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Broken Souls: Chapter 62

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Chapter Sixty Two

Garrett felt his stomach surge in horror as he dropped to his knees beside Anders. The mage had a wound on his forehead that was bleeding sluggishly, a line of red curving down his cheek and his neck, and although the gash looked painful he didn't seem to pay it any heed. Tahlie was deathly still in his arms, her eyes closed and her face relaxed despite the vicious burns on her wrists.

He tried to push back the panic rising in his throat. "Is she-?"

"Alive," Anders whispered; the layers evident in that single word were staggering. Panic and guilt and sorrow and love and hysteria and more, all sobbed in the space of two syllables. His arms tightened around her, and his fingers were brushing down the side of her face. "She's alive. I didn't kill her."

Garrett let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. "What's wrong with her then?" he asked hesitantly, feeling the others crowd into the cell behind him. Merrill put her hand on his shoulder, and he absently reached up to cover her fingers with his hand. Sebastian started to mutter something, and then made an 'oomph' noise. "Not the time, Choir Boy," Varric muttered.

Anders hardly seemed to register the question, instead murmuring something to Tahlie while he stroked her cheek; he bowed his head and made a keening noise, sobbing in a jagged breath as he pulled her closer and pressed his cheek to hers. She didn't even move.

It was the first time that Garrett had seen Tahlie's scars laid out so openly, and the evidence of the sadistic violence that had been wrought against her made him feel ill. He reached out awkwardly and placed his free hand on Anders' shoulder. "What's wrong with her Anders?" he said softly. "Why won't she wake up? Is she just unconscious?"

"Who cares what's wrong with her?" Sebastian snapped, pushing past Varric and Merrill and coming to stop beside Garrett. "Hawke, this woman is an abomination- she is worse than your pet apostate, because as much as I hate to admit it at least he has some control over his creature. She carries nothing but darkness in her; you must destroy her."

Garrett tightened his hand on Anders' shoulder, a warning to him not to speak. Regardless, he still felt the other man tense instantly at Sebastian's words. Garrett patted him comfortingly, before standing up slowly and turning to face the prince. "Sebastian," he said quietly, stepping in closer to him. "I understand that you think the Maker is just dandy, and that you're all invigorated in your faith and how it's given you purpose and direction in life." He paused, his eyes darkening as he visibly fought to rein in his temper. When he continued, his voice was even softer. "But unless your god comes down and speaks to me personally on the matter, you will not touch a hair on Tahlindra's head, and Anders goes without saying."

Sebastian reddened and his eyes flashed angrily. "You would blaspheme and deny the written word of the prophet all at once? This woman is a monster! She must-"

"A monster is someone who has lost the capacity for grace and forgiveness," Hawke said softly, his voice full of quiet menace "and someone who determines that their understanding of the world is enough to condemn another person to death."

Silence fell on the group, awkward and sharp with the threat of violence between the two men. Finally Sebastian looked away first. "You would allow an abomination to live, simply because she is the lover of your friend?"

Garrett snorted humourlessly. "I would allow a gentle woman to live, who despite a curse inflicted upon her by the most evil woman in existence, retains grace and humility and love in her soul."

Sebastian's nostrils flared. "She has killed people. She tried to kill me."

"And you sent me to kill two dozen men, who may have had wives and children and parents and friends. Tell me what's worse, Sebastian- a mindless creature that kills because that's all it knows what to do, or a man who pays another to end the lives of others because their very existence offends him?"

The prince took a step backwards, horror flickering over his expression. "You would compare me avenging the murder of my family, of innocent women and children, to the ravaging slaughter and terror inflicted by a demon?"

Garrett stared at him coldly, his eyes not moving from Sebastian's face. "I would very much like you to go to the surface now, Sebastian," he said quietly. "I am certain that the Guard Captain will have someone on hand to escort you back to the city if you so desire it, but I would appreciate it if you left now."

"And what am I supposed to do if I come across the same wretches who caged me in the first place? Smile and apologise and say that Serah Hawke sent me on my way without a permission slip?"

For the first time, Garrett's mask slipped. "Get out, Sebastian!" he snarled, grabbing the prince by the front edge of his breast plate and then shoving him backwards into the cage wall. "You and your self-righteousness are no longer welcome in my home or in my company! Leave now, before I let Anders have five minutes alone with you!"

The prince stumbled as he staggered backwards, and only just caught himself on the cage. He righted himself, brushing himself down with jerky movements. "You have lost an ally today, Hawke," he snapped, before stalking from the room with a slight limp from his earlier injuries.

