Disclaimer: I don't own Dragon Age, Final Fantasy, etc, or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other fans like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

Rating: T+

Spoilers: May contain spoilers for Origins, Origins DL content, and Dragon Age II as well as the novels The Stolen Throne and The Calling. May also contain spoilers for Final Fantasy XII, Final Fantasy XIII, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Dungeons and Dragons, and Harry Potter.

Chapter Three: Dragon Slayers

In the windowless dark of Lowtown, it was impossible to tell what time it was when he woke in the morning. Loghain lay where he was for a moment, half-stunned by the memory of what he had done in the night. He might have hoped it was nothing more than a particularly vivid Fade dream, but for the warm bundle of woman still asleep on his left arm. He searched his heart for feelings of guilt, and was surprised when he found none. They might come later, but for now, he was simply satisfied.

He watched her sleep for a few moments, and then quietly slipped out of the bed. He was careful not to wake her, and dressed in silence. He would like to be there when she woke up, even with the risk that she would not want him there, but there was a very large dog in the other room that almost certainly needed walking. She might still be asleep when he got back, but he was not about to walk into her house without permission. He walked to the large loading door that led up out of the South Sprawl and entered Giza Plains.

No dew sparkled on the few desert plants, but the morning looked fresh and pretty regardless. Loghain took Odd well away from anything that looked like a trail and let him do his business. That accomplished, he returned to Lowtown and had Odd sit up against the wall near Elilia's home, out of the way as best as possible of foot traffic. He leaned up against the wall himself and waited with his arms folded.

He did not have long to wait. Inside of half an hour the door opened and Elilia stepped out, dressed again in chainmail armor. She caught sight of Loghain and turned towards him.

"Is there any particular reason why you're standing out here?" she asked.

"I was waiting for you," he said.

"You could have waited inside," she said.

"The dog needed to be walked. I didn't have permission to come back in, so I waited out here."

"Consider yourself to have permission from now on," she said. "I wasn't sure I'd be seeing you again."

"I wasn't sure you'd want to," he said.

She adjusted the pack on her shoulder. "Well, come on. I've got all that meat we took yesterday; we need to get it sold before it goes bad."

He touched her on the shoulder. "Don't you think we need to talk, first?" he said.

"About what?" she asked.

"About last night. About where we stand today."

"Right now we stand in my doorway," she said. "I should like to remedy that."

"If you want to pretend it never happened that's fine by me," he said. "I might have trouble doing that, is all."

"I'm not pretending it never happened, but it's not happening right now…although there's an idea." She shook her head. "No, we have too much to do today, starting with selling all that loot we've got."

Loghain pushed his forelock out of his eyes. "You would…have it happen again?" he asked.

"It will happen again, if I have anything to say about it," she said. "As often as possible. Just not right now. There's a lot to do. Come on, we're wasting time. I want to take a few bounties today, and if we don't hurry someone might get to them before us."

"All right," he said, and followed her up out of Lowtown. They sold the spoils from their evening of hunting and ended up with a goodly sum of coin for their efforts. Elilia did not seem completely satisfied with it, however, and led the way to the Sandsea to peek at the hunt board.

"Hey, here's a new one: Flowering Cactoid. Must have been posted last night, or first thing this morning," she said. "Petitioned by a fellow named Dantro who will be waiting at the Outpost in the estersand. That's not much of a monster, but you should take it on. It'll help your clan rank, and the bounty will help with outfitting you."

"I'm game. It's one of those walking cactus plants, isn't it? Doesn't seem like the kind of thing someone would post a bounty on."

"If it's aggressive, it's more of a problem than you might think," Elilia said. "Still, you should be able to take it on without armor, if you're careful."

"Takin' on the flowering cactoid?" Oghren's beery voice said from the direction of the bar. "Mind if I tag along?"

"Oghren, Loghain needs the bounty so he can get equipped. We're not interested in splitting it," Elilia said.

"Who said anythin' about splittin' the bounty? I just wanna tag along; see how 'e does. He done good yesterday, but there's still some question in my mind as to whether he's really clan material," Oghren said.

Elilia rolled her eyes. "You can take my word for it; he is," she said.

Oghren slipped off his stool and hitched at his belt. "No offense, but yer just a kid. Whadda you know?"

"How many people in this room took a handful of farmers and with them managed to kick a great empire out of their land? Raise your hands," Elilia said. She took Loghain's arm by the wrist and waved it in the air, not without some resistance. "This guy did."

"Beggin' yer pardon, Eli, but I'm less in'erested in what 'e did than in what 'e can do," Oghren said.

"If Oghren wants to take time away from his precious drinking to observe me, I have no objections," Loghain said.

"I don't trust him," Elilia said. "Why so interested in seeing him face off against a flowering cactoid? It's not much of a test."

"Shows what you know," Oghren said. "Flowerin' cactoid's a pretty damned good test, of some things."

"Like what?" she asked, eyes narrowed with suspicion.

"Like we'll see, if it tests 'im," Oghren said.

"Hmm," she said, and glared at him for a moment longer. Then she turned and strode out of the tavern at high speed, which left both men to catch up to her, Oghren at a near run.

"What's wrong with you?" Loghain asked her, when he was close again.

"He's plotting something. I just don't know what," she said.

"What's the problem? You don't think we can handle him? He's a drunk and a slob, but I've not yet known him to be malicious."

"How do you know Oghren? You just met him yesterday," she said.

"I knew him back in Ferelden," Loghain said. "He helped the Warden and I slay the Archdemon."

She stopped short. "That's impossible. Oghren was here when I first came to Rabanastre."

"It was a different Oghren, but they're as alike as two peas. You haven't met anyone you knew from back home?"

"I…didn't really know very many people," she said, dazedly. "Do you mean to tell me there are copies of people from Ferelden running around Ivalice?"

"It would seem so. I don't know how common it is. I didn't really know all that many people, either," he said.

"What if we…run into ourselves?" she said. "That would make my head explode."

"I don't think it likely. If we existed in this world already, the gods or whatever wouldn't have needed to place us here."

"Do you really think this is a…whole different world?" she asked.

"I think it must be," he said, "though I hate so to admit it. Everything is different here. Even the laws of magic."

"I haven't wanted to think about it that way. I wanted to believe that, if I wanted to, I could board a ship and return home. But I think I knew that was never going to happen," she said.

He put his hand on her shoulder, but she shook him off. "It's no problem. Life is better here," she said. "My family is gone; there's nothing in Ferelden for me any longer."

"Ferelden needs people like you," he said.

"Ferelden will muddle by without me," she said. "Either that or it won't. My presence probably wouldn't have made that much difference one way or another."

"Hey, are we goin' huntin' or are we just gonna stand around all day flappin' our gums?" Oghren said.

They started walking again, but Loghain did not let the subject by. "How is life better here?" he asked. "What does Dalmasca have that Ferelden doesn't, aside from a lot of sand and a surplus of violent wild animals?"

"Well, from this point forward, it has me and you," she said. "I don't say Dalmasca is better than Ferelden, I just say my life is better here. Back home there were expectations, and though I made a habit of disappointing those expectations I was never really free. I'm free here, completely free. I can make of my life what I want to make of it."

He grudgingly admitted she had a point. "I suppose I can understand that," he said.

"Good. You made your own way in the world; I want my opportunity to do the same."

He laughed, a bitter sound. "You think I made my way? The way I made was one I was dragged along by chains forged of duty: to my father, to Maric, to Ferelden. I tried many times to escape my fate. I never got far. The chains always dragged me back."

"That's surprising. To learn that you, of all people, ever found duty confining," she said.

"It takes strength to accept one's duty. Strength that had to develop over time, in my case."

"Well, you're free now," she said.

"Perhaps," he said. "Then again, perhaps not."

"Oh, right. The great, mysterious 'destiny of the Mist-born,'" she said. "I haven't known anything important to happen yet."

"But there's three of us now," Loghain said. "That seems to me a faintly prophetic number."

They were come to the east gate now. Elilia strode towards it without slackening pace and the massive doors slid open for her. "Well, we'll see. If anything does happen, at least it should be an adventure."

"Ha. In my experience, adventures aren't much fun while you're having them. It's only in reminiscence that you say, 'Those were the days.' Once you know you can survive them," Loghain said.

"You don't strike me as someone who says that, even in reminiscence."

"I don't waste a lot of time reminiscing. The past is passed. Useful as a guideline for the future, but not a source of entertainment."

"What is a good source of entertainment, if I might ask?" she said.

"Not embroidery," he said, and she giggled.

"Come on, just tell me. What does Loghain Mac Tir find 'fun'?"

"Hunting is fun, I suppose, though I've never really done it for pure sport. A long ride through the country on a breezy day. A good book on an interesting topic." He dropped his voice into a lower register and a near whisper. "A night in the company of a peculiar but pleasant woman."

"Oo, I made the list," she said, and laughed. "I hope you're referring to me."

"Of course I am. I haven't met any other peculiar women recently."

They were well into the estersand now. Odd growled the native wolves away, and they passed without difficulty through the first sand-swept area to the narrow arroyo where the Outpost was. There were only a few people there under ordinary circumstances, a guard and whatever wayfarers paused to rest on their way to Rabanastre, so it was easy enough to find Dantro, seated on a crate in the middle of the Outpost near the bonfire. He talked to a blue seeq.

He saw them and turned his head. "Helloa, folks. Can I help you with anything?" he asked.

"Are you Dantro?" Loghain asked.

"That I am. Are you hunters?"

"That we are."

"Excellent. I was hoping it wouldn't take too long before someone came about my bill. This fellow here," he said, with a nod of the head towards the seeq, "just had a run-in with the nasty little bugger. Needles everywhere. Fortunately in his things, and not in him. Still, it's a pain in the arse, and if it isn't taken care of soon someone could get seriously hurt."

"Any idea where I'll find it?" Loghain asked.

"It was in the Yardang, just east of here, that this fellow got caught by it," Dantro said. "If you put a wiggle on it, I'd bet you'd find it's still there. Little beast likes to waylay morning travelers in that area. Kill it and bring me its flower so my wife can stew it up as an unguent for this sick traveler she's been tending. I'd do it myself, but I'm stuck here on guard duty for the next three days."

"It will be done," Loghain said. He turned to the others. "The Yardang?"

"The Yardang Labyrinth," Oghren said. "The maze of arroyos just past the Outpost."

"Rather a grandiose name for a couple of intersecting gulches," Loghain said.

"People get lost in them all the time," Elilia said. "It's a dangerous place for the casual traveler."

"Casual travelers probably shouldn't be wandering the desert in the first place," Loghain said. "Let's go."

They entered the twisting passages of the Yardang Labyrinth, which really was no more than two steep-sided arroyos that connected at two or three points. It was easy enough to keep a bearing there if you knew what you were about; the southeastern exit led directly to the fortress of Nalbina, the northeastern exit led deeper into the estersand (and eventually to the estersand village), and of the two western outlets one led to the Outpost and the other, Loghain was morally certain, led to the Giza Plains. Anybody who had trouble coming through the region was woefully unprepared for the desert. He did not yet own a map of the estersand, but already he had built a fairly accurate model of the region in his head, and led the way unerringly through the twisting paths.

