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Made For It
"She wants the world to tremble at her presence. To know she has touched it." - Mhairi has always known what she was made for. But the world is an unfeeling place for such dreams, and Mhairi's earnestness does not get her anything but a cold and unmarked grave.
Mhairi dies unknown and unmourned.
There is a tepid rain coming down around Vigil's Keep when Warden Commander Kosun Brosca buries the warrior's body. The soil is hard-packed and thick with roots. It takes the dwarven commander more than an hour to dig a deep enough grave. The ground is slowly turning into mud around her in the constant rain. She had insisted she be the one to bury the almost-Warden, alone. She had not buried Daveth and Jory. That duty belonged to Duncan and Alistair. But Mhairi was hers. And the regiments have enough work on their hands trying to repair the keep and tend to the wounded.
Kosun wipes her brow and leans against the shovel as she plunges it into the dirt and takes a breath. The rain does not lessen, it does not grow heavier. It stays as it is, lukewarm and even, a light and barely-there splatter. Kosun sweats uncomfortably beneath her leathers with the stickiness of the shower. Close by her are two lanterns set along wooden staffs buried in the ground, casting light over the soil as she digs. Alongside them lays Mhairi's body.
Kosun had closed the dead woman's lids but she remembers the way her eyes stayed rolled into her head, peeled toward the ceiling in a grotesque, chilling way. Mhairi's mouth hangs slightly parted, the thin trickle of darkspawn blood trailing from her lips already dried. Her skin is pale, with a darkening tint blossoming just beneath the surface, speckles of rising blood and an almost purple tinge to the dark blooms of her skin. There are moments Kosun swears she sees Mhairi's flesh move. Just barely. A twitch, a quick pulse of skin, almost as though something were buried beneath, clawing inside and trying to break free.
The dwarf turns her gaze from the corpse. The grave is dug. She has only to put her in it. Treading the muddy ground around the body, Kosun crouches behind Mhairi's limp form and gives a rough shove. The corpse is stiff, rigor mortis already set in, and Kosun has to give another heavy shove to push Mhairi's form along the dirt and into the grave, the warrior's rigid bent elbow catching along a broken root and dragging mud into her grave as she plops gracelessly into the hollow ground. Kosun brings her hands to her knees and bends over, panting. She looks at the fallen warrior below her.
Mhairi is rather unremarkable. Dark hair that could match any other woman's. In life, she had pretty enough blue eyes, but they were neither bright nor deep. They simply were. They simply blinked at Kosun when she spoke and the dwarf can only now even remember the color of her eyes because she had taken note to remember it, when she had closed them shut after the failed Joining. Told herself to remember. Because she should remember. This was her first fallen. And probably not her last.
Kosun sighs heavily and cocks her head to eye the sunken face of her lost protégé. Her cheeks are thin and there are no envious cheekbones to heighten the effect. Her lips are cracked and pale, though Kosun knows that when blood flooded through them they were a soft pink. Her brows are thick, slightly unkempt. Her ears are small. Her skin is unmarked but for the dead taint brimming just beneath the surface. There is nothing memorable about Mhairi.
Kosun clenches her jaw at the thought and straightens. Such a needless thought at this time. But then she stops. She doesn't understand why we must always say and think good things about the dead. Why we must always sing their praises and list off their accomplishments. She couldn't say what Mhairi's accomplishments were. She hadn't known her for long enough. What if Mhairi really was just that mediocre? Really was that forgettable?
Truth be told, the woman's eagerness and unwavering belief in the glory of the Grey Wardens, her righteous attitude and overly-good intentions, had been a bit overwhelming to the dwarven veteran. Grating. Bothersome. Certainly out of place in the dank and dark of Vigil's Keep, in the bloody battle that had welcomed them to the fortress. Kosun has to admit she was rather glad to be rid of the woman's company for the short few hours before the Joining when they had all drawn baths and cleaned their armor.
It seemed Mhairi had only cleaned hers for the grave.
Kosun leans down and places Mhairi's sword atop her cold body, trying to move her stiff arms around the weapon but it is awkward and difficult. She sighs, releasing the corpse's hands.
Kosun straightens up, grinding her teeth, and she grips the shovel beside her. Her fingers curl tightly around the wooden shaft until her knuckles are white. She takes one last look at Mhairi, at her glinting armor and magnificent sword. Her pale skin and deadened hands. Her shuttered face and knotted hair.
