We are here

We have waited

We have slept

We are sundered

We are crippled

We are polluted

We endure

We wait

We have found the dreams again

We will awaken

I had a dream, once. Of a white-haired young man standing in a wintery world wearing nothing but an ugly wide-brimmed hat with dark shirt and leggings. He didn't seem to feel the cold or the fierce storm battering at his back. Instead he grasped my hand as though it were an anchor. I feared I was doing the same - and I utterly failed to understand why.

If I had a mind to describe the man in front of me, I would say he had the soul of a poet, but I believed even that failed to encompass the magnitude of what the white-haired man was and what he shared with me.

"It wasn't your fault. She made that choice. Not you. She created what should not be.

But you are you, in this here and in this now, you allow this world to exist.

I am me, in this here and in this now, but I am not me.

I lost it at Haven, so I lost me.

You. Don't lose you. Don't lose it. Without you, this world ceases to be."

He hesitated at the last part, biting at his lip and an anxiousness entering his eyes that hadn't been there before. He squeezed my hand, whether to reassure himself or me, I didn't know.

"Should you fix what should not be?"

Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink.

Iron Bull used to chant it a lot on our travels, to the point it drove me batty. It was an old saying. One he used right up until the time that he died.

That, and 'ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall' seemed to be a favourite.

It was still an apt metaphor for the context and, gazing over the lyrium infested waters of Ferelden, I was inclined to agree. It looked like a lake of blood.

It was an unnerving but common sight. The once gorgeous forests surrounding the lake, beautiful and terrible even during the war, was now an ugly, blackened landscape pocked with red lyrium nodes. The only splashes of colour were the angry crimson veins of lyrium which riddled the dead, twisted trees.

Iron Bull had once told me by the fireside that the sickly green sky had once been blue. That Fade rifts - bright, blinding emerald cracks in the sky and on the land leading to the veil, were far more rare. As bad as things had been, he'd said with a wistfulness that'd made me catch my breath, a war-torn and broken Ferelden had been better than a dead Ferelden.

As for Thedas as a whole, well, the situation was little better, or so I'd heard. Most of the population were either dead, dying or mad.

It was truly interesting, then, that I had not gone as mad as the qunari who had raised me. I was certainly not a dwarf, whose resistance to lyrium in general had allowed them just enough time to shut themselves away in their underground kingdoms. Not a one had been seen in decades.

Appearance wise I was elven, possessing the same delicately pointed ears, sharp facial features and lean frame of my kind. I'd had little to no contact with them over the years, though, so I was somewhat estranged with my elven culture, both dalish and otherwise.

It was of little consequence really. My sanity aside, I still showed the effects of exposure to red lyrium just like everyone else. While most of it was hidden by well-worn leggings and loose-fitting tunic, my pale skin still exposed arms and face with veins tinged with red, and once green eyes now possessed a noticeable crimson tint. I was lucky, if one could call it that, as the more unfortunate of us obtained a rather unpleasant glow and a metallic cadence to their voice that was rather akin to listening to nails on a chalkboard.

However bad it was, it didn't matter. To quote the Bull, we were all the same now. It'd been a strange comfort to the qunari in his final days.

A head butted me from behind and I turned to encounter the hopeful yellow eyes of my dracolisk mount.

'Sorry girl,' I said, patting her massive head and sighing. 'No water here. Perhaps further west. Less lyrium there.'

An exasperated noise followed by a more insistent head butt.

'West, Kali. West. There's water. I promise. Just a little while longer.'

The next noise from Kali sounded suspiciously like an annoyed donkey.

'I can't give you what I don't have.'

This time the dracolisk outright growled.

I let out an annoyed puff of air. True to her species, Kali was a temperamental creature. With their lizard-like heads and fondness for meat, the dracolisk was a distant cousin to dragons, or so I'd been told, but they tended to closely mimic the movements and speed of an equine. My particular dracolisk had blue scaling with a yellow underbelly, a scaly blue tail, and a grouping of horns on top of her head which trailed halfway down her spine.

And bright, yellow eyes, the very same ones which were glaring at me as though I was one responsible for our current predicament. Cousin to dragons, indeed, as no drinkable water in sight meant living with a very grumpy mount, 'urg. Dried fish, then?'

I reached over my shoulder and around my staff for my pack, pulling out one of the treats I usually kept in reserve for when the dracolisk had been good. The growl was considerably toned down but my hand almost bitten off when Kali snatched it from my fingers.

I settled on a grassy patch by the lake, taking care not to meet Kali in the eye. I pointed towards the trees instead. 'Take it over there, missy. I don't want to hear your munching… no… over there. No… not near my ears. No… don't bother giving me the evil eyeball either. Over there.'

Eventually she did as I bid, but not before my irritated mount swung around and made sure to brain me with her scaly tail. Not enough for a concussion, mind, just enough to ensure I'd having a great whopping headache for the next few days.

'I hope you choke on it!' I called back to her, rubbing my throbbing skull. If I didn't know better, I could have sworn her answering honk as she disappeared into the dead trees sounded like a laugh.

