#dragon age leliana's song

[blightmage]

Doing some achievement hunting since I rebought the games from Steam, and Sketch and Tug are some of my favorite minor characters. I am kind of holding out hope that we;ll get to see Sketch again in DA4 due to him being mentioned in a DAI Base game or Trespasser Codex (can't remember which one off the top of my head) entry and being imply to have been working for Solas since Leliana knew him (predating ~9:20/21 Dragon).

Leliana's Song is probably my favorite DLC. Along side Mark of the Assassin.

[larena]

Fiona 🤝 Marjolaine   Fuck the Divine

[hergreywarden]

Oh, I watch my soul it floats above me It's like every cell is hitting light speed Got a new step movin' with momentum Add it up, double it, take it and then some

Crystal clear like diamond Waist deep in my thoughts Found the silver lining Buried in a box Universal timing What if we got lost? Somewhere we fit right in

-Fell Asleep At The Beach by Glades

[jules-of-arc]

🧡 The Warden's rest

After spending half an eternity running around Ferelden fighting darkspawn and gathering an army, there is only one thing left to do, take a nap.

(Bloodless version under the cut)

Dragon Age: Veilguard week countdown: « 9 »

From left to right; berserker Brosca, healer Surana, everyone's favourite warden Alistair and duelist Cousland with her mabari, Aegis!

🧡

[maintitle]

Nightingales Eyes played in a cafe in Antiva and I nearly teared up. I miss my bard chantry assassin spymaster divine, when will bioware let her return from the war?

[in-finitesuns]

leliana's song // the truth is a cave, the oh hellos

[dilfgmancoolatta]

[leliwardens]

oh my fucking god chat i forgot oisine was from denerim, chat. chat the leliana/tabris parallels and connections can run deeper. elf oisine? originally living in denerim's alienage??? running into the tabris family??? chat are you there-

[lelianasbong]

Playing Leliana's Song and that moment when she confronts Raleigh, when he knows he's about to get got and resorts to taunting her about the week he spent torturing her in his dungeon -

Raleigh: I still remember that scared little girl in my cell!

Leliana: I remember her too. This is for her.

And then she KICKS THAT MAN OFF A CLIFF

[a-soul-with-no-king]

Chase the morning light till all of this ends

[pulling-a-jowan]

Playing Leliana's Song for the first time and wow! I somehow hate Marjolaine even more!

[blightmage]

trying my best to recreate Adaia's morph, left is an unedited morph, right is my recreation. Also gave her some tucked hair. It's not prefect, but I'm pretty proud of how things are turning out. I still need to make some adjustments. Couldn't get the screenshots at the same angle though.

[invinciblerodent]

Oh yeah, the Veilguard trailer does look excellent, I sure love that deeply charming, yet unromanceable dwarf man voiced by Brian Bloom!

(something something weird that it happened three times)

[v-arbellanaris]

on divine justinia

Justinia V will be remembered as one of the most progressive Divines in the history of the Chantry. Before her untimely death at the Temple of Sacred Ashes, she made strides to break down barriers for both mages and elves, as well as encouraging free thought among the Maker’s many children. For her views, she won as many enemies as she did supporters.

-- World of Thedas Vol 2.

PART ONE of a series, exploring Divine Justinia’s political stance. Was she really as progressive as people claimed?

Firstly, before we even dive into any analysis, we should define the word ‘progressive’. In the most base of definitions, it implies progress -- a gradual betterment. As a widely accepted definition, someone whose politics advocate for social reform. 

PART ONE - LELIANA'S SONG. / PART TWO - DRAGON AGE II. / PART THREE - THE MASKED EMPIRE.

Leliana’s Song DLC

This is where we first meet the future Divine Justinia V. We first meet her as Revered Mother Dorothea; she appears literally as a salvation to Leliana in her darkest hour, after Marjolaine has betrayed her, after Raleigh has tortured and beaten her. To make the metaphor even more glaringly obvious, we don’t even see her face at first, we hear her voice and see her as a glowing light coming down from a ceiling in a blank room. She’s clearly being painted as a ray of hope for Leliana, some sense of salvation -- (I’m very much getting the Maker helps those who helps themselves vibe from it) -- and when Leliana finally “gets” to her, she tells Leliana she’s safe. 

It’s important to keep in mind that this is what Dorothea means to Leliana. This is what Leliana sees and thinks about when she’s talking to and interacting with Dorothea. To Leliana, Dorothea is hope and safety, sympathy and compassion, and ultimately, a path to salvation. 

And though she may be those things to Leliana on a personal level, these traits have little impact on Dorothea's politics, which are influenced by the Grand Game and specifically how well a person can play it. This is made especially salient in the next scene.

