[fic] ferro comitante [5/?]
Title: Ferro Comitante 5/?
Words: 2617
Rating: Teen
Summary: There's a lot of things wrong in the land of Ferelden -- little, little things. When Alistair discovers why, he will not be alone in his choice between the reality that is and the reality that ought to be. In this chapter: Alistair verifies his man-on-the-run status with a pair of Lothering templars. But he's not the only person in Ferelden who's getting weird visions.
ferro comitante
my sword as my companion
5.
“The word came down pretty fast, yeah. One thing after the other. We hardly knew what to make of it.”
“What, man, are you daft? We had other things to worry about, yeah? Like a giant bleedin' murderous qunari about to go on and homicide the countryside, y'know?”
“Er, I don't think homicide's a verb,” Alistair felt obliged to point out.
Benson scoffed, quaffing the last of his beer. His hand still trembled when he set down the mug, belying his air of belligerent non-caring. “Well, we took care of him, anyway. Might be stuck in this damned backwater hole guarding this sodding outhouse of a Chantry building, but when push comes to shove, Lothering can take care of its own self. No need to bother the high and mighty Arl's men, y'know.”
“Benson,” Gentian said warningly, casting a dark glance his fellow Templar's way.
The curly-haired Templar shrugged without repentance. “Am I right? We hocked the qunari's head clean off, dragged ourselves back, Ser Bryant's probably stuck writing the report right now, and we're getting completely pissed in this tavern like we do every night. Town saved, and the Arl didn't have to interrupt his busy schedule of buggering elf maids and embezzling road improvement funds for so much as a moment.”
Gentian stared at Benson, appalled. Alistair stared at Benson, impressed. Benson stared at his drink, annoyed. “Girl!” he shouted, waving the empty mug in the air. “Another!” Dutifully, the bar girl trotted by and filled his cup. Benson raised it high in sardonic salute to his table companions and tipped it back.
“I mean, as far as I know, it's not exactly like hunting a mage. They haven't got a phylactery for this Alistair fellow,” Gentian said, steering the conversation back onto its original topic with another sharp look at Benson. “But we were told to look lively and report if we happened to meet the man. They say he looks a lot like the Prince, which would be useful if any of us knew what Prince Cailan actually looked like.”
“Maybe when he snuck Prince Cailan out of Denerim, they just switched places,” Benson offered loudly. “So you've got this serving-girl's bastard, probably half-elf-”
“Would you lay off the bloody elf thing? It's embarrassing,” Gentian muttered.
“-well, come on, though, I'll bet you sovereigns to sand that half the Denerim elves have got the highest blood in Ferelden running through their foresty little veins. Running and jumping and skipping. Like deer.” Benson raised his brows knowingly at the party. “Eh? Eh? Everyone knows nobles sodding love getting by-blows on their hot chambermaids.”
Gentian slumped in his seat, putting his face in his hands. “You are an embarrassment,” he informed his palms.
“You weren't saying that when I stopped that qunari from splitting you over his knee with his bare hands,” Benson snorted. “Look, Cullen, you sure you don't want a drink? I can pour it through your visor. If you open your mouth and close your eyes-“
“Then I will get a big surprise? No thanks,” Alistair assured the other man. “Really. I've got to keep the helm on. It's part of my penance.”
“What'd you do that was so bad?”
“Oh, uh... it was pretty bad,” Alistair promised. “It involved three acolytes, a lay sister and a few spare flasks. The dog was upset for weeks, but I'm sure the soil in the vegetable garden wasn't permanently damaged or anything. Anyway, every four hours, I've got to state that one part of the Chant of Light - you know the part?”
Benson, with feeling, sighed. “I know the part. With the - ”
Gentian grimaced. “And the - ”
“Yeah, exactly.” Alistair heaved a breath.
“That's tough,” Gentian commiserated.
“Innit? So,” said Alistair, “that's that. Can't take the bucket off. Sorry.” Mentally, he apologized to Cullen for dragging his poor name through the dirt like this.
“I really doubt this Alistair bloke's going to come by Lothering.” Benson gazed morosely into the gold-chipped surface of his beer. “Because that would be interesting. And nothing interesting ever happens in Lothering.”
“We had a qunari,” Gentian protested.
“We don't have one right now!”
“But we did have one, though.” Gentian eyed his mash broodingly.
“Still.”
There was a long moment, enceinte, before Gentian allowed, “Yeah, still.”
