elfhame | PSL with justice_is_blond

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PSL with justice_is_blond | City Afire

It must be nearing dawn, although the sky is pitch black. It's probably the ash. The fires are still burning in the city, especially where the chantry once stood. The full extent of the damage won't be known until they stop, and that may take days.

Hours ago, Nathaniel ushered Delilah and her son onto a boat before hopping aboard a separate one filled with Templar supplies and Zevran Arainai, bound for the Gallows. By the time they arrived, they stood briefly in shock to see that mages and Templars both fought against living statues, one of which was the Knight-Commander. And at the end of the battle, the Knight-Captain held back his own forces, allowing the mages, and the Champion of Kirkwall, to pass out of the gates.

Nathaniel still doesn't know what happened.

Marian Hawke brushes straight past Anders, bumping past him almost pointedly on her way out. She climbs into a boat and reaches up to aid her brother into the same. Nathaniel, only really familiar with one person in the chaos, walks toward Anders.

"What happened?" he asks quietly, as he unstrings his bow.

Someone, a stranger, only makes the picture less clear by pausing and spitting at Anders' feet as they pass.

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He stares after Marian, heart breaking. The motion had been meant to hurt. They both knew it, though he hadn't known he could hurt more. He also didn't know what to do next. Today was supposed to be the day he died but he hadn't, he was still standing... and Nate was somehow now with him. Justice had fled to the back of Anders' mind, leaving him even more alone, and the look he turns on Nate is lost.

"I... I did this." The defiance and anger that had been propelling him forward just minutes ago has broken and left him exhausted. "They were all going to die, the Rite of annulment, all of the mages, and it was too much of an injustice, we couldn't, I couldn't..."

The rambling comes to a halt as he looks around and tries to wrap his mind around the extent of what he'd just done.

"They were supposed to kill me."

Okay, that was Nate's fault. Anders is clearly exhausted beyond belief, beyond giving a coherent answer. Nathaniel, at least, is still pumped full of adrenaline. He will crash hard in a few hours, but he can carry Anders along on his current, for now.

"Come on," he sighs, slinging an arm around Anders' shoulders and directing him toward the ferry. "If the night ended with the Knight-Commander turning into a giant statue of red lyrium, I can't imagine it started with a well-meaning tea party."

The touch startles him and he almost recoils, but instead he stumbles forward, some sort of survival instinct (or was it Justice?) finally kicking in. The boat has other people in it, huddled, frightened, looking like he felt. He'd done that.

They sit on the edge of the group, Anders huddling against Nate and staring at the mess they're leaving behind.

"I killed the Grand Cleric." His voice is little more than a whisper.

It is a testament to the sort of family Nathaniel grew up in, as well as his present found family, that he says what he says next.

"Oh. Is that all?" It's not that he actually thinks this is a small thing. It's that he's pocketing it away to deal with quietly, privately, preferably after a good night's rest. And it's sounding like he should get Anders out of the city before that happens. And three seconds later, he realizes that means Anders blew up the Chantry and didn't just pitch a fireball at her in all the chaos. He hadn't been at the center of the calamity by any means and the sequence of tonight's events have been put together very slapdash in his mind.

Well. The people who would have taken Anders into custody have clearly decided not to do so, so Nathaniel is going to stick with the original plan and not deal with this until he's slept.

"Do you have somewhere to go?" he asks calmly.

"N-no. And no." It's not all he did, to which the rising smoke attests. He's also driven everyone off, lost them all again. Except for Nathaniel.

"They killed my network, families and all. I didn't... There's nowhere for me. They kill and they kill and they kill and now I... I'm not... I do too." He is now a murderer. He sags against the archer and closes his eyes. There's no reason for Nathaniel to be rescuing him because there's nothing worthy of being rescued.

"You should leave me. All the smart people do." Tears are welling up and he pushes them away; he has no right to cry. He has no right to be breathing right now.

Oh.

Nathaniel's plan to deal with it later is already meeting its end. Anders is clearly dealing with it now. In the lantern-light, Nathaniel can see the ash and grime that covers Anders' face. He is probably dehydrated, among other things. Numbly, doing what he can while he listens, Nathaniel fishes a handkerchief from one pocket and a skin of clear drinking water. He pours water over the cloth, corks the bottle, and leans in when Anders is finished.

