My Love

by Sabrina Zbasnik

  Lana shook off her flames, drawing as much mana back into herself as she could before limping over to Cullen. Grabbing onto his arm, she spotted blood welling up over his tunic, the one without any armor under it because for the love of the Maker, they shouldn't need it. Not anymore!

  "It's bleeding, but not life threatening. I can heal it..." Lana said, dragging her fingers over his arm. Cullen nodded, gritting his teeth when both of them turned from his wound to look down the alley.

  Walking towards them dead center as if he owned all of Orlais was a man dressed in ill fitting armor. The pieces looked like they were all swiped from a different set, gaps evident where they should have been covered by chainmail. But what caused Lana's mouth to dry was the emblem someone took the time to paint across his chest - the sword of mercy surrounded by flames. The templar symbol. Folding out of the doors came another three people, two of them women, the last impossible to tell. Two carried bows aimed at them, while the last...oh Maker, had a staff.

  Cullen sneered and reached for the charred man's sword, but Lana yanked his hand back. "It's too hot," she whispered, eyeing up the hilt of the sword that warped and melted from her fire.

  Growling at that fact, Cullen parted his hands. "I'm unarmed, what am I to do?" She gripped onto his shoulder, then darted her eyes around hoping a solution would present itself.

  "I'm afraid it had to come to this," the false templar said, striding closer towards them. Lana redoubled her barriers, but despite the notched arrows none of the others moved to advance.

  "What do you want?" Cullen shouted. He glanced over at an unattended sweeping cart and imperceptibly began to slide towards it. What was he doing?

  The false templar paused within hissing distance to them. He was young, perhaps the same age Lana was when she became a Warden, with features far too large for his face. Features he had yet to grow into. Chuckling under his breath, the man shook his head slowly. He gripped onto the sword barely notched against his thin hips and drew it free. The blade glimmered by the sun's setting rays.

  "It won't matter to you what I want. Kill the Commander and his pet mage."

  Every man and woman behind him screamed, a primal feral roar that they no doubt practiced to strike fear into the hearts of their enemies. But they weren't taking down random street merchants struggling to make a living. Lana growled at their attempt and, digging into her reserves, she threw up a barrier that could stop a trebuchet. The first round of arrows bounced harmlessly off it, scattering at their feet.

  "What else ya got?" she jeered, trying to drag them out and throw them off. Glaring at the set, she dared both to make a move, when an archer drew her arrowhead across the ground and launched it quick. Shit! Lana didn't have time to think; drawing back her hand, she flung a fireball at it fast. The arrow exploded harmlessly in the air, shrapnel raining down through the clouds. Glancing at each other once, both archers lined up more of the exploding shots, attempting to fire together.

  "Cullen..." Lana called. He had to know she couldn't both defend them and attack at the same time.

  Still chuckling as if the world was his by right, the false templar strode forward towards the mage with her eyes upon the sky. Lana was flinging every fireball she could at the arrows, popping them off one by one, but if she missed just one it could be the end. How many of those blighted things were there?! She didn't watch the man walking towards her, the one with the sword aiming for her chest with plans to cut her down for no good reason.

  The man drew back his sword, a prayer of all things dripping from his lips, and he drove it forward when Cullen caught the blade against the handle of a broom. The cheap steel skidded off the thicker wood, slicing it up, but Cullen kept hold of his makeshift weapon. He must have grabbed it out of the street cleaner's pile. Slotted against his arm was a bucket which he used to fend off the templar's next attack. Lana had to trust him to manage it, she had the rest of the company to take down.

  "Honor!" Lana ordered to their mabari who'd stood at attention, "kill."

  Once the word slipped from her lips, Honor bounded towards the templar. She tried to bite through his cheap armor while Cullen attacked from the front, leaving Lana with the archers first. Twisting her head, she drew up from deep inside of her an old spell that few mages knew any longer. Certainly not the kind to go throwing around at a moment's notice.

