Chapter Text
Elm was almost certain that she was going to throw up.
Her body was washed in frigid sweat. Her mouth was dry and tasted of poor decisions. She felt strangely sticky and her legs...she had lost all confidence in her legs. Despite the best will and the best poultices and the healing spells cast with Wynne's kind smile, her ribs still carries a pommel-blow ache that refused to subside.
Some hero.
She stood, waiting for the huge doors in front of her to open. The swelling sounds of the crowd outside swam into her skull and pounded along with the throbbing ache in her temples. Her damnable stone heart beat in time with it all.
This would be a very bad time to throw up.
Her dark curls, at least, were sitting in place. The braids were behaving. No one could see her ears and the plastered-on Hero-of-Ferelden smile was doing enough to distract from the dullness of her ink-black eyes.
For more than a few thundering heartbeats Elm wished the darkspawn had lain waste to Denerim after all. Or, at least, to the good ale kept in the cellars. Elm had been laying waste to that instead. Thoroughly.
The truest cause of Elm's hangover stood flanking her wearing their own grim smiles; Alistair and Anora, the newly-crowned King and Queen of Ferelden, ready to present their hero to the good gathered people of the city.
If Elm had just been able to avoid them until this moment came. Hadn't had to watch what they would become. Hadn't had to step in. Maybe then she wouldn't be worried about vomiting all over her pretty shoes.
Really, this hangover hadn't started with them, or with good Ferelden ale. The beginnings of this nausea had their origins in Morrigan and bad wine.
Elm was still in bed, after the battle. 'Healed', but under instructions to rest, and rest was stubbornly refusing to come. Morrigan had slipped into her chambers, rooms fit for a hero that were fittingly far from the royal quarters of the keep.
Elm was lying vigil for her nightmares, with a bottle of rough stuff from Maker-knows-where to keep her company. She'd grabbed it during a quiet flit through the kitchens. Apparently, it was made from plums. Elm wasn't sure what sin those plums had committed to deserve such a fate. Morrigan had had the same idea, and snuck in with some similar cursed bottle boasting berries in its base. She was dressed for travel, and her presence in the castle at all was the last thing Elm expected. As far as Elm knew, Morrigan had quit the city the moment the battle was done.
She had promised she would.
'You're still here?' Elm climbed, trembling, off the bed and unsteadily embraced the woman she had called 'sister'.
Morrigan gracefully eased Elm back down and perched herself at the foot of the bed, leaning against the post. She proffered the berry wine and took the bottle Elm offered in exchange. 'I had to see it for myself. You live.'
Elm took a swig and grimaced. Berries were no better. 'I live.'
'And he...?'
'Lives too, for my sins.'
Elm spotted a look of concern on Morrigan's face, although the witch ducked her head to cover it. There was a burning question not being asked.
'I took the blow,' Elm admitted. She wasn't proud of it, wasn't proud of why she'd done it. It could so easily have been him.
Morrigan exhaled slowly. Never one to show emotion, now she pasted a smile over stone and left that important question alone. She raised a cup of the awful plum stuff and waited for Elm to do the same. 'So, you're a hero now.'
Only Morrigan could layer that statement with the appropriate amount of irony. Elm raised her cup and tried her own matching smile; it was more of a wince. 'The Hero of Ferelden, they're calling me.' A long draught of berry wine drowned the taste of the name. She eyed Morrigan's clothes, the hooded cloak ready to make her disappear, and kept any trace of hope from her voice as she asked 'You're leaving now?'
'After this last, awful one for the road. You're staying?'
'Not for long, if I can help it.' Elm shifted, trying not to grimace with the pain, draining her cup with determination.
'I can cast another healing on you, before I go,' Morrigan offered.
'There's no need, I'm fine.' Elm was decidedly not fine, but at this point there was little a spell could do for her. She upended the bottle into her cup, and swallowed the final dregs of berry stuff straight from the source. 'They want to have a celebration. Show Ferelden we're all better. I'm expected to be very present. After that, it's on the Wardens. All I'm hoping for it to be away from Denerim.'
Morrigan's sips were shallow, by comparison. 'You don't want to stick around? See how the rulers you've crowned handle things?'
'I'm not crowning them. They've got a Revered Mother in for that.' That wasn't the question Morrigan was asking, and Elm knew it. Morrigan stayed silent, inviting Elm to continue, and she took the bait too easily. 'It's over. Done. And if I stay, I have a joyous reminder of that in front of me every day.'
'Kings have been known to keep mistresses.' Morrigan was needling now, but Elm was wine-soaked enough to rise to it.
'Not mistresses who spare their enemies.'
'I never understood what you saw in him anyway.'