There were plenty of cactites in the labyrinth, and each went about their business without a care for the hunters that stalked through their midst. The wolves and cockatrices that populated the area kept well back of Odd's bared teeth.

"Walk cautiously, now," Elilia said, in a low voice. "You want to take this thing unawares, believe me."

Odd saw the creature first. The giant dog bellied down to the sand, growled quietly, and took a few steps back. Loghain took the warning seriously. He and Elilia dropped into a crouch behind a rock outcropping and peered around it. Oghren was already shorter than the rocks, and did not need to crouch.

The flowering cactoid was slightly larger than most of the other cactoids Loghain had seen, and had a pink lotus-like flower on its head. It did not see them, and when it turned away, Loghain crept out from behind the outcropping with his sword out. The creature went about its business without spotting him, and he did not see any sign of ears on it, but still he snuck up cautiously, careful not to make any noise. He drew into range to strike, and that was when something terrible happened.

Oghren farted.

Loghain was upwind, so he could not smell it, but the sound reverberated off the close stone walls. The cactoid evidently heard it, for it turned with a screech and pumped its arms rapidly. What felt like a thousand needles flew off it and struck Loghain in the legs, chest, and stomach. A few sharp points found more tender flesh. Elilia swore and vaulted over the outcropping with her greatsword in hand.

With an oath, Loghain struck out with his sword and chopped the top of the creature's head off at the eyes. Water gushed out of the severed stump, and both pieces fell to the sand. Elilia put a hand on his shoulder and dropped her greatsword. With one hand, she fumbled in her satchel for something.

"Here, drink this," she said, after she came up with a bottle of green healing potion. "It should heal most of the prickles. We might have to remove some of the deeper ones by hand, though."

Oghren laughed. "Took it like a man! You're a real hunter after all!" he said.

Elilia spun toward him. "Oghren! Do you mean to tell me you did that on purpose?" she said.

The dwarf shrugged. "What's the big deal? He didn't let it stop 'im."

"The big deal? Of all the malicious things - "

"It's all right," Loghain said. She spun back toward him.

"What?" she said.

"It's not a real issue," he said. "The cactoid is dead. Nothing went wrong."

"Nothing went wrong? You just took a thousand needles without any kind of protection. If they hit you just right, they could have killed you!"

"Bull. He's too damned tall," Oghren said. "Too thick, too. And armor wouldn't 'a been much help. Those needles woulda gone straight through leather, and it would just make 'em harder to pull out. Takin' a shot from a cactoid's just a rite of passage for a hunter. Lot of 'em curl up cryin'. He didn't. He's got what it takes, all right."

"That was fairly impressive, actually," she said, somewhat reluctantly. "I've been hit with needles before, and it's pretty hard to keep moving after it happens. Didn't it hurt? You do feel pain, don't you?"

"It hurt like hell. Would've hurt worse if it had the chance to hit me again, so I killed it," Loghain said.

"You can just…soldier on through the worst of pains," she said.

"I have a lot of experience with pain," he said. "There are some pains one can't soldier on through. That wasn't one of them, though I will admit it was pretty bad."

"Is this something you had to learn, or were you born with the ability?" she said.

"I learned. You will, too. I should imagine most pains dwindle into insignificance after you've birthed a child."

"I'm never going to do that," she said, "so don't go getting any funny ideas."

"I knew it! You two are bonking, ain't ya?" Oghren said.

"That is none of your business," Elilia said.

"You didn't deny it, I can't help but notice," Oghren said, with an obscene chuckle.

"Let's just get out of here, shall we?" Loghain said. He knelt down and cut the flower off the top of the cactoid's head. "There. This is what he wanted from the thing. Is there any worth to the rest of it?"

"No, the flesh is poisonous," Elilia said.

"Sure, change the subject," Oghren said. "Oghren's got you pegged. Oghren knows what you get up to in the dark."

"Oghren's going to be bloody in about three seconds if he doesn't shut up," Loghain said.

"Oo, touchy, ain't we? I know the cure for that, and Elilia's got it in her pants."

Loghain drew back his sword, but Elilia stopped his swing. "Don't bother. The lewd speculations of a drunkard don't trouble me. Especially since he's more or less correct. Let's just go get your bounty. You should have enough for some leathers after this, and we'll take what other bounties we can find in hopes of getting you a bow and a few good spells."

"Nothin' much left on the board except big-ticket bounties like the marilith and ring wyrm," Oghren said. "If you think you wanna go after them I'd be happy to throw a hand in for a cut."

"You've got to promise one thing," Elilia said. "No more tests. Loghain has nothing to prove to you. And no more wind, please. That was foul, in the extreme."

"Hey, I can't make any promises I can't keep," Oghren said. "When a man has'ta go, a man has'ta go."

"No more talk about the lady," Loghain said. "Or else."

"Fine, fine. Let's go, before we shrivel up."

They returned to the Outpost, and Dantro handed over the bounty with his thanks. "I don't suppose I can ask a favor of you?" he said. "I'm here for the next three days, as I think I said, and my wife could use this flower as soon as possible. Could you take it to her? Our house is in the South Banks village, next to the river by the gate crystal. You'll find her up and about this time of day, and she won't be far from the house since she's looking after that poor fella. I don't have anything else on hand, but she'll give you something for your efforts, I'm sure."

"Of course," Loghain said. He headed back out into the Yardang with the flower, and left Elilia and Oghren to catch up.

"Much more a' this trottin' around, an' I'm gonna put a saddle on that dog an' ride it," Oghren grumbled. "You're sure goin' awful far out of yer way fer what'll probably be a handful of copper."

"I'm not running on a schedule," Loghain said. "If you don't like it, don't follow."

"It's not about the reward, Oghren," Elilia said.

"Then why are we doin' it?" Oghren said.

"You wouldn't understand," she said, with a roll of the eyes.

Dantro's wife proved to be a short, slim-built blonde, like ninety percent of all Dalmascan women as far as Loghain had seen, and like most of the men as well. She stood in the doorway of the small round hut between the river and the gate crystal in the estersand village. Loghain touched his brow to her and offered the flower.

"Your husband said you could put this to good use," he said.

"Oh, excellent!" she said. "Dantro said he was going to put a bounty out for it. Thank you."

She took the flower and dug into her pocket. "Here; it's not much, but a little something to thank you for bringing this all that way."

Loghain waved it off. "No, thank you. Is there anything else you need?"

She hesitated, and her eyes wandered over the faces of the others in his party. "Well, there are a few things…I can easily get most of them myself, but across the river, in the Broken Sands, you can find valeblossom trees. A few drops of valeblossom dew, the sap that rises up through pores in the wood, would help a great deal, but that's a dangerous area. There are wild saurians in that region. I don't have much to offer in exchange, but you look like a strong party. Is there a possibility you might head in that direction sometime soon?"

Loghain looked to Elilia. "I'm in," she said. "We went through the Yoma, which leads to the Broken Sands, yesterday. That's where we took all the worgen. Likely the area's filled back in by this time, so we'll have to fight our way through, but we can get plenty in exchange for pelts and wolf blood, and if Oghren will come with us I'd bet we can take on a wild saurian, which would be a big payday. How about it, Oghren? A third of wild saurian meat, skin, bone, and blood. Sounds worth it to me."

"Longshanks ain't very well protected for goin' up against a saurian," Oghren said.

"I'll watch out for him," she said. "All we need do is keep him out of the way of the teeth. I expect if he takes a blow or two from the tail, he'll scarcely feel it. Or at least he'll pretend he didn't."

"All right, I'm up for it."

They went to talk to the ferryman. "I heard you're helping out Missus Huone, so I'll waive the crossing fee this time. All aboard."

The little boat, propelled by dual motor-driven paddlewheels, chugged slowly across the placid blue river expanse to the North Banks village, where they debarked. Odd jumped off the boat and lapped up water from the river's edge.

"He's got the right idea," Elilia said. She pulled a canteen from her satchel and took a swig from it. She passed it to Loghain. "Here."

"Thanks," he said, and took a drink himself. Oghren pulled a flask from his bag and tipped it back. No fools thought it held water.

"You know, alcohol dries you up faster," Loghain said.

"I'll die a happy man," Oghren said, and belched.

"Suit yourself."

They left the village and proceeded into the area Loghain now knew as the Yoma, a broad expanse of rolling sand on the banks of the river. Once again well populated with red worgen wolves, which were bold enough to attack in spite of Odd's growls. Individually the beasts were no match for the group, but they traveled in small packs and presented a formidable obstacle in conjunction with the massive dragon that guarded the narrow passage to the Broken Sands. They carefully cleared the desert of wolves before tackling the wild saurian.

This beast was not docile like the one close to the city; it attacked as soon as they came close. Oghren and Elilia set themselves to draw the dragon's attention while Loghain stayed out of range of the mouthful of six-inch teeth. It was a switch for him, when for so many years he had used himself as a human shield. He did not particularly care to be back in a position of vulnerability.

Though he was away from the dangers of the saurian's teeth, he was not safe, a fact that came home to him when the great creature's tail slammed into his chest like a battering ram. He flew backward three feet into a sandstone outcropping and crumpled, momentarily dazed. He got to his feet gingerly, thanks to his bruised ribs, but threw himself back into the battle, not aiming to kill but to cripple the beast, to aid his companions as best he could. Elilia made the killing blow, and jammed her greatsword into the creature's throat. Oghren barely made it out from under in time to avoid a nasty death as the beast fell.

"Everybody all right?" Elilia asked, as she wiped sweat and blood from her brow with the back of her hand. "Loghain?"

"I'm fine," he said.

"Look at all that cheddar," Oghren said. "This is lookin' to be the best payday I've had in awhile."

Elilia sheathed her greatsword and drew her hunting knife. "You won't get any of it if you don't help me portion it out."

It took all three of them to dress the beast out. There was apparently some value to every part of the creature, which made Loghain feel a little better about killing it. Leaving countless corpses for the scavengers was not his idea of proper hunting, no matter how inexhaustible the prey.

"This is one of those times when it would be good for you to have your own kit," Elilia said, as she paused to rest a moment. It was hard work to cut the dragon's tough hide. "I'm not sure I've got enough vials in my bag for all this blood, though I always carry more than I think I'm going to need. I suppose I could empty the ones I've got wolf blood in. Dragon blood is more valuable."

"I've got a few extra vials," Oghren said. "We should be okay."

"Might I ask what they use this blood for?" Loghain asked.

"Potions, mostly. It's gross, but if you drink it you get stronger for a little while," Elilia said.

Oghren chuckled. "It's a popular remedy for men who have a little trouble gettin' things started in the bedroom, too." He elbowed Loghain in the ribs. "Not a problem for you, right?"

