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It was dark when the Vi’Revas whispered to life and a weary, stiff Hissera spilled out into the Lighthouse.
Well—it was dark in Treviso, when the Crows finally shooed her out. It lingered on her, through the perpetual daylight of the Crossroads, that same Blight that clouded their sky beating in her veins. And it lingered on her as she trudged up the stairs and out to her room.
Rook hadn’t come to her until after. After the dragons. After the choice that Blighted a city built on canals. Maybe if she’d been here sooner—
Hissera shook her head. Just a little jerk that cleared the encroaching regrets from her mind. She hadn’t been here sooner. But she was here now. She would make that count.
The long day in Treviso hadn’t been for nothing. Her list for Evka and Antoine had grown; more lives that will be saved by their unique flexibility. Was it still breaking the rules, Hissera mused idly, if there was no longer a First Warden? After Weisshaupt, Evka effectively took charge. The only reason she hadn’t been formally named was because the world might end—and then, who would care?
She was unpacking her satchel when magic popped and sizzled, splitting the air at her side. It didn’t startle her anymore—not like when she’d first arrived, unused to the strange method the Lighthouse has for delivering mail to its occupants. Now, she turned eagerly toward the spark of light as it materialized into a letter. As she’d hoped, it bore the spidery scrawl of a familiar hand, one farther gone to the Blight than should have been possible.
Eagerly, she cracked the seal and scanned Avernus’ latest update. It wasn’t much—the Blight remained rampant in the South, and Soldier’s Peak has had no more luck discerning the changes to its song than the Wardens in Hossberg. New samples, more experiments, all of which yielded the same non-answer: if there was a cure, it remained beyond their reach.
A disappointing update, all told. Avernus raised a few interesting points, and Hissera knew she would spend hours unspooling the potential in each one, later. But with Blighted smoke in her lungs and the fate of Treviso such a poignant specter over her shoulder, it was hard to focus on anything other than the absence of success.
Except—
Just as she deflated, her eyes caught on the post-script beneath his slanted signature.
Aeducan writes of her imminent return. If her trip has borne the success hypothesized, we may soon speak of more favorable outcomes.
Excitement and relief replaced Hissera’s sour disappointment before it even took root and she snorted. The crotchety old fool would put the most important news in a footnote. Aeducan—back from the West, and close enough to send post to Soldier’s Peak. With the world outside the Lighthouse sorely lacking in magical mail delivery, that meant she’d at least reached Val Foret. Even with letter delivery and travel across the continent delayed, she might even now be only weeks away from the keep, from giving Avernus news that could change the entire world—
Aeducan had been West and back a handful of times before Hissera ever picked up solid evidence that the former Warden Commander was even still alive. She existed in rumors, in what ifs, in cautionary tales—surviving when she shouldn't have, trying still to circumvent the inevitable fate of the Order. Or so the Senior Wardens would have them believe.
But things were different now, weren't they? Maybe really different, depending on what Aeducan had to say.
A familiar itch scratched below Hissera’s skin. To scour the Crossroads for an Eluvian that would cross the Waking Sea. To pin Morrigan down and demand access to the network she used to ferry the Inquisitor to and fro. She wanted to be there, wanted to hear it from Aeducan’s lips, rather than see it in ink.
Aeducan would never say exactly what she was doing, out past Laash, across waters more distant than most could even imagine. Who she met there, what they knew, what they gave… Avernus knew little, and Hissera knew even less.
But she’d sworn to the old Warden mage that this would be her last trip, one way or another. And if she didn’t find that last piece of the puzzle, not to expect her back. So if she was—
“Perhaps you might consider a bath before settling in for the night?”
Hissera blinked, yanked from the sudden spiral of her thoughts. In her doorway, Lucanis softened his tease with a slight smile. Her sheepish grin matched it, tugging at her lips as she glanced down over the muck and grime that clung her armor and skin. Blight, too, which would be why he kept his distance.
