Part of the inspiration for this story comes from the painting The Last Child by Lynne Cerro, which can be seen at the artist's website.
Shortly after the bandit attack, stories began to travel the gossip circuit that an elven child had become a wolf and slipped her would-be captors. Shapechanging magic might be unknown elsewhere, but at the edge of the Korcari Wilds, there were whispers. Most scoffed. It was a likely excuse to explain how elven barbarians could outwit them.
This had happened not far from Lothering, so in due time Chasind traders caught wind of the tale. They knew to give it more credence, and to wonder at the report of the girl's young age. The Wolf Girl must be a powerful witch in the making, or perhaps there were spirits involved.
In the meantime, this Dalish clan had moved deeper into the wilds to escape further such encounters with humans, bandit or otherwise. As summer moved into autumn, the icy fog of the wilds strengthened its grip, and the clan began to prepare to move northward for the winter. Before they could do so, a watchman brought a rolled note back to the keeper, saying that a Chasind tracker had brought it. Marethari's face was grave when she read the note's contents. That night, the elders of the tribe huddled near her aravel, and there was arguing.
The following morning, the keeper found Idun and told the twelve-year old that they were going on an outing into the woods, just the two of them with a few hunters as guards. It would take several days and Idun should pack some things. Had it not come so soon after the bandit attack, the girl would have been excited at the prospect of an adventure. She could also sense the tension between the adults. Nevertheless she did as she was told, and didn't admit to her friend Tamlen that she was scared.
At first Marethari would not tell Idun where they were going. Under the relentlessness of a twelve year-old, however, she finally admitted that they were to see the asha'belannar, the Woman of Many Years. Idun thought she saw guilt in Marethari's eyes. The hunters gave each other uneasy glances. During the rest of their journey through the wilderness, Idun was much quieter.
No one consulted a map, and yet the adults did not seem concerned about getting lost. Occasionally Marethari would stop and gaze about herself slowly. She appeared to be listening. Idun overheard her telling one of the hunters that the witch would find them and not the other way around. She hoped that the witch would hurry up and do so. Five nights they passed in the chilly gloom, their fire a small comfort. There were things you could hear in the Korcari Wilds unlike any living creature from elsewhere: Strange, mourning cries, whispers that sounded like voices, strangled and guttural barks.
On the sixth day, Idun sensed something besides strange creatures. She had been taught about spirits since before she could walk. They talked to her sometimes, and the mage child had learned which were nice to talk to, and which were best avoided. That was most of them. There were free, roaming spirits, and those which inhabited dreams, and once or twice she had encountered a different type. These seemed stronger, their voices almost like actual living voices, their forms more solid. Marethari taught her that these were spirits who had bound themselves to some living consciousness in the world, human or otherwise, limiting but focusing their power by doing so. They might bind themselves to a person, some creature, or even to a place. Idun thought that it was one of these familiar spirits that she could sense.
Korcari mists made day seem like dusk. The last leaves clung wetly to the trees, but rather than look more sparse, the forest seemed to have closed ranks. No one spoke. Idun walked in the center of the group, Marethari at her back. Out of the corner of her eye, the girl caught the movement of a lizard on one a black, gnarled shrub. It darted along a branch and disappeared into the eye socket of a skull that was hanging on the branch. Idun stopped, her mouth agape. She made to say something about the skull, but not even a squeak came out of her mouth, and the others pushed her along.
Soon there were more skulls, animal and human or elven, lining the path on either side. Where there had been only dense forest before, the trees now stood apart to make a kind of path. Idun thought she could hear whispering again, though it might have been the wind gently rattling branch and bone together. Ahead on the path Idun noticed one small crabapple tree that was bursting with red fruit, its branches heavy with it. Her stomach growled at the sight. Then her eyes fell on a shack just beyond. It did not look like a nice place at all, and Idun's appetite vanished.
