They called it The Geode. Like the namesake it looked like something plain and easily ignored at first glance despite having a dazzling interior. The outside looked like a normal house with covered windows. It was once a manor owned by a noble family who had long since been struck from the records for some horrible deed. How the place landed in the hands of enterprising tavern owners was anyone's guess, perhaps it was a simple niche that knew its place.
The tavern most likely had a proper name but nobody ever used it. It was also the only place a dishonored noble or a noble trying not to attract attention could slip away for a private meeting or a simple moment's respite. The place was dark, the owners were well versed in the arts of discretion, and everyone usually kept their heads down.
One entered through the side and walked down a dark hallway. The barmaid would ask if you were drinking alone or with a friend, and would then guide you to your table and keep your tankard full. If you were waiting on company they would eventually be silently guided to you and then you would be left in relative privacy for as long as needed. The staff were impossible to bribe information out of, and if any did they would die rather messily. The price of this was steep. But you easily got what you paid for.
Lyria had paid far more for the privilege than many knew. She had meticulously spent the day calling in favors and assembling the closest facsimile of her old armor as she could, then polishing it to a dazzlingly brilliant shine. She even went so far as to wear the shield of Aeducan that she had rescued from Aeducan thaig on her back. Her feet were propped up on a table and her hands cradled a stone mug with images of great battles etched in gold across its surface. She may be an exile in title, but she was still of noble blood and made sure that everyone knew it.
"You know that ordering food and drink is hazardous," a voice murmured to her. "People say that the king died of poison. Shouldn't you watch yourself, big sister?"
She gestured to the empty chair at the table at just the right moment, an instant before Bhelen had begun to sit so it looked as though she had gracefully granted him permission to. She could see him consider rising up again, but that would be too obvious. Politics was a game of subtlety. "Hello bear," she purred, using the old pet name she had used when Bhelen was a child. "And I don't need to worry about poisons so much anymore. That whole Gray Warden thing, remember? Most of the poisons that exist here are derived from the darkspawn taint in some manner." She sloshed her mug and took a slow sip. "Besides, you're not the poisoning type."
Bhelen arched an eyebrow as he considered her words. "Does this mean you don't believe I poisoned father?" He glanced at her tankard, perhaps idly wondering if the gray warden initiation did make her immune somehow. Maybe she was bluffing. Maybe it was true. "I'm honestly surprised, since everyone and their pet nug seems to think it. Harrowmont knows the truth, but he's not being all that loose lipped about it."
Lyria waved her hand in a gesture that was akin to a revered mother's granting of absolution. "Of course not! You're not a poisoner, Bhelen. You're a backstabbing son of a dung-gribbit, but poisons aren't really your style."
He grinned at her. "Surely you didn't come here to insult me." He laughed. "I'm doing you honor simply by acknowledging our shared blood, despite you no longer holding the right to the Aeducan name."
"If I simply wanted to insult you I could have stood at your door and screamed at the top of my lungs. You know well enough how well my voice carries down those hallways." She took another slow easy sip from the mug. "I've missed the food and drink down here. On the surface the sun does something to all of it. Everything they eat on the surface is sweet. There's sweetness in the food and the ale and the plants. I can even taste it in the water sometimes."
Bhelen stared at her and planted a hand on the table, moving as if he were considering getting up and leaving.
"Oh all right, bear," she sighed. "I forget that you never were a patient one. I'm here because I am led to understand that you are suffering from an acute case of deadlock. In the senate, to be specific."
Bhelen stared her down, his eyes cold and calculating. "I thought you've sided with Harromont. That's what the public thinks at least."
Lyria rolled her shoulder lazily. She set her mug down and drew a dagger, spearing a chunk of meat on her plate with it. Bhelen didn't so much as flinch at the sight of the weapon. There was an unwritten rule about violence in the Geode that everyone followed unless they wanted to lose the right to visit the place ever again. Even royalty obeyed the unwritten rule.
"I'm keeping my options open. It seems to me that you need me, little bear." She finally met his eyes. They told her nothing, but she wasn't really surprised by that. Bhelen had long since shown that he was a master at keeping his intentions and thoughts well hidden. "Your bribes managed to get me exiled, but not executed. Your plans largely depended on me killing Trian myself. When your spies told you I wasn't taking the bait despite all the hints they dropped, you had to rush in and do the deed yourself. That left enough room open for suspicion. And that room has grown into a big fat chasm that runs right down the middle of the senate." She smiled and chewed her meal, savoring the taste. "Please tell me if I'm mistaken, my brother."
