The Shadow and the Flame-Chapter Four

[communi_kate]

The Shadow of the Flame

A Dragon Age: Origins fan fiction by xahra99
 

Chapter Four: Return to the Chantry - The Fate of Ser Mark - The Villagers' Lament - Alistair's Reward.


In that single frozen instant, several things happened very fast. Belda looked down at her ankle. The spell that had held Palamon and Alistair wavered. Alistair lunged forwards, and the spell snapped. Belda, who had raised Ser Mark’s sword to prod at its owner, tottered and cried out, a single high note like the scream of a hunting hawk. Palamon swayed and collapsed on his face in the dirt.

Alistair landed on hands and knees next to his sword. Panting, he snatched up the weapon and took hold of the hilt rather than the blade more by luck than judgment. The leather was warm in his grip as he forced his stiff fingers around the hilt. Blood tingled in his fingers and toes as life returned to his body. The cramps were bad enough that he would have been near-incapacitated by them on the training field, but right now there was no time. He'd deal with the pain later. If he survived.

Alistair lunged forwards. The firelight gleamed from the blade. Belda looked up, alerted by the sudden flash. She angled the sword upwards to block Alistair’s blow, but there was no time, and she’d had no weapons training.

Alistair’s blade cut cleanly across her throat.

Belda jerked once, gasped and fell. Alistair collapsed onto his knees beside the body. The red gush of blood from the severed arteries in the witch's corpse soaked his hands and then his knees, but he had neither the energy nor the breath to crawl away.

He sat like that for a long minute, teeth gritted against the cramps, sweat cooling clammily between his shirt and his back. When he could move again, he stood up, leaning on his sword, and walked to check on Ser Palamon. The initiate lay only steps away, but it seemed like an eternity to Alistair. Palamon was face down in the mud, but he was breathing and seemed well enough, even if unconscious. Alistair rolled Palamon on his side, crooked his arm underneath his head so he didn’t choke on his own tongue, and went to check on the only other living person in the clearing.

Ser Mark’s hand was still locked around the witch’s lifeless foot. The Templar had rolled onto his back and lay with his face upturned to the firelight. There was a deep gash across his throat, but it was oozing rather than gushing blood. Still, Alistair thought the Templar dead at first. He knelt down, expecting a corpse, and was surprised when Ser Mark opened his eyes. "She’s dead?" he asked, in a voice that seemed too strong for a dying man.

Alistair nodded.

"Good," Ser Mark said. He closed his eyes and appeared to doze off. Alistair ripped a strip from the hem of his tunic and hesitated, twisting the strip between his hands. Was it correct to apply a tourniquet a bleeding wound, if the wound was on the throat? He’d wanted to strangle Ser Mark many times before, but he was damned if he was going to do it unintentionally.

Palamon saved the Templar from strangulation by rolling over and sitting up. He rubbed at his arms and coughed.

"Is the old witch dead?" he asked.

Alistair nodded.

"Thank the Maker." Palamon hacked up a glob of mucus. "Andraste’s name! I feel like I’ve just gone through ten sparring rounds with Ser Mark." He got up gingerly. "How is the old bastard, anyway? I thought he was dead."

"He’s not. Nearly, but not quite."

Palamon nodded. "That was him that saved us, wasn’t it."


"Yes."
"But you killed her?"

"Yes,"

"That was blood magic, wasn’t it?"


"I’m pretty sure it was, yes." Alistair said woodenly.
"Then it’s a miracle we survived," Palamon said cheerfully -far too cheerfully, in Alistair’s opinion, for somebody who was stuck in the woods with three corpses and one barely living man. "Ser Mark was right about her after all!" He crossed the campsite to peer at the corpses of Ser Kyan and Ser Percival.


"Good. You can tell him so later. I’m sure he’ll be pleased. Now let’s…"
Ser Palamon interrupted "She really was a maleficar!" He peered at the slash in Ser Kyan's throat, but did not touch the corpse. "She did all this?"

Alistair ignored the question. "I don’t think she was," he said glumly. He checked Ser Mark’s pulse and was relieved to find that it was strong. He rolled the strip of cloth up that he had been planning to use as a bandage and pressed it to the wound. The blood slowed, but did not stop.

