Prologue
Dyana Cousland-Arkbrook and Kora Mahariel looked at one another as Old Orion finished the story of their ancestor's true history. "That explains…quite a bit." The female noble still could not wrap her finger on all this newfound knowledge. "To actually hear to truth about our ancestors…"
"The truth?" The old man-elf cracked. "It is always the best policy to speak the truth, unless, of course, you are an exceptionally good liar."
Kora raised a brow at his words. "So are you saying you've lied to us all this time?"
He smiled at her. "Not at all. I happen to be a mediocre liar, on my best days."
"Hmm." was her cold remark.
"The way you told us this, though...how can you tell your story and show us these memories at the same time?"
"It's an old art - one that may have sought, but never gained. And I have no intention of passing it down. Some things are best left from more ambitious and dimwitted minds."
"Did he love her?" Kora asked bluntly. When Orion looked back at her perplexed, she asked again, "Did he love Lyna?'
"Not in the way you're thinking of and yet exactly in the line of thinking you're thinking of." Orion sighed as his explanation failed to hit home. "He never told him, but I suspected his...feelings...were more towards a fatherly and brotherly sort than a lover sort. Yet I would say for it, but had enough sense to know the likelihood of something like that happening between them two."
After a short spell of silence, Orion spoke up. "So…what shall we talk about next?" He asked eagerly.
Dyana was caught unaware at his inquiry as she still was unraveling her family's mysteries and secrets, but nonetheless turned her focus back to her guest. "Uh, well…" She moved several books around on her desk, then stopped suddenly as one sh had not seen in an age came into view in the corner of her eye. She recognized the representation on it anywhere. She figured that if he did possessed all this knowledge, what she would ask would be firsthand knowledge to him. "The next important figure in that era: The Champion."
Orion's eyes glowed than died down at the last two words. "Which one?" He asked, stimulating confusion.
"You know exactly which one I'm talking about, Orion." He sneered respectfully.
The old man-elf sunk into his chair and looked back between her and the elf. "Do I? Please, enlighten me with your wisdom."
Kora intervened before Dyana utter a retort, nasty or noble. "She refers to Hawke, the Champion of Kirkwall."
Orion sighed sadly. "Ah...Garrett. Yes. He was most indeed an important figure in that era. Many question his rise to fame and power as it rapidly occurred somewhat…disreputable." HIs eyes become fixated upon the two women before him. "I think I can say, in confidence with you two, we know better than to fuel fires of any ignoramus who speak those words."
She gently flung the book that caught her notice on the other side of the desk for Orion to see. "You recognize this, yes?"
Her could not hide his smile away. there was no point of it now. If he divulged the Wardens' origins, Hawke's was the next likely candidate to come up next. "I do."
"So, the Tale of the Champion –" Kora began.
"Varric's most famous and infamous piece of literature. I still wonder even now what purpose it served the world, what made him tell the story that way. Then again, I never understood that dwarf, so what right can I have to say such things?" Orion asked.
Dyana waited for another quip. When none, she pressed on. "...How true is it?"
Orion shrugged. "That depend on your point of view as a reader. If you take the context of his volume word of word: hardly. If you put the message at the forefront: entirely."
"Can you tell us about it?" Kora asked with intrigue.
The old man-elf sighed, which in turn made Dyana commit one of her own; she knew she wasn't going to like his response one bit. "Fate is not with you today. As it so happens, I was not there where the events that brought chaos upon Ferelden unfolded. After, yes, but not at the time. I cannot call upon memorizes of mine I do not have to share."
The elf and the human groaned in frustration.
They stopped when both of them stared at Orion's magnificent and eerie grin.
"But…there is a recourse I can use that will, undoubtedly, give you what you seek." He offered, details nonspecific.
"And that would be what?" asked the elf skeptically.
He grin grew, and as he streched out a hand, a half-sphere of lighte came to life, and a blinding flash soon took all surroundings as its own.