"Your fascination with other people's private lives betrays your utter lack of one," Elilia said.

"I've just been tryin' to picture the eventual offspring. All I can figger so far is that it'll be really tall and have a big honkin' nose."

"Enough," Loghain said. "I'm only going to warn you once more: keep your thoughts to yourself. I'll not have you speculating on the lady's integrity."

"You don't have to defend my honor, you know," Elilia said.

"Perhaps I don't, but neither do I need suffer hearing it."

They finished portioning out the saurian. Loghain was amazed that, magic or no, they were able to pack it all out on their backs without the weight being a real issue. It was more than just the miniaturization magic; the satchels themselves were enchanted to eliminate the problem of weight. Impossible, by the laws of magic with which he had grown up. This was not the same plane of existence as Thedas. This was a place like the Fade, separate. Unique. And like the Fade, he suspected there was no easy way to cross from this place to his home, except perhaps in dreams.

There were more bold worgen in the Broken Sands. They had to fight their way to the crevasse where the pink-leaved valeblossom trees grew. They had one empty vial they saved, and they gathered as much of the welling sap as they could. They returned to the North Banks village and crossed the river once more. Dantro's wife met them at the door of her hut.

"Oh, thank you for this. This will really help. Here, let me administer this quickly so you can have your bottle back." She disappeared into the hut and returned in a few minutes. She handed Loghain the empty vial. "I rinsed it out for you. Thank you again. I put together a small reward for you."

"That won't be necessary," Loghain said. "We're glad to help."

"We wouldn't be if we didn't have a shitload of dragon meat in our packs," Oghren said, with a grunt. Elilia kicked him in the shin.

"Ignore him," she said. "He doesn't speak for the rest of us."

"Is there anything else we can do for you?" Loghain asked.

"No no, you've done more than I should ever have asked for already. Are you sure I can't reward you?"

"I'm sure. Good fortune to you," Loghain said.

"Let's take the gate crystal back to Rabanastre," Oghren said.

"Oghren, you lazy slob, it's only two miles," Elilia said. "I'm not wasting a teleport stone on a trip like that, and Loghain hasn't touched the Rabanastre crystal yet."

"All right, all right." Oghren whistled and slapped his hands on his knees. "Come here, you big mutt."

"You're not riding my dog," Loghain said.

Oghren grumbled under his breath the whole way back to Rabanastre. His mood did not improve until they sold off the pieces of the dragon. They each came away with a small fortune; a good day's work, and it was not even noon yet.

"I don't know about you guys, but I'm starving," Elilia said. "What say we take a break, grab something to eat?"

"Sounds good to me," Oghren said. "Sandsea?"

They went to the tavern for eggs and bacon and toast with coffee. Elilia checked the hunt board while they were there. "The tavernmaster right here petitioned the marilith hunt," she said. "The ring wyrm was petitioned by a fellow named Balzac, who'll be waiting in Lowtown. There's one other local hunt, for a White Mousse, but that's an amorph and would take some pretty strong magic. I think we should let that one go for now."

Oghren sat back in his chair and folded his hands on his stomach. He belched comfortably. "What you should be askin' is whether we really need to take on any other hunts. We made a boatload today."

"But imagine how much more we can make if we just put in a full day's work," Elilia said. "I know that's anathema to you."

"I thought you didn't hunt during the heat of the day," Oghren said.

"I don't care to, that's true, but we'd be underground hunting the marilith. It will be cooler down there. Come on; Loghain needs the coin, and a little extra always comes in handy, doesn't it?"

"With all the dragon meat we flooded the market with, we won't get jack for the ring wyrm," Oghren said. "Not 'less we take it somewheres else to sell it."

"Bhujerba is an hour's trip by airship and tickets only cost two hundred gil apiece. They don't get dragon meat often, so they pay more for it in the first place. We can go there, show Loghain the sights, and teleport back," Elilia said.

"Why don't we teleport there?" Oghren said. "Why waste money and time on an airship ride?"

"Idiot. You know Loghain hasn't touched the Bhujerba crystal. Besides, I like riding on airships, and I'd like for Loghain to experience it. The approach to Bhujerba is beautiful."

"He could come by drag-along," Oghren said. "That's the way that monster dog'll travel."

"You know as well as I do that drag-along teleportation is extremely uncomfortable," Elilia said. "No, we'll go by airship. The proceeds from the sale of the meat should more than make up for the cost of the tickets."

"You're assuming of course that we can, indeed, defeat this monster," Loghain said. "It's a dragon. It might be beyond us."

"If it was an especially powerful dragon the King would have petitioned to have it killed, or sent the army after it," Elilia said. "We can handle it. You'll be better equipped before we head out after it."

"A ring wyrm would have fire breath," Oghren said. "A good stout shield would come in handy. Then we wouldn't hafta babysit you as much."

"After the wild saurian, he should probably have enough for a shield, and everything else he needs to start out," Elilia said.

"Yer gettin' all excited, ain't ya?" Oghren said. "Shopping trip. You women love 'em."

"What, you don't like getting new things?" Elilia asked.

"Men don't like new things. Men like old things, worn-in things, comfortable things," Oghren said.

"I'd disagree with him, but it happens to be true," Loghain said.

"Oh, come on now. It can't be a universal truth," Elilia said.

Oghren snickered. "She don't know men very well, do she?"

"There are surely men who prefer new things to old," Loghain said, "but you'd find them in a resounding minority."

"And every one of 'em prefers cock to pussy," Oghren said.

Loghain grimaced. "Oghren, language. That's not true, anyway. Not…universally, at any rate."

"A real man'll take a pair of underwear an' wear 'em 'til they're held together with just a couple a' threads," Oghren said. "He'll never get new unless some woman forces 'im."

"Now, I like old clothes just fine," Elilia said. "But I prefer new equipment. Fighting with worn-out stuff makes no sense."

"You're talking to a man who fought with the same iron sword from his first battle to his last," Loghain said.

"But why? There's so much better equipment out there than an iron sword, and you were Teyrn of bloody Gwaren. Don't tell me you couldn't afford it," Elilia said.

"Men get attached to things like swords," Oghren said. "We give 'em names."

"I never went that far," Loghain said.

"Bet you never gave yer ol' fella a name, either," Oghren said.

"You'd be correct," Loghain said, with some asperity.

Elilia slapped her hands down on the tabletop. "Well, I guess I just don't understand men at all," she said. "Come on; finish your coffee. Like it or lump it, we've got shopping to do."

The men let Elilia lead the charge into the shopping district of Rabanastre, and she took the lead as well in bargaining with merchants, and ruthlessly chewed down their prices. Loghain was impressed. He typically paid full markup for anything he purchased, out of simple disinclination to barter, but Elilia was masterful at the fine art of bargaining. She seemed to have a keen grasp of what things were worth.

By the time they were done shopping Loghain was very well equipped indeed, with sundry items like empty bottles and handkerchiefs and eye drop solutions and poison antidotes as well as with leather armor, a bronze shield, and a longbow and quiver full of unusually lightweight arrows. He would see how well they worked out. For now, they were fine, but he might well prefer to make his own.

"Buy your licenses, if you can," Elilia said. "Can't equip your weapons or armor 'til you've done that. I'd bet you have enough."

He did, just barely. He found that he had to keep his finger pressed to the appropriate license box for several seconds before it was 'purchased,' different from what he had experienced licensing his cure spell. It made sense when he thought about it; the magic licenses were learnable after training, and did not cost license points to purchase, while the regular licenses did cost points and therefore it was important not to accidentally purchase an unneeded license. He remarked on this to Elilia.

"Speaking of magic, let's hit Yugri's for a few elemental spells," she said. "Then you should learn Accio from Batahn's, since you'll need to get things from your bag in a hurry sometimes."

"Accio?" he asked.

"Use the technick and whatever yer after jumps into yer hand," Oghren said. "It's handy just on general principles."

"Is there a magic spell to cover every possible problem in this world?" Loghain asked.

"Close," Elilia said. "The average Dalmascan would look at the way we lived in Ferelden and wonder how we got by without magic. Even kids usually know a spell or two."

It only took Yugri a few minutes to teach Loghain to use basic elemental spells. Accio took longer, nearly half an hour, but in the end, he was able to make it work for him. He had very little coin left in his pockets by the time all was said and done, but at least he was now well enough equipped to make his own way in the world. To rely too heavily on others was uncomfortable.

They had spoken with the tavernmaster of the Sandsea before they left to go shopping, so all they had to do now was head into Lowtown to speak to the petitioner of the ring wyrm hunt. They did this, and found Balzac seated on a crate in the southeastern corner of the north sprawl.

"I'm with an…organization…" he said, and his eyes shifted uncomfortably. "We do training exercises out in the westersand from time to time, and last time we were all the way out in the Windtrace Dunes when a sandstorm kicked up, like they so often do. We were all standing around debating whether to call it quits or not when all of a sudden this huge beast attacked! Well, I'm not ashamed to tell you we ran for it. We train hard, but not hard enough to deal with something like that! Thinking about that monster so close to the city made us all nervous, so we pooled our resources and came up with a reward for anyone who can take it out. We weren't able to pony up much gil, I'm afraid, but there's a ring that's quite valuable and a longsword that would fetch a pretty penny, too, if you didn't have a use for it."

Oghren grunted. "That's not much of a bounty for a dragon," he said.

"Remember: we'll have all that meat, bone, blood, and hide to sell when we're through," Elilia said. "There's your reward."

Oghren's eyes lit up with avarice. "True that," he said.

"Come on; let's take on this dragon before we head underground, so we're not hunting it in the worst heat of the day," Elilia said.

"I will warn you of one thing," Balzac said, with a raised hand. "I went back out to the Windtrace Dunes myself to see if it was still there, and saw not a sign of it. The weather was clear when I went. Perhaps it only comes out when the sands are in a fury."

"Well, it's not hard to find a sandstorm in the Windtrace Dunes," Elilia said. "If there isn't one now there's almost sure to be at some point today."

"Are they truly so common?" Loghain asked.

"Every time the breeze picks up a little," Oghren said. "Hopefully this dragon don't care if it's a little sandstorm or a real whopper."

"Yeah, I don't want to be fighting a dragon in a heavy sandstorm," Elilia said.

"How bad do they get?" Loghain asked.

"Bad enough you can easily get lost in 'em, not so bad you'll end up buried," Oghren said. "No, the real problem with a heavy sandstorm isn't the wind or the sand, it's the entites."

"What's an entite?"

"A giant glowing orb made up of powerful magics," Elilia said. "They're a type of elemental. You need special enchanted equipment and strong magic resistance to go up against one. They'll steal your voice away from you and even put you to sleep, then cast powerful magic on you 'til you're quite dead."

"You don't dare attack one or even cast magic in its presence," Oghren said. "They're touchy. They attack whenever they sense magic, whether you're castin' an elemental spell or a healin' spell."

"Most hunters who encounter an entite drop whatever they were doing and run for it immediately," Elilia said.

