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Strangers with Cookies	By : pirouette Category: +A through F > Dragon Age (all) > Dragon Age (all) Views: 9211 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Age/Bioware, its characters, or any content used for the basis of this fanfiction. I am making no money from this work.

Chapter List
- 16
- 17
- 18
Title: Strangers with Cookies
Chapter Seventeen: �You have carried us this far, do
not doubt that."�
Rating: T�

Word Count: 1,500

Characters: Sten/f!Mahariel, Alistair, Wynne, Urthemiel

Summary: The Wardens make their choices, and Sten is left in
the dark until it is too late.

Adhara knocks the hurlock from the top of the fort with an
exceptionally violent shield bash. Sten expects her to cheer or say something
as she normally does, but instead she simply turns grimly to the next opponent.
She has been like this since the witch left them in Redcliffe. She will not
laugh, or smile, or rest against him when she is tired. Instead, she sets her
jaw and kills. Today the two of them have dropped darkspawn by the hundreds
within Denerim, but her motions are mechanical. She will not tell him what is
wrong, but he also does not ask; he is not the one who speaks, and based
on Alistair's concerned glances, he already knows.
She has told someone. She is talking. That is all that
matters. Sten's job is to keep her alive.
More shrieks signal an impending wave of darkspawn. Sten
glances from Alistair to the overbearing mage, wondering who to aid next. The
archdemon solves that problem for him by leaping into the air and lunging at
the Templar. He and Adhara surge forward with a shout, and he sends Asala home
between two massive scales.
As he withdraws his blade, the ominous sound of stone on
armor causes him to glance over his shoulder. The overbearing mage is
surrounded by darkspawn and casting defensive spells. Vashedan. If she dies,
there will be nobody to heal the Wardens during the fight. He breaks away from
the archdemon and sprints for her, bellowing to draw their attention away.
More cuts. Daggers land, claws scrape, and Sten bleeds, but
his party stands. The archdemon takes to the sky again, limping away, and he
protects the mage as Adhara and Alistair sprint for it, determined to give it
no respite. When more darkspawn surge to the top of the fort, Adhara blows the
horn she strapped to her waist, and Sten waits for reinforcements and keeps
their mage alive in the interim.
More mages arrive, and soon he is too busy dodging
fireballs and frigid gusts of icy air to focus properly on the darkspawn. Parshaara,
they are as likely to die from magic as the archdemon at this point.
Adhara is knocked back by a buffet from the demon, sending
her directly into the line of a stone spike, and she goes down with a shout. He
wants to run to her, but instead he frees the overbearing mage from battle so
she can heal Adhara.
The stones around them begin to crumble as mortar melts
under heat and the sheer weight of their foe, and Sten is soon too busy
avoiding mages and rubble to focus on the Wardens. When a bone-shaking shriek
fills the air, causing his teeth to ache and his hands to nearly drop Asala, he
turns to see Alistair atop the beast's head, dealing a massive blow while
Adhara screams something at him. The archdemon thrashes, Alistair is knocked
loose, but the Wardens do not surge forward to deal the final blow.
Instead, they begin to argue. Adhara seizes Alistair by the
shoulder as he prepares to close the distance and end the fight, spinning him
and shaking her head angrily. When he pushes her aside, she places herself
squarely between the Templar and his goal, practically shrieking in rage.
Sten runs for them, utterly confused. �Now is not the time
to fight,� he tells them.
Adhara's face turns pale when she sees him approach, but
Alistair snarls at him. �Good! Help her see reason!�
She narrows her eyes. �Alistair, I can't let you kill the
archdemon!�
He ignores Adhara and gazes up at Sten. �Look, I dealt most
of the damage. I should get the credit for the kill. It's how we play when we
compete for points, right?�
Sten nods. That seems correct, as far as he pays attention
to the game the Templar, Adhara, and the priestess play, though also completely
irrelevant. �But you should not be competing. We are not killing genlocks on
the road.�
Alistair throws his hands into the air. �That's not all of
