Romulus had no particular fondness for Qunari.
Asala was another matter, and individually they were perfectly fine to get to know, particularly the Tal-Vashoth. But as a people they had always made him uneasy. It was that rigidness, their proclivity for order and organization in all things, that even their exiles couldn't quite let go of, that managed to sink under his skin. It was in the way the little houses were built, the way they were ordered around each other, the entire village carefully mapped out and situated just so. For refugees from the Qun, their home sure seemed like an army encampment.
He supposed that general distaste for the Qunari had made certain events in his past easier to swallow. Or his present, considering how little the slip up aboard the Qunari ship in Llomerryn was bothering him.
But this was not supposed to be a stressful visit, and the children playing their game in the center of the village reminded Romulus that this wasn't, in fact, any kind of military camp, no matter how well it was hidden or how tightly it was organized. He wasn't quite sure what he was watching, but they seemed to be having a good deal of fun.
"After you," he murmured to Khari beside him. Even the Herald of Andraste needed to loosen up once in a while. Maybe it was something he needed especially.
She looked at him a little strangely, but then shrugged. Her mouth was already spreading into a familiar grin. “Sure thing."
She half-strode, half-skipped forwards, bringing herself right up to the edge of what the children had marked out as their area. Even that was precise; lines drawn in the dirt with only the occasional unsteady wobble. Khari seemed to study them for a moment, her head tilted to the side. They were using some kind of ball, about the size of a small melon. No one was touching it with their hands, but pretty much anything else seemed to be acceptable—feet, knees, hips, elbows, shoulders. A few of the actual Qunari youths even used horns.
Not too long after, the ball flew outside one of the lines, towards her. Khari must have been waiting for something like that, because she was ready, hooking her foot around it and balancing it there, nestled back against her ankle.
There was a bit of an awkward quiet, then, as the children noticed the presence of the intruders, so to speak. Khari, not unexpectedly, was the one to break it.
“Hello." She waved to go with the word, still grinning. Fortunately, this one wasn't quite so bloodthirsty as some of her others. Pointing to herself, she continued. “I'm Khari. That's Rom." She pointed back at him as well, then gestured to the field.
“Can we play, too?"
This was met with some surprise, by the looks of it. Either they understood enough of the trade tongue to catch that much or else her pantomime was obvious enough to convey what she meant. A few of the older-looking children huddled together, speaking in Qunlat. They were obviously discussing whether to grant the request or not. Romulus could understand enough to gather that the primary concern seemed to be if the adults in the village would disapprove, rather than any particular reservations about the two of them.
Khari busied herself with the ball while she waited, throwing it up with her foot and catching it on her elbow, bouncing it there a few times before passing it to the other. She almost missed, but leaned sideways to bounce it again. One of the little ones giggled at her hasty save; she wrinkled her nose at him and stuck her tongue out. That, of course, only made him laugh harder.
"You can... play." One of the older ones nodded at them. The words were thick and clumsy in her mouth, but she seemed pleased for having been able to get them out.
“Great!" Khari tossed the ball to her and stepped over the line in the dirt so she was on the field. “Let's go, Rom. You can be on my team. I have no idea what I'm doing, but it should be fun."
Even though Romulus could understand them and Khari could not, he couldn't help but feel that Khari was the one who spoke their language.
He was naturally talented at many things, but apparently this game was not one of them. The Qunari children could deftly flick it about with their feet, chipping it up onto their knees, chests, and heads, and control it carefully with precise little movements that eluded Romulus any time the ball came his way. He always seemed to hit it too softly, or too hard. There were teams, apparently, but he could hardly focus on keeping them in order when they were mostly dressed the same, with Khari being the only one to blatantly stand out.
It wasn't clear if there was supposed to be another goal to the game, but it devolved into a simple affair of keep-away, with one team trying to secure the ball and pass it between themselves while the other attempted to steal it away for themselves. Romulus skirted the outsides of the makeshift pitch, stopping any ball that came his way and hurriedly trying to pass it along to someone else, only about half the time making it to someone on his team. A few times he was laughed at for his sudden clumsiness, but he found that he didn't mind.