Silence reigned as his footsteps stomped off into the distance, echoing through the endless tunnels; Varric and Merrill shifted uncomfortably as Garrett knelt down before Anders again. Anders hardly seemed to be paying attention to them, murmuring softly to Tahlie as tears glistened on his face in the low light; his shoulders were shaking slightly as he rocked her slowly.

Varric stepped forward and crouched beside Garrett. "Was that a good idea, Hawke?" he asked. "Vael is not an insignificant man to piss off."

Garrett's eyes were dark, and his shoulders were still tense with anger. "Bethany trusted Tahlie, enough to give up her freedom to protect her. I won't squander her sacrifice by just handing Tahlie over to the first arsehole who gets all high and mighty with me."

The dwarf sighed and rolled his shoulders. "Fair enough, Hawke. Your call. But Broody is still face down in the other cell, and we don't know if Aveline got all the slavers. What do you want to do?"

The warrior was quiet as he stared at Anders and Tahlie; there was a touch of something in his eyes that was not entirely platonic, but was something more akin to jealous regret. He ignored Varric's question as he leant forward and touched his hand to Anders' shoulder again. "Anders?"

"She won't wake up," he repeated brokenly.

Garrett gritted his teeth in what was beginning to feel like frustration. "So you've said. Why? What's wrong with her, Anders?"

Anders shuddered once and lifted his head from where it rested against Tahlie's cheek. "It… it was magic. I'm not… I don't really recognise it. Justice seems to know a bit about it though, and he seems to think it was similar to the magic that bound her in the first place."

Garrett glanced down at the burns on her wrists. "What was she bound to?"

"They bound her to the demon," he whispered. "The demon broke through from the Fade, and then they trapped it in her body. She… Justice thinks that her soul got wrapped too tightly around it, and when it got sucked back into the Fade she went with it."

That didn't sound pleasant. "And what do you think?"

He finally glanced up, the haunted look of desolation in his eyes making Garrett lean subtly away in horror. "I… I don't know. She's done something like this before, and I thought it was just… I mean, I didn't think demons were involved then. I've never heard of anything like this happening before. I just… why did I leave her alone?"

The question didn't seem to need an answer, and as Anders pulled Tahlie tightly against his chest, brushing her loose hair away from her face while he crooned desperate apologies to her and kissed her closed eyes, Garrett abruptly couldn't stand the intimacy any longer. He stood up and gestured for Merrill and Varric to follow him to the mouth of the cage. They weren't really out of hearing range, but he doubted that Anders would be aware of a damned thing he said. He could probably say he was going to marry the Knight Commander and institute martial law, and the mage wouldn't even raise a whimper.   

"Merrill," he said, waving her closer, "can you take a look at Fenris? See if he's badly hurt, or just unconscious?"

"I can't heal, Garrett," she said nervously. "I mean, I can certainly try, but I don't have the gift that Anders does, and I know that Fenris doesn't like me so I don't think he'd appreciate it if I didn't get it right and he was-"

"Merrill," Garrett said firmly, cutting her off. Her mouth snapped shut and her eyes widened for a moment, as if his tone had been harsher than he'd thought. He fought the urge to sigh, and instead brought his hand up to her cheek. "Please, Merrill," he said, softening his expression. "You don't need to heal him, but you'll have a much better idea of his condition than me or Varric would. Just take a look at him- for me?"

The way her eyes lit up made him want to grin foolishly, or squeeze her to him. There was something so endearing about her that he couldn't help but feel himself cave just a little bit more towards her. At the realisation, a little more of his heart died as he recognised the significance of his feelings. "Oh, of course I'll do it for you Garrett!" Her buoyant tone just drove the knife in a little further and he turned to Varric before his feelings showed in his face. "Varric, see if you can get the cell open for her to have a look at him."

The two of them ducked out of the mangled cell and headed for Fenris' cage; he heard the sound of Varric fiddling with the lock and muttering to himself as he turned back towards Anders. The mage was nearly insensible, and was being far from helpful right now. Garrett sighed and sat down next to him, eyeing his hands warily when he saw flickers of blue dancing up and down his fingers. "You with me, Anders?" he said carefully.

Anders made a noise that could have been a laugh, or it could have been a sob; his face was pressed into Tahlie's hair, so it was hard to tell. "I don't know what to do," he whispered. "I don't know how to fix her. I shouldn't have left her; this would never have happened if I'd been there."

