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[Maria13]

Preface:

The Elven Princess and other Tales is a direct continuation of my previous FF novel, Dark Ritual which is over 250k words long, a tad too long to summerise here, I think. That took me over a year to write, don't know how long this one will take, I'm also attempting to write some original fic and, err, poetry. Well...

Encouragement, constructive comments, queries even, always welcome.

Oh and last but not least, thanks Bioware! Thanks David Gaider! For such wonderful stories, characters and settings...


Chapter 1: The Third Child: Beginnings


"You know," Fergus Cousland said, "this could take some time."

They were having breakfast in front of the fireplace in a small parlour in Highever and Fergus had one of his Mabaris, at his feet. He stooped down to pat its head.

"Really?" asked Alistair, who only had the vaguest of notions.

"Oh yes," Fergus replied patting the Mabari some more. "Oriana was a day and a half. Started in the afternoon, went through the night, actually two nights and then gave birth the following morning."

They were eating a light breakfast of scrambled eggs with brown bread-and-butter. "If I were you, Alistair, I would find something to do, take your mind off it as it were, go hunting get some of that paperwork done, teach the little lass to fish, something like that." Fergus spooned up the last of his egg took a bite from the crusty bread and chewed enthusiastically.

Alistair who had eaten a few mouthfuls already but somehow found it virtually tasteless, scooped up some more, but then he paused holding the spoon in midair… and put it down disheartened.

"You have to eat, you know. Keep up your strength…" The Teyrn remarked.

"I really don't think I'm that hungry…" Alistair didn't like hunting, nor could he imagine himself sitting down to do paperwork or even playing with Niamh undistracted by what was going on just a few corridors down.

Fergus shrugged, "suit yourself. But I have work to do. My seneschal needs an urgent meeting with me… He scrunched up his eyes and glanced over Alistair, "something to do with some new land taxes, or something…"

Alistair set his spoon in his dish. "Amazing what Anora gets up to when I'm not around, isn't it?" He said in his sweetest voice. He poured himself some fresh milk from a jug on the table and downed it in one go.

"Hmm. Quite." Said Fergus averting his gaze and dabbing at his mouth with a napkin. "Anyway…"

"Don't worry about me," said Alistair.

"Believe me," said Fergus getting to his feet. The Mabari followed suit. "I won't. Rosy's the one giving birth."

Alistair side shoved his dish to one side, "see you later then."

"Of course." Said Fergus leaving the room followed by his dog.

                                                                                            ~...~        

They'd had a few false alarms before, of course, but the previous night Cosy had been more restless than usual and started whimpering.

"Are the pains regular?" Alistair had asked with his arms round her, vaguely recalling something about regular spasms.

"I don't know… I don't know… They're just… Painful." She thrashed a little in his embrace.

Maker forgive him, he must have been more tired than he knew because the next thing he became aware of was Cosy thumping his chest. "Alistair, Alistair, wake up you dolt!"

"Uh…"

"I wet myself! I…" She paused and sucked in air, "The baby's moving... Oh Maker I think it's coming… Alistair, go fetch Bregeth… Quickly."

The bedclothes were a little sticky. "Ah…"

"Alistair!" Her voice was so shrill that for a moment his ears rung. "Go fetch Bregeth, you lug…"

"Right." He said tumbling more that climbing out of the bed.

Cosy had the sense to put tinder to the lamp. Alistair started fumbling around on the floor for his smallclothes. Finding them eventually he hopped into them and headed for the door.

"Take a light." Cosy instructed.

"Yes, of course." He replied turning back to the bed and lighting another lamp from the wick of the first.

He looked down at her. Her face was tight and set. She had her arms wrapped around herself and her hair was limp and stuck to her scalp where she had perspired. He reached out a hand and touched her cheek. "It'll be alright, you'll see."

"Hurry!" Cosy said, moaning and turning on her side.

"On my way…"

He opened the door and barrelled into the corridor almost knocking down Lawler as he went. "Keep an ear out… I'm fetching Bregeth…"

It was only when he was half-way to the room Bregeth shared with Niamh that he realised he could have sent Lawler and stayed with Cosy himself.