Khari seemed to be having the time of her life. Unburdened by her armor, she was quick, and sized much more like the kids than he was. She played aggressively, but not so much so that she ever threw an accidental elbow into one of them. Knocking around the ball seemed to come naturally to her, though she also didn't quite look to know what to do with it, or what team she was on. The children didn't mind, not even when her mistakes were to their detriment.
Bouncing it off her hip, she drew her foot back and kicked it to one of the others, who jumped to hit it with his head, closer to one of the ends of the field. It nearly went out-of-bounds, but cracked against a pale blue barrier instead, falling back in.
“Asala!" Khari raised an arm and waved it vigorously at their friend, who had indeed been responsible for the rebound. “Okay, okay, time out everyone!" She held her hands up as though in surrender, shooting a glance at Romulus and jogging towards the side of the ring, where Asala was.
She wasn't fast enough however to beat the children already were surrounding Asala. She didn't recoil from the sudden surge of attention, but rather met it with warmth and affection. She leaned down and spoke with the children. The younger ones pleaded with her to play with them, while the older ones were just happy that she was back. They exchanged hugs and some of the younger ones took hold of her hands gently tug on her, until she finally spoke. "I will, later. I promise," she said from what Romulus could make out as she patted the jet black hair of a younger boy, "But first, Tammy and I wish to speak with your two new friends," she said with a smile.
The news seemed to sadden a few of the children. "I will bring them back, I promise," she added quickly with a warm smile. The pledge was enough to brighten their moods. "Tammy has some things she wishes to ask you both," she said, switching to the trade tongue for their sakes. She then pointed down one of the neat paths, "She is waiting at home now," she added.
Romulus wasn't sure what would be asked of them that Asala couldn't relay herself, but he nodded his agreement. "We'll finish this later," he told the children, grinning at them before following Asala down the path.
"I did not know you spoke Qunlat," Asala commented. She then looked off and seemed to slip into thought for a moment. Probably thinking about all the instances of Qunlat that were said in their presence.
Romulus nodded, though it seemed to be almost a guilty admittance from the way his lips were drawn into a hard line, his expression serious again. "Chryseis had me learn it as best I could, which admittedly wasn't very well." He wasn't fond of admitting that the majority of the skills and knowledge he had came from her, but it wasn't as though he could lie about it. "I can pick up most of what's being said, but I can't manage to say much myself without mangling something." He knew how to ask questions, mostly, but there was no need to say that. It had at least been occasionally useful when interacting with other slaves. The servants in Minrathous were overwhelmingly elven and human, but occasionally there would be a Qunari in the mix. Prisoners of war, or people much like Asala, fleeing from the Qun for whatever reason.
"That's uh, that's good to know," she added. With the way that she said it, she'd probably be more mindful of what she and others said around them. Eventually, she brought them to another housing unit, this one nearly identical to the others save for the personal touches. On either side of the doorway a patch of soil stretched from one edge to the other with a number of flowers blooming in them.
They were hardy flowers, built to survive the heat and terrain of the area, but still retained their color and beauty. Behind the flower beds, the walls were decorated in the geometric designs that governed other walls they'd seen. "I did that side," Asala pointed out, gesturing toward a thin lined design of bright orange and yellow on one side of the door, "Meraad did that one," the thicker red and blue one.
"Anyway, please, come in," she added, pulling back a curtain that served as their door "Tammy's expecting us."
The inside of the domicile was sparsely furnished. A low table sat in the middle of the one room home, a set of four colorful pillows set on each side of it. A bookcase occupied the far wall filled with various manuscripts and texts. On the edge of the doorway they'd just entered through, on either side, were a series of markings, beginning low and continuing until the last reached Asala's height. At the top of each line were one of their names, Asala on one side, Meraad the other.