it! Riordan's dead. I outrank Adhara, and I'll need the credit for this kill to
get the Wardens working again.�
A more sensible point. Sten nods again, and Adhara crosses
her arms.
�Alistair, don't you dare manipulate him like this!� Her
voice is hoarse from shouting.
�Maybe you should have told him, 'Dhara.�
�Told me what?�
She turns to him, face still pale, and eyes glassy, but
remains silent. Alistair chooses that moment to bolt for the archdemon
breathing its last nearby, sword drawn. When he screams and begins running,
Adhara tries to go after him, but Sten wraps his arms around her.
�He has decided, kadan. Let him do it.� Strange, that she
should be so stubborn about this.
�Let me go, Sten!� She struggles, pushing her fingers
into his gauntlet and trying to slip away when it comes loose, but he simply
lets it fall and tightens his grip, pinning her to him with his forearm.
�You idiot! You martyr! You coward!�
she shrieks after Alistair. �I'll never forgive you for this!�
�Kadan.� He is about to continue, but she sinks her teeth
into his thumb.
Qunari teeth are strong. He told her that the day he took
the mace to the face in the forest. They can cut through skin, and bone, and
metal if need be. The only thing that prevented him from chewing his way out of
his cage in Lothering was a perverse desire to preserve what little honor he
had left after murdering those humans.
Elven teeth should not be strong. Her jaw is small, and her
teeth smaller, but they still relentlessly split through his skin. She does not
stop when he begins to bleed, but he does not let go. She does not stop when
she damages tendons, causing pain to sear up and down his arm, but he does not
release her. His blood pools around her mouth and runs down them both as she
tries to work free to stop Alistair.
Her teeth halt at the bone, catching and grinding, but going
no further. Sten's eyes are watering, and he realizes through his pain that she
is sobbing, but he still does not let go. He looks to Alistair, who is raising
his blade for the killing blow, and braces himself for Adhara's anger when the
claim becomes his. She will calm down. She always calms down. Alistair will
talk to her and make her see sense.
Except that it is unlike her to be so adamant about such a
little thing. Something is wrong.
White light bursts from the archdemon, and Adhara releases
his thumb and falls to her knees as Sten stands and stares. He is blinded, and
surrounded by wailing sound as brightness spreads from its epicenter. Beneath
it, he can hear the Templar screaming and Adhara sobbing at his feet.
Sten understands almost instantly that he has made a
mistake. When the sky clears and his ears are ringing, two corpses fall, the
blade of the first buried into the neck of the second.
The city goes silent. Minutes pass, and eventually Adhara
rises, head bowed, gauntlets clenched at her sides, her tattoo stained with Sten's
blood. He looks down at his thumb, then over to where Alistair lies crumpled.�
�Maybe you should have told him.
She had known that killing the archdemon would end her life.
They both had.
Alistair died with his eyes open. Sten brings his thumb to
his mouth and sucks at the wound, willing it to cease burning as he stares down
at the last person he ever expected would be the wolf to strike Adhara from the
side. She would not be this angry at him unless they had reached a decision
before the battle. She had agreed to die, and he had broken his word and done
it instead. Sten wants to know why.
But the question he wants to ask Adhara proves both more painful
and more distracting. He spits his� blood onto the stone and turns his eyes on
her.
Why didn't she tell him?
She stands between him and Alistair, tears cutting lines
through the blood coating the lower half of her face. He takes a step closer,
but she refuses to look at him. Her eyes are fixed on the ground, and her fists
are still clenched.
He knows this emotion. He felt it when he stood in the
middle of the farmhouse, covered in the blood of the humans who had tended his
wounds. It is not rage that is making her clench her fists, but despair.
�Kadan,� he ventures.
She keeps her eyes locked on the stone below her feet.
�Leave.�
When he takes a step closer, her eyes narrow and fix on his.
�I said go, Sten! I don't want to talk to you.�
For the first time, his title sounds terrible when she says
it, and so Sten obeys.
- 16
- 17
- 18
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Strangers with Cookies