  Parting her hands, she squeezed out the mana from her veins and a rain of hellfire thundered from the heavens to splatter against the archers. They dodged the first few, but Lana increased the tempo. She could hear their own explosives popping off from the extreme heat, flames dancing off the no longer wet cobblestones, while smoke buffeted through the alley. Blinding and stinging her eyes, Lana couldn't see her victims through the black haze as more of her fireballs caught upon the streets themselves. But there was no way anyone could walk away from that much power. It was like walking through a volcano itself. She caught sight of a fireball lighting up the roof of a house and directed her fade energy to put it out, when an arrow flitted inches above her head.

  No!

  Lana dodged down and redoubled her barrier. Another two arrows flew where she'd been before sticking in the air and both archers leapt out of the smoke. Ash stained, but otherwise unharmed, they aimed anew at both the mage and the man fighting off their leader. How was that possible? How did they know to be prepared against fire? Instinctively, Lana reached back to find her ice but she faltered. If they were resistant to fire, then would they be against ice as well?

  Stepping forward, Lana knew one spell in her repertoire none of them could stop. Drawing not from the primal fade but the darkness in her heart and the depths of her mind she feared to touch, Lana poured the eternal despair into the first archer. The woman's bow dropped from trembling fingers and she crumpled up as if the hand of the Maker himself squashed her like a gnat.

  The second archer cried out for the first, but before she thought to turn on Lana, the same wall of death hit her. A horrific scream erupted from the second's throat, as she doubled up in agony. As energy drained from her body, Lana sagged against her cane, clinging tight to keep upright, but she had to keep going. The archers were down but not out. Summoning the force of nature itself, Lana lifted up her hands and drove them down. A sickening crunch echoed through the alley, drawing all attention to the two mutilated bodies, shattered bones splintering through skin and muscle, broken beyond repair. Blood, so much blood ran through the streets.

  Lana staggered over, exhaustion curling up her legs as she surveyed the remainders. Using his broom as a staff, Cullen caught the false templar's swings well, deflecting each with it or the bucket. Honor leapt back and forth, mostly getting in the way, but distracting the templar enough he couldn't get in a proper thrust. When the mabari bit deep into his back leg, the man screamed, throwing his arm up, which was when Cullen barreled into him with his shoulder. The thin templar flew backwards, landing flat on his back while Honor hopped out of the way.

  Cullen wiped blood off his cheek, his eyes narrowing upon the leader scurrying to get away. Nodding once at Lana, Cullen moved to finish the job when his steps faltered. He shook his head as if in pain, the bucket clattering first from his fingers followed by the broom. Making one step, he surged forward until his entire body crashed to the ground.

  "No!" Lana tried to run forward to him, but she could at best hobble. What happened? What could have...? In the distance she spotted the mage whipping away his hands. "Honor," she caught the mabari's attention before pointing at the man in robes, "kill that one." Bounding towards the man, the mage tried to throw every skill it had at the dog, but Lana reenforced a barrier and resistance upon the mabari. She watched while Honor leaped off the ground, jaws snarling as seventy pounds of pure muscle flattened the man to the earth. Teeth ripped into everything it could find, robes offering very little to stop that unbridled power.

  Lana was so engrossed in helping Honor, she barely had time to notice the sword glittering towards her. Twis
ting her body, Lana lifted up her staff and fired a bolt of energy at the false templar. Except, it wasn't a staff, it was her cane. Fire burst from the end, charring over the man and sending him flailing back a moment, but canes weren't designed to hold that kind of power. The entire stick exploded into splinters, wood splattering through the air embedding slivers into Lana's hands and arms.

  Without the balance, she tumbled forward onto her knees, pain jarring up her body and rattling her teeth. Blood dripped from her hands and down her arms where what was once her cane bit into her skin. Slowly, the false templar stepped closer to her, his sword extended down towards her beaten body. "All that effort," he tutted as if he had the upper hand, "and for what?"