Palamon frowned. "What do you mean, you don’t think she was?" He waved a hand around the camp. "She killed Ser Percival! And Ser Kyan! And she nearly killed Ser Mark! And us," he added as an afterthought.

Alistair tore another strip of cloth from his surcoat. "D’you think that she would have tried all that if she hadn’t been desperate?"

Palamon’s brow furrowed as if Alistair had asked a far too difficult question. "Who cares!" He slapped Alistair on his back. "She did and that’s that. Now let’s gather some trees, make a litter and we can all go home."

"Denerim’s too far." Alistair said. He reached over the almost-corpse that was Ser Mark and measured the diameter of a sapling with his hand. The tree was far too thin to make a litter that was going to have to carry Ser Mark the best part of a day’s march. "We’ll have to go back to the village. We can send a messenger from there."

"D’you think they’ll welcome us?"

Alistair wondered when he had suddenly become the man with all the answers. "I don’t think they’ll like it." He shrugged and measured up another sapling. This one felt better. "What other choice have we got? It's not worth heading straight for Denerim. "He glanced at Ser Mark’s still and waxen face. But for the shrill whistling of his breath, the Templar could have been dead. "He’ll never make it that far."

"I suppose you’re right," Palamon said as he hacked down a small tree. "Still, however little they like us, they won't turn us away."

Alistair shrugged. He wasn't so sure. "I don’t know. Even back to the village is a long way. He might not even make it there." He recalled the bandits. "We might not even make it there.

"Oh, we will," Palamon said optimistically.
He turned out to be right, but it was a very long road. A journey that had taken four Templars and one old but reasonably well dressed and healthy woman took two weary initiates dragging a makeshift stretcher two days. Burdened by the litter, Alistair and Palamon hadn't expected the journey to take as long as it did, so they were hungry as well as exhausted when the village came in sight. Worse, Ser Mark’s condition had deteriorated since leaving the camp. He woke once during the journey, asked for water, and then sank back into semi-consciousness. His strength was fading fast. It was a pity, Alistair thought, that there didn't seem to be any corresponding decrease in Ser Mark's weight. For all his weakness, the man was heavy.

They saw a few peasants working the fields before they reached the village, but they didn’t look up, or even acknowledge their existence. Alistair begged some water off one man they found working near the path, but apart from a sympathetic glance at the dying Ser Mark he didn’t offer more. "Why’re you carrying him along?" the peasant asked as Ser Palamon emptied his water-skin. "He’ll be dead by nightfall."

Alistair wiped sweat from his temples. "We’ve got to try."

"Suit yourself," the peasant said, and left them.

By the time they reached the makeshift palisade of the village, Ser Mark was barely alive. Alistair had to place a palm over his mouth to check his breathing when they lowered the litter in the town square. He felt a faint current of air on his palm and looked around. "Where is everyone?"

Ser Palamon shrugged. The village looked unchanged. Alistair felt as if they had left several years ago, but it had only been a few days. Despite the noise he was sure they had made as they dragged the litter in, there was nobody around.

"Hello," Alistair shouted. Nobody replied. A flock of pigeons roosting on one of the houses took fright at his voice and fluttered off in a clatter of wings. Ser Palamon jumped. Ser Mark moaned. As the clapping of the pigeons wings died away, and door creaked open and a thin figure limped out. As he came closer they realized that it was the old peasant Tobias.

"Templars," he said, as he came up to them. "Back again. Come to take more of us, have you." He peered at Palamon and Alistair and then down at the dying man. "Well?"

"No," Palamon said. “We need help.”

The old man shook his head. "You won’t find it here. Where’s Bel?"

"It’s in your best interest to offer succor-' Ser Palamon began.

"I doubt that very much,” the old peasant said. “Where’s Bel?"

"She’s dead." Alistair said reluctantly.

Tobias nodded as if he'd been expecting the news. "I thought as such. What of the others? There were more when you left."

"Dead too."

"Bandits?"

"No." Alistair said. He wondered whether or not to volunteer more information, but decided that the old man had a right to know. "It was Belda’s magic."

There was a long silence. Alistair used it to wonder whether or now Tobias would ask what had happened, but if the old man was curious he hid it well. "Well," he said eventually, and spat. "Gone to join her daughter, so she has."