He'd barely knocked on the door when the lanky Elven woman opened it. Wrapping a shawl around her shoulders, it was early spring and the corridors of Highever were very draughty, and quietly closing the chamber door behind her, she followed him without a word.

When they got back to his and Cosy's room, Bregeth put a cautionary hand in the middle of his chest and, approaching the bed alone, got down on her knees. There followed a murmured conversation between the two women. Bregeth eventually pulled up the covers to examine his lover and Alistair turned his back to give them both some privacy.

After a few seconds he felt a light touch on his arm:

"Alistair, your child is on its way; send for Mrs Heath, in the meantime I will tend to Rosaura." Bregeth's voice was low and solemn.

Mrs Heath was Highever's most experienced midwife and she had been advised to await this call some two weeks ago.

"Is she alright?" asked Alistair looking towards the bed.

"Your Majesty, these things…" Bregeth's eyes drifted for a moment and then she blinked a few times and focussing directly on him, "So far so good, Alistair."

It was meant as reassurance and it worked.

Alistair went out to inform Lawler who departed for the village woman's house with the swiftness of a shadow. After hesitating a few moments Alistair returned to his bedchamber.

Bregeth was seated on the bed stroking Cosy's hand, talking to her quietly. He stopped in his tracks for a moment struck by how friendly the two suddenly appeared to be. They had had more than one argument since meeting but this now seemed to be behind them.

"Alistair..." Said Bregeth noticing him at last, "Take Niamh down to the kitchen, Cook said she would look after her..."

"I can look after her..." He asserted.

Bregeth shrugged her thin shoulders lightly under the shawl, "very well then..."

"I'll take her down to the kitchen and be right back..."

"Alistair, perhaps it would be for the best if you... Stayed away..."

Alistair glanced at Cosy; from under the covers she waved a dismissive hand in his general direction.

"Alright..."

                                                                                  ~...~

So here he was staring at his uneaten scrambled eggs and bread and butter.

He poured himself another cup of milk and gulped it down. He should go and check on Niamh, he thought.

He found cook sitting upright at the long kitchen staff table with her eyes closed, snoring peacefully. Cook was seventy if she was a day and breakfast, he imagined was one of her busy times. Cosy had told him she'd retired shortly before Highever was attacked by Howe and once Fergus returned had insisted on coming back again.

One of the scullery maids who happened to be around a short comely girl with wispy flaxen hair roused her by whispering in her ear. Cook woke with a jolt.

"Oh, oh, Your Majesty... I'm so sorry..."

"I just come to look in on my little girl..."

"Bonny..." Said cook.

"I'll take him to her, don't worry..." Said the maid and she beckoned to Alistair to follow her. On tiptoe they entered the main kitchen which smelt of porridge, boiled milk and sweet fresh baked bread. At the foot of a great iron stove still glowing there was a rough brown blanket.

Niamh still in her linen nightdress, which by now was a bit grubby, lay fast asleep with a thumb in her mouth and a serious expression on her face. Her other hand clasped her dolly Poppy's tangled hair. Next to her lay a large brown dog with a scattering of white hairs on his long muzzle.

"Rufus belongs to Cook and is very gentle, except if you happen to be a rat." Bonny explained, "My little Nella plays with him too when I bring her in. But Niamh was calling him 'orsy' and trying to get on his back in the yard outside while we were making breakfast. They ended up chasing each other round and round the yard..." Bonny shrugged. "Of course she should be taken to her cot..."

Alistair looked at his little girl in silence for a while. Niamh had been excited by the journey to Highever and seemed keen to get a horse of her own. He'd hoped Poppy would bring out her gentler side but Niamh just seemed to view her new doll as a fellow companion in her rough and tumble adventures. He'd not been present at Niamh's birth, hadn't even known of her existence until she was handed to him in a rather bizarre fashion. He would always hold that against her mother, and his former lover and fellow Grey Warden, Neriya Surana.

Alistair turned towards the door he'd made up his mind. "I'm happy to leave her here for the time being."

Bonny seemed appalled, "but your child, she's a..."