The elves stopped outside the shack and waited. Marethari stood at Idun's back, her hands on her shoulders. Idun thought she could feel them trembling. No one spoke, but presently there was a rustle in the bushes and a woman appeared. She looked Chasind, dressed in tattered clothing, dark hair mussed and matted. Only her cloak of furs was well-made and relatively clean. Brown-gold eyes glinted among the wrinkles. The thrum of a powerful spirit's presence was almost audible now. Whoever this woman was, she was near to a spirit, maybe many of them. It was like nothing Idun had ever felt before.
The woman was not surprised to see them, indeed she uttered a throaty, satisfied laugh and said, "And here you are. I had begun to think you wouldn't come." Stopping before them, she crossed her arms and looked down at Idun. "This is she, I take it." There was a long pause while the witch's eyes bored into her. Idun felt like her skin was being peeled back layer by layer. The girl endured it for a few moments, then had had enough.
"Stop it." There was more threat than plea in the little girl's voice, and she heard some of the other elves suck in their breath. However, the woman only laughed again.
"A king will rise and a great darkness will fall on your word, little one," the witch intoned, confiding. "Who am I to deny you. But I did not call you here to harm you." With this, the woman's eyes lifted to include Marethari. "You have kept your side of the bargain, and I shall keep mine. Your clan will have my thanks and my protection in this part of the world so long as you keep out of my way. I understand, from what I have heard of your romps with bandits, that you could use it. There is something else I will offer the young mage here, if she will have it."
Idun regarded the witch steadily, no longer afraid. If these spirits around her were powerful, they also seemed cautious. Perhaps that was why her people occasionally treated with the asha'belannar, Idun thought. Not only did the witch have a powerful grip on these lands to which they fled as hiding place, in many ways she was a kindred spirit to them. Hated and feared, alone in all this wild, she survived.
"I will receive your gift, asha'belannar," Idun replied. She heard Marethari sigh heavily behind her, but the keeper made no objection as the girl stepped forward.
The witch's eyes glittered hungrily at Idun when the child willingly approached, and she bent over, bringing her foul-smelling mouth near the girl's ear. What followed was a long incantation in a language that Idun did not consciously understand, but which her inner mage sense did.
The witch stepped back, then waved a hand and dismissed them. "No doubt your clan waits for you, and my dinner waits for me," she rasped. "I will see you again soon enough, or maybe not, who is to say. The worm turns that way. Sometimes it even turns in on itself."
As the elves departed, Idun looked back once, and glimpsed a young girl peeking around the corner of the shack. The witch was not alone, then. The girl looked to be a year or two older than Idun herself, and though she wore bits of rag and feathers haphazardly sewn together, she was clean and her black hair lay neat on her shoulders. For one moment, she and Idun locked eyes. Then the girl was gone.
The Dalish marched through the night as long as Idun's legs could hold her, then stopped. At their breakfast fire, Idun leaned up to whisper to Marethari, to ask if she was wrong to accept the witch's gift.
"You were not wrong," the keeper answered wearily. "The elvhenan have done more dire things than this to survive over the years. Yet a being like that never gives but that it takes more. Let us hope for your sake and ours, da'len, that the price is not too heavy to bear."
"You turned into a wolf back there. 'Tis most surprising to see this skill in another."
Morrigan's tongue had finally been softened into something approaching friendly, though Idun was so distracted that she hardly noticed. They stood on the shores of Lake Calenhad, and the Dalish Warden's mind was on what had just happened in the ancient tower that loomed over them, its peak hidden by night cloud. A few stars were able to game their way through the same clouds, and water lapped against the pilings of the Tower's pier.
The very calm of it all accused Idun. They had found the Circle of Magi in chaos, and from there everything had only spiraled further out of control. It had been a bloodbath. In her mind Idun rationalized that if the shemlen magi organization was so reckless with its power, it was a greater danger even than the bloodthirsty Chantry knights. Yet she found it hard to reconcile the Warden who rained down judgment in fire and claw with the young woman she had been only months before. She had no keeper sense, it was obvious. It had been the creators' work that Merrill had passed her over. Alistair had said nothing, and not even his eyes accused her. Strangely enough, it was the elven assassin they had recruited who made the strongest objection to her decision to subdue the mages. Morrigan, the only other mage in their party, was positively aglow with admiration.