Tammy stood at one of the far walls, in what seemed to be the kitchen. When she noticed them, she asked "Tea or coffee?" a pair of small kettles sat on a stove, and the scent of both wafting through the small home.
"Tea, please. Thank you." Romulus settled somewhat cautiously on a pillow. It was force of habit more than anything else to analyze every room upon entry, but he reminded himself to be at ease. Tammy's home wasn't overdecorated, as was to be expected of every home in this village, but it still managed to be welcoming enough. It had the telltale signs of a home, namely the history of those who lived in it etched on the walls and doorways. That, more than anything, affected him.
Khari brushed a thumb over one of the shorter Asala-marks as she entered, offering Tammy a bright smile. “Tea, thanks." She dropped herself down onto one of the pillows without looking too concerned about it, crossing her legs underneath her and gripping her ankles in her hands. “Your garden's pretty." She glanced back over her shoulder as if to lay eyes on it again. “Wouldn't have thought much grew out here."
Tammy proceeded to pour the kettles into a set four cups, two from one kettle, two from the other. "The soil helps, it was brought from deeper inland, but the flowers themselves are a hardy species. Though, they still require care and nourishment to become as vibrant as they are," she said, with a glance toward Asala. The other woman nodded and went to help distribute the cups to their guests, and kept one for herself when both took a seat on a pillow. Asala concentrated on her cup for a moment, her hands taking on a blue glow for a moment. The steam wafting from the top of cup tapered off, and instead and thin layer of frost lined the edge. She then glanced at Romulus with a smile.
"My favorite has always been the lily," Asala added, "I saw that you still keep them where I used to."
"Imekari, they are yours," she said with a motherly smile. She then turned back toward Romulus and Khari, "I gave the two plots you saw outside to Asala and Meraad. She took to hers easily, but Meraad... Well, Meraad, did not have the patience." Her mood dampened visibly, but she continued to for a moment, "That is the reason we wished to speak with you..." she said, glancing toward Asala.
The woman sighed and looking down into her cup. she did not turn to look at them while she spoke. "I... I have never asked how... or even if Meraad had... died. But I know-- knew it when you both returned and he... did not. I-- We wish to know how... kadan died."
"Asala has told me everything that led up to it and everything since... I apologize if this is morbid, but... I would still like to know. If you do not mind," Tammy continued.
Khari glanced at Romulus for a moment, apparently deciding to take up the telling first. Reaching forward for her teacup, she balanced it on a knee and sighed a bit, straightening her back. “We left the Chantry after volunteering. It was... well, it was a mess out there, honestly. We were supposed to get to the last trebuchet and trigger an avalanche, to stop the other army and give everyone else a chance to escape." It went without saying that they weren't supposed to survive doing that, if they managed it in the first place.
Her lips thinned as she pressed them together, a slight crease appearing between her eyebrows. “Getting there wasn't easy, but it wasn't until we'd actually got the thing all set up that everything went to, uh..." She glanced at Tammy, then Asala. “Crap."
Taking a sip of the tea, she set it back down on her knee and continued. “About that point, one of the walls near us gets blown to smithereens. In march a bunch of Venatori mages. Uh, they're this weird Tevinter cult, if that didn't get covered. And they have this... dragon, only it's poisoned with red lyrium, which I guess means it's a normal dragon but meaner. And of course Corypheus, who's the nasty Darkspawn guy. So... it doesn't look too great for us at that point. I charged the mages and the Darkspawn, but that didn't work too well. I didn't actually see what happened right after that."
Her eyes found him again. This was, after all, the part he could tell much better than she could.
"I was wounded pretty badly at this point," Romulus continued, recalling with a rather grim clarity each moment before he fell with Khari. "My leg, my side. Couldn't really move. After Khari went down, Meraad attacked the dragon with magic. I'm not sure anything we could have done would have even hurt that thing." He paused for a moment, thinking how best to continue. She desired to know how he had died. It had not been a pretty sight, not a clean death, and thinking back Romulus wasn't sure it made all that much of a difference. But then, maybe it had made all the difference. Maybe the extra moment had given Khari enough time to come to her senses and salvage at least their lives. Maybe without the sacrifice none of them would have survived to mourn him or tell his story.
