Title: King of Birds
Pairing(s): Mouse/Amell, one-sided Jowan/Amell, mild Alistair/Amell
Summary: The fall from the tower isn't a long one. And when Solona falls, she falls hard.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Characters and setting and franchise in general all belong to Bioware - heck, even the given character names belong to Bioware too, because I'm just that creative.
A/N: So because I enjoy crack!pairings in the most unhealthy way you can imagine, I got on to FF-dot-net expecting to read some deliciously twisted demon/mage stories, but had a hard time finding any. I decided to write one of my own, but if anybody has any suggestions on stories I might have missed, please let me know! PM me or leave a comment or whatever. Either way, here's what my brain managed to fart out the other night. Enjoy!
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Prologue
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When Solona first reads the tale of the birds and their competition to determine who among them is king, she frowns mightily at the thought that a cheater is the one to snag the title. She sighs, tossing the book of fables aside and reaching for another, entirely unimpressed with the childish stories.
"Hey!" Jowan laughs from his place at the table beside her. "I take it you don't like it, then?"
Solona levels a mildly sheepish glare at him, a clear I told you so on the tip of her tongue but refusing to leave her lips.
"I get it, I get it, I like fun, easy-to-read, fantasy books and you like old-timey, dusty tomes written in dead languages, bursting with the wonders of herbs and medicinal properties in plants and other equally dull things." He leans nearer, grinning, all tongue-in-cheek. "Yawn."
Solona sighs again, but her eyes are bright and it's obvious she's forcing it. This is Jowan, her best friend and close confidante. She knows and he knows that she'll finish reading the stupid fables later, every single one of them, cover to cover, simply because Jowan had been the one to recommend them to her. She'd read the entire library if Jowan would tell her to do so, or tease her that she couldn't. She'd steal pastries from the kitchens if he made the slightest mention of wanting any, she'd give up countless afternoons of study to pull pranks and wreak havoc with him, and Maker only knew she'd throw herself from the very top of the Tower if he dared her to; she'd run full-tilt, no hesitation, and burst straight through the window, and only when she was airborne would she think to worry about her landing.
"The birds talk," she says by way of explanation, biting down on a grin.
"Maker forbid," Jowan swoons, gasping dramatically. Solona gives up, letting the smile stretch across her lips as she reaches over and thumps him on the shoulder.
"He has," she states imperiously, "unless you've been conversing with the local fauna recently and I am simply unaware...?"
Jowan laughs, and her heart flutters a bit. She completely ignores the dark presence in the library with them, glowering at her.
"It's called a fable for a reason," he shoots back, though he leans an elbow on the table and rests his chin in an upturned palm, already prepared for the inevitable diatribe that will follow. Solona's cheeks turn pink at his expectant look, so she swings her gaze back to the book in question and archly clears her throat.
"I mean really, what purpose does flying the highest serve? Shouldn't the birds be more impressed with whoever can fly the fastest, or the farthest? They may as well see who can fly the lowest while they're at it, or maybe which of them can hold their breaths the longest; either competition makes just as much sense as far as I'm concerned."
Jowan is grinning, and Solona rolls her eyes.
"Also, the Wren is a cheater, hiding in the tail feathers of the Eagle like that, though I suppose this is the Animal Kingdom we're talking about here. But honestly, how did the Eagle not feel another bird hiding in its tail feathers? Birds use those feathers to keep themselves balanced. Surely the Eagle would've felt a bit off-kilter, if nothing else." She pauses a moment, long enough for a breath and a sound of mock-agreement, issued forth from somewhere in the back of Jowan's throat, to reach her ears. "And another thing: technically, the Wren only flew from the Eagle to whatever height it reached. Comparably, the Eagle still flew the highest of any bird in the competition, and therefore should have won regardless."
"Wow," Jowan breathes, sounding slightly befuddled, voice escaping him in a huff of laughter. "You take a story that has literally maybe three sentences in it all together and you pick it apart with a lengthy speech that I'd wager isn't even half of all that you find wrong with it." He shakes his head empathetically. "You're amazing."
Solona's face does not burn red at the off-hand compliment, though secretly she's aware that Jowan wouldn't notice, either way.
"Well," she mumbles, eyes darting to look anywhere but at the object of her heart's affections. "I try."
"You know," Jowan says after a long moment in which neither of them speak, and he stares at her measuringly, "the moral of that story is that cleverness is better than simple brute strength. A brains over brawn type of thing."
Solona scoffs. "You mean to say that trickery is better than honest effort?"
"No." Now Jowan is frowning and Solona wishes she could take it back. "Come on Solona, I thought you'd understand at least a little. It wasn't even a fair competition to begin with! Of course the Eagle would win, he was bigger, stronger, and had a greater wingspan. The Wren was at a major disadvantage, with its tiny wings and weaker body, so it won the only way it could win. I see nothing wrong with that."
"Maybe that just means the Wren was never meant to be king," Solona murmurs, uncomfortable, because she truly dislikes the story but can tell by the way he's defending it that it's one of Jowan's favorites.
"And yet it became king anyway," Jowan smiles, confident, and Solona watches him with a familiar combination of exasperation and fondness that has only ever been apparent to everyone except the person it was meant for.