"Too bad, too, because the stuff they leave behind when they're dead is valuable as all get-out," Oghren said. "The entites, I mean. The hunters, too, come to think of it."

"So basically, if I see a big, glowing orb…floating in the air, I assume? I am to run for my life," Loghain said.

"Yeah," Elilia said. "Unless you'd like to die again."

"Is it difficult to equip oneself properly for a battle against one?" he asked.

"Not extremely," Elilia said. "But they're so dangerous even with all proper precautions that most hunters don't bother. They're hard to kill. Probably just as hard as this dragon we're going to take down. It would take a team of well-equipped hunters to bring an entite down without grave personal risk, and most hunters go it alone. We shouldn't; we can get so much more done working together. Look at what we're accomplishing today, with as small a team as this."

"Doesn't the clan organize group hunts?" Loghain asked.

"Not typically, and never officially. Sometimes we just go out hunting together, but most of the best hunters are pretty antisocial for some reason. They just don't like to travel in packs."

"I confess, I'd probably prefer to hunt alone myself," Loghain said. "I don't like being responsible for people's lives, though I should be used to it by this time."

"Ed Zackary," Oghren said, and Loghain looked at him in bewilderment. "I don't like to be relied on too much. Puts me in a bad position."

"Ed Zackary?" Loghain said.

"It's jackass for 'exactly,'" Elilia said, with a roll of the eyes.

"Oh."

"Come on, let's go get us a dragon," Elilia said.

The conditions did not seem auspicious for finding a sandstorm-loving dragon when they first entered the westersand, but Elilia and Oghren seemed encouraged by the scurf of sand stirred feebly by the wind.

"It'll pick up," Oghren said. "By the time we hit the Windtrace Dunes it'll be blowing like nobody's business."

"It was clear as crystal in the estersand," Loghain remarked.

"It usually is. The estersand is more walled-in than the westersand. You don't see many sandstorms there," Elilia said.

"Just in the Naze, mostly, and they never seem to be all that violent," Oghren said. "That's why hunters tend to favor the estersand over the westersand. Less sand gettin' in yer armor. It can gripe you somethin' awful."

"And I've never yet seen an entite in the estersand," Elilia said.

"That, too."

They tracked out into the sands. In an area called the Midfault, they came upon a gruesome sight, a walking skeleton that seethed with dark magic. They fell upon it at once with swords and axe, and it took some effort before the foul magic that gave it life abandoned it. Loghain wiped his brow on the back of his hand.

"So. The undead are a problem in this world," he said.

"It's not quite the same as what we knew," Elilia said. "They're not demon-possessed. They're enslaved by dark magic or intense emotions. I don't know which is worse, honestly. At least with demon possession you're fairly certain that the soul of your passed loved one is free somewhere in the afterlife."

"Well, we've laid this one to rest," Loghain said. "Let's continue."

They each took a quick drink and proceeded onward. The wind whipped the sand into a frenzy, and made traveling hellish. Loghain had never been in a sandstorm before. He could barely see, his eyes hurt, and there was sand in places it should not be, but the others seemed untroubled so he plodded on in silence. He supposed this passed for a mild storm, but it seemed major to him. He hoped he could keep his heading in the swirling sand.

"We're in the Windtrace Dunes now," Elilia said, after a bit. "Everybody stick close. If we get separated we'll never find each other again, and this dragon can pick us off one at a time."

They came to the edge of a drop-off. Not a long drop, according to Elilia, but with the sand clouding everyone's vision no one was eager to step off it. They crept along the edge of the ledge until they came to level ground. The vague bulk of a sandstone outcropping loomed before them.

"Are we entirely certain these people didn't just stumble up to a bluff and get scared?" Oghren asked.

"The only way to know is to hunt around. If there's no dragon, there's no dragon," Elilia said.

"Don't suppose that mutt can track it?" Oghren said.

"Unlikely in the extreme," Loghain said. "I can barely breathe; Odd must be fairly choking."

"Well, we are being a little stupid," Elilia said. She reached into her satchel and pulled out a handkerchief. "I don't think we can help the dog but we can save ourselves a lot of difficulty."

She tied the handkerchief over her lower face and nose. Loghain reached for his own handkerchief and did the same, while he cursed himself for not thinking of it. Oghren, it seemed, did not carry handkerchiefs, so Elilia let him use one of her spares. Thus outfitted, they were able to proceed slightly easier, though the sand still stung their eyes.

"This is hopeless," Elilia said after half an hour's fruitless searching. "We're never going to find anything in this. Let's head back."

"Which way is back?" Oghren said.

"Did you hear something?" Loghain said.

"Yeah, I heard me askin' whether we're lost," Oghren said.

"No, I'm serious. I thought I heard something. There - there it is again. Did you hear it?"

"Sounded like a growl," Elilia said. "And I don't think it was Odd."

It was hard to pinpoint the direction a sound came from in the storm, but they made their best guess and headed that way. Loghain called their attention to the feel of the earth beneath their feet.

"You feel that? That's an impact tremor. If something can walk on sand and create an impact tremor, it's got to be a bloody dragon."

"Or an oretoise, but I've never heard of one of them north of the Archelyte Steppe," Oghren said. "Come on; we must be close. This thing can't be that big."

Loghain readied his sword and shield, and they proceeded forward cautiously. When it rose up out of the swirling sands before them, it was easy at first to take it for another sandstone outcropping. Until it roared.

"Maker's breath," Loghain swore.

It was not as immense as the Archdemon, but that was only a degree of immensity. It was blockier, bulkier; its wings, though powerful, had to be next to useless for carrying it into the air. It had a clubbed tail and a massive head on a bullish neck. It did not look remotely intelligent, unlike the dragons with which Loghain was familiar. There was a huge metal ring around its neck, mark of a time that bound it in servitude to someone or something. Whoever or whatever it was must have been supremely powerful.

Elilia let out a war whoop and attacked. Oghren swung his axe at the creature's legs. Loghain gave an order to Odd to keep out of the way and waded into battle. His iron sword was almost useless against the dragon's tough hide but he kept its attention focused on him as much as possible, to save the others from damage. The creature spewed hot flames from its mouth, and Loghain ducked behind his shield for protection.

The dragon either could not fly away or was disinclined to do so, so the battle was relatively easy compared with the battle against the Archdemon. Still, it took a great deal of effort to overcome the monster's vast strength and durability. Compared to the battle against the wild saurian it was immensely difficult, for the creature was far better defended and had tremendous offensive capability as well. Instead of just jaws and tail, it fought with jaws and tail and claws and fire. Loghain's new armor proved its worth when the dragon's foreclaws ripped down the front of his thigh. The heavy leather was scored, but the flesh beneath remained intact.

The battle raged on for nearly half an hour. Fortunately, the wind died down a bit, so they were no longer blinded by sand, but Loghain was hot and sweaty in his leather armor and his throat was parched. When he finally saw a chance to end the creature he took it with a feeling of intense gratitude for the opportunity. The dragon ducked its head, and as he had done with the Archdemon what felt like an eternity ago, Loghain jumped on top of it. He jammed his sword down through the top of the monster's head as hard as he could with both hands, and used his weight to jam it in deeper. At first there was too much resistance; the creature shook itself and nearly dislodged him, but he held on and pushed the sword in a little bit deeper. He continued to press down until at last it seemed he found a chink in the dragon's armor, and his sword slipped in halfway to the hilt. The monster's roar turned into a rattle and it collapsed onto the sand, which puffed up around it in a momentary resumption of the sandstorm.

Elilia let out another whoop and waved her greatsword in the air over her head. "Bloody marvelous," she said.

Loghain coughed the dust out of his lungs, pulled his new canteen from his satchel, and took a deep swig. "Damn," he said, when he had powers of speech again. "That was quite the battle."

"That was quite the kill," she said. "Brave of you, to jump up on top of it like that, but I think you'll get yourself killed playing decoy to a dragon."

"You don't have a shield," he said. "It's better the creature kept its gaze on me."

"How'd that armor hold up? You bleeding anywhere?" she asked. She gave him a thorough inspection. "Looks good. Guess that was money well spent."

"I'm well protected, but I'm also hotter than the hinges of hell in this leather," Loghain said.

"Well, after we cut this thing into thirds we can head down into Zertinan. It'll be cool enough down there. After that, we can definitely call it a day, I think."

"Quite a day," Oghren said. "I should hunt with you turkeys more often. I'll get rich."

"We should hunt together more often," Elilia said. "Look what we can do."

It was hot and nasty work, carving the dragon up into portions. Loghain made a mental note to purchase a small saw blade like Elilia and Oghren had, to make the work easier. He also still needed his own spell of miniaturization, so he would no longer have to rely on Elilia to make his cut of the spoils small enough to cart away. Eventually they managed to portion the creature out sufficiently and nothing was left on the sands but a bloodstain that soaked in deep and dried up rapidly. Now that the sandstorm was over it was easy enough for Elilia to determine where they were and lead the way back through the desert toward the city.

"The entrance to Zertinan is over here," she said, as she led them off the track to the south. "I've never been down there, have you, Oghren?"

"Nah," he said. "Most folks leave the caverns alone. That's because the fiends down there are tough and plentiful, but the upshot is that the loot you can take from killin' 'em isn't much found on the market, so you can get a fair bundle for it."

"Do you at least know what's down there?" she asked.

"Oh, sure. Every once in awhile someone goes pokin' 'round down there, but they never go too deep. Hopefully we don't have to go too deep, neither. What I've heard is, there's toads and amorphs, mostly."

"Toads?" Loghain said.

"These aren't like toads back home," Elilia said. "Toads in Ivalice are freakishly large. As big as a mabari, at least. They get pretty violent, too."

"Figures."

She pulled a magicite lantern from her satchel. "Come on, boys. Fortune favors the bold, right? In we go."

They ventured into the dark recesses of the cavern. "Crawling down a hole after a giant snake," Oghren grumbled. "Not one of my finer hours."

"Quit complaining. The bounty alone is more than worth the effort," Elilia said. "Twenty-two hundred gil, just so someone can tip back a bottle of wine!"

"What kind of wine can you make out of a snake?" Loghain asked.

"Serpentwyne. Let me tell you, it'll knock yer boots off ya," Oghren said.

"They use what they call a 'must,'" Elilia said. "I'm fairly certain it's actually the venom gland. I've never taken one before, so I hope we don't mess this up. I'd have to figure it's a fairly delicate procedure."

"Are these caverns extensive?" Loghain asked.

"No one really knows," Elilia said. "They're unmapped. Pretty much unexplored. There's another entrance on the Ozmone Plain, miles to the south, but no one really knows if they're connected or separate caverns."

"I hear tell there's entrances in the Ogir Yensa and the Nam Yensa Sandseas, too," Oghren said. "That would make it a hell of a place to get lost in, if they're all connected."

"The Sandseas are miles west of here, covering a stretch of land larger than all of Dalmasca," Elilia said. "If Zertinan reaches them, it's pretty extensive, all right."

