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Author's note: This story is mainly based on the storyline of The Laughing Wall but can be read independently. It contains one major spoiler of that series.
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Apprentices keep to their studies and prepared their Harrowing. They follow the Harrowed mages with attention and make sure to do whatever they can to ensure they will follow their predecessor's path without falling into danger. That is what is expected of them. None of these tasks includes the welcome of new residents and, if he wants to be honest, he wouldn't like it even if it was required of him.
One look at the scene has his steps slowing, receding, and eventually stopping until Owain find himself hiding behind a column like he is a boy of ten and not a grown man of fifteen winters.
The brat he is observing doesn't speak as the Senior Enchanter explains her new position. The bottom bed, that will be hers, robes, new vellum and writing material. Her face turns to the different things but never rises to the elder man. A deliberate avoidance, he's sure of it. It is like the Enchanter's words make no sense.
Why Owain remains there, that's up for anyone's guess. He just is.
Little chit has blonde hair. Matted and in disarray, a little singed by the side. Her skin is red and fraying from exposure to the sun. Where was she kept all her life? Inside an attic? It is like her skin hasn't seen direct sunlight since birth. Good clothing though, excellent fabric for such a small girl. He would wager maybe four, five years old, of a good family. He was never too good at these things. Young to show magical aptitude, that is a certainty.
Owain shouldn't be there. There's a pile of work waiting for him the second he enters the library. And yet, he doesn't leave. He waits and watches the newcomer and his teacher without truly understanding why.
"Apprentice." And he should have left. Sweenie is, unfortunately, gifted with the perfect ability to perceive chances to dump his work on the back of any apprentice stupid enough to wander in his vicinity. "Good, you can take care of this from now on. Explain to her the rest, yes? I must. Go somewhere. I'll send a mage for her orientation later on."
He's off as if teleporting was actually possible, leaving him, the little chit and a parade of apprentices who try very hard to pretend not to be watching with curious ears. It is a slow day in the Tower if the arrival of an apprentice is news.
"Alright," he says, walking closer and resigning himself to the inevitable. "What else has he shown you?"
The girl's eyes rise to his immediately and he reads no hesitation. Green and severe, they narrow a little in a sharpness he'd expect for someone a little older.
"This bed is mine," she says in a clearly polished tone, heavy with an accent he hasn't heard for years. "And so is this material. I am expected to show up to my classes and study properly. He is also sure I can't understand him since he repeated himself over and over again."
Kirkwall. Her accent is pure Kirkwall in every sound. Owain finds himself listening to it in a stupefied stupor instead of paying attention to the words the girl says. This shouldn't hurt. This trace of that land shouldn't touch him but, according to the weight on his stomach, it evidently does. He swallows tightly, trying to dislodge that horrible lump which suddenly occupied the back of his throat. It doesn't seem to work.
"Why are you closing your eyes?"
Owain breathes deeply. Once and twice, another for good measure. He is a mage of the Circle of Ferelden and that bastard who disowned him is clearly not going to taint his current home. He is not going to allow it.
"You're from Kirkwall," he says slowly, as if struggling to accept the mere idea.
"Of course."
The girl's apparent shyness seems as far from them as the city from where she hails. It feels odd to hear her bluntly replying to every comment made, even when it's not a question directed to her.
"Why weren't you talking to the Enchanter?"
"Children aren't supposed to be heard."
He can see a major issue with that sentence.
"You're talking to me."
"You're not old." And that apparently says it all. It also implies he's a child. "Who are you? He didn't say who you are." Or even why I'm supposed to listen to you to begin with. Owain doesn't hear those words but he can guess them behind that cultured tone, which is so familiar, the traces of arrogance of a kid who thinks she knows it all.
Blonde and green eyed, early magic and of good family. It seems too familiar.
He doesn't feel like he's in Ferelden anymore. He's stuck inside his family home with the bastard towering above him, locked fists and eyes which would have been able to burn a building into ashes. He's listening to his father's screaming over the Templar's, his rough hand gripping his wrist trying to keep him back until he was certain it would break. The suspicion is so strong; it almost replaces the oxygen in his lungs.
"You're an Amell."
So am I, he almost finishes before his own words settle in.
Those are the magical words though. The girl's expression shifts into happiness with amazing quickness, her lips forming a light-hearted grin which is nothing less than blinding.
"Yes!" His heart stops. "Diana! Diana Amell." And he can't get it to restart.
A good family with magical ties. Owain almost laughs out loud. Who else would send their kid half across a continent but the Amells?
"Are you Leandra's kid?" He prods further. Diana's eyes show no recognition, her smiled dimmed in confusion. She's not Leandra's then. Aristide's? Did that bastard even have children? If he had, then it's a good thing the girl was sent away. Owain wouldn't trust the man to raise a dog, never mind a kid into a productive member of society.
But why? Why isn't he asking the right question even if the answer's so obvious? They were all the same, they were all different, those with their blood. He knew it. And they had done it again.
"You're Revka's."
The reaction is instantaneous.
"You know momma?"
Oh Maker. Andraste preserve me.
Her bundle falls to the floor because the other hand – his sister'shand – grips his arm painfully. And this is hope in her eyes as she acts her age for the first time, can I go back and she can't just as he can't, they have no more place there.
This is his sister.
At some point in time, his parents had another child. At some point in time, she grew inside her gilded cage, knowing nothing bar what little trickled through their parents' hands. And then she showed magic, just like he had, like their eldest brother had, like their elder sisters, and he finds himself kneeling and wanting to hug this little brat instead of staring like she is an illusion born from the Fade because he knows just what happened to her. To them.
They did it again.
Owain can't breathe. He thought he was beyond this, beyond the anger and fear and hatred, beyond asking why they couldn't realize it wasn't their children's fault. It was their blood! They hadn't asked to be born! They could only live with the cards they were given. Why couldn't they just try to keep them? The magic was in their family, why couldn't they try not to fear? Why? He thought he was beyond whys after so long beneath the Circle's hold.
At some point in time, he is the one being comforted. Diana pats his leg gently, staring up at him with almost kindness. She's such a small thing. Such a useless small thing with his mother's hair and their family's magic.
"You're a funny boy," the girl declares.
Owain laughs at that – never mind how strangled it sounds to his own ears. For an Amell, she's exceedingly blunt. Grandfather must have loved that.
"I'm a man, kid."
"Boy," Diana corrects. "You're crying. Boys cry, men don't. Momma told me."
And Maker knows momma's words were law. Grandfather's were the Chant.
"Am not."
The apprentice has no idea when his age decreased.
"Are too."
"Don't be annoying, brat."
"That's not my name!"
"You're still a brat."
His sister scowls but doesn't pull away, frowning in that adult-like manner once more. They had never allowed much touch between children of other families. And she's young, too young, she wouldn't have been sent to any party. More than that, she had no sister, no brother to hold her, to play with her, to coddle her. She's his mother's manners in a five-year-old's shell.
"Who sent you here?" Owain asks, presuming maybe too much. He was raised like her though. They all grew fast in Kirkwall.
"Momma. Momma did. Because I'm a. I'm a." She struggles with the next word. She knows what it is but it hurts to say it. Demon. He knows. So Owain stops her, a hand on her head because he knows she is not.
"She sent you here to learn. We'll look after you."
Diana raises an eyebrow in a move that is clearly mimicked from her older relations but Owain can't find in himself to care. His mother sent this girl here to keep her safe. Him and her. A family.
Owain almost loves the woman again.
Almost but not quite.