#elgara lavellan | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

choccy-zefirka · 2 months ago

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A ship ask I got suddenly reminded me of Elgara Lavellan, my ex-Tranquil Inquisitor and one of my many many Alexius kissers, and how she tried to nudge him towards escaping Haven for Reasons Seen Below (he did not get far tho, got lost in the mountains and was eventually recaptured).

This was obviously written pre-Veilguard so Elgara's beliefs about the gods (which are fractured at best already, as she's a city elf) have not yet been re-examined. Enjoy rarepair shipping and OC introspective?

(Also I know some readers get very upset about single quotation marks; I tended towards writing in British English at the time, please calm down).

There is a whole pantheon of gods out there. The Gods of old. The Creators and guardians of the Elvhenan.

They have been locked away in the abyss, and their light has faded with the memories of Arlathan. But some of their influence still lingers. Some of their essence is still preserved. In the air and the water, in the deep forest moss and the silvery sheen of a halla's coat.

These gods are still remembered by the People. Both those who walk the Lonely Path amid the scattered shards of the Dales, and those who endure within the walls of human cities — like Elgara's family.

It has been many years since she caught her first, fleeting glimpse into the gods' stories; or reverently opened a book on Elvhen lore, heavy against her bony teenage knees. Many years, yet she still yearns to know more.

More than the alienage hahren has shared, in snatches of whispers, with furtive glances for round-eared shadows around the corner. More than has been revealed by her Circle's library, packed to the brim with books that should have been safeguarded by her People, not by human enchanters with half-lidded, bored, indifferent eyes.

There is so much more to learn.

About Sylaise, whose name her Mom and Mamae mouthed, half inaudibly, just before she was born.

And about June, with whose tools her neighbours did their best to keep their modest dwellings sturdy and clean and homely.

And about Mythal, whose sacred tree reached with its mighty roots even into the alienage, where the intricate weave of its branches was reflected in the vhenandahl's rustling crown, and in the strokes of red and white paint across its trunk, and also in the little etchings along the door frame, which you traced with your fingertips before going in.

She would like to understand these gods better, and welcome them into her heart. But apart from the faith in the Creators — a precious secret hidden from humans — she was also raised to revere Andraste.

A very… particular kind of Andraste. The kind that the Sisters serving her Circle would later try to whip out of her and the other elven apprentices. A slam of a ruler across your knuckles, leaving a dent; a shrill, screeching voice in your ear, splitting your little skull from within.

The Sisters, humans one and all, did not like the 'blasphemous' stories that the Wycome child brought with her to the red brick tower on the outskirts of Ostwick, when her magic awoke, nearly three decades ago. She had just entered her teens when the Templars came for her, and she saw Mom and Mamae one last time, with her throat tight and hot and her head feeling swollen, as she was trying desperately to pack all of her memories of the alienage into her skull.

She did not want to leave anything out. She memorized, as best she could, every face, every sound, every smell, every texture, every splash of colour. Right down to the orange squares of evening light on the kitchen floor and the squelch of dirt under her bare feet just after the rain.

She preserved and catalogued all of this in the nooks and crannies of her brain. So she could take it carefully out in the Fade at night, and show to the spirits, asking them to recreate the memories of her childhood.

According to the Templars, those little performances were something she needed to be afraid of — but she has never been afraid of spirits. Even the howling, tooth-gnashing, red-eyed ones, who just looked this way because they were in pain.

So much time has passed since that day, the day of turning her back on the anguished, tear-streaked faces of those who called her daughter, cousin, neighbour, friend… Elgara, because of all the sunshine they said she'd brought into their lives. And still, she believes in her alienage's Andraste.

A mythical hero of old. A mighty battlemage that walked with the elves, and fought for the elves, and, if you asked hahren, might even have been an elf herself.

The protector of slaves.

The friend of the smallfolk.

Always ready to listen, to soothe and to understand, even as the human Maker was distracted by the scented candle smoke in the gilded Chantry halls, with tall stained-glass windows that Elgara would have loved to admire up close but was not allowed to.

She believes in that Andraste, and tries her best to follow in her footsteps. And she is very honoured to know that the ghost of this great hero decided to pull her out of the Fade, just as the clicking pincers of the voracious, nightmarishly giant spiders grazed her ankles. And shielded her from the explosion that punched a jagged hole through an entire mountain and melted down the imposing walls of the Temple of Sacred Ashes. And, most important, brought her emotions back.

She had been cut off from the Fade for most of her life at the Circle — more than sufficient for it to become her new normal — when the Conclave was called together.

She has never been afraid of spirits. She has always thought that they are just like people. Capable of twisting beyond recognition when they are frightened, or in pain, or grieving for someone they love.

She still remembers, in the mists of her childhood, how Uncle Killian, once the merriest, most apple-cheeked elf to strum a modest self-carved lute while the others danced, turned grey and bony like a Despair wraith after his wife died.

Or how their neighbour two doors down, Lynni the street sweeper, usually serenity incarnate, with her long thick eyelashes always casting down a fluttering shadow on her cheeks, flushed a vivid crimson, and drew herself up to her full height, like a Rage demon rising out of the cracked earth, when some mischievous boys wanted to play Emerald Knights and broke the broom with which she was earning a living for herself and her son.