“I don’t know.” Humor leaked into her voice as she carefully folded the letter and set it on the corner of her desk, “I made the mistake of sitting down, so it’ll take something quite appealing to convince me standing up again is worth it.”
Lucanis hummed, tapping his fingers against his elbow while he pretended to think. An ease lingered about him that Hissera appreciated; a quiet confidence that seeped from him like the tide into the sand. It almost—almost—covered the dark circles stamped below his eyes, the weary slant of trouble in his shoulders.
Almost—but not quite.
“Would a cup of cioccolata calda suffice?” he asked, that smile tugging into more of a smirk, though it softened right back down at the way her face lit up. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
“You’re insufferable,” she said fondly, but already standing, tending to her satchel and the samples she’d put aside. Lucanis’ eyes lingered on the vials as she set them in her testing rack, his hesitation a palpable thing in the air between them.
“Just samples,” she offered like an olive branch, a life raft. Some tension bled out of him. “I can fill you in over our drinks, if you’d like.”
He nodded. “Please. I—“ he looked away, breath heavy in his lungs, “—I should stay apprised. In case…”
She tilted her head, curious. There were… a lot of ways that sentence could end.
Lucanis spent nearly as much time in Treviso as she did. Once he knew the proper technique to wrap his mouth and nose, he spent every moment that Rook did not need him knee deep in Blight. Making good on the Crows’ promise to Treviso in a way that Hissera wasn’t sure she would have expected or even believed of the assassins, had she not witnessed it firsthand.
He pursed his lips and shook his head, as though one of Neve’s wisps had caught in his ear and he sought to dislodge it. “Just… in case.”
She tucked her satchel between her workbench and the wall and nodded. “Sure. There’s not much changed, but I can fill you in.”
“Thank you.” He hadn’t moved, and his eyes lingered on her, even though she could see his thoughts wandering as surely as falling leaves in the wind. She snagged her towel and raised a brow at him.
“Were you planning on accompanying me to the bath or…?”
A flush took Lucanis’ cheeks, right up to his ears, and for all his dexterity and grace he stumbled backward out of the door frame, holding it open as she strolled past, all nonchalance and a shit-eating grin.
“You could, you know,” she needled, just to watch the flush darken across those cheekbones—sharper than any of his blades, no matter how his love affair with the whetstone stretched on. He cleared his throat.
“But then who would make the cioccolata calda?”
Her laugh danced around the courtyard like twinkling lights and the corners of his eyes crinkled at the sound. “A fair point, as always.”
She had every intention of zipping through her bath, the promise of sugar and good company on the other side. But the spacious chamber drew her in, with its enchanted waters and endless supply of soaps. Not a luxury she’d always had, and one she was happy to take advantage of while she did.
So perhaps she soaked a bit longer than advisable, enjoying the never-cooling water and healing spells threaded seamlessly within. Blight and dirt and bruises faded from her skin, and invisible aches dissipated from her muscles. Something nameless and floral penetrated the steam, stealing away the time until her skin began to wrinkle and the edges of her hair curled in the beginning stages of drying.
With a sigh, she extricated herself from the tub, dressed, and found her way to the kitchen.
Immediately, she knew that the length of her bath had not gone unnoticed, but in the best of ways. Something fruity and baked filled the air, a tantalizing, tempting scent that Hissera followed to where Lucanis stood in front of the oven, twisting a towel between his hands. He slung it over his shoulder as she approached and reached for a mug.
“You’re spoiling me,” she said, wrapping her fingers around the offered drink and breathing deeply of the sweetness spiraling up from the chocolate. Lucanis set the ladle down, pointedly deliberate.
“There’s enough for everyone,” he deflected. When he opened the oven, the aroma of berries flooded out, and likewise desire flooded Hissera’s mouth. The tart he removed was just the right amount of golden and crispy around the edges, bubbling in the middle and practically begging her to burn her tongue on a piece before it properly cooled. She took half a step forward—only for Lucanis to snap his towel against her side.
