#Like. Grace and runes seem to be really closely connected and may even be the same thing

[zevranunderstander]

Thinking abt grace in elden ring bc i get the basic concept but i have so many questions about it and dont find any answers

[jaskierswolf]

Your heart beats like wings

Written for the Teef Week Event in @thewitcherbog.

Ship: Gerlion

Rating: E

CW: Fae!Dandelion, biting (and drawing blood), mating bites (of sorts), wing kink, coming untouched, blow job,

_

Geralt had always known there was something not quite human about Dandelion. Whenever his golden-haired poet was near, the wolf’s head would hum quietly on his chest, a fact that Dandelion seemed to delight in. Whenever they shared a bed or curled up together on the forest floor, Dandelion’s long lutist fingers would wrap around the wolf, calloused fingertips tracing the fur on its ears and muzzle. But Geralt never asked, and Dandelion seemed content to keep the mystery a secret. Years passed, decades, maybe nearing a century, Ciri blooming into a beautiful young lady, zipping off through time and space, Yennefer still scouring the Continent for a way to take back what she believed was stolen from her, and Regis settling down in Toussaint with a fellow vampire, popping in to see Geralt and Dandelion on occasion.

No one seemed to notice that the seemingly human bard hadn’t aged a day over the cruel winters and burning summers that had passed.

Geralt noticed but he was scared, scared of losing the one constant in his life. If he asked, if he drew attention to it, the peace surrounding them might shatter and he’d be left alone, always waiting for his friends and family to arrive, isolated.

Dandelion hummed, tucking his hair behind his ears before leaning down to press a kiss to Geralt’s neck, sucking a bruise into the tender skin, his hips rolling over Geralt’s cock. Ever the poet, Dandelion murmured a steady stream of praise as he trailed his lips under the line of Geralt’s jaw, whispering rhymes and verses as he nibbled Geralt’s ear.

“What thoughts are rattling through that pretty little head of yours, my darling?” Dandelion asked as he sat up onto his heels, his fingers tracing patterns into Geralt’s chest, not dissimilar to the runes on his swords.

“Nothing to worry about,” Geralt muttered, pulling his husband into a kiss to finally silence him. The words melted into a soft moan as Dandelion’s lips parted easily under Geralt’s, elderflower wine still on his tongue, sweet, delicious, divine.

They kissed some more, lazy and slow, a simmering heat gradually building into something more insistent as Dandelion’s hands finally wrapped around Geralt’s cock.

“You’re lying to me,” Dandelion hummed, hand slick with oil even though Geralt never heard the cork pop. “Tell me, dearest, please.”

Geralt’s eyes fluttered closed, Dandelion’s fingers working magic along his hardening cock, making it difficult to think about anything else. “You,” he finally mumbled, “was thinking about you.”

Dandelion giggled, the sound making Geralt’s medallion vibrate a little more against his chest. “And what about me?” Dandelion asked, his voice ever musical and beautiful, one carefully trimmed nail running along Geralt’s cheek.

“You- you never age, Dandelion. Why?” Geralt asked, feeling his cheeks heat up as he finally voiced the question that had been haunting him for years.

The poet sighed, pressing his face into the crook of Geralt’s neck, fingers wrapped tightly around the wolf medallion. “I was wondering when you would ask, my dear witcher.”

A heavy silence fell over the room as Dandelion sat up, legs resting either side of Geralt’s waist. He continued to trace patterns into Geralt’s skin, until the quiet became almost unbearable, crushing Geralt under the enormity of its weight. The question became a burning sword, ready for Geralt to fall upon, the destruction of everything he held dear. Until, in a strangely vulnerable voice, Dandelion spoke once more.

“Promise not to hate me, Geralt, darling, please.” His voice cracked, shattering along with Geralt’s heart. They may have had their spats over the years but to hear that his husband doubted him so… it was unforgivable. He would spend the rest of their days together trying to make it up to Dandelion, until his husband truly believed how much Geralt loved him.

Geralt took one of Dandelion’s hands in his, placing a kiss to each knuckle before gently turning it over to kiss the palm. “You must think me mad,” Geralt reminded him, echoing words from so long ago, “if you think I could ever hate you.”

And still Dandelion remained silent, cornflower blue eyes locked on his, lacing their fingers together. “Even if I’m a monster?”

If it weren’t for the sincerity in Dandelion’s voice, Geralt would have assumed the poet was joking. How could his husband, kind and gentle Dandelion who threw up at the sight of blood, think he was a monster? The most vicious Dandelion ever got was when he was up against Valdo Marx in a bardic competition, but his old rival had passed many years ago.

“Even then.”

“Are you- are you sure?”

“Dandelion, speak,” Geralt said, squeezing the poet’s hand in his.

“Very well.”

But instead of speaking there was a sudden burst of magic in the room, Geralt’s medallion jumping off his chest, the teeth of the wolf almost snarling as it vibrated wildly. Dandelion’s features blurred and changed, his already sharp cheekbones becoming more angular, the fingers between Geralt’s lengthening, claw-like nails replacing neatly trimmed ones. When Dandelion opened his eyes once more, cornflower blue irises now glowed with slitted pupils not unlike Geralt’s, and when he smiled, Geralt saw a row of sharp teeth glistening between rosy pink lips. His golden ringlets parted to reveal two curled horns, but what really drew Geralt’s attention were the shimmering rainbow wings that unfurled from behind his husband’s back.

He was beautiful.

“Dandelion,” Geralt breathed, unable to think of any other word.

“Hello, Geralt.”

“You’re- you’re beautiful.”

Dandelion’s eyes fluttered shut, a serene expression gracing his lips, and the room seemed to glow from whatever magic the poet was weaving, his hair gently blowing in a breeze that Geralt couldn’t feel. Behind him, Dandelion’s wings beat slowly, catching off the candlelight and sending glittery sparkles of light cascading across the room. It was captivating, enchanting, alluring, and Geralt couldn’t take his eyes off his husband.

“Can I kiss you?” he asked, his voice distant to his own ears.

“Hmm, well, I rather think you should,” Dandelion giggled, leaning down to press their lips together.

Geralt’s fingers tentatively reached out to caress Dandelion’s wings, making the poet shudder, a soft gasp falling from his lips, the taste of wild flowers on his breath.

“Again…” Dandelion murmured, and so Geralt stroked along the seemingly fragile veins of the wings until his husband was a quivering mess on top of him, cock hard and leaking onto Geralt’s stomach. “Oh gods, Geralt.”

“I’ve got you, Dandelion,” Geralt hummed, his fingers digging into Dandelion’s thighs as they rutted together, Geralt’s cock aching between the curve of Dandelion’s arse.

“Julian,” Dandelion whispered. “My name is Julian.”

Geralt blinked up at his husband, cheeks flushed bright, the very picture of ethereal beauty. “Julian,” he repeated, “my flower.”

As the name fell from Geralt’s lips, a strange silver light whipped around his husband, connecting his heart to Geralt’s, and he cried out, lost in pleasure as he came, purely from the caresses to his wings. He collapsed forward, sharp teeth latching onto Geralt’s shoulder to muffle his cries. Geralt hissed in pain as the fangs sank into his skin, but the pain soon succumbed to pleasure and he thrust up against Dandelion’s arse, hands still exploring the colourful wings that were so alive beneath his fingers. Every touch tingled against his skin, hot and cold at the same time, magic in its rawest form, making Geralt feel dizzy.

Dandelion moaned, releasing Geralt’s shoulder for barely a second before kissing over the wound. His husband then wriggled from Geralt’s arms, kissing down Geralt’s body as he shuffled down the bed, each kiss was accompanied by a sharp bite until Geralt’s skin was a map of unfamiliar teeth marks, some bleeding, some not, Dandelion didn’t seem to care. Wherever his razor sharp teeth did break through Geralt’s skin, there was a thrum of magic, building and building inside of Geralt, until he could almost feel Dandelion’s heart beat right alongside his. Wings fluttered out behind Dandelion, now out of reach but still so captivating.

“My darling, my husband, my Geralt,” Dandelion murmured between kisses, gazing up at Geralt with glowing blue eyes as he pressed a kiss to Geralt’s hip.

“Yours, Julian,” Geralt agreed, threading his hands through Dandelion’s soft blond curls, knuckles bumping against the newly grown horns. Unlike the wings, Dandelion’s horns didn’t appear to be sensitive in the slightest, but Geralt was still intrigued. He gripped one of the horns in his hand, guiding his husband lower, moaning with every kiss and bite to his skin.

Dandelion giggled, pressing a kiss to Geralt’s inner thigh, “Patience, love.”

“You try my patience, poet.”

“And yet you insist I’m not a monster,” Dandelion sighed, sinking his teeth into Geralt’s thigh.

Fire blazed through Geralt’s veins, crackling electricity, even as Dandelion’s tongue lapped over the bite mark. He knew there was some magic at play, but it was a part of Dandelion, a part that had remained hidden for so long and finally, finally, Geralt had been allowed to see.

The trust that Dandelion- that Julian had in him was almost overwhelming.

Glowing eyes met his and Julian winked, eyelashes even longer and darker than before. That was all the warning Geralt got before his cock was enveloped in the wet heat of Julian’s mouth, the bard already moaning around his length. Geralt’s own moans harmonised with his husband as his head fell back against the pillow.

He had a feeling he would be in for a long night.

_

Taglist: @geraltrogerericduhautebellegarde, @comfyswitcherblanketfort, @fontegagrilledcheese, @dani-dandelino, @dapandapod @unyielding-as-the-sea @officerjennie @feraljaskier @geralt-of-riviass @kueble @gilberik @llamasdumpsterfire

[cappymightwrite]

Customs, Chieftains & Countergifts

I'm currently writing up a deep dive chapter analysis of Jon XI, A Dance with Dragons, but wanted to post this section separately as a sort of preview, but also something to be enjoyed on its own (with some added visual aids). For all the medieval nerds out there...enjoy!

He slapped Jon’s back. “When all my folk are safe behind your Wall, we’ll share a bit o’ meat and mead. Till then…” The wildling pulled off the band from his left arm and tossed it at Jon, then did the same with its twin upon his right. “Your first payment. Had those from my father and him from his. Now they’re yours, you thieving black bastard.”

The armbands were old gold, solid and heavy, engraved with the ancient runes of the First Men. Tormund Giantsbane had worn them as long as Jon had known him; they had seemed as much a part of him as his beard. “The Braavosi will melt these down for the gold. That seems a shame. Perhaps you ought to keep them.” – ADWD, Jon XI

The exchange of arm-rings, or armbands, in medieval Germanic (notably Scandinavian/Nordic) cultures is hugely significant, and as a aspiring medievalist this interaction between Tormund and Jon really stood out to me. For some historical context:

Every ambitious chieftain faced the same problem: how was he to recruit and keep warriors in his retinue? His retainers, not simple mercenaries that fought for wages, were free men whose sense of honour would not have tolerated that kind of venal relationship. Instead, a chieftain needed to engage his warriors in close personal relationships. If they were not biological kin, they might create kinship through, for example, rituals of brotherhood, marriage alliances, and friendship formalised by drinking together in the chieftain's hall. Whatever their relationship, it was constantly reasserted through the exchange of gifts. It was their relationship with their chieftain that made warriors willing and eager to fight for him. [...] Appropriate gifts in a gift-giving relationship needed to be prestigious, which caused many chieftains to focus some of their energies on acquiring prestigious goods specifically rather than wealth in general. When the warrior recieved a gift of something valuable and prestigious from his chieftain, he was required to give a countergift. His first countergift was loyalty, unto death if necessary. This is how relationships of power were created in a society without states; rather than being obliged to perform military duty for his king (as in a full-fledged state), the warrior was persuaded with gifts to voluntarily perform that duty for his chieftain. The asymmetry of this interchange, with the chieftain giving more valuable gifts than the warrior, was an expression of the structure of political power: the more exclusive the gift, the higher the esteem of the giver, and the more power concentrated in him. – Anders Winroth, The Conversion of Scandinavia

The importance of this type of exchange is notably highlighted in certain passages from the Old English poem Beowulf:

Here is Seamus Heaney's translation of the same lines:

The above is just one example, but it illustrates how it was an honour to be gifted a ring/armband by a chieftain, and Tormund, we shouldn't forget, is a kind of Wildling chieftain. He is introduced to Jon by Mance as "the Mead-king of Ruddy Hall [...] Father of Hosts," (ASOS, Jon I), which connects to the significance of the chieftain's hall and the ritual of drinking in that hall to cement kinship bonds.

With Tormund and Jon, despite the former's earlier provocations, we see his real respect for Jon shine through here, initially by essentially inviting him to drink in his hall, or at least together:

“When all my folk are safe behind your Wall, we’ll share a bit o’ meat and mead. Till then…” – ADWD, Jon XI

This may seem like a small thing, but to the cultures which Tormund and the Free Folk play off of, this is a significant gesture, as noted above by Winroth. Furthermore, he makes clear the importance of his gift-giving by mentioning the armbands' prestigious history: "had those from my father and him from his." They are also materially valuable: "the armbands were old gold, solid and heavy, engraved with the ancient runes of the First Men."

The visual description of the armbands is very evocative of actual Viking era arm-rings that have been excavated, for instance, this gold one which has been recently found in the Isle of Man, which dates back to 950AD:

This plaited technique — probably more achievable in gold due to its relative softness/malleability — is reminiscent of other finds from around the same period (876-950AD), such as this one currently held at the British Museum:

As far as I can tell, however, runic inscriptions on arm-rings/armbands aren't really a thing, though you do see a variety of different kinds of engravings (the below date from the 10thC–11thC):

Of course, GRRM is just trying to evoke this kind of culture through his inclusion of "ancient runes of the First Men," rather than aim for exact accuracy, and we do see runic inscriptions on personal objects and some items of dress from the Viking period — often to denote ownership. However, in the below examples at least (a bone comb case and bossed penannular brooch), they seem more like later additions, rather than part of the original design:

But back to Tormund and Jon's exchange!

The armbands' prestige and value cannot be dismissed, and even though they are meant as "payment", Jon's acknowledgement of this significant gesture is reflected in his returning them. In fact, you could argue that his return of them is his "countergift" to Tormund, as well as the cementing of loyalty and trust between the two of them.

“The Braavosi will melt these down for the gold. That seems a shame. Perhaps you ought to keep them.” – ADWD, Jon XI

So, this little moment really plays on the dynamic between chieftain and retainer in a very interesting way. Indeed, we sort of see Jon take on the role of gift-giver himself, as he returns that same honour and respect to Tormund. Whereas Winroth describes the asymmetry of the interchange between chieftain and retainer, for Tormund and Jon there is symmetry, there is mutual standing; they are equals.

This is just such a beautiful, yet subtle, cultural exchange that is actually so meaningful. It really highlights Jon's strength of character and his respect and understanding of the Free Folk culture:

Tormund Giantsbane had worn them as long as Jon had known him; they had seemed as much a part of him as his beard. – ADWD, Jon XI

He understands how intrinsic this item of dress is to the Free Folk and to Tormund especially, how emotionally weighted they are, which is why he does not want to see them destroyed and diminished by being melted down for their gold. This stands in almost direct contrast to how Dany views the Meereenese tokar:

Dany had wanted to ban the tokar when she took Meereen, but her advisors had convinced her otherwise. "The Mother of Dragons must don the tokar or be forever hated," warned the Green Grace, Galazza Galare. "In the wools of Westeros or a gown of Myrish lace, Your Radiance shall forever remain a stranger amongst us, a grotesque outlander, a barbarian conqueror. Meereen's queen must be a lady of Old Ghis." Brown Ben Plumm, the captain of the Second Sons, had put it more succinctly. "Man wants to be the king o' the rabbits, he best wear a pair o' floppy ears." – ADWD, Daenerys I

Though to give Dany her due, the tokar is a far more restrictive and difficult item of dress to wear than a Free Folk armband, and Jon is also not being given Tormund's to wear precisely. Nevertheless, she fails to truly acknowledge the symbolism and cultural importance of the tokar. It is actually quite an offensive act to want to ban them, simply because you do not appreciate them aesthetically. It is a good thing that she takes on the advice of others and does wear it, but it is a concession on her part, not really anything deeper than that. It also doesn't exactly help things that the tokar continues to be referred to as the "floppy ears" by Dany from then on. It shows a lack of respect.

Jon continues his exchange with Tormund by not just showing respect to his culture, but by also sympathising with the loss of his two sons: Dormund and Torwynd. This moment between them was already bestowed with emotional meaning through the offer and return of the armbands. That could have been the end of it, yet Jon extends his understanding further to comfort a grieving father.

^ There you have it, just some stuff I found especially interesting in that interaction between Jon and Tormund — how it evokes a period of history and culture that I'm quite familiar with, as well as how it contrasts to Dany's own cultural confrontations in Meereen.

[paellaplease]

Firebird | Chap.7

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6

I’m back!

Chapter 7: Of Monsters and Metals Part 2.

...but by the restless heart that refuses to falter.

*

   Contrary to popular belief, whilst she was well accustomed to it, years of sweaty work hadn’t endeared her to the less glamorous aspects of working in a forge. It was hot, and oftentimes stuffy, making water breaks important as the hours passed on and her arms began to tire. Working through the summer was unbearable, with no amount of mountain air able to cool the uncomfortable redness on her face and arms.

Whilst Teacher could walk around the forge like it was her second home, it took months of discipline for Maiya to tolerate the place. How ironic that it seemed to follow her everywhere like a rope tightly wrapped around her wrist.

Shifting in her seat, she was thankful that the constant exchange of air above Jackdaws had rid the forge of the usual sulfurous stench of burning coal. This quiet, unassuming workshop kept close between Wayra’s rock and stone, like a beating heart beneath living flesh.

....But of course it would take a miracle to completely filter out the unmistakable burning smell of hot steel and the lingering taste of metal on her tongue.

A small drop of sweat rolled down the back of her neck. If I close my eyes, she mused, it would be like I never left home. Her head lolled forward, the previous hour’s excitement catching up to her. It wasn’t everyday a Rito takes you flying.

She was sinking in her seat, a single voice one of the only things standing in the way between her and an impromptu nap.

“…almost impenetrable rock like bodies completely covered in ice! I have heard with enough prolonged contact they could also freeze exposed flesh in seconds. It’s incredible...”

Oh. Right.

It took all her might to peel her eyelids back open. Of all the challenges she was bracing herself to encounter from Rito Village, she didn’t expect ‘being lectured again in another forge’ to be one of them.

Yep, definitely just like home.

In the reddish glow of the forge, Uleh gesticulated with a graceful turn of a poised hand. The Zora appeared fresher than a daisy, a completed sword blade resting on the anvil next to them, gleaming almost as bright as their teeth. Where they got all their energy from after what would have been hours of gruelling work was one of the many greater mysteries of Hyrule.

They spoke words that, whilst probably important, unfortunately fell on deaf ears as the Enchanter dozed off. The heaviness of her eyes continued to fight her as they settled on a rough sketch of the monster. Drawn in haste, it appeared to be one big blob with two smaller blobs attached at its sides to act like its appendages. It was a literal rock. A giant, dangerous rock. Larger than a house, the Zora had said. She briefly wondered if Uleh was having her on.

Guess so long as we don’t get within arms reach it should be fine.

“I suppose we’re not befriending the Talus and escorting it back home?” An exasperated voice called from a corner of the room. Maiya leaned her head back, her brain supplying an upside-down image of Revali testing the balance of a Falchion on one of his wings.

“Unfortunately not, but how uncharacteristically nice of you, Master Revali." The Zora replied, evidently unbothered by the archer’s sarcasm. Propping their head up with a hand, their smile was natural. Easy. "Making friends with monsters? We should table it for a later venture.”

The blue Rito opened his beak to protest, but was cut-off again by the Zora’s ringing laugh. “Ahah, you may be onto something though. Managing to form a positive connection would make your jobs easier. I mean, since you’re getting up close and personal anyway.”

“Hmmm...yeah.” Maiya sat up and stretched.

A beat passed as her brain finally decided to process the last sentence. “Wait.”

“Not to worry. It shouldn’t be too difficult.” Uleh said, totally misreading her panic. They tapped the side of their skull for emphasis. “The ingredient should be in the ore poking out of its crown. You can’t miss it. It’s usually right at the top of its head.”

Years of accumulated dust motes floated into the air as the Hylian slammed both her hands onto the aged writing desk. She gripped the edges in shock, the hardwood creaking. “Sorry.” A breath. “Can you run that by me again? Starting at the part where you said this wouldn’t be difficult.”

Uleh caught the tipping candle-holder before it fell, saving their map from going up in flames. They tilted their head down to look at her, wide-eyed confusion making her feel a little guilty. “Forgive me Miss Enchanter, had I said something wrong?”

“No.” She huffed, refusing the need to anxiety-pace around the room. “I mean yes. It’s just...” It was ridiculous. This is crazy. “You’re saying that the ingredient is found on a sentient boulder that wants to kill me.”

Adopting the countenance of a wise sage imparting worldly knowledge onto their pupil, the Zora clasped their hands and set them gently on the shaking table. "Not quite a boulder. Picture it more as a hulking, moving, ah... mini mountain. Encased in ice.”

"And it wants to kill me."

"And it wants to kill you, yes.”

This was bad. She should say something. She could feel Revali’s eyes piercing into her back. Goddesses, Maiya. Get a grip!

Was talking to the Blacksmith really worth the risk of getting hurt? Forging swords, setting traps, and being semi-decent with her throwing knives for self-defence were nowhere near enough to qualify her as a monster-hunter. A rabbit, fine. But a rock monster more than quadruple her size? I must be delusional.

She scrubbed her face wearily. “What makes you think this is a good idea?”