"I grew up in a kitchen much like this one myself..."

"Really? ..."

"With dogs, too, as my best friends..."

"Oh..."

"That could fly..." He grinned.

Bonny laughed.

"Just keep an eye out for her, will you? And take her back to her room when she wakes up or if she gets in the way too much. I have somewhere to be..."

                                                                                   ~...~

Mustering a great deal of his courage, Alistair tapped his knuckles on his bedroom door.

He could have sworn a voice from somewhere inside said "Go away!", but he knocked again.

Eventually the door opened a crack and a wide red face appeared, "Who..." the unknown woman ran her eyes grey/blue eyes over his face. "Hmmm... It doesn't matter even if it is you, you can't..."

Bregeth's long face appeared above the other face. "I think we are going to have to let the fool in, Mrs Heath, otherwise he'll just keep persisting."

Mrs Heath snorted and reluctantly tugged the door open. She was about half Alistair's size but about two-thirds of his bulk, solidly built. She looked a little like a frog. She wore a peasant's simple plain smock, darkly coloured. The contrast between her and the elf was rather striking...

Cosy was sitting propped up by a pile of pillows in the bed wearing a red robe, a birthing robe it was later explained to him. Alistair made a beeline for her but was intercepted almost forcibly by Bregeth.

"Alistair... Some ground rules..."

"Right..."

"One: You're here just for Rous..."

"Well of course..."

"This is a painful process; she may curse and swear at you, since you're at least partly to blame..."

"Uh..."

"Just grin and bear it, don't react... Battlefield stuff..."

"I can do..."

"I know. I know you can... But last and not least if she asks you to leave... Go... Sometimes women don't want their men to see them like this... Sometimes they just find them an annoyance... it won't last, if everything goes well... In a few days' time she'll forget all she's been through, it just blends in with the background, and she'll have hundreds of other things on her mind..." Bregeth's eyebrows gathered, "Well most women forget... Not all... But... You understand?"

Alistair took a deep breath. "Yes I do. Thank you for caring for her Bregeth..."

"Now go see her and help her." And Bregeth patted him on the back just above his backside, a strangely intimate gesture.

By the time he got to her Cosy was on all fours. Instinctively he reached for a flannel that had been placed in a basin at the side of her bed, wrung it out.

"How's it going, my love?"

Cosy sat back on her knees. "In between times it's fine, but when it hurts... Mrs Heath says I should use the in between times to take deep breaths, at least two, one for me and one for the baby, and collect myself... Ugh!" Alistair had just mopped her face.

"Sorry..."

"Please don't do that unless I ask you to... How's Niamh..."

So Alistair told her how he'd found his daughter Cosy laughed... and then grimaced when she had a spasm and reached out for his hand. Alistair felt her strong grip dig into the palm of his hand as she gritted her teeth. He found it strangely satisfying.

Once that had passed Alistair repeated to her what he had told Bonny about being brought up by flying dogs. Cosy reacted well, so he went on to tell her about the time he'd managed to lock himself in a cage and was trapped there all day...

From then on, he used his imagination. Told her they would one day visit Orlais and he would live on cheese and Cosy on cakes. Cosy liked cake. Or that they would take a silver ship to Antiva where the sun always shone to visit the vineyards and drink dark red wine to their heart's content.

Every now and then he would support her in a walk around the room, apparently that was good for her. When they were arm in arm Alistair pretended they were walking through some of the woods surrounding Highever, as they had been just a few weeks before and point out a squirrel to her or a pheasant and Cosy would pretend to see it and respond in kind.

On one such walk Cosy stopped at one point and placing her hands on his face looked Alistair in the eye and said, "You know I love you very much, don't you?" Pain seemed to have concentrated her features and given a feverish intensity to her gaze and for once, Alistair was at a loss for words and could only nod in response.

As for the hand squeezing, it evolved through scratching to pummelling with Alistair complementing Cosy on the strength behind her punches as she hit his chest. He feigned injury. Cosy called him a wimp and a craven and socked him even harder. So he rolled on the bed moaning in mock consternation while Cosy alternatively hiccoughed with laughter and grizzled in pain.