"Let's not get lost," Loghain said. "If there's any question as to where our path lies, I say we retrace our steps and get out of here."

"It looks like this first section is fairly straightforward," Elilia said. The light from her lantern illuminated a green glob-like creature. "Ew. Amorph alert."

"Hit it with fire," Oghren said, and cast a weak flame from his hand at the monster. Loghain had only just learned to cast the same spell, so it was with some feeling of trepidation that he cast his own version. A much hotter flame shot from his hand to scorch the creature, and it melted into a pile of green goo.

"Not bad. You're quite the magician," Elilia said.

Loghain examined his own hand with a sense that he had never seen it before. "I can't believe that came from me."

"Come on; let's bottle up some of this goo before it soaks into the ground," Elilia said.

"What's it good for?" Loghain asked.

"Beats me, but somebody'll probably buy it," she said.

They encountered more slimy green amorphs, and several large black and red toads, before they found themselves in a wide area lit slightly by light that came through small openings in the earth to the outside. By that light, they could see clearly the marks left by the passage of a large, serpentine body on the sand.

"It curled up here," Elilia said, as she knelt and pointed out a circular pattern on the earth. "I think we found its lair."

"If we wait here, it'll probably come back," Oghren said. "Then we don't have to go trackin' it all over tarnation and maybe get ourselves lost forever under the earth."

"It would be nice to fight it in a place like this, where there's a little light to see by. Could be hours before it shows up, though," Elilia said.

"Half of hunting is the patience to sit and wait," Loghain said.

"True. It's easy to lose sight of that in Ivalice, where the prey tends to come running to you."

Oghren busied himself inspecting the holes leading out. "A snake this size can't possibly use 'em to crawl to the surface," he said. "Do you think it dens near 'em to get fresh air? Maybe it likes the light?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," Elilia said.

"Does it matter?" Loghain said.

"I s'pose not," Oghren said. He positioned himself in a back corner and leaned against his axe.

They waited for the snake to return. Oghren, it seemed, was content to stand around and do nothing for perhaps hours on end, and Odd sat alert and perfectly still right down to his tail. Loghain, while naturally restless, had the self-discipline to remain still and silent, but Elilia fidgeted. Finally, she drew a particularly sharp glare from Loghain, and sighed in exasperation.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "This is the part of hunting I hated."

"School yourself," Loghain said, also in a whisper. "You have a strong will; use it. Make yourself still."

"I can't," she said.

"You can," he said. "Make it a competition with yourself. Set yourself to outlast the fidgets. Which is stronger, you or them?"

"All right, I'll try," she said, and took a deep breath. At first, she still twitched a bit, but he could see her start to slowly win over the urge to move around. She was a good student. His lips curved in a proud smile. She saw and it puffed her up a little.

It was another hour before they heard the dry rasp of scales over sand. Odd sat forward and growled low in his throat. Then he jumped up and attacked something at the far edge of the light. They heard a loud hiss. Loghain grabbed his sword, and the others readied their weapons. The giant snake slithered into view with Odd clamped on to its neck, half-wrapped in its coils. The beast was as much as twenty feet long and vivid red in color, with a body that split into two pieces at the neck for a space of three or four feet until it joined back together. The sight of the hunters distracted it from the dog momentarily and it tried to strike at them, but Odd held on tight and hindered its movement.

"Whaddaya know? The damned dog is a little bit useful after all," Oghren said. He swung his axe in a broad arc, striking nothing, and said, "If you want this thing in yer primers better get yer licks in quick, 'cause I'm fixin' to lop that head right off."

Elilia struck out at the snake, a slashing blow at a thick coil wrapped around the dog, and Loghain made a slice of his own, but when Oghren stepped forward he brought his big axe down hard right on the place where the neck joined the head, mere inches from Odd's snout, and cut the snake's head off. Still it was dangerous, for the jaws still snapped and the coils still writhed, but after a few moments the coils loosed their hold of the dog and the head grew still.

Loghain praised Odd, and scratched his ears. "Things might have gone badly for us if you hadn't been here," he said.

"I wouldn't go that far," Oghren said. "Still, he did slow him up nice. Made it an easy kill."

Elilia checked her primer. "Marilith. It made it in. Good. Even though I don't really feel like I was part of that fight. Oghren and Loghain's dog did all the work."

"We all put in the effort a' huntin' this thing down," Oghren said. "If it weren't for the dog we'd all a' been hackin' away at it, maybe for a long time. An' maybe somebody woulda got bit."

"Odd can take his reward out of the meat," Loghain said. "Perhaps its best if the bounty went to Oghren."

"No," Oghren said. "We split it, even Steven, three ways just like we said when we started on this goose chase."

"Oghren, I'm surprised at you. Turning down the offer of twenty-two hundred gil? Think of your reputation," Elilia said.

"I ain't sayin' it wouldn't be nice," Oghren said. "Thing is, it wouldn't be fair. You gave the beast just as many blows as I did, and we all put in the work. Even if that weren't true, we agreed when we started out that we'd make the split, and I'd be honor-bound to abide by that agreement."

"You are different from the Oghren I knew in Ferelden," Loghain said. "He didn't have much truck with the concept of honor."

Oghren grunted. "Maybe 'e did, an' just didn't like it known," he said. "Makes for a whole mess a' work, honor does."

"I'll agree with you on that," Loghain said.

"Come on, let's skin this beast out so Odd can eat," Elilia said. "That hide will fetch a pretty penny at the market."

"So will the eyes an' the fangs," Oghren said.

"Why the eyes?" Loghain asked.

"Lots a' people still believe that serpent eyes can turn folks to stone," Oghren said. "Lot a' rot, but alchemists still use 'em fer different things. 'Course, alchemists are mostly bonkers, but long as they're payin', Oghren is sellin', know what I mean?"

"Not entirely, since you imbue the words with a significance they don't quite warrant," Loghain said. "Not that I'd care for you to be more explicit."

"Yeah, I don't wanna know, either," Elilia said. "Come on, let's get a move on. Being down here is starting to give me the creeps."

"Lowtown don't seem t' bother you," Oghren said.

"Lowtown isn't crawling with snakes."

They quit the place as quickly as they could, slowed by the fact that they waited for Odd to finish eating the snake. The dog took a savage pleasure in eating the flesh of his foe, and as they walked away, he stopped to urinate on the place where the snake coiled to sleep. Toads and amorphs had moved back into the area during their wait, so they had to fight their way out. Soon enough, however, they stood blinking in the bright sunshine outside.

"I'm glad another sandstorm didn't kick up while we were down there," Elilia said. "Well, now we head back to town and get our bounties, and Loghain, you have to touch the southgate crystal. Oghren, if you want to teleport to Bhujerba you go right ahead. You can go drinking at the Cloudborne and we'll meet you there when our flight lands."

"Sounds good to me. Haven't had any a' that Bhujerban Mhadu in quite awhile."

They walked back to town and located their petitioners. The Sandsea tavernmaster handed over three teleport stones in addition to the sack full of silver, and Balzac's meager purse was supplemented by a silvery ring with a moon-shaped crest and a particularly fine longsword enchanted with a blade as cold as ice. Elilia inspected the sword and tried to hand it over to Loghain.

"You should take this," she said.

"Why?" he asked.

"What do you mean 'why?' You use a longsword, and it's far better than what you're carrying now. That's why."

"We're splitting this bounty. You can't split a longsword without selling it first," he said.

"She's right, Longshanks. Law of the hunter: Found equipment goes to him that needs it. You ain't had that sword of yours long enough to get attached to it," Oghren said.

"This is the kind of blade I would hang on my wall, not use," Loghain said.

"That's ridiculous. It's not a work of art, it's a piece of equipment. Equip it. Maker's ass," Elilia said.

"I don't like fancy blades," Loghain said, a little bit sulkily. "They're for winning off of opponents."

"Andraste's tits, you stubborn man! Take the thrice-damned ass-blasted blue-blazing sword already!" Elilia shoved it into his arms, almost blade-first, and deftly plucked his iron sword from the sheath on his back in the next movement. "We'll split what we can get out of this sword. Shouldn't be a bad price; it hasn't seen much use."

"Give in, Longshanks," Oghren said. "You may be King Shit back where you come from, but you're talking to the Queen."

Loghain sighed and sheathed the blade. "I suppose I am," he said.

"Finally," Elilia said, with an expressive roll of the eyes. "Let's go already. We'll miss the afternoon flight if we dawdle any longer."

They came up from Lowtown via the South Sprawl's massive exit to the southern gate, where Oghren vanished in a flash of light after he placed a stone against the side of the gate crystal. After he was gone, Elilia imperiously commanded Loghain to touch the crystal, so it would remember him.

"You won't be able to get back here tonight if you don't," she said.

He touched the stone, though he felt a little stupid under the gaze of the guard posted nearby. Then Elilia led the way to the western gate, and the aerodrome. Loghain followed her and wondered how he'd come to be pushed around by this slip of a girl. Then he realized that slips of girls, or at least blondes, were always pushing him around. Celia had been gentle about it but she was no less effective for all that. Anora was the master of it. Strange that when Rowan, dark-haired Rowan, pushed him, he only pushed back harder. Of course, that made up his sum total of experience with women. Well, there was Cauthrien, but as a subordinate officer, she did not dare push. That did not stop him from pushing her. Cauthrien was dark-haired, too. It was pure coincidence, but the superstitious side of his nature caught the pattern and held fast to it. Blondes were trouble.

Elilia brought him up to a counter inside the aerodrome and asked the lady who stood behind it for two tickets to Bhujerba.

"You're just in time," the lady said. "We started boarding that flight a few seconds before you got here."

"I knew we were cutting it close," Elilia said.

"Four hundred gil, please," the lady said, and Elilia handed over the coins. Loghain tapped her on the shoulder and tried to hand her two hundred gil.

"I've got it," she said. He offered the coins again. "I said I've got it."

He shrugged and put the coins away. Blondes were trouble indeed.

"What about Odd?" he asked. Elilia turned with a questioning look to the lady behind the counter, who peered over at the enormous dog with owl eyes.

"Well, management lets people bring their chocobos on board; I guess he won't be any problem," she said. "You'll probably have to keep him quartered on the deck, though."

"Whatever we have to do," Loghain said.

"The air steward on board the ship will tell you where to put him. You can board right away at the gate."

"This way," Elilia said, and led him through the crowded aerodrome to a long corridor that led to a tall set of stairs. At the top of the stairs, a steward checked their tickets and let them through a narrow gate into another room. At least, Loghain took it for another room. A blonde-haired woman in a steward's uniform met them inside.

"Oh, I will have to ask that you take your animal onto the deck," she said. "Right through that door at the top of the stairs."

"Can I ask?" Elilia said. "How do you bring chocobos onto the ship?"

