Summary: Many scholars believe that the age of the Elvehenan Empire ended when the god of betrayal Fen'harel, sealed away his brothers and sisters and stole the immortality of the elves for himself. But things long since dead are stirring, things thought lost are being found once more, and fates are constantly being unraveled and remade. When one of the gods thought trapped and lost to the mortal races finds his way back to the living world. What fates will change when he binds himself to the soul of an unborn child? How will the people of Thedas react to the return of Elgar'nan? Will he lead his people back to glory? Or will his hatred consume all the world in his quest to enact his vengeance on the one who destroyed everything he loved.
Chapter 1: A New Beginning
As with all legends, it begins with a tragedy.
A woman's scream echoes throughout the forest, and Athos' head snaps to the direction of the disturbance. He did not even look back to see if his companions were following him, the hunter took off as fast he could. Ducking, weaving, almost sprinting through the underbrush with the grace only a true Dalish hunter could have, he saw the clear signs of attackers as he drew closer and closer to the sound of the scream.
Leaves and grass trampled, twigs broken, and branches roughly hacked off of the trees. Had to be Shemlen, no true Dalish would defile the forest like this. The trio arrived in a small clearing to find a grisly scene. Two of their clan mates, one dead from multiple stab wounds, with arrows sticking out of his back. And his companion, a woman suffering from a long and painful looking slash wound across her stomach that had soaked her leather armor in blood, but the wound did not seem immediately fatal. "Fenedhis Lasa!"Athos cursed to himself, he recognized them, Valanna and Theras Mahariel. Theras was one of the few members of their clan to have descended from one of the noble bloodlines of the Old Dales. This would be a blow to the clan, as another piece of their history was lost.
Surrounding them were six corpses, each as broken and bloody as their two clan-mates, Athon despised the evil men that had casually taken the life of one of his brothers, and most likely would have killed or captured Valanna as well had they not arrived sooner. He could see the figures of three more men fading into the distance. Most likely they ran as soon as the woman screamed while their companions stayed to try and fight. But what disgusted him the most was that four of these bandits were elves, "flat-ears". He reminded himself, these were not true elves, they were no better than dogs.
Sighing to himself, he turned and saw his brothers had caught up to him and were equally horrified by the scene as well. Athos motioned to his fellow hunters to gather the body of their fallen brother while he gently pulled Valanna away and picked her up as she sobbed into his chest. They left the bodies of the bandits lying there to rot, may the wolves feast on their flesh and the crows peck out their eyes, for they were not worth burying.
It was several hours later, long after the sun had set, when Athon approached the Keeper to inform her of what had happened. Entering the Keeper's tent, he sat down across from her as she finished a prayer for the recently departed.
When she looked into his eyes, he could see the great sadness within them, "what happened lethallin?" Athon told Keeper Marethari everything that had transpired this day, and he apologized for allowing another old bloodline to be lost when he could have saved it, if he had just been faster. The Keeper was silent for a moment and spoke softly. "Athos, Valanna is pregnant."
Later that night, on the verge of sunrise, a white light began to emanate from Valanna's tent. And a few seconds later, it disappeared.
Several months passed peacefully for the clan, moving from place to place, never staying in one spot for too long. Life moved on as it always had for them all, all except one, Athos thought to himself. Valanna had become a shell of herself after the death of her mate, her eyes were hollow, and even the imminent birth of her unborn child could not bring her out of her stupor. He tried to banish these thoughts from his mind, she would eventually move on once she found closure for Theras' death. Perhaps seeing her child for the first time will finally bring her out of her depression. Looking up to the sky and seeing the setting sun, he began to make his way back to the clan's campsite. His patrol duties were finished for the day, and he needed to talk to the Keeper in case this birth did not have the desired affect on his friend.
As he reached camp, Athos noticed a large group of people standing near one of the tents, he increased his pace, it was Valanna's. As he reached the crowd, he asked one of the nearby hunters,"what is going on?" The man looked surprised, "haven't you heard Athos? Valanna's child has been born, the Keeper is in there with them right now."
Before the man even finished, Athos began pushing and shoving his way to the front of the crowd and threw open the tent flap and entered. There he saw Valanna, propped up by layers of blankets and pillows, holding a newborn babe wrapped in furs to keep the chill away. Next to her, Marethari was reciting a poem in ancient elvish to the baby, slowly lulling the child to sleep but she stopped once she saw him enter.