Dorothea tells Leliana that she came to Ferelden without permission in order to fix her mistakes. The mistake she’s referring to is giving Marjolaine the papers containing Orlesian intel, which were then used to frame and implicate Leliana. It’s implied that this was the result of a seduction on Marjolaine’s part.

When Leliana questions whether Dorothea is trying to get her to steal the documents back, Dorothea denies it, just barely -- but then admits that there is “unfinished business” with Marjolaine, equating the documents she gave to Marjolaine with Leliana’s feelings of hurt and betrayal. She suggests that Leliana might want to get revenge for being “hurt so dearly” and offers to provide both Marjolaine and Raleigh’s location. She suggests that Leliana “help Orlais, and yourself”. At the same time, she claims that she doesn’t want Leliana to cause more harm to people, and yet, who was it that sends Leliana after Marjolaine in the first place? Who was it that sends Leliana to fetch the papers in the first place? With what Leliana just went through, Dorothea likely has no illusions about what Leliana is capable of -- or what she might want to do to Marjolaine, in the name of vengeance. In fact, Dorothea specifically addresses those feelings in order to convince Leliana to "help" both of them. Sending someone capable of murder -- with the motivation to kill -- after Marjolaine after tritely telling them that you don't want them to hurt more people...

Is she giving Leliana a chance do better or does she simply... not care what happens to Marjolaine as long as she gets the documents back?

This is the darkest moment of Leliana’s life. And though Dorothea shows great sympathy for Leliana’s feelings, despite her words, the actions she suggests essentially use Leliana against Marjolaine, all the while playing it off as though she doesn’t really need Leliana’s help, and this isn’t really about her at all, but it’s about Leliana’s emotions and struggles. But getting the papers back benefits Dorothea. The papers could be thrown into the sea or destroyed but Dorothea specifically pushes Leliana to retrieve them, in such a way that makes it look like that’s not what she’s asking for at all.

As Leliana, we get to quiz Dorothea and we get to see some insight into Dorothea herself. She calls the Ferelden rebellion “the Orlesian-Ferelden war” and states “Many on both sides have been reluctant to abandon the hatreds of that conflict.” 

The “conflict” she’s referring to is, of course, the Orlesian occupation of Ferelden and Ferelden fighting back against that occupation. Ferelden was colonised -- I struggle to understand how the violent occupation of a nation can be equated to resisting such oppression. But, I suppose that’s typical Chantry rhetoric that we see often; we see similar commentary about any state sanctioned/Chantry sanctioned violence against elves, such as the Exalted Marches, and, later, about the mage rebellion. Dorothea does inextricably link what’s bad for Orlais to what’s bad for the Chantry; unsurprising, considering the Andrastian Chantry is used to prop up Orlesian imperialism (read here for this thought provoking meta by mllemaenaed!).

Leliana asks what happens to all the people who followed her out of the dungeon. Dorothea says that some will be turned over to the city guard, presumably of Denerim where the story is set. Dorothea does state that some of them have more than paid for their petty crimes/ The "some of them" she's referring to specifically is Silas, who wants to join the Chantry. Ah yes, the sign of true repentance... and I suppose that everyone else just isn’t sorry enough? Or being tortured and/or sexually assaulted by Raleigh and his men somehow isn’t enough to pay for petty crimes? Hmm...

Conclusions, so far:

Her politics so far don't seem to be progressive -- the implications that Marjolaine seduced her (and thus, she has an active sex life) is perhaps a bit taboo for a priest, but her politics themselves don't necessarily seem progressive at this point.

She believes those who turn to the Chantry have truly repented, but others who do not, have not. She paints the Ferelden rebellion as a two-sided conflict, rather than an acknowledgement of Orlais as a hostile colonising force in Ferelden. None of these beliefs are progressive -- they're standard beliefs of Orlais and the Orlesian Chantry.

She's aware Leliana is a criminal here, but a criminal with uses, someone she can leverage against Marjolaine -- and she does, with devastating effect. Dorothea sends Leliana after Marjolaine fully aware that it could result in Marjolaine's death -- and is either naively hopeful about the result or entirely apathetic. She plays the Game and she plays it well -- well enough to survive having sold out Orlais, well enough to manipulate Leliana into working for her for the next ten years.

This is a master of the Grand Game.

Silas: What about you? Leliana: Me? Nobody cares what I want. Silas: You should.

[angeltannis]

you can track how unwell I’m feeling about doomed female characters by how often I’m found listening to “The Path to Decay” by Sirenia

[danielnelsen]

Awakening not included for balance reasons :)