“You have your chocolate,” he reprimanded, “This needs to rest.”
She pouted, but there was no arguing with Lucanis, least of all when he’d made a decision in the kitchen. With a huff, Hissera settled herself in one of the chairs and savored the sweetness of chocolate on her tongue, the warmth of the freshly banked fire at her back. Lucanis stirred something else he had bubbling on the stove, then joined her, a half-drunk cup of lukewarm coffee in his hand. She wrinkled her nose.
“Do not start,” he warned. “I’ll give the entire tart to Rook.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“I would,” he threatened, but the joke twinkled in his eyes, and Hissera rolled her own in turn. They both knew he was full of it; he’d give it to Harding, at best, because Rook was the only one with less of a sweet tooth than Lucanis himself.
It was a comfortable silence between them, but it still wasn’t long before something else crept in, prowling around the edges of their relaxation. Catching at the corners of Lucanis’ mouth as he tried not to ask and at the edges of Hissera’s throat as she worked to find the right words.
It wasn’t as though the Wardens were known for bedside manner, after all.
“The new samples you collected—“ he began, just as she said,
“It’s nothing to be—“
They both stopped, and then Hissera laughed, shaking her head. She gestured with her mug. “You first.”
“No, I shouldn’t—“
“You should.” She sipped her chocolate. “The more you talk, the more of this I can drink.”
His eyes didn’t quite soften; he had Treviso on the mind now, and Hissera knew that his grief overwhelmed any hint of ease. But it… lessened, perhaps, or maybe she only imagined that her jokes and her presence and what she represented brought him comfort in the face of a devastated home.
“The samples you collected,” he began again, choosing his words carefully, as a warrior with a broken ankle chose their steps, knowing they must forge ahead but trying, however futile, to circumvent the inevitable pain. “They are… new Blight growths? Or just… more from the same?”
“More from the same, but I have new tests to run.” Hissera swirled her chocolate, casting the endless spiral of her thoughts into the vortex. “Treviso is… not in imminent danger of getting worse. The Blight spreads but—“
She hesitated. To another Warden, she would say: the Blight spreads, but no more than we would expect. No more than we can manage.
But to say the same to Lucanis felt like lacing a blade with poison and driving it deep in his heart. To say that they expect casualties. That they can manage the Blighted and the dead. She did not doubt his ability to take it in stride; he might even expect it. But she knew well: even those professionals, practiced in death, could be overwhelmed when it took its toll on their own.
She had comforted Davrin after Weisshaupt, after all.
“But?”
“It has not worsened,” she said carefully. “Our precautions are helping, and the Crows.”
“But they are Crows. Not Wardens.”
“Even Wardens could only do so much,” Hissera admitted. She pursed her lips. “In some ways, it is better that they are not. They—care, about Treviso, in a way that, for all their knowledge and skill, the Wardens never could.”
Lucanis winced, and Hissera with him. But there was simply no dancing around the fact that Rook left Treviso to burn. Hissera tried not to judge; Rook was not a Warden. Though they had probably heard stories of Blight all their life, confronting the horrible, sickly reality of it was something else altogether. They had no way of knowing, not really, that water posed greater danger than the Venatori. Were they to believe Lucanis, who they knew held bias toward Treviso, when he espoused the danger of the Blight in the canals?
Rook was a Crow. Her heart and duty belonged to Antiva, yes, but she owed allegiance first and foremost to her contract. Hissera understood this, even as it pained her to swallow. In the moment, Neve made a more convincing argument against their targets—the Venatori were a direct link to Elgar’nan and Ghilan’nain. Minrathous, a known seat of magical power, threatened by a faction they knew the Blighted gods held under sway. Through that lens, her choice made sense. But if she had known—
She regretted it, Hissera knew. Though she had not stood with Rook in the immediate aftermath, she felt the aftershocks of disappointment every time the elf brought her to Treviso. From the Crows, and from Rook herself, the biting cut of a noose ‘round her neck, unable to stay away, but equally incapable of reversing the decision she made.