"First things first," he says quietly, and wraps Anders up in a massive hug.

The hug takes his breath away, breaking the dam holding everything back and Anders starts sobbing in Nate's arms. He'll never be in Karl's arms again, nor Marian's. The city has taken away everything and what it didn't take he destroyed.

While Anders weeps, Nathaniel bunches up the handkerchief and wrings out cool water on the back of Anders' neck, just a few drops, before he wipes them away with his fingers and lets the air cool the moisture left behind. He must be terribly overheated. He definitely needs not to be alone right now.

Once the crying ebbs a little, Nathaniel pulls away just enough to hand Anders the waterskin.

"Here. Have a good long drink." And gently as he can, he begins to wipe Anders' face clean of the ash and sweat, starting with the eyes. "I'm not going to leave you. A lot of people have had a lot of heartbreak here, including you, but I haven't. I still have something to give, so I will, if you will let me."

He takes the waterskin with shaky hands and a murmured thanks, drinking long and deep and only stopping when Nathaniel starts cleaning his face. The gentle care almost makes him cry again but he holds it back, breathing slowly.

He's not sure if the voice telling him he needs to stop taking so much is his own or Justice's, but he does know he's not strong enough to voice the words.

"Please," he says. "I have nothing to give you back. I don't even deserve it." He'd helped find the man in the Deep Roads, but that's far less than Nate is offering here. "But I'll take it, because I can't... I can't bear to turn it down."

Once he'd wanted this man terribly. Now he just hurts, and knows that the price of being with him, with Anders, is too high to expect anyone else to bear.

A sigh. Nathaniel finishes the more delicate work around Anders' eyes and wipes the rest clean with a few broad swipes.

"Don't worry about it. You've healed me enough times for this to be considered payback. We'll think of what to do next, and do that thing. And the thing after it, when it comes along. And so on."

He's done this before, but not as the comforter. Well, in a manner of speaking, he was. He'd had to leave Starkhaven to sail back to Ferelden alone, knowing no one waited for him there. He'd wanted to pitch himself over the side of the ship numerous times along the way, but he couldn't find anything to give himself the weight he would need to sink. Nothing that anyone would let him take, anyway. He thinks he can be buoyant enough to keep Anders afloat until he reaches safe harbor.

He wrings out the handkerchief as well as he can and offers it to Anders to blow his nose with.

"Trust me."

Trust him.

Now Justice stirs, rousing from whatever depths he'd sunk to, asking Anders if they really can trust Nathaniel. When the Templars had kept up their torment of Anders in Vigil's Keep, no one had cared. No one had helped.

Anders concedes some of the point as true, but right now Nathaniel is here and right now, that's what matters. He's not alone.

"I will." The man's far more likely to simply leave than betray, too. He'd not betrayed Cousland's trust. He won't stab Anders in the back, no matter how much easier it would be for everyone involved. There's a prickling annoyance from the spirit and Anders sighs. "Justice will not, but I will."

Nathaniel gives him a wry look. "Justice never trusted me. I am a thief, and all."

The word thief is dripping with irony. He puts his arm around Anders again to give him another squeeze.

"If it helps," he says softly, "I've been...at the end. I've had no one in the world to help. I'm not going to let that happen to you. A good measure of it's my fault, anyway."

He winces at the emphasis on the word. Nathaniel Justice sees as a thief, but Anders has just done so much worse. He is a murderer, a mass murderer, a destroyer.

"You can only take a tiny portion of blame," he says quietly. It's Cousland that had offered him Wardening as a life, and Cousland who had truly abandoned him. He should have known things were going downhill the moment they'd taken his cat away and ignored his protests. He should have left then, and not thought that maybe it was a fluke.

"I should have left so much earlier. If I had..." He would have reached Karl before they found a letter. They would have been out before Hawke was in Kirkwall. He would have a little house with Karl and fifteen cats and maybe two cows.

Anders takes a shaky breath and leans back against Nate. "And it should have been my end."

"You shouldn't have had to leave," Nathaniel says lowly. "That wasn't your failing. It was ours. Everyone's. But that doesn't matter here and now. Nothing I can do will change it. What I can do is get us out of the city and to a place of safety. You'll be all right."

He can't remember the last time he was all right. He wants to say as much, wants to remind Nate that he's an abomination, but he's so tired.