"Why is it hurting so much? Why doesn't it stop?" Cosy asked the midwife.

"Because your body is working right, it's readying itself..." Ms Heath replied.

Mrs Heath checked on Cosy and suggested tactfully that perhaps she should save her strength as she might need it later...

A little after that he had a head-to-head with Bregeth and Mrs Heath and it was suggested that Cosy could eat. Being assured by Mrs Heath that she did not think the birth was imminent Alistair agreed to go down to the kitchens to make some arrangements for food.

About three quarters of an hour later the kitchen provided some chicken, all nicely cut up, some clear chicken broth and some fruit, winter apples, pears and nuts.

Cosy took one look at the chicken and turned away. She took a sip of broth and so did Alistair but despite his encouragement she said she couldn't stomach more. Alistair peeled an apple and she did chew a bit of that.

Most of the afternoon was much the same, the walks, the tussles, the breathing and the contractions... At one point Alistair fell asleep kneeling by the bed and with his head on the covers and Cosy gently ran her hands through his hair until the pains started again...

Towards evening, the spasms became more constant, with less space between them. Alistair caught Bregeth and Mrs Heath sharing a look, perhaps Cosy did too, and realised that something was happening. After about an hour of tossing and turning on the bed attempting to find a position that was comfortable for more than a few minutes and failing, Cosy said she needed to get up. Alistair supported her as before but she was very unsteady so Bregeth held her other arm, she took a few steps and then eyes fixed on the ceiling (Alistair following her gaze noticed it could do with some dusting) she took a deep, deep breath that filled her whole frame and let loose an unearthly ear-shattering yell.

"Good!" He heard Bregeth exclaim softly and she moved her hold from Cosy's arm to her shoulders and lower back. Stunned by the shout, Alistair automatically followed suit and not a moment too soon because Cosy began thrashing.

Mrs Heath moved quickly from the other side of the room as if sliding on grease and was standing in front of them.

"Deep regular breaths, my lady, and push when you get the urge..."

And Cosy was furiously gulping breaths bearing down on her belly and squatting lower and making very loud and unladylike ugggh, uggggggggggggggh sounds intersped with yelps and squeals... Mrs Heath dropped to her knees.

Alistair tore his eyes away from what Mrs Heath might be doing and looked over Cosy's shoulders at Bregeth. Her face under the turmoil of tattoos bore a stern serene expression that he had never seen before, as if it were cast in stone and she was whispering or chanting something he did not understand but which he suspected was Dalish under her breath.

"Good..." Mrs Heath was saying, "Good woman, not long now, not long, just a few more..."

Bregeth seemed then to snap to and gave Alistair a fleeting smile. He smiled weakly back and just then Cosy let loose an unearthly scream, there was a gush of liquid from her lower body and Mrs Heath had a bundle in her arms and started cooing.

She reached to the back of her smock and drew out a short glittering blade. Bregeth murmured a few words that Alistair did not quite catch and then he realised that Mrs Heath, still on her knees was offering him the blade handle first...

Things happened very quickly after that.

                                                                                        ~...~

Apparently Alistair did cut what there was to cut and then standing very slowly allowed the knife to slip from his fingers... something he had never done, even in the midst of the fiercest battle...

His first conscious but garbled thought following that was whether he should head for Mrs Heath and the bundle in the corner or stay with Cosy whom Bregeth was assisting back onto the bed...

Bregeth shooed him away so the choice was actually made for him.

It was tiny and wrinkled and looked like a skinned nug... Except for a mass of red hair. It was also quiet. Mrs Heath was bathing it in a basin and then she pulled it out lay it across her left shoulder and rapped it brusquely on the back...

He hadn't realised that the room was so still until that silence was broken by a humungous burp from the little thing on Mrs Heath's shoulder. The sound was out of all proportion to its size. From the other side of the room, Cosy laughed. The burp was followed by a gulp and then some raucous crying.

Mrs Heath removed the thing from her shoulder wrapped it tightly in a woollen shawl and handed it to him.