Rook was not a Warden, she did not know the ins and outs of the Blight as Hissera and Davrin did. But she was a Crow, and in the face of Lucanis’ grief, Hissera was left to wonder why, in the moment, that meant more to him than it did to Rook.
She knew that some things were inexplicable; driven by adrenaline, by the pulse of a moment’s heartbeat—but still. She wondered. May never know, but she wondered.
“Regardless,” she said, unwilling to disparage their leader, even to Lucanis, not that he would stand for it anyhow, “the Crows are helping. Their hospitals make a difference they might not understand. A place for the Blighted to go, and not be taken advantage of?” Hissera snorted. “Practically unheard of, in situations like these.”
“It is something.” Lucanis allowed, but the catch of his voice dragged with self-flagellation. Hissera bit her tongue and swallowed the assertion that it was not his fault. Fault had little to do with it. He had a responsibility to Treviso, just as Davrin to Weisshaupt, as Neve to Dock Town, as Bellara to Arlathan. Hissera knew any attempt to convince him that he lacked any blame would be futile, empty.
“So,” he took a breath and some of the grief settled back behind his mask. “what are these new tests you have to run?”
Hissera made an interested noise into her mug, swallowing too quickly and burning her throat. “I actually got word from my contact in Ferelden, so this might not matter at all, but my plan is to look into resonance neutralization. If we can identify the exact resonance of the Blight song, we might be able to reverse engineer it and…”
She launched into a winding explanation about how the “Blight” as the average layperson knew it was a gross oversimplification. From archdemon to archdemon, there were differences in the underlying song, in the nature of the disease, if not in how it presented. And each living being had a unique resonance as well; when the Blight took root, the key of their song shifted, a unique composition of the Blight’s poison and their own tune in the universe.
She was lamenting that as the reason any sort of Cure was nearly impossible to come by when—
She stopped. Blinked; tilted her head, and realized that, though he was politely nodding and humming along, Lucanis’ eyes were a distant stare.
Ah.
“Fuck, I’m sorry,” she said, barreling past his objection, “I just got caught up in it and—“
“Hissera—“
“—I didn’t mean to imply that we won’t—“
“Hissera—“
“—because we definitely will—“
“Hissera.” Lucanis’ mug snapped to the table and he leaned forward. “It is alright. I asked, did I not?”
“About the tests,” she huffed. “About the good they might do, not to be reminded of the difficulty in healing your city.”
Lucanis smiled, a little sad around the edges. “You’re kind to think so,” he offered, reaching for his coffee again. There was but a mouthful left against the violet ceramic, but he held it to his chest like a talisman. “And that is not lessened by this but—“
His smile faded and his shoulders—they didn’t slump. Hissera thought any attempt to imagine Lucanis in less than perfect posture would be in vain. So he did not slump, but she still saw the despair settle, like another stone atop the weight of the world that already sat there.
“I think of little else,” he admitted, carefully, painfully neutral. He did not want her to feel bad, she surmised, or he did not want to reveal how distracted he might be. Either way, her chest ached.
With a sudden burst of determination, Hissera discarded her half-drunk chocolate and shoved away from the table. “Let’s change that.”
“What?” Lucanis asked the question to her back, as she disappeared into his pantry room. When she reemerged, his cape flew at him across the table.
“Come with me,” she said in lieu of any real answer. Lucanis raised a questioning brow, but her eyes sparkled, lips pressed tight around whatever had spurred her sudden action.
“What about dessert?”
“It’ll be here when we get back. Or it won’t, and you’ll just have to make another one.”
Lucanis snorted, but made no protest. “Where are we going?”
“Uh uh,” Hissera shook her head and brushed away the half-dried hair that stuck to her horns. “You’ll just have to trust me.”
It was endearing that he did not hesitate, did not take the moment to tease, or make a jibe about assassins and trust. His eyes stuttered and went soft, and he slung his cape about his shoulders, fastening the pin at the hollow of his throat.