  Lana glanced over at Cullen laying behind her. He wasn't moving but she caught the shallow rise of his chest. Thank the Maker for that. There was still time. Turning back to the man, she glared up at him towering above her. He snickered at that, "Do not tell me you think you will still win. You can't even rise off the ground." Drawing his sword back, the man aimed for her head, "Foolish little mage, you weren't even supposed to be here."

  He sliced his sword through the air with all the power in his ropey arms, but an inch away from striking Lana's skin it paused, hanging in the void as if it shattered into an invisible wall and stuck. Slowly, she lifted the edge of her lip up and chuckled a mirthless dirge at him. Paralyzed from the tips of his hair down to his puny toes, all the man could do was gaze forever at the woman slowly killing him. Knotting her fingers together as if in prayer, Lana rolled her final spell sending the man into spasms as she unleashed crushing prison upon him knotting up every organ in his body. It wouldn't kill him, but he'd wish it would.

  Watching to make certain he was near death but not at it, Lana yanked her magic away. The false templar crumpled into a heap on the ground. She tried to reach to disarm him, but her spent and useless body refused to rise. "Honor, fetch his sword," she ordered. The bloody mabari trotted over and picked up the blade in her teeth, her stump of a tail twitching.

  Satisfied that he wasn't about to cause any trouble, Lana turned back to Cullen, every healing spell at her disposal dripping from her fingers. She crawled along the dirty and blood stained ground, unable to move any other way, but needing to touch him to know he was okay. Almost gracing across his hand, a whistle blew from the end of the alley.

  "Stop, in the name of the Empress!"

  No, she had to heal him...

  Lana ignored the order, reaching to feel for a pulse, to watch his breathing, when an armored glove wrapped around her thin wrist and yanked back. Shrieking in pain, Lana's body rolled forward to the dirt and the guard pushed down upon her back, digging her chest tighter to the stone.

  "Shit, that's the Commander of the Inquisition!"

  "No..." Lana gasped, "stop, let me help him." Her cries went ignored, the breath barely making it past her lips. Fingers dug into her limp body and yanked her up off the ground.

  "What do we do?"

  "Get a damn healer over here for him. Last thing we need is losing one of them on our watch."

  "Honor," Lana wheezed, glancing over at the mabari trying to trail after the woman being dragged through the streets, "guard Cullen." The mabari paused, no doubt torn between who to follow, but dutifully trotted back to the man laying crumpled on the ground.

  "What about the survivors? What do we do with them?"

  Exhaustion crawled up through Lana's depleted veins, cottoned her weary brain, and slowed her thudding heart. With her head hanging down, she felt her hands being pulled by the man tossing her around, and heard, "Same thing we always do. Finish the job."

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Rebellion

  Shame lodged in his stomach like a satiated serpent while a woman in white clucked her tongue and over bandaged his arm. A sleep spell; of all things it was a Maker cursed sleep spell that took him down. Sure, he was grossly out of practice, was distracted by that amateur swordsman - often the most dangerous to take on - and had enough alcohol left in his system to amplify the spell through his veins, but he should have shaken it off. It was what templars did. Disoriented, Cullen woke shielded behind a hastily tossed up curtain. Judging by the stack of crates overstuffed with plucked feathers for his medical bed he'd guess he was near the butchers, an upholsters, or a particularly strange Orlesian fashion house.

  "Hold still, Commander," the woman fussed, winding even more of a never ending roll of linen around his arm. It was futile, the cut barely a scratch. All it needed was a splash of alcohol to clean the wound and one or two stitches. He'd done worse by hand after Haven fell when they were short on everything. But he wasn't just anyone now, and people with fancy titles got the best medical treatment whether they asked for it or not.

  Cullen's free hand draped down off his lap to skim over Honor's head. Apparently, she'd stood guard over his body all but shoving aside anyone who'd dare to hurt him. In truth, Cullen was surprised he didn't wake to her sloe eyes shoved in his face as Honor perched upon his chest. For being a great war hound, she seemed to be under the impression her true calling was as a lap dog.