“Well, I’m speaking to one of the last known Enchanters of Hyrule and the Pride of the Rito. Why, it should be a doddle with two living legends on the case.”

The two responses from said Enchanter and Rito came at the same time:

“I’m not a legend.”

“Pah, naturally.”

Maiya inhaled deeply. “Why don’t you help us fight it, then? Three against one would mean surefire success.”

The furnace behind them crackled, sending sparks into the air. It illuminated the iridescent shine of the zora’s scales, their many jewels glinting in the gloomy atmosphere of the forge. It was a little funny. In contrast to their surroundings, they looked like an angel who had wandered into the wrong afterlife.

Uleh mulled over her question, idly spinning the charcoal in their hand. Whilst their smile remained, there was a tenseness that wasn't present before. After a minute, they finally regarded her, golden eyes far away as they cleared their throat to reply. “It’s because—

A disgruntled sigh interrupted them. “Honestly, enchanter. Must I throw the rulebook at you? It’s rather shameless really, asking the other party to help fulfill your part of the agreement.”

Maiya whipped her head around, leaning back so fast her chair nearly tipped over. “Lecturing me on manners now? That’s rich coming from you, Rito.”

“Why, I don’t understand your meaning. I’ve been nothing but a gentleman this entire time.”

Running a hand through her unruly hair, she would have marched directly up to him to give him a piece of her mind if it wasn’t for Uleh holding her back. She whipped around to look at them, realizing she’d forgot to drop her glare when they nervously coughed and released their hold on her shoulder.

“Ah, um.” They idly ran a claw down the silver chain decorating the two flat fins that hung on the sides of their head like hair. “I’m sorry for interrupting whatever’s going on here. You’re both right, in a way. It’s logical that the chances of success would increase with extra hands. In fact, if I could lend you my aid I would, but…”

Shrinking back, they went quiet again, words bashful and barely audible. “I’m no good in a fight.”

Maiya stared at them quizzically. Growing up with Teacher had its many challenges. For one, the Sheikah could read most people with ease, be it a guilty child who had just scribbled on a newly painted white wall or even a fully grown, extremely stoic adult trying to cheat her out of what should be reasonably priced eggs. For a young Maiya, it made stretching the truth risky, and lying to her mentor out of the question.

Whilst she was no expert in body-language, spending most of her teenage years under her mentor’s watchful eye had taught her a few things about common tells. Maybe it was in the way the Zora’s golden eyes lost their gleam? Or in their sudden shyness. Either way, whilst they may have been sincere for most of the conversation previously, Uleh in that moment wasn’t telling the full truth.

She pressed the bottom of her palm to the aching spot above her brow. This was getting too complicated. Her chest ached from the stress. She winced when the rune bit at her skin. The pulse at her wrist felt strong under her fingers, beating out a warning call.

We’re wasting time. So what if they’re lying? Anything for Enchanting, right? Wasn't that the goal? To further or find what was lost whatever the price?

There was no point in turning back now. Pressing the issue wouldn’t change the fact that it would just be her, Revali, and this Talus tomorrow. If she wanted to meet the Blacksmith and actually have him listen to her demands, then this seems like the most direct option available. Beggars can’t be choosers, she already failed in uniting the Enchanted dagger with an owner. Teacher would never forgive her for letting go of a lead like this.

“Alright. Deal still stands.” She decided.

Standing up, Uleh raised their hands to the ceiling to stretch, the relaxed grin they had before returning to their face in full force. They leaned over the table, annotating a place in the map marking ‘West Rospro Pass’ before rolling it up and sealing it with a clip. “Well then, time and tide wait for no one.”

Maiya reached her hand out, jumping when a blue wing beat her to it, swiftly taking the map from the Zora’s hands.

Beside her, Revali rolled his shoulders. Seeing her annoyed expression, he lightly tapped the map on the top of her head, his feathers puffing up at his excitement to leave this hellish hot-box. “Careful, Hylian. Your face will get stuck if you keep frowning like that forever.” He said, poking her cheek with a pointed feather.

She couldn’t help the surprised squeak that escaped her mouth, Revali’s smirk growing even wider.

The fact that the feather pressed to her face was unbelievably soft pissed her off even moreso. She quickly swatted him away, face warming. “Buzz off,” she groused.

The Rito chuckled, but complied, withdrawing his wing to haughtily cross it with the other against his chest. “Tomorrow you’ll have front row seats to watch a true Master at work.”

The silence that followed made him sigh. He looked at her pointedly. “Would it kill you to be a bit more lively?”

“Yipee...”

“Amazing. Your sincere exuberance is truly heart-warming.”

She rolled her brown eyes as Uleh gave them both a thumbs up. The Zora's laughter, like chiming bells, filling the dark forge. It was infectious, and she couldn’t help but crack a tiny smile in return.

Perhaps tomorrow wouldn’t be so terrible after all.

   Birdsong greeted Maiya as the night sky slowly brightened into a lavender hue, the first signs of dawn peaking over the horizon. She tiptoed down the outer staircase of Swallow’s Roost, careful not to wake the travellers who rested peacefully on the other side of the wall.

She rubbed her eyes, fighting back a yawn. Wisps of smoke left the tops of chimneys, chefs and bakers preparing their iron cook pots for another working day of feeding an entire village and more. A gust of wind brought the scent of charcoal and firewood, acidic and earthy...

— Fire. Burning. Melting feathers and flesh. An arrow piercing skin and muscle—

The Enchanter pressed her knuckles into her temples, attempting to relieve the pressure forcing her head to burst. Another night, another terrible sleep in Tabantha. She knew this wasn’t normal; these night terrors. Her bones ached from hours of tossing and turning, waking up in a cold sweat and forcing herself to relax, only to be met with the same dream once again. Perhaps when all of this was over, a visit to the village healer would be a good idea.

However, against her better judgement, there was something invigorating about the new day. This was crazy; mad! Teacher would never have allowed it had she been in the same room when the decision was made. And perhaps that was exactly why her stomach felt like it was doing dumb, excited flips, her mouth turning up at the edges.

This was her chance to prove herself, show her mentor how dedicated she was to the cause and her studies. It was a little unorthodox, but she was sure Teacher would understand once she comes home with new information. In fact, she could omit most of the details from the letter anyway and leave in the non-life threatening bits that won’t cause any alarm.

She nodded to herself, hands tightening around a relatively empty backpack. She patted down her front and sides to check that she had what she needed. Throwing knives, waterskin, materials for basic first-aid, and a hammer and chisel from Uleh to help her collect the ore pieces later.

“That’s everything, I think. As well as…”

Her fingers froze as they brushed the raised embellishments on the enchanted dagger’s hilt, reality running up to slap her in the face. Hands curling around it, she felt a torrent of shame wash over her. What was she doing? This wasn’t the time to act like an overexcited child. This was serious, so much was riding on her getting this right. And her mentor wouldn’t be happy if she were to fail. Wait. Her stomach dropped. What if I do fail?

What then? She wondered. Would she even be alive to report the bad news?

Sighing, she forced her hand away from the dagger, turning to look beyond the railing and into the world beyond. If anything, at least it was a beautiful morning.

A voice appeared to her right. “And where do you think you’re going?”

“Hylia’s left tit— ! Cheska!” She all but screamed, grabbing the railing in a death grip.

The innkeeper tipped her head inquisitively when a brief spark of blue flashed in her eyes.

“Uh!! Hello!” Maiya floundered. She hid her hand behind her back, feeling sweat build on her brow when Cheska’s eyes followed the action. “G-good morning. If this is about the late dinner you brought up last night, thank you so much! It was really, really good.”

She swallowed her spit, her nervousness still bubbling. “Not to say that your food isn’t always good. It’s just that I rarely eat fish. Not to say fish isn’t delicious. It’s just that where I live in Akkala we’re not really close to the sea so— ”

“Hylianlla! Slow-down.” The Rito laughed. “Jeez you are jumpy today. Take a deep breath. That’s it. In and out. Before the wind snatches it away— ah, I sound like my mother."

Cheska smiled warmly. Her rounded golden earrings reminded Maiya of two small suns, catching the light as she idly transferred the small paper package she held from one wing to another. “No worries, silly chickie. I’m always happy to feed a hungry traveller.”

The Hylian nodded, taking this as a sign that the conversation was over. She stepped to the side, moving to shuffle around the innkeeper, only for the Rito to block her path once again.

“However!” Her eyes sparkled. Maiya had a bad feeling about this. “What have you been up to yesterday that led to being dropped off by a mysterious and handsome blue-feathered stranger with the famous Great Eagle Bow?”

The Enchanter made a face. She was not mentally prepared to be having this conversation. “I can confirm that it’s not whatever you’re cooking up in that head of yours— and please stop wiggling your eyebrows!”

In an effort to distract herself from the blush that was snaking up her neck, her eyes strayed to the pink and orange sunrise above them, the clouds moving across the sky like white rolling waves. “As to what I’ve been doing. Well...not much really. Read a few books at the Archive. Got a tour of the village. Had a fight with the local blacksmith that led to striking a deal with the Zora that lives in the depths of the ancient rock supporting all of us right now.” She cringed at how crazy it sounded. “Did you know that by the way?"

“Uleh? Duh, they pass by from time to time.” She idly brushed a wing down one of her earrings. “We have the best chats. But tell me more about this tour!”

Despite the stress weighing on her mind, the Enchanter laughed, digging her hands in her pockets. “Of all the things...judging from your description I think you already know who this mysterious stranger is. Wouldn’t recommend it, but he’s all yours.”

“He’s all…” Cheska paused, voice breaking. She stood still, expression rapidly switching from confusion, realisation, to deep and feather-raising mortification.

Tilting forward, she began to giggle. Maiya stepped back in surprise, watching it transition into full blown laughter. “Uh, Cheska?”

The Rito doubled over and slapped a wing over her beak. “Revali?! Ha HA! Qoyllur-cha?” She sucked in a shaky breath, before dissolving into peals of incredulous laughter once again. “Heck no, amiha. I’m sure Mr. Grumpy is well and truly enamored with himself anyway.” The innkeeper wiped a tear from her eye. “Ah, Blessed Nayru. You’re a hoot!”

“Right,” Maiya said slowly, cheeks reddening at her social blunder. “Are you finished yet?”

“Yes,” the Rito snorted. “Okay I’m done. For real. I’m sorry!”

Forcing herself to keep a straight-face, Cheska shook her head, composing herself. “Goddesses. You just caught me by surprise is all. I’m recovering after an old friend showed up to the village yesterday. Big fiesta, great fun even though I couldn’t stay too long.

Jini brought out the good pisco this time.”

She smiled at Maiya’s blank expression, unperturbed by the lack of an equally excited response. Stepping back, she offered the Hylian the package she’d been holding on to. “Anyway, on a completely unrelated note, that mysterious blue Rito stopped by to leave this for you before dawn this morning.”

The Enchanter looked at the brown-paper package. She wondered if it was a good time to open it, but could feel Cheska’s poorly hidden curiosity bearing down on her. Might as well. Without much hesitation, she pulled on the thin rope holding it together.

A piece of cloth fell into her waiting hand.

It was a bandana. Dyed an azure blue, it reminded her of clear summer skies and the blue nightshades that glowed in her mentor’s study. Running her thumb over the soft fabric, she found that whilst it was simple and unpatterned, it was soft and very well-made. Unfolding it, a delicate piece of paper fell out, fluttering to the floor before she caught it.

She smiled, wondering if this was the prideful Rito’s version of an apology. Unbeknownst to her, her heart warmed at the thought.

Maiya quickly read the note:

So your haphazard hair doesn’t endanger us today - Revali.

The Hylian scowled, crumpling the message and stuffing it in her pocket. “Why am I so surprised?” She muttered. Despite her ire, she delicately smoothed out the blue bandana in her hand, pulling it around her hair and knotting it with irate conviction.

Saying a quick “Thank you and Good Morning” to the innkeeper, she began to angrily brisk walk up the village stairs.

Cheska waved her goodbye. “And where are you off to now, hylianlla?”

“I’m going to fight a Frost Talus.” She called over her shoulder casually.

“You’re what?!”

“Bye, Cheska!”

Revali was already waiting for her at the top of the stairs. He tapped his talons on the ground, leaning impatiently against the archway. The armour he had on the day they first met was fitted securely around his form, slightly hidden away by a flowing white scarf wrapped snug around his neck.

His back was to the sun, making it necessary for her to shield her eyes as she approached. Whilst there was no royalty amongst the Rito, he looked every bit like an irritable prince as light streamed from the heavens behind him.

His honeyed, infuriating voice called out to her as soon as he saw her hand leave the banister.

“You’re late.”

Maiya wordlessly tossed an object at him, the Rito Warrior snatching it from the air with ease. He looked down at the warm pastry that nearly hit him in the face, its icing topping and cinnamon scent unmistakeable. “A sweetroll?”

“Breakfast.” The Enchanter said, falling into step beside him as they walked down the ramp and onto the expansive launch point. The breeze was strong from this open landing, the battered wind markers around them whipping chaotically in the open air. These were the kind of conditions favourable to sailors, carrying amazing wooden creations to places unknown.

And I guess Rito as well, she thought, narrowly avoiding a tall, orange-feathered figure that landed a few feet away. Maiya righted herself, nearly stumbling backwards in surprise.

"Sorry, chika!" They called out, stepping around her quickly and making a beeline for the stairs.

The Hylian looked on in bewilderment, tugging a little self-consciously on her bandana as she turned back to face the archer. “What the...ah, anyway. I was on my way here when I realised I hadn’t eaten yet. Decided to stop by the bakery.”

Revali took a bite from the roll, making a small hum in approval before reaching into the utility pouch attached to his belt. Pulling out a glass vial, he passed it to the Enchanter. “My thanks then, as well as your payment.”

“What’s this?” She asked, narrowing her eyes at the vermillion liquid within. She uncorked the stopper and took a whiff of the unknown substance. It was pungent and sharp, making her pull away.

“Spicy Elixir. So you, pardon my bluntness, avoid freezing your pointed ears off whilst we’re traversing through the mountains.”

Maiya smelled it again, wrinkling her nose.

Revali tut-tted, though his eyes gleamed with barely hidden amusement. That bastard. “I don’t want to hear any complaints. The arctic chill is merciless. You need to drink it if you plan to keep all your limbs intact.”

She looked at the Spicy Elixir again, watching the dubious liquid slosh to the side—Oh Hylia, is that a butterfly wing?— before throwing it back as one would a shot. The warmth that came was instantaneous, as if an invisible force had suddenly encased her. It wrapped around her in the same way a blanket that had been left to heat close to the fireplace would. She was filled with a renewed sense of energy and realised then how cold her joints really were even in her heaviest of clothes.

Revali chuckled.

She opened her eyes, the curve of her mouth falling into a frown. “Care to share?”

“Not that I was speaking any falsehoods regarding the warming effects of the elixir but,” he smiled crookedly, shaking his head. “You trust too easily, Hylian.” Securing his bow to his front, he faced north and crouched.

Her brow twitched. “Me? Trust you?” Maiya shot back defensively as she hoisted herself up, minding this time not to grab on too tightly onto any feathers. “When Death Mountain freezes over.”

   Deep breaths and reign in the attitude was what she told herself as they left the landing. The drop still terrified her, her chest sinking to her knees everytime Revali so much as bobbed with the wind. She was thankful at least that the weather was favourable enough that he chose to forego the dive. Instead, he caught the gale with his outstretched wings, flapping and gaining height as they progressed forward.

Some adventurers on horseback looked up as they passed, many of them gaping in awe at the blue feathered warrior who sailed above them. Revali made no comment, head facing forward and beak an impassive line. Though the subtle fluff to his feathers gave him away, betraying the fact that he was basking in the attention.

Behind her, Rito Village became smaller with every passing minute, slowly disappearing behind the clouds until even the largest windmill was but a wink in the distance. Glittering waters turned into grassy forests as flat ground made way to grey rocks and white tipped bushes.

Revali’s wings caught a strong gust of wind, gaining speed as he advanced them forward through to the Hebra Mountains. Clouds parted, the white shroud slowly lifting to reveal a whole different world.

She felt like they were flying amongst giants. White capped peaks dominated the landscape from all directions, filling her peripheries and extending out into the distance. Reduced visibility combined with the blinding ivory void made it seem like it could go on forever. She’d never seen mountains like this before.

The wind also sounded different here. She would have thought that as a Rito, perpetually at mercy to the gale, he would find it troubling. Between these icy mountains it was wild and unruly, every gust pushing into them from different directions. However, as they ventured deeper into Hebra, it became apparent that Revali felt no fear.

If the breeze slammed into them at full force, he always knew just how to angle himself. Tilting, flapping, flying—anything to propel himself higher and further than ever before.

When it rebelled, he would soothe it. When it dropped away, he would easily reclaim it.

And when it calmed, a steady push against his wings, he would truly soar.

It was a literal breath of fresh air. Maiya could have sworn she was dreaming, still asleep in her room at Cheska’s inn. Up in the air, Revali was far from the gloating asshole who had nearly killed her with an arrow and never apologised. At this moment, he was quiet and precise, riding the gale like he was born amongst the clouds.

They flew behind one of the many snowy peaks, an empty mountain pass coming into view. Keeping close to the exposed mountain face at their left, Revali began to slow, aiming for a far-away spot jutting out perpendicular to the cliffside.

Landing on a slab of extended rock, he gestured for her to sit down, surprising her when he did the same.

The Hylian tried not to look down. They were suspended about 50 feet above the ground. Wind sifted through her hair, dancing around them and lightly ruffling the feathers along his side. She took this time to catch her breath, the mountain air surprising her with its sweetness. Vaguely she could detect the scent of the pine sticking up like pillars in the pure-white snow underneath them.

Temporarily shutting her eyes, she focused on her other senses. Cold rock underneath her fingers. Whistles from the wind. The smell of the pine trees mingling with something else. Wax and oak, with a hint of honey. She racked her brain for a reason why such an odd combination was now familiar to her.

Something cold touched her nose.

Maiya opened her eyes. She watched as snowflakes fell from the sky, imprinting temporary patterns on her clothes and melting on her exposed skin.

Then, like most times, panic decided to reel in its ugly head from out of nowhere.

Now seated and breath returning to her lungs, deep trepidation filled her. One scenario came after another, joining together and mixing into a single, big clusterfuck of a ‘what-if?’ What if she couldn’t fight? What if her knives never found purchase?

What if she froze? She could see the moment playing out clear as day. The fear would paralyze her. Glued to the ground with an angry Talus rushing towards her. Stuck in place until she was crushed underfoot like a bug.

“Stop that.”

Maiya turned to see that Revali had taken out his bow, running a feather down the gears. It was an intricate weapon, painted a steadfast dark-blue and embellished with geometric patterns along its sides.

“Stop what?”

“Thinking so loudly.” He explained, grunting with effort when he tightened a screw.

Her eye twitched in annoyance at his tone. Must he always pick a fight with me? She frowned indignantly. “I’m not allowed to plan ahead?”

“You call that planning?" He scoffed. "Don’t fool yourself, enchanter. I’m not blind. You’re running your mind ragged again, overly ruminating on imaginary events that have yet come to pass.”

He began to adjust the bow’s string, running a feather down its side. “If you continue looking behind only to lose your head in the endless possibilities of potential threats, then you are defenseless to the already existing enemy running towards you. Expecting to survive like that is foolish. You will be better off fighting with your eyes closed.”

He set the bow down on his lap, training his full attention onto her. Her breath hitched. She found herself at the mercy of eyes a deep, emerald green. Piercing and sharper than any of the knives she was carrying, not a single detail escaping his notice.

“You will not be able to face your opponent effectively if you keep battling yourself. Truly look at what’s in front of you. Do that properly, and you will not miss.”

The Enchanter was silent, still feeling very much pinned under the intensity of his gaze. He’d only known her for a day or two and had already managed to find the holes in her armour, striking at them with such precise accuracy that she didn’t know whether she should thank him for the honest assessment, or push him off the ledge for his blatant rudeness and reading of her character. Her hand twitched as the rune sent a jolt up her arm, dancing along to the erratic beat of her heart.

But why…, she found herself wondering, unable to stop herself from staring back. Unknowingly, she leaned forward ever so slightly, flecks of snow falling around them. Why is he looking at me like that?

The mountainside shuddered, making them both jolt up in surprise. Hurriedly, she rushed to the edge of the short rock platform, the tension on her shoulders tightening in a vice grip at what she saw below.

It was colossal. Terrifying to the point where it almost crossed over the line to awe-inspiring by the sheer characteristic of its size. Rising from the earth, it shook and shuddered as if possessed, hobbling forward and slamming its gargantuan stone fists into the snow covered forest floor with so much force that it shook the mountain and their platform once again. From her vantage point, she could see the piece of ore at the top of its head, sparkling in the morning light like a jewel on a crown.

When the Talus’ hands came away from the ground, Maiya saw that they were coated in red. Not blood, she thought, too pink and thick. Though the longer she looked, she noticed the same pinkish red substance coating its body in different places. On its bare face, along its leg, all across its rock appendages. It flowed and bubbled, creeping along the Talus’ body like a parasitic weed, dripping like acidic rain and melting the pure white snow below.

Uleh did not mention that.

She coughed, her throat suddenly dry and scratchy. “I think that’s our target.”

Revali exhaled a small cloud of air, unbothered. “Hm? That’s new. I thought we would have to lure it up from the ground. Seems it has done most of the work for us.” He pointed to the quiver of arrows on his back, some arrowheads curled and shaped to resemble a single flame. “It will go down easy with a few of these in its body. After all, a monster that relies solely on a barrier of ice stands no chance against the blaze of fire.”