"Ah, Athos, I was expecting you, a new brother has been added to our clan." All he could do was nod absentmindedly, for the child was staring directly at him with orange eyes that matched the color of the open flames that warmed the tent, he was disturbed by how calm the child was and the unsettling look the boy gave him as he stared at Athon.
It was rare for an elf to be born with orange eyes, many people believed it to be an omen of misfortune or death. But he never put much stock in those old wives' tales, but there was something definitely off about this child. He looked up into Valanna's own blue eyes, and he could see that they were not quite as hollow as he remembered, and the barest ghost of a smile graced her face. "His name is Theron."
The Keeper ordered Athos to watch over Valanna while she was recovering, and to make sure that the newborn child was kept safe. He awoke from his light slumber to the sound of a babies' cry in confusion. Wasn't he just outside of Valanna's tent? The last thing he remembered was resting his eyes as he leaned against a nearby tree. And now he was back in his tent, nearly a hundred feet away. Athos rose to his feet and unsheathed his Dar'misaan before making his way towards the sound of the crying. He just knew it was coming from her tent.
The crying became louder and louder the closer he got to the tent, but there was no other sound this night. There was no wind, no howling wolves, not even the chirping of crickets. Soon he was standing just outside, gripping the flap, and he dreaded what he would find inside. With a deep breath, he readied his sword and opened it, only to see Theron on the tent floor, crying and still wrapped in furs. But Valanna was gone, and as he looked closer he saw three items next to the boy, a stack of clothes that he recognized to be Theras' old armor, cleaned and repaired since his death. A silver necklace in the shape of a Dragon's skull with two red rubies for eyes, and a curved Veridium dagger. When Theron caught sight of Athos, he immediately stopped crying and stared at him with the same unnerving calmness that the child had the first time Athos had seen him. And for some reason that he could not place, this disturbed him far more than anything his own mind could have created.
The clan had searched three days and three nights for any sign of Valanna, but they found nothing, she had completely disappeared into the forest without a trace. There were rumblings within the clan, that the boy was cursed, that they would all end up disappearing eventually if he was left alive, after the death of Theras and now with Valanna having vanished, many people began to believe those old tales of cursed children with eyes of fire. And Athos might be starting to see where they were coming from, that boy was definitely not normal.
Everyone stood together in a large crowd as the Keeper began to address them, trying to calm them and assure them all that Theron was no threat. She asked them if anyone would be willing to watch over the newly orphaned boy, for a few moments the crowd was dead silent, all except for one woman. Ashalle stepped forward," I'll take care of the boy, and the rest of you should be ashamed of treating a baby like this." If he remembered correctly, Ashalle had been very close friends to Valanna.
Many of the people looked away or muttered an apology, and slowly the elves began to disperse and went back to their task of packing up their camp to move on, whatever would happen next. He could only pray that the clan would not suffer for sparing this child's life.
The next few decades were quite hectic for Marethari, Theron had been acting strangely from the moment he learned how to speak. They would catch him talking to no one when he thought he was alone and he knew far too much about the world for someone as young as him. He would disappear into the forest for days at a time, only to mysteriously reappear when they were on the verge of giving up the search, and when questioned about his whereabouts, the boy would refuse to tell them where he had gone.
These events only served to continue to make her clan mates afraid of the young man, saying he was cursed, plagued by spirits that caused the disappearance of Valanna and Theras' death. And they also pushed their fears onto their children, the other younglings would actively avoid Theron, that is, if they were not actively bullying him. For a long time, Theron had no one in his life that cared for him except for his adoptive mother Ashalle and herself. He began to grow colder, angrier, and quite in his isolation.
That is, until Theron reached the age of twelve, when he was sent on his first hunt with two other boys around his age, Fenarel and Tamlen. The twin brothers were both orphans as well, their mother having died during childbirth while their father had been killed by a bear when they were just four years old. She had hoped the boys would bond over their shared loss and finally help Theron integrate into the clan.
Like all of the other children, they refused to go on the hunt at first, fearful of the cursed boy who would kill them as soon as they were away from camp. But she had threatened to punish them severely if they disobeyed. Hesitantly, they agreed and went out into the forest midday, two days later, the boys stumbled back into camp, Tamlen had been carrying the unconscious body of Theron on his back and he was on the verge of collapsing. The duo were half dead and exhausted, but there had been a change in Fenarel and Tamlen, they refused to leave Theron's side until he received aid for three long bleeding slash wounds on his chest that stretched from his right shoulder down to his left side, and the two boys lacked the same fear and apprehension that they once had before leaving on the hunting trip, instead it had been replaced with worry and respect.