The world seemed distorted at the vision of Dyana Cousland-Arkbrook and Kora Mahariel came back.
No ancient hall was before them. Instead, an endless landscape of black stood before them, with a ray of light directly above them. Footstep echoed the area, and as they turned, they saw Orion, but no as he was as an old being, but his much longer, humanly self; the body that was his as the start of it all. Dyana was stunned, whilst Kora was beyond furious.
"Wh – What did you do?!" the elf demanded, bow and assan raised at the 'young' man-elf.
He took notice of it yet paid it no further heed. "Memories are funny things, aren't they? Memories are like stones, time and distance erode them like acid. Yet, at their core, the truth evades erosion." He wagged a finger, even with the threat of death from the Mahariel woman. "Lucky for you two, I have immunity to such erosion, so what I remember is the truth. Like the Fade, there is no one truth, but many."
"Where are we?!" she demanded again.
"You'll have your answer…now."
Another beam of light came from their backside, this time in the form of a great wooden door opening. Two guards, clad in armor with the insignia of the Old Chantry smack in their chestplates, came forth, dragging a smaller individual between them. He was conscious, but was not aware of what was going on, yet the small hint of a smug was caught by the elf.
"Who are you?! Who is that?!" Kora demanded a third time, her finger twitching on the bowstring.
Orion sighed. "That'll do you no good here, since your technically not here."
"Wha -" She gasped at what Orion said came to pass.
The guards literally passed through Kora like she was nothing but mist and shadow. Then they went out of view.
"How did - Wha -"
"We're in your mind." Dyana finally said, her voice draining of courage but full of understanding.
Orion smiled again. "The safest part of it. I would not risk you two on other plains, but this one will cause you no distress or harm...except for that you inflict on yourself." He paced back ad forth. "What you saw was a memory. That why it can't harm, and alternatively, you can harm it. As I was a guest to you, you are guest to me in this place. What you see is the truth, unfolding unrelentingly and impervious to 'outside' interference."
"How did you do this?!" Kora screamed in denial.
Orion gently pressed towards her and lowered her shaking weapon with a fatherly hand. "I can entail all you need to know to you. I swear it." His gaze went back to Dyana as Kora failed to regain her footing. "To answer you other two questions, my dear: This domain, this 'existence' as one would be fit to describe as such, is mine. As blunt as it can be put, we are in my mind. though I am old in body, but my mind is fresher than the ripest of berries. On a side note, I daresay that rather like this form that a wrinkling old one. More versatile, wouldn't you say?"
"Uh...yes. I suppose."
"Good. Answer number two: Yes, it would be in your best interest to see why that dwarf, for a dwarf it was, was in custody of the Old Chantry. Follow me." He ordered quickly.
While he lead, Dyana grabbed Kora to follow, and with a sisterly look, explained to her what she knew what was going on as much as she could fathom.
Dyana was the more practical of the two, after all.
Orion stopped them midway through their walk. Right before Dyana asked what was going another, another ray of light revealed a stone chair, and the dwarf seen previously by the trio was flung hard into it. The dwarf was male with blond hair tied back in a short, messy ponytail. His stubble was clean shaven, and his clothes were roguish and dirty.
"That dwarf…" Dyana finally asked.
Orion nodded. "That...is Varric Tethras."
Both women stood shocked at the legend next to them - and the one before them. "Impossible." Kora opposed.
'Young' Orion chuckled. "Well, he is dead, yes. Yet he lives on, in memory. Is that not the wish of the living? To be remembered in death?"
First the truth about her ancestors, then to actually see a memory of a legendary figure before them...Dyana was shellshocked. "How are we seeing this if these are not your memories?
Orion looked away as the two women noticed the dwarf swearing at the guards. "While I was less acquainted with most members of Aedan's party, Hawke's friends were another matter. I encountered all of them later in life, Garrett included, and helped them pass into the Fade peacefully. I was permitted to hold on to their memories – to ensure future generations would learn of the mistakes of their elders and become better for it. It's worked – partly."