He stood up, brushing the snow from his shoulder, a futile gesture as more began to rain down anyway. “No rush, it won’t be able to see us from up here.” He tapped the rock floor with his talons. “It uses the vibrations in the ground to make an ‘educated’ guess as to where its victim would be. From our vantage point, it’s like we don’t even exist.”

She tilted her head to the side, watching the Talus amble and sway from left to right, still feeling apprehensive at how relaxed Revali was in this situation. Warriors really are something else.

He brought the bow to his front, stretching his wings to the sky like he was about to go for a leisurely run and not, well, fight a rock monster that would crush you if you so much as sneezed on it. “Well then, enchanter. I do hope this seat provides you with an adequate view for the show this morning. Just sit back and get comfortable.”

Maiya stood and stalked towards him, not caring that she was invading his personal space as she stabbed a finger into his chestplate. “Get comfortable? What are you talking about?”

He took advantage of the height difference, looking down at her past the tip of his beak like he was appraising a petulant child. “You honestly believe I would let you fight that thing?”

She wanted to rip her hair out. “This venture is purely for my benefit, I am not letting you do all the dirty-work while I sit on my ass and watch like some useless piece of shi-”

The ground shuddered again. Both barely had time to react when a boulder was sent flying in their direction.

She blinked, suddenly finding herself gripping onto Revali’s front as they hurtled to the ground below. The Rito Warrior somersaulted in the air, the seconds of uncontrolled flight and pure free fall eating up the scream bubbling in her throat.

Then, his wings were outstretched, miraculously by the Goddess' grace catching the wind, slowing their descent before they hit the snow covered ground with a painful thud.

Her brain rattled, eyes fluttering and struggling to clear the fog blocking her vision. Her ears rang as she heaved in a breath, the very action making her cry out in pain. Her ribs hurt. Her hand...her hand was—!!

Shattered rocks rained above them. The Enchanter yelped, Revali’s voice loud in her ear as he gasped in alarm, wrapping his wings around her and rolling them to the side just as a large chunk of what used to be their platform stabbed into the spot where their bodies were half a second ago.

The Rito released his hold on her, standing up and equipping his bow in a single fluid motion. Through the haze of her clouded vision, she watched as he took aim, pulled the bowstring back and fired.

It surprised her how a monster without a mouth could make such a chilling sound. Cracking rock and a screech so glaringly inhuman reached her ears, making her blood run cold.

There was truly no turning back now.

In the next moment, her arm found itself in a vice grip as Revali hauled her to her feet, pulling her along as they sought cover in a nearby sparse grove of trees. Chest heaving, her brain struggled to catch up to what had just transpired. Barely, it managed to process the feeling of blue feathered wings running down her arms, tilting her head from left to right and brushing the hair away from her eyes.

“W-what are you doing?”

“Checking for injuries.” He said tersely. “Where are we?”

“Huh?”

Head snapping up, his eyes once again commanded her undivided attention. They were the same emeralds as before, except this time completely void of any kind of relaxed confidence, replaced now by a sharp focus and a clinical detachedness that made her stomach clench. “Hylian, do you know where we are right now?”

“Rospro Pass.” She said, remembering the words on Uleh’s map.

“Good. Did anything hurt when we were running towards the trees?”

Maiya blinked quickly. “No. Oh, well actually— fuck!” She screamed, hands slapping Revali’s wing away as she pulled her arms in to wrap around her aching torso. Her left hand shook and spasmed, strings of energy rattling through her veins like barbed wire cutting into her skin. This was too much. Mortifyingly, tears sprang up in the corner of her eyes. She’d been through much, much worse, but no matter how many times her rune had tortured her, pain is no different. Feeling something stuck in her throat, she spat it out to the side, a glob of fresh blood hitting the snow.

“Sorry,” Revali said quickly. “I need you to move your arms away.” With a little more prying, she agreed, too caught up in her panic for herself and the active and angry rune in her hand to feel embarrassed that he was lifting up the edge of her shirt, his wing poking the reddened, inflamed skin above her ribs as she hissed.

“One of them is fractured, but not severe enough to pierce the skin or anything important internally. At least from what I can see. Can you take some short breaths for me?”

She nodded, wincing at the sound of her wheeze.

“Then you’ll live.” Both their heads shot up to the direction of the same otherworldly screech from before, echoing not too far away from their current position. “Tch,” the Rito archer straightened up, reaching into one of his side pouches and pulling out a wide bandage. He made quick work of wrapping it around her middle, tying the knot and yanking her shirt back down. “You need to run away, enchanter. Follow the path down the mountain, there’s a guard post at the foot. Tell them to bring reinforcements.”

She glared at him, eyes red and venomous. “No! Not without you. I already told you, Rito, this is my mess and I am seeing it through.”

“We don’t have time for this,” he muttered, frantically scanning the clearing for some other kind of cover and coming up blank. “I’m still unsure as to what it is, but there is something wrong with this Talus. I’ve fought only two previous but I am confident that this one is different. It’s faster—smarter somehow.”

“And it can see us.”

“Yes, either through sheer dumb luck or something else entirely. Its movements are unpredictable. Almost like it’s being controlled from the sidelines.” He gritted out, annoyance shining clear at having to solve such a puzzle under immense pressure. He swiped the fallen snow away from his eyes, growling.

She directed her gaze to the floor, focusing on the patch of red seeping into the snow by her feet. Her blood was a stain against what was once uniform purity. Another roar echoed through the trees, this time accompanied by the crash of heavy footsteps, dragging through the snow. “I know you’re one of the best of your people, but even then there’s no way you can hold it back for that long without getting hurt.” She tried to reason.

Revali shook his head, squeezing her shoulder before turning to bolt past the grove. “I’ll distract it. Run!”

“Wait!” She reached out to pull him back, but her hand was met with only empty air. Pure dread stole the breath from her lungs as she watched him exit out the trees and into the open clearing where the Talus waited to meet him. Another jolt of pain rocketed through her hand. Combined with the stabbing ache in her chest it was almost unbearable. She inhaled shakily, moving forward and following the tracks that Revali’s talons had made on the ground, fighting for her eyes to stay open as she stumbled out into the light.

Snow lightly fell from the sky, brushing down azure feathers that fluffed at the edges as Revali levelled his bow. He fired three in quick succession, cutting a red line through the air like a shooting star. Each sunk into the Talus’ icy exterior, melting patches with a low hiss and exposing the black rock underneath.

Falling forward, the monster sunk back into the ground. Revali took advantage of the situation, sprinting away towards the cliff face to gain more distance.

Maiya took this chance to move as well, footsteps sinking into the snowy ground as she struggled forward in the direction of the Talus. The ground shuddered again as she launched herself at it, a knife in each hand. She dug the blades into its exposed interior, holding on for dear life as she scrambled to gain purchase.

“What are you doing?!” A frantic, angry voice yelled out.

“Fire more arrows!” Bracing her feet on the Talus’ surface, she took a chance and let go of one of her improvised hand holds, grabbing another knife from her bandolier and swinging it up to stab it into the last open patch of rock. She hoisted herself up, screaming out in agony but nonetheless refusing to let go. “Please!” She called out, feet slipping against the rock’s surface.

Something whistled past her ear. An arrow embedded itself into the space above her, rapidly evaporating the ice. Then came another, and another, marking a pathway up to the Talus’ zenith. Again she freed her opposite hand, fractured ribs shifting and aching as she stabbed a dagger upwards, pulling herself closer to the ore.

The strange parasitic pink substance flowed down next to her, emitting a stench of rot that made her gag. Carefully she maneuvered around it, not wanting to find out for herself what would happen if even the skin of her hand were to brush it.

Continuing to climb, she struggled against another monster, one intent on taking full control of her wavering resolve. It was a beast formed of intense fear and regret, tugging at her mind and causing her hold to grow shakier with every passing minute. Why didn’t you run away?! It roared.

The thud of another arrow spurred her forward, her adrenaline running high as she devoted her focus solely to reaching the top.

Almost there. For a moment, she could finally see the ore’s surface, shining only an arm’s length away from her. Maiya reached again for her bandolier, shaking fingers brushing an empty pocket.

“Fuck sakes,” she cursed. She was out of knives.

Clouds of air escaped her mouth as she leaned her head on the monster’s surface, an intense feeling of hopelessness freezing her movements. Everything felt heavy, the swinging scabbard at her hip weighing her down and threatening to weaken her hold on her knife.

Wait, there’s still...

Her hand drifted down to where the enchanted dagger was sheathed. In response, the rune spasmed, sending a shock through her veins in disagreement as if it knew exactly what she was going to do.

Not once did Teacher mention what would happen if she were to use an enchanted weapon of her own make. She was neither Master nor an unworthy stranger. So many things could go wrong. Would it kill her? Would it even work? What would happen if—!

Underneath her, the Talus shuddered.

Her heart skipped a beat.

Slowly, the surface began to move, lifting itself from the snow. All around her, the parasitic fluid coating its body came alive, calling out in celebration. Several arrows rained down from the sky, piercing into the Talus’ armour but failing to deter it from its course. The monster began to stand.

Maiya unbuckled the enchanted dagger from its scabbard. Grabbing the hilt, she lifted it up, and with all the strength in her body, swung up and stabbed it into the Talus’ ore.

There was a flash of light, an ear piercing screech, and suddenly she was in the air again.

It was like a bad dream. She could see the white ground hurtling towards her. Curling into herself, she braced just in time before her body collided with the snow. Something solid hit her head, rattling her brain and causing her world to turn black.

.

.

.

Wa…ke…!

Fire. Everything was on fire. She was drowning in a sea of fleeing people, ribbons of smoke were filling her lungs and the smell of burning and rot was choking her. A blood moon was in the sky.

Wa...ke….p

A figure was standing at the doorway of a crumbling house, calling out to her. Their feathers were burnt, dissipating into ashes as the skin underneath began to melt to the bone.

“I’m sorry, there are too many people!” She tried to scream, voice refusing to leave her lips as she fought helplessly against the tide. “Don’t just stand there! You need to run! I can’t— ”

A lilting voice, warm as sunlight, whispered in her ear.

“Hylianlla. Please. Wake up.”

.

.

.

In a disorienting second, her surroundings slammed back into place. Maiya sucked in a shaky breath, her cheek throbbing. Cold snow melted underneath her, seeping into her clothes and stinging like a thousand needles pressing into her skin.

The ground began to shake. A familiar voice was calling out to her. “Get up! Valloo damnit, enchanter! Stand!”

Every vein, every cell and atom in her bruised body cried out. She wanted to go back to sleep. This was too much.

Weakly, she rolled onto her stomach, the pain in her ribs causing her eyes to snap open. Coughing, she spat more blood onto the snow, her arms and knees shaking as she slowly began to stand.

She’d been thrown into the midst of an earthquake. Dazed, her head lolled upwards, watching in frozen horror as the Talus barrelled towards her, its heavy steps falling in time to the shuddering of the world underneath her feet.

Behind it, Revali furiously loosed arrow after arrow. Not one missed their mark, but not a single shot had managed to melt through its ice encasing. Belatedly, she realised that the archer had run out of fire arrows. The odds were stacked against them.

Yelling, she threw herself to the side, dodging a giant rock hurled in her direction. Desperately, she scrambled back onto her feet, avoiding one stone after another by the skin of her teeth. The monster continued to gain on her, quickly closing the distance between them.

Maiya blinked away the sweat from her eyes, the fear in her heart that had kept her alive for this long gradually losing its hold over her to the pull of fatigue. If she devoted herself to running, she wouldn’t be able to avoid the Talus’ attacks. If she slowed her run to focus on dodging, it would catch up to her in seconds.

I’m not going to make it.

Mind reeling, she didn’t notice the rock jutting up behind her. She tripped, falling face first into the snow. The monster shrieked in delight. Shaking violently, she tried to stand again, falling back down as the muscles in her legs seized from overuse.

The Talus was but a metre away at this point. Even if she tried, she wouldn’t be able to outrun it. A rare moment of peace settled over her as she slowly stood up.

If she were to die here, she wouldn’t die lying down.

As the monster approached, she managed to catch the glint of her enchanted dagger still embedded into the cracking ore. It was uncontrolled, spewing out flames in an unfettered act of rage. Her greatest creation was violent and angry, but the Talus remained unshaken. It would take days for it to make a noticeable dent.

What have I done?

Standing her ground, she watched as the Talus raised its fists to the sky, blocking out the sun as it readied itself to slam down and put an end to her life. She didn’t know what to think. Light escaped from the seams of her glove, the rune all but bursting into flames. Hylia, did it hurt. But it didn’t matter. This would all be over soon.

She kept her eyes open, making a quiet wish somewhere deep in her tired soul that despite all the odds stacked against them, Revali would escape.

A streak of red sailed through the sky.

Equal parts shocked and horrified, Maiya watched as the Talus’ movements suddenly came to a halting stop. All reality slowed. Rock arms, once raised high as a terrifying monument to her mortality, dropped to its sides as it turned around.

Facing completely away from her, the monster directed its attention to the Rito archer behind it, revealing to the Enchanter the single fire arrow protruding from its back.

Revali dropped his bow, every one of his arrows completely expended. Out of options, he unsheathed the hunter’s knife strapped to his belt, gripping it tightly between both his wings. “Hey, blockhead!” He called out, beak curved up in a mocking, open smile. “Face me.”

The repulsive pink parasite bubbled and writhed, releasing a vile, high-pitched wail. Its host shuddered to life, starting forward and dragging its hulking body along the snow in the direction of the Pride of the Rito.

Her body moved on its own.

West Rospro Pass melted into a mess of sound and colour. The pain that rippled through her chest, the frustration, the fear; all of it blended together and were cast aside as every fibre in her being rallied and converged on a single goal.

Nothing mattered beyond Getting. There. First.

Bringing her hand to her mouth, she sank her teeth into the glove, ripping it away. Energy sparked and crackled underneath her skin. Beams of blue light spilled from her scar, warming the surface of her cheek and begging for release.

“YOU STUPID BIRD!”

Revali lifted his head, green eyes stunned when he saw the Hylian sprinting closer.

The earth trembled as the Talus neared. In a last ditch effort she grabbed the Rito by his white scarf, yanking him behind her and placing herself between him and the path of the monster.

It was only steps away now, close enough for her to feel the chill of the ice on the tip of her nose. Operating on pure instinct, she raised her left arm, trying not to flinch as the shadow of the Talus’ form fell over the both of them.

Panic seized her unexpectedly. She was dumped into the ocean again and rapidly sinking, struggling to keep her head above the waves as the storm thrashed mercilessly around her.

Caught in the undertow, she fought to stay afloat.

This is my fault.

I did this.

I can’t let him die.

I can’t let him die!

I can’t—

Someone held her shoulder. Warm breath fanned the hairs on the back of her neck. Revali’s voice, lacking its usual sardonic edge, was but a gentle whisper on her skin, piercing through the water and pulling her up from the depths.

“Maiya.” He said, grounding her.

Without another thought, she plunged her glowing arm into the core of the Frost Talus. The parasite screamed and thrashed in alarm. For the first time in her life, she allowed herself to let go, letting the pull of the rune take over.

Her outstretched hand sunk past the ice with ease, beams of blue light escaping through the cracks of the rock and illuminating the Pass.

In mere seconds, her vision was full of nothing but fire. The Frost Talus, in its unfathomable enormity, was lost and overtaken in the light of the flames.

[writeanapocalae]

Inktober: Humiliation

Warnings for torture, gore, body horror, murder, and just lots of nasty stuff. 

And in an instant, as all of the pain that had formed it, sliding in through its ever expanding nerve endings, it went still. The fire was put out, slick black ooze like coagulated blood slipping over its still muscles, sucking it down and down. It was in a tar pit, cooled and encapsulated in the icy pressure. It closed its eyes, for it was dead and going to wherever it was meant to go, which may have been Hell or Heaven or just the earth. It had no way of knowing. It could not remember what it had done in life, all of its actions a distant memory, buried behind so many layers that there was no point in trying to remember. What good would a memory do for it?

It did not remember how it had died or even how long it had been dead.

It did not know if that mattered.

It relished in the slick slide of the cold darkness, the thick ink that poured through it’s flesh to wrap around tendons and bones, to massage against the broken pieces of it, to sift and sit heavy in its insides, coating its insides. The darkness filled it veins and it became the liquid, feeling a connection to what it came from, down in the depths, down beneath the earth, part shadow and part nothingness. It felt most connected to the eyes that were watching it, buried beneath the black waves of sludge.

A hand reached down, yellow and wrapped in rubber, it was too large, too foreign, as it dug down through the grime. It pulled back trying to pull away from the hand, but it tangled in its hair easily, and tugged, a sharp sting of pain lancing through its scalp, reminding its nerves of what pain was. It wrapped its own hands around the yellow wrist, squeezed and tugged, but it would not release its hair. In fact, it dug in deeper, grabbed firmer, and it when it yanked its head followed. Slowly it was dragged out of the darkness, out of the safe cocoon of darkness. It sputtered as its head came free, lungs revolting against the foreign concept of air. It struggled, found itself heavy and weak from the wet of its home.

“Come now,” came the frustrated voice of the man that held it. “We’re not through with you yet.”

It could not see the man, it was blinded by the bright candlelight. It could not fight him either. It was dropped to the hard floor, feeling cold and exposed as it gurgled and spasmed, trying to breathe, to remember how.

It could hear and what it heard was so loud. It was as if each breath of its own was the shuddering of a building’s collapse. The sounds of the others in the room, those watching it, were far worse. It was a reminder that it was not alone, hearing them gasp and shriek, which felt like nails shoved into its soft brain, and someone vomit.

That hand was still in its hair and the man pulled on it until it was half standing, awkward and rolling, pitching, its feet unused to carrying anything as heavy as a body. “What a wretched thing you are? The voice hissed, “Something must have gone wrong, you’re not even whole. What are we supposed to do with this?”

It was tossed, forced to catch itself on its feeble legs or even weaker arms. It ended up catching itself on its arms, catching something hard and solid and flat. It cracked its eyes open, trying to see amongst the brightness. It was a table that it had caught itself on, covered in blood and candles and runes. It couldn’t make sense out of any of it. There were, attached to the legs and sitting on top, unlocked and waiting, four pairs of manacles, what wasn’t locked in place open and waiting.

Its hands were bare. It looked from them up its arms, down its chest. It was more than nude. It had no skin at all. Instead it had bones that looked like charred wood, black and flaking, and white tendons spiraling around them. Pulsing and shifting around them were thick black tendrils, not acting as muscles, not reacting like muscles, but taking their place. It was a constantly shifting, dark thing. No wonder they were having such a hard time looking at it.

It turned on them. They were all wearing yellow suits and yellow gloves, their faces hidden behind bucket-like masks. Hazmat suits, part of its lizard brain woke up to remind it. There were more runes on the suits, painted in red, and a large black horseshoe with a diagonal line through it.

That was a symbol that it knew, one that it would never forget.

Umbra.

There was a woman on the floor, not wearing that mask, she must have taken it off to vomit at its sight. Now she was seizing, blood spilling out from her exposed orifices, others in full suits, holding her down. Just being around it would kill them. That made it smile. It wasn’t a short death. It was suffering and it was cold and it was relentless. It was what Umbra deserved.

The man that had ripped it away from its comfortable death was rumbling, the words of some sticky spell groaning under his breath. It was like wood splintering and it felt small and humble in its wake. It could not move. It could do nothing. The flames burned brighter. It was shoved closer to the table by the man’s arms, as he kept reciting, lifting and moving until it was laying on the table. It was humiliated by its own inadequacy as it was bound, hands and feet to the hardwood.

“How dare you try to escape us,” the man growled in its ear. It turned its head away. Everything was so loud. “You really thought that a little thing like dying was going to get you away from us? After all of the resources we put into you? Into making you what you are?”

It shook its head. It wanted to be away. It didn’t know what the man was talking about. It didn’t know what it was. Out of the corner of its eye they could see one of those holding the woman down draw a knife and slit her throat, see the blood spray out of her before another started to collect it with a roll of plastic bags.

It hadn’t spoken for so long. When it tried it just came out like water through dirt, most of it left behind to make a thick mud. “P-pleease.”

The man had no pity. Even though he was human he seemed to have absolutely nothing humane in him. His hand slipped down its chin and down to it’s chest, where he started to dig. He slid the squirming darkness out of the way of its ashy ribs and shoved through the bones. The sound of them cracking and sloughing apart was almost as painful of them turning to dust. Its back arched as it screamed, no sound coming out of it, just so much salty air.

He grabbed its heart, lifting it out of the broken nest of ribs, and another, shorter man in a hazmat suit came to it, holding out a bag of the woman’s blood. The heart was a dry desiccated thing, twisted and shaped like a conch shell, including the deep groove down one side. It was hardly half the size it should have been.

He dropped the heart into the bag and it slumped. It felt like the heart was still in there, not beating, not keeping it alive, but the size was there, made of something far heavier. It felt like there was a mass of lead ore inside of it.

“Once we get you dressed, your going back to your room,” the man said, and he was running his hand along its scalp. Before, he had dragged it up by its hair, now it seemed it didn’t have any at all. “And you’re going to have to work hard to get in our good graces again. How much do you think you can take from Umbra before we ask for something back? Well, we’re asking for all of it back now. With interest.”

It turned its head, seeing how the woman was now still and very much dead. It envied her. She could not feel pain as they cut long strips of skin off of her, more bags catching more blood.

The hand was on its jaw now, its attention wrenched back as he forced it to look at him. “We lost months of progress because of you! And we had to lose even more to get you back. Don’t forget that we own you.”

It snarled at him, or it tried to. It was hard to move with the hand so steady on it, and it was hard to move when the muscles were moving on their own accord.