Kosun tells herself to remember.
Mhairi.
Mhairi.
The first of her fallen.
A year from now, Kosun will not remember the sound of her voice or the way she swung her sword. A year after that she will forget the color of her eyes. And then her name. And then the reason she had buried a lone, luckless Warden recruit. And then she will forget her altogether. Mhairi's body will lay beneath the dirt of Vigil's Keep's courtyard and for years and years the men and women of the tower will never know the bones they tread beneath their feet.
Kosun heaves a heavy breath and tosses the first of the wet dirt onto Mhairi's face.
Mhairi receives the letter telling her of her father's death the day she is recruited by Warden Commander Brosca. She sits in one of the damaged barracks of Denerim a few weeks after the archdemon's death, resting along a bench as the other soldiers pass her by. The room is warm from the torches. There are no windows.
She cannot breathe.
Mhairi's fingers clench the letter tightly in her hand and she starts to shake. She only had him for twenty two years. Not enough. It would never be enough.
Her eyes follow the elegant script of her aunt's writing, rereading again and again until the words have blurred in her mind. Until the only words she recognizes are "father" and "dead" and "loved". Nothing else matters.
Her lips are trembling, trying to keep the sobs at bay, trying to keep that first heavy exhale of breath from leaving her. Because once it starts, she knows, it won't ever stop.
She holds a hand to her mouth and her face crumbles, the first tear lighting along the yellowed paper in her hand. She squeezes her eyes shut, tries to swallow down that thick slice of anguish. Her heart is tight with the pain of it.
Soldiers walk past her unnoticing. She is just another uniform to them. The average combatant. Just another warrior trying to wet their blade and dry their face. Overlooked. Unseen.
She looks like every other worn and battle-weary face in this place. They see nothing special.
Mhairi pulls a shaky breath in and holds her hand tighter to her mouth. Quiets any sound that leaves her. Her knuckles are white in their grip of the letter. She tries to steady herself.
She had promised.
She had promised him that the world would know her. That she would make a difference. That she would matter. That he would see it.
She has never felt so alone and unloved as she does now. So lost. So adrift and meaningless. She glances up and watches the other soldiers moving through the barracks. They all look the same. Ashen faces and battered armor. They walk as if ghosts. Tired and gone from this world.
She finds something spark inside her at the thought. She swallows back the sob lodged in her throat and straightens up in her seat, shoulders slowly pulled back. Her brows furrow over her blue eyes and her face hardens.
She will not break her promise. She will not let her word die with her father. Mhairi closes her eyes and digs deep. Looks further. Reaches higher. Tries to grasp that floundering dream that lays harbored in her heart, where she looks to at night when she thinks the world has given up on her. She remembers the way her father looked at her when she was young and bright-eyed, wishes of knighthood along her tongue. She remembers how she felt when he had stood beside her and told her it was possible. Told her the future was hers.
Everything inside her tells her she isn't finished. Tells her she's not done.
Mhairi folds the letter neatly and presses it against her heart.
She will be the woman her father made her, even if he will never see it.
The smell of burnt hair.
Even over the sharp tang of blood, the rot of darkspawn, the eye-watering, heavy smoke. Her own hair, burnt and charred. This is what she smells as the raging battle of Denerim finally wanes and the archdemon screeches its last rending wail through the night.
A gleaming shaft of light bursts from the top of the highest tower. The darkspawn around her are in sudden chaos. Their grotesque hands reaching for their ears, clawing their own faces, their howls tearing through the ash-filled night. Some of them jolt with unexplainable tremors and slash at the remaining men and women defending Denerim. Mhairi has only a moment to blink in confusion when a genlock snarls and bolts toward her, rushing full force. She whips her shield before her just in time and the creature rams into her, knocking her back a moment but she catches her footing, digging her heels in the dirt. The genlock grunts in pain, arms grasping for her shield in an animalistic frenzy. It has all but forgotten its own blade, only flailing and clawing in a senseless haze.
She bashes her shield into it once more and it stumbles back. It growls, teeth gnashing, dark, putrid spit flying from its mouth. Her eyes focus in the fire-lit street and she swings her sword quickly, surely. The genlock's head is swiped clean off its shoulders and its body drops to its knees before falling into the blood-strewn dirt.
