Chapter Text
"Bethany! Behind you!" Bethany turned sharply, flinging a large fireball into the midst of the Darkspawn following us. Not a two days' journey out from our now-destroyed hometown, and the blight was following us yet this far. There seemed to be no end to the creatures, continuously seeming to appear behind rocks or trees and charging us, as if they ever had a chance to defeat us. Against this force, my sister, my brother and I were, quite fortunately, formidable opponents. Our mother... regrettably, had been taken down by an ogre a distance back. A DRAGON, Maker bless it, had come to our rescue, but a moment too late. She died with her blade buried deep in the ogre's fist, still clamped shut around her. Giving us no time to grieve, the darkspawn had suddenly swarmed onto the small path. The dragon, which was clearly no ordinary beast, held them off long enough for us to escape. I would not call either of my siblings a coward, and I strongly doubt myself to be one... but there is such thing as blind stupidity, and standing to fight in order to retrieve her body would have fallen into such a category. There would be time for tears later. Once we got free of the spread of darkness.
It took four tries to finally find a port with boats yet available to leave on. Whole towns had packed up and left, swarming the ships, which had taken as many paying passengers as they could before departing these Maker-forsaken shores for good. This Blight needs to end soon, or there may be no world left to live in.
The ship was crowded, as expected. Bethany made the best of it, trying to lift everyone's spirits. It was impressive. I admired that about her. I had not the will to attempt such an endeavor, and Carver... was Carver. He complained the whole distance. He was quite honestly, a nuisance, and I could not stand to be around him for long, that trip. Neither could most of the crew, and he often found himself grumbling in solitude, which did not help his disposition at all. Luckily, I found myself a suitable pastime. Bethany did not approve of her, but Isabela was more than distracting enough from the rock of the waves. And she distracted me quite often.
After weeks at sea, we had lost dozens of passengers and quite a few of the crew to a sickness that swept the boat. Luckily, none my party had it, and so we went ashore as quickly as possible, so to avoid catching it. We could not afford such.
Kirkwall was a city of possibilities and opportunities. Or, so Mother had said. She had passed on the tales told her by her brother; our Uncle Gamlen. Looking at the outer gates... I was honestly not very hopeful.
"Dingy." Isabela commented, her mouth twisted in distaste.
"And dirty," Carver added. Bethany smacked his arm and glared. I could not help but agree with them. The city did look impressively large and old... but the outer walls were littered with people. Many, many people. In fact, I recognized a few from our village. So did Carver.
"Should we go talk to them?" he asked. He clearly was not very keen on the idea, and neither was I. They not only looked like they'd been there a while, they also looked... diseased. Horribly. I looked around. They were not the only, either. How long had these people been here?
Isabela was already in front of the gate guards, and talking heatedly. I motioned for Bethany and Carver to follow me and headed for the main gates.
"I'm sorry, but you cannot enter." The guard was holding his calm remarkably well. Isabela was clearly nearing exasperation. The guard's ears were tinged in red, which told me she'd already tried seduction, and bribing was always her next option. I'd watched her gambling with the ship's crew quite a few times. Which meant she was really unable to get us in.
"We DO have family here, though" I informed the guard. He raised an eyebrow, briefly glancing at Isabela before returning his gaze to me. "Name?"
"Amell. Gamlen Amell." Carver supplied. The guard smirked.
"He's quite rich. I'm sure he could pay our way in if you contact him" Bethany added. The guard's inexplicable amusement quickly turned to confusion. "Who?" he asked. "Gamlen Amell," I said, "Our Uncle"
The guard's fact contorted strangely. "The DRUNK?"
We were taken aback. Bethany started to try to explain further, but I stopped her. "A lot might have changed since Mother knew him." Isabela nodded, "It WAS nearly 30 years."
Bethany turned to me angrily and hissed, "SHE knows?! Brother, we don't even KNOW her!"
"I did not know it was meant to be a secret." I responded, admittedly a little sharper than intended. She shut her mouth angrily. She clearly did not appreciate me with Isabela, but I could do nothing about her disposition, and so I didn't try.
We turned back to the guard, who was eyeing us with a look that suggested he was going to call backup if anything happened. "I'm sorry, but unless there's another Gamlen Amell in Kirkwall, you're not going to get in. The only I know of is a mindless drunk who doesn't even have a place to his name anymore. We'd have thrown him out... but he's one of The Hanged Man's best customers. Not sure where he gets his drinking money from, but..." he shrugged, "'tis not my place to ask."
Bethany's mouth opened and closed, and she stormed away in a huff. "Thank you" Carver said to the guard curtly as we quickly started to follow her. Se didn't stop walking for a while. Apparently, it was to find a spot yet uninhabited by the vagabonds locked outside. Vagabonds... that I suppose we were too, now. Bethany, usually cool-headed and calm was quite angry. I did not know whether about Isabela or our uncle, or something else altogether, but we three silently voted to leave her alone to cool down and play some games. It worked. A few hours later, as the sky began to darken, she came back over with something... very foul-smelling.
"I found something for us to eat" She placed down her package and all three of us recoiled. She winced. "I'm sorry, it's really the best I could find." She turned to me and handed me our moneybag. "It was also QUITE expensive."
"Expensive?" Carver said in shock "That?!" Bethany shrugged and took one of the burnt lumps in the folded cloth. She bit into gingerly. It crunched loudly. Carver and I watched in sight disgust as she chewed and swallowed, wincing at every crunch. Isabela selected one, and began inspecting it.
"It's... not THAT bad." Bethany offered, well aware of our hesitation. Isabela took a good sniff of hers and tossed it over her shoulder in disgust. Bethany gave her a sour but sympathetic look and placed hers down gingerly. We re-tied the cloth and set it aside, then settled down with our makeshift bedrolls. The 'food' left a pungent aroma in the air. I decided I might break into it tomorrow.
If I got desperate.