The bags of blood were poured onto it, made to soak into the scales in its bones, making it feel wet and heavy and like it was drowning. If it had lungs it did not know but there was an ache in them, as if they were just kicked back into gear. The skin was wrapped around it too, forcing the squirming to tighten so the tendrils were pressed tight against its bones. The skin turned black when it touched it, as if soaking up the disease that it carried.

More words were said, not in the language that the eyes in the darkness had known but something else, something that sounded newer, somehow. It hadn’t even realized that it had been spoken to in the cradle of death.

By the time they were done, it was shivering, the cold no longer comforting but too real, and its body felt too physical for comfort. It was unbound and, now defeated and terrified, realizing that it had no escape, no idea what they wanted from it, it let them do as they wished. They flipped it onto its back and the man, who must have been in charged, pulled out a small blade. It screeched as the knife plunged into its back, into the bandaged of black flesh, as he carved the terrible symbol of their organization into it as deep as possible.

It would not try to escape the way that it had. Death was no longer considered safe. Someone had to carry it to its ‘room’ which was nothing more than a glass cell where they could watch it from all sides and then dump it inside. It did not remember why it had tried to escape but now it understood why.

It wouldn’t try to escape. There would be no need to escape. It would walk out of here easily. It just had to kill them all first. 

[feral-moonsaber]

Moonsong [Wandering Stars Pt 1]

Lady Anarah Lummeth brought the panflute to her lips as she walked barefoot through the large entertaining garden of her family's estate. The moon rose in full, visible through the slowly flowering trees that marked the central alcove. The estate was not as large as some; though incredibly old, the Lummeth’s line was not as prosperous as other families. They bartered in wine, magic, and secrets - commodities equally powerful and rare. Yet most of that wealth and power vanished when her dear father turned Felborne and Elisandre fell from grace. Now she fought tooth and nail to regain even a small amount of what had been.

The notes from her panflute turned sour and she took it from her lips. She fought, and fought and fought, because she'd been left the responsibility of the house, by the one person she was sworn to protect. She felt no ill will to her sister for her choice, but Anarah did not feel joy either at her name.

She stepped under the Moon Gate, hand touching the ancient stone in greeting. A long lost relic of their Highborne roots, layers and layers of runic wards had protected the sanctum within for millennia. Her touch flared magic through the stone and allowed her passage. The gate shimmered as her hand slipped from the stone.

Anarah shared almost all of her features with her elder sister, save the runes scarred into Sildre's dark skin, and Anarah's white feline eyes. They were so close in age, they were treated as twins. A paultry five years separated their births. She was the Heir's Protector, her Nightprowler (though -that- title was saved for their lost sister Lyewen) and she would do anything for her sister.

Even becoming the head of the family.

She stepped out from under the small ivy covered path into the sactumn proper. Moonlight lit the small space with an ethereal glow. The sactumn was about thirty feet across and round, barriered by hedges of starlit roses. A fine carpet of moss stretched from side to side, broken only by the white stone statue at the North end of the space. Standing several feet taller than Anarah was a perfect replica of her mother.

In front of the statue was a small altar and plaque. The plaque read

'Blessed be is our Mother Moon,

She who lights the way in the dark.’

Anarah crouched by the altar, lighting a candle at the East and West sides of the altar. The flames flickered and steadied, two beacons of light against the dark. The common story of her mother's death was that of withering. That her father cast her mother out of the fold for not taking the Fel and left her to die. That was the story Sildre had been told.

That was, however, not the whole truth.

She settled between the candles in front of an offering plate. The druidess bit her thumb, drawing blood. She drew a rune on the plate in broad strokes of red. The stone hummed as she finished the sigil of the Lummeth House.

“Blood to blood I call to thee,

Mother Moon, show thyself to me.

Blood to blood I summon thee,

Mother Moon, shine thy light upon me.”

Anarah thrust a dagger into the middle of the sigil, finding home in a hidden slot in the stone. The sigil flared to life, shining bright with moonlight. She stepped back, the moonlight beginning to coalesce in front of the statue. Panflute to her lips, she began to play a soft tune. Magic hung on the notes and the air felt heavy with it. Gathering this much energy in one place was always a risk, but Anarah was not who she was by chance.

The music steadied the magic, brought order to it, and the light solidified into a woman the mirror image of the statue. She was one solid color, except for the dark runes covering her white skin. Like Sildre, she too bore the weight of her magic upon her skin, and like very true Mother Moon before her.

Their mother did not die as the stories suggested. She and every other Matriarch before her became one with the Leylines upon their death. Though, she had not died. Not truly.

“My Crescent Moon…” said her mother, voice echoing and full of power. Anarah bowed deeply.

“Mother Moon, I thank you for gracing me with your presence this eve. I bring---” Power touched her chin, guiding her up until she looked at her mother's glowing face. It unnerved her, the sheer force of power humming against her skin. Her mother had always been a power magistrix, but this was… unheard of. Had she really gained so much power in the few short years she'd been gone? How had Anarah not noticed the other times she'd called upon her mother for guidance?

Her mother had never touched her before, she realized. Never felt the touch and power seeping into her veins and mind.

“My dear Crescent Moon, you need not be so formal. Now… tell me what has happened,” said her mother with a smile that did not quite reach her eyes. Anarah took a small step back, if only to disable the connection between them. Her mind cleared; she hadn't even noticed it was clouded.

“Our Wandering Star has gone dark, my Lady. Moreover the whole of Quel'thalas has gone dark. I cannot scry in, nor find the leylines connecting it to the rest of the world. It is though… it's vanished.

Yet we know that forces moved towards the home of the Sin'dorei, and more still move north via the sea. I fear she and the company she is keeping is in danger.”

Her mother was silent as she spoke, the only indication she was even real being subtle changes in her brow and lips. Once, Anarah could read her mother like a book; now it seemed the Leylines had changed beyond even that.

“... Yes,” said the Mother Moon after a moment, refocusing on Anarah. “I too have lost connection with our Wandering Star. I believe it is time we remind her of her place in the cosmos, Crescent Moon. You are to find her and bring her back into the fold. You have done a commendable job, but you are not the Heir.”

If she'd expected the words to sting, she was mildly surprised. They rolled off of her like water, and Anarah felt a weight lift from her shoulders. Her mother understood that much, at least.

“It is time our Black Moon reclaimed her birthright.”

Power thrummed in the air and Anarah shivered.

“Find her, and if she does not come willingly, make her. By any means necessary,” commanded her mother. A hand of power pressed against her face. Magic poured into her, setting her nerves on fire. It filled her up, up up until she felt like she would burst. She cried out in pain, and her mother let go.

“... I forget how fragile we are as flesh…” said the Mother Moon. She floated back and smiled again, not reaching her eyes. Anarah fell forward, body still humming with power. Stars it felt like she was burning.

“May the Moon guide and protect you, my Crescent Moon.”

Light flashed and Anarah found herself alone in the sanctum. The moon drifted behind the trees and left her in darkness before she could rise off the mossy ground. Her body ached with one purpose.

Find her sister.

Remind her of her duty.

Bring her home.

[dinoswrites]

Black Coral Chapter 21: Dead Water

Solavellan, Mermaid AU. Ongoing.

Masterpost | Read from Chapter One | Read on A03

My ko-fi

An alternate version of this chapter has been made available here, with content warnings for what was edited and what wasn’t listed at the top. I felt there was one scene at the end that could use it, and it was easy enough to edit so I provided it.

Aevalle has spent days now in a whirlwind of preparations, endless meetings and briefings with Cassandra and the others, hours spent with Keeper and Dagna, watching the dwarf take sketches of runes and doing her best to answer her hundreds of questions while Dorian or Solas interpet.

She feels like every moment she spends with her friends is stolen—Varric sneaking her away for another game of Wicked Grace, determined to get her to actually play this time, or scarfing down food at the tavern with Sera and Bull, or hiding away in the library with Dorian, supposedly helping him pour over books of magic but really just catching a break.

Solas meets her every morning on the battlements—he’s always there first, and he is always watching the sea when she sees him, his hands behind his back and his shoulders set in a straight line. He stares out past the waves, his gaze resting somewhere beyond the horizon that she can never make out.

She only has a moment to study his expression before he notices her—and then his posture relaxes, and his entire face lights up with a small, warm smile.

“Good morning,” he always says—always sounding a little breathless, as if her presence has made it so.

Loranil is settling into the Inquisition well enough—Aevalle doesn’t have much time to check up on him, but she’s asked Varric to keep an eye on the young man for her. One day for dinner Sera drags her down to the tavern instead of the mess hall, and Aevalle finds him sitting next to Solas there, yacking his ear off while Varric tries (and fails) not to look like he’s enjoying himself too much.

Solas, for his part, has that look on his face normally reserved for when he drinks tea.

Taking pity on him, she pulls up a chair on Loranil’s other side, and Varric takes the role of interpreter as she checks up on him. He seems well—though he doesn’t know much about military rank and file, he is earnest, and Cullen has stuck him with a famously patient captain.

“But enough about me,” he says, “tell me—are you any closer to fulfilling your contract with the Divine?”

“Winning her freedom,” Solas corrects.

“Pretty close,” Varric interrupts Solas, interpreting as Aevalle signs. “We can’t talk about the details, but we’re leaving to sort that out… soon.”

“Excellent,” Loranil says. “And where do you plan to go after that?”

It’s a little thing, but Aevalle sees Solas’s fingers curl around the tankard he still has yet to drink from. Just for a moment, before he catches himself and leans back in his seat.

I haven’t thought that far ahead, is the only answer she can give.

After dinner, she and Solas sneak away to the beach, and she floats in the water as Solas passes glittering seawater over her neck, and the glowing thing inside it that has brought her ruin, and to this place. To his smile as he finishes, and his hand gently cupping her face.

“You should tell me when it troubles you,” he says, softly. Moonlight reflects off the water and dances in his eyes.

She huffs. I’d be down here in the water with you all day, she retorts, making no move to get up.

His smile deepens to something mischievous. “Would that be so bad?”

He kisses her before she can answer him—gently, softly, while the ocean pushes and pulls them. The ocean is gentle, though—there are no crashing waves or raging undertow to separate them. There’s just her, floating on her back, and Solas treading water, his mouth on hers, her hand rising and resting over his, until their fingers twine. As if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

“Where would you go?” he asks, as she’s getting dressed again.

Her hands still on the buttons of her shirt, and she glances over her shoulder at him.

He’s standing very still, just above the tide line, and looking in her direction. Waiting for her response, but not meeting her gaze.

“If you could,” he adds, his voice falling so soft that the waves nearly drown him out.

She shakes her head at him. Not much point in thinking about it, she signs, before pausing to finish buttoning up her shirt. If I go too far from Keeper, Corypheus will find me.

He looks like he wants to press further—but his shoulders relax a little and he relents, instead smiling and reaching to take her hand as they walk back up the beach to the fortress together.

 --

It’s the middle of the night, and they leave for Adamant at first light, but Aevalle finds herself hovering outside Solas’s room. She’s got a blanket wrapped around her shoulders to ward off the evening’s chill—summer won’t be around much longer—but she shudders, still. The hall seems unusually dark, tonight.

She hesitates a moment—she doesn’t want to wake him, they have to leave so early—but there’s light under his door, and she can hear him moving about inside. So she knocks, but she barely gets through the first knock before the door swings open, Solas on the other side.

He’s still dressed—sleeves rolled up, vest missing, but decent. He’s smiling down at her as if it’s not the middle of the night at all, though she has to squint to see it. There’s light pouring out the door from behind him—warm, all golden like a sunset.

“Good evening,” he says, before stepping aside and allowing her into the room.

I know it’s late, she signs, her feet passing from cold stone to soft, warm grass. But there’s something I wanted to talk to you about.

“Of course.” He’s still smiling—and his eyes are twinkling like something’s funny, but he doesn’t seem eager to tell her the joke. He falls into pace beside her as she walks, and their feet take them down a gentle sloping path through tall, broad trees. Golden sunlight pours through the leaves far above them, alternating dots of light and shadow cast like so many freckles on the ground.

Again, she hesitates—to work up her courage, certainly, but there’s something…

“You had something to tell me?” Solas asks.

She shakes her head to clear it. Her blanket slides a little, and pulls her shirt with it so that one shoulder is bared to the air. She can feel a gentle breeze on her skin—and a pleasant warmth that spreads through her as Solas’s gaze falls and lingers there.

His cheeks colour slightly. Her heart beats a little faster.

I want you to stay at Seahold, she signs, all in a rush.

His eyes dart down to her hands, then back up to her face. But he only smiles again, and shakes his head a little.

It’s too dangerous, she continues, and you’re not a soldier, you shouldn’t have to—

He stops her with a finger to her lips. “I believe we’ve already had this conversation,” he says, smiling.

She stares up at him a moment. Then looks down at her feet—nestled in long, soft grass.

Solas’s bedroom doesn’t have grass in it.

Fuck, she signs, and Solas laughs.

“Forgive me,” he says, as she glares up at him, “I was going to wait until you figured it out on your own, but…”

I can’t believe I didn’t see it, she complains, turning her ire now to the tall trees surrounding them.

“You almost did, for a moment,” he assures her.

We’re already aboard Keeper, aren’t we.

“Yes.”

We’re probably about to be woken up to prepare for arrival.

“Probably.”

And my subconscious wants to spend it re-hashing an argument we’ve already had.

Solas sighs, then—and with a wry smile he catches one of her hands in his, so he can bend down and kiss the backs of her fingers once, softly.

“If it’s any consolation,” he says, his voice little more than a whisper against her skin, “I do not want you to go, either.”

She lets out a breath. But before she can make any move to reassure him, or sign anything, he smiles once again, and takes a few steps back, tugging her along with him.

“Walk with me,” he says, “before we wake.”

He looks so earnest, and his touch is so warm—and like there’s an electric current between them, here in dreams—and she does not resist as he leads her deeper into the woods.

 --

There are two spells Solas casts for her, in the quiet of her quarters as Keeper approaches Adamant.

There’s barely room for them both in here—there’s room enough for a hammock hung hastily from the walls, and hooks and a box for her gear, but that’s about it. It’s the only private room on Keeper—everyone else had to make do crammed into a room that Keeper insists is for storage, not sleeping, and being informed of the lack of actual sleeping quarters had done nothing to appease it on that front. She can still hear it complaining about it at the back of her mind—a low hum on the edge of her thoughts, slightly buzzing.

“May I see your piece of coral for a moment?” he asks, once the door is closed behind him and the bustle in the hall shut out.

She takes the cord and coral, where it hides under her shirt, and hands it to Solas without question.

He examines it for a length of time—and though his expression is soft and fond, she can’t help but feel a little self-conscious about her work as he turns the little halla over in his hand. But then he closes his eyes, and she feels that familiar pull of magic being worked—of power being pulled from the deep, and the part of her that is connected to it rising up in response.

It only takes a moment. He hands her back the halla, and she takes it from him, expecting it to feel different. As she runs her fingers over it, however, it just feels… more itself, somehow.

“Anything pulled from the water carries the Deep with it, for a time,” Solas explains, his voice low as if someone might overhear. “But black coral has a unique connection—it is an ancient, living thing, bathed its whole life in currents and raw power. Slow to grow, and slower still to let go of the place it came from, even in death. The ancient elves knew a spell to amplify this connection—to let the coral draw from the deep, long after it had dried. Power to preserve itself, and to protect those who carry it from… some measure of harm.”

Some measure? she asks, after the cord is once more around her neck.

He lets out a low, soft laugh. “I cannot imagine it would offer much,” he admits. “In a world where mages are locked away or made tranquil, I think what small charms or spells the ancients sought to preserve themselves from would be rare indeed. However, it will keep the coral itself from breaking, or leaving your side. And it will continue to draw power from the depths of the sea—enough to power one other spell, for as long as you live.”

Then he takes her left hand in his—and runs his thumb over the bracelet he bought her in Seahold, ages ago now.

She watches intently as his fingertips glow, and then the glow spreads through the whole bracelet. Winding over each individual cord, darkened by sea and earth alike, and settling in each of the blue, blue beads, like water pouring over stone and settling into the cracks.

She stares, mesmerised, watching as the whole bracelet is seeped through with Solas’s magic, as the beads and the rope pull everything Solas gives into themselves, and the soft light gradually begins to fade—leaving behind rope as white as the day he bought it, and beads that glimmer with a faint inner light.

Solas drops his hands, and she raises hers to get a better look at what he’s done.

“Now,” he says, his voice thick, “so long as you wear that bracelet, not a soul will be able to trace you or the artifact in your throat with magic.”

She looks up at him, wide-eyed. And he is watching her carefully, his face forced utterly passive, shoulders and back in hard, rigid lines.

His eyes, however, look impossibly sad.

“When we are finished here,” he continues, “you are free to go wherever you wish. Not even… not even the Inquisition could find you.”

And she suspects that she knows what he meant to say, before his words caught in his throat. She can’t help but smile up at him, reach for his hands, and tug him towards her. She stands a little taller, and he bends a little lower, and she watches his eyes flutter closed before their lips meet.

His lips tremble against hers. But she kisses him, slow and steady, without urgency, like the languid roll of waves in a sheltered bay. She kisses him until his breath catches again, and he leans into her with a sigh, his grip on hers tightening a moment before he releases her hands to wrap his arms around her.

She drops one of hers to his waist in kind—but the other she leaves between them, pressing her palm flat to his chest, over the frantic beating of his heart.

He breaks the kiss when her hand lingers there a moment. He leans back—just enough to look down at her, cheeks flushed, his gaze soft and fond.

He shakes his head, and leans down once more, and someone knocks on her door.

She huffs a frustrated breath against his skin.

“Captain Lavellan,” Cassandra says behind the door, her voice muffled. “We are entering our final approach to Adamant, and require your presence on the bridge.”

Cassandra waits until Solas—closer to the door—knocks three times. And then they stand there and listen to her footsteps as she leaves, and their eyes do not leave one another’s—but the moment is broken, it seems. There’s that sorrow at the corners of his eyes again, in the furrow of his brow, though he tries to smile as his hand comes to rest over hers.

“Now, vhenan,” he says, “let us go win your freedom.”

Her fingers curl over his heart for a moment, before he finally steps away.

 --

Keeper trembles when they pass under the great cliffs that rise up from the sea around Adamant fortress.

Everyone on board hears it—the creaking of metal, a low vibration running through the ship from bow to stern. They all look up at the same moment, as if the ship has scraped something in its passing—but Aevalle looks down at the orb of green light at the centre of the bridge instead, and brings her hands to cup it, gently.

Danger, it insists.

It doesn’t really… use words. She doesn’t think it can—or maybe she can’t hear it clearly enough. Mostly it talks to her in feelings, or sometimes images. Like it brings up flashes in her memory—a captain of a ship her clan used to trade with, or Deshanna and her First casting a spell that would hide them from a passing fleet with mist and rain. Sometimes, like now, she can feel what it feels, somehow inside her but separate—a sense of alarm ringing through her mind, accompanied by lingering undertones of dread, that does not in turn make her frightened. She is just aware of it—and sometimes it’s loud enough that she almost thinks it’s a sound she can hear, but not quite.

Right now, it’s loud enough it’s like she can hear it bouncing around in her skull.

“Report,” Cassandra says, jolting Aevalle back out of her thoughts.

“No damage,” Dorian reports—and sure enough, the display that shows Keeper’s physical status is all green and yellow, just as it was when they left. “No contact with anything, near as I can tell.”

“The, uh.” Blackwall has to pause a moment as he considers the display in front of him. “The… sensing spells? Those haven’t gone off.”

“The ship’s wards are intact,” Vivienne confirms with a single glance over his shoulder. “It seems the disturbance is… internal.”

It’s worried, she signs, frowning as she tries to puzzle it out herself. Something here is very dangerous.

“No shit,” Varric says, as if he’s cracking a joke, but sends one more worried look up towards the ceiling as he does.

Sera laughs nervously. It quickly tapers off into silence when no one joins in.

“I’m still for Plan Blow Up The Front Door,” Hawke grumbles, but her further complaints are silenced by a stern, yet somehow fond, look from Fenris.

“In the fortress,” Merrill asks, “or in the water?”

Aevalle waits for a moment, but Keeper offers no further clarification. Only dread, and worry—so she shakes her head, and gestures helplessly.

“The fortress itself is just ahead,” Stroud says from where he leans over a display with Solas and Bull. “That is if this… map is correct.”

“The sensing spells on this ship are more advanced than any of this age,” Solas informs him with an annoyed edge to his voice, “and the finest arcanist I have ever met has ensured they are working again. Of course this map is correct.”

“Apologies,” Stroud amends. “I have full confidence in your efforts. Though I will admit, I would feel much better about this if I could see where we are going.”

A question buzzes at the back of her mind, but she can’t quite make out what Keeper is asking her.

“Have a little faith,” Bull says. “This rust bucket hasn’t killed us yet.”

Stroud grimaces. “That’s comforting.”

It tries again—and this time, she’s very small, and looking up at her mother. Who is healthy, and whole, sitting cross-legged as she carves a spear. She notices Aevalle, and smiling down at her as she puts her tools aside and signs, Would you like to see, my little skua?

She inhales sharp and fast—like she’s come up for air.

And all around them, runes alight on the cold metal floor. Aevalle barely has time to look down at them, wide-eyed and startled, before the floor itself warms under her toes, and then the whole of the ship appears to melt completely away.

There are a few startled cries, but they all still breathe—though it looks like they are surrounded completely by a cold ocean, and sheer unforgiving cliffs, Aevalle still stands on solid metal. When Stroud jumps backward from his station, he stumbles only on Bull and the floor, which they simply cannot see.

“Elgar’nan,” Merrill breathes into the silence.