"Through the cargo doors at the back. There's a ramp leading up to the decks from the cargo bay, so they're free to walk about on deck while we fly," the steward said. "We usually have no problem with people bringing their dogs onto the ship; they can stay right in the cabin. But your dog is very large. I fear he would pose a serious inconvenience to other passengers."

"You should see him fill up the floor of my living room," Elilia said. She led the way up the stairs the steward pointed out.

"We'll have to stay in the cabin during takeoff and landing," she said as she walked. "Which is a pity; I'd love to watch it from the deck. Odd will have a better view than us. But we can stay up here the whole time we're in the air, which is nice."

"Are we actually on the airship right now?" Loghain asked.

"Of course we are."

"It just looks like part of the building. I expected a gangplank at the least."

"Nope, the fuselage butts right up against the gate and you come right into the belly of the beast."

"Foosawhat?" Loghain asked.

"Fuselage. The body of the airship."

"Oh. You know, you could have just said that. Don't forget that until yesterday, I'd not only never been on one of these things before, I'd never so much as dreamed they could exist."

They were on the deck now, but it did not feel like a deck to Loghain. He looked around at the broad expanse of grey metal under his feet. It was not built like a seafaring vessel, not as he knew them. There was a simple guardrail along the edges of the deck, which sloped down from there in a sharp curve. It looked like a dangerous place to stand, but then, there were no waves to wash you overboard in the sky. Still…

"Odd, stay in the middle," he said. He pointed to the middle of the deck. "Stay."

The dog whined, walked to the middle, and lay down.

"Worried he'll fall over the edge?" Elilia said.

"He's a dog. He could well jump if he takes it into his head to do so," Loghain said.

A klaxon sounded. "Oops, time to get below," Elilia said. "We need to find seats in the cabin before takeoff."

"Odd, stay," Loghain said again, and followed Elilia back inside. "I don't like leaving him out there on his own."

"He'll be fine," Elilia said. They found seats in the main cabin and waited for the ship to take off. A second klaxon sounded, the steward checked to be sure everyone was in their seat, and the engines started up, a surge of sound and vibration that startled Loghain. The ship rose into the air, and it felt as though a large hand were on top of him and pressing down. He swallowed and his ears popped.

After a time the ship leveled out, and he no longer felt the great force of gravity on his body. He relaxed, just a little, and the steward announced that the passengers were free to move about or go up on the decks.

"Be sure to stop by the souvenir stands in the Sky Parlor, and have a cold, refreshing drink in our Sky Saloon," she said. She pointed the way to these destinations.

"Come on, I want to show you something," Elilia said, and tugged at his arm. He got up from his chair slowly, as if he were uncertain of his footing. The ship traveled through the air far more smoothly than a ship through water, however, and it seemed unnecessary to develop "sky legs."

He followed Elilia out of the cabin into the Sky Saloon, then into a corridor that led up to the Sky Parlor or to the decks outside, depending on which set of stairs you took. She looked around for observers and then pulled him through an inconspicuous door, which she closed behind them.

It was very dark inside the room beyond the door, and exceedingly close; there was hardly room for the two of them to stand pressed up against each other. "What are we doing in this broom cupboard?" Loghain asked.

"We're ten thousand feet in the air," Elilia said. "Doesn't that…excite you?"

"Not in the way it seems to excite you," he said. "We're not getting frisky in a broom cupboard, if that's what you're thinking."

"Oh come on, just a little quickie."

"Are you out of your mind? Someone could walk in on us at any moment," he said.

"I know. That's part of what makes it so exciting," she said.

"Sorry, my dear, but if you want to be especially wild you'll have to choose another partner. I'm not an exhibitionist."

"Party pooper," Elilia said, but she fumbled for the door and poked her head out. "The coast is clear. Let's go."

They went up to the deck, where they found Odd still laying in the middle of the floor in a state of high tension. Loghain scratched his ears and cursed at him in a low voice, and the dog calmed down. The wind ruffled through his fur in waves.

"Come over here and look at this," Elilia said, as she danced to the rail. Loghain followed with a more sedate step. Odd stood up and followed him.

Loghain stood next to Elilia at the rail and looked out at the horizon. The desert stretched away below them, vast and almost featureless from above.

"Look down," Elilia said, and he did. Far below them and slipping away in the distance was Rabanastre, a toy city from this vantage. Loghain imagined falling from this height, an unpleasant thought.

"I've stood on top of mountains that didn't seem this high," he said. "I don't know that I like the feeling of nothing holding me up."

Odd stuck his head past the rail, looked down, whined, and backed away from the guardrail. He bellied back to the middle of the deck and lay down.

"I love it up here," Elilia said. "The wind, the sky, the earth spread out below me. Someday, I'll have an airship of my own."

"You're welcome to it," Loghain said. He went to crouch down by Odd, and petted him.

"Oh, come on. You have to admit it's beautiful," Elilia said.

"Yes, it's lovely. I can see it as well as I care to from here," Loghain said.

"Do you want to go back inside?"

"Yes," he said. He did not get up.

"Well what's stopping you?" Elilia asked.

"Odd is scared," Loghain said.

"So you'll ride out here all the way to Bhujerba because the dog is a little bit nervous?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Suit yourself. It's no hardship for me," she said, and turned back to the vista with her hands on the rail.

"How many miles away is Bhujerba?" he asked.

"Oh, I don't know. Two hundred and fifty, maybe three hundred," she said.

"Three hundred miles? And we'll be there in an hour?" he said. He shook his head. "Incredible."

Not all the air was smooth, he soon found out. The airship shuddered through a rough patch and Odd pawed at him, put his head in his lap, and whined. Loghain felt a bit like whining himself but he just petted the dog and cursed him low and under his breath. They stayed that way for most of the next hour, until Elilia tugged Loghain to his feet.

"Come on, you have to see this at least," she said. "We're coming up on Bhujerba."

All he could see at first were white clouds, all around the airship. He could reach out and touch them, they were so close. He was a little surprised to find they truly were nothing more than vapor, like the scholars said. Then they came through the cloudbank and he saw it: Dorstonis, the floating continent; a vast archipelago of rock that hung suspended in the sky above the Phon Sea, in perpetual shadow below. On the leading edge of the continent sat a small city sprawled across rolling hills, and above it a palatial estate with great wings of blue crystal that stretched up over it like the ears of some colossal rock rabbit. The walls of the city and of the estate huddled close inside a nest of thick green treetops, quite a welcome sight to the eye after so much endless desert.

"Looks like a pleasant little city, from here," he said.

Elilia laughed. "That's the big reaction? Most people are awestruck by their first view of Bhujerba, you know."

"It's not that pretty," he said. "The trees are nice."

"What does it take to get your heart pounding?" she asked.

"Well, you're pretty good at it," he said.

"Oh don't try and butter me up. I'm still miffed you turned me down."

"I wouldn't have done had the location been a trifle more private," he said.

A steward came up onto the deck, bowed, and called out in a loud, official voice. "Ladies and gentlemen, we will be beginning our descent into the Bhujerba aerodrome shortly. Please return to your seats in the cabin at this juncture. Thank you."

"That means us," Elilia said. Loghain nodded, but before he followed her back inside he stopped to give Odd another reassuring pat and a few choice curses of affection.

"Stay," he said to the dog. "Good boy. We'll be back on the ground in no time." It occurred to him that the ground would be just as up in the air as the airship, but the dog did not need to know that.

The airship docked, and it was with a sense of relief that Loghain set foot on firm ground again, though it niggled at the back of his mind that this firm ground could plummet from the sky at any time. It had not happened heretofore, it was unlikely to happen in the near future. The Bhujerba gate crystal was inside the aerodrome, and he laid his hand on it in passing, the simple action already becoming somewhat natural to him. It gave his frazzled nerves a bit of a boost to recovery.

Odd was happy to be ashore, and wagged his tail and panted gleefully. He sniffed the air of the aerodrome, busy with people debarking from airships or waiting their turn to fly.

"Oghren's waiting for us at the Cloudborne, the big tavern in town. Let's go and have a drink before we start bickering with merchants, eh?" Elilia said.

"Sounds good to me," Loghain said. He followed her out of the building and up the street outside, up a hill to an intersection where a tourist guide and a seller of maps stood vigil. Loghain stopped briefly to barter with the moogle with the maps, and purchased a map of the city and another of the Lhusu mines.

"What do you need those for?" Elilia said. "I know where we're going."

"I like maps," Loghain said. "I had a large collection of maps back home; pure conceit as I knew how to get to every place I cared to visit. I have greater need of maps in this world. Thought I'd start up another collection."

"Maps? That's your thing?" she said, with a note of incredulity in her voice.

"A fine map is a work of art as much as anything," he said. "You should have seen some of the beauties I had."

"Maps," Elilia said, and shrugged. "Good to know."

She started off down the other side of the hill. Loghain tucked his new maps into his satchel and followed her. "Just out of curiosity," he said, "what do they mine at this Lhusu?"

"Magicite, for skystones mostly," Elilia said.

"The stuff that makes the continent float," he said.

"Yeah."

"They…pull it out of the ground?" he said.

"Yes. Is that hard to imagine?" she said.

"I hope they know how much they can safely take before the land drops like a stone ought to do," Loghain said.

"I hope they do, too," she said. She led the way down the next street to a place where men lounged around outside in varying states of drunkenness. Obviously, this was the tavern. They went inside.

"Well, ya made it," Oghren said from the bar. "Wasn't sure whether yer airship wasn't gonna just drop out of the sky on ya."

"That happens?" Loghain said.

"Rarely," Elilia said.

"But it happens," Loghain said.

"Have a drink," she said, and raised a hand to the bartender. "Two, please."

The bartender poured two glasses of red wine from a green bottle. Loghain took his and took a cautious sip, and then put the glass down with a face. "Too sweet."

Every face in the bar turned to look at him. The place went dead silent. "What'd I say?" he asked.

Elilia laughed. "You've committed a mortal sin. The Bhujerbans are very proud of their mhadu."

"Well, they're welcome to keep it," he said.

Elilia drained her glass, and then knocked back his. She paid for both. "If you're done offending the locals, let's check the hunt board. Could be something interesting in these parts."

"More hunting? Woman, don't you ever get enough?" Oghren asked.

"Ask Loghain, if he'll tell you," she said, almost absently, as she walked over to the nearby notice board. "Oo, here's one for a nidhogg down in the mines. That's like a marilith, but smaller. We could take that easy, especially if Odd throws in like he did last time."

"I'm not crawlin' down another hole after no more damned snakes," Oghren said.

"Fine, then I'll split the bounty and the spoils with Loghain," Elilia said. She looked at him. "You up for it?"

"I'm game," he said. "Oghren would probably like another half an hour or so for getting hammered before he has to put a hand to anything resembling work again."

"Exactly. Come on; the petitioner is one of the mine's security people. He'll be waiting somewhere near the entrance, on Lhusu Square."

They found the man who had petitioned the hunt, a blue seeq named Aekom. He told them that the paling, the magical barrier that protected the mine by preventing the spawn of powerful Mist-born fiends from the rich magicite atmosphere, was broken, and a nidhogg had slithered up from the depths to prey upon the miners.