"Sire, you have a son..." He looked down at it: Its little red face was contorted its mouth gaping and it was waving its tiny fists erratically as if in the throes of a mighty temper tantrum.

For the second time in just a few hours Alistair was speechless.

                                                                                         ~...~

"Bryce." Said Cosy. It was the next day and they were naming the... His and Cosy's child, er... Son.

"I like Bryce," He replied, relieved it wasn't Fergus.

Cosy who was lying in bed handed him the precious bundle of new life. "You should give him a name too," She said, "Nobles always have more than one first name." she added when she saw him hesitate.

It was really no choice, no choice at all. "Duncan" he said, closing his eyes for an instant, recalling the gaunt tawny figure of Ferelden's Grey Warden Commander as he brought his son close to his face so he could feel the baby's faint, sweet breath on his chin.

"Duncan is good; he was from Highever, too. Always a plus." Said Cosy Alistair wondered whether she was relieved it wasn't Maric or Cailan. She held out her arms and Bryce Duncan was carefully placed in them.

"Perhaps he should have another name..." Alistair proposed cautiously. "One of his own... so he can be his own man..."

"What would you suggest? I mean 'Burp' would be strictly for the family..."

Alistair smiled, "A true Theirin..." He ran his hand gently over 'Burp' Bryce Duncan's mop of red hair, "Roan... Roan..." He said suddenly, "That means red doesn't it... Because apart from the burp... that was the first thing I saw of him..."

Cosy pulled the baby close to her breasts. "My little Roan, my lovely, my sweet, Highever's future..."

And so it was done.

Modifié par Maria13, 24 décembre 2011 - 05:15 .

[Maria13]

Chapter 2

DA 9:34 [some three years before Chapter 1] Solice/Solace The Kocari wilds

It wasn't until he had rounded up the goats an hour before evenfall that Wasim noticed the little grey and black kid was missing. Its mother, a youngish nanny was restless and bleating plaintively, rooting about the ground looking confused.

Wasim knew then he was in trouble, more likely than not a lone wolf or wild dog had taken it, he had no time to search for it home and a safe pen for the other goats for the night was a good few miles away.

His mother would get mad and might even beat him. She would probably be right to. Instead of guarding his charges like a good shepherd or even a good boy would, Wasim had spent the day building a model irrigation system, a little channel leading from the stream running through the pasture into a series of pools and other channels blocked with a stick gate until the rest of the system was ready.

Things were tough at home: His father had died suddenly at the beginning of last winter and even though he was believed to have accrued a little stash which he kept in an old crinkled leather pouch, his mother had been unable to find it and the thought that it might be somewhere nearby had driven her almost crazy. So Wasim took the goats to pasture daily and mother tried her hand at spinning, cooking, sowing and whatever else could earn them the pittance they needed to obtain food.

Mother ranted and raved and called him idle and a good for nothing... Things might have gone further if Micah hadn't happened to turn up. Today's excuse was that his sister-in-law had cooked too much for the three of them and Micah wondered whether Wasim and his mother would like a few servings... Mother poured her heart out to him and began to weep against his chest while Micah patted her gently on the shoulder.

"At least your boy is honest and did the right thing returning home when he did..." Micah said glancing at Wasim. "And he looks very sorry for it, I'm sure it won't happen again."

Wasim stuck his tongue out at Micah, who smiled.

                                                                                            ~...~          

The crows flew away in a rustled flurry of dust and black wings.

But one of the birds refused to budge. It was quite small but it strutted up and down ****ily and looked Wasim straight in the eye and cawed... This made Wasim really wild, something of his mother's anger erupted in him. He looked around desperately and finding a few pebbles pelted the bird. The bird appeared to duck and skip avoiding the stones at one point it took to the air and Wasim believed for a moment he had triumphed and set it to flee but it swiftly returned and made little snappy pecking motions in his direction as if aiming for his face... Eventually, one of the stones hit its left wing and knocked it off balance... Only then, following a sharp, almost indignant caw, did the bird flap its wings and appear to fly away leaving Wasim to examine what was left of the kid...