As soon as her apprentice Sarvel carried Theron back to the boy's tent to begin healing him, she interrogated Fenarel and Tamlen about what had happened to the trio. Fenarel was the first one to break the silence, "Keeper, while we were out on the hunt, a bear attacked us. We tried to fight it, but it charged at me and tried to swipe at me with its claws. Theron managed to push me out of the way and took the blow himself, and even though he was badly injured, he was still able to drive his knife into it's skull, and it took much longer to get him back with his injuries." Marethari nodded in understanding, "I hope you two realize how lucky you are to be alive, I think you both owe him an apology." The boys nodded in agreement, they couldn't believe how awful they had been to him after Theron had risked his life for them.
"Go and get cleaned up, you can apologize to him after we finish treating his wounds." The boys simply nodded and walked sluggishly back towards their tents, in contrast, Marethari began to make her way towards Theron's own tent to check on her First's progress. As soon as she threw open the tent flap, she was assaulted by the smell of blood, herbs, and the smell of rot, Marethari grimaced, sometimes she hated how sensitive an elf's senses were compared to the other races. Sarvel turned to Marethari while Theron laid on his bedroll unconscious, "Keeper, the rot has already begun to set in, I don't know if we can save him."
Marethari nodded in understanding,"you may leave Sarvel, I will take care of this." The young man nodded in understanding and left the tent. Slowly, she began to gather magic from The Fade and began to pour it into the ill child, willing it to purge the infection from his body, for three full days she worked to fully remove all traces of the sickness, relying on The Fade to sustain her.
At last, the last vestige of the rot was eliminated and Marethari set to the task of suturing the open wounds, grinding the herbs and mixing it with water to create a herbal plaster that would keep them from getting infected again, and finally wrapping his torso in bandages made from animal hide. She sat back exhausted, Theron would have these scars for the rest of his life, but he will live. Rising to her feet, she stretched her sore, aching, stiff muscles and left the boy in his tent, she was getting to old to be doing this sort of thing.
After his recovery, Theron, Tamlen and Fenarel became inseparable, everyone had heard how Theron risked his life to save his friends and it finally eased the concern of most of the clan, perhaps he wasn't cursed after all. Although it didn't stop all of the bullying, Theron now at least had friends who would come to his aid to defend him against the other children, and it had the desired affect on the young boy that the Keeper had hoped. He wasn't quite so angry anymore and seemed to act far more like the other children, although he was still far too wise for someone his age and he did still periodically disappear, no one quietly muttered about the cursed child or looked at him in fear any more. For his bravery that day and his success in killing such a mighty creature during his first hunt. Theron earned his Vallaslin, and chose the intertwining vines of the El'garnan tattoos. He was the youngest member of the clan to earn the Vallaslin.
Three years afterwards, Sarvel had been killed by bandits and the Sabrae clan was in need of a new First, without any other magical children within the clan, a young girl by the name of Merrill was given to them from the Alerion clan to become the next Keeper after Marethari. While the other children thought they would have an easy target with her being a newcomer, they were proven wrong when Theron stood up for her and quickly invited her into his small group of friends. Afterwards, she was never far from him when she had the time, Marethari mused.
When Theron reached the age of sixteen, Marethari had convinced Athos to train Theron in the ways of the Dalish warrior and while it took some heavy persuasion on her part, the man had hesitantly agreed to the arrangement, every day afterwards at sunrise for the next eight years, Athos ran Theron through a brutal training regiment to turn him into the best swordsman he could possibly be, once he mastered the blade, he taught him to use daggers and spears and axes. When he mastered those, he was taught to turn his very body into a weapon and learned to fight without armaments.
At the age of twenty five, Theron finally managed to defeat his master in armed combat. And in return, he was gifted a gleaming steel Dar'misaan and two curved Dar'misu. While he sported a few more scars than before, he was glad of it, he had grown to an impressive height of six feet and his body was muscular and toned, yet he still remained nimble like all of his brothers and sisters. And he kept his straight black hair short.
Now at the age of twenty six, he was the spitting image of his father, Marethari thought, and she was proud that he had grown into one of the strongest members of their clan. But she had a strange feeling that something terrible would happen today, and she did not know why.
Authors Note: This is just a little quick summary of Theron's backstory for this story, the next chapter will take place at the start of the Dalish Origin in DAO. I'm still undecided on who Theron will be romancing, but I am leaning heavily towards Morrigan at the moment. Feel free to give suggestions if you want to.