Alistair's heart sank. "Her daughter’s dead?"

"Died in childbirth. This very morning."

"I’m sorry."

"We will pray for her," Ser Palamon said, rubbing his blistered hands upon his breeches.

Tobias shook his head. "Save your prayers. They won’t bring Anna back. Or Belda for that matter." He sighed, scuffed his shoe in the dirt and looked at Alistair. "Did Bel die peacefully? Her daughter sure didn't."

No, Alistair thought, she died with the blood of two murdered Templars on her hands. He swallowed and said, "It was quick."

Tobias looked skeptical. "I hoped as much. She never did anything but good for us in her life." He scowled. "And what have you brought us? Nothing but death and pain, that's what."

Palamon was beginning to lose what little patience hunger and exhaustion had left him. "We can save the theology for later, Ser. Our comrade is in need of help."

Tobias looked at them all as if he would be perfectly happy to let them stand in the square until they all died of sheer exhaustion. "Do you now? What sort of help would that be?"

Alistair gestured at Ser Mark lying prone on his stretcher. "We need a healer," he said. “Isn’t that obvious?”

"Then it’s a pity that you took the only one this village had now, isn’t it?"

Palamon looked around. "Where is everyone else? Maybe they would be able to-"

Tobias interrupted him. "They don’t want any part in this, boy. And who’s to blame them? Swanning around in your uniforms, carrying one of us off to the Circle, and her never coming back. Denying her daughter help? You could have waited."

"If we wait now, this man will die” Alistair snapped.

Tobias sucked his teeth. “Why should I care?”

"There may be gold in it for you," Ser Palamon said persuasively.It didn't work.

"More like a passel of men with swords. We don’t want that. Not again."

"Shut up, Palamon," Alistair said between gritted teeth. "You're not helping."

Tobias sighed. "All I can give you is rest for one night. We’ll decide what to do with you in the morning. You know where Bel’s house is. You can stay there, where you won’t get in the way.”

“We’re not going to get in the way.” Alistair said through his teeth.

Tobias nodded cynically. “Right you are. Now get you going." He pointed towards the closed door of Belda's cottage.

Alistair and Palamon lifted the litter between them. Tobias didn't help. He stood in the centre of the square and watched them go with a weary worried expression as they dragged the litter across the marketplace.

"Fat lot of use that was," Ser Palamon said before they were half way across the square.

Alistair agreed. “They don’t want us here,” he said, searching for the needle of hope in the haystack of utter disaster that was their ordained mission. “At least they let us stay.”

Palamon grunted. “Any noble would have offered us help and healing," he said as they lowered the litter to the ground outside the closed door of the cottage. "It doesn't seem right to stay in a dead woman's house, anyway."

Alistair edged the door open. "It doesn't, but it's better than sleeping out in the woods again-" He paused in surprise as light illuminated the shabby room."Maker’s name! Was it always like this? I thought there was more furniture."

"Let me see," Palamon elbowed him out of the way and glanced around at the mostly bare room. It looked as if the villagers had looted the few sticks of furniture that Belda had owned. A few bags of herbs were piled up in the corner, but that was all. "They've taken everything."

"They knew she wasn't coming back," Alistair said.

"She was going to the Tower. Of course she wasn’t coming back," Palamon said. He shaded his eyes and looked up at the sleeping loft. "There might still be a pallet up there, if we can get to it. Those bastards have taken the ladder. "He shrugged."How are you at climbing? If we can't get up to the loft, we'll just have to sleep on the floor."

"It looks like they left some elfroot anyway," Alistair said practically. "Come on. Help me get him inside."

They maneuvered the stretcher through the narrow door with difficulty and set it on the floor. The makeshift contraption creaked, but it held. Palamon gazed at it skeptically. "We got here just in time. This thing is starting to give out."

Alistair was already investigating the pile of herb pouches. He picked up a bag marked 'elfroot' and frowned at what he found inside. "D'you think we should mix this up with water and make him

drink it? Or would a poultice be better?" He’d seen elfroot in vials and poultices a hundred times, but he didn't recognize the spiky plant inside the pouch. "Hang on, is this even elfroot?"

Palamon shrugged. "Damned if I know. Do I look like a healer?"