The sea encased by the cliffs of Adamant is… emptier than Aevalle is used to. Even as deep as they are, the full moon is bright enough to illuminate just how void of life these waters are—no shark swims past them, no great thing rising from the depths to feed in the protection night provides from predators. Moonlight does not catch on sleek forms as they rush past, or give a glimpse of great creatures lurking in the distance. Only the cliffs as they approach, dark and looming.

Nothing swims here. Not a thing.

Aevalle glances over at Solas—who is studying her with that narrowed gaze, as he used to when she first arrived. Seeing her looking, however, he quickly smiles and turns to survey the water ahead of them, his hands behind his back.

“Much better,” he says.

Hawke immediately follows with, “No, I think this is worse.”

Ignoring her, Solas points to the cliffs ahead. “I believe that cavern should be large enough for Keeper to pass through, if you will direct it that way, Aevalle. Unless you have any objections, Cassandra?”

“No objections,” Cassandra manages to say through gritted teeth. She looks pale, but seems to be taking the sudden transition in their surroundings better than Sera, who honestly looks like she’s about to throw up or pass out.

Everyone watches nervously as they pass through the cavern, the only light for them to see by the runes that glow on the ship’s hull—but though the rocks sometimes come close enough that Aevalle swears she could reach out and touch one, they slip through without even scratching the surface. They cannot move forward on the other side—there is a space just broad enough for Keeper to turn around in—but Keeper begins to rise, assuring Aevalle with slightly distracted thoughts that it knows where it is going.

Eventually, they break the surface, and the floor and walls fade back, until they are standing in Keeper precisely as they left Seahold—with its crew looking perhaps a little more traumatized.

Aevalle and Merrill scout first, guided by magelight, and the others follow. There is a narrow passage, too small for Keeper but large enough for even Bull and his horns to slip through, that leads them to what appears to have once been a storage room, but is still flooded up to their waists. All that’s left are some rusted hooks in walls, and the floor is more sand than stone, but it only takes Bull a moment to clear the doorway, and then they are through.

The hall on the other side is in even worse repair. Bull, the first through the door, nearly falls right into a sinkhole on his first step. He catches himself, obviously biting back a curse, and hesitates a moment.

The water around her feels old, and wrong. It does not have the familiar pull at her heart and her bones—but though they passed not one living thing on the way here, and not a mollusc clings to the walls where the water laps at them, she hesitates to call it lifeless.

Where there is normally a pull, it feels instead like there is something else. Holding its breath, waiting.

I’ll take point, Aevalle signs, before pulling out her spear.

Solas looks about to argue for a moment—but he only calls a light spell to his hand, and with a gesture guides it to float in front of her. It lights up the hall ahead of them in the eerie green glow of phosphorescence, bouncing off the ripples created as she takes a tentative step forward, testing the sand underfoot with her spear.

She leads them forward, and Solas falls in step behind her.

“This would be leftover from the days the Grey Wardens kept gryphons here,” Stroud whispers as they make their way down the hall. “They would roost in caves carved out of the cliffs—this must be where their equipment was stored. No one has walked this hall in… ages.”

“I’m guessing it’s not hidden behind a locked door and the Wardens just… mysteriously lost the key,” Varric ventures.

“There are not enough Wardens in Orlais to fill Adamant,” Stroud muses, “and more than enough unexplored halls in it that are relatively dry.”

“Do you feel that?” Dorian asks, out of the blue.

“Yeah,” Sera grumbles, “it’s cold and wet, and it’s called the fucking ocean in my boots.”

Varric chuckles. “Just your boots? Lucky you.”

Fenris makes a sound suspiciously like a laugh, followed immediately by an unconvincing cough.

“Isn’t this supposed to be a stealth mission?” Blackwall says from the back of the line.

Cassandra’s beleaguered sigh is the only response he gets.

“Oh,” Merrill pipes up, “I think I feel it, too. Like swimming too deep—but we’re not deep, deep. Are we?”

Hawke hums thoughtfully. “I thought my ears just needed to pop.”

Aevalle spares a glance over her shoulder at Solas. His jaw is a tight, tight line, and his eyes are drawn up and to the left, as if he’s trying to see through the ceiling above them to the next floor.

He meets her gaze, but his expression is not reassuring.

“Something is very wrong here,” Vivienne agrees, “and as such, I believe silence would be best at this juncture.”

At the end of the hall, there is another blocked door—centuries of grime and debris that Blackwall and Bull clear with little fuss, while everyone else waits with bated breath. On the other side is an old stairway—curiously enough, with ocean water running down the steps, but Aevalle sees no sign of erosion.

There’s a pressure building in her head. She blows a long breath through her teeth and tries to ignore it.

Before anyone can say anything, they hear a sudden splash and clatter of something metal falling, then more splashing and the sounds of a struggle.

“No,” someone cries, “please—please don’t—”

Aevalle climbs the stairs two at a time, the others rushing behind her, as the sounds above them break out into a cacophony of shouting, of screams, of the clash of swords, the echo of gunshots, and a high, unnatural cry that pierces through it all.

She rounds the corner and comes face to face with what seems to be a massive jet of boiling water and steam.

She nearly runs right through it—she backpedals before she does, nearly falling back down the stairs in her haste. She brings her spear up to bear as it whirls to face her, a massive maw opening up, gaps in the rapidly whirling water and steam narrowing into slits like eyes, and she hastily deflects the arm that reaches for her.

Her spear steams in the air, and the demon howls at her as it lunges for her again.

Before it reaches her, a starburst of icicles forms at the tips of its fingers—and it spreads with a rush, coating its whole arm in ice before it can even start to recoil away. She watches it struggle to, as it becomes completely encased in ice.

Bull barely even pauses as he rushes past her to smack it, hard, with the hilt of his saber. Aevalle stares, wide-eyed, as a crack splits the thing clean in two before it shatters into a thousand ice crystals, scattering into the water rushing down the steps. Washed away before she can even reach out.

“Captain,” Solas says behind her as she feels his hand on her shoulder, “don’t run ahea—”

Something brushes against her toes in the water. Something slick, and thin, and very, very cold.

She grabs his hand and throws them both sideways before something bursts from the water directly below her. They stumble, but Solas throws up a barrier as they catch their footing before whatever it is throws itself at them. She watches it writhe against his barrier—and it seems impossible for something that tall to have sprung water only up to her ankles, but it’s like it unravels itself, somehow. A twisted, angular thing, with a gaping maw and twisted flesh, like too many eels strung together to mimic the shape of a man.

“A Fear demon,” Solas explains, as she tries to make sense of what she’s seeing. His voice sharp and hard, as it is when he’s trying not to panic.

She exhales sharp and fast. She does not look back at him as she gives a curt nod.

It reels back for another strike, and she ducks low, and Solas drops the barrier as she strikes out with her spear at the demon’s torso. It twists too quickly, and her tip misses its target as the demon tries to shrink back into the water, a flurry of hisses and clicks accompanying its every move.

But the water rushing down the stairs suddenly stops—out of the corner of her eye, Aevalle can see it held up, building further up like the crest of a wave—and the creature stands uncertainly on the stairs, suddenly trapped.

She spears it through the middle, and it writhes in place, impossible limbs thrashing as an unnatural scream echoes in the hallway around them, amplified by the water and the bare stone walls. She pulls out her spear again, and it’s like the demon begins to collapse inward—its whole body collapsing in on itself, for half a heartbeat, until it gives one last shudder and shatters into a thousand motes of light that fall, without ceremony, to the water at their feet. Where they sparkle like seafoam, until they are swept away.

Not unlike Wisdom as its form fell to pieces.

She glances over her shoulder at Solas and finds his expression hard, his eyes wide with alarm as he stares down at where the spirit once stood. Then his gaze snaps up, and she follows it to where she sees Bull hammering at a mage’s barrier, and Cassandra at his back fending off a blast of ice from a small, agile creature that seems to swim through the air. Its scaly flesh seems to wrinkle around and hang off a skeletal form, and it has so many impossibly long, curved teeth that its whole face seems to be made up of its mouth and nothing more.

Aevalle hears someone shout, and sees Fenris charging up the stairs past her, lyrium glowing—and then two gunshots, and the demon Cassandra is fighting hits the ground with a high, piercing shriek. Cassandra finishes it off with her saber through its heart—and the moment she does, the mage Bull is fighting crumples to the ground without taking a single blow.

“What the fuck,” Sera yells, “are those?”

Fenris reaches the top of the stairs, and more inhuman screams greet him as he dashes beyond her line of sight. Cassandra takes off after him, and Bull moves as if to finish off the mage—but he frowns, leans down for a moment, and then shakes his head and follows Cassandra.

As the others rush past, one by one, to get to the fighting, Aevalle finds her steps taking her to the fallen warden, instead. She kneels down beside him, and reaches out to push him onto his back as Solas leans over her shoulder.

His eyes are wide open, his face drained of all colour and his expression twisted with pain—and as she touches his skin, she finds it cold and clammy. As if he’s been dead for far longer than a few seconds.

Solas sucks in a breath through his teeth.

“Damn them,” he snaps. “Fools. How—why?”

She looks back up at him—and his whole face is twisted in a rage that she has only seen twice. When they saw what had become of Wisdom; when he shouted you cannot own a person at Alexius.

By the time they reach the top of the stairs, the battle is over. There are two Grey Wardens bound in chains, up against a wall, and three more mages dead on the ground without so much as a scratch on them. There is one more body in the middle of the room lying face-down, bobbing up and down in a small, slow-spinning whirlpool.

Aevalle frowns, and moves to investigate that one—but just before she can reach him, her toes nearly slip off the uneven edge of the hard stone floor. She looks down, and there is a hole that has been dug right through the floor—and from the feel of water rushing about her ankles, it seems as if the water that has flooded the room and the stairs is coming from there.

As she stands on the edge looking down, she can feel… something tug at her. Just a little. And it’s not the usual sort of tug, either.

For his part, Solas immediately marches up to the remaining Wardens as Stroud and Cassandra help to remove their chains and snaps, “What is going on here?”

The younger of the two, a wide-eyed human who barely looks old enough to be a man, responds first. “I don’t know!” he cries, struggling against his bonds. “They’ve—they’ve all gone mad! Mad! The Calling is one thing but—demons? Marching into the Deep Roads with a demon army? Killing all the archdemons in their sleep?”

Solas’s eyes go very wide. And then his face rapidly shifts between several expressions, all of them too quick for Aevalle to catch, before he seems to decide to be angry again.

“That’s enough, son,” the dwarven woman next to him scolds—with more exhaustion than anything else. Her face is drawn into a scowl, twisting up her caste markings. “Let these folks untie us before they decide if they want to kill us or not.”

“I knew that Tevinter was bad news,” he says, as Cassandra gives him a hand up. “Said they’d be in control the whole time, but that’s blood magic, and you know what the Chant says about those—”

“Actually,” the other Warden drawls in reply, “I don’t.”

“Ves,” says Stroud, offering her his hand, “is all of this true? How can this be?”

The woman looks up at him for a long moment, before she grimaces. “Shit,” she says, “figures the only one with any sense would be fashionably late.” She slaps her hand into his, hard, and grabs her shield from under the water in the same motion he helps her stand.

“Please,” Stroud says. “I fear there isn’t much time.”

She sighs, and shakes her head a few times, although if it’s at the situation or to clear her thoughts Aevalle can’t tell. “You’re damn right, Stroud. That’s the Calling for you—those of us who were asking why and how were outnumbered by everyone who decided the end of the world was coming. And, convenient as ever, this magister waltzes in, and offers us the solution to our problem—and we’ve been opening up holes in the floor and dying one by one, so that we can bind demons to our mages and die in the Deep Roads like heroes.”

“Fascinating,” Dorian interrupts, leaning over the hole beside Aevalle. “Where do they all lead?”

“No idea,” Ves says, “but I’d bet they all go to the same place. And now most of our mages have demon friends, and they and everyone else are all crammed down by the biggest one, probably waiting for the Warden-Commander to off someone and take her turn.”

“What could he hope to gain?” Stroud wonders. “I cannot imagine what goal he would have, to corrupt the Wardens so.”

Dorian steps away from the hole and moves to examine one of the fallen mages. “Getting any demon to come to the surface is easy,” he explains, crouching down to get a better look at their face. “Keeping it there is the difficult thing. They tend to dry out, but most binding spells are rather… immobile. Or unreliable. Unless you bind them to a person, who can go wherever they please.”

“So in short,” Hawke muses, “your fine magisterial friend wanted to have his own personal army, and take it on the march.”

Aevalle catches the significant look Fenris sends Dorian. Ves sees it too, and begins to regard him with a frown.

“You with that other Vint?” she asks Dorian.

“Hardly,” Dorian says, gently touching the dead man’s jaw with his fingertips and tilting the head. Probably to get a better look at the eyes, but it makes Aevalle’s stomach turn. “I assure you, I’m of a much more charming temperament then—what was his name, again?”

“Erimond,” Ves answers.

For a moment, Aevalle doesn’t hear anything else. It’s like the whole room goes dead silent.

And then, bit by bit, she starts to hear a rush in her ears. A heavy, hard knocking. Her chest feels tight—and then something sharp on her hand, but it’s her own nails digging in, she’s gripping her spear so tight.

She remembers Erimond. Can picture him now—with his greasy hair, his yellow eyes and off-putting smile. A snide voice that didn’t even hitch when he said, Only figured out to use blood magic to keep them alive longer for the last few—and then they go and die before we get any concrete answers anyway.

A waste, really.

She feels like she can’t breathe. She closes her eyes, but she just sees that boy with the red scales, cut clean in half, just sees Deshanna blinded and bleeding to death—

At her feet, a slow whirlpool spins. Pulling water from a depth she’s never dreamed of swimming. And it feels wrong, and it makes her skin crawl, but—

But somewhere in this fortress, standing next to one of these holes, is the man who gutted her clan like fish and left them to die on tables.

She hears Dorian yell her name as she jumps in.

The surface of the water is deceptively slow-moving—the moment she is below it, her skin rapidly shifting from skin to scale, she is grabbed by a fierce current and yanked downward, dizzyingly fast, but she loosens the soft leather wrapped around her neck, and water rushes through her gills and it’s stale, but she can breathe.

She manages to slow herself with a few powerful kicks of her tail—long enough to find purchase on rough stone, and steady herself against the pull of the current as she tries to catch her bearings. It’s pitch black down here—even shifted, where her eyes would normally catch any scrap of light coming from the surface, there simply isn’t any for her to see by.

So she tugs the soft seal leather completely from her neck. She pauses long enough to wrap it around one wrist, tying it with her teeth, and tries to get a good look at her surroundings with just this little, fluttering green light to go by.

She seems to be in a series of caves at the base of the fortress—as far as she can see above her there is a cavernous ceiling, riddled with openings large and small. There is a wall at her back that seems to stretch far below her, but even squinting, she can’t make out anything further away. Or down, for that matter—just a vast stretch of empty, pitch black sea, not a thing living or dead to catch the light pulsing from her neck.

But the longer she looks down, the more certain she becomes that something is down there. Just… waiting.

She takes a moment to feel the current—the one that yanked her down so far seems to end here, or at least grow weaker. She can feel movement in this dead, dead water, and with her eyes closed it’s easier. Several of the other openings in the stone above her have similar currents, but all of them seem to falter and die here.

No, wait—pulled astray, perhaps? As if one is stronger than the others…

She swims closer to the ceiling, one hand gripping her spear tight and the other always touching stone as she moves, in case she needs to brace herself on it or hide. The thing in the depths doesn’t move—or if it does, she can’t tell—as she moves, flitting between stalactites and protective rock forms.

Eventually, she finds one opening so wide across that she can’t see the other side—and instead of down, it seems to be gathering water from whatever depths lie below her and pulling it up.

She peers over the edge, and the current catches her hair so it whips upwards unnaturally fast, towards a tiny spot of light, somewhere far above her.

She closes her eyes a moment—and allows herself half a heartbeat to pause, and touch the halla of black coral hanging about her throat.

Then she lets go of the rock face, and swims into the current.

It catches her and flings her upward, dizzyingly fast—she feels short of breath, like she might burst from the sudden change in pressure, but she holds, she rights herself so she is swimming upward towards that dot of light, growing closer and closer at an impossibly rapid pace—

She bursts from the water and into the air—and turns as she begins to fall, her body shifting of its own accord.

She lands on one hand and one knee—scales still glittering up her arms and legs, her pupils blown wide and catching every scrap of light the room has to offer. Torches, burning high on walls and failing to light a ceiling far above her, or in the hands of the people assembled in the room. She casts a quick glance around, seeing Grey Warden symbols on jackets, people of all races but mostly human, and all of them turning as one to gape down at her where she crouches on a stone floor, flooded up to their ankles with water that rushes out of the hole behind her.

The water at her feet glows green from the light pulsing in her neck.

To her right, standing near the edge of the hole some ten feet away, are a woman with a shaved head and the kind of cane Vivienne carries with her, an old man with a knife to his wrist, and just beside them magister Erimond, staring at her with an absolutely dumbstruck expression.

The man frowns, hesitating with his knife, and the woman opens her mouth and asks, “What sort of demon is this?”

She gets halfway through the question before Erimond raises his hand and shouts, “Catch her! Now!”

She launches herself towards him.

She bursts across the distance between them in a fury—and watches, as she runs, his expression slip from something triumphant, to confusion, and then to outright fear as he reads her expression, and sees her racing towards him with her spear raised, shoving past the two Wardens that stand between her and the man who murdered her clan.

They try to grab at her, but their hands slide uselessly off her scales, still slick with seawater.

Her spear tip crashes into the barrier Erimond raises between them—and then bursts under the weight of her whole body thrown against it as Erimond turns and flees.

“Wardens!” he cries, scrambling into their ranks. “Stop her! Stop her!”

The first three are too stunned to even react—she barrels right past them, and a few after them manage to draw their weapons but cannot quite reach her as she follows, gaining hard on Erimond as he is forced to shove people out of his way, clearing a path right for her.

But it doesn’t take long before someone steps in her way—a broad-shouldered human man with a saber in hand, raised over his head to swing down on hers as she charges towards him.

Her spear has the superior reach—and as she deflects his saber with its tip, sending the point low and wide of her face, she keeps up her momentum and ducks low as she runs, charging into his waist. He bends double over her, and in a few more steps she has flipped him backwards over her, only slowed down a heartbeat or two.

She swipes her spear sideways with the next Warden, catching his knees and toppling him down into a tangle of limbs that she leaps over. Behind him is someone with a rifle, who backpedals out of the way, unwilling to shoot his comrades by accident as she charges through them.

Someone comes at her from the side, and she is forced to deviate from Erimond’s path to deflect his saber—and then a club from her back, and she has to move with her spear as she spins on her heel, catching the club between the point and the shaft and letting her momentum rip it from his hands, flinging it out somewhere above the crowd. She raises her arm, and a saber point slides harmlessly across the lapis scales still gleaming on the back of her wrist, unable to find purchase.

Another tries to trip her up, and she leaps over the clumsy swipe with his cane. The attack makes enough of a gap for her to slip through, and she takes it, but it’s not the direction she last saw Erimond, and she bites back a curse as she is forced to stop, yet again, by a broad-shouldered dwarf, who is too low to the ground and sturdy for her to simply knock over.

He tries to simply grab for her spear—and she jerks it forward when he does, slamming his own fist hard into his forehead. Stunned, his stance falters, and she’s able to shove him over—but she’s been forced to pause long enough that now there are hands grabbing at her arms, nails scratching on her scales, trying to simply grab at her and force her to stop—

She tries to fight off the press of bodies, but there are simply too many. She struggles—slips to the side, kicks, and tries to bring her spear to bear but the dwarf gets up again and there’s not enough space between them, now. She bites back a curse, her face twisting into a snarl, but someone gets a hold of her leg and doesn’t let go, and she falters—

It takes five of them to get her down on her knees, spear on the ground. She manages to bloody two noses in the process, but they are simply bigger and stronger than her, and every trick she has to break their hold on her does not work. They start to drag her backwards, then, leaving her spear lying in the water, until someone races forward and scoops it up. A slim elven form—who looks down at the spear in her hands, and then back up at Aevalle with impossibly wide eyes, and a face decorated with Sylaise’s vallaslin.

Aevalle mouths, Help me, as they drag her away.

They take her back to the hole, and the woman who was standing there with the older man at her side, knife put away for the moment. Aevalle cranes her head, scanning the room for Erimond, but she can’t get a good look before they shove her back on the ground. Hands pinned at her back, a knife at her throat.

“What is the meaning of this?” the woman demands, her arms crossed over her chest. She too looks over the crowd, scowling. “Erimond, explain. What manner of demon did you summon, and why couldn’t you control it?”

The man in question is, frustratingly, keeping his distance. He stands on a set of stairs at the back of the room, leaning on his cane as he catches his breath. “A—a rogue element, Warden-Commander,” he calls. “Sometimes… things climb up from the depths, attracted to spells such as these.”

She raises a brow, clearly annoyed.

Aevalle huffs in anger, and struggles, but the men holding her have her firm.

“Then why does it look so much like an elf,” the Warden-Commander wonders, turning and regarding Aevalle a little more closely, “instead of a demon?”

“Just a trick,” Erimond calls, “nothing more. Though if you could detain it, I would like to keep it for further study—”

Aevalle takes a breath, and opens her mouth—

“Wait!”

Her teeth clack together as the Dalish woman bursts from the crowd, still clutching the spear.

“Wait,” she blurts out, “Warden-Commander, please, that’s no demon—I can explain.”

The Commander gives her a long, steady look. “Then by all means,” she drawls, “but quickly, we have a ritual to complete.”

She opens and closes her mouth a number of times—glancing awkwardly between Aevalle, the Commander, and then at everyone else in the room. “That is,” she says at length, “not—here.”

The Commander rolls her eyes. “I don’t have time for this,” she says, turning back to the men holding Aevalle. “Have her locked away, I will see this dealt with after the ritual.”