It would do no good to soften the details, if she really did want the truth. "The dragon caught him in its jaws. He struggled. His last words were 'vashedan ataashi, nehraa Asala.' Then the dragon thrashed and cast him aside." It was different looking back on it now than it had been at the time. In the moment, Romulus had assumed they would all die, and so the manner of their deaths was irrelevant. But they hadn't all died. He looked to Asala.
"Many people sacrificed their lives that night, for a number of reasons, but Meraad's sacrifice was for you."
Asala had watched them intently as they spoke, as if she wouldn't hear them if she looked away. It was perhaps the most intent she seemed when meeting anothers eyes, and only when Romulus wound down did she break her gaze. The small room was quiet for a moment, as Tammy and Asala registered their words. It seemed that the silence would stretch on for an eternity, until finally a quiet smile crossed Asala's lips and a hitch echoed across her shoulder. It was now tears however, that caused the hitch surprisingly, but a laugh. A small one, but a laugh nonetheless. She finally looked up and toward Khari, the little smile still on her lips. "Do you, uh... know what he called it?"
Khari blinked, clearly surprised to be on the receiving end of that particular question. “Something nasty, I hope."
"He called it a, uh, trash dragon," she said, with a melancholy smile.
"That is the polite term, yes," Tammy added. The sadness was apparent in her face as well and the corners of her eyes had mist within them, but she did not outright shed tears. Instead, she shook her head and rubbed her face. "Only he would be so reckless as to stand against a dragon on his own," she added. "But... it is still something he would've done," she added with a sigh. "Did you... Know him well?"
Khari fielded that one, too, shaking her head. “Not really." Reaching up, she scratched at the back of her head. “Everything in Haven happened so fast; from the beginning of the Inquisition to then was only two months, give or take." She sighed, then offered up half a smile.
“Gotta say, though... seems like I would've liked him a lot. Not just anyone would do something like that. Takes a special kind of crazy—and I mean that in the best way possible, honest."
"I can't say I knew him either," Romulus added, unable to keep his regret from his tone. "I... tried to avoid knowing anyone, to some degree. I thought I would need to leave the Inquisition behind. I actually planned to leave the night Haven was attacked, but afterwards..." He glanced at Khari before looking back to Tammy. "The Inquisition was already becoming a family, and the attack only brought us closer together. I just wish I'd made the decision to stay sooner." The regret was likely futile, of course. It hadn't been an easy choice to make, declaring his quiet, personal rebellion on his domina, and even still with all his larger concerns the fear of the future lurked in the back of his mind. But he was also willing to wager that he could've become friends with a man such as Meraad, if he'd only given himself the chance while there was still time.
"Oh no, I understand completely," Tammy said to Khari first, gently swirling the drink in her hand as she reminisced. "He was a... difficult child. Always so restless and impulsive. He had a wonderful heart, he would not have done well underneath the Qun," she said with a small smile.
Asala nodded in agreement. "He tried to be so many things. He apprenticed under our blacksmith, tried farming, fishing. But none of it ever seemed to... fit him. But he always did what he could."
"I had thought he would have joined the Saarethost-- our mercenary company," Tammy quickly clarified for Rom and Khari, "when he came of age. Instead, he took you and went out to see the world," she said.
Asala laughed despite herself, "He said it was to meet the free mages and have them teach us control of our powers." The comment caused Tammy to chuckle with her and both seemed to know that it was just an excuse. "However, I am... glad that he did. Else, I would not have been able to meet such wonderful people," she said as she looked toward Rom and Khari.
“We're glad we met you, too." Khari grinned around the rim of her teacup and swallowed the rest of it down, placing it back on the table with a soft clink. “Thanks for sharing your home with us."
"I'm glad we were able to come here," Romulus agreed. "And the tea was excellent."