Alistair scowled. He drew the plant out carefully from the pouch and laid it on the side of Ser Mark's stretcher. "No. You don’t. But right now you’re the only one we’ve got."

"Then I feel sorry for the poor sod," Palamon peered at Ser Mark’s drawn face. "And I never thought that I would say that. Templars are supposed to die in battle, not in some stinky cottage."

"You think he’s going to die?"

"Probably. You?"

"Yes." A thought struck Alistair. "What did you say about not coming back?"

Palamon frowned, and then his brow cleared. "I said the peasants knew she wasn’t coming back. Because let’s face it, the only mages who go to the Tower and live are the ones they think can be of use, or the ones that started off there in the first place."


"What happens to the others?"

"Made Tranquil." Palamon shrugged. "Or they kill them.What’s so wrong with that?"
"What’s so wrong? Well, for one thing, if they didn’t kill all of the illegal healers then, I don't know, there might be one here right now here to help us."

Palamon scowled. "You’re forgetting that she was the one who killed everybody in the first place, Alistair." He glanced at the Templar Sergeant's still face. "Except for Ser Mark, and she'll have killed him by tomorrow. His brain just hasn't caught up with his body yet."

"Don't say that! He might still recover." Alistair said quickly. He slid a glance at Ser Mark's face, but the Templar remained oblivious. "Maybe he’ll survive,” he said against all hope and common sense."Maybe if we get some elfroot into him, that’ll help-“

"Not enough,” Palamon said practically. “Let’s look on the bright side in all this. We can't do him much more harm at this point. So it doesn’t really matter how we prepare the elfroot. It’s still better than nothing. And it probably won’t make any difference, anyway.”

It didn’t. When they woke the next morning. Ser Mark was dead. He looked peaceful enough, if white as chalk.

Palamon and Alistair laid out his body, closed his eyes and wondered what they should do.

"We should take his body back," Palamon said. "Or burn it."

"Do you really think we’ll get his body back to the Chantry?" Alistair said. "I've got my doubts we'll even get ourselves back. And he's dead."

"No," Palamon admitted. "I suppose better one body left here then three between here and Denerim. Maybe we can say an Andrastian service for him-"

He was interrupted by a quiet knock on the door.

Alistair got up and opened it. Unsurprisingly, it was Tobias. "How's your man?"

"He’s dead," Alistair told him.

Tobias nodded. "Thought as much." He shrugged. Another body for us to bury."

Palamon leaned forwards. "Bury?""

Tobias came in and shut the door. His face was unshaved and tired. "Look, I said we weren’t Andrastians. We've been up all night discussing this. He’ll go back to the earth. We’ll do that for you while you travel. You boys have a long way to go. They’ll be expecting you in Denerim."

Alistair and Palamon looked at each other in exhaustion. They'd stayed up half the night watching over Ser Mark, and that was on top of the tortuous two-day hike.

"We've got to go? Now?"

Tobias sighed. "We can't feed any more extra mouths. You aren't our folk. We don't owe you anything except for a good few lumps to the head, and I reckon someone's already done that for you. You look worn out. Best to get back home where you belong. We don’t want any more knights here, so we'll send provisions. Just enough to get you back to Denerim, if you walk fast." He shoved a small hessian bag at Alistair, who took it more out of surprise than anything else."Call it an incentive. Take what you need, and be on your way.”

"What about him?" Alistair jerked his thumb back at Ser Mark.

"Like I said, we'll take care of him."

"Burial goes against the Maker,” Palamon said. "He was a Templar, man! Don't you know what that means?" A Tobias's blank look he quoted "For he who trusts in the Maker, fire is his water. As the moth seems light and goes towards flame, he should see fire, and go towards Light. Don't you understand that?"

The old man shrugged. "Our ways are not your ways," he said.

Alistair put a hand on Palamon's arm. The other initiate looked ready to draw his sword. "Please," he begged. "We'll go now. But can't you just do this? It’ll be less work that burying him either way." He was not bothered one way or another, but he knew that Ser Mark would have wanted a traditional funeral. And right now, after a bad night's sleep on a hard floor with no food and precious little medicine, he felt that he owed the dead Templar more than he owed the villagers."Come on, you bastards. Please?"