Aevalle jerks against the people holding her, yanking hard, but they don’t even stumble as they pull her backward, and she can see Erimond now, and he’s looking down at her afar, and grinning like he’s won—

“Stop!” calls a familiar voice.

On the other side of the room, on a stair opposite Erimond, Stroud charges through an open door, Hawke, Merrill and Fenris at his side.

His presence seems to make the Commander truly pause. Her eyes widen and something in her stance relaxes—before she seems to remember that he’s a wanted man, and she scowls. “Let him pass,” she calls, as he continues down the stairs.

“This is madness,” he says as he makes his way through the rapidly parting crowd. “Surely, you must see that.”

“We have always made the sacrifices no one else will,” she replies, “that the world will never thank us for. You doubt the cause now that there is blood magic involved?”

“Your Tevinter ally is binding the mages to Corypheus!”

“Corypheus? But he’s dead!”

Aevalle catches movement out of the corner of her eye—she doesn’t move her head to look directly at it, but she catches a glimpse of two horns poking out from behind some of the piled-up rubble that is probably left over from digging the massive hole in the ground. Only fifteen feet away—a glance up, and she can see the shimmer of a glamour spell below a hole in the wall in one of the upper levels. The longer she stares at it, the clearer she can make out the shape of the person climbing down a rope just below it, and the dwarf aiming his rifle through the hole.

“Look at what has been done to that poor girl before you,” Stroud says and Aevalle looks forward again as all eyes are on her. “Her clan killed, her throat marred by some great magic—with the aid of the man too frightened to stand and face her on his own.”

That seems to get Clarel’s attention—she frowns again, looking over the crowd to Erimond, still hovering on the steps and making no move to come closer.

“Perhaps we should see if there is some truth to these claims,” she says, slowly stepping away from the hole at her back.

Aevalle can’t make out Erimond’s expression from this far, but she thinks his face twists up as he says, “Or perhaps I should bring in a more reliable ally,” and slams the end of his cane on the ground.

It sparks with red lightning—and then he does it again, and Aevalle hears a low rumble, and the water at her feet begins to flow a little faster, and something tugs at her—

She kicks off the ground, shoving the men holding her backwards until they stumble, and are forced to let her go.

“Lethallan!”

Aevalle reaches up and catches the spear that the Dalish woman throws her way—and in the same motion turns on her heel, spinning the weapon so its tip points forward, and she faces the hole just as Corypheus’s blighted dragon bursts from the water with a bone-rattling scream.

She surveys the room, sweeping her head high and wide—her left eye an empty socket, a gaping maw of scar tissue, and dried, crusted sea salt, and she does not see Aevalle as her great claws find purchase on the stone floor and she pulls her massive, twisted body out of the water in one smooth motion. She reeks of death, of decay, of a pool of water that has stood too still for far too long.

As the dragon moves from the water, a snarl rising in her throat, Aevalle keeps her spear up and follows her movements, keeping in her blind spot.

The Grey Wardens scramble backwards as the dragon stretches out her massive, tattered wings. They knock into the ceiling when they are nearly fully extended, and Aevalle has to jump back to avoid some large rocks that come crashing down to the floor.

The dragon hisses.

“She’s right beside you, you stupid creature!” Erimond yells, slamming his cane down on the ground again.

When he raises it again, the burst of a gunshot echoes throughout the room—Erimond screams a half-second later, clutching his shoulder, dropping his cane with its now-shattered focus crystal to the ground, right before Cassandra charges down the stairs at his back and knocks his head, hard, with the butt of her pistol.

The dragon whips her head towards the source of the gunshot, twisting her whole body around to see with her good right eye.

And then Clarel hits it in the back of the head with a fireball.

The dragon barely even flinches, even as fire gathers on what remains of her great frills, as the heat blackens her pallid scales for a moment before the flames sputter and die. She snarls, low and deep, and it vibrates through the air and the water at their feet before she whirls, swinging her great tail behind her.

Aevalle catches a glimpse of Clarel before the dragon’s body blocks her from view—and before she stills, her one good eye coming to rest on Aevalle, standing on the edge of the hole in the floor.

The dragon opens her great maw and lunges forward—only to crash into a barrier.

She screams in rage—and Aevalle doesn’t wait around long enough to watch the barrier shatter under the dragon’s second assault, or to greet the man who cast it, even as he races towards her, yelling her name.

“Aevalle!” Solas cries as she races towards his barrier—and as it falls, she drops into a slide, passing unharmed under the dragon’s gnashing teeth. She thrusts her spear upwards, and it catches the underside of the dragon’s jaw and tears her scales open, but Aevalle’s reach isn’t quite long enough and the dragon pulls back before she does any real damage.

She rolls to her right as the dragon’s jaws come snapping down again—and then a makeshift shield of ice rises out of the water in front of her, curving over her, blocking the swipe the dragon makes with its claws, and she scrambles backwards until she can get to her feet, out of the reach of the dragon as it destroys the hastily raised ice wall.

Before she can dart forward again, however, Solas grabs her arm.

“We must go,” he says, right before Aevalle hears more gunshots—from the Wardens and from behind her, and though she watches them impact, and some of them even burst through disease-ridden scales to the sickly flesh underneath, they only seem to make the dragon angry.

She knows he’s right. Knows she cannot beat this thing—that the dragon will kill her before she can do any real damage. But she watches the dragon take a breath, then swing her head around and burn a wall of flame into the Wardens gathered before her.

“Vhenan,” Solas pleads, tugging at her arm.

She can barely hear him over their screams—and for half a heartbeat, they aren’t Wardens. She’s not standing in a fortress. She’s with her clan, and men from Tevinter are cutting down the hunters while the others try to flee—

Bull crashes into one of the dragon’s legs, Blackwall hot on his heels, and her flames die as she turns to face the new threat—leaving her back exposed.

A burst of electricity lights up the air behind the dragon—and she screams as it races over her, her whole body convulsing at it sparks over her. She writhes in place for a moment, her cries reverberating through the flooded room, and as the electricity courses down to the water at their feet Solas throws a barrier up to protect them. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees that someone has done the same for Bull and Blackwall, even as they backpedal as fast as they can to get away.

Aevalle hears Clarel cry, “I will never serve the Blight!” right before another, stronger blast hits the dragon.

The dragon staggers this time—before her fins flare, her wings twitch, and with a snarl she whirls on Clarel.

Aevalle gets one glimpse of the woman, standing tall, her cane raised, focus crystal crackling, before the dragon snaps her up in her jaws, yellowed teeth sinking easily through her crisp leather jacket, crushing and the Warden’s bones and tearing her flesh apart. The dragon shakes her prey, then tosses her aside without even bothering to eat her.

Before anyone can even react, the dragon whirls again, but as Aevalle tries to shake Solas off and charge forward he grips her arm harder and tries to pull her back.

The dragon’s claws rake across the surface of the barrier—and this time right through it, and as Aevalle braces herself, Solas suddenly shoves her out of the way.

She hits the ground on her back, and can only watch as Solas is snatched up in the dragon’s claws like a doll, as the great monster carries through with its momentum, turning to plunge itself directly into the gaping hole from which it came.

As the dragons’ great, many-finned tail swings over her, Aevalle reacts without thinking, and plunges her spear directly into it.

Over the pounding of blood in her skull, she hears the dragon’s muffled scream—and then a great crash as it breaks into the water, and then she hears nothing but wind rushing past her ears as she holds onto the spear.

She has the presence of mind to brace before she hits the water—and when her eyes snap open again, her gills and tail form, and though she can hardly breathe she is moving so fast she squints through the water as they whip through it, trying to catch a glimpse of Solas.

She thinks she can see a pulsing light ahead—the colour of seafoam in the sunlight—and she has to believe that it’s him. She has to.

So she grabs a fistful of fin—wretched, diseased fin—and pulls her spear out, so she can thrust it back in—harder, deeper. And she keeps her eyes trained on that light, as they plunge deeper, so deep that she can feel pressure building in her skull, moving so fast that she struggles to breathe as the water grows colder, but the light stays ahead of her so she stabs the dragon again, and again, until she opens a great bloody wound in its tail, and she hears the dragon’s scream echo through the water, and suddenly that soft, fading light is drifting on a different course.

She pulls her spear out and lets go—kicking away from the dragon and swimming, as fast as she can, towards that light. She keeps enough momentum from the dragon’s rapid plunge that she’s beside him in a matter of moments, though it feels like forever—just watching that light sink, slowly, flickering, growing weaker with each frantic kick of her tail.

When she catches Solas, whatever spell he was using to breathe has faded—he is lit only by the erratic flutter of the light coming from her own throat. He has a hand clamped over his mouth, and the other weakly pointing somewhere to her left.

She follows—pulling him with her as fast as she can, even as he clutches at her, even as his body begins to convulse as it tries to force him to breathe, and she does not look at him because she will make it, she will make it—

He was pointing to a cave, just nearby. She races into it, heart hammering in her chest, and follows the path it leads her, nearly crashing into a stone wall as it suddenly veers upwards.

When she breaks water into old, yet strangely electric air, Solas goes limp in her arms.

It takes her precious, desperate moments to find a ledge that’s above the water. She pulls him up onto it, and her hands tremble as she yanks at his collar, too tight around his throat, pulling his shirt open so fast that she hears buttons fling off and splash in the water behind her.

He’s not breathing. He’s not breathing.

She tilts his head back and puts the heel of one palm on his chest, the other over it, and starts pushing her hands into his chest. Steady, and though she struggles to remember how fast she’s supposed to go she thinks it’s slower than the racing of her heart. After a while, she bends over, and exhales into his mouth—desperate, shaking, trying not to think of all the stolen kisses…

His lips are cold, and unmoving. Tears streak down her cheeks, hot and heavy and useless.

She should have run.

She starts pushing down on his chest again.

The third time she breathes into his mouth, his chest buckles under her weight, and she barely pulls back in time as seawater rushes out of his mouth. She helps him turn as it all rushes out of him, and he chokes on it, gasping and coughing, and she runs her hands over his back as he breathes, desperate and hard, even though all she wants to do is cling to him and never let go.

He falls hard onto his back, still gasping for air as his breaths slow, and begin to even out. He reaches for her, weakly, and her hands find his face, cupping it for a moment.

Why didn’t you just change, she wants to ask. But she can hardly scream it at him as she wants to—and the light from her throat is too irregular for her signing, and his eyes are closed besides.

But the light is catching something on his skin, where she tore open his collar.

She frowns, and her hands slide down—and he does not try to stop her, as her fingers slip down his jaw, and down the sides of his neck.

Where she finds old, old scars, over the skin where his gills would form.

For a moment, she can’t breathe. Can’t believe what she feels—what she can see, when the light pulses strong enough.

But then Solas takes a shuddering, broken breath, and one of his hands catches hers, and she crumples—having enough frame of mind to roll so she doesn’t crush him—and she clings to him, shaking, burying her face in his chest as they both just breathe. They’re surrounded on all sides by old, dead water, deeper than Aevalle has ever been—

As Solas’s breaths begin to steady out, hers only grow more frantic, and she can’t help the hot, angry tears that spill from her, only to land on Solas’s bared skin.

They’re miles underwater, and Solas can’t breathe any of it.

There’s nothing she can do to save him.

[calemor]

Clues

The Heroes of Fannen-Dar, Chapter 4

Chester sat with his back against the massive stone wall, looking away from the town.  The view outside the walls of Fannen-Dar has inspired some mediocre poetry in the past.  A verse floated to the front of Chester's mind.

Though light doth break through cloudy sky, The shadows are set free. The forest dark, the mountains high, Make it really hard to see.

He was looking towards the Shadir Forest as he sat on the spot where they found the dead boy.  While artistic talent may not be one of Fannen-Dar's primary exports, the stanza certainly spoke true about the lighting.  Murky clouds drifted in from the Thundertop Hills to the northwest, where the peculiar terrain caused miniature storms to form almost constantly atop the jutting cliffs.  Even when the clouds cleared for one brief moment, the sun was usually either behind one of the mountains to the east or the Shadir Forest to the west seemingly absorbed all the light.  And yet it somehow managed to always be stiflingly hot during the summer.

Chester had ignored the captain's advice to rest.  He visited the barracks to put away his armor, but then returned to the scene of the latest crime.  He scoured the area, but found nothing except dirt, rocks, and a rough patch of grass where the body had been dumped.  There was no single footprint pointing the way toward a villain's hideout, nor a torn piece of fabric from a fleeing killer.  If there were a less obvious clue, Chester didn't have the expertise to find it.  Investigation was not something guards were taught, it was something they learned after decades of experience.  They weren't hired for their skills; they were signed on for the fact that they have bodies that can swing swords and block arrows.

Maybe there really wasn't a connection, Chester began to think.  After all, the similarities between the cases are already barely existent.  It could just be in his head.  There are too many differences, too.  The victims each coming from different parts of the town, being different ages, dying in different places.  This boy was even brutally bludgeoned, while the others only had stab wounds.  Why would a killer need to beat up one victim, but not the others?

The hairs on Chester's neck stood up, brushing against the stones of the wall.  He turned and looked up.  The top of the thick wall looked back down at him, and winked.

Chester scrambled to his feet.  Maybe the bruises weren't the result of a beating.  Maybe the kid obtained them after his death.

There was a tower nearby that connected two segments of the wall, and where a staircase could be found that led to the top.  The wall was six feet thick, with a traditional battlement lining the outside through which arrows could be fired at attackers.  Fannen-Dar hadn't seen a battle since the Savage War decades ago, so security along the top of the wall was thin.  The small number of sentries ordered to walk the perimeter of the wall meant that any particular area would be unguarded for fifteen minutes at a time.  Plenty of time for someone to sneak up and commit murder.

In the bards' stories, whenever the hero was faced with a mystery, all would seem hopeless until he stumbled across the one piece of evidence needed to solve the entire thing.  A lesson that Chester had learned the hard way was that life wasn't like those stories.  There weren't magic arrows that could point you the way, there wasn't always someone strong seeking justice, and you could never really be sure about, well, anything.  Most of all, he learned that you would never be able to solve all the world's problems.  But Chester wouldn't be able to forgive himself if he didn't try.

Maybe life just wasn't like that in Fannen-Dar.  In the other parts of the world, they had heroes whose adventures actually resulted in major changes.  In Fannen-Dar, you had people and their problems, but not a hero in sight.

Chester reached the top of the wall.  The stones stretched out in front of him like a snakeskin turning to dust.  He walked over to the edge and peered out through a crenel.  He looked down and could see the spot where the boy's body had been found.  The dirt around that spot perhaps looked a little darker, but it could also just have been a trick of the light.

He looked around, but this section of the wall looked the same as the rest.  He knew he was on the right path, but there was just not enough information, too few clues.

The gray clouds parted momentarily, and the sun shone through.

Chester looked down to avert his eyes from the glare.  There, scorched into the stone as if with fire, was the shape of a dagger.

Chester resisted the urge to shout in triumph.  Instead, he rushed down the stairs and sprinted back into the town.

He recalled that the merchant's wife had been killed not too far from there, only a few minutes' walk into an alley right on the edge of the marketplace.  It was all too true that most murders happen close to the victim's home.  This was because either the killer had been waiting for them to come out, or had been following them and then struck before they could get inside to safety.  Several more happenedinside the victim's house, if they lived alone.

Chester found the spot, which had been given a quick sweeping up since the body was taken away.  There was no blood to be found, but if Chester was right, there wouldn't have been any in the first place.  All he could see were puddles of mud, wooden crates, and a bucket placed strategically under a second-story window.  He heaved a pile of crates aside.

A mark identical to the one on top of the wall graced the side of the building.

Maybe there was more to the bards' stories after all.  Chester took off again, his mind set on only one thing.  He didn't need to find the place where the elderly noble was killed; there was no doubt in his mind of what he'd find there.  He needed to find Darrik.

***

"You can take your findings and shove them in the sewers," Darrik said.  Chester had found him on duty outside the Coopers Guild hall.  Every official guild in Fannen-Dar received protection from the town, except for the Fighters Guild, who claimed that it would be insulting to insinuate that they could not protect themselves.  In actuality, it was because they gambled on illegal fights during the day, and because nobody wanted to mess with the Fighters Guild.

"But this is proof!" Chester hissed.  The other guard, a stocky dwarf woman, was trying her best to tune out their conversation.  It wasn't her concern whether or not there was crime going on in the town until her superiors made it her concern.  Chester was trying to keep his voice to a whisper, but the excitement was proving too much for him to handle.

Chester continued, "I knew the deaths were connected.  The same weapon was used for each of them, a heated blade."  He had one hand on Darrik's shoulder, using his other to emphasize every other word with a jabbing finger towards Darrik's chest.  The loyal guard stood tall and only allowed his face to show his disdain.  "The thing is," Chester said, "there was no source of heat near the murder scenes, but they were clearly killed there without being moved."

Darrik bit his lower lip.  "And you can't figure out why?"

Chester shook his head.  "I know you've been doing this for longer than I have," he said, "and that your father was a guard before you.  You probably know tons about the way these things work, way more than I do!  I need your help."  He smiled, and added, "Buddy?"

Darrik sighed.  "Okay, I'll bite.  I've heard of something like that before.  A fire-branded weapon.  They could be using magic to make the dagger hot."

"Why didn't I think of that!"

"Because it's really hard to come by illegally," Darrik said.  "The Enchanters Guild has never had more than four members at a time, and those kinds of runes are pretty complicated."  Chester blinked at Darrik, who sighed again.  "My mother had some arcanist friends that she invited over for tea a lot.  I picked up a bunch of random, useless knowledge."

"Not useless," Chester pointed out.  He put his hand to his head.  "We need to figure out who would be able to get their hands on that sort of thing.  I'd say Dominaurus, everyone knows they own over half the town, but they'd never flub up like this..."

The other guard coughed.  "I, uh," she said.  "I might have an idea."

Chester and Darrik looked at her expectantly.

"Sorry," she said.  "I couldn't help overhearing..."

"No, it's fine," Chester said.

"I didn't mean to intrude..."

"Please.  Do go on."

She spun her warhammer around in her hand.  "Well, I just thought, it sounds like something the Firemen would do."  Chester and Darrik looked at each other, realized that neither knew what she was talking about, and looked back at her.  "They're a gang that got noticed for their tendency to, well, set things on fire."  She started scratching at a notch on the head of her weapon.  "They've been known to use magical fire, so they must have access to that kind of enchantment.  There's a rumor that their base is in North Hill, but there's apparently not enough proof for the captain to give the order for a raid."

Chester put his hands on Darrik's shoulders.  "We've got to check it out," he said.  His eyes had the sparkle that Darrik had only seen on children the night before gift-giving on the Winter Solstice.

"But...I'm on duty!" Darrik said.  "You've already distracted me enough."  The dwarf looked around at the empty street and shrugged.

"This is your duty!" Chester said.  "Your town is being threatened from within.  Yes, we have murders here all the time.  Yes, the gangs are far too powerful for two fellows like us to stop.  Yes, your orders are to stay here and be useless."  Darrik tried to interrupt, but Chester plowed forward.  It was something he was starting to like.  "But I say there's more to it!  The status quo is simply not okay.  Gangs, murders, uselessness...We signed up as guards because we wanted to make a difference."  Again, Darrik began to argue, and Chester cut him off.  "We vowed to protect the town.  Even if that vow was just a formality, that's what being a guard means.  And when people are dying, it's our duty to try to put a stop to it.  Now, the only way we can do that is by investigating these Firemen.  Are you going to fulfill your promise to Fannen-Dar?  Or are you going to just play it safe?"

Darrik shifted his weight onto a barrel outside the guild house door.  "Safe sounds really nice," he said.

"Then I'll go myself!"

"That's dumb," Darrik said, "and you know it."

"It's my job," Chester replied.

Darrik blinked.  "You're being honest."

"Honest to gods."  Chester puffed up his chest.  "Honest to Just, even."

"Glory to her," the dwarf added.

Darrik groaned.  "You'll die if you go alone."  Chester shrugged but nodded.  "We'll both probably die if I go with you."  Chester tossed his head back and forth, but nodded in the end.  Darrik sighed, sounding as though his lungs were getting worn out from constant overuse.  He put his head in his hand.  "All right.  I'll go."

Chester smiled.  "I know.  Come on, we're wasting time!"

The two humans scurried off.  The other guard stood wringing her hands on her warhammer before shifting to the other side of the Coopers Guild door.  She looked up and down the street, seeing burglars and thugs where before there had been commoners.

"They could have at least invited me along," she whimpered.

***

A part of the northern district of Fannen-Dar was built onto one of the low hills of the Thundertops.  It was short enough that it wasn't always stormy, but a dampness usually clung to the air.  Dwarves had dug tunnels throughout the hill before the town had been founded, to use as a fortress in a time when war raged across all of Calemor.  Now, the tunnels were mostly used for food and material storage for the town, but there were a few forges and armories scattered throughout as well.  It had been uncreatively renamed North Hill.

Gaining access to the tunnels was no problem for two guards.  Chester was off-duty, but he kept his copper badge in his pouch should he ever need to, say, heroically step into a fight and threaten the villains with his authority.  It wasn't as impressive as the silver badges of higher-ranking officers, but it made its point clear.

The tunnels certainly looked dwarf-made, with great blocky pillars holding up the roof, and plenty of extra space.  Dwarves weren't much shorter on average than humans, but for some reason they adored building massive rooms underground.  Being only a hill, North Hill's tunnels couldn't compare to the great halls of Bjergstning, but they were still fifteen feet from wall to wall, and at least as high.

They were also as confusing to navigate as a maze.

"We don't need to check everywhere," Chester said as they turned another square corner.  "We've passed the light armory, the dining hall, and the soldier's quarters.  A whole gang couldn't make their hideout in those places."