Or she had been, before she caught Idun ignoring her. "I am not speaking to you for the sake of your pleasant company, Warden," Morrigan snapped, succeeding at bringing Idun back to at least a half-hearted listening posture.
"I became a wolf," she acknowledged dully.
"As I saw. And as I was trying to say while you were gazing at your navel, such skills my mother and I also possess. I did not know that the Dalish practiced them."
"Some of the keepers do."
"So you say. Intriguing." Morrigan actually seemed sincere, not sarcastic as Idun might have expected. "I wonder where they learned this originally. Perhaps from the same source as Mother."
"I doubt they would tell you if you asked." Idun's voice was noncommittal and polite. While Morrigan made some regretful reply, Idun turned to look at her, searching the wolf-gold eyes for any hint of what the human mage might actually be thinking. How long are we going to keep up this pretense, she wondered. She could not be sure that Morrigan recognized her, or if she did, whether Morrigan knew that Idun also remembered her. It was almost certain, however, that both things were true. How long would it be before the witch asked for her payment?
Idun had been sure, when she was taken to Flemeth's hut along with Alistair and the other Warden recruits, that the demand would come then. The fact that Duncan's task to find some Grey Warden documents had led her to the asha'belannar's doorstep could hardly have been a coincidence. It was like the sentinel trees that had watched their passage those years ago. When the witch wanted to be found, a path was made to her.
Idun recognized her at once, though years had grayed the witch's hair and turned her speech even more peculiar. In the end, however, they had been given their treaties and sent on their way. After that came the terrible battle at Ostagar. She was surprised to still be alive, but when Idun woke up, it was only small surprise that she found herself in Flemeth's hut. Now it comes, she had thought. When the witch had demanded nothing more of them but to do their Grey Warden duty and to accept her daughter's aid in their task, Idun had understood that it was to be Morrigan and not Flemeth who would be the debt collector. Yet the dark-haired woman kept mostly to herself, said little apart from the occasional peevish remark and a particular delight in tormenting Alistair, and she fought alongside the Wardens both capably and willingly.
Idun said nothing to Alistair of her prior acquaintance with Flemeth and her daughter, and did not speak of it to Morrigan, either. They all had enough to worry about. For the moment, their chief concern was hiring a boat to take them across the lake to Redcliffe. She had sent Alistair and the qunari off to secure a passage. The sight of the other Warden returning gave Idun an excuse to cut off her discussion with Morrigan.
Turning to meet him, she asked, "Where is Sten?"
Alistair gestured back over his shoulder and shrugged. "Off in some meadow we passed. Said he was looking for something, who knows. I have even more good news, I'm afraid. For the price we're offering, the boat captains will take half of us all the way or all of us half the way. Take your pick. I'm not much in the mood for swimming, myself."
Idun sighed. A merry band of vagabonds they all were, clad in mismatched and ill-repaired armor, barely a sovereign to rub together, and outlaws every one. They went around begging aid, hiding from the authorities when they were not fighting them, and scraping by on what they could scrounge or barter. And killing innocent mages, her conscience supplied, a thought Idun quickly brushed away. It was some irony that she had become the very incarnation of a Dalish stereotype. If she had not been so tired and heartsick, Idun would have laughed about it.
"Find the qunari, then," she bid her fellow Warden. "We take the overland route. We'll need you to guide us, Alistair, since you know the way best. And perhaps we might look into this report of darkspawn in Honnleath on our way. If the horde has gone off that way and is approaching Redcliffe from the south, the arl or whoever is standing in for him will want to know."
Idun glanced at Morrigan and turned away, putting the Tower at her back. The terrible fight with demons and abominations had made it all too clear to her what the stakes were now that she was acting on behalf of the Grey Wardens. Her decisions and the power of her magic had taken on far more import than anything she had experienced as a young woman sheltered by the isolation of her clan. Idun had always imagined that whatever the asha'belannar's price would be, that only she would have to pay it. It was beginning to dawn on her, however, that now that she was a Grey Warden, the burden could fall on many others besides herself.