Tobias scratched his head. He said nothing.

"It'd have meant a lot to him," Palamon interjected.

Tobias looked from face to face and appeared to come to a decision, possibly that it was easiest to agree and deal with the consequences after they had gone. "What do I care what he'd have wanted? Don't bear that man anything but ill will. But," he added hastily as Palamon's hand once again reached for his sword, "all right. I'll see to it myself. But you'll have to leave. Leave now. We don't want you here. Sooner you're gone, sooner we can put things back how they used to be. This is best forgotten."

“We’ll just say a few words,” Palamon said.

Tobias gave a huge sigh. "Son, I don’t car
e particularly one way or another. Say what you like, just as long as you say it quickly,"
"The Maker says that it is a sin to commit a body to the flames without the proper funeral rites," Palamon told him.

"The Maker might say that, but he isn't here, is he lad? Right here there's me and I'm telling you to get out of here because," he jerked his thumb at the door, "it might not be too healthy for you to stay. And I don't care how many swords you've got between you."

"You threaten us?" asked Palamon.

Tobias sucked his teeth and looked at Ser Palamon’s sword doubtfully. "Wouldn’t dare."

Palamon bristled. "You mock-“

Alistair stopped him. "Stop it. We'll go now. He turned back to the corpse of Ser Mark and muttered a few lines from the Canticle of Benedictions over the body. "Blessed are they who stand before the corrupt and the wicked and do not falter. Blessed are the peacekeepers, the champions of the just. We commend Ser Mark's body to the Maker's grace." He crossed his arms and bowed. "Rest in peace. And if he doesn’t, then we will come looking."

Palamon nodded.

Tobias did not look the least bit intimidated. He held the door open for them both and then closed it behind them, cutting off Alistair’s last view of the shapeless mound of cloth that was Ser Mark’s body.

The Templars left the village in silence. They walked down the path in what Alistair thought was the right direction-at least it was the opposite direction to the path they had followed out of the wilds. Neither of them spoke for a long time. When the roofs of the houses had disappeared behind the horizon Palamon stretched. "That's that, then."

"Yes."

"Do you think they'll really burn him?"

"I hope so,” Alistair said pessimistically.

"Really? I don't." Palamon glanced wearily back at their path. "That peasant deserves whatever’s coming to him. I hope he wanders lost in the Fade. Are you sure this is the right way?"

Alistair ignored the blasphemy. "Pretty sure. What? You've got a better idea?"

Palamon shook his head. "No clue," he said. 'Your guess is as good as mine." He sighed. “It’s a long way to Denerim."

It was.

It took them longer than they had expected, much longer. But eventually the marshy moorland gave way to farms and open fields. The road became easier. Alistair and Palamon pushed on, and arrived at Denerim early one evening as the sun was setting. Palamon smiled and pointed at the sunset light reflecting off the white marble of Fort Drakon tower. "We’re home."

It was the first time Alistair had ever been glad to see the Chantry, and it was the first time they’d ever seemed glad to see him, even if the first words out of the Templar gate guard’s mouth was, “Where are they all?”

Alistair sighed. "They're all dead," he said.

That simple sentence got them both in to see Knight Commander Glavin faster than any royal herald or messenger could have done. To Alistair, it seemed like a bad dream. The Knight Commander peered at them over the same tall desk as he had done when Ser Mark had dragged them into the chamber only a few days ago. He dabbed grease from his mouth with a napkin as he sank into the chair one of the guards pulled out for him. The gate guards bowed and left. Glavin did not speak until the heavy door had creaked shut behind them. Alistair’s legs, already wearied with walking, were burning by the time he finally spoke. "My sons?"

Palamon knelt hastily. Alistair followed suit.

“You may stand,” the Knight Commander said. His gaze flicked from face to tense face as they got to their feet. "What has happened?" he asked.

Palamon jerked his head towards Alistair. "Tell him," he said.

Alistair did. He was glad that Palamon had volunteered him, because it gave him the chance to edit events. So he left out his own doubts and Lady Belda’s speech because he didn’t think the Knight Commander would want to hear them." Palamon's eyes narrowed over a couple of the more imaginative retellings of events, but he said nothing. Alistair was glad. Maybe it was rank cowardice on his part, but there was no use preaching heresy to the converted.