It was strangely comfortable to sit at the table with the two Templars. Rank and file soldiers, these two, exiled to a backwater beyond to serve the smallest and humblest of Ferelden's needy, and yet for all their complaining, they had served with the swift unquestioning expertise any Ser would have demanded. Gentian had had the order, straight from Mother Hannah; Benson had been the one to put his sword through the Sten's meaty neck, though the entire garrison had had to put the creature down first. For all that Gentian played at distant and disinterested nonchalance, weariness ringed his gray eyes, and Benson was plainly tired, slumping, half his body weight supported on one elbow. Alistair, who had spent half his life trapped in that one same, wretched, unchanging abbey, could imagine Benson's exhaustion, and how little of it had to do with the day's admittedly taxing events.
“It's about time for me to head out,” said Alistair, rising from the table reluctantly. He had his information. It was clear that he ought to leave Lothering before he was found out, and he was grateful, awkwardly, for the two Templars' clear addiction to drink. “Y'know,” Benson's vocal quirk was strangely addictive, “to do the Chant and all. Thanks for entertaining me, fellows.”
“If we see this Jowan maleficar, we'll let you know!” Benson promised, raising a quick grin Alistair's way.
“...How, exactly, will you let him know, Benson.” Gentian's lips thinned, though he was fighting back a puff of laughter.
Benson considered this for a moment. “...Never mind,” he said, and buried his face in his arms to Gentian's gentle laughter.
“Farewell, Brother,” said Gentian, and Benson emitted something polysyllabic which Alistair assumed to be a similar dismissal. Smiling inside his helm despite himself, Alistair raised a gloved hand, rose, and left.
---
A long time ago, elves had lived close to the land, in harmony with the cycles of sun and moon, clouds and rain. Every breeze was the breath of their gods, sweet and fresh and life-giving, and the stars twinkled with the Creators' joy at what they had wrought, and the elves gave thanks for the earth and all its wonders.
Presumably, these wonders didn't include bugs. Well, Jacinta figured they might, provisionally, have included the really tremendous bugs whose wingspan and menacing little insect faces commanded respect as well as discomfort and wailing, but certainly the wonders oughtn't include the dozen or so tiny gnats that hovered about one's head in late summer, just waiting to be accidentally inhaled. Or the myriad variations of grit that always found a way to embed themselves beneath one's scapulae. Or the mud - surely no one ever worshiped the mud.
Across from her, Leliana was curled up in her bedroll, eyes closed, breathing evenly. Jacinta couldn't tell whether or not she had fallen asleep, or if she had simply given up on getting much conversation out of Jacinta despite her clear curiosity. Jacinta had been quiet around her all evening, uncomfortably aware of how much she owed the Bard for her kindness.
She pulled the hooded cape close around her (Leliana had said it was a spare, that she'd had such things before and would have them again, but it looked to Jacinta like it must have been expensive, with all that delicate hand-stitching). Charity or not, it was warm and soft. Near her mud-splattered boot, there was a dry twig. She poked at the fire with it, then dropped it in, rewarded by the eager crackling of the flames as they tossed out a spark or two and briefly burst higher.
She could have heightened the campfire with a thought and the merest extension of her will, but there was no point in draining her mana unnecessarily, not now that she was keenly aware how finite supplies were. There was no stockroom at her disposal anymore, no endless stores of magical accoutrements for her to plunder at need, and she would simply have to get used to it. She was no longer in the Tower. She would never go back to the Tower again.
As if anyone would have tolerated this much muck back home, anyway.
Gold - with gold, the world would be an endless stockroom, but Jacinta didn't have it. She'd had to barter and sell everything halfway useful in her pack for the lyrium potions that sneering, condescending little man in the general store had deigned to sell her. Meeting Leliana in that tavern had been the greatest stroke of good luck Jacinta could have imagined, just short of the fact that the Templar assigned to hunt her down had been stripped of his duties. She wasn't glad at his misfortune, exactly, but....
It wasn't as though she'd left the Tower with a plan. No, she hadn't thought the Chantry heifer was worth all the bother and she'd told Jowan so, but yes, she'd helped him - what else were best friends for? Lily, alternating between pleading and panic, had been very little help once they were inside the storage rooms. Jacinta had shattered her phylactery on impulse, startled that it was even still there instead of halfway to Denerim, but Jowan had flung his against the walls with a giddy, disquieting laugh. She remembered how odd she'd thought that strained exultation.