"You don't know that," Garrett said, his eyes drifting unintentionally to the scars on Tahlie's body. They were so numerous, and some so horrific that he had to wonder how she'd lived through the procedures that had put them there in the first place; he felt his skin crawl when a low growl echoed through the room, and he looked up to see Anders watching him… his eyes blue instead of brown.

"Do not look upon her," Justice hissed. "She is not yours to see."

Garrett made a great show of looking away, so as not to antagonise the spirit. The blue mist cast eerie, flickering shadows over the roughhewn walls of the cell, making the scene more nightmarish than it already was. "What's wrong with her, Justice? Anders said you knew a little of what they did to her."

The spirit snarled unhappily, lightning pulsing over his features. The smell of ozone was thick in the air, like in the minutes just before a storm erupted. "She is likely in the Fade. Her soul has fled from her body, most likely with the fiend that stole her form in the first place."

He took a deep breath. "And how do we get her back? What did you do last time to retrieve her?"

"I was not involved in the incident last time," Justice said, his eyes darting down to Tahlie's still form. His rigid body language did not change, but the intensity of the power rolling off him softened a little. "But from Anders' memories, she seemed to retrieve herself, or was aided by one of my kin in the process."

Garrett rubbed his face tiredly. "Okay, pretending that I understand that for a moment, can we expect her to do the same thing again? Will she fix herself?"

"I have no idea," the spirit snarled. "Our combined knowledge of such things does not provide us with a definitive answer. We do not know which spirit it is that has taken her, or even if it is the spirit to blame and not the malignant bindings placed upon her."

Garrett glanced down at the fresh burns on Tahlie's wrists. When Justice growled aggressively, pulling her tightly against his chest, Garrett threw his hands in the air in frustration. "Maker's Breath, Justice, calm down! I'm not looking to steal Tahlie away from you." When Justice didn't answer, merely glared, he said "Well, if you're going to be territorial and irrational, let Anders have his body back so I can talk to him and have a sensible conversation!"

"She needs us to be strong for her," Justice hissed. "I am stronger than Anders. Grief has weakened him; I will care for her and defend her."

Garrett's patience was wearing unreasonably thin. "Justice…" he said warningly.

"She is mine to defend!" Justice snapped. "You will not interfere!"

"And I told you once before, spirit, that things are never in shades of black and white as you imagine them to be," Garrett snapped back. "Just because Anders is grieving doesn't make him weak. Let me talk to him, or interfering will seem pleasant in comparison to what I'll do to you!"

Justice stared at him, fury flickering in the infinite blue depths of his eyes. "I will do as you request," he growled softly, "but only because Anders desires it also. You have no power over me, mortal. You'd do well to remember that." In the space of a heartbeat he was gone, and Anders was there, his eyes haunted and guilt-stricken. "Hawke," he began, "you know he doesn't-"

"We'll leave that for a more appropriate time," he interrupted. It was hardly the right moment to discuss Justice's increasingly erratic behaviour wherever Tahlie was concerned. "You need to get her to safety, and hopefully it'll be enough that she just has a warm bed and a respite from evil magics."

Something hardened in Anders' eyes. "But if Mel was the one who sent the slavers, you'll need my help."

"Tahlie needs you more than I do. You need to take her home."

The sudden change from grief to anger was slightly frightening. "You can't underestimate Mel, Garrett," he snapped. "You have no idea how powerful she is. She-"  

Garrett put his hand on his shoulder and pushed him back when he started to sit forward. "I'm not asking anymore, Anders. I'm telling you. Take Tahlie back to my house," he said, fishing the set of keys from beneath his armour. "She'll be safer there if there really are people after her. We will deal with whoever was responsible for this."

There was a darkness in Anders' eyes that was utterly inhuman. "They hurt her," he said softly.

"And they will suffer for it," Garrett promised. "Now take her home. She needs you more than she needs revenge."

***

Once Anders was safely on his way, Tahlie tucked carefully into his arms and with assurances that he was welcome to keep her there for as long as he felt it was necessary, Garrett sighed and rubbed at his face before heading back into the cell block towards the cage that held Fenris. This day was fast turning into a nightmare, and so far he'd managed to yell at just about every one of his friends at some point for their blatant idiocy. Surely it was going to stop at some point and someone would show signs of being a rational, sensible adult.

Surely.