"Until we fix the paling it's too dangerous for our miners to work," Aekom said, "and until we're rid of this snake it's too dangerous to fix the paling. Help a fellow out, bhadra. Hunt this monster for me."

"Don't worry, Ser," Elilia said. "We hunt snakes like this all the time."

"She's exaggerating," Loghain said. "Still, we shouldn't have much trouble, I should hope."

"We won't," Elilia said. "We've got a secret weapon. A snake-eating dog."

"As long as he doesn't get bit," Loghain said, and followed her into the mine.

"I've got antidotes," Elilia said, as they walked. "They work on people; they'll work on dogs."

"All right, but you get to make him drink it."

"Nonsense. He'll do it for you, though. He'll do whatever you tell him to do. You tamed him."

"You should tame a dog," Loghain said.

"Why?" she said.

"Because you'd like one."

She shook her head. "Too soon. I'm still in mourning for my Kiveal. I've been thinking about getting a cat, though. I suppose you hate cats."

"You suppose wrongly. I get along well with cats, for the most part. We have similar attitudes, particularly the ones that prefer to be left alone and I."

"Have you ever had a cat?" she asked.

"Not for a pet, though a bond developed with one or two mousers I've worked with over the years. One used to sit on the edge of my desk in the evenings. Just sat there, doing nothing but blinking. Kept me company while I was pulling my hair out over petitions and contracts and court orders."

"What did it look like?" she asked.

"What does it matter?" he asked.

"I just want to be able to picture it, is all," she said.

"Well, it was striped. Black over brown and grey."

"Was this a Gwaren cat or a Denerim cat?"

"Denerim."

"Is it still alive?" she asked.

"Presumably, assuming it survived the darkspawn. Cats are pretty resourceful."

"What was its name?"

"I never asked it."

"Ha ha."

"It didn't have a name, as such. Unless one of the servants named it."

"You'd think you'd give a nightly companion a name."

"I just called it 'you.' As in, 'Hey, you.'"

"A cat named You. I suppose I've heard worse," Elilia said.

"I've given worse. Any animal that runs afoul of me runs the risk of a horrible name."

"Such as?"

"I had a horse named Stew Meat."

"Ew. Why didn't you come up with a horrible name for You?"

"He didn't demand a name. Some animals are content without one. Cats especially, I've found."

They reached the bottom of the mine, and the shaft opened out to their left. The remaining magicite in the walls glowed softly, so there was no need for a lantern to light their way, though it was not as bright as sunstone.

Elilia poked him in the arm. "You've got the map. Where do we go from here? Aekom said he'd seen it last on Oltam Span."

Loghain unfolded his map of the mines. "The path that far seems pretty straightforward," he said. "The shaft runs fairly straight up to that point, and then splits off into different shafts. I'll tell you, if it's crawled back down into the deeper mines we may never find it. The place turns into a labyrinth in the deepest sections."

"I've heard there are gates in these mines. Hopefully some of them are closed off right now, and hopefully they're enough to prevent the snake from escaping. Lead the way."

Loghain studied his map for a few more moments, then folded it and put it away. He jerked his head to the left, where there was a dark opening in the structured wall on that side. "That way. This shaft dead-ends a hundred feet ahead or so, if the map is up to date."

"Judging from the effort they expended in structuralizing this part of the mine, I'd have to think the map is accurate. I don't think they dig around this level much anymore, if at all."

"You're probably right."

They followed the path to where it turned parallel to the original shaft, made a right turn and a jog around a gate the map showed as a solid line across the path. The shaft turned back to join up with the main shaft, which opened to the sky on the sides shortly after they reached it.

"They cut right through the bottom of the continent," Elilia said, as she peered over the edge of the bridge to the sea below. "Nice to know it's so thin, ain't it?"

"Probably only in places," Loghain said. He and Odd both kept well to the middle of the span. "Looks like there's a lot of bats roosting up in the ceiling. Watch your step."

"Don't slip in the bat shit, you mean?" she said, with a laugh. "I don't see any sign of a giant snake here. Let's head deeper into the mine."

He nodded and she rejoined him on the middle of the bridge. He kicked one of the metal rails that ran down the track. "What are these?" he asked.

"Beats me," she said. "Must be some kind of transportation guide, don't you think? They must move tons of rock out of here. Probably in metal wagons that run along these tracks."

Pulled by what? he wondered. Oxen? Donkeys? Chocobo birds? Or perhaps the wagons moved along by themselves, propelled by engines of magic stone. An interesting question to ponder, but not at all pertinent to the task at hand. He refocused on their mission.

The snake was easily found, and just about as easily dispatched. The mine closed in around them again at the end of the bridge, and the snake was there, just at the place where the shaft split off in two directions. Odd attacked immediately, and they got to see the scuffle that took place before the big dog got his jaws clamped firmly on the snake's neck behind the head. Elilia drew her sword and scored a slashing strike at the creature's writhing coils.

"I think you should be the one to chop the head off," she said. "I don't want to risk hitting Odd."

Loghain drew his fine new blade, which shone somewhat in the dimness with the frigid glimmer of ice. He aimed carefully, and brought the sword down hard on the snake's neck, inches from Odd's nose. The sword sliced through the flesh and bone with the ease of a knife through butter. Then all that remained was to dress the beast out and let Odd eat his fill.

Loghain stood and watched the dog eat until he felt an urgent tug on his arm. He looked at Elilia, who looked back at him with fire in her eyes.

"Come on," she said, and tugged his arm again.

"Come where?" he asked.

"Back to that bridge. Let's have some fun."

"I don't follow you."

She winked and nudged him with her elbow. "You know what I want," she said. "We're not on an airship, but we're still up in the air, and you can't get much more private than an empty mine."

He was incredulous. "You want to do that? Here? Now?"

"Just a little bounce, and then I'll leave you alone. How about it?"

"What about the bat shit?" he asked.

"I saw clean patches back there. Come on. Come on."

The idea seemed ludicrous at first, until he remembered that he'd done it before, in a cave that crawled with darkspawn corruption and giant spiders, no less. Who was he to refuse her? He followed her away from the half-eaten carcass into the somewhat fresher air of the bridge.

It was not as he remembered. There was much more fumbling with armor and clothing, for one thing, and then it was hard to find a place clean enough for them to lie. The stone was uncomfortable and downright painful at times, and several times heads knocked into the steel rails painfully.

"You know what?" Elilia said at last. "This was a bad idea."

He sat up and reached for his trousers. "I don't know why it should be so different. It was just about perfect last time."

"You've done this before?" she asked.

"In the Deep Roads."

"You had sex in the Deep Roads? What were you even doing down there in the first place?" she asked.

"Another time," he said, and pulled his trousers on.

"No no no no no, you can't leave it at that," she said. "I want to know, and I want to know now."

"Pushy, ain't you?" he said. "Things went badly for the army at West Hill, and Maric, Rowan and I had to sneak back to Gwaren via the Deep Roads. With an elf named Katriel who Maric was banging, as Oghren would put it. She was the reason things went badly at West Hill; she was a spy in the employ of Meghren's right-hand mage."

"That's a long story put as succinctly as possible," Elilia said.

"I try," he said. "Put your clothes on and let's get out of this hole."

"Are you upset with me?" she asked.

"Why would I be upset with you?" he said.

"You just sound angry," she said.

"It's not a memory I care to dwell on much," he said. "The past can be upsetting, is all. I'm not angry at you."

She dressed. Loghain whistled to Odd, who came bounding out of the mine until he realized he was back above a drop-off, when he slowed his steps to the point where he was almost mincing. Disturbed by the sound of the whistle, a bat dropped down from the ceiling and attacked. Loghain slew it with his hunting knife.

"Come on; there's probably a whole slue of diseases we've been courting, laying amidst these creatures' offal," he said. He led the way back out of the mine.

Aekom was happy to see them, and happier still to learn his snake infestation had been dealt with. He handed over the bounty along with some advice. "You took the skin, right? Well, instead of selling all of it, take a piece or two, stew it up, and drink it down. Very invigorating!"

Elilia made a face. "Ew. Stewed snakeskin? I think I'll pass."

"Hmph. I wonder if it wouldn't be a help to that sick traveler Dantro's wife is tending," Loghain said.

"Very good for what ails you," Aekom said. "Picks you right up."

"I'll take her some when we get back to Rabanastre," Loghain said. "At the least, it doesn't sound like it could hurt."

"You're doing this as a kindness, right?" Elilia said. "I mean, you're not trying to get into her pants or anything, are you?"

"She's a married woman," Loghain said indignantly. "And I don't require more than one woman at a time, thank you."

"Although there's a thought," Elilia said.

"No there isn't," Loghain said, alarmed. "Let's get back to Oghren before you start getting any funny ideas."

"Too late," she said, and snickered.

They returned to the tavern and collected Oghren, who was staggeringly drunk by this time. They returned to the market street and sold off the pieces of the ring wyrm for a hefty sum, and then they went back to the aerodrome to teleport home. Elilia took a moment to coach Loghain before she disappeared herself.

"You're going to need to hold tight to Odd," she said. "Otherwise he'll get left behind. Just think of Rabanastre, and that's where you'll go. Don't hesitate and start thinking of someplace else or you might end up in pieces in a couple of different places."

"That can happen?" he said.

"No, not that I've ever heard. Just don't try it, all right?"

She teleported away then, and he stood there for a moment and looked doubtfully at the gate crystal. Then he put his arm around Odd's neck, put his teleport stone against the crystal, and closed his eyes. He pictured the Rabanastre gate crystal in his mind, but suddenly changed it. He pictured the Estersand crystal instead, and the world twisted away beneath him.

The world stopped turning and he opened his eyes. He and Odd stood in the tiny South Banks village, whole and healthy, though Odd looked as rattled as Loghain felt. When he had his feet firmly under him again, he walked over to the little round hut by the river and knocked gently on the doorframe.

Dantro's wife poked her head out from under the flap of skin. "Oh, hello. What are you doing back here?" she asked.

"Just thought I'd check and see how he was doing," Loghain said.

"He's much better now, thanks to you. I think with a few days' rest he'll be back on his feet."

Loghain reached into his satchel and pulled out the rolled-up nidhogg skin. "This might help him get back on his feet a little faster," he said. "It's nidhogg skin. I'm told it's a potent restorative."

"Oh, wonderful! Here, let me give you something for this," she said.

"No need," Loghain said.

"Well, thank you. Why don't you come back in a day or so? I'm sure he'd like to thank you himself, once he's up and about."

"Perhaps I'll do that, just to check and see that he's better," Loghain said. "Good day, Madam."

He and Odd made the long walk to Rabanastre. He knew Elilia would likely be waiting for him by the south gate crystal, and likely she'd be angry he'd made her wait and worry, but he couldn't see making the full round trip when there was an easier way to go about it. Perhaps he should have considered her feelings more carefully, but it was done now.

