Sergeant Kylon is one of the two NPCs I really wish you could add to your party. Through the magic of a Dragon Age-obsessed imagination, now I can. This is of course all AU. I love reviews, and welcome all suggestions and constructive criticism.
And as always, Dragon Age and all its bits belong to BioWare.
Outside, he could hear the sounds of Denerim waking. The merchants calling out their wares, the carts rolling through the streets as the farmers brought their produce in from the countryside. Inside the barracks was silence, broken only by the occasional groan as someone with a hangover buried his head under his pillow to drown out the sounds. Sergeant Kylon loved the morning noises, though. He firmly believed Denerim was the finest place in Thedas, and the familiar cacophony outside the window was a song to him.
He liked to get up earlier than everyone else—not that it was difficult. His men weren't exactly doing calisthenics at 0600. Still, he treasured these quiet hours when they were all sacked out and snoring. And he could pretend that he had real guardsmen who knew what they were doing, that he had real power instead of the sham that was left to him now that Arl Howe had taken over Denerim.
Kylon did his usual set of pushups and situps. At least one man out of the Denerim Guards was going to be in shape when the city eventually deteriorated into some kind of mass riot. Then he went into his office, shifting through some papers, checking on the latest intelligence. If you could call it that.
Near the bottom of the stack, a flyer caught his attention. For the moment, the words were a blur—all he could do was stare at the face. The wide eyes, the sculpted cheekbones, the wisps of hair. It was a good drawing, he thought. A pity such a beautiful woman appeared to be some kind of criminal.
Drawing his attention with difficulty away from the lovely face before him, he read the flyer. This, this vision, was the Grey Warden? The one being hunted from one end of Ferelden to the other? The one Arl Howe and Teyrn Loghain were accusing of being a traitor to King and country? And a mage, to boot, he noticed. He wasn't sure if he believed all the rumors about the battle of Ostagar, but some of it rang false. The Grey Wardens were supposed to be sworn to fight the darkspawn—he had a hard time believing they would have abandoned the King to be slaughtered by the tainted creatures.
Putting the flyer aside with some reluctance, Kylon continued through his papers, hoping to get through the stack before patrol. He hoped he could find a few competent men in the barracks who could actually stand up.
After a while, he left his office, heading back to the barracks to get the men out of bed. But before he went, he took the flyer off his desk and nailed it on the wall, where he could see it easily.