Under Darkness [AU]

[Tethras Clan]

Merrill has just enough time to mutter one last spell and reach out to tap Beka (which covers the mabari with a thin, almost wooden coating) before four people rush out of the woods. It would be six, but Silence bursts out of some underbreath to grab the last by the throat, taking him to the ground, the fifth of them turning back to him the poor sod currently being ripped apart. Beka lets out a deep baying noise and rushes them, clearly intending to go help her sister.

[Marian Hawke]

Hawke fights ferociously, losing herself in the extended Now of combat: striking out with her staff, weaving in her magic as she does. Mostly offensive magic; she's concerned about her girlfriend, her charges, more than she is her own life right now. This, this feels manageable: something she can handle and keep the babes safe.

[NPCs]

After the first five people- scouts evidently- more combatants rush out of the woods. Almost a score of kobolds are next- none of them a real challenge to Hawke or the mabari, but the sheer numbers present an issue. After all, a single one of them could kill a helpless infant regardless of how little threat they are to the adults. Worse still are the last two arrivals- a merikos ifrit and a full-blown troll bound in runed iron shackles. The only saving grace is that the merikos ifrit, a caster of some kind based on the glowing rod in one hand and a slaver based on the knotted whip in the other, seems content to allow Hawke to exhaust herself before sending in his slave troll.

[Tethras Clan]

"Hawke, I don't think-" Merrill covers a large cluster of kobolds in blinding, slowing mud. "-we can- we need to fall back," she finishes, speaking in dwarven, presumably in the hopes that their foes won't understand.

[Marian Hawke]

There's only one option for Hawke, only ever has been. Flashes of a dim temple, the basement lit only by flickering torches, flash past her eyes, but she pushes them away. Good. It will be a relief to finally rest, she tells herself. 

"Get the kids safe," she grunts in Dwarven. "I'll hold them off to cover your escape, then make my own." The last is a lie, but a white one, she figures -- there's no way Merrill will leave if she thinks Hawke won't survive. 

[Tethras Clan]

What? No, that's... one of us has to go first. Hawke is better in direct combat. It makes sense. But... No. Neither of us- even Hawke- is more important than the babies. They have to come first. They have to. "Buy me ten seconds to pick them up," Merrill replies. At Hawke's rather impressive response by way of massive ice damage, the elf scoops up both children, not even bothered to keep ahold of her sling, and launches into the air. "Silence, help winter alpha!" she shouts back in sylvian as she rapidly flees back towards town.

[NPCs]

Cursing savagely, the merikos ifrit starts shouting for the two remaining humans to chase her down even as he whips the troll towards Hawke.

[Marian Hawke]

Hawke lunges at the troll, rising to meet him. "Silence," she snaps, "the humans, keep them off Merrill. I got this." At least for a little while.

[Tethras Clan]

Silence doesn't budge in her efforts to keep the kobolds off Hawke. Beka, however, does chase after the humans, engaging the one with a crossbow and leaving the other one to chase rather futilely after the much faster flying elf.

[NPCs]

As for the troll... well. No acid, not much fire... Hawke is ill-suited for this fight. A troll this size, with armour and a weapon? Even if it's just crude chainmail and a iron band reinforced club, this would be a challenge if the magus was fresh. She can hold for a while, given how slow and awkward the beast is, but she's not really making any headway at winning.

[Marian Hawke]

It's a good thing she doesn't have to win. 

There's a part of her that's lost in the thrill of the fight, grateful that there's nothing left to do but this, just this. Her world narrows down to one singular focus: keep the troll busy as long as she can. Buy as much time as she can. Save Merrill's life. Save Gilly, save Tomas. Save her Clan.

She can't avoid the blows forever. One blow she almost manages to dodge catches her hip funny, and she can feel the pelvis shift, feel the depth of the bruise. It jars her out of her headspace. Surely it's been long enough, now? Surely she can run?

Gilly's laugh, so fierce already, like she's going to take on the whole world. The quiet depth in Tomas' eyes, the desire to know everything about a world he can barely even perceive. The look on Seli's face when she mentioned Andy's drinking, when she had to talk about losing both her husbands. 

Hawke grits her teeth, dragging herself back to her feet. It's not enough. It's never enough. I have to give them a future. She throws herself back into the fray, the only relief she'll grant a scream of defiance and pain as she redoubles her efforts. Again, she is lost in the endless thrill of battle, the eternal moment, aware of nothing but her movements, her body's desperate attempt to stay alive.