Some peace and quiet at last.

Closing my eyes and placing my staff and pack beside me, I maneuvered myself into a more comfortable sitting position and drew in a breath. As a Rift Mage it had been hard, very hard, once upon a time, to learn to reach for the Fade and communicate with the spirits that resided there. Ironically as the years went by and lyrium spread, it had become far easier to feel for the veil.

Like spending too much time around lyrium, it was also a good way to lose one's mind if one spent too much time in that otherworldly realm or drew too much on its power. Thank goodness, then, that the one that I searched for now did not reside within the Fade.

It took a few moments, but a chirp below me indicated I had been successful in my reaching.

I let a wistful smile take over my face and looked down to find a small fennec in my lap. A small, fox-like animal with oversized ears, silky brown fur and a bushy tail, he gazed at me with intelligent brown eyes. He was also horribly calm for an animal known for its skittishness.

The second chirp this time was questioning.

'Hello gorgeous,' I all but crooned, rubbing the fennec between the ears in a way I knew he liked. 'I'm sorry, I know you don't like being so close to the lyrium but I'm getting desperate. Any leads to a water source would be much appreciated. Any leads at all.'

The fennec did find water, leading me down a tiny, overgrown path to a small clearing. In its centre lay a pond partially obscured by half-dead shrubbery, but clean and untouched by the taint. He promptly disappeared as soon as we stopped, but that didn't worry me. It was his way and he'd done as I'd asked - where he chose to go in his own time was his own business.

It was a welcome sight. The body flopped on the ground beside it? Not so much.

It was a body, curiously, not infested with lyrium. A young dark-haired human in little more than bloody rags, spread eagled with a leg half in the water. And a mage, judging from the staff clutched in his left hand. The tight grip even in death was not surprising - many mages considered their instrument as an extension of themselves, myself included. He was perhaps not long gone from this world judging by the distinct lack of decomposition, but he still reeked.

Immediately suspicious and without looking down, I undid the rope tying my staff down to Kali's saddle and dismounted.

My thirsty mount, bless her, did not share my hesitation, and instead perked up at the sight of water. I whirled around and snatched the dracolisk's reins before she could amble off, forcing Kali's head up and causing her to squeal in protest, 'just. Wait.'

I paused and sniffed the air again. No. Not the reek of death. The smell of sweat. Blood. Fever. Dying but not dead.

An alive, unconscious body. I signaled to Kali to stay and tip-toed towards the water, bringing my staff to the front of my body. It was a rather ugly looking thing with a knotted top, but had been modified so that the bottom tapered off into a graceful, curved blade. I suspected the blade was dwarven.

It was the blade end, now, that I rested lightly on the young man's throat.

When it failed to get him to respond I pressed slightly harder - not enough to cut skin. It still did the trick and forced him back to consciousness. The man's eyes flew open, filled with pain and delirious with fever, and I let myself stare for a second. They were yellow eyes, almost cat-like. How odd, 'I believe you must be acquainted with the fennec if he's lead me to you.'

Too weak to answer, but the man was lucid enough to give a slight nod. That decided it.

'Try anything and I'll let my dracolisk eat you. Slowly,' I said calmly, but my threat was not an idle one (I still ignored the interested growl from behind me). Didn't matter if the man was dying and unable to move - even a half dead mage was a dangerous one.

I immediately got down to business. Time was of the essence, after all, 'so, mage, we have two choices here. One: I can simply fill my water skin, slit your throat, and be on my way. It'll be a messy but quick death. It would be the easier option for me, you see, and perhaps better for us both. Would you prefer that?'

The widened, desperate eyes told me that option hadn't even crossed his mind. Still, I had to ask.

I shrugged, 'then on to option two. I can stop the bleeding and try to save you. Again, it'll be messy, and painful, and most likely you'll die anyway. You're not infected – don't even know how that's possible unless you're a Seeker. That's something else you need to consider, because no matter how resistant you are to the lyrium, give or take a few months and you could be belching out the same damn song and dance routine the Red Templars like to give before they fling themselves from some high elven ruin. Knowing that risk, are you still sure you really want to live?'

I heaved out a resigned when there was no change in his expression. He wanted to live. At the very least, I did owe it to the fennec to try and save the man.

I took in a quick inventory of his wounds: shallow gashes on the arms, legs and face - a particularly nasty one on his cheek that would likely leave a scar. It was that dagger wound to the gut I was worried about, and he was bleeding out. He was keeping himself alive through a combination of magic and his own will. I felt a tiny flicker of admiration at that, but it was still against my better judgement when I knelt beside the strange mage, letting stray pieces of rift magic gather around me for strength as I dove into my own mana to prepare a healing spell.

It was as much to myself as the mage that I added the next words, 'better pray to your maker we don't get caught by either the Seekers or the Red Templars. They will find us, one way or another and if they do, well, let's just say it'll be you wishing you had flung yourself off of some high tower. Please, please, try not to scream as I heal you, because too much noise and the time they take to find us will be that much shorter.'