Merrill was kneeling beside the other elf, a faint greyish white glow rolling between her outstretched hands; her eyes were shut and her brow was furrowed in concentration. Fenris was slumped on the ground, still bound by more chains than seemed necessary for a single prisoner… but then again it was Fenris. He didn't really know many people who could punch through rib cages.

"Interesting that the hunters came so prepared," Varric said shrewdly, mirroring Garrett's thoughts exactly.

Garrett rolled his shoulders, already feeling the burn from the fighting settling into the muscles. It was going to be a long day. "More so that they seemed prepared for Tahlie's surprise talent and Fenris too," he said, watching Merrill weave her hands backwards and forwards as the soft light spilled from her fingers. She seemed so graceful as she worked, so at odds with the adorably clumsy young woman she presented most of the time. It was a painful reminder that she was more than endearing, and that what he was feeling was more than just gentle affection for a friend. Shying away from that thought, he said "So, any theories? Have you seen anything to suggest who they were after?"

Varric shrugged. "I made a point not to really stop and chat with anybody on my way through. My Arcanum's not great anyway, all I can say is 'tell me where the nearest tavern is' and 'I think someone's shanked me'. Although I suppose I could have used the second one if I'd come across more than one of the bastards."  

"You'd make a terrible spy," Garrett said solemnly.

"At least I know how to spell subtlety, and know what it is to begin with."

"Oh, but subtlety is so last season in Hightown," he drawled, batting his eyes. 'Or didn't you know that, darling Varric?"

Varric opened his mouth to respond, probably something scathing and witty, but Merrill glanced over her shoulder at that moment. "I think he's waking up," she said nervously, the light on her fingers slowly dying. "Or, at least, I hope he is. I've done all I can for him now."

Garrett came and knelt beside her, frowning at the chains encircling Fenris. "What's wrong with him, exactly? Is he hurt?" Maybe I should have kept Anders, at least long enough to look at Broody.

Merrill was shaking her head, biting into her bottom lip. "No, he's actually fine. The only injuries he has are quite small, and very treatable with just a salve and a potion. He's been ensorcelled, forced unconscious and held there by a malicious binding. I think I've lifted the spell, so now it's up to him to shake his way free and-"

There was a roar and a blaze of light, the sound furious and near hysterical with rage and fear. They all threw their hands up to cover their eyes as Fenris came to very abruptly, lurching off the floor and tumbling straight over again when the chains affected his balance. With a snarl, his lyrium markings flared even brighter and he tore through the chains as if they were paper, the links popping and snapping and flying through the air.

Before Garrett had recovered from the blinding radiance, he heard Merrill shriek in alarm as Fenris lunged for her. "Witch!" he roared, hands clamping around her throat. "What were you doing to me?"

Garrett surged forward, panic rising in his throat at the sight of his lyrium etched hands squeezing against the pale, smooth white of Merrill's skin. "Fenris, let her go!"

Fenris' eyes were wild and panicked, and his hand tightened around Merrill's throat. "She was using blood magic on me!" he snarled. "This witch deceives you all, but I can feel it! I felt it, in my bones and in my blood, she used her filthy magic against me!"

"She was saving your life!" Garrett snapped, wrenching on him until he relented and let go. Merrill whimpered and staggered backwards, flailing in alarm when Varric tried to comfort her and draw her a little further away from Fenris. "You've been unconscious for over a day, kept under by some kind of spell. Without Merrill's help, you'd still be under- and a plaything for any pervert who decided you'd make a good toy. So you can damn well apologise to her!"

"I will not apologise to a blood mage!" Fenris was shaking, and there was a wildness to him that Garrett had not seen since the night he'd helped him to destroy the hunters chasing him through the alienage. He was like a rabid dog, cornered and running out of options, lashing out at whoever tried to come near him just to protect himself. "She is no better than them- she is… she is-"

"She is the reason you are standing again!" Garrett thundered, fists clenching at his sides so that he didn't throttle the damned elf. He was three for three so far, yelling at friends. Maybe if he was really talented he could alienate everyone by the end of the day. "I understand you're not a fan of what she does, but sweet flaming prophet, Fenris, she saved your life! The least you could do is be grateful!"

Fenris spun away from them, nervous and panicky energy rolling off him. "Where am I?" he snarled instead in a low voice, ignoring Garrett's insistence that he should apologise. "Who brought me here?"