Mhairi pants in exhaustion, her eyes wide on the dead thing. She glances around and finds similar darkspawn aimlessly charging and attacking the troops. Other darkspawn are running from the city, ambling in pain and heady confusion, their voices chilling in the night. The last feral attackers are cut down by her comrades in the Arl's regiment. Her fingers finally loosen around her blade, slick with blood and sweat. Her whole body is ragged, trembling in weariness beneath the weight of her armor. Her thigh smarts with the searing pain from a gash and she can already feel her cheek start to swell from an earlier hit, her temples throbbing.
And then she smells it. Chalky and acrid. She yelps at the sudden burning along her neck and reaches back to find her long dark braid has burnt up around her shoulders. She stamps it out with her fingers, the strands falling forward over her cheeks, now loose. The ends are rough and hot. She blinks in surprise, glancing around the burning city littered with corpses.
There is the steady, slow rising of voices. The hesitant exhale of breath after the battle. And then a man hollers his triumph near her, startling her. Another man joins in. The whirlwind of cheers grows until it is all-encompassing, until she feels it in her bones, until her body is filled with it. She feels the hesitant tug of a smile along her dirt-smeared lips.
And then there is a word. Caught in the craze of shouts at first. And then louder. And constant. And then they are all chanting it, swords raised, limbs heavy, faces skyward.
"Warden! Warden! Warden!"
Mhairi sheaths her sword and looks up at the tower in the distance. The sky is an unrecognizable red with the flames and haze of blood in the night. But she can see the tower clearly. She cannot take her eyes from it. She is filled with longing and purpose.
She reaches for the dagger along her belt, securing her shield behind her. And then she is reaching back to grasp the charred ends of her hair, slicing the small blame cleanly through. Cutting the burned edges from her scalp. Watching the dead strands fall to the dirt. Her nostrils burn with ash and smoke.
She turns her gaze back to the tower and smiles. Blindingly. There is light and victory in her blood. She knows where she is meant to go. She knows what she was made for.
The next day she writes her father and tells him she is alive.
She tells him she has stopped searching.
"You of all people should know why I cannot marry him, Father." When Mhairi says it her voice breaks and she thinks her heart might have as well. She is sixteen and full of desperation.
Her father, who moments ago had been red in the face with his arguing shouts, his fists rattling in the air, simply looks at her, shoulders sagging, face falling.
She curls her fingers into the thick satin of her skirt and shakes. Her brows bunch together at the sight of him, so old and so worn. His threadbare shirt hangs off his form like a threat, pulling him lower, dragging him deeper. His grey hair is pushed back from his face and his wrinkles tell of years she is too stubborn to forget. His jaw unclenches, his mouth opening as though to speak but only a hesitant croak emerges. His hands go limp at his sides.
Her lip begins to tremble as she pulls in a shaky breath.
He shakes his head, eyes closing with a hand to his forehead as he braces his other palm along the mantle of the fireplace and leans against it. "Mhairi," he breathes raggedly. "My Mhairi, we don't…"
"I know, father," she chances, taking a step closer, feeling her chest clench tightly beneath the constriction of her corset as she breathes anxiously. "I know but…but we will find the money."
"Where?" he presses, voice rising as he opens his eyes and looks back at her. "Where else do you expect to find money but in this marriage? We agreed, little one. This was for the best. I cannot keep the estate if you do not marry."
Mhairi shakes her head, her lip caught between her teeth. "I'll help you, father. We'll find the money. But not like this. I…I can't. This isn't the life for me and you know it."
His brows knit together as his face pinches with pain, a heavy sigh raking his body that startles Mhairi with the force of it. He turns from her. Turns his eyes into the fireplace and braces both hands along the mantle now. "I know. I know but what else is there? The life I wanted for you is out of our reach, dearest. It is time you accepted that."
Something blazes inside her then. Her hands clench the wads of fabric from her skirt at her sides and she takes another step forward, chin raised. She will not let this be the end. She will not let go of the brilliant, beckoning vision of a future she has kept nestled in her heart. She has always wanted her own life. Always wanted a meaningful one. A life that spoke of purpose and honor and fulfillment. The respective nod of a nobleman's recognition. The glorious distinction of championing royal heraldry. Her name, treasured and celebrated, lingering on people's tongues.