Asala was another matter, and individually they were perfectly fine to get to know, particularly the Tal-Vashoth. But as a people they had always made him uneasy. It was that rigidness, their proclivity for order and organization in all things, that even their exiles couldn't quite let go of, that managed to sink under his skin. It was in the way the little houses were built, the way they were ordered around each other, the entire village carefully mapped out and situated just so. For refugees from the Qun, their home sure seemed like an army encampment.
He supposed that general distaste for the Qunari had made certain events in his past easier to swallow. Or his present, considering how little the slip up aboard the Qunari ship in Llomerryn was bothering him.
But this was not supposed to be a stressful visit, and the children playing their game in the center of the village reminded Romulus that this wasn't, in fact, any kind of military camp, no matter how well it was hidden or how tightly it was organized. He wasn't quite sure what he was watching, but they seemed to be having a good deal of fun.
"After you," he murmured to Khari beside him. Even the Herald of Andraste needed to loosen up once in a while. Maybe it was something he needed especially.
She looked at him a little strangely, but then shrugged. Her mouth was already spreading into a familiar grin. “Sure thing."
She half-strode, half-skipped forwards, bringing herself right up to the edge of what the children had marked out as their area. Even that was precise; lines drawn in the dirt with only the occasional unsteady wobble. Khari seemed to study them for a moment, her head tilted to the side. They were using some kind of ball, about the size of a small melon. No one was touching it with their hands, but pretty much anything else seemed to be acceptable—feet, knees, hips, elbows, shoulders. A few of the actual Qunari youths even used horns.
Not too long after, the ball flew outside one of the lines, towards her. Khari must have been waiting for something like that, because she was ready, hooking her foot around it and balancing it there, nestled back against her ankle.
There was a bit of an awkward quiet, then, as the children noticed the presence of the intruders, so to speak. Khari, not unexpectedly, was the one to break it.
“Hello." She waved to go with the word, still grinning. Fortunately, this one wasn't quite so bloodthirsty as some of her others. Pointing to herself, she continued. “I'm Khari. That's Rom." She pointed back at him as well, then gestured to the field.
“Can we play, too?"
This was met with some surprise, by the looks of it. Either they understood enough of the trade tongue to catch that much or else her pantomime was obvious enough to convey what she meant. A few of the older-looking children huddled together, speaking in Qunlat. They were obviously discussing whether to grant the request or not. Romulus could understand enough to gather that the primary concern seemed to be if the adults in the village would disapprove, rather than any particular reservations about the two of them.
Khari busied herself with the ball while she waited, throwing it up with her foot and catching it on her elbow, bouncing it there a few times before passing it to the other. She almost missed, but leaned sideways to bounce it again. One of the little ones giggled at her hasty save; she wrinkled her nose at him and stuck her tongue out. That, of course, only made him laugh harder.
"You can... play." One of the older ones nodded at them. The words were thick and clumsy in her mouth, but she seemed pleased for having been able to get them out.
“Great!" Khari tossed the ball to her and stepped over the line in the dirt so she was on the field. “Let's go, Rom. You can be on my team. I have no idea what I'm doing, but it should be fun."
Even though Romulus could understand them and Khari could not, he couldn't help but feel that Khari was the one who spoke their language.
He was naturally talented at many things, but apparently this game was not one of them. The Qunari children could deftly flick it about with their feet, chipping it up onto their knees, chests, and heads, and control it carefully with precise little movements that eluded Romulus any time the ball came his way. He always seemed to hit it too softly, or too hard. There were teams, apparently, but he could hardly focus on keeping them in order when they were mostly dressed the same, with Khari being the only one to blatantly stand out.
It wasn't clear if there was supposed to be another goal to the game, but it devolved into a simple affair of keep-away, with one team trying to secure the ball and pass it between themselves while the other attempted to steal it away for themselves. Romulus skirted the outsides of the makeshift pitch, stopping any ball that came his way and hurriedly trying to pass it along to someone else, only about half the time making it to someone on his team. A few times he was laughed at for his sudden clumsiness, but he found that he didn't mind.