Garrett took a deep and tried to tell himself that Fenris wasn't in his right mind; it still didn't make him any less pissed off at his wild behaviour. "You're in a cave on the Wounded Coast," he began. "Isabela escaped, and came to tell us that you were all attacked by slavers from Tevinter-"

"Hadriana."

Fenris didn't say anything else; he certainly didn't clarify himself, or explain who Hadriana was or why her name sounded like the most bitter poison as he spat it out. Garrett chased after him, and he could hear Varric and Merrill dashing along behind.

Garrett jogged alongside him, trying to keep up. "Who is Hadriana, Fenris? Care to fill us in before we chase after you to our doom?"

Fenris' lip curled. "Hadriana. My master's old apprentice. She is everything that I despise about mages. Power hungry. Selfish. Vain. Insidious. You can trust a snake more readily than you can trust her. And she has come to reclaim me."

"How do you know that? You didn't even know where you were when you woke up."

His stride quickened, and he turned down tunnels with unnerving precision, as if he knew exactly where to go. "I can feel her in the air," he hissed quietly. "Her own personal touch of evil. I will not leave this place with her at my back."

They reached a room that reeked with the scent of blood and voided bowels and that odd combination of sweat and tears that was instinctively recognisable as the smell of panic and terror. The room was lit eerily by the lava flows, flames leaping up every now and then from the trenches, and in the centre of the room was a slab of granite upon which sat a dismembered corpse.

"By the Stone," Varric muttered, looking queasy. Garrett couldn't blame him.           

"Do you see now?" Fenris snarled, gesturing violently at the massacred remains on top of the altar. "Do you see what mages are capable of, what they all succumb to eventually?"

Merrill was white as a sheet as she stared at the body. "They would hurt the unwilling?" she whispered.

Fenris laughed bitterly. "No, of course not, people line up to let the mages hack at their flesh and use their blood to summon demons. They offer up their children. You foolish girl, what do you think they do?"

Garrett wanted to intervene, to defend Merrill's naivety and snap at Fenris for being so harsh with her, but… looking at the bloodied remains on the stone, he couldn't find the words. His father had always imparted the dangers of blood magic to them, over and over and over until he knew the lessons just as well as Bethany- and he wasn't even a mage. This was everything that Malcolm had ever warned them about, just as dark and twisted and perverted as he'd said. He glanced over at Merrill, at the scars she hid beneath her long gloves… and found himself even more conflicted than before.

"The blood is still dripping," Fenris snarled, his voice filled with loathing and disgust. "Hadriana will be nearby. We must hurry."

Predictably, nothing ever went as expected. Oh, the demons and the evil spirits that the dead eyed Magister summoned were hardly a surprise, and neither were the dirty tricks she employed against them. Garrett didn't even recognise half the spells she flung at them, and after growing up under the attentive eye of a mage and then spending the last three years in the company of two mages, he had considered himself fairly well versed in combat magic.

The battle was intense, and it was not long before the Magister stood alone in a field of corpses and slime, the only remnants of the demons and undead that she had summoned to her side. She was panting for air, pressing a hand to her injured side as she staggered backwards and away from them. Fenris advanced on her, and she fell to the floor with a cry. Garrett knew that the moment that Hadriana begged Fenris for clemency, a scheming sparkle in her eyes as she wove the tragic story of a long lost sister, loving families, that the mage was not done, that she thought she had another card up her sleeve-

He saw Fenris' face twist with hatred and knew that the pretty lies had not done her any good.  But he didn't try to stop him either.

Fenris plunged his fist into her chest, and her agonised gasp echoed through the small chamber. Garrett forced himself to watch, to witness the death of this woman no matter how evil she had appeared to be. He owed Fenris that much, to stand by him at this point.

But of course… nothing ever went as expected. Not even when he was trying to comfort a friend and assure him that he'd done the right thing.

He stared back down the tunnel where Fenris had vanished and sighed tiredly. Nothing to be done for him now. "Let's go home before anyone else decides to have a breakdown," he said, not stopping to look if Merrill and Varric were following him.

Right at that moment, he didn't even know if he had the energy to care.

***

After years of sleeping beside her on a lumpy straw mattress in the back of the clinic, the bed in Hawke's estate seemed to dwarf Tahlie. She looked so much smaller, so vulnerable and frail, and as he lay beside her, kissing her brow and whispering nonsensical things to her while he waited for her to wake up it occurred to him that she deserved so much more than the half-life he forced her to live. Leandra stuck her head in from time to time, the pitying look on her face sending Justice into a frenzy of panic and fury every single time, and it was all he could do to keep the spirit contained. The hours crept by and Tahlie lay still as the grave, her skin cold to touch and her lips tinted faintly blue; he could find her heartbeat, a sluggish, sickly tempo that alarmed him even more, but just like that time back in Amaranthine, nothing he did to her seemed to rouse her or improve her condition. It was like his magic bled straight through her and back into the Fade, without leaving any kind of impact on her.

