian rested more comfortably than the Bull, but sleep always visited him second.

The day the Iron Bull's fever broke, Dorian did nothing so dramatic as weeping, but he might have rested against a tree to breathe deep, shuddery breaths for a moment or two. The Bull regained his strength by slow measures, but day by day he kept his eyes open for longer, kept down more solid food, made it far enough away from camp to relieve himself unaided. Dorian kept an eye on the wound, but it looked considerably less angry than it had in days and seemed well on its way to healing.

"Will it scar?" the Bull asked.

"Almost certainly," Dorian said. "Unless you know someone particularly adept at healing magic, you don't cut through that much muscle and get to keep your flawless complexion, I'm afraid."

The Bull looked pleased. "Good. Wouldn't be worth it otherwise."

"I despair of you," Dorian said, more warmly than he'd intended. Apparently near-death experiences made him sappy.

"Let me make this very clear: the Inquisition is not here to solve your petty political squabbles."

How long? Slow rage crept through Dorian's veins like poison, displacing the blood that had fled to rush in his ears. How long? followed by Do they know? Somehow, even finding out the truth about Alexius hadn't been this devastating. If even the Herald of Andraste was in league with the Venatori, then what hope was there?

He must have managed to keep his face suitably placid because the Herald gave him barely another glance before dismissing him.

"Cole," Dorian said, almost surprised by his own lack of surprise, "I've been wondering where you've been."

"I've been here, but you always forget."

A thin thread of panic worked through Dorian like a shudder. The idea of holes in his memory was nearly intolerable. Even so, he said: "I'm sorry." He meant it; being forgotten sounded worse.

"You hurt, but I don't help," Cole said, like that justified everything. Maybe to him, it did.

"Even so, I'd...appreciate knowing where you are."

"Why?" And then, before he could answer: "A hidden thing that cannot be hidden from, two things you wish you didn't have to fear; I make you uncomfortable."

"That's not wholly inaccurate, I suppose. Still, I'd prefer to endure some discomfort than worry that you're dead in a ditch somewhere."

Cole paused and then: "Thank you." Dorian didn't entirely know how to respond to that.

Dorian's heart hammered in his chest, staff too far away to grab inconspicuously. He'd been so stupid. He shouldn't have stopped to rest the night so close to Haven, should have got as far as fast as possible.

The boy was spindly, staring unblinking from under a wide-brimmed hat. He didn't look like much, but he'd entered Dorian's room undetected. It didn't take physical strength to hurt someone, as Dorian well knew.

"I'm Cole," the boy said, "and I want to help. So do you."

When the sky split for the second time, there was no grand event to warrant it. No Conclave explosions, no dead Divines, no Heralds walking from the Fade. Just an otherwise mild day and then the Breach began spreading again, like a slow sickness.

The Iron Bull stood bathed in green, a solemn statue, almost harder to look at than the sky. "Well," Dorian said, "this is very, very bad."

"Yeah," the Bull said, unmocking; if he felt the words were inadequate, he didn't show it. "You got any 'feelings' you wanna run by me?"

Dorian glanced at the corner where he knew Cole would be before he could think better of the impulse; he was not particularly comforted by what he saw. To be fair, he couldn't be certain that his own face didn't mirror the same naked fear. When he turned back to the Iron Bull, he was met with a patient, expectant expression that set a weight in his gut. "Ah. And when did you realize?"

"Ben-Hassrath."

"Ah," Dorian said again, feeling very eloquent today. Perhaps the more important question had not been when the Iron Bull had known, but rather when he had decided that knowing didn't matter. After all, the Bull was still here and Dorian still had a head on his shoulders; that had to count for something.

"What about you, kid?" the Bull asked, addressing Cole directly now. "What's our game plan?"

"I made a friend, but he wouldn't help us. A mistake to unmake a mistake; not what he wanted, but still what he asked for. The world is delivered into the wrong hands and this too was Pride." Cole turned to them and the shadows under his hat in the green light made his gaunt features ghastly - a shadow of the truth of what Dorian knew him to be. "He might want to help now."

The Bull made a face. "This friend of yours - he a demon too?"

Cole turned back to the Breach.

If one wanted to figure out when things went wrong, one need only have paid attention to the Herald of Andraste's inner circle. Even the most observant might have missed the Tevinter mage whose help was spurned (and most probably would have agreed, besides), but the departure of the elven apostate was appreciably more memorable. The Herald's anger was swift and unforgiving; considerable Inquisition resources were diverted from aiding refugees and warding off demons to searching for a wayward mage to no success. But maybe this, too, was not so strange. After all, the Seeker was nearly as furious and the apostate had been the closest thing to an expert on the Breach at the Inquisition's disposal.

The dismissal of the Red Jenny could also be seen as reasonable. The Inquisition was growing in power and standing, of course they would want to consider their allies more carefully.

Even the Qunari mercenary made some sense - no one really trusted or even understood the Qunari.

But when the Revered Mother's gentle chastisement fell suddenly silent? When the Knight Commander's forces found their leadership usurped? Somebody should have noticed something. Somebody should have said something. Somebody should have done something.

A reformist magister had coined a phrase about bread and frivolities shortly before his assassination. Good to know that history was ever burdened with unlearned lessons.

The most amazing thing about the end of the world was that life went on. Every town they passed through, people continued to live their lives as best they could with demons baring down on them and the sky shining like a fractured mirror, living until something stopped them. Dorian wasn't even entirely sure whether the attention he and the Iron Bull drew was because the world at large was kind of threatening as of late or because a Tevinter mage and Qunari would always raise some eyebrows this far south.

Sometimes the Bull took Dorian's hand when they walked, a twisted fulfillment of a silly boy's dream, one he'd never dared voice and never hoped to have for real. Still, the Bull's hand was warm where everything else was cold and Dorian enjoyed it more than was probably sensible.

The Bull was holding Dorian's hand when they found the scrap of red fabric on the fountain - a match for the one that had been unceremoniously arrowed into their camp that morning. He couldn't begin to guess what manner of garment it had been in its former life.

The Bull bumped his shoulder. "Ready to be big damn heroes?"