"Alright," she huffs, "I'll concede that the Wren is truly King of Birds, worthiness of that title notwithstanding. He's probably a raving lunatic and a megalomaniac to boot."
Jowan laughs, a full-belly laugh with merriment in his throat, and pats Solona on the back. "I knew you'd come 'round, eventually." Then he is standing and, just like that, strolling away.
"I'll leave you to it, then. I've got a hot date with my mystery woman! I'll see you at dinner." He winks at her over his shoulder, then Jowan is gone.
Solona stares after him forlornly, but only for a moment. She turns back to her books, schooling her features, and looks blankly at the dark presence that has moved from across the library to stand directly in front of her. She regards himcoolly, raising a challenging brow and silently daring him to do something about it, because he always threatens but never does. Not now that she's older, anyway.
She plucks the book of fables from its spot on the table and opens it to the page she'd been on, reading because she knows it will make him angry and because Jowan had suggested it to her, after all.
Inwardly, Solona quietly despairs. She'd do anything for Jowan, but Jowan has no idea.
Solona knows it.
He knows it, too.
So it doesn't really come as much of a surprise, then, when several weeks and a Harrowing later (the monster in her closet had only ever been a mouse, she thinks bitterly), she finds herself face-to-face with a smug Knight-Commander and a disappointed First Enchanter.
"You could have told me," Irving says when they emerge from the Tower basement, Jowan's blood already spilled on the phylactery chamber floor. Solona lifts her chin, refusing to meet the gaze of the man who'd only ever been a father figure to her, and responds, "No, I couldn't have. You were planning to make Jowan Tranquil."
"Oh, we'll be doing a lot more than that to him, now, and it's all thanks to you, mage," Greagoir sneers, mocking her newly gained title.
Solona opens her mouth to try and talk reason with them, but behind her Jowan is screaming, "No! I won't let you take her!" and pulling a dagger from within his robes and then there is blood, staining the floor and drowning the gathered group of templars under a tidal wave of dark red.
"Blood magic," Lily's voice trembles, but there is a coldness in her eyes now, resignation and sorrow. Maybe heartbreak, Solona thinks dazedly, because her own heart feels shattered into a million tiny pieces in her chest.
Jowan turns tail and runs, fleeing, and Solona stares after him for a beat and all she can think is that she and Lily had been the only ones left untouched by the sick pull of magic, the only two left standing despite the uncontrolled burst of copper flavor on her tongue, and she takes off after him.
She catches up with him just as a faceless templar has raised a wickedly gleaming sword, Jowan trembling on the floor underneath.
"No!" escapes from Solona's mouth, the cry torn from her lips before she can think on it, just as the electricity that dances between her fingers leaves her outstretched palm without a single thought from her mind, hitting the templar square in the chest and slamming him into the far wall.
Jowan is already up again, scrambling away, and Solona makes to go after him but feels the full force of a templar nullification hit her from behind. She falls to the ground, a pained cry echoing against the stone floor in her ears, and rolls to see her assailant more properly.
Cullen, standing there, wide-eyed and looking ill. Solona's heart wrenches.
She watches as Cullen hesitates, then strikes her with the flat of his sword, and she knows only darkness and a furious monster-turned-mouse until she is awake again, blinking groggily past the throbbing in her head and the dryness in her throat.
Her wrists are bound together, she's down on her knees, and Irving stares with disbelief while Greagoir stares with hatred and Cullen stares with something that looks an awful lot like heartbreak.
She stares defiantly at each in turn, but there is a gnawing pit of agony in her chest and worry churning her stomach.
Solona reflects numbly on the silly little fable she'd read that day, and wonders when exactly it was that Jowan had begun to think himself the Wren.
She asks, voice paper-thin, "Is he alright?"
"Is he alright? Is he alright? He's gone, you worthless piece of sin, he escaped the Tower and blasted the boat-," Greagoir spits, but Solona cuts him off sharply, rasping.
"Not him, Knight-Commander. Not Jowan. I meant the templar that I..." her voice trembles, "... that I attacked. Is he...?"
Cullen stumbles away then, seemingly lost.
"He is fine," Irving says shortly, hesitantly, as if it pains him to do so.
In the very next moment, Duncan of the Grey Wardens strolls forward, having just been another blur in the background up until that point.
"I want her," he declares - calmly, confidently, as if somehow that will be enough to save her - and Solona is blown over sideways when she finds herself traveling south a day later, headed for Ostagar and whatever else lies ahead.
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((Psst. In case there was any confusion, the fable Solona and Jowan argue over basically states that the birds all got together one day and said, "Yo, one of us gotta be king. How about whoever can fly highest?" And so they all compete to see who can, and the Eagle kicks everyone's butts, though just as his wings give out and he can fly no higher due to exhaustion, the Wren pops outta the Eagle's tail feathers and flies above him, winning the competition and becoming king. According to the wiki, this is an old fable by Aristotle, though I haven't found anywhere else on the interwebs that confirms this claim. Either way, the fable's not mine. Ah, Wikipedia, the ambiguous knowledge you bestow upon me.))
((Sorry for all the bird talk and lack of actual demon-interaction in this chapter. Frowny face. It was necessary to introduce the love-sick puppy that is the main character of this shin-dig. Let the angst begin!))