Even in his despair and her horror, they'd been a good team. She'd thrown up a shield automatically (blood had seemed to hover in mid-air, as though it did not dare touch her terror), and when Lily repudiated Jowan - ungrateful minx, Jacinta thought bitterly, after all he had gone through for her - and Jowan fled, Jacinta ran too, darting between the groaning armored bodies of the Templars, down the endless steps until her legs burned, out into the burning sunlight. Clinging to a conjured ice floe, she'd made it to shore, and then she'd run some more, hoping that somehow the mysterious woodcraft of her ancestors had a blood component that would activate in the forests.
Of course, it hadn't, and the only real wonder here was that she hadn't yet taken a chill or been eaten by a wolf. Or caught by a Templar. She hadn't seen Jowan as she fled, only the traces of him, the fat blood spatters here and there along the ground, blurry red streaks in her vision.
Presumably when First Enchanter Uldred woke from unconsciousness, he had been quite put out.
But to hell with him. To hell with the whole Circle. They'd quarantined her friend and mentor Wynne for the grave, grave sin of loving someone enough to wish to bring his child into the world - they had dishonored the man she loved, stripped Irving of his position and his teaching responsibilities, forced a capable and gifted man to do pious and menial labor any idiot acolyte could have done - and in their cruelty, in their suspicion and judgment, they had driven Jowan to the very extreme they would least have wished. To hell with Jowan, too, because he knew better, damnit, because she had been his friend and she would have helped him, had she only known.
To hell with it all. Her life was her own now, not the Circle's or the Chantry's.
Her own.
She curled up a small distance from the fire in her cape, grateful for the tiny shadow of privacy the hood afforded. Independence was a good thing, after all. She and Jowan had used to gas on about how much better their lives could be if they could just do what they wanted whenever they wanted without a Templar standing over them all silverite disapproval every time they went to use the privy, but they hadn't ever expected to pay such a price.
Unlike a lot of apprentices at the Tower, Jacinta could still remember her mother, the swirling bark-brown patterns tattooed across her high cheekbones, and her smile, wide and free-wheeling as the bluest skies. To her mother, independence had been everything - for all that she had been born free among the Dalish, freer than most elves could imagine. She'd wanted to roam the world with her baby on her hip, to know everything and teach it to her daughter (and look how well that went for her) and now here Jacinta was, and this was freedom, wasn't it (the fine fabric of Leliana's charity, blood leaking from between steel plates, the storekeeper's dismissive disdain).
For tomorrow, she thought firmly, shutting her eyes and willing herself to see nothing behind her eyes, only the blackness, not Jowan's blood or the Templar's blood or her own phylactery blood, she and Leliana would have to coordinate their funds. Lyrium was absolutely a necessity, not to be scrimped on, though perhaps Jacinta could learn to make her own potions. As for food, Jacinta had foraged and stolen, used her magic quite unfairly, but perhaps Leliana could cook, or could tell fauna apart - the real plants were so different from the illustrations in the Tower, and Jacinta had yet to get used to it...
---
She stumbled as she ran, and she never stumbled, she never tripped over roots and rocks like this, but of course now that time was of the essence and the burden on her back seemed scarcely to breathe, she would be falling all the hell over herself, that made sense. Her bow thumped against her leg, clumsily tied there so that she would never, ever have to return to that damnable cave again. Her lungs ached for air, her legs for rest, and all she could think was that she had to get him home.
Her arrival at camp was greeted by cries, and wearily she dropped to her knees, shifting the heavy body into her arms. His head lolled back, and she had to support it in the crook of her arm, his dark hair falling across his vallaslin as he drew in a great, scraping breath. He'd been so proud of the vallaslin he'd chosen for how bold and painful it was, trees and branches inscribed through the absence, not presence, of color - trickster writing for the trickster god.
She'd had to own, it was a mighty feat to withstand the vallaslin so long. And now without his sharp bright smile to enliven his features, that writing said nothing at all.
She gave him up to the strong and capable arms of her clan, painfully aware how little she could do for him now, and when they dragged her to a cot, she fell over onto it and passed immediately into dragging black hours. Words flickered in her hearing, broken by her own thudding and uneven heartbeat.
“Where came they by this sickness?” “Ask Tamlen, when he wakes.”
She struggled to consciousness to tell them to ask Idris instead, not her, but she woke to wailing, and she knew they had lost him.
---
Jacinta woke to dawn, and, shivering in the hazy fog, she touched the tear tracks on her face.