Bhelen sighed and laughed sadly to himself. "Dearest sister. You were the ruby of father's eye. But these are games for nobles, and even before your exile you were just a warrior who would strut like a noble now and then. You even had your face etched with a warrior's marks. You spent more time with the soldiers and the militia than you did with your own caste. You can puff up like an angry bronto all you want, but we both know which of us is better at this game because you already lost it the moment the Deshyrs exiled you. The senate is deadlocked, but there's little doubt that I will win in the end."
Lyria stabbed another chunk from her plate. "Well then, if you're so sure of yourself then you don't need any of my help. You may go." She made a shooing motion with her hand.
Bhelen stayed in his chair. "I would be willing to reinstate your title were you to make the process easier for me," he offered slowly. "I do this not because I need you, but because we are blood kin. I could just as easily have you executed."
"I'm a warden now, remember? What's a title mean to me?" Her mug of ale somehow magically refilled itself. The staff were very good at what they did. "Or is this your way of apologizing? Tossing your big sister a bone after all the set up?"
He laughed. "Ahh, now we're at the meat of the whole thing. This isn't about the election at all. You came here hoping to candy-talk me into telling you why I did what I did." He finally took his own mug up and sipped from it. "No need to play word games, sister. Simply ask me."
Lyria shrugged. "I know why you did it, Bhelen. People say that living on the surface addles the mind and saps you of your stone sense. But in truth it only does that to the people who want to be addled. For everyone else, it gives you a remarkable sense of of perspective." She ran her fingers along the handle of her tankard. "Tell me if my story is wrong. Father was getting weaker by the day. Trian was already acting as though he were king, but his version of playing king was to be a weak imitation of father. I didn't want the role but I would be next in line if something happened to Trian. So if you had any hope of claiming the throne and being the king you felt Orzammar needed, we both had to go."
Bhelen's brows shot up as he stared at her across the lip of his mug. "And do you think I'm the king Orzammar needs?"
"I think things need to change or we're going to end up like the Griffons the wardens used to ride. A forgotten legend." She stared at the chunk of bronto speared on her dagger. "I look at the humans and the surfacer dwarves up there. And they have no idea what it's like for us down here, and that's partially our own fault because we're happy to remain quietly smothering here in our little hole."
"That doesn't answer my question, big sister."
She smiled wryly. "I don't know what kind of king you'll be, Bhelen. You were always good at hiding your motives. I do know that Harrowmont will just try to follow in father's footsteps and do a bad job of it."
Bhelen eyed her calculatingly. "Are you vying for the throne now?"
Lyria made a face and held her hands up. "Fires, no. Even before my exile I preferred killing darkspawn to playing politics." Her expression sobered. "That doesn't mean that I don't care what happens to my people. Even if Orzammmar isn't my home any longer, I don't want to see it get swallowed up and everything lost forever."
He was quiet after that. The two ate and drank in silence. There were sounds of movement and whispered conversation in the Geode, but none of it could be made out properly and even the staff were invisible.
Finally, "You know I'd make the better king, Lyria. You may not like my methods, but I do what needs to be done. And with your support the rest of the senate would fall in line and back me up." He set his mug down hard enough that the black ale sloshed out and spilled across the table, staining the cloth draped across it. "But I won't bend to you any more then I'll bend to the Deshyrs or anyone else. You will fall in line as well, or else I will do what needs to be done with you as well."
Lyria studied him. She had been raised alongside Bhelen. They had played together as children. Sparred together as warriors. He often shielded her from Trian and she returned the favor whenever she could. Often times they would cover for each other's indiscretions. She wondered now how much of that was a calculating act or if all of that had simply fallen to the wayside for a chance at the throne.
"I know you will do what you think needs to be done, Bhelen," she murmured. "And I know that you're doing what you think is the right thing to do."
She could feel those icy eyes of his studying her, trying to read her motives and her thoughts. "And you know that the best king for Orzammar is someone willing to do that, sister. Sentiment killed father. Blindness killed Trian. A lack of understanding of how politics play out would have killed you were it not for the Gray Wardens being there to snatch you up from the roads."
Lyria nodded and smiled into her ale. "I believe I've heard enough now, Bhelen. You've given me a great deal to think about."
He rose then, smiling. "Just mark my words. You are either with me or you are against me." He said no goodbyes, he simply turned and vanished, leaving her alone with her thoughts.
As Lyria leaned back in her seat she felt the Aeducan shield press against her shoulders, and she recalled the words of the note handed to her at the same time the shield was. The note that she had read a million times and still carried with her. 'Only a fool would cut out his heart and burn it,' her father had written.
Such a choice.