Those two events, a big tragedy and a small hardship, happened really close to one another. And then, on the same day, Uncle Killian's lute began to strum itself as he sat still in his room, worn out and listless and seemingly all alone. And Lynni's broom glowed bright green and soared into the air, and the splinters began shoving against one another and clumsily attempting to fit back in place. That was when the alienage realized that Elgara might have magic... But that is neither here nor there.

She has never been afraid of spirits. And she was certainly not afraid of the spirit that was bound to a sigil in a small (rather cramped, really) pocket of the Fade and used for testing the apprentices from her Circle during the Harrowing. She saw how much it suffered in its sizzling, burning ghostly-purple tethers, and set it free. As simple as that.

This counted as a failure of her Harrowing, and earned her a brand on her forehead. A bleeding, swollen imprint of the sun, which tainted her name with a chilling darkness.

With the brand, came a plunge into dense, heavy fog, where she wandered on and on, with her heartbeat dulled and her mind pristinely, blindingly white, like a room with a blanket over every piece of furniture.

Until she travelled to Haven with Minaeve and the other Tranquil, and met the ghost of Andraste.

The blankets are off now. There is a multitude of different shapes in that room inside her mind now. A multitude of different emotions. Prodding and poking her, sometimes all at once, sometimes in rapid succession, sometimes in a bizarre spinning cycle.

Like an abrupt stab of fear, when Seeker Cassandra pointed a sword at her and barked 'Tell me why we shouldn't kill you now?'.

…Which was suddenly drowned out by sinking into the pink, squishy, glitter-speckled goo of 'Oh no, she is attractive!'.

Or bounce of squeaky, puppy-like excitement (probably unbecoming for a woman her age, she knows, she knows) when Solas the apostate invited her to a conversation about spirits. Which was followed by even more of pink and gooey 'Oh no, he is also attractive! Everyone is so attractive, and I can properly appreciate their attractiveness again, instead of impassively describing the symmetry of their faces!'

She loves it. She loves that she can love it.

She loves that she can feel relieved, and just a little bit smug, each time she closes a demonic Rift with her mysterious Mark, and the people that she has saved crowd around her, each breathless with shock and an overpowering wave of gratitude.

Of course, she never stopped helping people, not even as a Tranquil. Seeing others worse off than her, hungry while she was full, injured while she was in perfect health, sobbing while she was always impenetrably calm, seemed illogical to her white-wrapped mind, and therefore undesirable. So she shared meals, and clothes, and bandages, and monotonously recited facts that proved that the person's distress was statistically unlikely to last forever.

She even took up sword lessons from a friendly Templar — to protect the other Tranquil, along with some of the young and elderly mages, when their Circle fell and they found themselves afloat in the broiling crucible of war.

But now… Now saving innocents, and mending the green wounds in the fabric of the world, and putting corrupted spirits to rest, like she had done during her Harrowing, actually puts a smile on her face. A real, sincere smile, accompanied by a tender warmth, a honeyed brightness inside her chest, like those sun squares on the kitchen floor.

It is not all sunshine, though. Sometimes, the prodding of emotions in her mind grows too strong, so that her brain wobbles, close to puncturing.

Sometimes, tears come gushing out of her eyes unprompted, and she feels the urge to pound her fists against the nearest wall, a scream scraping at the back of her throat like a feral cat.

Sometimes, even the happy bark of a friendly mabari is too loud. Even the whiteness of a small patch of snow in the streets of Haven is too searing.

As a Tranquil, this was all just a part of her foggy world. But now that the Mark graced her hand, every tiniest thing, every face, every sound, every smell, every texture, every splash of colour, has started evoking emotions. And there is only so much she can feel at the same time.

…And then, there are the bigger things.

The clamour of steel against steel, which so often fills the air, like half-formed bubbles in near-boiling water.

The deafening, dazzling bursts of magic, unleashed by Solas, and Madame Vivienne, and their newest companion, Dorian of Minrathous. And the slither of magic through her own veins, awoken by the Mark but still not quite under her control.

And the dreams. Oh dear gods, the dreams.

She has lost count of times when Solas has had to walk beside her through the Fade and help her calm down the hapless, innocent spirits that would begin to writhe at the sight of her, with their peaceful see-through faces beginning to twist in a snarl. Because her head is now filled with more than just memories of an ordinary alienage childhood and an ordinary Circle life. There is war there, and desolation, and death.

There are the Temple's ruins. Carpeted by contorted red-and-black husks, with hungry green wildfire still picking out the last crisp morsels out of their sockets.

There are unnatural red crystals pushing out of cavern walls, throbbing with heat like infected teeth, with a whispering darkness oozing out of them.

There is the once broad, safe, well-paved road, now burrowed by fleeing refugee carts and pockmarked by shallow blackened pits from magefire blasts.

And there is that delirium-like future that she has only visited just recently. A future where the world was a smattering of barren islands floating in a green abyss under a sunless, moonless, starless sky, sucked one by one into the insatiable vortex of the Breach. Where mortals and spirits alike were reeling from a year's worth of torture, whipped into submission by cultists from Tevinter.

'My less good-natured, and certainly less good-looking countrymen,' Dorian would call them, with a wry smirk splitting across his face: a disguise, to hide a crushing mix of outrage and grief.

It was probably an excellent disguise, but Elgara could see through it. Any hidden emotion was easy to spot for her, after spending all these years surrounded by the vacant faces of her Tranquil siblings.

