#seeing our hinterland turned to a crisp is so sad

[scifiphan]

I’m in VIC and I work with people who volunteer in bushfires. I’m so scared for fire season here. NSW and QLD going up in smoke so early and so severely is NOT normal. I hope the fires stay away, Ms Teddii.

we need rain but there’s no rain in sight. when will scomo realise that this is a climate crisis and that the government needs to take this seriously. i could rant about how the lnp’s climate politics anger me but i’ll save y’all from that

[buttsonthebeach]

Lethallan

@cedarmoons and I had so much fun imagining how our Lavellans would interact with each other a few weeks back, particularly how they would each react if they were a companion and the other romanced Solas - so here is my take on Ellana as a companion, reacting to their break up!

****

People gave Ellana a wide berth when she made her way through the main hall of Skyhold. She’d learned to soften her stony countenance in her months with the Inquisition. It doesn’t do to have one of the Inquisitor’s companions frightening away the guests, you know.

She unlearned that lesson on her way to the rotunda.

She would be damned if she was going to be polite or considerate or open-minded or any of the things she’d been told.

Not today.

She’d gone to the Conclave for a chance at all of those things. A chance at a world outside the clan. And she’d gotten it - seen the explosion from a distance, gone down into the Hinterlands to help sort shit out, and run into, of all things, another Dalish elf. One the humans called the Herald of Andraste. But she wore Mythal’s vallaslin and said her prayers to the Creators and she skinned her kills with the same neat precision her own hunting master drilled into Ellana from the time she was thirteen.

Her name was Ariala, and she had a mark on her hand that could seal the sky, and in some ways she was everything Ellana wanted time away from: Dalish through and through, the kind of person who might have looked down on her own flat-eared parents when they were alive.

But Ariala was also just, and good, and funny, and kind, and in those long months fighting to seal the sky there was a comfort in having someone else who spoke of ironbark and the warm close circle of aravels in winter and the sound of halla in early morning. Someone who made her think that maybe she wasn’t lesser-than or not-enough after all.

But Ariala wasn’t who Ellana was going to see that day.

There’d been another elf there that day in the Hinterlands. Bare-faced, and a mage. One who smiled without showing his teeth when they brought blankets and food to the refugees, and one who scoffed at the Dalish, and one who did not hesitate to put himself in the jaws of the Chantry if it meant saving innocent lives. One who carried sadness like a heavy cloak and twined Ariala around his finger like a vine in summer.

(But really it was the other way around, she’d realized with time, at a dozen dozen firelit evenings when Solas sat and watched Ariala with grief and wonder in his eyes.)

There was grief in Ariala’s eyes when she returned from Crestwood. But no wonder.

And that was why Ellana forgot every diplomatic lesson she’d learned on her way into that rotunda, and became again the woman she always was underneath. A Dalish elf with a kinswoman who needed protecting. A person for whom that bond was absolute as any bond of blood.

The sound of the door flying open was enough to startle the ravens and Solas alike. Good. Ellana had saved her rage in the days since Ariala came back alone, hollow-eyed. And seeing him sitting there, stiff-backed, mouth already set in a thin line, she was ready to unleash it.

“What the fuck did you do?”

Solas closed his book with a crisp snap.

“I am afraid I do not know what you mean.”

“Don’t play games. I asked Ariala why she came back from Crestwood alone and heartbroken and she said she didn’t want to talk about it. I figured I would have to ask you. And here you are. So talk, Solas.”

Her tone irritated him. She could tell. He was a stoic man, but his blue-gray eyes were expressive.

“That is a private matter.”

Ellana thought, again, of the months they’d shared on the road. The dangers. The campfires. The times when it was her, Ariala, and Solas, and she felt like she might have a new little clan here, a place she belonged. And then she looked at Solas, his impassive expression, his false calm. He was drumming the fingers of one hand against his desk. He was rattled.

“I’m sorry,” she said then, her tone both light and acidic. “You must have me mistaken for some other elf. A stranger. Not the woman who has patched up your wounds and killed your meals and watched your back for months. Not the woman who would lay her life down for the Inquisitor. Or for you.”

That got some chagrin from him. He broke eye contact at last. Ellana stood, waiting. He did not look back up before he spoke.

“Ariala truly would not tell you herself?”

“No.” Another silence. For the first time since she stormed in, Ellana felt a pinprick begin to deflate her rage. She couldn’t read Solas now. Soft voice and downcast eyes. Why was he acting like this, when Ariala was the one who returned first, the one who returned wounded? How could they both act that way?

Solas looked up and caught her studying him. He swallowed, and regained his composure.

“I realized something while we were in Crestwood. That realization led to an end of the - connection that the Inquisitor and I have shared.”

There it was.

Someone had finally said it.

Ellana was never the smartest person in the room, but even a fool like her could guess that something happened to cause a rift in their relationship. What she wanted to hear was why, and how.

“And what exactly did you realize?”

Solas’s face turned to anger once more.

“What I realized is none of your concern. I have already spoken as much as I care to on this matter. If you wish to know more, tell the Inquisitor that you asked me, and I told you as much as I was able. She should be the one to tell you more. She is your friend, after all.”

He stood abruptly from his chair, and began rearranging the papers on his desk. Ellana knew his mask, suddenly. It was the same kind she’d worn throughout her life. The kind of anger that masked pain.

“So are you, Solas,” she said, lowering her own voice. “At least - I thought you were my friend. And if something happened - if you regret something you said to her - maybe if you talk to me, I can help fix it.”

He paused in his shuffling, but he did not look up.

“Your offer is unnecessary. Now, if you will excuse me, there are reports I must complete.”