Dyana was going to ask him to further clarify his ending remarks, but Kora blocked her attempts with, "So…whose memories are these?"
He opened his mouth, but clapped it shut, smiled at point across of him to her right.
Another figure entered the memory now, this time a woman. A white eye wreathed in a white sun was at the center of her unique armor. Dyana recognized it automatically from her studies; it was the mark of the Old Seekers of Truth, the organization that, for a time, acted as a check on the power of the mighty Templar Order, acting in a secretive, investigative and interrogative capacity to root out corruption and protect the Chantry from internal and external threats.
It was not this new information that stole her breath. And Kora's two.
It was the woman herself. Her short, boyish hair, stern demeanor, and fierce presence identified her as one person, and one alone, they only heard of. read about. Inspired to be in some form of.
The one person that, other than the Wardens and the Champion, changed the course of history as they knew it.
"Andraste's flaming sword! That's – That's - …" Dyana's breath was fast escaping her grasp.
Orion smiled again. "Yes, it is. In memory only now, but it is her. History would always revere her for her actions during the Breach, but that is yet to come. That story cannot be told until this one is. Now watch...and learn."
The woman had a book in her hand, which bore the same mark in its cover as her armor, and she opened it to a page with, though Kora could see better than Dyana, six faces aligned in a black pentagon. He moved her hand to upper right hand corner of the shape, stopping on the image of a face that looked identical to the dwarf before her. Above it at the top corner was a black-haired woman with a bandanna; under it was female elf. Next to elf was a human male. Above him was a red-hired woman, and above her was a white-haired make elf.
"These are her memories. This is what you seek to find the answer to your war." Orion explained at the woman paused at the page.
"She gave these memories to you? Willingly?" Kora asked, still in denial but slowly, very slowly, accepting the 'reality' of the situation before her.
"Gentle persuasion helped, but was not enough. So I gave her good reason and she complied. I explain that, uh, 'transaction' at another, less pressing time."
Before Kora could reply, the dwarf spoke up, stopping all other conversations. "I've had gentler invitations." He stated, slightly in pain. He then looked up to witness his captor's face.
"I am Cassandra Pentaghast, Seeker of the Chantry." The woman stated coldly, and motioned to the guards to leave the room so the only people left were her and the dwarf. Kora and Dyana's bewilderment was still in effect at the presence of historical figures in the 'flesh' before them.
"And, uh, just what are you seeking?" Varric asked.
"The Champion." was her short, blunt answer.
Dyana and Kora looked at Orion with better understanding now. Now they were why he was showing them this, and all he did was smile and watch history unfold before him as he did so many times before.
The dwarf scoffed and looked as his hand playfully before, as far as the Seeker was concerned, he asked rhetorically, "Which one?"
"You know exactly why I'm here!" She yelled before tossing the book she had glanced at before right at his face, which fell into his lap opened right in the middle. Cassandra then pointed her dagger just half an inch from the dwarf's throat. The Seeker's ferocity caught the two 'guests' unawares. they had read about Cassandra Pentaghast has a fierce temper, but to this extent...
"Time to start talking, dwarf! They tell me you're good at it." As she finished, the dwarf gasped at the dagger was thrusted into the book, right through a page with a unique emblem at its top. Dyana recognized it at the Amell family crest, for once, before Kora did.
"What, uh, what do you want to know?" He asked, understanding the tenacity of his captor and the possible outcome of death at his refusal.
"Everything. Start at the beginning." She demanded.
The dwarf moved a hand over that crest. He knew it all too well.
The woman gasped as the room changed shape and form, and all manner of colors danced around.
"This is where the fun begins." Orion said, laughing into silence.
-~0~-
So begins the true Tale of the Champion.
The idea of going into Orion's mind and seeing memories unfold as they did comes for Farscape. Season Three. Episode 11 - "Incubator".