The sudden burst of... well, Quintus wasn’t even sure what emotion the girl was expressing as her voice rose. His eyes widened in slight shock to the sudden passion Ashya had. He took a deep breath, focusing his gaze determinedly on the fire in front of them. The girl’s words had a powerful attitude behind them, but Quintus couldn’t help but ignore them. She was most likely lashing out from the combination of stress and lack of sleep. He stayed silent as the girl calmed herself on her own and continued to speak.
Once she had finished, the older man kept quiet, allowing silence to overcome the area. He stretched his legs out in front of him. Crossing his ankles, he tapped his foot so that the edge of his boot got dangerously close to the flickering flames. After a moment, he lightly kicked at one of the rocks that created the fire pit. The rock fell to the side causing the flames to become disrupted before they composed themselves.
“Darkspawn...” His voice was soft, almost as if he was murmuring to himself if it wasn’t for the clear way he pronounced each word so that Ashya could pick up on the words, “No one can ever imagine them until they truly see them. The more times you see them, the more disgusting and horrid they become. They’ll appear in your memories... in dream--- no, in nightmares.” He glanced over to the girl, realizing that he probably wasn’t doing a very good job of being reassuring or comforting like he had planned... but long-term, realism would be much more helpful to the mage. Feeling guilty if he made the girl’s emotions worse, he reached around to his pack. The man opened a pouch, feeling around until he pulled out a metal flask. He replaced his pack once more, leaning against it as he twisted open the flask. Quintus gently shook the flask to check that there was still liquid inside before he turned to Ashya. He held out the flask to her with a calm expression. It seemed to him if it had been decided that this girl was strong enough to fight darkspawn alongside him, then whether she could drink liquor was hardly an issue.