In that future, her companions — her friends, she thinks (unless she has let herself be carried away by her sparkly excitement and started using the word too soon) — were locked away in dungeon cells. Rather like the ones some Circles used to discipline the mages. With barely enough space to spread out your arms, and with a constant trickle of moisture that coated the walls in a sticky, tar-like film... Except there was a single, gut-pulling difference that set those cells apart from the Circle solitary.

Those crystals — again.

Drooping from every surface like gigantic clusters of poisoned grapes, they crawled under the prisoners' skin, welling up at the bottom of their straining lungs, rising above their spine like the crested back of a dragon, and hardening their veins into lumpy threads of crimson glass.

They would absorb every inch of their victims, every sliver, till they turned into crystal themselves, to be 'harvested' and used to feed the cultists' guardsmen… Most of whom, too, were scarcely human any more. Deformed into their most demonic selves, they now had jagged scarlet claws for fingers and stretched-out mouths full of far too many, far too sharp teeth.

Perhaps, some day she will be able to move on from all these memories, and look back on them without dissolving into a wailing wreck (yet again, unbecoming for a woman her age, and the Herald of Andraste at that).

Perhaps, some day she will start seeing just Mom and Mamae's faces at night, and the faces of her old Circle companions, and all the new people that she has met on her journey. With no shadows looming around the corner.

But that day has not come yet. In fact, her spikes of emotion have gotten worse since they returned from Redcliffe.

She guesses that it's because her schedule has been so hectic lately. New and new groups of their mage allies have been arriving, and she has to be there to ensure that they settle in properly.

And speaking of settling in! She also has to watch over Dorian. To supply him with warm clothes and whatever modest batches of spice-scented tea Josephine can get her hands on. And to keep the good people of Haven (she tries to think of them as good people, she really does, as they are all in her care, but sometimes they try her patience) from scrawling 'Maleficar' on the walls of the little cottage he was given as lodging.

And... It goes without saying that she needs to prepare for the march against the Breach. A daunting mission that makes restlessness crackle through the air in Haven like shock magic.

Sometimes, the charge of this shock is so strong that she cannot walk straight, and has to whimper discreetly for a little bit. Preferably while leaning against anything solid: the side of a building, or a snow-capped mabari statue, or the shoulder of one of her warrior companions (all so helpful, and so gorgeous, and not really deserving to be bothered by her like this).

Most often of all, though, she does her whimpering in the dungeon. Down here, she can safely rock from side to side. And rip into her fingernails with her teeth. And stare ahead with unseeing eyes. And try to breathe through the frenzied drumming of her heart, so hot, metallic in her mouth.

Down here, no-one can catch her in this state, and start questioning if the Herald of Andraste is truly fit to do her duty. After all, the dungeon is nearly always empty.

She will do anything to avoid imprisoning people. And not just because she does not need any witnesses to her embarrassing breakdowns.

She remembers the Circle solitaries all too well, and those crystalline cells in the dark future, and also the damp, rat-infested cellars where some of her neighbours had their ‘quarters’ when the humans took them on as servants.

No-one needs to suffer through something like this. So she declared, as the Herald of Andraste, the Andraste of the alienage, the Andraste that protects the small.

Her advisors do not quite agree. Which they make abundantly clear, again and again.

Cullen frowns and clears his throat. Cassandra tosses her head up, measuring her with a gaze that is filled with unuttered objection. Leliana narrows her eyes, which somehow grow less cold (a contradiction that Elgara might be imagining).

Even Josephine seems uncertain, but eventually opts for offering Elgara a glass of water when the tension in the war room congeals so much that her eyes start streaming with tears again.

They do have… a consensus of sorts. While they, indeed, imprison their foes far less often than could have been expected from an organization calling itself the Inquisition, sometimes the guards do escort a chained captive or two down the dungeon steps... And the poor soul is surprised to find a well-lit room with a warm bed, a bookcase or two for entertainment, and a tray of food from Flissa's tavern sitting beside the barred door.

Right now, there are two people residing down here.

One of them is the leader of the bandits that, for some purpose still unknown, were trying to scare away travellers in the eastern Hinterlands. Elgara let most of his men go altogether: quite a few of them were former farmers, driven to banditry out of desperation when the demons razed their fields and the rogue Templars confiscated their tools, because some of them were vaguely mage-staff-like. Hopefully, Elaine, the horse master's wife, will find some honest work for them, now that the enchantment has been lifted off the local wolves, and her hold is thriving again.

A couple of the more... disagreeable bandits, prone to spitting in people's faces, and shoving at the guardsmen, and grunting with laughter when questioned about how they set fire to a refugee's belongings for fun, were given a chance to cool off… While digging latrines under Quartermaster Threnn's supervision.

And their chief — a red-faced man with a protruding lower jaw, nearly as tall as Iron Bull, and built like a druffalo, especially around the neck — called Elgara a 'half-witted rabbit' when she listed all the peaceful jobs he could do around Haven, to make up for all the damage he and his crew had caused.

Pity. Someone as big and strong would have been of great use. Hauling building supplies; helping put up more shelters for the people that flock to the Inquisition's banner... But he chose to be everything that makes a human a shem, and there is no help for him now.