There it was, enough to burst the dam. 'I know you fucking didn't.' Elm's lips were berry-stained now, and she punctured her ranting with healthy swigs. 'You were kept clear of the circle, you wouldn't know. Fuck the Maker, it was never a place for friends. I was alone, all the damned time. I was never left alone, but I was always alone.' Elm heard the self-pity in her voice and hated it, but just this once she wasn't going to stop herself. She'd earned this, at least. 'I was never lonely though. That only came when I met him. Then I learned what it was to be lonely.' One last swig, and the berry wine was done. Morrigan didn't offer to return the plum; a kindness, perhaps. 'Then,' Elm continued, 'I was lonely whenever he wasn't at my side.' She sighed, looking up at the canopy over the bed and seeing the stars that they'd slept under, that they'd fucked under. 'Now, we're done, and for good reason.' Morrigan snorted at that, but Elm continued blithely on. 'And I'm supposed to watch, and stay lonely, as he marries his new queen and rules the country? Fuck that.'
'Fuck Alistair.' Morrigan topped up Elm with the plum, just enough for a toast.
Elm's smile as she raised her cup was more honest than any other she'd offered since that final blow. 'No. Shan't. Never again.'
'Where will you go?' Morrigan seemed to be done needling now, to be genuinely curious. Elm let herself believe, for a stupid second, that Morrigan had reason to ask, that she wasn't completely alone and there was someone in this world who might want to find her for some other purpose than the Grey Wardens and what lies in the deep. It was an idiotic hope. The witches curiosity was all that begged the question.
'Where the Wardens demand, I suppose. Or wherever the King and Queen think I'll serve best.' Morrigan huffed at that. Elm knew that she should take better charge of her own destiny, but despite the desperation that had her push Loghain to take that awful offer on the eve of battle, she simply hadn't expected to live this long. The future stretched ahead, bleakly expansive and dictated by the song in her bones. Despite herself, a vague plan had been forming as she lay in this bed, but she wasn't going to share it now. 'Where will you go?' Elm was already certain Morrigan's answer wouldn't yield any satisfaction.
'Where I will,' she replied with some smugness. Elm took the hint. She was going to need to see some things for herself, eventually, but Morrigan didn't need to know that. 'What of him?' Morrigan asked, and Elm accepted the diversion with a nod.
'My fellow Grey Warden?' If Elm had barely accounted for her future, she certainly hadn't planned for his survival. A familiar roil of guilt, disgust and lingering fear twisted in Elm's gut. She would not accept Loghain as her responsibility. 'He's not my problem anymore. Perhaps they'll send him to join the Wardens in Orlais.' Elm smiled at the thought. 'He'd be delighted by that.'
Morrigan looked thoughtful. 'I'm not so sure about that.'
'No, that was a joke. Or something like it, I think.' The berries and plums were making Elm's head spin, and the canopy held more stars than ever.
'I'm not sure that Loghain isn't your problem.' Elm half-lifted her head to give Morrigan an incredulous glare, but Morrigan stayed infuriatingly calm as she continued; 'You chose to spare him. You set his feet on the path of redemption. Do you really think you hold no responsibility there?'
'Not with the Archdemon gone.' This wasn't a thread Elm was willing to tug on. To be fair, following any thread at this point in the evening was a challenging prospect.
'I think your paths are intertwined for a while yet. You may find cause to keep him by your side.'
Elm glared at Morrigan, wanting to say something cutting. 'That prophecy voice makes you sound like your mother.' She raised her cup to her lips again, forgetting that the wine was done. She sighed to find it empty and tried to place it on the table by the bed, but her hands and eyes weren't behaving as they should and it took a few attempts.
Morrigan was irritatingly coordinated as she smiled and stood. 'Even my mother was worth listening to, on occasion.' She moved to Elm's side and placed a packet on the nightstand - Elm caught the all-too familiar scent of dried elfroot. 'For the morning.' The near-empty plum wine bottle joined the herbs with a thud. 'Try to stay away from this stuff.'
'More prophecy?' Elm asked, fighting the weight of her eyelids.
'Just good sense,' Morrigan said. She smoothed Elm's curls back and placed a single kiss on her forehead, awkward for a moment as if tenderness was an unpractised thing. 'It's time I took my leave.'
Elm looked up as a hundred plaintive pleas sat stunted behind her lips; pleas for Morrigan to stay, or take her along, or to come back one day. They were all useless, Elm knew. 'So soon?' Elm slurred. It was pathetic ot ask even that.
So soon, Morrigan was at the door and planning on leaving Elm's life forever. 'Sleep a dreamless sleep, sister.' Quiet as a shadow, she was gone.
Elm laid back, felled by another loss, and let the dark take her.