“Lead the way.”
And she did. Out of the kitchen, across the courtyard, pausing only briefly when Lucanis asked if they should bring anyone else.
“Pretty sure everyone else is asleep,” she said, lacing up her boots. Lucanis smirked.
“I am reasonably certain Bellara is awake.”
That—actually, she would like to bring Bellara. She considered for a beat, then dismissed it. Not right now. This would mean the most to Lucanis. He should see it first.
Actually—
It would mean something to Rook, too, probably. But Hissera wasn’t entirely certain whether it would be a balm to Rook’s grief, or salt in their wound. And she didn’t want to sour the moment for Lucanis if it happened to be the latter. Plus, Rook hardly slept as it was. If she was finally in the Fade, Hissera didn’t want to wake her.
“If Bellara’s awake, it’s because she’s neck-deep in the Archive and wants to stay there.” She held out a hand and, when Lucanis took it, drew him toward the Eluvian room “Let’s leave her to it.”
Hissera tried to sneak around the side of the Cantori Diamond opposite Viago and Teia, but she supposed she should have known better. They would hardly be Talons if they were poor Crows, and good Crows did not fail to notice the seven-foot Qunari walking through their nest. Still, the effort was worth it for how Lucanis laughed at her attempt, and for how it warmed her skin when she took his hand and darted toward the zip line as the Seventh Talon called after them,
“We told you to get some rest—!”
Any mirth Lucanis had fled quickly, replaced by the heavy blanket of Blighted air on their skin, the stench of Antaam and blood magic that only he and Spite could smell. Hissera cut as direct a path as she could, dodging adversaries and distractions until they reached the alcove she’d been tending, when the Blight and the wounded did not take her time.
Small blessings—there were no Antaam in the plaza off which it sat. She usually had to clear one or two before she started in; blood from the Karashok she’d dispatched this morning was still smeared across the stone. But none had come yet to take his place, so she and Lucanis circled the cracked, dried-up fountain unimpeded, and came face-to-face with a brick wall.
Lucanis looked sideways at her. “Are you sure—“
“Yes,” she huffed, rolling her eyes.
“I wouldn’t hold it against you if you got lost.”
“I know you wouldn’t. But it doesn’t matter, because I’m exactly where I intended to be.” Hissera stepped up to the wall and pulled mana to her palm. With a flick of her wrist the facade—nothing more than a barrier—melted away, leaving the archway that belonged there in its place.
“A secret passageway?” A humorous question, but Hissera heard the catch of intrigue in his voice and she counted that as a win. “You know, Treviso has plenty of those without adding more.”
“Not a passageway,” she hummed, remembering to look back as magic washed over her when she stepped into the alcove. “Ah—watch the enchantment.”
“Enchan—oh.” Instinct stiffened Lucanis when the unfamiliar magic hit him, purple flaring in his eyes, but only a gentle touch of spirit magic washed over him and he relaxed. The spots of Blight that caught on his boots between the Diamond and here vanished.
“Convenient,” he said. Hissera dipped her head.
“And necessary.” She waved him forward and flicked her wrist, putting the barrier back in place. “It’s what’s keeping this particular experiment viable, for the moment.”
The alcove was fairly nondescript. Tucked well out of the way of most foot traffic, which was why she’d chosen it, plus a single, easily-concealed entrance. A good choke point, as Lucanis would say.
The stone floor and walls were the same as all across Treviso, but enchanted lights sparkled in the high corners of the ceiling, a mockery of proper daylight that the city hadn’t seen since Ghilan’nain’s dragon had its way with her.
“And what is—“ Lucanis started to ask, then stopped. He tilted his head as he was wont to do when Spite had his ear, but instead of the usual ire, a slow, hesitant hope dawned in the tired lines of his face. “Spite says… Spite says that the only Blight here is… you.”