Which was nothing really, most had been picked clean and maggots were already breeding in its eye sockets, nostrils and mouth and under its rib cage. Wasim studied them for a while, observing how they wriggled and jigged anxious for life and flesh and then pulling out his knife, from the hide around his waist with some sawing, severed the little goat's hooves from the corpse so he could use them for carving. He was just tugging at the gristle of the fourth one when he felt a tap on the back of his knee. He dropped his knife and turned abruptly almost losing his balance.

He found himself looking down into two pale green eyes over a pert nose and a wide smile. The toddler seemed to be about three-years' old and like Micah, was a pale skinned Ferelden, despite an even tan. He was stark naked.

The dark-haired toddler didn't talk much, when Wasim asked him his name he lowered his head and gargled something in the back of his throat, but it turned out he was a good listener, tilting his head and smiling while Wasim spoke. Soon Wasim found himself telling him all about his life which didn't last very long because Wasim was only eight and his life, he felt, had been pretty boring. Later on he introduced the toddler to all the goats by name as he checked on them, and even got the ram, old Brawler, to lick his hand which made the toddler chortle.

Wasim shared his lunch with him under the shade of the large fig tree and tried to teach him to play his little wooden flute but the child did not seem to be able to grasp it and only puffed out his cheeks and blew into the instrument producing a strange keening sound... Admittedly his tiny fingers were too small to properly seal up the right holes.

As the time to depart for his village grew near, Wasim began to worry, there was no way he could take his new friend home even just for the evening, another mouth to feed would tip his mother over the edge. While he checked on all the goats again, Wasim wondered how to deal with this.

Eventually he decided that honesty was the best policy. He cleared his throat: "I would be honoured if I could share my table with you but..."

The toddler who had been attempting to draw Old Brawler with a stick in the dust, looked up with those extraordinary eyes of his and shook his head. So it was when the time to depart came, Wasim drove the goats before him and waved good bye to the younger child who was standing under the large fig tree, his hand in the air in a solemn farewell.

                                                                                                    ~...~

If Wasim had hoped to see the toddler again the next day he went to pasture he was disappointed. But on the third (or was it the fourth?) day the toddler was there once again. Naked and as bright as a button. He smiled at Wasim as he approached with the goats and when he was a few yards away put a finger to his chest, opened his mouth and said, with some effort.

"C-C-C-Cor... mac. Three. Boy."

Though the latter piece of information was obvious, Wasim welcomed the other two and noted with some satisfaction that 'Cormac' like Micah was a Fereldan not a Chasind name.

He tried to induce Cormac to speak a little more but apart from a few mumbled yeses and some noes those were the only words he would say until they approached Old Brawler who seemed to have become the toddler's favourite amongst the goats. When Cormac put out a hand to stroke the ram's nose Wasim noticed a nasty black bruise on his left arm just above the elbow.

"Who hurt you?" Asked Wasim, his was a tough world, hurts almost always came from someone or something.

Cormac turned around and still smiling placed a tiny index finger in the centre of Wasim's chest. "It wasn't me..." Said Wasim surprised, "It wasn't me, you're wrong."

The toddler nodded vigorously and made a clucking sound in the back of his throat.

"I didn't!" Said Wasim who was beginning to get angry.

Cormac's reaction to this denial was strange... He spun in place on his toes and a waft of warm air hit Wasim and made him blink. When he opened his eyes in the place where Cormac had been there was instead a little bird, a perky little crow, just like the one that other day... Oh.

                                                                                            ~...~

Two weeks later it was Wasim's turn to attend to Ellim the village elder for one day. The goats stayed in their pen and Wasim swept, tidied, brewed sweet floral tea and cooked for the old man.

It wasn't until they were eating a supper of roast vegetables and herbs that the raised the issue with the old man.

"A bird you say?" Said Ellim chewing with his mouth full he only had about three teeth in his upper gums and no more than seven in his lower, his faced had sort of scrunched up over the years and he couldn't see very well. He was hunched over his dish.

"A crow." Wasim said, "a little crow, young like him."

"Hummmph." Said Ellim helping himself to another spoonful.

There was a long silence only broken by mastication sounds.