Khari seemed to be having the time of her life. Unburdened by her armor, she was quick, and sized much more like the kids than he was. She played aggressively, but not so much so that she ever threw an accidental elbow into one of them. Knocking around the ball seemed to come naturally to her, though she also didn't quite look to know what to do with it, or what team she was on. The children didn't mind, not even when her mistakes were to their detriment.
Bouncing it off her hip, she drew her foot back and kicked it to one of the others, who jumped to hit it with his head, closer to one of the ends of the field. It nearly went out-of-bounds, but cracked against a pale blue barrier instead, falling back in.
“Asala!" Khari raised an arm and waved it vigorously at their friend, who had indeed been responsible for the rebound. “Okay, okay, time out everyone!" She held her hands up as though in surrender, shooting a glance at Romulus and jogging towards the side of the ring, where Asala was.
She wasn't fast enough however to beat the children already were surrounding Asala. She didn't recoil from the sudden surge of attention, but rather met it with warmth and affection. She leaned down and spoke with the children. The younger ones pleaded with her to play with them, while the older ones were just happy that she was back. They exchanged hugs and some of the younger ones took hold of her hands gently tug on her, until she finally spoke. "I will, later. I promise," she said from what Romulus could make out as she patted the jet black hair of a younger boy, "But first, Tammy and I wish to speak with your two new friends," she said with a smile.
The news seemed to sadden a few of the children. "I will bring them back, I promise," she added quickly with a warm smile. The pledge was enough to brighten their moods. "Tammy has some things she wishes to ask you both," she said, switching to the trade tongue for their sakes. She then pointed down one of the neat paths, "She is waiting at home now," she added.
Romulus wasn't sure what would be asked of them that Asala couldn't relay herself, but he nodded his agreement. "We'll finish this later," he told the children, grinning at them before following Asala down the path.
"I did not know you spoke Qunlat," Asala commented. She then looked off and seemed to slip into thought for a moment. Probably thinking about all the instances of Qunlat that were said in their presence.
Romulus nodded, though it seemed to be almost a guilty admittance from the way his lips were drawn into a hard line, his expression serious again. "Chryseis had me learn it as best I could, which admittedly wasn't very well." He wasn't fond of admitting that the majority of the skills and knowledge he had came from her, but it wasn't as though he could lie about it. "I can pick up most of what's being said, but I can't manage to say much myself without mangling something." He knew how to ask questions, mostly, but there was no need to say that. It had at least been occasionally useful when interacting with other slaves. The servants in Minrathous were overwhelmingly elven and human, but occasionally there would be a Qunari in the mix. Prisoners of war, or people much like Asala, fleeing from the Qun for whatever reason.
"That's uh, that's good to know," she added. With the way that she said it, she'd probably be more mindful of what she and others said around them. Eventually, she brought them to another housing unit, this one nearly identical to the others save for the personal touches. On either side of the doorway a patch of soil stretched from one edge to the other with a number of flowers blooming in them.
They were hardy flowers, built to survive the heat and terrain of the area, but still retained their color and beauty. Behind the flower beds, the walls were decorated in the geometric designs that governed other walls they'd seen. "I did that side," Asala pointed out, gesturing toward a thin lined design of bright orange and yellow on one side of the door, "Meraad did that one," the thicker red and blue one.
"Anyway, please, come in," she added, pulling back a curtain that served as their door "Tammy's expecting us."
The inside of the domicile was sparsely furnished. A low table sat in the middle of the one room home, a set of four colorful pillows set on each side of it. A bookcase occupied the far wall filled with various manuscripts and texts. On the edge of the doorway they'd just entered through, on either side, were a series of markings, beginning low and continuing until the last reached Asala's height. At the top of each line were one of their names, Asala on one side, Meraad the other.