It was worse now, knowing what she had to be going through. Knowing that she was probably lost, alone, scared, crying for him… and it was worse now having Justice with him. Justice was distraught, horrified that his knowledge was not enough for them to wake her.

She grew colder as the hours crept by, and Anders felt his heart break a little more with each whispered plea that she didn't hear. He clutched her to him, trying to impart some of his warmth into her icy skin; when he found himself sobbing into her hair he hugged her tighter, begging her to wake up. If only he hadn't broken her heart in Amaranthine, if only she hadn't gone off with her sister, if only he'd had the courage to chase after her before she'd been tortured so horrifically…

"Please, love," he whispered, smoothing her hair away from her face for the umpteenth time. "Please wake up."

Tahlie didn't stir and he wept and held her close.

He fell into an exhausted sleep at some point, waking to find the light gone from the sky and smells in the air that indicated someone was preparing dinner. Tahlie was cold and pale in his arms, her skin as perfect as marble and almost as lifeless. He winced as he eased out from her arms, taking care not to disturb her even though she was hardly going to notice otherwise. He stood by the side of the bed and stared down at her, at the utter stillness that enveloped her and turned away quickly before the panic overtook him again.

He busied himself making the room more comfortable for her- closing the curtains to block out prying eyes, stoking the fire so that he could pretend she'd find some warmth from it, tucking the sheets in tightly around her. His fingers traced over her lips; he could feel the faintest wisp of air, almost so faint that he could easily have missed it were he not so desperate to find a sign of life within her.

His head ached. And he was filthy and bloodied, still aching from the fight earlier in the day but that hadn't seemed important before now. There was a ewer of water on the side table and he took a moment to shuck his coat and roll up his sleeves, pouring the water out into the accompanying shallow bowl and scrubbing fiercely at what grime he could.

This is her blood. He bowed his head in agony as the truth ripped through him. Did the words come from within him, or was the accusation from Justice, or was it from both of them? He braced himself on the table as the wave of guilt slammed into him. If she dies, it will be my fault.

The room abruptly felt too warm, sweat beading on his forehead and rolling down his spine. What if he'd killed her, condemned her to death by not being there to protect her? What if Justice had been too violent in his fight against the demon that possessed her? What if she just drifted away like this, cold and lifeless, never able to say goodbye; what if he was never able to beg for her forgiveness and her love and plead with her to stay?  

He had to… do something. Anything. He had to get out. He felt panic rising within him, choking him, and he was stumbling for the door, away from the guilt and away from her. He loved her with every inch of his being but right now he was too much of a coward to face the prospect of living without her a second time… of knowing that her life had been snuffed out because of him.

He all but fell into the corridor, gasping as his chest tightened and the panic rose higher within him. He felt ill, and he only just managed to stagger over to an ornamental urn in time, his stomach heaving violently as he retched and gagged, his mind taking this ludicrous moment to note that he now owed Hawke a new urn.

Garrett. It was probably best to find him and see how things had ended in the caverns- if Melissandra really had been responsible for the slaver attack, it was best that he found out now rather than later. And he had to work out what to do with Tahlie, whether to leave her as she was, or whether to take her home to Darktown. His stomach lurched unhappily at the thought of dragging her back to the stench and filth of the undercity, when she deserved to live in a house as fine as this one. She deserved so much he couldn't give her. She deserved to live, and he didn't even know if he could offer her that much.

He finally found him in the conservatory, and only then because the damned Mabari had taken pity on him wandering about lost in the huge estate and had led him to the door in question. The dog nudged him forcefully when he hesitated.  

He almost missed him, but the Mabari wouldn't have shoved him through the door if Garrett wasn't in here, so he kept looking. He found him lying down on a couch, a bottle half full of amber liquid clutched tightly in his hand while he held the silver pendant out with the other. He was running his thumb over the face of it, his expression far away.

Hawke spotted him as he approached and quite noticeably tensed. He tucked the pendant back under his shirt and sat up with difficulty, patting the couch beside him. "Pull up a chaise," he said, waving the bottle around magnanimously.