The next failed dodge isn't so lucky. The club connects squarely with her ribcage, sending her flying into a treetrunk hard enough to shake the leaves, scare off a few ravens that had gathered to watch the slaughter. For a moment the world goes white, and she can't seem to get her breath; blood dribbles out of the corner of her mouth, and her eyes go glassy with pain. I'm alive. That wasn't the end, but it nearly was. Could she even stand? Crumpled in a heap at the base of the trunk, she's not sure she can.

Is this enough? she asks herself. Have I done enough?

Merrill's dark eyes, begging her, pleading her to make it stop, just to make the pain stop, to make it never have happened, to make it go away. To kill her, if that's what it took. Blood running down her back, angry red wounds marring her perfect moonlight skin. The sick knowledge that she caused this, that it's her fault. 

No, she tells herself, and she finds she can stand after all, it just hurts like hell. Less than Merrill went through, she reminds herself, and she grabs her staff from where it fell, casting a defensive buff on herself to make up for her slowness. "Come at me," she snarls, and launches herself into the fray again.

The best she could have hoped for would be a head wound. If the troll hit her with that club at that strength in the head, she'd be unconscious immediately, if not dead flat out. Likely, it would break her neck. But the Bright Gods aren't feeling merciful today -- or if they are, they're answering someone else's prayers instead of her own. As she gets in close, she takes a blow to the side hard enough to damage her spine, sending her flying into another tree, pain whiting out her vision long before she even leaves the ground as her broken ribs catch another blow. She can't get up, this time. It's all she can do to vomit, and the pain of that nearly knocks her out anyway, as more blood than bile leaves her. She clings to life, desperate and scrabbling, and something in her says to stay down, to play dead, maybe she can survive this, maybe--

Bethany' s dark eyes, seeking, frantic, meet hers. Blood dribbles from the corner of her mouth. 'Marian?'

She can't breathe. That doesn't matter. She can barely stand. That doesn't matter either. The world is spinning and it won't stop, she's made of pain itself, there's nothing left in her but agony and spinning and it doesn't matter, not if Merrill can take one breath more, not if Gilly and Tomas live, not if she can die trying rather than ever, ever be left like that again.

She lets out a sobbing cry, more of a whimper than a roar, and limps her way toward the troll one more time. 

[Tethras Clan]

Before Hawke can take more than a single step, the troll- and everything within five feet of it in every direction- is engulfed in a pillar of divine wrath. Incredible heat blooms across the clearing, the roaring column  a twisting mass of red and orange interspersed with bands of white. And, strangely enough, icy blue.  The troll is, just barely, alive once the flame ends. Then it's hit with a bolt of lighting. And a crossbow bolt. As Hawke stands there, stunned and confused, something goes between the clearing and the sun a few seconds before a bolt of energy impacts Hawke, filling her with a sense of fierce, almost inhuman devotion and unyielding protection. And also clearing away the worst of the ache in her head, the broken feeling in her ribs, the darkness in her sight.

Which allows her to see Aveline nearly falling off a griffon as it lands a little bit away from her. On the other side of the dead yet still smoldering troll, Hawke can see Zevran and Isabela taking the wizard slaver apart with cold deliberation. From the look of it, they're striking to capture, not kill, but they're also choosing to forgo joint disablement in favor of pain. Varric is hovering just above the trees, providing overwatch. And Merrill. Her daring, innocent, helpless Merrill is coming to a rest just in front of Hawke, left hand still smoking slightly from the flamestike, a simmering thrum of leashed storm rippling the air around her.

"It's okay Hawke," she says gently, a soothing, worried voice. "It's okay. It's over. Everyone is safe. You can stand down."

[Marian Hawke]

"Oh," she says faintly. "Good."

Then she keels over and knows nothing more. 


For the second time, Hawke wakes up when she didn't expect to. Again, she's in clean, dry clothes, and there's no sign of the ache she would have expected had she been healed by mortal means. I could get used to this, she thinks, before instantly regretting it.

Unfortunately, the regret causes her to flinch, just a little. It's enough. 

[Tethras Clan]

"Hey there amata," the voice she knows best these days says gently. "How's your head?" Next to her, Hawke can hear movement, the faint click of glass, then the sound of water being poured.

[Marian Hawke]

"Sore," she groans, licking at her lips. "Dry mouth," she adds. "But I'm-- thank you." Best not to call attention to how close I came to death.