After barking out his insult, the bandit chief lunged at Elgara, intending to close his enormous hairy fist around her throat. She blocked his blow as best she could, straining the arm muscles that she had honed while practicing all that swordplay ('An enjoyable side benefit,' Solas had once noted, while Sera, bright-pink and huge-eyed, made an odd noise deep from her chest, 'Whoah, you are thick for an elf!').

Anyway. Back to the bandit. In the end, Cassandra brought him to his knees by slamming her shield against his shins. And off to the dungeon he went.

He likes the bed, Elgara thinks, and devours the food in shovelling handfuls, with many a belch in between.

The books had to be taken away, though, after he tried to use one as a wipe when answering the call of nature in one of Threnn’s... facilities. Elgara would have asked Sera to draw him some picture stories, as they do to entertain the children of Haven — but he does not deserve them.

The other prisoner is, perhaps, the most unusual one these walls have ever seen, since the time when Haven belonged to dragon worshippers: the Tevinter magister from Redcliffe.

Or, well, former Tevinter magister. Dorian is nearly certain that, once word of his work for the cult reaches the Imperium, he will be stripped of his rank, his house name, and his land. To make a public show of how the Archon wants nothing to do with 'the vile Venatori'.

Dorian mimed that last part during a conversation over drinks, in a mocking, squeaky voice, while stroking an imaginary cat with his little finger extended. Quite a hilarious impression, even to someone who had never met the Archon, which was pretty much the entire tavern (young Krem from the Bull's Chargers only caught a glimpse of him once, when he was passing in a festive procession down the street, but there were many rows of heads blocking his view).

Well, maybe Dorian's show was not really that hilarious. But Elgara collapses into hiccupping laughter just as easily as into tears these days... And yet again, it was a disguise. Meant to distract from the shadow that glides across Dorian's face whenever he talks about the magister.

They were friends once, as far as Elgara understands. Two brilliant mages, mentor and apprentice, working together on a spell that challenged the laws of time.

She wonders if they made each other laugh. She wonders if they had inside jokes and wild stories — like the ones the apprentices in her Circle used to swap in the dorm, muffling their giggles into pillows and freezing in silence whenever a Templar's footfalls clamoured by.

They must have, surely. But now the magister, who tried to erase Elgara from time upon the orders of his cult's would-be god, and created the dark future in the process, spends his days in his room with a barred door.

Quiet and wraith-like. Empty-eyed, much like Uncle Killian in the days after his wife's funeral. Not caring for the books on the shelves and the food on the tray.

He does not try to deface the former like the bandit, at least. Sometimes he even picks one up and flips the pages. But in all her visits to the dungeon, Elgara has never once seen the faintest light of interest in his eyes.

And the root cause behind his state is not even his cult's failure. Nor the triumph achieved by Elgara — and her friends. Specifically, Dorian, who did the most important, the most vital work, reversing the time magic in a matter of minutes, while Elgara was nearly brought to the floor by weeping for Cassandra and Solas and the others, as the demons trampled and shattered their crystallized bodies.

He did not even try to rant about how they foiled the Venatori's efforts and disrupted his grand scheme. Well, not too much at any rate.

The root cause is... his son.

The da'len whom he fought so hard to save from the Blight. The da'len whom he watched leave, riding out of Redcliffe towards his destiny, with exactly the same look in his bruised eyes that Mom and Mamae had when the Templars took Elgara.

He really does love his da'len, so much that the force of that love echoes in Elgara's bones. As does the force of his pain.

The young Tevinter will die, and the man that his father once was, the man that Dorian admired, is gone already. Like a spirit that melts away in the flames of rage and grief, moulding into a demon — and then, when the demon is defeated, escapes out of its shattered carcass like a dying sigh.

With the dungeon thus... populated, Elgara tries to keep to the shadows. To sob into the empty dark. To leave the prisoners, the bandit and the magister, undisturbed.

She has just finished up with crying, again, and is taking slow breaths through her nose. To clear off the last of the dizziness that has wrapped around her pulsing head like cottonwool… But she is interrupted by a sharp voice, with a thick rural Fereldan accent.

'Oi! You lot! Time to stretch yer legs! 'Erald's orders!'

Elgara perks up, smiling to herself.

It's the guard on duty, about to take the prisoners out on their daily stroll around the back of the Chantry building. It's another part of their routine that she insisted on. Another comfort for the Inquisition's captives.

As Tranquil, she was allowed to travel beyond the tower's confines, rendering her rune-crafting services to various Marcher nobles. And she was still Tranquil when the Circle ceased to exist, and her tower's doors swung open, and the mages walked out under the boundless, ever-changing sky that many of them had last seen as children. She still recalls the sweetness of the air, washing her lungs clean of the caked dust from the book stacks.

A little bit of such sweetness every day will do her prisoners some good, she decided. The advisors, oddly enough, did not object. And she is always pleased to see the result.

So much so, that and brightness touch her heart again. Like a sparkling wave of sunlit sea, the sensation carries her up, giving her strength to get to her feet and step forward. To meet the guard and the two hunched figures that he is herding.

Even in this murk, she can distinctly see the guard's features. He’s frowning very strictly at the ropes that he has just tied over the prisoners' wrists, to keep their hands restrained behind their back. As if the serious look on his face will coerce those tight loops into staying put.

'Do you mind if I join you?' Elgara says, in a more or less… steady voice.