He felt a small surge of resentment, that Garrett could be sitting here being flippant and getting drunk, while Tahlie grew colder and colder the longer she stayed unconscious. Did he think this was some kind of joke? Did he think that ignoring the problem and drowning himself in whiskey was going to lead to some miraculous revelation, and all their troubles would be gone when he sobered up? He found himself shaking with rage, lightning snapping over his fingers in a way that had nothing to do with Justice and everything to do with the rash, quick-to-anger man he'd once been.

No shooting lightning bolts at fools.

His shoulders slumped as the memory of a friend's words drifted through his head. The lightning died before Garrett had a chance to notice it, and he felt… defeated. Completely and utterly lost and defeated.

He took the seat that was offered to him, sliding down with a bump as he felt numbness creep into his limbs. "I can't wake her up," he said, ignoring the way his voice shook.

Hawke was quiet for a long time, before bowing his head. "I should never have asked you to come with me to Sundermount," he said softly.  

Anders would have laughed, but the sound somehow got choked by the tightness in his throat. "That's hardly your fault," he rasped, even though his brain screamed that yes, it was entirely Garrett's fault, him and his stupid infatuation with that elvhen witch, and if only he hadn't felt an obligation to protect him from her, this never would have happened. He took a deep breath, trying to cut off the vitriolic rant before it poisoned him. "I could have just as easily said no."

Garrett sat silently, rolling the bottle around in his hand, until he sighed. "I want to fix this, Anders," he said, his voice a teensy bit uneven, as if the drink were beginning to affect him.

This time there was no mistaking the sound as a half-crazed sob, as if he were only just biting back on the maelstrom of agony threatening to spill from him. "I don't know how to fix this, Garrett; this isn't exactly magic I'm familiar with! Half of what they practise in Tevinter isn't recognised outside the Imperium anymore, and that's without even mentioning the blood magic…"

"But Justice said she fixed herself las' time." Garrett blinked as if noticing the emergence of the slur. "How did that happen?"

"I was being attacked by a Templar," Anders said, his blood freezing in horror at the memory. Within him, Justice hissed slowly at the memory of a comrade, a fellow Grey Warden, who had turned against them so readily. The spirit was not impressed with Rolan's attempts to serve two masters at once. "And Tahlie woke up to defend me; or rather, it's likely that a spirit came through her to defend me. She wasn't exactly… right, but she wasn't demon possessed either."

Garrett slumped back into the seat. When he spoke, the sarcasm in his voice was almost venomous. "Great, so all we need is some spirit bait and we'll be fine. I'll go round up a Templar now. I'm sure I can interrupt a Harrowing to drag away the Knight Captain, since Cullen and I are practically best friends these days."

Anders snapped forward in the seat, a wild look in his eyes. "Garrett…" he began, his voice unsteady. Something seemed to dawn on him, a realisation coming to him slowly. "Oh, fucking Maker, Garrett… I can't believe you were the one to work it out." How could he have been so stupid?

"Please tell me I've been absolutely brilliant and saved the day once and for all? Everyone kept stealing my thunder today."

"You have… Garrett, sweet flaming prophet it's so simple." The laugh that bubbled up from within him sounded a little crazed, and he saw Garrett lean away from him slightly. "A Harrowing. Garrett, we can send me into the Fade after her, like in a Harrowing ceremony. With enough lyrium we should be able to make our own doorway and go in to rescue her."

Garrett eyed him uneasily. "And where, pray tell, are we going to get enough lyrium for such an endeavour? I assume that the watery stuff I'm able to filch for you off the black market doesn't really cut it for what you need."

His brain was whirling at a phenomenal speed. "No, we'll need to get it from the Gallows, it's the only place in Kirkwall that will have a supply of lyrium strong enough to fuel the spell." What kind of spell would that even fall under? Primal? Spirit? Or maybe it would just be better if he went in alone, without taking the others, and then he wouldn't have to worry about semantics like what spells to use. "We can tell them it's Grey Warden business, then they'll be forced to-"

"Or we could avoid overusing the Grey Warden card," Garrett said dryly, "since I'm fairly sure you don't really qualify as Warden of the Month anymore, and instead I'll just go and browbeat Cullen until he gives it to me."

Anders blinked. "You… what? To the Knight Captain?"

Garrett snorted in a very unfriendly manner. "The man is a pushover. I have no idea how he made it to such an influential post- he jumps at shadows if you even mention the word 'blood mage' and he's hardly an inspiring leader. I'll get the lyrium for you from him; you stay and take care of Tahlie."

