The Market Gate was a far cry from being a peaceful welcome into town with barricade walls of magic erected via charged pylons, which ran a fence line around the city perimeter.

  Dorian and Deshanna had been applying barrier magic properties to ash palings for the clan and guards to layout.

  The people had to close their shops and temporarily board the windows of their homes with focus and haste. Tension and fear in equal measure was thick in the air, but there was also hope as they saw the defense preparations led by Clan Lavellan's Lead Hunter, the City Council and Dorian working like clockwork and with focus. The fishermen were preparing their boats for evacuations should the city defenses fall. The guards were gathering people in village and town squares to drill them on escape routes and ensuring everyone account for their loved ones.

  Despite confusions and questions, Wycome was no stranger to being the focus of attacks by the nobility, so their disaster recovery plans were a lot more robust than most other Free Marches cities. And they trusted their City Council to do what it took to keep them safe.

  The biggest draw for the people was having Anri among them. Even if he was no longer declared Andraste's Herald, his humble and pragmatic nature in dealings kept his title strong in their heads. Despite Anri's constant insistence to just call him by his name.

  By the first night of the preparations, Anri realized he had to completely fall back and let Dorian take the front leadership and be the heroic face with his brother and the City Council. He was frighten on repeating the costly mistake. Dorian had suggested he spend time with Elana, which he was more than happy to do.

  He was spending time making dinner in his villa kitchen, enjoying the homely warmth from the kiln against the stone back wall. Varric was sitting at the kitchen dining table telling a tale Elana was deeply engrossed in.

  "What happened to the dragon?" Elana questioned with her childlike curiosity.

  Varric chuckled, "Well, you see Hawke was running out of arrows, so he looked for something that would make a loud boom..."

  Anri smiled, watching the pair as he placed savory, hot bowls of stew before them and eased onto the bench opposite Varric.

  Elana laughed and clapped at Varric's theatrical conclusion of what Hawke had used to make the dragon Bonepit den go boom.

  The conversation over their meal was jovial and energic with Elana begging for more tales of Hawke's adventures as the Tale of the Champion.

  "But you know, Papa Lavellan here has many tales with loud explosions too." Varric winked at Anri who responded with a frown.

  "Baba?" Elana tilted her head to one side with a thought and sat upright, staring at Anri with a hopeful expression.

  Anri and Varric received a ravensky ping.

  Anri sighed and began packing up their empty bowls. "It's getting late Elana. Time to get ready for bed."

  Elana let out a deep sigh and stared at Varric.

  "Sorry kiddo. I have to get back to the Council. I'll tell you more tomorrow if you listen to Anri and get some beauty sleep."

  She nodded with excitement and hurried out of the kitchen to brush her teeth at the water barrels stacked outside the back entrance door and small grass courtyard to the stables.

  Mellana was casually grazing on choice plantlife in her trough and casting stink-eyes at the white halla, which hovered tentatively nearby. The young deer-like beast had a habit of finding its way out of the Clan Lavellan's compound to pester Mellana in the stables. Elana found it cute and lavished the young beast with tons of pats and hugs. The halla was a villa regular.

  Anri called out to Elana and chuckled when Mellana was looking annoyed at the young halla trying to get her attention. He spoke elven at the small beast, using calm tones. The halla stomped its hooves like it was child doing a protest but eventually ran off to return to his clan's compound.

  "Time for bed, little one."

  "Baba I'm not tired." Elana didn't hide her fear of sleep.

  Anri handed her a vial for her to drink. "This will help you sleep without dreaming."

  She nodded, drank the vial then headed back into the villa for bed. Anri followed her to her simple stone room of simple single bed with a chest of oak drawers and an armoire standing at the far end. The lull of a vast ocean beneath a sky of fading daylight could be see from her window.

  He tucked her into bed and sat beside her bedside, humming a soothing lullaby to help her drift off to sleep. When he felt sure she was in a deep slumber, he rose and redressed in his noble attire of dark samite and headed for the City Council Chambers and the meeting room where a War Council had been established.

  Inside the meeting room he was greeted by Deshanna, Varric and the entire Wycome City Council. Dorian showed him his chair at the oval table, which was next to him. Everyone had their focus on a large tapestry map of the Free Marches laid out.

  "What's the update?" Anri soberly asked.

  "I got a, er, raven message from Hawke that rumors from the Kirkwall guard indicated Venatori movement toward Wycome." Varric commented.

  "These nug-shitting Tevinter bastards again." A heavily bearded dwarf cussed loudly.

  "Why is the Starkhaven Prince driving a purge upon us?" A well-dressed human councilor nervously asked.

  "The Venatori are using their political connections to stir mistrust against the city," Dorian plainly answered. "I suppose they had to use their brains for once in their lives."

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  "It didn't help that we found deposits of Red Lyrium in the area." Anri seriously added as he eased back in his chair and crossed one leg over the other. His eyes were focused on the mapped Ansburg road into Wycome. "They only needed to twist facts that we were harvesting them rather than eliminating."

  Everyone listened to Deshanna's defense updates with undivided attention, which had many councilor heads nodding.

  "Can't say I'd ever thank mages for protecting the town." Another human merchant councilor sighed.

  "You should thank us once in a while. It reminds us mages that magic is to serve." Dorian flippantly suggested.

  Deshanna stifled a cough. "Whether thanks is or isn't required, all that matters is maintaining city defenses. We need to remain vigilant."

  Again more heads nodded in hearty agreement. The council discussed action plans for a few more hours before calling it a night. But Varric, Dorian, Deshanna and Anri remained in the room. Dennerisan soon joined them.

  "The city watch and our clan scouts are monitoring the area. So far, it's all quiet." Dennerisan dumped himself down in the empty chair next to Varric. "Also, is it wise for Kirkwall's Viscount to be here?"