'Course not, Yer Worship!' the guard springs into a stiff, toy soldier pose. But not for long. The chin straps of his helmet are rather poorly fitted, and he has to constantly adjust them in sheepish, fidgeting motions.

'If yer so inclined, could ye help me watch this lot? Might need an extra pair of eyes in case they get ideas 'bout escapin! Coulda gotten more backup, but the Commander says he cain't spare folks. I'll take this big thug here, and you can take the Vint. He seems more... whatcher call it... docile.’

The magister quirks an eyebrow — the first time Elgara has seen his face change expression since he was imprisoned — but does not have it in him to as much as scoff.

The bandit, too, merely strains his druffalo neck till his veins start bulging. He’s keeping something pent up within him; some angry, malicious emotion that Elgara cannot quite read.

With no objections from the prisoners, the four of them set off. Up the stairs; and along the candlelit main hallway (which, as Sera pointed out with a chortle, looks rather like a cock on the Chantry map; that's something that Elgara also found far more hilarious than it probably was).

Along the way, Elgara spots Avexis, another Tranquil from Minaeve's little group. With her back perfectly rigid, she’s staring at the statue of Andraste in the alcove ahead of her.

Elgara calls her name and waves, but Avexis remains silent. She has been avoiding Elgara ever since her awakening from Tranquility. Elgara's guess is that Avexis doesn't want to hear about her experiences.

Not every Tranquil is keen on the idea their state might be reversed (much as they can be keen on anything), and Elgara cannot blame them. All the wonders of smiling and laughing do come at a heavy price.

As they exit the front gate, they turn a corner and begin to climb a snowy slope. For a moment, Elgara looks away from the magister, who is dragging his feet beside her… and allows her senses to carry her off.

Everything is so beautiful out here.

The saturated, cloudless blue of the sky. So unlike the snaking billows of green and black that had swallowed the sun in the wrong future.

The juicy, apple-like crunch of snow underfoot.

The faint smell of something roasting that the wind carries from the village fires.

It has always been beautiful, of course, and Elgara's mind registered that even when it was swaddled in blankets. But now this beauty, like the beauty of the people she meets, can bring her happiness.

She feels a tingle in the corners of her lips, and it even seems to her that there are cheery little sparkles dancing before her eyes, shaping into soft, pastel-like silhouettes of flowers and birds, and just simple swirls, like fronds of some forest plant...

'Ah. Your mood seems to have improved all on its own. There is no need for this, then.’

Elgara blinks, coming back from her happy place. With a tiny jolt of astonishment, it dawns on her that the sparkles and the silhouettes are not imaginary. They have in fact, been conjured by magic, and are now hovering right in front of her face, blossoming softly and melting from one shape to another, like the traces of raindrops on the window pane... And just as she realizes that, the apparitions vanish.

She blinks again, and turns her head to face the magister. His hands are still tied, but there is an unmistakable pull of arcane energy distorting the air around him; something that Elgara always senses very keenly, sometimes to the point of developing a migraine.

'Have you...'

She fumbles for words, uncertain how to address the man who went from negotiating with her for the freedom of the rebel mages, to shrieking that she should never have existed, to kneeling in her shadow and leaving himself at her mercy.

He jerks his shoulder, as far as he is able.

'I overhear you in the dungeon at times, and it occurred to me that I might try... brightening your spirits. I may be in binds, but I can still cast some very minor magic. Not enough to break free and slaughter everyone, as I am clearly meant to do...'

This… is probably sarcasm. Elgara lost all ability to understand it while she was Tranquil, but she thinks she can deduce when it is there.

'...But enough to put on this little performance, especially since your watch dog with questionable fashion choices is lagging behind somewhere.’

He shakes his head, and goes on in a much quieter voice — likely not even addressing Elgara.

'A foolish impulse.'

The grey pall drapes itself over his face more, and the lines on his forehead and in the corners of his mouth suddenly appear more prominent.

'No, no — it's... What you did is... It was beautiful, and quite thoughtful! I — '

Suddenly, her heart feels tight.

Suddenly, she does not know whether to look away or show her assurance by maintaining eye contact — and when she chooses the latter, she gets carried off again, far, far away. Oblivious to everything in the world, except for studying the magister's eyes.

They have a very curious colour. Many mages' eyes do, she has noticed.

Even her own, which used to be more of an indefinite muddy shade when she was a Tranquil, are now back to the same saturated hazel, with a touch of gold, as when she came into her magic.

His eyes, in turn, are shaded a beautiful dark brown, with a swirl of silver just around the pupil... Like rays of moonlight against a night sky.

It is only after she stubs her toe against a snow-covered rock that this daze releases her. She whips her head to look away; so brusquely that the side of her neck feels like it has been stabbed by a knitting pin.

It turns out that the two of them have meandered quite far up an icy mountain slope, leaving the Chantry a long way behind. The building has now been reduced to a blob of misty blue, far beyond fir trees that rise all around them, tipping their fuzzy heads in the wind, as if in a bow of reverence before the Breach.

This is... not quite what she imagined when she asked the advisors to let the prisoners go on walks.

She shuffles to a halt and digs her boots into dough-like snow they have dug into. With the same suddenness as her admiration of the magister's eyes, comes a nauseating surge of panic.