"Will you forgive me if I fall asleep on you?"

"No," Nathaniel says fondly, then realizes he had better be explicit, for now, and remove all power imagination has to actually turn that into a rejection. "Of course," he amends. "But we'll be ashore soon and you'll need to walk then. Let's try to stay awake till we're out of the city."

This means, unfortunately, several hours before Anders can sleep. From Kirkwall, Nathaniel leads them directly into wilderness, avoiding roads at all costs. Deep in the forests near the mountains, they find shelter under a low overhang of rock. Nathaniel urges Anders inside.

"We won't find a better spot to sleep in," he says gruffly, hoarse from tiredness.

He stiffens at the no, but Nate is quick to clarify. Anders takes a breath, nods, and sits up so he can fight the tiredness. Traveling is even harder and Justice does nothing to help. Anders resents him briefly for that, but then the thought is gone, lost in how much he just wants to lay down.

It looks like he's getting down to crawl first, though. Stiffly Anders gets down to his hands and knees and scoots in as far as he can go to make room for the archer too.

"I don't need a better spot," he lies. "It's fine." In truth, it's so tight and close that he's having trouble breathing - not because of the current space, but a space he'd been locked in years and years ago. Nathaniel is exhausted. Anders can't make him keep looking, and if Nathaniel sleeps against him Anders should be able to forget the past; it'll be obvious he's not alone in a tiny space again.

Nathaniel drags branches in front of the entrance to the crawlspace, camouflaging their hideaway. He doesn't bother with spreading out the bedroll fully, but instead he halfway unrolls it like a pillow and throws his cloak over Anders. He is careful not to assume Anders is comfortable with being touched, keeping some distance between them.

"Comfortable?"

He doesn't want to ask for more. Nathaniel had said he was staying, but if Anders is too demanding, why wouldn't that change? But he needs to sleep.

"Could we share the cloak?" Look at that, he can hate himself more and feel more guilty.

After a beat's hesitation, giving Anders time to change his mind, Nathaniel rolls over again, carefully drawing the cloak over them both. Slowly, giving Anders time to say he is uncomfortable, he wraps his arm around the other man's waist, spooning him. He can smell Anders' hair.

"Is this all right?"

The hesitation feels tangible. The arm around him, on the other hand, is welcome and he can feel his pounding heart slow a little.

"Only if you're all right with it." He needs this warmth, needs to know he's not alone when he closes his eyes, but it's very difficult to kick the feeling that he's imposing on the last person left to him.

"I don't want to ask too much." He might cry again if Nate rolls away, though.

"You're not," Nathaniel says hastily. "I just...I didn't want to presume." Maker, Anders' hair smells good. It reminds him how their flirtation went, how foolish Nathaniel was not to go for it when he had the chance. This is neither the time nor place for such thoughts. As if to reaffirm what he is saying, he squeezes Anders a little.

"Good night."

Doubt and questioning take more energy than Anders has left. "Good night," he mumbles, already succumbing.

Hours later he awakens suddenly, jerking away from the walls that are so close and disoriented, winding up pressed against someone else and almost throwing up a barrier in panic before all of last night comes spilling back. It's Nathaniel. Somehow Anders is alive and he's being held by a friend when he thought all of his friendships were lost and broken.

And he's likely gone and woken that friend when they both needed all the sleep they could get.

"Sorry. I'm sorry."

"What?" Nathaniel halfway sits up and nearly clocks his head on the rock before he thinks better. He rubs one eye.

"It's all right," he says, reaching out to take Anders' hands and still them. "You're all right. You're safe."

Safe. That's never been true, not since the moment he'd set the barn on fire, and Justice never lets him forget that. All the same he lets Nathaniel hold his hands while he works on calming down.

"It's... it's small. That's all. There's, it's, I'm fine." The mask has slipped over the years, jokes getting weaker and fewer. Justice is a large part of it, but Anders thinks it's also him getting older, getting more run down, losing more. He just wants to stop. To lay down and be done. But Justice is absolutely against that and so Anders keeps going because there are no choices left to him.

He takes a shaky breath, looking down at their hands in the dim light. "I'm sorry," he says again. "I'm going to weigh you down. Are you sure you want that?"

PSL with justice_is_blond | City Afire

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