"Could we stop walking in circles, then?" Darrik grumbled.

"What do you mean?  We haven't been this way."

Darrik pointed to words carved into the wall.  The top sign had an arrow pointing in the direction they were walking.  It read Dining Hall.

Chester licked his lips.  "Maybe they have two," he suggested.  Darrik slowly shook his head, which was starting to glisten with sweat.  The torches that lit the tunnels also kept the temperature nice and comfortable, if you were a dwarf who was used to being next to a furnace the entire day.  For humans, even those used to the humid heat of Fannen-Dar, the dry air of the tunnels was like an armored knight to a stumpy mule.

"We can't search the whole place ourselves," Darrik said.

"Well we can't ask for help either, can we?" Chester snapped back.  He wiped his face and took a deep breath.  "Maybe we can just peek in a few more rooms."  He glanced down the long list of arrows.  Training Hall, Buttery, Dungeon Cells...

"And what about the rooms behind those rooms?" Darrik said.  "This place is organized like a cobweb.  It made sense long ago, but it's a tangled mess now!"

...Washroom, Undercroft, Temple, Infirmary...

"Not to mention how ridiculous the idea that a gang would set up here is in the first place.  We had to show our badges to enter, for Hope's sake!"

...Infirmary?

"Why would they need an infirmary?" Chester muttered.

"For treating the injured," Darrik said.  "As they are usually intended."

"Exactly."  Chester knelt down next to the wall.  The sign pointing towards the Infirmary was low to the ground, faded from age.  "Back when this was a dwarven fortress, sure, but now anyone sick or injured goes to Holy Row.  And look."  He pointed up to a sign at eye level.  It had been carved into a separate stone and slotted into the wall, whereas the low signs were etched directly into the tunnel.  This one read Hospice.

"In case there's an emergency, they go there," Chester said.  "The old infirmary would be up for grabs to anyone who finds another way in."

Darrik wrinkled his nose.  "It's a long shot."

"I'm a terrible archer, but I think that means we should check, just in case."

The two followed the signs towards the Infirmary for a half an hour, winding their way through the passages. They passed fewer and fewer of the other soldiers, until all they could hear were their own footsteps and the flickering of the torchlight. Dust was collecting in the cracks of the stone. The heat was becoming less oppressive as fewer bodies were around to radiate it. “I feel like a fly in a Spiders Guild,” Darrik whispered. His voice barely rose above his footsteps.

Chester raised a hand to Darrik's chest to stop him. “Wait,” he said. He tilted his head back and forth. They were at a turn in the tunnel, their vision cut to no more than ten feet in any direction before all they could see was a stone wall. “Do you hear that?”

Darrik held his breath for a few seconds, then let it out slowly through his nose. “It's completely silent, goblin breath.”

Chester nodded. “Right. What's missing?”

“Our footsteps. Anybody else's footsteps. And...”

They looked at the walls. In the sconces were cold-torches, lighting the hallway with their signature heat-less, yellow energy.

“If nobody uses these tunnels,” Chester whispered. “Why use expensive cold-torches?”

Darrik thought for a moment. He was sweating despite the cooler air. “They're used by arcanists all the time,” he said. “To light their libraries. So that nothing flammable gets set on...fire.”

Chester broke out in a joyless grin just as a door slammed and heavy footsteps started moving towards them.

Chester scrambled forwards, hopping down the hallway on his toes. The footsteps were clattering quickly towards them from the direction they arrived, meaning the only escape was deeper into the Infirmary. Darrik fell behind him, moving slower, for he still wore his armor. Any quick movement would be heard throughout the whole area. Like the tremblings of a trapped insect in a silky web.

Chester pressed his ear against the first door he found. Hearing nothing on the other side, he opened it. A long room stretched out before him. Where once dwarf-sized beds for the injured warriors after whatever battle they had waged that week would have been, now wooden crates were piled high and haphazardly. A table and chairs were set up in the center of the room, lit by more cold-torches. Chester waved back at Darrik to hurry up. Darrik waved back, with his fingers in a slightly more rude gesture.

Chester grabbed the front of Darrik's armor as soon as he got close and pulled him in. Just as he saw a boot coming around the corner, he shut the door without letting it bang against the frame.

Darrik was breathing heavily, but managed to maintain a whisper. “This is not how I imagined my day.”

“They must not guard that entrance, since nobody ever uses it,” Chester said. “We just wandered into their turf without noticing.”

“As long as they also went without noticing,” Darrik gasped, “I'm happy.”

Voices sounded through the door, coming closer. Chester nodded his head and the two guards moved behind a pile of boxes, where they were out of view from the door and the center of the room. The door opened.

“You see, we can work something out, as we always do,” a man said. The footsteps moved to the table, there was the sound of chairs scraping against the stone floor, and a sheet of parchment being laid out flat.

“This is our plan, see?” the same voice said. He spoke through his nose, but with such vim and verve that Chester could only imagine his nostrils were the size of cats. “The Firemen have had a hard time lately with our work, and we need this to get our name recognized again. I'm telling you out of trust that you'll hold together with our agreement.”

Someone else laughed a humorless laugh, one bristling with sharp edges that were sheathed but clearly displayed. The laugh turned into a voice. “Trust is not something typically associated with success in your line of work...is it, Kelvin?”

Chester felt the blood drain from his face and rush back to his brain, where it had some serious work to do. He leaned ever so slightly out from behind the box, so that just one eye could see the center of the long room. He saw the back of the head of the man who had just spoken, but there was no mistaking who he saw.

Captain Ignatius of the town watch was making a deal with the Firemen.

Keep Reading Start from the Beginning

[zelenacat]

When We Were Young- Chapter 26- An Obitine Story

The wedding has been set for four months from now, and Satine already couldn’t stand the idea. Korkie, Tristan, Mara, and apparently Tyra too, were now all on Concordia dealing with the Sith Temple, while the Duchess was entertaining Count Dooku. Celebrations for Queen Mara’s birthday were underway as well, and Satine found herself explaining the tradition to her fiance.

“I give a speech and we light paper flowers,” Satine stated, “then send them out on the water.”

“Quaint,” Dooku decided, taking a bite of breakfast, “is there dancing?”

“Naturally.”

The Count smiled.

“Honestly, Dooku,” Satine pointed, “you better not get any stupid ideas.”

The Count only smiled wider, “I make no promises.”

The Duchess sighed, “Dear me.”

Dooku laughed loudly, attracting some attention from farther down the table where Countess Bralor and Saxon were sitting. Satine gave them a polite nod.

“The populace is beginning to like me more,” Dooku observed, “only the old Countesses are unsure.”

“They are cautious,” Satine offered, “time has made them that way.”

The Count gestured with his wine, “As are you.”

“War makes us that way.” 

“Speaking of which,” Dooku interjected, “we must discuss how you will help the war effort.”

“We are a peaceful people.” Satine frowned.

“Offer optional recruitment,” the Count suggested, “and Mandalore has good trade deals with the Republic.”

“Oh no,” Satine almost turned green, “that will have to be broken off.”

“Use everything to your advantage, Satine,” Dooku replied, “that’s how we win.”

The Duchess did not like the use of the word “we”, but she allowed it, her mind drifted to Obi-Wan and what he would think of that.

“You should stop thinking about him,” the Count whispered, “we’re engaged and he’s on the other side.”

“At least I won’t have to meet him on the battlefield.” Satine sighed.

“No,” the Duchess looked up to see the Count smile, “that’s my job.”

Satine shivered.

“Cold?” Dooku questioned with a smile.

“Yes,” the Duchess lied, “my wedding dress will have to be long-sleeved.”

The Count raised an eyebrow, “Have you started planning?” 

Satine hesitated, “My seamstresses seem ready to go into battle.”

“It’s good they have a lovely canvas then.”

The Duchess did not know how to respond to that, she did not like it and worried about where that comment might lead.

The Count smirked, “I’ve made you uncomfortable.”

“I will not deny that fact,” Satine set down her spoon, “however as I am no longer hungry, I would say this meal is finished.”

Satine stood, scraping her chair back and held out her hand to Dooku. The Count took it and led the Duchess from dinner to an outdoor evening party for their guests.

“May I get you something to drink?” Dooku offered.

“If we’re going to keep talking I find alcohol mandatory.” Satine replied.

The Count actually winked at her before heading to the bar, the Duchess shivered.

“You do not like him,” Countess Saxon observed, coming up behind Satine, “and you do not like this arrangement.”

“I do not.” Satine agreed.

“Keep your head, Duchess,” Countess Bralor advised, “the Count is a master manipulator.”

“I will.” Satie promised.

The Countesses left and Dooku returned with the drinks.

“What did they want?”

“Information,” Satine replied, “they always do.”

“Information is a powerful resource.” Dooku nods.

Forcing herself not to think of her children, the Duchess scanned the party, eyes falling on the Prime Minister making her way towards her.

Satine turned to the Count, “Excuse me.”

“Death Watch has allied with bounty hunters and pirates to try and capture you or the Count,” Jaru Djarin frowned, “were you aware?”

“No,” Satine frowned, “I believe the Count feels that he shouldn’t worry.”

“I suggest you call your sister,” the Prime Minister continued, “you must ensure her help.”

With a nod, Satine left the public servant and climbed the steps to her room. She locked the doors and lowered the blinds in her personal parlor, then turned on her comm. Satine had to ring three times to get an answer.

“What do you want?” Bo-Katan hissed.

“Well, for a start, confirmation that you won’t kill me.” Satine replied coolly.

Bo-Katan snorted, “Wow.”

“The wedding date has been set.” the Duchess offered.

“We heard.”

“Bo-”

“No, Satine,” the criminal hissed, “you promised us something and didn't deliver.”

“What time works best for you?”

“Sooner rather than later,” Bo-Katan stated, “we hate him.”

“Do you have reach on Concordia?” Satine asked.

“Yes.”

“There’s an underground Sith Temple there that he wants to visit,” Satine frowned, “I just have to find out when he’s going.”

“Good,” Bo-Katan nodded, “call me when you have more info.”

An hour later, Korkie and his siblings returned, battered, bruised, and smiling.

“Quickly, children,” Satine ushered them in through the back door, “before anyone sees you.”

The Duchess directed the children to their usual rooms, where she had clothes waiting for them.

“Mothers worry.” was her response when asked about it by Tristan.

“You wouldn’t believe it, Lady Mother,” Mara clapped, “we got kyber crystals!”

“What?”

“The crystals that make lightsabers,” Tyra explained, “we-”

“Tyra Satine,” the Duchess said sternly, “don’t you corrupt your siblings with Jedi nonsense.”

“We don’t even have the parts to make lightsabers,” Mara offered, “also, we collected a bunch.”

She opened a bag and Satine gawked. Hundreds of small crystals glimmered inside.

“Those can go in the safe.” she ordered, holding out her arms.

“Your Grace?”

“Hera,” Satine smiled, closing the bag, “will you bandage up my children?”

“Of course,” the nurse smiled, “come to the med bay, children.”

After hiding the kyber crystals in the safe, Satine made toward the medbay, but was stopped by Dooku on the way.

“I would like to journey to Concordia,” he stated, “is there a good time to go?”

“It could possibly bring them closer to us,” Satine nodded, half paying attention, “is tomorrow good?”

“Yes,” Dooku relaxed, “thank you.”

“I shall see to it.”

Satine called Parna and Khaami to the med bay.

“Oh, poor children.” Khaami ran to the kids, “look at these bruises!”

“We’re alright, Lady Khaami.” Mara smiled.

“We had fun.” Korkie added.

“Are you sure you kids are alright?” Parna asked.

“Yes,” Tristan nodded, “just a little banged up.”

“I want to hear the whole story,” Satine approached, “but first, Parna tell the Ruling Council Count Dooku will go to Concordia tomorrow and makethe necessary arrangements.”

Parna curtsied and left.

“We had good timing then.” Korkie offered.

“Yes,” Satine turned, “Khaami, will you tell the Jedi Council that the Concordia Temple is destroyed?”

“Of course,” Khaami smiled, “anything else I should say?”

“No, Khaami,” the Duchess smiled, “that will be enough.”

After her lady left, Satine pulled up a chair and sat while Hera flitted between her children.

“Do tell me what happened.” she asked.

“No one was there,” Tristan began, “it was creepy, and it took all four of us to open the doors.”

“Also,” Tyra added, “there were some Sith runes on the floor, we copied them to show to the Council.”

Satine nodded, waiting for more.

“We found the kyber crystals and took them,” Mara explained, “I felt like they didn’t belong there.” “And,” Korkie interjected, “we fought Tyra’s boyfriend.”

Satine raised an eyebrow.

“Technically, we’re not dating,” Tyra gestured, “but apparently he’s Sith-Spawn, and his father is the Sith Master.”

“Tyra Satine.” the Duchess groaned.

“I know,” Tyra smiled sadly, “but Korkie set the Temple on fire, then we chased him across Concordia.”

“Wow.”

“He escaped,” Tristan explained, “but Tyra read his mind and his mother is Oana Shields of Harran, from Naboo.”

Satine gasped.

“Also,” Mara interjected, “Tristan can control water.”

“What?”

“Je’er barely escaped,” Tyra continued, “but that’s only because Tristan made it rain.”

“Je’er is the Sith-Spawn?”

“Yes.”

Satine placed a hand to her head, “Let’s call your father, meet me upstairs.”

On the way to her room, Count Dooku stopped the Duchess. Satine was so startled that she froze.

“My Master has informed me that the Temple on Concordia is destroyed,” Dooku’s eyes narrowed, “and that your children have destroyed it.”

Stuttering, Satine argued that his Excellency was already going to Concordia.

“Where are they?” the Count growled.

“Where are who?” Korkie bellowed.

Fear coursed through Satine, Count Dooku was going to kill her children!

“No, Satine, I won’t kill them-”

The Duchess heaved a sigh of relief.

“I’ll have their father’s mortal enemy do it, in front of you.”

Satine released a guttural scream and throttled the Count. She didn’t really know what she was doing, but she came to her senses when her fiance’s face began to turn purple.

“Lady Mother, Mother it’s alright!”

Dooku scampered off as Tyra and Tristan pulled Satine off him.

“Guards,” Satine shouted, “guards!”

Jaym and Gorg rounded the corner.

The Duchess glowered, “Catch the Count.”

“Capture Count Dooku!” Gorg yelled.

The guards took off, running.

“Mara, call your connections,” Satine turned, “have them look for Dooku!”

Tristan offered to find her mother’s ladies.

“Yes, go!”

Korkie blinked, “I’ll call Auntie Bo.”

When he ran off, Satine turned to Tyra.

“Tyra, alert your father of this new development!”

After her daughter ran, Satine followed her guards. The palace was in such a state of mass chaos that a throng of people pushed her towards the entertaining room, where there were many places to hide.

Satine broke free as they passed an exit to the gardens. Making her way across the dark grass, the Duchess followed a group of guards examining the maze. She walked for five minutes before her skin began to crawl.

“Satine.”

She turned. Count Dooku had his lightsaber ignited, and he was approaching her.

“Kal-”

“Oh, now you use my name?”

“You were going to harm my children,” Satine’s eyes narrowed, “all pretenses can be dropped.”

The Count growled, “Then shall we drop this marriage charade?”

Satine swallowed, “My family comes first, Kal, and you’re not a part of that.”

Dooku reached out through the force and grabbed Satine’s throat, lifting her off the ground. 

“You’ve made the wrong choice, Satine,” the Count muttered, “you could’ve had all the power of the Sith.”

“We don’t,” the Duchess gasped, “need you.”

Dooku laughed, “Stubborn as always, Satine.”

Gasping for breath, the Duchess' eyes widened as a clear night grew dark.

“Ugh,” the Count groaned, turning to face Tristan, “stop it, boy!” 

Blue, that was the color of Tyra’s lightsaber. She entered just behind Tristan, shouting at Dooku, but Satine couldn’t hear her over the wind.

“You couldn’t take me if you tried,” the Count laughed, “and if you move, your mother dies.”

The Duchess’ vision swam, the edges grew dark. Then, something moved in the darkness, and suddenly, Satine was able to see again.

“Lady Mother,” Korkie called, running to her, “can you hear me?”

The Duchess was coughing, but she scrambled into Korkie’s arms. 

“You didn’t tell me your children knew the ways of the force.”

Lightning echoed in the distance. Her poor people, Sundari was a weather-controlled dome, they must be so scared.

“Tristan,” Satine gasped, “stop!”

Her son obeyed while the other one helped her stand.

“Where’s the fourth?” Dooku asked.

“Right here!” Mara called jumping over a hedge.

The Count gazed at the four children with something between interest and disgust.

“Who would've known Jedi-Spawn had potential,” Dooku mused, “it’s a shame you all are prisoners now.”

“We are not.” Korkie growled.

The Count raised an eyebrow,“Oh?”

Black fire rose around Dooku’s feet, the dark flames melting into shadows yet burning the grass. 

“Good,” the count goaded, “try higher.”

Korkie snarled and the flames rose.

“Your anger is a tool,” Dooku smiled, “remember that.”

The flames disappeared. Tristan reached out his hand and summoned the Count’s lightsaber into his palm.

“Basic trick, boy, but good use of timing.”

Tyra, who had been inching closer, held out her saber.

“No, child,” Dooku smiled, “I would fight you, only I can’t kill you without your father here.”

Satine watched as Mara closed her eyes and the Count jerked.

“Nice try, girl,” the Count praised, “but I am a Sith Lord, that will not work on me.”

That’s when the guards arrived, making their way around the children and surrounding Count Dooku.

“Take your siblings and run,” Satine whispered to Korkie, “try to calm people down and help your Aunt when she gets here.”

Korkie nodded and gestured to Mara, who corralled her other siblings and left the maze.

“Count Dooku, you are under arrest!” Gorg yelled.

“What am I under arrest for, Satine?” Dooku smiled.

The Duchess straightened, “Threatening to kill the Duke of Sundari, conspiring to frame me, and threatening the safety of my palace.”

“What crimes,” the Count laughed, “I suppose you have proof?”

“More than enough.” Satine replied.

At that moment, a helicopter landed in the distance. Dooku frowned.

“Friends of yours?” he asked Satine.

“Depends.” she answered.

Bounty hunters and other underground criminals joined the standoff, and Jaym turned to the Duchess. She held out her hand. 

“What plan is this, Satine?”

Boba Fett approached the Duchess, eyes on the Count.

“Your sister sent us, Your Grace,” he whispered, “she’s sending pirates as well, they’ll be here in an hour, Death Watch is mobilizing, they’ll be here in the morning.”

“The morning?” Satine asked.

“I told Mara we were here,” Boba continued, “she said the Jedi would be here in less time.”

“Are we going to stand here forever, Satine?” Dooku asked.

“Capture him,” Satine ordered, “and have no fear, he’s without his lightsaber.”

Slowly, the circle around the Count grew smaller. Gorg gave the signal right after Boba Fett did, and it soon became a battle scene. Nervous, the Duchess took a step back, and a second later, she was glad she did. With a feral roar, lightning spewed from Dooku and sent many of Satine’s guards flying backwards, electrocuted.

“I am a Sith Lord,” the Count bellowed, “and the dark side will smite you all.”

“That’s what they all say.” Tyra laughed.

Everyone turned as she ignited her lightsaber.

“Ooh,” Mara clapped, “maybe the Count should just surrender.”

Dooku scoffed, “I can fight a Padawan, bastard.”

As if to prove this, the Count shot a lightning bolt at Tyra, who deflected it easily. Mara and Tyra jumped down from the hedge and approached their mother.

“Cover us, Tyra,” Mara whispered, “I have a plan.”

Standing in front of her mother, Mara closed her eyes and waved her hand.

“Is this what you want, Count?” she asked.

Tyra blocked a bolt aimed at them and Mara began to shake.

“In my head.” she whispered.

Satine grabbed onto her daughter’s waist, “Stay strong.”

“Keep going,” Jaym called, working to help Gorg stand, “he can’t stop us all.”

“On the contrary,” Dooku smiled, jerking his arms, “I think I can.”

It was a while before Death Watch arrived, and even then the Count noticed them first.

“Ventress,” he growled.”

Around him was a circle of dead guards. Jaym had been brave and brought some back from the tyrant’s feet to a med station Hera had set up, but there were at least half a dozen that didn’t make it.

Mara had passed out a while ago and was resting at the med station with Tristan. Korkie was off directing people and making phone calls to local government officials, while Tyra, who was classically trained in the force, was still helping the attack.

“Auntie!” Tyra smiled as Ventress appeared behind Dooku.

“Take a break, Jedi-Spawn,” the witch winked, “I’ll take it from here.”

Tyra practically collapsed in her mother’s arms.

“Come,” Satine whispered, “med bay.”

Bo-Katan flew down next to Satine at that moment.

“Keep him alive,” Satine whispered, “the Jedi should’ve been here by now.”

“The Count ordered an attack on the planet,” Bo-Katan stated, “they’re in the atmosphere.”

“Good God,” Satine whined, heaving Tyra across the grass, “good luck, Sister.”

Hera was happy to help Tyra at the station.

“I’ll take care of her,” she stated calmly, “go to Korkie, he’ll need you.”

Satine didn’t realize what he meant until she ran inside, all the doors were bolted shut and the lights were off. If Satine hadn’t known the palace by heart, she would’ve gotten lost.

“Korkie!”

He turned, saw his mother, and embraced her.

“I just got off the phone with Prime Minister Djarin,” he shook, “she’s mandating a stay-inside order and letting people know the Count has turned feral.”

“Thank you.”

“Governor Eldar and many of the Counts and Countesses are doing the same,” Korkie spewed, “and I called the Press Association to tell them that the Count tried to have you framed, I sent them the recordings.”