  "All right," the healer snipped off the end of her linen. Cullen was grateful that was over, his arm was padded enough it could probably take a mabari bite without feeling anything. Pushing her scissors into an apron pocket, she smiled, "I think one more roll should do it."

  "NO!" he cried, then dropped his voice, "no, it's quite all right. I'm good. Thank you."

  "Hm," the woman pursed her lips. Despite having the constitution of an elderly woman she looked at most fifty, her face only puckered around the eyes and mouth. "You were out for awhile there. Can you feel any damage done to your brain?" She knocked a finger against his skull as if flicking a fly. Instinctively, Cullen snagged her hand in his, earning him a glower. More of that shame kicked up in his gut, and he slowly lowered her fingers away from him as he sat up.

  "If there was any, how would I know?" he said sliding his feet to the floor. Someone took the time to yank his boots off while he was under.

  "Word is there were blood mages about," the woman said while fishing some other tincture out of her apron, "Did you feel any of them poking around in your mind?"

  Trying to not flinch, Cullen didn't ruminate upon her words. This was not the place nor the person he'd want to remember his traumatic past with. Instead, he rolled an eye over to her jostling a bottle free of her apron, "That has no effect."

  "Nonsense. Elder Jessup's Legendary Tonic," she read off the label as if he couldn't see it in its magnificent sized font stretching around the amber glass. "It'll cure any blood mage taint right out of you."

  He'd heard that bandied about before, in particular during and after the blight. In that case, that magical elixir was supposed to cure anyone of the darkspawn taint. After Kirkwall fell, it transformed overnight into the only way to free yourself from a blood mage's control. And when that wasn't your greatest concern it also acted as a baldness and impotence cure. The most versatile potion in all of thedas. Cullen would often load crates of the damn things into the trebuchets to calibrate them. Lies did no one any good, certainly not against blight or blood mages.

  Shoving aside her offered hand as gently as a breeze, Cullen smiled, "There were no blood mages in attendance." The woman looked about to argue, so certain she was with her information, when he threw down his cards, "I was a templar, after all. I know a blood mage when I see one."

  "As you say..." she began, when a commotion drew her to glance through the white sheet. "Oi, we're healing back here. No one's allowed in."

  Two guards stood at attention during her ministrations, mostly in that slouching, not certain why they needed to be there attention, but now they snapped upright and rigid. Hands drifted towards hilts, until a woman dressed in truly pristine white barreled through them.

  "Your Worship!" the healer paled, dropping to a knee. Honor barked in recognition at Leliana while Cullen only patted his knees and kept looking around
for his shoes.

  "Maker's breath," Leliana sighed, "I just heard. What happened?"

  "Ambush," Cullen said, sliding one boot on and reaching for the other. "Not the prettiest fight, but we..." He paused, and whipped his head up at the Divine, the solitary Divine. "Surely Lana would have told you what happened."

  "Lanny? She's not with me. I only received word a moment ago and raced over here to find you."

  Cullen grabbed onto Leliana's hand and towered above her, "What you mean she's not with you?!" The sound of metal drawing from a scabbard slithered through the air. Slowly, he released the Divine and slunk an inch back holding both hands up to show he meant no offense, but his heart pounded madly. A fear dried out his tongue dried, sticking it tight to the roof of his mouth and he stammered through it. "I woke alone, no one else here but Honor. I assumed Lana was with you, waiting for me to wake. I..."

  Maker, saying it aloud he realized that never would have happened. She wouldn't have left him alone, not unless she had no choice. Not unless... "No," Cullen shook his head. He'd assumed that Lana won, she was the Maker damned Hero of Ferelden. Surely she took down the rest without a second thought, and then... His eyes met Leliana's and a gurgle swallowed down his throat. Where was she?

  Leliana spun on her heels and marched up to the guards, "Were you at the disturbance?"

  "Yes, Your Perfection."

  "There was a woman there: short, dark skin, wearing a blue dress. What happened to her?"