The guard is nowhere to be seen; the magister can still cast magic; he tried to kill her once already — twice, if you count their battle in the wrong future...

No, no!

She bends forward slightly and digs her fingers into her hair.

In the Circle, it used to be cropped into tiny ringlets close to her skull, growing out after being shorn to the root to keep it being singed by the sun brand. And now, she is growing it longer than ever. Mostly so she can ruffle her wavy bangs and let them hang like a curtain over her Tranquil brand, since to many people are startled at best, and deeply disturbed at worst, when they see the telltale sun on the brow of Andraste's chosen.

No! She is not going to cower like a child!

She handled the magister before, when he was much more powerful, when time-altering Rifts sizzled into being upon his command, splashing their acid light all over the dark, half-ruined throne room.

Surely, she will be able to stop him as a half-starved prisoner! She has her sword with her: Cassandra insisted that she carry it at all times, even around Haven!

…But what if she will not even need to use it? What if she decides to trust the magister?

She has never been afraid of spirits. And he is just like one — just like Kindness.

That was the spirit from the sigil, from her Harrowing. It had been drawn to the Circle's corner of the Fade with the best of intentions. Eager to help the students learn and grow into better mages... But then, it was trapped and forced to tempt them instead. This affront against its nature, together with the agony of being chained, changed it. It darkened, and its softness peeled off, like the flesh of the red crystal victim, revealing a pained snarl.

But even inside the demon that was born out of the trapped spirit's torment, a wisp of its original self remained. Just a little bit of warmth and brightness. Like the sunlight squares that Elgara kept with her, packed safely in her memory trove, and carried through the coldest Circle nights.

That wisp called out to her, responding eagerly to her touch when she destroyed the sigil. And before she knew it, the demon's bulky, thrashing body turned into a distorted silhouette, as though someone had poured a bucketful of ink over its gnarly head. Presently, that silhouette thawed into a smoking black ink puddle. And from it, a much smaller figure emerged, its head inclined in gratitude.

It had always been there. Kindness had always been there. And it revealed itself to Elgara, because she was not afraid.

So why be afraid now? Why decide that the man from Dorian's past is gone, without giving him a proper chance to show himself?

'I do most sincerely apologize for all these outbursts,' Elgara says, with a sudden clarity and a firmness in her voice.

Oh gods, she is really doing this! She is getting a grip on herself!

She is straightening up, and turning back to him, and speaking to him not as a vile maleficar, but as a pleasant companion on a fresh-air stroll!

'You might find them bizarre, revolting even. But there is an explanation. I am a former Tranquil. Getting the Mark that your master wanted brought my emotions back, but the side effect is that I cannot always control them properly. Not yet, at any rate. I am certain I will get better at it with time.’

To further show her point, she pulls back her bangs, allowing the magister to see her sun brand. And now, it is the magister's turn to be stupefied.

'You are... You were... You were one of...' he stutters, his perpetually weary face twisted by dismay. 'Fasta vaas.’

His shoulders jerk, as he tries and fails to move his bound hands.

'The key,' he breathes out. 'There was... I had a key. Your Spymaster confiscated it, probably. It opens the door to an abandoned shed in Redcliffe. There are... artifacts in there... Crafted on the Elder One's orders, which I passed on to the Venatori in the Hinterlands... Though I imagine other Venatori cells are doing the same all over the south...'

'Doing what?' Elgara asks. An invisible hand draws a tight, perfectly attuned string through her body, from tongue to stomach, cutting into her innards.

'Hunting the Tranquil,' he says under his breath, dipping his head to his chest.

'The artifacts... the oculara... they are made from their skulls. I — I tried to hint to them... to your brethren, that they were not welcome in Redcliffe... Tried to get them to flee; to save themselves... Because even after stooping this low... I could not bear to...'

His lips twitch, and the moonlight in his eyes, before he shuts them, wincing, glints bright and wet.

'The things I did for the glory of the Imperium... For the sake of my son... And what did it lead to? The Elder One will reshape the world. He will make that future, the one Dorian screamed at me about, a reality, all over again... Felix will either succumb to the Taint, or perish in the storm to come. Your brethren will still be hunted, if not by me, then by the others who will replace me... I sold myself, over and over again — and it has all been meaningless.'

Elgara inhales, in several hoarse gasps, as if she were drowning.

Something slithers up her throat like a centipede, scraping her flesh raw. Another emotion. Anger.

The Tranquil are being hunted! Her brothers and sisters under the Rite — her friends! — could be in danger, even within Haven’s walls! She could lose Avexis, and Helisma, and others! And the man who had a hand in this, is standing right in front of her!

She squares her jaw and swallows hard, washing the centipede down.

He regrets what he did. The wisp is in there. It must have always been there.

She does not have to forgive him; not yet. But she can understand. She can reach out. And then, maybe, he will do what it takes to cast aside the demon husk.

'You heard me crying in your dungeon and wanted to ease my anguish,' she reminds him, placing her hand on his arm just above the elbow. Not afraid. Not afraid.

'That is not meaningless. And your friendship with Dorian, your love for your son — that is not meaningless either.'

He opens his eyes, and then his mouth, the knot easing between his eyebrows — but before he can say anything, he is cut off by a loud cry.