Tammy stood at one of the far walls, in what seemed to be the kitchen. When she noticed them, she asked "Tea or coffee?" a pair of small kettles sat on a stove, and the scent of both wafting through the small home.
"Tea, please. Thank you." Romulus settled somewhat cautiously on a pillow. It was force of habit more than anything else to analyze every room upon entry, but he reminded himself to be at ease. Tammy's home wasn't overdecorated, as was to be expected of every home in this village, but it still managed to be welcoming enough. It had the telltale signs of a home, namely the history of those who lived in it etched on the walls and doorways. That, more than anything, affected him.
Khari brushed a thumb over one of the shorter Asala-marks as she entered, offering Tammy a bright smile. “Tea, thanks." She dropped herself down onto one of the pillows without looking too concerned about it, crossing her legs underneath her and gripping her ankles in her hands. “Your garden's pretty." She glanced back over her shoulder as if to lay eyes on it again. “Wouldn't have thought much grew out here."
Tammy proceeded to pour the kettles into a set four cups, two from one kettle, two from the other. "The soil helps, it was brought from deeper inland, but the flowers themselves are a hardy species. Though, they still require care and nourishment to become as vibrant as they are," she said, with a glance toward Asala. The other woman nodded and went to help distribute the cups to their guests, and kept one for herself when both took a seat on a pillow. Asala concentrated on her cup for a moment, her hands taking on a blue glow for a moment. The steam wafting from the top of cup tapered off, and instead and thin layer of frost lined the edge. She then glanced at Romulus with a smile.
"My favorite has always been the lily," Asala added, "I saw that you still keep them where I used to."
"Imekari, they are yours," she said with a motherly smile. She then turned back toward Romulus and Khari, "I gave the two plots you saw outside to Asala and Meraad. She took to hers easily, but Meraad... Well, Meraad, did not have the patience." Her mood dampened visibly, but she continued to for a moment, "That is the reason we wished to speak with you..." she said, glancing toward Asala.
The woman sighed and looking down into her cup. she did not turn to look at them while she spoke. "I... I have never asked how... or even if Meraad had... died. But I know-- knew it when you both returned and he... did not. I-- We wish to know how... kadan died."
"Asala has told me everything that led up to it and everything since... I apologize if this is morbid, but... I would still like to know. If you do not mind," Tammy continued.
Khari glanced at Romulus for a moment, apparently deciding to take up the telling first. Reaching forward for her teacup, she balanced it on a knee and sighed a bit, straightening her back. “We left the Chantry after volunteering. It was... well, it was a mess out there, honestly. We were supposed to get to the last trebuchet and trigger an avalanche, to stop the other army and give everyone else a chance to escape." It went without saying that they weren't supposed to survive doing that, if they managed it in the first place.
Her lips thinned as she pressed them together, a slight crease appearing between her eyebrows. “Getting there wasn't easy, but it wasn't until we'd actually got the thing all set up that everything went to, uh..." She glanced at Tammy, then Asala. “Crap."
Taking a sip of the tea, she set it back down on her knee and continued. “About that point, one of the walls near us gets blown to smithereens. In march a bunch of Venatori mages. Uh, they're this weird Tevinter cult, if that didn't get covered. And they have this... dragon, only it's poisoned with red lyrium, which I guess means it's a normal dragon but meaner. And of course Corypheus, who's the nasty Darkspawn guy. So... it doesn't look too great for us at that point. I charged the mages and the Darkspawn, but that didn't work too well. I didn't actually see what happened right after that."
Her eyes found him again. This was, after all, the part he could tell much better than she could.
"I was wounded pretty badly at this point," Romulus continued, recalling with a rather grim clarity each moment before he fell with Khari. "My leg, my side. Couldn't really move. After Khari went down, Meraad attacked the dragon with magic. I'm not sure anything we could have done would have even hurt that thing." He paused for a moment, thinking how best to continue. She desired to know how he had died. It had not been a pretty sight, not a clean death, and thinking back Romulus wasn't sure it made all that much of a difference. But then, maybe it had made all the difference. Maybe the extra moment had given Khari enough time to come to her senses and salvage at least their lives. Maybe without the sacrifice none of them would have survived to mourn him or tell his story.