The Knight Commander, to his credit, listened patiently to all of it. When Alistair had stuttered to a halt at last he said "But the maleficar is dead?"

Alistair nodded, bemused.

"Very well." The Knight Commander nodded. "Ser Mark did his job. A service will be held in his honor, and in the memory of Ser Kyan and Ser Percival. I shall expect you both to be there."

“Ser?”

The Knight Commander regarded Alistair balefully for a heartbeat. When Alistair was almost certain that his own heart was going to leap out of his mouth Glavin nodded and said, “What is it?”

“Ser, what happens now? To the villagers, and Ser Percival, and Ser Kyan?”

"Hm,” Ser Glavin said in a deep voice that sounded as if the rust from his armor had percolated into it over the years. “I suppose that you have earned the right to know. I will send Templars to the village, of course, in order to verify Ser Mark's death and his right and proper funeral. They will then travel into the wilds to retrieve the bodies of Ser Kyan and Ser Percival, assuming there is anything left to burn." He sighed. "The wilds can be a cruel place."

Alistair dared another question. “You won't punish the villagers?"

The Knight-Commander frowned. "That is not for you to decide. Their judgement shall be appropriate.”

“But-“

“I said that is all.” Knight Commander Glavin said mildly. His mouth forced itself into a rictus smile. “You have fulfilled your duties admirably. You are a credit to the Order. Go, get some rest. And pray for Ser Mark's soul. I shall be watching your rogress with great interest. I think you shall both do well."

Alistair nodded. He bowed and escaped as fact as his tired feet would carry him.

Once they were outside in the corridor, Ser Palamon punched him friendlily on the arm . “That went better than I expected.”

"It did?”

"Of course. I think he was impressed."

"Really? I don't think so."

“You don’t? He said he’d be watching us. That’s a honor!”

“It sounded more like a threat.”Alistair said.

“The maleficar’s dead. What’s the problem?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Alistair said sarcastically. “Maybe the fact that he just lost three of his men,"

“They died a warrior’s death in battle,” Palamon replied. “So should we all aspire to. “ He cheered up despite the dismal subject. “You’ll see. Things will be better now for us. The nobles are sure to be impressed. They’re bound to be friendlier, and such connections could lead us to great things. The Knight Commander himself thinks highly of us! Who knows where we’ll end up?”

Probably dead in a ditch like the others, Alistair thought glumly, but he knew better than to voice his concerns to Palamon. The initiate’s enthusiasm was infectious, and it was hard not to become caught up. “Maybe you’re right.”

“Of course I’m right,” Palamon said. “You’ll see!” He threw a friendly arm around Alistair's shoulders. "Back to the dorms, then, huh?"

"Yeah," Alistair said without enthusiasm. He ducked out from under Palamon's arm. "You go on ahead. I'll see you there."

Palamon looked surprised. "Suit yourself." He wiped ineffectively at his face and loped off down the corridor, shouting a cheery greeting at the first cadet to come along, who looked surprised and faintly horrified to see such a bedraggled apparition in the Chantry's hallowed halls. Alistair watched him disappear down the corridor. When Palamon had vanished he sighed and slouched off in the opposite direction.

He had not planned to go anywhere, but his feet carried him back to the old graveyard where Palamon and his friends had interrupted him. Days ago, really, but it seemed like years. Alistair had seen his first taste of action, and he had liked it even less than he expected. He'd killed a woman who he really wasn't sure had deserved to die, or at least no more than Ser Kyan and Ser Percival had done. And all the Chantry cared about was that the witch was dead. And they’d said that he’d done well.

He sighed. The walls of the Chantry closed in around him, taller and thicker than ever before.

I’ll never get out of here, he thought. This is my life now. Fit only to apprehend rogue mages for a bed in the Chantry and all the lyrium I can drink…

It felt as if he had lost something, some image of future happiness, gone forever. Ser Mark would probably have called it growing up.

He sighed, slouched into the dormitory and headed back to his friends.

Finis.

DISCLAIMER: Kate is currently on holiday. This is being posted by her sister, who hates Pages, and Livejournal, but is very happy she has finally finished posting. Livejournal's a bitch but this story is awesome.