Using a spell like Fade Step would probably have helped her get there faster. But over the years of Tranquility, Elgara has come to rely on a blade, not magic, and she is still uncertain about returning to her Circle apprentice roots. Even if it makes Solas frown in disapproval and tell her that she is burying the great gift she was given.

So she chooses to do things the mundane, old-fashioned way. She runs.

She moves at a rapid, threshing rhythm, her sword hilt clamouring against her hip; and really, really hopes that her heart, which is not what it used to be twenty years ago, will not be speared by exhaustion. Or that the ever-intensifying apple crunch of snow will not trigger another migraine. This would be a really inopportune time.

She runs, as fast as she can. Which is not fast enough.

When she arrives at the source of the cry, she finds the bandit chief standing with his back against a large boulder, grating his tied hands fiercely against the edge of the guard's sword... Which is clutched in a stiff, frozen hand. A dead hand.

When the white blankets were still hiding all her emotions away, leaving her mind clean of distracting clutter, Elgara got very good at that clue-seeking they write about in novels where guardsmen track down criminals. Usually through the winding streets of a sprawling, anthill-like town like Kirkwall.

And even though the emotional clutter is back, lodging in between the puzzle pieces, sometimes she's still got it. Sometimes she can still spot the threads of logic — stretching between objects and people like spider webs.

She sees them now as well. She understands how they tie it all together.

The bandit.

The boulder.

The chaotic dots and dashes of tracks in the snow.

The Inquisition-issued pointy helm, which must have come off in the struggle because of those wretched chin straps.

The viscous smear of blood and bone matter that has painted the stone dark-red.

And the small armoured figure of the guard, which looks so still and hollow now, like the carcass of an ant that has been sucked dry by an antlion.

All of this takes far, far too long to describe. Her brain draws the connections much faster, and replays the story in lightning flashes.

The guard and his charge must have passed here on their walk, separated from Elgara as she was too caught up in talking to the magister. Then, seeing the boulder — just the right size, just the right height — the bandit must have seized his chance and, ramming his shoulder into the guard, overpowered him with his sheer weight, and sandwiched him between himself and the rock surface, pressing down till the protective helmet fell off, and the skull caved in.

And now, here he is. The druffalo is about to charge.

One last grating push — and the ropes come off. The bandit chief steps away from the boulder, and, with a smug grin, flexes his fingers: broad and square, like sausages someone drove a cart wheel over.

After the flexing, comes the looting. Just like in the guardsman books. Except real, and no less horrible, even after Elgara has witnessed battle scenes that were so much more gruesome, so much worse.

The dead guard's armour is too small to fully protect the bandit, but his sword fits quite nicely into his fist. He greets Elgara with a spittle-filled curse — 'Let's hear ya cry about this, fucking knife-ear!' — and a tremendous whoosh of the soaring blade.

She yanks her own sword out of its sheath, the steel’s flash nearly blinding her.

The bandit's blow is blocked, as is the next, and the next.

Her body fights of its own accord. Guided like a puppet by her sword fighter instincts. Another useful 'side benefit'.

Meanwhile, her mind, her over-cluttered, overemotional mind, is still with the poor guard. So sweet, so friendly, doomed to a stupid, stupid death because he did not have a good helmet. And an extra pair of eyes.

She was not there. She was not there.

He asked her to help out. He counted on her. But she forgot.

She took a wrong turn, let him out of her sight, left him behind to die.

She was not there.

These four words keep ringing out, like four slaps across her burning face.

Louder than the clanging of her sword.

Louder even than the sudden peel of thunder that rolls out somewhere from behind her back, while the clearing around the boulder is flooded with a pale purple glow.

Louder than the shriek the bandit lets out, staggering away from Elgara,

'You fucking Vint!'

Then come more shrieks, punctuated by panting as he tries to dodge the spears of lightning that pierce the ground all around him.

'Siding with the elf bitch now, are you? After your fucking friends hired me and my boys to work for you? No matter! I hid away the gold you hooded fuckers gave me for the road job — and once I am outta here, I —'

The next spear hits target. There is a whipping crackle, a gargle, a thud, a whiff of an acrid burning smell. But Elgara does not see the bandit fall.

She is on her knees again, hugging her head, whimpering, the four words rolling out of her mouth like vomit.

'I was not there... I was... not... there...'

Somewhere on the rim of her consciousness, a voice whispers. Soft, soothing, nearly unrecognizable. Far from the voice that gloated at the rebel mages been sold into servitude, or raved about the might of the Elder One,

'I know. I know.'

And then, Elgara tumbles into blackness.

When the world begins to take shape again, the boulder, or the guard, or the bandit, are nowhere to be seen.

Instead, there are more fir trees. Their bushy lower branches have formed a sturdy silvery roof over a patch of snow, coloured a rich dark blue by the lattice-like shade.

A small circle of ground has been thawed clean — likely by fire magic, since its outline is far too smooth to be natural — and Elgara has been seated in its middle, back firm against the trunk.

The magister is pacing back and forth in front of her. His hands are untied: he must have followed the bandit's example and used something sharp to cut himself free... Maybe one of the poor guard's pauldrons...

Elgara shudders at the thought, and a loud whine escapes her lips.

The magister stops pacing, suddenly on alert like a startled bird.

He rather looks like one, too, with his gaunt face and narrow, slightly curved nose. A very distraught bird that has had its nest ravaged… and has still decided to take a stranger, an enemy, under its wing.