It would do no good to soften the details, if she really did want the truth. "The dragon caught him in its jaws. He struggled. His last words were 'vashedan ataashi, nehraa Asala.' Then the dragon thrashed and cast him aside." It was different looking back on it now than it had been at the time. In the moment, Romulus had assumed they would all die, and so the manner of their deaths was irrelevant. But they hadn't all died. He looked to Asala.
"Many people sacrificed their lives that night, for a number of reasons, but Meraad's sacrifice was for you."
Asala had watched them intently as they spoke, as if she wouldn't hear them if she looked away. It was perhaps the most intent she seemed when meeting anothers eyes, and only when Romulus wound down did she break her gaze. The small room was quiet for a moment, as Tammy and Asala registered their words. It seemed that the silence would stretch on for an eternity, until finally a quiet smile crossed Asala's lips and a hitch echoed across her shoulder. It was now tears however, that caused the hitch surprisingly, but a laugh. A small one, but a laugh nonetheless. She finally looked up and toward Khari, the little smile still on her lips. "Do you, uh... know what he called it?"
Khari blinked, clearly surprised to be on the receiving end of that particular question. “Something nasty, I hope."
"He called it a, uh, trash dragon," she said, with a melancholy smile.
"That is the polite term, yes," Tammy added. The sadness was apparent in her face as well and the corners of her eyes had mist within them, but she did not outright shed tears. Instead, she shook her head and rubbed her face. "Only he would be so reckless as to stand against a dragon on his own," she added. "But... it is still something he would've done," she added with a sigh. "Did you... Know him well?"
Khari fielded that one, too, shaking her head. “Not really." Reaching up, she scratched at the back of her head. “Everything in Haven happened so fast; from the beginning of the Inquisition to then was only two months, give or take." She sighed, then offered up half a smile.
“Gotta say, though... seems like I would've liked him a lot. Not just anyone would do something like that. Takes a special kind of crazy—and I mean that in the best way possible, honest."
"I can't say I knew him either," Romulus added, unable to keep his regret from his tone. "I... tried to avoid knowing anyone, to some degree. I thought I would need to leave the Inquisition behind. I actually planned to leave the night Haven was attacked, but afterwards..." He glanced at Khari before looking back to Tammy. "The Inquisition was already becoming a family, and the attack only brought us closer together. I just wish I'd made the decision to stay sooner." The regret was likely futile, of course. It hadn't been an easy choice to make, declaring his quiet, personal rebellion on his domina, and even still with all his larger concerns the fear of the future lurked in the back of his mind. But he was also willing to wager that he could've become friends with a man such as Meraad, if he'd only given himself the chance while there was still time.
"Oh no, I understand completely," Tammy said to Khari first, gently swirling the drink in her hand as she reminisced. "He was a... difficult child. Always so restless and impulsive. He had a wonderful heart, he would not have done well underneath the Qun," she said with a small smile.
Asala nodded in agreement. "He tried to be so many things. He apprenticed under our blacksmith, tried farming, fishing. But none of it ever seemed to... fit him. But he always did what he could."
"I had thought he would have joined the Saarethost-- our mercenary company," Tammy quickly clarified for Rom and Khari, "when he came of age. Instead, he took you and went out to see the world," she said.
Asala laughed despite herself, "He said it was to meet the free mages and have them teach us control of our powers." The comment caused Tammy to chuckle with her and both seemed to know that it was just an excuse. "However, I am... glad that he did. Else, I would not have been able to meet such wonderful people," she said as she looked toward Rom and Khari.
“We're glad we met you, too." Khari grinned around the rim of her teacup and swallowed the rest of it down, placing it back on the table with a soft clink. “Thanks for sharing your home with us."
"I'm glad we were able to come here," Romulus agreed. "And the tea was excellent."