“Korkie,” Satine graped her son by the shoulders, “you did well.”

“Most everyone is hiding in the cellars on the far side of the palace,” Korkie continued, “I also told the police to keep a curfew.”

“Good,” the Duchess kissed her son’s head, “go check on the fighters in the med bay, they'll be happy to see you.”

Satine then commed Parna and told her to calm the palace staff and keep them safe. Khaami would help her. When lightning struck, down in the gardens, Satine ran back outside. Tristan was keeping most of the small fires out, but that meant he’d left Hera’s side as assistant outdoor medic. There were only two medical professionals at the palace, andDoctor Quial, who was on call today, was in the med bay.

“How can I help?” Satine asked, running up to Hera. “Bring people inside,” she ordered, “take the ones who can’t walk.”

The Duchess’ dress was bloody in ten minutes, but when she returned outside, the only two left resting were Tyra and Mara.

“Hera got hit,” Tristan explained, wrapping up her wound, “Tyra and Mara have fallen into some sort of stupor.” Groaning, Satine half carried, half dragged her daughters into the med bay. Korkie helped her with her burden

“There’s no more room,” Doctor Quial called, “if they’re not wounded, put them in a room.”

Mara and Tyra were left in their mother’s bed with Korkie watching over them.

“If you have to evacuate the planet,” Satine began, “bring the most important papers in the safe.”

Korkie kissed his mother’s cheek.

The Duchess placed a hand on the side of Korkie’s face, “Be brave, son of mine.” 

“I will.”

When Satine reached the garden, she realized what was taking Death Watch and the pirates so long, a Sith Zabrak was now fighting with the Count. As if he felt her presence, he looked up at her, yellow eyes blazing.

“Hello, Mrs. Kenobi.”

Satine shivered at the voice in her mind, it was cold, rough, and demonic.

“You want to help me,” he whispered, “come help me.”

“Help,” Satine mumbled, shaking with anger, “not help.”

The Zabrak jumped, landing outside of the circle of enemies around him.

“Duchess,” he smiled, “a pleasure to meet you.”

Satine made to turn and run, but he held her up by her neck with the force.

“Protect the Duchess!” someone yelled.

The wind left Satine’s lungs as she was thrown through the air and landed at the Count’s feet.

“Ah, Satine, my darling fiance.”

“Burn in hell, Kal,” Satine spat, sitting up, “you’re going to pay for your crimes.”

“My crimes,” the Count’s eyes narrowed, “quite devious of you to keep your plan hidden for so long?”

Satine swallowed.

“We should take her,” the Zabrak growled, “let me finish the job.”

The Duchess’ eyes went wide, “Maul.”

“Good,” the Zabrak grinned, “you know me.”

Satine struggled onto her knees, preparing to pounce, “Your master threw you away like trash.”

“You know nothing of my master.”

Satine actually giggled, “So it would seem.”

As Maul’s eyes shifted to Dooku’s, Satine lunged forward and tackled the Zabrak at the hips. His mechanical legs were thrown off balance and he fell backward. From there, Satine crawled a few feet to Jaym, who grasped her arm.

“Please, Satine,” Dooku sighed, “make this easy for us.”

“Never.”

Pushing herself along the grass, the Duchess made it a foot before she felt the air close around her throat.

“Hang on!” Jaym called.

Satine choked.

“The poor Duchess,” Maul laughed, “she-”

The Zabrak gasped and the pressure on Satine’s throat lessened. Jaym pulled her to safety. Satine looked up, Tristan was standing with his arms out and eyes closed, concentrating on something.

“No.” Maul frowned.

Tristan began to sway and Satine ran to her son. She caught him just as he fell.

“That’s enough for you.” she whispered, dragging him out of range.

In the distance, Satine vaguely registered Count Dooku tell Maul that there were four of them, but the Duchess’ current goal was to get her son to the doctor.

“Your Grace,” Boba appeared, “your sister and Ventress have set up a trap, the Jedi are waiting.”

Jaym appeared around the corner.

“Take him to the doctor,” Staine ordered, “if he’s alright, then bring him to my room.”

The guard nodded and picked up Tristan, Boba helped Satine to stand.

“The servants have been evacuated,” he whispered, “the trap is in the ballroom.”

With Jaym gone, the only people who could order her men was Satine.

“Fall back,” she commanded, peaking around the hedge, “follow me, and hurry!”

Boba Fett stayed back to enforce the order while Satine sprinted towards the dark palace. An angry growl explained that Maul was behind her, and the padded footfalls alluded to Dooku behind him.

“Help the Duchess!” a guard called.

Satine ran in the ballroom from the royal entrance, pausing to catch her breath in the middle of the dark room. She turned, watching Count Dooku approach.

“Duchess, Satine.” he smiled.

She swallowed and tried to smile, “Count.”

All of a sudden, Dooku grunted and his eyes widened. Satine began to shake with fear.

“Force stabilizers,” he whispered, “clever trick.”

Then, Death Watch soldiers appeared, all holding ghastly weapons and grinning wickedly.

“Count Dooku,” Anakin’s voice boomed, “you are under arrest for treason against the Republic.”

“Ugh, not you.”

“Actually,” Quinlan Vos contradicted, “there’s two of us.”

Count Dooku was put in chains.

“Remember, Anakin,” Satine whispered, “torture is inhumane.”

“Obi-Wan said the same thing,” the Jedi winked, “and speaking of my Master, there’s something he wants to ask you.”

Satine frowned, clearly confused, Dooku however, scoffed.

“Help us march him to prison,” Anakin yelled out, “and maybe if we’re nice, we’ll let you shoot him!”

Bo-Katan’s men and women cheered. The Count glared at Satine as he was forced past.

“Satine.”

“Kal.”

It was only at that moment, did Satine realize that Darth Maul was missing.

[school-works-ahead]

Fight For The Glory

It was a dead land, as far as the eyes can see, any form of life gone and turned to dust. The smell of rot fills the air as carcasses of both ally and enemy litter the ground. Blood taints the soil and scars of war will be immortalized by the amount of destruction wrought in the area. In the middle of this lies a man slowly bleeding out, his wounds not deep enough for instant death but enough to make anyone beg for it, but he can’t and would not steep that low to beg for death. Not when the knowledge of the destruction of his clan is still fresh in his mind, not when the knowledge of the fact that the man who he considers as a brother was the one to stab him in the back, and aided in the destruction of the clan that brought him in and treated him like he was one of their own. Only to repay them by giving away all their secret to their enemies and turning their allies against them.

“Hahahahaaah..”

The sound of his estranged laugh echoed across the air but no one was there to hear it, not one was able to see the tears stream down his face mixing with the dirt and blood. And no one was there to see the hatred and anger that burned in his eyes.

“If only we saw him as the snake he really was,” He said out loud, body still bleeding out, the pool of blood surrounding growing bigger. “But we were fools to trust him, and now I can’t do anything but wait for death to take pity on me.”

He fell silent and just continued to look up to the red sky as if it were reflecting the bloodied earth. Trying to find peace in his final moments, but the anger would not leave his soul.

“Is it wrong for me to want their death, would it be wrong for me to want take back the glory of my clan that they have taken away?” He asked to the empty air not at all expecting a reply, his eyes slowly lost their focus the red sky blurring with the smoke, closing on their own making his vision go dark. “This is it, this is the end, maybe in the next life I would know better.”

“And how do you plan, to get back the glory that was stolen?” A voice asked

Eyes snap open and right above him he saw was a young girl who looks to be around the age of 7, her features were that of any little girl he would see, but what made her feel different was the aura she had. It was as if the void was personified into a person, her dark hair seemed to not reflect light like it was a void. But it was her eyes that caught his attention more, they shone like molten gold, shifting into different shades not at all solid.

“Who are you?” He rasped throat dry and soar.

The girl never responds as she pulls out from his view, the sky was once aging the only thing he could see before he felt himself being pulled upwards to a sitting position. It was strings pulling him up, he observed, following the threads he saw that they were connected to her fingers. They continued to pull him along but were surprisingly gentle with his wounds, which he felt were slowly closing up.

They crossed the bloody field passing many bodies, it was horrible. The number of the dead was not noticeable when in the middle of battle but with the silence, and with the only signs of life being the two of them along with crow picking away at the carcasses. They continued to travel, with only the girl knowing the destination, and him going along for the ride. He finally was able to recognize where they were headed to when the trees became thicker and larger, the area seemingly untouched by the war. The runes carved into the trunks reacted to his presence glowing for a second as they passed. They finally slowed down stopping at a large entrance to a cave.

“What are we doing here?” He demanded.

But still there was no reply from the girl, who was only looking into the darkness of the cave. Instead all she does is let go of the strings holding him up, causing him to trip as he landed not at all prepared for the sudden drop. Looking up he sees the girl enter the cave, the darkness enveloping her. He rushes to stand up following after her, worried that she would get stuck in one of the rune traps that were still active.

“Hey wait, you can’t just come in here without any warning, who knows how many runes you might spring,” He said reaching out to the girls shoulder, “Even the elders of the clan would have trouble navigating through the cave…”

The words lost momentum as they left his mouth when he noticed where they were. It was the shrine that should be deeper in the caves and would normally take longer to arrive to, but presently it only took a few seconds. He froze in his spot loosing his grip on her shoulder to which she shrugged of and took a few steps towards to large statue that was situated in the middle of the room,  vines were slowly making their way down the walls only a result of a few weeks of negligence due to the war.

She walks up to the statue and gestured towards the unlit braziers that lined to walls, causing them to burst into flames bringing light to the dark room. She gazes upwards inspecting the statue, it was at this moment the man brings himself together and approaches the girl and stops only a few steps back of her.

“Who is that?” She asks pointing upwards to the statue, which was carved of white marble depicting the image of a woman whose hands were cupped where it seems as if life was created from her hands.

“She is my clan’s patron god, Lady Epitheme god of life.” He asked as he slowly lowered himself into a sitting position, body still sore even if it was healed.

“Your patron?”

“Yes, she’s deeply ingrained in our clan history, dating from out beginnings until now.”

“But she did nothing for your clan during the war, no matter how much you prayed for her help.” She said looking to him, “Do you still respect her after that?”

“I still do, my people believe that she would be the one to receive us after death.” He answered after a few moments of thinking for a while.

“So what you said back then at the bloody field, do you not mean it then?”

He thought back to what he said, and still felt the anger and the want for paying them back return to his not at all cooled down.

“I still mean it, because no matter how much I believe in the next life and that our patron would be there to receive us, I still want to fight back and reclaim the glory our clan once had.”

“Then what do you plan on doing then?” She asked this time fully turning towards him, “You are alone, your allies turned didn’t bother returning your cries of help, and the only reason why you’re not dead was because I found you.”

“I don’t know yet,” He answered honestly, “I wish that there was an easier way but I still haven’t thought that far.”

“And if I were to offer my help to you, would you accept it?”

It was at this point the shadows seemed to come alive crawling up the walls, shifting and surrounding them. As if they were given life, but he was aware that the shadows were not at all as they seemed, it was as if they were filled with life, that they had a presence to them.

“May I know who you are first?” He asked after observing the scenario, there was nothing but curiosity in his voice, not a drop of fear present.

“I have no name, it has been lost through time,” She replied, “All I have is the void and the dead keeping me company through the years.”

“And I want to know your purpose of offering your help to the man who lost everything.” He said his bitterness hidden from his voice but it was clear in his eyes, mixing with his anger and rage, “After all, as you said my clan is dead and the people we thought as allies didn’t bother returning our cries for aid.”

She smiles and walks towards his position on the floor, stopping in front of him and plopping herself down to sit, “Who knows, even I am unsure to why I want to help you, but there is something in me telling me to help you, and maybe I’ll find out the reason why as time passes on,” She says before holding her hand out as if asking for a handshake, “Let me ask again, if I were to offer my help would you accept it”

He says nothing, and just takes the offered hand, which causes runes to erupt from their seated position. There were now changes to the girl seated in front of him, her eyes shone even brighter as if it were the sun. The shadows were now closing on to them, tendrils wrapping around their clasped hands binding them.

“What is your name?” The girl asks, her voice now more ethereal and layered as if it were multiple beings talking out of her.

“Erik, my name is Erik.” He replies, his blue eyes gaining a glow to them as the binding between them started to form.

“Well then Erik, I hope that you will succeed with the aid that will be given to you.”

And with those words the binding was completed, shadows start to envelop the both of them till all that remained was a pair of glowing eyes one shining blue shining like the blue moon that would rarely grace their lands the other shone like the sun that graced the lands.

[darkfeanix]

If you see this, post an excerpt from a WIP

The Dragon Age: Origins modern AU that couldn’t. Originally intended to be a full re-telling of Origins with a modern slant, I lost the will to continue it when the Harrowing passed 12,000 words. That being said, I really love what I came up with, so at some point I would like to at least finish up the Harrowing and post it. Anyway, here is nearly 2,000 words of this would-be re-telling.

Warnings: References to de-humanisation of prisoners (kind of?), brief nudity, brief allusions to prior sexual encounters of a BDSM nature.

My name is Hamish Amell, he said silently, as much to the templar as to himself. I am a Kirkwall Amell. Mine is a lineage that dates back to the Exalted Age. I am proud of my name and proud of my origins, and I will never be made to forget that. 

It was a mantra he had recited to himself many times since he had been taken from his family across the sea, a constant reminder to always push himself forward no matter the circumstances. It was also a reminder that he still had a home to go back to, one day, when he had proven to the Circle’s leaders that he could be trusted. 

Now fully naked, he wasted no time taking the bundle of cloth from the templar and letting it fall open, revealing it to be a flimsy, shapeless robe not unlike the sort worn by patients in the medical wing. The back was split almost completely down the middle, with only two buttons to fasten it closed. He managed that on his own, with some difficulty, but it was clear the robe had not been designed with the wearer’s comfort or modesty in mind. Once again, he couldn’t help but wonder if that was an intentional decision, done to throw him off-balance. It would be consistent with the supposition that, whatever the Harrowing entailed, he was expected to maintain control of himself and his powers under duress. 

“Please, take a seat,” the templar said, managing to keep his voice steady now. With only the barest nod of acknowledgement, Hamish walked past him, head held high as he approached the chair in the centre of the room.

As he got nearer he took note of the thick leather restraints on the arms and front legs of the chair. Were they standard for all apprentices, or only the difficult ones? He quickly reasoned that the difficult ones probably wouldn’t have even been brought to this chamber, which did nothing to ease the knot of anxiety in his stomach. Nonetheless, when he reached the chair he turned around to face the room at large, and then eased himself down into it was as much poise and grace as if he were the Empress of Orlais herself, seated on her Sunburst Throne. 

Apparently satisfied, the templar moved over towards the door, while Hamish took the opportunity to look around the room again, this time with a more cursory eye. It was at that point that he saw something that, for the first time since he had entered the Harrowing chamber, truly alarmed him. 

Each of the eight templars that ringed the room was armed with the standard baton and CEW on either hip, but what truly shocked Hamish was that each and every one of them also carried an assault rifle the likes of which he had only ever read about in books. 

Common law forbade templars from carrying any sort of lethal weapon while on duty, and until that moment Hamish – like every other mage he knew – had simply assumed that that meant there weren’t any such weapons in the tower. Clearly he had been mistaken, and the realisation that the templars were not only prepared to kill him but armed and fully capable of doing so at a second’s notice made him feel ill. 

“This is the apprentice?” 

Hamish looked up to find that while he had been reflecting on the possibility of his imminent demise, a small group had entered the chamber and arranged themselves into a semi-circle before him. At the centre of the group, he recognised the two highest-ranked individuals in the Kinloch Hold Circle: First Enchanter Irving Norwood, his own personal mentor for the past three years; and the man who had voiced the question, none other than Commander Greagoir Holt of the Templar Order. 

“Yes, this is him,” Irving replied to the commander’s question, though his eyes remained fixed on Hamish. 

They had three mages each on either side of them, all wearing the standard uniform robes of the Circle of Magi. At Irving’s words those mages stepped away to position themselves in a perfect circle around the room, interspersed between the templars. Hamish noted that only four of them carried the rune-carved staves needed for a mage to open a wide enough channel to the Fade to cast higher-level magic. He wondered what the other two were going to do, but didn’t have a chance to dwell on it as Commander Holt began to speak again. 

“‘Magic exists to serve man, and never to rule over him’,” he recited, a line from the Chant of Light that was well-known to anybody who had spent time in a Circle of Magi. “Thus spoke the prophet Andraste as she cast down the magisters of the Tervinter Imperium, every last one of them a mage who had used their Maker-given magic to enslave and oppress the people of this world.”  

As he spoke, Hamish got the impression that this was a speech he had recited almost as many times as that quote from the Chant. Even so, he spoke with absolute conviction, and like Irving, the commander never once took his eyes off Hamish, who had to resist the urge squirm under that intense gaze. 

“Your magic is a gift,” he went on, “but it is also a curse. The power borne within you acts as a bridge between this world and the Fade, and it also connects you to its denizens: the spirits and demons who watch enviously from across the Veil. They will invariably be drawn to you in your dreams, where you are most vulnerable… and if you let them, they <i>will</i> use you as a gateway into this world.” 

At that moment the first enchanter took a few steps forward, so that he was only a few feet from where Hamish sat. 

“This is why the Harrowing exists,” he explained. “The ritual will send your awakened mind to the Fade where, armed only with your will, you will have to face and overcome a demon.” 

As he finished speaking, Commander Holt stepped up beside him. “Know this, apprentice: if you should fail the Harrowing, we templars will do our duty. No abomination has escaped this chamber since this ritual’s inception, and you will not be the first.” 

Hamish felt a shiver run up his spine that had nothing to do with the cold metal against his back. It was one thing to speculate about the possibility of battling a demon as part of the Harrowing, and another thing entirely to have it confirmed. 

Almost against his will he found himself glancing nervously at the templar guards, at the guns they held ready. That was certainly one way to deal with the demon if it overcame him. 

He squeezed his eyes shut, shaking his head as he forced that thought from his mind. It would not overcome him. He was Hamish Amell, he had the blood of countless generations of great men and women pumping through his veins, and he would accept nothing less than absolute success. 

Taking another deep breath, he opened his eyes and said, “I am ready.” 

Irving smiled and nodded, apparently having expected as much. The commander, too, seemed unsurprised – although, Hamish reflected, that may have just been his base expression. As Holt continued to watch him, the first enchanter turned towards the door. 

“Cullen, the bowl, if you would.” 

As he said this, Commander Holt stepped forward, and Hamish knew even before the older man reached him what was about to transpire. With Irving’s back to them, the commander proceeded to fasten the padded cuffs around each of Hamish’s arms and legs, working with the kind of methodical precision that came from years of repetition. 

It wasn’t the first time in his life that Hamish had been restrained – it wasn’t even the first time in the past month – yet it took all his willpower to meet the commander’s gaze and not resist. This was no fun romp between the sheets, and there wasn’t any safe word here; he would not be released under any circumstances. Not until the Harrowing was over. 

Irving stood waiting when the commander was finished, a simple brass bowl in his hands. Almost immediately Hamish noticed a peculiar silvery-blue mist rising from the contents of the bowl, and as Irving approached him with the bowl held out, he became aware of a strange sound, almost like a song, though not like any song he could have heard with his ears. It was hypnotic, and he began to lean forward unconsciously. 

“Lyrium,” he said breathily. A highly dangerous substance that was mined by the dwarves; in its raw form it was toxic to handle for most ordinary people, and flat-out deadly for a mage. Yet once it had been processed into a powder form and properly diluted, such as with a potion, it could be used to strengthen a mage’s connection to the Fade, albeit only for a short time. 

It was also well known to be horrifically addictive; just one of several reasons for the Chantry to keep a chokehold on the lyrium trade. 

Apprentices only rarely saw it up close, and were never permitted to actually partake of it. He would be the envy of all the others when he got back. 

He was snapped back to reality suddenly as he remembered that he wouldn’t be going back, at least not to the apprentices’ quarters. Once the Harrowing was over, he would be moving into the mages’ quarters on the second floor and leaving all his old friends behind. That sobering thought put something of a damper on the lyrium high he had been on the verge of experiencing. 

Perhaps mistaking his moment of reflection for hesitation, Irving laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. He started slightly in surprise. 

“This is your last chance to refuse the Harrowing, but understand this: you cannot go back. If you will not go forward, then the templars will have no choice but to put you through the Rite of Tranquility.” 

He spoke very matter-of-factly, but Hamish had gotten to know the First Enchanter well over the past three years, and he recognised the unease in his expression as he spoke of the Rite. He could hardly be blamed; Hamish couldn’t name a single mage at Kinloch Hold who liked to think about the Tranquil, much less talk about them. 

“I told you: I’m ready.” He nodded resolutely, trying to reassure his mentor. 

Irving smiled once again, though it was a sadder smile this time. He returned the nod, and then held the bowl out so that it was almost directly under Hamish’s nose. 

The first thing Hamish noticed was that it was no simple potion in the bowl: it was raw lyrium, pure and unrefined, and right at that moment bubbling like hot soup on a stovetop. The song returned to him tenfold as the mist twisted lazily through the air before him, and distantly he became aware of voices blending with it. The other mages had begun the ritual, but he hardly noticed, as intent as he was on the song. It grew louder, drowning everything else out as the mist from the bowl continued to drift around him, encircling him, pulling him out of himself. 

It reached a crescendo: a high, unending note that overwhelmed all of his senses; the room around him vanished and he had no idea if his eyes were open or closed; he felt nothing, <i>experienced</i> nothing but the song. For a single second that seemed to stretch on and on, all he existed for was the song. 

And then an instant later his mind snapped back into place and he was alone in the Harrowing chamber.