Exclusively on SiB@LJ: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4
On Archive of Our Own: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4
On Fanfiction.Net: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4
Words: 2617
Rating: Teen
Summary: There's a lot of things wrong in the land of Ferelden -- little, little things. When Alistair discovers why, he will not be alone in his choice between the reality that is and the reality that ought to be. In this chapter: Alistair verifies his man-on-the-run status with a pair of Lothering templars. But he's not the only person in Ferelden who's getting weird visions.
ferro comitante
my sword as my companion
5.
“The word came down pretty fast, yeah. One thing after the other. We hardly knew what to make of it.”
“What, man, are you daft? We had other things to worry about, yeah? Like a giant bleedin' murderous qunari about to go on and homicide the countryside, y'know?”
“Er, I don't think homicide's a verb,” Alistair felt obliged to point out.
Benson scoffed, quaffing the last of his beer. His hand still trembled when he set down the mug, belying his air of belligerent non-caring. “Well, we took care of him, anyway. Might be stuck in this damned backwater hole guarding this sodding outhouse of a Chantry building, but when push comes to shove, Lothering can take care of its own self. No need to bother the high and mighty Arl's men, y'know.”
“Benson,” Gentian said warningly, casting a dark glance his fellow Templar's way.
The curly-haired Templar shrugged without repentance. “Am I right? We hocked the qunari's head clean off, dragged ourselves back, Ser Bryant's probably stuck writing the report right now, and we're getting completely pissed in this tavern like we do every night. Town saved, and the Arl didn't have to interrupt his busy schedule of buggering elf maids and embezzling road improvement funds for so much as a moment.”
Gentian stared at Benson, appalled. Alistair stared at Benson, impressed. Benson stared at his drink, annoyed. “Girl!” he shouted, waving the empty mug in the air. “Another!” Dutifully, the bar girl trotted by and filled his cup. Benson raised it high in sardonic salute to his table companions and tipped it back.
“I mean, as far as I know, it's not exactly like hunting a mage. They haven't got a phylactery for this Alistair fellow,” Gentian said, steering the conversation back onto its original topic with another sharp look at Benson. “But we were told to look lively and report if we happened to meet the man. They say he looks a lot like the Prince, which would be useful if any of us knew what Prince Cailan actually looked like.”
“Maybe when he snuck Prince Cailan out of Denerim, they just switched places,” Benson offered loudly. “So you've got this serving-girl's bastard, probably half-elf-”
“Would you lay off the bloody elf thing? It's embarrassing,” Gentian muttered.
“-well, come on, though, I'll bet you sovereigns to sand that half the Denerim elves have got the highest blood in Ferelden running through their foresty little veins. Running and jumping and skipping. Like deer.” Benson raised his brows knowingly at the party. “Eh? Eh? Everyone knows nobles sodding love getting by-blows on their hot chambermaids.”
Gentian slumped in his seat, putting his face in his hands. “You are an embarrassment,” he informed his palms.
“You weren't saying that when I stopped that qunari from splitting you over his knee with his bare hands,” Benson snorted. “Look, Cullen, you sure you don't want a drink? I can pour it through your visor. If you open your mouth and close your eyes-“
“Then I will get a big surprise? No thanks,” Alistair assured the other man. “Really. I've got to keep the helm on. It's part of my penance.”
“What'd you do that was so bad?”
“Oh, uh... it was pretty bad,” Alistair promised. “It involved three acolytes, a lay sister and a few spare flasks. The dog was upset for weeks, but I'm sure the soil in the vegetable garden wasn't permanently damaged or anything. Anyway, every four hours, I've got to state that one part of the Chant of Light - you know the part?”
Benson, with feeling, sighed. “I know the part. With the - ”
Gentian grimaced. “And the - ”
“Yeah, exactly.” Alistair heaved a breath.
“That's tough,” Gentian commiserated.
“Innit? So,” said Alistair, “that's that. Can't take the bucket off. Sorry.” Mentally, he apologized to Cullen for dragging his poor name through the dirt like this.
“I really doubt this Alistair bloke's going to come by Lothering.” Benson gazed morosely into the gold-chipped surface of his beer. “Because that would be interesting. And nothing interesting ever happens in Lothering.”
“We had a qunari,” Gentian protested.
“We don't have one right now!”
“But we did have one, though.” Gentian eyed his mash broodingly.
“Still.”
There was a long moment, enceinte, before Gentian allowed, “Yeah, still.”