"Ah, well now... People have been known to turn into wolves..." He said vaguely.

"Everybody knows about werewolves, baba VaEllim..." said Wasim.

"There was a witch muroyi somewhere to the north of here, no so long ago..." Ellim replied licking his spoon, "She had many daughters but they all looked the same, they were familiar with..."

"This was a boy..."

"Hummm yes, but what was the colour of his hair?"

"Black, like a crow's wing."

"And his eyes, eh muko?"

"Gold, sometimes, amber others, in the morning especially, green."

"So they changed colour?"

It was Wasim's turn to hesitate, "Perhaps..." He said.

"He could be related to this witch..." mused Ellim, "but I've only ever heard of females, her and her daughters..."

"He has never harmed me... He seems friendly..."

"But you are still worried..."

Wasim hadn't eaten much and stirred what was left in his dish, "I need to know if he is good..."

"Is he good?" Ellim asked.

"That's what I said..."

"I mean," said Ellim, "only you can say, muko... I haven't met him... Some will tell you that only people of our own kind, Chasind, are good." He paused to stifle a yawn, "That Fereldens, strangers, outsiders and whatnot are all evil, all want to harm us, use us or get something for nothing. I won't tell you that, because that is not what I have seen and I have lived rather a long time."

Wasim's face crumpled in thought, remembering the bruise on the toddler's arm, "I believe he's good..."

"Ask him for something... If he wishes to extract something in exchange then he may not be good, but if he wants to help you without any reward then he just wants to be a friend."

"I will." Suddenly Wasim felt a lot happier.

"But be careful, if he asks something in exchange Wasim, especially for something that makes you feel uncomfortable... Tell him 'no' very clearly then and don't give in, whatever you do... Now, muko, leave me to my dreamweed..."

                                                                                                           ~...~

Three days later the next time Wasim met Cormac he went into some detail about his mother and the missing money pouch. He was not entirely sure that Cormac, who was busy drawing trees and goats and even Wasim himself in the dust, understood everything he said or was following the main points of his explanation, but he rounded up his piece by asking, "So will you try and do this for me?"

Cormac squinted looking over to where two of the younger goats appeared to be playing, frolicking and chasing each other around the pasture. "Yes" he replied.

Wasim waited a little while but he added nothing else. He put the bent, rusty copper in the sand between them. "Coins look like this," he said.

Cormac picked it up and looked at it briefly, weighed it in his hand, he didn't seem very impressed. "Yes." He repeated and gave it back to the elder boy.

Wasim decided not to importune him any further.

                                                                                   ~...~

It seemed that a lone wolf or a wild dog had caught the mage they had pursued for three days first.

"Not much of him left," Said Yrsa who was leading the four Templars and a mabari in her usual laconic tone, "Just a few scraps of his robes, bones and a little flesh... Poor fool. He would have done better to stay in the tower. Mages are not made for the outside." She prodded the sad bundle with her left sabaton.

The tiny platoon was Yrsa's first command, a female Templar was still a rarity but less so after the Blight.

"It happens," Said Mullen, "Don't take it to heart..."

From under her raised visor thrice-widowed Yrsa quirked a heavy eyebrow at the youth who was young enough to be her son and barely old enough to grow a beard. "I don't."

"Too late to start back now." She said stretching and addressing the rest of the party standing behind her. "Nice place to camp. Let's do it and start off fresh in the morn. Mullen, you can cook and take first watch."

Predictably Mullen groaned and equally predictably the others laughed or at least smiled. Yrsa seemed to know instinctively how to hit the right notes.

While Mullen struggled with the fire, Bald Bottomley settled down with the book he never seemed to finish and which, illiterate Yrsa joked, while winking at the others, rather than the combat manual he said it was, was really a tender-hearted romance, Yrsa, Sams and Kieron set up the dice game. Unlike many Templar commanders Yrsa was opposed to drinking but apparently not to gambling.

Earth came up trumps which meant water would be the enhancer and fire the deuce.

"E'th." Sams groaned, "Donna like it, neither did...Too passive."

"Earth" Yrsa replied, "is what we died for..." No-one was going to dispute that with her. Yrsa had helped form the militia that defended her village from the Darkspawn.