He gathered the papers he’d shuffled around, and left the rotunda. Ellana watched him go, no longer angry so much as confused.

“Well, that was an entertaining show. Will there be an encore at dinner?” Dorian’s voice came from the library. She looked up to see him leaning over the railing.

“Somehow I doubt it. Do you know where the Inquisitor is?”

“I believe she returned to her quarters after her meeting with the advisors this morning. I saw her heading that way when I made my way to a late breakfast.”

“Ma serannas.”

The Elvhen words lingered on her tongue as she crossed the hall towards the door that led to Ariala’s chambers. There had been tension between Ariala and Solas over the subject of their shared heritage - or not so shared, as Solas would have it - since the early days of the Inquisition. It seemed they’d moved past it, though. What had come up on their trip to Crestwood?

Ariala was not in her chambers. Ellana went down to the courtyard next, and heard that the Inquisitor had been seen practicing archery near the Herald’s Rest. Sure enough, her ears picked up the rhythmic sound of a bow being drawn, an arrow being loosed, and a target being struck. A rhythm as familiar as her own heart. There were practice bows nearby, no doubt left unattended by some hapless recruit, and she grabbed one as she made her way towards Ariala rather than head down to the stables she shared with Blackwall and recover her own equipment.

Ariala did not acknowledge her as she approached, except for with a quick glance. Ellana watched her finish the arrows in her quiver, burying each one neatly in the dummy. Sweat shone on the orange vallaslin crossing her brow. When she was done, Ellana spoke.

“Well, I got more out of Solas than I did out of you, lethallan, which isn’t saying much. I hope you’re pretending that dummy is him.”

Ariala did not respond. Instead she went to the dummy and removed the arrows. “What did he say?”

“That he had a realization in Crestwood, and that said realization led to the end of your ‘connection.’”

Ariala returned to her mark, and swiftly loosed three arrows. These ones did not fly as true. One missed entirely. Her draws had been short and stiff.

“Well, then you officially got more from him than I did. Congratulations.”

Another three arrows. Two missed.

“Mythal’s tits,” Ellana said at last. “Will you just tell me what happened?”

Ariala lowered her bow, and her eyes. “He took me to a grove in Crestwood dedicated to Ghilan’nain. He told me I was beautiful and that I meant the world to him. Then he told me that our vallaslin was used as slave markings in Elvhenan, and asked me if I wanted him to remove mine, and then I said no, and then he kissed me, and then he told me we were over.”

Ellana didn’t think she’d ever heard a more confusing story in her life. Her heart sank. Vallaslin, the markings of slaves? It couldn’t be.

And yet.

If it was true, who would know better than a man who could walk the Fade? Who spoke Elvhen like he’d been born speaking it - and yet had no vallaslin himself?

Her stomach twisted.

Ariala was looking at her, something like a challenge in her eyes. Ellana strung her practice bow, plucked an arrow from the quiver at Ariala’s back, and took aim. She took one deep, steadying breath. Vallaslin as slave markings. Another thing the Dalish got wrong. Or were they? Ariala clearly hadn’t believed him - or didn’t care.

Was that why he left her?

She loosed the arrow and after it hit the dummy, she felt ready to speak.

“I can’t believe it.”

“Which part?” Ariala’s voice was bitter.

Ellana took another arrow. She got another look at Ariala’s face as she did so. The beautiful, intricate markings - the beginning of her Mother’s Tree. How could anything so lovely - so prized - come from something so hateful? And if they did - did that matter?

Ellana thought of her own markings, that long night when she’d gotten them. She hadn’t done what most young elves did the day of their ceremony. She hadn’t kept a vigil for her chosen god. If she was being perfectly honest, she wasn’t sure she believed in them. Instead, she’d thought of her parents, whose graves were still fresh. She’d chosen June for them, for their clever hands and all the crafts they made, for the life they’d left behind in Ostwick to ensure their daughter grew up free. Her vallaslin weren’t for the gods. They were a sign of her adulthood, of her love for her parents. A sign that she did belong in her clan, however much she doubted it at times. If she could redefine what they meant for herself, why couldn’t the Dalish as a whole redefine them?

Another deep breath - another arrow loosed.

“You did the right thing,” Ellana said. “Not letting him remove your vallaslin.”

“He clearly doesn’t think so.”

Ariala’s voice was still bitter - but it was also small. Ellana turned to face her.

“You think that’s what he meant? His realization?”

“What else could it be?”

Ellana’s emotions swirled too quickly for her to name them all accurately. Anger - pain - disbelief - and a nagging suspicion, born of Solas’s own pained expressions, that his realization wasn’t related to the vallaslin at all.

“If it is, then he is wrong. Dead wrong. Do you hear me?” Her friend looked up at that, her dark eyes sad. “You know - there are days when I agreed with Solas. The Dalish can be closed-minded. We don’t do enough to help the rest of our people. Some Dalish don’t even see other elves as their people. I saw that firsthand when my parents were alive. I volunteered for the Conclave because I wanted to see what the world was like outside our narrow little view of it out there in the wilds.” Ellana dropped the practice bow and set both her hands on Ariala’s shoulders. “But Ariala - you are everything that is good about our people. Everything that reminds me that I am proud to be Dalish. You are proud of who we are without being prideful - a champion for the Dales and for the rest of Thedas. Solas should never have tried to take that away from you.”

Ariala looked at Ellana for a long moment, and then reached up and squeezed one of her hands.

“I’ll bet I can split one of your arrows again,” Ariala said, when the moment passed.

Ellana smiled, and raised her bow.