Title: Wardens' Plight

Rating: T

Summary: Duncan knew six Warden-Commanders. Three men, three women. Six deaths. Original characters. Mahariel/Alistair

A/N: Thanks for reading.

Sylvaria

Duncan met Sylvaria in Orlais while requesting wardens on behalf of King Maric. He was young then, freshly snatched from the Gallows, and by all rights, he shouldn't have been the one leading such an important rendezvous. Still, orders were orders. He tried to put on a good face for his men. Though most of them were older than him and resentful of his command, Duncan managed to escort a small compliment all the way to Orlais to meet with the Warden-Commander.

He was startled to see not a pale-faced noblewoman who knew how to handle a dagger, but a plucky, dark-skinned dwarf with only half the necessary entourage to be wandering the streets at night. Her manner was brusque, her orders succinct. He might have thought her dull if not for the careful way her eyes followed every move he made. She seemed to catalogue everything about him before extending her hand, intelligence gleaming in her black eyes.

"Warden-Commander Sylvaria," she said in her thick, Orlesian accent. "You must be Duncan."

"It is an honor."

Her eyes clipped to the men behind him. "How many do you want?"

…

At the Grey Warden headquarters, he saw her potential and skill at leading. She might have been the shortest person in the training room, but to her men she was a ten feet tall. They listened to her every word. They stood on their toes when she entered a room. What seemed strangest to him was that she didn't appear to be putting on a show for him. The men worked as though they did so every day. She didn't offer him any special hospitality. No great banquet was made in his honor. Only when necessary did she introduce him to anyone. When she selected the men, there were no groans or complaints.

In her office, he saw the sparse furniture, bereft of anything remotely sentimental. A rotting Hurlock skull sat on the corner of her desk with a silver trinket wrapped around one of the horns, and he tried not to raise his eyebrow. "They are not my best," she confessed, "but they will do for what you have in mind. My best I need here."

"I would not dream of asking more," Duncan said courteously, as his superior had instructed him. "Orlais has been more than gracious."

"These Grey Wardens don't belong to Orlais," she reminded him tersely. "They belong to me."

…

Duncan spent three days at the Orlesian Keep, and he learned what it meant to be a Grey Warden under Syvlaria's rule. Regimes were harsh. Food was scarce as the Wardens were ill-supplied. She paced in front of them with her quick eyes, shouting orders as the men trained together in the courtyard. The building behind loomed like an archdemon, though Duncan had never seen one and hoped he never would. The fear and rush he felt while following the men and women around him was probably comparable, though. After years of conditioning, even he was out of breath by the end. One of his own men stumbled into the bushes to vomit, a female Warden following and panting kind words.

"We are all united by blood and Blight," Sylvaria called out to her men, but she was staring at Duncan. "The young and the weak with us today will become hard tomorrow. Ferelden, Orlesian, or Antivan, it doesn't matter. We are Wardens. We carry no nationality, no ties. Interchangeable pieces used to fight the Blight. We are all harbingers of war. Those that fall are not lost to us. One day, as we joined to become Grey Wardens, we will join the fallen again in death."

A chorus rang out from the men and women around him, heads bowed. "So shall it be."

Duncan cast a glance at the man vomiting, shaking. He put a hand to his chest, listening to the beating of his heart and whispered, "So…so shall it be."

…

Sylvaria picked him to go down into the Deep Roads, and expedition lead by herself, no less. Duncan was surprised right out of his sleepy stupor and soreness, and he nearly sprung off the chair in her office. "Warden-Commander," he said, trying not to sound cowardly, "surely there are other, more experienced Wardens that can go with you."

"You're young, and you need experience," she snapped, unrolling a map she pulled from a drawer in her desk. "How do you teach a duster respect?"

"I-I don't know."

"You show him." Pointing at the map with one of her small fingers, she stared at him with a challenge sparkling in her eyes.

…

"Buck up, boy," she hit the back of his knees with her broadsword, and he nearly fell over. The Deep Roads was everything they had said it would be. Every nook and crevice was splattered with swollen blood and bile. Gore piled in the corners; skeletons crunched under his feet. Bloated corpses surrounded by flies lined the skinny hallways they followed. How the dwarves could live so close to such an ongoing massacre, he didn't know. The smell made him want to vomit.

As Sylvaria sidled forward, leading the team, he stood in place. A small hand came to rest on his shoulder, and he turned to look into the eyes of a pretty elven girl with bright blue eyes. "Don't mind her," she said in a soft soprano with only a slight accent. "The Commander doesn't know what it's like the first time. She grew up so close to this place. Maker, she played near the entrance as a child."

"It's just…" Duncan drew in a breath, tasting death on his tongue. "I don't…"

"Hey," the elven girl said, lifting his hand that held his blade. He was numb. He could barely feel her touch. "Just…keep your blade and shield up. If you hear something, get ready. You're going to be all right. You get used to it." With a reassuring pat on his back, she stepped around a pile of nug bones and fell into place behind the Commander.

Eventually, Duncan forced himself to move.

…

Years later, he was visiting Orlais to find promising recruits. Instead, he found a Grey Warden with red hair and a charming smile. They sat down at a tavern and had a few drinks. The man was kind but not too far from his Calling. Grey tinged his hair. Wrinkles at the corners of his eyes gave him a friendly look. Duncan decided quite early on in the evening that he liked the man.

"Shame about what happened to the Warden-Commander, don't you think?" he said suddenly, shaking his head over a pint.

Duncan glanced up in surprise. "Sylvaria? Why, what happened to her?"

"You mean you haven't heard?" asked the man.

"No."

"Sad story," he frowned at his ale. The liquid was starting to sit unpleasantly in Duncan's stomach. He set his own mug down, glaring at it as if it had bit him. "They say she was betrayed by one of her own men. Knife stuck in her ribs. I say it was the Antivans, those Crows. Eh, they're trying a man now for the deed, but I saw her Wardens. Not one of them, not a single damn one, would harm her before cutting his own throat."

As the story finished, Duncan thought he should say something, but he couldn't think of a single word.

…

She was entombed in Orlais, appropriately. Duncan brushed some of the moss from the plaque as the rain fell heavily downward and dripped in his eyes. Four names were carved into the stone, other commanders that had served at the same Keep. The tomb was in the shape of a griffin with its beak open, wings halfway spread, as if giving out war cry.

Duncan knew his sentiment was silly. He hadn't known her well—he'd barely known her at all. Just a few days he'd spent at her Keep, learning to fight. She'd only spoken to him because he was the liaison. Yet he felt he owed her something. His first venture into the Deep Roads had been under her command. She'd taught him something, even if he couldn't completely identify what it was.

So maybe standing in front of a tomb filled with a stranger's body was odd, but the words she'd said on a hot summer day came back to him as if on the wind.

We are united by blood and Blight. We are Wardens. We carry no nationality, no ties. Interchangeable pieces used to fight the Blight. We are all harbingers of war. Those that fall are not lost to us. One day, as we joined to become Grey Wardens, we will join the fallen again in death.

Duncan whispered back into the sweet night air, "So shall it be."

Five more to go. Thanks for reading. Review please.