As expected, she was waiting by the south gate crystal when he finally stepped through the gate from the southern plaza. She did not look angry; she looked furious. She caught sight of him and ran to meet him, and slapped him hard across the face.

"Do you have any idea how worried I've been?" she said. "I went back to Bhujerba to see what was keeping you, and you weren't there. Where did you end up? Nalbina?"

"South Banks village," he said, a trifle sheepishly. "I gave Dantro's wife my half of the nidhogg skin."

"You mean you weren't lost? You went to a different gate stone deliberately? You…you…you…you man." She flung his gender at him as though it were the worst epithet she could think up.

"I'm sorry," he said. "It was done before I had the chance to think better of it, and then I didn't have another teleport stone to get here quickly, so I had to walk."

"Well, you owe me two teleport stones," she said. "Come on; let's go to the Clan Hall. I've been kicking around an idea most of the day and I'm just about ready to go into action. You up for one more hunt? It's a big one."

"I suppose," he said. In truth, he felt more ready for his supper, but that could wait.

"Good, 'cause I'll need you."

He was already beginning to feel that she had him, in more ways than one, but she did not need to know that just yet. He would tell her when he knew for certain it was true, and let the chips fall where they may. She would tire of him before long, that was a given, but he would enjoy every moment with her that he was granted, no matter how broken it would leave him in the end. He functioned fairly well with broken pieces. He had done it all his life.

She led and he followed, a pattern of behavior he thought likely to be repeated often in the coming days. He did not mind her "take charge" attitude. It was actually rather nice not to have to be the one in charge of making every decision for a change, particularly in the wake of so many disastrous decisions during the Blight. The position of follower might chafe after awhile, but there was nothing that said he had to follow her to the ends of the earth and back. If he came to love her strongly enough he would probably want to.

She burst into the Clan Hall like a wind off the desert, and before she was fairly through the door she shouted, "Who wants to help Loghain and me take down the Earth Tyrant?"

"Odds Bodkins, woman, I just got sat down!" Oghren said from the stairs.

"Oghren! I thought you'd be at the tavern," Elilia said.

"It was a big score day. Thought I'd do some braggin'," Oghren said. "Now what's this about the Earth Tyrant?"

"Loghain and I are going after it. Come on; one more hunt to make this day legendary. The bounty on that thing comes from the Crown, you know. They pay in gold."

"Yeah, but hunters who've gone up against the Earth Tyrant have paid in blood," Oghren said. "You really think we can handle it?"

"We killed two dragons today! We can handle anything," Elilia said.

"I'm not so sure. I ain't sayin' I won't give it a try, 'cause takin' down the Earth Tyrant would be legendary, but I think we need some more help," Oghren said.

"What's the Earth Tyrant?" Loghain asked.

"Just another dragon," Elilia said.

"Just another dragon, she says!" Varric said from the stairs. "Like dragons are easy prey to begin with!"

"I'm not saying it'll be easy, but we can do it. Come on, Varric. What do you say?" Elilia said.

"I say you're crazy, but I'm game. I'll be standing well back of the rest of you, though, that's for sure."

"Is this a flying, fire-breathing dragon, or what?" Loghain asked.

"No, it's like the wild saurian, only bigger," Elilia said.

"Oh. Well, that's not so bad, then."

"Not so bad? The Earth Tyrant has killed dozens of hunters," a yellow bangaa who stood by the wall near the door said. "It'll eat you up and shit you out."

"Sounds like there might be a bit of superstitious dread about this dragon," Loghain said.

"The bounty's gone unclaimed for years," the bangaa said.

"It can't be as bad as the Archdemon," Loghain said.

"Exactly! Come on, Monid, what do you say?" Elilia said, referring to the yellow bangaa by name. "Make one kill, drink on the story for years to come."

"I say it's been nice knowin' ya," Monid said, and laughed unpleasantly.

"Fine, we'll do it with just the four of us, then," Elilia said. "Come on, fellows. Pretty soon we'll all be legends."

"Pretty soon you'll all be dragon shit," Monid said, and laughed again.

"I do kinda feel like I'm setting off to my doom," Varric said.

"Nonsense. Just stick close behind us and keep that crossbow of yours singing," Elilia said.

"Where is this dragon?" Loghain asked.

"In the westersand, trapped in a hollow on the way to the Mosphoran Highwaste," Oghren said. "It's too big to get out through either of the two passages, which has been the city's savin' grace since it manifested years back. But the nearest route to Mosphora's been blocked off ever since, so the Crown would like it handled. The area where it stands is too small to send in the army, so they left it up to us hunters."

"What's to stop it from manifesting again once we've killed it?" Loghain asked.

"The gods. They don't put too many such monsters in this area, thank all that's good and holy. They probably put this one here on a whim. They ain't terrible likely to do it again any time soon."

"Come on, boys, we're wasting daylight," Elilia said. "Let's go get this thing, then grab some supper. My treat."

Loghain thought she had already treated too much for one day, but it was none of his business so he kept silent and followed her out of the clan hall. It felt strange to be going after his third dragon of the day. In Thedas, you spent hours, days even, preparing to go up against just one dragon, and after you'd fought it, if you survived, you spent what remained of the day tending your wounds. Ivalice dragons, what he'd seen of them so far, were more varied but less impressive. They were smaller, seemed incapable of flight even when they had wings, and just generally seemed less intelligent. Thedosian dragons had the spark of a baleful variety of intellect, possibly on par with anything human. Ivalice dragons seemed nothing more than animals. It had to be for the better, and yet somehow it only made him miss home that much more.

Their path led them to the north of the westersand this time, north of the city toward the mountains of Mosphora. Though the weather was clear in the desert, Elilia bade everyone put handkerchiefs over their mouths and noses.

"Supposedly there's been a constant sandstorm in the hollow ever since this thing first appeared," she said.

Wonderful. Fight another dragon in another sandstorm. Oh well. At least they'd picked up some additional support, though he didn't know yet how much good Varric was in a fight. Loghain readied his shield, probably of far more use to him in the coming battle than his fine new blade.

"Everybody ready for this?" Elilia asked, at the entrance to the area now known colloquially as the "wyrm's nest."

"I might suggest you and Oghren work to cripple the beast," Loghain said. "A two-legged dragon with puny forelimbs could be easily downed, and it seems to me a downed dragon is a dead dragon."

"Good idea," Varric said. "I vote we go with that plan."

"What are you going to do?" Elilia asked Loghain.

"Keep the beast's attention as best I can," he said.

"There you go, playing decoy again. You're going to get yourself killed, you know."

"Not today, I think. Come on. As you said, the daylight's wasting, and I'm getting hungry."

"Just be careful you don't end up supper, instead of getting it," she said. She raised her sword and gave out a battle cry only slightly muffled by the handkerchief over the lower half of her face. "Charge!"

"Erm, maybe we should enter more cautiously than that?" Varric said. "Nothing against a good old death charge, of course, but maybe not rushing headlong into the jaws of the monster would be a good idea."

"Spoilsport," Elilia said. "All right, cautiously now, charge." And she led the way into the hollow with an exaggerated mincing step.

There was a sandstorm raging in the hollow, fiercer than the one that morning when they faced off against the ring wyrm. Loghain could scarcely see his own shield before him until he angled it enough to block the wind whipping past his face.

"How are we going to fight anything in this?" Varric said. Though he was nearby the sound of his voice was ripped away from their ears so that he sounded far away.

"Quit complaining," Elilia said, similarly distant-sounding. "Just stand back by the entrance and shoot at anything that moves and is larger than one of us."

"I hate to tell you this, but from the entrance I can't see any of you, let alone anything else," Varric said.

"Well, that's because there's nothing else here…yet."

"It's gotta be here. It can't leave this hollow," Oghren said.

"Stinks of dragon in here," Loghain said. "Perhaps it just hasn't heard us yet."

"Maybe it died. Not enough hunters to eat," Varric said. He sounded hopeful.

Just then, the ground shook beneath a giant footfall.

"Here it comes," Loghain said, and braced himself for an attack. The creature roared, and the force of its breath was so great that the sands parted momentarily, allowing a clear view of it. It was a mighty beast, as much as fifty percent larger than the wild saurian, dull grey in color with a great blunt horn on the tip of its massive snout. It came toward them at a trot that shook the earth, and when its snout dipped down to bite Loghain met it with a blow from his shield. It was like striking solid stone, but when he followed it up with a slash of his sword, the ice-cold blade bit in deep to the dragon's hide. Elilia gave out another battle cry and attacked the creature's leg. Oghren hacked away at the one on the other side.

The great, whipping tail was their greatest enemy, while Loghain battled against the teeth. Varric stayed well to the rear and loosed bolts that pierced the dragon's side like ladder rungs. Odd used his teeth on the dragon's legs whenever there was a break in the swing of either sword or axe. Loghain knew it was mostly up to Oghren and Elilia to bring the beast down, but as he slashed away at the creature's gums he fancied at least he was giving it one monster of a toothache. One particularly fierce blow sliced one of the great teeth off at the base, and it dropped into the sand at Loghain's feet. He was careful not to step on it, for he felt positive it could cut a hole right through the sole of his boot.

Loghain heard Elilia scream. Was it triumph or pain? The dragon stumbled, and its precariously balanced body drove it to the ground. Oghren wasted no time in climbing on its back and burying his axe in the creature's skull.

"Take that, you rock-humper!" he shouted. He levered the axe out and brought it down hard again. Loghain abandoned the head end of the beast and ran to where Elilia stood with one hand on her side as she leaned against her lowered sword.

"Are you all right?" he asked. Out of breath, she merely nodded. She took a gasping breath.

"Tail caught me a good one in the ribs," she said, in a strangled voice. "I think there's one or two cracked."

Loghain moved her hand aside and laid his own there. He felt nothing out of place, which was a mercy. Cracked ribs he could possibly do something about. He cast his spell of healing over her, and she brightened immediately.

"Damn, that feels good when it stops hurting," she said. "You really are a pretty good magician."

"Hey lovebirds, this thing ain't dead yet. Could a fella get a little help around here?" Oghren called.

"Whoops, back to the task at hand," Elilia said. She raised her sword again and drove it into the creature's side. Loghain turned back to the dragon and stabbed it repeatedly. Oghren continued to hack away with his axe. They nearly had to begin carving it into portions before at last life abandoned the monster. When it breathed its last, the sandstorm abruptly died out.

"Eerie," Varric said.

Elilia gave out a loud whoop. "Three dragons in a day! We'll be the talk of the town."

"And two giant snakes," Loghain said. "I have to say, I like your work ethic."

"Let's carve this beast out and head back to town," Elilia said. "Drinks and steaks for everybody, eh?"

As he turned to the task of carving up the meat and hide of his third dragon of the day, Loghain had not a thought in his mind that he had just bought himself far more trouble than he'd ever wanted. If he'd known what was coming, he would have left this particular dragon well alone.