Prologue: Young Noble Life
Standing at her bedroom window, Natalia sighed heavily as she watched Fergus practicing his swordsmanship. If it were a regular day, she'd obviously down there with him, but ever since the little incident she had with one of the nobles in that last trip to Denerim, her mother has kept her locked up as punishment. Then again, she couldn't really blame her mother's anger seeing how Natalia had given the old grump a powerful right hook to the face in front of everyone, but the man did call Natalia a wench after all and she felt like that couldn't go without doing something.
Pacing back and forth, Natalia let out yet another sigh and crossed her arms in irritation. In truth, she hated being cooped up in one place and was the kind of woman that preferred being outside doing something, but she also knew that her mother would gut her if she tried to escape….Again.
Stopping as a sudden idea came to mind; Natalia ran to her personal chest and took out a thick black book. Keeping the book close to her, Natalia slowly opened her door to see if anyone was nearby and smiled when she saw that the closest anyone was at all the way down the hall. Closing the door back quietly, Natalia then walked to the center of her room and opened the book to a certain page.
After reading a couple of pages, Natalia slowly closed the book and closed her eyes for a moment, giving the look as if she was in the middle of making a small prayer. Putting the book down, Natalia put out her hand and after mumbling a couple of words under her breath, conjured up a small flame.
Yes, Natalia was using magic; something that could have her sent to the Circle of Magi. It wasn't something that was of common knowledge obviously, and not even her family knew of this. Not even Natalia herself knew she had such abilities until recently and after closely examining her family's history, she found out that the Cousland family did have magic in their blood, but the family members that were mentioned to have those abilities were in a time before even her grandfather, making it seem like said magic to have died out long ago. Obviously Natalia was an exception to this and this made her a rarity among her family, but she was in no hurry to tell anyone of this.
At some point during the beginning of learning these abilities, the thought of telling her family or the chantry occurred, but Natalia had no love for the idea of being locked up in a tower and being kept from her family. To best honest, knowing full well that keeping this a secret would make her an apostate gave Natalia pause, but she didn't really know just how powerful her magic was just yet and she wanted to test her limit before saying anything despite the heavy consequences she knew were there.
Moving the flame to and fro, Natalia gave a small smile to see how much better she was getting, only to jump when she heard a sudden knock on her door. Unfortunately, this made her lose focus and the small flame she appeared to have control of ended up bouncing all over the room, eventually hitting the rug and igniting a small fire upon it.
"Natalia, I need to speak to you. Open the door." A voice said.
Natalia instantly paled. That voice belonged to her mother. Panicking, Natalia rushed over to the fire and stomped it out, making sure she stood over the burn marks as her mother came inside.
"Natalia…? Are you alright? You look a little pale." Eleanor asked, her face full of concern.
"Hmm…? Oh yes! I'm perfectly fine! My stomach is just a bit out of sorts that's all! Is there something you needed mother?" Natalia asked, laughing nervously as she quickly changed the subject.
Raising her eyebrow a bit, Eleanor eventually shook off her earlier concern and took a seat at Natalia's desk, which made Natalia give a small sigh of relief.
"Well, I just wanted to inform you that I'm relieving you of the punishment I placed upon you earlier." Eleanor stated.
"Oh…? What brought this sudden change of mind on?" Natalia asked, obviously a bit shocked at her mother's words.
"After speaking to your father, I realized that while your actions were….Unfitting of a young noblewoman, they weren't without reason." Eleanor eventually said, giving a small smile.
For a quick instance, Natalia smiled at the mention of her father. He always did have her back whenever she and her mother ended up in disagreements and always did seem to get her out of the many sticky situations she and her quick temper would get herself into.
"I see. Well, I'm glad that you now see things from my side. It's not like I would just punch a man for no good reason mother." Natalia stated, giving another smile.
"I understand that my dear, but it's still not something a young woman of your stature should do without thinking first." Eleanor said, giving a somewhat stern look.
As she spoke, Natalia's eyebrows twitched. She hated when her mother would bring that up. Natalia knew full well of how important their family was and the heavy responsibility it held, but it was to her, their family name was just that; a name and nothing more.
"I'll… Try to keep my temper in check next time mother. I apologize once again for displaying such behavior." Natalia sighed, trying to hold back her irritation.
Smiling as she spoke, Eleanor simply placed her hand on Natalia's should and kissed her cheek before leaving out. Watching her leave, Natalia let out a heavy breath of relief as she stepped away from the burn marks on her rug and scratched the back of her head.
"Holy Maker, that was close. I wasn't sure how much longer I could stand here without losing it." Natalia mumbled, letting out one more sigh.
Looking around, Natalia grabbed one of the extra chairs in her room and placed it over the mark. It would make a good cover until she could find something else or find a new rug to replace this recently burnt one.
Now seeing that she was free to roam outside of her room, Natalia excitedly grabbed her practice armor and blades and changed into them. Knowing full well she couldn't use her magic to defend herself, Natalia decided to take on the role of training as a rogue to serve that little issue and found pleasure in doing so after finding out she had a knack for sneaking about…as well as maybe lifting a few things from people's pockets. Getting ready to run right outside, Natalia suddenly stopped and glanced at the book she used for her spells. Giving a quick thought or two, Natalia eventually grabbed it and placed it in her pack, thinking she could practice her spells after everyone left the practice fields.
"It wouldn't hurt to learn some new spells…After all; I might have to use them someday!" She said in thought as she ran outside.
Without realizing it however, Natalia had no idea just how right she was because she would soon use those abilities to not only save herself, but to save Ferelden itself as well.