Doom Upon All The World

Chapter 7: Octavia

     She remembers her parents. Not the biological ones. No. Those she didn't even care to think of. But the ones that took her in, that cared for her. Those ones she remembers. She doesn't know how. Julien can't even remember his mother's face. How she recalls the features of a Tevinter mage and a Qunari war beast, she cannot fathom.

She remembers them none the less.

"I love you," A voice breaks her reverie as she lies on her side in the bed. "you know that, don't you?" Her voice is sweet, calm, lovely.

Sleep pulls at her, Octavia can hear it in that voice. She rolls over, taking the thin, young thing beside her in her chubby arms. "I know." She whispers, kissing the nose of Camille Montilyet. She giggles at that and snuggles into Octavia's side, reveling in her warmth. "Four days," Tavvy whispers to the lovely noble born girl. "Four days until the fifteenth anniversary of their deaths." She stares at Camille's sleeping face.

But then the bronze skinned beauty isn't sleeping. She blanches and her eyes sadden. "The others, it is their's. Not yours. Lord Pavus and The Iron Bull perished months before the battle here. You know that, my love." She whispers, kissing the side of Tavvy's face.

"That does not make it hurt less." The dwarf nuzzles into the body beside her, looking for solace. "It does not make it better that I, nor the others, remember the day that they sacrificed so that their parents may have lived a few months more." Camille kisses her temple and squeezes her little dwarf. "At least you know that they died bravely. At least you know it was not your fault they died." A tear falls down her bronzed cheek and Tavvy pulls away to look into those earthy dark eyes. "My mother died three days after giving birth to me because my sister and I ripped her apart. Her death drove my father insane and so he ran, abandoning his children, and getting himself killed in the process." Her bottom lip quivers and all Tavvy can do is hold her tighter as she cries.

She listens to her pleas and whimpers until they stop, her convulsing and shuddering with every cry ending as she buries the pain back in its grave. "Anthony returned today." She whispers.

"I know." Is all Octavia replies.

"He has not returned home for five years. He then decides that on this day, he should come back to mourn with his sister." She sighs heavily. "I can't make sense of it." Octavia chuckles at her. "I suppose it's difficult to make sense of much of anything these days." She returns with as much of a smile as she can muster.

"He's not back for that anyway." Tavvy tells her. She leans in, pressing a soft, slow kiss to her plump lips.

But the Antivan is not convinced. She looks at the surface dwarf and reads the look in her eyes. "Then what is he back for?" She kisses her again, gently, too gently. "Nicolynn." Tavvy tells her confidently through urgent breaths. "He's come back for her. To tell her. To take her far away." Camille goes still at her words.

She opens her eyes and stares at the dwarf. "You told him." She says. A statement. Not a question. But Octavia won't lie to her.

"I had no choice." There is no regret in her voice as she responds.

"You do realize that he'll never let her out of his sight again, don't you?" Camille is teeming with rage now. So much so that she gets up from the bed, shirks on her silken robe and storms to the door. "I hope you know the consequences of what you've done. You've just damned Nicolynn to a cage of your own creation." She opens the door, walks through, and slams it behind her, leaving Octavia to a cold, empty bed.