It was strangely comfortable to sit at the table with the two Templars. Rank and file soldiers, these two, exiled to a backwater beyond to serve the smallest and humblest of Ferelden's needy, and yet for all their complaining, they had served with the swift unquestioning expertise any Ser would have demanded. Gentian had had the order, straight from Mother Hannah; Benson had been the one to put his sword through the Sten's meaty neck, though the entire garrison had had to put the creature down first. For all that Gentian played at distant and disinterested nonchalance, weariness ringed his gray eyes, and Benson was plainly tired, slumping, half his body weight supported on one elbow. Alistair, who had spent half his life trapped in that one same, wretched, unchanging abbey, could imagine Benson's exhaustion, and how little of it had to do with the day's admittedly taxing events.
“It's about time for me to head out,” said Alistair, rising from the table reluctantly. He had his information. It was clear that he ought to leave Lothering before he was found out, and he was grateful, awkwardly, for the two Templars' clear addiction to drink. “Y'know,” Benson's vocal quirk was strangely addictive, “to do the Chant and all. Thanks for entertaining me, fellows.”
“If we see this Jowan maleficar, we'll let you know!” Benson promised, raising a quick grin Alistair's way.
“...How, exactly, will you let him know, Benson.” Gentian's lips thinned, though he was fighting back a puff of laughter.
Benson considered this for a moment. “...Never mind,” he said, and buried his face in his arms to Gentian's gentle laughter.
“Farewell, Brother,” said Gentian, and Benson emitted something polysyllabic which Alistair assumed to be a similar dismissal. Smiling inside his helm despite himself, Alistair raised a gloved hand, rose, and left.
---
A long time ago, elves had lived close to the land, in harmony with the cycles of sun and moon, clouds and rain. Every breeze was the breath of their gods, sweet and fresh and life-giving, and the stars twinkled with the Creators' joy at what they had wrought, and the elves gave thanks for the earth and all its wonders.
Presumably, these wonders didn't include bugs. Well, Jacinta figured they might, provisionally, have included the really tremendous bugs whose wingspan and menacing little insect faces commanded respect as well as discomfort and wailing, but certainly the wonders oughtn't include the dozen or so tiny gnats that hovered about one's head in late summer, just waiting to be accidentally inhaled. Or the myriad variations of grit that always found a way to embed themselves beneath one's scapulae. Or the mud - surely no one ever worshiped the mud.
Across from her, Leliana was curled up in her bedroll, eyes closed, breathing evenly. Jacinta couldn't tell whether or not she had fallen asleep, or if she had simply given up on getting much conversation out of Jacinta despite her clear curiosity. Jacinta had been quiet around her all evening, uncomfortably aware of how much she owed the Bard for her kindness.
She pulled the hooded cape close around her (Leliana had said it was a spare, that she'd had such things before and would have them again, but it looked to Jacinta like it must have been expensive, with all that delicate hand-stitching). Charity or not, it was warm and soft. Near her mud-splattered boot, there was a dry twig. She poked at the fire with it, then dropped it in, rewarded by the eager crackling of the flames as they tossed out a spark or two and briefly burst higher.
She could have heightened the campfire with a thought and the merest extension of her will, but there was no point in draining her mana unnecessarily, not now that she was keenly aware how finite supplies were. There was no stockroom at her disposal anymore, no endless stores of magical accoutrements for her to plunder at need, and she would simply have to get used to it. She was no longer in the Tower. She would never go back to the Tower again.
As if anyone would have tolerated this much muck back home, anyway.
Gold - with gold, the world would be an endless stockroom, but Jacinta didn't have it. She'd had to barter and sell everything halfway useful in her pack for the lyrium potions that sneering, condescending little man in the general store had deigned to sell her. Meeting Leliana in that tavern had been the greatest stroke of good luck Jacinta could have imagined, just short of the fact that the Templar assigned to hunt her down had been stripped of his duties. She wasn't glad at his misfortune, exactly, but....
It wasn't as though she'd left the Tower with a plan. No, she hadn't thought the Chantry heifer was worth all the bother and she'd told Jowan so, but yes, she'd helped him - what else were best friends for? Lily, alternating between pleading and panic, had been very little help once they were inside the storage rooms. Jacinta had shattered her phylactery on impulse, startled that it was even still there instead of halfway to Denerim, but Jowan had flung his against the walls with a giddy, disquieting laugh. She remembered how odd she'd thought that strained exultation.