Hissera nodded, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet. “It was protected, mostly, from the dragon’s breath. And what did seep in here, I was able to scrape and disinfect before it took any root. The enchantment and the barrier keep more from finding its way in.”
Lucanis took a slow, deep breath, casting his eyes around the tiny chamber. As though he searched for the shape of home he’d lost, the foundation that crumbled, even just a slice of it. But this wasn’t that, and that wasn’t what Hissera was selling.
Hopefully what she was would be good enough, for now.
Across from the entryway, chunks of the stone pathway had been ripped out, exposing dark soil entirely out of place in the urban architecture. From the dirt, several shoots of green climbed toward the artificial light above. Hissera knelt beside them and Lucanis joined her, catching one of the leaves between his fingers. He was no de Riva, but he recognized flora well enough, and he’d stood in that grove in the Wetlands for nearly an hour while Hissera theorized over its existence with Evka and Antoine.
“This is that flower,” he said. “The one from Hossberg.”
“Brona’s Bloom,” Hissera confirmed. “I brought a few bulbs back from our last trip and planted them here.”
“Why?”
She bit her tongue around her knee-jerk response—that it was a test, to see if Treviso’s soil was still viable, or if the Blight had already seeped too far within. Although true, technically, it wasn’t what Lucanis needed to hear. And there was another, better reason that was also true.
“They brought hope to Lavendel. To Hossberg, to the Anderfels, places have been Blighted for hundreds of years. I thought Treviso could use some hope like that.”
“It could,” Lucanis agreed. There was a catch in his voice that neither of them mentioned and he cleared his throat before asking, “Will it—survive?”
“I was going to wait until it was flowering to show it to you,” Hissera admitted, “for that reason exactly. But let’s do this, instead—“
She took Lucanis’ hand and guided his palm to the dark, damp soil at the nearest plant’s base. Gently, she called unshaped mana to her palm and threaded it through Lucanis’ non-magical aura, shivering slightly at the jolt Spite’s presence brought to the process.
“Ready?” she asked, when the spell had settled. Lucanis snorted.
“And how would I know?”
Hissera laughed, and the edge of Lucanis’ mouth softened into an indulgent smile. “Fair enough. Just—feel this, then.”
She drove the end of the spell down, following the base of the plant along where its roots carved their path through the soil. Still new, but already strong and getting stronger. The feeling reverberated up the spell, to where the magic leaked into both her and Lucanis, and she heard his quiet gasp when it hit.
“That is—“
“Life,” she finished for him, unable to smother the broad smile that stretched across her face. “They’ve taken root; there’s no reason to think they won’t grow, here.”
She held the spell as long as she could, feeling the ripples of how it affected Lucanis, this tangible connection to hope, and unwilling to release that too soon. But eventually she felt her mana waning and she knew having a bit on tap for the journey back was the responsible choice. Slowly, she withdrew the spell, noting with delight that a few worms had joined the roots in the soil. Another good sign.
When the spell finally dissipated, Lucanis turned to her, eyes shining. “I—I don’t know what to say. How to thank you.”
“You don’t need to.” Hissera shook her head. “This is what I do.”
“That doesn’t make it any less worthy of thanks. And—“ he took a breath, fingers trailing through the soil, circling the stems, “—it means more than you probably know, to me. So—thank you.”
“Treviso is strong,” Hissera said. She reached for Lucanis’ other hand and traced the silver scars that lined his skin, the dips and callouses of his palm. “Her land and her people. If these flowers can grow here—well. Treviso will recover. She will heal. And there will always be hope, for the city and for her people.”
She laced their fingers together and squeezed his hand, tight. “For you.”
His throat worked around a lump. Ever patient, Hissera stroked her thumb across a mole on the back of his hand. “I had forgotten,” he finally managed. Bringing their hands to his lips, he brushed the lightest of kisses over their joined knuckles. “Thank you, for reminding me.”
He looked down to the blossomless plants and smiled. “For reminding me, and for bringing hope back to my home.”