She wants the world to tremble at her presence. To know she has touched it.
She knows only one way.
"I'll earn it," she urges, steadfast, unrelenting.
He blinks up at her, lips pursed in confusion.
She steadies her breath, reaches a hand for his arm and lights her warm touch along his sleeve. "We have money yet to purchase a commission."
He narrows his eyes at her momentarily, the thoughts piecing together slowly.
"In the army," she clarifies.
He nearly scoffs, but it is mostly a sad sound. It is mostly defeat. "Mhairi, don't be –"
"I can do it," she interrupts, her hand on his arm squeezing slightly. "You know I can. You've taught me enough."
He waves a hand through the air, his voice heightened and disbelieving. "But to buy a commission? Even more debt!"
"I'll earn it back," she urges, her face hardening, her voice sure. "And I'll earn the estate back. This is what I was born to do, Father. This is what you've always known was in me. Please, tell me you still believe in me."
His face softens at her words and he reaches for her touch along her arm. "Oh little one," he breathes haltingly, his eyes welling with tears that are all too easy in his old age. "I have never stopped believing in you."
"Then let me do this. Let me at least try."
His mouth dips into a frown, tinged with hesitance and fear. He opens his mouth to speak but nothing he can think to say will mean anything in the face of this daughter he is powerless against. She smiles at him. And though it does not reach her eyes it is all he needs. All that moves him. All that he lives and breathes for.
He sees her face when he goes to sleep and wakes to the thought of her.
Of all things in this world, she is what he is most proud of. Most honored to call dear.
She swallows thickly and offers a vulnerable smile. "Everything in me is screaming at me to do this, father. To be this person I've always known I was. Please. Will you help me?"
He has lost to her years ago. On her first night in this world, wailing and wide-eyed and beautiful.
He heaves a heavy sigh and takes her hands in his. He nods, the tightness of his throat too strong for words.
But she knows. She has always known
She is six winters old. All braided hair and skinned knees. Toothy smile. Hands that are small and yearning, perpetually searching.
She sits on her father's lap as she finishes reading the storybook to him. The room is lit by a lone candle beside their chair. He smiles as she looks up at him and closes the book.
"What kind of knight do you think I'll be, Father?" she asks curiously, her voice small and lilting with the hint of her delicate smile.
Her father cocks his head as he looks at her, smiling. "Hmm," he begins, one hand adjusting her leg on his lap so that she shuffles into his embrace. "Good, for certain. A kind knight."
"Will I be brave?" she asks excitedly, eyebrows shooting into her dark hairline with eagerness.
He laughs. "The bravest."
She pulls one small hand up to play with the dark braid of her hair, her fingers threading through the loose strands at the end. "Will they sing songs about me?"
He strokes a strand of hair from her face and his eyes crinkle with his smile. "Of course, little one. They will write great poems and compose epic ballads. They'll even erect a statue of your liking. Right here in Dragon's Peak. So everyone will know the great Mhairi was born and raised here. And that you protect it."
"I will," she agrees eagerly, her head bouncing up and down. "I'll protect you father. And our home."
"I know you will, little one."
She beams up into his face. "Tell me about it again. Tell me about the future."
She cannot get enough of this wonderful, beautiful, exhilarating dream of a future her father weaves for her. Her tiny heart bursts with longing for it. She can see it in his eyes. Feel it in the cool steel of his blade that she touches secretly at night, when he thinks she is asleep. Hear it in the barely-there, promising wind that whistles through her bedroom window at night. Taste it in the sweat that lines her lips when she rides the family's horses. Smell it in the tang of smoke that wafts from the nearby smithy.
Her whole body aches for the dream. For the bright, glinting promise of a life well-lived. Well-earned. Well-cherished.
She hears that constant whisper of her heart that tells her she was made for it.
Her father moves his hands to her cheeks and peers into her eyes. "My little warrior. You're going to do great things in this life. I just know it. The world will know my Mhairi. And they will love you, just as I have."
She believes him. She believes him when he says it. She believes him when he wraps his arms around her. And when he presses a warm kiss to the crown of her head. And when he holds her to him like she is something precious. Something beautiful. Something loved.
And she believes him still, until the end. She believes him even as she drinks her death with a smile upon her face.
She was made for it.