At the reminder, Justice seethed unhappily, desperate to get back to Tahlie and see that she hadn't drifted any further away from them. "Well… if you really think you can manage it, I'd be eternally grateful, Garrett." He climbed to his feet. "I'll go check on her now."

He only made it half a dozen steps before Garrett called out to him. "Anders?"

Something in his voice made him pause, and turn back to face him. "Yes?"

Garrett looked vastly uncomfortable, and there was a bleakness in his eyes that hadn't been there moments earlier. "Did you ever think Tahlie was coming back?" he said hoarsely, his voice more than a little hesitant. "When she… in that year you were separated; did you ever think that maybe things would work out and she'd just magically appear on your doorstep?"

Anders took his time in answering, perplexed by the question. "I didn't," he said honestly, "but she did turn up. I stopped hoping fairly early on in the piece."

Garrett took another swig from the bottle and ran a hand through his already dishevelled hair. "How did you know to stop hoping?"

Anders hesitated again. "You just… know. You feel it, in your heart, that what you've done is too big, too insurmountable and no matter how hard you hope and how hard you dream, it isn't going to change things."

"But things did change," he said, slumping backwards into the seat with the bottle clutched against his shoulder as he crossed his arms. Despite the air of hopelessness that his body language gave out, there was a tendril of desperate optimism in his voice, as if he was clinging fanatically to the last shred of a dream. "Tahlie came back to you."

There wasn't really anything he could say to that. "She did," he said softly, his heart breaking at the thought of her so cold and still in the bed upstairs. "I don't know whether it was the best thing for her, but she did."

Garrett took an agonisingly long time to speak. "Did you ever… think that maybe it would be best to move on, and find someone else?"

Justice's scream of fury made his head spin, but somehow he managed to contain him. "I couldn't have even if I'd wanted to."

Neither of them spoke, Garrett digesting his words while Anders wondered what on earth could have sparked this chain of questioning. Clearly something had happened between him and Merrill, but it was apparently more complicated than he'd first envisioned.

Garrett slapped his hands down onto his knees, sitting forward with enthusiasm that seemed forced. "Right then; that lyrium isn't going to collect itself from the Gallows so I should be off," he rasped; for some reason he found that statement to be vastly amusing, and his hollow laughter rang through the conservatory. "Or rather, I'll go when I'm sober and not being maudlin over lost opportunities. Unless you have something in your extensive bag of tricks that can help?"
As I've said in the past, if an event isn't really that crucial to what I'm doing with the main plot, I'm going to assume you all know what happened and I will skip over it. For all that this mission is great for developing Fenris' character and backstory, he is sadly not my hero (I apologise to all the Fengirls in my audience) so I was never going to give this quest much time in comparison to the fallout for Tahlie and Anders.

I will make a vague and weak attempt to defend Sebastian once again, as my husband got quite incensed to learn how much I hated him even after trying to write him impartially. The conversation went a little like this:

T: But he was looked in a cage, within reach of a demon. Has he ever seen Tahlie transform before?
K: Uh, no probably not. He doesn't strike me as the kinda guy Tahlie and Anders would invite around for dinner.
T: So, he's never had the chance to experience Tahlie's curse before? Of course he's going to assume she's dead! You can't blame him for taking the evidence at hand and making that assumption!
K: Um... sorry?

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Tahlindra belongs to me.
© 2011 - 2024 Defira1985
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guen20's avatar
As I'm sure you know, I'm a massive Fengirl, but I'm not reading your story for the sake of my inner fengirl. I read it because it's good and has been from Chapter 1, and by good I mean really good. So Fenris can take a backseat for the time being while we enjoy Talie's story. No problem.

As for Seb? He drives me crazy. Or, well, his borderline fanaticism drives me crazy. It strikes far too close to home with some of my own extended family members who are arrogant enough to think they know the thoughts of God personally. <takes a deep breaths and holds it before going off on a religion rant> .... Anyway, I tend to see him the same way you seem to see him, so no need to defend yourself there. I wish it were possible to influence him a bit more strongly, but I'm also glad glad Bioware tends to make the npcs follow with whatever core beliefs they are originally designed to have.

I digress, where was I? Oh yes! Wonderful story hun. I've missed it. Hope things are good with you. Did you ever hear back from Bioware about your story? I can't wait for the next one!