This started as an answer to a Cheeky Monkeys' challenge to write something within ten minutes. This prompted me to not only answer the challenge, but decide to do a series of prequel drabbles for my Fergus/Amell story 'Worth Fighting For'. These may or may not be in any order, just posted as they come to me. But each 'chapter' will be in answer to the above challenge.
It Did Not Matter:
It did not matter, not anymore. And who was she to care?
Aimlessly she wiped the cloth along the blade of her greatsword, Starfang, blinking away the tears that threatened to escape her blinking eyes and flood her cheeks. That he was with her should not matter any longer. He had set her aside, claiming that she – as a mage, as a commoner – was no longer good enough…her breath caught in her throat. His words. Almost exactly.
During the year and more they had travelled together, Magda had never seen the level of callousness within Alistair that she saw at the finale of the Landsmeet. Not only had he claimed the throne – after they had agreed he would not – but had ordered Anora's execution.
Nearly choking, the young mage fought to erase the memory of Anora's shocked and terrified face as the queen learned her fate. That had not been what they had agreed to. What Alistair had agreed to.
He had turned Magda into a liar.
Not only had he done these things, but then he turned to her, the woman he had claimed to love, and proclaimed that their affair (and again, these were his words) was over. As king, he would need a suitable noblewoman as his bride.
Even Arl Eamon was astonished by the level of callous thoughtlessness his former ward had exuded. Magda wondered if it had been thoughtlessness.
The nobles, however, seemed to eat it up. They were thrilled, after all, to have a king of the Theirin line back on the throne. To have the common-born queen removed once and for all.
And now he rutted, yes rutted, with that…that Swamp Witch! She who had proclaimed to be her friend, akin to a sister! What had happened? Why had the two people she had been closest with betrayed her?
What had she done to earn their scorn so thoroughly?
Tears finally overflowed their bounds, and ran unimpeded down her cheeks. Unable to see, she set her blade down, blurry eyes seeking the door to her chamber, willing her sight to see beyond the wood and stone.
Not that she really wanted to see whatever it was the pair of them was up to.
No. She really did not.
Heartbroken, she lifted her blade again, running the soft cloth along the strange, gleaming star metal, counting her days until she faced the Archdemon.
And, despite Morrigan; despite Alistair, she would meet the Blighted fiend. For, somehow, the will and desire to continue to live had fled her.