It truly is there. That wisp of the man Dorian was friends with.

'You...' the magister begins to explain, keeping his voice down and making a small gesture in the direction of the hillside beyond the trees' shelter. 'You were sobbing and shaking, and I reasoned you could use less light and noise. And...'

He smirks mirthlessly.

'And fewer dead bodies, naturally. So I teleported us here. And cast a healing spell, just to be on the safe side. Have you... recovered?'

Elgara passes her hand over her face.

Her fingers are unsteady, and she feels withered and drained like a prune, but the urge to howl in tears has passed.

'I — I think so. Thank you'.

'Hm.’

The magister purses his lips and looks away.

‘Consider it me - awkwardly - trying to make up for the gruesome Tranquil hunt. And to thank you for your extraordinary treatment of your prisoners. I wish I were capable of appreciating the books you so graciously supplied me with.'

He glances quickly back at Elgara, and she almost stops hearing what she is saying to him, transfixed by the moon beams in his eyes.

'Think nothing of it. You had too much on your mind to focus on reading. I... certainly know what it's like.'

He gives her an absent-minded nod, and turns back to gaze into nothingness while his fingers restlessly peel off flakes of pine bark.

'I have known several enchanters with a... predicament somewhat similar to yours. We Tevinters love breeding our bloodlines like prized horses. The stronger their magic, the better. But strong magic often comes with fragile senses, easy to overload. I imagine it is the same for you as a former Tranquil, is it not?'

'Quite so.'

Mysteriously, the more time she spends like this, amid the serenity of the winter woods, shielded from the... overloading world by these snowy branches, side by side with the man who once plotted against her, the stronger those warmth and brightness bloom inside her chest.

When they reach their glowing peak, she blurts out,

'I am... deeply thankful that you were there.’

The magister moves his head slowly from side to side.

'Sing no false praise, Herald. Not in front of your advisors,' he says bitterly. 'I am still very much looking forward to meeting your kind headsman.'

Elgara's heart makes a new, rather painful leap up her windpipe. But she does not let this shatter the bright, warm sun squares in her mind.

'As a matter of fact, I intend to tell my advisors that you had escaped while I was fighting the bandit. And that I simply could not find you anywhere.’

She laughs suddenly, and covers her cheeks, her skin scorched by a blush.

'I... have not lied often since my Tranquility was... cured... but... I think I have it in me.’

The magister tears away from the pine trunk, pulling his fingers out of the crevices in the bark like a cat pulls out its claws.

'You would let me go? Just like that? After all that I wrought?' his voice thins out into a rusty creak.

'What is the point? I do not have anywhere to go. I am a wanted man out there, in Ferelden — and in here, I can at least have an execution. Like I deserve. Like I need.'

Again, Elgara senses a tide of pain rising around him. She jolts upright and, casting aside all of that Tranquil logic, not caring to waste even a single moment on thinking, grabs the magister's hand and squeezes it.

'You do not need to die,' she says earnestly. 'And if you go free, you can try making the journey to Tevinter. You can go home. Like Felix wanted. You can be near him when he passes away.'

You can do what it takes to revert from demon to spirit. Like Kindness did, when it, too, was set free.

'I...' the magister chokes, two red dots breaking out over his cheekbones.

Elgara wonders if she has crushed his hand too hard, and drops it hastily. But his expression remains the same.

'I was so wrong about you,' he manages to squeeze out at last. 'I should never have called you a mistake. I apologize, Herald... And I wish... I wish we had met under different circumstances.’

'So do I,' she admits. Quite truthfully.

He bows to her — like he did during that charade of a meeting in Redcliffe. And yet... Not exactly like that. This time, there is no darkness pooling and bubbling around him. No malice in his eyes. Just... Just sadness.

'Farewell, Herald,' he tells her. 'I am not certain if your ambitious little expedition succeeds, but... the sheer idea is quite fascinating.'

'Well, now I have to seal the Breach just to spite you,' Elgara says — and nearly gasps, petrified by the realization that she just... bantered!

She thought the skill lost to her, erased by Tranquility, just as her ability to decipher sarcasm. But she... She actually did it... She bantered!

And in response to her banter, the magister chuckles, before fading in a cloud of smoke. This must just be the effect of another teleportation spell — but Elgara thinks of Kindness again. Of how it was transformed from a demon back to a spirit. Perhaps the same will happen to the magister, if he finds his way.

There is a whole pantheon of gods out there. They probably care little about the fate of a Tevinter, a man whose kin once destroyed the realm of the People beyond repair. But they might listen to Elgara if she speaks on his behalf.

They might keep him safe. They might bring him home.

Elgara smiles at the thought, running her fingertips along the grooves the magister left in the tree bark.

Well. Time to turn back to Haven.

Time to tell her lie, and then the truth.

To face the family of that poor guard, like the magister faced her, and to warn Leliana about the hunt for the Tranquil, so that she sends out scouts across Thedas. Rescuing as many as they can, from among those who are still wandering about, displaced when the Circles fell.

Maybe Madame Vivienne will have some ideas too.

All of these tasks will overwhelm her; more than once.

She knows they will.

But — but she is not afraid.

#dragon age #dragon age inquisition #dai #inquisitor lavellan #gereon alexius #alexius x inquisitor #elgara lavellan

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