  "Ha. Bran is more than capable of running the city while I'm away. I have Hawke and Aveline keeping the guards out on patrols and not gambling their lifesavings on card games." Varric added with solemnness. "Sebastian and I go way back. You may need me to talk him down."

  At that moment everyone got a ravensky ping and Dorian opened the group call.

  "Rector, I hope you bring good news of our dear prince seeing the error of his ways and packing up to go home." Dorian joked.

  Rector chuckled as he tethered his horse to a tree and crept through bushes to lean over an edge of a cliff that overlooked a military camp below. "Not quite. I've been following their march. They have tents pitched in the woods 60 miles out."

  "Then they should be at Wycome within four days." Dennerisan frowned.

  "I see the prince's tent pitched slightly away from the soldiers. I might be able to slip a message and give him warning."

  "What more have you learned?" Anri interjected.

  "I investigated that Lord Milton lead. You were right Dorian, he has funding ties to a smuggling ring funded by a Venatori cell. He's not the only one, four of the lord's colors traveling in Sebastian's party are Venatori sleeper agents, based on what I was able to decipher from smuggler and lyrium trade networks."

  "Shit!" Denerisan cursed loudly.

  Anri gave him a gesture to calm down and cordially asked, "Dorian what do you suggest?"

  "I'm getting everyone on call now. Hang back Rector and let us talk it out." Dorian frowned.

  "We can do that?" Anri gasped, worried that having nineteen fade links running at the same time might be a strain and cause communications to break.

  "Let's test with Dagna first and have her monitor the channels. We need everyone now." Dorian called up Dagna with what they needed.

  Dagna didn't hide her uncertainty but reassured them that as long as she had a place she could run frequency turning tests in a dampening environment, it should be safe for her to handle. Dorian called up Hawke and asked if he help Dagna find a location for her frequency monitoring. They went off to find a location. A short while later, Dagna had established a fade frequency that was capable of having 19 people on a ravensky call.

  "I hope you're just calling to say hello." Maevaris said with her spirit voice as she was watching a heated debate being played out in the Imperial Senate from her upper echelon booth.

  "I wish. We have a Venatori situation that is rapidly escalating." Dorian said with seriousness, which drew her full attention.

  Dorian, Rector and Hawke shared their perspective updates with everyone on call.

  "The shits!" Sera cursed as he slammed her tankard down on the table she sat at in the Hangman tavern. "They're stealing children in Kirkwall."

  "Are you sure?" Anri gulped, praying it was misinformation.

  "You didn't tell me this?" Hawke didn't hide the shock and concern in his voice.

  He and Dagna had set up his cellar to be her fade channel monitoring room.

  "I didn't have time before, now I do." Sera updated everyone on what she and Dagna had learned from Merrill and other city guards. A few elven children had gone missing, one who had survived was drawing pictures of a venatori mage as a monster. "Not sure where they've gone though. They could be anywhere."

  "If the venatori are corrupted by red lyrium, Alistair and I could seek out their corruption energy and map them." Anri calmly suggested.

  "Yes! If I overlay your corruption mappings with my tracking map, I should be able to give you specific targets across a fair chunk of the Free Marches." Leliana added as she stared at her enormous wall map of Thedas on the treasury chamber wall. It was covered with a lot of red and white pins that marked corruption sightings and static rifts. She lifted one of her nugs off the table before it could knock over a bottle of flammable liquid and make one of the flame cauldrons go boom.

  "Meanwhile, I'll have the Lucerni find out who our Venatori big player is. Having a little chat with our devil friend would be interesting." Maevaris added her action item to the list as she moved away from her booth and out of the senate building.

  "I'll keep the Seekers monitoring the static rift situation, but, Anri, I have to remain oblivious and neutral or it would cause fire to situation if I involve the Chanty." Cassandra sighed as she oversaw paperwork at her office in the Grand Cathedral. "But as soon as there's an opportunity, I'll write a proclamation to support Wycome, but I have to go about this carefully."

  "I understand. We'll make sure to give you that safe opening." Anri reassured her and added for everyone to take note. "Also, if you haven't guessed, Dorian will be lead point for this, er, operation. I'll be focusing on surveillance and mapping. Remember, he has the same authority as myself."

  "Rector, I'll hook you up with some contacts to speed up your intelligence gathering." Varric offered.

  Everyone agreed on their given tasks. The call ended and they all dispersed.

  Dorian and Anri's walk back to their villa was quiet, reflecting the silence of the streets and closed doors where people were tucked in early for the night.

  As they were turning into the grass courtyard where Mellana was asleep in her stable with a young halla curled up next to her, they both stood near the edge of the cliff face their villa was situated. The rhythmic sigh of the sea ebbing in and out of the shore made their own heartbeats fall into a sober pattern.

  "It never ends does it." Anri sighed.

  Dorian stared at his battle-worn expression. He never really thought of Anri's age until he and Dennerisan had talked. It was difficult to imagine that his lover had only been twenty-one years old when he was faced with the monumental task of leading a world order against a god-monster. But he did it and now he had to do it again.

  "Why don't you keep caring for Elana. I'll handle everything."

  Anri faced him with a mixture of emotions being cycled through his expressions but he eventually nodded.

  The men returned to their room to get as much sleep as they could.

  Earlier Dorian had made some witty remark about Anri's four-poster bed being good enough for sea shanty-loving folks. Despite its quaint, simple charm, it was highly comfortable, especially when they enjoyed their energetic bonding time beneath the sheets.

  Tonight, Anri snuggled up close in his arms and refused to let go. It was hard for Dorian not to find his little lover so adorable in those clingy moments. He couldn't love him enough, but it wasn't an expression he could say with words. So he kissed his forehead, pulled him closer and they feel asleep in each other's tight embrace.