She's gone, just as she said she would be, if the spell worked. 

Then...it's over. It's over? 

"Andraste's tits."

"Azry!? Azry!" Alistair screams, and then upon seeing her, all covered in blood and stunned looking, runs full pelt to grab her, and pull her into his arms. 

"Thank the Maker, you're okay. Maker, you're okay," he half-sobs into her hair. 

Azry's arms are tight around his neck, and she holds him as close and tight as her shaking body will allow.

"I'm okay, I'm okay, I promise," she murmurs, squeezing her eyes tight to stop the flow of tears. She laughs a little. "Your chest piece is digging into my neck."

Alistair's laugh is loud, broad, and rather wet sounding. He's crying right through it. 

"When- when you grabbed the sword-"

"Ali-"

"You said I'd make the kill. You promised-"

"Shhh," Azry soothes, stroking his hair. "It's done, it's over."

"I could've lost you."

Azry pulls back far enough to cup his face. "And I could've lost you. It's no fairer either way, you selfish prick." 

She kisses him.

That could be a laugh or a sob against her lips, but Alistair holds her fiercely enough that she will know he knows that wasn't an insult.

She presses a kiss to his cheek, his nose, his temple- the tip of his kinda-pointy ear. 

They're safe. They're together, and the Blight is over-

"Wynne, my darling, let us celebrate our victory in the Grey Warden manner, yes?"

"Throw yourself off a parapet, Zevran."

"The darkspawn! They are retreating!"

Alistair pulls Azry as close as their armour will allow. "We did it. We actually did it. We ended the Blight."

He sounds like he believes it even less than mabari flying. 

"It will take some time for Denerim to recover. But now, it is an option."

Something in Azry freezes, and then she tears herself from Alistair's arms, staring up at him in horror.

"The Alienage."

The horror is echoed in Alistair. 

"Go. Go, we'll catch up- Zev!"

Zevran leaps over the obstacles in his path, catching up with Azry easily-

-Leliana close on their heels.

Blind, furious panic fuels Azry the whole back down the castle towers, into the streets, and across the entirety of Denerim. They make sure to bypass the broken bridge, taking the other entrance, and Azry's mind only clears once she spots a familiar head of red hair-

"SHIANNI!"

"AZRY!" Comes the echoing scream, and soon the woman in question is throwing herself into Azry's arms. "We saw the light, and the darkspawn ran, but you told us that you might- you might not-"

"No, no, I'm fine, I'm fine but- Soris? My-"

She can't even say it.

Shianni pulls away, eyes full of tears. "Soris is fine, I saw him a few minutes ago, but I haven't seen Cyrion or-" Shianni's words are cut off by another scream of Azry's name. 

And then: "COME QUICK!" Soris, outside Azry's childhood home.

Azry and Shianni tear off across the square, Zevran and Leliana on their heels. 

Soris waves them inside, and then-

Cyrion, Azry's father, fine, but in his arms-

"Stio!"

Azry falls to her knees in front of the body Cyrion is holding. 

The body of her barely-alive baby brother. 

A blackened ring of blood circles a wound on his stomach.

"He- they were baring down on me, I told him to run-" Cyrion sobs.

Azry leans over him, to press her forehead to Stio's. "How the fuck did you raise two reckless children?" She tries to joke, but her cries make her words shake.

"He wouldn't run, he said that he could fight- Maker, Azry, he sounded like you, when Adaia-" 

Cyrion's head rests on Azry's.

"He can't- we can't let him-"

"Azuria, I don't want to- I didn't want to lose either of you."

"Neither of us are dead!" Azry growls, but doesn't raise her head from Stiofan.

"I'll go see how far Wynne is. There's still hope." 

Zevran runs back out into the Alienage. 

"I have a poultice, it might...ease the pain." 

Leliana presses a small pouch into Azry's hand. 

Azry takes it, and tries to force her tears back down, as she rucks up her brother's tunic, to gently daub the elfroot-and-valerian onto the black, sick looking wound. 

Stio moans-

"Shhh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry Stio, it's just a little- it'll stop-"

And then she feels it. The sick rolling beneath her skin, echoed in Stio. "Fuck. No."

"What? What, Azry, are you-"

"It's the Taint, he's Tainted, he's got the Blight- FUCK!"

Cyrion turns snow-white. "No. Maker, no, I won't lose another to the Wardens, I can't-" 

He curls over his son. "I can't, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I failed you both."

She should've been here, she could've protected him.

Time crawls to a stop, but also goes too fast, and suddenly Wynne's hands are replace Cyrion's over the wound. 

"I can heal it, but I can't cure-" She says, not unkindly.

"I know."

"But there is a cure. The Joining." 

Alistair wraps his arm around Azry's shoulders.

"Because we just have the potion lying around at all times."

"We don't. But Riordan wanted to Join Loghain, right? So he would have to have it? Or at least instructions on how to."

"I know how to put it together. I was one of the Enchanters who made it at Ostagar."

"You...you have a potion? To cure him?" Cyrion's voice was hopeful.

"Dad, there's only one cure for the Taint." 

"And it's not really a cure, as such."

"He'd become a Grey Warden. Like me and Alistair." 

"But it would save him?" 

"Not...not for good, and it could kill him-"

"Azry-" Cyrion took one of her hands in his. "Azry, he'll die from this anyway. Please, if it might- if it could-"

Azry moved closer, to hug her father, her brother cuddled safe between them. "You don't know what you're asking."

"No, no I don't. But I still...I can't watch him die like this. I can't...not at least if there's something we can do to change that."

"We can make the potion, we can put it together. You don't have to use it, but at least it will be there?"

"It is a significant decision, Azry, but he doesn't have a lot of time. The Blight can take the healthiest men down in hours." 

"You think I'm not aware of that, Wynne? You think I'm trying to draw this out to kill him faster?" Azry spat. 

Alistair hugged her, and pressed a kiss to her temple. "Wynne didn't mean that. We'll go, but we'll be back soon."

Azry gripped his wrist once, and then let go. 

Alistair, Wynne and Leliana left, heading up towards Arl Eamon's estate.

Zevran knelt down beside his friend, resting a hand on the small of her back. 

"He would not have to be a Warden."

"It's not like being a solider. It's not something you can run from."

"Yes, he will be a Warden in nature, inexorably. But, considering his age, you could just Join him, and not have him join? So to speak."

"Warden in nature, not name."

"Precisely. You cannot hide from him that it happened, but you can keep him from the fight."

Cyrion laughs softly, and a little sadly. "You can't keep Adaia's children from the fight. Only temper their hot-headed recklessness." 

"Should've known Stio was gonna take up hell raising in my place," Azry murmurs, stroking his hair back from his face. 

"After every thing that happened here, could you blame him?" Shianni says. 

"No. I would've been spitting mad too. Already was, before Duncan took me away."

Shianni kneels down beside Azry, to cuddle her. "Don't blame yourself. You got us out." 

Azry pushes Stio's blonde fringe back from his forehead. Her baby brother.

"It's hard not to blame myself," she admits. 

"And I, also," Cyrion says.

Azry leans in closer to her father, Shianni and Soris joining in on the hug.