Once they'd had their supper the three of them save for Bottomley, a firm believer in early nights who curled up with his mabari Stalker and Mullen who was on watch, started playing. When Mullen's watch was over the game was in full swing and he was allowed to join it while Sams retired to take second watch. The Templers were far from rich so they played for coppers and the odd silver Sams who sent most of his earnings to his mother, had had to resort to IOUs.

Mullen was lucky that night and had soon accrued a tiny silver and copper hoard. When Yrsa rose to take third watch the game had all but ended through exhaustion more than anything else. The night was rather balmy so Mullen who couldn't be bothered to crawl into his sleeping furs simply drooped amongst his stash next to the waning fire.

When shortly after dawn the bald Templar returned to the camp with Stalker just after taking a dip in a nearby pond he saw from a few yards away something that appeared to be scrabbling around the still prone Mullen. At first he thought it was the other Mabari but it was too small, then perhaps a rabbit or a rat but when it stood up, he saw, beyond a doubt, that it was a child. For a very brief moment, their eyes met, the child's were green, he was carrying something in his hand which he dropped.

Before Bottomley could pause to take this in, there was a rush of black wings. Stalker who had no truck with hesitation was already launching forward off his powerful hind legs and managed to catch the bird, there was a screeched caw that turned to a very human cry...

A dazed Mullen raised his head, "What in Andraste's... Stalker... Bugger..."

                                                                                                   ~...~

"So Yrsa, you left looking for one mage and return with another?" Carroll asked, "I always said you were a strange one. Still, he's so tiny he's more a magelet than a mage. Perhaps you should have just let Stalker finish him off, you could then have saved on the food..."

From his seat in the middle of the boat Bottomley scowled at the Templar ferryman he did not take kindly to Carroll even on his best days, "Stalker does not eat children, mages or not..." At his feet lying on the planks Stalker whined as if in protest. Bottomley patted the hound's head "He was just confused, the boy turned into a crow and then back into a boy when Stalker caught him by the leg..."

"Andraste's smallclothes..." Muttered Carroll, as he rowed the boat through the waters of Lake Calenhad "a rare bird indeed... I'm surprised you're not clutching him, Yrsa."

"We put a bracelet on him, had to use a link from the adult manacles, beat it into shape with a rock, I don't think he realises. As for carrying him, he doesn't seem to like me, Carroll, he squeals every time I've tried."

"Oh, I would do the same... Shall we try later? I can squeal most appealingly..."

Yrsa rolled her eyes.

"Tyke's a theef too." Added Sams who was also pulling oars, "He was a'trying to steal Mullen's winnins when he caught him..."

"A thief AND a magelet... What is Thedas coming to?"

"Don't listen to them, Cormac," Mullen whispered to the toddler, he was holding against his cuirass. "See, there's the Tower, isn't it nice?" Without realising Cormac scratched the cut on his leg because it was itching. "Don't do that", the silverskin with the kind eyes told him, "you'll remove the poultice and the wound will mortify... You don't want that to happen..."

He couldn't understand everything that was being said, far from it, but he felt much better now because he of the second voice had told him two nights ago while he was asleep not to worry. "You are where you should be... You will be safe..." Cormac was not sure whether he actually used words or not, but in any event that was what he understood. That and the fact that he seemed to be beyond 'meth... Or perhaps she had left before, let him go... He couldn't quite work it out. It didn't matter...

He'd never seen so much water in one place, it moved in a strange way under the boat. And then there was that place Mullen had pointed to... He pressed his hands against the metal chest plate and the young Templar released him. Cormac moved closer to the boat's prow to get a better look... it was tall, taller than any tree he had ever seen... He turned looked interrogatively at the young Templar.

"The Tower of Mages," Mullen explained in response to that look, "All mages in Ferelden live there... You are a mage, Cormac, that will be your new home."

Cormac raised his eyes; the tower's summit seemed to be lost in the dawn clouds. He wondered what it would feel like to fly from such a height, feel the ebbs and flurries of the air currents under his wings. He was looking forward to it...