Even in his despair and her horror, they'd been a good team. She'd thrown up a shield automatically (blood had seemed to hover in mid-air, as though it did not dare touch her terror), and when Lily repudiated Jowan - ungrateful minx, Jacinta thought bitterly, after all he had gone through for her - and Jowan fled, Jacinta ran too, darting between the groaning armored bodies of the Templars, down the endless steps until her legs burned, out into the burning sunlight. Clinging to a conjured ice floe, she'd made it to shore, and then she'd run some more, hoping that somehow the mysterious woodcraft of her ancestors had a blood component that would activate in the forests.
Of course, it hadn't, and the only real wonder here was that she hadn't yet taken a chill or been eaten by a wolf. Or caught by a Templar. She hadn't seen Jowan as she fled, only the traces of him, the fat blood spatters here and there along the ground, blurry red streaks in her vision.
Presumably when First Enchanter Uldred woke from unconsciousness, he had been quite put out.
But to hell with him. To hell with the whole Circle. They'd quarantined her friend and mentor Wynne for the grave, grave sin of loving someone enough to wish to bring his child into the world - they had dishonored the man she loved, stripped Irving of his position and his teaching responsibilities, forced a capable and gifted man to do pious and menial labor any idiot acolyte could have done - and in their cruelty, in their suspicion and judgment, they had driven Jowan to the very extreme they would least have wished. To hell with Jowan, too, because he knew better, damnit, because she had been his friend and she would have helped him, had she only known.
To hell with it all. Her life was her own now, not the Circle's or the Chantry's.
Her own.
She curled up a small distance from the fire in her cape, grateful for the tiny shadow of privacy the hood afforded. Independence was a good thing, after all. She and Jowan had used to gas on about how much better their lives could be if they could just do what they wanted whenever they wanted without a Templar standing over them all silverite disapproval every time they went to use the privy, but they hadn't ever expected to pay such a price.
Unlike a lot of apprentices at the Tower, Jacinta could still remember her mother, the swirling bark-brown patterns tattooed across her high cheekbones, and her smile, wide and free-wheeling as the bluest skies. To her mother, independence had been everything - for all that she had been born free among the Dalish, freer than most elves could imagine. She'd wanted to roam the world with her baby on her hip, to know everything and teach it to her daughter (and look how well that went for her) and now here Jacinta was, and this was freedom, wasn't it (the fine fabric of Leliana's charity, blood leaking from between steel plates, the storekeeper's dismissive disdain).
For tomorrow, she thought firmly, shutting her eyes and willing herself to see nothing behind her eyes, only the blackness, not Jowan's blood or the Templar's blood or her own phylactery blood, she and Leliana would have to coordinate their funds. Lyrium was absolutely a necessity, not to be scrimped on, though perhaps Jacinta could learn to make her own potions. As for food, Jacinta had foraged and stolen, used her magic quite unfairly, but perhaps Leliana could cook, or could tell fauna apart - the real plants were so different from the illustrations in the Tower, and Jacinta had yet to get used to it...
---
She stumbled as she ran, and she never stumbled, she never tripped over roots and rocks like this, but of course now that time was of the essence and the burden on her back seemed scarcely to breathe, she would be falling all the hell over herself, that made sense. Her bow thumped against her leg, clumsily tied there so that she would never, ever have to return to that damnable cave again. Her lungs ached for air, her legs for rest, and all she could think was that she had to get him home.
Her arrival at camp was greeted by cries, and wearily she dropped to her knees, shifting the heavy body into her arms. His head lolled back, and she had to support it in the crook of her arm, his dark hair falling across his vallaslin as he drew in a great, scraping breath. He'd been so proud of the vallaslin he'd chosen for how bold and painful it was, trees and branches inscribed through the absence, not presence, of color - trickster writing for the trickster god.
She'd had to own, it was a mighty feat to withstand the vallaslin so long. And now without his sharp bright smile to enliven his features, that writing said nothing at all.
She gave him up to the strong and capable arms of her clan, painfully aware how little she could do for him now, and when they dragged her to a cot, she fell over onto it and passed immediately into dragging black hours. Words flickered in her hearing, broken by her own thudding and uneven heartbeat.
“Where came they by this sickness?” “Ask Tamlen, when he wakes.”
She struggled to consciousness to tell them to ask Idris instead, not her, but she woke to wailing, and she knew they had lost him.
---
Jacinta woke to dawn, and, shivering in the hazy fog, she touched the tear tracks on her face.
Exclusively on SiB@LJ: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4
On Archive of Our Own: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4
On Fanfiction.Net: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4